What some on the far left (and the far right as well)
fail to understand is that the alternative to civil discussion and
debate is a descent into uncivilized behavior: shouting slogans,
slinging weaponized words, attacking ad hominem, denying a platform
to those you disagree with, abandoning the level playing field of
ideas in favor of animalistic noise-making and shows of strength.
They may not have fully considered where that path leads.
If your ideas are worth considering, then they are
worth formulating and presenting with care and civility and arguments
to back them up. Let them loose on the level playing field of free
speech where they can be tested on their merits. If you arrogate to
yourself the right to shut others down, you place yourself in a value
system, in an arena, where someone with more brute strength than you
can shut you down as well. Two sides engaging on this level set off a
cycle of escalating conflict that can only end tragically.
Healthy public debate isn’t a death match between
colliding interest groups. It’s the way we reach consensus as a
community and more whole understanding as individuals. It is a
natural and peaceful mechanism for achieving wisdom, balance, and inclusion in
our collective decisions.
We need not fear each others’ voices. In fact, we
desperately need to hear each others’ authentic voices so that we
can see where we agree and where we don’t and A. build bridges of
understanding and acceptance, B. approach the truth together, and C.
determine the path that will best serve us going forward. This
requires open, free, intellectually honest exchange between
individuals based on a shared sense of unity (our common humanity),
allowance for diversity (the breathing space for everyone to be,
express, and develop uniquely), and a common interest in discovering
truth (humility and openness to being corrected as well the integrity
to stand up for what we directly perceive as truth).
When we engage in true dialogue, we are tuning the
instrument of our mind to resonate with truth. That means changing
our ideas when they come into conflict with what is demonstrably true
and holding steadily to truth in the face of what is demonstrably
untrue. Post-modernism repudiates the very notion of truth and
therefore represents anti-logic. It is based on self-referential,
circular reasoning that collapses in the face of logic.
In this video, Dr. Jordan B. Peterson calmly explains
why we need free speech and why the best thing to do about the
anti-free speech activists is to let them play out their tactics
while we keep speaking our truth to the best of our ability and
defending everyone’s right to be heard.
The activists speak. We let them speak and make their
positions known. We weigh their ideas on the impartial scales of truth
along with every other idea. We let their behavior speak for itself
as all behavior does. As long as they do not engage in debate, they
render themselves irrelevant to the debate. You don’t debate a
child who’s throwing a tantrum. You can’t. You stand calmly in your
truth and don’t budge for any manipulative, bullying tactics. Don’t
give them the response they’re trying to provoke. Don’t feed the
monster that’s acting out through them by answering in kind. Feed
their better angel by setting an example through your own behavior.
As Matt Kahn advises, when faced with the fevered,
conflicting energies of a turbulent, fractured mind, we can
consciously choose to respond with the opposite vibration. Peterson
does an admirable job.
Activists chanting: “You are not a victim!”
Peterson: “That’s true. I'm not a victim.
“Once you start to regard yourself as a victim, you
look for a perpetrator. And the thing you look for in a perpetrator,
you look for someone that it’s OK to hurt. It’s really not a good
thing.”
Activists chanting: “Shut him down!”
. . .
Peterson: “As far as I’ve been able to determine,
this kind of protest is an expression of a philosophy that’s
grounded partly in post-modernism and partly in Marxism. Now, the
post-modern element is basically this: there’s no such thing as
genuine individual identity. What there is is group identity. And
you, like it or not, only have the interests of your group. And the
whole world is nothing but a battleground between groups of different
interests. There’s no dialogue. There’s no possibility of talking
between the groups. It’s just a power stage where combat has to
take place.
“And so the reason that speakers with whom the
radical post-modernists and the Marxists don’t agree are denied a
platform is because those people do not believe, from a philosophical
position, that dialogue can bring consensus. And all that’s left,
if you forgo that particular principle, is this. [Indicates the
protest.] And this is only where it starts.
“You know, the fact is that you’re all pretty
damn civilized. And thank god for
that. Because if there were enough fools in the crowd, especially
those who are intent on violence, this would turn out very
differently. We do not want to go down that pathway! It’s a big
mistake. We’ve been down that pathway many, many times.”
. . .
Peterson:
“The question was, had we called the police and had them removed,
would that have been a failure?”
“I
think the answer to that is there’s no point in it. There’s no
reason to assume that this [protest] is a bad thing. It’s noisy and
it’s annoying, but that’s fine. You gotta let things – you
gotta follow what you believe to be true. Right? And don’t worry
about it, and let things happen, and see what happens. Because it’s
perfectly possible that if you’re trying to do the right thing,
you’re trying to speak properly, that whatever happens around you
is [partially a] consequence of that and it’s a good thing. So
we’ll see. We’ll have weeks after this event to analyze its
consequences. And so far, all of you that are there to listen to the
talk, you’re peaceful and reasonable, and you got a chance to show
that to hundreds of thousands of people. So, good! This is a good
thing, not a bad thing.”
. . .
Peterson: [Repeating a question from the audience]
“How do we get these people to understand that dialogue leads to
consensus?
“You cannot make people who don’t listen, listen.
You can’t. They have to decide to listen on their own. But you do
that by listening. You show them. You engage in dialogue yourself and
[seek] consensus among you. You lead by example. Because there’s no
getting through this. [Indicates the protest.] It’s an
ideological wall. And the harder you push against it, the larger
it’ll become.
“Don’t worry about it. But don’t get pushed
around. And don’t let people indoctrinate you.”
Today I want to share a song that has touched me deeply. Its emotional resonance for myself comes from my experience breaking up with my wife. Some of the lyrics don’t necessarily relate to that, but many of these words have impacted me powerfully.
Can you imagine feeling and knowing a love so full and perfect and timeless and pure – the stuff of heaven – expressed directly from the heart of a person with whom you’ve shared intense years of trial and tribulation, to whom you’ve wanted to commit your all, someone who actually needs a good, strong, wise person by their side to defend and help them. . . only once you’ve become aware that your marriage with them has been built on sand, is hopelessly dysfunctional, and is keeping you from your own true path?
The freeing revelation has been that that love is not just with that one person: it is behind, inside, and around everything. It is the stuff of life itself! It doesn’t bind you to that particular person or to any set path. And it doesn’t make the pain and sorrow go away. It allows you to embrace the pain, to embrace yourself within the experience of the pain, just being there, present, for as long as the pain wants to express. It allows clear sight, forgiveness, acceptance, letting go.
I am learning to listen to myself – to feel what my body is telling me – and to be honest. I want all of my relationships to be balanced and free. I want to go through life with a light touch, no twists, no baggage, no holding back. I want to give myself permission to feel every twinge and torrent of sorrow, regret, injustice, unfairness, outrage, and anguish. I want to feel connected to life. I want peace.
(For every statement beginning with “I want,” take away the “I” – that’s ego – and “want” – that’s desire – and you’re left with the thing itself. Yay Zen aphorisms!)
(Embedding is disabled on these videos, so I’ve hotlinked them for you below.)
Allow me
to write my final words I can’t stand this anymore Hold me
when the time has come
’Cause I don’t want to be alone
In
my heart you’re still here, it’s the bond that we share I can
feel you’re around everywhere Even though you are gone our
spirit is strong We’re honoring all the work that you’ve
done
When there’s no chance for a defense I’ll have
to bend and give it all
(Each angle will give a new view) All that I’ve been standing for Was
an illusion after all
(As both sides should always be heard)
In my heart you’re still here, it’s
the bond that we share I can feel you’re around everywhere Even
though you are gone our spirit is strong We're honoring all the
work that you’ve done
I’ll see you somewhere again Away
from all the insanity We can’t beat injustice now and for
all I’ll see you somewhere again Away from humanity We
can’t beat unfairness now all alone
Even though you are gone
our spirit is strong I felt you all around alone In my heart
you’re still here, it’s the wound that we share I can feel
you’re around everywhere Even though you are gone our spirit is
strong We’re honoring all the work that you’ve done
I’ll
see you somewhere again Away from all the insanity We can’t
beat injustice now and for all I’ll see you somewhere again Away
from humanity We can’t beat unfairness now all alone.
I am very reluctant to share my weaker, more vulnerable moments even with people who are close to me. I have times when I withdraw completely into my shell. I have been in that state now for four days: not leaving the house, not talking to anyone, just keeping myself occupied with mass Internet / movie / TV intake and drifting on a sea of inner turbulence while doing little or nothing to steady it, find my anchor, get back on the horse. Powerful thoughts and emotions arise, but am I channelling them in a healthy way? I've been running from myself in a manner all too familiar from decades of mental and emotional fragmentation. I get the high highs and the low lows. Been psychiatrically assessed as borderline bipolar, just shy of a clinical diagnosis.
I need to find a way to self-correct these wild swings. Something deep inside me has yet to stand up and invite the warring inner factions to a round table where all can be heard and accepted. Trying to rule one's self as a dictatorship leads to disaster. It's just one persona after another setting the agenda while the others wait for their chance or plot their coup.
I fear both success and failure. I fear both life and death. Sitting in this black hole of fear and self-inflicted misery seems easier than manning up. Is there a way out? I intuit that the only solution lies at the center. Inward. Where everything meets and relative truths implode into the singularity of consciousness.
The world is in crisis. We who feel that crisis on a personal level are responsible for our part in resolving it. But to attempt to resolve it without first resolving our root conflict is a circular path. The linear notion is that this is something we will do once and everything will be peachy from then on out. No. The quantum understanding says that there is no incremental path to peace, no future time point of resolution to hope, wait, and prepare for. The only peace is the one we already have within, timelessly waiting for our wandering attention to stop seeking it out as if it were beyond us, as if we lacked it, to just settle in and make contact.
This is it. This is all there is. Just the now moment and the eternal choice to accept or reject. To abide in peace or perpetuate war. To let the current of life carry us or seek in some way to control it.
Stop.
Breathe.
We are Breath. Rising, falling. Expanding, contracting. Ever new. Ever present. No agenda. Just in and out. Rhythm. Pulse. Zero point extending in time and space in a dynamic designed for one thing: the exploration of experience. To have our experience rooted in the knowledge of what lies beyond experience, we are called to go ever deeper into peace, into breath, into Being.
Into Life.
Thank you for breathing with me. We are separate in form and experience, but one in the great Breath of Life.
This text was born of my response to a thread on facebook. I owe the inspiration for it to many dear souls, but mainly to Irina, whose words are a spiritual depth charge of mystic, numinous insight.
When I
connect with my deeper self, I know only a Love that surpasses all
understanding. This tells me that evil is not an absolute reality,
but arises within relativity. I would characterize it as the result
of progressive layers of distortion overlaid on the mind’s codec
(coding/decoding software), affecting its perception of base
reality-as-it-is to the point where identity becomes a false
construct and authentic connection is lost. The notion of an isolated
“I” within a fundamentally uncaring or hostile universe
supersedes the base reality, creating the need for an arsenal of
defense mechanisms and control schemes. By degrees, the sublime music
of the spheres is twisted into a cacophony of chaos and confusion.
Meaning is hidden from view, vitality withers, divine evolution gives
way to spiritual diminishment and degradation. The virus of
narcissism and fear insinuates itself into the structure of our being
on every level. Every choice in favor of truth, forgiveness,
liberation, and growth (for oneself or another) is a choice to
reclaim a truer experience of our divine self and repudiate the
programming of the virus.
I see the regions of the multiverse
infected by the virus as dark, dense, chaotic
disruptions/interruptions within an otherwise clear sea of white
light. This visual-tactile-auditory-gustatory impression was a familiar one to me
in childhood fever dreams. There was a nasty roughness to these dark
regions that contrasted with the silky, frictionless, infinitely
permeable liquid smoothness of the white light. The vibrations were
intense and low compared with the sublime peace of vibes that were so
high in frequency as to disappear entirely.
We are developing
spiritual antibodies every time we recognize and “flag” a viral
distortion within our perception without identifying with it or
attaching to it with guilt or loathing. Blessing and releasing it severs the energetic cord binding us to it.
Even the virus – though it lacks a life of its own independent of the host consciousness and has no free will the way conscious beings do – is an equal in a world of equals. It behaves
according to its nature and all we can do about it is choose not to partake of that nature.
My concept of Christ is influenced by Philip K.
Dick’s VALIS trilogy. I see Christ as unbounded
consciousness that has walked the path we are on and possesses full
immunity to the dark that is only a passing shadow, a momentary
nightmare within the grand, exquisite dream of God. Since our nature
as Christ exists beyond our limiting construct of linear time, it has
access to and is theoretically accessible from any point within time.
Perhaps certain time frames within cosmic time – such as the
astronomical alignment we are in now – facilitate access both ways.
This is an in-built “weakness” in the viral construct, an “escape
hatch” for beleaguered souls yearning for Home. But since Balance
is a universal law, there must then also be an equal opportunity for
the dark to make its own harvest of souls, claiming those that have
become so karmically heavy and committed to evil, so steeped in the
worldview of narcissism and fear-based hierarchy – so possessed by the
virus – that they “pop” through the membrane separating this
battleground Middle-Earth from the negative
4D realm.
The realms
of Light are far greater and vaster and more varied than those ruled
by the morbid themes of shadow. The realms of Light allow free rein
for all creator beings to bring forth whatever they desire, solo or
in tandem or in groups. Respect for free will is unbreachable. Trust
is absolute. Learning and exploration and fun and beauty are pursued.
Evolution happens with elegance and grace. The existence of an
inimical alternative, of the possibility of evil, lends these realms
a preciousness and poignancy that enhance the experience. We don’t
fully appreciate something until we’ve missed it.
We’ve
been here a long time. The amnesia is so thick, there’s no telling
how long, how many lifetimes we’ve wandered here in this twilight
zone. But we have a chance now to return to our precious Home. To
take steps toward the Light. To heal all sin and shame. To embrace
and be embraced in the arms of Love.
Our hearts
have been calling out to Home, to the brothers and sisters and loved ones we left behind, and Home is calling us just as dearly and
longingly. May we of this battle-weary diaspora of hardy souls now
forge new alliances, combine forces, pool our talents, and work
together to close the final gap and pierce this nightmare veil,
blazing a shining path for millions upon millions to follow if they
choose. We call them with love to follow us in orienting ourselves with the True North Star. We will help and guide
and inspire them in turn as we have been helped and guided and
inspired ourselves. May the lost return and may God protect every one
of us until we reach the destination.
Take heart, dear brother and sister. We remember you. We are always with you. You are God’s own child and we love you just as you are. Peace eternal be with you. OM!
