Negotiable Truth?????

I like this picture for the contrast between the two trees. However, this picture is not a true picture of the moment of time in which it was taken. I have edited the picture to ensure that the trees are the focal point. So, this picture is a true depiction of the trees, but not of their surroundings. Isn’t that how lies are sold–always include a truth to lend believability to the lie?

Is truth a function of the society in which one finds oneself or is there an immutability like Plato’s “Forms” that defines truth? Is “truth” like an experiment that can be tested and verified? I don’t know. I do know that the more one knows, the more one questions “truth”, especially in this age of lies, hypocrisy, and propaganda.

Below are some excerpts from the Tennessee State Constitution: Adopted 1870, as amended:

Section 3. That all men have a natural and indefeasible right to worship Almighty God according to the dictates of their own conscience; that no man can of right be compelled to attend, erect, or support any place of worship, or to maintain any minister against his consent; that no human authority can, in any case whatever, control or interfere with the rights of conscience; and that no preference shall ever be given, by law, to any religious establishment or mode of worship.
Section 4. That no political or religious test, other than an oath to support the Constitution of the United States and of this State, shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under this State.

Section 33. Slavery and involuntary servitude are forever prohibited. Nothing in this section shall prohibit an inmate from working when the inmate has been duly convicted of a crime.

Why read the above? When Tennesseans are in need of health care, school funding, infrastructure improvement, food security, there is a legislator of Asian descent who believes that the children of Tennessee are more in need of a curriculum that teaches that the founding fathers were “Christian”.

1. This is part of the hype from certain persons that we, the people, are in need of the “truth” about this country. However, the “truth” that they want taught is propaganda to prop up a version of a country that has never existed.
2. When funding for school lunches and health care is too costly, but billions for war is not, who cares whether or not the founding fathers were Christian? Where is that a requirement to hold office, legislative or otherwise? Doesn’t the oath taken by government officials say something about upholding the Constitution? What about the separation of church and state which is in both the Federal and the Tennessee Constitutions?
3. Doesn’t she know that the famous words “all men are created equal” didn’t include her forefathers?
4. The “truth” that she wants taught does not include Slavery, an evil institution that persisted for more than two hundred years and morphed into Jim Crow which included lynchings, theft of property, destruction of Black towns, taxation without representation, and prevailed until the 1960s when legislation was enacted to extend the rights granted in the Constitution to Blacks and other marginalized groups. Which, of course, today, is being dismantled to ensure that white supremacy reigns.
5. Why is white adjacency and white approval so important to these people? White people will make a fool of them when their usefulness is no more. I suppose she hasn’t heard that ridding the elite universities of affirmative action hasn’t gone so well for the Asians.

At least two representatives spoke against her rendition of “truth”. Can an intelligent human being be so ignorant as to make the argument that because the Bible has verses about Slavery, then the Slavery practiced by the white supremacists in the United States some thousands of years later is acceptable, justifiable? This representative of Asian descent did. Obviously, she has never read any of the Biblical passages dealing with Slavery with any comprehension. That it was mentioned in the Bible of her religion of choice makes every iteration of “Slavery” acceptable and justifiable. Where do these low intelligence (in my book, lack of critical thinking is a sign of low intelligence) people come from? Why are they being elected? They do nothing for their constituents.

The Oscars were yesterday. I haven’t looked at the Oscars since some white male rapper won the Oscar for best song. Last night, KPop, Korean rip-off of Black music, won an Oscar. The song that should have won, a homage of Black music from Africa to the present, I Lied To You, the Oscar nominated song from the Movie, Sinners. I watched clips of the movie version and the Oscar version and both were real, authentic, and sung and danced by us. That song, for me was the heart of the movie and the last scenes where who I named the “good” twin shot the white cowards and joined his family in the afterlife was the “soul” of the movie.

Anyway, somehow I ended up looking at a videos of Big Mama Thornton singing “Hound Dog” and “Ball and Chain“. I knew that Elvis Presley had covered “Hound Dog” and that the original was sung by a Black artist, but I had never heard her version. I had never really listened to the song before, but she was singing about a no-good man who wanted the goodies and no commitment. And she had his number, knew what he was, but nevertheless had bow-wowed with him. When she sings you can hear the disgust at herself and him in her voice. Here are some of the lyrics:

You made me feel so blue
You made me weep and moan
You made me feel so blue
How you made me weep and moan
You ain’t looking for a woman
All you’re lookin’ is for a home

You ain’t nothing but a hound dog
Been snoopin’ ’round my door
You ain’t nothing but a hound dog
Been snoopin’ ’round my door
You can wag your tail
But I ain’t gon’ feed you no more

I think a lot of women today can identify with this song! Ball and Chain is in the same vein. I had never heard Ball and Chain before. Seems like Janis Joplin covered it and the song was a hit for her.

Something, I thought was interesting in De Tocqueville’s book. De Tocqueville referenced the residents of other countries as being of a different race. Maybe, that’s a nineteenth century use of the word “race” or maybe that’s the mindset of the translator. But maybe that distinction is why the different people who all basically looked the same were always fighting. Something in their makeup could not process the similarity in appearance and even in world view. They all wanted to conquer, to rape, to pillage. And they defined anyone not in their country as “other” so they could conquer, rape, and pillage with impunity?

My fig trees are supposed to be cold hardy. I covered them, but the wind blew open the covering on one of the trees and yesterday, I saw some wilted leaves. Tomorrow, I will uncover all of the covered plants as the temperatures are rising again. Today is the tomorrow, I spoke of. The fig trees did not like the cold weather. They’re not dead, but there might not be any figs this year. All the other plants look okay…no visible damage from the cold. This is a wait and see situation.

Finally got a picture of a butterfly before the cold spell–

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What passes for identity in America is a series of myths about one’s heroic ancestors. It’s astounding to me, for example, that so many people really seem to believe that the country was founded by a band of heroes who wanted to be free. James Baldwin

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