Convictions

Its been said that mankind is a moral animal, we need a cause, something to protect, a code to live by. The need for a moral compass is in everyone so to speak but its a matter of where north is. In today's current climate with the so called Duck Dynasty controversy we see this in action, at least I do. I'll tell you why. Given the stories I've read about the entire ordeal I find the underlying motif is a crusade. A crusade alleged by GLAAD or the ADF depending on the side you're on. Its unfortunately not that cut and dry. The current political atmosphere makes it literally impossible to speak your mind about homosexuals without either being praised or berated. This is dangerous. This is where the the first sentence I wrote comes in. The latest "moral" crusade is for justice towards the homosexual. Equal rights and the like, which is interesting. I'm speaking in a constant stream here, with little backspaces so bear with the flow of the thoughts.

   I'm not telling you were I am on this issue. I think the whole thing is a distraction, a smoke screen for other much more important events going on. Particularly whats being passed by our "representatives" in the senate. Regardless my two cents. Let's take my opening statement, and lets roll with it for a minute. The idea that we are moral animals who need a cause. I will say this, it becomes apparent whenever the media portrays its version of injustice, notice its usually the television first, then conviction later. Again digressing, ok back to the point. With Facebook and other social media its a lot easier to be vocal about your ideaology which is great but its also easier to do absolutely nothing about your ideaology. I think thats the issue, its really easy to say you're for "gay marriage" or some other made up right ( more on that in another post, but for the record I think rights are an illusion, a social construct in which all other people must participate or it falls apart, unless there is some form of an absolute.) whiles rambling but its hard to do anything about it. I mean its lazy to go with the current media tide. I may be against gays getting married but not because there is hatred in me, maybe I think the state has no right to affirm anything, including marriage period. If we give the state the right to define our rights, its ALWAYS a matter of time before the rules change and someone is on the receiving end of a bullet.

   Its extraordinarily discomforting to me to watch the reactions about duck dynasty, firstly because its a damned cable tv show, and the guy has a right to say whatever he wants regardless if I like it or not and they can fire him as that's well within their right to do so. Secondly, and more importantly, the situation is a divisive label thrown on other human beings. The fundamental element we all have is being human, the rest are really negligible details. If we reduce others to political views or sexual orientations or skin color we find we have left the realm of equality altogether and turned into tribalistic labels. " You're just a bigot, You're just a liberal, You believe religion is true? You're an atheist... etc..." those are the most obvious ones being thrown around today. Let me rephrase that, those are the ones being ENCOURAGED today. The pushing of labels onto other human beings may be a social identifier but the level of disregard for the humanness of another at the encouraging of a perceived threat is scary.

Take for example Catholic priests, I bet as you read that you immediately thought pedophile. The media's smearing of all Catholic priests as being notoriously bad is failure of critical thought on behalf of its audience. Outside of the drastic overblown media hype we can get some facts and learn to relate to reality a little better. Do not read what I am not saying, I am not condoning anything. I believe at the time of this writting its less than 2% of Priests have been accused of abuse. That's the same rate as all humanity, about 2% have abused someone else sexual, that includes politicians, school teachers, cops, janitors, nurses, doctors, billionares etc. The point I am trying to make is the common default thought process of americans is to lump and collectively label and this by a alleged society focused on tolerance. How is that tolerant to throw an individual into a group based on assumptions, that shows we are not looking at persons but that we are categorizing things and that is the grave moral error of our current climate.

   The television gives us a rose colored look at whatever the network has on its mind as a good thing. And the audience passively soaks it up. This is what is dangerous, people should be yelling at the TV, saying that's not true, thats a fallacy, that's not the whole story. People should be turning off the TV and getting to know people. I remember when there was a "hate" crime against a mosque in the area I live at. I thought well time to put the money where our mouth was and called to see if I could help with the cleanup. Granted they graciously turned me down but it was a small step because the underlying intent we need is to refuse the label and embrace the human being, the "thou" to quote Buber. We need to get to know someone and trust them rather than look at them through a television media induced preconceived notion. We need to be able to completely disagree with each other and be okay with that. We need policies which will encourage true diversity, not silencing critics and calling it tolerance. The dead are easily tolerated because they cannot speak. We must embrace the other, and realize they are not us and that is not an evil thing. We need to encourage debate, with logic and clarity, and listen without belittling the others views. We need to understand the words we casually use today to label another could result in holocaust in the future. The holocaust did not happen overnight, it was a build up of 500 years of antisemitic thought and the perfect storm of a geopolitical situation. It can happen again. I don't want to say it WILL happen again but it distresses me deeply when I see the casualness in words of hatred from the right and the left political zones. The right comes out and says it but the skeleton in the lefts closet is the silencing of critics without engaging the argument, mocking rather dialog that is nothing more than intellectual cowardice.

ok I need to sleep.