Why I Encourage Ex-Trump Supporters

It is annoying to hear a former Trump supporter become regretful for selfish reasons. It’s tiresome when they regret their vote only because they are getting screwed over, not because they care about anyone else’s struggles. There is bound to be some “serves you right” schadenfreude that accompanies this, as that’s a natural reaction. That being said, I have recently been seeing an influx of blogs and thinkpieces making fun of regretful former Trump supporters. I’m concerned with the ones that explicitly say, “I don’t want you to change your mind. You made your bed; now lie in it.”

If this sentiment comes from people who are most directly affected by his policies, I get it and am not going to suggest you respond differently. But I’ve seen a whole lot of this generated by middle class white people who are not Trump’s targets. Your feelings are valid—and, again, a sense of “I told you so” is normal. Even so, it’s counterproductive to tell Trump supporters, “I don’t want you to change your mind.” That’s effectively saying, “I don’t want you to learn. I don’t want you to become a better person.” When it comes from a middle class, white, non-immigrant citizen, it sounds privileged. When a person supports Trump for bigoted reasons, privileged people are the primary ones who can afford to tell them, “I don’t want you to change. I want you to stay bigoted because then I can feel gratified when bad things happen to you.” A marginalized person is more likely to want bigots to change their minds, because that affects their lives.

This is how I feel when people gloat about Trump supporters losing their health insurance, particularly if the gloater has secure health insurance and a good job. “If I’m going down, I’m taking you with me” is understandable, even though I disagree with the idea. But “I’m doing fine and I want you to lose your basic safety” is not something I can support. This comes down to “You made this choice; now suffer the consequences.” I agree that Trump supporters need to face negative consequences in order to understand the harm. However, no lesson is learned if those consequences include dying because they can’t afford treatment of a manageable disease. They also won’t learn if they lose access to higher education, as they will be deprived of resources that may enable them to change their minds. Saying that a person should be allowed to die of cancer because they’re a Trump supporter is still saying that people should be allowed to die of cancer if they can’t afford treatment. It’s supporting a system in which people lose their healthcare. This is similar to saying that rapists should be raped as punishment.

I don’t believe anyone is obligated to reach out to Trump supporters, but there is a difference between reaching out and just refraining from saying, “Don’t change your mind.” Within the far right, this is used to deter members from looking into other perspectives. They tell them, “See? Even if you change your mind and your whole way of thinking, the left will never accept you.” This is not the reason why Trump supporters think the way they do, but it doesn’t help the situation.

If some ex Trump supporters never move beyond primary self-interest, then that’s wrong. Still, the fact that they initially changed their minds because a policy affected them doesn’t mean they’ll always look at it with self-interest. It can start out that way, and then branch out into concern for others who are unlike themselves. A complete about-face rarely happens within one conversation. It can take years. The fact that someone is ignorant now, or is just starting to come out of it because they were harmed, doesn’t mean they’re forever irredeemable. When they are first starting to question their previous assumptions, that is when they most need encouragement from those who are willing. Encouragement is different from undue praise. It’s saying, “I’m glad you’re now seeing it this way. There are many ways in which he’s harming this country, and I’d like to talk about this more.”

How many of us on the left have improved our own values over the years? By improvement, I don’t mean becoming more ideologically pure. I mean compassionate, and nuanced, and understanding of potential. A hard leftist who says “I hope none of the Trump supporters ever change their minds” is by no means the moral equivalent of a Trump supporter who voted for him because they hate immigrants and condone sexual assault. I don’t know how much hope there is for the latter (although I’d like to think there’s hope for everyone). But to forget that we have also come from places of ignorance, and that we have sometimes been motivated because we were personally hurt, is to make ourselves morally unimpeachable. That position can become dangerous, no matter who it’s assigned to.

When the underprivileged are not political

I often hear the opinion that saying “I’m not political”, or choosing to avoid conversations about politics, is an act of privilege. That only sheltered people have the option of non-involvement. I would agree that if you’re personally effected by an issue, you are far more likely to care about it. I also recognize that people who are poor, or non-white, or immigrants, or women, or not straight, are often judged as “being political” when they’re just relaying their everyday experiences, because their existence itself is deemed political. All of this is true. But there are also ways in which marginalization can prevent political focus. Here are some examples.

A person who is homeless and living on the street is more likely to be focused on the basics of everyday survival than on contemplating political topics. If you’re expending all your time and energy trying to find food and shelter, you’re not going to spend hours reading about politics on the internet. You (most likely) won’t attend marches. You don’t have money to donate to causes, and can’t boycott products because you need to take what you can get.

Back in the fall of 2011, I was involved with the Occupy movement in New Haven. I’m glad to have taken part, as I learned a lot and met some wonderful people. Many of them made efforts to give to the homeless people on the New Haven green, which was good. They gave them food and offered a media platform to those who wanted one. But not every homeless person was enthusiastic. Some of the Occupiers were sleeping in tents on the green, and a homeless woman informed me she didn’t like it because “me and my friends need this space.” There was a notable moment when a fellow Occupier tried to high-five a homeless man in solidarity. He shook his head, clearly not enjoying the gesture. I’m not going to assume that none of the homeless people cared about politics, but many were too focused on their immediate needs to invest themselves in philosophical theories and keep up on current events.

If a person is not homeless but still living in urgent poverty, they may be too busy to pay attention to politics, get involved in community organizations, or similar things. They could be working so many hours that they barely have time to sleep, let alone dedicate large blocks of time to an ideology.

Additionally, mental health can play into this. I know people who disengage from social justice issues and choose not to involve themselves in political conversations—not because they’re apathetic, but because it will throw them into a psychological crisis. Extensive involvement in these things can be very detrimental to some peoples’ mental health, particularly if they struggle with depression, anxiety, PTSD, or agoraphobia. There are people with these conditions who choose to be involved, and that’s perfectly fine. But I respect the choice to disengage for their own well-being. Sometimes the ones who are most impacted by these topics are the ones who most need to pick and choose their battles, or else they strain themselves to the breaking point.

Some who are impacted by these social issues don’t have access to education that will teach them about it. Some are politically invested, but not liberal. I know people of marginalized identities who have right-wing values. Some don’t have the time, and others care so much that it drains them and they need to maintain distance for the sake of their health.

Many privileged people are involved in politics—and that can be a problem when they’re out of touch with others. It’s true that privilege can also play into non-involvement or apathy, but it can be more complicated than that.

The Spaces Between Tolerance, Authoritarianism, and Complacency

One statement I hear a lot is that it’s healthy to let people into your life who see the world completely opposite from you. The idea is that you can learn from each other. While that can be true, it varies from situation to situation. Depending upon what your worldviews are, there are times in which that can be harmful—or at least frustratingly pointless.

There’s a theory that if people on the left create “echo chambers,” then those on the right are limited to doing the same by default, because we deprive them of our perspective. (I’m not strictly dividing everyone into two camps. There are those who identify as neither conservative nor liberal, although I do think most lean at least slightly more toward one than the other.) But entering into a friendship with someone for the purpose of trying to change them can be dishonest—no matter where your beliefs stand. It's reminiscent of a religious person befriending an atheist just to “save” them. It’s also not as if there are a great deal of conservative people who want to be friends with liberals and we are callously rejecting them.

I can be friends with someone who differs from me on some fundamental topics, but not if they’re diametrically opposed in nearly every way. People of different ideologies can be friends, but it can be draining to communicate with someone whose moral values are the polar opposite of yours. Particularly if you belong to a disenfranchised group which they believe should not exist. It’s tiring and painful to have to repeatedly defend your humanity. You get enough of that from the world; you don’t need that from friends. It creates problems to keep somebody around who wants to change everything about you.

A few years ago, I had a sort-of friend who was one of the most conservative people I’ve ever known. I wouldn’t comment on his page—I had unfollowed him—but he would comment on almost everything I posted. He would often become condescending and sarcastic. Other times he claimed to want a dialogue. But there was never a point in which he seemed to be considering my point of view. He just listened for the sake of trying to pick apart my argument, having already decided to reject it. I did the same with him, so I was partly responsible for that. Most of the conversations consisted of us talking at each other, talking to ourselves, and trying to persuade the other. I got tired of him telling me I had no right to reproductive rights, that people of my sexual orientation have an “agenda,” and that people with disabilities are acting entitled when we want the legal right to aid and accommodations. I was called too emotional when I couldn’t speak with detachment about such issues which profoundly affect my life. That kind of communication isn't productive. A friend is not a person who expects you to jump through hoops to prove you deserve rights. In such discussions, each participant acts as though they have valuable new information to offer. But the truth is that I’ve already heard everything he had to say. I grew up in a home that relied almost exclusively on Fox News. I know conservative social Darwinist arguments back to front. My left-wing worldview isn’t due to a lack of exposure to anything else, and neither is his conservatism. We both chose the approaches we preferred.

When you believe that certain opinions reflect an overall status quo, then a perspective no longer seems like a lone opinion. Some opinions don’t exist in a vacuum. Even if a person with a bigoted belief holds no particular power, their hate is part of a larger trend. That’s why I think an individual viewpoint makes at least a slight difference to our culture.

That being said, I will always support freedom of speech—even if the thoughts being vocalized are abhorrent. Most people who share my perspective seem to agree on that. But unfortunately, within some social justice circles, there is support for a type of legal censorship that concerns me. Voicing some concerns about social justice culture isn’t disloyal to the culture in itself. It’s important for critique to come from within, because it will be expressed with more knowledge of and respect for the community. Otherwise all the criticisms will be from social conservatives.

I have heard a few far leftists reject capital punishment in all other forms, except when used against anti-leftists. Maybe they are unusual, but I have heard similar thoughts from some others on the far left: that people should be arrested for writing conservative blogs. That anyone at a right-wing protest should be imprisoned. It’s unsettling that those who hold this perspective see no difference between supporting a legal right to free speech, and supporting the speech itself. Sometimes these same people will say in an argument, “I’m not limiting your free speech. You legally say what you want, but that doesn’t shield you from social consequences and I’m not obligated to provide you a platform.” That argument is entirely right, but it becomes weakened if the one using it wants others to be arrested for what they say.

If somebody goes to jail or faces other legal repercussions for expressing specific viewpoints, that doesn’t always change their stance. They might be less public about it, but their beliefs could be further cemented by a newfound martyr complex. Most people don’t want to renounce their opinions after being made to suffer for them, because they don’t want to think they suffered pointlessly. Facing legal punishment will fire up their supporters, and could garner sympathy they wouldn't have otherwise had. Also, forcefully removing a person’s public platform (such as a blog) could bring their rhetoric into the private sphere and allow it to operate and spread unseen. When someone has a verbal outlet, it allows them to blow off steam, and they may lose motivation to take physical action. Pull that out from under them, and that hatred could manifest physically—even more so than it already does.

I fully support the ban of violent threats and the willful spread of slander if it is provably untrue (for example, it should be illegal for a school to teach its students that the Holocaust was a hoax or for a person to burn a cross on somebody’s lawn). But some types of hate speech are subjective. If hate speech is defined as anything perceived as insulting or anything that makes a person feel threatened, then we could be censored for telling a person that what they said was racist. We know that’s not a hateful or threatening thing to say. But if they take it as such, then we could be penalized. There's also a difference between saying "I hate X person or group" and "I think we should kill X person or group." I hate certain members of our government, but I'm not going to go bomb the Senate. When one says "I think that person should be killed," that would be crossing a line because it could be interpreted as inciting violence.

I wonder how these limitations on speech would be enacted. If it involved the government monitoring conversations and instructing people to report on family members and friends, that would be a great violation of privacy. It wouldn't just affect bigots; it would affect everybody.

This is why, if I say that someone should stop expressing certain ideas, I don’t mean the government should silence them. I mean they should make the personal choice to do so. I’m more in support of providing counter-voices and counter arguments than removing the original source. Of offering more dissenting voices, rather than removing the voice they’re speaking against.

A common criticism of liberalism is, “You preach tolerance, but you don’t tolerate people you think are bigoted.” They are right that if you promote the tolerance of all viewpoints, then it’s inconsistent to not tolerate certain ones. That’s why I try to promote anti-white supremacy and anti-misogyny and anti-LGBT phobia, rather than a blanket form of tolerance. It follows this reasoning: I respect your right to have an opinion and your legal right to voice it, but I don’t have to respect the opinion itself.

Not all opinions are respectable. “Different races shouldn’t mix” isn't a respectable opinion. “Women should have no bodily autonomy” isn't a respectable opinion. “Federal laws should be based on religious scripture” isn't a respectable opinion. Legally allowable, yes. But that doesn’t mean it should be legally affirmed or socially encouraged. (An example of legal affirmation: I mean a business owner can believe that homosexuality is wrong, but they shouldn’t be permitted to refuse gay customers.)

I’ll talk to someone who has an overall worldview that disturbs me. I’ll explain to them why I see things differently, but I won’t have a close relationship with them.

Maybe all of this makes me politically intolerant, but not politically radical. I’m all right with occupying that space.

The Nazi room

Some friends have said that they regret using Facebook because it makes them like their peers less. That someone they would probably like in person becomes someone they can’t stand because of the opinions they post. I understand this sentiment, and at times I can relate to it. But at the same time, it’s hard to believe that somebody’s defining beliefs and overall worldview would never be expressed face to face if you know them well enough. And if they are hiding certain values, I’m not sure I’d rather be unaware of what those values are.

In the past, I have written that there is no single “true” self. People are multifaceted, and we can be kinder and more complicated than our belief systems. I don’t believe that a human necessarily has only one set of values; they can have several at odds with one another. But even if their values aren’t a neatly matching set, others can still feel alienated by a particular belief they have—even with the awareness that it isn’t their only belief. I know I will distance myself from a person if they express specific beliefs, just as I know I’m not exempt from alienating others with mine.

The internet is a paradoxical place. It’s a space where humans are bolder and more confrontational about expressing themselves, and at the same time more cautious if their words are for public consumption. It’s a place where individuals can perform a one-dimensional version of themselves, and where they can also share sides of their psyche that are not usually seen. It’s a meeting ground where people dismiss each other more readily because it’s easier to see a human as a set of pixels or an algorithm, but people also might offer each other more time. Because the online world is us, an outgrowth of both space and time.

Just as the internet is people and the internet is a place, people are places. Some are homes. Some are locations we think are homes, but turn out to be stops along the way. Some are havens we visit routinely, but where we don’t ultimately live. That’s why I think of a personality as a house. Some houses have consistent themes throughout. Those homes are cozy and predictable. Some prefer that, others find it dull. Some houses are neat and affable in the rooms that are meant for showcasing, but complete chaos in the private quarters. And others don’t hide their mess.

This is the type of home I’d find most disconcerting: The social, guest-receiving rooms are open and embracing. The living room contains an MLK poster and books about environmentalism and civil rights. Then, somewhere tucked far down a hallway, there’s a study full of KKK propaganda and Nazi memorabilia. The resident is flustered upon guests discovering it, but insists it’s “not a racist thing.” They say they have no problem with (X minority group), they just “don’t want them in their country.” (So what does “having no problem with them” mean? Not objecting to their basic existence, provided that existence occurs far away and they never have to inhabit the same space?) The person who owns and maintains this house may not see the space dedicated to bigotry as their “true” room. They may see it as just one coexisting with all the others, no more of a core space than anywhere else. They may even like to have minority friends in the house; just not in that area. But the guests who liked the main quarters won’t feel comfortable there anymore, and it would be especially scary if the house was a place where they’d regularly enjoyed spending time.

That figurative house is who some people are. Some may not actually be aware that they contain that specific room. Others might know about it but blame others for putting the contents inside, not acknowledging that they choose to hold onto those things. And I know my definition of welcoming is subjective; some would feel a lot more embraced in the bigotry room than in the main socially presented areas. But that is how I see it, and I think the internet provides a window into rooms that might not otherwise be seen—even by those who live in the house. The difference lies in whether or not the homeowner justifies that room; whether they respond to its discovery by more carefully hiding the contents, by bringing them out into the open, or by trying to renovate.

Honey, I Shrunk the Trump

In a group chat, friends were discussing "Honey I Shrunk the Kids", which led to a discussion of which celebrities we'd like to shrink to an inch tall.

I want it to be the entire panel of presidential candidates, just so we can hear them all debate each other in tiny squeaky voices.

The oxymoron of "politically correct"

I finally figured out what bothers me about the phrase “politically correct.”

            We all know that conservatives criticize what they see as political correctness, as do some liberals who think others within their own camp “go too far”. Those on the far left tend to believe that no criticism of political correctness is valid, because it really means treating marginalized people with respect and it’s not possible to overdo that. The understanding is that anybody who rails against political correctness is really railing against the expectation to treat oppressed groups with basic decency.
            Often, that is the real complaint. Many times, people who take issue with political correctness really are objecting to the fact that their racism, misogyny, or other types of bigotry will be socially frowned upon. But as frequent as that is, it’s not always the issue. Sometimes when a person chastises another as “politically correct”, they mean that the person gets so focused on specific words that they lose sight of the message as a whole. Sometimes it means the person uses an academic vocabulary that may be inaccessible, and that they scorn others who aren’t familiar with their terminology. It can mean assuming that a person who says something misinformed has malicious intentions, and immediately responding with hostility. (I know that intentions ultimately matter less than results, but I don’t believe them to be completely irrelevant. Somebody without hateful intentions is more open to productive discussion. That being said, a person who is directly affected by their ignorance isn’t obliged to educate them or react with patience.)
            So I disagree with the idea that in every single circumstance, criticizing “political correctness” is criticizing the idea of treating marginalized people with respect. But I have a problem with the phrase “politically correct” to begin with.
            Calling something “politically correct” implies that it’s politically beneficial. It implies that it’s the dominant view held by the government; by political systems. It assumes that it’s in line with the status quo. Therefore, describing oneself as “politically incorrect” makes some people feel edgy and rebellious. It makes them think they’re fiercely independent. In reality, “politically correct” is a buzzword—or buzz phrase—just as much as any phrase I might use, and I have been frequently described as politically correct. The difference is that I and others with similar mindsets know that we’re expressing ideas that are shared by others. I’m not a special snowflake for being liberal.

            If a leftist mentality was the political foundation of our culture, then racism and sexism and homophobia and anti-trans bigotry and classism would be far less rampant. They wouldn’t be supported by numerous public policies. They wouldn’t be systemic. Unfortunately, though, those systems of oppression are the status quo—both personally and politically.
            Efforts to dismantle those things disrupt our current system. That’s why they’re as far as possible from being politically correct.

Consistency is overrated

During election season, there are often sound bites passed around which depict a candidate saying something offensive when they were significantly younger, sometimes in their twenties or even their teens. The takeaway message is always, “Is this the kind of person you want in office?”

I understand the validity of this if the candidate still expresses the same attitudes today, and so it’s meant to show that they haven’t grown. But that doesn’t seem to be the case. Almost always, it’s meant to imply that an opinion someone holds in their youth is a defining part of their permanent nature. That assumption is not only unfounded, but unfair. How many of us cringe when we recall insensitive, bigoted, or just plain ignorant things we said when we were younger? Everyone deserves a chance to be seen as a more evolved version of our former selves, as long as we actively demonstrate it and denounce the harmful things we used to espouse. In that case, changing your mind isn’t hypocrisy. It’s maturation.

If the candidate is known for flip-flopping, that’s another story. Tailoring your core values to your audience, rather than just adjusting the presentation, is dishonesty. That deserves to be called out. All the same, I think it’s rarely relevant to try to prove a point by showing a clip of someone being foolish in college.

This relates to the way that consistency is falsely assumed because it's so overvalued. You hear a lot of quotes like, “Don’t make fun of other peoples’ appearance when you’re not attractive yourself” or “Don’t use the Bible to be homophobic unless you follow all of its rules.” Why is being hateful toward the LGBT+ community somehow more acceptable if you’re religiously consistent? Why is it more excusable to harass people about their looks if you are traditionally attractive?

It’s better not to hold horrible beliefs at all, whether or not they’re consistent with other behavior or with beliefs one has held in the past. Unfortunately, the allegiance to sameness—even sameness to your self—can cause many to stubbornly cling to bad ideas.

How Ben Carson Inspires Anti-Choice Extremists

In light of the act of terrorism committed at a Planned Parenthood clinic last month in Colorado Springs, many have brought up the fact that mainstream anti-choice rhetoric often galvanizes the extremists. This rhetoric is frequently expressed by Republican political candidates, notably including Ben Carson. His stance is especially alarming when considering the fact that he’s lauded as the “reasonable” and “moderate” conservative option.

Carson is against same sex marriage, but enthusiastically supports the sanctity of marriage between church and state. He has also been consistently vocal about his anti-choice position. In an October interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” he stated that he believes abortion should be illegal even in the cases of rape and incest. Carson presents himself as guided by even-handed logic and reason, but look at this quote from the interview: “I’m a reasonable person and if people can come up with a reasonable explanation of why they would like to kill a baby, I’ll listen.”

The above quote is a prime example of begging the question (although it’s a statement, not a question). He frames it in a way that already assumes certain factors—that abortion is “killing a baby”, and that people seeking abortions are doing so because they “like” to terminate pregnancies. As if they derive joy and fun from the experience. This is the type of assumption that inflames anti-abortion fanatics to the point of wanting to murder doctors and patients, because they see it as a genuine battle between good and evil.

As a person who has worked many years in the field of medicine and science, Carson should be well aware that an early-stage embryo is not a baby. Before it has a brain, it has no consciousness or subjective experience. Before it has nerves, it cannot feel pain. It makes no sense to personify such a pre-developed life form and to talk about it as if it experiences suffering. Because doctors are aware of this, their only reasoning for defining an embryo as a baby can be religious. This applies in Ben Carson’s case.

His religious ilk defends this rhetoric by citing Bible verses from Psalms saying “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb.” Even purely within the context of that belief system, it can be argued that this isn't defining embryos as babies. It's King David talking about himself, not about all people. Additionally, Numbers 5:26-28 advises its readers to carry out a procedure that will cause their wives to miscarry if they suspect them of being pregnant with another man's offspring (“...If she has made herself impure and been unfaithful to her husband, this will be the result: When she is made to drink the water that brings a curse and causes bitter suffering, it will enter her, her abdomen will swell and her womb will miscarry, and she will become a curse.”) This is from a recipe to deliberately induce abortion. There are Old Testament passages in which “God” threatens to slice open the bellies of pregnant women (Hosea 13:16). Thus people can't accurately argue that the Bible forbids or even frowns upon ending the life of fetuses. Some might respond to the passages about cutting open pregnant women with, “Well, that's only under specific circumstances and only if ordered by God,” but that sounds like obvious straw-grasping. Going on to say “thou shalt not kill” is just talking in circles because no passage defines abortion as murder. Also, how many Christians take that to its absolute literal and all-encompassing conclusion? How many are vegetarians, for example? How many refuse to kill animals under any circumstance (if “all life is sacred”)?

The above argument aside, there is no reason a President or hypothetical President should be invoking religious rationale for laws in a country that is supposed to operate on separation of church and state. Ben Carson himself has acknowledged this in his explanation of why a theocratic Muslim is not fit to be president. For this issue, though, he doesn't seem to apply it to Christians.

The “Christian nation” he envisions may not include zealots opening fire at Planned Parenthood clinics, but his rationale packs the weight of their bullets. It’s time we start acknowledging the role that such viewpoints play in these acts of violence.

Can you believe terrible things without being a terrible person?

I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to definitively answer that, since illustrative examples are include too much gray area for any person of any ideology to feel fully comfortable with.

Hating already-marginalized groups is certainly more likely to lead somebody to do terrible things. As I’ve said before, beliefs don’t exist independently of consequences. They profoundly affect the way you treat everyone around you. People of all belief structures will often say their worldview has brought them peace, but inner peace counts for nothing if it doesn’t also entail bringing that peace to the outside. By “peace,” I don’t mean complacency or avoidance of conflict if those conflicts are needed to bring about positive change. I mean making an active effort to comfort people, to encourage them, to expose abuse and to do our best to end injustice. I mean motivating others toward goals that will instill social peace in the long run and right the wrongs in society.

If someone claims to have “inner peace” on account of their political or religious perspective but then only uses that perspective to make people feel hopeless or bring agitation for no reason, then their “peace” is not productive. I’m thinking of Christians who tell non-Christians they’re going to hell. I’m thinking of atheists who troll internet prayer groups and tell someone whose mother has cancer that there’s no use praying for her because heaven is a fairy tale and she’ll only end up as worm food. I’m thinking of conservatives who proudly embrace bigotry because they think it makes them brave and unique, free from the “politically correct” masses. I’m thinking of far-leftists who tell more mainstream liberals that all of their views and causes are worthless unless they become radicalized and embrace Leninism. I have met people who fit every single one of those descriptions.

I used to say you can tell you’ve become an extremist if you think it’s impossible to go too far within your own belief structure, and if you think anyone who disagrees with you is extreme. I still maintain that for the most part, although I don’t think it’s possible to go “too far” with the belief in equality, because equality by definition is fair. Most people will say they champion equality, but will differ in their ideas on how to achieve it—as well as in their perspective of who is actually being persecuted. We all believe we root for the underdog, but we’re largely defined by who we believe the underdog to be.

Even white supremacists think they are defenders of equality. They’re convinced that the way to achieve it is to restrict the rights and freedoms of non-white people, because they are genuinely certain that racial minorities are privileged and that whites are being oppressed by said minorities, as well as by self-hating white liberals. You see it in their propaganda all the time. “Anti-racist is really code for anti-white.” “Diversity=white genocide.” Of course their beliefs are not deserving of equal consideration or respect. They’re wrong, plain and simple. Wrong in a way that’s empirically and statistically provable, as well as morally bankrupt. They have a long-standing history of doing horrendous things in defense of their beliefs.

But I think it’s important for everyone to remind ourselves that even if we believe the right thing, we’re also capable of taking it in negative directions.

In recent years, I have been called an extreme ultraliberal. Maybe I am—although I have only been called that by people who are far-right conservatives, rather than those I would consider mainstream. Maybe the fact that I see them as radical means I am radical, or maybe they really are extreme. But I do know there are people who are further left than myself, and further left than I’d strive to be. For example, I’m not a socialist. I have socialist friends whom I highly respect, but it’s not a camp I fall into. I was raised intensely conservative. My father used to say that most Democrats are closet socialists, and that socialism will lead to communism in the same way that HIV often leads to AIDS. He said that communism is socialism perfected. I grew up fully believing that, but then I met plenty of liberals who don’t identify as socialists or communists. I met socialists who say that communism goes too far. Eventually I became liberal, and I recognize the difference. Liberalism is by no means a monolith.

To my dad’s credit, he never discouraged me from making friends with leftists. Some of his closest friends are liberal, and he once told me that sometimes it’s not worth it to argue with people you like. The lessons I’ve chosen to retain from my upbringing are scarce, but that’s one I still carry.

One of the problems with believing liberalism=socialism is the assumption that all socialists are socially progressive. The Nazis are solid proof that it’s not true. Many conservatives like to hold up Nazi Germany as a socialist boogeyman, but their beliefs and practices were heavily socially conservative. They restricted abortions and birth control for the Aryan women they encouraged to reproduce, while forcing eugenics on those they deemed “undesirable”—the non-white, non-Christian, mentally ill, LGBT, poor, and disabled populations, all of whom are still popular scapegoats for social conservatives today. They used fundamentalist Christianity and an entirely literal interpretation of the Bible to drum up hatred of Jews and other non-Christians, which is still a common tactic among the religious right. I am not going to make the same sweeping assumptions about All Conservatives that I used to make about All Liberals. There are conservatives who don’t espouse bigotry, but most of these types of bigotry do seem to be espoused by those of a conservative bend.

At the same time, it’s definitely possible for a left-leaning person to behave terribly and think it’s excusable because they hold progressive beliefs. I’ve known my share of liberal activists who treated others with complete inconsideration and rudeness on an individual level, but thought that was justifiable because they cared about humanity in an abstract sense and because they were fighting for the correct political causes. I had one former friend who stands out particularly in that sense. She thought she’d become a better person because she had honed her Marxist philosophy, but she was still just as narcissistic and manipulative as ever. She didn’t become a better person, just a better communist. Some might say that meant she wasn’t a “true” communist; that real communism would have resulted in the improvement of her character. But whether or not that’s true, it falls too close to the No True Scotsman territory.

Some beliefs may justify or excuse someone’s preexisting negative traits, but it’s hard for me to believe those views are entirely responsible for creating them. Unkind people tend to be drawn to unkind ideologies. A good person may be brainwashed into a terrible worldview, and they may say and do awful things as a result, but I have faith that their natural drive toward decency will save them in the end. And a cruel, vindictive person can adopt a benevolent belief system but refuse to practice it properly, using it to rationalize their abusive tendencies instead.

It’s hard to tell for certain where beliefs start and identities end. I just think they form circles which often overlap one another and sometimes even eclipse.

Never Trust Anyone Who Hasn't Looked in a Mirror

          The other day I came across an article that must be seen to be believed. It’s called “Never Trust Anyone Who Hasn't Been Punched in the Face,” written by a man named Scott Locklin. It's been receiving a great deal of attention and praise. I clicked on the article because the title intrigued me. What followed was a tangent so riddled with misogyny, gender stereotypes, racism, homophobia, and outrageous misinformation that my husband theorized that it may actually be from another world, transported to ours via the Tardis.

          I briefly wondered if it was satire, but as I continued to read, I realized the truth. Locklin wholeheartedly believes his own bunk. He’s expressed the same views in other articles he’s written, most of which are featured on Takimag.com. (Taki’s Magazine is a publication which pretentiously describes itself as “mental caviar.” The “About Us” page claims that they’re politically and ideologically neutral, but they mainly publish material that is sexist, racist, or homophobic in nature. Only two of their columnists are women, both of whom are virulently anti-feminist. Another regular columnist is Pat Buchanan, who wrote a piece bemoaning the “anti-Christian” assault on Christmas. Despite the fact that 77 percent of American adults identify as Christian, America is clearly an anti-Christian country and Christmas is in grave danger of going the way of the dinosaurs and Paris Hilton’s career.)

         I couldn’t resist adding my own input. Locklin’s article follows below, and my own commentary is the bold print after each of his paragraphs.

****

“Conservatives like to talk about the causes of Western Civilization’s downfall: feminism, loose morality, drug abuse, Christianity’s decline, reality TV. Blaming civilization’s downfall on lardy hagfish such as Andrea Dworkin is like a doctor diagnosing senility by an old person’s wrinkles. The fact that anyone listened to such a numskull is a symptom, not the cause, of a culture in decline.”

        At first I was perplexed as to why he’d mention Andrea Dworkin at all, let alone mark her as the first target of his diatribe. She’s hardly relevant to this topic or to modern public discourse. Later on in his screed, I realized why. You’ll see.

“The cause of civilizational decline is dirt-simple: lack of contact with objective reality. The great banker-journalist (and founder of the original National Review) Walter Bagehot said it well almost 150 years ago: ‘History is strewn with the wrecks of nations which have gained a little progressiveness at the cost of a great deal of hard manliness, and have thus prepared themselves for destruction as soon as the movements of the world gave a chance for it.’”

      "Hard manliness." I see what he did there.

“Every great civilization reaches a point of prosperity where it is possible to live your entire life as a pacifist without any serious consequences. Many civilizations have come to the state of devolution represented by modern Berkeley folkways, from wife-swapping to vegetarianism. These ideas don’t come from a hardscrabble existence in contact with nature’s elemental forces; they are the inevitable consequence of being an effete urban twit removed from meaningful contact with reality.”

           …And this article was penned by a Berkley-dwelling number cruncher who self-admittedly has “limited experience with violence.” Also, referring to wife-swapping as an act of “devolution” contradicts his own argument, since that practice would almost certainly lend itself to a population increase. He makes it sound like a mainstream lifestyle within our society, rather than something marginal. Now who’s the one “removed from meaningful contact with reality”?

         A side note: Why the bitterness about vegetarians? This resentment is pervasive in his other articles as well. Did this guy have a traumatic experience with a soy burger or something? And how presumptuous—and inaccurate—to assume that vegetarians don’t get into fights. There are wrestlers, MMA fighters, and other athletes who eat vegetarian and vegan diets. You don’t need to eat meat to kick ass.

        I may be overanalyzing a bit, but it seems that Locklin equates "meat eater" with "tough guy" because to him, meat isn't just a part of one's diet. He appears to think that eating an animal is an act of conquer. It's one of many examples of his overcompensation. (Not that every non-vegetarian eats meat because they want to "conquer" an animal, but those who regard vegetarians as weak and wimpy seem to hold that attitude. It's a form of posturing that's near-painful to listen to.)

“The over-civilized will try to portray their decadence as something “highly evolved” and worthy of emulation because it can only exist in the hothouse of highly civilized urban centers, much like influenza epidemics.”

         Actually, non-urban people can certainly be vegetarians or wife-swappers. And influenza epidemics are hardly limited to “highly civilized urban centers.”

        Yes, it is flawed reasoning to deduce that a behavior which can only exist in a highly advanced society must, in itself, be an evolved and highly productive behavior. But as we've established, vegetarianism and non-traditional marriages don't fall into this catagory. Another fact to consider is that a society resting on fistfights, gang violence, and abuse is not highly evolved, and certainly not one to strive toward. Technology doesn't separate us from that way of life, either. On the contrary, technology often enables us to develop more far-reaching forms of warfare.

“Somehow these twittering blockheads missed out on what the word “evolution” means. Evolution involves brutal and often violent natural selection, and these people have not been exposed to brutal evolutionary forces any more than a typical urban poodle.”

        In other words, people never face violence in cities?

“Through human history, vigorous civilizations had various ways of dealing with the unfortunate human tendency toward being a weak ninny. The South Koreans (for my money, the hardest men in Asia today) have brutally tough military training as a rite of passage. I’ve been told that the Soviet system had students picking potatoes during national holidays. The ancient Greeks used competitive sports and constant warfare. The Anglo-American working classes, the last large virtuous group of people left in these countries, use bullying, violent sports, fisticuffs, and hard living.”

           There is so much wrong with this paragraph that I barely know where to begin. You’re either a violent bully or a “weak ninny”? Wow, someone’s dichotomous thinking is showing. He uses the ancient Greeks as an example of a group that thrived because they were stoic and aggressive. They were tough, but also every bit as “decadent” as the contemporary urban masses he sneers at. Not only that; he’s trying to condone brutality by using ancient Greece and the Soviet Union as examples to emulate, though both of those governments fell. (Whether their downfalls were due to warfare or in spite of it is beside the point.) In regard to the Soviet Union, he criticizes their form of government later on in his essay. This article has the consistency of a bowl of Jell-O.

           He lauds bullying as some sort of strength of character, when by its very definition, it is anything but. Bullying is the act of targeting someone vulnerable; someone who won’t pose a challenge to oneself. In that sense, a bully is a coward.

          Also, the Anglo-Americans are “the last virtuous group of people left in these countries”? Mad props on the xenophobia and white supremacist overtones, bro.

“I think there is a certain worldview that comes from violent experience. It’s something like…manhood. You don’t have to be the world’s greatest badass to be a man, but you have to be willing to throw down when the time is right.”

         Or, in the author’s case, you have to imagine you would hypothetically be willing to beat up those nefarious wife-swapping vegetarians if one of them kidnaps you in his Prius, force-feeds you his homegrown soy products, and tries to rope you into his polyamorous marriage. In reality, any one of those folks could probably kick him to the curb with their faux-leather Birkenstocks.

“A man who has been in a fight or played violent sports has experienced more of life and manhood than a man who hasn’t. Fisticuffs, wrestling matches, knife fights, violent sport, duels with baseball bats, facing down guns, or getting crushed in the football field—men who have had these experiences are different from men who have not. Men who have trained for or experienced such encounters know about bravery and mental fortitude from firsthand experience. Men who have been tested physically know that inequality is a physical fact. Men who know how to deal out violence know that radical feminism’s tenets—that women and men are equal—are a lie. We know that women are not the same as men: not physically, mentally, or in terms of moral character.”

           Welcome in, sexism! I was wondering when you’d arrive. For those of us less fluent in Misogynese, his dig at women roughly translates to: “I’ve been blocked too many times on OKCupid.” BTW, way to knock feminism without the slightest inkling about what it is. By asserting that men and women are equal, feminists do not claim that both genders are “the same.” As far as that’s concerned, men are vastly different from other men and women vary greatly from other women.

          From the get-go of this essay, he’d set the bar pretty high in terms of gender clichés, and this paragraph does not disappoint. The statement that “a man who has been in a fight or played violent sports has experienced more of life and manhood than a man who hasn’t” is meaningless. You could say that a man who’s attended college or traveled to foreign countries is different than a man who has not. That generalization could apply to anything.

“Men who have fought know how difficult it is to stand against the crowd and that civilization is fragile and important. A man who has experienced violence knows that, at its core, civilization is an agreement between men to behave well. That agreement can be broken at any moment; it’s part of manhood to be ready when it is. Men who have been in fights know about something that is rarely spoken of without snickering these days: honor. Men who have been in fights know that, on some level, words are just words: At some point, words must be backed up by deeds.”

           “Civilization is an agreement between men to behave well.” He completely excludes women from his definition of civilization, even though we make up over half the population and we certainly fight, too. As far as words being backed up by deeds, who’s to say that those deeds always have to be violent in nature? There are numerous ways to change society, stand up for oneself, and gain power without employing violence. Civil disobedience, boycotts, changing laws, suing one’s oppressors, and gaining media attention are just a few of those methods. History has shown time and again that there are myriad factors which contribute to people gaining power. You don’t need to be a bloodthirsty brute. People climb to positions of influence by way of intelligence, talent, useful information, money, manipulation, social connections, and more. Not all of those are positive or honest means of ascent, but they’re not necessarily violent.

“Above all, men who have been in fights know that there is nothing good or noble about being a victim. This is a concept the modern “conservative movement,” mostly run by wimps, has lost, probably irrevocably. They’re forever tugging at my heartstrings, from No Child Left Behind to Israel’s plight to MLK's wonders to whining that the media doesn’t play fair to the overwrought emotional appeals they use to justify dropping bombs on Muslims. The Republicans even took seriously a pure victim-candidate: Michelle Bachman. As far as can be told, she’s a middle-American Barack Obama with boobs and a slightly loopier world view.”

            Ah, yes. You can’t write a racist, sexist, xenophobic piece without a good old fashioned dose of victim-blaming. No, a victim is not always a brave or noble person (it would depend on the individual), and it’s true that victimhood is not a badge of honor in itself. At the same time, it is neither a sign of weakness nor a fair cause for derision. Many people who have been victimized have chosen to turn their experiences into triumphs by learning from them and using their unique insight to help others avoid their own plights.

           Besides, what kind of alternate universe does he live in? Is there really a parallel world in which the modern GOP is overly sympathetic to marginalized victims? Or another planet in which Republican media frequently invokes the rhetoric of MLK? No Child Left Behind was in no way a sentimental initiative. Sure, it used a double-speak name in a shallow attempt to sound more humane, but it focused on punishing schools for their underperforming students. It assessed a student’s entire aptitude by their grade on a standardized test.

          As far as the comparison of Obama to Michelle Bachman, I have no words. Just an incredulous blink.

“Modern “civilized” males don’t get in fistfights. They don’t play violent sports. They play video games and, at best, watch TV sports. Modern males are physical and emotional weaklings. The ideal male isn’t John Wayne or James Bond or Jimmy Stewart anymore. It’s some crying tit that goes to a therapist, a sort of agreeable lesbian with a dick who calls the police (whom he hates in theory) when there is trouble. The ideal modern male is the British shrimp who handed his pants over to the looter in south London.”

1.) A great many civilized males and females play violent sports. What makes them civilized is the fact that they don’t allow that violence to leak into other areas of their lives.

2.) I understand using examples of John Wayne or James Bond, but when was Jimmy Stewart ever regarded as a masculine ideal? He was admired, but never seen as especially macho. Additionally, James Bond is highly educated and cultured—two qualities that Locklin often thumbs his nose at.

3.) This can be paraphrased as “real men don’t cry or go to therapists.” I just rolled by eyes so far that I’m surprised they didn’t lock into place.

4.) Aside from the glaring sexism and homophobia inherent in using “lesbian” as an insult for men, it’s not even consistent with his other thoughts. He hates men who he sees as “effete” and “wimpy” (his definition of feminine). In the beginning of this article he took a swipe at Andrea Dworkin for her feminist outlook, but her perspective was far from pacifistic. She was frequently criticized for being forceful and endorsing violence toward male supremacists. She doesn’t represent the face of feminism at all; there’s great variation within the movement. However, the author seems to use her as an example of the quintessential feminist. He only criticizes aggression when women use it. This tells me that it's not really passivity he objects to; it's people who don't conform to gender stereotypes.

5.) He is in no position to express contempt for those who would call the police instead of taking vigilante action. Unless he’s prepared to take down a burglar with his own brass knuckles (or tin knuckles, more likely), it’s just plain ridiculous for him to judge. Anyway, police are trained to maintain order and use violence if necessary, so you’d think he would appreciate their societal role.

“How did we get here? Estrogens in the food supply? Cultural Marxism’s corrosive influence? Small families? Some of the greatest badasses I’ve known had many brothers to fight with growing up. When good men who will fight are all extinct, there is no more civilization. No lantern-jawed viragos are going to save you from the barbarian hordes. No mincing Nancy boys with Harvard diplomas will stand up for the common decencies: They’re a social construct, dontcha know. The conservative movement won’t save you: They’re chicken-hearted careerists petrified of offending a victim group.”

           Sounds like someone’s a subscriber to WorldNetDaily.

           Plenty of scrappy adults grew up without brothers to fight with, and plenty of pacifists have siblings.

          Why does he have a problem with barbarian hordes? They’re far from the “mincing Nancy boys” he disdains. It sounds more like he wishes he were a member of a barbarian horde instead of a metropolitan office worker.

          His anti-intellectualism makes little sense, since he seems to be desperately grasping for the tone of a Harvard graduate. He believes that “common decencies” are not a social construct, but blindly insists that bullying, sexism, rigid gender roles, homophobia, and overcompensating machismo are healthy and innate aspects of our nature. Doesn't common decency require us to not hold those attitudes?

         And once again, he asserts that American conservatism somehow panders to victim groups. I don’t know which bodily orifice he pulled that concept from, but it certainly was not from his head.

“Teddy Roosevelt, my ideal President, kept a lion and a bear as pets in the White House and took his daily exercise doing jiu-jitsu and boxing. He even lost vision in an eye in a friendly boxing match while he was president. Our last three glorious leaders are men who kept fluffy dogs and went jogging. I don’t trust squirrelly girly-men in any context. When confronted with difficult decisions, they don’t do what’s right or tell the truth—they’ll do what’s easy or politically expedient. Unlike the last three, Teddy Roosevelt never sent men to die in pointless wars, though he was more than happy to go himself or risk his neck wrestling with bears.”

         So he believes that an ideal president treats himself as expendable by choosing to go out and wrestle with bears while the country is in his hands?

        And “real” men don’t own fluffy pets? I wonder if he’s aware that his favorite president had guinea pigs.

“I’m no great shakes: I’m a shrimpy egghead in a suit who thinks about math all day. I don’t train for fighting anymore, and my experiences with violence are fairly limited. Nonetheless, I judge people on these sorts of things. When I first meet a man, I don’t care what kind of sheepskins or awards he has on his walls. I don’t care if he is liberal or conservative. I want to know if they have my back in a fight. That’s really the only thing that matters.”

        He recognizes this about himself, yet believes he’s still in a position to judge. Not only that, but he claims not to judge people by their political views while assuming that a liberal would be unwilling or unable to defend another person in a fight.

       Then again, what do I know about logic or consistency? I’m just an “effete urban twit,” and worst of all, female. I should just spend my days picking flowers and baking cupcakes for a bored internet-surfing financier who wishes he were a Skyrim character. He’s the real expert on what life is all about.

You can read the original article here: http://thoughtcatalog.com/2013/never-trust-anyone-who-hasnt-been-punched-in-the-face/