Government Give and Take

Globalism Is DANGEROUS!

With so many global institutions dominating private life, is it any wonder why so many people now behave as if they should be committed to institutions?  True meaning — the kind formed through personal struggle, adventure, hard work, religion, community, and family — has been replaced with the incremental oppression of international rule-making.  The sanctity of the family home has been bulldozed, so that a global cabal of atheists — whose only real mission is to severely reduce the human population — can poison the natural bonds nurtured between parents and children.  The blessings of marriage have been paved over with such vulgar elevation of sin as to condemn human beings, who would otherwise have been made whole through matrimonial commitment, to lonely lives — bereft of hope and adrift in promiscuous isolation.

  

Culture, marriage, children, and a devotion to God are the bricks that build communities, which in turn fortify nations against the evils propagated by those who lead drab, meaningless lives drenched in self-loathing and hatred for humanity’s existence.  The UN and its sister organizations do one thing well: they vanquish cultural bonds and, by doing so, demolish civilizations.  And with the wreckage that they reap, they extinguish human happiness.

J.B. Shurk, Globalism Is a Disease That Deprives Life of Meaning

The Tyranny of "Mush" Words

This whole article is thought-provoking so I decided it needed to be posted on this blog. Enjoy!

How to Achieve Tyranny With Mush Words, by Steve Rose at American Thinker.

If you want to become a tyrant and transform your fellow citizens into slaves, all you really need are a few good mush words. “Mush words” are words with vague definitions. They’re slippery, hard to pin down, elusive, ultimately unknowable—and, for budding tyrants, extremely useful.

The word “racist,” for example, is a superb mush word. “Sexist” is outstanding as well, as is “(whatever)-aphobe.” Better yet, accuse someone of being full of “hate.”

But how do they work? Why are mush words powerful enough to achieve tyranny?

First, you don’t need to understand why they work, only that they do. It takes no talent or intelligence to just sling these words around and reap the rewards without understanding the dynamics involved. That said, for those who want to dig deeper, here’s a brief summary:

The two keys to good mush words are 1) unknowability and 2) accusation.

Unknowability (#1) is the magic ingredient that gives mush words their mushiness. The essential element is slipperiness. A mush word is like a verbal greased pig, or Proteus, the shapeshifting Greek god who could change forms at will. Vagueness is critical. Clarity is the enemy.

It’s interesting to notice that hardly anyone accuses anyone else of having six fingers or being nine feet tall.

Why is that? Because those can be easily verified. They’re clear, objective, and open to the public. There’s no uncertainty, no controversy—a complete lack of drama. For budding tyrants, they’re useless.

Good mush words, on the other hand, point to things that are impossible to quantify, measure, see, hear, know objectively, or disprove. While nearly everyone can easily verify six fingers or measure height, no one can conclusively “see” that you’re “racist” or harbor “hate” in your heart.

These can be argued about, of course. But arguing requires effort, which creates opportunity. As Bertrand Russell said, “The most savage controversies are those matters as to which there is no good evidence either way.”

Since there’s no objective, public, scientific way to verify mush word accusations one way or another, these areas are beyond the reach of fair-minded, reasonable people. This sets the stage for a confidence game, which allows anyone to bluff their way in. Whoever can pretend to have certainty on the matter wins.

If you can pretend to be certain of something ultimately unknowable, chances are the other person won’t be certain precisely because it is unknowable. It isn’t hard. Just pretend to be psychic and act confident about it. If the other person even seems less confident, the battle is essentially won.

The trick is to weaponize uncertainty.

If it’s done properly, it creates a heads-I-win, tails-you-lose, house-always-wins scenario. If anyone gets close to clarifying things, the mush word changes definitions, escapes into vagueness, and the game can continue.

The best mush words are so slippery they can be applied to practically anything. Math, for example, could be described as racist—or pancake syrup, coffee, golf, sleep, grades, “assault weapons,” or wanting honest elections. It’s the mark of a great mush word: anything and anyone can become “wrong.” To some, this might make the word meaningless. But with proper salesmanship and coercion, it becomes all-powerful.

But that requires the second ingredient.

Accusation (#2) makes mush words truly lethal.

Publicly blaming someone for doing something “wrong” is powerful because we all want to be “right.” (Even the rebellious and humble—both of whom describe themselves as wrong—do that because they think it’s “right” in a bigger sense). The ethical framework involved might be real or imaginary. It doesn’t matter, so long as the target believes it.

Use a mush word to accuse anyone of doing something “wrong,” and they’ll panic and scramble around like terrified children, trying desperately to prove that they aren’t whatever you accuse them of being. They’ll fail, of course—which means they’ve fallen right into your trap.

Take, for example, accusing someone of being “racist” (or whatever-aphobic, hateful, etc.) They’ll likely—and desperately—start naming dear friends and family members of different races. Whatever they do, you can laugh at them and mention how ridiculous—and racist—they look, even in their attempts to deny it. The more they try to escape your spell, the more they’ll often find themselves enmeshed. Informally, they’re guilty until proven innocent unless they can definitively clear their name—which is usually difficult, if not impossible because the burden of proof is on them.

It’s all-powerfully effective and often hilarious to watch.

But is that person actually racist? That brings us right back to slippery definitions (“What is a “racist”?) More importantly, it’s irrelevant. The aim isn’t to discern truth but to eliminate political enemies, create an outlet for real hatred, or cow people into submission.

Once a person has been accused and is squirming, offer a way out. People will often do anything to “prove” that they aren’t whatever you accuse them of being. So, you can point them in any direction, such as telling them to donate money to your pet organization, make public declarations, join a cause, etc. To the degree that your ploy has been effective, you own them, and can point them wherever you want.

Why does this work?

Deep down, many of us carry around a secret sense of guilt or shame, as if we’ve done something wrong in the past (even if we aren’t clear what that was, exactly). That guilt can come to the surface and get activated quite easily. Tyrants exploit this. Those who constantly accuse others of racism have essentially rediscovered “sin” (something Judeo-Christianity and other religions described thousands of years ago, now dressed up to look secular and therefore socially acceptable).

That’s how this con game hijacks human nature. We often don’t know ourselves. Human motives can run deep and are often mysterious. So, when someone loudly accuses us of having a specific motive—especially if they seem confident or have a clever argument to back it up—many of us will collapse into gullible puddles of goo. “That person accused me of being (insert mush word)? Maybe it’s true! I should do some introspecting and try to better myself so I don’t get accused of being (insert mush word here) again.”

The Salem Witch Trials demonstrated this well. The formula was simple. Accuse someone of being a witch. What’s a “witch,” exactly? Nobody knew. (They pretended to know, but their answers were absurdly tragicomic.) Ultimately, “witch” was simply a mush word. Today’s witch trials work the same way.

The process is like casting a magic spell. A dark sorcerer chooses a mush word, picks a target, accuses them of being guilty in some mushy way, and then watches them squirm and scramble. Unless they can break the spell, they’re yours.

So, what breaks this spell?

The game collapses when someone assertively stands up against mush words. If people insist on being judged by clear, objective, publicly available measures—or if they simply know themselves well—then they’ll see through it all. (Or worse, they might go on offense and accuse the accuser of slander). When that happens, the gig is up. The spell will be broken. It’s time to find a new mush word and an easier target and start over.

Luckily, few do this. Laws, cultures, and even entire societies are built around mush words. People are imprisoned, impoverished, and executed based on mush words. The fact that it’s based on a kind of verbal sorcery made up of senseless, hysterical, impossible-to-verify accusations is beside the point. For most humans, mush words rule.

And that’s why they’re so easy to enslave.

Steve Rose is a pseudonym.

True Islam

The media is full of talk of “radical Islamists” or “Islamicists” or “terrorists.” To those who studied Islam and talked to the followers this is all foolish. I call all these people “Muslims.” Why? Because their prophet - Muhammed, who had an entire male population of a Jewish village beheaded, who owned many slaves including what we commonly refer to as sex slaves, who married a six-year-old girl, molested her for three years and then had sexual intercourse with her at 9 and so on.  How do I know this? I know this because of the Muslim “holy  books”— the Quran (recitation), Hadiths (stories about Muhammed and his early followers), and Sir (biographies). I don’t need to make this stuff up, nor am I just throwing rocks. I can still read (barely) and I know what Muslims are called to do—submit to the will of Allah as revealed and exemplified by their prophet Muhammed. Terrorism is just a tool of the true believer. Rape and torture are part of the package of the jihad (war) against the kafir or non-believer in Islam.

Bill Honsberger, Haven Ministries Newsletter, December 2023.

A HUGE Problem with Public School

The purpose of public education has changed over the last 200 years in this country, but, fundamentally, the public school system was meant to come alongside parents and teach young citizens to think critically, solve problems, communicate effectively, express creativity, and pursue truth—all with the ultimate purpose of helping to create well-rounded citizens who could participate in civic life.

This is not what’s happening today. Instead, many public schools have settled for teaching your students what to think, not how to think. In the process, the pursuit of truth is abandoned for an ideology, and any speech against that ideology is stifled.

It is not the public school’s responsibility to teach our children about sex and sexuality. That’s the parents’ responsibility. However, as we’ve handed the education of our kids over to the state, we’re seeing the results. Indoctrination is the right word here. Our public school system has become a way for the government to indoctrinate your children according to a highly divisive view of sex and sexuality. And it is not right.

Jonathan Noyes, Do You Know What Your Child Is Being Taught about Sex?

Don’t Seek Impossible From Politicians

The fact that so many successful politicians are such shameless liars is not only a reflection on them, but it is also a reflection on us. When people want the impossible, only liars can satisfy them, and only in the short run.

Thomas Sowell

Wisdom Is No Longer Valued

In early America, when most people greatly valued wisdom, parents taught it to their children, and schools taught it to their students. Wisdom, as much as faith, was the reason virtually every home and every school, including universities, taught young people the Bible—and the great Greek and Roman thinkers (who, though not believers in the God of the Bible, were neither irreligious nor atheist).

In the modern era, American and other Western children study neither the Bible nor the literature of the great classic minds. The result is more and more well-educated people who are devoid of wisdom. This why universities became centers of foolishness. The great American thinker William F. Buckley famously said, “I should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone directory than in a society governed by the two thousand faculty members of Harvard University.”

Dennis Prager, The Rational Bible, Deuteronomy: God, Blessings, and Curses, pg.81-82

"Ethical Porn" is an Oxymoron

Hypocritical Darwinists

Ironically, in the Scopes trial, Clarence Darrow argued that it would be sheer bigotry to teach only one view of origins—ironic in light of the fact that Darwinists today demand we only teach one view of origins: theirs.

A Matter of Basic Principles: Bill Gothard and His Cultic Teachings, by Don and Joy Veinot and Ron Henzel, p. 38

Being a Mother

When you have a child, you decide to have your heart living a lifetime outside your body.

Unknown

Celebrate the Founding Fathers

Each generation must pass on the appreciation for the wisdom of the U.S. Constitution and the liberties it protects. Today, while too many seek to cancel out Founding Fathers, we celebrate them.

Senator Tim Scott

College Indoctrination of Students

 College, the public knew, has certainly eroded from our cherished idea of a four-year idealized respite from adult employment. It once was intended to be a place where youth learned to be open-minded, tolerant, skilled, and eager to learn the nature and traditions of Western civilization, art, literature, languages, philosophy, and history.

Instead, all too often “college” has now descended into a six-to-seven-year misadventure that nationwide often results in only half those enrolled ever receiving degrees. Nearly all sink deeply in student debt. And yet for all the borrowed tuition money, few prove capable of writing analytically, speaking articulately, or knowing the general referents, past and present, of their very civilization.

Students, especially at the elite campuses, learn to mouth monotonously accusations of “genocide.” “apartheid,” “colonialism,” or “imperialism.” But they lack the ability to define these nouns. As a result, they so often name drop empty slogans in the context of supposed Western sins.

Victor Davis Hanson, Can We Save our Universities?

The USA and Christianity

In 1853, there was an anti-God group who sought to have God removed from government much like we see being pushed today. They wanted references to God removed from government documents, sought to remove chaplains from the military, etc. Their vision was a religiously neutral Government. But the problem with their vision, and with those who espouse similar views today, is that neutrality is a myth, a point which will be addressed below. 

The anti-God proposal was submitted in the U.S. Congress to the House and Senate Judiciary Committees for deliberation. They deliberated for several months and, in 1854, came back with the following report:

"Had the people, during the Revolution, had a suspicion of any attempt to war against Christianity, that Revolution would have been strangled in its cradle. At the time of the adoption of the Constitution and the amendments, the universal sentiment was that Christianity should be encouraged, but not any one sect … In this age, there can be no substitute for Christianity … That was the religion of the founders of the republic, and they expected it to remain the religion of their descendants.” 

Brad Sherman, Iowa State Representative for District 91, The Sherman Liberty Letter 12/19/23

Do Programs Solve Crime?

If crime is a product of poverty and discrimination as they say endlessly, why was there so much less of it when poverty and discrimination were much worse than today? If massive programs are the only hope to reduce violence in the ghetto, why was there so much less violence long before anyone ever thought of these programs?

Thomas Sowell 

Wisdom is Important

A person of average intelligence can have a great deal of wisdom; many do. A person of high intelligence can be a fool; many are. Given how much more important wisdom is than intelligence in leading both a moral and happy life, wisdom is far more important than intelligence. Yet precisely because people so value intelligence, wisdom has become less valued.

Dennis Prager, The Rational Bible, Deuteronomy: God, Blessings, and Curses, pg.81

The Spoiled Child of Liberalism

At the core of liberalism is the spoiled child — miserable, as all spoiled children are, unsatisfied, demanding, ill-disciplined, despotic and useless. Liberalism is a philosophy of sniveling brats.

P.J. O'Rourke

The LEFT Attacks Those Who Disagree

Anyone who studies the history of ideas should notice how much more often people on the political left denigrate and demonize those who disagree with them—instead of answering their arguments.

Thomas Sowell

Marriage

Character and Common Sense are Most Important

[M]any people act as if intelligence is the most important quality in a human being. With regard to children, for example, middle- and upper-middle-class parents usually boast most about their intelligence: how “bright” they are, how well they do in school, and what university they attended. Few parents say to their child, “I care more about your character than about your grades.” Nor do most parents teach their children that clear thinking and common sense are more important than brains.

Dennis Prager, The Rational Bible, Deuteronomy: God, Blessings, and Curses, pg.80.

"Privilege" vs "Underprivileged"??

Unfairly promoting a less talented person over a more talented person because of his respective skin colors is celebrated as a victory for “diversity” — a reminder that in the twenty-first century, racists are still obsessed with how a person looks at the expense of what thoughts occupy his mind.  Without any public debates or votes, governments have replaced “equal treatment under the law” with “equitable” redistribution — or, in layman’s terms, “special treatment under the law” — so that certain classes of people can benefit at the expense of others.  

In an amazing instance of Orwellian “doublespeak,” the State categorizes those classes that are unfairly rewarded as “underprivileged” and the people against whom it discriminates as “privileged.”  Never in human history have people with “privilege” felt so marginalized.  All this cheating is done for the stated purpose of “including” many different kinds of people, but it depends entirely on “excluding” people to obtain fraudulently manufactured and prejudiced results.  

None of this is fair.  Stealing the earned successes of some, so that others may benefit without sacrifice, has a tendency to permanently scar both the victim of the theft and the supposed beneficiary.  When hard work and dedication are spurned, a seed of dejection is planted that can spoil an otherwise promising life.  When unearned rewards become expected entitlements, the enriching pursuit of human excellence withers and often dies.

J.B. Shurk, The Catastrophic Death of Fairness

Transgender is a Fraud

No matter how advanced trans pharmaceuticals and surgeries become, the biological reality of man and woman cannot be abolished; the natural limitations of God’s Creation cannot be transcended. The attempt to do so will elicit the same heartbreak and alienation captured in the final scene of Mary Shelley’s novel: the hulking monster, shunned by society and betrayed by his father, filled with despair and drifting off into the ice floes—a symbol of the consequence of Promethean hubris.

Christopher F. Rufo, Inside the Transgender Empire

Transgender Danger

According to survey data, up to 80 percent of trans individuals suffer from serious psychopathologies and one-quarter of black trans youth attempt suicide each year. “Gender-affirming care” largely fails to solve these problems, yet the doctors use these failures to justify even more extreme interventions up to the final one: genital reconstruction.

Christopher F. Rufo, Inside the Transgender Empire

The Goal of the Transgender Agenda

This is the great project of the transgender movement: to abolish the distinctions of man and woman, to transcend the limitations established by God and nature, and to connect the personal struggle of trans individuals to the political struggle to transform society in a radical way.

Christopher F. Rufo, Inside the Transgender Empire

What Evil Is

There is…a level of cruelty and evil that transcends the word “sin.” All evil is sin, but not all sin merits the word “evil.” Where exactly that line is crossed cannot be defined. But to deny it exists is to declare all sins equal and all sinners evil, which empties the word “evil” of its horror and renders it superfluous.

Dennis Prager, The Rational Bible, Deuteronomy: God, Blessings, and Curses, p.78

How to Have a Healthy & Happy Marriage

A healthy and happy marriage is not about the self. At the heart of the happiest marriages is the principle of selflessness. This means denying yourself for the purpose of serving the other person. It means giving when you’ve already “given.” According to a study in 2006, the most happily married couples are ones who express altruistic love for one another. Altruism is defined by Merriam-Webster as “unselfish regard for or devotion to the welfare of others.” It is the truest form of love — giving without expecting anything in return. 

Abi Dills, The Wonderful Thing About Marriage That ‘Love Is Blind’s’ Stacy Snyder Gets Wrong.

Quit Complaining

There appears to be little correlation between people’s well-being and how much they complain. Many people who live in the freest and most affluent countries—and who themselves are particularly affluent—complain more than their less affluent fellow citizens and more than people living in poor countries. Similarly, it is impossible to gauge from people’s levels of complaint how much they have actually suffered. Many individuals who have suffered terribly almost never complain, and many who have had it comparatively easy constantly complain. 

Dennis Prager, The Rational Bible, Deuteronomy: God, Blessings, and Curses, pg.25

Stick With the Truth

It is of great importance to set a resolution, not to be shaken, never to tell an untruth. There is no vice so mean, so pitiful, so contemptible; and he who permits himself to tell a lie once, finds it much easier to do it a second and a third time, till at length it becomes habitual; he tells lies without attending to it, and truths without the world's believing him.

Thomas Jefferson (1785)

The Problem With Anti-Gun Laws

Laws that forbid the carrying of arms ... disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes... Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than to prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man." 

Cesare Beccaria, The Patriot Post email news, 10/27/23.

What the Culture produces

The combination of secularism, higher education, and affluence seems to produce more people who are afraid of emotional pain, and even of marrying and having children.

Dennis Prager, The Rational Bible, Deuteronomy: God, Blessings, and Curses, pg. 14

Law or Mob?

Do you want to live under the rule of law or under mob rule? Virtually everyone will say that they want to live under the rule of law. But what people say is not nearly as important as what they do. And what far too many people are doing is moving us closer to mob rule.

Thomas Sowell

LEFTIST College and University Destruction of the Culture

Universities…aim to dismantle the status of luminaries who works celebrate traditional values. For example, in 2016, the English department of the University of Pennsylvania removed its long-standing portrait of William Shakespeare, the greatest English-language writer. The reason  was that Shakespeare was white, European, male, and presumably heterosexual. The portrait was replaced by that of a black lesbian poet (Audre Lorde), who replaced Shakespeare because she was not white, not male, and not heterosexual. In the secular university, considerations of race, gender, and class have replaced considerations of artistic and intellectual excellence.

Education uncoupled from God becomes a false—and therefore dangerous—god. Western universities were founded to pursue truth and excellence. American universities were founded almost exclusively by Christians rooted in the Bible, especially the Torah.

Dennis Prager, The Rational Bible, Deuteronomy: God, Blessings, and Curses, pg.73-74

Diversity Is Conformity

In the academic world, diversity means black leftists, white leftists, female leftists, and Hispanic leftists. Demographic diversity conceals ideological conformity.

Thomas Sowell, copied from a “Patriot Post” meme

Use Discretion With Political Leaders

One of the painfully sobering realizations that come from reading history is the utter incompetence that is possible among leaders of whole nations and empires—and the blind faith that such leaders can nevertheless inspire among the people who are enthralled by their words or their posturing.

Thomas Sowell, copied from a “Patriot Post” meme. 

When Accountable to the State Instead of to God

One does not have to believe in God to recognize that as America has become increasingly secular—that is, as God has become smaller and smaller—the state has become bigger and bigger. In order to prevent moral chaos society must inculcate moral accountability in its citizens. And as people hold themselves less accountable for their behavior to God (specifically, the God of the Bible), the more they will be accountable for their behavior to the state. In order to create a free country—and America did become the freest country in world history—America was designed to have people morally accountable to God. This is the reason John Adams, the “father of the Constitution” and the second president of the United States, wrote, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral an religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

Dennis Prager, The Rational Bible, Deuteronomy: God, Blessings, and Curses, pg.67

Blacks Need to Rethink Their Votes

Public School Failure

In public schools, where character formation should be a paramount concern, children are instead indoctrinated with agendas that extol relativism over absolute truths. This soil of moral ambiguity has proven fertile ground for the growth of attitudes and behaviors that, even a generation ago, would have been universally recognized as disastrous. The elevation of subjectivity over objectivity has left young people unable to differentiate between enduring principles and transient whims, undermining the foundation of democracy itself—educated and morally sound citizens.

The Dissenter, The De-Education of America and the Resulting Judgment of God

Ultimate Manliness

The ultimate manliness is to get married, protect your family, provide for your kids and family, provide a space for them to grow in safety and security, and provide them roles and responsibilities. This is the role of a man; this is what a man does.

Ben Shapiro

Envy

Families MUST Teach Morality

The foundation of national morality must be laid in private families. … In vain are Schools, Academies, and Universities instituted, if loose principles and licentious habits are impressed upon children in their earliest years.

John Adams (1778)

Importance of Fathers