Bad-Asses Wanted

 

Sometimes you have to be a little bit bad-ass – just to be a decent person, and do what must be done to help and protect others. Gandhi was right: cowards can never be moral.

Moreover, it is true: the world is a dangerous place, not because a few people do terrible things, but because millions of people let them. Complacency in the face of evil is complicity with evil. We are collaborators with evil if we do nothing in the face of it. To say this is morally unacceptable would be a most extreme understatement.

Joan of Arc, Gandhi, Martin Luther King Jr., and yes, Churchill, Roosevelt and Eisenhower, despite their faults – we need more people like them now, and fewer Neville Chamberlains, Vichys and Quislings, which unfortunately are our present norm.

Joan of Arc

Step one is to think for yourself. Question authority, question the media, question the standard narrative, question what you assume to be true – because it may not be. Question everything. Don’t be afraid of drawing conclusions, at least tentatively. But do question, for heaven’s sake.

Step one is to question, and to seek the truth. Step two is to speak the truth. Orwell was right, and it certainly applies now: “In times of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”

Beyond that, trust yourself. That is most essential. Use your natural intelligence, keep a good heart, and trust yourself.

Be bold. We don’t need to have all the answers before we act. In fact, we will never have all the answers. We are not born to be omniscient, necessarily; we are born to do what we can, with great love. That is enough. That is more than enough. And furthermore, we are capable of far more than we generally imagine – as individuals, and especially when we unite.

Courage. Life is short, and as Shakespeare said, “rounded by a little sleep”. Let’s give our best while we are here, in this fleeting dream. It matters. It always matters.

JTR,
May 7, 2020