Get Your Boots On

Guest Column

Oct. 13, 2018

There is an old adage sometimes credited to Washington Irving, other times to Mark Twain, but no one is sure: “A lie can travel halfway around the world before the truth has a chance to get its boot on.” This has been assumed to signify the power of a lie rather than the speed at which it travels. People confuse it with Vladimir Lenin’s assertion: “A lie told often enough becomes the truth.”

Lenin’s contemporary followers have taken his tenet as a marching order. In an attempt to fabricate truth, the left has adopted the policy of repeating unsupportable claims over and over, thinking that fiction will turn into fact. As history has shown us, Lenin was wrong. A lie is the little pig’s house of straw. It’s easily made by the lazy, but also quickly crumbles under challenge. Truth is the house of brick — it takes longer to establish, but once constructed, withstands all forces.
 
When the lie becomes your weapon, and your way, the truth is your enemy and must be guarded against. Politically correct language and speech codes are defensive tools against people trying to voice the truth against lies. The explosion of speech rules and “safe zones” are evidence of deception. When people make restrictions on speech and shout down opposition, you can be certain the wind of truth will dismantle their straw house of lies. Censorship of truth has taken many shapes over the years, but the current incarnation is attacking speakers of truth for the form of their message, not the substance of their arguments.  
 
It has become axiomatic in popular culture that anyone who uses and acknowledges the true, scientific description of biological sex assignment hates people who are uncomfortable with their genetic composition. The rage mob has taken it even farther. People who challenge the idea that sex is fluid, that a man can become a woman, vice versa, or that humans can be non-sex, are also shouted down as people who also must “hate” the gay and lesbian community.
 
This current political pressure can prevail for years, or even a few generations, but it will never be true. Male humans have both different plumbing and different genetic composition than female humans. You can put a boy in a dress, but if he has Y chromosomes, he’s male. A woman can have modest breasts and slender hips, she can cut her hair short and don a baseball cap, but with only X chromosomes, she is still female. A surgeon can mutilate her genitals into something resembling a penis, and we can give her hormones to make her grow facial hair. She will still be a female — just one who looks outwardly like a man. When this cultural trend dies off, and it will, the truth of male and female will be right here waiting.
 
Truth doesn’t need a PR campaign. Lies and deception need promotion campaigns, spokespeople, and movements. Deception needs slogans and talking points. The united forces of the Left— national democrats, the traditional media, and Hollywood — marshaled their deceit machine to keep Brett Kavanaugh off the Supreme Court. The full power of the left was employed, but they failed because their tactic was deception, not truth. They smeared Judge Kavanaugh. They accused anyone who looked at the facts and supported him as “wanting to kill women.” With the most ambiguous of claims, they decided he must be evil, and that the majority of Americans who trusted him must be anti-woman. Their tactics had the ring of “the dog ate my homework.” The left was so hurried and careless in their deployment of disinformation that they used the weakest boondoggles. Their accusers looked and sounded like teenagers trying to talk their way out of coming home drunk. Only the Left’s foot soldiers bought it.

From this Monday-morning-quarterback example of the latest political smear, it’s easy to assume the truth will always win, but truth cannot prevail alone. Truth needs one thing: strong, brave people willing to speak it. Justice Kavanaugh is on the Supreme Court because important people had the courage to stand firm under the pressure of dishonesty. Perhaps the greatest legacy of President Trump will be his example of disregard for the power of social pressure. He has demonstrated how propaganda is defeated by indifference. For more than 50 years, the greatest strength of the progressive movement has been its masterful slight-of-hand in promoting lies. Progressives use their tactics to destroy any opposition who do not unapologetically employ the defensive tool of truth.
 
We learned as children that peer pressure could lead to trouble. The social pressure of political correctness is nothing more than the kid on the playground offering other children a cigarette. It’s easier to go with the crowd and take one harmless puff than to be seen as someone who’s uncool. It’s not easy to stand up for truth in Traverse City. The power of the progressive deception is strong, and bizarre ideas are pushed forward. Michael Moore, whose only talent is making mockumentaries*, is a hero in many circles. Our paper of record tilts so far that if you use it to line a birdcage, all the droppings will slide off to the left. Still, our home is dry land compared to the Washington,D.C. swamp. We have seen in the last few weeks that, even in the swamp, truth can prevail when bold people defend it.

*mockumentary: a type of movie or television show depicting fictional events but presented as a documentary. While mockumentaries are usually comedic, pseudo documentaries are their dramatic equivalents.

Thomas Kachadurian is a photographer, designer, and author. He lives on Old Mission with his wife and two children. He is a member and past president of the Traverse Area District Library Board of Trustees.