Some things are inevitable, and at this point in the culture war, trying to damage the opposition, rather than discredit its ideas with fact-based logical argument, has become the primary game plan of the S-P movement. To be fair, some traditional forces use smear tactics as well, but again, not nearly on the level that the S-Ps use them.
And so we march on. This book will intensify the fight and, I hope, might also convince some Americans not fully engaged in the culture war to step up and support the good guys: us.
If that happens, the S-Ps are doomed, because the vast majority of Americans, according to the polls, believe the United States is a good country and that Judeo-Christian values continue to provide a foundation for justice and prosperity. Most Americans, therefore, don’t want a drastic restructuring of the country and are firmly in the traditional camp. But, I’ll submit, many potential culture warriors on the traditional side don’t have a clue as to what is going on. They are a great untapped resource.
The question then becomes: Why are so many traditionalists disengaged? On paper, it doesn’t make much sense.
Consider that, overwhelmingly, Americans oppose gay marriage, partial-birth abortion, legalized drugs, the banishment of spirituality in the public square, and most other core S-P issues. Did you know that 87 percent of counties in the United States do not have one physician who will perform an abortion? Why is that? Could it be that most doctors and Americans in general are uncomfortable with this anti-life procedure?
Doing the math once again, we see that it all adds up to a decidedly traditional country, does it not? At this point, the prevailing wisdom among both the Republican and Democratic Party operatives is that 15 percent of Americans are hard-core liberal, 35 percent conservative, and the rest moderate or apolitical. Those numbers come from internal polling done by both parties.
But you’d never know that liberalism is embraced by so few by listening to the media, would you? To many who consider themselves the elite in the United States, S-P doctrine is attractive and comforting. No God to worry about, a “nurturing posture” toward the poor, and an “enlightened” philosophy of government and, indeed, of life. The S-P view of the world really takes the edge off the “consumer guilt” of some who are living large in the wealthy precincts. Yeah, we may be greed heads, but we’re enlightened greed heads, they might admit (under hypnosis).
But most Americans do not have “consumer guilt” because they live normal, economical lives. Yet despite being outnumbered, the S-Ps, mostly hard-core liberals, are still very active on the battlefield and, in some states, traditional forces are suffering. How can that be happening, with the numbers skewed so strongly toward the traditional? The next pages will provide the answer.
The world is filled with concern but also with hypocrisy. Hypocrisy on the part of people who see no evil and speak no evil to avoid becoming involved.
—MARCELLO PERA
So which side are you on in the culture war? Or are you sitting things out? If you truly love your country, these are key questions, because if the secular-progressive vision becomes reality, your love interest will mutate right before your eyes. Think it over. This culture war deal might just be worth your time and attention.
Right now, it is the conservative Christian groups that are most engaged on the traditional side, and their interest stems primarily from theology. The secular-progressives despise groups like Focus on the Family and The Christian Coalition because their members tend to judge the S-Ps along moral lines and, generally, condemn their behavior and aspirations. There is nothing that angers the S-P forces more than to be told they do not hold the high moral ground.
But I don’t believe this culture war will be won in the religious arena. Even though the Christian groups are effective in getting their traditional message out, they are outgunned. In order to stop the S-P movement cold, nonreligious Americans have to be persuaded that traditionalism is in their best interest. The most powerful nonreligious argument against the S-P agenda is that it is simply better public policy for the United States to stay close to the vision of the Founders, which includes independence from big government, hard work, personal responsibility, and looking out for your neighbor.
Remember, the S-Ps want a huge government apparatus to dispense their notion of “economic justice.” They envision an enormous centralized force in Washington that would nurture its citizens from cradle to grave (at the expense of others, of course). This utopian dream is impossible, especially in a land of 300 million people, but the S-Ps will never believe that. If they gain power, your assets will become their assets. On the foreign-policy front, our government will become a cog in a “one world” consolidation of power ruled by global consensus—a kind of United Nations on steroids. Add to that the permissive social environment the S-Ps so desperately espouse and, presto, the United States as we’ve known it for 230 years will disappear.
Yes, I may have overstated things a bit in the above paragraph, but not by much. The truth is that there are varying levels of fanaticism in the S-P ranks. As with every movement, there are both militants and moderates in the S-P army, but they all have one thing in common: They want a far different America from the one in which we are living today. Okay, I’ll say it once again: The secular-progressive dream is not an impossible one for them to achieve—largely because so many traditional Americans are ignoring the escalating culture war. An unfortunate example of this is the Roman Catholic Church in America, which has largely been missing in action as far as the culture war is concerned. As a Catholic, I’m perplexed and disappointed by this. Right now, American Protestants are really doing most of the heavy lifting on the traditional side. Jewish Americans are divided; in fact, some of the most fanatical secular-progressives are Jewish (are you listening, Barbra?). But the nation’s more than 67 million Catholics have certainly not been encouraged by their leadership to enter the fray.
With the exception of Archbishop Michael Sheehan of Santa Fe, New Mexico, I know of no high-ranking Catholic cleric in America who consistently speaks out against the secular-progressive agenda. Most of the official Catholic energy is devoted to the pro-life movement. Of course, S-Ps adamantly support unfettered abortion. Their agenda includes legal partial-birth abortion, no parental notification when minors abort, and no spousal notification, either. All of this comes under the banner of a woman’s “reproductive rights.” As I mentioned earlier, destroying a soon-to-be-born baby by extracting its head from the mother’s womb and putting a piece of steel through the base of the baby’s skull (that’s the partial-birth abortion procedure) doesn’t sound very “nurturing” to me, but the S-P forces have no problem with it.
Anyway, the Catholic hierarchy does stand up on the abortion issue; however, when faced with other culture war issues, they recede back into the sacristies. But why? Surely, the Church understands what has happened in Europe, where secular culture has replaced the traditional religious landscape. Countries like Spain, France, and Italy, once devoutly Catholic, have now moved away from organized religion and are increasingly embracing secular culture. The free fall of tradition is most noticeable in Northern Europe, where the percentage of people attending weekly church services is down to the single digits in places like Holland and Scandinavia. Even in Italy, the historic seat of the Catholic Church, attendance at mass has plummeted as the secular-progressive culture has swept away traditional beliefs.
To replace this loss of spirituality, millions of Europeans have embraced the secular concept of “relativism.” According to this way of thinking, there is no absolute truth, no certain right and wrong. Everything is “relative.” What is wrong in my eyes might not be wrong in your eyes. By this logic, even heinous acts can be explained, so they should not—in fact, they cannot—be condemned. In other words, no definite judgments about behavior should be made because there are always extenuating circumstances to justify not taking a stand.
The wide acceptance of relativism has rendered Europe weak, confused, and
chaotic. Socialist or quasi-socialist governments now provide the necessities of life to their citizens, allowing many Europeans to live entirely within themselves. When that happens to a person, it is hard to rally him or her to a greater cause. Thus, nothing is worth fighting for outside of one’s immediate well-being. The only creed is a belief in personal gratification.
The president of the Italian Senate, Marcello Pera, has recognized the danger especially in how it pertains to fighting the international war on terror, which much of Europe refuses to do. In the book Without Roots, Pera writes:
Crisis is an overused word these days, but in the present circumstances of Europe it is, unfortunately, appropriate…relativism has wreaked havoc, and it continues to act as a mirror and an echo chamber for the dark mood that has fallen over the West. It has paralyzed the West, when it is already disoriented and at a standstill, rendered it defenseless when it is already acquiescent, and confused it when it is already reluctant to rise to the challenge.
How can we speak of, and defend, “universal human rights” in a cultural climate in which the very idea of “truth” is under sustained assault?
The answer to Pera’s question is that you cannot defend the human rights of others if you believe the only thing worth fighting for is yourself. Remember this: Much of Europe was perfectly willing to do business with Saddam Hussein and allow him to murder at will, even after he invaded Kuwait in 1990. These days, most of the European press expresses far more outrage over President Bush than they ever did about Saddam, or even Osama bin Laden. The truth is that much of Europe will not confront Islamo-fascism and will not support the United States in the war on terror because that would mean putting their own butts on the line. Yes, I know some NATO countries have provided troops in Afghanistan, and that Great Britain, a blessed exception to the European rule, is America’s most reliable ally. But when it comes to crunch time against a nuclear-minded Iran, or a terrorist-supporting Syria, or another 9/11-type attack here or abroad, do you really expect to see most Europeans step up?
I don’t.
Far more than most institutions, the Catholic Church has been able to see and experience firsthand the rise of secular-progressive thought and the decline of European power and influence. Yet in the United States, which thus far has rejected the relativist philosophy of the secular-progressives, the Church is a nonfactor in the culture war. Every Sunday at mass, I pray that will change.
It is frustrating to me to sit in the church pew and listen to the priest explain St. Paul’s letters to the Corinthians for the 876th time. What I want to know is how St. Paul, a Roman warrior and pagan activist before conversion, would see today’s culture war. If Jesus were alive on earth right now, would he be a traditionalist? If so, why? Once in a while, a priest will discuss a social issue from his pulpit, but that’s rare.
What traditional Americans need desperately is leadership along with a clarification of which traditional values are worth fighting for and why. But don’t expect that leadership to come from Washington or your state capital. Like the American Catholic bishops, most politicians fear the culture war. It is too emotional and controversial. Better to lock themselves into a party and ideology than to confront day-to-day issues that directly affect Americans. That would be too messy. And every elected official knows that the secular press would come after them with a vengeance if they enlisted on the side of traditionalists in the culture war.
Because of that prevailing wisdom, conservatives like President Bush, and even moderate liberals like President Clinton, avoid the culture war almost entirely. And the lesser lights on Capitol Hill follow that lead. No culture war for them.
One exception to that rule is Howard Dean. As much as I dislike what the governor stands for, he is an S-P warrior front and center. No question about that. In fact, Congresswoman Pelosi and Dean are the two most engaged American politicians in the culture war today. Sadly, they are on the wrong side.
One of the political issues that have crossed party lines and trotted onto the culture war battlefield is the gay rights debate. According to a Pew Research Center poll taken in the spring of 2006, 50 percent of Americans feel that homosexual behavior is morally wrong, just 12 percent feel it is morally acceptable, and 33 percent do not see it as a moral issue at all. But in this area, some traditionalists have chosen to make a stand. And that may be a mistake.
Recently, Catholic Charities got out of the adoption business in Massachusetts after that S-P state demanded that the Catholic organization actively help gays adopt children, a practice the Church opposes. Now, I happen to favor allowing children consigned to foster care to live in a gay home when no other alternative is available. There is no question that children thrive in a loving environment, and there is no question that having a mother and a father is what Nature intended. But we live in the real world of the twenty-first century. If it’s between a kid bouncing around a chaotic, sometimes dangerous child-care system and being placed in a stable home with honest people who very much want the abandoned child, I am in favor of the latter. And I’m not basing my opinion on emotion. A variety of scientific studies have shown that kids raised by gay parents usually turn out the same way children in traditional homes do. Remember, the traditional warrior fights with facts.
But I will listen to the other point of view and am very interested in hearing exactly why the Catholic Church disagrees with me on this issue. But I have heard little. No solid reasoning was put forth by Catholic Charities other than upholding the Church’s position that homosexual conduct is wrong.
A long time ago, I decided to leave the judgments about sin to the Deity. I believe that falls under His or Her job description. Since every human being is a sinner, we should all concentrate on healing ourselves. Whatever Larry and Lenny and Penny and Connie are doing is none of my business. By the way, privacy is a traditional value.
But I do understand that gay marriage has an impact on straight marriage, which of course is a bedrock traditional institution. And there is a good reason why American society is built around the traditional heterosexual home. As a societal stabilizer, traditional marriage deserves a special place in our national life. Homosexuality is an alternative situation. There are many other alternative situations, such as polygamy, triads, and whatever Paris Hilton comes up with next. Again, morally, the Deity can sort this out. But the United States, in my opinion, is under no obligation to change the traditional definition of marriage so everybody can feel good about themselves.
Now, I realize I am not telling you something new. According to every poll and actual votes on referendums, as I’ve noted before, Americans overwhelmingly support the special status heterosexual marriage has in the United States. In my mind, there is no compelling reason to alter that status, especially if the states approve legal partnerships so that citizens are not denied things like hospital visitations, participation in end-of-life decision making, and insurance coverage.
By the way, traditional warriors do not base their philosophy on bigotry, as many S-P propaganda merchants charge. We look at what is best for the country. We can see the decency in respecting all legal partnerships Americans choose for themselves. But altering the traditional fabric of society is not necessary in order to do that.
Unfortunately, the Catholic Church, like many other religious organizations, provides none of the above analysis. Its approach to this issue is all based around “sin.” That approach plays directly into the hands of the secular-progressives, who loudly wail that religious intrusion into society is un-Constitutional and demonize religious leaders who dare to speak out. Maybe that is why most American Catholic leaders remain silent in the face of the culture war. Like the politicians, they don’t want to become targets. The priest-pedophilia scandal proved that Catholic leadership was weak. The lack of engagement in the culture war is another demonstration of that.
To be fair (a hallmark of the traditional warrior), it is certainly true that if a religious person does wander onto the
cultural battlefield, he or she better have a strong stomach, because he or she has a good chance of being demonized.
Stanley Kurtz, contributing editor for National Review Online, sums it up this way:
The fact of the matter is that the Left’s [S-Ps’] rhetorical attacks on conservative Christians [traditionalists] have long been more extreme, more widely disseminated, and more politically effective than whatever the Christians have been hurling back. And now that their long ostracism by the media has finally forced conservative Christians to demand redress, the Left has abandoned all rhetorical restraint.
Kurtz points to a number of examples. On April 24, 2005, the S-P fanatic Frank Rich, writing in the New York Times, compared conservative Christians to George Wallace, segregationists, and lynch mobs.
In a similar vein, Christopher Hedges, a former New York Times writer, produced an article in Harper’s magazine called “Feeling the Hate with the National Religious Broadcasters.” Hedges patched together a series of vitriolic statements by Pat Robertson and other religious broadcast pundits to selectively paint the picture that the religious right is nuts. This is standard issue for S-P magazine writers: dig up kooky quotes and print them without context. Any writer can do that to any subject. It’s simple but off-the-chart dishonest.
That is not to say there have not been nutty statements made by the traditional side; there clearly have been. But think about this: Every time Jerry Falwell or Pat Robertson or anybody on the right goes over the line, it is played big in the mainstream media. But if an S-P player uses loony rhetoric, like calling all Americans who oppose gay marriage bigots, well, many in the American media have no problem with that. So, to use a cliché, the deck is stacked.
Culture Warrior Page 16