Improving the World by Stimulating Compassion — It is easy to complain about whatever platform(s) we’re using for our online writing. I’d never suggest that our complaints aren’t valid or that we shouldn’t issue them. Instead, I’d like to share something I have come to appreciate about this platform. It wasn’t anything I knew I was looking…

Changing Before Its Too Late — We keep hearing that an indictment of a former president is “unprecedented.” I suppose it is. It also strikes me as something that is less common than it should be. Accountability should be the norm rather than the exception. It should apply to our leaders too. Nobody should be above…

Holding the Other Side to a Higher Standard — We’ve all heard people excuse immoral or unethical behavior in many different ways. One of the more common involves pointing out that the act wasn’t a criminal offense. When someone they like does something wrong, we hear about how “it wasn’t a crime.” Minimizing the act in this way makes…

Overcoming My Hesitancy — Spirituality is a topic I haven’t written much about. This might seem odd because I do have some interest in secular spirituality. I’ve thought of writing about it many times but always seem to pull back. Of all the posts I’ve started and abandoned before finishing, most relate to this…

The Stakes Are Too High to Ignore — In the United States, we hear a lot about the ongoing conflict between Democrats and Republicans. Around election time, we hear about red states and blue states. We hear about the urban-rural divide. We hear about how differences in education account for differences in attitudes. As relevant as these divides…

No Consent Needed — As humans, it seems like we can get used to some pretty strange things. So much of our world races past every day without us noticing. But every now and then, something unexpected jolts us back into consciousness. We find ourselves asking questions. Why do we put up with the…

I’d Rather See It Coming — If someone hated you, wouldn’t you want to know about it? To clarify, I am not asking whether you’d like to listen to them express their hatred of you. I’ll assume you would not enjoy that any more than I would. Instead, I’m asking you to imagine a scenario where…

Undone by Authoritarianism — We are all familiar with the concept of political power. We have seen various leaders wield it, sometimes with dire consequences. But what does real power look like? Is it the power to start a war, to have one’s opponents murdered, to stay in power longer than one should? It…

Maintaining Belief Without Evidence — “Faith,” in a religious context, does not refer to an abstract sense of hope or confidence. It refers to a particular sort of belief, a belief in something not supported by evidence. That’s not to say there can’t be any evidence whatsoever, but there isn’t enough to support the belief. …