"Accept Random Events"
http://theconcourse.deadspin.com/accept ... 1786890887Quote:
How much are you willing to give up in a futile quest to control things that cannot be controlled? Everything?
This past weekend, a man planted a bomb in New York City. It appears that he did it because he was angry over our nation’s foreign policy, though it is also possible for someone to plant a bomb because they are angry about any number of other things, or because they want to cover something up, or just for kicks.
...
Any sufficiently large group of people will produce a certain number of individuals who will do just about anything you can think of. Get millions of people together and you will find geniuses and idiots and gay people and straight people and nice people and mean people and, primarily, a lot of average people, who possess all of the complications that the human personality entails. You will find some people who are great athletes and some people who can ride unicycles. You will find some people prone to sadness and some people prone to anger. And you will find a certain number of people who, given certain combinations of genetics and culture and upbringing and environmental factors and unpredictable occurrences, will plant bombs on a street in New York.
The promise of absolute security is a trick. We can persecute group after group and give up our civil liberties one by one and close ourselves off from each other and the world at large more and more and still we will find perfect safety to be an illusion. We can build walls and build weapons and build prisons but we cannot change the fundamental fact that life is to a certain extent unpredictable, propelled by random events that we cannot foresee and can only react to. After we have killed all strangers and locked ourselves in a hidden bunker, the ceiling can still collapse on our head. We would have been better off spending all of that time outside, enjoying the mild weather. It will be winter soon enough. Some time later, the earth will be swallowed by the sun.
The worst part is, I actually agree with his central tenet: sacrificing our fundamental liberties in furtherance of delusional safety is not a good idea.
Thing is, this is Gawker Media, the place that calls for immediate abandonment of the Second Amendment, and Hamilton Nolan, who posts stuff like this:
Restricting the rights granted by the Constitution is fine when it has to do with guns or a state exercising their right to legislate under the 10th, but when their multiculturalism dictates the uncomfortable argument that people should accept radical jihad inspired by Wahhabism because "it's just their culture", Americans are told to "accept" "random" acts like a naturalized Islamic terrorist trying to kill multiple people with explosive devices.
Login
Register
FAQ
Search
