(Blair Witch Pirate)
I've done it again this morning. I've been reading articles online. My response to many of these articles follows a similar trajectory and I strongly suspect that this is by design. The article starts with a basic premise, one that is nearly impossible to disagree with - people deserve equality of opportunity - unless you possess an ideological bent that insists on the naturalness of unfairness, or some other idiotic foundation for social cruelty.
Then, there is a secondary argument that emerges, one that is related to the premise, and that seems to follow from that premise but is often based on a logical fallacy of some sort. A false equivalence between general principle and specific anecdote, for example. Once the writer has freed themselves from the responsibility of their own virtue, cloaked in the honor of their premise, they are off and running into the wide open world of presumed injustices that of course result from the misapplication of that same value. Or worse, free to play with the suggested iniquities of the value itself. There is an If this, then why that? sensibility to all of it. If you happen to agree with the writer then this doesn't represent much of a problem and the writer's hope, I assume, is that reader not only goes along for the ride but internalizes the argument as truth.
I do a similar thing here much of the time, so I recognize the pattern. I try to convince myself of all manner of mania and attempt to lure the reader into a kind of complicity, because it's fun to pretend to pursue premises indirectly. One type of freedom is the unhindered use of the mind. Most freedom of that kind eventually seeks agreement and validation. Nobody wants to feel that they're not making sense on any level. The pursuit of a single line of imaginary logic is the minimum requirement for fallaciousness. Without it, comedy can not exist. Within it, rhetoric is birthed.
In these journalistic works there is a problem, then there is a suggestion of a solution. Or, if the writer wishes to seem inclusive they will end the piece with open hands, suggesting something along the lines of, I don't know, you tell me? This is a purely persuasive device made to seem as if they are in need of the reader's intelligence to draw conclusions. This, only after an arrangement of the narrative presented as a series of self-evident facts.
The conflict is often framed as there being oppression and oppressors. The reader is always encouraged to relate to the oppressed. Membership in the group of oppressors also follows strict notions of identity, the very thing the piece often purports to argue against - that these designations are somewhat permeable and always subject to personal choice. Everyone, it seems, is free to choose identity except those categorized as having benefited from their own. We all know the type: the very image of the enemy.
The conflict of the piece would fall apart and lose the reader's interest without this basic dynamic. Mixed throughout are suggestions and prescriptions for justice. These rarely rely on any accepted concepts of justice but rather only an immediate need and demand for it, often by the writer's terms and always in defense of their identified group. We are told that systems of justice favor the oppressors, so they must be done away with, yet no alternate system is presented. There is only the demand that one group must now pay. This starts with individual members of that group and advances along those lines until their power and authority have been dissolved.
Once the writer has established that there is systemic wrongdoing then the obvious solution is to overthrow that portion of the system, if not the entirety. Lack of adequate and enthusiastic agreement to this end or means identifies you as one filled with hate - a bigot, sexist, or racist of some kind.
In the less subtle pieces there is a sense of recruitment as well as that of a sharp defining of the enemy involved in the rhetoric. It relies heavily on group identity and the persistent need for that group identity. There is always an impression of group struggle and success provided. Very rarely, almost never, is there any open encouragement for the reader to think and feel for themselves or to research a subject in the spirit of open inquiry, then to draw their own conclusions. Because the world out there is always filled with very dangerous lies. This last assertion is the one that aligns them most closely with their own enemies.
So, I'll leave today's post with that encouragement: stop being such an adjective. Be a noun in pursuit of verbs. Don't spend your life hanging around waiting to be a preposition. If you look around and see only synonyms then you just might be one. Don't wait for a conjunction to clearly state your interjections.
Be the verb you wish to participle in the noun... (What MLK must have meant)
When you wake up tomorrow you'll still rush off to be a good proletariat. If you're reading this piece, then I already know you will.
See how easy it is?
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