Intersectionality – Being Human

How to think about things you hear others say that you believe are not true…..

Truth – there is such a thing.  It is not as simple as you think.

We, as humans, live in language.  We tell ourselves stories about the interpretations we make up by the way our nervous system is perturbed.

Two people walk outside.  One says it is hot and the other says it is cold. Is someone lying?

Assessments of temperature reflect how someone interprets their experience of their surroundings.  But there is a measurable temperature.  So the measured temperature is the fact – the truth..  The assessment of warmth or cold is an interpretation of how one human body experienced the temperature.  When one is warm and the other is cold, each may authentically be assessing their experience.  They are declaring their truth about the temperature as they experience it.

So what is ‘lying’?

Lying requires you to know something is true – verifiable by independent sources.  And then you speak as if something else is true – you intentionally say something you know to be false.  This is what lie detectors detect – the physical aspects it takes to say something you know to be false.

But what if you think something is true but it isn’t.

Is that lying?

Maybe…..

At first,  you can just be ignorant.  You can think something is true that isn’t.

Birthers thought that President Obama wasn’t born in America.  For them, this was ‘true’.  So at first, you heard them express their interpretation – often based on what they saw [he is black] and what they heard or perhaps read [on the internet?].  They demanded proof. But then the facts came out – a birth certificate, first short-form then long-form.  Yet some persisted – he wasn’t born here…..

When a ‘Birther’ declares that Obama wasn’t born here, are they lying?

For them, the truth wasn’t true. The facts were rejected.  They chose to believe something to be true to fit their view of the world – to fit into the rest of the stories they tell themselves.

So this isn’t being ignorant, but what is it?

I call it living in a world you choose to create based on what you want to be true.  You aren’t trying to convince anyone but yourself that the world works the way you want it to.

But there is another set of actors that operate outside the truth.  They don’t lie – because they actually don’t care if what they say is true or not.  They often contradict themselves….  because they don’t care.  Over time, they may even lose track of what is true.

They have an agenda – a hidden one.  They may want to be liked and say whatever they think it will take to be liked or popular.  They may be trying to sell you something and will say anything to get you to buy what they are selling.  They may want to distract you from what they are up to  and will say anything it takes for you to stop paying attention to what they want you to ignore.

This is what it means to bullshit.  This is the con.  And some people do this so much they, too, lose track of the truth.

What we are watching play out in our country – the United States of America – is a combination of people who want to believe the world is other than it is, liars who are deliberately saying things they know to be untrue and bullshitters who are working a con.

And our President seems to be a combination of all three.

And the danger is that he sometimes seems like he can’t tell the difference and neither can his supporters.

How do we tell?

Well, votes are counted and there are real numbers that are certified and become the official results of an election.  There are real statistics based on real numbers of murders or crimes.  And when someone says they won the popular vote when they didn’t or that the murder rate is the highest in years when it isn’t, they are not speaking the truth.

And when others believe it – they aren’t lying.  They are just trusting someone who should not be trusted.  Because the ‘truth’ isn’t in the person they choose to believe.

So watch the polls for how many people believe things to be true that we know are not true.  That tells us how many people are rejecting facts for living in a world they prefer.

Birthers preferred a world that didn’t have a black president of the United States.  They were conned or lied to – does it matter?  They were ready to accept the falsehood because it produced a world they preferred.

So watch out.

Keep an open mind – you might hold things to be true are not.  You bought the story because you wanted it to be true.

Because this is what the Russian hack may have done.  They may have created so many sources of things that people wanted to be true – about Hillary, about our president, about the democrats – that they created hundreds of thousands of people who believed what they read.  And those people may not even realize that they made their choice based on ‘facts’ that were manufactured by the Russians to get people to either stay home and not vote or to vote for Trump and the Republicans.  And those people spread the lies as if they were true and convinced others to believe – for there is safety in numbers and we can’t all be wrong, can we?

It is hard to prove what really happened.  Because people have a rough time locating why they believe what they do.

But when many people still believe President Obama was not born in America, you know that the fantasy is alive and well.  And when people believe that President Trump won the popular vote or that the murder rate is the highest in years, they remain in that fantasy world.

The danger of the liar and the bullshitter is that they produce people who no longer know what is true and yet who think they operate from truth.

This is one source of the bitter divide – one side believes things that they hear but are not true and the other adopts the truth and cannot accept those that can’t ‘see’ that they believe lies.  There is no compromise here – the war is a war of what is real not of policy.  And behind it is a war of values.  Some believe that all are created equal – others believe that some are more equal than other.  Rights are rights vs. rights are earned.

So what do we do?

Start talking to each other more.

Question into the things we do not agree on.   Are we dealing with different ways to interpret something or different facts.  If is a difference of fact, be careful.  Some hold onto facts because they reject the truth.  It will be hard for them to let go  – because their world will become less to their liking.  But the conversations are important.

Because we, the people, are supposed to care about truth and justice.

Care enough to be willing to find out what we want to be true isn’t.  And to help others see that what they want to be true isn’t.

Trump came in 3rd -with people who did NOT vote being 1st and Hillary voters being 2nd.

Republican gerrymandered many districts to be ‘safe’ where the only worry was being primaried out by more right facing candidates.

Citizens United confused them more – corporations aren’t people; money isn’t speech.

And with the Presidential ‘win’, Republicans are governing like they have a majority behind them because they have the corporations and the money from the powerful – and that is who they have been representing.

But ‘We, the People’ are pissed.

Most don’t want the things that are being put into law or put in place by Executive Whim [disguised as Orders].

And the more than two-thirds that did NOT support this set of policies, that care about rights, that care about the environment, that care about inequality, that care about getting money out of politics are trying to let government leaders know that this is not what they voted for.  Because it isn’t.

Corporations aren’t people and they don’t vote. And when you hang around the corporate lobbyists and wealthy donors too much because you need their money and you like the power it provides, you forgot who you actually are supposed to work for – We, the People.

In frustration, they are taking to the street.  They are calling their representatives.  They are not being listened to.  So they are getting mad and getting frustrated.

They are demanding that Congress do its job and defend the Constitution instead of their agenda and their party.  Because MOST of us didn’t back them – they just didn’t like the options and were blind to the policies of the Republicans that would go in place if the President were a Republican.  And since the candidate is a con man, they believed he would be different and get Congress to listen.  And they were wrong.

People do not like to feel they are wrong.  They don’t want to admit it.

During this campaign, the excitement was for an Independent candidate running as a democrat.  He convinced the successful candidate to adopt his platform – very progressive.  That candidate didn’t win and the Senate and House stayed Republican.

The protestors are the people who always held those progressive beliefs about basic fundamental rights and that government ought to work for the People and not Corporations or Money.

And they won’t go away.

And they shouldn’t  – because there are more of them.   He came in 3rd.

Those that did NOT vote are mostly more progressive but didn’t like Clinton.

Many that say they don’t like the ACA, want a Public Option not repeal.

And now they want a Congress with ethics and oversight – so I would start there. Act like it matters.  Act like you are ok if you find out that Russian Influence DID make a difference – that the Russians attacked us from within and their attacks worked.  And then figure out what you are going to do when you learn that is true so you are willing to start the Independent investigation that is required.  And follow that with an independent investigation into the FBI actions.  And follow that with an independent investigation into the impacts on voting starting with the states where the outcome was other than predicted.

He came in 3rd – and you are making the people angry.

“A White House official said the two countries would launch a new task force called the United States Canada Council for the Advancement of Women Business Leaders-Female Entrepreneurs. The official said Trudeau’s office reached out to discuss working on a joint effort, noting that this was seen as an area of shared interest between both leaders.”

Every once in a while, the administration will say something that sounds normal and positive.  The kudos erupt and we are all supposed to breathe a sigh of relief and sit down.

But take note, the council focuses on entrepreneurs not workers.  And was suggested by the Canadian leader – not ours [follow the leader is not a powerful move].  There are also discussions of this being championed by Ivanka Trump – who caused ethics violations to occur in her defense.

But the proposals put forward by Ivanka have all benefited those with much and altered programs that benefit women with less.  Tax Credits require you to have income and the capacity to fund the costs upfront and to fund the difference between cost and credit.  All while giving tax benefits to those who already have the capacity to fund the services / help.

Our president nominated people who are largely rich, white men.  They hold positions that have not supported women’s rights.  One appointment is the wife of the Senate Majority Leader – who just silenced another senator for saying things on the floor that were tolerated on the same floor.  The president then resumed use of a nickname when referring to this Senator – challenging her legitimacy and showing no respect.

The focus on de-funding Planned Parenthood hurts women – but mainly the young and less affluent.  Loss of services provided by Planned Parenthood can hurt the health of women.  Yet this is a widely held position of this administration and of the Republican party.

The appointment of the massively incompetent but very wealthy donor, Betsy DeVos, as head of Education insults women everywhere.  There are competent women who would take this role and use it to elevate our public schools and overall education of our kids to be competitive.  He selected someone whose policies caused Michigan’s standings to drop from middle of the pack to the bottom.

It is the actions that matter.

So don’t get distracted by what looks like one good deed.

Pay attention to the continued silence over the slams against women.  The lack of any outrage over the silencing of Elizabeth Warren is unacceptable.

It is the real issue with women’s rights and of the remainder of the human rights concerns.  You point to a specific situation where  you take action that is positive in some way.  You use this to claim you are ‘for’ women’s rights, because you are not against all rights that some women are given.

This human rights thing is simple.  If you tolerate the challenge of basic rights to any group, you are simply not for human rights.

The same is true of women’s rights.

And this president, the Republican Party and far too many others are fine with selective acts being sufficient to make this issue go away.

But most of us will not go away.

This was the lesson of the Women’s March.  Democracy will not end quietly and Women are not going away.  We, the people, want equality for all.  We want the principles of our country was founded on to finally rise to their full measure.  To end the wink-wink exceptions of privilege.

What do we expect?  Wrong question.  What will we accept?  You need to acknowledge the past acts as being wrong.  You need to declare the new thinking that you are committed to adopt.  And you need to act in ways that are fully aligned with your new thinking for a sufficient time that it is possible to begin to trust you.

Otherwise, we will consider this one more pile and we no longer look for the pony.