Science may be the best way humans have to develop reliable knowledge. Underpinning 21st Century science is the idea the world has a rational basis that can be understood. In this time of political chaos and confusion, craving science seems a logical next step as we seek reason in the social and material world.
As I wrote before, I find solace in withdrawing from society into family as a reaction to Republican hegemony. As I do, I find people and situations requiring attention. As a septuagenarian, I find more people who need medical care and financial help than I did during the Reagan years. They also need companionship. The vulnerability of living on pensions is no longer an idea, but a reality. There are limited funds to go around and a small number of income-producing mechanisms available to the aged. Current threats by the administration to cut Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid can be alarming. It isn’t any easier for millennials entering their fourth decade.
Due to extreme cold, I missed about a week on the trail. It is my concession to aging and self-care. I resumed trail walking Friday when ambient temperatures rose to the teens. Building a good life under the oppression of Republicans is a best practice. We must keep our health, strength, and financial resources for when we really need them. While we might sense the ineptitude of the administration during its first five weeks (how could one miss it?) the noise has not reached a crescendo. If not careful, all the hailstorm of attacks on the liberal consensus could blow up in Republicans’ collective face. We plain folks need to keep our powder dry for now, and be ready to act.
What is the underlying reason for a person to exclaim as “evidence,” in a public meeting, that the American Library Association is a “Marxist organization?” That librarians conduct a “grooming barrage” of unacceptable books? It seems clear such citizens’ language is weaponized and they departed reality in conceiving their analogies and metaphors.
Educators sometimes get upset with me when I point to the education system as the cause of such deviance from rational thinking. I suppose indoctrination into a cult could be a different cause, but legislators seem to accept such “evidence,” as the subcommittee and full education committee advanced the bill repealing Iowa Code 728.7 to the full Iowa House. The underlying reason may be the desire to feel there is a culture war going on in our public libraries and schools. If there is, departure from reason is a part of it. For me, I browse the public library collection to see what new books I might have interest in, and are available for check out. I don’t need a nanny state to do that.
Life can be reasonable and certainly the physical world has a scientific underpinning the understanding of which scientists continuously refine. The ship of American society has become unmoored and is heading for the shoals. Whether it can be saved is up to us. Old and young, we must be ready.
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