Originally Posted by
Stavros
I'm not avoiding any issues, Stavros. I've stated how I feel. I am pro-rights for everyone; black, brown, gay, female, transgender, young, old, EVERYONE.
-Nothing wrong with this statemet, so I assume means that you are opposed to the proposal that the right of Americans to self-identify other than as Male or Female is a right that must be maintained and not discarded? It doesn't mean the end of America, it costs almost nothing, it provides a degree of security for those who want it. It asks you to respect them, and for them to respect you, a win-win outcome for all.
My rights have nothing to do with my race, my gender, my religion, or any other factors that people frequently cite as the underlying reason for their problems. My rights all derive from the fact that I am a good citizen who makes an effort to be an approachable, contributing member of the community. Nothing more than that.
--And yet, historically, the USA has denied rights to people precisely because of their race, to the extent that they were not even considered citizens at one time, eg in the 19th century. It had and has nothing to do with behaviour, everything to do with prejudice and fear, two negatives that reinforce each other. We went through this in the UK when Jews and Roman Catholics did not have the same rights as everyone else, and I don't need to document the history in the USA, other than, yet again, to argue that for the Obama administration to recognize that gender is not made up of fixed categories, and to extend rights to people who do not consider themselves to be Male or Female was the right thing to do, that it has little or no impact on the security of the USA, and as for behaviour, you can't legislate for that in the sense that you can't force people to be good citizens, though you can punish them for not being good.
Or the real shocker, "Oh dear, I can't believe that police officer shot that two-time ex-felon when all he did was refused to comply with a legal order while reaching into his pants. Must have been because he was black."
-This is the real shocker, for someone claiming to be a realist -it is also offensive in the extreme when you know as well as I do how many Black men have been shot dead by law enforcement when there was no need for the cop to even pull out his gun. How many cases can you cite? A victim shot 16 times -16 times! The number shot who had no opportunity to 'reach into their pants', and so on. If there were not such a grim history of excessive police force being used against young black men, we would not be having this conversation, Black Lives Matter would not exist, and James Brown would have been a crooner not a soul singer with an edge.
You want to walk around looking like a freak? You're gonna be treated like a freak. You want to cop an attitude? You're gonna get treated like a person with no respect for the law. Want to live beyond your means? You're going to get treated like the deadbeat you are. Want to run down the USA? You're gonna get treated like the enemy.
--Nick, what is freedom? Surely one of the outstanding freedoms the USA has conferred on its citizens is the right to walk around looking like a freak -only the definition changes from San Franciso to rural Kansas, Alaska or Nebraska. As for 'running down' the USA -free speech allows you to do just that: but there were some people who did think Martin Luther King Jr was an enemy of the USA, and indeed, he was murdered by an American, where others believe he was an American hero who improved the quality of American democracy. Free speech is what it is, but gives you the right to engage when possible, rather than suppress.
-The President claims the media is 'the enemy of the people', why? Because it does not adore him, because it points out, on an almost daily basis that he is a liar, because his rhetoric is soaked in venom, hate and violence. The man is obsessed with himself and convinced he is the greatest and most popular President in the history of your country. And he wants the media to tell everyone that: to declare it 'the enemy of the people' is infantile on one level, but on another is a tactic borrowed from the playbook of every fascist and every dictator who reigned supreme over their country before seeing it collapse, because of them.
Anyone complaining about his/her rights is a non-conformist. And you might say, "But I have the right to be a non-conformist." Of course you do. And the rest of society has the right to put pressure on you to conform. This is what liberals perceive as a violation of their civil rights. In fact, it is society doing you a big favor, giving you some solid information that you should take to heart. If you don't, that's okay too - America's been dealing out misery to non-conformists for centuries, and they can keep pounding on you until you're beat into the ground like a railroad spike with no harm done to the larger purpose.
--This is the most astonishing thing you have written so far, Nick. The USA was created by non-conformists! The religious communities that emigrated from Britain, the Netherlands and Germany were all non-conformists who were escaping persecution because of that. So maybe the purest American is someone who does not conform, which rather suggests that Transgendered Americans and those who do not self-identify as Male or Female are not just non-conformists, but the purest or pure Americana. Bravo to them!
