You Really Don’t Want a Democracy

After the 2016 Presidential Election, many were upset that even though Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, Donald Trump took the presidency by winning the Electoral College vote. Cries of “unfair”, and “he’s not my President” rang out; along with a push to eliminate the Electoral College because, after all, we are a Democracy.

Actually, no. We are not a Democracy. We are a Republic. Thus the Electoral College.

I bring this up because we have a current movement that is trying to rewrite history and remove anything deemed offensive from the public eye. Included are statues, flags, and even baseball team mascots.

As a Cleveland Indians fan, I’ve been pummeled by the anti-Wahoo folks for years. Even a recent article I read lumped the mascot with statues of Robert E. Lee as being equally racist. Hogwash!

First off, the Supreme Court has determined that trademarks cannot be considered “hate speech”. So as far as the law is concerned, Chief Wahoo is not hate speech.

Nevertheless, those few are screaming the loudest in hopes to bully a decision in their favor. Even the MLB Commissioner is pressuring the Cleveland Indians owners to remove the mascot.

Dear MLB Commissioner: IF you bow down to the pressure of a few and remove Chief Wahoo from the Cleveland Indians, we the fans will NOT go quietly into the night. Third-party vendors will start making a killing selling Chief Wahoo merchandise - which means the MLB gets none of that sweet, sweet cash.

I for one am getting a bit tired of a few hypocrites calling the shots.

Hypocrites? Yep. Hypocrites.

Go back and reread the first paragraph of this post.

The same folks calling us a democracy don’t really WANT a democracy. Why? Because the majority of people don’t want the mascots removed, or history to be rewritten. And IF we WERE a democracy, you crybabies would have to go away.

It’s called the First Amendment. If you like the idea of freedom of speech, then you have to accept that you will be exposed to speech you disagree with. That gives you a choice: You can either move to a country that does not respect the freedom of speech - which would eliminate you hearing anything that might offend you, or you can go ahead and get thicker skin.

As far as whether or not to remove statues, flags, mascots, or whatever, I direct you to Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations: “Don’t ever take a fence down until you know the reason why it was put up.” (ascribed to Chesterton by John F. Kennedy).

Do you honestly believe that the people who erected a statue (that includes designing, creating, paying for, and authorizing it) did it BECAUSE they were racist?

"Let's put up a statue to show the world how racist we are. Good idea, huh? All in favor?"

"Aye!"

That’s hard to believe. Just because you are offended by CHANGING the original intention, does NOT give you the right to force the majority to accept your cries as truth.

So, before you “like” a tweet or Facebook post that encourages the removal of this or that, do a little research to find out WHY this or that was erected in the first place.

And if you don’t agree, go ahead, move to North Korea, and shout that statues of their dear leader are racist and hate speech. I’m sure they’ll praise your bravery.

(Idiots.)

© Emittravel 2017