Safety first? Not according to Mike Rowe, who appeared on Tucker Carlson’s show last night. “Safety third” is what we should strive for according to Rowe, in what was an unusually profound segment for a cable news show.
It all began with Tucker bringing up the recent news story of a 30-year-old man that was successfully sued by his parents to move out. (RELATED: Judge Demands Unemployed 30-Year-Old Man Finally Move Out Of His Parents’ Home).
Rowe tied that into a “work ethic scholarship” program he runs, that’s given out $5 million over the past five years. You’d think it would be easy to give money away, but Rowe says it becomes harder every year to “affirmatively reward work ethic,” as the scholarship has hoops to jump through for the applicant.
Fewer and fewer are willing to go through those hoops when confronted by them, Rowe says. And why? According to his theory, in part due to some of the expectations that have arisen from the safe space mentality. “There’s a fissure running through the expectation of what happens when we elevate ‘safety’ and feelings to a level of primacy. I think it creates a real disconnect people are struggling to parse. If safety is the priority, then let’s just wrap ourselves in bubble wrap and drive at speeds approaching five miles an hour.”
Rowe had another profound point: that entrusting your safety to others makes you less safe, because only you truly care about your own safety.
Rowe pointed out that “The unintended consequence of telling you that nothing is more important than your safety, is the very dynamic that leads people to walk across Fifth Avenue when the little man says walk, instead of looking both ways. It’s not a coincidence that the most dangerous intersections in the world are intersections that have signs that tell you when to talk.”
I’ll end with a personal favorite quote of the same spirit:
Humans need challenges to overcome, just like a muscle needs resistance to grow. In a zero-gravity environment, an astronaut’s muscles atrophy because there is no resistance. The government giving you a bunch of handouts and living your life for you is the equivalent of doing push-ups in outer space. Big government is like the void of space—it’s massive, constantly expanding, and if we immerse ourselves in it, we’ll simply wither away. – Adam Carolla
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