How to Cauterize Ignorance

Lately, I've been wondering a lot whether ignorance can be cauterized. Ignorance, in its most insidious form, is the willful rejection of knowledge and growth. It is a seething wound, that is festering beneath layers of propaganda, fear, and historical amnesia. And today, in the shadow of a regime that echoes some of the most terrifying chapters of human history, have been asking: Can ignorance be cauterized? Can it be seared shut, burned away like diseased flesh to prevent further infection, or are we already too far gone, consumed by a sickness we refuse to diagnose? Because, the way some people are acting as if any of the nonsense is defensible, I am shuddering as if somebody just dropped ice cubes down my drawers.

The current state of this nation is not the result of a single election, a single figure, or even a single party. It is the product of a slow, deliberate erosion of basic decency. Decades of revisionist history, corporate-controlled media, and an education system gutted of critical thinking have birthed a citizenry that outright denies history. They do not believe fascism could happen here. This is not because they have studied the rise of past dictators and determined that America is immune, but because either they have never truly studied at all, or this is exactly what they want, or they just don’t care. The warning signs have been blinking in red but to acknowledge them would require admitting complicity, acknowledging their own participation in the unraveling of democracy.

So, asking for myself: can ignorance be cauterized? Can we press the burning iron of truth to its malignant flesh and force a healing? The answer is not as simple as we might hope. Because ignorance, once it metastasizes into dogma, does not easily yield to facts. It does not surrender to reasoned argument or historical precedent. Instead, it fights and doubles down. It drapes itself in slogans and flags and scripture torn from their context. It thrives in the echo chambers of social media, where outrage is currency and lies are gospel. 

Whelp! Cauterization is not a delicate process. It is painful, and sometimes even violent. It destroys in order to preserve. And perhaps that is where we find our hope. Let’s talk about it.

Rather than debated away, ignorance can be confronted with unrelenting truth. My Granny used to tell us to 'tell the truth and shame the devil.' So, thus stripped of its comfortable euphemisms and forced to stand naked in its contradictions, ignorance is exposed and prepped for the surgery. The flames of history are already licking at our heels, and if we do not wield them as tools of reckoning, they will consume us entirely. So, to cauterize ignorance, we must be relentless. We must teach, write, march, protest with our spending habits, educate ourselves, and refuse to be gaslit into silence. We must name what is happening—fascism, racism, authoritarianism, white supremacy, oligarchy—and reject the temptation to soften our language for the comfort of those who refuse to see, or who are more interested in protecting their comforts, than in mending their hurtful ways.

The wound is already deep, but the fire is still ours to wield. Perhaps then, the question is not whether ignorance can be cauterized, but whether we have the courage to wield the iron before the infection consumes us all. 

I am part of the 92%

Let those with ears, listen (Matt. 11:15)

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