A real weekender...lighter at the bottom.
Dissent
I don't know this writer well enough to endorse the specific content of his dissent, or not, except that in this piece he affirms that he's a Christian. So far, so good. But I tend to respect people who dissent, even when they're in error...so I'm differing with him, here, by way of encouraging him.
It is true that, when you dissent from those around you on any kind of point, you'll wonder whether you're mistaken; otherwise, surely some of these other people would see matters your way. If the people around you happen to be jerks, they'll tell you you're not merely mistaken but stupid, crazy, or even corrupt--that you're part of some sort of unethical scheme that doesn't even exist, e.g.
For example, Glyphosate Awareness people (still today!) get called Communists. The pretense-of-reasoning goes: Glyphosate is a profitable product for American Business Nobody wans to reduce the profitability of American Business except Communists. Therefore people in Glyphosate Awareness are Communists..
Hello? Obviously the people who say that are not familiar with this web site! I am aware of people who are Socialists (the political affiliation), whether or not they ever were Communists (in the sense of members of a group advocating the overthrow of the US government by force and violence). I disagree with them on a lot of things; I think Socialists are misguided and Communists, in that sense of the word, deserved to be deported, but they're welcome in Glyphosate Awareness all the same. They have bodies like everyone else. They have as much right to live as everyone else. It may even be easier for them to accept that socialism is not realistic when their minds clear up after we've all had time to recover from glyphosate poisoning. And even if they want to be Communists they have every right to go and be Communists in some country where people are still willing to put up with that, without being poisoned.
I've even heard the claim that people are paying Glyphosate Awareness activists just to sabotage American Business. Hah! Or, "Well, then maybe you are being cheated while whover-'they'-are are paying someone else well. Check out this picture of some other activist's house, car, whatever." I don't know whether that's the other activist's house, car, or whatever. Nor do I care. Maybe they're well-to-do enough to be activists in the first place because their grandfather was wealthy. So what?
I do what I do because I'm concerned about my health and my Nephews' health. Robert Kennedy does what he does because presumably, being Irish too, he's concerned about the health of people he knows personally. If I were an employee of his I'd expect him to pay me, but I'm not. I do what I do, he does what he does, and we happen to be on the same side of the same issue. So what he does with whatever wealth he's inherited and/or earned has nothing at all to do with me. He's not my client, I'm not his; I think most people in Glyphosate Awareness, actually, just happen to concur.
Those accusations sound as if they were based on facts, but they're not. They're the same kind of frantic verbal attacks as the "stupid" and "crazy" sort of thing. By the way, throwing around "stupid" and "crazy" can get people thrown out of stores or off buses, and it should have similar effects on public discussions, even on Twitter. Not censorship. Not shadowbanning. People should see who's spewing that kind of garbage, and should just block, mute, and shut out that kind of people, accordingly. Social media should let'm spew...so that then, five years later, when they apply for a promotion the boss can say, "Is...this post...an example of your communication skills?"
Meanwhile...it's not always necessary to tell everyone about the ways we see things differently than they do, or the reasons why. High Sensory Perceptivity automatically means that we don't enjoy some things as much as other people do, and if you really insist on analyzing why, it's because we see, hear, taste, understand, or empathize more efficiently than they do. There is no need to rub that in. If you are a Real Princess and there is a pea underneath the twenty featherbeds, and you feel it, and also you smell mold in the peasant's cottage loft and the livestock kept waking you whenever your eyes finally closed all night, you think "This is this family's daily life," and you suck it up and you say "If I lost sleep it was purely because travelling is such a new experience. The bed and the room were fine. Thank you."
Being a Christian automatically means that we don't do, or really approve of, some things that are acceptable in other religious traditions (or lack thereof). There is no need to belabor that point either. If people want to know why we don't gamble, or whatever, let'm ask.
But sometimes, when human lives are in danger from profitable but harmful products, or the nation is in danger from popular but misguided political ideas, or if we have to be on the jury in a murder trial, or in various other situations, we have to "Dare to be like Daniel! Dare to stand alone!" In youth Daniel had friends who upheld his religious standards with him; in old age he probably found some comfort in remembering those friends, but he seems to have outlived them. He was thrown into the dungeon alone...with the lions. In the morning the king was still his friend, but he spent that night alone. And Elijah also cried out in prayer, believing it to be true, "I am the only prophet of God who is still alive, and people are trying to kill me."
What God said to Elijah is what I'd like to say to the writer linked below. You're not alone, even if you are the only one taking your position in a given room.
More Americans identify as Christians than don't.
More Americans even in the Democratic Party agree with fiscally conservative policies than don't.
More people want GMO labelling, bans on glyphosate and other toxic chemical spraying, more food that genuinely is organically grown and not merely stamped with a meaningless "organic" label that doesn't even exclude its having been sprayed with glyphosate, decent places for children to live where each child can have a room and a garden of per own, and a massive defunding, purge, and reorganization for the World Health Organization, than don't, also. In fact, while the commercial media try to give you the idea that only a lunatic fringe of "outliers" know or care about these issues, surveys have shown solid bipartisan support for them. These issues are what make Robert Kennedy the only D candidate who has a chance to win a popular vote--against Trump, or against DeSantis, or against Bo Derek (the barely-legitimate-film star who disclosed, at movie retirement age, that she was a Republican).
The people were badly confused by their bad leaders, in Elijah's time, but they were on Elijah's side, and if you feel like Elijah that may well be the case for you too.
Ecology
You tell me, please, Gentle Readers. This is a poem about the idea of filtering approximately ten percent of the carbon dioxide--never mind cyanide, dioxin, plastic particles, soot, etc., etc.--released through the chimneys of large commercial enterprises, such as power plants, that burn coal. It's proposed as a guideline primarily for Europe, where what they have and burn these days is "brown coal"--much more like peat than like Pennsylvania hard coal, gives off large quantities of heavy sooty smoke. Greens complain that filtering out ten percent of the carbon dioxide is not enough to protect the local environment--well, duh. People whose concern with more about monitoring the cartoon villains come to life at the WHO ask whether there's even any honest intention of reducing carbon dioxide imbalances, or whether this kind of "guidelines" are entirely about usurping control over cities where the usurper wouldn't be eligible for a seat in the council.
What I'd like to find out from youall is: To what extent does the mere mention of a group based in Europe (and identifying with Europe rather than with, say, Neuilly, or Doerfli or wherever) set up the expectation, "Well, that will be a non-starter."
If you share the inclination to believe that anything proposed by "an organization" identified with Europe is bad, to what extent does that bias extend to proposals being made by, say, "Jean Deaux, a retired mail carrier in Vertville" or "a petition signed by 150 members of the Stockholm Chimney Cleaners' Union"?
To what extent do we perceive all of Europe as supportive of, and/or deserving to be penalized for, the WHO's disgraceful attempt to "rule the world"?
Education
Doesn't every community need one? Public funding is not to teach children opinions; it is to teach them facts and skills.
Do we need a caveat? Children from happy homes have a tendency not to want to commute to school, though I understand that teachers do less yelling, verbal abuse, and hitting now than they did in my day, and I always knew that even at my school only some kids' school days began and ended with an hour or more of standing about on wet pavement. Anyway, any heathy ten-year-old is likely to open per eyes in the morning and see books, puzzles, paintboxes, craft projects, science projects, garden, pets, games, and all sorts of things to do that are fun, and then remember "Oh wait, first I have to go to school and do--what, exactly? Mostly stand about, or sit still, waiting for other people whom I wouldn't mind at all if I didn't have to waste so much of my life waiting for them. Bleah." So your healthy red-blooded child is likely to take advantage of any opportunities for whistleblowing and complain that anything might be Child Abuse int he Classroom. That exercise in Waste Age conspicuous consumption that was the Valentines Day ritual of my childhood--excuse for a certain storekeeper to sell junk and for his friends to buy it, or indoctrination? You might have to think long and hard about what to whistle on. You might have to tell your child to be fair.
You might, for instance, need to say: "If the teacher wants to wear a shirt with an antichristian theme or message on it, that's not really indoctrination, although he probably thinks it is,. Likely he thinks he's so special that just seeing him wear a shirt will make you want to agree with an idea. Why don't you wear a shirt with a Christian message? In fact,why don't all your friends wear shirts with Christian messages the next day. If that teacher is as blind a follower as he imagines you to be, he might even convert.""
How bad is that?
Glyphosate Awareness: Why the New Crop of Oats May Be as Bad or Worse
If chlormequat only reduced fertility, I wouldn't worry about it. But these things never work that way. There will be other adverse effects on somebody. Very likely that somebody will be the celiac who's hoping to be able to rely on Cheerios as a convenient, wheat-free, staff-of-life food. Don't.
History with a Real Authentic Vintage Joke
Vince Staten...The story told "with a twinkle in his eye" is the giveaway. Davidsons owned land in Gate City, but never owned all of it, nor claimed to. The old fellow who paid a small fine for some petty offense, overpaid, and told the judge to keep the change in case he wanted to repeat the offense, is a favorite urban legend. I first heard it in Clinchport with regard to an older man who was still living there in 1985. It may actually have happened, and some of the people who've named in some versions of the story may actually have said the punch line, but you know how it is with urban legends...
Poetry
What would it take to bring a musical comedy scene to real life? Would that qualify as a super-power?
No comments:
Post a Comment