Bigot: ( A soldier, Vietnam veteran, comes into the bar and speaks to the bartender, also a Vietnam veteran. ) Hey, you know those gooks in Vietnam? We should have nooked them 'til they glowed. It's not like killing humans. Did you see how they lived, sheetmetal tents and so forth? Killing Asians is almost like killing fish.
Bartender: How about Japanese people?
Bigot: Them too. They bombed PerilHarbor and smiled at us all the while with their slanted eyes and buck teeth. We did nuke them a little. Should have wiped them off the planet. The Chinks too.
Bartender: Don't you think your views are a little extreme?
Bigot: Ah, what are you, unamerican or something? Why would you have sympathy for those yellow skinned meatballs?
Bartender: Didn't you take an oath to defend the principles for which your country stands?
Bigot: Yes, that's what I'm talking about. Defend Americans, not Buddha heads.
Bartender: Isn't one of those principles "that all men are equal"?
Bigot: All Americans are equal.
Bartender: Did it say all Americans or all men?
Bigot: I don't know why you bring that up anyhow. It's just a bunch of nice sounding words that don't mean anything today. There are no absolutes. You know that.
Bartender: There are no absolutes? You mean everything is relative?
Bigot: Exactly! That's why I have a right to my opinion. If you think all men are equal, well that's just no more right or wrong, valid or concrete, than my opinion that Asian people are inferior. I'd like to see you prove otherwise.
Bartender: Well, should we use a standard of logic, that opinions cannot be both right and wrong at the same time?
Bigot: Sure! Why not?
Bartender: Okay, so if your opinion is no more right or wrong than mine, and my opinion is that your opinion is wrong; then isn't there the possibility that an opinion and it's negation are both right at the same time?
Bigot: Well, I don't know what you are talking about.
Bartender: If my opinion is just as right as yours is, and my opinion is the opposite of yours; then your opinion is both right and wrong at the same time.
Bigot: I think you've been drinking too much of the stuff you've been serving. Listen, everybody knows that there is no objective right or wrong. Morality is a human construct. It evolves just as humans evolve and societies change. That which was once right is now wrong, and it's all up to society.
Bartender: Who is society without individual people?
Bigot: That's what I mean. People decide what is right or wrong.
Bartender: If we had five people in this room and four of them were Asians who hated white Americans like you, would it be wrong for you to be a white American?
Bigot: No,no, no. You just don't get it. Hypotheticals don't prove anything. Anyhow, I gott'a go now. This conversation is getting boring.
bis bald,
Nick
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