Resisting the Thought Police

frog-boiling

We have all heard of the boiled frog analogy which is used often these days because of the media driven moral, political and cultural decline.  The phrase “politically correct” has become almost an overused cliché for the same reason.  It’s not that these ideas are overused in the sense that there are not abundant applications for their legitimate use, but because there are so many proper applications that their distinct connotation seems less and less meaningful.  In other words, the frogs are pretty much done and ready to eat.

I again give the example of Miss California, because in spite of her faults, her situation underlines how far the media has taken their “laws” of acceptable speech.  One may now be crucified, not only for a politically incorrect opinion, but more importantly, for even daring to give such an opinion as an honest answer to a direct question.  It is as though the PC police think they have the right to random searches of our consciences, and more than that, to inspection on demand of what we are willing to say or not to say.  They know what we think and we know what they want us to say, and we both know that the two are not the same.  We are expected to tell them what they want to hear.  They will indulge our opinions as long as we do not express them or act on them, but God help us if we bring our honest convictions out into the public forum, even when we are asked for our opinion.

As almost completely boiled frogs we have lost most of our sense of pain and are nearly paralyzed.  Consciousness is slipping away and we find it hard to care enough to resist.  It’s almost over.  But even if we had been thrown into the lukewarm water just a second ago, we would still have to resist with all our might, because the whole modus operandi of political correctness is to lull us into complete inaction by means of an incremental continuum of euphemisms and self congratulatory, non-confrontational and passive admonitions of tolerance.  To the extent that this is successful, the behavior of the masses  in turn conforms itself to the goal of the social engineers.  The only effective resistance is that which is total and unyielding.

The ironic and horrifying thing is that many people have gladly donated their froggy bodies to these “social scientists” for the progress of humanity.  I remember on several occasions that in the deliberations of the Connecticut State Assembly on the question of same-sex marriage, any number of legislators would talk about the evolution of thought on the question of homosexuality and gay marriage.  “We have come a long way from when we discussed the question of same-sex adoptions,” they say, “In a few more years, who knows where we will be questions related to homosexuality?”  Granted some of those who made remarks like this were ideologues and propagandists with an agenda, but others, I think, were genuinely searching, though it seems to me that they knew they were going to be cooked.  They were just grateful for the time to get used to the water.

I would prefer not to be the prophet of doom.  If only we could be like the people of  Nineveh and those in my position like Jonah, who though they prophesied the end and its inevitability, were almost disappointed when the people unexpectedly repented and put on sackcloth.  God actually had to rebuke Jonah for his disappointment.  I would like to be more encouraging, but that really depends on our willingness to face facts.  We are almost cooked and unless we find the strength to jump out of the water, it really is over.

The only ones who can get out of the pot are people like Ezra Levant, who beat the thought police by not giving an inch, by fighting back swiftly and relentlessly.  He beat the human rights commission in Canada, when they tried to shut him up for reporting on the Muhammad Cartoon flap back in 2006.  He turned their attack on him into a direct offensive against the social engineers and the thought police and he did it by exposing their lies, on YouTube.

Take a look at his opening remarks to the commission about his case:

And at his response to the question “What was your intent in publishing the cartoons?”

Aside from prayer, this is the only thing that will work, but don’t use prayer as an excuse to do nothing.

Chesterton on the Crusades, Sort of

I can only say that I am not much of a crusader, but at least I am not a Mohammedan.

Well, I don’t think anyone would get away with saying something like that today. G.K. was so warmly welcomed by the students of Holy Cross College, because, as was said, he was one of the “foremost Cruaders in the modern world of letters,” meaning he was not a skeptic and was willing to defend his position; meaning he was also a Catholic and willing to defend his position.

In accepting the honor, Chesterton was typically self-deprecating. This is especially edifying, considering that he was to receive, posthumously, from Pius XI the title “Defender of the Faith,” a title once granted by Leo X to Henry VIII for his defense of the Catholic faith against the Protestant heresy.

The selection of the Crusader as the mascot of Holy Cross college, back in 1925, had seems to have been more or less unrelated to the themes of this blog:

Holy Cross’s athletic teams for both men and women are known as the Crusaders. It is reported that the name “Crusader” was first associated with Holy Cross in 1884 at an alumni banquet in Boston, where an engraved Crusader mounted on an armored horse appeared at the head of the menu.

The name was rediscovered by Stanley Woodward, a sports reporter for the Boston Herald, when he used the term “Crusader” to describe the Holy Cross baseball team in a story written in 1925. The name appealed to the Holy Cross student body, which held a vote later in that year to decide whether this cognomen or one of the other two currently in use – “Chiefs” and “Sagamores”- would be adopted. On October 6, 1925, The Tomahawk, an earlier name of the student newspaper, reported that the results of the ballot were: Crusaders 143, Chiefs 17, Sagamores.

However, the connection between the history of the Crusaders and Mr. Gilbert Keith Chesterton, did not go unnoticed by the students of Holy Cross. I wonder what would be said about this crusading business today on the campus of the average Catholic university or college. Well, for example . . . or how about this?

Unfortunately, it might not be until our Catholic universities are operated under sharia law that we will have more admiration for the simple honesty and humility of the Chestertonian response.