Thoughtlets – Page 5 – pam-mentations.com

January 26, 2021

Thoughtlets. xxxii.

A scapegoat is (usually) a person or group of people unjustly blamed for some set of circumstances arising from the actions of others. Scapegoats bear the brunt of crowd hostility and, once identified by an angry mob, find themselves in no-win, dangerous — even lethal — situations. Scapegoating is as old as humankind. In The Annals, Continue reading

Thoughtlets

anger, behaviour, blame, crowd, fear, madness, mentality, mob, scapegoat, Tacitus, tension

January 26, 2021

Thoughtlets. XXXI.

Resistance is not raising up an army and trading fire, by that time too many have needlessly suffered — as will many more. Resistance is inviting someone you’ve been taught (and are expected) to hate to your table and treating her as a friend. The people you need to resist, to this end, are your Continue reading

Thoughtlets

betrayal, civil, civility, courage, diplomacy, peace, polarization, resistance, traitor

January 26, 2021

Thoughtlets. xxx.

What some forget is that, like it or not, the military is social. It’s embedded in a polity, and it’s just one of many familiar social and political institutions therein. There exists no impenetrable wall with soldiers on one side and civilians on the other. A soldier moves from a theater of war to a Continue reading

Thoughtlets

civillian, community, human, institution, military, people, social, values

January 26, 2021

Thoughtlets. xxix.

Today’s Thoughtlet is a quote on freedom of expression that originates with Tacitus, a Roman historian who lived in the first century CE. This quote, translated as follows, appears in Latin on the title page of the first edition of Hume’s A Treatise of Human Nature, “Seldom are men blessed with times in which they may Continue reading

Thoughtlets

academic freedom, free speech, freedom of expression, freedom of thought, history, Hume, Philosophy, political correctness, quote, Tacitus

January 7, 2021

Thoughtlets. xxviii.

It’s no small annoyance whenever an interlocutor stops to evaluate whether what I have just said falls on the political left or the right. In so doing she’s pegging me to a side. And once pegged, in her mind, whether what I’ve said is likely to be true or false as indexed to whichever side, Continue reading

Political Rhetoric, Thoughtlets

barriers, critical, ideas, left, polarized, politics, right, Thinking, thought

December 12, 2020

Thoughlets. xxvii.

Two SJW slogans are: Silence is Violence and Words are Violence. If silence is violence, then one must speak. But words are violence. If words are violence, then one must be silent. But silence is violence.To avoid absurdity, the SJW must stipulate that Some Silence is Violence and Some Words are Violence – neither of which make great slogans. But which silence is Continue reading

Thoughtlets

absurd, absurdity, acts, censorship, compelled speech, logic, Philosophy, silence, SJW, slogan, social justice, speak, speech, violence, words

November 16, 2020

Thoughtlets .xxvi.

What fascinates me about Speakeasies was the mingling between and relative equality of rich, poor, women, men, black and white. These illicit clubs helped with the momentum and success of civil rights movements. The current Prohibition with its categories of prohibited speech are liable to create a new kind of Speakeasy. I’m curious about what kinds Continue reading

Thoughtlets

autonomous effects, civil rights, critical thinking, moral, myopia, prohibit, prohibition, solidarity, speakeasy, speech

October 31, 2020

Thoughtlets .xxv.

If you like something a political speaker has said or the way she’s said it, ask yourself who her target audience is and whether you are a member. If so, remember the politician is soliciting your vote. It would not go amiss to slow down and inspect her wares for incorrigible defects, a most difficult Continue reading

Thoughtlets

bias, critcize, critic, deliberate, discern, emotion, inspection, judge, oratory, partisan, perspective, politician, politics, prejudice, rhetoric, scrutiny, slow, sophism, sophist, speech, think

October 29, 2020

Thoughtlets .xxii.

Look below a grand narrative, e.g. left vs right, dark vs light, and you will discover people doing the best they can with the circumstances in which they find themselves. Continue reading

Thoughtlets

grand narrative, humility, myopia, perspective, Philosophy, political, social, standpoint, standpoint epistemology

October 12, 2020

Thoughtlets. xxiv.

It’s good epistemic practice not only to have gatekeepers in science and scholarship, but also to have others beating at the gates to ensure the freedom of movement of ideas – using a battering ram, if required. In which measure it’s required is anyone’s guess. Too little force might result in stagnation, too much, a Continue reading

Thoughtlets

academic freedom, constraints, gatekeeping, Liberty, paradigm shift, scholarship, science, stagnation