Back in my school days, I got caught trying to make a weapon in shop class. Being a boy, I was fascinated by those Nightsticks used by police and thought I could get away with this flagrant violation of rules. But very early into this project the teacher, who had been around the block, confronted me and gave the cease and desist order. However, rather than owning up to it, I went the route of plausible deniability and claimed that I was actually building a stool.
Club…stool…all semantics!
Likewise, some people when seeing many not happy with sacred Christian tradition being mocked tried to play off the display as a depiction of a Greek Bacchal Banquet. Whether you believe that explanation or not is up to you. However, in either case, this was an obscene celebration of debauchery that had absolutely nothing to do with the Olympics. And, no, that’s not coming from a prudish angle, rather Bacchus (not on Mt Olympus) was never a part of the Ancient Olympics. So this clever response by apologists, like “Rev Cassie Rapko” (dutifully quoted in the Daily Mail), falls flat.
Her pronouns are…
This new official explanation repeated over and over again in headlines, that “nothing to see here” denial of the Christian imagery in this depiction, also contradicts what these performers themselves had said before the damage control effort, as reported in their own words, “took inspiration from Leonardo da Vinci’s famous painting to create the setting.” One of them even doubled down on the insult in a post that was later deleted after the narrative shifted. The back peddling and gaslighting is incredible and it just goes to how unreliable our sources of information really have become. This is an example of revisionist history in real-time:
But you’re crazy to think this has anything to do with Christianity!
The irony of the bizarre “It’s not the Last Supper, but The Feast of the Gods,” cover story is first that the explanation before the fury (above) is still online, and second that this painting by Dutch artist Jan van Bijlert was itself inspired by da Vinci’s The Last Supper:
And it is not so much about this one act as it is the meanspirited pattern of ridicule (and very deliberate misrepresentation) of Christianity by the left in part of a campaign of debasement and demoralization. It is cultural vandalism, not art, and should be identified as such. The left regularly betrays the love and tolerance it claims to stand for—only to greet with a Judas kiss acting as if they’ve done nothing wrong to deserve rebuke.
“It’s just art!”
Try that excuse for spinning out on one of those rainbow flags painted on a roadway, see how it turns out.
Relax, don’t get so butthurt! This is just art!
At the end of it all, the hypocrisy on the part of the fake tolerant “kindness is everything” left is expected. They are the civilizational equivalent of a plague of locusts, destroying all in their path and lacking any actual moral direction. Sure, they’ll appropriate Christian morality, most especially when it is useful for bludgeoning others, but principles are for those trying to build. The left lacks any creative power, which is why they parody and mock what is beautiful, what is meaningful, and truly life-giving in the world. This isn’t even speaking from a Christian perspective, what truly awe-inspiring comes from these clowns other than their stupidity?
Until it comes to respecting your sacred traditions and symbols.
The need to recognize a bunch of talentless slobs, in the name of their false diversity, equity, and inclusion, only shows a lack of culture on the part of the French organizers. This isn’t edgy or original, and it certainly isn’t going to help those who claim to be marginalized gain acceptance, it is simply sacrilege and a lame attempt to denigrate the faith of those who make up a 1/3 of the world population in an event that is supposed to welcome all people. The only art on display was that of deception when they got called out.
Derision isn’t love.
Ridicule isn’t tolerance.
Remarkable how wrong all of our eyes are about what they see.
They lie to our faces and expect us to deny reality like they do, but you’re certainly not crazy for believing your own eyes. I guess I should have told my shop teacher to squint harder and see the stool rather than the weapon. But I was not that practiced in the art of deception.
Remember, as a child, those day-dreams of a life unrestricted by parental control, where it would be video games all night, ice cream, pizza, and soda all day? What is amazing is upon reaching adulthood the thought of this lifestyle is disgusting. First off, it would be horribly unhealthy—in the sense that those who indulge bulge. Second, a party every day is totally unsustainable, someone has to do the work to keep the lights on and put food on the table.
Many people become more conservative as they mature and start to realize the value of the limitations they once spurned. Yes, an adult will modify what was taught to them by their parents and community. And some grew up in social environments where there was not much worthy to be preserved. But to totally throw away everything inherited from prior generations is a terrible mistake. Only an ideological extremist believes stripping it all bare is necessary and good. It is wiser to build on what works.
That is not to say that the tradition passed down can’t become stifling and overbearing or limiting our potential either. There must be a bit of flexibility, some Oikonomia, or means to adapt the rules as the need arises. However, the opposite ditch, of discarding everything and starting from scratch very quickly becomes chaotic, everyone does what is right in their own eyes, and it soon requires authoritarian measures to enforce the vision. This is the thing Nietzsche warned about—our morality is not self-evident and we should think long and hard about those monsters that we will release with our neglect.
This wasn’t a sacrilege, it was a lament of what happens when you yank the foundational rug out from under a moral system.
Cultural revolution, while always promising to upend systems of oppression and usher in a new utopian age, ends up being worse than what it is replaced. Yes, “All animals are equal” may be the founding cry, but is very soon after modified by opportunists who sadly are now unrestrained by those institutions despised and yet there for a reason. The only good thing is that this out-of-balance off-kilter, ‘we know better than all who came before’ attitude, tends to implode on itself if given time. The Soviet Union only lasted as long as it did because of Christian ethics within the population.
Two Visions For Our Future
Recently, with the decline of Joe Biden and a failed assassination attempt against his rival, the Democrats decided it was time to make a change up top. It is her time now—that is to say Vice President Kamala Harris—and there is plenty that could be said about her career thus far, but there is one peculiar repeat statement she has made that really deserves our attention:
“What can be, unburdened by what has been.”
This strange little mantra has been widely panned by the right. This is more Kamala word salad, they chortle, and yet—while she does sometimes explain things like a school teacher talking to a kindergartener—it is not gibberish. This is something Harris has apparently put some thought into and is something with a meaning that we should try to unpack.
What does it really mean to be unburdened by what has been?
I’m not going to sinisterize.
Most on the left I know have a glowing hope for the future and could never imagine that their philosophy could lead to Gulags. I do not believe Harris intends it this way, but it does hint heavily of Marxist thought where we are to be liberated or emancipated from all that came before. On the surface, this is an inviting thought. Imagine a world with no abuse, no poor, everyone has their needs provided and has complete freedom. This would be wonderful—and this is what every cookie-cutter college leftist has in mind as the end product of their efforts.
So how does the unburdening begin? Well, it already has. If you have been paying a bit of attention, everything normal is now being called fascist. Believe that women exist as a category and isn’t something a man can ‘transition’ to? Fascist! Maybe you like the nuclear family and see it as a praiseworthy social convention? Fascist! How about a border where there is reasonable control over who is allowed in and who is kept out? That makes you literally Hitler! And Harris has embraced this side of the debate, she announced her pronouns and the nature of her politics.
None of this is to say that Harris is a terrible person. I simply don’t want a leader unbound to existing ethics or any standard of decency, or who can write off Constitutional law as being a “what has been” product of wealthy white men with some of them slave owners and thus should be discarded. Sure, it may be a document with flaws, and could possibly use more amendments too, but it is better than nothing and represents the will of the people who signed onto this national project to this very day—white, black, Native, or immigrant alike.
What was established is for our benefit. It is no more a burden than a wool coat in the blistering cold. To think that we know more than every other generation that came before us, that science and technology have made us into gods, is delusional.
Furthermore, the left’s unboundness means they do not care about precedents (except as a tool to restrict their rule-obeying opponents and the ends justify the means. And they mean well. They plan to fight injustice. But this script has played out many times before and is the very thing that tradition is a bulwark against. At the very least those who believe what “has been” has value will hesitate and consider before they destroy the foundations of civilization.
Make America Great Again
Donald Trump rolled out his red hats and MAGA slogan in his 2016 campaign. The message was simple, a repeat of Ronald Reagan’s “Let’s make America great again” encouraging answer to the total economic disaster of the Carter years. As he said, in the 1980 Republican convention:
For those without job opportunities, we’ll stimulate new opportunities, particularly in the inner cities where they live. For those who’ve abandoned hope, we’ll restore hope and we’ll welcome them into a great national crusade to make America great again.
Trump knows a good brand and borrowed it from the best Republican leader since a guy named Abraham Lincoln. The progressives lost their minds. They dug up the one time it was used by the KKK. And couldn’t decide to condemn with “America was never great” or be offended because “America is already great and how dare Trump suggest anything otherwise!” If you were playing a game of “wrong answers only” this harsh criticism of MAGA as white supremacy would make a bit of sense.
MAGA is not hateful.
When the left says, “Do you know who else said make America great again?” and then goes on to associate this benign statement with all manner of evil, they’re poisoning the well. There is zero reason to interpret this slogan as Trump’s desire to bring back Jim Crow or the racial policies that were once championed by Democrats. But this does whip the left into a frenzy and it keeps them from deviating and making an independent decision whom to vote for based on the actual positions of candidates.
What does Trump mean by “make America great again”?
Trump is a businessman, his interests are mostly economic, rebuilding our industrial base, bringing back gainful employment for blue-collar workers lower taxes, and less red tape standing in the way of entrepreneurial spirit. My wife, who opened a store in her home country, complains that the US is not a free country and is appalled by the many layers of taxes and requirements. This is what dooms many to working for “the man” or corporations that can afford compliance costs while drowning their competitors with cheap imported foreign goods.
The legalism of US law would make a Pharisee uncomfortable.
Jobs can stop leaving our country, and start pouring in. Failing schools can become flourishing schools. Crumbling roads and bridges can become gleaming new infrastructure. Inner cities can experience a flood of new jobs and investment. And rising crime can give way to safe and prosperous communities.
Had Trump’s first term not been sabotaged by COVID and blue state shutdowns, there is no doubt this would have been fulfilled. In fact, by the third year of his presidency the minority unemployment rate reached record lows. Even NPR, while downplaying it, could not deny these numbers Trump touted were real. Biden’s only success comes from not rolling back those tariffs the fear-mongering media had so roundly criticized. It is strange how the success and failure of policies is determined only by who is employing them, isn’t it?
No, Trump’s not woke. He believes in hiring based on qualifications. He doesn’t want to continue world policing and the massive expansion of government programs. This is why he is the enemy of those who derive all of their power from the administrative state and sap our resources. He is keenly aware that a free flow of cheap labor, while it helps elites who want nannies and landscaping at a discount, pulls down wages for those who do not come from wealth. Even a Senator named Barack Obama understood this:
If this huge influx of mostly low-skill workers provides some benefits to the economy as a whole—especially by keeping our workforce young, in contrast to an increasingly geriatric Europe and Japan—it also threatens to depress further the wages of blue-collar Americans and put strains on an already overburdened safety net.
Make America Great Again is not about a swerve in the direction of Nazism or some new form of ethno-nationalism. It is about restoring the economic conditions that had allowed our grandparents to buy their home and a car on a single income. Back in 2015, Bernie Sanders had blamed open borders on a right-wing conspiracy, that will make everyone poorer, but now the left is saying that normal border security is racist. What changed? Why are these Democrat policies, like the immigrant cages during the Obama administration, demonized under Trump?
Compassion means disincentivizing illegal crossings where human trafficking is a concern requiring sorting facilities.
It is really disorienting for those who soak propaganda like a sponge. They never see that Democrats did this full 180 on multiple issues where they had been right. Trump is right about the border. It should be the top priority. Just the Fentanyl overdoses alone are a reason. I’ve lost a former high school classmate and football teammate this way— 83,000 Americans died in 2022 alone—and it had ironically played as much role in the death of George Floyd as a knee on his shoulder. Why do we even talk about that dozen killed in a school shooting or Ukraine in light of this?
Reform, Not Revolution
Progressives tear at the fabric of civilization without understanding the consequences of their actions. They believe that the erasure of history, destruction of monuments, or the degrading of religion (see Paris Olympics) is a path to a better future. But this amounts to cultural vandalism and is ignorance of the positive contribution of these religiously created values we’ve internalized. There is truly nothing that is written on the substrate of the universe that says slavery is wrong or that genocide is evil—the stopping point to “unburdened by what has been” is a return to animalistic impulse.
By design, not accident.
The frontal lobe of the brain is developed by the myths and moralities that progressives do everything in their power to destroy with ridicule and sacrilege. And it will inevitably go much further than anticipated. We rarely have enough appreciation for what we have been given. Everything is taken for granted until it is gone. And when there is a vacuum that is left to fill, and the ‘demons’ waiting in the wings will come rushing in:
When an impure spirit comes out of a person, it goes through arid places seeking rest and does not find it. Then it says, ‘I will return to the house I left.’ When it arrives, it finds the house unoccupied, swept clean and put in order. Then it goes and takes with it seven other spirits more wicked than itself, and they go in and live there. And the final condition of that person is worse than the first. That is how it will be with this wicked generation. (Matthew 12:43-45 NIV)
Christianity led to equal rights in the West, the abolition movement, is a product of St Paul advocating for Onesimus or telling the Galatian church, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” The left assumes the values it has are universal. They see only the faults without giving credit.
“You will not surely die!”
The progressive left, by contrast, denies all limits and conventions. Their “can be” may seem good at first glance. But is opening Pandora’s box, it is releasing what previous generations have built social structures to contain and could end up being more like a trip on Event Horizon. America has been good and bad, had moments of greatness and failure. We should tune the ideal it was founded on, not tear it down to start all over again. There is much to conserve in “what is” with an eye to improvement. Veer not too far to the right or left.
At least with Trump, morally corrupt as he may be, he comprehends that our inheritance is not a burden. For him, there is something that can be recovered “again” from the past generations even if those lessons were not perfectly applied to him. He’s a grandpa, he has seen trends come and go, old enough not to care about what is currently popular. Trump may have some narcissistic traits, at least that is the character he plays on television to the roar of the WWE crowd—but he isn’t trying to be God.
Conspiracies happen all of the time. It is not a surprise that people plot evil schemes and would be more strange if they did not. But it doesn’t mean that everything that happens is a conspiracy. Being old enough to recall the black helicopter theories and warnings of imminent UN takeover. Who can forget the FEMA camp claims and those pictures of ‘coffins’ Barack Obama’s administration would soon be loading us into? Strangely many dates come and go, but none of those who push these wild global plots come forward later and say, “You know, I may have been wrong about JFK being the Antichrist… “
Wild conspiracy theories are about political ideology more than evidence. It is oftentimes a product of those who feel disempowered and seek uncomplicated explanations. The left, for example, hallucinates nebulous things like systemic racism or white privilege. Not entirely claims without any merit and yet if it is used to explain every outcome—if you see it lurking behind everything people do—then stop, get some help! The fringe right likewise, turns to fantasy when reality is too hard for their simple minds to understand. Inflation can’t just be about the Fed printing trillions of dollars devaluing currency, no it must be fires at food processing facilities!
There is always a motivated misunderstanding of evidence that is involved beneath this kind of claim—a misuse of statistics and facts to form grandiose theories.
The common thread of conspiracy theories is that they can’t be disproven. They are all established on faith, firm belief evidence connecting all the dots can be found and can shape-shift as needed. If one part can be disproven they can simply move the goalposts or deny the evidence is legitimate. If someone does not want to believe that the moon landing happened you could show a Saturn V rocket, introduce them to one of the astronauts, thoroughly explain all of the alleged irregularities they see and they’ll still believe that it was faked.
It is a matter of political orientation, not facts or plausibility, and stems from assumptions and a general mistrust of the system.
To the conspiracy-minded folks, everything becomes a conspiracy, there can never be an accident, or a lone wolf attack, no such thing as coincidence in their world. Sandy Hook couldn’t be a deranged (drugged out) Adam Lanza. No, to Alex Jones it must’ve been a false flag with the casualties being crisis actors rather than real people. And some of those hunch I understand, this is what happens when every tragedy is treated cynically as an opportunity by control-freak politicians.
The real issue I have with Q-Anon, where all is a hidden criminal plot (and everything is going according to the plan) is how it sucks the oxygen out of the room for discussion of real observable corruption. The far-flung theories, worse, are used to discredit those reasonable concerns about the expansion of government power and proliferation of unaccountable agencies. We should be far more concerned with what those with power are ‘legally’ doing in plain sight—and not giving them cover of cockamamie theories they happily use to dismiss us all as crackpots.
That’s the irony here, the conspiracy theorist is aiding the conspiracy. For example, fact-checks of “Covid is a bioweapon” were used to strawman the reasonable questions about a possible Wuhan lab-leak. This is why we couldn’t have a serious conversation.
So why do the kooks need to speculate so far beyond the evidence? Why can’t they stick to what is known or factual, the most plausible explanation, rather than always having to gallop to the craziest possible conclusion? In some cases it might just be stupidity, that they simply aren’t very good at tracking normal human motivation. But in many cases, it is just a form of resentment, they are unserious people—with a massive inferiority complex—who both need to distinguish themselves and also discredit those who did attain more.
It is basically the working-class equivalent of pulling the race-card.
And yet this is not entirely without cause.
They’ve endured globalism, they have seen their jobs outsourced, prices rise and wages stagnate. This was not the America that was promised to them. A place where their own dreams would be the limit. They see things going the wrong way, opportunities drying up for people like them, as a flood of new faces replace the familiar. There has been a sort of conspiracy against them, but not in the way they imagine. Yes, in many ways, they have been screwed over by their betters—so perhaps that is where the deep suspicion originates?
Trump, who packs rallies despite somehow losing the last election, took the stage again in Butler, Pennsylvania.
Nearby another man crawls on a roof top, a rifle in his hands, takes aim and he pulls the trigger. He missed his mark, but continues to fire, one bullet fired striking a person in the crowd, killing them instantly, another hit the former President who drops.
Thomas Matthew Crook was only 20-years-old. His entire life he has been propagandized by a partisan media blinded by rage. After the dismal debate performance of Joe Biden, a heroic old man fighting till his last breath for the good of the country he loved, great fear gripped this young man. The evil Drumfler would ascend to power again!
And this time, as the headlines screamed in warning and even Biden himself claimed in the debate, Trump would be out for revenge—which would lead to a literal bloodbath.
Worse yet, the justice system that a month back would never make an error in regards to charges against Trump, suddenly gave way to a Supreme Court that wants Trump to be a dictator! This gullible young mind absorbed the hysteria.
Voting would not be enough!
No, Crook wasn’t going to leave the future of the nation in the hands of fate. Women depended on him. Black people too. Gays and lesbians as well. The time for talk was over, Trump and his MAGAt minions needed to be stopped and he was prepared to lay down his life for the good of his country to put an end to this threat. If the courts could not stop Trump, if Biden couldn’t, then the only option left was a rifle.
If only someone could have talked some sense into him. If only he had gone outside the ‘mainstream’ corporate news bubble or considered other possibilities.
Had he done this he would’ve have learned Trump is liberal, a New York businessman with an immigrant mother and married to a foreign born wife, who (despite gesturing to Evangelicals) has the morals of Bill Clinton and is therefore not remotely interested in implementing the Heritage Foundation’s “Project 25” conservative fever dream.
Trump is actually a disappointment to the right-wing, he banned bump stops and has a centrist platform when you stop taking the Democrat claims as fact or the full truth. It isn’t like he’s going to bring back slavery or force women to be barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen. He’s a fiscal conservative who supports bringing manufacturing jobs back and likes trolling on social media. That’s it. He’s not a fascist. He won’t ban abortion (which he says should be up to states) nor is he any more evil than those who falsely accuse him for their own gain.
Crook came within millimeters of his target, which is quite impressive for 150 meters, but will be remembered as a brainwashed fool who mistook rhetoric for reality.
He may have actually secured a second term for Trump when most people take a step back and realize that the extremists might be on the side of the leftist media—that initially had responded to the assassination attempt by playing it off as popping noises and Trump falling down.
Reprehensible misreporting!
It is time to start seeing through this nonsense.
If Trump were literally Hitler, the President Biden would not have come out against the shooter. No, he would’ve lamented the bad aim and reiterated the bullseye statement he made just days ago. Instead he is now pulling ads and admitting that the show has gone too far after his opponent was nearly killed. Ironically, for a brief moment, Biden has looked very presidential.
Too bad Crook didn’t realize that he was a pawn in a manipulation game before he executed on the plan.
After reading a review of Gran Torino, a Clint Eastwood movie from 2008, that dismissed it as shallow in its exploration of racism, I’ve decided to explore some of the depth of the movie that was missed. It was a great story about finding common ground, that takes a bit of twist at the end from the typical Clint Eastwood film. My family (mixed race and culture) could appreciate the themes more than the average viewer—yet is a beautiful redemption story that all people can enjoy as well.
“Get off my lawn!'”
The story is about an angry old man who is not dealing well with change. Walter ‘Walt’ Kowalski, a Polish-American retired auto worker, Korean War veteran, and recent widower—his beloved wife passing right before the start of the narrative.
In the opening frame, he fits a stereotype of an elderly homeowner defending their patch of turf from an encroaching world. It seems every small town has one. That guy who trims his front lawn with scissors and does not deal well with the trespasses of the younger generation, the snarling “get off my lawn” line from the movie became an instant meme.
Why?
It is just too familiar.
The expression captures the essence of a fading dream. The American middle class values property ownership. A lawn, once a complete luxury and exclusively for wealthy estates, had become the mark of post-WW2 affluence. Walt was the beneficiary of this period of economic growth. He had lived a quintessential suburban life.
But now it had become a nightmare. It is not the same neighborhood anymore. The once tidy little homes, owned by people like him, had fallen into disrepair as a new group of immigrants took over. The woman who he built a home with was gone. His sons bought foreign brand vehicles and betrayed the legacy their father had built working at Ford. The world Walt had known was falling apart and he was bitter.
That patch of land, other than the ghosts of his past, was all Walt really had left. To set foot on it was to violate his sacred space. It was a shrine. And his 1972 Gran Torino in the garage likely represented the pinnacle of his productive career. Since the Korean War ended in 1953, this would put this car purchase around two decades into civilian life with a young family and point when the future looked bright. So he was clinging to what was left of his identity and willing to defend it with deadly force.
Demons of the Past
Early on we see Walt, the tough guy, who is playing a part. His racist language is a part of the facade—a barrier he puts up—because the alternative is to be vulnerable—or a victim. He is still haunted by his war experience, in the beginning using it as a threat, saying he could kill without remorse:
“Yeah? I blow a hole in your face and then I go in the house… and I sleep like a baby. You can count on that. We used to stack fucks like you five feet high in Korea… use ya for sandbags.”
However, later, when it comes to stopping the neighbor boy from taking revenge, we see the reality under the surface:
“You wanna know what it’s like to kill a man? Well, it’s goddamn awful, that’s what it is. The only thing worse is getting a medal… for killing some poor kid that wanted to just give up, that’s all. Yeah, some scared little gook just like you. I shot him in the face with that rifle you were holding in there a while ago. Not a day goes by that I don’t think about it, and you don’t want that on your soul.“
Just like today, where Russians are called “Orcs” and portrayed as subhuman by propagandists, racial and ethnic slurs were used against various Asian enemies of US policy in the region. But for Walt, he knew better, he knew that it was not a demon at the receiving end of his rifle. He had murdered a human child and he felt immense regret. Note how he says “poor kid” rather than all of the racist terms he used freely throughout his conversations. It is almost as if, up to this point, he had to reinforce the dehumanizing descriptions to keep ahead of his shame. The truth is Walt didn’t sleep like a baby. No, he was running his sins his entire life and exhausted.
War propaganda then and now. Enemies are always portrayed as evil and subhuman.
Walt’s racism was part of his pretty much equal-opportunity disdain for other people, including the young parish priest, and his own family. He was a broken and hurting man, who had driven away his children and was hiding his own terminal illness. What he needed was some compassion, a safe place where he could finally let his guard down, and it was the persistent effort of a young Hmong neighbor that finally broke through his wall of insults.
Finding Common Ground
The review, that sparked my response, tried to overlay a “white savior” trope on the story and completely missed that it was Walt who was being saved!
*spoiler alert*
Yes, ultimately, Walt sacrificed himself for the sake of the Asian family next door. But this only after Sue, played by an actual Hmong actress (some critics panned the amateurism, others praised), went above and beyond to disrupt his dismal world.
She was his savior.
It was by her effort that he would face the demons of his past and could be at peace with his Creator. It was a redemption story, a story of an old man who had lost his wife, lost his children, lost his religion and even lost his neighborhood, but finds life again by learning to love his enemies.
I can feel this character. My own life didn’t go as planned. I had to leave the religious culture where my hopes had been built. I had a beautiful Asian woman who was patient with me while I was still lost in delusion and did not give up when times were difficult. Now we have a blended-culture home. Yes, my Filipino wife and son are different from me in many regards. However, after seven years of knowing each other and now over a year of being married, our love has only continued to grow. Some of my happiest moments were with her family in the Philippines and recently while visiting her relatives in Canada.
I am Walt.
My ‘Sue’ did save me.
The real story of Gran Torino is an old man who finds more common ground with those he had thought were strange than he does with his own children. Once Walt had got past the superficial differences he realized he had more connection to these Hmong people than many who looked like him. Unlike the war, he was now defending real people and not political ideologies. He was fighting for the local community, against those within who are destroying it, and not gunning down random boys thrown into a conflict not truly their own. The storyline is a comparison between perspectives and shows us what really matters in the end.
It is about relationships, not race.
It is about building bridges.
The ongoing dialogue between Walt and his priest demonstrates this. The priest, who is of European descent based on appearance, is at first scoffed at by the grizzled military veteran for his youthfulness. The baby-faced “Padre” is bluntly rejected by him:
“I think you’re an overeducated 27-year-old virgin who likes to hold the hands of superstitious old ladies and promise them everlasting life.“
But, despite this insult, Father Janovich will not go away. And eventually, with his persistence, he does earn the respect of Walt. The bond, built over a few beers, culminates with Confession and Walt is finally able to have the guilt that had plagued him since Korea absolved. Now he is free and at peace, ready for a last act that goes contrary to expectations and confirms the redemptive arc.
It was faith that saved Walt, both that of the young woman who withheld judgment and didn’t allow his wall of nastiness to stop her and finally of the persistent outreach of the Church. And it is only because of this concerted effort that we get to see the protagonist do what is right. By the end of the film, Walt has overcome those demons driving his anti-social behavior and also has gained a son worthy of his prized Gran Torino.
Now To Review the Reviewer…
Why did the critic miss the obvious?
The reviewer who inspired me to write my own was projecting their own worldview onto the script. Eastwood is a rare conservative Hollywood producer. In fact, so conservative he spoke at a Republican National Convention and gave a mock interview with an empty chair, used to represent Obama, and he calls Biden “a grin with a body behind it.” Perhaps it is this that the review is responding to? But I think it goes a bit deeper than that.
The Marxist left sees the world as being a zero-sum game, or that for some people to gain others must lose, and thus everything is a competition for power. But, not only this, but everything is divided up into strictly bounded categories based on their skin color, financial status, or sexual classification. If someone cooperates across these lines then they are an “Uncle Tom” or traitor. So the themes of Gran Torino just do not compute. Asians are collaborators. Walt is an irredeemable privileged white man, he needs to be canceled—not humanized.
So, since we can’t have everyone come out as a winner, the only thing the woke reviewer has left is to hallucinate something color-coded and negative. Thus they see a movie that tells us to reach across lines of age, culture, and race as just another “white savior” trope. It is bizarre, such a narrow and distorted perspective, to entirely miss everything and then to insert what is not actually there. Yes, Walt saves, but in the context of others saving him, and that’s not even the point. The point of is that color (or age) doesn’t matter, finding our common ground and community does.
Gran Torino isn’t a perfect movie. It may go a bit overboard with ethnic slurs at times. But, then again, the comedic relief of the barber and Walt exchanging these insults as terms of endearment is also great commentary. Why do we let words be “violence” when the same utterances can be laughed at in another context? It is because these words have the power we give them. What this is suggesting is that we can go further when we reframe the conversation.
The left wants to believe that our behavior is determined by what others have done to us—Eastwood says we can be free to live above their rules.
Politics may be all about power, in-group and out-group, but love overcomes all.
A frequent complaint of Western men (who were burned) in a relationship with a Filipino woman is that she was only ever interested in his money and not truly in love. I mean, it couldn’t possibly be that he was an entitled and whiny beach who expected her undying adoration while producing minimal returns, right? She was supposed to love them like their dear mother who had let them live in the basement rent free for thirty years!
And you think I’m exaggerating.
Part of the problem (which is not a problem for those who understand the arrangement) is age-gap. My wife and I have a difference in age that is normal or within several years of each other. But frequently there is a gap of decades in these pairings and these men marrying women that are young enough to be their daughter (or granddaughter) don’t seem to get that she didn’t marry him for his charm or charisma. She is hoping for a bit of financial security and her happiness will depend on his ability to deliver.
Many are aghast that Bill Belichick, 73 years old, would dare to enter into a romantic relationship with a 23 year old Jordan Hudson. They say what business does a man his age have to date this young woman? Isn’t it exploitative, an illegitimate relationship? But they hate it because it exposes the reality of love. Sure, the young cheerleader and old coach is extreme on the age scale. And yet how is it any different from a 5′ tall 100lb female who picks a 220lb 6′ male rather than a guy that is her own size?
Is this gross?
Women Instinctively Marry Up
We all love those “living on a prayer” stories about two people surviving together against the odds. And certainly there is an element of this type of spirit that we will needed to sustain love through thick and thin. But, as my wife put plainly in our discussion of this, “You can’t live on just love.” The practical is not as glamorous, we prefer not to see the crude mechanics that are always working beneath the surface. And yet a man must deliver if he wants to have her adoration for more than the first year of marriage.
We don’t hear anything about Joseph when Jesus was an adult. He’s already out of the picture. And it is probably because he was older (maybe a widower) when he married Mary, a teenager, and died. Traditionally an older and thus more established man was considered to be safer. He already had his land and house. He could provide support for her children and had a reputation going before him that younger men did not. Why take a chance on an unknown commodity when there’s man who can afford to care for his new bride?
And despite the egalitarian push in the West women still want to marry up. High earning educated women do not lose this tendency towards hypergamy. Sure, maybe they will settle for less, but prefer the man who can provide more. This, incidentally, is why my pursuit of the impossibly failed, as she put, “You’re thirty years old living in Milton.” Or, in other words, I lacked the size of ambition and type of social status she was into. And, shallow as it sounds, this is just the honest truth. Men marry youth and beauty, women marry size, strength and status.
Potential Drives Attraction
Young women marry the poor young man’s potential, but all want financial security and physical protection. While men, no matter how old or pious, appreciate women who of fertile age. Men marry her potential to bear children. This is reproductive instinct. Even if both parties in a sexual relationship are not consciously interested in offspring—this is what drives their behavior.
He provides, she nurtures.
While the Belichick and Hudson pairing did raise my eyebrows and likely would not be possible if he wasn’t worth 70 million. I’m also guessing they do have a few points of compatibility. It is possible, you perverts, that they really do enjoy logic that much and have stimulating intellectual intercourse. In the end, it doesn’t matter if your ideal says otherwise, you’ll always need to give something in order to get—nobody is going to fall in love with you for simply existing.
Whether it is paid in cash up front or in IOUs of our future potential, we all must pay the bride’s dowry or move on. If you’re old or ugly it is going to take a lot of money for her (and her family) to make her interested. Only the young men can win by promising her the moon. Of a certain age and you will need to deliver those goods up front.
Hide this reality under layers of your storybook romantic fantasies and feelings of meant to be—love is transactional.
Identity is fluid, a physical characteristic is not. I had identified as being “Mennonite” for many years of my life. It was not much of a choice for me. Raised in a Mennonite home, participated in a Mennonite church, and had internalized the values, the belief system, etc. Mennonite was simply what I was and it still remains by ethnic/cultural background. Leaving the community does not mean I’ll escape the genetic realities of my birth tribe.
Is an identity surface level or deeper?
There was many of these labels that have to do with our social status, some we pick and others are picked for us. In school if you’re into sports, hang out with other athletes, it is going to get you a “jock” designation and likely also stereotype applied with that. Likewise, if were to wear a particular wardrobe to conform with a group of self-described non-conformists then you’re Goth or Emo. People tend to coagulate into identity group—they find others who are like them and also become more like those whom they identify with.
But there’s a huge difference between these identities built around how we dress or who we associate with and those like eye color, bone structure or genitalia. Sure, someone can dye their hair purple and claim that they are an astronaut, but that does not change what they were born with nor does it make them qualified to fly a space shuttle. There are those ‘assigned’ categories that need to be objective facts rather than some kind of self-identity or cosplay act. Science needs to have clear definitions or the endeavor is impossible. And society simply can’t let you be a medical doctor because you feel like you should be a Porsche owner while you’re stuck driving a Kia.
Anyhow, getting to the point, a big problem with these conversations is that people are using the same words to mean something different. For example, Rachel Dolezal, the woman who identified as ‘black’ despite her being born a daughter of European parents and having their biological characteristics, yet she could be ‘black’ for many years. In my mind she can be both black or not black depending on what the term is describing—is it the genetic inheritance or the adopted culture?
I mean, think of Eminem’s lyrics: “I am the worst thing since Elvis Presley, to do Black music so selfishly and use it to get myself wealthy.”
Technically, if it is a ‘white’ artist doing the writing and performing, what is so ‘black’ about it? He’s performing in English. He’s doing naval gazing more common with the self-loathing European culture and his lyrics were about being some weird trailer trash hybrid rather than the themes common with the gangsta rap I knew growing up where it was at least presented as being something to take seriously. How is a genre of music a skin color? Asians are quite good at playing instruments and music first developed by the West—is that appropriation?
In many cases ‘black’ is not referring to something truly immutable. No, rather it is about a lifestyle, a set of values, a certain way of behaving and, by this definition, it is perfectly legitimate for someone to identify as black without African genetics. In other words, it is more like belonging to political party or religion than something someone is born. And this is how suddenly the far left can claim work ethic or nuclear families are ‘white’ despite the Africans I know being as hard working and loyal to their spouses as any other person.
It is grotesque, horrendously racist, when a political candidate tells a whole segment of the population that if they don’t vote for him then, “You ain’t black.“
Of course that was to intentionally confuse actual skin color and everything associated with it, with a ideology and perspective. It is to rob the targets (black people who think differently than him) of their identity and is a form of gaslighting. An outsider doesn’t get to decide what people should or should not belong. It is inappropriate and bullying behavior, this truly is the worst kind of manipulation, it reinforces stereotypes and denies the true diversity within a category of color.
So identity is fluid. We can change our own idea of what we are. Still, there are also the fixed points determined by birth, a physical characteristic, that even if the surface level manifestations are surgically changed and hormones artificially employed, cannot be chosen or changed. A man can behave in a feminine way, a woman in a masculine way, yet he doesn’t lose a Y chromosome simply for declaring himself a woman. Sure, he can have his male anatomy reconstructed to resemble the female sex. But there is more to being a woman.
Due to chromosomal abnormalities, there may not be a binary of male and female, but there most certainly is between female and not female. It is one thing for the man once known as Bruce Jenner to reject the typical male role and change his name. But that does not change the fact that he fathered his children and lacks the real hardware to be a woman. Again, Rachel Dolezal can act in a manner that is associated with those of African origins, even fool the NAACP with her outward appearance, but she is not truly African American.
We do not need to recognize every claim as being valid. I can’t just thrash around in the pool, march up to the podium and demand to be recognized as the winner of a swim meet without the necessary qualifications or actual achievement. Why then is it ever okay for someone with male genitals and body to dominate in a female category for simply changing his name and having the powers that be join him in his psychosis?
Changing your name and official category doesn’t change the physical reality.
It is a serious threat to civilization to attack the common language in this manner and it cannot be taken lightly. One person with a delusion is not a problem. However, when it is a significant portion of society going off the rails together then very quickly becomes dangerous. Matters of our preference and culture are subjective, what is feminine or masculine is not set in stone, but science and reason must be built on something that is objective. There must be a wall between identity that is merely social construct and that which is grounded in substance.
My wife asked me if it is normal in America to call someone “Hey!” Her coworker had used this exclamation rather than her first name. “My name is not Hey,” she thought, not verbalizing the protest. In her Filipino culture this casualness is considered to be impolite bordering on an insult.
It has been a big adjustment, coming here, to see how little respect there is for others, especially the elderly and the pregnant. For her, from her perspective, I should not use my elder neighbor’s first name. He should be “uncle Steve” instead, to denote his age rank in comparison to us. Likewise, she was shocked how expecting mothers are not given lighter duty, as they would be in Asian countries. However, tough as she is, she vowed that if an American woman can do it then she can.
But it really does say something about us that we can’t be bothered to recognize the status of others. Most people in the world, including our own past generations, realize that we come into the world and leave the same way. The deference shown to elderly is paying it forward, a recognition that we too will become old and increasingly frail, that we will need help. The use of honoring language is part of that care or setting them apart from those youthful and able.
We have sought absurd equality in the US, where people are all interchangeable, the incel ‘conservative’ says it is unfair for him to have to pay women for maternity leave and ‘progressives’ think biological men can be women with some nipping tucking and a change of wardrobe. Feminists, ironically, strip motherhood and natural feminity of its glory to prioritize the tasks that any human can do. Egalitarian aims are good so far as equal protection under the law, but when it becomes erasure of all human difference it isn’t so much anymore.
Concepts of social rank, codified in religious law like, “Honor your father and mother,” are a part of natural order. Social animals have hierarchies, a pecking order or status that is earned through age or abilities. This can be abused and yet the alternative of disorder is not an improvement. Why be honorable, for example, in a world where accomplishment or reputation is no longer recognized? This may be why we’re so afraid to age—we only lose abilities and gain nothing in return for the experiences we’ve had.
My wife also observed how her American boss doesn’t want to be referred to using a title of respect. It is as if men are afraid of rank, would rather just be one of the boys, and therefore are uncomfortable when the language of their status is used. This, of course, doesn’t change the authority that is wielded by a manager. No, all it does is hide this under a layer of obscurity and makes me wonder why we have become so afraid or ashamed of status.
This all adds to the comedy when Taylor Swift screams “F*ck the patriarchy” to her stadium full of adoring fans. A billionaire who got her start with the help of her rich Daddy pretending to be some poor little powerless girl, a victim of oppression, in a society where nobody wants to be called “sir” or “ma’am” (maybe due to ageism?) and attractive women have all the power—both feminine wiles and all of the opportunity for worldly wealth possible. Total buffoonery on the part of the pop icon.
Still, part of the deal with titles of respect and social rank is living up to your honored name. I’ve blogged against patriarchalism, that is the spirit of entitlement some men have and believe that those who want to be addressed in a dignifying proper way must be dignified. There is also a little bit of self-respect required. My wife is also aghast at how her female coworkers will playfully call each other “whores” and I start to wonder why we must be so degrading?
We all know a story about a little girl going to her grandma’s house and is confronted by a talking wolf who convinces her to go astray. But this written account is predated by tales with similar characters, and yet not exactly the same. In the end, no matter the version, we read it as being a fairytale and understand that it should not be taken as being a historically accurate record of an event. Why? Well, animals don’t talk and we were told it is an old fable.
I had to think of this while seeing so many fundamentalist friends share a false claim that Travis Kelce threatened to quit the Kansas City Chiefs if they did not cut the currently embattled franchise kicker. This part of the hysteria (both in response and in reaction to the response) over the conservative kicker’s commencement address that promotes traditional Catholicism. Normally it would be customary for these Protestant friends to bash those who believe in Jesus in the same manner as Harrison Butker. But, in politics, I guess the enemy of my enemy is my friend—suddenly those who give special honor to Mary are now acceptable?
The problem with this Kelce claim is that it is as fictional as Little Red Riding Hood and being spread as fact. I mean, I would think that credibility is important to Evangelicals, being that their mission in life is to convince others a man literally walked on water and then rose from the dead because they read about it in a book. But nope, they share the most urban legends of any demographic on my friends list. For those who say that they know the Truth, personally, this should be a huge embarrassment—except it never is.
Those who have no ability to detect fakes or frauds, who spread blatant lies, really aren’t in a place to preach their values.
As much as I support Butker’s freedom of speech and think the cancel culture outrage over his comments is ridiculous, I really do not find a home amongst those who accept any claim that confirms their ‘Biblical’ views on social media. All it takes is a satire site say that there has been evidence of the Red Sea crossing has been found or that a solar eclipse is passing over seven towns in the US named Nineveh and they will spread these blatant falsehoods to the ends of the Earth because they can’t be bothered to verify the claim before posting it.
If the religious adherents truly occupied the high ground of truth why would they dare to risk their credibility?
Whether it is fake news or just exaggerated tales, that believers are gullible or in people in denial in the manner of a sports fan who can only see what promotes their team as good, the cost is credibility. A consensus of idiots is meaningless. I have no reason to think that prior generations were any better at sorting out the facts from the fictional BS. It is just disheartening, for someone who had hope of a marked difference between the faithful and the frauds.
The truth is that Travis Kelce (and his brother Jason) have come out in support of Butker. So maybe it is time for some professing ‘Christians’ caught spreading this malicious gossip to do what their religion requires, humble themselves, and repent?
Wolves will likely talk before these reactionaries reconsider anything…
The nurse pronounced baby as “BEE-bee” in our prenatal class and it got me thinking of how language develops. Words will shift to reflect their usage. The meaning eventually match with the reality when we attempt to disguise unpleasantness in flowery speech or try moral inversion. Cultural values will shine through and snap understanding back where it was prior to the manipulation.
How did “bAy-bee” become “BEE-bee”?
The latter evolution in pronunciation is cuter and therefore a better representation of the subject matter. The word never will change the thing it describes. Yes, words influence our perception, they also change to reflect a new understanding of the things that we are describing. For example, the word “baby” only changed in pronunciation for me when considering the little human now within my wife’s belly. It was no longer an abstraction or vague category, but a tiny vulnerable ball of loveable life.
When we experience something firsthand it is harder to deny what it is. We can use the terms detached and technical to distance ourselves from the emotional content. Say that a baby is just a clump of cells or some kind of parasite—up until the moment when we finally hold it in our hands. To keep up the charade after this would be delusional or psychopathic. It is not human to see an infant as anything other than precious. The political lexicon becomes irrelevant.
A Tangled Ball Of Words
Words trigger emotions. I was thinking of this as a tear formed while the instructor in a prenatal class described the ideal of “skin to skin” and a soothing environment. Some of this reaction may be feeling the weight of my wife’s pregnancy. But it also has a lot to do with my own identity as the “premie” and “fighter” who struggled for life. Discussion of baby care today compared to what it was for me. The thing is, while my experience certainly impacted my development, I don’t have memories of the trauma. It probably only looms large as a part of my personal identity because my mom told me what I went through and reinforced it. The I gave further shape and form to it by attributing many of my struggles to the events of my birth—everything from my delayed growth to difficulties with focus in school.
However, it is impossible to know, outside of creating a genetic clone, if I would have been much better off with a normal birth or with more human touch rather than being in a plastic box with ‘stimulating’ music. This had some impact, no doubt, and yet there is the bigger psychological complex I’ve built on top of this named thing. Like an irritant in an oyster, it provided a nucleus to attach all of my insecurities to and blame for my failures and shortcomings. With a normal birth would I have been more like my more accomplished siblings and less a mess?
However, it is very easy to reverse cause and effect to give ourselves an excuse for our being lazy and taking of exceptions. We become the label that we apply to ourselves as much as it truly describes us. We act the part. Things of identity, like race, sexuality, religion, are as much a construct or fantasy as they are facts. We live up to our name to an extent. My mom would often tell me that my name meant “strong-willed” and it might be one of those self- fulfilling prophecies. If we tilt confirmation bias in a direction it isn’t a big surprise if our character develops that direction. It is like strapping a young tree to influence where it grows.
In a sense, nobody is truly “born this way,” it is a statement discredits conditioning and culture too much. But the environment itself doesn’t make us where we are as much as those descriptive words that reverberate in our heads. A child that is called “stupid” by a parent or teacher may spend many years trying to sort through their doubts. My dad letting me look over his blue prints and then giving some affirmation when spotted an error made by the engineers is likely what led to my being confident in my abilities and a career in design. Our reality is influenced by use of language.
These are just personal observations, but it is also backed up by other sources that put it more succinctly:
Language is not just a medium of communication; it’s a lens through which we view the world and a mold that shapes our identity. From shaping cultural perceptions to influencing personal identities, language’s role is pivotal in constructing our social and personal realities.
Language is more than a mere tool for communication.
It’s a portal through which we perceive and interpret the world.
Imagine how our understanding of colors evolves when we learn names for shades we previously couldn’t distinguish.
With each new word we acquire, a facet of reality emerges from obscurity, offering us a richer tapestry of experiences.
The Dynamic Relationship Between Language and Reality
Neither of those sources are academic or truly authoritative, but do say what I’m saying in a different way and thus useful so far as my goal here which is to provoke thought. New use of language reframes the world. It can amplify our efforts and transform society as more people begin to see the world through the lens we provided. Memes do this, as do pounding of propaganda headlines, it is why “fact-checkers” exist—all to reinforce a particular narrative.
With so much power in our words there is plenty of reason for cunning and conniving people to exercise this for their own selfish ends.
They take advantage of insecurities and level accusations to shame or confuse the innocent.
Wordsmiths, they could turn a baby into a villain and murderer into a saint—beware.
His talk is smooth as butter, yet war is in his heart; his words are more soothing than oil, yet they are drawn swords.
(Psalms 55:21 NIV)
There are some use the guise of compassion to gain control. Their promises are about attaining power. They seek only to bind us and yet many people are blinded to these motives because their identity has been hijacked by these nefarious actors.
Categories Are Social Constructs
The structures and constructs of language are entirely fabricated. There is no person who is “black” or “white” by birth, no, rather these are categories we create, clans that we join, and always artificial divisions. We are often grouped by others using various label words and internalize the divisions as being inseparable from our own experience, in that we identify with other “rednecks” or “blue-collar” types as those ‘like us’ and yet also *become* like that. Nothing requires a rural person to use country slang or go buy a massive diesel pick-up truck, some of the markers of this lifestyle (chewing tobacco or dress) can impact opportunities. This is about politics, not genetics. It is about the strength of an identity group that helps us gain power for ourselves. Being a victim of an “ism” is a lever, a social tool or means to build a coalition against others.
The individual without these groups, that is denied the right to put their fist in the air in solidarity with others ‘like them’ is weakest and most disadvantaged in this game. That is the irony of the “systems of oppression” language. Those who describe this kind of problem are actually creating it more than they are simply observing. In the same way that observation in quantum mechanics is an influence of reality (collapses the wave function), the ‘study’ of human interaction is an interaction and is a product of our bias as much as it has basis in reality. Those who are concerned with the existing ideas (of racism, sexism, or heterosexism) steal attention (and thus disenfranchise) victims of systemic heightism and those who lack privileges in ways not discussed, defined or even recognized. The individual is the most vulnerable, a minority of one, and frequently abused by recognized groups. Bullies travel in big groups—victims are often alone.
1) “Language both mirrors reality and helps to structure it” (2). Explain and give an example.
2)Racism, sexism, heterosexism, and class privilege are all interlocking systems of oppression that ensure advantages for some and diminish opportunities for others, with their own history and logic and self-perpetuating relations of domination and subordination (3). Explain what this means. Do you agree/disagree? Why?
3)What are the economic impacts of constructing race, class, and gender?
Sandwiched between the lines of this effort to build awareness (indoctrinate) are a pile of assumptions that, in the end, only serve to darken these artificial dividing lines.
It is rewarmed class warfare rhetoric, Marxism, and is basically designed to feed envy or feelings of being an other and disenfranchised. No, this is not to say that prejudice or abuse is entirely a social construct. What it is to say, rather, is that their worldview, segregated by these simple binaries, is too compartmentalized and minimizing of other factors.
There isn’t one group of oppressor and one group of oppressed.
There is no hierarchy of victimhood.
Everything depends on the context or situation. A Jewish student that is harassed on a college campus because of the IDF dropping bombs on Gaza is not privileged in this moment even if they are ‘white’ and rich. Nor is it anti-Semitic to characterize the decades long campaign against the Palestinian people as an ethnic cleansing. Labeling terms like “terrorist” or “occupier,” while useful to an extent, rarely explain accurately and are dehumanizing ends of conversation.
The whole point of claiming the existence of “interlocking systems of oppression” is to make anyone who dares to question their narrow perspective a part of a monolithic enemy rather than an individual with life experience to be respected. It is truly the educated left’s own version of a conspiracy theory where anything they don’t like is part of some invisible system that can teased out of the statistical categories they created to emphasize identities based on color and physical features. If some in one of these groups lag behind then some other group must be at fault.
Building humanity requires the de-emphasis of meaningless boundaries and formation of bonds based on behavior. Skin color is not synonymous with culture or the choices one makes that shape their outcomes. Yes, we must identify mistreatment of people on the basis of appearance, but this isn’t black and white, nor is it oppression to apply the same standard to all. Indeed, some people are treated unfairly, but many end up being marginalized for antisocial behavior and yet claim to be victims of oppression when the chickens come home to roost.
Call A Turd a Baby…
Bringing this full circle, the word “baby” is cute (and the pronunciation of the word is becoming cuter) because babies are cute. The language of description is merging more and more with the reality adorableness that we perceive in a human child by our instincts. Using the word “baby” to describe an adult does not make them cute. Albeit pet names, used to convey fondness, do imdue the quality a bit or at least will hijack some of the sentiment that associated with babies. However, this is something that can only be stretched so far before the absurdity is too obvious.
In this regard language that is used in an attempt to counter popular perspective, or overrule accurate description, will eventually take on the meaning that it was supposed to erase. The language police can only temporarily remove a stigma (albeit never long enough to make the effort worthwhile) and it is because the unpleasant reality will always bubble to the surface again. In fact, “special needs” today probably carries more negative baggage than the use of the words slow or retarded in the past.
Likewise when a person is accepted at the university or get your job simply as a result of the particular identity group they belong to rather than only on the basis of equal qualifications this leads to an asterisk with the accomplishment—even when equally earned. New terms like “diversity hire” will spontaneously and organically come into existence as a result of need to delineate between identity and merit based. These, sadly, are far more damaging stereotypes applied to minorities who are outstanding by their own right.
Just as one cannot relabel a turd as a baby and expect people to cradle it once the truth is revealed, one can’t just apply credentials or distinguished titles to someone thinking this will change a lack of qualifications. It will only degrade the meaning of words and in the long-term will do nothing to solve the socio-economic divide.
Calling someone a fisherman and giving them a pile of fish is not the same thing as teaching them how to fish. You can’t simply declare reality as the left believes they can. Turds are only cute when the term is used ironically to describe something truly cute.
Irregular Ideation 