The so-called "religious freedom" laws being debated in Indiana and Arkansas clearly illustrate the war of wills which, although age-old, does seem to be ramping up of late between older, close-minded conservatives and younger, close-minded progressives. Face it, few amongst us still live in tiny, insular communities of like-minded folks, and no one else. Today's society puts almost everyone in potential contact with almost everyone else. So, to peacefully coexist elbow to elbow with one another, everyone has to bend a little and learn to think of others. The laws, in fact, should force them to do so, whether they like it or not. Tolerance is the price of freedom and rights.
Conservatives (unless they want to move to a remote cabin in the backwoods) need to do their part by admitting that they will always have to share their space with people who do things they find offensive. And, by choosing to be members of society, they have a responsibility to put up with those annoyances, try to ignore them, and move on.
Progressives (unless they want to move to a remote, self-reliant commune somewhere) need to do their part by admitting that, while they may inherit the earth someday, they haven't yet. They don't own the public square---and, with their right to be non-traditionalist or eccentric, comes the responsibility to avoid offending people around them whose values may be more traditional and less politically correct than theirs.
These religious freedom laws are tricky. They must be very carefully worded in such a way that both sides are forced to compromise and become more tolerant. Or else they will never work.
Friday, April 3, 2015
Thursday, March 12, 2015
Breaking News! Texas is out of execution juice!
Wednesday, March 4, 2015
Same-sex leaning: By birth for some, by choice for others
Would-be Presidential candidate Ben Carson keeps proving over and over that he is not ready for prime time. You may have heard his opinion this week that being gay is "absolutely" a matter of choice---as evidenced, he says, by the homosexuality displayed in prisons by inmates. Is he looney? Or is he correct? Or is he partly looney and partly correct? Okay, here is where I come down on that:
As a never-been-married total layperson on such matters, but a fairly seasoned people-watcher, I believe it would be incorrect to pretend it is a one-size-fits-all proposition. The gays and lesbians I have known over the years seem to me to fit, more or less, into one of about 3 main categories: (1) Those who are born with a biological makeup, perhaps genetic or hormonal, that gives them a propensity for same-sex attraction; (2) Those to whom it is a personal preference, like preferring someone older, or younger, or bigger, or skinnier, or lighter, or darker, etc.; and (3) Those hipsters who gear their dating life around what is trendy at the time, especially within their own circle of peers.
Bottom line? I would surmise that most of the time you are born with it, but sometimes you choose it. Either way is okay by me. It's none of my business. That is, until you get into trying to redefine marriage, an institution which human civilization invented a long time ago more as a way to create a stable home situation for having and raising children than to create a nice bond between people who love one another or to provide them with legal rights.
In the olden days, when church and state were inextricably linked, 'marriage' worked for all of the above. But, now that times have changed, there needs to be an entirely new civil institution just for the 'bonding' and 'legal rights' issues, split off entirely from the largely religious institution of 'marriage'.
To arbitrarily give 'marriage' a broader meaning than it has always had would serve to completely water down the significance of every marriage that has ever taken place. Suddenly, whatever our grandparents and all those other generations of kinfolk had that was subsequently passed down to us as 'family' would be rendered a whole lot less meaningful. How can that possibly be right?
As a never-been-married total layperson on such matters, but a fairly seasoned people-watcher, I believe it would be incorrect to pretend it is a one-size-fits-all proposition. The gays and lesbians I have known over the years seem to me to fit, more or less, into one of about 3 main categories: (1) Those who are born with a biological makeup, perhaps genetic or hormonal, that gives them a propensity for same-sex attraction; (2) Those to whom it is a personal preference, like preferring someone older, or younger, or bigger, or skinnier, or lighter, or darker, etc.; and (3) Those hipsters who gear their dating life around what is trendy at the time, especially within their own circle of peers.
Bottom line? I would surmise that most of the time you are born with it, but sometimes you choose it. Either way is okay by me. It's none of my business. That is, until you get into trying to redefine marriage, an institution which human civilization invented a long time ago more as a way to create a stable home situation for having and raising children than to create a nice bond between people who love one another or to provide them with legal rights.
In the olden days, when church and state were inextricably linked, 'marriage' worked for all of the above. But, now that times have changed, there needs to be an entirely new civil institution just for the 'bonding' and 'legal rights' issues, split off entirely from the largely religious institution of 'marriage'.
To arbitrarily give 'marriage' a broader meaning than it has always had would serve to completely water down the significance of every marriage that has ever taken place. Suddenly, whatever our grandparents and all those other generations of kinfolk had that was subsequently passed down to us as 'family' would be rendered a whole lot less meaningful. How can that possibly be right?
Thursday, February 26, 2015
Beware the existential threat we face from the dark side of technology
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. The adage has been around for years---millennia if we care to trace it back to the garden of Eden and God's dietary advice. To modern people it has always seemed little more than a trite cliché and not particularly relevant--until now, that is--until the Computer Age. The rapidly deteriorating situation we see all around us today could not be more dangerous, and it is a direct result of a little knowledge in the hands of a lot of naïve, ill-informed young people. It also has a name: Technology. And when technology becomes the golden calf, worshipped as a God by naïve, ill-informed young people by the millions, it becomes, for all us, a WMD--a weapon of mass destruction.
Been following the news lately? It is not good. Bombings in public places. Kidnappings, beheadings and burnings alive of people in cages. Drones over Paris and high school football stadiums. Hormone-driven teens from the U.S., Europe and elsewhere chasing their dreams of lust, romance and derring-do into the clutches of alluring, treacherous terrorists. Hackers shutting down critical systems and endangering peoples lives everywhere. All of these things are the direct result of young computer-savvy kids, Millennials mainly, who thought they knew it all when they proceeded to upset all the apple carts and then go merrily on their way. These are the same kids who grew up learning by way of violent video games how to employ their new-found anti-Christ--technology--to wreak mass destruction, and the art of sharing those skills via social media. Now a bit older and more bored, they are being easily lured into playing real-life killing games by predatory, radicalized cult-leaders who know exactly how to manipulate naïve, ill-informed young people.
ISIS and al-Qaida are the two biggest facets of a movement which is metastasizing at an alarming rate. Those groups are opportunistic, moving like blazing wildfire into failed states throughout the Middle East and Africa, or anywhere they see a power vacuum waiting to be filled. But why are these countries "failed"...and who made them that way? Let's review the recent history.
It began in Iraq when our coalition removed that nation's stable government, killing Saddam Hussein and replacing him with...nothing. Then came the so-called Arab Spring when more of those naïve, ill-informed young people, chatting it up with one another on social media, mistakenly concluded that they were ready for freedom and democracy, overthrew the stable governments of Gadhafi, Mubarak, and al-Assad, and replaced them with...nothing. Those power vacuums, now being eagerly filled by bloodthirsty, opportunistic psychopaths pretending to be religious, would never have occurred in the first place had it not been for social media and the dark side of technology. Yet, those who worship at the feet of that golden calf remain in denial, refusing to imagine that their little bit of knowledge could have led us directly into the jaws of the most dangerous situation the world has ever seen.
I have said it before that human civilization has very likely rolled up and over the pinnacle of the waning Renaissance--the Computer Age being the last stage--and is now poised to begin the long, frightening descent toward another Dark Age, where innovation ends and deterioration starts. And we have one thing to blame: a little knowledge and a lot of technological fire-power in the hands of the naïve, ill-informed, bored, and treacherous. That is the real WMD.
It is time to be afraid!
Been following the news lately? It is not good. Bombings in public places. Kidnappings, beheadings and burnings alive of people in cages. Drones over Paris and high school football stadiums. Hormone-driven teens from the U.S., Europe and elsewhere chasing their dreams of lust, romance and derring-do into the clutches of alluring, treacherous terrorists. Hackers shutting down critical systems and endangering peoples lives everywhere. All of these things are the direct result of young computer-savvy kids, Millennials mainly, who thought they knew it all when they proceeded to upset all the apple carts and then go merrily on their way. These are the same kids who grew up learning by way of violent video games how to employ their new-found anti-Christ--technology--to wreak mass destruction, and the art of sharing those skills via social media. Now a bit older and more bored, they are being easily lured into playing real-life killing games by predatory, radicalized cult-leaders who know exactly how to manipulate naïve, ill-informed young people.
ISIS and al-Qaida are the two biggest facets of a movement which is metastasizing at an alarming rate. Those groups are opportunistic, moving like blazing wildfire into failed states throughout the Middle East and Africa, or anywhere they see a power vacuum waiting to be filled. But why are these countries "failed"...and who made them that way? Let's review the recent history.
It began in Iraq when our coalition removed that nation's stable government, killing Saddam Hussein and replacing him with...nothing. Then came the so-called Arab Spring when more of those naïve, ill-informed young people, chatting it up with one another on social media, mistakenly concluded that they were ready for freedom and democracy, overthrew the stable governments of Gadhafi, Mubarak, and al-Assad, and replaced them with...nothing. Those power vacuums, now being eagerly filled by bloodthirsty, opportunistic psychopaths pretending to be religious, would never have occurred in the first place had it not been for social media and the dark side of technology. Yet, those who worship at the feet of that golden calf remain in denial, refusing to imagine that their little bit of knowledge could have led us directly into the jaws of the most dangerous situation the world has ever seen.
I have said it before that human civilization has very likely rolled up and over the pinnacle of the waning Renaissance--the Computer Age being the last stage--and is now poised to begin the long, frightening descent toward another Dark Age, where innovation ends and deterioration starts. And we have one thing to blame: a little knowledge and a lot of technological fire-power in the hands of the naïve, ill-informed, bored, and treacherous. That is the real WMD.
It is time to be afraid!
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