Contradictions

All of the controversy that exists- surrounding religion, politics, science, religion in politics, and science as it applies to religious beliefs- does more than just provide for entertaining and thought provoking dialogue between people who don't have enough else to do with their time (like me).  It also highlights that there is at least one more thing we as Americans can count on besides death and taxes.  We can count on the fact that every single one of us is in some way a walking contradiction.  We all, if we think, hold contradictory beliefs simultaneously and quite often believe in them with the same amount of conviction.

I don't think that this is something that we have to strive to change within ourselves or our society all that much. Rationalizing and reasoning away the similarities between our contradictory beliefs is what allows us to maintain our existence at even the most primal level.  We start from a place where avoiding pain- whether it results from hunger, thirst, or physical injury- is worth doing and then immediately begin inflicting pain on others in order to avoid experiencing it ourselves.  Without the ability to rationalize our right to supremacy over other people, places, and things we would have no choice but to sit passively and wait for death or divine intervention to sustain us.  Any action we take establishes our place in a hierarchy of our own choosing and we begin fighting for supremacy over the forces exerted by every other person, place, and thing around us which stands between us and what we need or want to use in order to sustain ourselves.

I'm pretty sure I just summarized and restated Darwin's theories on Survival of the Fittest right there, but I'm gonna go with it because that's a pretty good segue for introducing the topic that loosely inspired me to write this post.  That being the decision made by TVLAND executives to stop airing Dukes of Hazzard episodes on their network.  I saw that news while surfing the net and avoiding the pain of folding laundry today and it brought me up short.  It was actually kind of funny cause I can just picture myself sitting here with a confused expression on my face.  I think I actually vocalized my initial thoughts about it, with a "Huh?" that would do a dumb blonde proud.

It's not that I don't understand the point, or at least the point they were trying to make.  I've caught all the other news stories about the controversy surrounding that flag that's painted on the General Lee recently. Personally I probably have just as much desire to see that symbol eradicated from our nation's collective history and conscience as the average homophobe has to see rainbows go back to symbolizing Judy Garland before the Gays fell in love with her and adopted her and her little rainbow too as their own.  I really do get it that for a whole lot of people that this flag stands for hate rather than heritage.

What I don't get is the value of supporting and promoting the censorship of individuals (or the companies they own and by extension the products they create) rather than letting them speak their piece and ignoring them if you don't like what they are saying.  To me that smacks of taking your right to establish your own supremacy too far.  Eradicating a symbol rather than overwhelming it and giving it new meaning or rendering it obsolete by convincing people to stop supporting the ideas it represents is a completely different thing.

We as Americans, equal under the law and entitled to participate in our government in a variety of ways, have the right to influence the actions of the government that represents and governs us.  South Carolina bowing to public pressure from it's citizens to withdraw their support of this symbol is an example of us working within the bounds of our individual rights to affect change.  Exerting that same pressure on individuals and companies to bring about the same result is reasonable too, but less excusable if it means you're applying that pressure upon people and companies you'd never have anything to do with if not for the fact that you don't like their stance on a certain controversial topic.

Hmm.  That last sentence was a bit of a personal epiphany for me.  I started this piece because it seemed to me that my opinion about the TVLAND decision was contradictory to my opinion about NBC's similar recent decision and my opinions about the rights of business owners to refuse service to gay customers or birth control to their employees.  With one sentence I've either zeroed in on the real, narrow parameters of my personal belief or I've managed to rationalize my own contradictory beliefs to my own satisfaction. Impressive.

According to my spanking new belief, the executives at TVLAND and NBC don't have to check their rights to freedom of speech or to act in accordance with their own conscience at the boardroom door.  Unlike the government they speak for themselves and for the people who freely choose to associate with them as business partners and customers.  If they choose to allow their actions to be influenced by others then that's great, but the influence should really only matter if it's coming from people who are affected by their actions.  If I don't ever plan to watch TVLAND (face it, I really don't) regardless of what shows they air then it's not up to me to influence them to take programs off the air that other people do want to watch.  Even if something that I don't like is depicted in one of those shows.  It's also not up to me as the consumer to try and influence the programming NBC chooses to air, it's up to them to choose programming that entices me to watch.  If they make the decision to cut ties with a particular personality that I can't stand then bonus, but for me to exert pressure on them to do so without any plan to reward them for the action they take at my request is ridiculous (I still wouldn't tune in to watch a program like the Miss Whatever it is Pageant even if Bernie Sanders was behind it.)

Naturally, I have to go on to explain how my new (old but redefined in scope) belief applies to the pressures both legal and social that are used to influence individuals and businesses when it comes to "religious freedom" and discrimination.  Still no question in my mind that refusing to sell someone a cake for their gay wedding or attempting to stand between them and the insurance company that provides their major medical policy in order to deny them access to birth control or abortion is discriminatory, but there is a question about how much right people should have to act in a discriminatory manner towards other people, whatever the reasoning behind it.  My problem with individuals and the companies they form behaving in a discriminatory way has always been tied to how much control they are able to exert over the actions of those they discriminate against by hampering their ability to access something they need or are entitled to have the right to purchase if they want to.  In my view we have a tier system, or should have, of how much you have to give up your right to discriminate in exchange for gaining control over people.

The top tier is for government in all it's forms.  Flat out no way do you get to behave in a discriminatory manner towards people whose only option to avoid you and that discrimination is to move somewhere else. Number one principle upon which our entire country was founded is that everybody is equal and deserves the same treatment in the same circumstances.  If you as an individual cannot set aside your beliefs in order to treat people the same then you don't get to profit off of funds collected from those people or hold a position of control over them.  For at least the length of time that you're in that position of control your beliefs don't count.  Everything the government offers must be available to everyone equally in accordance to their need for it, and everything the government restricts needs to be equally restricted for everyone based upon whether their actions qualify them for the restrictions.  Not only can government not discriminate, they can't promote discrimination by awarding special rights and privileges to businesses and individuals based upon criteria that aren't germane to what the right entitles them to do (i.e. laws that restrict licensing of wedding officiants to religious persons or voting privileges to those whose driver's licenses are issued by the district they can prove residency in.)

The next tier would have to be people who individually or through ownership of a business control access to absolutely necessary resources.  Food, water, shelter, medical care, and the ability to move freely about in pursuit of these items.  Access to employment to earn the means to purchase these items.  Everybody gets an equal shot at purchasing the necessities of life for the same price as everyone else who is trying to buy the same things, and everyone gets an equal shot at trying to land a job that is advertised publicly.  Once hired, everyone is entitled to equal pay for equal work.  Penalties imposed by the government if you get caught restricting access to or refusing to sell a necessary resource to, or hire an applicant for, or pay an employee less because of who they are rather than what they were giving or offering in exchange for the resource, job, or paycheck.

Beyond that it's a free for all.  Everyone is free to think what they want to about everyone else, and act accordingly as long as they keep their hands and feet to themselves.  Say whatever you want and be prepared to hear what other people have to say in response.  You are only limited by how much or how little you are able to inspire other individuals to reward you for your efforts, be they words or actions or objects you produce.  If you want to go into business selling cakes only to straight white Catholic couples then do that, but be prepared to get called out if you're not upfront about it and deal with the consequences if someone publicizes it and the result is that people stop wanting to buy from you because they think you're a bigot.  Be prepared to deal with being called a bigot.  If you only want to hire people who agree to think and act like you do then deal with the restriction that you've got to find a way to advertise your open positions only to them and deal with it if that limited pool doesn't give you the workforce you need to run your business successfully.  Recognize that you can't advertise widely for candidates and hire based upon skills then try to force changes in your employees thoughts and actions that have nothing to do with their job and that you are not compensating them for.  Understand that you have the right to refuse to extend a benefit based upon your beliefs, but no right to stand between your employees and their right to know about and accept that benefit from another source when their beliefs prompt them to do so.


We're all walking contradictions.  We all to some degree hold beliefs that are in conflict with each other.  Getting through the day and living with ourselves and with each other requires constant compromises between acting according to one belief or another.  We do it because absolutely nothing is completely black or white when viewed in the context of all the different forms that thing can take.  That's how people end up being pro-life and in favor of the death penalty at the same time, or in favor of free speech while wishing there was a way to silence all the speech we don't want to hear.  We all end up having to pick our battles and dealing with the consequences by not getting everything we want because there isn't enough time in a life to beat every opponent.