Creating the Illusion of Bigotry is About Words

I want to talk about words, and how certain words are strategically used to create division, and the illusion of bigotry. I use the word bigotry because it has morphed into that from before being mainly just about racism. I say that even though the word "racism" these days carries a very different meaning now than it did not so long ago depending on who you ask to define what it is.

Take the phrase, "Your kind of people." It's a rather benign statement that does not by itself mean anything specific. It requires context in order for the phrase to have meaning or a definition.

The phrase can be used in its entirety, or it can be abbreviated. "Your kind." It means exactly the same thing depending on the context. It also means different things depending on the nature of the conversation in which it is being used.

Many people often say, "I know your kind." Adding the words, "of people," may be a bit redundant because we are all people, of course. But it doesn't in any way change the meaning of the entirety of the phrase.

Unless the one hearing the words wants it to.

Ultimately a "kind of people" can be anything. There are good people, bad people, devious people, unscrupulous people, charitable people, mischievous people. In other words, it can be said that in this world there are "all kinds of people." Another common phrase that is used in the English language.

Depending on who you direct the words to, and often times regardless of the context, "Your kind of people" suddenly becomes a racist statement even if, in the context of how it is stated, it has no racial component to it whatsoever.

In other words, to the ear of someone who wants to create division, the ears will process the word or phrase in a way that creates the illusion of bigotry.

It's not just a white or black issue, though. Thus, choosing the word bigotry over racism. Because the same thing is happening with the LGBTQ community and the "fight for their rights" argument permeating the political landscape today. Words are being turned into something else in order to create the bigotry to further the cause and perpetuate the idea that bigotry exists on a level that perhaps it really doesn't. 

It's designed to widen the divide and justify a reason for the argument. It's a strong-armed attempt to change the conversation.

That's really what the pronoun thing is about when you get down to it. It's a challenge. It's a call to create an argument. It is a cause to force someone into a challenge for which now they must defend themselves and for which the person who believes they are being bigoted against can now point fingers at and assign blame.

"Could I speak to her," now becomes a bigoted statement if it is directed at someone who wants to be called they. By itself nothing at all is implied by the term "her" unless the word means something else to the person it is directed at.

The word, "her," now becomes a challenge. The person who wants to be called "they" now gets to put the other person on the spot to see if they will now assume using the new desired pronoun or will pose an argument against it. And if the person does not comply with the challenge, they are now confirmed to be a bigot.

Communication is the greatest form of bringing people together. But when you redefine words and make the language used confusing, that's what creates the divide. Because when people no longer know how to communicate, some people avoid the communication altogether.

"What do you mean by your kind of people?" asks boldly the black man if it is said to him by a white person. The challenge has begun, and a benign statement now has been redefined and the entire context and nature of the conversation changes from one that had no racial connotation, to one that now does.

You've been put on the spot to now defend yourself but have also been immediately accused. Beyond that, your defense will be harder since the person accusing has, presumably, already made up their mind.

In other words, one side is saying, "You can't use those words." Or they are saying, "You have to carefully choose your words around me." A person who is not racist now has to communicate in a way that proves he is not racist at every word.

When a group of people assumes they are bigoted against, it is on the other side to constantly prove they are not a bigot. They are guilty until deemed innocent. And if you slip? Now the challenge is on—but the accusation remains, often times despite the defense.

Take the word cis as another example. Beyond being so far just a made-up word transgender people use to describe non transgendered people, if you say you are not "cis," but just a man, suddenly the affirmation of the word "man" and the denial of the word "cis" implies you are a bigot. 

And that's the challenge. That's what the so-called bigoted person is now forced to do. Either to accept the definition they have chosen for you and change your verbiage or be accused of being a bigot if you don't.

The English language, or any language for that matter, is supposed to be simple enough that words mean something, but all words must mean the same thing to everyone or else the ability to communicate breaks down.

But of course, context and body language and inflection also play large roles in how we communicate with each other, and even changes the nature of words used. Calling someone stupid can be playful, joking, or serious.

It's all in how you say it and in what context you call someone stupid which determines if the word is being used to accuse or to simply suggest or is nothing more than a joke.

"You're an idiot!" with a furled brow, raised voice and wave away means a very different thing than, "You're an idiot," with a smile and giggle and wave away. The context should immediately assign to the person the word is being directed at what is meant by the word "idiot." And often times it is clearly understood.

Unless they happen to be certain words deemed to have specific other meanings that have been reassigned to the words—again, such as to create the illusion of bigotry or racism. To create the divide and further the gap. To put otherwise normal, benign people on constant alert, and to stand at the ready any group of people who want to perpetuate the illusion of bigotry to challenge it and have an opportunity to affirm it.

When one is predisposed to assume something exists, in any encounter, regardless of the nature of it, that person will deeply look for any reason to find the thing they are predisposed to believe exists. And anything can be turned into an opportunity to say, "See, right there. There it is."

The problem is that the more one or another group tries to redefine language, the more divided as a people we become. The more unable to communicate effectively we become. The less inclined we become to have an open and honest conversation about anything. Especially in situations where any number of words may be up for challenge as to what they really mean depending on who says them and who hears them.

The answer is that any of these "redefined" words or phrases can be bigoted. But they need to be understood on a different level, and the context should be sought just as strongly as the bigotry is being sought to be found. 

Because here's the deal. If you are looking for bigotry, and are predisposed to believing it is present everywhere, you will find it. No matter where it comes from. No matter the context. No matter the meaning. You will find it.

Everyone says we want to eliminate racism and we want to eliminate bigotry. And I think on all sides, deep down, that's what most people really want to do. At the same time, in order to do that, if we really want to accomplish it, we need to stop finding ways to breathe new life into it. We need to stop finding new ways to rekindle flames when the fire is dying down.

Rather than look for ways to divide each other, we need to find ways to come together. And if we can be creative about how we change the meaning of words to perpetuate the illusion of bigotry, I think we can be equally creative about finding ways to remove the illusion and just go back to words meaning what they actually mean.

I think the world would be a much better place if we did that.

Biden Harris is Harris Question Mark

It may still be up in the air momentarily whether or not Kamala Harris will be Joe Biden's running mate into the 2024 presidential election. But if one were to assume how the Biden/Harris administration, and perhaps even the democrat party at large, views the success of what they've done, one could easily assume they see no reason to make any changes.

In their eyes, despite all indications otherwise, including in the polls, their administration has been a glowing success full of achievement and progress.

Without sounding brash or harsh, aside from my personal politics, I think one major consideration needs to be made this time around when people go to the polls and make their choice for who becomes the next president in 2024.

Joe Biden is now the oldest serving president in United States history.

For one thing, the life expectancy for males in the United States stands currently at about 76 years, and Joe Biden is 80 years old now. He'd be 82 by the time he took the oath on January 20, 2025. In order to complete his term, he'd have to make it to nearly 86.

Sure. That's possible. But despite what the public has been told, it is also clear to most people that Biden is not necessarily in the best of cognitive health—something that is vitally critical when you are the president of the United States or any country for that matter.

Therefore, it is safe to assume that Kamala Harris, if she is indeed the intended running mate going into 2024, will be, not might be, but will be the president at some point if Joe Biden wins reelection.

So, the ticket really isn't Biden/Harris. It's Harris/? That is ultimately what you are voting for if you cast a vote for Joe Biden. A Kamala Harris administration with whomever she will choose as her vice president when she takes the oath of office in Biden's absence through death or for health reasons.

Does anyone really think this is a good idea?

I mean, unless you happen to be living under a rock, the Biden presidency has been an abject failure that pales in comparison to anything that ever happened under Trump. And when it came to Trump, it wasn't his policy that had their issues. It was the optics, and the way the media portrayed things Trump did and said.

Can we afford one disaster after another for another four years? And moreover, can we afford potentially three or four years of Kamala Harris as president?

When we go to the polls in 2024 we need to be focused on what's best for the country, set our politics and divisions aside, and make the best decision we can possibly make for America. That's going to present a hard choice, no doubt. But it's a choice we are going to have to make if we want to preserve our country and actually move it forward.

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What is Truth and the Silencing of Conservatives

It often becomes, to me, a confusing area of contention. Why does it seem that the only people being sought after to silence is targeted to silence only those who speak from the right? Granted, there may be no actual data to support the claim, so let's just call it an observation, shall we?

But you have to admit, it does seem a bit obvious. The right IS the target.

I will even grant you that most of the time there's "something" behind the silencing. Or at least, that is the impressive that wants to get left after the silencing occurs. 

Why is that, and again it seems, that the left can say anything it wants, call anything it wants to truth, and have their say and no one gets to question that? But when the right says something, everything is questioned. And in the minds of those asking the questions, and ultimately doing the silencing, there is no room for questioning the questioner. 

You will remember around 2017 Bill O'Reilly, then the top-rated cable news show host on television, was boost off the air amid sexual harassment allegations. Okay, sounds justified, right? Sure, according to all of the allegations and reports he was a bit of a fox in the den of Fox News. 

But was he? Or was he simply pushing back too hard and getting too big of an audience for his clearly conservative viewpoints? Maybe. Maybe not. It does seem odd that Fox News would want to remove a host who was clearly a large part of their bread and butter without at least good cause.

Or was the left just pushing too hard? Were the other things Fox News was concerned about that they used Bill O'Reilly as an opportunity to quiet the potential bigger onslaught?

Tucker Carlson, the latest target, was removed from their airwaves with his last show airing Friday, April 21st—which at the end of the show he told audience he would see them on Monday. So, it was a quick development over the weekend following the settlement of the Dominion voting machines defamation lawsuit.

Lou Dobbs was also recently cancelled, and he happens to be another one among those named in the filing against Fox News.

Before I go any further, might I remind people that there were many hosts on other networks who were offering up false information and lies galore during the entire Russia Collusion farce. Who fact-checked? Who offered redactions? Who corrected the record?

Why was no one sued for defamation in those cases? Okay, no one brought the suits. But should someone have? Maybe. Should calls to action have been encouraged? Probably. Should it have been important to set the record straight and tell the news straight? Would it even have been a good idea to maybe offer up apologies?

I mean, say what you want about the claims regarding Dominion sort of accusing Dominion of being the source for stealing an entire election from the American people. But one could easily argue that the entire left wing media news organization which is comprised of NBC, CNN and even media giants like Google and Facebook might have had more to do with rigging an election than Dominion ever was if the claims made against them by Tucker Carlson and others were true.

Whether it was about issues surrounding the election or the supposed insurrection of January 6th when it was supposed that angry conservative Trump supporters sought to storm the capital and overturn an election, the mere fact is that conservatives were literally silenced and shut down from having anything to say to potentially open a dialogue, even if was just to ask questions and see where those questions might lead.

Donald Trump was at the forefront of course. A former sitting president was literally kicked off of Twitter. And others followed him—all conservatives. All of them cited for supposedly spreading misinformation and lies.

Based on who's truth? I mean, that should be the question of the day, right? Who's truth is the Imperial truth and who gets to decide what that is? Why is always so immediately assumed the right is at the helm of harmful misinformation?

We have people out there who can openly debate that a woman exists for Heaven's sake. Isn't that patently false? Is it even an argument? Apparently it is. They can freely say that a woman cannot be defined by old outdated standards. But can we, the right, openly deny their truth?

No. We can't. Even if we are not silenced for that speech, surely we are made into pariahs for it. We're called liars and racists and homophobes, we're called out of touch and out of sync with the times. We are called imaginiationists (a word I just made up) instead of realists. We're labeled as bigots.

To be completely honest what I take issue with more than anything is the very use of the word misinformation. Frankly, I think it gets tossed around too readily and too easily—and of course it's the right being accused of it time and time again.

As I asked before, "Based on who's truth?"

Who are the fact checkers? The media of course. And what makes up the largest portion of the media? Liberals. The left. They are the ones cracking the code of truth and anyone who questions the person supposedly setting the record straight is simply spreading more misinformation and denying the truth. The truth they decide.

Now TikTok is up in arms and running a bit scared by the truth seekers of the world—particularly the United States government.

They say they have a team of individuals of more than ten thousand people scanning through the media being offered by members to root out the evils of hate speech and information. And who gets targeted? Not the woman sitting in her bath robe sipping on a cup of coffee in a live stream getting to voice her opinions about men and women not existing in the world and defending her use of the word cis to redefine non-transgender people, who before the word existed in the imaginations of the left, simply described men and women. No. She gets to keep talking even if she is offensive to tens of millions of people who disagree with her.

The ones getting silenced and banned and shut down are the ones who voice their opinions other than what the left has already predetermined to be the truth. A guy can be banned for a week for simply suggesting that president Biden may not actually be running the country. Not because he stole the election. But because maybe he does not have all his faculties and can't be in charge.

Granted, it's an opinion. Just like suggesting a man or a woman is somehow now a cis is an opinion. But of course the left are the ones who decided that there is a difference between fact and opinion. Saying a man cannot be a woman, even if biologically that's a true statement, is not allowed. It's misinformation that could potentially be harmful of disrespectful to others.

Never mind the harm or disrespect imposed on someone who thinks otherwise.

Will it ever change? Who knows? I can say that more people seem to be pushing back more than ever. Even coming from both sides—although of course most of the push back is coming from the right and those middle ground people who call themselves independents.

No one sought to silence that crazy democrat congresswoman Maxine Waters from California for shouting, "Impeach 45," with no basis for impeachment other than she disliked the president, or called her out for potentially inciting violence during the Derek Chauvin trial telling protesters to "get more confrontational." No one held Chuck Schumer to the fire for saying there would be "hell to pay" if Roe v. Wade would be overturned which sent a madman nearly to the door of Supreme Court Justice Cavanaugh wishing to murder him.

But people Mike Lindell and Tucker Carlson will be targeted and silenced. Donald Trump himself will be hounded by baseless accusations and investigations, impeachments and indictments. And rather than stack the courts the media and whoever can find any dirt to dig up will go after a Justice like Clarence Thomas and try to physically remove him from the courts.

It is literally a case of the fox minding the chicken coop here and people need to start paying better attention to what's really going on. The misinformation is happening not just on the right—in fact, I would strongly contend that the lion's bulk share of it is actually coming from the left. 

The left, by the way, who have become literal masters of fictional tales selling their books as gospels of truth and verifiable and undeniable correctness to the masses for wide consumption, also bearing the arms against anyone who might question their truths so that they may pounce swiftly and unleash their terrorism of their own defamation and destruction of character—hopeful that eventually all real truth might finally see its own abolishment so that the only thing ever labeled as truth is what they badly want you to believe.

Is Alissa Heinersheid Out, or Is She Over Bud Light Marketing Controversy?

Was the vice president of marketing, Alissa Heinsersheid, fired over the Bud Light controversy? Well, that depends on who you talk to and how you want to interpret words. Which, by the way, is an age-old tactic with the left that perhaps took root when Bill Clinton famously answered a question by asking another question, "That depends on what is is."

Or maybe it was something the left has been doing long before Clinton's now famous response to what was a rather simple question. They say things that sound like the same thing but aren't exactly necessarily the same thing.

What Anheuser-Busch InBev said is that she simply took a "leave of absence."

One thing the left, and particularly the woke and cancel culture people, hate to do is admit defeat. They very strongly don't want to be wrong. 

It depends on what "is" is.

Whether or not company officials say she was fired or not to me doesn't matter. As I have said before, business is about dollars and cents. Not politics—even if many corporate America executive boards and leadership now seemed to have tapped into woke people to lead them.

They chose to allow a bad idea to hit the airwaves thinking they were being inclusive and thinking that woke culture is "the new next best thing," and they thought that consumers would rejoice when they saw transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney on their beer cans.

Because woke people, besides being misinformed about their own cause and popularity, and despite the feeling of power they think they have, are simply out of touch with reality. Consumers are having had enough of it and they sent a clear message to Anheuser-Busch InBev about it. They don't want to just come right out and say they were wrong.

So, they didn't fire the person behind the marketing idea gone wrong. She's just on a leave of absense. Okay. Whatever.

Meanwhile, Todd Allen, who is the vice president of global marketing for Budweiser takes her place, and other changes to marketing teams and leadership have also been made so that there is more oversight over how marketing campaigns will be conducted and reviewed in the future.

Sounds clear to me that Anheuser-Busch InBev is making these changes because of the Bud Light, Dylan Mulvaney controversy. What else would it be about?

Speaking about transgenderism, I think it is worth noting that the way the media is portraying any backlash on the issue, they say that the right (and republicans in general) are "fixated on transgender issues," with many state governors and legislators introducing bills that they claim infringe on transgender rights.

Wait a minute. Who is fixated?

For several years now I think the truth is that the left has been fixated on it, literally shoving their cause down everyone else's throats and forcing them to "accept this or else." Join our woke movement or be labeled as a racist, homophobe or demagogue.

They don't care what the majority wants. We are not supposed to have our voices heard. We are supposed to just quietly sit back and take it—all of it—and accept whatever their definition of the world is.

Regardless of whether or not Alissa Heinsersheid is out of a job or not I don't think makes a difference, ultimately. At least not in the short term. With this wording of her departure, I think consumers are smarter than the narrative. They want an admission of guilt, and they want the company execs to be honest about what happened and why, and admit they were wrong.

This isn't going to be a moment where consumers, essentially ignored and unappreciated, now simply go back to the stores and start buying Bud Light again. The damage has been done and the little token of a "white flag" being thrown up in a kinda sorta way isn't enough.

Besides, I think consumers need to continue to stand tall against what Bud Light tried to do. If the "moment" is one in which execs simply feel they dodged a little bullet here, the real message will be lost in translation.

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In Bud Light Debacle Workers Should Fight Too

I stand firmly with the Bud Light boycott over the controversy surrounding putting transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney on their beer cans. And that's saying something since I am generally opposed to boycotts. However, when it comes to woke and cancel culture, which has permeated businesses of all kinds for some years now, I take a different stance.

Enough is enough.

The role of business is not to promote social causes or to necessarily have one position or another. It is to promote their products and services and make a profit. When they sway from this primary purpose, they jeopardize their ability to do that.

But it is not just owners and shareholders that suffer when a backlash happens. It's the workers who get hurt in the process as well.

Consumers who are unhappy with what a business is doing is going to make a stand against it with their wallets. As someone once was quoted as saying, "Every dollar we spend casts a vote for the kind of world we want to live in." In the case of the Bud Light controversy, consumers are speaking quite loudly about their unhappiness.

At some point the position the company is taking is going to affect the workers who produce the products and services and I think they should be fighting just as hard against this sort of thing as consumers are. It's their jobs at stake, after all.

Because let's not forget, while Bud Light is only one brand among many, consumers boycotting Bud Light aren't necessarily boycotting just that brand. They are boycotting the company behind it. Anheuser-Busch InBev. So, while one may consider that other brands being sold could pick up the slack, so to speak, that's not necessarily the case.

Workers need to stand up and tell the company they work for that this sort of thing doesn't do anyone any good. You are taking a stand for a group of people who represent only 1% of the population. The other 99% are standing against you and if profits fall, our jobs could be cut.

Granted, people in general do have short attention spans, and so it is reasonable to assume that perhaps this issue falls by the wayside sooner rather than later. Still, with losses looming around $7 billion and counting, and with woke and cancel culture becoming more and more disliked, the impact of Bud Light's decision to put Mulvaney on the can could well be a lasting one after all.

Part of the issue, I think, is that I don't think companies are necessarily getting the message clearly enough. The response from Anheuser-Busch InBev about the controversy, which was more of a non-response, seems to indicate that.

They sort of said to their customers, "We don't care what you think." And even if that's not word-for-word what they said, that's what customers heard. That was the essence of the company's response. "We are going to do what we want to do and you're just going to have to accept that and fall in line."

In other words, I don't think it is enough for just consumers to stop buying the products. I think other businesses should make a stand too and pull products from their shelves, and workers should step off the production line and say, "We're not returning to work until you understand your customers better."

You have to fight fire with fire. Because the woke and cancel crowd right now have all the fire, and a lot of it. The rest of us need to have as much fire individually as they do, because ultimately we will have more fire. We are the majority.

Whether or not workers would actually do this is debatable. Or even retailers. I understand, on a common-sense surface level why they might choose not to. Still, if the message is not delivered strongly enough, the other side will simply keep on winning, and the majority will have to continue to be bombarded with more of this nonsense that is becoming a deadly cancer on American business.

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