Let's get political! I try not to do so that often, given that I'm pretty far left it can be scary. But I've just about had it lately w/o all the B.S. I'm seeing from Conservatives that it's driving me crazy, and I want to get it off my chest.
Disclaimer: I have no problem with people being Conservative. I happen to know and like a lot of Conservatives that I know personally. But there are soooo many in government and on TV being stupid and hypocrites that it's those that I can't stand. If you have Conservative values and live by them genuinely, great! I applaud that. But when Conservatives use their "values" to prop up inequality and hatred, that's when my gloves come off.
So, here goes: things that make Conservatives hypocrites, as seen on TV ;^)
1. Always respect the office of President (unless he's a Dem) - So, I recently learned about the whole Obama saluting with a coffee cup and the media circus around it. And then I saw John Stewart rip those people a new one b/c Bush did a similar thing with a dog. This is just another example I've seen of something I've been feeling awhile. I remember when Bush was President and Conservatives screamed that we should be more respectful b/c no matter our thoughts on the guy, he was the President and ALWAYS deserved respect. Me? I was a huge fan of the TV show "Little Bush," which was hilarious and an honest caricature of those peeps. But as soon as Obama becomes President? People I know personally who chastised me for being disrespectful of Bush turned around and did/said/posted things just as bad or worse. And of course the media is all over Obama over every stupid little thing. Don't like Obama? That's fine, you don't have to. Don't want to show a particular President respect? That's fine, I only do when it's earned. But if those first to are true, then have it be true all across the board. Because I do.
2. The Government shouldn't get involved with my personal liberties ever (unless it's a woman' vagina) - This is a rather short paragraph, b/c I feel like so many other people say it better, and it's self explanatory. Leave women's parts alone. You don't want to regulate things that need it, like polluting and equality, fine, but stop regulating things that you have no damn business regulating!
3. All life is precious and you shouldn't get abortions (but the death penalty is ok) - This one pisses me off. And it's not really the whole Pro-Life thing (because I have my own wacky feelings about abortion) but it's more the way they argue for it. The propound how all life is precious and make it this big deal about killing a soul and on and on. But it's ok to kill full grown living people? I get the people on death row aren't exactly great people, but I feel that if we can't kill people before they are even formed, we can't have the moral right to kill people once they are full blown adults. Don't we have the right to "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."
4. Ok, this one is a little tenuous, and just the product of my own crazy brain, so it doesn't get a heading. I recently read an article about this school district in Colorado that wants to change history taught in school to only teach parts of history that support the idea that the US is the best, and all about patriotism and supporting America, and basically remove the bits that make the US look bad and encourages dissent. First of all, that's terrible - I'm pretty sure that's what bad countries do to keep citizens in line when their governments are bad for the people. Second - that's unAmerican. Our history is what makes us great, and we learn from it. But also, it made me think of something else. The Conservative Justices on the Supreme Court like to interpret the Constitution using Originalism, which is basically to interpret the Constitution they have to look at it how it was meant back when written. But wait? If we don't teach kids now about ALL of the US history, how can the future Justices even do that? They won't have the correct context, which means they will corrupt the Constitution. But isn't that anti-Conservative? Isn't the Constitution supposed to be honored in its original form? And think about it - not all of the Amendments were written at the beginning. How can we interpret the Amendment not discriminating by race if students don't learn about the terrible racism from the past and how that Amendment came about, and the ramifications of that? Yeah, it was a terrible time, and learning about it made me cry at the pain and injustice of it all. But it's history. And because of that history, we've worked (even if there is still more work to be done) to make things better. Without teaching that to our children, what's the use of the change? What's to stop it from repeating? We have to teach our children all of our history, and then let it be up to them how they decide to be good Americans. Because forcing your idea of what an American is onto them is UnAmerican!
5. The Government shouldn't be our masters and have so much control on our lives (but it's ok if student loan bearers are indentured for ever and ever) - There seems to be a theme here - Conservatives want government out of their business - unless it regulates something that helps their goals of inequality. You would think that if Conservatives don't want the government involved w/ people's lives, then maybe they'd support loan forgiveness in some form - help people achieve, work hard, and then become active members of society who don't need government aid. Because, think about it. There are sooo many people that can contribute, but because they come from places where they can't afford college, they need loans. If they got loans, and then paid, say, a flat amount above their loan amount (whether it's 10% or 100% above their loan amount) and then it's done, that makes sense to me. A Government is not a bank, and should do what's good for its citizens. Even if we have to pay for years and years on loans, if we knew there was a cap on the total owed, eventually the loans would go away. But with job options and education options, some people could end up paying 4, 5, 6, etc. etc. the amount of there loans before completely paying, or getting forgiveness. The Government is obviously getting their money back plus some - why treat the interest like a bank? B/c with less loans, we can start buying houses and having a family and sending in the economy. That's good, right Conservatives? Not to them. B/c giving student loans in the 1st place encourages poor people to better themselves, and as much as Conservatives complain about the poor, they don't want less poor people - they just want them to be invisible and not get aid of any kind. So, if they have to give student loans, why not keep post-grads poor, and maybe the will discourage more people from getting them.
6. Complaints when they aren't allowed to put Christian items in government places, but try to prevent other religions from putting their religious items anywhere else, all in the name of protecting their freedom of religion - never have a group of people so misunderstood the Constitutional rights of Freedom of Religion. It does mean that the government will keep church and state separate so they don't appear to promote one religion as a government religion, thus making people of other religions feel alienated. It doesn't mean Christian religion can be wherever it wants in the government. And it doesn't mean Christians can stop other religious stuff from being where it's allowed. Like I get that many of the founding fathers were Christian, but they had religious persecution too. (Not all forms of Christian were the same back then). So they formed a government that didn't have a religion. And they formed a country that welcome different people from all over. So it only makes sense that the values of non-religion in government protects ALL religions, not just Christians. We all have to play by the same rules.
7. Poor people should stop being poor (but our policies basically want to keep them that way) - the economic inequality in the US probably make me more upset than anything else. I watched this video from the Daily Show yesterday where a Conservative was confronted about the poor health care some Americans receive already (before the ACA). And he said that if poor people want better care they should stop being poor. Really? I didn't think of that. But you know what? I can point to so many things that Conservatives in government support that keep the poor poor - trying to eradicate government aid, increased costs of higher education, terrible primary education in poor areas, food deserts in minority neighborhoods, all sorts of ways corporations and the extremely rich keep money while the rest of us get less and less. And the list goes on and on. People complain about government aid to people in need, but don't know about or ignore way more money given to "aid" people that already have more money than they would ever need - payouts to large banks, helping Wall Street, farm subsidies to rich farmers, etc. etc. You want the poor to stop being poor? Then stop supporting a system where there aren't options to stop being poor (except for those few exceptional people that beat the odds, and are then touted as why things are actually fine). If you don't want to support the poor, fine. If you want the rich to stay rich and believe we are better to have defined economic classes, fine. But just admit that your policies are aimed to do that. Don't perpetuate the trickle down economics lie when you know that's not what you want and that's not what happens.
There are probably soooo many more things for this list, but that's all I can think of at this moment. And there are more things that get me riled up, but I'll save those for some other time.
No comments:
Post a Comment