One of the reasons that free speech is collapsing in America is because of our constant offense at everything and our belief that speech should be silenced if it offends anyone. Colleges are supposed to be the epi-center of free speech but instead have turned into the book-burners of today.
Dr. Ben Carson has some great comments on this...but is it all too late for America?
HUD Secretary Ben Carson on Sunday urged Americans to stop being offended “by everything” and to “grow up.”
Carson, the secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, made the comments on ABC’s This Week with George Stephanopoulos after being asked about President Trump’s acceptance speech being scheduled in Jacksonville, Fla., on Aug. 27, the 60th anniversary of a KKK mob attacking mostly black civil rights protesters in that city.
“Is it appropriate to be having a convention speech on that anniversary in that city?” Stephanopoulos asked.
“We’ve reached a point in our society where we dissect everything and try to ascribe some nefarious notion to it,” Carson said. “We really need to move away from that. We need to move away from being offended by everything, of going through history and looking at everything, of renaming everything. I mean, think about the fact that some of our universities, some of our prestigious universities, have a relationship with the slave trade. Should we go and rename those universities?
“It really gets to a point of being ridiculous after a while,” he said. “And, you know, we’re going to have to grow up as a society.”
Earlier, Carson said the U.S. can only be destroyed if Americans “destroy ourselves.”
“We have to stop putting everything into the arena of combat. Let's see if we can find a way to work together because if we don't, we’re doomed,” he said.
Carson also pushed back on criticism of Trump’s suggestion to governors of “dominating the streets.”
“There are lots of different ways to express things,” Carson said. “I believe what’s being said there is obviously we cannot submit to anarchy. I think we would all agree with that. We might not all express it the same way, but we would all agree with it. And we’ve got to begin to look at the big picture, what is the thing that we’re aiming to do, not what someone said this day or that day.”
Stephanopoulos asked Carson, a medical doctor, if it was appropriate for Trump to hold campaign rallies again.
“I think if it’s done in conjunction with the public health experts, which it is being done in conjunction with them, that’s quite acceptable,” Carson said. “We do need to always, all of us, need to do what we can to prevent the spread of COVID-19, but it is very important that we utilize what we have learned about the disease so that we can live with it, rather than allow it to dominate us and determine how we’re going to live.”
Yes! We have to find a way to work together or we are doomed. That is so simple to say and even simple to realize but near impossible to implement.
I believe we should start having conversations on HOW the United States might agree to split up before we devolve into Civil War. This may simply be impossible. But what might it look like if America divided willingly into a Confederation of Conservative states and a Confederation of Liberal states? I'm becoming more confident every day that our divides in world views are simply too strong to overcome.
"If you believe in abortion on demand, de-funding the police, Black Lives Matter, Gay marriage, transgender surgeries paid by the state, polygamy, legalization of marijuana, guaranteed income for all at age 18, legalization of prostitution and that every person should be able to self-identify....then you can live in the following states..."