PERCEIVING BAD THINGS
Broadly speaking, the world scene is too horrible to be believed. Things are just too bad and too scary. That is a very big part of why bad things are invisible. People do not see what is going on in the world because they have no idea how bad it is. They don’t want to find out how bad it is. They don’t want to get the bad news. They say “It can’t be true.” or “That’s impossible.”. People cannot see what they believe is impossible.
In order to understand the world, one has to be able to perceive the evil which exists there. If a person starts with the assumption that world leaders are uniformly good and honest men, then he will not be able to observe the evil which exists, because seeing it would show that his assumption is false. That in turn might mean he needs to reexamine his priorities. He might discover that the future which he envisions for himself, or for his children, is not what is going to happen. This might be difficult or painful. It might be easier for him to indulge in the illusion that our leaders are good and honest, that they are skilled in handling such matters, and that they are doing their best to create Liberty, peace, and prosperity in the world.
PERCEIVING WITHOUT AGREEMENT
The second big reason why people just don’t see what is happening in the world is that one has to disagree. If one is going to talk about what’s going on in the world, what’s really going on, one has to talk about:
Evil in high places
Conspiracy
Loss of Liberty
Collapse of Constitutional Rights
The advancing Police State
Unjustified and undeclared wars
Random bombing of innocent people
How Congress has become a rubber stamp
Financial irresponsibility that defies easy description
Billions and trillions of dollars that just disappear into one black hole or another.
Even suggesting such things is cause for ridicule, scorn, contempt, and rejection. One has to disagree with all the “authorities” on the public scene. One has to disagree with newspapers, TV broadcasters, “anchormen”, “pundits”, “experts”, professors, politicians, world leaders, Senators, Congressmen, and all the Very Important People that one sees on television or reads about in the newspaper.
Rather than getting answers to one’s questions, rather than getting data, rather than getting counter-arguments, one is subjected to endless psychological explanations of why he is so paranoid that he doesn’t trust the government and he thinks politicians might be lying to him. “The reason he doesn’t trust the government is because his mother did not treat him right.”. Or “It’s because he’s a radical right-wing extremist.”. Or “It’s because he hates black people.”. Or “It’s because he’s a fundamentalist Christian. He believes the Bible. That proves he’s crazy.”.
Any of these psychological explanations is considered sufficient to justify rejecting anyone so deviant as to vary from the very limited selection of “acceptable” political opinions. Both the person and his arguments are rejected, dismissed, and ignored. Sometimes this rejection is done with patronizing sympathy. Sometimes it is done with expressions of concern about how dangerous such people are. More recently, it is sometimes done with warnings that such people are potential terrorists.
PERSONAL REQUIREMENTS: COURAGE AND INDEPENDENCE
Thus there are two personal requirements which one has to have in order to be able to perceive what is happening in the world.
One has to have the courage to face the evil in the world. There is a lot of it. It’s scary. It’s enough to scare the bravest of men.
America is said to be “the land of the free and the home of the brave”. This is good. Without courage, Liberty will not last for long.
Secondly, one has to be able to think independently. One has to be able to disagree. One has to rely on his own observations. If everyone is telling you that black is white, you have to be able to look at it and say “I don’t care what they say. I’m looking at it. And it’s black! So there!”.
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