Freedom to Love is Freedom to Hate

Which is more loving, a God who creates a world in which love is possible or a God who creates a world in which love is impossible?  It seems reasonable that a loving God would create a world where love is possible and can be experienced by creatures who are designed “in His image.”  But a world in which love is possible can be a dangerous place.  Love requires freedom.  True love requires that humans have the ability to freely choose; love cannot be forced if it is to be heartfelt and real.  The problem, of course, is that people who have the freedom to love often choose to hate.  That’s why freedom of this nature is so costly.  A world in which people have the freedom to love and perform great acts of kindness is also a world in which people have the freedom to hate and commit great acts of evil.  You cannot have one without the other.

J. Warner Wallace, “Cold-Case Christianity,” p.136

Who Wins?

He who creates the laws, wins.

Erwin W. Lutzer, When A Nation Forgets God, p.60

Learn Self Control For Marriage

The young man who has not learned self-control before marriage will not have it during marriage. . . .  In a sense, you deprive your future wife of something, even if you do not yet know her, and you endanger your happiness together.

Walter Trobish, I Loved A Girl, p.8, cited by Robertson McQuilkin, An Introduction to Biblical Ethics, p.232

Unhatched Egg Is Like Unborn Baby

It is a serious crime, and strictly enforced, to break an eagle egg.  Apparently, because there are plenty of unborn (parallel to unhatched) human babies, it is not a serious crime to kill them.  Everyone knows that to break an eagle egg before it hatches is to kill an eagle.  What is it to perform an abortion on a person?

Randy Alcorn, "ProLife Answers to ProChoice Arguments," p.79

Psychobabble

To be able to say with society's approval that a person who doesn't conform to a completely subjective and relativistic norm is ill and possesses a diseased psych, is an extraordinary power.

Richard Ganz, "PsychoBabble: The Failure of Modern Psychology -- and the Biblical Alternative, p.47

Same-Sex "Marriage" Is NOT About Civil Rights

Same-sex marriage is not about civil rights.  It is about validation and social respect.  It is a radical attempt at civil engineering using government muscle to strong-arm the people into accommodating a lifestyle many find deeply offensive, contrary to nature, socially destructive, and morally repugnant.

Greg Koukl, "Same-Sex Marriage -- Challenges and Responses"

It Won't Stop With Abortion

At Nuremberg, Hitler and his henchmen were condemned by the American judges because they encouraged the killing of the unborn. . . .  Hitler was wrong, even though most of the men on our Supreme Court today defend what the Nazis did.  If we do not stop killing infants on the premise that they are nothing unless they weigh five or six pounds, we will do what Hitler did: we will kill the handicapped, particularly when those handicapped are aged.  Then we will kill the truly handicapped who are retarded: the only "angels" among us, for they have never sinned. . . .  Unless we stop abortion we will go further than Hitler, being "better" educated that the Austrian paperhanger.  We will kill infants after they are born.  We will do it scientifically, of course.


Dan Lyons, Christian Crusade Weekly (1979), cited by John Powell, S.J. in Abortion: the Silent Holocaust, p.37

True Bigotry

The people who are most bigoted are the people who have no convictions at all.

G. K. Chesterton, cited by F. LaGared Smith in Sodom's Second Coming, p.7

A Problem With Psychology

Unfortunately, what is done all too often is this:  A disease that may not exist is treated with a drug whose action in humans no one really understands while the person undergoes months or years of psychotherapy with no defined therapeutic, measurable endpoints.  Fifty years of research has yielded only symptoms, no biologic basis, no cause, and certainly no cure.  Is mental illness a disease or are issues of the heart and people relationships the core issues?  Could sin be to blame?

David Tyler & Kurt Grady, Deceptive Diagnosis: When Sin is Called Sickness, p.71

Same-Sex Unions Have NEVER Been "Normal"

No human society -- not one -- has ever embraced homosexual marriage.  It is not a part of the tradition of any human culture.  Only until the last few "nanoseconds" of history and experience have societies allowed it.  Homosexual unions, married or otherwise, have never been regarded as a normal, morally equal part of any society.  Nonmarital same-sex unions have been tolerated in some places at some times to be sure but have never been taken to be morally equivalent to natural marriage.

Glenn T. Stanton and Dr. Bill Maier, Marriage on Trial: The Case Against Same-Sex Marriage and Parenting, p.22

How Effective Is Birth Control?

According to its own reckoning, [Planned Parenthood’s] program of birth control fails miserably to do the one thing it is supposed to do: inhibit unwanted pregnancies.  The annual in-use failure rate of the Pill is as high as 11 percent.  For the diaphragm, the normal failure rate is nearly 32 percent.  For the intrauterine device (IUD), it is almost 11 percent.  For “save sex” condoms, it is more than 18 percent.  And for the various foam, cream and jelly spermicides, it can range as high as 34 percent.  That means that a sexually active fourteen-year-old girl who faithfully uses the Pill has a 44 percent chance of getting pregnant at least once before she finishes high school.  She has a 69 percent chance of getting pregnant at least once before she finishes college.  And she has a 30 percent chance of getting pregnant two or more times.  If she relies on “safe sex” condoms, the likelihood of an unwanted pregnancy while she is in school rises to nearly 87 percent.  In other words, the Planned Parenthood system virtually guarantees that women will get pregnant and that they will then be “forced” to fall back on the birth control linchpin: abortion.

George Grant, Immaculate Deception: The Shifting Agenda of Planned Parenthood, p.20

The MAIN Social Problem

Of all the social problems facing American civilization, the decline of marriage and the breakup of the family is unquestionably our most pressing problem. It is the common denominator driving other social ills. But it is also the one social problem that touches our lives most directly.

Glenn Stanton, "Why Marriage Matters," CitizenLink Update, email 2/11/15

Fifty Shades of Garbage

It is shocking to me that an article such as this needs to be written to professing Christian women.  Even the world recognizes the damage such garbage can inflict on people.  For instance, read the following excerpt from a recent Charisma Magazine article:

We Americans get really angry when oil companies spill toxic fuel in our oceans; yet we applaud when Hollywood dumps a tanker of poisonous garbage like Fifty Shades of Grey on our country—with no offer to clean up the damage. We should be outraged.

Last year a researcher from the University of Michigan did a study on the effects of Fifty Shades of Grey on women readers. It showed that women who read the books (it is actually a trilogy) were 25 percent more likely to have an abusive partner; 34 percent were more likely to have a partner who stalked them; and 65 percent were more likely to engage in binge drinking. Just as there is a link between violent video games and violent behavior in teen boys, this study showed that women who read graphic porn novels tend to gravitate toward the types of abusive relationships depicted in books like Fifty Shades. The study also showed that these women were more likely to have eating disorders. (Interestingly, the dominant male character in Fifty Shades carefully controls his girlfriend’s eating habits.)

In one scene in the book, Christian buys Ana a platinum and diamond bracelet so she can cover the bruises on her wrists—which she got after being tied to her boyfriend’s bed. The message from Ana’s lover: I will hurt you, but I will buy you nice gifts so you will stay with me. That’s twisted. And couples are going to see this movie on Valentine’s Day?

One of the most bizarre moments in the book occurs after Ana leaves Christian and then goes back to him. She says: “The physical pain you inflicted was not as bad as the pain of losing you.” Any psychologist will tell you that is the mentality of an abuse victim, who is brainwashed to believe that the attention she gets from her abuser is better than no attention at all.

Does this sound, in any way whatsoever, like a book or movie a Christian woman should have anything to do with?

Landon Chapman, "Fifty Shades of Grey" and the Annihilation of Christian Women’s Innocence

Do You Love A Person?

“If you want to love someone, tell them the Truth.  If you want to hate someone, know the Truth and say nothing.“


Justin Peters, Clouds Without Water, cited by Landon Chapman in, "Fifty Shades of Grey" and the Annihilation of Christian Women’s Innocence.

Lust Does Not Want A Woman

The thing [sex] is a sensory pleasure; that is, an event occurring within one’s own body. We use a most unfortunate idiom when we say, of a lustful man prowling the streets, that he “wants a woman.” Strictly speaking, a woman is just what he does not want. He wants a pleasure for which a woman happens to be the necessary piece of apparatus. How much he cares about the woman as such may be gauged by his attitude to her five minutes after fruition (one does not keep the carton after one has smoked the cigarettes).

C.S. Lewis, cited by Landon Chapman in “Fifty Shades of Grey" and the Annihilation of Christian Women’s Innocence.

Wisdom

Wisdom in one of its aspects is the capacity and the power to make use of knowledge.  A man may be very learned, but if he lacks wisdom he is of little value in society.


D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, The Unsearchable Riches of Christ: An Exposition of Ephesians 3, p.81

Wrong Views of Sexuality

The media not only distorts sexual realities but it also cultivates feelings of inadequacy among teen viewers. … First, the media communicates that the value of a person is primarily his or her physical attractiveness.  We are bombarded with a constant parade of beautiful women, which gives teenage firs a very unrealistic standard by which to judge their own attractiveness.  I hope that most of us realize that the media’s beauty standard is not a normal one.  What’s more, it’s constantly changing.  For a time, large breasts were the standard.  Sometimes the emphasis has been on a woman’s legs.  A few years ago Farrah-Fawcett-styled hair was the desirable.  Then tight fashion jeans were the “in thing” with emphasis on the buttocks.  It’s ridiculous.

Think what that does to the average young person.  Many a young woman has a totally distorted sense of self-worth.  If by comparison to the latest standards of physical beauty she is not attractive, she sees herself asa without worth or value, which results in tremendous feelings of inadequacy.

The young male is also affected.  He develops totally unrealistic ideas about a woman’s true beauty.  Why do most men place physical attractiveness above all other considerations when they seek relationships with the opposite sex?  Because of the media, of course.  All the male heroes on TV have “beautiful women.” . . . 

Sad to say, most young people, even from church families, have not learned about their sexuality in church.  Even a greater tragedy, most did not learn about their sexuality at home.  They have learned it from television, movies, and music.  Those are three great influences on teens.

Josh McDowell and Dick Day, "Why Wait?" p.44, 45

The Homosexual and Pedophile Connection

Psychologist Eugene Abel found that homosexuals "sexually molest young boys with an incidence that is occurring from five times greater than the molestation of girls."  A 1992 study by researchers K. Freud and R. I. Watson discovered that homosexual males are three times more likely than heterosexual males to engage in pedophilia and that the average pedophile has sex with 20 to 150 boys before he is caught.  A 1988 study in the Archives of Sexual Behavior found that 86 percent of pedophiles identified themselves as either homosexual or bisexual.

And there is a definite link as well between child molestation and later homosexual behavior.  In a 2001 study, it was found that 46 percent of homosexuals and 22 percent of lesbians reported that they had been molested by a homosexual during childhood, compared to 7 percent of heterosexual men and 1 percent of heterosexual women.


Alan Sears & Craig Osten, The Homosexual Agenda, p.83 (2003)

No Such Thing as ADD or ADHD

For almost two decades I have witnessed a dark -- I'll be so bold as to term it evil -- trend in psychology and psychiatry.   I have watched, often incredulous, as members of these two respected professions mass-marketed two non-existent diseases, Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) and Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder (ADHD), to the American public.  The success of this propaganda effort has resulted in the victimization of millions of parents and children.

Psychologist John K. Rosemond, Forward to "Unraveling the ADD/ADHD Fiasco," by David B. Stein.  Cited by David M. Tyler, Ph.D and Kurt P. Grady, Pharm.D in ADHD: Deceptive Diagnosis, p. 10

Marriage Philosophy 101

If God Is Dead

If God is dead, somebody is going to have to take his place.  It will be megalomania or erotomania, the drive for power or the drive for pleasure, the clenched fist or the phallus, Hitler or Hugh Hefner.

Malcolm Muggeridge,  A Third Testament.  Cited by Ravi Zacharias in "The Real Face of Atheism," p.32

Eroticized Children

Eroticized media in our homes, in schools and on the Internet produce eroticized children in our homes and our schools.  Eroticized children are, by definition, damaged children.   They are vulnerable prey for any and all predators.  They are also often tomorrow's predatory adults.

Judith A. Reisman, Ph.D, "Kinsey: Crimes & Consequences," p.175

Fix Emotional Pain by Fixing the Heart

Rather than seeking to deaden, ignore, or elevate the importance of our emotions, we should allow them to speak to us about our hearts.  Because God gave us the ability to experience emotions, we want to be very cautious about ignoring what they may be telling us.  We want to carefully consider whether dampening the awareness of our feelings through the use of medication (or alcohol) is the best road for us to take to better health.

Medicines or alcohol may make us feel better for a time, even if our "heart problem" is not addressed.  For example, we know that morphine dulls the pain of a broken arm.  It does not heal or reset the bone, and it does not fix the root cause of the pain.  The same is true about medicines and emotional pain.  In order to resolve such pain, we need to deal not with the symptoms, but the root cause of the pain.


Elyse Fitzpatrick & Laura Hendrickson, M.D., "Will Medicine Stop the Pain?", p.32

The Complementarity of Sex

Heterosexual intercourse is much more than a union of bodies; it is a blending of complementary personalities through which, in the midst of prevailing alienation, the rich created oneness of human being is experienced again.  And the complementarity of male and female sexual organs is only a symbol at the physical level of a much deeper spiritual complementarity.  

John Stott, Same-Sex Partnerships?: A Christian Perspective, p.35

Marriage vs Cohabitation

Even if couples consider themselves essentially "married" while still cohabiting, they know that without a marriage license and wedding rings, they are freer to exit the relationship at any time.  And this lack of security is there in the minds of each partner.  It affects how they deal with each other.

Glenn T. Stanton, The Ring Makes All the Difference, p.41

Diversity Stats Are Nonsense

Some people see discrimination when schools punish black students more often than white students. But schools punish white students more often than Asian students. Lenders turn down black applicants for loans more often than white applicants -- but they turn down whites more often than Asians. Most statistics on such things omit Asians, rather than spoil a politically correct story.

Thomas Sowell, Random Thoughts, Townhall 1/27/15

Public Education Is Propaganda

Somewhere Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes says that the purpose of an education should be to produce a mind that cannot be humbugged. But today our educational system, from kindergarten to the universities, is engaged in the mass production of fashionable humbug -- propaganda rather than education.

Thomas Sowell, Random Thoughts, Townhall 1/27/15

Public Schools Are For Union Members

So long as public schools are treated as places that exist to provide guaranteed jobs to members of the teachers' unions, do not be surprised to see American students continuing to score lower on international tests than students in countries that spend a lot less per pupil than we do.

Thomas Sowell, Random Things, Townhall 1/27/15

Praise Must Be Earned

A child who learns to read, who can do mathematics, who can play the piano or baseball will have a true sense of accomplishment and an appropriate sense of self-esteem.  Schools that fail tot teach reading, writing, and arithmetic corrupt the proper understanding of self-esteem.  Educators who say “Don’t grade them, don’t label them.  You have to make them feel good about themselves” cause the problems.  It makes no sense for students to be full of self-esteem if they are empty of knowledge.  Reality will soon puncture their illusions, and they will have to face two disturbing facts: (1) that they are ignorant, and (2) that the adults responsible for teaching them have both failed them and lied to them.  In the real world, praise has to be the reward for something worthwhile; praise must be connected to reality.

Paul C. Vitz, "Psychology As Religion: The Cult of Self-Worship," p.18

It Will Be Done In Politics - Even if Insane

In politics, never assume that because something is insane, it will not be done. The Holocaust was as insane as it was a moral horror. But it was done. Even after the tide of war turned against Germany and it faced invasion and devastation, Hitler continued to pour scarce resources into the mass killing of people who were no threat.

Thomas Sowell, Random Thoughts, Townhall 1/27/15

Abortion Is Never Safe

For pregnant women, abortion is four times deadlier that childbirth, and often results in infertility and breast cancer -- commonly referred to as the "ABC link."  Eleven of 12 studies of American women reported an increased risk of breast cancer after having an induced abortion.

Gregg Jackson, Conservative Comebacks to Liberal Lies, p.4

Evolution is a Bad Philosophy

If the unimpeded progress of evolution were our chief concern, why should we care for the senile, the imbecile, the hardened criminal, the psychopath, the chronically sick, or the starving?  Would it not be more prudent to put them to sleep like a well-loved dog, lest they hinder the evolutionary process?  Compulsory euthanasia, not compassionate service, would be the logical deduction from the humanists' premise.  The fact that they draw back from this abyss indicates that their heart is better than their head, and their philanthropy than their philosophy.

John Stott, Decisive Issues Facing Christians Today, p.18

Why Mock Virtue?

When did we decide to be the kind of society that mocks virtue? When did we turn into the pudgy, freckle faced bully in all of the 90′s teen sitcoms who points and laughs at the studious kid just because he’s well behaved and does his homework? Maybe it’s always been this way. I don’t know. What I do know is that, these days, we are lost. It’s not that we do terrible things (although we do), it’s that we either don’t know or pretend we don’t know what we should be doing.

We run around like decapitated poultry, colliding with each other and bumping into walls. And when someone with their head on straight, or with their head on at all, suggests a clear direction, a course of action, or a change of behavior, we descend upon them like crazed hyenas. When someone simply says, “hey, that there is not good, but this here is good, so we should probably do this rather than that,” we pounce on them and rip their guts out, then hang their entrails from a bridge as a warning to anyone else who might get a little bold one day and think about developing a moral compass.

Matt Walsh, “Hey, Look! That Woman Is Trying to Be Modest! Let’s All Laugh at Her and Call Her Names!”

What Is Psychotherapy?

Modern psychotherapy is simply the attempt to do face-to-face pastoral work in service to different gods (e.g., self, feelings, desires of the body or mind, pleasure), different ideals (e.g., the "good life," wealth, entitlement), different diagnosis (e.g., addiction, dependency, poor self-esteem), and a different gospel (e.g., man is the center of all things, "I deserve it").

David Powlison, "Faith's Psychology & The Psychological Faiths," Christian Research Journal, Vol. 28/No.3, 2005

The Benefits of Faithful Marriage

In concurrence with the Bible, a growing number of secular theorists are also celebrating the wisdom of monogamous commitment.  Studies show that it enhances the life span of men and women who practice it and that the quality of life improves in proportion to the practice of fidelity.  Drug and alcohol abuse dropped significantly among married test subjects in a University of Chicago study, and monogamous individuals made more money, had twice as much sex as their non-monogamous counterparts, and experienced half the domestic violence of those studied who either lived together unmarried or lived alone.

Joe Dallas, "Darkening Our Minds," Christian Research Journal, Vol.27/No.3, 2004

Sex is Not an Idol

Human existence is not, first and foremost, about sexual pleasure and the display of sexuality.  There is much more to human life, fulfillment, and joy.  Sex simply cannot deliver the promises made by our hypersexualized society.

R. Albert Mohler, Jr., Desire and Deceit: The Real Cost of Sexual Tolerance, p.xii

Be Careful of Thoughts

Sow a thought, reap an action; sow an action, reap a habit; sow a habit, reap a character; sow a character, reap a destiny.


Source unknown; cited by Donald E. Wildmon in "The Case Against Pornography," p.141

The Truth About IQ Tests

Specious intelligence tests, colloquially known as IQ tests, were invented to justify incarceration of group labeled "feebleminded."  Often the so-called feebleminded were just shy, too good-natured to be taken seriously, or simply spoke the wrong language or were the wrong color.

Edwin Black, "War Against the Weak: Eugenics and America's Campaign to Create a Master Race," p.xv

Be Careful When You Say "I Love You"

My father counseled his four sons never to say "I love you" to a woman until they were ready to follow immediately with "Will you marry me?"  Nor should they think of saying "Will you marry me?" unless they had first said "I love you."  How much pain and confusion would be averted if men followed that rule.

Elisabeth Elliot, Passion and Purity, p.93

Individuals Make A Nation

There is surely nothing which is quite so illuminating and contradictory as the way in which people think along one line when they are thinking of nations and along a quite different line when they are thinking of individuals.  There is little point in talking eloquently about the sanctity of international contracts while you are dealing with people who break their own marriage contracts and other personal contracts, for nations consist of individuals.  The nation is not something abstract, and we are not entitled to expect conduct from a nation which we do not find in the individual.  All these things have to be taken together.

D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, God’s Way of Reconciliation: An Exposition of Ephesians 2, p.61

Disease Mongering

The business model of the pharmaceutical industry depends on extending the realm of illness -- using creative marketing to expand the pool of customers by convincing the probably well that they are at least mildly sick.  Disease mongering is the fine art of selling psychiatric ills as the most efficient way of peddling very profitable psychiatric pills.  Manipulating the market is particularly easy in the United States because we are the only country in the entire world that allows drug companies the freedom to advertise directly to consumers.

Disease mongering cannot occur in a vacuum -- it requires that the drug companies engage the active collaboration of the doctors who write the prescriptions, the patients who ask for them, the researchers who invent the new mental disorders, the consumer groups that advocate for more treatment, and the media and Internet that spread the word.  A persistent, pervasive, and well-financed "disease awareness" campaign can create disease where none existed before.  And psychiatry is especially vulnerable to manipulation of the normal/disease boundary because it lacks biological tests and relies heavily on subjective judgments that can be easily influenced by clever marketing.


Allen Frances, M.D, "Saving Normal," pp.28-29

Homosexual Hypocrisy

“Marriage equality” is their hypocritical rallying cry. But the cat has been out of the bag for a long time, and everyone is fast beginning to realize that this is the most ridiculous thing they’ve ever heard. It’s nothing more than a godless demand for unrestricted debauchery. What they really want is not equality, but absolute cultural dominance. Their unmasked agenda involves the implementation of an oppressive double standard in which their “gay” Special Rights invariably squash our all-important Civil Rights. It’s the “gay” way or the highway.

The institution of marriage is the inimitable edifice and social load bearing wall upon which any free nation and stable civil government must certainly be established. However, in their anti-Christ crusade to destroy, devalue and desecrate the foundational structure of the family, the homosexual juggernaut is rapidly augmenting their Leftist arsenal through a menacing cache of lawless judicial rulings and the ostensibly named anti-discrimination ordinances. Through these and other Statist strong-arm tactics, their wrecking ball strategy has succeeded by compelling silence, intimidating dissent and purging the country of every voice of reason. The very rights they claim to be fighting for are ironically the exact same legal protections that they ruthlessly strive to strip away from the people of faith and decency – or anyone else who might dare to disagree with the endorsement of their lascivious lifestyle. The Baal of homosexuality is a viscerally hateful and jealous god.

The militant homosexual efforts have alarmingly functioned as the caustic social acid that eats away and erodes every constitutionally-protected freedom we have ever held near and dear to our hearts. The pro-deviancy advocates claim to merely carry the mantle of freedom, but in their wake, they leave the republic ravaged and in ruins. If they have their way, the landscape of liberty will be left desolate. Satan’s compliant foot soldiers for the cause of counterfeit marriage will never stop sadistically trampling the principles of self-governance, the First Amendment and the will of the people under their feet.

Jeff Allen, The Hostile World of Homosexual Hypocrisy

"Homosexual" Couples Cannot Properly Parent

Psychologist Dean Bryd, vice president for the National Association for the Research and Treatment of Homosexuality, shares this concern:  "Studies demonstrate there is, in fact, a difference between non-heterosexual and heterosexual parenting.  Children raised by non-heterosexuals are more apt to experience gender and sexual confusion, they are more apt to become promiscuous, they are at greater risk of substance abuse or suicide."

Researcher Barbara Eisold conducted such a study and came to similar conclusions in her report "Recreating Mother," in which she asserts the need for a mother. ...

Researcher Harry Biller draws similar conclusions while studying infants raised by a lesbian couple without fathers:  "Differences between mother and father can be very stimulating to the infant -- the infant who receives verbal as well as physical stimulation from both mother and father profits from the experience.  Infants with involved fathers were usually at a developmental advantage.  Well fathered infants are more secure and trusting in branching out in their explorations."

... Children raised in a stable heterosexual home fare better than those raised by a homosexual couple, no matter how stable.  The difference between the two homes lies not so much in the nature or personality of the parents but in the contrast of gender, which is built into heterosexuality and which homosexuality, by its nature, must lack.  The male-female complement, a critical part of Created Intent, is praised in the Bible and confirmed in secular observations.  No matter how healthy, likable, or sincere a homosexual couple may be, they cannot offer a child a part of what is in that child's best interest: a father and a mother.


Joe Dallas, "What About Rosie?", Christian Research Journal, Vol.25 / No.1, 2002, "Practical Apologetics"

There Is No Such Thing as a "Homosexual"

If we use the false definition [of "homosexual'], where does one draw the line?  Are you a homosexual because you have a homosexual thought for one moment in time?  If not for one moment, then how long?  A season?  A lifetime?  Is a man or woman a homosexual who engages in one act of homosexual behavior or a series of encounters or relationships?  Are those who engage in exclusive homosexual practice for a lifetime the only "true" homosexuals?  Often we have stumbled in our efforts to share the truth of freedom in Christ because we were wrestling with opponents over what makes a person a homosexual.  Since there is really no such thing as a "homosexual," then we are chasing a mirage, a cloud, something we will never be able to grasp.

Already in the first moments of our battle with proponents of "homosexuality equals identity," we give ground by using their terminology; and we lose more ground as we seek to put forward a solution based on the terminology of their lie.  The truth is there are no homosexuals. ...

The Devil, working behind the scenes, has succeeded in redefining the meaning of key words, and therefore we only reinforce and strengthen a false identity by calling individuals by a name that does not apply.  Homosexuality involves feelings, attractions, and sexual behavior; it can be a mindset, and it can include cultural associations.  From these factors, one can embrace it as a personal identity.  People investing their lives into this kind of identity can expend so much of themselves that to think of leaving that identity can be quite threatening and very difficult even to discuss. ...

Truth One:  There is no such creation as a "gay" or "homosexual" person.  There is only homosexual attraction and behavior; accordingly, there can be no "change" from a sexual identity that never existed in the first place.


Rev. John J. Smid, "You Can't Change a Homosexual," Christian Research Journal, Vol.24 /No.2, 2002, "Viewpoint."

Psychotherapy and Prostitution

Psychotherapy, the world's second oldest profession, is remarkably similar to the first.  Both involve a contract (implicit or explicit) between a specialist and a client for a service, and for this service a fee is paid.  The expectations of the client and the personality characteristics of the specialist are important in determining the success of the transaction.  Both professions claim that their specific techniques are crucial, though evidence suggests that underlying nonspecific factors may really be the important determinants of a successful outcome.  One makes the mind feel better, the other makes the body feel better.  Both, furthermore, are difficult to study, for they are essentially human transactions.  When they are taken apart on the dissecting table, a part of the interaction ceases to exist.


E. Fuller Torrey, M.D., Witchdoctors and Psychiatrists: The Common Roots of Psychotherapy and Its Future, p.1

Education is the Great Equalizer

The great equalizer in America remains education. A good education or the acquisition of technical skills provides tremendous options for everyone, regardless of their birth circumstances. We live in a country where people are free to move without penalty to any state where jobs are available. We need to emphasize the fact that almost any kind of employment confers knowledge and skills that become valuable when trying to move up the economic ladder.

Dr. Ben Carson, Dispelling the Myth of Haves and Have-Nots in America

Class Resentment?

Obviously, the billionaire can afford to pay for certain things like luxurious homes and cars and the best seats on airplanes and at the theater. There is nothing wrong with that. It should not cause resentment in a society in which anyone is free to work hard and use their God-given talents to excel and increase their own value in the marketplace.  Some will not admit it, but our society would be pretty dreary if everyone shared the same level of poverty with no chance of advancing themselves economically through their own efforts.

Dr. Ben Carson, Dispelling the Myth of Haves and Have-Nots in America

America Really Is Great

The U.S Constitution was designed to preserve the freedom and rights of all citizens. Our Declaration of Independence states that all men are created equal and that we have certain God-given rights. With documents like these, how have we arrived at the state of such discord between purported haves and have-nots in our society?

Some will try, of course, to discount any discussion of this topic by talking about the treatment of slaves, indentured servants, Native Americans and others who historically were not treated well. I am willing to acknowledge that the same human frailties that characterized societies throughout the world found their way into America, but it is unfair to demonize a nation and its many constituents based on the shortcomings of some of its members. Those who condemn America for its past seldom talk about the tremendous good and generosity that have been demonstrated by the country that cannot be denied the title of most benign pinnacle nation in the history of the world.


Dr. Ben Carson, Dispelling the Myth of Haves and Have-Nots in America

Dangerous Sex

Aside from any religious or theological considerations, homosexual acts are unnatural from a medical standpoint.  Physicians can attest to some horror stories of what physically happens, especially to men, from such activities.  The human anatomy is such that it is apparent what role and function each part of the body plays.  Men engaged in homosexual acts suffer various serious physical side effects and debilitating diseases and injuries.  If those acts were natural, it follows that such harmful effects and diseases would not take place.  The bodily canal designed to evacuate some of the body's worst filth and toxins is hardly inviting to normal people.  Penetrating an orifice fashioned to evacuate the waste and toxins of another person rises to the level of abnormality for nonreligious as well as for religious people.  Even nonsectarian scientists form similar opinions about certain acts, depending on the harm the body suffers.

Helen Louise Herndon, "If Gays March on Rome, Why Not Mecca Too?"  "Viewpoint," Christian Research Journal, Vol.23/No.3, 2001

Darwinists Suppress Dissent

Defenders of evolution used to style themselves the champions of free speech and academic freedom against unthinking dogmatism.  But they have become the new dogmatists, demanding judicially imposed censorship and discrimination against the teachers, scientists, and students who dissent from Darwin.  These are tactics of intellectual suppression, not free inquiry, and they betray the Darwinists' insecurity about the defensibility of their own theory.


John G. West, "Darwin Day in America: How our politics and culture have been dehumanized in the name of science," p.267

Lifting and Leaning

There are two kinds of people on earth today, 
Just two kinds of people, no more, I say.

Not the good and the bad, for ’tis well understood
The good are half bad and the bad are half good.

Not the happy and sad, for the swift-flying years
Bring each man his laughter and each man his tears.

Not the rich and the poor, for to count a man’s wealth
You must first know the state of his conscience and health.

Not the humble and proud, for in life’s busy span
Who puts on vain airs is not counted a man.

Wherever you go you will find the world’s masses
And ever divided in just these two classes.

And, strangely enough, you will find, too, I ween,
There is only one lifter to twenty who lean.

In which class are you?  Are you easing the load
Of overtaxed lifters who toil down the road?

Or are you a leaner who lets others bear
Your portion of worry and labor and care?

Ella Wheeler Wilcox
From "The Best Loved Poems of the American People."

Are We Human Cattle?

Leftists and the Black Community

When the political left wants to help the black community, they usually want to help the worst elements in that community -- thugs they portray as martyrs, for example -- without the slightest regard for the negative effect this can have on the lives of the majority of decent black people.

Thomas Sowell, Random Thoughts, 12/30/14

Parasites as Victims

There are few modest talents so richly rewarded -- especially in politics and the media -- as the ability to portray parasites as victims, and portray demands for preferential treatment as struggles for equal rights.

Thomas Sowell, Random  Thoughts, 12/30/14

Achievement or Privilege?

Our schools and colleges are laying a guilt trip on those young people whose parents are productive, and who are raising them to become productive. What is amazing is how easily this has been done, largely just by replacing the word "achievement" with the word “privilege."

Thomas Sowell, Random Thoughts, 12/30/14

Achievement Differences?

Explaining differences in achievements between groups often pits those who attribute these differences to ability against those who attribute differences to barriers. Neither seems to pay much attention to differences in what people want to do. Few guys from my old neighborhood were likely to end up as violinists or ballet dancers, simply because that was not what they were interested in.

Thomas Sowell, Random Thoughts, 12/30/14

Freudian Child Care Crime

Most of the damage we have seen in child rearing is the fault of the Freudian and neo-Freudians who have dominated the field.  They have frightened parents and kept the truth from them.  In child care I would say that Freudianism has been the psychological crime of the century.


Dr. Louise B. Ames, Co-Director of the Gesell Institute of Child Development.  Cited by E. Fuller Torrey, M.D., in "Freudian Fraud: the Malignant Effect of Freud's Theory on American Thought and Culture," p.128

Without God There is No Basis for Society

As belief in God has been abandoned, people have questioned the basis of the society in which they live.  For instance, if there is no God, then why should they obey the Ten Commandments?  Why should anyone say that homosexuality is wrong?  Why should not women be allowed to have abortions whenever they desire?  Once people eliminated God from their consciences, they set about to change any laws based on Christian absolutes that held God as Creator (and thus Owner) of everything.

Christian absolutes have been diluted or removed as the basis of society and replaced with a world view that says, "We do not have to accept that the Christian way of doing things (basing our world and live view on Biblical principles) is the only way; we must tolerate all religious beliefs and ways of life."  However, this "tolerance" really means an intolerance of the absolutes of Christianity.  This false idea of tolerance has subtly undermined Christianity, and most Christians have not recognized what was really happening.  Many Christians have been deceived into believing they have not right to impose their views on society.  We are told, for instance, that anti-abortionists have no business impressing their particular bias on society.  Have you ever heard anyone say this about the pro-abortion groups?  The result is one bias being imposed on society by the pro-abortionists -- legalized abortion on demand!  No matter what you do, you cannot avoid the fact that a view is being imposed on someone by someone.  There is no such thing as neutrality, although many Christians become ensnared in the trap of believing there is.


Ken Ham, "The Lie," p.3

Government Should Not Support the People

I feel obliged to withhold my approval of the plan, as proposed by this bill, to indulge a benevolent and charitable sentiment through the appropriation of public funds for that purpose.  I can find no warrant for such an appropriation in the Constitution, and I do not believe that the power and duty of the General Government ought to be extended to the relief of individual suffering which is in no manner properly related to the public service or benefit.  A prevalent tendency to disregard the limited mission of this power and duty should, I think, be steadfastly resisted, to the end that the lesson should be constantly enforced that though the people support the Government the Government should not support the people.

The friendliness and charity of our countrymen can always be relied upon to relieve their fellow-citizens in misfortune.  This has been repeatedly and quite lately demonstrated.  Federal aid in such cases encourages the expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character, while it prevents the indulgence among our people of that kindly sentiment and conduct which strengthens the bonds of a common brotherhood.


President Grover Cleveland, 1887, in response to a bill appropriating money to Texas farmers suffering a catastrophic drought.  Cited by Glenn Beck in "Arguing With Idiots," p.6-7

This Says It All

Diversity?

In academic circles, the equally vast generality is "diversity," which often stands for a quite narrow social agenda, as if those who reiterate the word "diversity" endlessly had no idea that diversity is itself diverse and has many dimensions besides the one with which they are preoccupied.  Advocates of diversity in a race or gender sense are often quite hostile to ideological diversity, when it includes traditional or "conservative" values and beliefs."

Thomas Sowell, "The Vision of the Anointed," p.20

With the LEFT, There is No Personal Responsibility

What is the position of the Left?  Absolutely predictable.  Evil is found in this world, but never because any people elected to commit evil.  Evil is always the result of outside forces making people do things.  Would you accept this from your children?  Would you excuse little Tommy when he kicks his sister in the stomach and tells us that a bad dream made him do it? . . . Yet secular liberalism offers us an unbelievable proliferation of mental and social disorders to explain how factors other than free moral choice make people act the way they do.  There is even a frantic attempt to find a genetic component for infidelity.  All right, even if men are genetically programmed to be unfaithful, we still have the choice to follow that instinct or to refrain.  Instincts are determining factors in animals, not in people.  If God said, "Personal accountability," the Left has to say, "No personal accountability."  Enormous social dislocation inevitably results from such a seemingly small decision.


Rabbi Daniel Lapin, "America's Real War," p.64-65

Evolutionism Kills Law and Order

Why have law and order deteriorated so rapidly in the United States?  Simply because for many years it has been commonly taught that life is a random, accidental phenomenon with no meaning except the purely materialistic one.  Laws are merely a matter of human expediency.  Since humans are allegedly accidents, so are their laws.


A.E. Wilder-Smith, The Creation of Life, p.ix. cited by David A. Noebel, Understanding the Times, p.545

"Adolescence" Is Made-up Ideology

HT to J.L. Pattison

A Right Question

One of the right questions to ask is why the scientific and educational authorities are so fearful of what may happen if the public is encouraged to learn to distinguish between the data or testable hypotheses of science on the one hand, and religious or philosophical ideas for which scientific authority is claimed on the other.


Phillip E. Johnson, The Right Questions: Truth, Meaning & Public Debate, p.70

Pro-Choice?

The truth is that from its very inception, Planned Parenthood has sought mandatory population control measures -- measures carefully designed to deny the freedom to choose.  Over the years it has proposed that our government implement such things as "compulsory abortion for out-of-wedlock pregnancies," federal entitlement "payments to encourage abortion," "compulsory sterilization for those who have already had two children," and "tax penalties" for existing large families.


George Grant, "Grand Illusions: The Legacy of Planned Parenthood," p.25

The Road to Eugenics

What was it about Darwinian theory that produced a change in thinking about the value of human life?  First, Darwinism implied that humans arose from animals, and many interpreted this to mean that humans did not have the special position accord them in Judeo-Christian thought.  Instead of being made in the image of God and falling from a pristine state of perfection, humans ascended from some kind of simian.  In explaining the evolution of human mental and moral traits from animals, Darwin and most Darwinists denied the existence of an immaterial and immortal soul, a central tenet of the Judeo-Christian worldview that undergirded the sanctity of human life.  Second, Darwinism emphasized variation within species, which implied biological inequality.  Applying this to humans, many biologists, anthropologists, and social thinkers used Darwinism to justify social and racial inequality.  Third, natural selection and the struggle for existence in Darwin’s theory — based on Malthus’s population principle — also implied that death without reproductive success is the norm in the organic world, and that the death of multitudes of “less fit” organisms is beneficial and fosters progress.  Death had previously been viewed by most Europeans as an evil to overcome, not a beneficial force.  But Darwin perceived some good in this evil.  In concluding The Origin of Species he wrote, “Thus, from the war of nature, from famine and death, the most exalted object which we are capable of conceiving, namely, the production of the higher animals, directly follows.”  Darwin’s theory was thus not just about biological change; it was a matter of life and death.

Richard Weikart, From Darwin to Hitler, p.16-17

A Nation of Soulless People Will Not Survive

Remember: the most perfect machinery of government will not keep us as a nation from destruction if there is not within us a soul. No abounding material prosperity shall avail us if our spiritual senses atrophy. Walk humbly; you will do so if you study the life and teachings of the Savior, walking in His steps.

Theodore Roosevelt, inscription on the cover of New Testaments given to soldiers preparing to set sail during World War I.

Law As An Instrument of Plunder

You say: "There are persons who have no money," and you turn to the law.  But the law is not a breast that fills itself with milk.  Nor are the lacteal veins of the law supplied with milk from a source outside the society.  Nothing can enter the public treasury for the benefit of one citizen or one class unless other citizens and other classes have been forced to send it in.  If every person draws from the treasury the amount that he has put in it, it is true that the law then plunders nobody.  But this procedure does nothing for the persons who have no money.  It does not promote equality of income. The law can be an instrument of equalization only as it takes from some persons and gives to other persons.  When the law does this, it is an instrument of plunder.

Frederic Bastiat, The Law, (1859).  Cited by Brannon Howse in Grave Influence: 21 Radicals and Their Worldviews that Rule American From the Grave, p.279.

The Playpens of Scientists

Scientists are not content with running their own playpens in accordance with what they regard as the rules of the scientific method, they want to universalize those rules, they want them to become part of society at large, and they use every means at their disposal -- argument, propaganda, pressure tactics, intimidation, lobbying -- to achieve their aims.


Paul Feyerabend, as cited by Phillip E. Johnson, "Objections Sustained," p.66

Morality by Culture?

To improve a society's moral code means that the society changes its laws and values to more closely approximate an external moral ideal.  If no such standard exists, if cultural values are the highest possible law, then there is no way for those standards to be better than what they are at any given moment.  They can only be different.

Francis J. Beckwith and Gregory Koukl, “Relativism: Feet Firmly Planted in Mid-Air,” p.53

Unconstrained Sexuality

At the cultural level one of the most revealing indexes of a civilization is the way it orders human sexuality.

When left to itself, human sexuality appears unconstrained and to the innocent mind shockingly polymorphous.  But the hallmark of a society in which all sexual constraints have been set aside is that finally it sanctions homosexuality as well.  This point is hotly disputed today, but is reflected in the wisdom of the ages.  Plutarch, the first-century Greek moralist, saw libertinism to be the third and next-to-last stage in the life-cycle of a free republic before its final descent into tyranny.  Edward Gibbon in eighteenth-century England understood this principle with respect to ancient Rome, but from a historian’s perspective.  Sigmund Freud emphasized the same principle with respect to many cultures in the West — although from a radically secular psychoanalytic perspective.  For him, universal sexual repression was the price of civilization.  Without constraints, civilization would lose its discipline and vitality.  And, of course, the Bible repeatedly shows the effects of unconstrained sexuality, such as its stories of the rise and fall of Sodom, Gomorrah, and indeed Israel itself. …

In sum, it is a simple and sobering fact that no society that has sanctioned unconstrained sexuality has long survived.


Jeffrey Satinover, M.D., Homosexuality and the Politics of Truth, p.17-18

Sex Indoctrination

Sex Education does not seem to be helping.  In the journal Pediatrics, Dr. James Stout and Dr. Frederick Rivera of the University of Washington and Children’s Hospital and Medical Center, Seattle, reviewed studies of the effects of sex education on teenage sexual behavior. . ..   They concluded that “sex education programs in junior and senior high schools have little or no effect either positively or negatively on altering the age of onset or frequency of adolescent sexual activity, on increasing contraceptive use, or on preventing unplanned teenage pregnancy.”  They noted that “a classroom course alone cannot be expected to change sexual behavior in a direction that is in opposition to the adolescent’s sexual world as molded by the television, motion picture, music and advertising industries, as well as peer group and adult role models.”  Besides…some classroom courses seem designed to increase teenage sexual activity.

Dr. Judith A. Reisman & Edward W. Eichel, Kinsey, Sex and Fraud: The Indoctrination of a People, p.89

Psychology is Wrecking Society

Psychology presents itself as a concerned and caring profession working for the good of its clients.  But behind the benevolent facade is a voracious, self-serving industry that proffers “facts” which are often unfounded, provides “therapy” which can be damaging, and exerts influence, which is having devastating effects on the social fabric.  The foundation of psychology, its critical thinking, if not an illusion from its inception, had by the end of the 20th century been abandoned in favor of power and profit, leaving only the guise of integrity, a show of arrogance and a well-tuned attention to the bottom line.

Dr. Tana Dineen, Manufacturing Victims: What the Psychology Industry is Doing to People, p.15

Take Responsibility

Then there are the people making minimum wage who want more money, but don’t want to earn it. Rather than building their skills so they can be promoted or moving on to a better job, their solution is to ask the government to force their employers to pay them more than they’re worth. Why should someone who can be replaced by a 16 year old with two weeks of training get $15 an hour for his work? If you’re dirt poor and you don’t want to do what it takes to earn more money, then you deserve to stay poor – and no matter what the government does, you will probably get exactly what you deserve.

John Hawkins, “Your Screwed Up Life Is Your Own Responsibility.”

An Irresponsible Nation

We seem to be moving steadily in the direction of a society where no one is responsible for what he himself did,but we are all responsible for what somebody else did, either in the present or in the past.

Thomas Sowell, cited by John Hawkins, “Your Screwed Up Life Is Your Own Responsibility.”

God is Truth

Since God is truth, a contempt for truth is equally a contempt for God.

Gordon H. Clark, A Christian Philosophy of Education, p.158

No God = Man Is Beast

It is said that after God died in the nineteenth century, man died in the twentieth.  For when God is dead, man becomes an untamed beast.

Erwin W. Lutzer, When A Nation Forgets God, p.10

Teach A True View of Human Sexuality

Is it possible to teach an acceptable view of human sexuality in a value-free, nonjudgmental context?  A true view of human sexuality, unlike a true view of mathematics, physics, or English grammar, cannot be achieved apart from a biblical view of human sexuality.  Sex without love, without permanent commitment in a monogamous marriage, is not the same as sex without these crucial elements.  In fact, to teach sex without the elements of the primary purpose of oneness is not merely an inadequate treatment of the whole subject, it is inherently subversive of the real thing.

Robertson McQuilkin, An Introduction to Biblical Ethics, p.227

Origin of Anti-Capitalism?

President Lyndon B. Johnson launched the "War on Poverty" in his State of the Union address on January 8, 1964.  Although well intended -- after all, we would like to eliminate poverty -- this would have a detrimental impact in several areas over time.  Churches and charitable organizations would play less of a role in assisting the poor not only in supplying food, clothes, and other needs, but also in guiding them to take personal responsibility and training them to provide for themselves.  As a result, the spiritual guidance, which previously came from those organizations, was eliminated in the life of the community.  As the Federal Government programs grew and rewarded bad behavior and irresponsibility, poorer communities began realizing they received more benefits by having more children out of wedlock.  Therefore, there was greater dependence on an increasingly Socialist government that worked at eroding Judeo/Christian morals and ethics and replacing them with new ethics -- the new ethics of self.  Hard work, taking risks, entrepreneurship, and business success came to be viewed as evil, and Capitalism was made the "boogey man" and cause of all the world's ills.

 L.L. (Don) Veinot, Jr, "The End of Comfortable Christianity?" Midwest Christian Outreach Journal, Summer-Fall 2014.

Sex Education Agenda

In the words of an article in the Journal of School Health, sex education presents "an exciting opportunity to develop new norms."  Only in light of this agenda does it make sense that so-called "sex education" should be advocated to take place throughout the school years -- from kindergarten to college -- when it could not possibly take that much time to teach basic biological or medical information about sex.  What takes that long is a constant indoctrination in new attitudes.

Thomas Sowell, "The Vision of the Anointed," p.20

Rejecting God Rejects the Family

The same people who proudly converted the world’s finest education system into a degenerate joke also mock the traditional family.  This fits my hypothesis rather well since hierarchy is also one of the organizing principles of the family.  If you reject God, you must reject the principle of hierarchy, which means you must reject classical family life.  How backward, sexist, and repugnant for the husband to act as spiritual leader of the home!  And how old-fashioned for parents to discipline their children, whose aberrant behavior may have been considered wrong in the 1950s but today is regarded simply as a healthy expression of selfhood.

Rabbi Daniel Lapin, "America's Real War," p.62-63

Threats to Ruling Paradigms

When one scientific theory is enshrined as the reigning paradigm, dissenting views are often silenced for reasons other than lack of evidence.  Dissenting views represent a threat to the ruling paradigm, and so those who have earned power and prestige from advancing it are loath to let their authority be eroded.  For this and other reasons, scientists who have spent their lives working within one paradigm may have a difficult time acknowledging problems within that paradigm no matter how much contrary evidence accumulates.

John G. West, "Darwin Day in America: How our politics and culture have been dehumanized in the name of science," p.241

A Society Which Won't Confront Evil

A society that continues to redefine deviance as disease, or refuses to acknowledge and negatively sanction the deviant acts our common sense tells us are destructive, is a society that has lost the capacity to confront evil that has a capacity to dehumanize us all.


Anne Hendershott, The Politics of Deviance, p.158

Sex Standards and Family

A society that denies the reality of total man (body, soul, and spirit) cannot help but undermine the Christian family structure.  Today, our society encourages sexual permissiveness.  Magazines, books, and television programs often stress sex outside of marriage and other deviances from Biblical morality masquerading as “sexual orientation.”  The Christian sociologist, recognizing the threat such deviance poses for the traditional family, calls for a return to sexual sanity in the form of monogamous heterosexual marriage.

Any other sexual relations are damaging to both men and women, and in the long run to the institutions of marriage and the family.  Thus, [1811-1845 SCOTUS Justice] Joseph Story writes, “If marriage be an institution derived from the law of nature, then, whatever has a natural tendency to discourage it, or to destroy its value, is by the same law prohibited.  Hence we may deduce the criminality of fornication, incest, adultery, seduction, and other lewdness. . . . “  For the Christian, any deviance from the model of faithful sexuality in marriage is strictly prohibited.

This includes homosexuality.  [George] Gilder writes, “Because psychologists cannot explain homosexuality, they discuss it in terms of sickness or mystery.  But homosexuality is merely the most vivid and dramatic manifestation of the breakdown of monogamy — and extreme expression of the sexuality of single man.”  Homosexuality is a physically and spiritually unhealthy manifestation of sexuality that corrupts the total man and wears away at monogamous marriage.  The Christian sociologist views homosexuality and all other deviations from faithful monogamous marriage as dangerous to the institutions of family and marriage and, therefore, to society as a whole.

This appears to be a very narrow view of sexuality.  But it is really the only view that respects the individual.

David A. Noebel, Understanding the Times, p.488

No Such Thing As Free Love

For years now we have allowed the media to misrepresent casual sex and free love. Young people have been shown that the cure for everything is to jump into bed.  It doesn't matter if it's morning, afternoon or evening; or on television, in popular music, in movies and videos; sex is proclaimed as a cure-all.  It's a cure for emptiness and loneliness.  It's a cure for lack of significance.  All lies.  Sex is not a cure-all.  There's no such thing as casual sex.  There's no such thing as free love.

Josh McDowell and Dick Day, "Why Wait?" p.43

The Handicap of Victimhood

Intellectuals give people who have the handicap of poverty the further handicap of a sense of victimhood.  They have encouraged the poor to believe that their poverty is caused by the rich — a message which may be a passing annoyance to the rich but a lasting handicap to the poor, who may see less need to make fundamental changes in their own lives that could lift themselves up, instead of focusing their efforts on dragging others down.

Thomas Sowell, Intellectuals and Society, p.544