Similarly, when my cousins were little, my aunt and uncle used to trick them into eating the bottom dregs of every cereal box by mixing them all together and dubbing the resulting concoction "cereal surprise." This too worked like gangbusters.
Since the beginning of time, I suspect, parents have had to use every psychological trick in the book to convince their kids to do things kids don't naturally want to do. The reason for this is pretty straightforward: children below a certain age simply aren't mature enough to understand, say, the tightness of a family budget. Kids below a certain age are also not ready to fully care for themselves and don't know how to wisely assess the world's dangers; for these things, they certainly need adult guidance.
But during the usual, healthy development process, parents must eventually loosen the reins. As children get older, they should learn how to do their own laundry, cook their own food, manage their own money, and make their own judgments in re: risks and rewards. As children get older, in other words, they should learn to be essentially independent. And back when the world was sane, we used to incentivize this maturation by not immediately swooping in and rescuing legal adults from their own bad choices -- and by simultaneously allowing said legal adults enormous latitude when it came to making decisions in their day-to-day lives.
Unfortunately, as several recent news items indicate, we now live under a regime that has stopped expecting grown adults to do what 99% of grown adults should have no trouble doing regardless of their socioeconomic status. Further, not content with merely giving us the tools to live our lives intelligently and well according to our own lights, our so-called betters have instead chosen to outright manipulate us into doing what they want. In short, our elites clearly perceive us as perpetual toddlers -- and they just as clearly get their kicks off of mothering us to death.
It's patently ridiculous to claim, for example, that requiring proof of ID to vote in an election is "the new Jim Crow." Getting a driver's license or a state ID is not a difficult thing to do; if it were, wouldn't we have already heard story upon story of people being unfairly barred from buying liquor, flying on airplanes, acquiring over-the-counter medication, etc.? But that hasn't stopped our nanny-staters from waxing eloquent about the poor, poor folks-of-color who've somehow lived their entire adult lives without needing an ID and therefore will be barred from voting by laws like Georgia's. Yeah, sure. Even if such people actually existed, why not use the time between now and the next election to reach out to those extraordinarily rare ID-less legitimate citizens and make sure they get their required documentation? Why not assume these ID-less voters are capable adults who can understand and fulfill basic legal mandates once they're explained -- particularly if help is provided?
It's also not some terrible imposition to ask adults to formally request absentee ballots during a designated time frame (especially when that time frame runs very generously from eleven weeks to eleven days before Election Day). Nor is it some unconscionable restriction to ask that all in-person voters come on particular days at particular hours (especially when those days include weekends and especially when the law also states explicitly that anyone standing in line at close of business on Election Day must be permitted to cast a ballot). And oh yes: it's also utterly laughable to suggest that people can't plan ahead and bring their own damned water to drink while they wait to vote (though of course, Georgia's law says that official poll watchers can bring people refreshments, so that isn't even a potential issue).
(That water thing in particular reminds me of those feminists who were complaining about the air conditioning at work a while back. For eff's sake, what's stopping you from bringing a sweater to the office?)
Lots of things - lots of essential things - outside the elections process come with deadlines and restrictions. In most cities, buses and subways only run at particular times and only serve particular places. In most cities, most restaurants and stores are not open 24 hours a day. There are dates by which you must get your tax paperwork submitted to the feds and your state, dates by which you must apply for health coverage, dates by which you must mail applications to college or other special programs -- on and on. Demanding that elections be conducted at lawfully defined times does not limit your right to vote any more than closing your local grocery store overnight limits your right to eat -- or shutting down the Atlanta MARTA at Peachtree Center after 1:30 am limits your right to travel. One key understanding that comes with adulthood is the realization that you can't just do things whenever you feel like it. To respect the rights and time of other human beings, you have to learn how to manage your time and honor reasonable schedules and other civil boundaries.
Some may say at this point that leftists are only pretending to believe adult Americans are stupid and helpless in order to establish a porous election system that makes it virtually impossible to stop activists from cheating like the dickens -- and yes, that's no doubt one motivation in play. But I also think leftists harbor a good deal of sincere distrust in our collective ability to manage our own affairs -- and in no context is this viewpoint more apparent than in the discourse surrounding COVID-19. Here, public health officials have decided as a class that forthright delivery of accurate scientific information is insufficient to inspire "proper choices"-- that instead, they must resort to operant conditioning (and fear-mongering) to get their fellow citizens to comply with their dictates. Get your jab and you get a free donut like a good little boy or girl! Get your jab and maybe we'll start respecting your rights again!
Blech. I feel like barfing up three feet of my intestine.
I might get one of the vaccines once I've talked to my doctor about it. Given my pre-existing medical conditions, it's probably a good idea. Given my pre-existing medical conditions, I'm confronting a different risk calculus. But I can understand why healthier people might hesitate to step up for their shots. These vaccines were rushed to market via an emergency program; they're not like, say, the MMR, DPT, shingles, flu or pneumonia shots that come with years of scientific data that confirm their safety. Given that 99%+ of healthy younger adults are likely to survive a COVID infection essentially unscathed, it's entirely reasonable to choose the small known risk (i.e. the risk of serious complications from COVID) over the risk of unknown size (i.e. getting an experimental vaccine). And it's entirely reasonable, too, to wait a bit to see how others are affected by the COVID vaccines before you yourself decide to get your own.
And please note too: we're not (yet) babying - or forcing - people into getting their seasonal flu shots even though the flu can rival COVID in its lethality. We're not (yet) proposing, say, "smoke-free passports" that grant bearers special access to travel and other economic activities. And while some localities have tried to curb our obesity epidemic with soda taxes and the like, we haven't (yet) robbed the average American of his fundamental right to buy a 20 ounce bottle of Mountain Dew if he so chooses. Why is that, I wonder? What makes COVID so gosh-darned special that basic acknowledgment of our personal liberty must be thrown out the window and replaced with the firm hand of the Great State Mommy?
Most of us are not brain damaged. Most of us are perfectly capable of getting a state ID and/or filling out a ballot request. Most of us are perfectly capable of looking at an in-person voting schedule and choosing which day and time would work best for our personal situations. And most of us are perfectly capable of assessing the risk COVID poses to ourselves and our family members. Those few of us who aren't capable of these things due to illiteracy or a cognitive disability can and should get help -- but the rest of us need not be coddled by state officials looking for ever more excuses to wreck our democracy and control our lives.
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