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One remarkable outcome of the madness of the last three years is that the authoritarianism and insane policies have brought a number of us to each others' attention who would not have otherwise known how to find one another. Given that "liberal" and "racist" and "fascist" are all words that increasingly mean the opposite of what they used to--why not "bad guys" too?
One remarkable outcome of the madness of the last three years is that the authoritarianism and insane policies have brought a number of us to each others' attention who would not have otherwise known how to find one another. Given that "liberal" and "racist" and "fascist" are all words that increasingly mean the opposite of what they used to--why not "bad guys" too?
The same goes for the label 'disinformation spreaders'. We may want to consider wearing it as a badge of honour !
My husband thinks that because I am not in lockstep with everything GOP, I’m not real conservative. The labels and groups do indeed need to go away. They describe nothing identifiable. If there was a way to have double-blind publications, and have the audience decide on the contents and merit, we might wend our way. Thank you is so insufficient when referencing the way you have navigates the past three years. I “got it” immediately when you went through the events at Evergreen, and thought, “I need to hear from these people”.
As a conservative, I find the GOP's apparent willingness to be "the respectful opposition" in perpetuity rather distasteful. I don't lionize Trump, despite voting for him twice, but the "never Trumpers" did all conservatives a disservice IMO.
Knee-jerk governing or thinking does us all a disservice. I’ll always vote Republican, because I am a conservative. Yesterday on “The Five”, Harold Ford, Jr., hit the nail on the head, and affirms my conservative position. He said, “Until the GOP gets on the right side of the abortion issue they have no chance.” I’ll never put a check to vote for a pro-choice candidate, regardless of other positions. His mind will never be changed, as will not the other pro-choice minds. I shared my opinion that the GOP will lose because the numbers don’t seem to be there.
The language tricks are nothing new. Here’s Orwell himself, excerpt from Essays:
“The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies "something not desirable"...In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using the word if it were tied down to any one meaning.”
That's how a new culture will rise from the ashes, when we recognize the epithets as chevrons and wear the experience as armour.