Scaredy cats
Jun 25, 2007 Sisyphus
Emily Yoffe writes, in a piece referred to by Glenn Reynolds:
It was a mild January evening, and people had filled the restaurant’s outdoor patio. As our group walked past the tables, one of my friends said, “This terrifies me.” I don’t know if she was reassured later by the chilly April, but we are all supposed to be terrified of the weather now.
Rather than weigh in, again, on the topic of fear-mongering among climate changers, I wanted to make a point about “terrified.”
I notice that people on the left are always terrified of something or an0ther. They even teach their children to be terrified — I remember when the polls were telling us, 25 years ago, that Ronald Reagan was making all the chillun go to sleep ascared because he wouldn’t agree to a nuclear freeze.
We’re always hearing how terrified they are of this, that and the other thhing. They’re terrified of censorship, they write in major circulation magazines, newspapers and blogs. They’re terrified the infringement of this right, the loss of that one — almost all things that never come to pass, and which, in the rare cases that they, do, are hardly anything to be afraid of at all.
For a grown up.
June 25th, 2007 at 12:57 pm
From Rebbe Nachman of Breslov (Likkutei Moharan II, 48):
“A person has to cross a very narrow bridge in this world. The most important thing is not to be afraid.”
June 25th, 2007 at 2:04 pm
Are you denying global warming? Yes or no? If no, then why do you think this is not worth being afraid and acting upon?
June 25th, 2007 at 2:11 pm
I don’t know enough to deny “global warming” — by which I assume you mean human-caused global warming. I have no problem with reducing carbon dioxide emissions and think it’s a great idea.
I have no use for fear, no.
June 26th, 2007 at 12:50 pm
Ron said, “I have no problem with reducing carbon dioxide emissions and think it’s a great idea.”
While Ron may have other ideas, I reserve the right to open bottles of fizzy beverages, even in public.