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I’ve heard a few rumbles lately about my take on the recent centerline rumble strips now adding a new form of local color along my part of the north shore. Also noted was some reaction to my remarks on a river clean-up project that wiped out a small bit of local history. I’ll tell you this. Whether a person likes or dislikes what’s written doesn’t matter in the long run because neither communication nor progress runs well on the fuel of popularity or of acclaim without a larger social good held steady on the compass. A writer can do his-her work to make a reader happy but he-she may other times have to follow the tack of what needs to be said, which is not always about fluffy kittens and feel-good endings. Many prefer a sugary style, but followed in our mental lives that approach will get you where an addiction to sweets with get you; a mouth full of cavities and a seat in the dentist chair if you’re lucky. Frankly (in my view) being habitually too nice too often is one of a civil democracy’s larger dangers. Being nice is not always good for us.

The live heart of a healthy democracy is the freedom to speak one’s mind. Having respect or being respectful doesn’t require kowtowing or submission. If I want to be nice I can say, “With respect, your policy is wrong,” or I can shortcut and get to the chase with “What misguided soul (long-form for idiot) came up with this awful idea?” The freedom to disagree vigorously is a thing people in places of authority don’t like because it causes them trouble. That’s tough, but not important enough that I need give it priority. Indeed, trampling a feeling or ten might be the best and only way to assert one’s message. In a civil democracy we have the option of respecting the office of an elected official while hewing away at that officer’s wrong moves for all we are worth. A fine example comes to mind.

I can respect the current US President’s role and still ask in boldface opposition WHAT ON EARTH WERE YOU THINKING when his glib mouth said “The future shall not belong to those who insult the Prophet of Islam.” Was he too dense or brainwashed to see that statement as utterly and detestably un-American and anti-democratic? There’s a time and place to apply insult where it is needed. Times a polite “wake up” won’t serve so well as “GET UP IDIOT.” Those asleep or ignorant don’t want to be roused. They’re fine with their sloth and have to be kick started the same way you get a teenage boy off a couch; by setting it afire if need be. In a civil democracy pretty much all that enters the public sphere is fair game for criticism and mockery. No one and nothing is immune and for good reason. A western philosopher put it this way. “If you want to know who rules or wishes to rule over you ask only who it is you cannot criticize.” A lively and constructive political and civil life requires the freedom to be critical. Civil order and government doesn’t run well on sacred cows of any order. I’ll respect what I feel deserves to be respected, and not simply because I’m told I must, which would mean killing American Democracy. If I want that I’ll move to a theocracy where pastors or mullahs make laws and see them enforced. (Even the nicest sweetest form of Inquisition would still be Tyranny.)

A good many of us, myself included, are often too tired for windmill tilting, which is what taking officials to task often amounts to. But, it must be done. If an elected President doesn’t see his multi-culture nation doesn’t require citizens to stay silent at things and ideas they do not believe then someone (that could be us) has to say it for him and do so long and loud enough that the message be heard. Elected officials need reminding. Mr. President, respecting prophets belongs in an Islamic Council and not in an American Democracy.

Being critical (including insultingly so) is not a negative act despite its outward appearance so. Saying center-line rumble strips are a questionable half-measure of dubious value does not mean I am opposed to highway safety. What I do know is we will always have limited funds for any public project and to me ripping up pavement in rural areas to create noisy, unneeded warnings is prime to be viewed as waste. Do something useful and needed. This might require us citizens to tell legislators to give departments more flex in how they manage overall budgets to avoid surplus in some accounts and shortage in others. Complaint coming from us the public should tie into constructive engagement with the process. Griping without a willingness to help fix issues is not constructive.

Likewise, I can and will question a river project based on my views and my doing so not mean I am against clean water. But honestly, when I see miles of turbid water along the shore in one area and relatively little in another I rightly question why what appears a lesser problem area got attention. I might also rightly wonder at the ultimate value of “clear” water if water with more colloidal suspension wasn’t a good thing for binding heavy metals and entombing them in bottom sediments. We have mercury and heavy metal polluting Lake Superior fish. We know this. That side of the picture needs to be considered as should cultural or heritage resources when projects are done. We tend to leave things to the trained professionals, but it was exactly some of those who toured a site in Newfoundland where they walked over piles of clay tile debris from Portuguese whaling in the New World early or earlier than Columbus (coming up next Monday). The professionals were looking for something else and walked over the site without seeing.