Opinions - not always necessary!

 I am constantly amazed when people make a choice to voice opinions - those critical and rude opinions that are totally unnecessary.  And I am quite sure I'm seeing more of it, especially on social media.

Let me explain with some examples.

I'm in a Facebook group where people share recipes and ideas on cooking with an air fryer.  Group members share tips and ask questions.  Pretty safe and innocuous group, right?  Wrong.

One member posted a recipe for roast beef with a photo of the finished product.  She was excited that it turned out so well and that her family loved it.  But right away, other members started blasting her.

"How can you eat such red meat?"

"Didn't you even cook that stuff?"

"Do you want to hear the cow moo when you cut into it?"

"WAY too rare for me!"

And then came the vegans ...

"You don't care that a cow died so you could eat that?

"Cows are such neat animals.  Why are you killing them?"

Heaven help the member who posted a photo and recipe for a dish that included bacon!

"Why aren't you cooking something more healthy?"

"I can't imagine eating little pigs! You should feel bad about that."

"Doesn't this recipe defeat the purpose of an air fryer?"

Now, all of the above opinions were unnecessary and, in my view, rude.  Why do some people feel the need to criticize others for something that doesn't affect them at all?  They don't have to eat the food and certainly don't have to cook it for themselves, yet they chose to bash someone else for daring to make different lifestyle choices! Have these adults not learned to scroll on by?  I actually asked that a couple times and both times were told that they "have the right" to voice their opinions.

Yes, they do.  But maybe we should all learn that our opinions aren't always necessary or helpful or kind. Sometimes it's better to just scroll on by.

There IS a difference!

 Many times, I hear the complaint: "The two parties are just the same! No difference at all!"

I am here to tell you that there IS a difference between Democrats and Republicans and yesterday - January 6, 2021 - is all the evidence I need to prove my case.

In 2016, I voted for Hillary Clinton. And I was extremely disappointed when she lost.  She is a highly capable, very competent leader who had experience at all levels of government.  But she lost the election.  

Maybe people didn't vote for her because she's a woman.  Or maybe because she is President Bill Clinton's wife and they didn't like him.  Or maybe they didn't like her personality.  Or maybe they simply didn't trust her.  And James Comey's FBI email investigation announcement days before the election didn't help, either.  In spite of all that, Clinton WON the popular vote!  She didn't, however, get enough votes in a few key districts that would have given her the 270 electoral college votes needed.  So, she lost.  Trump won.  It's as simple as that.  Trump won, Clinton lost.

Even though U.S. intelligence agencies had warned of Russian hacking, Democrats did NOT claim the 2016 election was "stolen."  

Clinton supporters did NOT file dozens of frivolous lawsuits - with no evidence - aimed at invalidating election results in key battleground states.  Judges at all levels, many appointed by Republican presidents (even a few appointed by Trump) dismissed the cases.  

Democrats did NOT threaten election officials during and after the election, requiring many officials to need extra security.

Clinton supporters did NOT breach our nation's Capitol wielding long guns and waving Clinton signs, flags and banners. 

We did NOT assault the People's House by breaking windows and ransacking some lawmakers' offices. 

Clinton supporters did NOT vandalize media equipment and threaten reporters.

Democrats did NONE of that.  But Republicans did.

Trump doesn't like the fact that he lost the 2020 election.  No one likes to lose.  But until Trump, every presidential election loser did the right thing:  conceded with grace and professionalism.

The whole world has been watching.  What they saw was a bunch of Republican thugs who would prefer a dictatorship to a democratic republic. Thugs who cannot stand to lose an election. Thugs who were led by their idol who hid out in the White House supporting their illegal acts. Thugs who certainly do not understand, let alone comply with, the rule of law.

If you are a Republican and you did not publicly condemn Trump's verbal diarrhea  and his supporters' actions, then YOU are complicit.  You are no better than they are because your silence encourages them to continue.

At least their actions - and your silence - give us some real evidence:

There IS a difference between Democrats and Republicans.  

And history books will have a field day making sure that difference is laid bare for all to see.