Evil is Often Indifferent

There are, I am sure, some people who are evil for the sake of being evil, or nearly so. They relish the thrill of getting away with it, or enjoy seeing others suffer. True cruelty exists as a means to the pleasure of another, who relishes the suffering of others.

Far more prevalent than this, though, is indifference. Evil is mostly banal, and it is more often caused by carelessness or apathy than for it own sake (or for the sake of some perverted pleasure derived from the suffering of others). For every man who seeks to persecute others for the sake of watching them suffer, there are many more who would "accidentally" persecute others for the sake of expediency or convenience.

Case in point:

This is real bigotry. This is real evil, raising its head to mock. Refusing to participate in somebody else's evil is not bigotry. Real small-mindedness is insisting that others must serve you at all times, that all other people are there for not but your convenience. Evil likes to trivialize itself: just offer one single, small, pinch of incense to Caesar, and hope that God does not notice or care. Bow down before the Golden calf, just once, what can it matter?

I saw a nice counterpoint to all of this:

This is difficult, and often untried. But we do live in a vale of tears, and those tears are all the more bitter because of the sheer cruelty of indifference. We don't live in a time and place of hard persecution--but it is certainly a time and place of soft persecution. This may seem trivial in comparison, as if there is a great gulf between what we suffer here and what martyrs suffer elsewhere: in a sense, there is a wide gulf. But even the greatest distance can be traversed by taking many small, seemingly trivial steps.

A Few Good Links (vol. 19)

So many links, so little time:

1. My favorite living sci-fi author is profiled by the New Yorker. They fail to mention my favorite of his works, however, which is the fantasy duo The Wizard Knight.
2. Why don't religious liberty arguments work better, particularly in regards to the question of Christians and "gay marriage?" For one thing, it's because there are a number of people who aren't religious, and therefore don't really understand or care about the religious rights of others; they therefore don't see the importance of defending religious liberties when these conflict with something else which is desired. Others are openly hostile to religion, and so will support any cause simply because it will conflict with (and thus could destroy or hamper) the recognition of and preservation or protection of religious liberties. Further, there is a divorce between religious doctrines concerning "theology" or "beliefs" (the "creed" part of religion) and the morals which are sometimes not so obvious from those beliefs (the "code" part of religion). Finally, because religious liberty arguments are perceived as whining; nevermind that most feminist or homosexualist arguments also sound like whining--the people who present (and thus, largely narrate and at times frame) the debate are friendly towards gays and feminists, but not towards people of faith. Bottom line: we need to do a better job of evangelizing and then catechizing the culture.
3. The world needs more everyday heroes, but it also needs for everyday men to be heroic when called upon. Sometimes they are.
4. We need more moral and religious heroes, too. Unfortunately, being a morally, religiously, or virtuously heroic man is often a harder road to toe, in particular because the world hates this kind of hero more than any other. Thus, for example, a bishop who is on the whole doing his job in a meaningful manner looks like moral hero, for the simple reason that he faces much backlash for it, and for the reason that there are no other men of valor to march with him in the field. There are a few, however, who lend there pens (or keyboards) to the cause.
5. Actually, heroism isn't all we need. A simple return to virtues, basic morality, and even simple human kindness and decency (soft virtue, those) would work wonders for society. Unfortunately one side in the culture wars is increasingly (though not surprisingly) warring against private morality or public virtue.
6. Speaking of good witnessing to the culture, have I mentioned that I love the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist?
7. There is a certain romance to rituals, religious or otherwise.
8. Churches have been vandalized in the name of homosexualism. These vandalisms are under-reported in the name of "tolerance." 
9. Elsewhere, we see that holding beliefs against the homosexualist agenda must be punished on a personal level. Meanwhile, those who are being fined--and whose businesses are being shuttered and thus whose livelihoods are being ruined--are now being denied aide via such sources as crowdfunding. And of course, the real reason behind the push for "gay marriage" should be obvious to any with eyes to see or ears to hear. Happily, there's still Samaritan's Purse, which won't be so easily shut down.
10. A nice flowchart to answer the important question: "Did I buy a good whiskey?" However, the chart should flow through "taste it" more often.
11. Fear of the Lord means hating our sins--and we should pray that we are given a holy fear of the lord, and thus that we hate our sins enough to overcome them.

With great tragedy and great calamity often comes the opportunity for the harder virtues to be practiced. Let us hope that we see more fortitude, and indeed even some heroism, emerge from these increasingly hot culture wars.

Freedom For Some Religions

The Supreme Court has decided two religious freedom cases this week. Neither one was the big case, and one is a de facto decision (for now) via refusing to hear a case, but:

1. The Court ruled that a Muslim prisoner had the right to grow a beard in accordance with his beliefs
2. The Court decided not to hear an appeal against a Louisiana court's decision that Catholic priests may be ordered to violate the seal of confession (thereby automatically excommunicating themselves).

The former case is a relatively minor decision, since Muslims don't actually have to grow beards (I've met a few who were beardless, and they weren't recent converts, and for that matter I think we have Muslims in our armed forces, which generally don't allow beards). Nevertheless, I think this is a generally correct decision, since the ban against the beard could violate this particular Muslim's interpretation of what Islam requires of him and since the ban doesn't really accomplish much in the way of maintaining control of the prison (beards must be kept short, so a to not alter appearance suddenly if cut off).

The second decision, or non-decision (it more-or-less amounts to the same thing, but without really setting any kind of lasting precedent) is clearly wrong. Priests are basically not going to be testifying about what they hear in confession, regardless of the law, and so this is just a convenient way of creating a vehicle for jailing priests. Even if priests could testify about what has been said in confessions, I doubt that such testimony would in principle be used to actually put away the "bad guys," at least not long-term. People who know that their secrets aren't the least bit safe will tend not to share those secrets. So this will mostly just cause people to stay away from confession--score one for Satan.

Passive Aggressive Resistance

The Public Discourse recently had an article advocating an interesting sort of passive resistance for faithful Christians who are being increasingly compelled to violate their consciences as regards their participation in so-called "gay marriage."

Although it may not be acceptable to all in this situation, it would be acceptable to many. It is simply this: to obey the law and serve gay weddings, but to make it known publicly that you believe that the law forcing you to do this is unjust, needs to be changed, and is obeyed only under protest and out of your respect for law and the democratic process...
I could well imagine a pious religious couple, running the kind of wedding-focused catering hall that I once worked at in New York, posting on its premises an announcement something to this effect:

[lengthy statement declaring that the store owners are Christians, that they oppose "gay marriage and the "gay lifestyle," and that they will nevertheless provide the demanded services out of obedience to the law, but that they would like to see the law changed]

We are required by the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity (SOGI) provision of New York State's anti-discrimination statute to make our wedding facilities available to anyone who seeks to use them, including gay and lesbian couples who want to marry under New York's same-sex marriage law. We believe strongly in the democratic process and the rule of law. For this reason, we will obey the state law governing our business. However, we obey this law only under the gravest protest, as we believe it violates our deepest moral and religious convictions. It does so needlessly and with apparent intent to polarize our country and inflame an already overheated cultural war.

Such a declaration would have many advantages over simply giving in silently to an unfair law to save one’s business. It would strike out in a public way against the injustice of such a law and gain sympathy from many quarters for the business owner’s point of view. 

It would also cast the business owner in the sympathetic role of the admirable peacemaker. His opponents would be cast in the role of authoritarian bullies picking on pious religious folks and opposing simple live-and-let-live solutions to the problems posed by American pluralism. Finally, such a declaration would probably discourage gays and lesbians from ever wanting to hold their wedding celebrations at any establishment that posted such a statement. The catering hall owners would have a strong First Amendment right to air their views, and by doing so they would probably end most instances where they are asked to do what their religion and moral sense forbids. 

It’s possible that such a declaration might drive away the business of liberals sympathetic to gay marriage, but it is just as likely that it would gain sympathy from many quarters, including not only from social conservatives who oppose gay marriage on principle, but from many liberals and moderates who resent small guys being pushed around by state bureaucrats. If the declaration were properly worded and sounded a courteous-yet-concerned tone of inclusiveness, it would probably attract and repel equal numbers of people. Most potential customers, I suspect, would not be affected one way or the other.

Suffice it to say that I am on the fence for this one. I think it is a good fallback position*, though I suppose that as a fallback position it loses some of the "we're just trying to leave in peace" overtones. I am also less-than convinced that it is a position that we will be allowed to fallback to--today, compulsion for participation, tomorrow laws against protesting against said compulsions. Today, it's free exercise of religion (and rights of association which are under assault--Constitutional protections thereof be damned--and tomorrow it will be the rights of free speech.

On the other hand, there is a slightly more aggressive version of this, in which the "shopkeepers" post (and state) that all proceeds from providing services to "gay marriages" (weddings, receptions, honeymoon,s etc as applicable) will go to support the National Organization for Marriage (or a comparable pro-marriage and frankly pro-sanity organization).

*Similarly, the idea that the Church should refer to the Sacrament only as "Holy Matrimony" and not ever as marriage," and to the civil institution/partnership as "marriage" but never matrimony, is a fallback position which ultimately leaves much to be desired. In both cases, there are better options even as "fallback" options.

The Experts

The experts often agree that X, Y, and Z are all healthy, normal, ethical actions or beliefs, but the Church says that X,Y, and Z are sinful, disordered, or immoral. I hear "arguments" like this from time to time, covering a wide variety of topics: homosexuality, pornography, abortion, adultery, hook-ups/fornication, contraceptives... in our sex-saturated culture, it's pretty much any item on an exhaustive list of the sexual sins condemned by the Bible, by Tradition, and by the Magisterium which is brought into contention.

Often, the experts agree because consent is a criterion of becoming an expert. There are many examples of this. Students studying psychology and psychiatry are told that they cannot graduate or get licensed to practice unless they counsel a gay patient--and the counselling cannot be towards chastity. A sociologist publishes a peer-reviewed study with a large sample size which contradicts previously peer-reviewed studies using small and at times self-selected samples sizes, and brings upon himself the secular inquisition because his study found that children raised by heterosexual parents fare better in life than children raised by homosexual parents. And, to add one last recent example, the licensing practicum requirements in Britain to become an OB/GYN are prohibitive for Catholics and others of good faith:

Dr O’Donnell told the conference at Ealing Abbey, west London, on 17 May that a Catholic training to be a consultant in obstetrics and gynaecology would soon find he or she had conscientious objections to such tasks as prescribing artificial contraceptives, giving unmarried couples fertility treatment or Viagra to gay couples. 

To be a sound Catholic regarding sexual ethics it is not possible to train as a consultant obstetrician and gynaecologist but this is not because of discrimination against Catholics. There is a total conflict of culture of what is good sex, a dichotomy of belief between what we as Christians believe is good overall for the individual and what secular society believes.’

Indeed, there have been attempts in the US to require that all OB/GYNs either commit abortion themselves, or refer their patients to another doctor who would commit the abortion instead. And there are medical schools which have required "abortion training" as a part of their residency programs, not to mention some states which have toyed with making such training a requirement of all medical schools.

Is it any wonder, then, when the experts' opnions are at times unanimously on the side of evil?

About That Secular Inquisition

I've already mentioned the unsettling development of the secular Left's inquisition, and how they will begin ferreting each other out for being insufficiently dedicated to the progressive ideology. They will of course drop any quarrel to go after us first. Lest that seem an overstatement, we have Exhibit B (Eich being A): the public outcry against Dropbox for its hiring of Condeleeza Rice. One of my friends had about the right reaction to this: "Seriously? The left is out of control. They become outraged when conservatives get jobs now."

That does seem to be about the shape of it. To be fair, there are some legitimate reasons for concern, and many of the people involved voice those concerns, specifically that it does not bode well for privacy/security to appoint the woman who oversaw the expansion of the NSA to the board of a file-sharing/cloud storage service. This is, however, just one of four major complaints against her listed by "Drop Dropbox." The others are that she supported the Iraq War (as did a large majority of Americans at its beginning, according to most major polls), she supported torturing prisoners, and she was also on the board of directors at Chevron. In other words, the reason why we should be outraged by Dropbox's hiring of her is that she is a Republican, a part of the Bush Administration, and she happens to have been a board director for a big oil business.

I don't necessarily agree with all of the things she's done, and I consider some of these complaints to be legitimate reasons why she should not be trusted with high political power. Some of these are at least legitimate enough as reasons that reasonable people could disagree whether to vote for her in a hypothetical election. None of these save for the wiretapping is a reasonable reason why she should not be hired by any company as a board member; and wiretapping seems to be the least of her offenses (greater only than being a board member at Chevron), if "Drop Dropbox" is listing here "offences" in order (let alone by the written content of each grievance). Further, there is little evidence that her authorization (and use) of wiretapping as a member of the Bush Administration will necessarily lead to her violating user privacy/security as a board member for Dropbox.

Of course, the leftist might respond that he is only targeting people who are being hired to high-level positions in a company, or only targeting the people who are directly involved in a given "bad" issue. He is only targeting Mr. Eich, because Eich was to be made CEO and he donated a substantial sum ($1000) to the non-progressive side of a major issue. He is only targeting Dr. Rice because she was an actual member of the Bush Administration, was actually in charge of implementing or was directly involved in implementing some of these policies, and is now being hired to the board of directors. The Leftist might excuse himself by saying "We're only going after top people," meaning people who have a direct and measurable impact and who are being hired to top-level leadership positions.

This is already problematic as-is. It essentially says that you can dissent from the Left, as long as you do it quietly and as long as that dissent is impotent, even in the short-term*. Alternatively, you can still freely oppose the Left's "progress", but in so doing you become a second-class citizen. You might after being beaten be allowed to live--to make a living--to find such employment as you will, but there will be a ceiling** on how high you can rise. The old glass ceiling has long since been shattered, but the progressives want to replace it with a new one.

Of course, it's a very small step from arguing that a person can't be ever allowed to hold top leadership, to excluding them from middle management and then from entry-level positions. It's also a small step from barring those who visibly work for or contribute to a cause or candidate--political, social, cultural, moral, whatever--to barring those who somehow supported it in any way at all. Today, it's those who helpd implement the Wars in the Middle East; tomorrow, anyone who supported the Iraq (and Afghanistan, for that matter) wars under Bush***. Today, it's anyone who donated to the pro-marriage (and therefore anti-"gay marriage") bill in California; tomorrow anyone who at any point in time voted for a similar bill in any state. Today, it's any member of Bush administration; tomorrow, it's anybody who voted for Bush.

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*Impotent: the progressive Left is always bragging about being  on the right side of history, whereas their opponents are "on the wrong side of history." If they really believed that, then all dissent is ultimately impotent, though it may slow the tide of history for a short time.

**Ceiling: in honor of "income equality day," which was sometime this week. The usual tired (and blatantly false) 77% statistic was trotted out, most prominently by the President. This is the same president who pays his own female staffers 88% of what he pays his male staffers, presumably for the same reasons why women--averaged over all careers at all level of experience--make on average less than men averaged in the same way. 

***Under Bush: the wars have been going very badly under Obama--with far more casualties in Afghanistan than were suffered under Bush. We've just stopped hearing the daily reports now that it's Obama and not Bush who is in charge of the war.

Leave Mozilla a Comment

You can apparently leave feedback for Mozilla here. Let them know what you think of their products--or how they treated their co-founder and now-former CEO, Brendan Eich. I left them a short and not necessarily eloquent comment:

This isn't a comment about your products themselves. I like Firefox, and Thunderbird has been my main email client. However, I can't help but be appalled by how you treated your now-former CEO. The man was made to resign over a $1,000 contribution to Prop. 8, a proposition which not only won a majority vote in the state at the time, but was supported by a majority of people across the country (based on opinion polls and actual statewide votes as of the time). This was an action from 6 years ago and frankly has no effect on his ability to run an organization.

Ridiculous. How would all of those calling for his resignation have liked it if he, as company CEO, had simply fired them and replaced them with people whose views were more in line with his own? Shame on Mozilla for acting in such a childish manner and punishing a man for his privately held opinions. Perhaps those calling for his head should have simply resigned themselves instead, if the thought of working for someone with whom they disagreed on a political issue is such a problem for them. Good luck to them in finding a person whose political, ethical, and/or moral principles are 100% in line with their own to take over his position.

It looks like most of the reactions lately are pretty unhappy with their mistreatment of Mr. Eich. As well they should be: their forcing him to resign over a political opinion smacks of a secular inquisition. Since it has been done in the name of tolerance*, it is also outright hypocrisy, in the truest sense of the word. It is also worrisome that this kind of political persecution is not limited to just one issue (bad as that would be); rather, any dissent from the Left now leaves potential for punishment. The "gay rights" movement may be the worst offenders (rivaled really only by the pro-abortion movement), but they are by no means the only ones.

The movement which once claimed to be about equality and freedom is now identifiable with fascism.

I should end by adding that there is no word of where we can leave feedback for President Obama's (corrupt, frankly Orwellian) IRS for leaking this private information. I hope that Mr. Eich sues them and wins big, since political donations of this sort are in principle private and not public knowledge. It also suggests that we should be wary of what we report as donations to the IRS. A small tax break now may not be worth losing a job in a decade.


Update: While you're at it, why not leave Mozilla. Here are some alternatives which are similar to Firefox, using basically the same source code--though I think that SeaMonkey may still be by Mozilla, so not all of these are true alternatives. And here is a longer list of alternatives, courtesy of Wikipedia.


*I'm noticing that tolerance as a buzzword is even becoming a thing of the past on the Left. The idea has been dead for decades, but even the words is being used more by those of us who criticize them than by "progressives" and other Leftists themselves.