Woodstock versus Charlottesville

I read a comment by @aedroberts in a recent post about books that will help your children see the wisdom of anarchy, and his comment was that Orwell was actually a Statist and that 1984 was a braggadocious novel (And yes folks, Trump was using a real word.)

I'm no expert on Orwell and that certainly could be the case -- if 1984 was not meant to be a warning but actually a prediction of the overwhelming inevitability of the power of Statism, then Orwell is a great lens through which to view what is currently going on in this country. If Orwell represents the stick of what we fear that drives us towards totalitarianism and Huxley is the carrot of what we love that entices us in the same direction, I believe that we have become a mix between Orwell and Huxley, a "HuxWellian world", so I'll preface my thoughts on that with 2 Huxley quotes:

The propagandist's purpose is to make one set of people forget that certain other sets of people are human.

Idealism is the noble toga that political gentlemen drape over their will to power.

In the recent events in Charlottesville, we just witnessed both of these quotes in action. An understanding of the Civil War is impossible without understanding exactly what the South was fighting for, which was the right of self determination. An ideal and noble cause. Unfortunately, and this is what makes history complicated, they draped this idealism over their will to power, their desire to be free to continue to enslave others, and thus nullified their entire point. Similarly, trying to frame the North as having been fighting to "Preserve the Union", certainly a noble cause also, misses the fact that by "Union" they meant "territory belonging to the Federal Government" -- not nearly as noble, and thus they hid their will to power under idealism no less than the South did.

Trying to frame the Civil War as having been just about slavery misses the point of the conflict entirely as well as neatly blinding us to the reality that the Civil War marked the end of the American Republic and the beginning of the American Empire. It cheapens our history and thus deprives us as a society of valuable perspective. Should we rejoice that slavery is gone? Absolutely. Should we mourn that in the process of ending it through force of arms we may have done mortal damage to the character and self perspective of our society? Absolutely. Should we acknowledge that other societies (England in 1830) were able to end slavery without any conflict, and question ourselves as to why it took a civil war in this country to end it, and why our educators continue to stoutly presume that war was the only way to end it? Most certainly.

Should civil war statues be taken down? Only if we want to erase and forget history, which is the mindset of ISIS and their quest to blow up all reminders of the variability of human perspectives and opinions. Could civil war statues be a chance for us as a society to reflect on the complicated nature of history, human society, and freedom? Only if the opposing sides remember that they are both human and that society is a joint effort and partnership.

Unfortunately, just as the Confederates didn't want to accept that their slaves were human, the alt-left now wants to forget that the Southerners and historical slave owners were human too. And that is the dominant theme today from the alt-left, that anyone who tries to remember that the Civil War represented both the peril and the promise of decentralized freedom as well as the peril and the promise of centralized power is a racist white nationalist. And thus they see no cognitive dissonance in taking power into their own hands, tearing down a public statue, and chanting "No KKK, no fascist USA" just before they march down the street chanting "I believe that we will win" -- as if fascism can only be practiced by people with white skin! And thus they drape idealism over their will to power as well.

Time for a music break -- the band Genesis has something to say about how our society is degenerating into a Land of Confusion. Listen to the lyrics.

Meanwhile, the unstoppable juggernaut of Orwell's State power chugs on, steadily infiltrating all aspect of life. Consider Orwell's three INGSOC slogans:

War is Peace is the mantra of today's Right. Perpetual war in order to protect the Pax Americana. We label as "Peace" the Iraqi sanctions that killed 500,000 children over a decade, drone strikes that routinely kill innocent people of all ages, and support of Syrian "moderate" opposition who behead children because they are christian. This is an intellectual monstrosity that should horrify us all. But we don't seem capable of learning. Just as we don't seem capable of comprehending that the War on Drugs has destroyed Mexican and Central American society, that the War on Poverty poisoned the inner city nuclear family, and that the War on Inequality has bitterly divided rather than united us.

Meanwhile, Freedom is Slavery is the mantra of today's Left. The Pollyanna "glass half full" Liberalism of our Founding Fathers, who found reality to be delicious and thus saw opportunity in freedom despite the necessary cost of personal responsibility, has slowly turned into the Eeyore "glass half empty" Liberalism of today which finds reality to be distasteful, and thus sees in every freedom nothing but responsibility and therefore just another way to trip and fall down, just another burden that prevents us individuals from being footloose and fancy free from all of the responsibilities of existence.

Thus the freedom to educate your child in any way you see fit, free from mandates and heavy handed intrusions from others, has instead become slavery to the intolerable burden of having to provide an education for your children yourself.

The freedom to negotiate independently with an employer and come to whatever arrangement the two of you feel fair without being forced into lockstep decision making with your fellow employees, the freedom to freely offer your efforts as a service under the belief that this labor is considered to be valuable by others, and the flip side to the free offering of your labor which is the individual freedom to walk away from a job and find another one whenever you choose to without having to get permission from some higher authority, instead becomes slavery to the dread fear that at any moment you could be fired from your job.

The freedom to save whatever resources you wish for old age, in whatever form you desire, whether that is farmland or rental properties or government bonds or old violins or heirloom whisky, because your tax burden is low enough that you don't feel compelled to shelter your savings in retirement plans mostly restricted to the stock market to avoid an otherwise punitive level of taxation, becomes instead slavery to the millstone of the uncertain wisdom of your choices.

The ability to interact with any medical provider you desire, free to shop around until you find an individual whose vision of health resonates with your own, with whom you can negotiate whatever form of payment and level of intervention suites your resources and risk tolerance, instead becomes slavery to the russian roulette of existence in a mortal body with a finite life span and limited resources.

The freedom to worship whatever greater power you desire and to gather together with like minded individuals to rule yourselves, in the process mixing however much of your religion you desire into your local civic customs and local government processes, instead becomes slavery to the anachronistic habits of prior generations and the illogical whims of your fellow citizens.

And thus, America has returned full circle to life inside the womb of empire.

Which takes us to Ignorance is Strength, which is neither the mantra of Left or Right, but is the Mantra of Power. This one is simple. Just watch this clip from A Few Good Men.

Colonel Jessup's rationalization would be an acceptable answer if a government of men could be trusted to wield this power in the dark. But as Madison noted in The Federalist #51, men cannot:

The great security against a gradual concentration of the several powers in the same department, consists in giving to those who administer each department the necessary constitutional means and personal motives to resist encroachments of the others. The provision for defense must in this, as in all other cases, be made commensurate to the danger of attack. Ambition must be made to counteract ambition. The interest of the man must be connected with the constitutional rights of the place. It may be a reflection on human nature, that such devices should be necessary to control the abuses of government. But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature? If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.

So if government is not the answer, then who is? Time for the next music break -- Who'll stop the Rain?

The answer, as far as I'm concerned, is alluded to in the last verse of that song. How will we set our souls free? By allowing each other to peacefully do what we want and trusting each other. Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young wrote a song about how this process feels. Listen to the lyrics.

The world can be an amazing place if we allow it to be. But it will not happen unless we turn away from the darkness of trying to do good with evil.

Image sources:
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