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Sunday, June 3, 2018

Reject Passivity

       I don't like mowing the lawn, but I do appreciate that it is a mostly mindless task that allows my me time and opportunity to just think and ponder. Yesterday, my thoughts wondered to the topic of "the meek shall inherit the earth," and who are the meek.

       Language has become so imprecise in the modern world, that I think most people misconstrue meekness as passivity or tolerance. I would dare say that a fair number of people believe passivity to be a virtue. The word that is bandied about is "tolerance," but which is really meant to be passive acceptance. I am reminded of Alexander Pope's warning:

“Vice is a monster of so frightful mien
As to be hated needs but to be seen;
Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face,
We first endure, then pity, then embrace.”

Only, it is not just vice of which we are to be accepting, but also our own, slow, annihilation.

       Over the past two centuries, we have seen the growth of various philosophies that are inimical to human happiness, culminating with the socialist philosophies including so-called progressivism. I written before, and cited to many others that have written or spoke about, Cultural Marxism, which sought to overthrow society, not by violent revolution, but through a slow "march through the institutions" with the intent to poison the culture, and twist it to reflect the Marxist agenda.

       During the march through the institutions, our passivity was assured mostly by appealing to our natural goodness and generosity: that we needed to be tolerant and respectful of the views of the left, no matter where and how these views were expressed. Social and moral relativism ruled the land.

       But today, with the march through the institutions complete, we are seeing a shift from appealing to our goodness and generosity, to threatening us should we speak out. Thus we see social justice warriors attempt to shame us into acquiescence and passivity. Don't speak up, or you will be labeled a bigot, racist, deplorable, or some other label.

       When reading the teachings of Christ in the whole, it is evident that He never intended for his followers to be passive in the face of evil. The meekness he discusses is not that of passivity and acceptance in general, but a submission to God much like a child submits to his or her parents. Christ was outspoken and a man of action and deed. He overthrew the tables of the money changers and was not afraid of calling out sin. Even to his followers, he spoke truths that were hard. He expected us to change in order to become better than we thought, but change is difficult, and it is not easy to accept that we have been doing wrong.

       Similarly, Christ never preached tolerance for evil. Quite the contrary, he constantly warned about allowing evil into our lives, whether it was admonition to cut off an offending arm, or to reject the wolves in sheep's clothing.

       I believe this applies to the current cultural war. The left has mostly won: abortion is firmly the law of the land, two-parent families and stable marriages are so far in the past that most of us cannot remember when it was the norm, Christianity has been driven from the public square and most Christian religions are now in the process of self-destructing in order to avoid the "sin" of offending a special snowflake or victim group. The left can shame the right all it wants, but the opposite is denied. The only thing left for the cultural Marxist is to destroy "whiteness"--the vestiges of Western civilization and the hold-outs among Christians. And to ensure continued passivity, we that are of European descent are told we are guilty of some irredeemable sin, and that we just need to shut up and listen ... and confess our guilt.

       The first step in this is to reject the idea of white guilt. There is no such thing. One of the basic Biblical teachings is that the child is not answerable for the sins of the parents. So, even if Western civilization was not the second best thing to have ever arisen (Christianity being the first), there is still no need for guilt, apology or reparations. SJW's always lie, as Vox Day has written, and its time to stop passively accepting their lies, but actively reject it and defend rightness.

2 comments:

  1. Planning on quoting you extensively as I am teaching the EQ lesson this Sunday.
    Dig your blog, by the way. Excellent work.

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    Replies
    1. Thank you. I'm glad it can be of assistance. Good luck with your lesson.

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