Honestly thinking (& rethinking) about God, the universe, and everything in between

Tag: protests

They!

We hear it continually.

It pervades the social atmosphere.

Seeping in like an odorless gas, it invades every crevice.

Its toxicity eats away at our collective conscience.

And Its destructive symptoms cause us to spew more bile substance – its contagiousness spreading like a plague from one victim to the next.

None of us are asymptomatic, because if you listen closely, you’ll see it on social media, in headlines and articles, on news sites, on college campuses, in office hallways, in churches, mosques and synagogues, at dinner table conversations, during protest marches, and in just plain everyday speech.

An insidious use of a word – with a mortality rate that threatens to destroy us all.

I’m talking about the use of the word “they.”

It’s not the word itself but the way it’s often used.

It’s what’s at the heart.

A single actor makes an outrageous statement, and immediately it becomes about everyone who works in the entertainment business.

“Those Hollywood Elitists, THEY are trying to destroy America with their radicalized agenda!”

A church leader fails.

“Those Christian hypocrites, THEY are all just charlatans, getting rich off deluding ignorant followers!” Continue reading

Trump, Hiroshima, and the Casualties of Politics

On Aug 6, 1945, a U.S. B-29 plane, under the authorization of President Harry S. Truman, dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, followed by a second one, Aug 9, on the city of Nagasaki. This action was credited with causing the surrender of Japanese forces, effectively ending World War II.

Some estimates place the death toll from the bombings upwards of 100,000 people, mostly civilians (including children). Add in the number of injuries and the numbers rise to over 200,000 casualties.victim_of_hiroshima_atomic_bombing_3

Since then, the bombings have been the subject of great moral debate as to whether such an action was necessary and worth the cost in casualties. Proponents then and now have argued that it avoided a prolonged battle with an enemy committed to fighting “to the bitter end” – which, in turn, would have cost a projected “half a million American lives and many more that number in wounded” as well as an equal number or more of Japanese lives.

In his public address, President Truman stated, ““Having found the bomb we have used it. We have used it against those who attacked us without warning at Pearl Harbor, against those who have starved and beaten and executed American prisoners of war, against those who have abandoned all pretense of obeying international laws of warfare. We have used it in order to shorten the agony of war, in order to save the lives of thousands and thousands of young Americans.”

In addition, many supporters have argued that the brute force of the bomb served as a demonstration to the Soviet Union, consequently keeping them in check for years to comes and saving potentially millions more lives.

Today, a different kind of war is taking place on actual U.S. soil – what has often been called the “culture wars.” Now, while I do not pretend that what is going on here even compares to the tragic loss of lives in physical war, it must be admitted there are still costs.

For politics, like war, is dirty…and people get hurt.

Consequently, amidst all the politicking arose another great moral debate.Faced with the prospects of either selecting a vitriolic person of questionable character to lead the country or continuing to battle against a political enemy whom they saw as destructive to our future, conservatives and many independents were forced to make a difficult choice.trump-vs-clinton

In the end, the majority decided the former was worth the cost.

Thus, on November 8, 2016 a bomb was dropped on half our population…

…a bomb known as President-elect Trump. Continue reading

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