From National Review...
The current notion that we must avoid hurting anyone’s feelings is becoming oppressive. Particularly in academia, deviation
from this standard can lead to educational or career consequences.
Speaking up for gun rights, for instance, is virtually verboten; even a
seven-year-old boy who chewed a Pop-Tart into the vague shape of a gun
was punished by school authorities, who suspended him for brandishing
the pastry in play.
Now a court has jumped on the bandwagon. On April 27, the Seventh
Circuit Court of Appeals decided Friedman v. City of Highland Park,
Illinois, voting two to one to back the city’s banning of certain
firearms and magazine capacities, partly based on feelings: “If it has
no other effect, Highland Park’s ordinance may increase the public’s
sense of safety.#…#If a ban on semiautomatic guns and large-capacity
magazines reduces the perceived risk from a mass shooting, and makes the
public feel safer as a result, that’s a substantial benefit.” Left
unexamined is how anyone’s feelings are more important than actual risk,
or how the court can override the Bill of Rights. As the dissenting
judge correctly stated, “Both the ordinance and this court’s opinion
upholding it are directly at odds with the central holdings of Heller
and McDonald.”
Being disagreeable has become a justification for censorship.
With increasing frequency, administrations and student bodies in schools
from kindergarten through universities have censored free speech
because it could make someone feel “unsafe.” Unsurprisingly, speech that
makes some people feel “unsafe” correlates 100 percent with beliefs
they find disagreeable. Being disagreeable has become a justification
for censorship. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis (for whom one
university that is now a hotbed of political correctness was named)
said: “Fear . . . cannot justify oppression of free speech and assembly.
. . . It is the function of speech to free men from the bondage of
irrational fears.”
The shift toward demanding kid-glove treatment of one and all is a
cultural change that bodes ill for our future as a people of strength,
initiative, and creativity. Attempting to wall off ideas so that others
won’t get their tender feelings hurt goes beyond political correctness.
It invents a new goal for humankind: freedom from fear. This phrase was
first used by Franklin Roosevelt in 1941 as one of his Four Freedoms,
when he was describing America’s war goals. He meant freedom from fear
of annihilation, which was then acute in much of the world. It has
evolved to the point that some Americans demand the right to be free
from feeling uncomfortable about what others might say. Ensuring such
freedom would require the most rigid kind of censorship. And who would
determine which beliefs pass muster and which are beyond the pale?
Why do people in 21st-century America imagine they should never have to
be afraid? Fear is a healthy reaction to real danger — but not to mere
words. Is the adage “words will never hurt me” passé?
One needn’t feel shaken by others’ unpleasant beliefs or opinions. They
can test our own assumptions and lead to greater understanding. And one
can’t rely on “trigger warnings” to shield against unpleasant
encounters. That comes from self-confidence, which grows when we face
our own vulnerabilities, needs, and hurts. Wisdom comes from experience,
and it comes fastest in learning from bad experiences.
In Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, the physiological requirements
for life come first: air, water, food, adequate shelter. Once these are
satisfied, the next requirement is safety. Once we have that, we can
experience love and belonging, and the esteem of others and ourselves.
Finally we can seek self-actualization, to try to lead the ideal life we
should have. But safety comes first.
Feeling “safe” now seems to be mixed up with desires for love, a sense
of belonging, and self-esteem. In a twisted way, we sometimes try to
feel safe by disregarding others. But rejecting others because their
ideas differ from our own or our group’s is a regression in development,
individually and socially. People used to seek a higher education
because it challenged one’s assumptions and social attitudes and thus
led to intellectual and emotional growth. Education today too often
prescribes right thinking and demonizes dissenters.
People who have lived through traumatic experiences do hurt when they
are reminded of their traumas. They re-experience them when they
encounter reminders of them. But the world doesn’t adapt itself to
individuals’ fears. The realistic, caring intervention is to provide
help for the traumatized so they can cope with the world and learn to
protect themselves — not to sanitize their world of all triggers, an
impossibility. Adults, trauma sufferers and all, have the responsibility
to seek help for their own hurt. That means some form of counsel,
whether friendly encouragement or formal psychotherapy, and sometimes
medication for strong or persistent symptoms.
Let’s cut to the chase. There is no “right” to feel safe. There is
certainly no right to be safe in this world. Most of us most of the time
assume we are safe; we don’t think about it, and, luckily, are mostly
right. Occasionally something dreadful and unforeseen happens, which can
shake us to the core if we survive. We can run into unpleasant people
with unlikable opinions, sometimes about us. These are opportunities to
grow, to reinforce our own safe boundaries, emotionally and physically,
and live fuller lives. We can’t grow if we are sheltered from being
challenged, hurt, or questioned. That infantilizes us.
As to our nation’s risks, Benjamin Franklin said: “Without freedom of
thought, there can be no such thing as wisdom; and no such thing as
public liberty, without freedom of speech.” How free is speech when we
can’t tolerate objectionable ideas? Do we still disapprove what someone
might say while defending to the death his right to say it? Isn’t the
best cure for abhorrent speech more virtuous speech?
The wish always to feel perfectly safe is an irrational ideal,
unattainable both physically and emotionally (much like a world without
gun violence, or any violence). The best we can do is to minimize our
own hurtful speech and actions. Trying to prevent others’ hurtful words
is the worst we can do. A “safe” world — as conceived by those who expel
children for pointing a finger and saying “Bang!” — would be a world
without change or growth. We’d be automatons instead of the complicated
humans we are. We are responsible for our own emotional well-being, not
everyone else who might say something we hear.
— Robert B. Young, M.D., is a psychiatrist who also writes for Doctors
for Responsible Gun Ownership at DRGO.us.
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