Born This Way?

 

Scene from the Brooklyn Public Library

Friend Max asks, Are people born gay?

Unlikely. 

Back in the eighties and nineties, because the Human Genome Project was the big thing happening in science, genetics were imagined to be the cause of everything.

Just as, when electricity was discovered, it was postulated to be the cause of everything, of life and consciousness—so the novel “Frankenstein.”

Just as, when magnetism was first understood in a scientific sense, it was imagined to be the cause of everything; of consciousness itself. “Animal magnetism,” “mesmerism,” could cure “mental illness.” This evolved into modern psychiatry. Freud started with it.

Just as, when computers first appeared, saying something had been put through a computer established its unquestionable truth. I remember getting into structuralism back in the day, which argued that all human cultural artifacts could be analyzed into binaries and, theoretically, computerese. That claim gave the theory vast authority.

Just as, when the atom was first split, radiation was supposed to do all kinds of magical things, both good and, mostly, bad. The superheroes of the early sixties got their powers by being exposed to gamma radiation, being bitten by a radioactive spider, or the like. At the time, it all sounded plausible.

In a similar way, in the eighties and nineties, almost everything was supposed to be genetic: homosexuality, pedophilia, alcoholism, depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, “antisocial behaviour,” whatever. A dangerous path to tread—it leads logically to racism and eugenics. But no plausible gene has yet been found for any of these. Since the white coats have been looking intently for over forty years now, with our understanding of the human genome growing exponentially, it seems unlikely they exist. There are no genes for thoughts, opinions, likes or dislikes. Apparently there’s this thing called free will. Who could have guessed?

But the gay lobby seized upon the moment back in the eighties to declare that homosexuality was an inborn characteristic, like skin colour, something over which they had no control, so it was unjust to criticize, let alone discriminate, on that basis. “Born this way.” Now that is frozen into law, even constitutional law, and we are not allowed to question or we are “homophobic.” 

But it was always illogical. If gayness were based on a gene, that gene would breed itself out within a generation—homosexual sex does not produce offspring.

There is one alternative possibility: that it is caused by some sort of intra-uterus brain damage. But what’s the mechanism?

Moreover, you may know, as I do, of “homosexuals” who have gone “straight” later in life. Kathy Shaidle used to claim that every “gay” friend she knew in high school later went straight. This used to be assumed to be the standard path in ancient Greece; young men dabbled in homosexuality before later settling down to have a family. It was also more or less expected in British residential schools back in the day. We often hear news of this or that prominent person, married with children, suddenly declaring in midlife that they are gay, and running off with a same-sex partner. If it can happen in one direction, surely also in the other. We might at most be dealing with an addiction, like alcohol, or tobacco, or any other sexual fetish.

How do people become gay? After all, you yourself probably have no desire whatsoever to have sex with another man; nor do I. The most likely explanation is some pleasurable early experience of gay sex; which then develops a habit, overriding the natural instinct for the opposite sex. Just as we reach for an olive because we remember how good an olive tasted once before. And prefer redheads because of some notably pleasurable early experience with some redheaded girl.

In other words, homosexuals are groomed into it by other homosexuals. This, and the need to maintain the population of the polis, is probably reason enough for most past societies taking a dim view of the practice. I note that in Saudi Arabia, while homosexuality is technically illegal, nobody will disturb you at it until and unless you approach a minor. Then the hammer falls quickly.

If you are gay, you face a fundamental problem: 97% of those people you want sex with will not want sex with you. There is no obvious way of telling who that remaining 3% are. Without facing eternal and possibly brutal rejection, what are your strategies?

Bath houses with a certain reputation are one. Being very publicly gay, acting effeminate, is another—so the classic image of a gay man lisping and mincing. Marching half-naked in a gay pride parade to advertise your availability is another.

Another obvious one, though, perhaps the most obvious one, is to groom someone too young to really understand sex. They will probably not reject you, because they don’t grasp what’s going on. You’ll initiate them into the habit, and perhaps have a reliable sex partner for a time. In any case, you have enlarged the pool.

Even if gayness is broadly socially accepted, this still may be the easiest path, and the one that needs the least courage. Why do all these transsexuals and transgenders and their advocates currently want so badly to introduce “drag queen story hours” in schools and libraries, and books referring to explicit gay sex to grade school children? We would never tolerate such sexual displays among heterosexual adults.

If it isn’t grooming, what else could it be?

To be fair, we cannot accuse all gays of going after children. Many gays understand that being gay is, at best a misfortune, and are as adamant as anyone about opposing sex with children.

Trump or Chaos

 

The electoral system has declined so badly in the US that the Democrats are blatantly trying to rig the 2024 election by indicting their leading opponent and trying to take his name off the ballot. 

Given how thoroughly they have discredited the process, it is urgent that Donald Trump be declared the winner in 2024. That is now the only way to restore public confidence. If Trump does not win, his supporters are unlikely to accept the result, and their only recourse, the electoral process having been withdrawn, would appear to be insurrection or civil war.

We can be grateful that it has not reached this stage in Canada yet, although the Canadian Liberal government is hurrying down that same path.

Is the Pope Catholic?

 

A Catholic friend sends me this link, Pope Francis complaining about “reactionary American Catholics who oppose church reform.” He asks for my response.

My response is that Pope Francis is a heretic. He speaks of the “evolution” of the faith, “church teaching evolving over time,” and of “backwardism.” “True doctrine always develops and bears fruit.”

This is the heresy of modernism, which Pius X called “the synthesis of all heresies.” In a nutshell, that, as Justin Trudeau put it when asked why he insisted on half his cabinet being women, “this is 2015.” As if a date on the calendar made a difference.

Truth does not change with time. An evil deed does not become a good deed through the passage of time. Therefore, Catholic teachings on faith and morals, the “deposit of faith,” cannot change; they cannot “evolve.” They can only b elucidated, perhaps to apply to new circumstances. Just as in an Act of Contrition, the Ten Commandments are applied to one’s individual circumstances.

Pope Francis gives examples of Catholic morals supposedly changing over time.

"Today it is a sin to possess atomic bombs; the death penalty is a sin, it cannot can be practiced, and it was not so before. As for slavery, some pontiffs before me have tolerated it, but things are different today."

It could not have been declared to be a sin to possess atomic bombs before there were atomic bombs; but it is not a sin to possess atomic bombs. It would be a sin to detonate one over a city.

Tolerating slavery is not the same as declaring it moral. Politics is the art of the possible. The Catholic Church is obliged to tolerate many things it thinks are sinful.

The death penalty, it has become illicit due to applying s consistent ethics to changing circumstances. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church explains, “more effective systems of detention have been developed, which ensure the due protection of citizens but, at the same time, do not definitively deprive the guilty of the possibility of redemption.” The death penalty was once justifiable to preserve public order when there was no prison system, and less effective law enforcement.

Francis especially has in his sights “the so-called 'sin of the flesh',” which he accuses traditionalists of having under a magnifying glass.

But it is not traditionalists who chose this focus. It is the modernists, who as of the 1950s began scorning sexual sins as “conventional morality,” and preaching, “if it feels good, do it.” It is the modernists who chose this battle, on this ground.

One might, by construing Francis’s words in a very careful, lawyerly way, avoid the charge of heresy. 

I do not accept that. It is his duty, as pontiff, to be a reliable shepherd. Even if he is just obscuring the matter, he is doing Satan’s work. He seem to be consistently obscuring, at best, the correct teaching. Surely he is not so stupid as to be consistently doing this by mistake. He believes the heresy; or, rather, he wants to promote it.

The Future of War

 

Our first surprise in the current Russo-Ukraine War was that Russia was a paper tiger. Its vaunted military could not make progress after the initial surprise attack was stalled.

Our second surprise is that everyone is a paper tiger. Now Ukraine too, with NATO doctrine and all its NATO weapons, is struggling to make progress.

It turns out it is not that the Russians were so incompetent. It is that the current state of weaponry gives an advantage to defense. We did not see this coming, because the offense has been dominant since the Second World War, and as recently as the Second Gulf War. 

This balance between offence and defense has swung back and forth many times over history; although in the days of set battles it mattered less. Mounted knights gave advantage to the offense; a charge could mow down a static line. Then the longbow gave advantage to the defense. Muskets gave advantage to the offense: their accurate range was short, and cavalry could break through infantry with a charge. The machine gun decisively killed the cavalry charge, and we had the static tranches of WWI. Then the tank broke things open again, unexpectedly, aided by air power, and we had the shock of blitzkrieg. 

Now the era of the tank is over.

What has changed since the Gulf Wars? 

Drones and portable missiles like HIMARS. 

These are cheap weapons. Cheap and simple enough to be mass produced by countries like Iran and Turkey, not famous for efficiency and high-tech.

Cheap drones and HIMARS can too easily take out a fantastically expensive modern tank or jet fighter.

I wouldn’t want to risk an aircraft carrier in a war situation these days, either.

This is good news for world peace. So long as defense has the advantage over offense, aggressors are much less likely to start a war. War becomes too costly in general.

The Mug Shot Heard around the World

 

Trump’s recent mug shot has me pondering whether God is taking an active role in political events in North America. 

Trump had little control: the photographer was not there to make him look good, and it was probably just one shot. Yet the picture makes Trump look like a true and resolute leader; as good as Karsh doing Churchill. It is going to rally a lot of support behind him. It seems at least a small miracle; the opposite of what Trump’s enemies intended.

Karsh's Churchill

There are other recent hints of divine intervention, improbable and pointed things happening. Chrystia Freeland being stopped for speeding bare days after claiming she did not own a car and did not drive. The Trudeau separation, suddenly, in midweek. The sudden rise out of nowhere of Oliver Anthony. A year ago, the uncanny organization of the ad hoc Freedom Convoy. At a more granular level, eucharistic miracles, uncorrupted corpses, and Protestant revival meetings in the US. At a global level, the improbable ability of Ukraine to hold off the Russian invasion; the surprising solidarity of NATO.

Those who do not believe God works through history will scoff. But that has always been the Jewish and Christian understanding: that history has a purpose, and is working towards the redemption of all things.

Recent events have shown us wickedness in high places: to list all that has come out would be tedious. That list is now too long. Culminating, for the moment, in this attempt in the US to imprison the leading opposition candidate.

God may have allowed all this to come about, may have given the wicked free rein for a time, in order to make the moral plain. 

He may now be gathering the reins in his strong hand.

Abortion Unwound

 

The young adult novel Unwind is being used to teach our children. Resolutely woke, it argues the case for abortion. This hinges, apparently, on when a human being gets a soul. It gives four positions, presumably spanning the field:

• At conception
• At quickening—"when the baby kicks”
• At birth
• When someone loves it.

And then the novel gives its own conclusion: that we really do not know. 

Therefore, no one has a right to impose their own views on the next person.

“If more people could admit they really don’t know, maybe there never would have been a Heartland War.”

Therefore, unrestricted abortion.

It is indeed true that we do not know whether a child at any given age has a soul. We also do not know whether Jews have souls. We do not know whether blacks have souls. Or women. We actually do not know whether anyone other than ourself has a soul, is conscious and self-conscious. We cannot see or hear the soul, or consciousness, or thoughts, other than our own. Everyone else might be imagined, or simulations, or alien lizard people.

Accordingly, this argument for unrestricted abortion is just as serviceable as an argument for unrestricted murder, or genocide. 

“Hey, nobody likes the Jews. That mean they don’t have souls. Let’s kill them and take their stuff.”

Why is it morally necessary to assume all other humans have souls? Because of the golden rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. If you are not prepared to accept that these lizard people or simulations have the right to kill you on a whim, you must not claim for yourself the same right over them. You cannot honourably take to yourself a right you would not want everyone else to have.

The question, therefore, is when the foetus is alive, and when it becomes human. 

It is identifiably human at conception, and it is identifiably alive.

Any other position ends in holocaust.

Oliver Anthony Gives His Backstory

 

Black Hats

 

More woke wisdom from Unwind, the novel your children are reading in high school:

“One thing you learn when you’ve lived as long as I have—people aren’t all good, and people aren’t all bad. We move in and out of darkness and light all of our lives.”

The rap against American culture is that it tends to be white hats against black hats: villains in American novels and movies are one-dimensionally evil. Think of “Injun Joe “in Tom Sawyer.

Andrew Breitbart said that politics is downstream from culture. Yes; and culture is downstream from religion. This tendency to such a clear divide between good and evil characters comes, I warrant, from America’s Calvinist upbringing. Baptists are the dominant American denomination, especially in the South. Baptists are Calvinists. New England was settled by the Pilgrims. They were Calvinists. New York was settled by Dutch Reformed: Calvinist. By contrast, England is Anglican, a bit of everything; Canada Catholic and Methodist; not Calvinist.

Calvinism believes in predestination. People are simply created for salvation or damnation, good or evil. They do not have a choice. They do not have free will. This does not leave a great deal of room for character development; or for moral ambiguity.

No doubt in reaction, Unwound and modern wokery go too far. If we are all just moving in and out of darkness all our lives, there is no moral distinction to be made between Adolph Hitler and Albert Schweitzer; between Charlie Manson and Mother Teresa.

They preserve the idea that we have no free will, and ditch the idea that there is either salvation or damnation. Wrong move. 

The Catholic understanding is that we all sin; we must struggle constantly against temptation. Some of us have given up the fight, turned away from the good and committed ourselves to evil. In Jesus’s words, some of us seek the darkness and fear the light. Others, the saints, shine like a city on a hill.

 There are indeed good and bad people. But a bad person can become good.

Lost Sheep

 

The gospel reading from last Sunday, the story of the Canaanite woman, sheds light on true evangelization. People commonly think it is about converting people from some other religion to their own: from Catholicism to Mormonism, say, or Islam to Christianity. But Jesus here actually refuses to do this.

He answered, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of Israel.”

Later, it is true, he sends out the disciples to preach and baptize to all nations; but this is apparently a secondary consideration.

This suggests that the primary focus of evangelization, ought to be fellow Christians: those already belonging to the flock, but who have lost their way.

If someone is a devout Hindu, or Muslim, or Jew, it seems malicious to try to convince them that Hinduism or Islam is wrong. Now, they have clear direction in their life. You are trying to rob them of it.

Lost sheep, for us in the task of evangelization, are firstly Christians, or more specifically, for Catholics, Catholics, who are suffering a loss of meaning or direction in their lives. This is not necessarily due to a lack of faith on their part, or culpable. Given that they are believing Christians, it is due to demonic oppression or possession, or some event that has them disoriented and questioning what they thought they knew. They have gotten turned around, confused, often by some false premise or false guide.

In a word, the depressed or “mentally ill.” These are the lost sheep in need of our attention.

This may extend to those of other faiths as well—if they are disoriented and confused in that faith, and feeling unsatisfied. In such cases, they too benefit from learning and embracing the Catholic faith. In such cases, as Jesus with the Canaanite woman, one should stand aloof and let them come to you. It is up to them to indicate such a need and such a desire.

God calls his sheep, and knows who they are. It is not up to you.

Trump's Lies

 

Here’s a riddle. The number one complaint about Trump on the left is that he lies. The Washington Post claims to catalogue 30,573 “lies or misleading claims” over his first term; a “tsunami of untruths.”

Examples:

“He overstated the ‘carnage’ he was inheriting, then later exaggerated his ‘massive’ crowd and claimed, despite clear evidence to the contrary, that it had not rained during his address. He repeated the rain claim the next day, along with the fabricated notion that he held the ‘all-time record’ for appearing on the cover of Time magazine.”

Yet, according to a recent poll, those who support Trump trust him to tell the truth more than they trust religious leaders, their friends, or even their own family.

These views directly contradict one another. How is this possible? Are we experiencing different truths?

Exactly.

The claim that Trump lies is intrinsically dubious. All politicians lie; Joe Biden will say anything. So will Justin Trudeau. So why this peculiar focus on Trump? Surely Trump is being held to a different standard here.

And note the lies the Post first cites to make their case: whether or not it was raining during his inauguration. Whether he holds the record for most Time cover stories. A claim that he exaggerated America’s problems. They seem oddly trivial. Would you call an acquaintance a liar for thinking it rained when it had not?

Here’s how the paradox is solved: the left, those who oppose Trump, are likely to embrace postmodernism and the dogma that there is no objective truth; only “my truth” and “your truth.” So that a man can declare himself a woman, and that becomes incontestably true.

When they say Trump “lies,” what they really mean is that he is not endorsing “their truth”: what they wish were true. He refuses to go along with their preferred “narrative,” which is to say, fiction.

Interestingly, Trump is apparently not entitled to a pass on the premise that he is asserting “his truth.” 

This is a backhanded admission that he is not asserting “his truth,” but truth itself. He refuses to lie, and that is what is intolerable.

Canada's Disappearing Genocide

 

Why Trump Should Win in 2024

 

Pundits are saying a race between Biden and Trump is a tossup, that the polls are neck and neck.

But polls also show a large majority of people do not want to see another contest between Biden and Trump.

So if that is what is offered to them—which seems at this point most likely—what happens?

Those who support Trump will come out in huge numbers to vote, over the dead bodies of wild horses. The people who do not want a second matchup are anti-Trumpers dissatisfied with Biden. They don’t want Trump; but they don’t want Biden either. 

There is already at least one unusually strong third-party candidate in the race, Cornell West. And he is on the left. The general dissatisfaction with the choice of candidates is likely to draw others in: perhaps JFK Jr.; there is talk of a “no labels” candidacy by either Joe Manchin or former Maryland governor Larry Hogan.

They are not going to pull votes from Trump. You either love him or you hate him. Those who have him are never going to vote for him anyway. Those who love him will never vote for anyone else if he is running.

So ther support comes entirely from the anti-Trump side; which means entirely for Biden. Nobody feels that strongly about voting for Biden.

The resulting split in the anti-Trump vote should throw the election to Trump.

Because Trump’s voters back him more strongly than Biden’s voters back Biden, this predictable strong showing by third parties should throw the election to Trump.

The Canaanite Woman

 

At that time, Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon.
And behold, a Canaanite woman of that district came and called out,
"Have pity on me, Lord, Son of David!
My daughter is tormented by a demon."
But Jesus did not say a word in answer to her.
Jesus' disciples came and asked him,
"Send her away, for she keeps calling out after us."
He said in reply,
"I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel."
But the woman came and did Jesus homage, saying, "Lord, help me."
He said in reply,
"It is not right to take the food of the children
and throw it to the dogs."
She said, "Please, Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps
that fall from the table of their masters."
Then Jesus said to her in reply,
"O woman, great is your faith!
Let it be done for you as you wish."
And the woman's daughter was healed from that hour. - Mt 15:21-28

This, the Gospel reading at last Sunday’s mass, makes Jesus look racist. No service for Canaanites? Isn’t that like no service for negroes?

First, this must be understood as a matter of religion, not ethnicity. The people of Tyre and Sidon were polytheists. 

Second, Jesus’s denial of service may have been a simply practical matter. Unless you put your faith in God, you cannot be cured of a demonic possession. If one demon is cast out, another will soon take their place.

“When the unclean spirit has gone out of a person, it passes through waterless places seeking rest, but finds none. Then it says, ‘I will return to my house from which I came.’ And when it comes, it finds the house empty, swept, and put in order. Then it goes and brings with it seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they enter and dwell there, and the last state of that person is worse than the first.” – Matthew 12:43-45.

The house must not be left empty. For it is as Bob Dylan said, “You’re gonna have to serve somebody. It may be the Devil, or it may be the Lord, but you’re gonna have to serve somebody.” 

Or as Chesterton said: “Those who do not believe in God will believe in anything.”

The pagan gods are demons. To be possessed by any of them is demonic. Only possession by the loving God is proof against demonic possession.

Next point: demonic possession is what we now, incorrectly, call “mental illness.” It follows that no mental illness can be cured except through turning to God in faith. 

So how is it that the faith of the mother, in this passage, heals the daughter?

Final point: “mental illness” is never an individual problem. The demon exists in the family relationship. When one member of the family is possessed by the demon, generally the parent, the other member is oppressed by it--and is more likely to manifest the symptoms. Cast the demon from the possessed parent, and you heal the oppressed child as well.

Sin and Repentance

 

This last Sunday’s second reading reminds us of a basic tenet of Christianity that is commonly misunderstood by non-Christians—as well as many Christians.

Truncated, St. Paul writes, “God delivered all to disobedience, that he might have mercy upon all.” – Romans 11:32

Non-Christians consider it intolerable that the church declares something they do sinful: homosexual sex is the obvious example, but we might also mention masturbation, using artificial birth control, chastity outside of marriage, and so forth. This is unreasonable; this is oppressive. The church is just being prejudiced, or prudish. 

Then they will point to some priest(s) or bishop(s), or practicing Catholic(s) they know, whom they know or believe do these things themselves. So they will accuse the Church and Christians of hypocrisy.

They will also point to the known or supposed misdeeds of Catholic saints. Saint Thomas More, as Lord Chancellor, had Protestants burned at the stake! So Catholics approve of burning Protestants at the stake!

They are making the gravely wrong assumption that a good Christian never sins. According to the Christian teaching, as Saint Paul says above, everyone sins. “All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” (Romans 3: 23).

The morality demanded by Christ is perfection. It makes no allowance for human frailty: “Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.” (Matthew 5:48)

If you call someone a fool, this is as bad as murdering him. If you look at a woman lustfully, this is as bad as raping her. And so forth.

Jesus is not being unreasonable. You are being unreasonable to declare yourself righteous and without sin. You are not God. 

You do not go to Hell for having sinned; you go to Hell for denying that you have sinned. The mark of the true Christian is repentance, not self-righteousness. If you admit and sincerely regret your flaws, God will forgive. If you do not, he cannot.

The Cause of War Unwound

 

A reasonable compromise, and war is averted.

The novel Unwind, omnipresent in the schools, is faithful to the woke “narrative” at every point. Men are always acting impulsively, the beasts, and some woman has to take them in hand and set them straight. But women are not just more rational than men. If any character shows compassion for the less fortunate, it will be a woman. If a black character is featured—sorry, “sienna,” because the word “black” is apparently pejorative--he must have an IQ of 155 and a strict moral code never to steal. 

Predictably, it cleaves to the familiar line on the issue of war. War is always and under all circumstances wrong on both sides.

“You see, a conflict always begins with an issue—a difference of opinion, an argument. But by the time it turns into a war, the issue doesn’t matter anymore, because now it’s about one thing and one thing only: how much each side hates the other.”

Wars, the book implies, are caused by some misunderstanding. The war starts because both sides lose their temper, apparently at the same time. And the good guys are the ones trying to broker a compromise.

This theory of war requires us to believe that governments, groups of people generally chosen from their peers for their good sense and level headedness, are prone to suddenly lose their temper for no good reason and send thousands or millions of their fellow citizens to their death. Possible, but not a likely explanation.

In the real world, among individuals or among nations, so long as both sides feel they have a legitimate argument for their position, they will keep arguing. Only when one side loses the argument do they stop negotiating. Then the loser must back down, or resort to force. That is when and why a war starts. As Clausewitz says, "war is a continuation of policy by other means." It is entered into not in a fit of temper, but to achieve some political purpose, in cold blood.

And one side is almost certainly right, and the other side is almost certainly wrong.

Accordingly, those who want to negotiate a compromise are not the good guys. They are doing the Devil’s bidding. It is as though the police, called to a crime, tried to negotiate a compromise between the thief who took the wallet and his victim. Or refused to intervene, as both parties must be at fault for the misunderstanding.

The sure result will be more injustice, and more wars.

And that is what our kids are being taught to think.

Poilievre the Rhetorician

 

Do others realize that Pierre Poilievre is a brilliant rhetorician? He’s better than Reagan, “the Great Communicator.” 

This is an essential talent for rea leadership and getting things done. Without it, all you are is a careerist who will follow the polls. With it, you can take popular opinion along with you.

People credit Justin Trudeau with being a great campaigner, because he has won three elections in a row. His training in acting no doubt helps; a background in acting helped Reagan, Zelensky, Pope John Paul II, Queen Elizabeth II. However, he is not a very good actor, more of a wannabe, and it tends to show. He is an actor in about the same sense Hitler was a painter.

I say Trudeau did not win those three elections so much as Tom Mulcair, Andrew Scheer, and Erin O’Toole lost them. As Peter MacKay put it, Scheer missed a shot on an empty net. And they all lost for the same reason: they abandoned principle and “moved to the centre.” They were poll-watchers.

This never works in opposition, because it is a simple matter for a government too to watch the polls. But they, unlike the opposition, can take immediate action on them, getting on the right side of every issue as it arises. All the opposition can argue, then, is that they would be more efficient or honest in doing the same thing.

Those who like the government will naturally vote for the government again, not some unknown promising to do the same thing.

Those who do not like the government will not vote for someone else promising to do the same thing.

To defeat a sitting government, you need to do what Poilievre is doing: stick to your principles, and sell them to the public. You can’t win the debate if you don’t debate. You can’t begin by conceding all the premises of the other side.

Abortion, War, and Being Unwound

 

The fundamental problem with the young adult novel Unwind, now being studied in a classroom near you, is found in this passage:

“In a perfect world mothers would all want their babies, and strangers would open up their homes to the unloved. In a perfect world everything would be either black or white, right or wrong, and everyone would know the difference. But this isn’t a perfect world. The problem is people who think it is.”

On the face of it, this makes no sense. Who thinks it is a perfect world? Not the left, who are always on about social injustice. Not the religious right, who say the world is fallen. 

What seems to be meant is that the problem is people who think things are either black or white, right or wrong. People who believe in morality; who would condemn a mother for not loving her baby, or people for not helping a stranger in need, as if they could know these things are wrong.

In other words, this is a rejection of the idea of morality itself. Right and wrong are only matters of personal preference, whim.

This is the dogma of the modern classroom. I got it drilled into me myself long ago in grad school, even back in the Seventies. One must never be “judgmental.” That was automatically wrong. One must never assert anything as true. That was arrogant. 

It took me decades to unlearn this; perhaps I am still tainted by it.

The book, lacking self-awareness, contradicts itself only a few pages later. Lev, a deeply religious kid who believes being killed for his organs is a good thing, because this is what he has been taught, has been kidnapped by Connor and Risa, wanting to save his life. 

So he escapes and reports to the nearest authority, the school administration.

“From here in the nurse’s office, Lev has no way of knowing if they’ve captured Connor and Risa. He hopes that, if they have, they don’t bring them here. The thought of having to face them makes him feel ashamed. Doing the right thing shouldn’t make you ashamed.”

In other words, despite his indoctrination by his family, his pastor, his religion, the government, and the educational system, Lev knows innately that Connor and Risa are in the right, and he is in the wrong.

Everyone does know the difference between right and wrong. Conscience will out. Such things are not socially determined.

When I dispute the initial claim, that nobody really knows what is right or wrong, I get a great deal of resistance from students. Particularly because the context seems to be abortion. They have  been well indoctrinated already; they simply will not say that abortion is ever in any way wrong. They will not even agree that it is a necessary evil. No, you can’t say anything is evil.

Then I ask “is war wrong?” And they immediately agree, seemingly without having to stop to consider. They have always been taught this too: that war is wrong in all circumstances. Despite the logical inconsistency. They had apparently never noticed it before. Some students realize the contradiction at this point, some seem not to.

Then I point out the passage featuring Lev’s thoughts on turning in Connor and Risa. 

Here they always, so far, fall silent. 

Poor kids.

Unwind

 

I am currently reading the novel Unwound (Neal Shusterman), because it is assigned in high schools.

As literature, it is on the level of Dan Brown, or a good comic book: great plotting, but no linguistic charm, vivid description, symbolism, deep characterization, or thematic sublety. It looks to be mostly a conversation starter to discuss politics; specifically, the abortion isse.

The opening premise is that, at some future date, the US dissolves into civil war on the issue of abortion. Eventually a compromise is negotiated: abortion is illegal, but you are free to kill or “unwind” your children at age thirteen.

There is an immediate logical problem with this premise: those opposed to abortion are not going to feel better about killing teenagers. Evidently the author does not understand the issue, or is deliberately falsifying it. Either way, this is not education, but misinformation.

Then the novel has the sole religious family being most aggressively in favour of unwinding their children, on the premise that it is in the Bible. 

Eh?

The author means tithing—so they are obliged to “tithe” their tenth child by killing him. And, after all, wasn’t Moses left in the bullrushes to die? So killing every tenth child is a religious duty.

The problem, as anyone who has read a newspaper or news aggregator knows, is that the religious are generally the ones in favour of “family values,” and against abortion. And, as anyone who has read the Bible knows, Moses was not left in the rushes as a tithe or sacrifice to Yahweh, but at the command of a pagan ruler trying to wipe out the Jews. They might also be aware that such child sacrifice was the crime that provoked Yahweh to cast the Canaanites out of their land, and give it to the Jews.

“Then they made their sons and their daughters pass through the fire, and practiced divination and enchantments, and sold themselves to do evil in the sight of the Lord, provoking Him.” 2 Kings 17:17

This book, used in our schools, is teaching young people the opposite of the truth. Partly, is seem to me, to discredit religion. Religion, they are told, is out to kill them.

According to the peace that ended the imaginary second American Civil War, mothers were also permitted “storking.” That is, unwanted babies could be left at someone else’s doorstep without penalty. This being a supposed concession to the women who wanted abortion.

They can do this, however, only if they do not get caught in the act. 

In other words, it is illegal. It is hardly a concession to say that those who do not get caught will not be prosecuted for a crime. 

 Moreover, the current laws are actually more generous. Currently, it is not a crime. Any mother can put her baby up for adoption. In many states, all she has to do is drop the child off at the nearest hospital. 

Again, the book is falsifying the abortion debate, and feeding the impressionable misinformation.

There is a grave problem here. As I think Mark Twain has said, it is far easier to trick someone than to convince them they have been tricked. By filling their heads with falsehoods, the schools are actually preventing kids from learning.

On Having Enemies

 

He had many enemies himself.

Xerxes the left-wing columnist asks, in his latest effort, “Why, oh why, does America always seem to need an enemy?”

This reminds me of an Analect of Confucius. Asked about the appointment of officials, Confucius said,

“If a man has no friends, it is necessary to make inquiries.
If a man has no enemies, it is necessary to make inquiries.”

If America did not always have some enemies, this would be prima facie evidence that it was a bad actor.

All conspicously moral people have enemies. Indeed, anyone who does anything conspicuous will have enemies, merely due to envy. Churchill, Martin Luther King, Gandhi, Lincoln—highly controversial and often hated, in their day. Some might recall that Jesus was crucified.

Pursuing his theme, Xerxes laments that the US attacks “Even though most of those enemies had neither the desire nor the ability to invade -- let alone conquer -- the United States of America.”

That is a non sequitur. Self-defense is not the only just grounds for war. You could make this same accusation against the police—constantly harassing people who have done them no harm. Or of anyone who, say, energetically opposed slavery in the US South, given that they were not themselves enslaved. Or objected to Hitler killing Jews, if not themselves Jewish.

They came for the Jews, and I did nothing.
For I was not a Jew.

Not to claim that the USA is always moral or in the right in its foreign engagements. But engagements must be considered one by one. It seems to me a stretch to suggest the US was in the wrong fighting Japan or Germany in WWII.

A discussion of Trump in his comments section is oddly related.

Quoted respondents denounce Trump as a liar, a reprobate, a conspirator, a grifter, a buffoon. Yet none give an example of anything Trump has ever done, or even said, to justify these epithets.

It cannot be that these writers are simply trapped in news silos, unaware of the need to justify their claims to others. They have to know that large numbers of people voted for Trump; they often mention this, lamenting the fact. 

So why do they feel no need to justify their own claims?

The most likely explanation is that they see people who disagree with them as not worth talking to, not worth persuading, their opinions not worth considering. “Deplorables.” Subhuman, with no right to opinions; or they see themselves as superhuman, with the right to pass judgement. 

This attitude is disturbing to anyone who has read Crime and Punishment; it is also the core argument to justify slavery, or the Nazi Holocaust.

They came for the Jews, and I did nothing.
For I was not a Jew.

The alternative explanation is that they know that their position is untenable—they simply assert, and go ad hominem, because they do not dare discuss it. We must assume, in this case, that the real reason they hate Trump is disreputable. We must guess what it is.

But let’s go to the bottom line. Apply Confucius’s principle to Trump. Trump has both fierce detractors and fierce supporters. 

This is actually the sign of a good man.

The Plan to Invade Canada

 

This guy came up with a VERY detailed plan to conquer Canada and people are loving it in the replies 🤣 | Not the Bee

But seriously, folks; it would all be over in a couple of days. All that is really needed is to rush up the pancake-flat highway and take Winnipeg. That cuts off everything west from support or reinforcement from the more populated East. 

Then, pincers west from Winnipeg and north from Montana into Alberta, all good flat tank country, to take the Prairies and the oil fields.

After that, who cares?

If you want it, Vancouver is close to the border, and the approaches from Bellingham are again flat. Pacific ports are useful, and awkward not to have, and it is the only significant one Canada owns.

The entrance to the Gulf of St. Lawrence is absurdly narrow at the Cabot Strait and Strait of Belle Isle, and easy to blockade. Nothing would get in or out of Ontario and Quebec. Canada starves, and must capitulate. No need to dirty your trousers crossing the river or Great Lakes to seize the industrial heartland.  But just to play it safe, the USAF can bomb the St. Lawrence Seaway's locks and dams to prevent transit of goods. It could even be done by artillery. 

You could still have the Atlantic Provinces holding out, but that would be like Monty Python's Black Knight in revernse: "Talk to the hand." They are relatively unpopulated, poor, and rely on subsidies from the rest of Canada. Without Canada's trunk, they are likely to turn to the US with cap in outstretched hand.

Canadians could not, of course, be allowed to vote. They are too liberal, and would skew the balance of power. They might instead be classed as a form of wildlife.

Got to Post It Here

 

Politics is downstream from culture.

And the dam is about to blow.

The Folk Mass

 

In my youth, in the wake of Vatican II, the Church decided to jettison all the liturgical music of the past two millennia, The Beethoven and the Bach and the like, generally written for choir and organ, in favour of the “folk mass,” with guitar, up in the front of the church. Folk, after all, was what all the youngsters were listening to. The church was going to be hep.

Except—I was one of those youngsters, who adored folk music. A tradition is rich with deeply religious songs. Indeed, rock itself is only secularized gospel music. “Go Tell It on the Mountain”; “We Shall Not Be Moved”; “We Shall Overcome”; “Turn! Turn! Turn!”; “Children, Go Where I Send Thee”; and the like, were on the radio every day.

But the church did not go to real folk music. Instead, they had a small group of St. Louis Jesuits compose almost the entire new hymn book, with songs presumably in the folk tradition; but soulless and trite. Hallmark Card stuff. To anyone who loved either folk music, or true religion, it was offensive.

The low point, for me, was when I passed a Catholic Church in grad school days, and the carillon was playing the notes of John Denver’s “Sunshine on my Shoulders.” 

“Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy
Sunshine in my eyes can make me cry
Sunshine on the water looks so lovely
Sunshine almost always makes me high”

Why didn’t the church use true folk music? I suspect a need to control, a Pharisaic fear of the Holy Spirit. But probably also because, in the English world, the folk music other than that substantial body out of Ireland was mostly going to be written by Protestants, and express Protestant theology. For example, “The Old Rugged Cross”:

“And exchange it one day for a crown.”

That easy conviction that one is going to heaven would be, to Catholicism, the sin of pride, and a likely ticket in the opposite direction.

Still, there was a ready alternative, a better road not taken. There is a rich Catholic folk tradition in non-English-speaking countries. The lyrics need only be translated. My wife and I were the choir back in Athabasca, and the priest allowed us to sing the English version of the Spanish song “Pescador de Hombres.” Not included I the regulation hymn book, but he had pasted it inside the back cover. A visitor came up to us afterward and said it wax the most beautiful thing he had ever heard in a church.

“O Lord, with a glance you embraced me:
Then you smiled and whispered my name.
I’ve abandoned my boat in the harbour;
Close to You I will seek other shores.”

For that matter, the good old Protestant hymns could be adapted.

“So I'll cherish the old rugged Cross
Till my trophies, at last, I lay down
I will cling to the old rugged Cross
And wear every thorn like a crown.”

Some day, I pray, the Church will come to its senses on liturgical music. 

But how long, O Lord, how long?

Who Replaces Trudeau?

 

As Justin Trudeau’s popularity plunges, people begin to talk about his possible successor as leader of the Liberal Party.

Chrystia Freeland is his second in command. But she is too closely identified with him: if his popularity goes down, hers does too. 

The rest of the cabinet does not look much better. The problem is that Trudeau has been relying on a personality cult, and no cabinet ministers have been able to develop a strong independent identity or following. 

Mark Carnet is mentioned. But he looks too much like Michael Ignatieff, vulnerable to charges of being a carpetbagger; and with untested political skills.

There is no obvious candidate that nobody seems to be mentioning: Jody Wilson-Raybould. This actually follows the typical Liberal tradition: a former cabinet minister who has resigned over disagreements with the leader comes back from retirement to take over. So Jean Chretien, John Turner, Paul Martin.

Raybould has earned a reputation for strict honesty and respect for the rules, which would be the antidote for the odour of corruption and overreach left by Trudeau.

She has remained loyal to the party: ejected, she ran not as an NDP or Green candidate, although she had offers. They would have killed to have her. She took the harder path of running as an independent.

Why do the mainstream media not mention her?

It seems sinister.

The Devil As a Way to God

 

J. P. Sears has an interesting take on his conversion to Christianity. He says he started believing in the Devil before he started truly believing in God.

The presence of evil-and Satan, the source of evil, he says, is becoming ever more apparent. Lean away from evil, and where are you leaning?

So for Sears, accepting the reality of the Devil came first. Perhaps recognizing evil is a necessary step to true belief in God. Without it, you may have a nominal, lukewarm belief. But a belief without urgency is not a true belief. In fact, according to the Bible, it is better to be an atheist than a lukewarm Christian. Perhaps because that is more sincere, and shows you care about the issue.

“you are neither cold nor hot. I wish you were either one or the other! So, because you are lukewarm—neither hot nor cold—I am about to spit you out of my mouth.” Revelations 3: 15-16.

But Sears has another revelation.

“Anyone who wants to control you purposely pulls you away from God.”

They do so, he says, because their control is always based on fear. The ultimate fear is fear of death. Sears cites the climate crisis: do this or we’re all going to die! He cites the covid panic being used to justify totalitarian measures.

And those who believe in God, and an afterlife, are less afraid of death, and so harder to control. This is why totalitarian movements always reject religion, even persecute the church and the religious. 

But Sears is missing a trick. Christianity and its separation of church and state—thee state, after all, crucified Christ—makes this difficult, but in nations where other religions are dominant, the better tactic is to identify God’s will with that of the totalitarian state. Then the dissident has even greater reason to fear: he goes to hell. This is common in Islam—see Iran. It is arguably why democracy has been unsuccessful in those lands.

It is easier for narcissistic parents. Christianity is not so clear on the separation of church and family. It is there, but the average person actually thinks Christianity and “family values” are more or less synonymous; and that the commandment to “honour thy father and they mother” is without limists and imposes no obligations on the parent. 

So it is relatively easy for the controlling narcissistic parent to convince the child, not that there is no God, but that there is, and God hates them. 

This explains too why narcissistic parents will invariably put their children into moral dilemmas or encourage them to do immoral things. This explains why they will scapegoat the more moral or dutiful child. They want to convince the child that God is on the side of the parent, and total obedience is essential.

This is again why Jesus, in the Gospels, considers moral misdirection the essential form of child abuse.

“If anyone causes one of these little ones—those who believe in me—to stumble, it would be better for them to have a large millstone hung around their neck and to be drowned in the depths of the sea. Woe to the world because of the things that cause people to stumble! Such things must come, but woe to the person through whom they come.”

“Mental illness,” CPTSD, is the result of this moral misdirection. The way out is first to plainly see evil as evil, as Sears suggests, and pull away. Too many are trapped here by a fear of God, because they have been taught to identify God with the autocratic parent.

In such a case it makes sense to first recognize the devil, the spirit of evil, and pull away from him. And you find God as a result.

Western Civilization

 

What exactly is “Western Civilization”? What makes it distinct from “Eastern Civilization” or “Middle Eastern Civilization,” or come other civilization? 

Not that it is Western, certainly. Australia and New Zealand are part of “Wesrern civilization,” and New Zealand is further east than any of the lands of “Eastern Civilization.”

Which tells us that “Western Civilization” is a euphemism. What we are referring to is Christian Civilization, Christendom. “Eastern Civilization” is founded instead on the principles of Confucius, while Christendom is founded on the Old and New Testaments. Morocco is not a part of Western Civilization, as far west as it is, because it is founded on the Quran and Shariah law, not the Old and New Testaments. Indian Civilization is not “Western” because it is founded on the Vedas as its bottom line.

This being so, if Christian civilization rejects Christianity, it collapses; it ceases to be. Not instantly, but inevitably. And that is the way things are going.

It is from Christian doctrine, from the New Testament, that we get the “self-evident” truth that all men are created equal. “Self-evident” is a con; Jefferson originally wrote, correctly, “sacred and inviolable.” Locke explained: it is not that it is self-evident; it follows from one divine creator and one act of creation. As the Levellers chanted in the English Revolution, “when Adam Delved and Eve span, who then was the gentleman?” In any polytheistic culture, there is no idea of human equality. Often the king claims exclusively divine ancestry; there are castes.

It is from Christian doctrine that we get the idea of human dignity and human rights. Human dignity follows from the claim that man is made in God’s image: so each man contains that divine spark. Human rights follow from the dogma that man was created, in the Garden of Eden story, to exercise free will and choose the moral good. He must therefore at all times be allowed the widest possible freedom of choice. The individual, in short, mut be free.

It is from Christianity that we get the idea of a separation of church and state, of freedom of religion, and of checks and balances on civil power. In pagan cultures, or in Islam, the civil power is also the religious power. There is no question of challenging the actions of the state, or of holding some non-state-sanctioned religious belief. This separation of sacred and secular spheres is succinctly expressed by Jesus in the New Testament: “render unto Ceasar what is Ceasar’s; render unto God what is God’s.”

And on it goes. Kick the Christian foundation out from all these assumptions, and there is nothing to support them. Sooner or later they are questioned, then no longer honoured. We are seeing this in real time. Nor will there be anything that magically appears to  replace them—any other foundation or set of general principles to which we can appeal in case of conflicting interests. We will no longer be able to do anything together: civilizational collapse.

Perhaps some new civilization might rise from the rubble. That might take thousands of years.

The Weimar Dominion

 

Justin Trudeau is incompetent, corrupt, and with totalitarian and dictatorial intentions. This is apparent in a dozen ways to Sunday. It is therefore hard to accept that a large body of Canadians has voted for him in three elections, and, according to polls, a large body of Canadians would still vote for him. This does not speak well of the intelligence of Canadians.

It also condemns the Canadian elite. It has always been the Canadian way, unlike the American one, and like the British, to trust those at the top to keep things in good order: the police, the professions, the civil service, the media. In Canada democracy is seen more as a check against possible excess than the fundamental sovereign act.

Accordingly, Trudeau’s ascension to and persistence in power is disillusioning in what it says about the Canadian elites. They have not stopped him, nor pointed out how harmful he is for the nation. Following the Westminster system, there should have been a cabinet revolt long before now—as happened recently to Boris Johnson, or happened in his day to John Diefenbaker. Instead, when Jody Wilson Raybould resigned, only one cabinet member, shamefully, went with her. 

Had that not happened, there should have been a caucus revolt, as took down Erin O’Toole, or Liz Truss, or Theresa May. Prime ministers and party leaders, after all, are supposed to serve at the pleasure of their members.

Had that not happened, the big donors—Bay Street, Power Corp. and such—should have pulled the plug on Liberal Party finances. 

Had that not happened, the party brass, the backroom armies, the volunteers, should have pulled their services to force Trudeau out.

Had that not happened, the press and media mavens should have been pointing out on air and in print how irregular and improper Trudeau’s speeches and measures have been. A few have—Rex Murphy, Conrad Black, a brace in the new media. But where is Andrew Coyne, say, or Chantal Hebert? Even those who do speak out regularly against Trudeau, like John Ivison or Brian Lilley, seem to me on the whole to be soft-pedalling it.

All these systems seem to have failed. How come?

Each of these groups seems to have been acting in their own personal or class interests, in disregard of the greater public interest. If not positively and voluntarily benefitting from logrolling with the regime, everybody found it to their advantage to leave the battle to somebody else.

John Adams said, of the nation he had partly founded, “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.” This is probably true of any system of government: it succeeds or fails mostly on the morality of the people, and of the leadership in particular. The secret to British success over the last few centuries was the strict code of gentlemanliness and “fair play” that had been imbued in the upper classes. Such things are not instinctive, and cannot be presumed. They have to be carefully taught.

We have seen a collapse in morality in Canada and the rest of the West over recent generations—in “conventional morality,” as its opponents call it—and a collapse in moral education. Social collapse is bound to follow.

It can only be averted by a religious revival, which is then applied to the education system.

Vivek Ramaswamy

 

Vivek Ramaswamy is getting some traction as a presidential candidate. 

This my not mean much. Most times, dark horses rise and fall in the course of the presidential season. Herman Cain, Howard Dean, Michelle Bachman, Pete Buttigeig, Ben Carson; all had their day.

But just in case, it seems worth pointing out that some of his positions are alarming.

He wants to impose a “civics test” to allow 18 to 24-year-olds to vote. This is plainly discriminatory: the right to vote is inherent and follows from every man’s right to decide what is best for himself. Moreover, the content of any “civics test” could be skewed to exclude voters of a given opinion. No government should be allowed to choose its own voters.

Ramaswamy also wants to extend the use of executive orders. This subverts the legislative branch, reduces checks and balances, and moves the US in the direction of a dictatorship, if an elected dictatorship.

I imagine Ramaswamy is well-intentioned, but some of his instincts are bad.

Safely Dead

 

There are a lot of YouTube videos recounting “near-death experiences” (NDEs). In one I was watching recently, the woman reported feeling an overwhelming feeling of relief, a sense that she had made it safely.

Safely? She’s dead. Safe from what?

She does not say, and perhaps does not know. But the answer is obvious. Safe from sin, safe from hell. I expect the sense is instinctive. 

“Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell.”

We all die. That is not the struggle for which we live. 

Merit and Class

 

Kathy Shaidle

David Brooks’s NYT essay “What If We’re the Bad Guys Here?” is stirring much attention. Link was posted here yesterday. This seems to mark an inflection point in the ongoing collapse of the ancien regime. Members of the Second Estate are starting to move over, to acknowledge that the Third Estate has legitimate grievances. They are not just deplorables, bitter clingers, rednecks, racists, unwashed peasants,

However, Brooks does not fully get it. He argues that the problem is the “modern meritocracy,” “that sorts and excludes people on the basis of the quality that we [sic] possess most: academic achievement. Highly educated parents go to elite schools, marry each other, work at high-paying professional jobs and pour enormous resources into our children, who get into the same elite schools, marry each other and pass their exclusive class privileges down from generation to generation.”

To describe this system as a “meritocracy” is to add insult to injury. A system that preserves class privileges generation to generation is the opposite of a meritocracy: it means success is by birth rather than merit.

Arguably, one reason why things do not seem to work as well as they used to, in Canada or in the US, is that we have in recent decades abandoned merit in favour of inherited privilege. Some of this privilege is enforced by “affirmative action,” discrimination on the basis of race or sex rather than merit. But most of it comes from the growing emphasis on, as Brooks says, “academic achievement.”

Academic achievement is not merit, and is not necessarily related to it. Merit means being the best at doing the given job. Free markets tend to do that. Credentialism (“academic achievement”) and such similar regulations and restraints on trade work against that.

Journalism is a case in point. As Brooks points out:

“When I began my journalism career in Chicago in the 1980s, there were still some old crusty working-class guys around the newsroom. Now we’re not only a college-dominated profession, we’re an elite-college-dominated profession. Only 0.8 percent of all college students graduate from the super elite 12 schools (the Ivy League colleges, plus Stanford, M.I.T., Duke and the University of Chicago). A 2018 study found that more than 50 percent of the staff writers at the beloved New York Times and The Wall Street Journal attended one of the 29 most elite universities in the nation.”

This parallels a clear decline in the quality of North American journalism, which surely everybody who loves the smell of wet ink can see, and which is reflected in the subscription numbers. And the rising competition that is eating this legacy media’s lunch is, just as in the glory days of journalism, most often card-carrying members of the working class who never attended university, let alone journalism school: Kate MacMillan, Kathy Shaidle, Matt Drudge, “Clyde Do Something,” “the Pleb,” and the like.

Journalism is a highly-skilled occupation: perhaps the most highly skilled. Language is itself mankind’s most sophisticated invention, underlying and comprehending everything else we have accomplished. A journalist must be master of it: able to write both well and fast, on any topic, on demand. Moreover, he must know how to become an instant expert on any topic.

Being able to do it well is the acid test. On the whole, more members of the “working class” can than members of the professional class. This is a strong indication that the professional class collectively is not more intelligent than the working class. The magnificent organization of the recent “Freedom Convoy” to Ottawa, all done on the fly, is another.

Our growing demand over recent decades for formal academic credentials has worked to weed out the people who can do journalism well. It weeds out the best and brightest, no doubt, in other fields too. 

It works against merit in a number of ways. 

First, one’s family must have a good bit of money, and be prepared to invest it in you, for you to be able to stay out of the workforce for four, six, or nine years gathering some academic credential. This would be true even if higher education were free. This favours established wealth over ability.

Second, higher education is of course not free. Brooks notes that the journalists at the top newspapers come not just from universities, but from the top 29 most elite universities. He cites the Ivy League, MIT, Stanford, Duke, and the University of Chicago. These are all private universities, with astronomical tuition—tuition growing ever higher, vastly faster than the rate of inflation. Your parents must be wealthy to afford you this entry ticket—even leaving aside the common “legacy” preferences. The rich thus stay rich, and the poor, poor.

Third, even if higher education were free, and students could earn money while attending, the skills required to succeed in a classroom are usually different from the skills needed to succeed in a given job. And this is true not just in the trades. As a sometime teacher of language, I am acutely aware that a classroom is about the worst place possible to teach someone to speak a language. The best place, obviously, is out in the street, where one has a chance at actual conversation. A classroom is designed for lectures. As a sometime teacher of writing, I am acutely aware that writing is the same. It cannot be taught by rote and rule, because once any rule is commonly followed, breaking it is desirable: it makes the reading more interesting. Moreover, since writing is the hardest brain exercise available to mankind, doing anything else but sitting down and starting to write is less effective at learning the craft than the craft itself.

Good students, overly devoted to rote and rule, are almost automatically going to be bad writers, and bad journalists. They will be bad, or not particularly good, at any number of other things. They are inclined, to speak bluntly, to be drudges.

Fourth, as any intelligent teacher must realize, or any intelligent person prepared to think about it, in a classroom, some students are always left behind. Because students will always vary in their abilities, and in their prior knowledge, a teacher must pitch the lesson to some, and ignore the needs of others. A classroom ends up working best for those of average intelligence and ability. The less intelligent or less well prepared get left behind, and either fail out, or keep moving up the queue without ever learning the material—because the class has moved on before they have had time to grasp it. The more intelligent are left bored and with nothing to do—the time spent in class actually hinders their learning and holds them back. They learn to be lazy, or begin to rebel. As often as not, they too fail out, or drop out.

While there is much public sympathy and concern for less intelligent or less prepared students, and programs to supposedly help them, there is virtually nothing for the most intelligent—if anything, they are resented. Worse, if teachers or administrators, exercising their exquisite social conscience, insist on pitching the lesson or curriculum lower to make sure the slow students get it, necessarily, more students towards the top of the spectrum get left behind.

Therefore, beyond a certain point, a little above average intelligence, academic achievement weeds out not just the lower end of the intellectual spectrum, but the higher end, and produces mediocrity.

Journalism used to be an opportunity for those brightest students who could not tolerate high school, or were too poor to get to college. That is now lost, and journalism is in crisis as a result. So too with a number of other occupations, that are just not getting done what they once could do. Teaching is another example. I am sure readers know others, based on their own professional experience.

Fifth, our public schools are actually designed, since the beginning of the 20th century, to turn out factory workers. They are designed to produce conformity and submission, not to educate as such, and certainly not for leadership or initiative. Those who succeed in this system will be good soldiers, but too easily led. 

The original plan was that expensive private schools would teach leadership, keeping the ruling elite in power. This was bad enough; but, over time, the same philosophy has seeped into the private schools, through the ed schools and legal requirements for private schools to hire only “qualified” teachers, so that now everybody is trained for obedient conformity.

It is not, as Brooks blithely assumes, the educated elite that “invent new technologies that privilege superskilled workers.” Steve Jobs and Bill Gates were college dropouts. Orville and Wilbur Wright were bicycle mechanics. Albert Einstein was a patent clerk. New inventions and new ideas are more likely to come outside than inside the established academic institutions. Academic institutions are innately conservative—not necessarily or always a bad thing; they are supposed to be there to preserve and to pass on established wisdom. A task at which they are now failing.

I’m not sure Brooks quite understands why “it’s not the entrepreneurs who seem most threatening to workers; it’s the professional class.” They see Trump, a rich entrepreneur, as their champion. This confuses the professional elite. Based on their Marxist ideology, the working class should see such a “rich capitalist” as the enemy, keeping them down. While the socialist professional elite should be seen as the allies of the working class. Even if they would not be caught dead in their vicinity

But, while Trump may not have started from the bottom, the thing about entrepreneurship is that it is indeed a pure meritocracy. 

It is not any lack of merit that is keeping the working class down.

A Half-Woke Essay

 

Originally appearing in the New York Times.

"What If We're the Baddies?"

People are slowly wake up, including members of the professional elite. 

What's That Smell?

 

Justin Trudeau and his wife Sophie have announced their legal separation. I think Trudeau is an awful human being, but as far as his marital situation goes, none of us on the outside can know the rights and wrongs. We should not gloat or take sides. All we can say is that every divorce is a tragedy, and divorce is too frequent in our culture.

Tangentialy related, Viva Frei suggests that Justin Trudeau probably smells bad, and that may have had something to do with the separation. Bad people, he says, generally smell bad.

That is too crazy a comment for me to ever make, but since Viva has raised it, I have always found the same: bad people smell bad. Perhaps not always, but usually. I have often pondered why. Is it because, loving themselves, they also love their own smell, and so do not think much about personal cleanliness? No: I know of one who showered at least once a day, but still stank. Is it because they are chronically nervous, fearing their conscience, and therefore sweat more than the rest of us? This could be; lie detectors work on something like this principle. 

Or is it something supernatural?

After all, good people conversely often smell good. Including, I read, their uncorrupted corpses. This must be more than the absence of perspiration. And I also find that bad people look different: they have a dark, sickly pall about them. I do not mean a dark skin tone-their skin can be quite pale. It is more like shadows on their face. Something about them looks less lifelike, more waxen.

Okay, it sounds crazy. But Viva Frei apparently notices it too. Perhaps others do.

It might be that many others experience this, but it does not register, because they are committed to the belief that there is no such thing as good and bad people.

Why There Is an Indelible Stigma around Mental Illness

 

Peek-a-boo!

There is a reason for the stigma around “mental illness.” There is a reason why the stigma cannot be gotten rid of, despite official efforts. Insist that depression and the other forms of PTSD are an illness, no more a matter of moral weakness than, say, breaking a leg, and “you’re sick” simply becomes an insult.

There is a reason we commonly insist that the mentally ill are violent and dangerous, when the statistics show they plainly are not.

The way we treat the “mentally ill” is actually strikingly like the way we once treated lepers, as Michel Foucault has documented.

It is because we fear the mentally ill. It is because mental illness is contagious; and we fear becoming mentally ill.

The problem is that those suffering “mental illness,” or CPTSD, chronic post-traumatic stress disorder, as it is now often called, have some intimate experience of evil, and are utterly sincere. That is their trauma. The rest of us are delusional about evil, generally pretending it does not exist. We whistle past the graveyard. Because otherwise, we ourselves would experience the trauma. We shield ourselves in denial. 

As Winston Churchill, himself depressive, perhaps “bipolar,” observed: “Men occasionally stumble over truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.” Churchill credited his depression for his ability to see the genuine danger of Adolph Hitler, when all the wise heads of his time were for appeasement: Germany had been treated shabbily at Versailles, Hitler was not as extreme as his rhetoric, his demands were not so unreasonable. Churchill was for years condemned as a warmonger.

George Orwell similarly credited his chronic depression for his critical ability, as he saw it, to confront unpleasant truths that other people could not.

General Sherman went mad for a spell at the beginning of the American Civil War. He could see the horrors ahead, when the general public were streaming to the hillsides at Bull Run to enjoy the battle. He, and General Grant, were both depressive—as are most great generals. A military leader cannot afford delusions.

So the mentally ill alone confront the truth, and the mentally ill, being utterly sincere, cannot be relied on to shut up about it. So calling them insane—literally, “dirty”—and discounting anything they say is the necessary attitude among the general run of us in order to preserve our common delusions.

In earlier times, this tendency of the “mentally ill” to speak truth was put to use in the institution of the court jester—some artistic type declared to be insane, who then had special warrant to speak the truth to the king without punishment. After all, the poor fool could not control himself.

And this is the one way the king could ever know the truth about the state of his reign. Courtiers would always have motive to flatter instead.

This is also the point of the cultural institution of “the artist” generally. Artists are broadly loopy in the eyes of the world, and so, if obliquely, if they re true artists, can get away with speaking the truth. Emily Dickinson summarized the artistic task: “Tell all the truth, but tell it slant/Success in circuit lies.” As with Jesus’s parables, those who have ears to hear can take away what they are ready to accept. The rest can just imagine it is some idle entertainment, or that Leonard Cohen is singing about sex.

But for the general run of the “mentally ill,” those with no or little talent to entertain, shunning, contempt, and torture are the usual lot.

This is to be expected in this world. It is exactly what Jesus warned about—and showed in his own person.

Confessions of a Warmonger

 

There is these days a strong isolationist sentiment in the US, on both the left and the right. Many have been questioning why NATO still exists—after all, the Cold War is over. The Russian invasion of Ukraine gave it a new lease on life, but as that war has dragged on, the questions are being raised again.

I think such talk is both foolish and immoral.

The point of NATO, and of supporting Ukraine, is collective security. If a large enough group of countries pledges to defend one another in case of any external attack, war becomes far less likely. It is the same principle on which, in the words of the Declaration of Independence, governments are instituted among men: to mutually defend our rights.

Just as it is immoral to stand by and do nothing if you see a woman being raped, or a child tortured, it is immoral to stand by and do nothing when you see one country invaded by another. You cannot honourably say it is not your business, that “most Americans don’t even know where Ukraine is.” We are our brothers’ keeper.

What about Afghanistan, you might ask. What about Vietnam? Doesn’t the US keep getting into trouble by sticking its nose in?

In Afghanistan, the US was naïve in thinking it could impose democracy. The proper approach would have been good old gunboat diplomacy: go in, overthrow the government pull out, let the cowchips fall where they may. In Vietnam, the US was not engaged in collective security, and arguably the aggressor, since the Viet Cong were not a foreign invader. The moral case was unclear.

The naïve might suggest that keeping world peace is what the UN is for. But the UN is almost invariably ineffective in stopping aggression, or attacks on human rights; all it can generally do is send in peacekeepers to avoid incidents once a treaty is signed. The UN includes everyone, and most governments do not share any real commitment to human rights or the good of mankind. On top of that, a couple of the most likely aggressors have vetoes. Let the UN set up a panel on human rights, and Saudi Arabia, say, Iran, China, or North Korea will likely be on it.

NATO is, by contrast, a coalition of liberal democracies. They do share essential values, and so can act together if needed. Moreover, their interests are unlikely to seriously conflict: there is rarely any point in one democracy going to war with another. Should they conquer any of a neighbour’s territory, after all, those people too must be given a vote, and so the change is relatively trivial to either people or government. Unlikely to be worth a war.

Accordingly, NATO can have a vital role as a de facto world government. It indeed ought to be expanded, not just to include Ukraine, but to include Japan, New Zealand, Australia, South Korea, Singapore. 

This collective security system would protect democracy. It would also give currently autocratic nations a strong incentive to go democratic: it would allow them protection by this security umbrella.

Conversely, on the other hand, if any member country slipped away from the democratic fold, it ought, by vote of the other members, to be expelled. This loss o the security guarantee should make this less likely to happen. Currently, the one problem member is Turkiye—for this reason. Under Erdogan, it has become more autocratic.

So go ahead—call me a neocon. Call me a shill for the military-industrial complex. I’m into world peace. Sorry.