I’m traveling again today, so once more I’m asking readers to keep the ethics fires burning by taking over the blog and engaging with each other on whatever ethics-related issues and current events that come to mind. Several blogs I frequent do this regularly, and in most cases the exercise has devolved into nonsense or worse in short order. Nothing like that has happened here, and it is a credit to the quality of active participants here that I’ve never seen any hint of that.
If I were on the open forum today, I’d probably want to discuss Bernie’s heart procedure (reminding us that 70-plus-year old Presidential candidates may not be responsible); the statement by Rep. Ocasio-Cortez that “billionaires should not exist”—nah, she’s not a Communist!—and the not-so-surprisng news that Rep. Schiff coordinated with the whistleblower before his complaint was filed.
But that’s just me.
That does lead me to my idea, however. For an Ethics Alarms project, I would like to launch a separate website dedicated to presenting all of the relevant news, evidence and commentary regarding the Democratic Party/ “resistance” impeachment efforts. This would be a non-partisan site where citizens could be informed regarding this fiasco without news media spin and hype. I can’t do this alone, however, so a condition precedent to going forward will be finding two or more partners to assist with the site.
If you are interested, please contact me off site at jamproethics@verizon.net.
Ethics Alarms 
Yesterday’s tragic, fatal B-17 crash in Connecticut.
Are warbirds carrying anyone, even their pilots, an ethical endeavor? Ten or fifteen Christmases ago, I took my son and son-in-law on a one hour flight in a B-17 out of Falcon Field in Mes, Arizona. It was mind-boggling in so many ways. Incredibly crude and rickety. I can’t imagine flying in it at altitude for twelve hours, never mind enemy fighters and flak.
Was it responsible to put my son and son in law at such risk in a plane built in a hurry to last for twenty five missions sixty or seventy years, an entire lifetime, after its construction? Should all warbirds be grounded and placed on static display? Seeing them fly brings tears to my eyes, but is the risk worth it?
Mesa, AZ
“Was it responsible to put my son and son in law at such risk . . . ?”
I suspect it was ethical to place one’s son-in-law at such risk. From my own experience, my wife’s father routinely attempts to shorten my life span by at least 3 decades. Sheesh. I hate the taste of strychnine in scrambled eggs.
jvb
And then there are sons. “When a boy turns 13, put him in a barrel and feed him through a knot hole. When he turns 16, plug up the hole.” — S. Clemens
And at 17 bury the barrel? Just how did old Mark Twain propose we stop the species from dying out?
Details, details Steve. We’ll just worry about that tomorrow. You’ve obviously never had a teenage son? Mazel tov.
I do not have any kids, and I am in the on-deck circle for 50, so I think I probably won’t. My brother has ONE daughter who is about to turn 13, so I think he and his wife won’t have any more. On my dad’s side I have two cousins, 37 and 31, neither of whom are married or likely to have kids, 2 more who have 2 each, but one’s in FL and I’ve never even seen his second daughter.
On mom’s side, of five siblings she and my one uncle were the only ones to have kids (her older sis was married five times to worthless men and one brother was gay, the other bipolar). Of the four cousins my one uncle produced, one, I repeat ONE, had kids (another never settled down though he had girlfriends and the other two preferred fur babies to actual ones).
By rights, between the eight in my parents’ generation I should have sixteen or seventeen cousins, maybe even eighteen just to make an even 20 with me and my brother, and between all of us there should be forty or more in the generation after us, not seven. By rights my son should be starting his junior year of college and my daughter should be starting to think about her prom this spring. Instead, nada. My Asperger’s precluded dating, so I’ll probably be single for the duration, and my one uncle (who was never there) and his now deceased wife (who was usually drunk) set a horrible example for their four kids.
Nope, no teenage son for me, and I’m pretty glad of it.
Hmmmm. I guess you have to measure the number of warbirds flying versus the number of accidents and the number of fatal accidents. Don’t forget, the FAA has some very stringent rules in place as to what standards an aircraft, especially an antique, needs to meet before it is allowed to fly. Flying is by nature risky, even with modern equipment.
Over the years 27 of the 261 pilots who have passed through the Blue Angels have been killed in crashes or other accidents, roughly 10%. So every man (no female demo pilots on that team yet, although the USAF Thunderbirds have had at least 2) who suits up with that team has a 1 in 10 chance of dying, statistically. Does that mean we should ground them? Italy’s Frecce Tricolori (Tricolor Arrows) demo team had a disastrous crash in 1988 that killed 3 pilots and 67 spectators. They’re still flying (saw them myself last year) and no one talks about disbanding them.
Warbird flying is more so, because of the fact you are dealing with very old aircraft and crude equipment by today’s standards. However, those who fly them accept the risk. The same goes for show flying, particularly with these aircraft so small you are almost wearing them rather than piloting them. I have to add that in 2016 the American Airpower Museum’s P-47 “Jacky’s Revenge” suffered engine failure during a promotional flight over the Hudson, crashed, and sank, drowning the pilot. The remaining AAM pilots and aircraft continue to soldier on, however.
I think we should wait and see what the NTSB says. From what I heard this partly sounds like a mechanical issue, but partly also possibly like a pilot error. Those are two things that are impossible to totally prevent, and, if all required maintenance was performed on schedule and everything checks out, this may well end up just being one of those disasters that no one could have seen coming and no one could have done anything more about than was done.
Only you can decide if it was ok to take your relatives up in the B-17. Presumably the crew briefed you on the risks and you had to sign paperwork to that effect. If they were adults, they made their own choices. Now, dealing with the question of whether it is ethical to OFFER those rides, I’d say it is no more unethical to offer them than to offer hang glider rides, parachute jumps, bunji jumping, or other thrill experiences that, if done wrong, could result in a fatality. It is no more unethical to offer them than it is to teach kids risky sports like football, hockey, or gymnastics, and maybe less so since kids might not grasp the risks.
As for grounding the entire warbird fleet (well over 200 aircraft in the US only), my response is “are you kidding me?” That’s the same mentality that says that all guns should be banned because a few crazy people abuse them. Never mind the fact that there is an educational component to them flying. Never mind the fact that they bring history to life the way books can’t. You ground them all, and you kill the airshow industry’s second biggest draw (the military aircraft, of which there are a very limited number dedicated to the industry, being the biggest). The airshow promoters will really love that. So will the concessionaires who sell food and souvenirs. So will the hospitality people who cater to the spectators, and the restauranteurs, and the gas station owners, and all the other supporting industries who do really well on airshow weekends. So will the cops and sheriff’s officers and so on, who count on these shows as an overtime opportunity. Not only that, but you kill the main revenue stream for the museums and foundations that maintain these planes. Before long they’ll all have to bang up shop and sell these aircraft to, presumably, the big places like the Smithsonian, who might not take them, because they have limited display and storage space. If they can’t, these historic aircraft, some of which there aren’t that many of to begin with, end up in the boneyard to rust away, and there go a bunch more links to history.
Is elimination of the risk worth losing all that?
Thanks Steve. A great post covering pretty much all the thoughts I had and a few more. I personally would love to take a ride in any of the old aircraft. I hope some of them are able to keep flying forever. There is nothing like the thrill of hearing the pulsating roar of those big piston engines and seeing the aircraft soar overhead to remind one of the heroic deeds of the men who flew them in combat.
We also need to keep in mind that the Air Force has some pretty old aircraft on active service. The last B-52 was delivered in 1962 and the last KC-135 in 1967. As of Jun 2018, there was a KC-135 built in 1957 that was still flying air refueling missions at the incredible age of over 60 years.
If you are ever in north central Indiana, try to get by Grissom Air Reserve Base near Kokomo. There is a great static display that includes a B-58 and a B-25 “Passionate Paulette” that was used in the filming of Catch 22.
Do they ever put on any air shows?
They had an Air and Space Expo in early September this year that included the Thunderbirds. Unfortunately, I couldn’t make it up there. The last air show there was over 10 years ago so I’m not expecting another one soon.
Hmm, on the other hand they just started doing Thunder over Dover at Dover AFB in Delaware again and they just resumed the Scranton Airport show after a very long absence and both are expected to continue on a 2 year cycle.
The Connecticut plane had crashed twice in the past few years.
Did it pass inspection both times before they put it back in the sky?
Trust me, Steve. I hear everything you’re saying. The planes are probably essentially new and inspected and remanufactured for every major inspection. But still. What was that poem about the buggy that had every part replaced but then finally just fell apart because it was too old. “The One Hoss Shay?” What’s the puzzle from intro philosophy class about if you change the ax handle and the ax head is it still the same ax? At some point, is it just too crazy? Mid ’30s radial engine technology? High octane AV Gas? Cable controls? I just don’t know. Would I get into the B-17 with my grand kids? No. Not worth the risk. Literally too many moving parts. And grandson no. 1 is a WWII nut at age 11.
None of them are the actual planes they portray, and some of it is about suspending disbelief and just having fun as “Gunfighter” and “Moonbeam McSwine” and so on take to the air again. They’ve been doing WW2 Weekend in Reading, PA for almost 30 years and huge gatherings of WW2 planes at Oshkosh for probably longer, and never a disaster. Would I take a ride on a bomber? Probably not, they’re kinda pricey. Would I fly up in a propeller airplane to photograph some of these planes in the air? Quite possibly.
In a world where a single missed mistake in software written by a sub-sub-sub-contractor in a third-world country has the potential to cause a brand-new, top-of-the-line aircraft to flip over and fall out of the sky, maybe radial engines and steel cables aren’t any more unreliable than the technologies we all trust our lives to every time we give an airline $350…
“ Should all warbirds be grounded and placed on static display?”
Is it reasonable to place poorly trained drivers, in a variety of physical, mental, and pharmacological states, into machines ranging from 100 years old to months old, on congested roadways with vastly changeable driving conditions, and not expect slaughter?
Yet we are just fine with the ethics of the above scenario. I am quite certain (although I have not checked) that flight is vastly safer than driving in your hometown. Warbirds are not falling wholesale from the sky (at least not since the 1940s) and there are far more deaths from commuting on our roads.
Reminds me of the old saying regarding trained bears in the circus:
The marvel is not how well the bear dances, but that it dances at all.
New topic.
What are the ethics of speech in face of political indoctrination, marginalization, demonization?
When you are confronted by the deranged resistance and presented with baseless leftist propaganda, what do ethics require we do?
What if our livelihoods are very likely to be threatened should we respond in opposition to them, regardless of how calm, rational and factual the opposing response we provide?
Because you qualified the person as deranged the only thing you can do is say I am sorry you are unable to process my point of view and walk away.
What can you do when an advocacy group can declare a harmless symbol nearly universally recognized worldwide as just meaning, “I’m okay” as a racist sign?
https://www.yahoo.com/news/family-outraged-universal-character-made-210442980.html
I don’t know why the character made that sign. That seems a bit off to me, especially in light of the hysteria. I know my own hands and fingers do weird things when posing for photos. Was it conscious? Was it auto-reflexive? Is it racist?
Or do a few jerks get to appropriate this symbol and stifle our ability to express ourselves?
Yesterday I realized that when President Trump talks he sometimes makes the ok sign with his hand inadvertently. Not sure if that’s why suddenly it’s considered racist.
What’s strange is that the okay sign is probably on every Smartphone’s emoji options. Wouldn’t that be a clue that it’s a longtime symbol of something other than hate?
MY understanding is that some groups in 4chan (whatever that is; I hear it is a deep web system for people engaged in potentially nefarious activities) crated the controversy to poke liberal and leftist activists.
jvb
Yes, and some woman did the upside down OK sign to ‘own the libs’ while sitting behind someone testifying to Congress when the testimony was televised. So then it became about “made you look, snowflakes!” and actual white supremacists have been using it for real. It’s a chicken-or-egg discussion to most people who won’t go on 4chan or other similar sites. There’s some sort of contractor around my area that has it on his back window with “made you look” and his phone number. Regardless of my personal politics, it seems an impolitic choice for his business. The reaction to the actual hand signal is often based on the viewer’s politics.
My fingers have probably done that sign, too. It would be completely unconscious if I did, though.
One reason that the “okay” sign is seen used so often by public speakers has to do with training. Many people gesture extensively with their hands while speaking. Many of those people have a habit of pointing with their index finger to emphasize points when they speak. Many audience members don’t like being pointed at; research has proven it to be an off-putting habit. Speech coaches (and instructor development instructors like me) have for years taught speakers to touch their index finger to the thumb when speaking, just to avoid the direct finger-pointing gesture. Depending on the position of the hand, this can look like the “okay” sign to the observer. Bill Clinton was, I am told, one of the most difficult speakers to break from the pointing habit, and there are many photos of him that show the “okay” sign. Ditto for Hillary and Obama.
An Army buddy of mine used to constantly play the “made you look” game way back in 1990 and still does it today. This is a photo he posted on his Facebook page…
He’s obviously a black guy so do these blindly ignorant social justice warriors think he’s a white supremacist too?
HoR Rashida Tliab (Demented-MI) tweets on 08/20/2019 “@detroitpolice You should probably rethink this whole facial recognition bull$#!T.”
FF to Monday, Tliab to Detroit Police Chief James Craig (who is reportedly black): “Analysts need to be African Americans, not people that are not. I THINK NON-AFRICAN-AMERICANS THINK AFRICAN-AMERICANS ALL LOOK THE SAME (bolds/caps mine)
Not only does the talented Ms. Tliab issue a disgustingly-n-openly bigoted, and implicitly biased insult to ~ 88 % of the U.S. population, but strongly suggests melanin-content should be THE primary consideration in hiring practices for certain positions.
Demonstrating bona fides for post-government service employment…at Harvard Admissions…?
Mmhmmm, she tweets like this and it’s great. The president tweets like this and he’s a horror. Just another example of liberal hypocrisy.
Counterpoint: She’s actually kind of right. The Cross-Race Effect tells us that people have a much easier time identifying someone of the race they are most familiar with (which will generally be their own race, although that’s not guaranteed). In a city that’s as overwhelmingly Black as Detroit, it DOES make sense that you should have a predominance of Black individuals doing facial recognition as an actual job qualification.
Now, I’m sure she’d say it’s because White people are all racist and don’t care enough about Black people to tell them apart, and THERE she’s wrong- but I also wouldn’t want a team of all White people (who science tells us are overall worse at differentiating between Black people) deciding which Black people are breaking the law, based on their ability to differentiate between them.
The other issue is that facial recognition software is only as good as the training data fed into it. It is not, on its own, and objective system.
Companies developing this software have had difficulty distinguishing minorities in their software, as the training sets have tended towards being photos of identified white persons. The computer takes the input photos of multiple people, and compares pixels from multiple photos of the same person, and creates complex and often arbitrary mathematical relations between these pixels. It then compare patterns between sets of different people, and marks which patterns are most significant across multiple people. The result is a series of mathematic equations and relationships that are gibberish to even the most advanced programmer.
Programmers must then manually inspect the results, and reject false positives to better train the system, further complicating the equations. Failure to feed appropriate training data, and calibrate against false positives increases the chance of people being misidentified and flagged for arrest. These systems require very careful and responsible monitoring to not become an unmitigated blight on civil rights.
Good point on the programming aspect! This is the kind of thing that needs actual careful balancing, and just screaming that the system is bullshit and that only Black people aren’t racist just buries it in mud.
Because we should teach our computer systems to favor the 13% demographic over the vast majority of subjects? That makes sense. Wait… who commits the majority of crimes…?
Of course, if we DO bias the software to better identify blacks, the objection will be that we are racist for doing so.
Doesn’t Talib’s argument suggest that only black persons commit crimes? Theoretically, if black people commit X percent of crimes and represent Y percent of the population then the percentage of facial recognition personnel should be XY percent
”Doesn’t Talib’s argument suggest that only black persons commit crimes?”
In my best Euphegenia Doubtfire voice: ”Oooh you wicked, wicked man, you!”
If you look even deeper into this historically, the fact that picture taking, the development of film, etc. all tended to have a white bias means that AI is battling several troubles to get better at the work. Kodak developed their color film with all white men, so when differing skin tones started using it, it didn’t do well (there are articles about this, but I can’t find them at the moment). It’s been a historical problem with several kinds of technology that grew up in a vacuum. Heck, the reason they now tell you not to smile on a passport picture is because of facial recognition scanning in law enforcement- so many things change when you smile it’s harder for the machine to recognize you. AI has gotten better at masculine vs. feminine (facial structure AND the hair on faces and heads presents problems), but it’s also still developing and behind on different skin tones. It’s an inherent ‘bias’ because of the amount of light reflected by skin. This is an acknowledged issue in the film/tv/theater industry because of the changes needed in lighting and costuming (heck, even set design) to make sure all performers are evenly lit/seen, no matter what. Makeup has also been changing a lot in the past years to adjust to more skin tones in the general population. Kinda tangential, but there you go.
I assume if she took the time to fully say what she means instead of just a pithy tweet, she’d come up with something along the lines of “White people are racist so they don’t bother to differentiate between Black people, so they’re bad to have in facial recognition in a mostly-Black city. Black people aren’t racist and/or are in a largely-White country, so they are able to perform just fine at facial recognition of White people.”
That’s just my assumption, but it does fit the bill of being internally consistent and placing all the blame at the feet of White people.
I like the idea that there be a place to obtain unspun information. I do not know how to make it non-partisan given that all the information, evidence and commentary is pre-spun already.
Nonetheless, I derive a great deal of insight from both sides here. Having both sides give their positions, backed up by source information is extremely helpful in developing my own thinking. Without the source that can be checked and its sources checked that undergird the argument, the opinion is no better than the talking heads on TV
Has the Democrat party been infested with Witches? as in MacBeth’s ‘weyward sisters? And should America reestablish burning at the stake as part of National Purification?
”should America reestablish burning at the stake as part of National Purification?”
Rather than the Ducking Stool?
Hard to argue the logic of: “if you live, yer a witch, if you drown, yer innocent,” am I right?
It probably wouldn’t surprise you to know that I tend to think that what we do in our Modernity is to re-describe things that were formerly described and defined in other terms.
What else I observe is that we are — really and truly we are — within a sort of threshold or liminal area between one entire structure of view and another, competing view (scientific description for want of a better word, or essentially ‘chemistry’).
For example, the structure of view that is operative in Christianity is evidence of the ‘old metaphysics’. If you read St Paul as a ‘text’ that describes a real metaphysics, and if you actually believe it and *see* it operating in the world around you, you are (still) within the olden metaphysics.
While I cannot define a ‘witch’ (although there are native healers in my region of Colombia and they are essentially Pagan-Catholics) I am aware of and I guess you’d say I ‘believe in’ the concept of ‘psychological possession’ (in a Jungian sense, which is also a restatement of olden terms).
I would actually be forced to say that in certain senses some conservative criticism of feminism (the term Femi-Nazi comes to mind) makes a reference to a peculiar ‘possessed woman’ who is a danger to the ‘established structure’.
I also do subscribe to the notion of the demonic or the effect of the demonic on people.
I wonder if — someday — I will grow up and no longer be ‘stuck’ in a Shakespearean world?
”I also do subscribe to the notion of the demonic or the effect of the demonic on people.”
Who am I to DISAGREE?
“I wonder if — someday — I will grow up and no longer be ‘stuck’ in a Shakespearean world?”
At the risk of disappointing your extensive fan base….?
Were you raised in a Christian tradition? (If you do not mind the personal question).
”Were you raised in a Christian tradition?”
I reckon you could say that; the folks ”dropped us off” for Sunday School and Church (Lutheran/Wisconsin Synod), which were mandatory until Confirmation; after that we were allowed to continue if we so chose.
I believe the ”dropping off” part was my parents (never “religious” types, they) feeling beholden to their parent’s wishes that we be raised “right.” In retrospect, a prudent move seeing that (IMO) the greatest part of growing up is making your own choices and learning to live with the consequences.
Post Confirmation, a half century ago as we speak, I decided not to continue for reasons varied-n-many. I’m now…um…unaffiliated and consider myself a devout, yet spiritual, Agnostic.
Or, as you may have surmised, a self-made man that worships his creator…
Amusing, yet I am fully with you on this.
St. Paul was a jerk, and a chunk of his advice is not the kinder and generous that Jesus promoted.
There were some other interesting punishments in the ‘witch era’ that are humiliation based to make shame a serious punishment like a shrew’s fiddle. There are an unfortunate number of people who do awful things in the public arena without any just repercussions. False accusations should carry a cost, (false is making a crusade about something untrue, not just being unproven)
Apropos of the Shew’s Fiddle:
“A bell was sometimes attached to this portable pillory, to alert townspeople that the victim was approaching so that she might be mocked and otherwise humiliated. Another version was a “double fiddle” by which two people could be attached together face-to-face, forcing them to talk to each other. They were not released until the argument had been resolved.”
Are you suggesting that this be applied to Nancy Pelosi and Donald Trump?!?
St. Paul was a jerk, and a chunk of his advice is not the kinder and generous that Jesus promoted.
Everyone is a jerk really. I have set myself the task to become a jerk but to do it with real panache. I’m not saying I am there yet but I do feel I have progressed. 🙂
Your statement is slightly ‘blanket’ — not much, just a little! — but I am curious to know if you have an example in mind.
“Are you suggesting that this be applied to Nancy Pelosi and Donald Trump?!?
More general than just people at highest levels. I’d include the reporter who fabricated a rape for the Rolling Stone with real names attached instead of marking it as fiction, or serial offenders lie Cosby. These are people taking advantage of their place in the public eye to do great harm. Like Paul and the resistance, they refuse to see the harm they do. Shame used to be valuable as a counter for non-lethal matters. Shameless is not a compliment.
St Paul was a misogynist, one of the few I detest, because his antiquated ideas are still used as important, even if they as relevant as some of the Bible’s comments on slavery. A friend explicitly said nothing from Paul in her wedding ceremony, but the preacher agreed and used it anyway. (that was a bad omen as it turned out)
St Paul was a misogynist, one of the few I detest, because his antiquated ideas are still used as important, even if they as relevant as some of the Bible’s comments on slavery. A friend explicitly said nothing from Paul in her wedding ceremony, but the preacher agreed and used it anyway. (that was a bad omen as it turned out)
I respect your opinion, but can you provide a concrete example that illustrates your assertion?
Nope. Every time I have to hear or read his words on women and marriage in some service, I want to choke someone. So I’m not going to seek it out to torture myself.
I guess I will be forever steeped in controversy! It is my destiny to engage in polemics. My sister tells me it is astrological . . .
If you *believe in God* and if you believe in the incarnation of Jesus Christ, you are (unless I am wrong) forced to believe, obligated to understand, that God chose Paul for his revelation. And by extension that *God* knew what he was doing. If one *sees* from that angle things look a bit different, in comparison to our modern perspective. It follows that the general content of Paul’s teachings were 1) inspired by God through his revelation, and 2) contained important elements.
Interestingly (I am reading MacBeth over again) those strange personages encountered on the heath they are referred to as the weyard sisters. But I am confused if that is an early spelling of weird (weird sisters) or if it means ‘wayward’. Now wayward is an interesting word:
Feminism is, in various ways, a profound rebellion against an established metaphysics. Or to put it another way the feminist doctrines have connecting points to radical/rebellious doctrines and also to radical forms of atheism. This all fits together of course: the rejection of ‘a metaphysical order’ as happened in the Occidental rejection of scholasticism has led, bit by bit, to the overturning of the conceptual order that can conceive of such a ‘metaphysical order’.
The paragraph that I wrote above — interestingly enough — is a paragraph that *we* (the great generality) can no longer believe. In fact we do not believe it. We do not believe in a ‘revelation of God in Jesus Christ, nor in the Incarnation, nor in any of the necessary elements that flow from that belief. What we do is to *interpret* from our Modern Perspective. So, yes, *something might have happened* to Saul on the road to Damascus, but it was likely sun-stroke or some sort of neurological fit. But certainly not a vision of Jesus Christ. And whatever was transmitted there, was not ‘God’s Will’, but rather ‘the will of a man’.
You will notice that I am amphibious in my understandings. If I am actually to be a Christian (this is what I have come to understand) then I actually have to believe that at a specific point in time God entered this world in a unique way and at that moment, and not before that moment, made ‘salvation’ a possibility for man. If I take that as a fact — if I can take that as a fact — and not the shadow of a sort-of fact, it changes many things.
I do see how thoroughly inappropriate I am for this blog (generally) since I can only see things through rather complex filters. But, as the non-saint Paul implies: I must not abandon nor disappoint my ‘fans’.
Ah, but I can believe that God is divine, and Jesus was divine,. And Paul was picked for his talent and potential. But Paul was fallible and mortal and did not fully get the unversality of the gospel, even if he was much closer to source material than we. He brought his own prejudices that were part and parcel of his teachings.
I believe you must take the Bible with a large grain of salt as they were speaking to believers in that time and place. Some issues are universal and make teachable moments, but putting down any minority (women in that culture and time) because your group is inherently better goes completely against Jesus’ edicts to love one another. So yes, I count Jesus’ words far higher than a bigot like Paul (even if he was valuable to the early church) It links in an odd way to the Presidency: the most effective are also often arses. That doesn’t mean I voluntarily read tweets or certain books in the Bible…
ps: I don’t think you mean the say you are amphibious, as that is saying you’re a frog. Did you mean ambivalent?
Yes, I meant *amphibious*: able to live in two realms. I was referring to the ‘old metaphysics’ and the ‘new metaphysics’.
…but putting down any minority (women in that culture and time) because your group is inherently better goes completely against Jesus’ edicts to love one another.
Again, I respect your opinion and view. But I devote myself, with relish, to polemics on the important issues. I just see things differently. The origin of the *possibility of love* and certainly of matrimonial love, is an Occidental creation. And contained within that is a special understanding of ‘woman’. No other culture that I am aware of has *seen* women or a woman in that light. I do not regard St Paul as misogynistic in the way that you do. But you’d have to define misogyny and fill out your definition for me to understand it. I regard modern feminism as misogynistic — destructive of woman. So, for me, the question is What is truly woman’s role and how can it be fulfilled?
I definitely turn to traditionalism and tradition-based modes of understanding, and such people like Gertrude von le Fort.
But this all fits together, doesn’t it: I exist within contrariness. All the assertions of the Present, I oppose and question and contradict.
But Paul was fallible and mortal and did not fully get the universality of the gospel, even if he was much closer to source material than we. He brought his own prejudices that were part and parcel of his teachings.
Yes, I understand what you mean.
I’m not going to convince you of Paul’s great contribution to faith and life but I’d like to share why he is my favorite saint (which I know may seem odd given 1 Corinthians 6:9 and other verses mentioning fornication – which is often interpreted in newer translations as homosexuality). I’m a Bible reader and not a scholar, however my understanding is that he was harsh in his letters because the early Christian churches had issues regarding adherence to doctrine within the church as well as the behavior of the faithful outside of it.
1 Corinthians is a reflection of reports Paul received regarding competing factions within the church, as well as Christians who were “puffed up” including a situation where a son was sleeping with his mother yet glorifying God. Romans 5:19 says “For as by one man’s disobedience many were made sinners, so by the obedience of one shall many be made righteous.” Paul was strict because, as I understand it, he was trying to keep the church from succumbing to “grievous wolves” using “another gospel” and “another spirit,” turning the church into a false one (Corinth was particularly troubled). Considering the state many churches are in today (Matthew 24:24), it seems he was wise to be gravely concerned.
While there’s a lot of debate regarding what Paul meant about women’s heads being covered and being silent in the church, some feminists have used those verses to throw away everything Paul discussed. This is a shame. He argued for the values of love (yes if you actually read all his letters that becomes apparent), defending the church from deception, righteousness (ethics, morals), faith, trust, justification, unity, and joy (in Philippians rejoice and joy are mentioned 16 times).
Paul’s ultimate message to me is to walk after the spirit and not the flesh…which means to practice discernment. In other words to listen to my ethics alarms to challenge my own and others statements so I’m focused on what’s most important, rather than being fooled by powers and principalities, as I once was when progressivism was for a brief time, my religion. Does it seem like there are contradictions to Paul’s assertions? Maybe there are or perhaps we will be able to see and hear at some point the overall picture painted by his words.
Paul may be a jerk to you but I suspect you may agree with him on a few things:
-To not be “puffed up” against others
-To not be deceived
-To have charity for others
-To not be vainglorious or envious
-To not glory in trying to make others be the way you want them to be
-That husbands and wives love each other
-To minister grace
-To not be wrathful
-To not foster strife
I’ll end this long winded comment with one of my favorite verses from Paul.
““Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these things.” Philippians 4:8
Well stated. Too often the words of Paul have been used as cudgels to keep people in line. At the same time tossing away writing such as Galatians 3:28 which stresses the dignity of all.
“There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.”
On the other hand those who dismiss all of Paul’s writings miss the historical, cultural moment of his writing. Not unusual. The whole concept of self-sacrifice and picking up one’s cross isn’t popular.
Sadly, those words are not the ones that get the most play in churches and services and sects I’ve read/experienced. I just vehemently disagree with the stuff about women/marriage. He was a tremendous organizer who did a lot the church needed in its transition from rabble to religion. He was an inspired choice, but it doesn’t mean I won’t think he had a serious flaw too.
It’d be nicer if the dissing section got less positive airplay… it reminds me of how the other Abrahamic faiths also restrict women in religion. Just as a personnel issue, you lose too much talent.
The “gentler, kinder Jesus” line is a reflection of the idiocy from the late 1960s and 1970s. If you read the Gospels, Jesus is pretty tough on the disciples, especially Peter. He rebukes Peter all the time (“get thee behind me, Satan”), and Jesus teaches absolute devotion, to exclusion of all others. He calls on His followers to leave their families, jobs, possessions, and homes. Lewis Black would say that Jesus was a bit of a prick (to my long-suffering wife’s horror!).
jvb
Standards are needed for any faith. Christianity is a wide umbrella with competing standards. But just because the standard for minimizing attachment in the line of duty fails, doesn’t mean all standards are bad and the Jedi Order should die. 😉
https://futurism.com/the-byte/google-hate-speech-ai-biased
Barring the fact that I say it’s unethical to try and automatically censor speech, because someone might find it hurtful, is it wrong for these articles to jump to conclusions on why these automated programs flag black posts as hateful more often?
Every article that talks about this says that the problem is the programmers are all racist against blacks. Not a single consideration that black people might actually post things that people consider hateful. I don’t know what the case would be; no article actually shows any of the posts that the programs flagged as hateful. I do think it’s unethical to assume that these programmers are racist and that’s why their programs are flagging posts written by black people more often than other races.
Blame the programmers, blame the canary in the coal mine? What does that mean if programmers are black, women, or muslim? While a majority are white male, the young white males are willing to work insane hours to keep the technical agglomeration staggering forward in ways more balanced people are not as willing to do. Ie, parents with toddlers or some crusade to feed, are not willing to work the 80 hours a week required in hot programming projects. Hand waving won’t make a website or package work, look at the insurance helper from the Obama era; technology is results based not feelings.
Good time as any to repost one of my favorite essays about programming. This guy gets us. 🙂
https://www.stilldrinking.org/programming-sucks
The likely reason why the AI seems “biased” is pretty obvious. It’s not racism on the part of the programmers, it’s because there’s a certain word that’s flummoxing the algorithm. This word, depending on context, can be one of the most vile, hate-speechy things you can say, or it can be a joyful sobriquet to a friend. Or anything in between. It’s no wonder that a machine-learning algorithm gets tripped up on this word, because it has exactly zero cultural background and context on which to base this determination. It’s only analyzing the words used, and even very smart humans who understand all the issues and shades of gray surrounding this word sometimes get tripped up by it, as “acceptable” use of the word is constantly shifting, dependent as it is on the race, cultural background, economic status, skin color, educational history, and politics of both the speaker and listener.
AI is a brute-force tool, and identifying “hate speech” is a finesse task. Trying to get AI to evaluate hateful language accurately is like asking a lumberjack to do eye surgery. The results will be messy.
I submit that one could fill a sizeable web page with just examples of people demanding a 100% neutral, automatic set of standards that are purely consistent, and then absolutely losing their minds when it doesn’t produce the outcome they assumed it would.
Americans SPENT MORE On Taxes In 2018 Than On Food**, Clothing**, And Health Care** Combined.
Lefty designates each of ** as Human Rights.
Adding in Free College and “protection” from Climate Change shouldn’t affect that too much, should it…?
“Rep. Ocasio-Cortez that “billionaires should not exist”
That would carry a lot more moral weight to me if she wasn’t part of a very visible effort to overturn the results of an election, efforts that have probably wasted hundreds of millions in the public sector alone. Money that could make a real difference in so many needed areas! Spending MY money like a drunken sailor does not endear me to your POV. Billionaires at least know when to cut line and stop wasting money, because it is their money. Officials like her don’t care how much money they’re wasting.
”Billionaires at least know when to cut line and stop wasting money, because it is their money.”
A notable exception would be Tommy Steyer.
Why stop at billionaires? Why not decide that millionaires, near-millionaires or just anybody who has more than you do shouldn’t exist? We’ve got a nice big list of undesirable people who have to be taught that they don’t deserve the money they have. Maybe after the Revolution, all of them will be lined up and shot and their property redistributed to those who have less.
Why should the focus be on money or cash equivalents.
Maybe we should demand that we force ab equilibration of power. Money just buys stuff, power gets you the money. If theses folks are concerned about income inequality they should first focus on power inequality.
Bernie used to say millionaires. He doesn’t anymore. I wonder why that is…
No I don’t. He’s a millionaire now.
No more billionaires? No problem! Devalue the dollar! Presto chango!
I’m not usually into memes but this one was pretty funny:
Socialists
A bunch of rich people convincing poor people to vote for the rich people by telling the poor people that other rich people are the reason they’re poor.
Mark Hamill has done it again.
https://www.thewrap.com/mark-hamill-is-not-a-fan-of-ivanka-trump-and-jared-kushners-son-wearing-a-stormtrooper-costume-photo/
As a lifelong “Star Wars” fan, I submit the following:
* There is a time and place to criticize the First Family should you deem it necessary. Perhaps a photo of their young child in a cute costume is not one of those times.
* Trump family members (as well as Trump supporters, Republicans and other non-resistance members) are allowed to like “Star Wars”.
* Children dress up like Stormtroopers (and Darth Vader) all the time. It has nothing to do with their parents’ or grandparents’ stance on political or social issues.
* I would have hoped that there would have been a lesson learned when Samantha Bee decided to retaliate against Ivanka for posting a photo of her baby online by launching a vicious personal attack on her, along with a disgusting allusion to incest, because she doesn’t like Ivanka’s father’s border policy.
Sadly, Mr Hamill has been under attack from uber-progressive Lucasfilm because he refuses to say the progressive destruction of his beloved character is what they deserve. While it may be craven to virtue signal like this, I see it as an expression of unresolved cognitive dissonance. He does not want to, or his retirement fund requires, he give lip service to things that are really against his own interests. He lacks the nerve to repudiate progressive Hollywood. Chapelle and the director of the Joker movie are on the hot seats right now, I think Mark just wants to get quieter, and signaling Trump-hate buys him some space.
Hamill’s been a dick about political issues for a while now, at least on Twitter – certainly he’s been doing this schtick since before he reprised his role in the latest Star Wars debacle. I don’t think it’s any particularly calculated way to ingratiate progressives to him, I think he may be yet another showbiz asshole who’s trying to conceal an average (at best) intellect by being louder and more obnoxious.
I just feel sorry for the sod, that the progressive causes he supports have destroyed his fav character and legacy for the cause. Note the woke media is currently crashing against the new Joker movie, and tried to generate outrage last winter when Vader in a comic offed a stalker woman. (helping destroy the jedi and enslaving the Wookies was not enough a clue. Villains may end up a redoubt against cultural PC purges.
Geek Culture is notoriously full of Gatekeepers- it’s not enough to like the same stuff I like, you have to like it in the same WAY I like it, to the same EXTENT I like it, and from the same PERSPECTIVE that I like it. Everyone who frequents a comic shop has seen the unfortunate individuals spouting garbage like “Oh, you can’t name the Captains of the Enterprise in order? FAKE GEEK!”
This is just Hammill doing more of the same. He wants to like his fans, he wants to agree with people he likes, therefore his fans have to be people he agrees with. It’s a shame, I thought he was better than this.
Thanks Luke. I’ve seen this in my son in law, a gamer. Conformity is required.
I misread your first sentence as discussing Greek culture! Yikes, that’s one of Jack’s territories. My first thought was, “Ooh, proceed with caution!” Hah.
“Oh, you can’t name all of Zeus’ concubines in order? FAKE GREEK!”
Exactly! Nevermind all the ingredients of baclava!
Mr. Hamill, and his family, shouldn’t be throwing stones. The horrible situation with his son and wife trying to pressure the son’s girlfriend to get an abortion is mind boggling. The argument that a child is better dead than without a father is dreadful.
https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/happened-mark-hamills-son-got-210000237.html
The best characterization of Mark Hamill I’ve seen is this:
He’s not a very good actor, he’s a disgruntled out of work jedi in real life and it’s all he can play in movies too.
Nah, he’s an out of work Joker, who wishes he could be a Jedi. Generally liking his fans doesn’t make him a Jedi, and pressuring for abortion is probably against the Jedi Code. The Force is kind of a codependancy with life, protecting life would include infants.
Ooo straight to where it hurts.
Jack, I have no issues with you starting a separate page focused on the media, but you are fooling yourself if you think you are approaching this from a non-partisan point of view. You’ve already made up your mind. You put “resistance” in quotes and it only focuses on the Democratic party. It is, by definition, partisan.
With all due respect Still Spartan, that’ not what Jack’s idea is.
<blockquote" I would like to launch a separate website dedicated to presenting all of the relevant news, evidence and commentary regarding the Democratic Party/ “resistance” impeachment efforts."
Also..
You make a very good point; however, being anti-Trump is clearly NOT just a partisan thing. Just because the political left has latched on to and plays the dominate role in the efforts to impeach President Trump it does not mean that it is strictly a partisan effort. That said; the closer we get to the election the more partisan it will become.
What I “think” Jack meant when he wrote “non-partisan” is present the facts (likely based on ethics) not the opinion about the facts.
Spartan, I agree with your assessment and I was trying to make the same point but I stated that information we have access to is pre-spun so non partisan evaluation is impossible.
I don’t think there has ever been an absolutely bias free journalist. Unless we all read the actual primary sources we are subject to being influenced directly by third parties. Additionally, we cannot escape our own built in biases that we use to evaluate information.
My interpretation of Jack’s suggestion is that a site be developed to take all the information presented by both sides, strip away the polemics and evaluate the facts as they are without the hyperbole. Obviously, different people will come to different conclusions. Some will be in diametric opposition and some will allow some consensus. The goal is to provide a forum in which people can consider information without feeling that their opinions are ridiculed and developed in good faith.
Sparty. You think the resistance is a legitimate enterprise? People organized to undermine an elected president as if they are guerrilla fighters in WWII France fighting against NAZI occupiers? It’s wrong to look askance at that? It’s wrong to be skeptical about what the Dems are doing and have been doing for the last three years? Is it bias to think this investigation is trumped up like the preceding one? It’s bias to want to examine the actual evidence and compare it against the law rather than blindly accept pronouncements of guilt from Adam Schiff and Nancy Pelosi? You’re not biased? Me thinks thou dost protest way too much.
This is not about me — and I have never asserted that I was unbiased (quite frankly, that’s an absurd statement for any human to make). This is about Jack’s idea. If he wants to create a website that focuses on media coverage, fine by me. And even if we wants it to focus on fighting the Democratic “Resistance,” I actually don’t care about that either. What I DO care about is any friend living the fantasy that such a website can be unbiased or neutral in creation or content.
I call relativist bullshit on the idea that something can’t be unbiased. Baloney. Clear thinking is always possible. If it’s not, we’re all reduced to doing what we’re told and thinking what we’re told to think by our superiors (you know, HLS grads and profs, and San Francisco pols). You really want to live in that world? I don’t.
OB
I get where you are coming from but speaking only for myself I cannot definitively say that my interpretations of any given issue are not bias and only brought about by life experience.
I do believe there are relative degrees of objectivity. Objectivity is a function of how much work one is willing to engage in to establish that any issue is given a fair hearing. Given that none of us are omniscient every issue evaluated is measured by the credibility of the evidence and as such we can, as humans, make mistakes based on our method of evaluating credulity.
I think the best we can ever get to is an acknowledgement that our lack of perfect information can create bias and that bias is often a function of an unwillingness or inability to be better informed.
I don’t think life’s that complicated, Chris.
OB — who gets to decide whether or not someone is engaging in “clear thinking”? If the masses are on your side? Your small select group of followers? You? If it were that easy, we wouldn’t be so divided. I think it comes down to wiring and environment. “Birds of a feather flock together,” or “Birds of a crazy feather flock together,” depending on your viewpoint.
This “bias” and “partisanship” obsession is a post modernist deconstructionist Marxist Alinsky trap intended to shut down reasoned analysis. Jack and the bulk of the commenters here are a voice of reason in the wilderness. You think EA is an echo chamber. That’s unfortunate. You’re a product of your era. For you it’s all about muffling one’s ethics alarms and adhering to lefty doctrine. Anyone who dares to say “hey, wait a minute,” is suspect and deemed “biased.” It’s the modern day equivalent of “reactionary.” I don’t agree with you so you dismiss me as being biased. Nasty and sneaky but I’m not buying it. I think being reasonable is achievable and calling out unreasonableness when it occurs is doable and essential. I think that’s the project Jack is proposing.
OB — that sure is a lot of name calling for what was purely a philosophical question.
And I assure you, I am not a product of my era or my community. I am very much the black sheep.
Scientist here, whose job is entirely based around doing all I can to generating hard concrete facts that aren’t flavored by human bias.
ANYBODY who says they’re right because they’re objectively reasonable is throwing up a red flag like you wouldn’t believe. You’re biased. I’m biased. Spartan is biased. Jack is biased. The problem is you’re conflating “bias,” an unavoidable part of the way human brains operate, with “prejudice,” an avoidable and unacceptable way that bias presents itself.
You say that “being reasonable is achievable.” Would you agree with the phrase “reasonable people can disagree on something?” Because if the people on both sides are reasonable, but still disagree, their own biases are probably playing a part in why they disagree. If you DON’T think that “reasonable people can disagree” on something, then you’re convincing yourself that anybody reasonable would agree with you on everything, and that’s not borne out by anything.
Thank you!
There is something unclear about your paragraph. True, ‘the masses’ by nature do not think, so having them on your side means little. A ‘small group of followers’ implies a clique, and most cliques are closed off and insulated. So, one cannot hope to find proper ‘clear thinking’ in a clique and less when their interests are involved. To ask where the one you are talking with — ‘you’ — is capable of clear thinking, in your cited example, is actually to doubt that they can think clearly. So, you have indicated that you ‘do not believe’ in the possibility of clear thinking. Because where would you find it? Who is capable of it?
You cite as an example — of your incapacity to locate people who can ‘think clearly’ — that the nation is divided and people do not agree. But that is simply follow-up to your initial declaration. Then, you imply that what one thinks depends on ‘environment’ or ‘wiring’ (whatever that means). But one must note that when you refer to ‘environment’ you are repeating both that ‘the masses’ tend to have distorted thinking, as do a small group of people who are ‘followers’ of some idea-leader. The poor individual might ricochet from one ‘environment’ to another and in each one, like a chameleon apparently, he or she will take on the thinking colors of the environ.
If as you say everything depends on ‘viewpoint’ it seems that you are pretty firmly locating your own view of ‘clarity of thinking’ within an ultra-relativist camp. You are saying that if there is ‘clear thinking’ it is only the clearly defined but subjective positions or ‘viewpoints’ of given people. Therefore, it seems that you conceive of no standard. And if you cannot posit a standard then — again — you are explaining why you think that relativism is the standard.
I would say that what you say — it is a ‘declaration’ in the sense that you are making very basic statements and declarations about the nature of knowledge and the possibility of gaining, or not gaining, knowledge and revealing ‘what you really think’ — is a common perception. But actually it is more than a perception as it is in fact an expression of ideology (or perhaps ‘philosophy’ is a better word).
To have such a view — and I would say that all people share it to one degree or another, which is to say that we have great difficulty, in this confusing present, defining ‘anchors’ in absolute values — is a symptom of modernity, or postmodernity as OB has said. But what is the solution to the problem? Does a solution exist?
I am forced to say that yes it does, and it must. It is a logical necessity.
It occurred to me that we could employ an example here and use it as a challenge. The object here is ‘clear thinking’ which also implies clarity of seeing. I selected this portion from an article that Michael West posted from The Hill:
Is this a partisan misadventure? Is it a ‘farce’ in the sense that it is a faux-impeachment proceeding whose real purpose is to affect the election (and thus is an election-strategy, not a real constitutional proceeding). If ‘clear thinking’ (and clear seeing) were possibles, how would a clear-seeing one decide this specific issue? Is it possible to know? (And note that according to your declaration the answer must be ‘no’).
It seems to me that this issue — that is if I *see clearly* (and perhaps you will assert that I do not) — is answerable with a yes or no. Can clear thinking, and thus clear seeing, arrive at a simple yes or no in this instance? Or, will one’s answer depend on ‘environment’ ‘wiring’ ‘clique’ ‘mass opinion’ or any other conditioning factor?
“Resistance” is in quotes for very right reasons.
“Resistance” conjures up legitimate authorities in hiding while a totalitarian regime slowly conquers the land, while the legitimate authorities wage a guerilla war or clandestine rebellion to reestablish liberty again.
Not a single bit of that analogy is accurate in modern America. So “Resistance” gets quotes.
If one were to establish an investigation of the post-2016 election fiasco as being grounded in “reporting on entities that are hell-bent on burning it all to the ground”, that would be a non-partisan angle.
If it turns out in the process of that investigation, 98% of the bad actors are Democrats, that doesn’t suddenly make it a partisan effort.
Michael.
In February of 2017 I made the comment here that the Russians only interest was to sow the seeds of discord and we were playing right into their game.
Had the Dems not gone down the path of saying Trump colluded with the Russians but instead simply stated that Russia meddled I would bet Trump would have not called it a hoax. His use of the term witchhunt conveys that he believes he is under attack. And, he has good reason to believe that.
If you call a man a liar you create an adversarial environment right off the bat. But if you ask him why he made a given statement to establish rapprt you might just have an opportunity to change a mind.
I am no geopolitical savant but does anyone believe the antagonism toward Trump is occurring in a vacuum? It seems to me that the more we try to destroy Trump the bolder our adversaries get. We should ask those leaders hell bent on political wafare if they have considered how their actions have impacted China trade deals, NOKO denuclearization, and the uptick in Iranian aggression.
The question remains should we focus on some comment made off the cuff about Biden or should we focus our efforts in making a unified front against those that want to see our undoing? Which represents an existential threat to America Trump’s comment about Biden or the activities of China, Iran, and NOKO.?
Good point, Chris. Who doesn’t think the Russians, Iranians, North Koreans and Chinese aren’t all playing rope a dope to see whether they will have an easier mark to deal with in a year or less? They’re all playing the long game. They can’t wait to have somebody as president who wants to play nice with them a la Obama.
Oh I totally think alot of this is Russian disinformation. It’s how they work and it’s Putin’s expertise. He was KGB after all.
As for anyone being a direct supporter of Putin in our own government, I find it hard to believe. But if we really really really want to go down that rabbit hole, let’s not forget which political party is fully embracing socialism and which political party is backed by a brain trust of big education, all of which was heavily infiltrated by which socialist nation back in the day?
Russia.
Oops, I forgot to link that chart above…
_Flowchart tells non-minority students they could be ‘taking up space’
Here’s a link that should work
https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=13561
The chart is absolute gibberish, both biased and simply illogical.
– If I’m a minority, I can still be “taking up space” if I “Don’t have enough perspective to represent that identity.” Anyone care to wager whether being a Black conservative or a woman who supports Trump are assumed to mean you lack the right perspective?
– If you’re a minority AND that minority is OVER-Represented, then you’re contributing to the space. Thus, we see that a non-diverse group is desirable as long as they’re a monolithic block of the same minority.
– If I’m the relevant minority, and this minority is under-represented, I’m still “taking up space” if my participation prevents “helpful voiced from being heard.” But I’m relevant, so isn’t my voice more important? Plus, by definition, doesn’t the addition of any new participant reduce the focus on the other participants?
I could go on, but I’ve gotten a headache.
How about this little gem at the University of Notre Dame.
Discuss…
Crazy. Unless they want to think semi-random roommates is supposed to be a dating opportunity? Instead of single sex wings as being an attempt to leave dating out of roommate assignment. Crazy and contrived. I would very much have disliked getting a guy roommate at that age, and randomized gal roommates were problematic when SOs interfered with my sleep or study schedule. I do not see that changing at all if they start offering gay dorms.
Wouldn’t same sex dorms facilitate non-heterosexual norms?
Oh MY! Our Lady of the Lake. Sacre Bleu! You are beginning to reap what you’ve sown for the last thirty or so years. Social Justice Warriors don’t always do what you want them to do. Hahahahahahaha. When I was at ND from ’78 to ’81 for law school, you could be gay but you couldn’t act on it. Otherwise, you were out of the church. No communion for you! Mortal sin! Eternal damnation!
It was also the most jock school in the country. the most docile student body you’ve ever seen. I hope the Holy Cross fathers have fun dealing with this. Of course, they’re about as heteronormative as a bath house. But they’ve let the camel put his nose under the tent. Have fun, boys.
Chaos.
Ugh. The whole heteronormative ballyhoo just seems silly because most people are heterosexual. Trying to “queer” up everything I suspect is really more about pushing an agenda that actually has little to do with gays (I can’t speak for the other letters). In Portland I have observed far more rainbow shirts, socks, hair, and yard signs with straights who want to look…woke I guess – than with actual gays. Lately I’ve seen arguments about how there should be more gays because of the upcoming climate apocalypse (!!!!). Then you have the whole thing with young persons who are gay being pressured to have sex with opposite sexed people because apparently being gay is considered fetishist and oppressive. Welcome to modern queer culture!
Of course if there is ever a backlash against the alphabet people (thanks Dave Chappelle) because of some of the craziness going on (including sadly pedophiles now wanting to be part of the movement or healthy kids at younger and younger ages being put on hormone blockers) gays who have nothing to do with this stuff will be punished along with everyone else. This may be controversial to say, but straights pretending to be queer have ruined gay rights culture and turned it into a rainbow cudgel and power grab.
The only rainbows I like anymore are in the sky.
Great comment, Mrs. Q.
jvb
“We’re coming for your heteronormativity!” 🙂
First, they can for the heteronormatives, and I did nothing….
Cause I had no frickin’ clue what they were talking about.
-Jut
Mrs. Q to the rescue. As usual. A voice of reason crying out in the wilderness. There is a definite attempt to queer everything up. Which is exhausting. I met a twenty something girl who struck me as likely unhappy about realizing she’s likely lesbian. Unfortunate. Not made any easier by a friend saying “she’s non-binary.” To which I wanted to respond: “Non-binary? What the fuck is that?She likes girls. Big deal. What’s so complicated about that? It would just be nice for her to be happy, don’t you think?”
Mrs Q wrote: Trying to “queer” up everything I suspect is really more about pushing an agenda that actually has little to do with gays (I can’t speak for the other letters).
The Dissident Right, and of course the ‘conservative Christian right’, makes the effort to investigate the ‘causal chain’ that has turned sexuality into a tool of political control. E Michael Jones has written extensively, and convincingly though from a definitely Catholic perspective, on the issue in his books and talks on libido dominandi:
This is a description of his book (written by himself) that appeared in St. Augustine’s Press:
[I obviously repeat my points and keep a focus on my area of interest: the investigation of causation. I have definitely come to understand — when I think on my friends for example — that they live within ‘outcomes’ of movements of ideas, and of value-choices, which they cannot in fact define. They do not know and they cannot see what has ’caused’ then to act, think, see, believe as they do.
Therefore, the investigation of causation is — in a distorted and distorting and also a rather twisted present — a counter-revolutionary act, a dissident act. That is, if one sees and if one accepts that there are dangerous machinations in operation right now, right in front of us, that are indeed (as they often say) connected, causally, with severe political control and its outcomes.
If this is true — if there is a danger of power-factions gaining control that are capable of using power to enforce control, and if we really take that seriously and not as a mere ‘meme’ or vain trope — then we are bound by duty and honor to deconstruct and dismantle the ideological chain that has led to the causal chain which has produced not only this present but our own selves. The Self that is complicit in the creation and the upholding of those ‘norms’ that the causal chain has brought into being.
Such a difficult problem! Because the Self is complicit.
This is how I understand Christian praxis: it is not only understood as a ‘war against powers and principalities in high places’ but a war against elements within the self. If the Self is complicit — or given over to complicity — it cannot be a ‘Christian actor’ or in full service to The Logos as Jones is fond of saying).
If there is a reaction in our Present against the ‘excesses’ of that present, and if there is a conservative reaction against the false-declarations of liberalism (or liberalism that has exceeded its proper limits and become something radically else, such is my opinion) then there is no way around the necessity of actually defining a ‘proper foundation’ for the self and, really, for the ‘world’. Certainly ‘the political world’.
But all of this is excruciatingly difficult . . . again because of the whole issue of ‘complicity’.]
I agree. I think a lot about these things.
With appropriation, I’d had to stop getting my elderly mother rainbow and unicorn gifties. Too many random people would believe she’s signaling.
In my state the police chief of Decatur decided to make it a sanctuary city.
“Policy outlining the Decatur Police Department’s policies related to immigration procedures was recently handed down from Allen. It stated that Decatur police would not assist in ICE’s efforts within their jurisdiction.” (https://yellowhammernews.com/additional-78-million-now-available-for-struggling-alabama-hospitals-in-fiscal-year-2020/)
The mayor came down hard stating that Decatur would not be a sanctuary city. I always wonder when people think they can make this type of change on their own and there will be no push back. It’s Alabama!
Ever since POTUS candidate Robert Francis O’Rourke said something like, “Hell yes, we’re going to take away your AR-15s, your AK-47s…” and even before the Texas politician whose name I don’t recall responded with something like, “Yeah, mine’s waiting for you…” (which RFO and his fans predictably, propagandistically denounced as a “threat”), the following rhetorical (and ethics-related) questions have been on my mind:
Who threatened, and is threatening, whom? What’s makes a threat unethical, anyway?
Sure, anyone can say that something, anything, that someone else says is a threat, and pretzel their thinking and articulation in an infinitude of self-defensiveness (and sly, self-righteous offensiveness) in an effort to establish that what they call a threat is unethical.
I don’t claim infallibility in my thinking or actions in regard to “threats.”
From my point of view, I took RFO’s “Hell, yes” statement as a direct threat: a threat to me and my life; to my family and their lives; to my property and my right to possess property of my choice, for intents and purposes that I am forever free to choose; to the rule of law and due process; to the Golden Rule; to the Constitution; to my and everyone’s unalienable rights; and to the lives of The People of The United States plus to the life of any and every person who would ever happen to inhabit the sovereign territory of the United States at any time.
I took the Texas pol’s response as a threat, too. But, only as a man-to-man threat. Nothing more inclusive or comprehensive than that. A threat to do, accountably, unto a would-be doer what the would-be doer self-entitled to do to others (either personally or inter alia), with expectation that the same should never be, thus would never be, done to himself (in other words, a would-be doer who is a typical imperious, totalitarian-minded leftist TAKER, self-righteously self-entitled to NO accountability).
I echo the same “threat” as embodied in what the Texas politician said.
A threat in response to a threat.
Call it tit-for-tat. I don’t care. My threat stands. So do my questions, be they answerable or unanswerable, answered or unanswered.
World, beware.
I get what you’re saying but when I read that particular sentence this face and his voice immediately came to mind.
Sorry. 😉
No apology necessary. My breath smells worse than his.
HA!!!!!
One thing I’ve always hoped to see in “resistance” reporting is the creation of two parallel timelines.
One timeline charting the actual events being recorded. And another timeline charting when the events are actually being reported to the people.
I have a hunch, seeing the two in parallel, readers would see very clearly how “dirt” that gets reported first occurs much later in the events timeline, and as earlier events are reported that clear up the “dirt”, you can see how much backpedaling the Left Wing propaganda machine engages in…especially as events begin to clarify that most if not all of the dirt ends up being all over Left Wingers.
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/464140-ignore-the-hype-this-is-not-an-impeachment-inquiry
That’s an interesting read.
Thanks Michael. A great piece. Too bad McCarthy’s biased and partisan. Hah!
https://www.foxla.com/news/borderline-mass-shooting-charity-event-canceled-due-to-trump-supporter-controversy
I’m just simply at a loss to understand this… I can’t even believe the organizers would capitulate to this kind of a demand…
The cancellation of the event based on the reasons stated is signature significant.
Republicans have become nothing to Progressives, Social Justice Warriors, ANTIFA and a huge cross section of Democrats. This is one of the best straight forward examples of the unethical and immoral undercurrents that’s driving the political left into the abyss, it’s physical actions taken against Republicans specifically based on Democrat’s outright bigotry and hate towards Republicans. The political left truly seem to feel a need to stomp on Republicans and exclude them from the “norms” of society; in the eyes of the political left Republicans have literally become a societal pariah.
When unethical and immoral opinions, like those that caused the cancellation based on the reasons stated, are allowed to take precedence over everything else we are rapidly approaching what this totalitarian fascist talked about…
…this kind of openly fascist rhetoric has become common place and anyone that challenges the hive is accused of being fascists, racists, white supremacists, authoritarians, misogynists, child abusers, evil, etc. and in online discussions many are banned from participation if they challenge the hive and their comments are deleted. First you demonize those you oppose, then you exclude them from the “norms” of society by publicly smearing and intimidating them, then you strip them of their rights, and lastly you physically isolate them from society.
If people don’t think that “little” things like this are signature significant at showing how the political and social divisions in the United States are rapidly nearing, or already at, 1861 United States and that hate is at an extreme boiling point, they are dead wrong.
What was supposed to be wrong with Trump threatening to withhold aid to the Ukraine unless they reopened a criminal investigation?
Michael
I thought the same thing. Asking for an investigation is far different than a demand to dig up dirt. An investigation merely looks at an issue to see if wrongdoing took place where an answer can include no wrongdoing, while digging up dirt means come back with something I can use against my opponent.
Sure, both require interviewing people and documents but the rationale for each are different. Investigations that ferret out practices that on their face are at best unethical are for the public good. Investigations for the purpose of smearing someone are not.
Even if true, it would not justify impeachment.
The conduct has to be egregious.
Beside, the precedent was set in 1999. Committing perjury to defeat a sexual harassment lawsuit does not seem to warrant removal.
https://www.foxnews.com/faith-values/christian-doctor-fired-gender-pronoun
A doctor in England was fired because he refused to use his patient’s preferred pronouns. A court reviewed the case, and found that belief in what Genesis says (specifically that God made man and woman), and a belief that one cannot fundamentally change their gender is incompatible with human dignity. There have been articles here where Jack has stated that if someone cannot fully do their expected job because of religious beliefs, they should not be doing that job. In this case, the doctor was treating the patient, though he refused to refer to the patient as a woman. Is using someone’s preferred pronouns part of a doctor’s job?
I haven’t been able to review the content here, but 1) What an excellent turnout! Thanks. and 2) it is very gratifying to see Still Spartan weighing in.