211 Curtains

This may or may not be a grateful post…

Perhaps I am grateful that I have the ability to see through bullshit – can I type that on my blog? I suppose that I can because I just did.

Another gift I have, besides the ability to see through bullshit, is the gift of research.

I research everywhere – except google.

Four basic research rules I follow:

1. Go to websites that are not tracked.
2. When researching .edu sites and peer-reviewed papers, always search the authors to determine their affiliations. Sometimes they are surprising and remove all credibility.
3. Experience is a great teacher and if no experience exists, follow the trail of history.
4. If someone is being censored, they are probably correct.

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“Without Freedom of Thought, there can be no such thing as Wisdom; and no such thing as public Liberty, without Freedom of Speech.”

― Benjamin Franklin

The fact of the matter is that social media is becoming less social and more a place to spew opinions and political crap – but only if they agree with the “ruling party” and are not an opposing view.

A few weeks ago I was “cursed” for expressing an opposing, researched, opinion on a social media platform.

This week, one friend was permanently banned for something he posted more than a year ago and yesterday my fiancee received a 24-hour ban for posting someone else’s view and video.

Maybe I should bake his favorite cake with a file enclosed so he won’t feel so bad…

That’s right, I am engaged to a thug (I’m laughing right now, just in case you might think this a serious sentence)…

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“If freedom of speech is taken away, then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.”

― George Washington

Today on the well-known social-media platforms free speech does not exist.

The “greatest generation” of the early 1900’s is almost extinct. I miss their veracity. They went through the Great Depression, understood sacrifice, experienced rationing, fought in WWII, lost family in concentration camps, and fought to save the world against Nazi oppression and Japanese Imperialism.

How would we react if faced with the same?

My grandparents were from that generation. They instilled a great sense of patriotism in me.

My grandmother wrote a diary every day of her married life. A microcosm of what she did every day, money spent, sometimes laced with the news of the day, always mentioning family births, deaths, and so on. Her diaries are my cherished possessions. However, I often wonder who will want or care about them after I am gone.

Although my grandfather had a middle-school education at best, he was involved in city government, politics, wrote his congressmen, watched the news (before it was fake), and shared many stories of his life that I will never forget.

His stories always centered around freedom.

“You can’t pick and choose which types of freedom you want to defend. You must defend all of it or be against all of it.”

― Scott Howard Phillips

The point of this post is that freedom is non-existent when all men and women are not free to express their opinions.

Regardless of their

gender

religion

politics

or

viewpoint.

“Most reasonable people are ok with folks having a strong opinion about something. Where the smoke starts, is when those same people try to make you think YOUR BELIEFS are wrong (or stupid). Respect begets respect. That 1st Amendment reaches well past anyone’s circle of like-minded friends.”

― Liz Faublas

XO Lisa ❤️