1071 : THE PAPER BOY : Part XIX
• Merit is our Strength 4 of 4
One of the things I focused on for my paper boys was scholarships.
I helped the Roper clan with a scholarship for Glade while he was a paper boy. We never had a problem on Glade’s route and I’m proud to say many if not most of those kids grew up young and became very successful.
The responsibility at an early age was the merit badge whether you were in the boy scouts or not. You knew it, you lived it, and you didn’t need to wear a badge.
Remember that reality check in blazing saddles where they made fun of the badges. The punch line was “We don’t need no stinking badges.” I saw Blazing saddles in a sold out Porter Theater in the 1970’s back when it was a single screen before it was split into three.
“We Don’t Need No Stinking Badges”
Paper boy recognition was a great way to celebrate good leadership. We used to put a picture and a profile in the paper for carrier of the month highlighting these young people who delivered the news.
We celebrated with a dinner at the Elks Lodge. It was something to aspire towards and the whole family could enjoy a night out. A private recognition meeting with the exalted ruler was a nice touch because it was earned and unique or special for the whole family.
Paul Kerrigan headed up the local business networking efforts to secure prizes for carrier of the month. Mr. Kelly always encouraged us to support the kids and the paper circulation with a commitment to local community. Downtown Porterville was thriving back then as the center of town. I long for a return to a Downtown center that is thriving and a destination for folks to celebrate our Porterville Identity. We get a glimpse of this when we have parades and events.
• We need to be more focused on Downtown again. This is our original Identity.
The paper was the starting point for conversations. The paper was about local events and local politics that effected local culture and local government. In short the past reporting was about issues and the politics were about who best would address the issues that was left to the people to decide. The media’s role in this process of informing the public over time has disconnected us from the central issues of our fair city and country with terrible political bias.
• Those claiming not to be political are the most political of all. When we lost the common focus on local issues the people became more politicized by modern media that is less objective.
Simultaneously because things are more politicized transparency began to wane as a focus on privacy or safety narratives began to dominate. “Government” is supposed to be transparent so as to maintain trust. When personal privacy is diminished and government privacy increases trust is eroded. I put government in quotes here because a basic premise is inverted when we forget that “We The People” are the Government in a republic.
When Personal Privacy Is Diminished and
Gov't Privacy Increases ~ Trust is Eroded
So when the “government” is not transparent it is protecting people that are likely abusing their power. Conversely and to the same end the people outside of “government” are losing privacy protections making them more vulnerable to abuse of power?
• This is why the media is supposed to be the watchdog for the people, not the “gov't”. It’s getting harder to earn it as we have embraced the woke ethic.
Politics took over from the more objective campfire discussions of the past that were more community oriented and less special interest oriented. With all of the censorship and cancel culture in the modern media “news” has become mostly political and completely biased “info-tainment.” We saw this during the pandemic when the big pharma companies paid for most media through advertising (more than 80%) which is astonishing and frightening at the same time.
• The paper used to be the paper of record and the last word.
The problem today is the printed paper only goes to about 4000+ people now. The electronic version may reach as many as 15,000+ but still with a general population of more than 80,000 this is woefully inadequate both for public record and for public information. We are in the midst of an information revolution. The internet is the new printing press.
• This is not pessimism this is reality. We remain very blessed to have a local independent paper of record. There is a wide variety of news in our paper and plenty of controversy but that is what makes it great. We all have different points of view and clarity over agreement is what freedom is all about. No one person possesses the truth save for God.
The truth can be found in conversations somewhere in between people but it must be sought after. The irony about the term “group think” is that while many embrace it, group think does not really exist unless you are an unthinking person and you just go along with the crowd.
• The woke supremacy relies on agreement without thinking & protects the status quo. Freedom requires thinking and merit and conversations to pursue the truth. Individuals challenging the group think are the antidote to the status quo leading to freedom. Responsibility and merit required.
Yes ~ Merit Is Our Strength
Merit has always been our strength. Responsibility leads to freedom
Merit leads to success. Responsibility is an individual value and accompanies accountability. These basics are centered in Merit. We all get what we deserve in a free society based on merit. Dave Ramsay says it best in his greeting on his radio program. “Better than I deserve” is a great way to stay humble.
• Fomenting socialism claiming we all deserve something is a vice not a virtue. ENVY. That is just marketing of evil in my view.
A government big enough to give you everything is a government with the ability to take everything away. If we all get what we deserve and it’s based on merit we are all in for a rude awakening. This is especially true as we all know the wages of sin are death. We really don’t want what we deserve in reality.
The best way to serve the social good is through merit which is the true American social contract. You shall know them by their fruits.
