Granny's Business Model -- She'll say what you're afraid to say, for a dollar a word

                                                                                           -- Just Jests                        

           

                                   Media Visit to Granny's Free Speech Kiosk

Interviewer:  So Granny, this is a nice little business enterprise you've made for yourself.

Granny:  Yes, censorship opens up a surprising number of commercial opportunities.

Interviewer:  So, in taking this opportunity would you call yourself a free-speech heroine, or a trouble-maker?

Granny:  I don't aim to be either, although heroism often does cause trouble -- for someone.

Interviewer:  Will it make trouble for you if someone decides your speech is too incorrect? Aren't you afraid of being shot?

Granny:  Yes -- so this is bullet-proof glass I'm sitting behind.

Interviewer:  Ah. Opinions can be dangerous. Maybe you should add a Danger-Pay Surcharge to your fee. 

Granny:  Really, speech should be free. If someone is wise and broke, I'll express their forbidden thoughts gratis. (But don't tell the rich folks ...) Everything is monetized now. Your own magazine charges buyers or advertisers to read your words.

Interviewer:  True. I see you have quite an audience around your booth. Do some get upset if they don't approve when you contradict fashionably-correct attitudes?

Granny:  I do get an audience, but no one has to stay and listen if something offends them. The other side of free speech is the freedom to not listen.

Interviewer:  You're performing a public service, eh? 

Granny:  Indeed. I'm retired, I've got my little pension, I can afford to do this because I don't have to please an employer who could fire me for expressing what their pollsters have determined are not the popular public attitudes of the moment.

Interviewer:  Well good luck, Granny! Stay safe.

Granny:  I'll be fine. The up-side of being an old granny is that by being dismissed by influencers and virtue-signallers, we oldsters are also often overlooked by cancel-culture.

*  *  * 

"Democracy is not about how many people vote but about how many people feel free to say what they think in public".

                                              -- V. Ramaswamy, 2022

"... in the sunset of life ... I feel it my special mission to tell people what they are not prepared to hear." 

                                          -- Elizabeth Cady Stanton,1898

                                                      

Homeless Man Identifies As Dog - Demands Housing in Animal Shelter

Regarding "BC politicans are aghast at blatant rights violation": https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/transgender-woman-denied-access-to-women-only-gym 

"People deserve to feel ... affirmed for who they are. Trans women are women — period.”              --- Kelli Paddon, B.C.’s parliamentary secretary for gender equity

News bulletin:

   Homeless Man Identifies As Dog                                                            

When he demanded the Animal Shelter give him free housing in a kennel, the Shelter explained that they only take in homeless animals.

The man sued the Animal Shelter under the BC Human Rights Code for "injury to dignity, feelings and self respect”. 

The Minister of Gender Equity was sympathetic: “Each individual knows their own gender ... uh, species ... best," she explained.

This homeless man has had his self-esteem attacked, say his advocates. (His what? ask skeptics. Wouldn't self-esteem involve working? renting an apartment?)

But "cool"! say animal welfare advocates. This means the Human Rights Code will need to be expanded to become the Human and Animal Rights Code.

Meanwhile, the government plans to table a Bill for the Eradication of Skepticism.

If I lose my case at the tribunal, says Dog-Man, I shall move to England. They have a Gender Recognition Act, under which if you have papers and present yourself as a member of another gender for two years and fill in a bunch of trans-forms, you legally ARE of that gender. Maybe they'll introduce the Species Recognition Act, establishing the same rights for trans-species citizens.

If so, I think I'll become a Corgi. With a bit of luck I might end up at Buckingham Palace, living in the lap of luxury.

 

The Innocent Reporter is an Honest Reporter

"Innocent" means not-knowing (in-nocere). The innocent reporter doesn't know for sure what today's news is or what its importance is. Accuracy in reporting is important, but sometimes reporters imagine facts. They rush into print or online, or quote bad sources.

The "Innocent Reporter" reports headlines in Today's News with an impartial accuracy (hesitant to commit?) so often missing in breaking stories:

A Robbery Might Have Taken Place ...

Crime Statistics Might Go Up ... or down

Someone Might Run For Office ...

Interest Rates Might Go Up, or Down, and we might see recession ahead ... or not

A Child Might Have Gone Missing 

All Travellers Could Lose Any Luggage Any Time

A Dog Might Have Gone Missing

The Pandemic Might End ... or Come Back

The Climate Might Be Changing Faster, or Slower, than scientists-of-varying expertise thought

Possibly-lost Dog Might Have Been Sighted Today, says potential eye-witness

Your Followers Might Not Really Like You At All

There will be Rain, Clouds, Sun, Snow, Hail, Sleet, or Wind Tomorrow

An Asteroid Might Be On the Way ...

        Sorry folks ... I just don't know,

                 your Honest Daily News Reporter

Imagine Life Without the Marginalized

Social commentators fret about the rights of the marginalized, but they are the powerful: socio-political action happens on the margins. Many fashionable contemporary historians re-write history in ways designed to appeal to an audience of "marginalized" groups. We could playfully call this history-product, the companion of journalism's "fake news", the "Fake Olds".

As for the societal activity occurring on margins, who populates these domains?

-- the nameless public that votes well-known leaders into office

-- the nameless school-teachers who shape students' minds (for better or worse)

-- the nameless care-givers and nurses who tend the sick

-- people who drive transport so the movers and shakers can move around and shake

-- people who build roads, bridges and rail for the transport to run on

-- people who put the power lines back when storms knock them down

-- people who grow food, and those who maintain infrastructure through which food gets to masses

Do we know the names of these people on the margins (whatever their race or gender may be) who get central things done, and without whom "the centre cannot hold"? These are the anonymous leaders, the majority whose opinions the elected "leaders" follow. These are the level-headed non-extremists who get things done because they have skills and training, while loud and trendy "influencers" command centre stage "full of passionate intensity" about whatever's politically correct this time.

Thank heaven for the marginalized. The centre wouldn't hold and things would fall apart without them -- as W. B. Yeats poetically explained.

Justice Stew -- the difference between "Social Justice" and the "Just Society" is ...?

Remember when "social justice" had something to do with a "just society"? Now it's linked to other, slippery concepts: identitarian politics and "critical race theory". Does social justice mean social thought control (group think)? 

What then was the Just Society, back in the 20th century when it was the ideal? It was a society in which everyone had equal rights. There weren't separate racial rights, marginalized rights, disability rights, gender rights and so on. They were the same for all -- called "civil rights". 

"Civil" is related to "city" and "citizen", and civil rights developed to keep things fair and non-violent when humanity began massing together in large centres (cities). Spread out in rural lifestyles everyone could be individualistic, dreamy-imaginative, in touch with natural rhythms, or, in a word -- pagan ("of the countryside"). But living with the madding crowd was more of a challenge, in terms of keeping the peace.

So do we still have a concept of civil justice as practised in a Just City? What civil rights would it depend on? Some would be:

Right to free speech

Right to not read speech you don't like

Right to be offended, or to choose not to be offended, by multiple opinions

Right to congregate with soul-mates

Right to walk away

Right to privacy and quietness (un-stalked by CCTV and smartphones, or harassed by noise)

Right to access health care, contraception, and assistance in choosing to die, according to individual choice

Right to access nature, green-space, and the refreshing company of non-human animals

            The right to add to this list -- please do so.

What systems do these rights rest on? 

Government by elected representatives, separation of church and state, an independent justice system, and an uncensored press (and literacy to read it)

What institutions protect those? 

Schools, Science-and-Humanities study, public libraries                     (Can't afford university fees? Many a genius, inventor and leader educated herself using civic public library systems as set up by the self-educated Scot, Andrew Carnegie, and others 

Systems of professional certification in: health care, teaching, conservation, legal services.

Add some attitudinal flavours to this justice-stew, such as open-mindedness, historical perspective, and humanitarian spirit. Blend and serve! 

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