Drew Hernandez

And feelings, you know,

I hate to break this to you, Ben, but feelings matter.

The way people feel affects their lives.

And so when you see things like, when you hear the word pride, you immediately know you're dealing with shame.

When you hear black pride, gay pride, you immediately know somebody feels ashamed.

And I think that you can't make it go away the way the left wants to make it go away by proclaiming that you're proud.

No, you're not wrong that the, you know, I have had black people say to me, slavery was bad, slavery was bad, but I'm glad I'm here.

I have had black people say that to me, and I understand it.

But, you know, still, the history counts, and I think we can have some kind of compassion for that and understanding for it.

They're also wrong about what identity is, but I take your point.

Yeah, absolutely.

Namely the British, right?

What is the that?

I guess one way to think about it is just because we're conservatives, we're not libs, ideologues who think that one action of politics can just erase the totality of human experience.

You would say, well, look, the 13th Amendment was great, but it's not a magic wand.

The 14th Amendment or all the way up to, I don't know, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 or whatever, all sorts of bungled policies that have actually made things worse in many cases.

But in any case, those are just magic wands that erase...

a human identity or heritage or a feeling of tradition or place in a society.

And so I guess my point is basically boiling down to, I kind of get it.

You know, identity really does matter.