Archive for the ‘Philosophy’ Category

Matthew Galluzzo says the incest charges against his client, Columbia University Professor and Huffington Post blogger, David Epstein are “unwarranted and unfair.”  While defending Epstein, Galluzzo succinctly illustrates the corrosive nature of moral relativism.

“Academically, we are obviously all morally opposed to incest and rightfully so,” he told ABCNews.com. “At the same time, there is an argument to be made in the Swiss case to let go what goes on privately in bedrooms.”

“It’s OK for homosexuals to do whatever they want in their own home,” he said. “How is this so different? We have to figure out why some behavior is tolerated and some is not.”

The moral relativist defends some behavior many consider immoral but when presented with something they believe to be immoral they’re confused. They must start at square one and re-derive the moral equation. Having forgotten the moral foundations of western culture they form a new morality in a vacuum. This rethinking of morality leads through moronic sounding statements such as this one from Hofstra family law professor, Joanna Grossman:

“You have to worry about how it changes the nature of the parent-child relationship…If it’s not taboo, and you end up dating or marrying your own daughter, it may corrupt the way you raise your children.”

You think so?

This sort of “academic” rethinking of conventional morality leaves no logical choice but to conclude that moral opposition to a behavior in question is ultimately unjust. Therefore one more immoral act is normalized. No longer are we “obviously all morally opposed” to it, “academically.” After all, who is to say what’s really right or wrong? We shouldn’t tolerate anyone being that judgmental.

The process continues until virtually everything is permissible and those who raise moral objections to certain behaviors are seen as the the ones perpetrating evil upon society.

Switzerland is now considering decriminalizing “consensual” incest. Europe seems eager to eliminate all vestiges of western morality. Perhaps they’ll regret it once they’re living under Sharia law, but for now it seems the self serving moral relativism will continue.

Jim’s Doorknob Axiom for those who have not heard of it is the following:

Watching reporters comment on science and/or religion is like watching dogs trying to work a doorknob.

The axiom has long been overdue for an update though. To science and religion we must now add the Tea Party to the subjects which most vividly expose the vacuousness of the majority of journalists.

Carry on.

I have to be honest. Apart from the recognition of the tremendous sacrifices made by our Special Forces, I wasn’t particularly moved by the Restoring Honor event. I really didn’t hear much that I hadn’t heard before. I mainly attended because I like being around people with whom I share common values. That’s pretty much the reason most people attend events like this or the 9/12 march–not to see celebrities or hear a particular person speak. The turnout was huge and that made more of an impression on me than most everything that occurred on the stage.

I think my feelings are largely due to the fact that the part of me that wants to celebrate honor is less energized than the part of me that wants to root out and defeat dishonor. Beck bent over backwards to make the event non-political but I believe the larger part of me wanted it to be political. Without the politics, it felt like a big, watered down mega-church gathering.

The left-wing histrionics that broke out across Twitter and the blogosphere portraying the totally benign event as some racist or Nazi-like enterprise have ceased to anger me because that sort of thing has become pathetically transparent. Those people are trapped in a vicious cycle. They preach tolerance but they are so filled with hate for conservatives that they must project their own hatred on to the conservatives in order to rationalize it with the peace-love-and-harmony cover story they’ve sold themselves. Their tortured reasoning is simple bigotry. They believe that conservatives are deserving of their hatred because they hate conservatives. Like any bigot they lack the capacity for self reflection or the humility to consider another’s opinion before condemning it. As Chesterton said, “Bigotry is an incapacity to conceive seriously the alternative to a proposition.” Any thinking person who read of the nonsense being said and compared it to what actually took place recognizes this to be true. I’ve long since ceased to care about the opinions of those who won’t, can’t or otherwise don’t think.

Speaking of people who don’t think, by a twist of fate I was still hanging out on the mall when the “reverend” Al Sharpton arrived with his marchers. I wasn’t close enough to see any of the signs they were carrying but I was able to hear some of their silly chanting. The chant’s included the following:

Glenn Beck doesn’t speak for me.

Clearly this one precisely captures the sentiments of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. His “dream” was all about protesting radio talk show hosts who hold rallies about honor, faith, hope, and charity.

Frankly, Glenn Beck doesn’t speak for me either. Glenn Beck speaks for Glenn Beck. I speak for myself. My attendance at his event is not a tacit endorsement of everything he says. That these folks chose to follow Al Sharpton under the assumption that Glenn Beck speaks for everyone at the Restoring Honor rally leads me to believe that they feel that Al Sharpton does in fact speak for them. That tragedy speaks for itself.

The people

United

Will never be defeated

This one clearly leads a thinking person to wonder several things. Who are “the people?” The American people? Black people? White people? With whom are they “united” and who is trying to “defeat” them? At what endeavor are they not going to be defeated?

No justice

No peace

This one gets chanted quite often at left wing protests I’ve witnessed. On one level I agree that peace is difficult to attain without true justice. The chant however seems to be a threatening message of violence and civil unrest if the group perceives some “injustice.” Coming from people who let Al Sharpton speak for them, this sentiment is disturbing. What they may see as an injustice may not truly be an injustice (e.g. the Tawawna Brawley hoax).

Reclaim the Dream

This one is puzzling. Reclaim what dream and from whom? As I recall, the dream expressed by Martin Luther King Jr. was not the sole property of any one group of people. That was sort of his point. Unless someone has convinced these marchers that the “dream” is holding an event at which only one race is welcome, this chant–which was also the title of Al Sharpton’s event–makes little sense.

Having been there to witness the end of Sharpton’s march, I also happened to run across some of the nattily attired New Black Panthers with they’re sunglasses and berets. I was walking to the Metro station and three people who I believe were part of Sharpton’s march were walking in front of me. The New Black Panther guys were selling some sort of newspaper. They offered one to the people walking in front of me. The older gentleman in the group asked the price and was told “One dollar for you, black man.” Given my proximity and relative melanin deficiency, the comment seemed to be intended for me. I was briefly tempted to ask how much it would be for a white man but even though I was genuinely curious, I figured it would be taken as an insult so I just kept walking.

I refer back to G.K. Chesterton quite often. He is to me what I imagine Mao is to Anita Dunn. Chesterton was an amazing mind and is rightfully known as the “Apostle of Common Sense.” He is one of the most quotable writers in recent history, probably because he though and wrote about anything and everything–even the Declaration of Independence.

Whenever I come across a particularly profound quote from Chesterton, I like to dig up the original source so I can see the context, and often this yields some very interesting food for thought. One such quote comes from his book What I Saw in America and is often seen truncated to just one sentence: “America is the only nation in the world founded on a creed.” Expanding the quote reveals as succinct and profound a description of the Declaration of Independence as I’ve seen.

America is the only nation in the world that is founded on a creed. That creed is set forth with dogmatic and even theological lucidity in the Declaration of Independence; perhaps the only piece of practical politics that is also theoretical politics and also great literature. It enunciates that all men are equal in their claim to justice, that governments exist to give them that justice, and that their authority is for that reason just. It certainly does condemn anarchism. and it does also by inference condemn atheism, since it clearly names the Creator as the ultimate authority from whom these equal rights are derived. Nobody expects a modern political system to proceed logically in the application of such dogmas, and in the matter of God and Government it is naturally God whose claim is taken more lightly. The point is that there is a creed, if not about divine, at least about human things.”

Reading a bit further you are rewarded with another profound and timely nugget. I recently took a class in which the instructor told us how America is no longer a melting pot, but rather a salad bar. She actually said this as if it were a good thing. I found the thought depressing, because as Chesterton says, “the melting-pot must not melt.”

Now in a much vaguer and more evolutionary fashion, there is something of the same idea at the back of the great American experiment; the experiment of a democracy of diverse races which has been compared to a melting-pot. But even that metaphor implies that the pot itself is of a certain shape and a certain substance; a pretty solid substance. The melting-pot must not melt. The original shape was traced on the lines of Jeffersonian democracy; and it will remain in that shape until it becomes shapeless. America invites all men to become citizens; but it implies the dogma that there is such a thing as citizenship.”

Citizenship is a dogma in the American creed. One wouldn’t seek to join a religion without first accepting all the things that religion professes to be true, but more and more, people seek citizenship and the benefits thereof without actually seeking to become Americans. This is like joining a church based on the relative comfort of its pews rather than on what the church professes to be true about God and Man. The melting pot is melting, and politicians for whom this is advantageous seek to speed up the process. Those who come to America only for the comfortable pews will vote for whomever promises to maintain or extend those comforts, not for those who espouse individual liberty and the responsibility inherent in it.

America is unlike any other country because it is at once a nation and a philosophy. This is the kernel of what we call American exceptionalism. To believe in American exceptionalism is to recognize what Chesterton, the Brit, recognized–that America is the manifestation of a creed. President Obama said he believed in American exceptionalism the same way the Brits believe in British exceptionalism or the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism (by the way, I wonder how exceptional the Greeks are feeling these days). With those words, Obama was saying that he rejects the American creed. He tried to hide this fact by redefining it as some sort of nebulous national pride or patriotism (which in itself is probably a stretch for him), but what he said was akin to heresy.

As a Catholic I’m used to reciting the Nicene creed every time I go to Mass. I know various Protestant denominations do something similar. We do this because it is a continual affirmation of what it is we believe. As a people of faith we often fail to live up to what we believe, so we recite it to remind ourselves. We need to know what we profess so that we can know when we are drifting or being led astray.

As Americans we need to know and recite our creed as well. We need to teach it to our children and to those who come here from other nations so that they understand what it means to be an American. We need to be evangelists for America. We need to harden the melting pot so that it retains its original Jeffersonian shape because when we stop believing in America, America will cease to be.

“Do not enjoy yourself. Enjoy dances and theaters and joy-rides and champagne and oysters; enjoy jazz and cocktails and night-clubs if you can enjoy nothing better; enjoy bigamy and burglary and any crime in the calendar, in preference to the other alternative; but never learn to enjoy yourself.” – G.K. Chesterton, The Common Man