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President Trump didn’t cause the shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue. Nor did conspiracy theories or MAGA rallies cause a madman to mail bombs to congressmen. No, the root of these things is social collapse, and yet folks still want to blame everyone else rather than looking within.
Oh, there’s plenty of finger-pointing to go around. Take, for example, what happened when Rep. Steve Scalise, a shooting survivor himself, expressed his sadness at the carnage in Pittsburgh:
My heart is broken and my prayers are with the members of the Tree of Life Synagogue, the brave first responders, and all affected by this despicable act of evil and hatred. https://t.co/4ObfqB4Sv8
— Rep. Steve Scalise (@SteveScalise) October 27, 2018
Whereupon Matt Yglesias of Vox called Scalise “David Duke without the baggage.”
Or when Ivanka Trump, a convert to Judaism, wished for God to bless those affected by the shooting:
America is stronger than the acts of a depraved bigot and anti-semite.
All good Americans stand with the Jewish people to oppose acts of terror & share the horror, disgust & outrage over the massacre in Pittsburgh.
We must unite against hatred & evil.God bless those affected
— Ivanka Trump (@IvankaTrump) October 27, 2018
And those who hate her father erupted in social media rage:
“Perhaps you and your whole garbage family should stop literally ruining the whole world.”
“Her father is the depraved Bigot in Chief who enables bigots and she enables him.”
“You did this.”
Then there are the very agents who instigated the horrors we saw.
Like the shooter in Pittsburgh (I will not use his name) who slaughtered 11 people while screaming “All Jews must die!” Or the mail bomb suspect (who shall also remain nameless) who apparently sent 12 bombs to Democratic legislators and other liberal activists.
You can say it’s evil, of course, which will always be with us — it’s part of the human condition. But social collapse is cranking that evil to 11.
Credit: pixabay.com.
Then again, why should we be surprised?
We are a people who have rejected traditions which we once honored, but now sneer at — things like religious faith, respect for others and for life, and morality. Instead of believing in God, we make ourselves to be gods, and self-interest is what we worship.
It’s not working out too well, is it?
But what do you expect from a society that allows the murder of its own unborn children under the guise of “rights?”
Or a society which dismisses the raising of children within marriage — instead bringing nearly 40% of babies into homes without fathers?
Or whose media regularly mock traditional religious faith?
The great British writer C.S. Lewis observed in his 1943 book, The Abolition of Man, what results from rejecting traditional truths of morality and virtue:
“We make men without chests and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honour and are shocked to find traitors in our midst.”
So we suffer from a culture filled with these men without chests. And as a reaction to this suffering, we pass laws — endless laws. Gun laws. Hate crime laws. Laws to limit speech and expression. And when they don’t work we move on to even more onerous edicts which we think will protect us from ourselves.
But they don’t. And we shouldn’t be so shocked when more shootings and bombs and other carnage result from our social collapse. Sadly, it’s inevitable.
Featured image cropped from pixabay.com.
Kate says: These are dark days.
GWB says: Whereupon Matt Yglesias of Vox called Scalise “David Duke without the baggage.”
Actually, he was quoting him. Scalise said that about himself at some point in his past (my head hurts too much to look it up at the moment).
Instead of believing in God, we make ourselves to be gods, and self-interest is what we worship.
QFT
Chinaberry Tree says: Here’s the NYT link (don’t know how to create an actual hyperlink in the comments, so no promises). You decide whether the Yglesias comment was fair or not. The relevant bit is toward the bottom of the article.
Micha Elyi says: Thank you, Chinaberry Tree, for the link that corrected GWB’s remark. Apparently I missed the memo to us Internet web users recommending that actually false comments should be preceded with the word “actually” as a kind of warning to readers.
jorod says: The fruits of 50 years of the welfare state.
Jim says: I agree: the deterioration of social values and thus Western society began in the late 1960s and has continued unabated, accelerated with the advent of accessible social media which has allowed concerted attacks by ill-informed, bullying rabbles of [mostly gullible] young people raised on a diet of popular leftist theory and psycho-babble with no historical frame of reference.
Denver says: 60 years of Progressive control of primary education.
mac says: Go reread Kipling’s “The Gods of the Copybook Headings.” They are on their way back, and they’re bringing the terror and slaughter with them just like he said they would.
Micha Elyi says: Kipling’s Gods of the Copybook Headings advised “stick with the devil you know”. So, mac, did you vote for old Hillary Clinton in 2016 or choose the political newcomer? Just askin’.
DSmith2 says: Spare me the “society” and “culture” and “people” stuff. Only one part of the people that live in the United States want any of the things you list that comprise social collapse: the Left, the Democrats. They are the ones who pushed for, accomplished, and support all those things. Conservatives and Republicans are the ones who have opposed them, and who have tried to hold our society together. So please, stop with even a hint of false equivalency; there is none, and to claim it is a disservice. We will not cure the problem until we can first say clearly what it is.
Jim b says: And…even the religious leaders that we Catholics..or former Catholics…used to find as moral guides have proved to be as venal and corrupt as the politians. Strangely enough, it is the despised Jews who seem to have remained steadfast in basic morality…the conservative Jews, anyhow.
GWB says: Progressivism is a religion all its own, and those progressives who are members of other churches infest them with their heresy and idolatry – Jewish, Roman, Eastern or Protestant.
Cospar says: Social Collapse is an inadequate term. Collapse sounds of an unintended structural failure. We are experiencing a more malevolent social disruption. Through the influence of media and corporate social agents, the bones and joints of society are being separated. It is an act of Social Disarticulation. We are being torn apart, not falling apart. An idea of global discourse become an abattoir of all ideals.
Howard Hirsch says: Thank you, Kim, for that. Sadly, the ground you covered has been trod all too many times with no visible effort to correct a well-identified problem. See, for example, the famous editorial “No Guard Rails”, which appeared in the Wall Street Journal on March 18, 1993 . . . over 25 YEARS AGO!!
Best wishes from a Jewish Hirsch to a Lutheran Hirsch.
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