I’m With Emily
Reflections from the Burning House
“Ms. Feiner’s treatment raises concerns about the silencing of citizens and the targeting of professionals who are committed to speaking out on behalf of vulnerable communities. . . We call for transparency and a renewed commitment to protecting the rights of all individuals to participate in the democratic process without fear of intimidation or removal.” ~ National Association of Social Work-New York City/New York State
Not If, but When. It’s not a matter of if you’ll be willing to take a public stand against injustice like 64-year-old New York social worker Emily Feiner (and so many like her) but when you will feel you must do so.
I know this moment personally, and you may as well. It’s filled with visceral fear, even terror, when the senses bring a deep call to speak up right now for justice - loudly - and in public before detractors and naysayers.
I first experimented with this degree of chutzpah - albeit cautiously, diplomatically, hesitantly - at meetings with fellow clinical staff members at the U.S. Indian Health Service twenty-five years ago. My boldness emerged alongside a growing reluctance to support rampant psychiatric labeling and prescribing of psychiatric drugs, especially to Native children on the reservation where we worked.
As misgivings grew, so did my audacity, and at one point, colleagues responded to my vehemence by calling me “the biggest threat to the wellbeing of children on the reservation.” Ultimately, they were proved quite wrong, of course, and instead, science continues to support my skepticism. But back then, it was a hard road.
Inside the moment of one of several group tongue-lashings, my heart rate escalated, my palms began to sweat, and I noticed I was trembling. For weeks afterward, my sleep was fitful, agitated, and broken up by obsessive rumination - that is, continuous mulling over of the details and ramifications of having spoken my own truth. Such was the effect of this team on me who otherwise were supposed to support the “mental health” of people.
Portions of these experiences are highlighted in my most recent book, Coyote’s Swing: A Memoir & Critique of Mental Hygiene in Native America (Washington State University Press, 2023), but I don’t intend to promote it here (although I just did!), just offer some thoughts about the proverbial experience of “speaking truth to power.”
My novels, Tessa’s Dance, and its sequel, Signal Peak, all my presentations, lay and professional articles, and of course, seven years of solitary work investigating the U.S. mental health system in Indian Country that went into Coyote’s Swing - all of it fits loosely under the heading of speaking truth publicly on behalf of justice.
This intense disposition I seem to have for promoting and defending social justice (a dirty phrase to alleged powers-that-be), to speaking out “no matter what happens,” sometimes exhausts me so much I can only find solace through long solo hikes. This troublemaking pattern had no name until my fellow dissident psychologist-brother Bruce Levine wrote Resisting Illegitimate Authority, and described my dilemma more eloquently. I have little doubt that the views and behavior of Ms. Emily Feiner of New York State (who I now presume to call “Emily”) are informed by a similar disposition toward those “in charge.”
Speak Freely. The right to free speech - under constant threat and currently rapidly eroding - can only be sustained by our felt duty to exercise it.
I’ll try you out a bit. The so-called “woke speech” of a facile-minded liberal academia who’ve naively believed that “making people speak and write differently changes their intolerant minds” has been sabotaged by its devout critics so completely as to subvert and pollute the concept. Don’t put professors in charge, please. I’ve been one and can only say there is no more political being than an academic. The critics and followers reaching for their low hanging fruit easily expanded their hatred of an overplayed, overstated focus upon “woke categories” into a vigorous denial and suppression of any of the daily realities of ongoing injustice, racism, violence, and intolerance. That’s what made it such a breeze for the current administration to kill diversity, equity, and inclusion programs (which I refuse to call D.E.I.): Elite academics tsk-tsking and browbeating the ignorant. Now, please admit it, and let’s move on to better strategies. So-called “woke speech” never woke anybody up at all, but it did further alienate and empower the “unwoke.” More on their willful ignorance in a moment.
Being a person who does not always express himself quite so forcefully, I am hoping you are still with me, and will say whatever you like in the comments or chat on this or any matter you like. We are different people and can only benefit via the clashing sparks flying between shared ideas and beliefs, especially those with which we disagree. All I ask is that we maintain mutual respect. Beyond this, speak your mind and heart.
Free Speech as Duty. Despite having my own ideas about what is meant by “social justice,” I was not accustomed to engaging in defense of free speech as a duty until after I came to work in Native America. If I ever did anything at all along such lines, I likely confined it to songs or poems I felt inspired to compose.
I could be assertive - but prefer enthusiastic - and to speak as a professional psychologist directly against ideological beliefs strongly held by my supervisors and colleagues felt both rude and intimidating. I was more ready to just get along.
Then I ran face first into a brick wall as I entered a new kind of workplace. It took me at least a year to realize that the organizational culture of any U.S. Indian Health Service facility - including mine - has its basis in military medicine, hierarchy, and chain of command. Many military reserve medical officers continue to provide services through there now, and many uniformed U.S. Commissioned Corps officers remain in charge, wielding extraordinary power over the health and wellbeing of Native Americans.
I have nothing critical to say about these folks. I only note that IHS is not a Native but a military organizational culture, and this was something I didn’t realize when I first began working there in 2000. You see, I’ve already mentioned that I have issues with authority. I have to respect it first before I can get along with it. Even then, we’re going to work “on par.” I’m not very good at being somebody’s subordinate.
The Importance of Learning. I’m not going to use this post to detail the perils of psychiatric drugs or their side effects. I’ll only say that when I worked at IHS from 2000 to 2004, what is now well-established research regarding youth suicide risk exacerbated by so-called “antidepressants” was much more controversial. Additionally, problems with illicit trade and abuse of ADHD stimulant medications were only just emerging. The idea that older youth labeled with ADHD diagnosis and then prescribed stimulants would have heightened susceptibility to getting involved in cocaine or methamphetamine abuse would have been considered ridiculous. These were issues that concerned me back then (still do) and that I was bringing up to my colleagues, and my ideas and views were generally not well received at all.
These days, there are many more resources for consumers to investigate such kinds of issues for themselves, and I did somehow succeed in writing Coyote’s Swing so as to challenge the role of the U.S. mental health system in pacifying and sedating normative individual reactions to oppression, violence, and generational trauma.
Over the “course of my career,” if I can permit myself to call it that, I’ve asked directly for greater accountability from public officials and then received various forms of “ejection” that Emily Feiner experienced physically and literally. Since I’d like to encourage rather than discourage you when it’s your turn to go through stuff this this, I thought I’d offer a few caveats.
Prepare yourself. I work toward being a nice person, but my self-concept becomes questionable when I seek answers from someone who refuses to be accountable for their unjust behavior or assertions. I have had to force myself to differentiate their inherent value and worth as a fellow human being from negative, sometimes vicious reactions to being questioned or challenged. It’s a serious undertaking to speak out. I can only do so via a kind of “compartmentalizing” - I don’t go around calling out people all or most of the time or even once a month. It’s such a rare event because I’ve had to learn that it’s best undertaken intentionally, that is, when I feel I’m truly choosing to do so. And so I have to feel ready and prepared. Impulsiveness doesn’t ever work out well for me. I doubt it does for you either.
Once upon a rare but sweltering day touring Monet’s (gorgeous) gardens with my wife and sons, an irritable French waiter delivered us four small and astoundingly overpriced (10 euros each) beverages alleged to be “American milkshakes.” We were all very thirsty, and these drinks were all sour. My gentle wife scrutinized the waiter’s surly attitude (we hadn’t bought lunch and his resentment had already ripped placemats from beneath our elbows) alongside my own downturned expression. She then asked, “Are you planning on saying something?”
And she already knew the answer and easily swept the children toward more promising festivities. After they’d departed, I finally caught the waiter’s attention, and told him in broken French that I refused to pay the bill. His expression soured further than the milkshakes. I then asked to speak to the manager. “Pourquois?” he wondered without moving an inch. Thus, I had to get up and go find this person. Interestingly, “sour” in English sounds like “soeur” (sister) in French, so communicating about sour milkshakes to the boss was nearly as confusing as accidentally telling a French pharmacist during the same trip that I suffered from “being a pain in the neck.” There’s probably some truth to the misstatement anyway.
I’m suggesting it’s unlikely that Emily seldom announces “I’m not leaving” to people she’s offended. Most of us willingly leave the scene if we’ve created offense. The exception is very rare. I believe Emily knew she had to take a stand in that moment knowing that she deserved to have her question answered. She knew it would be unjust to cooperate with leaving. It took grit to just sit there and say “I’m not leaving.”
If you are someone not so accustomed to speaking up to others who may be put off by what you are saying or asking as well as your noncompliance in being ejected, you’ll need to “soak yourself in pickle brine.” This means developing a tougher skin like Emily’s or others you may also admire, while not surrendering your beautiful and sensitive heart. I assure you that this only takes a little practice and “exposure therapy” to tolerate the discomfort involved.
Consider this kind of hardening an aim toward being anti-fragile like I described in a recent post about my mom when she got her dander up. I remember being 17 years old and walking with her down an urban street when a “roving TV reporter” stopped us to ask her about the new draft lottery and my apparent eligibility for going to the Vietnam War. “That won’t be happening,” she assured him. “I’ll take him to Canada before he fights in that stupid war.” Straight up, no ketchup or mustard.
What does this kind of behavior really entail? To clarify what may be obvious to your mind but not as much to your heart - brave doesn’t mean not being afraid. Compelling yourself to act alongside fear, that is true bravery. Let your voice vibrate - but speak. You should expect to feel uncomfortable when speaking about what you truly believe or don’t before others because people can be judgmental or critical. That is, they shouldn’t be, but they often are, and that’s if they choose to listen. So let them have the benefit of your wisdom, even if you don’t feel sure of yourself. I’m often somebody who truly wants to hear more from those who hesitate to speak.
Three feet back. It’s helpful emotionally to stay “three feet back” from passionately-held beliefs whenever you state or defend them. Pursuing qualities of equanimity and detachment regarding your own beliefs means you don’t so overidentify with them that you yourself become unable or unwilling to hear the perspectives of others. Ideas, even those deeply-held, should always be open to revision in light of new learning. Impressively, some people aren’t much interested in or don’t know about this concept.
Sometimes the best resource for stepping forward is stepping back - into a greater awareness and recognition of who you might be trying to speak out for - that is, who’s not allowed to be present or even permitted to speak. This crew is growing exponentially now, and anyone retaining some degree of privilege should feel a sacred duty to try to at least represent and bear witness by asserting what they know about injustice. Whether or not it’s being asked for, in my opinion.
I remember a neighbor who wanted to tell me a joke about “camel jockeys,” unaware that I was at that very moment working on a dissertation on the emotional stereotyping of immigrants, including those from Bedouin Arab backgrounds. I shut him down with a furrowed brow and a serious tone, saying “I don’t care for racist humor,” and it embarrassed him, I’m sure. He never spoke to me again. His bad, not mine.
Connecting more fully with the current predicaments of marginalized and invisible communities of people, restricted, imprisoned, endangered, afraid, or just too overwhelmed or otherwise disenfranchised helps prepare one with a newfound capacity to speak what must be spoken and is now being suppressed, censored, and punished. Doing so entails learning all you can from those living under increased oppression right now, and then contemplating what you understand morally, philosophically, and factually.
Be prepared to challenge willful ignorance. By “willful ignorance,” I’m proposing that, in this day and age, sizable numbers of privileged people in are openly resistant to learning and educating themselves regarding whatever truths run contrary to their opinions. There are many jokes about this, but it’s not really a laughing matter. It’s not funny at all. This is not “simple ignorance” either, that is, a lack of access to knowledge, but a highly privileged and often arrogant refusal to know and learn about the plights and difficulties of people all around you and the world itself.
I’m all done making excuses for willful ignorance. Let’s counter with strong reasoning and reliable knowledge. Feel confident that you’ve purposely investigated all sides before taking any stand public or private with others. You must know how to evaluate knowledge, think critically, and debate even against your own views in order to take on the falsehoods, misinformation, propaganda, and injustice you’ll be met with.
When I don’t know about a given issue, I cease talking and listen closely. I’d do it anyway, but it’s the opposite of what I sometimes see others doing. Lots of folks seem ready to offer an opinion based upon incomplete information. When I run across this kind of situation, I have to make a decision as to whether I might be persuasive in casually offering some resources or contrasting information. I might decide not to speak. But like Emily, there are going to be times when I will feel I have to take a stand with someone. Perhaps an admonishment. Maybe a cautionary remark. An expressed desire that they rethink what they’ve said. I might even say something that causes their rationale to collapse. Sometimes it works, most times it doesn’t. The point is that sometimes I have to speak on behalf of justice whether the other party appreciates it or not.
The path of opposing willful ignorance is open to nearly everyone still. What will it mean when that opportunity disappears? Right now, portals to human knowledge about any subject are still available to nearly everyone. But this access is aLos under attack. Make smart and open debate fashionable again. Speak justice often.
Thus, my inward counsel has shifted in light of recent events. I’m feeling much less tolerant of stupidity and ignorance. I want to be better at refuting it. I feel it’s imperative that I hallenge how things are and how they’re becoming much worse very rapidly. I do notice not everyone is going to be as into cultivating this kind of discipline. I understand, but there are perils to sliding into the same dirty pool with the willfully ignorant.
At IHS, I first began asking questions, and my questions were minimized or ignored. This was off-putting, but it contributed to me researching, learning, and progressing. It’s very strange to consider how denial, and eventually, derision and ridicule, inspired me to research more so that I felt more certain and confident. Please try this.
Demand Answers. And here’s another place where I resonate a great deal with Emily, this dedicated social worker - a self-declared moderate who voted Republican in the past - someone with whom I’d likely disagree on several topics - who simply asked a question of U.S. Representative Mike Lawler at a town hall meeting on May 5th, 2025.
“Given all the unconstitutional acts by this administration, did he have a red line, and what was it?” she recollected.
According to witnesses, “Lawler did not directly answer the question, and instead started talking about the appropriations process.”
Emily, noting his shift, then stood up, and became “louder,” shouting, “Answer the question! Answer the question!”
She later said: “What is much more important to me is that they are pursuing a playbook that is reminiscent of Germany in the 1930s — that this is what they do with dissent; that they have no problem carrying a 64-year-old woman out of a town hall that was being held by my publicly elected congressional representative …”
Emily knew what she believed and why before she decided to act. It’s important to note that she did not violate any federal, state or local law, but exercised her Constitutional right as a U.S. citizen to engage in the public expression of dissent and free speech. With respect to any potential exceptions to her First Amendment rights, she never engaged in obscenity, fraud, child pornography, illegal conduct, incitement to riot or lawlessness, violation of intellectual property rights, threats, false statements of fact, hate speech, defamation, or slander.
No, Emily simply shouted “Answer the question!” repeatedly toward her own governmental representative, which is something many of us might wish to do. By her insistence, she evidently broke “Town Hall Rules” to which she’d been compelled to verbally consent and then provide picture identification twice before being permitted to even enter this allegedly-democratic forum. Among the rules was “no shouting, screaming, yelling, or standing,” which leaves one wondering what Patrick Henry might have experienced yelling, “Give me liberty, or give me death!” like he did in 1775, or James Madison, in shouting, “I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations!” as he did at the Virginia Ratifying Convention for the U.S. Constitution in 1788.
By then refusing to leave, Emily found herself forcibly carried out of the Town Hall by four state troopers. Speaking to Mother Jones’ reporter, Julianne Ames, she reflected, “I think this says that they will not tolerate us being active participants in our democracy—they want an autocracy, and they’re using state actors to enforce that.”
So Choose Your Battles Carefully. It was not until I witnessed how reductionistic psychiatric ideologies - pseudo-scientific “perspectives” about now-debunked brain science pertaining to “mental disorders” - were endangering and harming people that I too became “louder” in ways akin to Emily Feiner.
First, a young client told me she’d been threatened with forced psychiatric hospitalization if she refused to consume her prescribed psychiatric drug, which made her feel “funny” and “jittery.” She asked me what her options were. I didn’t actually know, but I sure thought there should be some, and tried to find out.
When I subsequently learned that methylphenidate and other stimulants on the reservation where I worked sold for “10 bucks for 4 hits,” I began investigating this issue too. Using in-clinic software, I discerned several entire families - living in abject poverty- had developed a cottage industry by having every household member diagnosed with ADHD and then selling their IHS prescriptions to others. Four or five hundred dollars more each month makes a real difference when unemployment can be as high as eighty percent.
Then, a horrific “cluster suicide” of numerous youth occurred over just a few months , and I was asked by several elders to please look into the matter in my “professional capacity.” I cross-referenced the medical information at IHS with emergent scientific evidence that for some young people popular SSRI “anti-depressant” drugs might “induce,” ie. cause, suicidal behavior. This was years before the FDA instituted its black box warning to that effect. For my trouble, I was eventually placed on a PIP (“performance improvement plan”) for stepping over artificial boundaries invoked by my superiors.
Such experiences made me very angry. As a psychologist specializing in substance abuse and trauma, I was now trying to help people in desperate situations created by my own employer. But anger is not as important and can get in the way when trying to speak up. The insights from my research were what inspired me to write several internal memos to IHS supervisors detailing “concerns.” I still held hope that I could change these minds and hearts. The first of those memos proposed greater medical oversight on prescribing of controlled substances by nurses - an idea which I now see as not nearly enough.
Hope can be a dangerous thing. This initial memo became central to the most infamous staff meeting of my career, occurring - ironically - on the afternoon of September 11th, 2001. It was a battleground, a shouting match, likely fueled by the morning’s events, and I’d never experienced anything like it in my life before. Despite the vitriol, I was nonetheless shocked at “colleagues” uniting in their hostility against me. I was astounded when people literally turned their backs on me, refused to look at or speak to me, and could be overheard as I walked by their open office doors in conversations about “what to do” about me. Such talks contributed to middle-school behaviors like reaching into my mailbox and tossing client messages into the wastebasket, backbiting me toward people I’d never met (who awkwardly later confided what’d been said), and lodging false “official complaints”about me.
Soon, medical staff by-laws for the clinic were being rewritten to make it impossible for somebody in-house like me to get away with researching and critiquing the given psychiatric ideology I disputed. I was asked to review these by-laws and agree with them in writing as an employee.
Like Emily, I was told I must consent to a list of rules I considered unjust if I wanted to still “be remain in the room” of the clinic as a psychologist and continue my own employment.
I did not consent. But no bother - with the passing of the Patriot Act in 2001, the tenure of any federal employee was now tied to refraining from any public criticism of the policies of any federal agency due to being reconstrued as a possible “threat to national security.”
It was the President of the United States who finally shut me down. As to the continued bullying and misdeeds of my colleagues, I realized I’d chosen much more than I’d realized in simply speaking up. I’d been naive. There are very real risks to speaking assertively about what you believe. There are gradations to these risks - and it’s important to consider them in advance.
But you must speak, nonetheless.
Social Support Helps. It’s pretty hard to speak up alone. You’re more likely to suffer the “shoot the messenger” scenario most of us know about without at least some tacit support from others. Singled out, you’re more likely to be ridiculed, dismissed, bullied, or even physically assaulted. I almost got into a fistfight at IHS after a mental health colleague intentionally pulled my hair. No, I’m not kidding.
Others who are with you don’t have to speak themselves. Please remember this if you feel too intimidated or there’s too much at stake in your own life to risk speaking out. Being present and accounted for when others are taking the risk helps everyone involved. You have a spokesperson. They have an ally. There’s power in numbers.
If you’re the one speaking, knowing others in the room are with you - even if it’s only one person - makes a real difference. I had this experience when I was asked to speak at a huge meeting of state employees with federal auditors regarding the “mental health” of Native youth. I told the regional state administrator who invited me that I planned on speaking truthfully and “pulling no punches.” Surprisingly, he smiled and told me this was why he’d invited me. He couldn’t speak as truthfully as I could from inside his state position.
So I won’t pull any punches with you either. There will come a time in your life when you, too, are the one person with no one present to back you up, who must speak out what you know to be right on behalf of justice for the sake of others or for yourself.
How might you bolster your own strength and even “be your own ally”? I have been in this very place - yes, a painful and scary one - and I came upon a method of imagining others who - with growing awareness of the issues I was trying to address - would soon move alongside me. These “future allies” were all I had, and they did eventually emerge from the shadows.
Please know if you hold to speaking your truth long enough, you’ll eventually find you’re never truly alone.
Find Empathy and Think Strategically. Concerning my memos in-house at IHS, and the major heartburn they stirred up, I almost quit my job. But I felt overjoyed to receive the support of the Native community, and this helped me stay. It was my last strategy, my hope and intention to try to elicit their support, and they gave it readily.
It’s very important to be able to speak from one’s heart in Native America. I guess I believe this same adage should be true just about everywhere. By the time I’d been beaten up several times by IHS, many community members already knew I was swimming upstream there. I’d also already worked with Native young people who’d lost their lives. They understood that I too was deeply affected by such tragedies.
At first, I declared I didn’t have ready-made answers, but I was trying to learn all I could to be a good helper. I asked if I could join them at gatherings. Under these conditions, I began sharing more from my heart, mind, and spirit. I’d been quite humbled by my IHS experiences, but I still had no grasp at all on the vast number of cultural teachings that were surrounding me.
As people understood more about what I’d been up against, several encouraged me to back off “trying to rehabilitate the agency” and to get more involved in the community’s own efforts toward wellness and balance. They brought me to sweatlodge and ceremonies and longhouse meetings. I was invited to funerals too. Certain wonderful elders began teaching me.
I soon came to accept that I was no longer an expert but the one who needed to be taught, and this shift became life-changing and liberating. No matter what I might write here or my occasional assertiveness, I’m still no longer an expert and very glad of it.
Instead, I’ve been a co-collaborator for many years now. Nowadays, if I feel called upon to speak on behalf of justice, alone or alongside others, I feel stronger and more centered. How can this be? I’m just not very intimidated about it anymore. I don’t have to be an expert. I just own my truth to the best of my ability and speak it.
You can too. Things are changing very rapidly, and you already know there’s far too much at stake in not speaking out. We all need to try. I vow to try to make my words and ideas as palatable and persuasive as I’m able while I try alongside you.
It’s about speaking up now, even if it’s against the rules, like Emily Feiner and so many others across history. If you can’t quite bring yourself to doing so yet, go to meetings where speaking up will matter and just be present and willing to stand or sit alongside anyone who dares to hold forth about justice. If you can’t be present, then find some way to let others know what you believe and why, and explain it to them, so they can understand what’s at stake and can agree to go to such gatherings on your behalf.
Look to your own days ahead, and those well beyond to be lived by our children. If you don’t have kids, please feel free to consider mine as yours. We’re all relatives. Standing up and speaking up matters now.
Prepare yourself now, and be brave, become knowledgable and disciplined, ready to oppose willful ignorance and to educate anyone who’d seek to learn, use your empathy to connect with them alongside your fierceness to question and challenge any and every injustice, stand up against tyranny, oppression and cruelty - be ready to do so down to the gates of hell because that’s where we’re heading.
Let’s think strategically and take deliberate action, always seeking to protect the future. This is the path of the heart I’m so grateful to have learned about and now invite you toward. This is the crooked journey toward becoming anti-fragile.
I’ll end this post where every typist in the English language should …
Now is the time for all good people to come to the aid of their country.
And also the world itself…
Yes, let’s aspire to be like Emily - ready to be carried out of the building - either literally or figuratively - in defense of justice and freedom.
“The best beloved of all things in My sight is Justice; turn not away therefrom if thou desirest Me, and neglect it not that I may confide in thee. By its aid thou shalt see with thine own eyes and not through the eyes of others, and shalt know of thine own knowledge and not through the knowledge of thy neighbor. Ponder this in thy heart; how it behooveth thee to be. Verily justice is My gift to thee and the sign of My loving-kindness. Set it then before thine eyes.” ~ Bahá’u'lláh, The Hidden Words
“The founders of the league, therefore, proposed and expounded as the requisite basis of all good government three broad ‘double’ doctrines or principles. The names of these principles in the Native tongues vary dialectically, but these three notable terms are expressed in Onondaga as follows:
(1) Ne’Ske´no˘n, meaning, first, sanity of mind and the health of the body; and, second, peace between individuals and between organized bodies or groups of persons.
(2) Ne’´Gaii‘hwiyo‘, meaning, first, righteousness in conduct and its advocacy in thought and speech; and, second, equity or justice, the adjustment of rights and obligations.
(3) Ne’Ga˘’s‘hasda‘´sä’, meaning, first, physical strength or power, as in military force or civil authority; and, second, the orenda [the mystical power within all life] or magic power of the people or of their institutions and rituals, having mythic and religious implications.” ~ Translator’s note re: The Great Law of Peace by Deganawida, the Peacemaker, which formed the Iroquois Confederacy of the Haudenosaunee (inspiring the U.S. Constitution) as recited in Odondaga by Seneca Chief John Arthur Gibson to J.A.R. Hewitt, 1899
“The just are so set on justice that were God not just they would not care a fig for God; they are so staunch to right, so perfectly indifferent to self, they reek not of the pains of hell nor of the joys of heaven nor anything whatever. Were all the pangs of those in hell and all the pain borne or to bear on earth to be the fruits of justice, they would not mind one jot…To the just human nothing gives more pain, there is no greater hardship, than what is contrary to justness …” ~Meister Eckhart