Please don’t tell me ….

Please don’t tell me that my wife and I shouldn’t try to have children, because we’re jointly infertile. Please don’t tell me that my wife and I should not be married, because we’re infertile and cannot have children without medical assistance. Please don’t tell me that medically assisted reproduction is an abomination. Please don’t tell me that it’s ok for a man to cheat on his wife, divorce her, marry the second woman, cheat on her, divorce her and marry the third. Please don’t tell me that the afore-mentioned cheating man’s marriages uphold the sanctity of marriage, but two men or two women who wish to marry each other will destroy everybody’s marriage. Please don’t tell me that Britney Spears’ or Kim Kardashian’s marriages uphold the sanctity of marriage, but two men or two women who wish to marry each other will destroy everybody’s marriage.

Please don’t tell me that “it’s God’s plan” for my aunt to die of leukaemia, for my wife to get a brain tumour, or for my mother to get breast cancer.

Please don’t tell me that it’s ok for people in positions of power to abuse the trust placed in them by parents and abuse children. Please don’t tell me that it’s ok for those powerful people to then tell the rest of society who may or may not be married, or to actively prevent investigation into and judging of their crimes.

Please don’t tell me that “national security” excuses human rights abuses.

Please don’t tell me that some people do not deserve a trial in open court with competent representation, with charges that are invented to keep those people locked up, and with evidence which the accused is not allowed to see.

Please do not tell me that “people like that” aren’t or shouldn’t be allowed to seek asylum. For that matter, please do not talk to me about “illegals” or “illegal asylum seekers.”

If you do try to tell me these things, you have lost whatever argument was going on.

Here are some of the principles I try to live by:

  • Justice must be seen to be done, quickly, competently and fairly.

  • Do not discriminate.

  • Treat others as you yourself wish to be treated.

  • Respect my right to not believe what you believe, and I’ll respect yours.

  • Facts and the truth are appropriate. Do not try to promote opinion as fact. Do not present discredited research as “fact.”

  • The plural of “anecdote” is not “data”