I only recently started following UnknownSkywalker for his great astronomy posts—but he posted this today and everything he says about the quote he includes is how I feel, too. It’s very heartening to know that there are other reasonable people out there who see the world—the universe—as a big, diverse space with lots of shades of gray. So, apologies for the length, but I think it’s worth your time to read it all.
Sorry for the long text copy&paste but I wanted the whole thing on my blog, and felt the need to share it here. I almost felt as if I had written this myself. I think everyone should take five minutes to read this, regardless of the country you’re from or political inclination you have; this applies to the whole world.
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Written by Phil Plait
Any time I post my political thoughts on this blog, inevitably someone in the comments or on Twitter will accuse me of being a far-left nut. I typically ignore people like that, because it’s clear to me that they are not capable of understanding what I’ve actually written, and in their mind, and in these hyperpartisan times, anyone who isn’t a far-right neocon must perforce be some sort of commie or socialist.
In reality, my own thinking on political and social issues is more subtle. I am in many ways an individual libertarian (I think people should have far more personal freedom than they do in this country), a social liberal (I think one of the many roles of government is to help those who cannot help themselves, and to do what individuals and corporations cannot do or cannot be trusted to do), and a governmental conservative (in the actual sense of the old party; I want a government that is big enough to do what it needs to do and no bigger).
I also understand that ideas sometimes have boundaries in practice.
Freedoms are tricky things. Just because you can do something doesn’t mean you should. The old adage saying “Your right to swing your fist ends at my nose” is wrong and dumb; in fact the act of swinging your fist at all is a threat.
I want a government that’ll help when it’s needed, but won’t when it’s not, because I know that a lot of people will take advantage of a government that is set up to help them.I know our economy should have the freedom it needs to grow. But I also know it needs to be regulated because people are greedy, and people with nearly unlimited power and resources will sometimes spectacularly abuse them to the detriment of the country and the planet.
I loathe the idea of killing, but I know that there are bad guys out there, and we need a strong military to keep them at bay.
I hate paying taxes. But I love our highway system, clean water, and space exploration.
I think that people have the right to defend themselves, their family, their property… and that’s why they have the right to bear arms. But I also know that many people aren’t wise enough and emotionally stable enough to own a gun, and that’s why I don’t think everyone has the right to bear every arm.
I think that everyone has the right to speak their mind. But I think many loud voices right now belong to hateful, mean, bigoted, small-minded hypocrites who will say anything to get themselves noticed or to push their agenda. I also know they all have the right, the freedom to say the terrible things they do. But I have the right, and we have the duty, to counter their speech with my own voice.
So what do we do?
We need to teach people to think. To understand that there are balances in life, nuances, corollaries to decisions.
When I watch TV news, read political opinions online, and listen to our politicians, what I hear are low resolution ideas, chunky things that this way or that way, no in-between, with big thick impenetrable borders around each part.
But when I look around I see things being rich, diverse, subtle, poetic, minuscule, vast. I don’t subscribe to any particular ism, but look over the issues as they come, dig into my personal values and unholster my critical thinking, and come to each conclusion one at a time — though based on previous experience. Conclusions are not independent of one another.
The world I see is gloriously complex. It’s layered, with subtleties interacting with other subtleties, forcing decisions to be more difficult for me to make but more important once made, making the path more treacherous for me to walk but more satisfying to me once the journey is underway, making the view more of a struggle for me to understand but more awe-inspiring and world-changing once I do understand it.
The world I see is not black and white. No amount of shouting, no amount of name-calling, no amount of insults, no amount of spin, lies, distortion, sniping, negativity, or propaganda will change that.
Here’s how they see things:
Here’s how things really are:
The decision is yours. Which world do you want to live in?
A couple of quick notes from me:
1) I actually disagree with the sentiment that threats should not be protected speech. I don’t think the phrase “Your right to swing your fist ends at my nose” is wrong or dumb. I believe words represent what you think and feel—if you need to make threats to express your feelings or thoughts, then that’s OK with me. But if you take any action to carry out those threats, there should be consequences only then. Anything else is telling me what I can and can’t *think* and that is patently wrong and much worse than dumb, it’s oppressive.
2) this is a minor point, but one I feel compelled to bring up—any time someone says that “there are bad people in the world who want to hurt us” and “we need a strong military” I cringe. The reality is that a) lots of people hate us but almost none have the resources to act on that hate, b) even if they did have the resources, they wouldn’t be willing or able to deal with the consequences, and c) our military is stronger by several orders of magnitude than any other military out there today—including China, which has a much bigger population.
Those two differences aside, I pretty much agree with the above quote, entirely. I understand that we need to simplify things in order to make choices—but we’ve gotten into the habit of simplifying things so much that we can no longer see the forest for the trees. We all need to take some time—slow down—read more, absorb more and most of all, embrace the gray.
