Watching and seeing what is happening
I am amazed and concerned as I watch what is happening in our nation. I wonder, can this be real? Is this happening in the United States of America?
How did we get here? Have we really lost all sense of values? What does the future hold? What happens to the kids and grandkids? Our future?
If we can allow media leaders to turn off a President from communicating and get away with it, is anyone safe?
If they can eliminate apps because they allow a different view, is that America?
I thought we were about free expression of thought as long as we did not harm others. Wasn’t it, your rights end at the tip of my nose? As long as we did not harm others we could say what we wanted. When did that change to words I don’t approve, that reach my ears?
When did the free press and media change from reporting to hindering open expression?
When did we say it was okay to blacklist people from jobs and futures because they worked somewhere we didn’t like?
When did publishing companies begin to prohibit books and articles because they didn’t like the thoughts?
When did people stop speaking up about censorship? Who decided it was okay?
I remember growing up and reading something that moved me but couldn’t quite apply and put into prespective. Today I understand it. I bet you do too:
First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a socialist.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—
Because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.
It was written by a Lutheran Pastor in Nazi Germany post the war as he lamented his failure to speak up. He was a supporter of the Third Reich until it was too late.
To those supporting social media suppression, book publishing restrictions, biased coverage, free speech limits in education. job denial for others and limitations on all we held sacred, here’s a warning. It doesn’t end here. As Pastor Niemolla learned in Germany only 75 years ago, if you don’t speak up they eventually come for you.
In this case, silence is a killer. Speak up. Too many died fighting for the values of this nation to have a self proposed elite destroy it today.