Asheville – Buncombe County is about to continue to pass ordinances that are unnecessary to the residents of the county and for what reason?
What am I talking about?
(see article page 1).
The ordinance starts out, “WHEREAS, this Board has determined that it is in the best interest of the citizens and residents of Buncombe County…” Hold the phone! It is scary when the government says it has the “best interest of the citizens and residents” at heart.
It continues by saying, “…to enact protections against discrimination that reflect the community’s shared values of equality, inclusion, and fair access, and to preserve the health, safety, and welfare of people without regard to certain actual or perceived status or characteristics.”
Well, now wait a minute. If the “protections against discrimination that reflect the community’s shared values” reflect the community’s shared values,” why enact the ordinance? If these “protections” are already part of the community’s “shared values,” why tell members of the community you have to do them?
I certainly haven’t heard of anyone being discriminated against in Buncombe County, but I may be missing something. We have people who get in touch with the newspaper to describe how they are being discriminated against. I’ve heard nothing about a need for this kind of ordinance in Buncombe County, one of the most open and accepting places in the state.
Is this what is called “virtue signaling”? Well, look on the internet you can find several definitions of “virtue signaling”:
Dictionary.com – “the sharing of one’s point of view on a social or political issue, often on social media, in order to garner praise or acknowledgment of one’s righteousness from others who share that point of view, or to passively rebuke those who do not”
Dictionary.cambridge.org – “attempt to show other people that you are a good person, for example by expressing opinions that will be acceptable to them, especially on social media:”
However, the one I especially like is the one from Urbandictionary.com, which says, “To take a conspicuous but essentially useless action ostensibly to support a good cause but actually to show off how much more moral you are than everybody else.” Yep, Rev. Beach-Ferrara and the county commissioners are about to show-off their “Holier than thou” attitude by telling citizens and residents how to go about doing what they are already doing.
While there are exemptions carved out for certain employers, why are we telling anyone they have to abide by these rules? Is this just another example of the government trying to micromanage people’s lives?
Of course, to make this enforceable, there has to be a system of reporting such violations and penalties associated with those violations.
Complaints will be filed and investigated, with violators being fined a civil penalty of $100 per day until remedied.
Wouldn’t it be great if we had a remedy to ‘virtual signaling governments?’