"The Free Exchange"
With the whirlwind that is my life, I have not been keeping
up with “The Free Exchange” as I should have been. To make up for it, though, I
plan to address all of the comment left on the blog until I have answered each
and every one. At that point, then I will continue with regular articles.
Conservatism’s strength emanates from its penchant for
robust debate. “The Free Exchange” is a series of articles aimed at
highlighting and broadening the debate at Black and Red. When you comment on
essays you read at this site, I will respond to you via this blog series. If
you wish to send an email for consideration in an upcoming “Free Exchange”
article, please email me at blkandred@gmail.com and write “The Free Exchange”
and the title of the article you are commenting on in the subject heading.
Hopefully, the free exchange of ideas will prove beneficial to readers and
participants. Thank you for reading and thank you so much for commenting.
-J. Hunter
This week, Yukio Ngaby and Sheldon comment on “RepublicansGet Schooled: But What Did We Learn?” BJ weighs in on “Gun-Control Delusions:Why the Newtown Massacre Fails to Ameliorate the National Debate,” and “MyFellow Americans?” Finally, an Anonymous commenter offered thoughts on “OurStolen Generation: Brenda.”
Yukio’s comments are in yellow. BJ’s are in orange.
Anonymous’ are in blue, Sheldon’s are purple and mine are in green.
Yukio Ngaby:
Hard to say what happened. It's so close, I just can't get
rid of a nagging feeling that there's more to this. I can't find what that
"more" was, what that little push was. Maybe we'll know more tomorrow. And remember to look at the popular vote count. That's a good indication on what the next two years are going to be like. And I don't think it's going to be pretty.
Thank you for commenting Yukio. As I’ve written since the
election, I don’t know what happened in November. I’ve heard so many rationales
offered for what went wrong that I don’t know what to believe—none of them seem
to make any sense to me.
The one thing that appears to be undeniable is that
liberalism is on the rise in America. This was the one reality that I feared in
2008 with the Democratic electoral power grab. The Supreme Court is already
more liberal with the addition of Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. I expect another
vacancy in the next 4 years that could result in a very liberal replacement.
Obamacare is here to stay—a reform that further perverts the American character
by telling folks that they are no longer responsible for their individual
health insurance costs. Spending is out of control in Washington, with no sign
of cessation.
It feels like everything is wrong in this country—and the
feeling is widespread. Polls show that Americans are much more pessimistic
about the country, now, than they have been in quite some time.[1]
Furthermore, Republicans (74-24) believe that the country’s best years have
come and gone.[2]
The nation is awash in pessimism and I understand that. I
just don’t understand why we elected the pessimistic choice in November.
Sheldon:
It has been a long time, and for
that, I apologize. However, I knew that after Tuesday night's results I would
find the needed salve here with your blog. It is often hard to know exactly
what the electorate as a whole wants especially when we are left with a
situation as gridlocked as the one with which we are now stuck. I know that the
so-called moderates that tend to be the prize of the day for either party tend
to be less ideological than people with principled disagreements on either
side, so I would like to hope that especially after four more years of
lackluster leadership and economic performance, 2016 (and perhaps the midterms
in 2014) will be a time ripe for the taking...That being said however, with the
ever-increasing percentage of people reliant on the government to solve their
ills, I do worry about what will happen when that number eclipses 50%. I fear
that it is possible that there may be no going back to the days of
self-reliance. Alas, we will have to see, but it is always nice to know that
there are those like yourself who share my beliefs. Thanks for letting me vent
as well as for your wonderful blog!
Thank you for venting here, Sheldon. I’m glad to know you’re
still fighting out there. I wish I could offer something more optimistic, but I
haven’t anything like that to offer. We share the same fears. The election ended
months ago, but I still feel hurt and worried and confused.
I used to believe that America was rugged and that it
rewarded and revered hard work and self reliance. Now, she seems weary—unable
to fight wars, to balance her books, or learn from her mistakes. The Fiscal
Cliff “compromise” taught us that the government will hold the entire nation
hostage just to take a swipe at successful people, regardless of whether doing
so would solve any portion of the economic woes facing the country.
I guess, Sheldon, that the one bit of good news is that if
we continue to support ourselves and our families, we will always be better off
than those who give up and go the easy route. We will be happier. Our lives
will have more meaning. Even more, we will be able to do more for ourselves and
for our families than can the government.
All this will remain true until, as you mentioned, the scale
tips to where 50% of the country is on the dole, and wants to take more from
the other half.
God forbid.
BJ:
I'm grateful for your honest and heartfelt writing. I have
been in a similar place. I simply don't understand what happened. However for
whatever reason, I feel more energized and enthusiastic than ever. I have been
slowly and painfully writing an essay on what exactly happened. Obviously I
don't pretend to know all. But this process has been enlightening. I'll send it
to you whenever I finish it. Until then, it's good to rest and recharge. We're
going to need you more than ever during these difficult times.
BJ, you must know that you have been absolutely instrumental
in keeping me in the game. Every time I think about closing this site and
fading into the masses—watching baseball and turning my attentions to my
immediate personal goals—I think about the many talks we’ve had where you have
convinced me not to go that route.
Sometimes, it’s just useful to have someone with whom to
mourn and emote. I know that I’ll feel better, but I don’t regret feeling
dejected for all this time—too many things are going wrong to feel any other
way.
One thing that gives me hope is comparing this election
defeat to the one in 1964 against Lyndon Johnson. The Republican Party and
conservatism survived after that abysmal cycle, and that was nothing like what
we just came through in November. In other words, as bad as it feels, we’re not
a dead movement, we’re just down and out right now. That perspective is the
only thing sustaining me these days.
As for your findings on what happened in November, I look
forward to reading your thoughts.
BJ:
Amen. Well said and welcome back. I agree that the real
issues are mental health (& growing government to accomodate that) and gun
owners securing their guns. We need greater penalties for people who don't do
this and stricter trainings/laws on this before people can buy guns. Well said.Thank you, BJ!
You’re right—a focus on assisting people with mental health
issues, and finding ways to serve those among us who need mental health
services is a helpful addition to this conversation.
In my view, beyond that, events like this seem to elicit a
laundry list of pet peeves that are offered under the umbrella of stopping
tragedies like this from occurring again. This is not a criticism, I do it too,
but it is exactly what the society needs to avoid. It’s related to the “Do-Something”
disease that urges officials to do something—whether it is useful or not—to deliver
us from bad situations.
What you and I both know is that humanity is fallen. We do
horrible things to each other and we preoccupy ourselves with ways to do even
worse. No government policy can change that without being equally cruel (we can
all be chained to stakes and left in seclusion).
There is room for conversations about how firearms are to be
secured, about the responsibility to report stolen weapons, about the rules of
private firearms sales and other aspects of an individual right to firearms
ownership. What I fear, though, is intervention in an aspect of our freedom that
is gratuitous, or worse, infringing. These interventions are always meant to be
helpful and they always appear right after a tragedy.
My answer is understandably unsatisfying: we mourn the loss
of innocent life. We abhor the perpetrator. We examine what happened, look for
patterns and look into our own tradition, heritage and values for answers—all the
while accepting that the best course forward is to simply shake our heads and
sit on our hands. Anything more can be harmful.
As always, I look forward to your further thoughts.
Anonymous:
come on! - you really think this documentary is a good
argument to be pro- life, if anything I would have wished she could have had
services available to her, lets face it no one with a heart feels good about
having an abortion, but she wasn't healthy enough to give any quality of life
for a child, and if you paid attention, the documentary does not suggest that
she is neccessarily uneducated, but actually suggests her family has some
money- "we are not asking my mother for money Boo Boo" or something
like that I believe was what she said, and then she ended up almost going to go
have one of those horrible partial birth abortions in New York because services
were not made available to her to terminate the pregnancy -earlier on - had she
gone through with that it sounds like something that would fuck her up and
traumatize her more than she already was AND then they recessitate the poor
baby to a life that sounds horrible- and I personnaly think her and boo boo
were addicted to drugs with or without each other i wouldnt blame him for her
addiction or her for his addiction- i stumbled across this site cuz i was
actually hoping maybe they both got their shit together and the kid ws alive
and well somewhere cuz although i may not be a radical prolifer I just try to
use common sense, harm reduction and look at the individual situaition, -but I
digress, as I was saying I stumled across this site looking for info on what
happened to these people after the documentary and could immediately tell I had
stumbled onto some sort of prolife conservative website that was taking this
documentary and using it out of context to further their own positions with
politics. I would also like to say that I am not a fan of abortion but more see
it sometimes as the lesser of two evils no one ever thinks that getting an
abortion is a cool thing to do unless they are sick in the head- I also thought
it was about time someone came forward about going through all the shit that
Brenda went through in the documentary -i mean came out in the open and didnt
try to hide it under the rug so to speak- i think she really did a service
bringing a lot of societal issues to the surface, I just thought I would add
that I do not think she sounds unneducated or stupid - she sounds down and out
- and i really felt bad for boo boo too when i watched him looking all over the
place for her- but dont assume because you make an ass out of you and me- i also believe that the soul leaves the body of the fetus and moves to a new body in a new womb one that is ready to incarnate for whatever bigger reason the universe may have i dont have all the answers
good night
Thank you for commenting Anonymous.
You’ve provided a lot for me to talk about so I will do my
best to address each of the issues you raised.
First, “High on Crack Street” is not a pro-life movie, per
se. The only point I wanted to make about the film is that I was struck by how the
logic of the pro-life argument is so visceral that it could grasp and motivate even
someone who spent much of her life destroying her brain and her human spirit.
Furthermore, I would like to completely disagree with you that only the
heartless feel good about abortions. I’ve had professors and met people who
argue that an abortion should be a complete nonevent. They even argue that the
only reason people feel bad about aborting a child is societal pressure that
should not exist. I would not call them heartless, but they’re missing a
different vital part of their body, located atop the central nervous system.
Second, Brenda is doubtlessly uneducated. However, I think that
her lacking further emphasizes how pro-choice proponents must tie themselves
into knots to teach people how to unlearn what comes naturally to her and to
each of us. Nor am I convinced that she comes from money. She lives in Lowell,
which is a forgotten industrial town. Assuming, as you did, that because she
could ask her mother for abortion money, that she comes from money, makes no
sense to me. Abortions are surprisingly cheap. Moreover, she may have been
reticent to ask her mother for money because she didn’t want to deal with any
more shame. There are many reasons why that line may have been spoken.
Surmising that it reveals that she comes from money is nonsensical.
Third, I disagree that this documentary illustrates a need
for more access to first or second trimester abortions. I am against abortion in
nearly all instances: rape, incest and when the mother’s life is at risk are
the general exceptions. That one will be born into a bad circumstance is not justification
to kill him—even if one believes, arbitrarily as you do, that the fetus’ soul
will effortlessly enter into some other body. The implication of the view you’ve
promoted makes all murder victimless and tragic deaths less tragic. I don’t buy
it.
Finally, though we disagree (rather, because we disagree), I’m glad that you’ve found this site. I hope
you return and continue to engage with me and with the other readers who
frequent Black and Red. I’m glad that you could tell immediately that you
stumbled across a conservative pro-life website.
No comments:
Post a Comment