Doesn't Matter

Words do not matter. We will write it again, for emphasis: words do not matter. It's very popular in this day and age to believe that saying some kind of special magic words will make you a better human being, will change your life. The current president of the United States believes this.

But it's just not true. Character is revealed through action, not through some ethereal state of being that one attains internally. You can't change yourself; you are who you are. You can only do different things than you used to do.

The internet and its network of blogs, chat rooms, message boards, and the like, is an easy place to forget this. When you're on the internet, you're not really doing much. (This doesn't make it bad to be on the internet, or to be doing not much. Remember the Tao of Steve.) Most of us on the internet are fine with this, but some people begin to confuse hanging out on the internet with actual work.

Well, OK, writing on the internet can be actual work. But it's just producing words for other people to read and think about. Maybe you'll change their mind with your spectacular ideas, but probably not; most human minds are much too complicated to change.

Maybe some day you'll be in a position to yell fire in a crowded theater or broadcast hate-filled propaganda in order to ignite mass slaughter, but we certainly hope not. Words do occasionally incite people to action, but not in any predictable way. And certainly not in any admirable way. Inciting a mob is nothing to be proud of.

We love to read at the Blasphemy Blog, but we believe that the only true value in reading the words of others is that it causes us to think. And sometimes that thought spurs us to action. You may say that you take Jesus Christ as your personal savior. Then, you will think about what that means. Then, you will do something. It might be good; it might not. But the goodness or badness comes from the action itself. The words alone are like a flame in a vacuum.