Knowledge affects behavior.
Hiding the truth is sometimes necessary, as for example, the location of the keys or the combinations to locks to the vaults where the money is kept in a bank or to a home safe where valuables are kept. No sense making things easy for the bad people but as in the case of information that can reveal how wrong some ideas are, hiding the truth is not only wrong, it can be evil.
Suppose you are in a criminal gang. You need to suppress the locations where you meet. Law enforcement needs to keep secrets about efforts designed to catch criminal gang members. In a family certain information is kept secret from children on the theory that it’s either bad for them to learn about some things which can led them in the wrong direction or that it would help them by making it more attractive to do wrong things.
Suppose you are in a group of very smart people. Since most people are smart enough they have little or no problems knowing there are people who are smarter than they are but human nature includes envy which has good and bad effects on an individual. the good effects of envy include fueling ambition to do better. The bad effects are usually stronger and include fueling hatred and in come cases physical responses to harm smarter people.
Suppressing the truth that some people are given advantages needs to be kept from the people who are paying for the advantages pf others because it causes disadvantages to those from whom something is taken. It’s a form of theft but it’s the basis of a government run welfare state. Why would that be accepted by those from whom the advantages are taken?
Suppose it’s possible to easily find out the locations of criminals. If the information is widely known the criminals have the advantage of not being found out. In the case of dumb people finding out they are dumb can have a negative impact so it’s simple compassion to keep their actual intellectual ability from them.
That leads to the idea that intelligence can be measured which it is during early schooling but the information is not only kept from the students, it’s kept from the parents too. Is that a good thing to do? Yes because students are unable to handle information like that. They will use it against other students which will caus un-necessary divisions between students and some students may retaliate against the innocent.
That’s apparent in the current activity to destroy monuments commemorating the Confederate side, the losing side in the Civil War which was the bloodiest war in America and it was fought to eliminate slavery in the Southern states.
DESTROYING HISTORICAL MONUMENTS
Soldiers who fought and died for the South were husbands and sons of mothers and fathers just like the soldiers of the North. Simple compassion would accrue towards the feelings of the relatives and friends of the dead. Confederate soldiers were no less human and no less loved. In addition memorials commemorate more than just fatalities. Very few people like war and any memorial serves as a reminder that war has awful consequences so it’s better to not have wars but wars are still with us. The soldiers aren’t.
That’s apparent in the current activity to destroy monuments commemorating the Confederate side, the losing side in the Civil War which was the bloodiest war in America and it was fought to eliminate slavery in the Southern states.
DESTROYING HISTORICAL MONUMENTS
Soldiers who fought and died for the South were husbands and sons of mothers and fathers just like the soldiers of the North. Simple compassion would accrue towards the feelings of the relatives and friends of the dead. Confederate soldiers were no less human and no less loved. In addition memorials commemorate more than just fatalities. Very few people like war and any memorial serves as a reminder that war has awful consequences so it’s better to not have wars but wars are still with us. The soldiers aren’t.
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