In a world where lies are accepted as truth and to love is to only speak relative rhetoric being sure to say nothing that is absolute, one can conclude that an ideology or religion of a certain kind is trying to hide behind cracked doors and open windows, waiting to expand and destroy all sanity, truthful rhetoric, and anything that keeps it from progressing further into the depths of society. This poison that seems to be taking over all areas of civil society is hiding underneath the umbrella of liberalism.
The word liberalism is supposed to denote a type of acceptance and tolerance for differing viewpoints; it is to promote free thinking and a type of respect for individual rights; however, what we find through liberalism is far from this notion. “Liberal democracy” has become the bait-and-switch for minorities and activists, and it didn’t begin two years ago. Starting in the 1960s, during the civil rights movement, there was a call for change; however, this liberating change for human rights would begin to unravel moral tradition as well. Liberalism would increase but shift to other forms.
Political Theorist Yoram Hazony highlights this concept well. “In the decades that followed, many Americans and Europeans came to believe that in liberalism, they had discovered the final political theory: a regime so obviously desirable that competition among political ideologies had in fact come to an end.” Fast forward to the past five years, where we find that the lie is beginning to be uncovered; the rise of social media and more ways to communicate is bringing more opposing voices to the table. The liberal voices are being threatened, and they don’t like it. These voices swarming the federal government all the way to large corporate companies have joined forces to continue the eradication of conservative traditions and values that were the foundation of our American government.
Hazony provides a solution to the poison of liberalism that has poured into American culture. The naivete of certain so-called conservatives doesn’t help to rid the fast progression of dangerous liberal ideologies. Hazony highlights how there is a kind of suppression of traditional values that is destroying societies as we knew them to be. America had been built around ideas that included God and the Bible as well as “nation and congregation, marriage and family, man and woman, honor and loyalty. . ..”
As we look at American culture specifically today, one can see that something has gone wrong. Totalitarianism and the silencing of opposing viewpoints is becoming far too common. The sexualization of children has become far too popular and desensitized; the distinction of man from woman has become moot; and the obsession over race far too predictable, amongst other declines in civil society.
There needs to be a rediscovery of what made America such a powerful and great country to begin with. There needs to be a shift from the idolatry of liberalism to a return to conserving moral ethics that surpass the test of time. As Hazony puts it: [T]he liberty of the individual is a fine thing, both good in itself. . .when taken in the right proportion.” What we see today is a type of so-called freedom and liberation that is infringing upon religious freedom, family values, inalienable rights. Moreover, it is destroying the productivity of humanity in many grotesque and unjust forms. There is hope; an awakening can be seen in the distance.
Stopping Socialism is a project of The Heartland Institute and The Henry Dearborn Center for Human Rights, a nonprofit association of professionals and scholars.
