Why We Need to Talk About the Common Characteristics of the Enemy

Thanks so much for your generous tips!Hello Friends,We live in dark times. There's no sense in complaining about it, there will be time for that if we survive. For now, we have to put down our heads and learn what we can so that one day our children might inherit a better world.I hope.It occurred to me that it might be useful to brainstorm the common characteristics of the enemy. Sometimes, by assembling information in a new way, it allows you to perceive truths hidden in plain sight.Here's a list of what came to mind when I started jotting down the characteristics of the people who are ruining the world. I think there's a commonality here, but first it's important to simply identify the problem. This list is in no particular order.Lack of accountabilityI despise this characteristic in people. I've had to deal with too many individuals who absolutely refuse to admit a mistake. The problem with people who don't admit their mistakes is that they keep repeating them. They steadfastly refuse to implement changes that save labor and increase profit. Both at work and as a parent, I think the most powerful thing you can do is take ownership of your mistakes and embrace a commitment to personal growth.This characteristic is revealed in everything from politicians who never think they're wrong, to nefarious forces who want to censor the history that embarrasses them.Those that bristle at any challenge to authorityAuthority for authority's sake is a problem. I first ran into this in grade school when the conservative teachers in my red rural community got angry if I questioned them about a mistake. They seemed to think it was better that the whole class learned an error rather than having me speak out to undermine them. This is an attitude that leads to compounding human misery. Authority isn't truth. We should teach that.Sin and sacred concepts that override reasonThere are too many Americans who are conditioned to default to indoctrinated beliefs rather than accept the evidence of their own senses. The simple fact that people even believe “sin” exists, is already a problem. That we don't have a healthy dialogue about how it's an invented thing is a cornerstone of the authoritarian arsenal.We have to embrace critical thinking. That means questioning everything. Today, we're not allowed to do that.Volume, fast-talking, denying the opportunity for a rebuttalOne of the things I've noticed about the nefarious forces at work today is that they stack lie on top of lie on top of lie. Before you have time to address the first one, they've already told ten more lies. I worry about this in the context of my kids. Children are told to respect authority figures, but then those authority figures betray that trust by spreading propaganda.We have to overcome our unwillingness to interrupt our deceitful opponents. We don't have to sit there and allow them to attempt to program us with lies and self-doubt. In fact, we have to prevent their efforts to indoctrinate the innocent.Falsely claiming they are the victim—grievance mentalityYou see this a lot in our society. Christians claim they're targeted without being able to provide any evidence. White supremacists behave like petulant toddlers angry that their hate ideology isn't accepted. What they're very effective at doing is invoking the concepts of victimhood without going into detail about how they're victims.They say things like “I've been hurt.” In order to cultivate sympathy. They leave out that they're hurt because they've been rejected over their abuse and exploitation of their fellow human beings. We have to call this out.Emotionally undeveloped and weakDealing with entitled, hostile, and aggrieved people in our society is like dealing with an emotionally undeveloped high school student. I know this from my teaching days. You come across kids who simply have no idea about a healthy way to manage their emotions. In a child, it's heartbreaking. In an adult it's terrifying.Perhaps this characteristic indicates one of the areas where we can make an immediate impact. We need to improve our services that allow people to get the help they need. We need to provide our opponents with appropriate tools to manage their emotional frustrations so they stop lashing out at the innocent.Their ability to ignore or deny shared experiencesI grew up with this. You're supposed to “focus on the good times” and when a bad time happens you're pressured to pretend your painful memory doesn't exist. You see this in abusive situations where the man expects his wife/girlfriend to forget the reality that he physically assaults her. This pressure to just pretend as if certain realities never transpired is a fundamental deceit of the enemy.They put their own blinders on, and they force us to wear them as well. This one is more nefarious than you might realize. They refuse to recognize the pain they inflict on others.Misogyny/homophobiaPerhaps this ties into the reality that our enemies are emotionally underdeveloped. They are always fixated on human sexuality, and that manifests in hatred towards women and homosexuals. This is also a rejection of compassionate and kind relationships.RacismRacism is equating “sin” with skin color. The absurdity of how racism can persist can be attributed to the other hostile concepts that we are conditioned not to question.Decisions based on emotion rather than reasonI'm not sure where the fear over intellectual advancements comes from. Has this gotten worse over time? Throughout my lifetime, the United States has been an anti-intellectual society. But this wasn't always the case. There was tremendous national pride for the space race. When did the focus turn to an emphasis on knee-jerk emotional responses rather than the development of critical thinking skills?Food for thoughtOur enemies refuse to change a belief once they adopt it. As a society, we give scant consideration to the way that evil evolves over time. We think of evil as static, and that sets us up for exploitation.Our enemies believe all relationships are transactional. They are lazy, they demand sexual satisfaction, they demand wealth and power. They are willing to lie to get these things. They're willing to commit crimes and then cover up their crimes. They'll look for scapegoats to make sure criticisms never fall on them.In fact, they'll demand accountability but only in regard to the innocent scapegoats. They delight in seeing the scapegoats punished. When all the scapegoats are eliminated, they have to find more to blame for the problems which have never been addressed.Collectively, as a society, we need more “learn to ride a bike” moments. We need more of those revelations where your mind snaps from not knowing to knowing in an instant. We have to learn how to cultivate these moments.We need a greater emphasis on clarity of thought, spontaneous understanding, inspiration and creativity. We have to do more to provoke a recognition of false actors so that the general population might be more empowered to seek out accurate information on its own.Our society is currently driven by basic emotions such as pain, pleasure, unhealthy love, hate, shame, embarrassment, guilt, fear—basically anything other than reason.Perhaps the most succinct thing to say is that we have to reinvigorate our emphasis on reason. We need to initiate a new age of awareness. We have to stop allowing ourselves to be prisoners of animalistic traits and embrace the path of illumination.It's starts with making that decision for ourselves, and then encouraging that choice among others. Don't despair. When you start to double your allies at every turn, you can quickly convert all of humanity. We need a nuclear humanitarian revolution.You all make this newsletter happen! Thanks for your sponsorship! I have payment tiers starting at as little as twenty dollars a year.Upgrade at 30% offUpgrade at 40% offUpgrade at 50% offUpgrade at 60% offI'm so happy you're here, and I'm looking forward to sharing more thoughts with you tomorrow.My CoSchedule referral linkHere’s my referral link to my preferred headline analyzer tool. If you sign up through this, it’s another way to support this newsletter (thank you).I'd Rather Be Writing is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. 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