… other than to say that this is 100% true:
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Marissa's musings about liberty, individual rights, justice, grief, loss, and other random things
… other than to say that this is 100% true:
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Um, yes, someone is. Many people, actually.
I came across this image on Facebook. It was the profile picture of someone who left a bullying and harassing comment on a post about statues.
Contrary to what is claimed in this image, I can think of various ways in which I have been tread upon.
First of all, as an autistic person who wasn’t diagnosed as such until I was 25, I’ve spent the majority of my life being held to the same standards and expectations as a neurotypical person, causing me to be almost constantly stressed and exhausted from trying to live up to standards and expectations that were not realistic for me.
Growing up, even though I didn’t know that I was autistic, I knew that I was different from other kids, and they knew it too. I was bullied for the way that I talked, the way that I dressed, the way that I did my hair, the music that I listened to, the shows and movies that I liked, the fact that I collected toys, and the fact that I wasn’t good at gym class, sports, or physical activities.
I was also taught from a young age that each person is required to have friends and to socialize, a belief that I internalized. As a result, I spent countless hours forcing myself to participate in social activities, even though I didn’t enjoy them and would much rather have spent the time engaging in my interests. Having been rejected again and again by my peers, I was unable to say no or to express disagreement with anyone, no matter how inappropriate their behavior or unreasonable their demands, because I didn’t feel that I was in a position to push away any of the few people who were willing to be friends with me.
Due to these repeated negative experiences with the people around me, I became interested in history, because historical figures were the only people I could relate to. Particularly, I was interested in historical figures who today are frowned upon and misunderstood, historical figures who fought losing battles for unpopular causes.
Historical figures such as those who fought for the Confederacy.
After a lifetime of feeling rejected, hurt, criticized, and controlled by the people around me, I was forced to watch helplessly as our society decided, starting in 2020, to obliterate from existence the one thing that I actually liked, the one thing that made my life worth living: the historical figures. I was forced to watch helplessly as statues, monuments, memorials, and holidays honoring the historical figures that I love were destroyed, sometimes violently. After a lifetime of bullying and exclusion, I was forced to watch helplessly as our cities, our parks, our public spaces, our calendars were reconfigured to ensure that I could not feel represented or included.
And our society declared that it was doing all of this in the name of diversity and inclusion.
When, in my eyes, nothing could possibly be further from the truth.
And I haven’t even mentioned the fact that within the past few years, governments at the local, state, and federal level have decided that they should have the power to force people to undergo medical procedures against their will.
If the totality of what I’ve described doesn’t constitute treading on someone, I’m not sure what does.
That’s why I like the Gadsden Flag. That’s why it resonates with me. That’s why I display it in my home and use it online, including in the header of this blog.
So yeah, contrary to what is being claimed in the above image, someone is actually treading on me. Multiple “someone’s,” in fact. People have been treading on me in various ways throughout my entire life.
Frankly, it is disgusting that someone would create, post, and/or use an image like the one above. Doing so is condescending and contemptuous, dismisses the experiences and struggles of other people, and demonstrates a complete lack of empathy. Perhaps the person who created this image, and the people who use it, think that it is somehow clever, or edgy, or funny. But in reality, it is none of those things. In reality, it is mean-spirited, cruel, and idiotic. Using such an image as one’s profile picture is abhorrent and achieves nothing other than proudly broadcasting one’s lack of empathy. And I’m not sure why anyone would consider a lack of empathy something to be proud of.
I choose to display the Gadsden flag in my home and to use it as an avatar online because, as a person who has been tread upon in various ways throughout my life, its message resonates with me. No person should tread on another person. This concept is not a joke. It is not ridiculous. It is the very essence of morality.
Therefore, the Gadsden Flag is neither a joke, nor ridiculous either. Any person who would treat it as such has no concept of morality and no empathy for other people.
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I came across this post from “Defiant Ls,” which shows not only the blatant hypocrisy of Rep. Anna Eskamani and so many others who share her political views, but also their disturbing practice of presuming the truth of what they are trying to prove.
In particular, the use of the term “election denier” demonstrates the intolerance and authoritarianism of the left.
When you call someone a “denier,” you are presuming that the thing in question is true and therefore that the person is wrong to deny it.
The use of the term “election denier” presumes that the election was legitimate.
The use of the term “Holocaust denier” presumes that the Holocaust happened.
The use of the term “climate denier” presumes that climate change is occurring.
The use of the term “science denier” presumes that the scientific findings in question are correct.
I could continue giving more examples, but I think you get the point.
The problem is not the act of claiming that an election was legitimate, or that the Holocaust happened, or that climate change is actually occurring. In fact, I would probably agree with these claims. The problem is presuming these things. A person should never presume the thing that they are trying to prove, no matter how obvious they believe that thing is.
If you believe something, you need to state it, as opposed to presuming it.
If you believe that a person is wrong, you need to state that, as opposed to presuming it by calling that person a “denier.”
Presuming the truth of what you are trying to prove implies that there are no possible views that a person could have, other than your own. It doesn’t even allow for the possibility of alternative views existing. And that is the ultimate in intolerance and authoritarianism.
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Correct. Disliking something is not the same thing as being afraid of it. Equating someone’s preference with a fear is a way of unfairly de-legitimizing preferences that you disapprove of. A person is not cowardly or fearful for disliking something; they simply dislike something. Do not imply that people are cowardly or fearful for having preferences that differ from your own.
Liberal news website the Palmer Report posted the below tweets in which (as pointed out by “Defiant Ls”) they demonstrated both hypocrisy and intolerance:
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So just to recap: attacking the character of not only Melania Trump, but also all people who respect her, is perfectly fine, but attacking the character of Jill Biden is so unacceptable that doing so makes a person “pure trash.”
Also, just to recap: the Palmer Report believes that Melania Trump, all people who respect her, and all right wing pundits, are pure trash. This demonstrates that like so many others on the left-hand side of the political spectrum, whoever published these tweets on behalf of the Palmer Report is a bigot and a bully with no tolerance for anyone who differs from him/herself in any way.
I would argue that whoever published these tweets on behalf of the Palmer Report has shown him/herself to be pure trash through this display of intolerance and hypocrisy.
Making matters worse, one not particularly intelligent commenter wrote, “one of these two women is a literally mail-order bride and the other one is an actual american.”
Um, I doubt that Melania Trump is literally a mail order bride.
Plus, more importantly, this comment has nothing to do with the actual point of the post, which is to point out the hypocrisy of calling a first lady “trash,” only to later claim that it is unacceptable to attack a first lady’s character.
This commenter seems to be implying that Melania’s country of origin somehow erases the Palmer Report’s logical inconsistency and makes the two tweets logically consistent. It doesn’t.
Additionally, this commenter seems to be implying that because Melania Trump was not born in America, it is somehow okay to call her trash. Which makes this commenter not only completely lacking in logic, but also a bigot.
Yet another example of the bigotry and intolerance of those on the left.
This headline from a few weeks ago on Yahoo News is a bit puzzling. I am not sure what it is referring to, because no Capitol riot took place three years ago. There was, however, a protest that took place at the Capitol on January 6, 2021. Perhaps that’s what Yahoo News was thinking of?
This headline should read: “Capitol protest, 3 years later: Hundreds of convictions, yet 1 big mystery is unsolved.
Hundreds of people have been convicted in the massive prosecution of the Jan. 6, 2021, protest in the three years since the U.S. Capitol protest.
Dozens of protesters still on the lam.”
This, of course, raises the question of why any people, let alone hundreds of them, would be prosecuted, let alone convicted, for participating in a protest in support of a politically unpopular cause. The answer to this question, of course, is that the United States has become a totalitarian dictatorship. For a person to be charged, prosecuted, or convicted of a crime for expressing unpopular beliefs is abhorrent, immoral, disturbing, and completely incompatible with a free society.
This is a point that, unfortunately, seems to be lost not only on the employees of Yahoo News but on far too many people in the general public.
And yes, as Yahoo ominously reminds us, dozens of people are still on the lam for the “crime” of having expressed unpopular beliefs. Why the expression of unpopular beliefs would be considered something that a person would need to go on the lam for… that is a question whose answer is the same as above: the United States has become a totalitarian dictatorship.
The absurdity of people being on the lam for having participated in a protest is also largely lost on both Yahoo News and the general public.
It’s also interesting that a couple of years ago, when I posted on Twitter to express my outrage that hundreds of people had been arrested for participating in the Capitol protest, a bully responded by calling me a “drama queen” and alleging that only 70 or so people had been arrested. This Yahoo News headline, as biased as it may be, confirms that hundreds of people were not only arrested, but actually convicted of crimes, for participating in the protest. Contrary to the bully’s assertion, I was not exaggerating the numbers; I was correct.
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Complete hypocrisy. And also absolutely disgusting that a person would “love” for people who are different from them to be silenced. Another example of the bigotry and intolerance of the “woke,” politically correct ideology.
Any person who “loves” for people who are different from them to be silenced is a bigot and a bully, full stop.
A little while ago, Jimmy Kimmel posted the following tweet:
In reality, Jimmy Kimmel, and not Aaron Rodgers, is the a**hole in this situation.
It doesn’t matter whether Kimmel had any contact with Jeffrey Epstein, or whether his name appears on any Epstein-related list. Regardless of whether or not he is guilty of what Rodgers accused him of, Kimmel is wrong to issue such a pompous, stuck-up, and self-righteous statement.
“Soft-brained wackos”? Really?
“Nonsense” that Rodgers “can’t seem to distinguish from reality”? Really?
“Reckless words” that “put my family in danger?” Really?
Apparently, in Kimmel’s eyes, anyone who disagrees with him is “soft-brained” and a “wacko.”
Apparently, in Kimmel’s eyes, any idea with which he disagrees is “nonsense.”
And apparently, in Kimmel’s eyes, any person with ideas that differ from his own is unable to distinguish “nonsense” from “reality.”
The fact that Kimmel would speak and write this way about people with whom he disagrees is a far more important issue than whether or not Kimmel had anything to do with Jeffrey Epstein. Regardless of whether or not Rodgers’s allegations are factually correct, it’s unacceptable for anyone to speak or write this way about people with whom they disagree. Doing so is the very essence of bigotry and intolerance. Doing so demonstrates a person to be a pompous, stuck-up, and self-righteous bully.
Honestly, it is completely lacking in empathy for Kimmel to be so angry and upset at Rodgers’s accusations, regardless of whether they are true or false. Did Kimmel speak out against government policies requiring people to undergo medical procedures against their will? Did he stand up for the historical figures who have been murdered en masse over the past three and a half years? Did he stand up for the autistic people who have had to witness public spaces across the country being redesigned in order to ensure that we cannot feel included?
No?
Then, quite frankly, he has no right to be upset about anything.
For these are the things that are actually upsetting. These are the things that should cause Kimmel to be filled with pompous, self-righteous anger, not comments by Aaron Rodgers.
This is why Jimmy Kimmel, and not Aaron Rodgers, is a true a**hole.
Stonewall Jackson’s 200th birthday was yesterday, and this is how I celebrated!
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