@hallmarc Well...it was *supposed* to.

I was at a wedding reception tonight, and just remarked to the person I was sitting beside that the horseradish was particularly potent, right before I accidently scooped a whole forkful into my mouth.

[cue sound of a steam-whistle]

@BillieBun But, also, opponents are on to him. And by that, I mean people inside his party, too.

He cannot be allowed to have that kind of power ever again.

Perhaps the saddest part is that their winner-take-all mentality sets up a dynamic where a loss makes them feel like they've lost everything.

This unnecessary sense of humiliation drives them.

#polltics

The right is seeking winner-take-all totalitarianism. They're playing for keeps, so to speak.

But they don't really want this kind of the-buck-stops-here responsibility.

Why do I say that so confidently? Well their hero is Trump, the poster-child of 100% power, 0% responsibility.

Trump finds bizarre ways to take credit for good things that had nothing to do with him, and equally bizarre ways to scapegoat others for bad things of his own making.

He found an exploit and hacked it.

@JKxZ I'm currently reading High Conflict by Amanda Ripley.

In it she cites a study "In their research, Willer and Feinberg found that about 20 percent of liberals would not reframe their arguments to persuade conservatives, even if it would work better."

She says "It's very hard to get outside of our own heads and speak the other side's moral language. It is counterintuitive. It requires discipline, humility, education, and empathy."

But the reward is that you can find common ground.

@JKxZ Sadly, I think the world is burning enough already as it is.

What do we win if we win by engaging in the same tactics? Nothing meaningful -- the tactics win because we had to sacrifice our nature to adopt them.

To me this is a matter of gain the whole world, and lose your soul.

I'm watching the right breach all manner of rhetoric guardrails with eagerness and impunity.

Deceit.
Projection.
Overreaction.
Paranoia.

I find it reprehensible. So for me to engage in the same tactics would make me a hypocrite.

This is why I want language I use to be measured, mindful and accurate.

But I'm concerned that this quest for accuracy and balance moves too slow for populism.

@Kaysymmetry This is such a bizarre reality, a disastrous redefining of freedom that invokes restriction, coercion and government intrusion into clothing choices, one of the most consistent and obvious vehicles of free speech.

"We build the wall to keep us free." -- Hadestown

I was at an Indigenous event this past weekend, and I saw a child in meltdown. It was late, it was loud, there was a lot going on, so it wasn't overly surprising.

A woman in this child's life was standing near saying over and over, in a calm voice: "Let it out. Let it all out."

That really stuck out to me. The affirmation of emotion, the permission to express it, the sustained comforting presence, and the signal to witnesses that this is all in-bounds...there was so much care in that moment.

@redenigma You're right. Equality feels like a loss to people who don't actually value their "them" the way they value their "us."

Often the people who are hypervigilant about power being exerted over them are determined to remain unaware of how they exert power over others.

@redenigma Cue the "why not both?" meme.

@smittycanada1 I think you're right, but how does this get addressed?

If these protests serve to further undermine the trust parents have in the system generally, and teachers specifically, how can we fix this? How does more expertise help when expertise is increasingly mistrusted?

To me, it's just adding to the colossal and growing credibility vacuum we have in our culture.

I'm concerned that the chaos agents who just want to watch the world burn are starting and stoking the fires already.

@smittycanada1 Parents want their kids to be safe, and they're being told that they're being indoctrinated.

The only indoctrination is acceptance and inclusion.

A gay friend told me this: "The gay agenda is for everyone to love everyone."

So the fear and suspicion about this scare me; I've watched (esp religious) conservatives rail against political correctness and now what they call "wokeism" my whole life. I grew up in their ranks.

I don't trust people defending their right to be cruel.

@smittycanada1 Admitting confusion is a brave step! I wish more people would do it.

Instigators on the right are filling a lot of people's confusion with paranoia and conspiracy theories, presented as fact.

In short, almost none of what they are worried about is happening. There are red herrings everywhere.

All the reading material I've seen personally is age-appropriate; helping the broader project of inclusivity & safety for all. Parents arguing against that end up arguing for prejudice.

@NiveusLepus @BosmangBeratna Thank you for sharing your story.

I wish that these aspects of your childhood had been different.

And I hope that we can all work together to prevent this kind of prejudice from being passed along to future generations.

Current protests in Canada are are striving to pit parental rights against LGBTQ+ rights.

NPD leader Jagmeet Singh offered this succinct comment on the situation (from the CBC):

"We want parents involved. I think it's a bit of a red herring argument. There's no question that parents should be involved in everything that their kids are engaged with at school, that parents should be incorporated," he said.

"It's also important to acknowledge that for some kids, home is not always a safe place."

@holon42 Oh, yes, it's so important to recognise each of these on their own.

We often conflate (for example) anger and hate (and our mass media and influencers aren't helping too much with this).

They aren't the same, and need to be processed in different ways.

@LnzyHou Thank you for doing the inner work, Lindsay! And for being a part of the journey toward compassion and away from, uh, all of the opposites. 🙂

@LnzyHou Ha ha! I think I'd be really *smart* if I knew what to do with this realisation.

For now, I think it's enough to motivate me keep taking inventory to ensure that I'm not allowing anger to seed itself too deeply into my motives.

I'm angry about a few things, and I can be honest about that. But anger is not a reliable energy source.

And I need to know that about others too, so that I'm not overly-influenced by their anger (which can be bizarrely, compellingly contagious).

Anger is a tactic people use to prevent themselves from feeling vulnerable.

Anger is also a quick way to forge a group identity, joining people who don't want to feel vulnerable collectively.

But anger is a fragile bonding agent.

Anger is fickle, constantly seeking out new rationales and targets. And sometimes anger just ends.