in the thread, “Hay biggie, we need some context”
there is fair amount of talk about the act of judging…
a Noun…judge: a public official appointed to decide cases in a
court of law…
a verb…judge: form an opinion or conclusion about.
“it is hard to judge whether such opposition is justified”
but what is left unsaid, is the very act of judging…
how do we judge and what criteria do we use to judge?
for example, I judge Trump to be the worse president in American history,
others, judge Trump to be the best president in American history…
we both can’t be right, but we can both be wrong… ok, he is the second
worse president in American history… behind Bush Jr…who is slightly ahead of
Ronald Raygun…
and we can marshal facts and evidence to prove our point… say, Job creation,
was terrible under both Bush Jr. and IQ45… a bit better under Raygun…
but facts and evidence can be made to prove anything because depending on
the facts and evidence presented, we can prove, well just about anything…
one might say, Raygun “defeated” communism… but if communism was such a failure
as the right claims, it would have failed in any case and Raygun got the reward
of “winning” the cold war without actually doing anything. Communism
collapsed in 1989-1991 which was the Bush SR. presidency… why didn’t bush Sr. get the
credit? we made a “judgement” about that historical “fact” which isn’t true…
in truth, we allow our prejudices/biases/bigotry to cloud our “judgements” about
facts, evidence and truths… to those on the right, it was conservativism that
made America great and to those on the left, it was liberalism that made America great…
and how are we to “judge” that matter?
one could make the argument, quite a compelling argument that
as long as America held its “liberal” viewpoint, it was the greatest country
on earth… when America began its collapse, it was because conservatism
began a rise to power… and we can not get back to being a Powerful nation,
until we return to the liberalism that brought us here…
the very idea of a democracy is an liberal one… the very idea of the
“common” man voting is a liberal one… the very idea of women voting
is a liberal idea…social security is a liberal idea… progressive taxation is
a liberal idea…(held by both Karl Marx and Adam Smith) that having children
publicly educated is a liberal idea… every great idea of what makes America great
is a liberal idea…we can look at history and see this… we can judge this to be true,
because the facts tell us so…if you want to time the exact moment America began its
fall from grace, you can time it to the 1981 election of Ronald Raygun…
Conservativism rose to power and America still hasn’t recovered from the ongoing
damage conservatism had done to America… as a liberal, I judge it so…
but a conservative will make another argument…and judge it differently…
the question becomes, who is right? and how can we tell who is right?
to judge, one needs a point of judging from… what perspective should I use
to judge such matters as conservatism or liberalism?
I can judge little kids behavior, as I did when my daughter was young…
but why? what standard can I use to judge properly?
I am an adult… I can see what behaviors are right and appropriate for
a 2 year old vs a 6 year old vs a teenager vs a 20 year old…
at each age, different actions and behaviors are right and appropriate…
at 62, acting like a teenager isn’t right nor is it appropriate…and how do I know?
experience and knowledge of growing old, of having once been a teenager
and a 20 year old…I have knowledge and experience that a 20 year old
won’t get for decades… and that experience and knowledge allows me to judge
a teenager behavior or a 20 year old actions…
when I was young, 22 and above (I didn’t drink until I was 22)
I did drink and drive… but with experience and knowledge I stop
doing that by 25… I gain in knowledge and experience enough to
judge that drinking and driving was, not just legally wrong,
really a dumb thing to do…and after age 25, I didn’t engage in drinking
and driving… (which meant at times, I would walk home from the bar at
2:00 in the morning, roughly 3 miles… but it beat drinking and driving)
and I judge that to be “smart” and how do I judge that? by experience
and knowledge…
now can I use experience and knowledge to judge all matters?
nope, sometimes, experience and knowledge just doesn’t give one
enough information to be able to judge something…
I might turn to “experts” to fill in that gap of knowledge/experience…
so, when I decided to get the Covid vaccine, I didn’t have enough
medical experience or knowledge to make a good judgement, so
turned to medical experts… I have friends who are doctors,
and I read the reports and use their experiences and knowledge
to make an “informed” judgement…
I got the vaccine and I would make the exact same judgement today,
as I will get the booster shot when it becomes my time…
as I will get the shingle shot and the flu shot and the tetanus shot,
when necessary…because in my judgement, with my experience
and knowledge, I know that taking those shots is the smartest way to
protect myself, my family and my society/state…
I judge the vaccine shots to be vitally important in making sure
everyone is safe and sound…and why? because I have been given shots
my entire life… if, there had been a measles shot to protect children when
I was born, I would have been born with hearing… I am a victim of
children/people not having the measles vaccine when I was born…
as I was born in the 50’s and the measles vaccines came out in the 1960’s…
I can use my experience and knowledge to know that getting a vaccine is important
and can save lives and prevent what happened to me, happen to others…
the act of judging is done from experience and knowledge…
given a historical background which helps create the experience
and knowledge…in other words, my judgements are also made in context
to my social, economic, political and philosophical background…
my wealth or lack thereof, dictates what knowledge and experience
I might have… thus the context of my life, the who, what, when, where,
how and why, of my life, helps dictate the knowledge and experiences of my life…
and from that knowledge and experiences, I make my judgements…
thus my life context helps dictates my experiences and knowledge which
helps makes my judgements…
thus who I am decides my judgements and I make my judgement within
my experiences and knowledge, not outside of them…
to make a long story short, we make judgement based on us, our experiences
and knowledge…but at times, we allow society/the state to make our judgements
for us…because it has deemed, in its experiences and knowledge, to have
a better understanding of a particular situation then we do… and at times, it is right…
at times…
and in the long human struggle between the state and the individuals,
the pendulum has swung to the state at times, and then to the individuals, at times…
there is no fixed answer when the state is right or when the individual is right…
we must use our experience and knowledge to judge when the state is right
and when the individual is right… and today, right now, the state, in regards
to the covid vaccine, is right, tomorrow, the state may be wrong it is application
of what right and wrong…
and how do we judge?
that is the question…
Kropotkin