What I Don't Understand

Actually, there are many things I don't understand. Thing such as astrophysics - I understand that there are planets, and that they are large, and that they move. But beyond that it's all a bit complex.

I don't understand international economics, nor indeed how the price of oil can rise so very fast when the West buys most of it. Just refuse to pay that much - what's going to happen? It's a sort of fixed system, isn't it?

But my lack of understanding does not manifest itself in the belief that whatever I do not understand is easy to do, nor the idea that my lack of understanding shows that people are just too stupid because they do actually understand - or admit they don't understand, and yet say that there is something to understand.

Alright, that's complex - I don't expect you to understand that (I'm not sure I understand it myself). But, let me break it down - there appears to be a class of persons who fail to understand how something might work (let's say; government). They don't get it, they don't grasp (as another example) the electoral college. However, instead of saying, "Well, I don't get it - but it must make some kind of logical sense!" they seem to deny all sense of reason and scream "CONSPIRACY!"

Thus, when faced with the fact that the President might not be the person who actually won the popular vote, they don't admit that there are reasons for this which lie beyond their comprehension - but rather state that the reasons are well within their comprehension, are ludicrously simple, and that anyone offering a more complex solution is clearly dumb as a post, and gullible.

Example one; the Moon landings. This over-application of Occam's Razor states that "they are hoaxes!" Why? Because photographs taken on the Moon don't look like we think they should - light reflects oddly, or the stars aren't visible. The idiot who doesn't understand space (which is, let's be fair, most of us - I understand space as The Stuff Which Stays The Hell Away From Us Because It Is Scared That Sarah Palin Will Beat It Up (Which Is Why There Is So Much Of It) - space is complex) says "Well, I know that is not what it would look like on Earth! I can see the stars, why can't I see them there?"

The logical and truthful answer is .... actually, I don't really know. I don't understand why you can't see the stars in those moon landing photographs. But I don't claim my ignorance as some sort of badge of ability to see through flim-flam. I understand that there are things that exist beyond my understanding.

(A paraphrase of Socrates, there.)

Anyway, this is a sidebar. Or a tangent. My main point is not to discuss the act of not understanding, but a particular thing I don't understand.

Recently, I asked our PR company (this is the corporate "our", not the matrimonial "our") what the feedback was regarding our new news program - was it too biased? Or, rather, was the fact it was slightly to the right of Fox an issue? The answer I got back was instructive - and educational, from a woman who understands stuff.

"Well, it's a issue with the people who don't like that viewpoint, I guess. But most people understand than you condemn Sen. Obama for his pro-choice views because you are Catholic and Catholics condemn abortion."

The woman who wrote this is not, as far as I know, Catholic. She was also the woman who came up with this wonderful summation of lapsed / fallen-away / cultural Catholics;

Catholics who hold non-Catholic views

Awesome! That is, frankly, the best description EVER! This woman gets it - she understands perfectly what this is about. There are positions held by the Catholic Church on a wide variety of issues and that Catholics have to subscribe to those positions in order to be Catholic. If you don't, then you aren't really Catholic.

She gets this - others ... don't seem to. And that is what I don't understand?

How can someone who claims to be Catholic honestly support Sen. Obama for President - especially when said claiming-Catholic says that "abortion should be illegal"? Sen. Obama has said that his first act will be to make abortion even more legal. And yet, I encounter these people every single day.

How can someone who claims to be Catholic and who quotes from the catechism to me (proving that he has read it) deny the centrality of the Eucharist, instead choosing to elevate the decalogue and advance an almost sola scriptura point of view? How does this work?

It is this that I do not understand - I understand perfectly that there are those who do not follow a particular viewpoint, and I do not expect them to agree. But what of those whose very positions are logically inconsistent with their professed opinions and views?

Someone who says that abortion should be illegal should not, in a rational and sensible universe, be voting or supporting or even thinking of doing so for Sen. Obama. It defies rational sense to do so.

And yet people do.

I think I will have to do what I despise in others - seek a simpler solution. These people are either hypocritical liars, or very stupid, or both.

In fact, I think my simple solution is just fine. People are simply trying to have their cake and eat it.

I think I understand this now.