Alert: This is going to ramble and probably get into ranting in some spots. The events of the last few weeks have been . . . a lot, and I have too many thoughts to know how to organize them into any kind of coherent flow. You've been warned.
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Students sometimes ask me if I am bothered when a movie is not scientifically accurate. It depends on the purpose of the movie. In a superhero movie, of course not. We couldn't have superhero movies if we required that. What does bother me, I tell them, is when they are internally inconsistent. Once they have established something in their universe, it drives me nuts if they contradict it. The writers of Interstellar wrote an interesting plot point about the relativistic effects of a black hole's gravity on time and then ruined it when the same characters were surprised by the tidal waves caused by the same gravity. The Flash defined absolute zero differently in two episodes that aired three weeks apart because it served the plot better. I could go on, but this post isn't about movies (the fourth Indiana Jones movie and magnetism - no, I'll stop).
Inconsistency in a movie or tv show is annoying. In real life, it is more dangerous. In the past few weeks, this has been more evident than ever (at least in my life). The same people who celebrated the apparent end of Roe v. Wade because they believe in the sanctity of human life have responded with far less compassion when the killing of 3rd graders and black people in two mass shootings within ten days time led to a call for a solution involving gun control. Apparently, the sanctity of human life matters less when held up against the second amendment. When it comes to abortion, they want laws changed; but when it comes to gun violence, they want anything but that. They claimed "All lives matter," but it doesn't seem like they really believe it.
While this is the most recent example, it is far from isolated. The investigation into the SBC showed that the very people who stand in pulpits and speak at length about sexual sin were stepping off the dais to perpetrate sexual assault and that the very people who claim that the doctrine of submission is about protecting women didn't use their authority to do so. They re-victimized women who spoke out and protected the abusers.
For the past year, people who have screamed at and threatened the lives of school board members over the safety masks and the ideas in library books, those who have demanded to see a teacher's lesson plans so they can scrutinize them for any ideas they don't like have suggested the arming of those same teachers. Apparently, masks are psychologically damaging, but having your teachers strapped is healthy. Books are dangerous, so they must be removed from schools. Guns are dangerous, so they should be added to schools? They don't trust teachers to teach because of "their agenda," but they trust us to wield a weapon.
In case you think I am only able to recognize the inconsistencies of conservatives and evangelicals, I am not. They are just the people I know the most about. I also recognize that many pro-choice individuals only think a fetus is not a baby when it is unwanted. Otherwise, they are posting sonograms and throwing gender reveal parties at the same rate as anyone else. The same people who don't believe gender is real will still ask pregnant women if they know what they are having. Inconsistent thinking isn't confined to one party.
A few weeks ago, I was teaching my 8th graders about the history of our understanding of the nature of light. Democritus called light a solar particle, and Aristotle called it a disturbance in the air (a precursor to wave theory). I explained that neither of them had proof of what they were saying, and the people decided who they wanted to believe and just became a follower of theirs. They were acolytes. This was understandably a weird thought for my kids, but I asked them to think about whether we are truly different from that now. We do have science and experiments and proof, but on many issues, we just decide what we think about a thought based on who we associate it with or which celebrity or athlete promotes it. When one of our party's leaders talks about prayer, we cheer that he isn't afraid to show his faith publically. When someone from the other party talks about prayer, we assume she is just saying it for political theater.
We blame the President we didn't vote for when gas prices go up, but when our guy is in office, we understand that the President doesn't have control over the price of gas. When some issues are brought before the Supreme Court, we insist they rely on precedent (because we like that precedent), but on other issues, we recognize that there is no such thing as "settled law" and remind people of the times precedent has been overturned. It takes months for an asylum seeker from Guatemala to go through the process of entering our country while it can take only hours for Ukrainian refugees (I'm not saying it should take longer for Ukrainians, but it shows that we have had the ability to do this more quickly all along and have chosen not to).
I was taught by conservatives throughout my early childhood, and one of the primary things I was taught was that the ends do not justify the means. I was taught it frequently and passionately, but now many of those same teachers are posting that desperate times call for desperate measures. I was taught about the 10th amendment as an important restraint on the federal government, but those same people want federal laws when it comes to the issues they care about. One of the most frightening moments of the early pandemic was when the President said, "I'm the President; my authority is total." While this should have freaked out my libertarian friends, they remained remarkably quiet.
The inconsistent thinking isn't just annoying like it is in a movie. It is beyond upsetting or infuriating. It is dangerous. It is dangerous, not only in what it does to our society at large because we can't agree on anything, even if we would have were it not for the acolyte problem. It is also dangerous for us as individuals because deep down, we know that we are sellouts, but we can't address it because we would never say it out loud. We are subjecting ourselves to the stress of cognitive dissonance because we are unwilling to do the work of deep thought. We need to respond from our values, but instead, we respond from our party (and those aren't remotely the same thing). We need something external from us to provide stability and to serve as North Star for guidance, but instead, we have made ourselves and our in-group the measure of all things (which would frighten us if we reflected on our own hearts more).
Before the next bombshell news event, sit down and make a mental top ten list of your values. Don't make it from a party platform. Ask yourself what you truly believe. Then, respond to the events of the world based on that rather than which politician you love or hate.
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