When it comes to complex issues like the economy, health care, and climate change, I do not fault anyone for taking a stance opposite of mine, because those issues are very large and very hard to understand and comprehend. It is in that space that I love to debate, because there is much to debate about; I love to share my views as well as I can and I love to let others educate me on their position and beliefs. All of us, even the true experts, constantly have much to learn in those areas. But there is another class of issues that are so asinine, so simple and so toxic that I have found myself actively ignoring them, not because they aren’t important (they are easily the most important issues facing the USA today), but because the debate itself just bores the hell out of me.
I often feel quite bad for myself by not engaging with others on those issues, because many of my friends and family are affected by them directly, and if we are silent we might as well be on the other side. So to that end, I want to make absolutely clear where I stand on these boring but terrible issues, but I feel as if I can only debate them in the terms and phrasing that I believe is appropriate for them. I will attempt to distill a nuanced policy position into three simple words: “go **** yourself”.
If you feel as if 1.6 billion Muslims are somehow to blame or need to collectively apologize for the actions of a radical group of about 10,000 people primarily located halfway around the world, go **** yourself.
If you think that the influx of Mexican immigrants to this country is resulting in any kind of major increase in violent crime, go **** yourself.
If you think women don’t deserve equal pay and social equality, as well as the right to govern what occurs inside of their own bodies, go **** yourself.
If you think it is OK to roll back decades of progress for LGBT rights and tell people what bathroom they can use based on what you think they have going on inside their pants, go **** yourself.
If you look at hundreds of thousands of people forced to flee their home due to war and terror and monstrous things as “too risky” to allow into your country, go **** yourself.
If you think more than 1 mass shooting in the USA per day is an acceptable amount of casualties and that the problem will not be mitigated greatly by a responsible and simple approach to gun rights, go **** yourself.
There are many approaches to debating these issues. All have been debunked thoroughly by facts and statistics. But facts and statistics are not the appropriate response when the claim itself is too ridiculous to warrant a debate. The debate has ended, “go **** yourself” begins now.
