Word gets around. I must have said and written that millions of times by now. Yet those who most need to remember it often seem unwilling or unable to do so.
Barbara Tuchman defined folly as “knowing better but doing worse.” As a historian, she had plenty of examples to study. They continue to accumulate today.
In the main, people will remember what you do longer than what you say. Moreover, they’ll talk about what you did; what you said will be a footnote at most. That’s why promises matter less than performance.
The hundred words above suffice to explain all that will follow.
Mark McCormack listed three sentences as the hardest to learn how and when to use:
- “I don’t know.”
- “I need help.”
- “I was wrong.”
Contemplate the brevity of those three sentences. The third one is the focus of today’s sermonette. Note this especially: between wrong and the full stop, there is no but.
He who can admit to an error without qualifying it as (partly) someone else’s fault is a mature, honest man. He who cannot or will not do so is of dubious quality. Yet as desirous as we are of being thought honest and mature, the majority of us seek to offset our culpability for our mistakes and failures by citing someone else’s “contribution.”
One’s motive for “butting” after being revealed as wrong could be any of several: averting unpleasant consequences, retaining a particular reputation, and asserting authority come to mind at once. In politics and politically associated matters, the assertion of authority, especially moral authority, looms large. Consider the sentence made famous after the Dan Rather / Mary Mapes falsehoods of the 2004 presidential campaign were disproved: “The facts were wrong but the narrative was right.”
Moral authority is easily lost by those who “but.” It takes time, but as I said at the outset, word gets around. In this case, the word that gets around is cowardice.
He who “buts” is revealed as unwilling to accept the blame for his mistake. While the blame may be severe for an honest man, it can be devastating for the “butter.” His status is reduced by the magnitude of his error plus the suspicion that will henceforth attach to his assertions of moral authority.
This is one of the largest consequences of the recent revelations about the origin of the COVID-19 virus:
[B]asically, everyone in power knew all along that the Chinese Communist Party was responsible for the covid-19 epidemic, perhaps with an assist from Anthony Fauci’s NAIA, which funded gain of function research in Wuhan, despite Fauci’s later, desperate denials.
So whoever believed government assurances about the genesis of covid in 2020 and thereafter was a sucker.
The decline in the willingness of ordinary Americans to believe health-and-medicine-related government edicts has been staggering. No one likes to admit to himself that he’s been “had.” However angry he might be with himself for being overly trusting, he’ll be twice as mad at those who deceived him, once he knows that it was deliberate. As bad as that can be for individuals, it’s catastrophic for a government agency.
Claiming the moral high ground was the Left’s favorite tactic for many years. It was always a pose, but as long as their representations survived attempts to falsify them, they could continue their public hauteur. Moreover, that hauteur alone was sufficient to cow and silence many who dared to question them.
As regards the COVID-19 fiasco, “butting” has cost them their pose. We’ve heard the pleas for “pandemic amnesty.” We’ve learned that the “COVID vaccines” were never what they were represented to be. And we now know that governments and their private-sector hangers-on were fully aware of what we now know. Yet the “butting” continues:
You’d think that by now we’d have learned it’s not a good idea to test possible gas leaks by lighting a match. And you’d hope that prestigious scientific journals would have learned not to reward such risky research.
Why haven’t we learned our lesson? Maybe because it’s hard to admit that this research is risky now and to take the requisite steps to keep us safe without also admitting it was always risky. And that perhaps we were misled on purpose.
[…]
It’s not hard to imagine how the attempt to squelch legitimate debate might have started. Some of the loudest proponents of the lab leak theory weren’t just earnestly making inquiries; they were acting in terrible faith, using the debate over pandemic origins to attack legitimate, beneficial science, to inflame public opinion, to get attention. For scientists and public health officials, circling the wagons and vilifying anyone who dared to dissent might have seemed like a reasonable defense strategy.
Note the source of those cited paragraphs. Note the deliberate conflation of “scientists” with “science.” Note the wholly unsubstantiated assertion that “the loudest proponents of the lab leak theory… were acting in terrible faith.” When you attribute malice to your opponent in a dispute over facts, you haven’t defended your moral status; you’ve forfeited it. To cap such a “but” by saying that vilifying your questioners “might have seemed like a reasonable defense strategy” is beyond my ability to parody.
I’ve had little regard for the New York Times for many years. Its sole value is as a leftist weathervane. In the above, the Gray Lady shows its colors for what they are: entirely black.
Moral authority? Please; it’s too early in the morning for a gale of uncontrollable laughter.
The Left’s pose of moral authority is being demolished from end to end. If youngsters who’ve been miseducated by Left-dominated “public” schools can – despite their lack of perspective and sophistication – flummox willing Leftist apologists, the Left is teetering from its ivory tower heights. What will they have left, once their pose of moral superiority is stripped away? Simply asserting without evidence that their critics and opponents are “wrong,” as Michael Ian Black does:
There’s no point in combing through the conservatives’ claims; they were almost all incorrect, as fact-checked by Jubilee during the video. But, contrary to the t-shirts, the MAGA worldview is not informed by facts but by feelings. They feel that Social Security is a disaster despite the fact that, as Sam pointed out, it keeps 2/3 of our senior citizens out of poverty. They feel that gender-affirming care for minors is, as one said, “a huge problem” despite the fact that, as Sam correctly stated, a miniscule number of children actually receive such care.
The reason there’s no point in identifying where they misunderstand—or ignore—facts is because the MAGA worldview is immune to them. No, DEI initiatives cannot be a tax credit for government agencies because government agencies do not pay taxes. Yes, vaccines work. Yes, climate change is real and man-made. But none of that matters because their bias is of the confirmation variety.
Assertion after bald, easily falsified assertion! “Fact-checked,” my ass. But note the supercilious dismissal of the “MAGA worldview:”
Although there were moments when Sam threw his opponents a bone, none of the conservatives conceded a single point back to him—because they’ve internalized the most important lesson for all the aspiring Jordan Petersons and Candace Owens out there: it doesn’t matter if you’re wrong so long as you are confidently wrong. And oh boy are they confident.
The Left’s towers aren’t just teetering; they’re crumbling. Don’t let them posture as your moral superiors.
