Recently I was discussing strategies for educating the public regarding scientific realities concerning a technical matter (e.g., climate, energy, medical), and an ally said: “We need to be careful not to offend anyone!”.
OMG! Let’s unpack that concern and assess its legitimacy.
To begin with, the Left has created a broad collection of new standards (like social justice). If we listen closely, we will see that their communications are now infused with value assessments (e.g., Democrats calling a border wall “immoral”).
This has bled into areas of Science — which should be based on facts, not subjective values. For example, leading Climate Change advocate, Dr. Michael Mann, stated that he is “fighting on the right side of a battle between good and evil.”
In the same vein, carefully consider this official statement from the Dean of Duke’s prestigious Nicholas School of the Environment, on receiving that appointment:
“At a time when we’re so deeply divided as a society, and issues seem to grow more contentious daily, we can no longer treat environmental issues as solely scientific or technical problems. We have to wade into the complex value choices that are at the heart of policy decisions. Science will always be a central and essential input into the decision-making process, but policy decisions require choices. And choices reflect values.”
What is going on here?
Basically. this is part of a larger campaign, where our traditional Judeo-Christian standards (an integral part of America’s foundation) are being attacked, undermined, discarded, and replaced.
They argue that traditional religions are archaic, corrupted, and inappropriate for today’s “enlightened” world. (The trend of this thinking is clear.)
Note: They employ similar arguments against traditional Science!
However, as Carl Jung (the founder of analytical psychology) insightfully observed: "You can take away a man's gods — but only to give him others in return.” (Ironically this was in one of his greatest books, where a key message was: “the future depends on our ability to resist society's mass movements.”)
Essentially what is transpiring is that the Left is following Jung’s insight by substituting a secular religion for traditional Judeo-Christian beliefs.
The core belief of this new religion is environmentalism. It doesn’t take much reflection to see that environmentalism has literally evolved into a religion (e.g., see here, here, here, and here).
OK, so what?
Well, the first so what is that we need to appreciate that this is an important element in the campaign to promote world governance (vs individual countries that we have now). The idea is that if we all have the same world belief system, then there will be little resistance to the concept of a world government.
But there are a multitude of unanswered questions about this new global secular religion, like:
1-Exactly who is it that determines what the acceptable “values” are?
2-Specifically where are these fundamental “values” published?
3-Who has the judicial authority to ascertain whether we are properly adhering to these said “values”?
4-Who has the power to punish the miscreants who do not properly adhere to these said “values”?
The implications of these matters are literally unfathomable!
Just to make sure that they have covered all the bases, the Left is promoting an alternative to secular religions: relativism. This gives them new power, as “a true relativist can do anything and doesn't have to respect the views of anyone.”
This brief overview brings us back to the initial question: is it rational to set up criteria that we engage with the Left, and do not offend any of them?
Since they are making up “standards” — usually self-serving, and often on the fly — there is no possible way of not offending them. Of course, that is one of their objectives — so they then can play the victim…
The answer is to do Critical Thinking — and then speak the Truth. If it offends someone, that’s their problem.
Here are other materials by this scientist that you might find interesting:
Check out the Archives of this Critical Thinking substack.
WiseEnergy.org: discusses the Science (or lack thereof) behind our energy options.
C19Science.info: covers the lack of genuine Science behind our COVID-19 policies.
Election-Integrity.info: multiple major reports on the election integrity issue.
Media Balance Newsletter: a free, twice-a-month newsletter that covers what the mainstream media does not do, on issues from COVID to climate, elections to education, renewables to religion, etc. Here are the Newsletter’s 2024 Archives. Please send me an email to get your free copy. When emailing me, please make sure to include your full name and the state where you live. (Of course, you can cancel the Media Balance Newsletter at any time - but why would you?
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There is one thing that could be added to this message.
The major deliberate inequities that we observe are due more often to “bias for” rather than “prejudice against.”
Decision makers favor their friends, basically people whom they are comfortable working with.
For hiring and promotions, Yalies favor Yalies, women favor women. Canadiens favor Canadiens etc.,etc., etc. (a long list).
Bosses, however, make a mistake when they promote someone with their identical Myers-Briggs code indicator. The boss will learn little that is “new.” And will continue with the same mishaps in thinking.
A boss who favors “a minority like me” just so “we” can “catch up” is not societally productive. Cheating someone with known better performance qualities from hiring or promotion is not socially productive.
Making decisions based on “well, maybe, he/she could learn on the job and be just as good or better as this other fellow whom I know right now can admirably do the job” is socially retrograde.
Some examples:
My father (with not even a HS education) solidly passed the intellectual and performance tests to be a plumber, but he was told his certificate would not come without paying a significant bribe. He refused even though he was responsible for feeding a family of seven.
My brother, just out of the Navy “Seabees,” and able to operate almost any piece of construction equipment, was able to join the “union,” but come winter he was told he would get no working assignments unless he provided a kickback of his earnings. Although he had a wife and child, he did what his Dad did. He said “No,” gave up a job career he would have loved and took the Fireman’s entry test. There were tests before each promotion, he always came in third or fourth when there were 14 openings, was leapfrogged by 6 to 8 people of “designated minority” status at each promotion level, and still became a highly respected Deputy Fire Chief in the City of Boston.
I was the top student in a rigorous high school in Boston, had all A’s, and smashed the SAT test. I certainly would have received a scholarship to Harvard, but I balked when I saw the application asked for my photo, my “race,” and my religion. I was going to say I didn’t know my race **, but I decided not even to apply to Harvard.
** I was fairly well aware of racial issues since my father grew up in the Irish and Black (Negro) district of Boston; he was a gym rat and a highly rated amateur boxer. He had a lot of respect for Black Americans. When his plumber plans (see above) were squelched, he began a sewer cleaning business, called the AAA Electric Drain Cleaning business (to be first in the yellow pages of the phone book). His “work crew” was usually represented by two of his three oldest sons (in HS or younger). We had no car and so he needed a cab to take all of the heavy coils, tool, and motor to jobs that were all around the City. We were in every ghetto, and that is where I had my first affirmative action awareness (with the aa words unaware to me at the time). There were nice people and slobs, independently of race.
I smashed the Naval Battery Test (more difficult than the SATs) and accepted their full “contract” scholarship plan, and this allowed me to go to Notre Dame, earn a few extra dollars on my own, and never have my parents pay a penny. I had a wonderful three years in the Navy, where we “contract” students had the same commission and commission date as the graduates of the US Naval Academy. It was a great boost in confidence to have successful responsibilities and achievements (specializing in nuclear issues). I received nothing but “4.0’s” in my ratings and upon leaving the Navy, I was rated in the top 0.5%. I had a perfect 2400 on the GRE and was offered a full NSF Fellowship that would take me all the way to a PhD – something I never would have imagined. But I still had no practical experience in the career I was choosing, and I accepted a job offer from Bell Telephone Laboratories. The plan was that BTL would support a work plan within which I could achieve a PhD. It was perfect. And since I had a growing family, the pay was much better than the stipend that comes with an NSF fellowship. When the proper time came for me to pursue a PhD, BTL was well into the aa (affirmative action) moral code, but, even more so into the AA (Affirmative Action) rules code. The Education Department now had Rules that white men could no longer be given education aid; aid was to be given only to women and to “designated” males. But my boss’s boss’s boss , the Lab Director and eventual Nobel Prize Winner – on his own, and unknown to me – arranged for me to attend Princeton daytime courses and to do my (still undecided) thesis work at BTL. The Director had talked with me only a couple of times, but he had seen my reports, and I have to admit I was definitely a “bias for” candidate, since the AA rules had treated me as unworthy meat. I would never have been so successful without my Director’s wisdom.
With my PhD I was a recruiter for BTL with a heavily slanted awareness for aa. I had a very successful career. As a boss, there was never a qualified woman or minority who was treated with less than equal respect. (For example, I wrote a letter of recommendation to MIT for an aa summer trainee. He returned with a PhD four years later and was hired by BTL. And there were many other such managers.) -- WTL
-- ... an ally said: “We need to be careful not to offend anyone!”
You and I know many people in the climate issue, I sure hope that ally was not anybody I know. One of my gripes about guys on our side of the issue is what I view as too defensive, or minimally, too neutral, of a posture on climate matter, when I advocate for going on sheer offense at every opportunity. Some of our most prominent speakers miss golden opportunities to illustrate to the public just how vulnerable enviros are when it comes to being incapable of defending their unsupportable assertions. For example, when a prominent enviro claims a 'scientific consensus' exists proving man-caused global warming, it is simply too neutral to say the studies rely on cherry-picked polling, it should be stated first that the idea of a "show of hands" validating a science conclusion is fundamentally an anti-science / anti-intellectual position to have. And when it comes to the egregiously false accusation that 'Big Oil paid skeptic climate scientists to spread disinformation,' it is not enough to say the accusation is false, the response should be that the accuser could not point to any evidence proving such a corruption situation exists if their reputation depended on it. This tactic shifts all the focus onto the folks who paint themselves into corners they can't get out of, but our side needs to aim the bright spotlight directly at them in their indefensible corners instead of letting them squirm out of them every time.