Wisdom from NY Times David Brooks unpacked by Gaffney Facebook community

  A Few days ago fellow Furman Alum James Hawkins of Gaffney posted some concerns about America's divide with reference to a July 1 column by David Brooks. Brooks wrote about shared knowledge, a common consensus refined over time without which there isnt much national cohesion. As George Wallace said to LBJ in the movie Selma, my people in Alabama have their customs and they "adhere".

    Brooks was groping for a better virtue of the sentiment than Wallace. Here is a couple paragraphs that get to the guts of his assertion

       Today many of us feel that America is suffering an epistemic crisis. We don’t see the same reality. People say that they often assume the problem is intellectual. Our system of producing propositional knowledge is breaking down. Why can’t those people fact-check themselves?

But Donald Trump doesn’t get away with lies because his followers flunked Epistemology 101. He gets away with his lies because he tells stories of dispossession that feel true to many of them. Some students at elite schools aren’t censorious and intolerant because they lack analytic skills. They feel entrapped by a moral order that feels unsafe and unjust.

The collapse of trust, the rise of animosity — these are emotional, not intellectual problems. The real problem is in our system of producing shared stories. If a country can’t tell narratives in which everybody finds an honorable place, then righteous rage will drive people toward tribal narratives that tear it apart.

Part of the blame goes to conservatives who try to whitewash history. Part goes to progressives who tell such a negative version of history that it destroys patriotism. But the core problem is our failure to understand what education is.

About the same time , last weekend to be exact, I found myself in an inflamed discussion among Baptist progressives when I took exception to a young woman who was not showing enough respect for good Baptists, mostly men, who in their time leaned in the right direction so she could be of influence today. She had a point that maybe I shoulda read what she said a second time before I expressed my concerns, but another person had joined the conversation and I took Madison to be a female name when in fact it was a male. I called that person "sweetie" and it was on. How dare anybody second a woman of color under thirty just because it appeared they didn't know the legacy of Stewart A Newman after three years of seminary education underwritten by Baptist progressives after the Fundamentalists walked away with most of the seminary property in the 80s.

So where do sensible people gain enough numbers to show Ralph Norman the door, without alienating the folks to whom he is making polarizing appeal with his foolishness about Critical Race Theory. And Nikki Haley with Project 1619 who ought to be embarassed for what her GOP friends in NC just did to the woman who just this morning told CBS UNC can have their school of Journalism, she is going to Howard.

Great job Nikki and Ralph. BTW did either of you see Neutral Ground last night, the POV Doc on PBS. I am hoping Northwestern and Rock Hill HS and Gaffney High, devote a week this coming academic year to watch that Doc and The Blinding of Isaac Woodard and then they will know what fools their Congressman and Former Gov have made of themselves. Also waiting to see if Clemson and Carolina Trustees can conduct themselves more honorably than UNC in regards their recent treatment of a Pulitzer Prize Winner.

Our little sewing Facebook circle in Gaffney is in the minority for sure, but I am proud of the Remnant I have come to know in the last couple years, Jeff Paschal the Limestone Proff son now a Presbyterian minister, Barty Sides who was the PCUSA ministers son and still remembers good BBQ loves Clemson and political virtue, Hawkins, Diane Masters whose mother was long time elementary principal in Blacksburg, My friend of Dogwood Drive Mike Hammett, Jerry Shinn former writer for the Charlotte Observer, John Grooms former editor of Creative Loafing in Charlotte.

We see the Light and a few others chime in on occasion.

Last week Hawkins and I counted 37 something Gaffney High Grads who went to Furman from 1960 to 1978. There were ten in the Beta Club 1969 picture alone that were at Furman for at least a year.

I have to feel like J Paul Beam a 1920s Furman grad and School supe for Cherokee county in the 60s is proud of us all.