Silence is Violence

Silence is violence, which is why I’m always packing. 

I carry an airhorn in a holster under my jacket at all times. 

I hope I never have to use it, but you never know. Like what if I’m at a party and everyone awkwardly stops talking at the same time? It’s frightening times, knowing that seemingly nowhere is safe from silence anymore. 

There are also various noise making devices hidden throughout my house. I sleep with a whistle under my pillow in case someone breaks in in the middle of the night and tries to unplug my white noise machine. In a locked safe I keep various instruments including a 1978 brass plated Yamaha trombone with spit valve and interchangeable mouthpieces. You might think that’s overkill, but you can never be too safe.

Don’t be naïve. You may not want to hear this, but there’s even people carrying noisy things into your local house of worship.

You have to nowadays. What if the Rabbi is fumbling through the reading and suddenly gets lost in his notes? Can you imagine everyone sitting there helpless in the quiet, all the while you could practically hear a pin drop? Or even worse, suppose one of these slick, know-it-all pastors calls for a moment of contemplation in the middle of service. It’d be a blood-bath. 

We can’t allow that to happen. The only way to be safe is more noise.

Man ensures the safety of a local park

Photo by Juliana Polizel

My neighborhood used to be really rough. There was a yoga studio nearby that would attract a lot of unsavory types - the kind of people who sit and “listen to their bodies”. Luckily, that was demolished and things are now heading in a good direction. They put a major freeway through the middle of the block, providing an endless din. In the summertime people race motorcycles and cars with no mufflers. Even in the middle of the night there is now a constant cacophony of yelling, construction, overhead airplanes and helicopters. Sometimes they’ll come so close to the ground our entire house will shake and you can barely make out what the person next to you at the dinner table just said. 

I’m proud to raise my kids in such a great place. But I’m staying highly vigilant. 

Because every year the world becomes a more dangerous place. There are truly evil people who want to instigate a World War III type scenario. Were they to succeed we would all be annihilated by nature walks and quality time around the campfire. The fabric of society would be torn asunder, as we are made to endure the hardship of no more 24 hour news and the horrors of pumping fuel without GasStationTV. 

These evil terrorists would love to see social media caught up in the conflagration, as we are sent back to the stone age of talking on the phone and having conversations with people we’ve met in person. They want to ensure that seemingly nowhere is safe from silence, that you’re out for a nice dinner with family and all the televisions in the restaurant suddenly turn off. 

They want my beautiful neighborhood to start going downhill. They want to see people meditating in the park, even in broad daylight!!

Perhaps they’ll try to get a millage passed that would fund the local library and release a bunch of newly hired librarians into the community where they’ll menacingly roam around, ready to shoosh someone at random.

These hate-mongers are spreading their rhetoric everywhere now, saying things like: “Please silence your cell phone” and “Sir, keep your voice down, the other urology patients don’t want to know the details of your medical issue.”

Silence. This is the dark vision these monsters have for the future of humanity. 

Perhaps their honey-tipped words have penetrated your heart. You’ve been deceived into believing that a little peace and quiet wouldn’t be that bad. That maybe we could find a way to live with it?

Like the serpent in the Garden, these treacherous liars come to you and say, “Just stop talking so much, surely you will not die.” 

Well gird yourself for the coming battle, because you can’t compromise with extremists. As Edmund Burke famously said, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”