When I was growing up, my father used to tell me that there are only two types of people: nice people and jerks (he didn’t use that word, but I want to keep this blog PG). Nothing else matters, not religion, ethnicity or nationality.
He went on to say, that the problem is that sometimes good people act like jerks, and jerks act like nice people so the only way to know the difference is to get to know someone.
In my experience, I have modified that philosophy a bit, I think that we all have the good person and the jerk inside us and, every day, in every situation, we decide which we want to be. Unfortunately, especially when we disagree with someone, we let the jerk win.
With this blog, I’m trying to reverse that. I want this to be a place of ideas, a place where we can discuss and debate social and political issues with respect and logic. I don’t want this to be just an echo-chamber of people who agree with me. I hope that people from all sides of an idea will participate.
So please join me in letting your good person out and we can have discussions and disagreements using respectful language.