Are Americans Burning Ideas?
Are We So Insecure That We Can’t Have a Dialogue?
Burning an Idea: Part One
You might also like…
Fact-checkers, cancel culture, big tech, all the fear porn that floods us all the time and from a myriad of angles—I know, this all makes me sound like a right-wing radical who’s scheming for the next coup at the Capital. But let’s do some thought experiments here for the next few minutes and apply some critical thinking.
In all reality, it's rather simple.
Everyone has an idea or a set of ideas, and by the natural law of life, there are antitheses to what we have in our mind’s eye. Big and small, every proposition to the human condition has supporters, promoters, resistors and people whose advocacy goes against it. That’s what a free, enlightened society allows—the flow of discourse, concept, and belief. Ultimately, there are only two ways to approach any idea. You either build out a better argument and basically have a better idea, or you squash the opposition, suppressing any direct resistance to your belief and by happenstance, your ego.
“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose.”
Communism is Good — Dr. Seuss is Racist
We’re seeing a culture grow that allows the destructive ideologies of socialism and communism to flourish, but Dr. Seuss is racist despite him being a Civil Right activist before it was popular. Our culture is one in which Andrew Cuomo literally made policy decisions that led to the death of the elderly in nursing homes and then tried covering it up, and yet, as giddy as it makes me to have seen him remove himself from office, the focus seemed to have always been about creepy old man Cuomo.
Yes, good!
Justice needs to be served to perverts, however, why was the entire book not thrown at him? Why crucify him over one thing and not for gross negligence of another? Call me crazy, but while one accusation serves something like the #metoo narrative, his incompetent handling of COVID very well could shed bad light on the fear porn the pandemic has been fabricating.
I digress.
The question is really why? Why cancel Dr. Seuss? Why cancel anyone for that matter? What does the “freedom of speech” really mean? Not only does stifling thought fly in the face of the profound cultural transformations of representative democracies and governments, the age of science and reason, and the establishment of individual liberties to be lived according to one’s own beliefs, but this “burning of ideas” is an expansive, unsatiated, unchecked problem in the copy and paste world in which we live. When there is no foundation to a world view and there’s a legitimate possibility of a better idea snuffing it out, survival by any means necessary arises.
The Taliban V. Trump
Now, when it comes to freedom of speech, yes, there are limitations. While slander and character defamation used to be things we all abhorred, I hope we still are in agreement that death threats are off the table.
I’m doubtful of even that though.
The echo chambers that social media platforms like Twitter thrives from has created radical groupthink that can’t muster the balls (or ovaries) to handle any form of dissent. It’s brought people of similar thought together that bastardize the liberal, free thinking that the first amendment states. I don’t give a shit if a company has “the right” to suppress thought. What are we instilling in our culture when we support those who openly distort facts for marketable gains?
There is a serious fracture in the National Psyche if Trump Disarrangement Syndrome is being seriously discussed in psychological circles and yet, the Taliban in Afghanistan are just a poor group of men who need time in learning how to properly govern, because as of right now, they’re leadership style looks a lot like the rape of women and children, misogyny, and murdering homosexuals. Nothing to see with there while the 45th President of the United States is a mean tweeter!
Seriously, what the hell is their justification?
We all know it’s bull shit that the only reason the Afghanistan terror group is still on Twitter is because they “follow the rules.” What rules? Since when is Twitter impartial to the murder and genocide and yet the Orange Man is Satan reincarnate? There’s nothing sophisticated about Jack Dorsey here. He’s just an anti-American hippy that got stranded on an island for a few too many months. The masses didn’t give Derek Chauvin the benefit of the doubt, why do the Taliban get that luxury?
But again, I digress.
It’s not old news to talk about Parler and the coordinated assassination of a company that had a viable solution to big tech’s market monopoly. The hypocrisy of Twitter and the handling of Parler is a historical lesson that should scare everyone, left, right, conservative, liberal, because when an entity of any fashion begins violating the rights of citizens unchecked, it must be asked: where does it then stop?
Idealist Turned Cynic
March 4th, 2021, in Provo Utah, a group of LGBTQIA+ supporters lit up the Y on the Provo mountainside in rainbow colors as a statement of “we’re here, we belong”—not as a protest against the LDS religion and the BYU policies in which the private school supports and endorses under the Church's faith.
“BYU did not authorize the lighting of the Y... It appears it was lit by individuals on the Y with colored lights. The Y is BYU property, and any form of public expression on university property requires prior approval. We intend to make certain that members of our campus community understand this.”
— BYU Spokeswoman, Carri Jenkins
Because of this statement, there has been outrage of intolerance and condemnation of the Church owned university from social media activists.
And more recently, Jeffery R. Holland, a key leader in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints gave a speech that had this same community outraged. Not only did he call for everyone to “avoid language, symbols, and situations that are more divisive than unifying at the very time we want to show love for all of God’s children,” but he had the audacity to declare his “unequivocal love for those who live with same-sex challenge and [the] complexity that goes with it.” He went on to say that “too often the world has been unkind—in many instances crushingly cruel—to these, our brothers and sisters.”
Let's break both of these cases down for a minute.
Now before you get your panties in a wad, first of all, we’re talking about the right to free speech versus the right to silence and be outraged. Secondly, the free market is a living process where both consumers and producers are allowed to make decisions for themselves when it comes to the image they want to uphold. Thirdly, in the example above with Twitter, they are more than free to support the Taliban over Trump, but with that being said, clearly there are going to be consequences to allowing a murderous terror group flourish while silencing the traumatizing Orange Man.
Now that we have that out of the way...
Maybe it was that students of the LGBTQIA+* community felt that BYU and Jeffery Holland implied that they were a mistake for their sexual orientation or identification. If this was the case, BYU, a private organization is allowed to do this, are they not? Like Twitter is allowed to block the Orange Man, BYU too can imply this assumption that seems to be the focus here. Now whether the lighting of the Y was an act of protest or a simple demonstration, it put BYU between a rock and a hard place. Support the rainbow lighting of their symbol, they alienate their values that disagree with gay marriage and pander to people who already do not think highly of them. Or, they take the approach the way they did and stand by their values and those who believe in them, causing outrage from those who are already enraged at BYU.
Now here’s the crux.
Whether you agree or disagree with BYU or Jeffery R. Holland and their stance, words, values, and image they want to uphold, there comes a point, where idealism turns cynical. Idealists transform into cynics when indulging in hyper-critiques, involving themselves with extreme judgement against anything that doesn't fit their idealistic world view. This is dangerous! When you become cynical, you no longer focus on the good in any given situation—only the bad and insomuch that you are willing to stop perceived evil by any means necessary. This is the theme that Saul Alinsky was promoting in his Rules for Radicals—the ends justify the means.
But they don’t. The ends should never justify the means.
Social media activists seek to destroy BYU and the Church it espouses rather than use the free market to support organizations that are pushing for LGBTQIA+ rights. They seek to change the image of an organization that doesn’t want to, nor does it have to. Rather than having, or the very least supporting a better idea, they destroy and attempt to suppress opposition.
*I’m willing to bet this acronym has changed a handful of times since the writing and publishing of this document.
Hate Speech
“Name ONE time in human history when the group fighting to ban books and censor speech were the good guys. I’ll wait...”
Let’s talk about the open-ended nature of subjective language. With terms like “common sense”, “hate speech”, and the obviousness of “black lives matter” leaning on emotionally charged sentiments and events, their actions and policies make anyone feel like an asshole for wanting to have a conversation and dialogue about something that may seem out of place with these Liberal narratives.
Enter the radicals.
Not only do they weaponize emotions, but they turn words into violence, using their sophistry to blind others to their true intentions, which if we’re being honest is sheer brilliance—that is until you dig a layer deeper. Labeling something as “hate speech” is a rather weak argument that we as a society let be more effective than it should be. Have you ever asked how many countries truly allow for freedom of speech?
Russia? Good luck!
While countries like Canada say they allow for freedom of expression, consider the illegality of protesting near abortion clinics and comics paying fines. If someone can’t be a check and counterculture, challenging (sometimes ungracefully) established power without heavy penalties, then what is the point of the freedom of speech? To say what you want just so long as it doesn’t piss the wrong person off?
Burn or Build
Sure, if what is said or done truly is abhorrent on a human rights level, certainly there are consequences to be had—it’s our duty to protect the individual liberties after all. However, we need to have the self-awareness and humility to accept the fact that not every off-color statement and comment that “just doesn’t sit well” are grounds destroy.
Here’s a novel idea.
Why waste energy and resources to force a certain way of thinking? Do we really need the validation of someone else’s submission? We either believe in free speech, or we don’t. We either believe in letting fools speak, trusting that reason, evidence, and logos will weather their foolish ways. Or we shut the fool up, lacking the trust that reason will win out. It’s a major red flag signaling a double standard when Mein Kampf is indiscriminately sold despite its anti-Semitic origins, the author initiating a genocide, while Dr. Seuss is held up as intolerant. If left unchecked, it will only continue to destroy.
Rather than tearing down, build something. At the very least, throw support behind those building institutions, values, and ideas that you believe in. I vehemently disagree with the Marxist organization BLM Inc., and everything the espoused founder stands for, but if the useful idiots want to be duped by their million-dollar mansion binge buying antics, then be my freaking guest! Rather than being cynical and hyper-criticizing, I’ll be learning how to build and fortify my own argument because I’d rather be a failed participant in the arena than a political prostitute.
Stop pre-burning books and ideas and hold true to the American Values that made this country great to begin with!
