Always remember: The status quo is worth dying for

benfell

See corrections and updates through December 13, 2021, at end of post.

As it happens, I was already awake, because I usually wake up at some gawd-awful hour of the morning, and I was seated at my computer, trying to catch up on the latest, when the blinds on my front room window lit up with a flash. A few seconds later, a loud thunderclap.

I assume this was the same supercell, or at least its remnants, that spawned at least one—whether it was one or several is not yet clear—exceptionally strong tornado along an exceptionally long and long-lasting track stretching from Arkansas to Ohio that has likely killed at least 100 people.[1]

Somebody tweeted, inviting people to block them saying that they should do so if they blame Southerners for this tragedy. It’s pretty obvious why: Southern white resentment, which can now be found across a far wider geographic area than the old South, is indeed a focal point for much of the denial that contributes to so many of our problems.


The simple fact is that Abraham Lincoln made a terrible mistake in fighting the Civil War, not to end slavery, but rather to preserve the Union.[2] Had sanity prevailed, it would have been apparent that this war, like any war, substitutes lethal force for persuasion. In the end, we must concede that it in fact settled nothing: Slave holders call themselves employers now but remain existentially appalled by even the softest whisper that they should pay anybody for anything,[3] let alone that people should actually earn a living wage,[4] while the divisions of that terrible War poison our politics and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future.[5]

As I returned to bed, I noticed a green light blinking on my printer. I’m guessing my Internet service had gone down. Perhaps the wind had taken down a line. It was back to its usual self when I finally got up for real.

And now here I am, the following morning, catching up on all of this. Somebody—no, it was not Albert Einstein—defined insanity as “doing the same thing over and over, and expecting different results,”[6] but I think in the case of our society, we should perhaps define it as a malice that pretends compassion.

If we gave a damn, we’d make some changes. We don’t. Because, just as for Abraham Lincoln, the status quo is worth dying for.

Update/Correction, December 12, 2021: When I originally published this blog post, I described the storm[7] based on the information I had at the time.[8] This appears not to have been entirely accurate[9] and I have revised the text accordingly. Also the estimated death toll has risen from at least 60, at the time I read the story, to at least 70,[10] to at least 100[11] and as long as I was revising the text to reflect the more accurate information, I went ahead and revised it for this as well.

The two stories, both appearing in the Washington Post, remain discrepant,[12] with the first story describing the event this way:

More than 30 separate tornadoes moved with devastating power and speed through an area stretching from Mississippi in the south to Illinois in the north. As they swept through the region over several hours, the twisters killed dozens, including workers in a candle factory in a flattened Kentucky town, lakeside vacationers in Tennessee and a nursing home resident in Arkansas.[13]

In the more recent story, Jason Samenow, the Post’s weather editor, whom I treat as more authoritative, begins his description this way:

First, there is little precedent for the path length of the quad-state tornadic storm, which carved a 250-mile course through northeast Arkansas, southeast Missouri, northwest Tennessee and western Kentucky. The storm exhibited evidence of rotation even longer, for about 11 hours and 600 miles, according to Jack Sillin, a meteorology student at Cornell University:

The storm was also exceptional for its intensity, given this is December, and the height to which debris was lifted and the length of time it was kept aloft.[14]

Samenow stops just short of attributing the intensity of this storm to climate change.[15] This is to be expected: Yes, it’s possible all the conditions Samenow describes might have happened without global warming, but Samenow does note that such events become more probable with it.[16] This is the problem with counterfactuals: We’ll never know for sure if the storm would have occurred in the absence of elevated levels of heat-trapping gases because that counterfactual is simply not available to us. It’s just that the crisis made the storm more likely.

Update, December 13, 2021: It appears many missing people presumed dead at a Kentucky candle factory have now been found safe:

Initially as many as 70 people were feared dead in the Mayfield Consumer Products candle factory, but the company said Sunday that eight deaths were confirmed and eight people remained missing, while more than 90 others had been located. Bob Ferguson, a spokesman for the company, said many employees gathered in a tornado shelter, then left the site and were hard to reach because phone service was out.[17]

It was hoped the death toll in Kentucky “might be as low as 50,”[18] but 74 are now confirmed dead in Kentucky with a storm total confirmed total of 88.[19] I am still waiting for other uncertainties noted in the previous update,[20] including whether this was one tornado or several, to be ironed out. What is already known is that this was an exceptional event in many ways. Whether it was exceptional in even more ways remains to be seen.[21]

  1. [1]Austyn Gaffney, Abigail Hauslohner, and Scott Wilson, “Deadly tornadoes leave path of destruction across six states: ‘It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen,’” Washington Post, December 11, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/deadly-tornadoes-leave-path-of-destruction-across-six-states-its-unlike-anything-ive-ever-seen/2021/12/11/6a143b2c-5acc-11ec-b0c0-fe531874605a_story.html; Jason Samenow, “December tornadoes aren’t rare, but Friday’s outbreak was something totally different,” Washington Post, December 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/12/december-tornadoes-quad-state-outbreak/↩
  2. [2]Abraham Lincoln to Horace Greeley, “A Letter from President Lincoln.; Reply to Horace Greeley. Slavery and the Union The Restoration of the Union the Paramount Object,” New York Times, August 24, 1862, http://www.nytimes.com/1862/08/24/news/letter-president-lincoln-reply-horace-greeley-slavery-union-restoration-union.html↩
  3. [3]David Benfell, “About that alleged ‘labor shortage,’” Not Housebroken, October 16, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/05/09/about-that-alleged-labor-shortage/; Eric Levitz, “5 Explanations for April’s Bad Jobs Report,” New York, May 7, 2021, https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2021/05/jobs-report-explained-ui-childcare-seasonal-adjustment.html; Heather Long, “It’s not a ‘labor shortage.’ It’s a great reassessment of work in America,” Washington Post, May 7, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/05/07/jobs-report-labor-shortage-analysis/; Jon Schwarz, “The Business Class Has Been Fearmongering About Worker Shortages for Centuries,” Intercept, May 7, 2021, https://theintercept.com/2021/05/07/worker-shortage-slavery-capitalism/↩
  4. [4]David Benfell, “The right to survive,” Not Housebroken, October 17, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/10/17/the-right-to-survive/↩
  5. [5]David Benfell, “Just another skirmish in the Civil War,” Not Housebroken, July 26, 2011, https://disunitedstates.org/2011/07/26/just-another-skirmish-in-the-civil-war/↩
  6. [6]Quote Investigator, “Insanity Is Doing the Same Thing Over and Over Again and Expecting Different Results,” July 31, 2019, https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/03/23/same/#:~:text=The%20definition%20of%20insanity%20is,the%20acclaimed%20genius%20Albert%20Einstein.↩
  7. [7]David Benfell, “Always remember: The status quo is worth dying for,” Not Housebroken, December 12, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/12/12/always-remember-the-status-quo-is-worth-dying-for/↩
  8. [8]Austyn Gaffney, Abigail Hauslohner, and Scott Wilson, “Deadly tornadoes leave path of destruction across six states: ‘It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen,’” Washington Post, December 11, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/deadly-tornadoes-leave-path-of-destruction-across-six-states-its-unlike-anything-ive-ever-seen/2021/12/11/6a143b2c-5acc-11ec-b0c0-fe531874605a_story.html↩
  9. [9]Jason Samenow, “December tornadoes aren’t rare, but Friday’s outbreak was something totally different,” Washington Post, December 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/12/december-tornadoes-quad-state-outbreak/↩
  10. [10]Austyn Gaffney, Abigail Hauslohner, and Scott Wilson, “Deadly tornadoes leave path of destruction across six states: ‘It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen,’” Washington Post, December 11, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/deadly-tornadoes-leave-path-of-destruction-across-six-states-its-unlike-anything-ive-ever-seen/2021/12/11/6a143b2c-5acc-11ec-b0c0-fe531874605a_story.html↩
  11. [11]Jason Samenow, “December tornadoes aren’t rare, but Friday’s outbreak was something totally different,” Washington Post, December 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/12/december-tornadoes-quad-state-outbreak/↩
  12. [12]Austyn Gaffney, Abigail Hauslohner, and Scott Wilson, “Deadly tornadoes leave path of destruction across six states: ‘It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen,’” Washington Post, December 11, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/deadly-tornadoes-leave-path-of-destruction-across-six-states-its-unlike-anything-ive-ever-seen/2021/12/11/6a143b2c-5acc-11ec-b0c0-fe531874605a_story.html; Jason Samenow, “December tornadoes aren’t rare, but Friday’s outbreak was something totally different,” Washington Post, December 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/12/december-tornadoes-quad-state-outbreak/↩
  13. [13]Austyn Gaffney, Abigail Hauslohner, and Scott Wilson, “Deadly tornadoes leave path of destruction across six states: ‘It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen,’” Washington Post, December 11, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/deadly-tornadoes-leave-path-of-destruction-across-six-states-its-unlike-anything-ive-ever-seen/2021/12/11/6a143b2c-5acc-11ec-b0c0-fe531874605a_story.html↩
  14. [14]Jason Samenow, “December tornadoes aren’t rare, but Friday’s outbreak was something totally different,” Washington Post, December 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/12/december-tornadoes-quad-state-outbreak/↩
  15. [15]Jason Samenow, “December tornadoes aren’t rare, but Friday’s outbreak was something totally different,” Washington Post, December 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/12/december-tornadoes-quad-state-outbreak/↩
  16. [16]Jason Samenow, “December tornadoes aren’t rare, but Friday’s outbreak was something totally different,” Washington Post, December 12, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2021/12/12/december-tornadoes-quad-state-outbreak/↩
  17. [17]Bruce Schreiner and Claire Galofaro, “Thousands without heat, water after tornadoes kill dozens,” Associated Press, December 13, 2021, https://apnews.com/article/tornadoes-business-arkansas-kentucky-mayfield-b6ef6a901cc2e4552e760a36c749937c↩
  18. [18]Bruce Schreiner and Dylan Lovan, “Tornado toll in dozens, yet not as high as initially feared,” Associated Press, December 13, 2021, copy in possession of author↩
  19. [19]Valerie Bauerlein, “Tornado Death Toll Rises to 88, Including 74 Dead in Kentucky,” Wall Street Journal, December 13, 2021, https://www.wsj.com/articles/kentucky-puts-current-death-toll-from-tornadoes-at-64-11639410110; Bruce Schreiner and Claire Galofaro, “Thousands without heat, water after tornadoes kill dozens,” Associated Press, December 13, 2021, https://apnews.com/article/tornadoes-business-arkansas-kentucky-mayfield-b6ef6a901cc2e4552e760a36c749937c; Washington Post, “The record-breaking tornadoes that swept the United States, by the numbers,” December 13, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/12/13/tornado-mayfield-kentucky-amazon/↩
  20. [20]David Benfell, “Always remember: The status quo is worth dying for,” Not Housebroken, December 12, 2021, https://disunitedstates.org/2021/12/12/always-remember-the-status-quo-is-worth-dying-for/↩
  21. [21]Washington Post, “The record-breaking tornadoes that swept the United States, by the numbers,” December 13, 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2021/12/13/tornado-mayfield-kentucky-amazon/↩

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