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Saturday, March 06, 2021

News Weakly - 3/6/21

On the Prowl
Perhaps you've heard. Amazon is deciding what you can and cannot think by deciding what you can and cannot read. They've removed Ryan T. Anderson's book, When Harry Became Sally: Responding to the Transgender Moment. "No, we will not discuss it. No, we will not refute it. No, you cannot read it. We are not interested in free speech; we are interested in removing those who don't agree with us." Couple that with their current "Buy through black owned businesses" option (no "Latinx" or "Asian" or "Native American" and certainly no "white"), and you see a company blatantly telling you how to think. (Troubling since they still offer Mein Kampf.) Like a roaring lion.

The Latest Casualty
Beloved Dr. Seuss is the latest to be canceled in our cancel culture. Why? Because Seuss opposed the Japanese during World War II. Privately, but too much. So they're ceasing sales of 6 of his books because of "racist and insensitive imagery." (The offending image in his first book was an Asian man with squinty eyes and a coolie hat and chopsticks -- clearly racist since no Asians have squinty eyes, wear those cone-shaped hats, or use chopsticks.) This way, no parents today will be able to examine this stuff with their children to see for themselves what is appropriate or not, and learn from the mistakes of others. If we can successfully erase history, we will successfully control your thoughts and certainly repeat history. In modern America, the aim is to remove the "offensive" rather than deal with it. Before, we had to think it through and accept or reject it; now our benevolent overseers will tell us what we can and cannot think. (Hey, just wondering here. In Horton Hears a Who, Horton claims that "a person is a person no matter how small." Why haven't they banned that one? Clearly Seuss hated women's rights and wanted to control their bodies.)

And Anna Makes Three
New York's governor "Sure my policy killed 10,000 more people than I allowed them to report" Cuomo now has a third accuser for "unwanted sexual advances," but, after roundly denying it, he has apologized and he is a Democratic politician, so that should be it, right? I mean, if he was a Republican or some sort of serious conservative we'd be looking at Cancel Culture, but, surely, his status as a Democrat is only bolstered by his "I am truly sorry" to make this all go away, right?

When "Spiritually Fatal" is Viewed as "Safe and Stable"
Bethany Christian Services is the largest Protestant adoption agency in the U.S. They announced that they would be dropping their belief that marriage was the union of a man and a woman and would be including LGBTQ people in their adoption services. Historically an evangelical organization, they've decided that biblical marriage and morality around the topic of LGBT is not a place that they can claim a position because "Christians may disagree." "Our sole job," they said, "is to determine if a family can provide a safe, stable environment for children." One primary reason, ">Joe Carter points out, is that self-professed Christians have largely jettisoned their own beliefs in biblical family and sexual morality -- basically an "everybody else is doing it" approach. Al Mohler is (understandably) concerned. I'm fascinated by this idea that doctrine that doesn't have full agreement must be questionable and the notion that God's idea of "a safe, stable environment" would include the environment that has no part in the kingdom of God (1 Cor 6:9-10).

Debt Relief
College students are crying out for debt relief. Bankruptcies are high. America is currently $28 trillion in debt. The goal of the Democrats is to push that over $30 trillion. Understand that this is a debt that cannot be repaid. There is no debt relief for this one. People are complaining about the world we're leaving our children. America is aiming to leave them a bankrupt (economically and morally) nation as well.

Banning Assault Weapons
Eight people in Sweden were injured by an axe-wielding attacker. Sweden is now looking for better axe control measures and considering possibly outlawing axes as assault weapons. What ... no?

Obviously a Hater
According to a study in early 2020, the "achievement gap" -- the discrepancies between scholastic achievements between people of color and white students -- is not a matter of race. The study indicated that "if an African American or Latino student was a person of faith and came from a two biological parent family, the achievement gap totally disappeared." Oh, now, hold on. You can't be saying things like that. That's too ... well, it's not anti-racist enough. Obviously a hater did that study.

The Real Reason
The Bee has figured out the real reason Texas is lifting the mask ban. It's not to give freedoms; it's to scare off all the Californians. Good luck, Texas. Let us know if that works.

Must be true; I read it on the internet.

4 comments:

Craig said...

As has been demanded by others, I’ve been seeking out more “black voices”, and one thing I’ve learned from them is that in virtually any measure of achievement, after you factor in all of the variables, that the achievement gap is much smaller than presented. This also ignores that multiple “groups of color”, out achieve “whites”. So much so that some have taken to include various non white groups into the category of “white” for some reason. I can’t imagine why anyone would do that, can you?

Stan said...

You have to do what you must if you're going to make the facts fit your narrative ... and they don't.

Craig said...

I agree. From what I’m seeing the more significant factor might be class. It seems that the problem is that there enough immigrant groups (POC) that are having enough success to raise questions about the simplistic racism narrative. As we’re seeing, non white ethnic groups are being counted as white in order to drive the narrative.

I think that the notion that if you’re born poor, regardless of race, you’re more likely to have lower achievement levels that those born less poor. Which raises things like fatherhood, drug use, regard for education, and other cultural mores as potentially more significant than skin color.

Marshal Art said...

With regard to that issue, Thomas Sowell...a black voice that apparently doesn't matter where problems in the black community are concerned...states that all the issues we're told are reflections of our black racist souls are mirrored in white communities in London, such as the East End. And of course, it's my understanding there's similar problems among the poor whites in Appalachia. But the white privilege of East Enders and Appalachians denies them the ability to claim it's all due to racism. Bad luck, that.