Of Kindness, Cruelty, and a Viral Commencement Speech

Do you have to be a Democrat to be considered kind?

Illinois governor J.B. Pritzker’s recent commencement speech has gone viral. References to it kept coming up in different newsfeeds I scroll through each morning, so I decided to have a look.

The speech was at Northwestern University. Pritzker is a Democrat, of course. No one in his right mind thinks a Republican would be invited to speak at such an event, after all, especially these days! (Well, a RINO like Liz Cheney might be, but not many others.)  

Those who wish to view the entire speech can do so here.

What drew my attention were the extrapolations some so-called pundits were doing based on the speech (example: here), that it contained an “idiot detection system.”

The speech draws heavily from a sitcom I’d not heard of (I’m probably showing my own cultural deprivation by saying that, but I’m not much of a TV watcher): The Office.

Let me just quote him. I’ll try and keep interruptions to a minimum. Initially quoting a character named Dwight Schrute (sp.?):  

“‘Whenever I’m about to do something, I think, would an idiot do that, and if they would, I would not do that thing….’

“The entire efficacy of this incredibly useful piece of information hinges upon your ability to pick the right idiot. I wish there was a foolproof way to spot idiots, but counterintuitively, some idiots are very smart. They can dazzle you with words and misdirection. They can get promoted above you at work. They can even be elected president.”

Two quick comments. The first: I doubt the last sentence was aimed at Joe Biden. The second: I think he really means BS artists. Because idiots by definition are not smart. But BS artists are usually quite intelligent. Indeed they abound. We might have disagreements on who they are, however. Continuing:

“If you want to be successful in this world, you have to develop your own idiot detection system. As part of the responsibilities of being your commencement speaker, I’m going to share mine.”

Following is some disarming humor implying that those who prefer Star Wars sequels and prequels to the originals are “idiots.” This elicited low-key audience chuckles. Then this:

“The best way to spot an idiot? Look for the person who is cruel.”

Here’s where things start to get interesting. I found myself with very mixed feelings about what followed:

“When we see someone who doesn’t look like us, or sound like us, or act like us, or love like us, or live like us — the first thought that crosses almost everyone’s brain is rooted in either fear or judgment or both. That’s evolution. We survived as a species by being suspicious of things we aren’t familiar with.”

“In order to be kind, we have to shut down that animal instinct and force our brain to travel a different pathway.

“Empathy and compassion are evolved states of being. They require the mental capacity to step past our most primal urges.

“I’m here to tell you that when someone’s path through this world is marked with acts of cruelty, they have failed the first test of an advanced society. They never forced their animal brain to evolve past its first instinct. They never forged new mental pathways to overcome their own instinctual fears. And so, their thinking and problem-solving will lack the imagination and creativity that the kindest people have in spades.”

This, of course, sounds very good. It is the sort of thing bound to be shared even on the new Twitter and picked up by corporate media in a woke world filled with allegations of “systemic racism” and “transphobia.” Surely you don’t have to be a woke Democrat, your every public conversation sprinkled with such phrases and words, in order to be considered kind! Or do you? In sorting this out, where do we even begin?

In my experience, people like stories. So perhaps a story is our best bet — a recounting of an event I have from a former pastor (I wish I recalled where this happened).  

An associate of his, a pastor at a different church, had sermonized against the cultural acceptance of homosexuality. He’d invoked the familiar passage in Romans (1:24-32), arguing that it says what it says, and that Christians cannot simply be “tolerant” of open homosexual conduct.

The sermon had been recorded, uploaded to the Internet, shared across social media, and caused a stir among the community wokesters.  

One result was a street protest in front of his church the following Sunday. Angry homosexuals and supportive others stood in traffic and blocked people trying to drive into the parking lot. The confrontation had the potential to turn violent.

Then a group appeared from inside the church. Two of their number carried a table to the sidewalk in front of the church. Another bore a large coffeepot, a long cord dangling behind and presumably plugged into an electrical outlet just inside the door. Still others: a can of instant, supplies (packets of sugar and cream, stacks of plastic cups, napkins), trays of small donuts, cakes, etc.  

The leader of the church group quietly directed traffic as they set all this up. Then he gestured to one of the people directing protest traffic in the street, approaching possibly with the sense Daniel must have had, going into the lions’ den. By this time hot water was dripping into the pot.

Everyone in the protesting group was invited to have coffee and donuts or cakes (or both). Gradually and hesitantly — perhaps not believing what their eyes were telling them — a few came over. They hesitantly began obtaining cups, filling them with hot water, and spooning coffee into them. And then sampling the donuts and cakes.

Eventually, halting conversations began, probably with introductions. I don’t know the details, but the two groups began talking. The dangers of confrontation were minimized.  

The outcome? Again, I don’t know, including if anyone in the protesting group converted to Christianity. But can anyone honestly call those Christians cruel?

The homosexuals and pro-homosexual protesters were clearly taken off guard, doubtless because of what they’d been told about Christians by their own leaders. (And yes, there are Christians who would have angrily called the police instead of undertaking something like this. I do not deny that.)

At no time did the Christians endorse homosexual conduct. That wasn’t their purpose. Their purpose was to open a few doors of communication and perhaps provide a testimonial.

Not endorsing a behavior is not the same thing as cruelty, any more than criticism of an idea means the critic hates anyone advocating the idea.

I see such confusions so often, and the cognitive problems — to me, anyway — are so obvious, I cannot help but think they are being fostered on purpose.

I have no idea what causes homosexual tendencies, including whether it is innate in certain individuals, or is chosen behavior — although the fact (for fact it is) that some have converted to Christianity, repudiated homosexual conduct, and sometimes gone on to have happy, fulfilling marriages with children, is telling.

There is academic research on the subject, but any such research is bound to be so contaminated by politics (including just that of grantsmanship) that I see no reason to trust it. There may be slight differences in the brain that cause homosexual impulses. Or perhaps the behavior causes the brain changes.

Can anyone honestly say this issue is going to be decided empirically?

There’s also the claim that homosexuality has been observed in higher animals, suggesting that we’re looking at a poorly-understood natural phenomenon that might emerge under certain conditions. But let’s remember that from the standpoint of a Christian worldview, the world’s fallenness extends to many aspects of the natural order.

What should Christians say about homosexual conduct, then?

Back when I was teaching, I admit I used to ask students if whatever was going on behind closed doors really bothered them, and if so, why?

A Stoic would claim that it isn’t the conduct that is bothering you but your emotional response to it. Your best bet, he’d continue, given that you can’t change the person’s conduct, is just to walk away. Walking away need not be seen as acceptance or endorsement, just an acknowledgement of the difference between what you can do something about and what you can’t.

As I recently told my associate Jack, as a Christian I cannot endorse homosexual conduct even if whatever impulse leading to such conduct has a physiological, systemic cause. Some people seem genetically predisposed to alcoholism, after all — are more susceptible to the effects of alcoholic beverages than others. Noting this is not to “accept” much less “endorse” alcoholism.

But neither, I continued, would I want to see society move in a direction in which homosexuals were hunted down like animals, or thrown from atop tall buildings as they are in some Islamic countries.

That’s what I would call cruel.

Christians, accordingly, do not do such things.

I chose homosexuality because the example seemed close at hand, and without identifying it, Pritzker’s love like us, or live like us surely refers to it indirectly. There are other hot-button culture-war issues I could have chosen: abortion, guns, etc.

Conservatives may well open themselves to criticism by defending the rights of the unborn if they come across as totally uncaring towards the mother who might have to be working two jobs at the same time she has a(nother?) newborn to take care of.

There are larger issues here. This last is partly a phenomenon of neoliberalism, not conservatism. They are far from the same thing. The first is an economic manifestation of the materialist worldview. The latter ought to issue a clear rejection of that worldview. Conservatism calls upon the transcendent and the Eternal (not simply “the past” or “nostalgia”).

What conservative Christians can do, it seems to me, is invoke the idea of persons as having intrinsic value: the value they have by virtue of who and what they are: beings created in the image of the God they worship (Gen. 1:26-27; cf. Jere. 1:5).

How, then, do we treat beings of intrinsic value? Will this give the J.B. Pritzker’s of the world all they can legitimately ask for? I think so.

Jesus was tested. The story should be familiar. John 8 recounts how a woman was brought before Him by the scribes and Pharisees who told him she’d been caught in adultery. They cited Mosaic law as calling for the woman to be stoned.

What did Jesus do?

Unquestionably knowing He was being tested, He bided His time, not saying or doing anything immediately. Jesus never acted impulsively, of course.

After a suitable amount of time had passed, He stood up and said, “He who is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone.”

At first, no one moved. They probably looked at one another, to see if anyone would do anything. Then they started leaving, one by one, leaving Jesus alone with the woman. He asked her where her accusers were? “Has no one condemned you?”

She replied, “No one, Lord.”

“Neither do I condemn you; go and sin no more.”

He let her go. He showed mercy.

According to the Christian worldview, we’re all sinners who need to repent. This is the beginning of the Christian Gospel — the real thing, not the fake “social gospel.”

We all also merit just treatment: Biblical justice, not “social justice” which is a secular materialist concept.

We can also show mercy.

Biblically-based calls for acknowledging wrongdoing (sin, which God cannot countenance) should not be confused with cruelty — we’re all guilty, after all — if delivered in the right way. This includes mercy, and can involve empathizing and trying to get inside someone else’s life, if they will permit it.

Nor should a blanket tolerance of any conduct whatsoever be confused with kindness. In the long run, which is what counts, this isn’t being kind at all, since most of these behaviors are both personally and socially harmful: harmful to oneself and to others.

And if innocent children in particular are being encouraged into actions they will regret undertaking for the rest of their lives (e.g., “transitioning”), then what passes for kindness in the woke world becomes, in fact, one of the worst imaginable forms of cruelty. Even the sexuality educators of yesteryear took age-appropriateness seriously!

Summation: when cruelty and kindness are filtered through the ideological world of woke, you get these inverted results. Democrats, of course, either encourage the inversions or fail to understand why conservative Christians think, speak, and act as they do. It is extremely unfortunate that so many university students — and graduates readying themselves to enter the workplace — will be fooled.

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