“You’ll sit enthroned and enshrined, you, the little people, the absolute ruler to make all past rulers squirm with envy, the absolute, the unlimited, God and Prophet and King combined. Vox populi. The average, the common, the general. Do you know the proper antonym for Ego? Bromide, Peter. The rule of the bromide. But even the trite has to be originated by someone at some time. We’ll do the originating. Vox dei. We’ll enjoy unlimited submission—from men who’ve learned nothing except to submit. We’ll call it ‘to serve.’ We’ll give out medals for service. You’ll fall over one another in a scramble to see who can submit better and more. There will be no other distinction to seek.”
~ Ellsworth Toohey, whose life is devoted to creating a collectivist society, addressing one of his victims, Peter Keating (from Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead)
A recent family encounter immediately came to mind. I left these comments:
During a recent family picnic, I sat (suffered) through a recording of my brother-in-law’s commencement address to the 2018 graduating class of the Rhode Island high school he principals. His speech lauded the students who “studied” “social justice,” “sustainability,” and “renewable energy.” On individual “achievement,” he reserved his highest praise for a student who logged 3000 hours—that equates to 1-1/2 years of full time work @ 40 hours a week—in “community service.” (That’s no misprint. 3000 hours in 4 years.) That was the only part of the speech that was interrupted by cheers from the audience! The speech was generally classic Left collectivism. My brother-in-law was quite proud of it.
Ellsworth Toohey is alive and well.
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During a recent family picnic, I sat (suffered) through a recording of my brother-in-law’s commencement address to the 2018 graduating class of the Rhode Island high school he principals. His speech lauded the students who “studied” “social justice,” “sustainability,” and “renewable energy.” On individual “achievement,” he reserved his highest praise for a student who logged 3000 hours—that equates to 1-1/2 years of full time work @ 40 hours a week—in “community service.” (That’s no misprint. 3000 hours in 4 years.) That was the only part of the speech that was interrupted by cheers from the audience! The speech was generally classic Left collectivism. My brother-in-law was quite proud of it.
Ellsworth Toohey is alive and well.
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I often hear about indoctrination in America's schools. I get anecdotal evidence from time to time; in an article, a conversation with a friend or teacher, something one of my grandchildren say. But my brother-in-law’s speech is “straight from the horse’s mouth” evidence of systematic collectivist/Leftist indoctrination. I want to focus on so-called “social justice.”
“Social justice” is collectivism and is particularly insidious and evil. “Social justice” holds that only groups based on some common characteristic—race, gender, sezual orientation, national origing, the catogories keep expanding—count, with each member judged according to average group statistical outcomes current or historical, and then assigned victim or oppressor status according to his group regardless of his individual choices, character, or circumstances. The goal is to equalize outcomes through economic redistribution and regulation, taking from “oppressor” groups and giving to “victim” groups. It’s always about the group, not the guilt, innocence, actions, or actual injustice or victimization of individual people.
Real justice applies only to the human entity that actually exists--the individual. But the individual doesn’t matter to “social justice.” He is an inconsequential cog in a group machine. It doesn’t matter whether the success you achieved was earned or not, whether you were lazy or ambitious. It doesn’t matter whether you are racist or not, or whether you were ever a victim of racism or not. In the case of actual oppression, such as against blacks in earlier America, it’s not enough to correct the injustices (such as repeal of Jim Crow Laws). You are what your group is deemed, victim or oppressor, in perpetuity, until the “injustice”—including past injustices that you had nothing to do with—has been “corrected” (reversed, actually) or until average equal outcomes are realized—the equality imposed by government policy; i.e., by force. It’s the collectivist mindset that leads straight to massive injustice, including genocide.
I’ll give you another personal example of the “social justice” mindset, this time relating to a specific event.
My wife was explaining to a leftist friend about how unfair it is that our daughter must pay school taxes even though she homeschools her four children. Our friend’s retort? “She’s lucky she can do it. But I believe we have a moral responsibility to those less fortunate.” Does it matter that our daughter is a victim of injustice perpetrated against her by her own government? Doesn’t that qualify as “less fortunate?” No. Because she’s “lucky”--that is, capable and willing to make the extraordinary effort to take on the responsibility of educating her own kids. Who are these “less fortunate” others? Who knows. Who cares whether their “less fortunate” status is due to bad circumstances beyond their control, their choice to send their kids to public school, or lazyness, or incompetence, or just lack of interest in their kids’ education.
Who cares even who they are? To the collectivist, it’s all about some abstract grouping, not real people with real circumstances. Our daughter is a real victim of a real injustice, yet “thrown under the bus” for an abstraction, “those less fortunate.” Collectivism is a moral escape hatch--an end run around an actual moral judgement. It’s merely an individual. How does a mere individual compare to the “greater good” of taking care of the “less fortunate?”
“The rule of the bromide.”
“Social justice” is anti-justice. Social justice in fact makes real justice impossible, because it shifts the focus away from real, actual, living, breathing, thinking human beings. It’s a repudiation of the dignity and autonomy of the individual. “Social justice,” like all forms of collectivism, is a moral escape hatch--an escape from having to treat people fairly. The ultimate goal of the Social Justice movement is, of course, socialism—the social system of greed, powerlust, envy, and hatred of and desire to destroy success and achievement. This is really what the school indoctrination is all about--to condition the young to reject individualism and accept the basic premise of collectivism, thus paving the road, a back road, to a socialist America.
Related Reading:
Collectivism Generates Irrational Hatred
The idea of ‘Protected Classes’ Does not Advance Individual Liberty
Collectivized 'Rights' versus Individual Rights—Ayn Rand
Individualism vs. Collectivism: Our Future, Our Choice—Craig Biddle
Related Viewing:
How Social Justice Warriors Rationalise Their Hatred For Life & Humanity—Yaron Brook
“Social justice” is collectivism and is particularly insidious and evil. “Social justice” holds that only groups based on some common characteristic—race, gender, sezual orientation, national origing, the catogories keep expanding—count, with each member judged according to average group statistical outcomes current or historical, and then assigned victim or oppressor status according to his group regardless of his individual choices, character, or circumstances. The goal is to equalize outcomes through economic redistribution and regulation, taking from “oppressor” groups and giving to “victim” groups. It’s always about the group, not the guilt, innocence, actions, or actual injustice or victimization of individual people.
Real justice applies only to the human entity that actually exists--the individual. But the individual doesn’t matter to “social justice.” He is an inconsequential cog in a group machine. It doesn’t matter whether the success you achieved was earned or not, whether you were lazy or ambitious. It doesn’t matter whether you are racist or not, or whether you were ever a victim of racism or not. In the case of actual oppression, such as against blacks in earlier America, it’s not enough to correct the injustices (such as repeal of Jim Crow Laws). You are what your group is deemed, victim or oppressor, in perpetuity, until the “injustice”—including past injustices that you had nothing to do with—has been “corrected” (reversed, actually) or until average equal outcomes are realized—the equality imposed by government policy; i.e., by force. It’s the collectivist mindset that leads straight to massive injustice, including genocide.
I’ll give you another personal example of the “social justice” mindset, this time relating to a specific event.
My wife was explaining to a leftist friend about how unfair it is that our daughter must pay school taxes even though she homeschools her four children. Our friend’s retort? “She’s lucky she can do it. But I believe we have a moral responsibility to those less fortunate.” Does it matter that our daughter is a victim of injustice perpetrated against her by her own government? Doesn’t that qualify as “less fortunate?” No. Because she’s “lucky”--that is, capable and willing to make the extraordinary effort to take on the responsibility of educating her own kids. Who are these “less fortunate” others? Who knows. Who cares whether their “less fortunate” status is due to bad circumstances beyond their control, their choice to send their kids to public school, or lazyness, or incompetence, or just lack of interest in their kids’ education.
Who cares even who they are? To the collectivist, it’s all about some abstract grouping, not real people with real circumstances. Our daughter is a real victim of a real injustice, yet “thrown under the bus” for an abstraction, “those less fortunate.” Collectivism is a moral escape hatch--an end run around an actual moral judgement. It’s merely an individual. How does a mere individual compare to the “greater good” of taking care of the “less fortunate?”
“The rule of the bromide.”
“Social justice” is anti-justice. Social justice in fact makes real justice impossible, because it shifts the focus away from real, actual, living, breathing, thinking human beings. It’s a repudiation of the dignity and autonomy of the individual. “Social justice,” like all forms of collectivism, is a moral escape hatch--an escape from having to treat people fairly. The ultimate goal of the Social Justice movement is, of course, socialism—the social system of greed, powerlust, envy, and hatred of and desire to destroy success and achievement. This is really what the school indoctrination is all about--to condition the young to reject individualism and accept the basic premise of collectivism, thus paving the road, a back road, to a socialist America.
Related Reading:
Collectivism Generates Irrational Hatred
The idea of ‘Protected Classes’ Does not Advance Individual Liberty
Collectivized 'Rights' versus Individual Rights—Ayn Rand
Individualism vs. Collectivism: Our Future, Our Choice—Craig Biddle
Related Viewing:
How Social Justice Warriors Rationalise Their Hatred For Life & Humanity—Yaron Brook
“Social Justice” is an Assault on Justice—Craig Biddle
1 comment:
Social justice is an oxymoron.
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