commonsensicalblogger

Anyone who has any idea of world history knows what the Cultural Revolution was in China.  For those of you less educated, it was a heinous time in the history of China where the Communist Party decided that educated people were dangerous and needed to be taken down a peg–or just killed outright.  It went a long way to making the population compliant to the communist regime.  Make no mistake, there was nothing cultural about this event.  It was marshal law and brainwashing of the highest order.  It was carried out through intimidation and indoctrination, especially of the younger generations who didn’t know any better.

Does this sound in any way familiar to our circumstances now?  Well, if you said no, think again.  Although we have not been subjected to mass murder–yet–as a populace, we are being intimidated constantly and our children are definitely being indoctrinated.  Most college campuses are filled with liberal teachers who seek not to just teach the subject assigned to them, but to indoctrinate the students in their liberal principles.  They shroud their ideas with terms like “diversity,” “equal opportunity,” “microaggression,” “racism,” “bigot,” “sexist,” and many others.  To disagree with them, you risk being labelled as some sort of monster, bent on the destruction of humanity and all that is good and pure.  Dare say that you think perhaps performance should be used as a measuring stick rather than awards based on gender, race, religion, etc. and you will be a pariah.  Grades and working hard are down played, unless you are a special interest group currently favored.  If you are white, christian, male, heterosexual and middle class good luck, you were docked 50 points just for having the nerve to compete.  Your ‘white privilege’ has given you an unfair advantage and it doesn’t matter if you are the best candidate or the hardest working, you don’t count anymore—unless of course you agree that you are a pathetic privileged spoiled son of a plantation owning slaves.  Of course these places no longer exist in the United States, but that doesn’t matter.  Whites must continue to pay for the sins of their fathers(even if your family never owned slaves or did anything the least bit racist) forever.  Blacks cannot succeed as long as there are any white people in positions of authority.  Now, you may substitute gay for black, male for white, etc etc.

I watched a brief video today of young white male on a school campus on the left coast.  He was attempting to grow dreadlocks in his scraggly blond hair.  A young black woman with an semi-afro accosted him and told him he was not allowed to wear dreads because it was her culture and he was just not allowed to do it.  She blocked him trying to walk away and even put her hands on him.  Now, imagine if you will, a young white male stopping a young black woman with straightened hair and physically restraining her while explaining to her that she could not straighten her hair because straight hair was culturally a white trait.  Yeah.  Think about it.  Would that person be expelled from school?  Made to take sensitivity classes?  Publicly excoriated?  Have to go into hiding because of death threats?  Yes, all of the above would be true.

This is how ridiculous our society has become.  Inclusion is only indicated for a select few.  Shouldn’t that young black woman be flattered that a white person sought to imitate her race?  Is that not the highest form of compliment?  What exactly does this young woman want out of life?  Total domination and control over anyone that disagrees with her?  How far will she go to push her agenda?  She put her hands on this boy.  The very thing that Trump’s campaign manager is now facing charges for in Florida.  And he is backed up by Secret Service testimony.  This woman accosted a total stranger(and who knows, perhaps he has black DNA in his background), knowing nothing about him, and tried to dictate how he fixed his hair.  What would she do to someone over an important issue?  I shudder to think.  And yes, I said black.  It is a descriptor.  It is not racism.  All blacks are NOT African. As long as we are white, they are black.  Because as soon as African American is no longer special enough, it too will become offensive and you won’t be able to say that either.  I am jumping the gun and going straight to being ‘offensive’ right now.  I mean nothing by the descriptor other than the color of the skin.

So, when is this nonsense going to stop.  Blacks and other minorities has the opportunities that everyone else in this country have.  There is no ‘white privilege’ any more than there is true privilege for rich people.  Most rich people are poisoned by their wealth.  Women can do what ever they want.  Gays can work where ever they want.  Opportunity abounds.  Will there be failures?  Of course there will.  That’s life cupcake.  Can you blame all your failures on others?  Sure you can, but you won’t learn how to succeed unless you embrace your failures.  Success is not what teaches people, failure is.  Getting everything your heart desires often results in depression and a feeling of emptiness.  It is the journey that is fulfilling much more than the destination.  The special interest groups seek to bypass the journey altogether and skip straight to the destination.  And anyone that dares say they have to journey like the rest of us, watch out, the PC Po Po will come and get you.

I have a liberal ‘friend’ on FaceBook.  Well, I guess more accurately an acquaintance, I guess.  She may no longer consider me a friend due to politics.  I think this is a shame since intelligent discourse is at the heart of all  matters political.  It seems to me that people who lean liberal more often than not get downright mad when you disagree with them.  I mean, ‘them’s fightin words’ mad.

I believe it is frustration on their part because they just cannot believe that anyone with a brain could disagree with their viewpoint.  I get it, I feel the same way but it doesn’t anger me.  It makes me want to prove my point instead of getting angry.  Emotion shouldn’t have a place in politics, but of course it does.  We have another situation like the one that occurred in 2008 with Obama.  The difference is that it is at the other end of the political spectrum(sort of, Trump is more middle of the road than Obama ever was).  The phenomenon is a cult of personality.

The people that follow Trump are more like a religious group than regular voters.  I don’t say this in a derogatory manner.  I find it refreshing that old republican farts can be this enthusiastic.  After the last two presidential elections, I was beginning to think there was not enthusiasm at all left in the conservatives.  They believe in Trump as some sort of political Messiah.  Can you blame them?  The usual slings and arrows that fell political candidates by the dozen seem to bounce off him and hit the person who sent the arrow at him.  The usually omnipotent Media is stumped.

The Media and other politicians are scratching their heads and wondering how to bring him down.  They won’t sway these followers.  Just as Obama’s followers could not be swayed by common sense in 2008, neither will these be swayed.  They believe that Trump is sincere.  Something almost never seen in politics.  Whether or not this bears out remains to be seen, but many believe he is the real deal.

Notice the wording….believe is the word I use.  Politics is a religion of sorts.  This is why it incites such raw emotion from people.  Get a liberal and conservative in the same room and you had better hide the weapons, there’s liable to be violence.  Surprisingly enough, from the many posts, replies and articles I have read, it seems the liberals are the more violent overall in their intense hatred for the opposition.  They don’t just dislike Trump, they abhor him.  They would cheer, I believe, if he was assassinated.  The conservatives, minus the fringe lunatics, are overall just enthusiastic about their man.  Liar seems to be the strongest word used over and over to describe Hillary Clinton.  Trump has been called a monster, a sexist, a racist, an Islamophobe, etc.  And try as I might, I cannot find real, concrete evidence in print, documented, that this is actually the case.

Perhaps the lack of concrete proof is what is firing up the libs.  I think that surely if Trump was the racist sexist he is supposed to be, don’t you think there would be documentation other than liberal interpretation of a few speeches?  He was accused of being a racist because of one of his earlier speeches, where he simply points out that Mexico is not sending us their best citizens.  Somehow this got interpreted as ‘Trump hates Mexicans.’  Do you really think he would have been in business for over 40 years and hates Mexicans and is so vile to them that there wouldn’t have been at least one lawsuit?  I mean, with his resources, he has a target on him to every lawyer around.  Why no discrimination lawsuits?  He’s a sexist supposedly as well.  Where are the sexual harassment lawsuits?  Surely by now the media would have dug up someone willing to jump on the ism bandwagon and call Trump out.  Try though they might, black Americans can’t even find  a speech that in any way is derogatory towards them.  Here’s a clue—it’s because he is not a racist.

So tell a liberal to find proof of his racism, sexism, phobias, etc and they just repeat what they heard on the evening news.  Even the news media is resorting to spreading rumors now.  The NY Times supposedly had an ‘off the record’ recorded meeting with Trump where he says the whole strategy is a ruse.  Do we believe that someone that media savvy would actually sit down with NY Times reporters and not make sure that there were no recordings?  And why only audio?  What good sound engineer couldn’t string together a compilation of Trump speeches and edit it into what ever they wanted it to say?

Let me get back to the anger issue.  Liberals HATE Donald.  He is satan incarnate.  He is the end of our country.  Funny, before he ran for president, he wasn’t sexist, he wasn’t racist, he was just a rich guy with an entertaining show about entrepreneurship and a bossy style.  If he was such a heinous person, why didn’t anyone notice until now? Why wasn’t the ACLU all over him?  Surely someone so systematically evil would have been on the radar before now.  The reason is that politics often doesn’t follow logical thoughts.  It’s raw emotion in many cases.  For liberals, who are frequently atheists or at the very least not very devout, it is their religion.  Everyone needs to believe in something bigger than themselves.  For many conservatives it is God, as they know him.  Liberals don’t have a God in many cases so they must believe in something.

Liberals want desperately to believe that they have the answers to saving humanity.  They have better answers than God.  They can change all of society if just allowed, they will transform us all into a peaceful mosaic of loving people.  Except humans are not always a peaceful animal.  We have a violent history and that is ingrained in us.  The will to survive is strong.  When we no longer have to use our will to scratch out a living from dirt or chase down our dinner, we direct our energies to other things we feel we need to survive.  Religion is one.  In the absence of religion you have politics.

Most conservatives could live very happily without government.  They have been taught a set of morals from an early age.  It is what they live by.  They don’t need a body of men to set up more rules, they already got theirs from their God.  Politics is more of a hobby or a business to them.  It is not a reason to get mad, at least not fightin mad.  Liberals were not raised with a set of rules other than their parents guidelines.  There was no bigger picture other than government.  They place their faith in government.  This is by design if you read any literature on socialism or communism.  Religion cannot coexist with either because it implies a power higher than the government.  In any socialist/communist system religion is at the least discouraged and at the extreme outlawed and people killed persecuted.  Liberals don’t believe in any higher power.  Government is their God.

So, why do they get so mad about politics?  Because we are attacking their religion.  We are attacking the only thing they really believe in.  This is their intangible higher cause.  To conservatives, it’s just politics.  At the end of the day the conservatives go back to their families, their churches and even though they may be frustrated by government and yell a little, it’s not the be all and end all it is to liberals.  If liberals lose to conservatives, they are defeated in spirit.  It’s like someone coming in and burning down your church.  Except that we are burning down their entire religion when conservatism wins.  They have chosen to have no beliefs except those of the world.  When those beliefs are not validated, it’s like being told there is no Santa Claus.

So, I hope that my liberal friend is not too mad at me.  I am trying to make logical sense to a person who believes in a political solution to the world’s problems.  She is not a bad person, she is a true believer even though she is not going to any church.  She prays at the church of liberalism.  If the elections are lost, it is more than a defeat, it is a catastrophe.  For conservatives, it’s a frustrating obstacle, but we have other things to fall back on.  I hope that I never have to rely on politics to fulfill my need for higher understanding of life.  I do believe in God.  I am not much of a church person, but I do believe in God.  I believe that all politicians bow to the same God sooner or later that I do.  I don’t believe they have the capacity to change the world.  The world, believe it or not, has been going through the same struggles since the beginning of civilization…the phrase ‘there is nothing new under the sun’ is so true.  We are destined to turmoil until we die.  It’s just the way it is and it’s not so much if your guy always wins.  It’s just as important to thrive in spite of the other guy winning.  Anyone can do wonders if everyone is on their side.  Show me what you can do when the chips are down.  Liberals need that government to back them up.  They feel powerless without political strength.  I wish I could let them know that there is an immense peace to be gained in believing that we are not completely in charge of our own fates.  Failures or successes are never 100% up to us.  It makes life interesting.  And redefines what success and failure really is.  We are free to succeed or fail.  The government doesn’t have any role in our lives other than setting the speed limits.  That’s the way we like it.  We don’t need the government…we have better things to worship.

 

You may think when you read this blog that I am possibly a closet racist….you know, one of those white people who secretly loathe black people but never say it.  I say this because this is how all conservative white people are portrayed these days.  I am a white professional, so of course I must secretly despise black people and do everything I can in a subtle and non-assuming way to undermine their success and stand in their way….I mean it’s in my DNA isn’t it?

Well, let me tell you, if you know me, this couldn’t be further from the truth.  I try very hard to be completely fair in my life.  I don’t care if you are a man, woman, gay, straight, black, white, brown.  If you do a good job for me or treat me well, I will return the favor.  Likewise if you slight me in any way or do poor work for me, I will let you know that you did in no uncertain terms.  That being said, I am very concerned about the distinct direction many in our country seem to be headed nowadays.

I think we are moving more and more to ‘acceptable racism.’  What do I mean about that?  I mean that a minority, be it gay, black, hispanic, whatever, purposely treats a majority person with disdain, disrespect or even with outright violence and hatred for the sole reason because they are the majority.  Now, when they perform these atrocities, for that is what they are-atrocities, inevitably they are excused by many people.  ‘You just can’t understand what it’s like to be black in this country’ is what is said to ameliorate the bad behavior.  Or ‘our people were enslaved by your people for hundreds of years.’  Both of these statements are true, but so what?  Did I personally enslave anyone?  Are there any current slaves, that were slaves in this country, still alive and not ensconced in a nursing home?  Does being black, gay, hispanic mean that you don’t know right from wrong?

Right now some of you are saying, well if it’s about gays, that can’t be racism.  Well, technically true but I am speaking about behavior of a group, lets say their mob mentality, and I am going to lump some gay people in with other special interest groups.  Forgive me for my lack of distinction, but it is not germane to my argument.  Now that that is out of the way, let’s get to the heart of the matter, because this is where this behavior originates, in the heart.  This type of behavior is just wrong thinking, so it can’t come from the brain, it comes from raw emotion.

I get that minorities are mad.  OK.  But at some point they have to learn to leave the past behind and look at what is available to them now.  Does everyone treat them the same?  No and that will NEVER happen.  The reason it will never happen is because everybody is different in their feelings, how they were raised, their life experiences.  And some people are just plain mean and evil and they will never change their ways.  Get over those people.  Ignore them.  Spending valuable time on people like that will only shorten the time in your life when you actually get stuff done.  There is no law that can be passed that will make a hateful person into an accepting person.  So leave them behind.  They are bitter and will never be happy or successful(even though to some they may appear to be successful) and that is their just punishment for being assholes.

I wonder when the fight for equality turned into a fight for revenge.  Some time within the past 10 or 20 years, it became less about becoming equal than it did with being able to stick it to the people that stuck it to you.  More and more you see minorities with new found media generated power and confidence seeking to harm someone they think doesn’t like them.  Why do they think they are not liked?  Usually NOT because someone actually did something to them.  No, they are told on the nightly news in obvious and not so obvious ways.  The news fuels their anger and outrage by repeating the same stories over again and tagging the events with polarizing headlines.  ‘Black man killed by police.’  Why do we care if he was black?  If it was unjust, then shouldn’t we care that ANYONE was unjustly treated by the police?  ‘Gay couple refused service by Bakery.’  People get refused service every day and why would you want ANY food to be prepared for you by someone that just said they didn’t agree with your lifestyle?(hint: Ex-Lax is chocolate flavored, or the chocolate cream pie in the movie ‘The Help’).  ‘Jury acquits White police officers in Rodney King beating.’  what does white have to do with it really?  Isn’t it heinous when any cop beats a man mercilessly?

There is a growing movement in this country to dismiss antisocial behavior in any minority that is directed at any majority(read white, straight).  It is dismissed due to many reasons.  Institutional racism.  Institutional sexism.  Institutional homophobia.  Institutional Islamaphobia.  Where is this institution where this hatred is taught?  I was not raised that way and I believe the majority of people in this country–white, black, gay, hispanic, straight–were not raised that way either.  They would never condone it and most have never engaged in any type of hateful behavior.  What the majority in this country has engaged in is apathetically standing by while bad behavior was excused due to some perceived slight committed by society in general.  We have sat by and watched while more and more behaviors are excused because we did not want to be labelled ‘racist’ ‘sexist’ ‘homophobe’ or whatever bigoted moniker someone chooses to assign to you if you don’t excuse the bad behavior of a minority.

Now, Donald Trump comes along and says whatever he wants to because he can.  Nobody will fire him for this and the more the press reports his outrageous behavior, the more everyday Americans say ‘Finally, someone who is not afraid.’ A white man is not afraid.  Has he done anything racist?  Maybe, but you have got to believe that he did not become a successful businessman by being intentionally racist.  He would have been marginalized by customers, clients, the media.  But we heard not one word about his supposed racism until he ran for President.  Dontcha think if one of the richest people in the world was openly racist, it would have been noticed by now?  And has anyone come forward to say, “Mr Trump found out I was a Mexican and he never gave me raises like the whites I worked with and made me do all the menial and demeaning tasks.’ ? Of course not.  Trump cannot really afford to be a racist.  He’s a businessman and racism is bad business.  The almighty Dollar affords everyone the ultimate equality.  A dollar doesn’t care if a black hand or a white hand or a gay hand clutches it….it is worth the same at QT for all of them.

But I digress.  Racism these days has been the battle cry for a multitude of bad behavior.  Ferguson Missouri was burned and looted in the name of protest of racism.  The media loved it and fueled it.  Then they get to report the violence they helped create–great ratings!!!  They didn’t bother to report the real facts of the case when they became known–that Michael Brown did not have his hands up and that he had already beaten a much smaller policeman by the time he was shot.  He was not an innocent man–he had just robbed a convenience store.  But that’s not news.  He cannot be a hero if they report the truth, the story becomes less dramatic.  He becomes just what he was–another criminal hiding behind his race.  Who suffered in this case?  Well, the police officer, who worked every day in the community to protect the very people who turned on him, left his job, got death threats and was beaten badly by the man he shot.  Notice I said the man he shot.  I didn’t use a color prefix because it doesn’t matter.  If he was white, he would still be a criminal and would still have deserved to be shot.

The good people–black, white, gay, straight, hispanic, Islamic–of this country need to send the message to the media that this needs to stop before a lot of people get hurt.  The anger boiling up from both sides is ripe to explode and it won’t be pretty and the minorities will not win because they are outnumbered.  It is right to want and expect equality.  Everybody claims that this is the agenda.  But when a group called Black Lives Matter gets mad when someone says all lives matter, you see how bad it has become.  They got pissed because someone stole their thunder.  Someone undermined their whining.  They took attention away from them by being fair. If all lives matter, then that group is no longer a focal point for the angry people.  All lives do matter.  All lives should matter.   We should all care when anyone is discriminated against.  When people are discriminated against because of race, religion, sexual preference, we all lose.  Potentially wonderful people may be denied something that they could use to make society better as a whole. I despise racism, sexism, homophobia.  From ANYONE. This means that if a black person hides behind his or her race to explain bad behavior, I am going to despise them.  Not because they are black, but because they refuse to take responsibility for their bad behavior.

I grew up in the North, around zero black people.  I moved to Atlanta and I am surrounded and frequently outnumbered by black people. You know what?  The majority of black people I have dealt with personally–as friends, employees, professors, colleagues, etc-have been decent, hard working people.  Same with gays and hispanics.  I don’t personally know any muslims, but people are basically all the same and good and bad behavior exists in all communities.  I know people(white people) who are afraid to go to certain areas of Atlanta because they feel like they are at risk.  Guess what?  They are right.  Those areas of Atlanta are not safe for anyone, but more so for a white person who stands out.  This is the complete opposite of the South 75 years ago.  Is this really what Martin Luther King fought for?  Did he really fight for the day when black people could behave just exactly like the Klan that terrorized them?  I don’t think so.  Does Louis Farrakhan fight for equality?  No, he is a blatantly hateful, racist person.  Why doesn’t the news media call him out for what he is?  They are afraid of being labelled racist for calling a racist a racist.  So how crazy is that?  He doesn’t want peace.  He thrives on anger and outrage against another race of people….sound familiar?  If it’s unacceptable for white people to act that way, it’s unacceptable for black people to act that way also.  It is wrong.  Hatred is wrong and not ever at the root of any really meaningful movement.  Farrakhan does not want equality for blacks, he wants revenge.  I am sure he has reasons for it.  I am sure he stokes his hatred daily to keep the fire hot so he can pass it on.  When will he be happy?  A person like that can never be happy.  Even if every white person was wiped from the face of the earth, he would not be happy.  He would still blame all of his failures on someone else.

So, what do we do?  We stop being politically correct for one.  We tell it like it is.  We don’t use racial slurs, even when they are about our own race.  We don’t treat people differently because of their minority status.  This means we don’t discriminate against them and we don’t discriminate for them either.  Discrimination breeds the kind of hatred that lives in Farrakhan.  That hatred did not live in Martin Luther King.  I feel certain he faced just as much racism as any black in the South during the 50s and 60s and yet he fought for equality and wanted all of our children to play together.  For the most part, our children do play together–peacefully.  Children do not have the capacity to discriminate based on unimportant things like color or sexual preference.  They discriminate based on bad behavior and they discriminate based on what they perceive their parents want.  If someone treats them bad, they remember and pull away from that person.  If we label that person–any label other than person–this plants the seed of future bigotry.  More and more we are seeing black people segregate themselves and then not allow whites in.  Martin is rolling over in his grave.  He fought for integration and his grandchildren’s peers are seeking to be what he fought against.

Please people, lets get smarter before it’s too late.  Let’s start treating everybody how they deserve to be retreated.  Let’s admit that everyone has the potential to be good or bad and that there are no free passes for your minority status.  Lets set the standards of behavior high and make sure our children know that it’s wrong to treat ANYONE  in a bad way because of what they are instead of who they are.  This country is an amazing place.  It really is the land of opportunity for everyone who wants to try.  Let’s finally let the past go.  We can never go backward and undo what’s been done.  We need to learn from the mistakes of the past and not repeat them in reverse.  We all have the power to act this way, but more importantly, we need to call out EVERY person who discriminates against anyone, regardless of what their personal minority status is.  Bad behavior is not racist–it’s exists in every group and doesn’t care what you are.

So, to answer the headline, which I am sure a lot of people clicked on because it’s intriguing…..When is Racism Acceptable?  NEVER EVER EVER EVER EVER.  Did you get that?  Racism is wrong, no matter what you are or how many times you were the victim of it.  I have always wondered why some people, when abused or misused, go on to commit the same affront to someone else….the ‘shit rolls downhill’ phenomenon.  Don’t you remember how it made you feel?  Why would you want to do that to someone else?

This is the slogan a lot of Bernie Sanders supporters are using.  I have to wonder who came up with it.  Although the supporters think it’s really catchy, I hate to tell them it can easily be turned into slogans for the opposition.  How about ‘Feeling the Bern: How Socialism will vaporize your property rights.’  This is an example of exactly how much tunnel vision Bernie supporters have.  They believe so much in their candidate that they cannot conceive of why anyone would disagree with them.  This will likely be their downfall.  Only by understanding your enemies can you hope to defeat them.

Sanders supporters love Bernie for the same reason that Obama supporters loved him in 2008.  They see him as a Savior.  A deliverer of free school, free medical care, free, free, free.  Many of them have yet to experience the agony of a higher tax bracket and how that mutates their paycheck from a nice fat sum to a pile of pennies.  They all aspire to get there.  I doubt that many of them truly want to be socialists.  Socialism is all about sacrificing for the good of all, at the expense of many.  Does anyone really believe that these self centered young people want to give away what they have to make life better for others?  Of course not.  They want others to give in order that they may get more, but I feel certain that they would balk in mass at the idea of them giving away to others.

For example, truly poor people still don’t have their own cell phones in some places…..THE HORROR!!!!  I suggest, that in order to equalize cell phone access that all the IPhone owners be charged double for their phones to make sure everyone has access to the latest, greatest phone to take selfies with.  I mean, there are even people out there suffering through the degradation of owning a flip phone.  They need to be saved.  It’s inhuman to expect anyone to live without a good phone these days.  Do you suppose that, if I circulated this on college campuses, I would get support for it?  I doubt it.

When you show how socialist ideas will impact individuals, they rarely jump for joy and say ‘I would gladly give all that I have to make things better for everyone.’  That’s a very naive notion about people and not even a 5 year old is usually willing to give up what they have to equalize things for others.  So, Bernie, a master manipulator, has invented a villain to be targeted.  Those evil rich people…..that 1% of the population that has the nerve to have a lot of money.  Why, if we could just take all their money, we could get whatever we want.  They have more than enough money to pay for free college for everyone who wants it, healthcare for anyone that wants it, for heavens sake, free IPhones for all as well.

The problem is that the math just doesn’t work.  In order to fund all these ‘free’ things, middle class people will have to anty up much more than they are already being bilked for and turn it over to a government that is notoriously horrible at managing anything.  The government will make absolutely certain that this money is distributed in a fair manner and everyone will have whatever they want…HOORAY!!!!!  Bernie has already said that he will definitely raise taxes.  To the millenials still in college, this doesn’t mean much.  Most of them have no clue what most adults pay in taxes every year.  It’s one of those cold realities that slap you in the face once you have your diploma and your first job out of college.  You take that job offer—$80,000 a year!!!  Hot Damn.  Comes to about $1,500+ a week.  Well who couldn’t live on that?  So you diligently start your job, enthusiastically expecting that $1,500 check and planning what all you will do with it.  Then you get the paycheck…open the envelope….’Hey, what happened to my $1,500?’  It was stripped by taxes down to about $1,000 a week.  Well, still pretty good money right?  Hold on.  Rent is $1,000/month, student loans are $1,000/month.  Car payment $500/month–had to get something nice and new since you are a professional adult now…are you keeping track?  That $6000/month paycheck is now down to $1,500/month.  Out of that you buy food, medical care, gas, utilities, etc, etc.  Ah, reality.  You really could use some of that $2,000 a month they government took from you.  And guess what they do with that money?  They allocate a large amount of it for people that don’t work or that try to raise 5 kids when they don’t have resources for one.  You pick up the slack.

You cannot tell the young ens this, however.  They think they are different.  They would gladly give up more money, because of all the ‘free’ things they get.  Now they are starting to realize that ‘free’ means that a taxpayer funded it.  Now they are the taxpayers, not the ones getting the freebies.  How long do you think they will feel the Bern from that?

The title of this post is also a lyric from a song performed by REM.  They were terribly offended that Donald Trump used it for one of his rallies.  Perhaps they will also be pissed that I used it to title a post.  Well, since I can’t play music on this post(probably could but I don’t have the talent to do it), I hope they won’t be too offended.

What does the title imply?  Well it implies that the world, or at least our country, is turning into something unrecognizable to many people my age.  My age is over 18 and less than 65–what employers are allowed to ask prospective employees.  I’ll give you a hint, I remember hearing about Watergate on the radio.  Interpret that as you may.  Things that were taught to me ask a child and a young woman seem to have less importance to people.  I get that things change and evolve over time under the influence of advances in technology, medicine, communication, etc.  I am not worried about those changes.  The changes that are frightening are the attitudes towards work, how we treat others and our own personal responsibility.

When I was growing up, I couldn’t wait to get a job and earn my ‘own money.’  My first job paid a whopping $1/hr and had no benefits.  There were no mandated lunch breaks, no rules about who could be hired or fired, no taxes taken out, just a job for what I felt was a fortune.  I worked hard all summer, sometimes 14 hours a day.  Of course ‘work’ was sitting on the back of a horse and guiding people around wooded trails.  I saved all the money I made and had enough to buy new clothes for school that fall.  We grew up pretty poor.  We never went without food, but it was a struggle for my mother to buy us new clothes every year.  Buying my own clothes took a big load off her.  I was proud of those clothes.  I bought them at a discount store, but it didn’t matter.  I bought them myself.  This was to be the first time I experienced the jealousy of someone who didn’t work towards me.  It was my own sister.  She complained to my mother that I got more new school clothes than her.  My mother explained that I paid for all of them.  Didn’t matter, my sister felt that she should always get as much as I got or it ‘wasn’t fair.’

This is a common attitude nowadays. People have made choices that mean they cannot make the type of salary that some other people make.  They perhaps feel trapped in a lower paying job.  They complain about never being able to get ahead.  They say if only they made more, things would be better.  They say that it is criminal that people only get paid a certain amount for basically unskilled labor. What they don’t say is that they want the opportunity to learn more important or valuable skills to earn more.  No, they just want more for the job they already do.  They feel it’s ‘not fair’ that others earn so much and they earn so little.  They complain that they cannot feed their families on such a low salary.  They are jealous and bitter.  They will not expend extra energy going out of their way to get new skills.  They will spend a lot of time and energy complaining–which they call protesting.  Time away from the children they are so desperate to support, time they could be working and making more money or learning new skills.  However, they have time to protest.

Jealousy is poisonous.  It doesn’t help anyone involved, least of all the ones that are jealous.  These people have been convinced that somehow they have been wronged by being forced to work a low paying job.  Nobody tells them that a low paying job, if done very well, can be a stepping stone to a better paying job.  In order to grow beyond that job, they have to perhaps make sacrifices.  Give up time that might be spent doing enjoyable things working more or learning new skills or going to school.  It’s not easy.  Just demanding more pay because they are having trouble making ends meet is not productive at all.  What got them in a situation where the only job they can get is minimum wage when they have child?  When I was younger, I made just as little on a proportional basis compared to someone in my position now.  I didn’t sit around whining that I didn’t make as much money as my boss.  I got up off my ass and went back to school, while I still worked.  It took another 9 years of working at lower paying jobs, but now I have a higher paying job.

You also have to have a work ethic and take responsibility for your own life.  If you only work the absolute minimum number of hours possible or put in the minimum amount of effort required at that job, do you really expect to rise to the top?  Young people these days do.  They have been coached to believe there should be no winners or losers, just participants.  This is not reality.  There are winners in life–they are the ones who find out what it takes to get what they want and then implement it.  They also accept responsibility for what doesn’t go right.  They don’t try to blame mishaps and setbacks on other people.  Are some bad situations caused by other people?  Absolutely.  Can you overcome these occurrences in the country?  Absolutely.  To be successful you have to be just as good at failing as you are at succeeding.  Admit the mistakes that caused your failures and don’t ever repeat them.  Don’t whine about the mistakes and say that they were beyond your control.  If you really examine your failures, you will find that usually are the main architect of your failure.  Only once you admit this can you learn the important lessons from the misstep.  You learn so much more from failures than you do from winning.  I promise you that.

Is the world as we know it really over?  I have to be hopeful.  I do know a few young people who are on fire about what they do and are willing to do whatever is necessary to get where they are going.  They don’t complain about being poor or tired or not having what everyone else has.  They look at what they want.  They determine what they need to get there.  Then they go for it.  They cannot help but succeed, even if they never reach their ultimate goal.  The journey is half the battle.  When you are busy working towards a lofty goal, you forget about what others have or don’t have.  You just focus on what you need to do.  That kind of attitude made this country great.  The attitude that, in this country, anything is really possible for anyone.  I still believe that, even now.  I have to.  For those young people who think income equality and socialism is a great idea, they need to understand that in 25 years they will be the ones supporting the young and dumb and they won’t like it any more than I do.

This is what the liberals most want to do.  They claim to have safety of the populace in mind, but most don’t even understand what they are asking for.  They want to limit the access Legal gun owners with carry permits have to anywhere they are.  I have had one person tell me she would not feel safe if I showed up with a gun.  I am not a convicted felon.  My most horrific crime to date is speeding…..lock my ass up quick!!!  I tried to reason with this person, but she has been convinced that my gun would jump up out of my purse and shoot her without warning.  I find it perplexing.  Have liberals all been exposed to the same autonomous guns?  I have never encountered these guns that shoot without warning or provocation.

The fact is that most legal gun owners, especially those that have gone to the trouble to apply for a carry permit, are the most responsible people you will meet.  They are not Bubbas running around in Appalachia firing at anything that moves.  They have been vetted by the local police department.  They are most certainly not felons.  Most are also fairly well trained in the use of their guns.  They understand when to use it.  They understand that it is a right that can be taken away if they abuse the use of it.  They understand it is deadly and respect this.  They don’t play with their guns.  What most liberals don’t understand is that those legal gun owners may just save their life one day.

Case in point.  A liquor store in Georgia was the site of a shooting.  A disgruntled customer who owed money to the owner shot the owner and another customer.  What stopped him from shooting others in the store?  A legal gun owner emptying his gun in the direction of the shooter.  This man undoubtedly saved lives that day.  It was not well covered in the media.  It was a footnote.  Another case in point.  A man went to sell a puppy(yes a puppy) and a gun was held to his friend’s head when they showed the puppy to the potential buyer.  Little did the ‘buyer’ a.k.a. thief know that they friend was a former Marine.  He fixed it so this ‘buyer’ would never attempt to buy something else that way.  This ‘buyer’ had also recently robbed two others at gunpoint.  How long would it have been before the ‘buyer’ killed an innocent person?  A legal gun owner stopped that from happening.

The attitudes in this country are the result of years of preaching by ultra liberals who would love to disarm those of us with sense.  The Second Amendment was designed to protect citizens from tyranny.  Most liberals don’t even know what tyranny means.  They know what Kim Khardashian had for lunch, but they don’t understand the Second Amendment, even as they rail against it.  The framers of the Constitution understood all too well what it was like to be defenseless in the face of a tyrannical government and they wanted to prevent it from ever happening again.  All this talk about whether or not someone would shoot a deer with an AK-47 is moot.  Our guns are to protect us from tyranny.

Most American gun owners are truly peaceful people.  That does not mean they are pushovers.  They don’t wish to be violent to anyone.  At the same time, they want no one to be violent to them.  They want to protect themselves, their loved ones and whatever unarmed liberals they can from becoming the victims of violence.  Violence most commonly takes the form of crime these days, but don’t ever believe that tyrannical government is not possible here.

Think tyranny doesn’t exist here?  Ask Mr Finicum’s family if tyranny is alive and well in this country.  He and his fellow protesters were called domestic terrorists nonstop from the time they occupied and empty building until the time one of them was shot with his hands in the air.  Yes, they showed up with guns.  Did they ever shoot them?  Nope.  Because they are responsible gun owners who only fire when they feel endangered.  Perhaps they should not have assumed the government had no such compunction.  Now they are all being arrested for the crime of disagreeing with the government.  And that is the definition of tyranny my friends.  We should all be watching what happens in these trials.  Of course, they will barely get any air time on the news.  That is also part of tyranny–control of information.  The government has effectively trained the media to report only what they want reported.  Thank God we now have the internet.  And the liberals hate the internet.  They hate an outlet of free speech that opposes them that they have no control over.  They want controls.  They call it hate speech.  Again, who died in Oregon?  A protester was the only person to lose a life.  Nobody else was even injured.  Think about that.  All these heavily armed, dangerous men and not a one of them shot at the authorities.  Kind of pokes holes in that whole domestic terrorist label.

Tyranny does not come from immediate overthrow of a government.  It comes in the form of multiple small erosions of liberty.  First they limit speech, but only speech in opposition.  Speech in favor of tyranny, no matter how hateful, is allowed.  They also wish to limit means to make a living.  They couch it in the form of ‘benefits.’  Benefits are nothing more than crutches they hope to get the populace dependent on.  The more they depend on the government, the less likely they are to oppose it.  It’s the most subversive form of slavery.  Finally, when they wish to gain complete control, they talk about totally removing our ability to protect ourselves.  They will protect us.  They will come to our rescue.  We are to trust that when they destroy our guns, they will step in and provide the protection we got from the guns.  But they can’t and I don’t believe for a minute that this is their goal.  Their goal is a submissive populace.  Once guns are turned in, they can do what they want without fear of retribution.  Think it can’t happen here?  Keep your head in the sand then.  I will keep my gun and protect you.

We hear this all the time now…how life is not fair for this person or that person or this group or that group.  And how is fair defined?  Someone got something the other wanted.  Is it so much that life isn’t fair or that the people complaining are envious?  In this wonderful country, you really can get whatever you want.  All it takes is work.  Are there exceptions?  Sure.  There are instances when someone is truly prevented from doing something because of their race, sex, religion.  These are rare occurrences, however, in this country.  In other parts of the world, people are kept from reaching their true potential all the time.  Why do you think all the world wants to come here?

So, why are there so many citizens here that feel like they cannot make it?  Perhaps they are being taught the wrong lessons in life.  When people are more willing to protest something than they are to work for it, well, what do you expect?  You want $15 an hour working at McDonalds?  Shut your mouth and put down your sign.  Bust your ass and do a spectacular job and you will make $15/hour there–as manager.  But show up late, do a half ass job, provide poor customer service and be generally rude to everyone, well, my dear, you deserve minimum wage because you put in minimum effort.  The media should be reporting about people that have overcome and done something amazing instead of covering the people sitting around complaining that they don’t get paid enough for the crappy job they do.  Was it a secret that no education means crappy salary?  I don’t think so.  Was it a secret that having children changes your life forever and requires a lot of money?  I don’t think so.

Don’t like your lot in life?  Change it.  Don’t expect the world to change for you.  It’s not their fault you dropped out of school and got pregnant or got someone pregnant.   It’s not the world’s fault that you got arrested for drugs 5 times and still haven’t learned.  It’s most certainly not the world’s fault that you spend all your money on an IPhone 6 and couldn’t pay your rent.  Most of the people with money in this country have one thing in common.  They don’t blame other people for what they have or don’t have.  They get up every day and do what needs to be done to have what they want or need.

The newer generations are being taught that hard work is not fair.  Nobody should have to actually break a sweat.  Everyone should share in the prosperity created by the hard working, even if they haven’t done anything.  That is what’s NOT fair.

OOOh, hear the hate mail flying in for the title, but allow me to explain.  First of all, I am a woman.  I am also a business owner.  I am not an ultraconservative fundamentalist Christian or Muslim that thinks women should be relegated to having babies and making their men happy.  Any who know me personally, know that.

I have no children.  It was a conscious decision, made easy by the readily available forms of birth control available to each and every woman in this country.  I could also make this decision because the social atmosphere makes it ‘OK’ to choose this path.  I applaud those who have had children and are raising them.  I am sure the rewards will be far more than anything money can buy.

So, why don’t some women deserve equal pay?  I think we all agree that women want equal pay for equal work.  That’s a given.  Consider this, a woman of child bearing years makes a decision to have a child–and it is a decision.  Birth control and abortion are available to everyone.  Maybe there are some nuts forcing women to have babies, but I am betting you they don’t work.  So, she decides to have a baby.  When she becomes pregnant, her doctor is going to make all sorts of recommendations for her health and the health of the baby.  Depending on the job she has, this can severely limit her activities at work.  She may not be able to lift over 10 lbs, she may have to take frequent breaks to put her feet up.  This does not make her lazy, it’s just what an employer has to work around.  The employer is not permitted to let her go, even though she is not nearly as productive as she once was.  The employer will likely have to spend money to get someone additional to make up her workload.  Once again, fact, not supposition.  The employer also needs to train someone to be ready to take over that job at any time–pregnancy is not always predictable.  Once again, costs the company more money.  When she has the baby, federal mandates allow for up to 6 weeks maternity leave.  Now the company does not have to pay her, but has to pay her replacement, who is probably not as well trained, and thus less productive.  This costs the company money.  Once she returns to work, she has a lot more stress–the baby WILL get sick.  She will want time off to take the baby to the doctor, time off for many things to do with the baby.  This doesn’t make her a bad person, but it does make her a less valuable employee in many situations.  If she has a computer job where she can make up time and still be just as productive, bravo, but that is not how most jobs work.  Most jobs require a physical presence at the workplace.

So, women of child bearing years, who plan to become pregnant are not only not as valuable to a company due to lost time, but cost the company money.  And they are saying they deserve equal pay?  What does that mean, equal pay?  Does it mean the same pay per hour, or the same pay per year?  Obviously, it would be grossly unfair to pay a woman who went through a pregnancy the same yearly salary as a man or woman who did not.  If that is the case, it will breed resentment from both the men and women who have not had children, and rightly so.

Equal pay should always have an asterisk that says for equal work.  Yes, if you work the same as a man, you should be paid the same as a man.  The fact is this, however, many work aged woman are also in their child bearing years and want to have at least one child.  This may make them less valuable to the company.  Is the decision to have a child bad?  Of course not, but it’s not and never should be a decision made without considering the financial ramifications.  Kids are expensive, pregnancy is expensive.  Should those people who decided NOT to have children really be expected to subsidize everyone that wants children?  Of course we already do with WIC and other programs, but now are we to pay them regardless of whether they perform up to the standards of the best employees in the firm?

From personal experience, I know how inconvenient it is to have pregnant people working for me.  In every instance, I hired someone for a job who was not pregnant or who said they weren’t, and they then went on to get pregnant.  I run a very small company.  I cannot afford to hire extra people just to cover for someone else who wants to do something that takes them away from work.  It means less for those employees I have that don’t miss work.  And what about the poor person that gets hired to cover the maternity leave?  Just kick them out when the other says she is ready to come back.  Well that sucks.  Have you ever had to fire someone?  Even if they are bad employees, you still feel bad firing them.

Women need to understand that the choice to have children is a choice.  It will come with a financial cost, one that is probably totally worth the lost money, but at a cost none the less.   Nothing is free, nor should it be.  People need to be responsible and pay for the choices they make.  It may mean you do not make as much as a man, and you may think that is unfair, but really calculate how much you make and factor in any extra time off, benefits paid, etc and see if you aren’t really making as much or more than many men in the workplace.  Pregnancy and child bearing are not constitutional rights, they are life choices.  Plan for it, consider what you will have to sacrifice to have a child.  Having a child comes with sacrifice, as I said before, probably all the sacrifices pay off big time.  Don’t expect the world to make up for your personal sacrifices.  Accept that once you have a child you life has changed.  Also accept the fact that it is usually the woman who bears the brunt of it.  That’s life and life is not always fair.  Just because life isn’t fair doesn’t mean it can’t be good.  If you have everything you need, is it really so important to be paid what someone else is making?  You will drive yourself insane comparing your income to others’ .  There will always be someone out there that makes more, man or woman.

This morning I read some very disturbing tweets from a group purporting the killing of white people by black people.  They suggested that groups of blacks find white people alone and attack them.  They also openly engaged in this type of conversation on a radio blog.  Had this type of talk been broadcast by whites, there would be huge outrage.  Likely arrests for hate speech.

Why are we excusing racism for some individuals?  Clearly saying that white people needed to be killed is racist.  It’s as racist as any Ku Klux Klan speech.  What is wrong with people that they want to kill perfect strangers for the color of their skin?  I think these attitudes have arisen out of the idea that certain groups of people are somehow entitled to reparations for past grievances.  Why should the people alive today, who have done nothing, pay for what happened before they were born?

Yes, horrible things happened to black people.  Nobody disputes that.  NOBODY.   But does this ever justify committing atrocities on others?  If it does, when does the vicious cycle end?  After blacks kill whites for killing blacks, whose to stop the whites from seeking revenge and killing blacks again?  Revenge does nothing but perpetuate hate.  At some point, you have to say the past is the past and stop the hatred.  But hatred is easy.  It’s visceral and sometimes hard to overcome, especially when you feel somehow wronged.  But hasn’t everyone been wronged somehow.  So do we all deserve to exact revenge in like kind?

Heroes have changed as well.  Black heroes used to be Martin Luther King and Harriet Tubman.  Now they are Michael Brown and Trayvon Martin.  Neither of the latter two had any positive influence on society.  I am not saying they were worthless human beings, but since when does dying a violent death make you a hero?  If so, then we should have millions and millions of heroes.  How did these two dubious characters get to be exhalted by other young black people?

It is very frightening for today’s youth to see what they are saying and what they think will help them.  Killing white people for being white won’t help anything.  Blacks are still the minority in this country and will remain that way.  If they randomly start killing white people, it will backfire and in a bad way.  Although they may feel superior in numbers in certain areas, the overwhelming majority in this country are white.  A backlash would be severe and only hurt the black people.  Where are young black leaders telling others to live together and stop holding up criminals as heroes?

I guess the problem is that people young folks look up to these days are not necessarily smart, honest, decent people…they are famous.  They got on TV and thus they are to be looked up to.  Miley Cyrus is no better role model than Michael Brown, but they both get plenty of attention.  Is this truly what has become the most important?  Whoever can say the most shocking, vile thing and become famous?  These blacks calling for killing random white people may be just that, saying ridiculously nasty and heinous things to grab their 15 minutes of fame.  And they broadcast from Texas…..were I them, I would be very careful of white Texans, they mostly carry guns and know how to use them.  If you really want to spew hatred about Whitey, might be better served moving to Detroit or Chicago.

 

An intriguing title for sure, but one worth exploring.  People are continuously accusing others of hatred in various forms–they call it bigotry, racism, homophobia, sexism, whatever.  It boils down to hatred of things not like yourself.  It is driven first and foremost by fear.

It is human nature to distrust and be uncertain about that which appears to be different than oneself.  This is not just human nature, but animal nature….just watch a horse the first time it sees a chicken, or a cat investigating a frog for the first time.  Humans are no different.  We are, after all, animals as well.  When encountered with something totally foreign, we react with suspicion, caution and if something bad occurs during that initial encounter or subsequent encounters, it may develop into a hatred for that which is new or unfamiliar.  For some, this propensity is worse than others.

Some humans envelop themselves in a cocoon of similarity.  They surround themselves with like minded individuals, never trying to understand or accept the other viewpoint.  Ah, yes, liberals are nodding in agreement–white racists, won’t let in blacks or homophobes, refusing to allow homosexuals into the inner circles.  But, I think liberals are just as bad.  They are, after all, human animals just like us.  They crave security and stability, just like conservatives do, they just have a different environment in mind.

I propose that all human animals have something to offer each other unless doing harm to others is their intention.  Having lived around and worked with homosexuals, blacks, mexicans, women, men, I don’t see much difference at all in the basic human emotions.  There are mean spirited, evil and bigoted blacks, just as there are generous, open minded whites.  Women can be just as hard hearted and matter of fact as any man, and many men are so emotional that they are considered ‘effeminate.’ I have seen no white person who fits a mold, any more than I have seen a black person or mexican who fits a mold.  They fit in where they were taught to fit in.

The thing ALL people need to keep in mind is tolerance of the other person’s point of view.  That means, that no matter that you understand or not, if a person’s viewpoint harms no one, you should tolerate it.  Conservatives are not dangerous people going around trying to hurt people.  They simply want fiscal responsibility.  If anything, that will help people, if they will only listen.  Is expecting people to work for what they want racist, sexist, or discriminatory in any way?  The fact that certain groups of people were born into poverty does not mean those groups of people are bad, but in order to pull themselves out, they must work for it or they will fall right back in if the support is suddenly withdrawn for any reason.  Liberals cannot tolerate this point of view.  They think it means that poor people are hated.  They are not hated, they are expected to do what they can to further their own agenda.  They are expected to ‘pull themselves up by their own bootstraps.’  This is not hatred or lack of conscience, it is simply a sense of fairplay.

Should these people need help to attain the goal of working to better themselves, most conservatives will lend a hand or donate money whenever asked.  Conservatives, however, do NOT want to lend any money or hands to people who refuse to better their situation.  They don’t want to throw money at drug addicts and criminals who repeatedly CHOOSE to live in the squalor into which they were born.  In America, and yes this is still very true, you can do whatever you want.  You may have to work harder than someone else.  So what?  I am short, I have to work harder to get cookies off the top shelf.  Should the rest of the world saw three inches off their legs to make me feel better?  It’s my load to bear and it makes up a part of me that is unique.

It is not impossible to succeed if you are black, female, homosexual, mexican, whatever.  It is never impossible to succeed unless you concede.  If you are constantly judging your success against the success of others, you will never be happy.  If you consider a glass ceiling to exist because you didn’t earn as much as someone else, and this eats at you, maybe you should sit back and ask a few questions.  Did you get what you needed?  Did you achieve YOUR goals?  Can you be happy where you are?  If you can answer yes to all these questions, then who gives a rip what someone else has?  Someone is ALWAYS going to have more than you somewhere.  They may be male, white, black, female, hispanic, homosexual, heterosexual.  If you are bitter and jealous about not getting something, you will find someone to blame–and it will be someone different from yourself.

I am NOT saying all people are created equal.  They are most decidedly not, and this is a wonderful thing.  It makes life interesting!!!