The Blame Game
Since the middle of November 2020, I have been defending my right to think differently and to voice these views from some of my inner circle, most especially my “best friend” LB. We are currently unable to find any common ground, and this is not surprising, considering the reactions and insults that I have been putting up with from LB since I published an article on Medium.com about Donald Trump and Covid on November 21st, 2020.
Let me put this situation into context. Ever since I was a young child, living in the West Indies where there were no televisions and our sources of entertainment were rather more cerebral than in most places, I have listened to the adults around me discussing politics, religion, culture, and current events. As a result, I have always been aware of those subjects in a relatively passive way. However, I rarely voiced any dissenting opinions and more or less accepted the world views of my family, friends, and colleagues.
Having an extraordinary amount of unstructured time since the beginning of January 2020 due to being on sick leave from my job as a college teacher, I started focusing my attention on the news and reading about current events. I looked into the history of news items and found my source materials extending beyond the more accepted popular mass media information simply because the information given by the mainstream mass media was quite superficial and it seems that they were all reading from the same script with minor differences.
I began to discover links between organizations and political figures and to see signs of corruption in the most unexpected places. This was, to say the least, disturbing and not something that I had sought out. Nevertheless, it was something that didn’t completely surprise me. I suspect that, due to my particular family history and social environment, having first hand knowledge of many people succumbing to greed and ambition, relentlessly pursuing power, influence, and money at all costs has made me more aware than most that anyone can be corrupted.
You see, some of my entourage are very rich and influential. They hold coveted positions of power and position. They look good to the public and they are respected and admired in their individual communities; in fact, they are seen as pillars of the community. However, they are some of the most corrupt, degenerate individuals you would ever hope to avoid.
As an example of their behaviour, some have sued family members, stolen and tricked friends and colleagues out of property and possessions, and gotten away with serious crimes (allegedly). So when people talk about the corruption of the 1% of the 1%, it is not difficult to believe that it is highly probable.
To be clear, I am instinctively suspicious of anyone or any organization that is too rich, too powerful, too influential, or too altruistic because based on my experiences and observations, I am convinced that power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely, to paraphrase Sir John Dalberg-Acton. And the more respected and respectable a person or organization is, the greater the possibility that they are hiding dark secrets.
If you think of power, riches, influence (political or social) as an aphrodisiac or an addiction, then once someone has gotten a taste of it, they want more and more of it. The initial high (like with Crack cocaine or heroin or KFC in my case) fades after a while and the same intensity or feeling of euphoria requires a larger quantity and more frequent hits. In practical terms, an addicted person will want more and he or she will do whatever is necessary to maintain their supply and to obtain those highs.
Why do you think the US Senate and Congress is full of older people in their 60s and 70s, even their 80s? These career politicians are addicted to the power and influence, the control they have over people’s lives, and that high needs to be maintained. No-one or nothing will be allowed to interfere with that or to get in their way.
So, keeping my background and my prejudices/suspicions in mind, I began to look at the 2020 Presidential election and its lead-up back in August 2020. I was suspicious of the unprecedented and incomprehensible vitriol directed towards former American president, Donald J. Trump. All my antenna went up and I started to sniff around because at first glance it seemed like a remarkably coordinated smear campaign.
I did a lot of research and I came to the conclusion that something very fishy was happening. I looked at the policies and the record of achievements of the Trump administration, and I couldn’t see why the positive aspects of this administration were not being addressed or acknowledged in the mainstream mass media. In fact, as I have remarked in other articles, Trump was portrayed as the scum at the bottom of someone’s shoe or as a gross slimy creature. The only suggested course of action seemed to be his immediate squashing and permanent eviction from US politics.
As I said in the beginning of this article, after I wrote my November 2020 article, I received blowback from several people. The most vitriolic and shocking response was from LB who immediately questioned my sanity, my intelligence, and my character. It seemed clear to him, after knowing me for almost 15 years, that I had become a Nazi sympathizer, a White Supremacist, a woman with White privilege as well as a “house negro” who wants to see all Black people oppressed and in jail. I have also been labeled as a member of a cult who supports Trump despite his racism, his sexism, and all of his other -isms. I am now classified, by him, as completely morally bankrupt.
For several weeks now, I have tried to explain my point of view and to reiterate that I am the same person that he has known and trusted for years. LB assures me that on most other subjects, he trusts my opinion, but this is the exception. I have definitely gone off the reservation. Because of this, he can no longer tolerate being around me. He is ashamed of and disappointed in me, he says.
In May 2020, I got Covid-19 and I was hospitalized for 3 months. I almost died and it is truly a medical mystery that I survived. You see, I have several underlying conditions like diabetes and asthma that make the virus particularly deadly, including a severely depressed immune system from having received both chemotherapy and radiation therapy from January to April 2020.
I was ventilated, intubated, and in a coma. And I now have long-haul Covid-19 symptoms.
That, according to LB, is the only possible explanation for my insanity. My near-death experience is responsible for my supporting the policies of the Trump administration, for my questioning the results of the 2020 presidential election, and for my distrusting the Big Tech censorship and the Democrat’s frenzied attempts to impeach ex-President Donald J. Trump … twice.
LB’s favourite expression is “Facts matter! Stick to the facts!” This seems logical, doesn’t it? However, anyone who studies history or science fully understands that nothing is immutable. History is told through the eyes of the victor (usually) and as power bases change, our knowledge of history is augmented and other incidents become known. In other words, history can and does change over time.
Likewise, science changes over time. Our theories are adjusted or clarified and scientific certainties are replaced by other scientific hypothesis or theories which might then become “certainties”. Remember when everyone knew, without any question, that the earth was the center of the Universe? Galileo really put a spoke into that, didn’t he, with his evidence for Copernicus’ heliocentric theory in the 17th century ?
Knowledge changes “facts”, and as we become more knowledgeable or informed, many of us realize that what we had previously taken as being absolute certainties are not necessarily that. For example, take the Hunter Biden laptop story that was broken by the New York Post in mid-October 2020. It was immediately dismissed by Twitter as “disinformation” and few if any major mass media outlets reported on it, except as a joke or as “a Russian hoax”. It has since been proven to be true and, in fact, the FBI had been aware of its existence for months. They have been investigating Hunter Biden and his uncle for months as well, but it was kept secret so as not to influence the 2020 Presidential election results.
Secondly, Time Magazine recently published an article by Molly Ball: “The Secret History of the Shadow Campaign That Saved the 2020 Election” (February 2021). For some reporters, it is “irresponsible hype” while others find the campaign to “secure US democracy” completely justifiable; the drastic measures and the manipulation employed by Big Tech, Big Business, Big Union, Mainstream Mass Media, Democrats, Patriotic Republicans, etc. was the only way to preserve a truly democratic process and a free election, it is claimed.
Knowledge changes “facts” and perceptions, LB.
If another example is needed, look at recent discovery of the deception by Governor Andrew Cuomo (New York State) who, it is alleged, deliberately underestimated the number of Nursing Home deaths after engineering the return of residents and patients who were Covid-19 positive to these homes. These returned patients are believed to have then caused the infection of and subsequent deaths of other, extremely vulnerable people. The newly revealed death toll is approximately 15,000 deaths.
So, is Governor Cuomo still a hero? Did his Covid-19 policies save the elderly in NY? According to the mainstream mass media in 2020, he surely was a hero and a saviour. Are those people who were so eager to believe the “official” version of things so sure now? Wouldn’t it have been better to not immediately close their minds to alternative possibilities and to reserve judgement?
But here is my big, very personal question: how do you respond to a person like LB who is reluctant to see or understand that facts are fluid in some ways. Because of that, and because people have different backgrounds and experiences, opinions and world views differ. How can you explain there is absolutely nothing wrong with disagreeing with others? In fact, these disagreements, if they are not violent or aggressive, can lead to a much better understanding of the world. Discussions and debates can allow opinions to strengthen or to be fine-tuned.
And isn’t it better to understand and accept others, perhaps agreeing to disagree, especially if you know that their opinions are not personal attacks on you, than to blame or ostracize them for being different from you?
The most regrettable thing that the Cancel Culture is removing is compassion, understanding, and acceptance of differences. Despite its assertions, it is not removing diversity and promoting unity, it is remaking this world into an intolerant, narrow-minded, tunnel-visioned, and relatively uneducated (in the truest sense of the word) environment.
We need to regain our balance.
