Feelings Do Not Care About Your Facts
Ben Shapiro is famous for his quote “Facts don’t care about your feelings”. This is a true
statement, however in today’s times it’s perhaps one that we should disregard.
After all, we’ve presented our facts, over and over and over again. We’ve used logic and reason, we’ve appealed to common sense. Over, and over, and over again we’ve been rebuffed. Sometimes we are dismissed in a cold, stony manner Sometimes it is a barrage of insults instead, leveled by the self righteous and the indignant.
I’m not saying we should disregard facts. After all, we have them on our side. However, a
consistent fact that we’ve dismissed, over and over and over again, is that facts do not make a dent, a mark, or a single impression on our ideological opponents. Despite every use of reason, we fail, again and again.
Today my wife asked me “Was it Patrick Henry who said ‘Give me liberty or give me death?’” I’ll admit I was only 95% sure it was him, and I said so. She responded “I don’t know much about him. I’m going to look into his life.”
If a man’s life were to be reduced in posterity to a single quote, “Give me liberty or give me
death” stands right up there with “To be or not to be...”
The interesting thing about this particular quote, from this particular man, is that if you examine
his life you’ll find it fits the quote quite nicely. It’s not only a factual statement, it contains a bold passion
that will not relent. And so he was in life.
He didn’t compromise at the First Continental Congress. He deferred, waiting for a Bill of
Rights, without which he was extremely wary of any governing document.
He learned his oratory style from preachers, seeking not only to capture their minds but their hearts.
We must look to him as our guide. Right now we stand as a bulwark against total insanity
brought from the Leftist, Collectivist, Postmodern, Marxist, Clown College Theology. Leftism has short circuited entirely the logical, reasoning side of those who adhere to it.
We scream into the mob “Why can’t you see the cliff to which you run!?!?!?!?”
Yet we are run over, run down, run into, until we are forced to run for cover.
Not only must we realize that we cannot run any longer without giving everything up, we must realize that a change in style is what’s needed.
“Give me liberty or give me death!!!”
It’s a statement so bold that it demands the listener pay attention. Against a tide of people whose hearts have completely surrendered to a cause, it is the only cry that could possibly work.
We mustn’t say “Corporate taxes are in effect a tax not only on the buyer but on the worker. A corporation that has more income from its goods has a greater ability to either cut the price of its products or pay its workers more, creating a market in which everyone becomes more wealthy more quickly.”
We must say instead “How can you be your own boss if you have no freedom to invest your money into a business without paying your very life’s blood for it? Don’t you deserve the freedom to do what you like with your hard earned money?? Do you want to live a life of permits and permissions, present past and future”??
Instead of “Socialism has never worked, change my mind”, we should say “Do you want to be forced to give up your possessions and your right to say whatever you choose, lest you and your family be lined up against a wall?”
We must appeal to the common man, the individual, the pioneer who wishes to live his life the way he sees fit, without being told what he should do at every turn. We must say to that man “Can you not see what is coming?”
We may never win over the mob, but that shouldn’t be our only goal. Our goal should be to
galvanize this bulwark against the horde, until they are eventually shown to be rabid, and their ideology put down. We must shout “I want liberty for you, and I’m willing to die for it!!” We must appeal to the passions of the downtrodden and spark a fire in the dampened hearts of those who have little hope.
If we can find a way to convert each and every one of our arguments into an appeal, not only to the logical side of man, but to the side that desires adventure, fairness, and freedom, we will have taken a step. Frankly, it is the only step that I can see that has a chance of ending the madness that descends upon us.
What is your cry? How will you shout to the mob? At what point will you stand up and say
“Enough, it is here that I make my stand.”? We must compel the attention of those who have tuned out of the debate, confident that both sides are merely shouting at each other. We must rise above that tide with our passion and our temperament, and speak to their souls.
At the root of every man is a desire to live his life in security and peace, but even deeper lies his desire for freedom.
How will you speak to that?
Written by: Zak