Citizens or sheep? / LJWorld.com

To the editor:

We need all three: education, liberty and democracy. Free people think (education), then speak (liberty) and finally vote (democracy). Thus we govern “us,” ourselves, from the bottom up, without the guiding hands of theocrats and aristocrats. The idea of democracy is that “we the people,” the herd of sheep (common people), elevate ourselves (through education) to think and act (vote) for ourselves without need of shepherds (priests) or dogs (nobility) to guide and guard us. The Enlightenment idea was that enlightened people can govern themselves.

But, what if we become unenlightened, uneducated? Does it still work? Do we lose the right of liberty and the power of democracy? Can the ignorant remain free? If we become stupid, will the shepherds and the dogs return? When we turn our backs on science, reject knowledge, do we also abandon liberty?

Have we funded our public schools and universities? What of burdening our children with collective tuition debt exceeding the entire national credit card debt?

Yet each day we become more dependent upon technology created by the science many politicians attack. Are these doubters of evolution honest; do they really distrust science?

A Shawnee Mission East High School girl, while listening to the Kansas governor tweeted “#heblowsalot,” whatever that means. Using technology based upon a science he’s spurned, the governor watches his people on Facebook and Twitter to know what they say about him.

The tweet, he decrees, was not “respectful.” So the girl is told she must apologize. Are you worried yet?

Paul R Getto 2 years, 4 months ago

Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.Let's move on. This one is over. Watch what Muscular Sam does; that's more important than what he says or how he chooses to use social media.

kansasredlegs 2 years, 4 months ago

Sheeple, no doubt about it.

Richard Heckler 2 years, 4 months ago

The governor’s staff noticed the tweet and brought it to the attention of educators. Sullivan said she was summoned before Shawnee Mission East Principal Karl Krawitz, who scolded her and told her to write an apology to the governor.

Reports of the dispute — and the apology demand — soon engulfed much of the Internet debate-o-sphere.

“There’s no reason why a voting-age citizen, whether in or out of high school, should be prevented from making negative comments about an elected official,” wrote blogger E.D. Kain on the Forbes website.

“Our political leaders are not gods. They’re just men and women, flawed like the rest of us.”

Emma Sullivan has the right to make comments = the bottom line.

Meanwhile this is making national news which should reveal to so many others how the RINO's push big government in spite of their rhetoric. Intrusion in our private lives is truly big government extreme.

There is no doubt if Emma Sullivan needed financial support for legal defense, donations would come. The Emma Sullivan Legal Defense Fund would be an example of how the majority of Americans do not appreciate the intrusion of "big government" in a democracy that preaches Freedom of Speech.

Flap Doodle 2 years, 4 months ago

(from a source)

cato_the_elder 2 years, 4 months ago

I wonder whether the author of this letter to the editor (one of many he has written) has ever considered having his works vetted by someone who knows how to communicate in English.

its_just_math 2 years, 4 months ago

This whole Brownback/Tweet debacle has been really hard on many and I'm not sure if they'll ever be the same again.

Armstrong 2 years, 4 months ago

Are you worried yet ? No.

The first half of this article seems to focus on unenlightened,ignorant,stupid people (authors words) and wondering if they or we as a society will be taken advantage of I'm guessing here by enlightened, educated and or smart people ? Probably no. The awray of government programs welfare, food stamps, to name a couple make life much easier for the "challenged" to live a much higher quality of life versus someone say in Korea, Venezuela, Cambodia....

Secondly this article makes the mistake of confusing sience with technology, two different things. Technology makes use of machines to solve problems or perform specific functions. Science is a method of acquiring knowledge through use of observation and experiment.

The article is slanted to the liberal montra "always the victim". In fact, life is what you make it. You (society) can choose to be educated, informed and motivated or let others make life choices for you. We are all citizens, the option of being a farm animal is a personal choice.

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