{"id":56499,"date":"2024-01-28T00:02:02","date_gmt":"2024-01-28T00:02:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=56499"},"modified":"2024-01-28T00:02:02","modified_gmt":"2024-01-28T00:02:02","slug":"heeding-the-critics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=56499","title":{"rendered":"Heeding the critics"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n<p>Taking heed of what passes for constructive criticism is a good thing, so I am going to listen to what some of my critics have said about the stern language I have been using to describe the ardent followers of the 45th POTUS.<\/p>\n<p>They don&#8217;t like the <em>m-word<\/em> I have used to describe the MAGA adherents. It&#8217;s an alliterative term and I thought it sounded cool when I first used it.<\/p>\n<p>Then I got a scolding from a longtime friend of mine in Amarillo, a fellow journalist &#8212; and a fellow I got to know after I left the newspaper in Amarillo more than a decade ago. He was disappointed that I would stoop to using such language to describe those with whom I disagreed politically. I don&#8217;t believe he is an adherent to the idiocy preached by the immediate past president, but his disappointment in me hit me where it hurts.<\/p>\n<p>Then a family member chimed in later. Saying essentially the same thing. He thought it was &#8220;beneath&#8221; me to use such language. He took direct offense to my use of the descriptive word and said I also was denigrating another member of his immediate family who, I presume, also is part of the MAGA movement.<\/p>\n<p>Others have chimed in, too.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;m a grownup. I also am a decent human being &#8230; at least that&#8217;s what my friends and family members tell me.<\/p>\n<p>I also am cognizant that not every follower of the former POTUS qualifies for the moronic description I ascribed to them. They&#8217;re smart and educated, but &#8212; shall we say &#8212; misguided.<\/p>\n<p>Understand, too, that none of this lessens the visceral loathing I have for the MAGA Daddy. I&#8217;m just going to go a bit easier on those who follow his idiotic pronouncements.<\/p>\n<p>So &#8230; there. Even bloggers can keep &#8212; <em>more or less<\/em> &#8212; an open mind.<\/p>\n\n<div class=\"twitter-share\"><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?via=jkanelis\" class=\"twitter-share-button\">Tweet<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Taking heed of what passes for constructive criticism is a good thing, so I am going to listen to what some of my critics have said about the stern language I have been using to describe the ardent followers of the 45th POTUS. They don&#8217;t like the m-word I have used to describe the MAGA &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/?p=56499\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Heeding the critics<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,10,13],"tags":[1941,7419],"class_list":["post-56499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-local-news","category-media-news","category-national-news","tag-gop","tag-maga"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56499","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=56499"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56499\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56502,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56499\/revisions\/56502"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=56499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=56499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/highplainsblogger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=56499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}