Tag Archives: hatred

The Most Powerful Organ

The most powerful organ in the body is not the heart, or the liver, or even the descending bowel!  Athletes might think the greatest power is in the “glutes” or the femoris and adductors.  In obese America even the stomach is way behind the greatest organ.

The organ we’re describing is the source of the greatest hatreds in the world.  It moves armies and populations to hatred and dehumanization of outside groups, so that they might be bombed and killed without conscience.  It is so powerful that it can change the meanings of words to the degree that murder is no longer murder and crimes are now “rights.”

The most powerful organ is the MOUTH!  I know, right?

The most comforting words of love and compassion can issue from a mouth connected to one’s heart – a phenomenally useful combination.  These can lead to love between friends… and even between strangers.  They can lead to procreation and great parenting, recognition of strengths in others and acknowledgement of heroism.  They can educate in great principles and improve one’s society, culture and public good.

The mouth is fairly close to the brain.  This doesn’t always mean there’s a connection, however.  A mouth can spew corrosive vitriol directly at people we love, even to the point of destruction of marriages, families, companies and governments.  Mouths sometimes, well… run off at the mouth, so to speak.  Friends of the mouth’s host will then ask, “What on Earth were you thinking?”

Nothing, probably.  Recently, for example, that great philosopher, Madonna Louise Ciccone, proclaimed for as large an audience as she could find, that she had thought about blowing up the White House (based, apparently, on its legal resident).  One would hope that her mouth had spewed with no forethought, but she claims there was some.  She should know, no?

World-famous deep thinker, Stephen Colbert, said on broadcast TV that the mouth of the president of the United States was good only for holding the penis of the president of the Russian Federation.  That was scripted, evidently, and probably practiced, but it still is not evidence of a connection between the Colbert’s mouth and his brain… hmmnn, unless, Lordy, maybe it is!

I wonder if that is where the term, “Full of (euphemism for turd)”  came from?

Social media provide ways to “speak” by typing, and those who enjoy the process seem to act as though typing out text makes one an “author” or some sort of “journalist” and not a “speaker.”  Verbal crap that people – most people – would never say face to face, might be magically insulated by virtue of social-medium “publication.”  This is proof that there is often no more brain-connection to peoples’ hands than to their mouths.

This is true for Presidents and paupers, liberals and conservatives.  One need only be able to discern unfounded – or unbounded – hatred in texted speech, as opposed to reasoned criticism, to gauge the connection of brains to much of modern “speech.”

 

 

 

SNOWFLAKES IN NOVEMBER

caitlyn-v-baby-photographyBelief can be a most powerful weapon, spurring action, hatred or love. Election 2016 is a frightening example of popular belief manipulation and those who fomented it deserve our condemnation. Don’t let “fomented” be a comfort – it’s still going on.
The “press” in the form of television, is hardly the equivalent of the printed newspaper / newsmagazine “press.” Since 1960, really, television has been the primary organ of information for voters – at least until 2008. And, it is still a major one. Several factors prevent it from being an honest one.
First, it divides its attention between actual news and information, and entertainment. In a newspaper the Sports section and the Comics pages are clearly defined and separate – handled separately from “News.” TV, not so much.
While a newspaper has time to make decisions about what is most valuable to report, biases notwithstanding, television news strives to be “up to the minute” in its transmittal of events. A dozen Internet services have worsened this. The presence of live-action video must be canned, edited and packaged for transmission in a few hours, or, when events are “breaking news,” fitted in unfiltered to an otherwise choreographed “segment.” What is actually displayed may or may not be the best representation of “truth” about an event, a belief-group, a protest or significant civic function, or about a crime.
Having taken the time to read a paper, the recipient of the views and news it contains can process them and develop his or her own beliefs about what was read. Everything on television, on the other hand, is “read” for the watcher/listener, and speculated upon or interpreted and delivered to multiple senses simultaneously. This implants the ideas of the presenter quite effectively. If no alternative sourcing is done by the recipient – if no newspaper is read later, for example, the beliefs and biases of the TV presentation are left to form beliefs.
One can see the effects of belief manipulation in topics like race, climate change, “immigration” and, most currently, Trump’s campaign and election. “#BlackLivesMatter” rides this dragon with abandon. We can also see the effects of overreach when media giants fail to be convincing.
A few months ago a new member – a young Hispanic woman – of a service club I am proud to be part of, heard us talking about corrupt practices connected to the Clinton Foundation. She questioned what we were saying. I assured her that there was plenty wrong with how they acquired money through the influence of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State.
She was wide-eyed in shock! She’d never heard of any of this. One can trace the path of her disbelief: she obtained her news from an outlet that wanted her to know nothing about Mrs. Clinton’s negatives – an outlet that never reported on Clinton Foundation practices.
This recognized, carefully applied ability to sway large swaths of “low-information” voters was on bright display during our recent 18-month election marathon. Unfiltered hatred of Donald Trump, and unfiltered calumny, has millions now believing that he is barely a change of clothes away from gathering his armies of hateful racists on the Washington Mall and leading them with a “Seig Heil!” salute!
No wonder our college-age snowflakes – and many of their “teachers” – need safe spaces in which to worry about… nothing, actually.
How much brighter the future would be if both these groups spent more energy becoming smart, rather than angry.

TRUTH IN EDUCATION

Members of the University of Maine class of 2010 keep a beachball aloft during the commencement ceremony at the Alfond Arena in Orono Saturday.  The university held two  ceremonies because of the large number of students graduating this year.  About 1700 students received their diplomas this year. BANGOR DAILY NEWS PHOTO BY GABOR DEGRE
Members of the University of Maine class of 2010 keep a beachball aloft during the commencement ceremony at the Alfond Arena in Orono Saturday. The university held two ceremonies because of the large number of students graduating this year. About 1700 students received their diplomas this year. BANGOR DAILY NEWS PHOTO BY GABOR DEGRE
LEARNING TRUTHS
Truth in education would seem to be a perfect sequitur. That is, educators will naturally be imparting truths to their students… without question. Go to school – society’s best expression of its worth, strength and future – and truth will be your reward. Naturally. But, increasingly it seems, not necessarily.
HISTORY AND TRUTH
What has happened in the past, for example, to the best of our ability to discover and document, provides a body of truth that should be the basis of a History course. In order for our children to know our nation’s origins, our standards of action and cultural “traditions,” we are obligated to convey to them what the facts are and were. We are obligated to tell our children the truth… I think.
Adults – and teachers – sometimes forget that what they show and what they tell their kids is grasped as TRUTH. It can take years for those who have the good fortune or good parenting to unlearn opinions, biases or hatreds, and replace them with “truer” truths. Unless they also have the good fortune to go to most colleges.
COLLEGE LEDUCATION
There they’ll listen to deeper biases, radical anti-Americanism, lists of words that can’t be used any longer, while learning about “trigger” words or concepts that can damage their fellow students… although they won’t be allowed to say “fellow” students. That’s a micro-aggression.
The “Education Industry” used to open minds to new ideas, challenge them with opposing views, teach them to embrace exploration for ever greater and purer TRUTHS. That is a habit that serves American citizens and other humans, for their entire lives.
TRUE HATE
How did higher educators become sources of so much hatred? Inordinate amounts of effort are expended teaching students whom they ought to hate, largely by accusing their targets of being haters! No debate seems to affect this process. Then they demand campus cultures that protect their charges from hearing hateful opposing views. Often this includes agitating to prevent certain people – some quite accomplished – from speaking on their “safe” campus.
WAR ON TRUTH
The college war on TRUTH includes cleansing courses of books written by white people that have been judged by today’s irrelevant attitudes to have been hateful, regardless of truths they may have understood or discovered. There are, apparently, no reasons to learn about truths discovered or described by people we no longer approve of. The entire basis of the United States, going back 500 years, is now rejected as distasteful and properly hated by our delicate “students.” One wonders if they are students if their areas of exploration keep shrinking.
The Constitution and its intellectual premises are well documented, forming a certain body of truth worthy of study (“worthy” is an opinion). At least, one would hope that raising new citizens would include truths about their own country.