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Friday, July 04, 2008
The Stopped Clock
When you know a man to be upbeat and forward looking, when he's been that way for all the years you've known him, it can be terribly hard to endure his fits of melancholy. We all have them -- yes, even me -- but the contrast makes his particularly gloomy.
Fran and I were chatting yesterday evening, as we often do after work. I had wonderful news to share: my dear friend Amber, whom some of you have read about at my other site, has left the porn trade and taken up far more wholesome work. She's enthusiastic about it; it's her first "regular job" since high school. I expected Fran to celebrate along with me.
Well, he didn't. Not that he regards it as a bad development; he's simply too low emotionally for it to register with him in a big way. He expressed approval, congratulated me on my contribution, and trailed off. His lack of reaction left me feeling very sad.
I tried to probe a little. I know, it's often the exact wrong thing to do, but I couldn't help it. (It's a girl thing.) It turned out to have a lot to do with today -- Independence Day.
I don't pay much attention to politics, but even I know things aren't going very well for people who just want to be left alone. As bad as they can seem here, the world beyond is in even worse shape.
The wars America fought throughout the twentieth century were all intended to promote freedom. If you were unaware of the outcomes of those wars, from the state of the world today you'd hardly believe we won them. From the state of the nation today, it would be easier to believe the Nazis conquered us.
I say "us," even though I'm less than two decades an American. I love this country with an intensity that verges on worship. But until fairly recently, I didn't think much about why I love it so. Yes, I came here to be free, and I'm as free as I can imagine being. (All right, taxes could be a lot lower.) But until you think seriously about why Americans are pretty much free, and why just about no one else anywhere is free at all, you can't really appreciate it.
Here's what Alexis de Tocqueville had to say about it:
I sought for the greatness of the United States in her commodious harbors, her ample rivers, her fertile fields, and boundless forests--and it was not there. I sought for it in her rich mines, her vast world commerce, her public school system, and in her institutions of higher learning--and it was not there. I looked for it in her democratic Congress and her matchless Constitution--and it was not there. Not until I went into the churches of America and heard her pulpits flame with righteousness did I understand the secret of her genius and power. America is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great. [Democracy in America]
Goodness is our greatest national asset. It's hard to see it that way, because you can't heap it up in a mound for people to gawk at, or make a pretty photograph out of it, like a Space Shuttle launch. But it's out there, in quantity, in the hearts of millions of Americans. They respect one another's rights. They insist on justice. They come to one another's aid when it's the proper thing to do. And they don't sit quietly when they see an injustice or an atrocity; they say and do what they think they should. That's the only sort of people that can sustain freedom: good people.
But there are other people working on that goodness -- to destroy it. And we're cutting them an awful lot of slack.
We're not a country full of wimps. We still rear up on our hind legs when it's the right thing to do...most of the time, anyway. But we're letting more and more offenses slip by unpunished. Here's an example from my other site.
I didn't think much of the incident at the time, beyond how badly it upset me. It only occurred to me much later that I'd made myself part of the problem by not counterattacking with all the resources I have. Those two viragoes wouldn't have dared to raise a hand to me. Bullies are always cowards. If I had lashed back at them in my best style, I probably would have sent them running for home. When they next saw a woman in a fur, they would have thought twice about their tactics. As it was, they probably congratulated themselves on a successful foray for their cause. They're more likely, not less, to do it again...or worse.
When a good person confronts evil that way, he has to give at least as good as he gets. I didn't. I failed my responsibilities.
There are a lot of bullies roaming around, these days. They're more numerous and more various than ever before. Muslim bullies. Environmentalist bullies. Homosexual bullies. Union bullies. Anti-Catholic and anti-Christian bullies. Victimist bullies -- like the irony in that? Educationist bullies. Bullies who want to disarm you and bullies who want to suck you dry. You can hardly avoid them, especially if you live and work in a large city.
They're as many as they are because we failed our sacred responsibility as the gardeners of fertile soil: to pull the weeds before the roots go too deep to dig out. We told ourselves that it was our duty to tolerate even the most blatantly evil nonsense. Instead of punching back, we held our tongues. Look where that got us.
I feel a little naughty, writing about this today. This is the secular holiday nearest to my heart. Besides, Fran's the political animal here, so I'm sort of trespassing on his jurisdiction; I'm supposed to write about love, sex, chess, and shoes. (Good thing Eternity Road isn't a union shop!) But if the state of things has got him down, I can only imagine what it's doing to other good people who lack his resilience.
I'm not telling you how to live your life, or how feisty you should be towards people of un-American views, or even how to deal with them when they "get in your face." I'm as averse to confrontation as any of you. But right now, the country is suffering from the proliferation of bullies, all of whom want you to bend the knee to their notions, and the only way to stem the tide is to fight back. I'm going to get to work on that for myself.
Sometimes, your local bully will be someone you've been told you have a duty to tolerate, even respect. A duty to tolerate or respect a bully? Why on Earth? Enough of that BS; I mean to find out if he can take a punch. I don't know what will come of it, but it's a good person's responsibility to try. Anyway, it has to be better than silently allowing them to run over our freedoms.
I discussed this with Fran before I decided to write about it. He had an interesting angle on it.
"We're at a stopped-clock moment in American history," he said. "There's a lot of trouble and anxiety out there. Most people are holding their breaths, awaiting developments, instead of forging ahead with their lives and their ambitions. Only the statists and the Cause People are really in motion, and that's exactly the reverse of how it ought to be."
"How do we get the clock started again?" I asked.
"By fostering goodness," he said. "De Tocqueville wrote that America is great because America is good. He grasped the essence of the thing long before any other European did. A good people can be free, and can hold onto freedom, but a free people who cease to be good will sooner or later be enslaved. If we want to avert a new enslavement, we have to become good again -- good enough to insist on goodness, to fight for it wherever it's threatened, and never, ever to give an inch willingly. We'll lose sometimes, but if there are more of us than there are of them, we'll eventually win."
"Are there more of us than there are of them?" I asked.
"I don't know," he said. "I used to think so, but these days I'm no longer sure."
Cheer up, America. If there's a fight to be fought, let's not pre-defeat ourselves. I mean, look at all we have to protect:
(My most recent acquisitions. For a change, I struck in time!)
Happy Independence Day!
Comments
Pres Bush spoke at a naturalization ceremony at the U of Virginia today. Totally non-political speech, great country new citizens etc. Hecklers were yelling f** y** at the top of thier lungs at the President of the United States and it was being picked up by TV mikes. Bush’s policies are actually very close to Clinton’s. Imagine if an ideological righty is ever President again.
Anyway this self righteous hatred and willingness to do anything you are so self justified is scary. I wonder if they were U of V students or hired goons.
Posted by on 07/04/2008 at 12:14 PMWhat a frickin’ great post! You are so spot on that it makes me want to cry. Bullies - simply put and rightly named. I look around and see this so much in my daily life and it’s hard not to be depressed about it. It seems they are everywhere and winning. Hopefully, there are a lot more of people like you out there who see this too and do what they can to stop the dawgs in their tracks.
I really enjoyed reading your take on our country and thank you for posting it.
WC
Posted by writer chick on 07/04/2008 at 12:51 PMWell said, in many respects we have become too “nice” for our own good. And please pass my congradulations on to Amber on her new career.
Happy 4th,
marc
Posted by on 07/04/2008 at 01:23 PMWhile I share your & Fran’s frustration with current politics, in a way I find this frustration as a motivator to continue posting on what is the real story. For instance, while obsessively focusing on Obama the US media has largely ignored the biggest news story in Latin America/American relations - the release of the 15 FARC hostages two days ago, and the disintegration of the FARC. It falls on the bloggers to disseminate this story, and why it’s important.
We’ll never run out of blogging material.
And I love those shoes!
Posted by Fausta on 07/04/2008 at 10:01 PM"When a good person confronts evil that way, he has to give at least as good as he gets.”
So well put. In one paragraph, you picked apart, in a most scathing manner, the reason why the laws that state that a person “must attempt to flee the situation” before fighting back are so wrong. When bullies, crooks, and criminals have their actions reinforced by the good-natured instincts of other, less aggressive people to avoid conflict if at all possible, it perpetuates the problem. When criminals have nothing to fear, they can reign terror with impugnity.
The only thing necessary for evil (wo)men to succeed is for good (wo)men to do nothing. You are a nice person, good natured and probably instinctually wired to avoid conflict if possible, like most of us. Bullies the world over see this as cowardice and fear, but what it really is is the fact that most people are simply too good natured to really do much of anything about stuff like this. It happens so rarely, and is basically harmless (even a mugging ususally only ends up with a loss of less than a hundred bucks and a bushel of hassles) that most folks figure it is easier to ignore bullies and just move on.
I was bullied in middle school and early high school. Prior to puberty, I was a bit chubby, awkward, and socially inept. My Freshman year in High School, I became who I am today. The social butterfly, congenial, humorous person, who, most importantly to the bullies, got REALLY BIG and EXTREMELY CAPABLE of handling himself. Essentially, i became a popular jock. I never forgot what it felt like to be bullied and demeaned, and so Imde it a point to call bullies out for cowards when I saw them bullying other kids at the school. I actually made a name for myself with the picked-upon, and found that upon my graduation, I had a lot more friends at that school than I’d ever really known.
That carries on today. I’ve been mugged once by a group of four men who saw me out with their best friend’s ex-girlfriend one night. I broke one of their noses and put a steel toed boot into another’s kneecap, and the other two decided that it wasn’t worth the hassle. i never even took a punch. But the point is, I won’t back down. I am too big to run fast, so i don’t even try. Criminals the world over should be well informed that Goober doesn’t run. For better or worse, he plants his feet and FIGHTS. If more men would do the same (sorry, Fetiche, but we can’t expect tiny oriental women to fight our battle for us, although i’m sure you’d give us all a run for our money), then I think our country would be a safer place.
Even inthe lawless west, crooks tempered their actions because they knew that even though the law didn’t exist west of the pecos, the men living there had no qualms about handing out an ass-whooppin if it was needed. I wish that this was still the case, but sadly, it is not. The continued push towards the feminizing of men, and the passage of laws FORBIDDING the stand and fight mentality have lead us down the well-intentioned primrose path to utter lawlessness.
Posted by on 07/07/2008 at 03:37 PM
