Civilizations and Impulses

Civilizations exist because their members control their impulses. When their impulses control them, civilizations fall.

Daniel Greenfield, The Personalization of the Political.

A New Utopianism?

A new and intolerant utopianism seeks to drive the remaining traces of Christianity from the laws and constitutions of Europe and North America.  This time, it does so mainly in the cause of personal liberation, born in the 1960s cultural revolution, and now inflamed into special rage by any suggestion that the sexual urge should be restrained by moral limits or that it should have any necessary connection with procreation.  This utopianism relies for human goodness on doctrines of human rights derived from human desires and — like all such codes — full of conflicts between the differing rights of different groups.  These must then be policed by an ever more powerful state.  A new elite, wealthy and comfortable beyond the fantasies of any previous generation, abandons penal codes (especially against the possession of narcotics) and abolishes marital fidelity so as to license its own comfortable, padded indulgence, and it therefore permits the same freedoms to the poor, who suffer far more from this dangerous liberty than do the rich.  Inevitably, it is the Christian churches who are the last strongholds of resistance to their change.

Peter Hitchens, The Rage Against God, pg.213

Assault on American Civilization

The rebellion which rose to a peak here and there and over and over during the period from 1964 to the early 1970s was nothing else than an ongoing assault on American civilization.  The most dramatic episodes in this assault were Black riots in cities and student takeover attempts of universities.  But the assault had many facets, ranging from the raucous noise of hard rock to pornographic movies to the obscenities that now became rampant in much discourse to the peddling of sexism in Playboy to the vulgarities of Hustler magazine.  The assault was the new destruction which followed in the wake of the new reconstruction.

Clarence B. Carson, A Basic History of the United States, Volume 5: The Welfare State 1929-1985, pg.247

How Revolutionaries Play Victim

It is well to note in connection with the crackdown of revolutionaries of the appearance of a tactic that has often been used since by Communists, their sympathizers and fellow-travelers.  It is the device of taking attention away from Communist methods and violence by focusing attention on real or imagined wrongs done by those who oppose them.  To put it more bluntly, it is the device of turning revolutionaries into the victims and the prosecutors into aggressors.  This is accomplished by downplaying the purposes and methods of revolutionaries and focusing upon the allegedly unsavory tactics of those who act to contain and restrain them. Revolutionaries are portrayed as innocent advocates of unpopular ideas, beset by heavy-handed Yahoos. 

Clarence B. Carson, A Basic History of the United States, Vol. 4: The Growth of America 1878-1928, pg.224-225

Blacks Are the Main Victims of Lawlessness

Among the nation’s most dangerous cities are Detroit, Chicago, St. Louis, Baltimore, Memphis, Milwaukee, Birmingham, Newark, Cleveland, and Philadelphia. These once-thriving cities are in steep decline.

What these cities have in common is that they have large black populations. Also, they have been run by Democrats for nearly a half-century, with blacks having significant political power. Other characteristics these cities share are poorly performing and unsafe schools, poor quality city services, and declining populations.

Each year, more than 7,000 blacks are murdered. That’s a number greater than white and Hispanic murder victims combined. Blacks of all ages are killed at six times the rate of whites and Hispanics combined.

According to the FBI, the police kill about 400 people a year; blacks are roughly one-third of that number. In Chicago alone, so far this year, over 2,000 people have been shot, leaving over 320 dead. It’s a similar tale of mayhem in other predominantly black cities. …

The primary victims of lawlessness are black people. To address this problem and most others, black people should ignore the liberal agenda. If civil authorities will not do their job of creating a safe environment, then black people should take the initiative. ...

Black residents of crime-infested neighborhoods should set up patrols—armed if necessary—to challenge thugs, gangs, drug dealers, and other miscreants, and make black neighborhoods safe and respectable.

No one should have to live in daily fear for his life and safety. Most Americans have no idea of—and wouldn’t begin to tolerate—the climate of fear and intimidation under which so many black people live.

Without self-initiative, there is not much that can be done about the high crime rate in black neighborhoods. Black and white liberals and their allies in the American Civil Liberties Union, as well as many libertarians, will not countenance the kind of tools needed to bring about civility. … 

Black people have the capacity to run the criminals out of their neighborhoods. Let me put the issue another way. Suppose it were the Ku Klux Klan riding through black neighborhoods, murdering 7,000 blacks year after year. How many black people would be willing to wait for the Klansmen to behave themselves or accept political promises and wait for a government program?

Walter E. Williams, “The Primary Victims of Lawlessness Are Black People”

The Problem of Authority

The basic problem in the world today is the problem of authority.  The chaos in the world is due to the fact that people in every realm of life have lost all respect for authority, whether it be between nations or between parts of nations, whether it be in industry, whether it be in the home, whether it be in the schools, or anywhere else.  The loss of authority!  And in my view it all starts in the home and in the married relationship.  That is why I venture to query whether a statesman whose own marriage has broken down really has a right to speak about the world’s problems.  If he fails in the sphere where he is most competent, what right has he to speak in others?  He ought to retire out of public life.  The real breakdown starts in the home, and in the married relationship.  I am asserting that the appalling increase in divorce which has taken place since the second world war . . .  is due to one thing only, namely, that men and women do not understand this Scriptural teaching about marriage and about husbands and wives.

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, Life in the Spirit in Marriage, Home & Work: An Exposition of Ephesians 5:18-6:9, pg. 111-112