The Divided States of Arrogance: How We Mindlessly Fiddle While America Burns

I was asked on a national radio show last week what key stories of 2018 I believed had the greatest impact on our nation, our freedoms and the way we live our lives. For me, the answer is obvious.

First, the feelings versus facts narrative has destroyed our culture, and it will continue to do so. It’s now all about “bread and circuses.” Nero fiddles—he entertains us, he feeds us, he placates us—yet, Rome burns. It’s no longer about the reality of the “economy, stupid” but rather about the illusion of our stupid feelings.

As long as our bellies are full and our intellects are numb, we march along like mindless lemmings toward our own destruction. The infatuation with socialism, the Kool-Aid of climate change, the literal lunacy of sexual fluidity, the name-it-claim-it teleology and ontology of the left, the suppression of free speech on our college campuses—all of this is the result of elevating feelings over facts. Left unchecked, this will continue to destroy anything that’s left of a free society and a free people.

Second, 2018 was the year we saw the death of due process. We now live in society where you are guilty as accused rather than innocent until proven guilty. This means we are all doomed to the fate of the accusation or the lie. Any of us—all of us—can be, and likely will be, destroyed by someone who just wants to silence and marginalize us because they don’t like our politics, our values or our religion.

Lady Justice is no longer blind. She now lifts the edges of the blindfold and sees economic and social status, educational background, political party, religious history, gender and race. When the standard becomes “your truth” rather than “The truth,” justice is a joke. All of us are now in a position to be guilty simply because someone said so, not because there is any actual evidence to corroborate their claims.

Third, our ongoing worship at the altar of diversity will be our demise. We are the United States and not the Divided States for a reason. We are one nation under God, and not many nations under the gods, for a reason. I am the president of a uni-versity and not a di-versity for a reason. A civilized culture celebrates unity and not division. It strives to bring people together rather than divide them.

The etymology of the word “culture” is obvious: It suggests there must be a unifying “cult” —a body of people who cultivate common values, common beliefs, common ideals, a common piece of land, with common borders, for a common purpose and a common good. Unity focuses on the bond of the 100 percent, not the fracture of the 99 versus the one.

Teaching victimization rather than virtue always leads to vice. This always results in vengeance and always ends in violence. Fanning the flames of resentment; of “us against them,” only encourages everyone to get their pound of flesh regardless of the blood. The attitude of “give me mine” rather than “let’s celebrate ours” will be our downfall. Balkanization will be our death.

Fourth is the loss of what it means to be human. This is the big one. If we are not objectively defined as human beings, then men, women, boys and girls become little more than cubistic cartoons drawn by those who presume to erase all form and ignore all lines. If we can’t defend the basic premise of the image of God, the image of what it means to be human, then freedom for the human race is lost.

Proof? The headline for 2018 should be “Women Lose!” This is the year women lost their showers, lost their restrooms, lost their scholarships and lost their sports. Because arrogant men with unleashed libidos refused to admit that a female is a biological fact and not a personal fabrication, women have lost their dignity and even their identity. Women lose their freedom to even live as women when the definition of the person becomes little more than the sum total of a dysphoric man’s sexual passions and proclivities.

Welcome to 2019.

This is no longer the United States of America, but the Divided States of Arrogance: A land that celebrates division and not unity; a society where science is denied and due process is dead; a country where the female is social construct rather than a concrete fact; a culture without a binding “cult”; a land of more and more laws and less and less liberty.

This is no longer the republic of Jefferson and Adams, but rather the dystopia of Huxley and Orwell.

Welcome to a brave new world.

Take your Soma. Listen to the music of the ministry of truth. Trust Big Brother. Slip into your dream (though it be a nightmare).

Welcome to a time when the delusions of powerful men strangle the freedoms of powerless women.

Welcome to a country where diversity crushes dissent.

Did I say it was 2019?

I stand corrected.

Welcome to 1984.

Everett Piper is president of Oklahoma Wesleyan University and author of Not a Day Care: The Devastating Consequences of Abandoning Truth. For the original article, visit washingtontimes.com.

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