Thursday, March 28, AD 2024 6:52pm

Believe This or Else

 

“In my study of communist societies, I came to the conclusion that the purpose of communist propaganda was not to persuade or convince, not to inform, but to humiliate; and therefore, the less it corresponded to reality the better. When people are forced to remain silent when they are being told the most obvious lies, or even worse when they are forced to repeat the lies themselves, they lose once and for all their sense of probity. To assent to obvious lies is…in some small way to become evil oneself. One’s standing to resist anything is thus eroded, and even destroyed. A society of emasculated liars is easy to control. I think if you examine political correctness, it has the same effect and is intended to.”

Theodore Dalrymple (Anthony Daniels)

 

The totalitarian impulse in contemporary Leftism is sowing a bitter wind:

 

And so we are asked to agree to things which we cannot believe, and told not to object to things to which most people object, such as giving children drugs to stop them going through puberty or allowing men who self-identify as female to use female toilets. The pain that comes from being expected to remain silent on important matters and perform impossible leaps on others is tremendous, not least because the problems are so evident.

As anyone who has lived under totalitarianism can attest, there is something demeaning and eventually soul-destroying about being expected to go along with claims you do not believe to be true.

If the belief is that all people should be regarded as having equal value and be accorded equal dignity, then that may be all well and good. But if you’re asked to believe there are no differences between men and women, racism and anti-racism, homosexuality and heterosexuality, then this will drive you to distraction. That distraction is something we’re in the middle of and something we must try to find our way out from. If we fail, the direction of travel is clear.

We face not just a future of ever-greater atomisation, rage and violence, but a future in which the possibility of a backlash against all rights advances – including the good ones – grows more likely.

A future in which racism is responded to with racism, denigration based on gender is responded to with denigration based on gender. At some stage of humiliation there is simply no reason for majority groups not to retaliate with the exact same weapons that have worked so well on themselves.

Go here to read the rest.  Being forced to give public assent to lies in order to preserve one’s livelihood and to avoid being the target of social media, makes a bad joke of any country purporting to be free.

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Art Deco
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 6:32am

Twitter mobs you can face down; they only influence people who are overly other-directed. The curio in our time is that wide swaths of our professional-managerial class are enforcers of this system, and astonishingly sanctimonious enforcers. That would be, for example, the doctors and administrators who have had Paul Church fired from his job and removed from the attending list at four hospitals in greater Boston. His crime was making critical remarks about male homosexuality in an intra-office circular. The question for the rest of us is why these people are willing to do this. This same social type is happy to ignore – and denigrate – much larger cultural minorities.

Foxfier
Admin
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 6:45am

You can only face down Twitter mobs if no-one you care about can be reached by their influence.

My cousin’s house was literally surrounded, for hours, by a chanting mob of protesters that were sent by a twitter mob. Because someone thought her company might have applied for a bid that the twitter mob forming group didn’t want filled.

Those doctors don’t attack the dude? They’re next on the list. And are generally much, much more vulnerable.

It’s becoming standard to threaten folks’ kids, for heaven’s sake.

Foxfier
Admin
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 6:47am

People are going to die. The activist mobs keep going further, and further….

Penguins Fan
Penguins Fan
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 7:26am

I have to put up with Pride Month at my place of employment. They fired an employee for making a Facebook post unrelated to her job or her employer. We do not have free speech anymore.

Philip Nachazel
Philip Nachazel
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 12:01pm

Hang in there.

Mercy first.
Justice to follow.
Keep trying to win souls for Christ by living your genuine life of Faith in this darkened world.

One co-worker moved by your witness can repent and return to the fold. Oh the great Glory that is God as he graces that soul who comes back to the Father. You, who planted the seed without even knowing, will share in that victory.

This is our time folks.
Make it count.

Art Deco
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 1:09pm

They fired an employee for making a Facebook post unrelated to her job or her employer.

I.e. someone grassed her up to HR or her supervisor. Again, people operate these machines. There excuse is just what?

Art Deco
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 1:10pm

My cousin’s house was literally surrounded, for hours, by a chanting mob of protesters that were sent by a twitter mob. Because someone thought her company might have applied for a bid that the twitter mob forming group didn’t want filled.

Your cousin wasn’t facing a Twitter mob, but an actual mob.

trackback
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 1:22pm

[…] FRANCISPLANET:  “A SOCIETY OF EMASCULATED LIARS IS EASY TO CONTROL” […]

GregB
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 1:37pm

To me the whole social media virtue signaling thing has overtones of something like drug addiction. The emphasis is more on feeling good rather than actually doing good. The habituation of the pursuit of emotional highs, always on the hunt for the next fix.

Bob S. in PI
Bob S. in PI
Monday, September 2, AD 2019 9:20pm

Sad to say, but this brings back bad memories while serving in the military. Then we had to attend mandatory sensitivity training about how to accept homosexuals and transgender people in the military. In one sense, those people were entitled to proper respect due to human beings. But, in another sense, we were told their lifestyle was normal and we couldn’t say anything about it. To try to talk to them about what the Bible said or what other, previously accepted psychological findings were [such that transgender ideas were manufactured by others with a political / social agenda] was not allowed. To raise those issues was considered unacceptable with the new military policy. We certainly felt like we were part of a “social engineering” effort. We talked about it among ourselves and accepted what we could while trying to stay focused on why we were in the military in the first place: to serve the country and fight our enemies. This stuff was a distraction which made us grind our teeth but then we got back to work…

Don L
Don L
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 4:00am

Freedom, to the God–loathing left, means the freedom to destroy…everything and anybody, including self.

David WS
David WS
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 6:20am

The mantra of same sex marriage and homosexual sex (and more) must be enforced for at least these two reasons:
1. It won’t hold up to intellectual scrutiny, open debate is not permitted.
2. Deep down those who do these things know they’re wrong, they in no way want to hear anyone saying as such, so they silence others.

Michael Dowd
Michael Dowd
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 6:23am

To fight this kind of thing I make comments in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal which aggravates the Liberals–especially pro-Trump comments.

Ernst Schreiber
Ernst Schreiber
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 6:55am

Silence isn’t enough. What they really want is your approval.

Foxfier
Admin
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 7:32am

Your cousin wasn’t facing a Twitter mob, but an actual mob.

Which was recruited on Twitter, activated on Twitter, organized on Twitter and actually live-Tweeted their behavior while there– then did the after-action follow-up on Twitter.

That’s the implicit threat of twitter mobs; “do what we want, or we’ll come physically mob you.”

trackback
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 1:12pm

[…] Kalb, J.D., at The Catholic World Report The End Of The News – John Waters at First Things Believe This or Else – Donald R. McClarey, J.D., at The American Catholic Top 10 Myths About Clergy Abuse in the […]

Art Deco
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 2:02pm

That’s the implicit threat of twitter mobs; “do what we want, or we’ll come physically mob you.”

People making random comments all over the country are not a threat to anything but your emotional equilibrium. This only works if they can stir up a hornet’s nest within a critical mass of people who live within commuting distance of you. Easier to do with Twitter, but possible to do with listservs and phone trees.

Foxfier
Admin
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 5:19pm

People making random comments all over the country are not a threat to anything but your emotional equilibrium.

Yeah, like some guy standing next to you yelling “kill that dude” isn’t.

Until, y’know, you’re f*n dead.

That is why they have an “incitement” charge, and why you don’t have to actually kill someone for a mob violence charge.

Mary De Voe
Tuesday, September 3, AD 2019 7:19pm

“That is why they have an “incitement” charge, and why you don’t have to actually kill someone for a mob violence charge.”
Peaceable assembly is our birthright in our First Amendment. The sovereign person/citizen is imbued with the peace of Christ in our Constitution which also endows citizens with an acknowledgement of self-defense.

Foxfier
Admin
Wednesday, September 4, AD 2019 7:34am

Emphasis on peaceful.

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