Month: November 2021

bookmark_borderThanksgiving thoughts

Posted on by Marissa

It has been a dark and demoralizing couple of years. The things that I value most – individual rights, liberty, history, tolerance, and diversity – have been under attack in various ways across the country and world. But there are a few signs of hope, indicating that possibly, just maybe, the tide might have begun to turn. In the spirit of Thanksgiving, here are a few things that I am thankful for:

The Christopher Columbus statue in Fairfield, NJ

The vicious campaign against Christopher Columbus over the past year and a half has been nothing short of sickening. At the hands of intolerant mobs of protesters and equally intolerant politicians, statues of the brave explorer have been torn down and in some cases violently destroyed, his name has been erased from schools and other places, and his holiday has been obliterated. However, defying this horrible trend, the town of Fairfield, New Jersey unveiled a brand new statue of Columbus on October 9, 2021. The statue, located outside the Hollywood Avenue Recreation Center, was commissioned by the Fairfield chapter of UNICO and was unveiled at a ceremony featuring pro-Columbus speeches by the mayor and other Italian-American leaders. Recent events have been so demoralizing that I believed another Columbus statue would never again be created, and that the only possible outcome was for the number of statues to inevitably decrease bit by bit until it reached zero. The brave decision to create a new statue of Columbus gives me hope. 

Continue reading “Thanksgiving thoughts”

bookmark_borderJustice for Kyle Rittenhouse

Posted on by Marissa

Today (or technically yesterday) the jury in the Kyle Rittenhouse trial returned the correct verdict, acquitting Kyle of all charges. This trial resulted from an incident last year in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in which Rittenhouse fatally shot two people (and injured a third) who were participating in a BLM protest/riot and who physically attacked him. He argued that he acted in self-defense, and the jury agreed.

Throughout the entire ordeal, numerous people, including reporters, commentators, politicians, and even the president, have viciously insulted and slandered Rittenhouse. People have called him a white supremacist, presumed his guilt, made racist and sexist comments, and ridiculed him for crying when he testified in his own defense.

The assumption behind these anti-Rittenhouse attacks is that the BLM movement is right and just, and that anyone associated with it has the right to do whatever they want, no matter how aggressive, cruel, mean, or harmful, with impunity. According to this way of thinking, any attempt to defend oneself against BLM supporters is aggression, and any attempt to push back against the BLM movement’s ideology of black supremacy is white supremacy.

I disagree with this way of thinking, to put it mildly. So, apparently, did the jury.

Many people have claimed that if Rittenhouse were black, the trial would have had a different outcome. This is true – if Rittenhouse were black, he would never have been charged in the first place. He would have been deified and glorified as a hero, politicians would be falling over each other in their haste to issue statements praising him and insulting the people he shot, and rallies to support him would have erupted all over the country.

For those who claim that Rittenhouse’s acquittal is an example of “white privilege” or “coddling of conservatives,” for someone to be charged with murder in a clear case of self-defense is the opposite of privilege and coddling. For those who claim that Rittenhouse killed two people and faced “no consequences whatsoever,” to be arrested, charged, and tried for murder, viciously insulted by millions of people, and almost unanimously slandered as a white supremacist by the media (and by the president of the United States) is the opposite of facing no consequences.

Many people have criticized Rittenhouse for traveling across state lines. Did these same people also criticize the counter-protesters who demonstrated against a rally for the preservation of the Robert E. Lee statue in Charlottesville, Virginia in 2017? If you believe that people in the latter situation acted rightly by counter-protesting, you are inconsistent if you believe that Rittenhouse acted wrongly by going to Kenosha. By all accounts, Kyle went to the site of the protest/riot to oppose the actions of the protesters/rioters. His plans included acting as a medic, putting out fires set by the protesters, repairing property damage done by the protesters, and protecting businesses and people from violence and looting. It is wrong to say that Kyle “had no business being there” or “should have minded his own business” or “was looking for trouble.” When there is a protest – particularly when it is a violent protest in the service of an unjust and racist cause – people have the right to counter-protest. And people have the right to bear arms while counter-protesting (or doing any other activity, for that matter). 

Anthony Huber and Joseph Rosenbaum were not victims. They were bullies and aggressors. They would still be alive today if they had minded their own business and not attacked Kyle (or if they had altogether abstained from rioting in support of an unjust and racist cause). To all those people claiming that there is no justice for Huber and Rosenbaum, this is false. Huber and Rosenbaum chose to align themselves with an ideology that supports anti-white racism, discrimination, the destruction of statues and monuments, the violent erasure of unpopular historical figures, ethnicities, and cultures, and the infliction of horrific emotional pain on anyone who dares to express dissenting views. And while demonstrating in support of this ideology, they chose to physically attack an innocent person. This might sound harsh, but Huber and Rosenbaum got exactly what they deserved. 

For far too long, “woke” and politically correct people have inflicted horrible pain, damage, and injustice on other people in the name of “racial justice” and “equity.” For far too long, supporters of the BLM movement have been allowed to bully and intimidate others, completely dominate the public discourse, perpetrate countless acts of violence, vandalism, and looting, obliterate the legacies of historical heroes, destroy priceless works of art, spew the most vile and vicious words of sexism and racism imaginable, and both verbally and physically attack innocent people. For far too long, they have faced no consequences for these despicable actions. 

But today, that stopped. Today a jury recognized that in at least one instance, members of the politically correct BLM mob acted wrongly, and an opponent of that mob was justified in defending himself. 

This doesn’t come anywhere close to undoing the enormous harm that has been done by the BLM movement over the past year and a half. It doesn’t come anywhere close to achieving justice for the countless people whom the BLM movement has hurt, or for the historical figures whom this movement has torn down and stomped on. But it is a start, perhaps, to a long-overdue turning of the tide. Along with the victory of Glenn Youngkin in Virginia and the (at least for now) defeat of the totalitarian vaccine mandate, I am imbued with a sense of hope that there may, possibly, be some good left in the world that is worth fighting for.

Kyle Rittenhouse, you give me hope. For your courage in standing up to bullies, I salute you. 

Jurors, you give me hope. For rendering a just verdict despite tremendous pressure to do otherwise, I salute you.

bookmark_borderJudge Kurt D. Engelhardt is awesome

Posted on by Marissa

On Friday, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals confirmed a lower court’s decision to halt, temporarily at least, the immoral and authoritarian OSHA order forcing businesses with over 100 employees to force all of their employees to undergo medical procedures against their will.

Judge Kurt D. Engelhardt, who authored the decision, made some excellent points that had me pumping my fist and jumping up and down with joy while reading it. Some highlights are below:

  • “On the dubious assumption that the Mandate does pass constitutional muster – which we need not decide today – it is nonetheless fatally flawed on its own terms. Indeed, the Mandate’s strained prescriptions combine to make it the rare government pronouncement that is both overinclusive (applying to employers and employees in virtually all industries and workplaces in America, with little attempt to account for the obvious differences between the risks facing, say, a security guard on a lonely night shift, and a meatpacker working shoulder to shoulder in a cramped warehouse) and underinclusive (purporting to save employees with 99 or more coworkers from a ‘grave danger’ in the workplace, while making no attempt to shield employees with 98 or fewer coworkers from the very same threat).”
  • “The Mandate is staggeringly overbroad. Applying to 2 out of 3 private-sector workers in America, in workplaces as diverse as the country itself, the Mandate fails to consider what is perhaps the most salient fact of all: the ongoing threat of COVID-19 is more dangerous to some employees than to other employees. All else equal, a 28-year-old trucker spending the bulk of his workday in the solitude of his cab is simply less vulnerable to COVID-19 than a 62-year-old prison janitor. Likewise, a naturally immune unvaccinated worker is presumably at less risk than an unvaccinated worker who has never had the virus. The list goes on, but one constant remains – the Mandate fails almost completely to address, or even respond to, much of this reality and common sense.”
  • “It is clear that a denial of the petitioners’ proposed stay would do them irreparable harm. For one, the Mandate threatens to substantially burden the liberty interests of reluctant individual recipients put to a choice between their job(s) and their jab(s). For the individual petitioners, the loss of constitutional freedoms ‘for even minimal periods of time… unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury.'”
  • “Of course, the principles at stake when it comes to the Mandate are not reducible to dollars and cents. The public interest is also served by maintaining our constitutional structure and maintaining the liberty of individuals to make intensely personal decisions according to their own convictions – even, or perhaps particularly, when those decisions frustrate government officials.”
  • “Health agencies do not make housing policy, and occupational safety administrators do not make health policy. In seeking to do so here, OSHA runs afoul of the statute from which it draws its power and, likely, violates the constitutional structure that safeguards our collective liberty.”

To say that the vaccine mandate threatens to substantially burden people’s liberty interests is an understatement. Almost nothing violates individual liberty more severely than requiring people to undergo a medical procedure as a condition of employment.

Engelhardt is 100% correct when he writes that OSHA has overstepped its bounds by enacting the mandate. OSHA’s job is to protect workers’ safety in the workplace, not to control people’s personal medical decisions or to shape behavior in order to achieve the government’s desired public health outcomes. Although forcing all workers to get either a vaccine or weekly covid testing does reduce the likelihood of a covid outbreak at a workplace, it is clear that the motivation of Biden and his administration in enacting the mandate is not specifically to make workplaces safer, but simply to force as many people as possible to get the vaccine. In other words, Biden wants everyone to get the vaccine, and his administration determined that an OSHA standard would be the most effective (and most likely to survive legal scrutiny) means of doing that. The fact that making everyone get a medical procedure does not fall within OSHA’s purview (not to mention the fact that doing so violates everyone’s rights) doesn’t seem to matter to the Biden administration. 

Nothing makes this clearer than the fact that the mandate applies even to workers who work from home 100% of the time. If the mandate was intended to protect workers from catching covid at work, then it would grant people the option of working remotely (if their job duties allow) as an alternative to vaccination or testing. If a worker never physically sets foot in the workplace, their vaccine and testing decisions do not affect the safety of their co-workers. Forcing remote workers to undergo medical procedures does nothing to improve workplace safety, yet this is exactly what the Biden administration chose to do.

By enacting this vaccine mandate, the Biden administration has perverted the purpose of OSHA. A government agency that was founded to protect workers from the harmful actions of employers is now being used to require employers to do harmful things to their workers. Let’s hope and pray that these recent court decisions are the beginning of turning the tide back in the direction of liberty, individual rights, and human decency.

bookmark_border“No one needs an AR-15”

Posted on by Marissa

Proponents of gun control often point out that no one “needs” an AR-15 (or another type of gun, or a bump stock, or a pistol brace, or a gun in general). The argument seems to be that if a person does not need something, then they shouldn’t be allowed to have it.

This argument is, to put it bluntly, preposterous. Seeing it repeated ad nauseam by dozens and dozens of different people all over the TV, the newspaper, and the internet is one of my pet peeves.

When one applies this argument to other situations, it becomes obvious how wrong and illogical it is to argue that unless someone needs something, they shouldn’t be allowed to have it.

To name just a few examples, no one needs designer clothing, no one needs tattoos, and no one needs to get their ears pierced. Does it follow that designer clothing, tattoos, and earrings should be banned? Of course not.

No one needs 20 dresses, or 30 pairs of pants, or 40 sweaters. Does it follow that people should be banned from owning these amounts of clothing, and restricted to owning only the amount of clothing that they absolutely need? Of course not.

No one needs Beanie Babies, or Pokemon cards, or toy soldiers, or sports memorabilia, or video games. Should these things be banned? Of course not.

No one needs to get married, and no one needs to have a baby, because being single and being child-free are perfectly valid and acceptable ways of living. Does it follow that getting married and having children should be banned? Of course not. In fact, I’d bet that many people who argue passionately that marriage is a basic right also argue that AR-15s ought to be banned because no one “needs” them.

The list of things that people do not “need” could continue until this blog post became as long as a novel. When you think about it, the only things that people truly need in order to live are food, water, shelter, and perhaps medical services (if they have a life-threatening medical condition). But it would be insane to argue that because of this, these basic necessities are the only things that people should be allowed to have! Yet this is exactly the presumption that you are making if you point out that people do not “need” guns and think that this somehow proves that guns should be banned.

You don’t need to need something in order to be allowed to have it. The ability to have and do things that you like – whether that be clothing, body mods, toys, games, collectibles, relationships, or guns – is inherently valuable because it makes your life better. A world in which people are allowed to do anything they wish (as long as it doesn’t violate the rights of anyone else) is self-evidently better than a world in which people are allowed to have only the things that they need. Owning and possessing guns and related paraphernalia does not violate the rights of others. And for people who like such things, the ability to own and possess them makes their lives better. Therefore, guns and related paraphernalia should be available to anyone who wishes to have them. It really is that simple.

bookmark_borderRestrictions are imposed by the government, not by the virus

Posted on by Marissa

“Somehow, we have to keep convincing people that this is not something being imposed upon them by the government. It’s being imposed on them by the virus. And we don’t want the virus to win.”

These are the words of Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health. This quote stood out to me when reading this article about the Covid pandemic and the possibility that it might finally be winding down. Collins is claiming that restrictions on individual liberty – such as stay-at-home orders, mask mandates, Covid testing requirements, and vaccine mandates – are not being imposed by the government but by the virus itself.

This sentiment is common. Since the pandemic first began, we have been told that if we just comply with the rules and diligently follow public health advice, then the number of positive cases will go down, allowing restrictions to be lifted. We have been told that vaccination is the way to get life back to normal, and that mask requirements allow schools to remain open for in-person learning. Until recently, signs at my local park implored people to maintain social distancing so that the park would be able to remain open.

But this way of thinking is false. The decision to impose restrictions on individual liberty in an effort to combat the virus is just that – a decision. When restrictions are imposed, they are imposed by governments (or whatever institution is imposing the restrictions, whether that be a university, employer, or other organization), not by the virus.

This might be a revolutionary concept to some people, but not imposing restrictions is always an option. The city government could have left the park open regardless of whether or not people were practicing social distancing. Stay-at-home orders could have been lifted regardless of the number of positive cases or, even better, could have not been imposed to begin with. Many people will say that abstaining from imposing restrictions is a bad option. Most likely this option would result in more people catching the virus, more people getting sick, and more people dying. And many people believe that preventing these outcomes is of paramount importance, no matter how badly people’s rights must be trampled on in order to achieve this.

As anyone who has visited my blog knows, I do not subscribe to this point of view. But regardless of what you believe about the relative importance of safety and liberty, the choice to prioritize one over the other is just that – a choice. When someone says that they have no choice but to impose restrictions because doing so is necessary to combat the virus, that person is unfairly avoiding responsibility for his/her actions. That person is also treating his/her opinion as fact and denying the possibility that alternative opinions might exist. The decision to impose Covid restrictions results from the belief that fighting the virus is more important than respecting individual rights. Even if you agree with this belief, you cannot just presume it as fact and then blame the restrictions on the virus.

When political leaders, and others who hold positions of authority, choose to prioritize safety over liberty, they must acknowledge that this is indeed a choice that they have made. Restrictions are not imposed by a virus. They are imposed by the government, and the government needs to take responsibility for this.