I will start this post with a quote from Conan the Barbarian. But it is expressed many times. In this fallen world, it is human nature.
The Debate Over Whether To Crush Our Enemies Or Be Nice to them is an interesting one brought to us by Kurt Schlichter at Townhall.com. Schlichter is in favor of crushing our enemies, as am I. Schlichter has principled reasons for crushing the enemy. I have additional ones. On the other side are people like Peachy Keenan, David Harsanyi and Mark Hemingway who also have principled reasons. So they are not being soft, or pacifist here, but I think Schlichter's reasons are the stronger ones.
Some ghastly woman who was a clerk at a Home Depot decided to go online and cheer the attempted murder of Donald Trump, that is until conservative social media influencers exposed her to her bosses, and they kicked her malignant carcass to the curb. This cancellation counterstrike – and the growing default to retribution as a means to combat cancellation culture – created significant controversy in the conservative webosphere, with various internet personages taking to the Twitters to cheer or decry it. Many – and I am one of them – heartily support this crushing of our opponents, even puny smallfolk jerks who tweet hate from their basements while buzzed on Trader Joe's chardonnay and catnip. Others – not all for the same reason – see the avenger mode as a bad thing. They are wrong in their conclusion, but the ones who advocate mercy to the minor minions for tactical reasons instead of posturing about principles for clicks are still hardcore. They just disagree on tactics. They are not Jeb!s, goody-goody scolds mortified by the thought of fighting fire with firepower. It's good to disagree in good faith; it's bad to be weak. Regardless, we still need to use our power against even the little people on the other side. Failing to do so leaves the little people on our side defenseless. If we can't break our enemies' will, at least we can avenge the wrongs they did.
We must play by the New Rules, even when it is ugly and unpleasant. If you get off on canceling people, that's lame. But you should enjoy seeing justice done.
Schlichter, a retired Army Colonel, knows a thing or two about leadership. One thing he knows is that the people you are leading must feel that they will be defended, by you if necessary. When they are attacked, you must mount an effective counterattack which teaches any others that they do not want a piece of you. That is human nature. It has every been so. It is so even for God, which explains the story of Job.
It's nothing new. Payback is essential. Your own people need to know that they will be defended and avenged, or they will stop being your people—where are the people of Jeb! and the other softies of the 2000s GOP now? There aren't any. They left us undefended and unavenged, so we left them.
Here's the brutal reality. We must be willing to inflict pain on our enemies, and the refusal to do so ensures your own people are going to suffer pain because the other side is damn sure not worried about feeling bad for hurting us. We have seen our own people ruined and abused by cancel culture, and we need to use our power to stop it by any means necessary – including the means of being mean.
We have power, and we must use it ruthlessly to defend our people and defeat our opponents. That means no passes, granting no grace until grace becomes the norm instead of unilateral disarmament. There are three ways this goes—our submission to their will, their return to the pre-cancellation rules, or war. Option One is out. Option Two is my preference, but until they embrace it, Option Three it is.
We cannot pretend that human nature got repealed somewhere along the way just because some on our side have no stomach to deal the pain. Some pretend to not even understand how human interaction works and accept that you either wield power or get it wielded upon you – I'd recommend you ask a Melian about power but there are no Melians anymore. Some of Team Soft Cell recoiled from that during the Home Depo doofus debate, one child-pundit even labeling talk of power as "cringe." But if this person had been involved in politics for more than five minutes and to a deeper level than seeking mid-tier interweb clout, this person would be aware that politics is only about power.
The facts are that our enemies created New Rules that declared open season on conservatives who made conservative comments in public spaces, putting their livelihoods and – as we saw in Bulter, PA – their lives at risk should they say unapproved things. We opposed these New Rules. We argued against them. And we were ignored. They imposed the New Rules and launched a reign of terror against our people. Well, now we are fighting back. Ruthlessly. Mercilessly. Not because we get off getting some jerk fired from her job operating a cash register but because we know that the only way ever possibly to change the New Rules back is to make the consequences of the enemy – all of the enemy – so unpleasant for our enemies that they rethink their new rules. Will that work? Will they rethink cancel culture? Maybe, but the worst case scenario if we choose to fight every battle and strike every target is that they pay for what they did. We at least owe our own people whose lives they have ruined that piece of payback.
In addition to the above, which I fully endorse, by the way, I have still other reasons. In our daily lectionary, we have now read Genesis through 2 Kings. In addition to our salvation history, the other thing going on is spiritual warfare. In Exodus, God led the children of Israel out of Egypt, yes. But the 10 plagues of Egypt were a direct rebuke of the "gods" of Egypt. The people at the time recognized that their God, YHWH, was mightier that Egypt's gods. Having done that, He led them out directly under the command of the Angel of the LORD, which angel carried the NAME of the LORD. When Joshua led the people of Israel into Caanan, again the Angel of the LORD commanded them. Certain cities were devoted to destruction. This was horrible to behold for every man, woman, child, even the livestock were killed. Not all the cities, mind you, but certain places. What to make of this?
The Bible isn't always clear preferring to use circumlocutions to get the message across. But some of the places devoted to destruction were centers of Baal worship. The demon Baal directly challenged the Most High claiming to be the actual creator and sustainer of the world. Certain other places were centers of worship of Asterah, who is said to have "sacred prostitutes," both male and female, as well as what we would call "trans." Drag queens anyone? Then there was Molech. Worship of Molech involved tossing first born infants into the fire which was burning in the idols belly. A number of the Kings of Israel passed their children through the fire. They did not just get their kids warm; they burned them up as sacrifices to Molech. All such places and practices had to be destroyed.
These ancient "gods," really demons, are still around today. We have already discussed the worship of Asterah, with the sexual revolution, the 857 genders nonsense. Baal worship is more subtle. Money is not evil, nor is success in business. Rightly done, business that serves others is good, and in this world making a living for you family is also good. Any honest job is good. But the accumulation of money and power for its own sake is evil. Many of our so-called "elites" both here and at the global level are, whether they know it or not, worshipping Baal. One cannot be a Marxist and a Christian. The two are incompatible.
Well, then what about Molech? Nobody throws their infants into a fire do they? But in a way, they do. Abortion is the modern way of worshipping Molech. Listen as the people of Molech "shout their abortions." They are proud of the fact. Do they not hear themselves? Right now in North Carolina, one candidate for Governor, Mark Robinson, is being smeared nightly on the television because he opposes abortion. It is sadly a sacrament of the Democrat party, but there are some Republicans in favor of abortion too.
Jesus, who is God, who is the Angel of the LORD, commanded us to pray for our enemies. We should. But sometimes we have to do more. We are in a cultural war, sure, but it is also a spiritual war.
No comments:
Post a Comment