Politics Plus

No April Foolin’ here.

Whenever there is a national election, there are always people who say “If so-and-so is elected, I’m getting outta the country!” Yeah, right. I doubt that even one in a thousand of those who talk that talk actually walk even a few steps of the walk.

After Trump won several state primaries, a website on how to move to Canada received so many hits that its servers crashed. Even so, there was no mass exodus across the border in 2017.

In last week’s essay I discussed what we should do if a fascist or extremely religious government does take over the U.S. For some people, fleeing the country may be their best bet. However, unless you do face violent persecution, staying here so you can fight back may be a better option. Emigration should be a last resort. Some of this essay will be redundant, but this essay grew out of the previous one, and some of the points I made previously bear repeating.

Moving to Canada entails a lot more than piling your lares and penates, the cat, and Junior’s Pokemon card collection into the SUV and heading north. Visit any website about how to emigrate to Canada – or another country – and you will see it’s rather complicated.

Even if you get accepted as an immigrant, or a refugee, settling in a foreign country can be expensive.You will have to move a lot of your personal belongings, which could cost thousands of dollars. You will have to find a new place to live and a new job. You probably will have to get a sponsor. You may have to learn a new language, and you certainly will have to learn a new culture. Finally, if you decide to renounce your US citizenship, that will be another big expense.

Besides, if your country is going in the wrong direction, it’s often better to stay and resist. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: Contact your elected officials, sign petitions, take part in peaceful demonstrations, attend phone and text banks and postcard-writing parties, and above all, do your homework on those running for office, and VOTE!

Of course, if a real bugnut extremist does get in the White House, and Congress is overrun by right-wing wack jobs, certain people in this country will face persecution and arrest. Non-binary people, anybody who stands up for real science, anybody who is of the “wrong” race or ethnicity or creed, known activists who support certain causes, and many others will risk the ol’ midnight knock on the front door. The urge to flee will be very strong for them if they feel that they have no support network here, or a thin one that cannot accord sufficient protection.

Indeed, for some people emigration may actually make sense. One need but consider the fate of Jews who found themselves at the mercy of the merciless Nazi regime. In some countries today, many people face persecution and even death due to their ethnicity, creed, gender identity or sexual orientation. Even today, in the United States, non-binary people are regularly and often ruthlessly harassed and bullied, and numerous atheists feel as though they must keep quiet about their non-faith lest they face discrimination.

To stay, or not to stay – that is the question. You will have to play this by ear so you can decide whether it is (more or less) safe to stay, or if you really need to bug out. If you are a member of a group that is likely to face violent persecution, you may want to start doing your homework now. Also, you will have to consider the expenses and other problems that emigration entails. How much can you take with you? How will you find work and make friends in your new country? Will you have to learn a new language? Can you get to your destination by car, or will you have to take a plane or ship? Which of your possessions can you sell or donate in order to reduce the burden? Do you have kith or kin in another country, who can sponsor you or at least provide a place to stay? Are you a member of an international group that can assist its members when they move?

One of the numerous catch phrases that has been circulating during the past few years is “cancel culture.” As you have probably heard, the long-running and much-loved comic Dilbert has been removed from hundreds of newspapers since Scott Adams made blatantly racist comments in a YouTube video. While many cheer the decision to make Dilbert clear out his desk and scram, others bemoan what is perceived as an assault on freedom of speech.

Freedom of expression is important and precious, but 1) it is not an absolute, and 2) free speech – or any other kind of freedom – does not mean freedom from consequences. You make racist comments, you’re going to be pilloried. And it serves you right.

Conservatives have been howling about “cancel culture” for years. Yet who are the ones biggest on practicing it? Conservatives! Look at Governor DeSantis’ decision to reject a supplementary high school course in African-American studies. He has also banned “woke” textbooks, as well as numerous volumes from Florida school libraries. Teachers and librarians face serious repercussions if they do not remove certain books from their shelves.

For decades, conservatives and right-wingers have been censoring information and culture. Why? They snarl that the books they ban – or try to – have “objectionable material” in them. What sort of objections material? Harsh language, sex, violence, drug use, depictions of non-binary characters. OK, I can understand making sure that kindergartners aren’t exposed to 50 Shades of Grey; but when the right lose their sh*t over And Tango Makes Three, they make themselves look foolish. Are they afraid that reading a book about two male penguins who raise a chick will turn all straight kids non-binary? Children who are gay, lesbian, bisexual, etc. read hundreds of books that feature straight characters, but they still don’t become cisgender.

Right-wingers have their own razor-narrow view on How The World Should Be, and the least deviation from this is unacceptable. They don’t want the minds of children to be stretched and broadened by certain ideas, or to think that anybody other than cisgender, white, fundamentalist Christian males can be heroic and/or large and in charge. They want women and people of color to be quiet and submissive, to remain in the background or serve as eye candy, while non-binary people stay closeted and non-Christians remain quiet. They want the Old Guard of white male Christian wealth to stay in power forever. They simply cannot stand social and moral progress, or stomach the idea of people who are different from them having the same rights and social status.

Not only that, the far right is anti-science. They are the ones who spread the rubbish that vaccines cause autism, COVID-19 is a hoax, Barack Obama is Kenyan, masks infringe on our rights, evolution is fiction, and Earth is no more than 12,000 years old. They refuse to accept scientific truths that contradict the Old Testament; many sincerely believe that the Second Coming and the end of the world are just around the corner – something nut jobs have been preaching for centuries.

In the old days, inquisitions cracked down on dissent, warning people to abandon heretical beliefs or face the rack and the stake. They were the OG cancel culture, squelching free thought in order to keep the sheep in line. Those in power needed to maintain control, and there was no better way than to threaten anybody who got out of line with eternal torment.

Today, people are free to believe as they will; the plethora of information available to the general public makes it easier for people to learn about science and garner overwhelming evidence, even proof, that the scientists are telling the truth. The Internet makes finding out about things a lot easier, though it also makes disseminating propaganda and misinformation easier as well.

To conserve means to keep things the same. A society cannot survive if it stays exactly the same year in and year out. A healthy society changes and progresses over time as people get new ideas and realize that some systems and ways of doing things don’t work. Social and moral progress are just as vital as scientific and technological progress – in fact, they are more vital because we need strong ethics and morals to handle the perils and promises of more knowledge and better technology. A stagnant civilization is a doomed civilization.

Yes, cancel culture on the Left may go overboard; but when those on the Right yowl about “cancelling,” the pot calls the kettle black.

So-called pro-lifers and their gilded male bovine solid bodily waste ejecta. They may be sincere in their defense of embryos and fetuses, but evidently they think life begins at conception and ends at birth. Actions speak far more loudly than words.

“Don’t abort your baby because he/she may grow up to find a cure for some dread malady.” Nice try. Where is your concern for children who have already been born? Where is your protection for them?

The middle-school boy who came out as gay and then was ruthlessly and continuously bullied by his peers until he took his own life could have grown up to find a cure for some dread malady.

The girl who was so badly mutilated in a school shooting that her body had to be identified using DNA could have grown up to find a cure for some dread malady.

The kid who froze to death after a heartless governor did nothing to improve his state’s infrastructure could have grown up the find a cure for some dread malady.

The diabetic teenager who died because her family couldn’t afford her insulin could have grown up to find a cure for some dread malady.

The compulsory birth crowd shriek that we must protect every embryo and fetus because you never know which one will become the next Lincoln or Mozart or Einstein. Nice try – you also never know which one will become the next Charles Manson, or Ted Bundy, or Jeffrey Dahmer, or John Wayne Gacy. Or, for that matter, the next Hitler, or Stalin, or Idi Amin, or Pol Pot. Or the next Donald Trump. Howling that an aborted fetus could have become a President is an excellent example of reductio ad absurdum.

How come “pro-lifers” never seem to be around when activists stage protests against gun violence, war, poverty, environmental destruction, or corporate greed? To those of you who wave signs that say “Abortion kills children,” I say, “Guns kill children. Poverty kills children. Hunger kills children. War kills children. Lack of affordable health care kills children. Abuse and neglect kill children. Pollution kills children. Homelessness kills children. Indifference kills children.”

If you “pro-lifers” really give a rat’s behind about babies, how come you support politicians who suck up to the firearms industry and its powerful stooge the NRA? How come you support politicians who cater to defense contractors? How come you support politicians who oppose raising the minimum wage to a living wage? How come you support politicians who oppose taking measures to deal with the inevitable effects of climate change? How come you support politicians who want to eliminate Social Security and Medicaid? How come you approve of yanking immigrant children out of their mothers’ arms and locking them in cages like stray animals? How come you heed garbage about the COVID-19 pandemic and refuse to wear masks or get vaccinated?

Meanwhile, the people whom you brand “commie baby killers” are the ones volunteering at food banks, distributing socks and hygiene supplies to the homeless, writing and signing petitions calling for better wages and environmental protections, raising hell for affordable child care and housing and healthcare, pestering our elected officials for sensible gun laws, demanding that our government wean us off dirty fossil fuels, and supporting immigrants, the LGBTQ community, and other groups frequently subjected to persecution.

Maybe some of you forced-birth activists support one or more of those causes. I realize that I shouldn’t tar you all with the same brush, but your numbers appear to be lacking when it comes to supporting the post-born. How often do you actually turn up – once or twice a year? And are you really doing enough volunteering to help all the people you will impose on the world?

Besides, the compulsory birth crowd support life in prison, and in some cases the death penalty, for doctors who perform abortions and women who have them. Know who else supported such harsh penalties for abortions? The patron saint of the “pro-life” movement – Adolf Hitler. Yes, that personification of evil was the greatest “right-to-life” activist in history. In the nightmare that was Nazi Germany, abortion was totally outlawed. Doctors found guilty of doing abortions were sentenced to death, while women who had abortions were sentenced to 10 years of hard labor, which was pretty much tantamount to a death sentence there and then.

Some have even offered to adopt babies. OK, sweetie, what if the baby is born with severe birth defects? What if the baby needs a lot of special, expensive care just to stay alive? Unless you have really deep pockets and/or good health insurance, you’ll be living in a trailer and subsisting on beans and rice while Junior works at a nearby burger joint.

If you really were concerned about “family values,” you’d want the minimum wage to be a living wage. You’d want childcare to be affordable – right now it costs as much as college. Nowhere in this country is the current federal minimum wage enough to keep up with rent, let alone utilities and other expenses. Stop demanding that women have babies when they can barely keep their own mouths fed.

You say that sex has consequences, that abortion is dodging responsibility. How quickly you forget the children you profess to be protecting! You want the woman to be saddled with caring for a baby, but you never think for one moment about that kid’s life. You fill your fliers and ads with pictures of cute babies – which are white 99% of the time, and healthy and well-fed 100% of the time. But you never think about what happens AFTER birth. You never think about whether all those children you “rescue” will be fed, or clothed, or housed, or educated. You never think about whether they will have access to affordable health care, or higher education – provided they live that long. And you certainly don’t care whether they are reasonably safe in school, or anywhere else.

And what about the men? It takes two to tango, after all. A man’s contribution to a baby is basically wham, bam, thank you ma’am. Many a lass has been lured into some Lothario’s bed by the ancient lie “If you get pregnant, I’ll marry you and help support the kid.” That’s right down there with “His bark is worse than his bite” and “The check is in the mail.” Men get all the rights, women get all the responsibility. You impose all of the consequence on the one who gets the “baby bump” while the male gets away scot-free. Face it – the anti-abortion movement is all about controlling womb-bearers.

As a society we cuss too much.

I am not squeamish about profanity – I can curse like a wounded Marine when the spirit moves me. However, when we use “four-letter” words at the least provocation, we do our language a disfavor.

When you first encounter spicy food, it’s quite a shock. The first time you try the El Diablo sauce, your mouth feels like a set for The Towering Inferno. A couple more times, and you have adjusted. However, if you use the hottest sauce too much, soon your taste buds become dulled, and you have to use hotter-than-hot sauce to taste anything.

So it is with profanity. The occasional f-bomb and s-bomb and other bombs are fine. If you use them only now and then, they can definitely liven up a conversation. However, when every third or fourth word out of your mouth is one that you wouldn’t learn on Sesame Street, soon the bleepable words lose their oomph. One or two oaths here and there are fine, but too many and they become bland.

Probably every language has its no-no words. They have a purpose, namely, to help blow off steam. Scientific studies have shown that swearing can actually help ease pain. That is why you cut loose with some PG or PG-13 rated language when you stub your toe or hammer your thumb. And that is all the more reason to cut back on your use of oaths – so that when you need them, they will be at full strength.

A long-ago co-worker told me that his mother, while she was in grade school, hear about a classmate getting her mouth washed out with soap because she said “fart.” William Shatner shocked a lot of people when he said “Let’s get the hell out of here!” in the Star Trek episode “City on the Edge of Forever.” Back in the day, even mild profanity prompted strong reactions.

Kids these days are exposed to vulgarities right, left and center. As a result, they become potty-mouths before their ages are in double-digits. Kids think swearing is funny as all-get-out, so they will cuss all over the place.

Mark Twain wrote, “Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer.” However, overuse of dirty words takes away from their power. Ergo, use your strong language sparingly. Please keep oaths off protest signs – what’s wrong with one or two letters and a string of grawlixes? If we want profane language to provide relief and ease pain, we need to use naughty words less and family-friendly substitutes more; then we can save the “bombs” for when they are truly needed.