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Showing posts from September, 2010

On Mosques, Burnings, and the Past

Today marks the ninth anniversary of the new definition of America. Having grown up as a pre-9/11 American--and now dealing with students who only remember a post-9/11 country--I have a mixture of feelings about what's going on in the nation these days. Obviously, we've got divisiveness. Partisan politics insist on rewriting definitions of what it means to be American, a top-down (corporations and news punditry also count as power-brokers and are party to the "top" label) approach that should nauseate most logic-leaning thinkers. We long have been taught in an overarching black and white binary that insists on absolutes in most everything, a poison we assume to be natural. While absolutes absolutely exist (for categorically denying them is an irresolvable paradox), I fear that what is viewed as 'traditional' or 'natural' is actually a distortion. One thing that I truly dislike is being lied to.* I am aware, for example, of some of the less-savory aspec