Richard Carnes: To ban or not to ban is a pointless question

Everybody seems to be jumping on the politically correct BanWagon lately.

But which ones are due to a moral repugnancy for some and which ones are for political controlling of the masses?

We have the travel ban, the transgender ban, the pretend bans on Christmas and Christianity, states wanting to ban gay marriage and gay wedding cakes and cities wanting to ban plastic bags, bottled water and toy guns.

What’s next, the town of Avon considering a ban on council members from talking smack about each other to the Vail Daily?

Sure, I understand not all of these issues are black and white (meaning there is a very clear-cut delineation between right and wrong, although the pun is clearly intended), but what is morally repugnant to one can be perfectly legit to others, so who are we to judge?

I suppose majority still rules in a democracy (Constitutional Republic … whatever, stop screaming and give it a rest), but if the majority were Nazi sympathizers, that wouldn’t make it any less wrong.

I remember a little bit of my childhood schooling, but I don’t recall ever hearing anything negative about Robert E. Lee until a few weeks ago.

Naive?

Perhaps, but I truly do not understand those who claim history will be forgotten if a statue is removed or “relocated” (i.e. stashed in a basement) or those who claim to have learned their history from the existence of statues.

I’m pretty sure there’s no statue of John Wilkes Booth, yet we all know who he was — same for Charles Manson and Colin Kaepernick.

And hey, the White House was built with slave labor, so should we demand Congress tear that sucker down?

Of course not.

Rather than banning certain types of light bulbs, David Duke (former head of the Ku Klux Klan) from praising President Donald Trump or priests from being alone in a room with young boys, the First Amendment provides the right for all three to exist.

Doesn’t make any of them correct, however, just legal according to our Constitution.

Applying for and receiving a permit to peaceful assembly adds zero validity to your purpose for needing said permit, but that is not the reason for the permit in the first place.

Sure, they serve a purpose, but the 9/11 hijackers had plane tickets, the Barcelona van driver had a license and I don’t recall Pearl Harbor having any tributes to Japanese warplanes.

None of this stuff needs to be banned, as it has the same effect as boycotting a company because a meme on Facebook told you what an evil company it is.

Sports teams don’t need to change their mascots or names any more than a flag needs to be banned; folks just need to make sure they can handle the consequences, as the waving and wearing speaks for itself.

Some people think I personally wish for all religion to be banned. Nope, I simply wish for the ancient myths and nonsensical beliefs to speak for themselves and let society as a whole reach logical conclusions (be nice if they were taxed, though).

In other words, there’s very little in this world worthy of actual banning, as we should allow the act, the words, the statue or whatever speak for themselves, and society can respond accordingly.

An exception being if they attempted to tear down the Tom Landry sculpture in Dallas, of course, as such blasphemy should certainly be banned.

Richard Carnes, of Edwards, writes weekly. He can be reached at poor@vail.net.