Moral Authority
Hebrews 13:8

Tweet, Tweet!
Seems like everyone has a Twitter, Facebook or some kind of social media account, well everyone except me. Thus far, I have avoided social media platforms, unless of course, you count the occasional religious article like this. But, I do read and listen to a lot of news, much of it digital. So even though I have no social media accounts, I still have exposure to everyone else’s social media rants via the news. I liken social media to the 1970s phenomenon of “Streaking”. Sooner or later you are going to get flashed! “Look out Ethel” If you don’t get the reference look up Ray Stevens song, “The Streak”.

Recently, I was listening to a local sports talk show, in which the hosts were discussing a few sports stars’ old tweets of a racist nature. These tweets were made by some current baseball stars when they were teenagers. The consensus seemed to be to forgive them, because of their youth and inexperience, as they had apologized and matured over time. Plus, all are pretty good Major League baseball players and baseball is America’s pastime after all!

Then, there is Roseanne Barr and her racial tweet a while back. Well, I’m sure everyone knows that story so I won’t go into all the details, except to say that most of the pundits turned against her and the social media lemmings followed suit.

Just in case by some outside chance you don’t know what a lemming is, they are a small arctic rodent made famous by a large media company for committing mass suicide. I’ll let you in on part of a little secret. That large media company, which originally made the little lemming famous for mass suicide in a 1958 nature documentary called “White Wilderness”, is Walt Disney. Additionally, the first trillion-dollar company as of yesterday and now a media GIANT, Apple, heightened the small rodent’s fame even more in a 1985 Super Bowl commercial in which everyone not buying the Apple Computer was depicted as a mindless lemming bent on suicide. The word lemming today has become a popular metaphor for someone who blindly follows the crowd to destruction. Two separate racial tweets, similar circumstances one is forgiven, the other is not.

I said all of the above to get to the following related questions:

(1) What is the basis for your moral authority?
(2) Do you have principles that guide your everyday decisions?

Merriam Webster Dictionary defines principle as; 1 a: a comprehensive and fundamental law, doctrine or assumption, b (1): a rule or code of conduct (2): habitual devotion to right principles

Merriam Webster Dictionary defines social as 1: involving allies or confederates 2 a: marked by or passed in pleasant companionship with friends or associates

The problem with social media making all these moral judgments is that the conclusions reached are nearly always subjective. Restated, social media conclusions are often based on who your companions are and what your friends think. Moral authority is void of reason when it is given to a social contentiousness that is carried about by the wind of change. Moral authority should be based on a code of conduct which is comprehensive, one which is never changed by public opinion or half-truths. Earlier we mentioned a little-known secret about how the lemming was made famous and became a culturally popular metaphor for blindly following the crowd to destruction. I’m going to let most of you in on an even bigger and lesser known secret about the lemmings and suicide. Ready? IT IS NOT TRUE! That’s right! The lemming suicide story is what today is known as an urban myth. Urban Myth is a fancy and destigmatized (politically correct) way of saying it is a Big Fat Lie! Research it yourself, the entire lemming suicide story is a perfect example of what is now becoming known as “Fake News”. Back in the 1950s, when Disney was trying to film the nature documentary they could not find any lemmings lining up to jump off cliffs. So, they bought some lemmings from local children and staged the whole scene in the documentary.

What is the basis for your moral authority? The only true basis for “Moral Authority” can be found in Hebrews 13:8.

Send comments to archie.wilson@historicunioncounty.com