Noise

Originally published by James Broadwater at http://www.onlinebyram.com on Sept. 29, 2006

Many of my fellow Christians seem to believe that the measure of their obedience to God is how much they're willing to tolerate. Well, they're wrong. Remember the Intolerable Acts? Our Founders believed that there were certain things that we weren't to tolerate, and they staked their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor on it.

Have you ever noticed that the word "nice" is not to be found anywhere in the Bible? We're commanded to be kind, etc. But "nice" means that you're willing to do anything to try to get people to like you, and that you're also willing to do anything to avoid their criticism and condemnation.

I think that too many of us have been far too "nice" for far too long, and I want for you to think about what it's gotten us.

President Bush tried to "reach across the aisle" to Democrats right after he became President, and in doing so, he let Ted Kennedy write an education bill. Now, would you want a person like Ted Kennedy having anything at all to do with your child? Not if you love your child. No wonder our schools are in the shape they're in.

What does all this have to do with noise? Well, I said that we've been far too nice for far too long. Really, we're called to expose evil to the light, to speak the truth in love, and to do justice. Such is the case with all this unnecessary noise that surrounds us every day. People are now playing, at very high decibel levels, "music" that's not fit for anything except for use in trying to extract information from suspected terrorists. Much of this "music" promotes, in explicit detail, such things as illicit sex, murder, rape, and even the murder of law enforcement officers. And the music itself is obviously designed to annoy most of the population.

But what do we do about it? Most people choose to ignore it and appease the offending parties. Well, let me ask you something. What did appeasing Hitler get the Allied powers before and during World War II?

I have a "neighbor" who plays this loud music. He doesn't care whether his neighbors like the music, he doesn't care whether it keeps us from concentrating on something important that might benefit someone other than ourselves, and he doesn't care whether he's keeping us awake at night, making it impossible to get our needed sleep so that we can do our jobs properly the next day. I guess he feels that he doesn't have to care. You see, he's on "public assistance," which, in his case, means that our elected government is stealing money out of our paychecks before we even get them, and giving a part of it to him for sitting on his front porch or in his car and doing nothing but making life miserable for his neighbors, who have acted in good faith toward him.

And what happens when we call the Hinds County Sheriff's Office? We are told that there is no noise ordinance in Hinds County, and that these people are allowed to play their excuse for music as loudly as they want, whenever they want, for as long as they want. Well, there is a state law against disturbing the peace. I contacted Justice Court Judge Bill Skinner, who also used to be a Jackson police officer, and whose father was murdered by a thug while serving as a police officer. Judge Skinner told me that the sheriff's office can arrest the offending parties IF THEY'RE WILLING TO DO SO. And therein lies the problem. I guess they're also concerned with being nice? The question is, do we need a nice guy to be our sheriff, whose main goal seems to be to prove that he can get reelected, or do we need a real man, whose main job is to ENFORCE THE LAW?

We should all remember that Sheriff Malcolm McMillan is up for reelection in 2007, and cast our vote based on who will enforce the law, not on who will promote tolerance.