The Opposite Of Political Correctness

For those of you who watched the recent fox news broadcast of the first ever debate between the Republican hopefuls for President of the United States, you may have noticed that Donald Trump, as expected, acted like himself.

I have limited patience for his positions, and do not intend to defend them here. However, it is noteworthy the extent to which he has, in a short time, generated considerable support simply because he is himself. The absurdity of his proposed positions does not seem to shake the majority of his supporters who I strongly believe do not support him so much for his proposed policy as for his seeming lack of ability to behave like a decent human being in front of an audience.

This signals confidence, decisiveness, and even clarity of thought. All these attributes are markedly lacking from postmodern society. They are also high human virtues that we are deeply attracted to, and for some of us this is regardless of content, as Mr. Trump has demonstrated.

We easily assume that Donald Trump is the opposite of political correctness from the opinions he shares regardless of if anyone asked for them or not, and it is easy to say he is as successful as he has been to this point because of his disregard for political correctness.

However, I challenge this position to ask who defines PC. It is often assumed that PC is a virtue of the left wing. It certainly is, but it is also of any point along the political spectrum that forgoes critical thought in favor of prepackaged platforms and rehearsed outrage at whatever is assumed to be destroying society. Outrage at the state of immigration, debt, foreign policy as apposed to income inequality, gender inequality, opportunity inequality, or anything held dear by the left wing is nothing more than what is PC for the point on the political spectrum from whence the position arises.

And increasingly, anyone who holds to any particular form of political correctness is causing flashes through my conscious of this character

and his supporters.

The actual non-PC path is to apply critical thought to the aspects of your own world view so that you have content worth raging for to begin with. Everyone may have an opinion. However, only those who understand theirs are entitled to one.

To take a your non-PC path into reality, you must exercise the above mentioned virtues of confidence, decisiveness, and clarity of thought, or to simplify, you must exercise both wisdom and courage, the true opposites of political correctness, and which I argue the majority of our problems stem from a lack of.

Postmodern society does not require more mass followers. It requires more individual leaders willing and capable of wisdom and courage. This does not require your candidate to win, or your position to be validated. It rather requires you to actually do something. Individuals remain the greatest potential black swans in existence.

Straining Out Lions And Swallowing Genocides

The death of the large, aggressive cat known as Cecil the Lion and the accompanying outrage highlights the profound depths of postmodern ignorance towards the true conditions in much of the world.





It does not help mass hysteria that the cat's killer fits the stereotype for the postmodern evil hiding under the bed. Rich, affluent, white, male. However, the point of this commentary is not to defend him, as there is little to be defended on further examination of his record. It is all about attacking the disproportional reaction. Needless death and killing, regardless of the species, is unfortunate and to be avoided. At the same time, fixating on the death of a cat, in the midst of massive corruption, oppression, human suffering, and in fact, the death of several other protected creatures, is the highest form of collective ignorance yet demonstrated.

To begin, the cat was killed in Zimbabwe, formerly Rhodesia, named after Cecil Rhodes, for whom the cat in question is also the namesake. Many still remember, if vaguely, what Nelson Mandela sacrificed for. In summery, Rhodesia was the metaphorical alcoholic, degenerate younger brother to South Africa in every way. The people of European decent upholding institutionalized oppression and backwardness were exchanged for Robert Mugabe and his inner circle when Rhodesia became Zimbabwe after a brutal civil war in 1980. Not much has improved since, as Robert Mugabe is still in power, the economy of the country has been destroyed, and a human rights record that is unquestionably bad continues to be added to.

Furthermore, the region including and surrounding Zimbabwe, among other things, has HIV infection rates approaching 30% in some places; one of the highest rates of malaria infection and death in the world; considerable water born illness resulting in one of the highest infant mortality rates in the world; a lack of government services in much of the area or simply corrupt government, resulting in under employment, under education, and questionable to non-existent law enforcement and public security. This is only Southern Africa. Go farther north and you will find the largest and least reported genocide in the world in the DRC, which no amount of UN observation seems to be effective in stopping. Go even farther north and you will find the world's youngest country reeling from its own genocide and on the verge of yet more war in South Sudan. These are only a few cases. There are many more besides if anyone would care to look.

But what makes headlines and serves as fodder for more viral posts? The killing of a big cat. What garners over 140 thousand signatures thus requiring the US Government to take it under consideration? Extradition of the cat's killer to Zimbabwe to face charges by the same people who have eaten their share of exotic animals, not to mention the future of their country.

There is nothing wrong with demanding an end to useless killing of any sort. However, it is ignorant and banally evil to fixate on this while not even paying attention to the far greater evil.

Black lives matter far more than lions.