By Patrick
It is Sunday again, and we hope that all you will make the most of the day. I will hopefully pull myself together to do some sport later, so wish me luck. But first, let's look at some things which are informative and sometimes entertaining as well.
As we all know, Donald Trump tirelessly works every day to poison the hearts and minds of Americans, and although he most likely won't succeed with his big goal of becoming the most powerful man in the world, his open hostility towards "Mexicans" and potential other troublemakers from the "outside" certainly will cause much damage. I guess that it already has, because once politicians encourage their base to hate others, it usually does not take very long for the hate to "break free."
This has been proven over and over again in history, and that is why in many countries "hate speak" is discouraged, either through laws, an "agreement" in the society, or both. Whether this is good or not is certainly debatable. Different countries have different concepts and traditions, and the American concept of "unlimited free speech" has been at odds for example with European rules on hate speech on several occasions in the past. For example, the fact that Germany made it a crime in 1985 to spread "Holocaust denial" theories prompted criticism for example from some American observers, and also from some UK commentators.
In reality, laws like the "Holocaust-denial-law" have been proven to be very effective in order to combat Neo-Nazism in Germany, as a vital "recruitment-tool" for young Neo-Nazis has been made illegal through these laws. But back to the USA: The reason why I am mentioning these issues is the fact that I firmly believe that the encouragement of hate that we have seen from people like Donald Trump, but also from others, will prove very destructive to US society in the long term. Once the genie is out of the bottle, and once "hate" will become a "mainstream opinion", then society will have a massive problem which won't quickly disappear again. The human mind, in combination with ignorance and low education, can be manipulated very effectively.
What politicians really have to do in order to achieve a better society is to encourage the opposite: Compassion and understanding. That does not mean that for example existing problems should not be tackled. However, if you have a high-profile "politician" like Donald Trump playing the race card, then people will eventually not end up discussing whether "Mexicans" are actually "rapists", but only will discuss how many of them are "rapists", and not whether there should be a wall to Mexico and Canada, but only how "high" this wall should be.
In short, if you plant bad seeds in people's minds, these seeds will grow, and this fact has been exploited by countless evil leaders in history over and over again.
During the last two days, a video went viral of a young American girl in a Kebab shop, and she is apparently hugely upset that the staff did not speak English, and this memorable as well as ugly video really demonstrates what I am talking about: The fact that "normal" people these days obviously feel encouraged to insult "foreign" citizens in public who are apparently not behaving like they are supposed to behave.
I am pretty sure that this misguided young woman will love to vote for Donald Trump - watch:
Therefore American politicians should be careful what they wish for, and this does not apply to Donald Trump.
So let's move on. I have seen that the topic of Kim Davis and her martyrdom for Christian America was discussed extensively in the comments during the last days, so I thought it would be good to post this wonderful graphic, which provides an overview to the rather convoluted marriage history of Kim Davis - good for sharing:
Well, as we already know from long experience, if you want to find a hypocrite, take a quick look at "conservative-constitutional" Americans, as "Hypocrite" is basically their middle name.
I also find this one very fitting:
What else do we have today - oh yes, there are lots of people who love to present their incredibly interesting private life for example on Instagram on a daily basis, and by doing so reveal more about themselves than they wish to reveal. In honor of these people, the Instagram account "socialitybarbie" has been created, and yes, one will quickly see similarities to real people which I am too polite to name right now - click to enlarge:
Well, I think this is spot-on indeed.
Moving on, back to Europe, a clip was posted yesterday showing refugees from Syria being warmly greeted a the Frankfurt Main Train Station. I was at first quite hesitant to put this clip up, because I do not want to give the impression that everything is perfect regarding the huge number of refugees coming to Germany right now. During the last months, there have been a number of arson attacks in Germany on houses which were designed to shelter refugees, and these despicable attacks still continue. However, I am convinced that the people who commit these attacks do not represent a majority of the citizens in Germany. Therefore, I find it important to show that there are also lots of people here who also welcome the refugees, and understand their desperate situation.
Watch the clip from Frankfurt Main Train Station:
These events are newsworthy because the massive migration of refugees to Germany has huge consequences for international politics as well. This crisis will continue, and I am happy that Germany steps up and leads in the right direction and will accept hundreds of thousands of refugees this year, the number reported being up to 800.000 people, for example in this excellent CNN TV-report from Berlin:
Please do not get me wrong, no misunderstanding here: I am not saying that everything is bad in the USA, and everything is good in Europe. This is not the case. What I am trying to express here is the fact that good behavior needs to be encouraged, and bad behavior, the sinister manipulation of the population, needs to be strongly discouraged.
Especially the Germans have seen first hand what can happen to a country if the minds of many people are being poisoned. It is about finding the right approach, about the fact that we are not just "one country", but one world, and we have try to find the best way to live together. It is never easy, and there always will be conflicts. But politicians need to encourage the good nature of people, and if they do the opposite, they will cause huge damage which will last many years.
BONUS - Sarah strikes again:
I planned this to be the end of the post, however, Sarah Palin just gave a wonderful new "Palinesque" interview on CNN, in which she already announced that she will quit this job as well (no joke), because as a Secretary of Energy in a Trump-administration, she would dissolve the Department of Energy. This could have actually been a SNL-skit!
As usual, Sarah "barstool" Palin is not helping matters.
Oh, and in this interview, she talks a lot about her "pregnancy" with Trig as well.
I did not find a way to embed this clip with Sarah's new interview, so please watch it here.
Have a nice Sunday, everybody!
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BONUS 2:
Kathleen thinks I should end this post with an ultra-sweet baby-clip which public figure Jason Silva posted on facebook: Captivating the mind of a baby.
Here is his twitter. But this clip is not just "sweet", it also has a deeper meaning.
You can watch this amazing video also without a facebook account - click here.
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