Tag: freedom

Fines aren’t about Safety

On By Susan St.PierreIn In my humble opinion...8 Comments


I want to discuss the use of laws and fines as Public Safety measures.

In a free society, the public service arm of government agencies keeps the public informed. Once upon a time when these agencies were trusted, the public was offered enough information to act responsibly and protect themselves accordingly. The safety of each individual was where it belonged- in their own hands according to their own perception of risk.

Once the government started instituting laws to ensure ‘public safety’, the citizens’ ability to judge ‘what’s good for us’ was interfered with and slid toward the idea that ‘government knows better’ attitudes. “One size fits all” became more palatable to the public and government intrusion into personal freedoms got a lot of traction. We all deep down know ‘one size’ never fits all but who wants to argue with something called “safety”? Now, whether you know it or not, the government has taken the role of a ‘parent’. “For your own good” is their excuse to impose their will. Then the government started agencies monitoring all things (it deemed) ‘for our own good’. Keep in mind, these agencies were not elected. The public was now cut off from any direct say on the implementation of regulations. Regulation is another word for control. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news but the government has unimpeded control of everything you do. We’ve given “them” the muscle to do it too.

You may be one (of many) who say, “Well, I think ‘safety’ is a good thing, so I don’t mind.”. I want to examine if ‘safety’ is the real impetus for most of regulation. I also want to ask you, “Who knows better about your individual situation, you or the government?”. Are you a good person? I think most people are good and wouldn’t intentionally harm a fly. (Have you noticed ‘bad’ selfish people don’t follow laws?) Why then are you comfortable with government telling you that freedom is too dangerous for you use?

If the government were actually serious about every single person’s safety, why are safety infractions mostly subject to fines? I don’t know about you but a ‘fine’ tells me that I can go against ‘safety laws’ for a price. There’s an uneven, ineffective, process going on that ultimately enriches the government more than it causes total safety. (Total safety isn’t a thing I hope you know.)
If you’re wealthy enough, you can be as irresponsible (in the eyes of the law) as you wish. Guess what? Good people like yourselves already operate with an ‘eye’ on keeping us safe with or without laws. 😉

Personally, during my childcare years many other providers imposed a fine for frequent tardy ‘pick-ups’. I did not do that. I understood reasonable delays, BUT, if being late became a pattern, I told those parents that we needed to renegotiate our contract to allow for more overall time or for termination of my service if they no longer fit into MY schedule. To have instituted a ‘late fee’ meant that “you can be late for a price”. Being late interfered with my family’s routine and wasn’t going to be ‘for sale’!

BTW-If imposing safety on everyone were Constitutional, it would have been mentioned. It’s not. But being free to protect yourself from danger and also to be protected from unelected governmental intervention is clearly there. Even though the Constitution is being overwhelmingly ignored at our peril these days, it still is the ultimate “law of the land”.

I believe it is the only thing standing between us and our chaotic demise as we slip into totalitarianism. I’ve never cared to tell others how to live but I am not going to ignorantly give up my own freedoms to a group of people who don’t know (or care) about my family as much as I, without objecting to it.

Have a nice day!

The Sunday Whirl 579- Baker’s Dozen-Debating Kids’ Futures

On By Susan St.PierreIn Writing Prompts4 Comments

spin, creep, loom, whirl, crack, light, grip, stain, curl, glimpse, slack, lord, wonder

I caught a glimpse of my archrival in the crowd and felt like I wanted to curl my ‘tail’ between my legs and light out of the auditorium. The Superintendent and I had had an indelible ‘stain‘ on our pretense of mutual respect since our unfortunate heated confrontation months ago.
“Get a grip!” was my brain’s immediate response.
“That ‘creep‘ can’t crack your confidence unless you let her.”

I then whispered to myself as I bowed in a moment of prayer, “Lord, please don’t let me defeat myself today. This is for the kids.”

The debate was about to start, and the whirl of noise began to settle as we took our seats on the stage.
After a brief introduction by the event organizer, we were called upon to present our cases on the topic of Homeschooling vs Public School.

My job was going to be extra difficult because of the venue itself. There’s no need to wonder about the uphill battle in presenting an argument in front of professionals eyeing me with furrowed brows from the audience. I’d call that a looming pressure. If I couldn’t effectively appeal to these people who are holding their own pre-conceived preferences, they’d easily ‘spin‘ my ‘points’ as proof of Public Schooling superiority.

All we disenchanted parents wanted was the freedom to choose without governmental regulatory interference.

When my turn came, I brought out the BIG guns first.

” You all know the first woman on our esteemed Supreme Court. Sandra Day O’Connor was a brilliant legal scholar, a pioneer in breaking down professional barriers to women, and the product of early homeschooling. Thomas Edison and Theodore Roosevelt spent their whole young lives being homeschooled too.”

It was then that the Superintendent’s defiant face and pursed lips went slack.



https://sundaywhirl.wordpress.com/2022/11/20/wordle-579-a-bakers-dozen/

SoCS 11-5-22- Outrage, Regret, and Input

On By Susan St.PierreIn In my humble opinion..., Writing Prompts10 Comments


Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “your favorite word.” Decide on your favorite word and use it in your post any way you’d like. Enjoy!



My favorite word used to be anthropomorphism. I love how it rolls off the tongue and makes the person using it sound ‘smart’.
It is most certainly something we do, that is, attribute human emotions and tendencies to animals (sometimes inanimate objects or forces in Nature). And when it comes to the emotional lives of animals, it isn’t always a misguided view. If you’ve owned and loved a dog or cat, I know you’re ‘in tune’ with their capacity to love, worry, and miss others.
But recently I’ve been fascinated with the word consequences. I personally thought it meant ‘bad results’ but I have come to know it more precisely means any reactions or results of one’s actions or words. So, the consequence of being kind probably is receiving kindness from others and so on…
Today, I found out that the political Left publications, one being The Atlantic, are asking for something called “pandemic amnesty”. To paraphrase it, they’re saying, “Hey, we all did and said things we regret during the pandemic so let’s just all be friends and forget about it.”.
Um… I regret nothing and didn’t do anything to anyone but ask to retain my freedom and be left alone. The Left, and their malleable minions on the other hand, called people terrible names, infringed on their freedom, ruined their lives by shutting down businesses and firing people, even outwardly calling for “the unvaccinated” to be refused medical treatment and mobility, to be shunned and censored, even to be arrested. They (anyone who liked those ideas) want to, now, shrug and offer a handshake with the suggestion they were “just kidding”. I can’t imagine that’s going to work. LOL
When it comes to consequences, people who demanded that our free citizenry snap to full unquestioning compliance, dished out a boatload more than I ever thought possible in the U.S.A.
I personally hope that those arrogant people are about to reap some consequences at the ballot box on Tuesday.
As a consequence of having and sharing my own opinions, I’ve had more than a few good results. I’ve made new truly tolerant friends whom I don’t expect to completely agree with but enjoy on a more important level of mutual respect. We exist, people.
Just yesterday, though, I did something I know better than to do. I used written language trying to explain a complicated and controversial topic in few words. Ugh! I’ve regretted it since. My message (upon rereading) wasn’t clear, and it seemed condescending. I did not mean for that to happen. There are some topics that require face to face discussion or need to just be avoided. I hope I can learn that!
In my own defense, my problem comes from insatiable curiosity and an eagerness to exchange ideas. I feel like Johnney Five in the movie Short Circuit. I cannot seem to get enough “input”! And just now I realize that my ‘stream’ has come full circle.
Johnney Five (a robot) adopted anthropomorphic traits in the end.
Well, hopefully I learned from my mistakes last week. I can’t wait to make new ones this week! LOL
Happy Weekend Everyone! Hope your mistakes are few and all your consequences are the good kind!


https://lindaghill.com/category/stream-of-consciousness-saturday/
https://lindaghill.com/2022/11/04/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-nov-5-2022/


SoCS 10-29-22- Elemental Humility

On By Susan St.PierreIn In my humble opinion..., Writing Prompts14 Comments

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “element.” Use it any way you’d like. Have fun!



The term “element” means a basic building block that more complicated principles, things, or beings, are built upon. Elements cannot be changed or created. They just ‘are’. You may call them ‘truths’ which are unchanging and undeniable.
Human beings are extremely complicated. There are layers of ‘inborn’ traits and then there are experiences which nudge them in multiple directions. In other words, every one of us is unique. When it comes to the current ‘diversity’ mania, it sadly overlooks this ‘truth’.
So why all the anxiety over instituting ‘diversity’ everywhere? Well, human beings love to simplify and make conclusions about everything. Actually, the search for the quintessential human ‘elements’ probably is an inborn purpose. Our curious nature drives us to explain everything and to truly explain anything means we need to start at the ‘roots’. There’s a problem though. First, human beings are not meant to nor have the capacity to understand, or even explain, everything. Secondly, many human beings don’t know (or refuse to believe) this.
All human beings have what I call “the oops factor”. I don’t care how educated or expert you may believe you are, ALL people make mistakes. Some are small, like forgetting your grocery list, and some are large, like the oft seen headline, “Scientists Baffled”.
So why the nearly ‘religious’ reliance on what ‘experts’ say these days? Furthermore, why the vitriolic movement to quell any questioning of ‘experts’?
There are likely more reasons than I can ‘see’ but taking my human limitations into consideration, I still think it’s good to offer my viewpoint to the discussion.

The ‘elephant in the room’ at the elemental level of human hubris is the arrogance that accompanies the lack of belief in a Creator. You don’t have to ‘buy’ any specific religious dogma to realize there are unexplainable forces at work. Such forces which human beings are not the commanders of even if they care to label them.
Socrates- a fulltime thinker- believed he actually knew ‘nothing’. That realization of his own limitation of full understanding made everything else he said all the more valuable, IMHO. Humility is key. You cannot have humility when you believe YOU are all powerful and all knowing, aka God.

(The concept of ‘perfect‘ as something attainable in ANY human life has also done more harm to human happiness (and many marriages 😉 ) than any other concept, IMHO. I purposefully refrain from using that term… especially around children.)

Those who can repeat the term ‘settled science’ with a straight face certainly need a humility ‘injection’ along with their Covid shot.
In our current oversimplified, secular, celebrity ‘worshipping’, culture there’s a tragically low level of humility and an even more tragic reverence for “expert” opinion. Add to that a few generations who had their ‘self-esteem’ artificially inflated and were told that THEY can (and are entitled to) do anything they choose, you get a hopelessly incurious and compliant population. They’re even easier to turn against each other with this empirical mindset. This makes Marxists salivate with glorious expectations.

There’s one ‘truth’ when it comes to Communism, the central element of which is the capture of the minds of people in order to dominate them… Religion must be eliminated. The religious, and or, the ‘thinkers’ who cannot worship the government as “all knowing” because of their own humility, are dangerous to the effort of creating a ‘collective’ of unquestioning serfs.

IMHO- Any society’s measurable freedom is unequivocally linked to the amount of leadership humility and human humility is undeniably linked to the belief in a Creator. That’s why Freedom of Speech and Freedom to Worship are elemental to our country’s prosperity and survival. I’ll defend those two elements any way I can.

Happy Saturday everyone! Embrace your beautiful uniqueness today!

https://lindaghill.com/2022/10/28/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-oct-29-2022/

SoCS-10/15/22- Happy Place- Suspending Time

On By Susan St.PierreIn In my humble opinion..., Writing Prompts11 Comments

Your Friday prompt for Stream of Consciousness Saturday is “happy place.” Write the first thing that comes to mind when you think of “happy place.” Have fun!

I want to talk about Time. Human beings have calibrated it to milliseconds and like many things we make possible to measure, we feel that we can manage it. Don’t get me started on the ‘Climate Crisis’. The arrogance of human beings is beyond measure. The belief that we can control or manage the Natural world is absurd. But I digress.
Time is an oppressive force according to my sensibilities. Escaping that ‘weight’, even in small episodes, is my ‘happy place’. I don’t wear a watch. Why should I? The ticking of time is all around us. Clocks are everywhere and the calendar is mentioned or referred to many times a day. But I want you to know that it is possible to step away from that tick, tick, ticking existence.
Have you ever been absorbed in a book, movie, or project, and lost all concept of time? To me, that is the most freeing place I can be. Freedom looms large in my soul if you haven’t noticed.
There are times while I’m at my camp when I feel weightless and lost. So much so, that I ask what time it is and truly have no idea if it’s 11:00 am or 2:00 pm. It’s a glorious experience that to many on ‘timed existences’ would be dizzying and might even give them a feeling of being off-balance.
Schedules and deadlines are necessary, but I dread them. I love winter in New England for the peace, beauty, but mostly for those snowstorms. On a snowstorm day, life slows almost to a stop. Businesses close, travel is unlikely, and no one expects you to BE anywhere. The world is yours for your own sake.
Gosh that’s grand!
I often write about ‘living in the moment’ and I pursue that every day. In retrospect, my choice to spend most of my days with children [animals too] came from my, then unrecognized but looming, pursuit of shunning time. Kids and animals truly do live in the moment and that is where time releases you from its grip.

I am an unapologetic Star Trek fan and have been since I first sat too close to the ‘boob tube’ in the 1960s drinking in all the mind-blowing themes it presented. This stream of consciousness brought one of my favorite themes in the movie Star Trek Insurrection immediately to mind. It is the perfect ‘cherry on top’ of this post. I’ll share it below with a brief explanation for people who are not Star Trek buffs.
Happy Saturday friends! Try to take some time for yourself today!



Here are two (very short) scenes from Star Trek Insurrection that express what I’ve talked about.
Captain Picard and his crew have encountered a foreign human race who live on a planet that, because of unique conditions, are capable of living for centuries. In these clips, he learns a lot about time from one of the inhabitants. Enjoy!

https://lindaghill.com/2022/10/14/the-friday-reminder-and-prompt-for-socs-oct-15-2022/