The Essential Value Of Proportional Response; To Any And All Dangers


As an antitheist, anti-God-ist, rational skeptic, I understand that Evolution of Species is an established fact; at least as much as gravity is a fact. I also realize that the entire matter has nothing whatsoever to do with whether or not any "g/Gods" exist. And yet, ... I realize that any Creationist Camp pushing Creationism on Youtube isn't enough of a big deal to get upset about. Being gas-lit by Bad Faith Actors in a debate is cause to feel some irritation. It can even be good cause to GO OFF on someone who keeps playing head games. Gaslighting is a form of abuse. A Zero Tolerance Policy for abuse is reasonable. But it's important to recognize when that is or isn't happening. Most Creationists (like Sal and Rebekah) simply don't realize how wrong they are. [As always, words in BLUE are links.
These are set to open in a new tab]
They're not lying.
And they're not gaslighting. They're just wrong. And the reasons they are wrong ... are things like psychology, sociology, neurophysiology, etc.. They literally were forced to be wrong, by some rather unfortunate physics; - due to persistent elements of dysfunction within their semi-isolated subcultural niche. Meanwhile, Creationists, Flat Earthers, etc ... just really don't have a strong impact on my life, nor most people's lives; - at least ... not as a direct result of those mistakes. I mean, sure. If they're indoctrinating their kids into these crazy Conspiracy Theories, ... they're doing harm there.
For example, it threatens their kids' future ability to make rational sense of the world they live in; but so does the larger whole of their religion. It also threatens to disqualify them from being competitive in all STEM-related professions. Yes, all of that is a big deal. I'd even go so far as to call that Child Abuse.
But that's not really the thing some skeptics are getting so upset shape about, most of the time. Usually, when a skeptics hears this crap, they take it personally; like it's attack on them, or an attack on the fabric of society. But I think that's really overblown. I would remind my fellow rational skeptics. There really isn't anything Creationists, Flat-Earthers, etc can do to hold society (overall) back anymore. Common education has overcome it, in all developed nations. So the only people whose education they can still sabotage are: an ever-shrinking minority of sufficiently vulnerable targets. Granted, that's a big deal because those people matter. However, most of those victims will eventually overcome that sabotage. Why? Because of how successful we've been at making sure actual-education is provided to the vast majority of humans on our planet. "Intelligent Design" is a stubborn, progress-resistant meme which won't live beyond this century. It started in a knowledge-vacuum; as something to fill that troubling gap. But these days? It's a Hail Mary Pass. It's a futile attempt to protect their conservative, Abrahamic-literalist culture from dying out. They will fail.
In fact,
such societal-arsonists (both the willful and the naïve) have already lost more ground than they can recover. Why? Because of the larger wave of physics crashing down upon their many roaring fires.
And yet, pushback on Youtube (especially small Youtube channels) is a very minor force in our collective wave of remedy. Misinformation on Youtube merits just a measure of our attention; even less of our ire. If we're going to prioritize the spending of our respective personal resources, there are other stages and other matters which warrant more of our time, energies, etc.. Please DO stand as vanguards against every form of destruction their Klan tries to spread to the larger body of humanity.


Stand united.
Stand STRONG 

between them and science classrooms. Stand united.
Stand STRONG 
between them and the targets of their bullying of the LGBT, atheists, etc..

Stand united.
Stand STRONG 
between them and their collective efforts to enslave and destroy people through legislation. -- Just don't lose any sleep over them saying really dumb things on Youtube.
-- Necessary lines must be drawn. And ^THAT is where some anger is both DUE ~and~ can translate into some benefit to our collective resolve. Where we draw those lines matters. Otherwise, we're wasting our precious time and energies. SOMEONE qualified should challenge such nonsense wherever they notice it. But when there are a hundred stages for that battle, and a hundred other battles worth fighting, ... We should scale our efforts, for every scene.

Our responses (external and internal) should always be roughly proportionate to the dangers posed.

Comments

  1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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  2. Hi, James, I read your comment(s) on Rebekah's channel and i wanted to share that i'm sailing in a very similar boat :-).
    I think i share your experience of frustration and continued disappointment, and mostly agree with your assessment.
    Then after a while asking yourself if your eagerness and interest is in the bounds of healthy.
    You start to care about people who then end up taking decisions, defending ideas and people you can not understand.
    You take a small step back and overlook...
    You see how much energy you put in and how little it even advances mutual understanding or the discussion as a whole.
    Every small-stepped resolved issue is just rewinded, discarded and forgotten … to be an seemingly untouched, unchallenged issue again in the next stream.
    I have seen the gaslight…
    You zoom even further out and you start to see the weird behaviours of those who you deem to be on your side of the issue.
    I've read Rebekah's book, you start to see motives and strategies, needs, … so nice…so wrong…

    I wanted to let you know that i (and i’m sure a lot of silent others) value your conduct, insights and contributions.
    When we turn inwards on our own, let’s keep sharing those learnings.
    I believe that is a worthwhile profitable niche :-)

    I wish you and yours the best!
    Kim (dr. kim (random pattern designer)

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    Replies
    1. Thanks for sharing your thoughts, Kim. I'm sorry that you feel that our discussions were a waste of time. I don't feel that way. And I still care about you even if we have strong disagreements. It seems that you feel more comfortable to "turn inwards on [y]our own." Thanks for reading my book. My motives have always been plainly stated. My purpose on Youtube is to tell the good news about Jesus. What was your motive in talking to me? Were you only comfortable caring about me if you could persuade me to your worldview?

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    2. Hi Rebekah,
      Thanks for replying.
      First let me make it clear that i do not want to persuade you to my woldview, at all, in contrary.
      I do not even assume nor hope you are in the end wrong about god.
      I truly hope that i am wrong on many stances.
      You were never unclear about your motives.

      I’m interested in the dialogue, the reasons, the arguments, the bettering of mutual understanding, learning,...
      I do not feel like our discussions were a waste of time.
      I told you i was first and most disappointed in my own ability to communicate.
      Secondly in the behaviour on your channel of some who are on my side of the aisle (depending on the stance).
      But there were other issues too in our conversing and choices you made that sometimes do make me uncomfortable in caring.


      "turn inwards on [y]our own." was referring to the sentence that James’ wrote in his comment on your stream.
      “I've recently turned my attention more inward, to examine my own reasons for why I do the things I do.”
      I feel and resonate with that, but hope that even when some are inclined to turn inwards, we do not forget to turn outwards once in a while and share.
      Keeping it healthy.

      I enjoyed reading your book, made some notes, i hope you’ll soon write a similar one but more explicitly about your experiences with and learnings from building bridges of understanding with non-believers.
      Would very much look forward to reading that.

      Wish you the best,
      Kim




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    3. Thanks, Kim. I was sad when I read your first post, but this response is comforting. If God does something worthy of writing about (in my conversations with non-believers), I'll gladly write a book. The vision the Lord gave me about what he plans to do hasn't happened yet. I eagerly hope for the fulfillment of that vision.

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    4. I hope you did not just read over "But there were other issues too in our conversing and choices you made that sometimes do make me uncomfortable in caring.".

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