An important thing to remember at all times. The greatest minority in the world is, indeed, the individual.
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Category: philosophy
bookmark_borderThe hypocrisy of wokeness
It’s hard to put it better than this:
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bookmark_border“Actually, they were! Hope this helps!”
Take a look at the below comment by “maddieelam”:
“Actually, they were! Hope this helps!”
Excuse me?
Maddie appears to be stating that, in fact, Benny Johnson’s ancestors were evil.
What an abhorrent, despicable, and brainless thing to write.
How dare someone state that another person’s ancestors, in their entirety, were evil?
It is unclear exactly what Benny’s ancestors did wrong to merit such a harsh condemnation. It’s possible that an individual ancestor, or even several individual ancestors, did something sufficiently bad to merit the designation of evil. But for each and every one of Benny’s ancestors to have been evil is statistically extremely unlikely, to say the least, and is not something that Maddie could possibly have evidence to prove. Therefore, Maddie is falsely, and without justification, condemning people as evil.
To criticize, let alone condemn as evil, a person or group without justification is cruel and mean-spirited. And to state that a person’s ancestors, in their entirety, were evil, is an act of intolerance and bigotry.
Does Maddie think that the ancestors mentioned in the post are evil because they came from Europe? Because they had light skin? Because they lived in a different time period than she does, and therefore dressed differently, talked differently, and thought differently than her? Regardless of the exact reasoning, Maddie is cruelly condemning people as evil for the “crime” of being different from her. This is the epitome of intolerance and bigotry.
Maddie’s intolerance and bigotry become even worse if one interprets Benny’s post as being about the ancestors of Americans in general, rather than just his own personal ancestors. If one interprets the post this way, then Maddie is stating not only that all of Benny’s ancestors were evil, but that all Americans of the past were evil. The bigotry and intolerance inherent in such a statement are appalling.
“Actually, they were! Hope this helps!”
Um, no. Actually, they weren’t. And you are a bigot and a bully for making this racist comment. Hope this helps, Maddie!
bookmark_borderDear Tim Walz…
Lately, I have been finding it difficult to go on.
I have been thinking about the idea that everyone has the right to their own perspective, their own viewpoint, their own feelings, their own emotions. Some people would argue that it makes no sense to say that a person’s feelings are wrong, or that someone has no right to feel angry or upset at a situation. According to this way of thinking, if a person is angry or upset at a situation, then they automatically have a right to feel that way, because that is the way that they feel. As a believer in objective moral truth, I am skeptical of this idea. I believe that if something is objectively not bad, then no one has the right to criticize it or feel any negative emotions about it, because to do so is to punish someone who has done nothing wrong.
But I digress. Regardless of which side is right in this philosophical debate, what has bothered me so much about the events of the past four and a half years is that people have not merely felt, or voiced, negative emotions about the historical figures that I love. They have enacted those feelings in ways that have involved the physical destruction of the historical figures. And regardless of one’s feelings about the historical figures that I love, regardless of what one thinks about their merit as historical figures, everyone should agree that physically eradicating historical figures from the earth is wrong. Everyone should agree that disliking someone does not give you the right to murder them.
Yet everyone, clearly, does not agree with this.
I’ve had to watch, through pictures, videos, news reports, and social media posts, the man that I love be strangled, lynched, beheaded, smashed to pieces, drowned, burned. I have had absolutely no power to stop this, to prevent it, to reverse it, to gain any sort of compensation or restitution for that harm that has been done to me. I don’t even have the power to voice my pain and be heard. Because no matter how hard I try, no matter many different ways of explaining I attempt, society refuses to recognize that any harm has been done to me at all. Whenever I try to express my viewpoint, to voice my grief and anger, to present any sort of argument for why what happened was wrong, I am met with insults and ridicule. People call me a racist, an idiot, a moron, say that I should be barred from public spaces, laugh in my face using Facebook’s hideous “laughing face” reaction. When I contact public officials, I am either ignored entirely, or lectured about how I am wrong, and how the murder of the man that I love was a good thing, and how I need to have more empathy for others and to educate myself about the harm caused. The fact that harm was caused to me by the murder of the man that I love is denied and disregarded. The idea of others actually having empathy for me is not even acknowledged as a possibility.
This is why I’m outraged upon coming across the following quote from Tim Walz: “How is it fair that you’re paying your taxes every year, and Donald Trump hasn’t paid any federal tax in the last 15 years?”
Walz’s sentiments are so lacking in empathy that it’s appalling.
After being forced to watch the man that I love be strangled, lynched, beheaded, smashed to pieces, drowned, and burned, dozens upon dozens of times, I don’t care a whit about how much tax money Donald Trump pays. What I care about is the man that I love, and the fact that he was murdered.
Tim Walz, in fact, made a deliberate decision to allow the man I love to be murdered. Tim Walz knew that a group of bigots and bullies were planning to lynch Christopher Columbus at the state capitol building in St. Paul, Minnesota on a particular day and at a particular time. And he ordered the state police to stand down, to do nothing, to make no attempt to stop the lynching. So the man that I love was lynched, brutally and excruciatingly, on the steps of the state capitol, as dozens of cops stood and watched. The images of the noose being tied around his neck, his metal body crashing to the ground, a bigot named Mike Forcia standing on Christopher’s pedestal and thrusting his arms into the air in sickening triumph, mindless bigots posing with their knees on Christopher’s neck as he lay pitifully face down on the ground, a line of cops standing at attention and doing absolutely nothing as these horrifying events took place, are indelibly seared into my mind. The excruciating agony will be with me forever. It burns my consciousness and torments my soul as I type this sentence.
But to Tim Walz, the lynching of the man that I love does not matter. It is not important, not a problem, not worth doing anything about. Tim Walz thinks that the amount of taxes paid by Donald Trump is more important than Christopher’s life, more important than the soul-crushing trauma and pain that I’ve been subjected to.
Lately, my mood has been low and down, my soul feels crushed, and everything feels heavy. For four and a half years I’ve lived with trauma that never goes away, that contaminates nearly every person, organization, place, and activity, that eats at my mind when I’m trying to fall asleep, that erupts into a volcano of anguish at the smallest reminder. And no one cares. Society thinks that the problem is me, that the man I love deserved to be murdered, that I am racist and bad for loving him, and that I need to change so that I’m not as upset about the fact that he was murdered. It’s difficult to imagine a path forward, a life that could be meaningful, given these circumstances.
Meanwhile, the people who lynched the man that I love have faced no negative consequences at all. Their needs are being met, just as they always have been. They haven’t suffered trauma. They are told that they are perfectly fine the way they are (righteous and honorable even, depending on who you ask), that they don’t need to change. They are able to live their lives, spend time with friends and family, love their romantic partners, raise their children, engage in their hobbies, and voice their views without criticism, without insults, without laughing face emojis. Tim Walz is able to campaign for Vice President of the United States with his wife and children by his side, participate in debates, speeches, and interviews on meaningless issues, and almost entirely avoid any accountability for his decision to facilitate the lynching of the man that I love.
In the eyes of society, the people who hurt me, the people who murdered the man that I love, hold the moral high ground. In the eyes of society, I am condemned as shameful, disgusting, and morally bad for having been hurt, and the man I love is ridiculed for having been murdered.
In other words, the person who has done nothing wrong in this situation bears 100% of the negative consequences, and the people who have done something wrong, by causing the horrible situation, bear 0% of the consequences.
Tim Walz, that’s what isn’t fair.
bookmark_border“Our Out-of-Control Federal Law Enforcement Agencies” by Ryan Cleckner
The latest issue of Imprimis, a publication by Hillsdale College, was so disturbing that I feel the need to share it. It’s not the viewpoint expressed by lawyer and firearms industry executive Ryan Cleckner that is disturbing – that is both eloquently expressed and completely correct – but rather the actions of federal law enforcement agencies that he describes.
Cleckner describes how federal agencies such as the ATF and FBI murdered people, destroyed their homes, obliterated their fundamental rights and dignity, and overall acted like thugs.
In one case, the ATF determined that airport executive Bryan Malinowski was required to have a license, which he didn’t have, for his gun collecting hobby. Instead of informing him of this, they decided to violate his privacy rights by placing a GPS tracker on his car, and then to conduct a pre-dawn raid on his home, during which they brought ten vehicles filled with agents in SWAT gear, cut the power to his house, and killed him.
In another instance, a volunteer at an abortion clinic, Bruce Love, began to profanely harass a 12-year-old pro-life protestor. An argument took place during which the boy’s father, Mark Houck, pushed Love to the ground. Love pressed charges against Houck, despite the fact that Love is the one who deserves to have charges filed against him, because he initiated the conflict. Love’s bogus case was dismissed, but federal prosecutors subsequently decided to charge Houck with violating the FACE Act (prohibiting blocking access to abortion clinics). Two dozen FBI agents conducted a pre-dawn raid on his home, armed with SWAT gear and battering rams. Houck was arrested and chained to a table for 6 hours, despite the fact that Love is the person who deserves to be punished in this situation.
After reading this piece, I believe that law enforcement agencies should not be allowed to conduct pre-dawn raids, ever, for any reason. I also believe that all of the agents, prosecutors, and officials involved in the incidents that Cleckner describes should get the death penalty. (At the absolute least, they should be fired.) Their actions are truly, truly despicable. The incidents that Cleckner described make it clear, if anyone still had any doubts, that we live in a totalitarian country. And this should not be acceptable to anyone.
As Cleckner notes, the agencies responsible for these atrocities respond to criticism by pointing out that their actions are “by the book.” If this is the case, then we need a new book.
You can read Cleckner’s full article here.
bookmark_borderSociety’s appalling inconsistency regarding Ukraine and the Confederacy
“Fighting for freedom, fighting for the right to live peacefully and independently”
During the Olympics, one of the commentators used these words to characterize the efforts of Ukraine during their war with Russia.
And it struck me that this is exactly what the Confederate States of America was doing during the war with the United States from 1861 to 1865.
The Ukrainian people are deified and worshipped by our society, praised effusively at nearly every opportunity for their bravery, resilience, and strength. People fall all over themselves in their eagerness to express their solidarity. During sporting events like the Olympics, audiences are reminded, again and again, about how inspirational the Ukrainian athletes are, the difficult conditions they’ve had to overcome, the sacrifices they’ve made, and the fact that they are fighting for something larger than themselves.
Yet the Confederates, who were fighting for the exact same thing, receive the exact opposite treatment. They are unanimously condemned as racists, white supremacists, “traitors,” and “insurrectionists” (as if defying authority is somehow bad). It is accepted as self-evident that they do not deserve to be honored in any way. Their names erased from streets, buildings, and military bases, their commemorations canceled, their monuments sickeningly destroyed in a systematic and relentless campaign of obliteration.
In the eyes of society, fighting for freedom is noble and honorable when done by Ukrainians, but “treason” and “insurrection” when done by southern Americans.
The fact that two nations, fighting for the same thing, are treated so differently, demonstrates the utter hypocrisy and lack of logic of our society.
Freedom. The right to live peacefully and independently.
These are things that all people deserve. These are things that the people of the Confederate States of America deserved just as much as the people of Ukraine do.
bookmark_borderFour years ago today…
Four years ago today, three historical monuments were removed from the North Carolina state capitol grounds in Raleigh. One honored Confederate soldiers, another honored the Women of the Confederacy, and the third honored Henry Lawson Wyatt, the first Confederate soldier from North Carolina to be killed in the war.
“Monuments to white supremacy don’t belong in places of allegiance, and it’s past time that these painful memorials be moved in a legal, safe way,” stated Gov. Roy Cooper.
Even four years later, reading these words makes me sick to my stomach.
These were not monuments to white supremacy; they were monuments to the idea of being different, thinking for oneself, and resisting authority. They were monuments signifying the right of people who are different from the norm to be accepted and included.
These memorials were not painful. Rather the removal of these memorials was painful. The removal of these memorials – along with countless others like them across the country and world – was not only painful but was the most painful thing, by far, that has ever happened to me. I believe that it was the most painful thing that has ever happened to any person.
Because I am a person who is different from the norm, these memorials were necessary in order for me to have a life worth living. And Roy Cooper chose to take them away, on purpose. This action was so completely lacking in empathy that it defies comprehension. And Cooper’s words, in which he characterizes the memorials that he removed as somehow “painful” – while completely failing to acknowledge the excruciating, indescribable, and unbearable pain that he inflicted by removing them – are even more lacking in empathy.
In other words, not only does Cooper falsely condemn statues as “painful” and “white supremacist” when they are nothing of the sort, but he simultaneously fails to acknowledge the pain inflicted by his own actions.
Four years later, I am still grieving. I am still in pain from Roy Cooper’s actions and words, and the dozens upon dozens of similarly horrible actions and words of bigots and bullies across the country and world. To some degree, I always will be.
It is reprehensible for bullies like Roy Cooper to describe the statues that they obliterated from existence as somehow painful, when in reality it is the statues’ removals that are not merely painful, but excruciatingly, indescribably, and unbearably so. The words and actions of these bigots demonstrate a complete lack of empathy, complete intolerance for people who are different from them, and complete disregard for our feelings and thoughts.
Confederate memorials are not painful.
Removal of Confederate memorials is painful.
And not just painful, but the most painful thing that has ever happened, and the most painful thing imaginable.
Period. Full stop. No exceptions.
bookmark_borderThe idiocy of Martin Heinrich
“There’s no law enforcement application for a bump stock. There’s no military application for a bump stock. There’s no self-defense application for a bump stock. These devices are tailor-made for mass shootings. Ban them.” – Sen. Martin Heinrich
It is exasperating and exhausting to keep seeing statements like this.
The non-aggression principle, the rule that determines objective right and wrong, states that people have the right to do anything they wish, as long as it does not violate the rights of anyone else. This means that, unless owning a bump stock violates the rights of someone else, each person has the right to own a bump stock.
Does owning a bump stock violate anyone’s rights? No, it does not.
Does owning a bump stock, in and of itself, hurt anyone? No, it does not.
Therefore, each person has the right to own a bump stock. It really is as simple as that.
Why does Heinrich care about the fact that bump stocks (allegedly) have no law enforcement, military, or self-defense applications? Why does he think this fact is relevant to the question of whether or not bump stocks should be banned?
It isn’t.
There is no moral rule stating that if something has no application, then it should be banned. There is no requirement that something have an application in order to be allowed to exist. The only requirement is that the thing not violate the rights of others. Bump stocks meet that requirement. Therefore, people have a right to own them. They cannot be banned.
Contrary to what Martin Heinrich is claiming, people are not required to prove to him that their possessions have an application in order to be allowed to own those possessions.
Contrary to what Martin Heinrich is claiming, people do not have a right to do only those things that he has deemed useful or necessary.
People have a right to do anything they wish, as long as it does not violate the rights of anyone else. That includes owning bump stocks.
bookmark_border“I don’t care how you were raised, unlearn that shit”
So said an idiotic Instagram post that I had the misfortune of encountering.
“Being from another generation or culture isn’t an excuse for prejudice,” the self-righteous person pontificated in the caption.
My question is: why are other people’s opinions, viewpoints, and perspectives considered “shit” in the eyes of this intolerant and self-righteous person?
How ironic that in the very same post that this person condemns prejudice, they call other people’s perspectives “shit.”
Not realizing that considering other people’s perspectives to be “shit” is the epitome of prejudice.
In reality, the person who made this post is the one who needs to unlearn shit, because they are the one expressing intolerance of, and contempt for, other people.
If this person actually cared about combatting prejudice, the best way to start doing so would be by looking in the mirror.
If this person actually cared about combatting prejudice, they would be making an effort to understand and have empathy for others’ perspectives, rather than contemptuously dismissing those perspectives as “shit” that needs to be “unlearned.”
bookmark_borderApril Ajoy is a bully
I came across the below Instagram post which, to put it bluntly, really pisses me off:
I am not sure what Ajoy means by “temper tantrums.” It does not constitute a “temper tantrum” for people to express a view that differs from her own. Evangelicals may be opposed to pride month, and may indeed be expressing that opposition. They may even be expressing their opposition in a vehement and passionate manner. But expressing opposition to something, no matter how vehemently or passionately, does not constitute a “temper tantrum.”
It’s ironic that Ajoy ends her post by writing, “You’re just a bully,” because in reality, it is Ajoy who is the bully. It is the epitome of bullying to characterize beliefs that differ from one’s own as “temper tantrums.”
If Ajoy disagrees with the views of evangelicals regarding pride month, then she needs to actually argue against those views, rather than insulting, ridiculing, and dismissing those views as “temper tantrums.”
A differing perspective is a differing perspective, not a “temper tantrum.”
Making things even worse, the comments on Ajoy’s post anger me as much as the post itself.
“They eat pork and then hate on LGBT people,” writes a stuck-up, contemptuous jerk called downtoearthqueen. “They literally pick and choose which OT laws they believe Jesus fulfilled.”
Well, excuse me for breathing. I absolutely despise this contemptuous use of the word “they,” which is ubiquitous in posts and comments from people on the left-hand side of the political spectrum. This usage indicates that the person views people who are different from them as “less-than,” as things to gossip about and analyze, as opposed to actual people with thoughts and feelings. It is infuriating and enraging.
A commentator named Sandi Joy repeats the same infuriating use of the word “they” when she asks “that they stop using Veterans as a pawn in their bigotry.” And then she ridicules people whose views differ from hers with the infantile “OuR vEtErANs OnLy GeT oNe DaY” and “trooooops.”
What is so incredibly infuriating about Ajoy’s post and the comments on it, is not the views themselves (although these are certainly wrong), but rather the way in which Ajoy and the commentators express their views. Instead of simply expressing their perspectives, they express contempt towards those who feel differently. Instead of making counterarguments, they mock and ridicule. Enough already. This behavior hurtful and mean. And then, making things even worse, these very same people, in the same breath that they express contempt towards people who are different from them, claim that the targets of their contempt are bullies. Not realizing that the truth is the exact opposite. Not realizing that in reality, the bullies are themselves.
In conclusion:
If you characterize other people’s perspectives as “temper tantrums,” you are a bully.
If you treat other people as objects to gossip about and analyze – “they” do this, “they” do that – you are a bully.
If you caricature other people’s opinions with the puerile alternation between capital and lowercase letters and deliberate misspellings of words, you are a bully.
No, April. Evangelicals are not bullies. It is you and your mindless, sycophantic followers who are bullies.
P.S. I have no idea what you are “tired” about, given that your beliefs are shared by the entire political establishment, media establishment, and all major sports teams, companies, and brands. It is posts like yours that make me exasperated, demoralized, mentally exhausted, and, yes, tired. You have nothing to be tired about. I do.