A call to the fearful

We are in many ways a fearful nation.  We call it political correctness, decency, tolerance and many other empty terms but it, boiled down, is a reluctance to enter into conflict with other humans.  We’re taught from birth “Don’t hit”, “Share”, “Be nice” and we follow what we have learned.  Conflict has been bred out of us here in America.  If there’s a chance to vote, discuss, meet, ignore or even suffer from an issue we will gladly if the only other option is confrontation or violence in some form.  And how’s that working out for us?

There also seems to be a faction of Americans who heard these lessons and were gifted in their ability to ignore the pangs of conscience and just roll over others.  Some would call them bullies and others would say that they just exploit the weakness of their neighbors.  Either way, these folks play by a different set of rules from the “nice” people.  Some of these folks seem to be drawn to the machine of politics as a way to act out on their lesser impulses and the machine, as it exists and the People, as we exist, present them with a “target rich environment”.  The Sheep never do more than complain and ask nicely to be left alone as they are shorn, year after year.  As their lambs are dragged off to be taught how good sheep act and why they should never, ever resist.  Clearly it works well.  We have the record of generations of abuse to our Rights and our Persons at the hands of .gov and other governmental entities and there exists no real record of any sort of real resistance to those abuses.  Lots of posturing exists but there has been no real action by more than a suspect few.

We, as Free-willed People are looking at this all wrong.  We are assuming that somewhere in America, some of us are brave and courageous and they will save us.  I seriously doubt that is true.  The evidence would show that we are a nation of cowards.  The only brave among us have been co-opted and they often work for those who seek to oppress us.  We call them police and soldiers and while they are in harness they are a boon to those who would rule.  Some call them sheep dogs.  A sheep dog is owned by and serves the owner of the flock.  It is when they slip out of the harness and look at what they themselves have become that they are a liability and a threat to .gov and then they become potential domestic terrorists.

God help us.  This rabbit hole is so deep and convoluted.  The work of a few men over generations has done incredible damage to the people of this once great land.  And today they consider the opposition to be weak and gutless based on the lack of real resistance. 

So what should we do?  Exercise.  Not just the body but the courage.  Here’s my thoughts on how we do that.

"Unjust (and unconstitutional) laws exist; shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once? Men generally, under such a government as this, think that they ought to wait until they have persuaded the majority to alter them. They think that, if they should resist, the remedy would be worse than the evil. But it is the fault of the government itself that the remedy is worse than the evil. It makes it worse. Why is it not more apt to anticipate and provide for reform? Why does it not cherish its wise minority? Why does it cry and resist before it is hurt? Why does it not encourage its citizens to be on the alert to point out its faults, and do better than it would have them?  Why does it always crucify Christ, and excommunicate Copernicus and Luther, and pronounce Washington and Franklin rebels?"

"If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go; perchance it will wear smooth — certainly the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another (your children for example), then, I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter friction to stop the machine. What I have to do is to see, at any rate, that I do not lend myself to the wrong which I condemn."  HD Thoreau, Resistance to Civil Government

I have been struggling personally with the issue of fear.  I feel fear when faced with the future that we as a people are looking at, I feel fear for my children who will have to live in this world, and I hear fear in the voices of my friends and others I talk with.  We are a people who do fear our government and this is wrong.  Free men should not fear their government.  If anyone should fear, it should be those who wrongfully RULE over a free people they have sworn to SERVE.

So, to address a good friend's point on speaking openly about the end of our nation, I would ask should we, as supposedly free men talk about what is actually right or what is merely legal?  Should we self edit our words and thoughts simply because someone in OUR government might no like what we are saying?  Or that it might be perceived as some form of “illegal” speech and thus bring down the feared power of .gov on our forums or even on us individually, as just people. 

Personally I would challenge the owners and mods of the forums we attend to do a little research on the position and effect of local newspapers on the years leading up to the establishment of our once great republic.  They were the backbone of the communications between otherwise unattached groups people, establishing a sense of community and common purpose throughout the Colonies where none had really existed before.  These papers were the force that gave men, real men with real fears for their family’s future, a sense that they were not alone.  Today, forums are filling that same role and building community across America.  The papers today are clearly in the establishment’s pocket and for the very same reasons they resist talk of real Freedom so do the owners and staffs of many forums hesitate today.  It is personal fear warning never to speak out in a clear and forceful manner against the government in power and advocate a reset of our nation.  Fear, a powerless emotion, is deciding the course of our nation.

“The fears of man are many. He fears the shadow of death and the closed doors of the future. He is afraid for his friends and for his sons and of the specter of tomorrow. All his life's journey he walks in the lonely corridors of his controlled fears, if he is a man. For only fools will strut, and only cowards dare cringe.”  James Warner Bellah

Fear is just a feeling.  It’s what you CHOOSE to do when you feel it that makes you a man.

Conspiring?

“But thou know’st this,

‘Tis time to fear when tyrants seem to kiss.”

                                                            Shakespeare

“Power on an ancient consecrated throne,

Strong in possession, founded in old custom;

Power by a thousand tough and stringy roots,

Fixed to the people’s pious nursery-faith.”

                                                            Schiller

What do these three above items have in common? 

Simple, they infer that there are things going on in this world that few actually see or are willing to acknowledge.  Some call it business as usual, others conspiracy and many don’t believe it actually exists.  Regardless, there are connections between the events of today and yesterday if you are willing to look.  The meanings of some of those connections are clear when you see them and others are not. 

On a global scale some of these things are fairly simple to see: The constant expansion of power over the people by their governments.  Few deny that the function of government seems to be selfish preservation of its position.  Refer to the simultaneous coalescing of the European governments into a single monolithical EU power as an example.  There’s the steady degradation of the acknowledged Rights of man across the so-called civilized world as men try to assert themselves in the face of a rapidly expanding government control structure.  How about the trained emphasis on debt as an accepted way to live our lives?  Each is a symptom of powerful and wicked individuals at work.

Now, there are the mockers out there who will scoff at anyone who points to these machinations as something both unnatural and evil.  But why?  Why is it so hard to believe that those people who would actively seek to exalt themselves to the positions of the very highest power would also be without other motives and thus somehow unwilling to harm others to gather the very power they crave?  Why, in the light of centuries of recorded history would reasonable and otherwise intelligent people refuse to acknowledge a pattern of abuse that stretches throughout that same history?  That kings and rulers, presidents and dictators are all subject to the same corruption and desires as normal man or perhaps worse?  Is it fear?  A willing disbelief?  A desire to reject reality and it’s painful results?  I don’t know but for me it was mere ignorance.

I grew up in a typical American life.  School, divorce, television.  And my favorite was distraction.  Be it games, play, media, or just fantasy life, I did whatever I could to deny the painful reality I was forced into.  From birth I was ready to seek and accept the pain free path.  I was educated by the state and expected to magically just fit in.  My parents expected the state to educate me in a neutral manner, providing me with the tools needed to live a productive life.  While I love them both, I really doubt they ever lost sleep about the contents of the information I was exposed to.  Between the media storyline and the education provided by the government schools, I was told many things I have since found to be completely untrue. 

An example is the lie that we live in a free democracy.  Or even that we should want to live in one.  By extension a democracy is the rule of the will of a mob.  That is not a safe place to reside when the mob rules and dictates the law.  In actuality America is supposed to be a representative republic where the rule of law is primary.  And the law is Statute law not case law that can be easily bent by unscrupulous men.

Or how about the talk that certain presidents are far superior to others?  I was told in school that Lincoln and FDR were truly great men.  Well, they were great in the power that they exorcised in their terms of service but great in a moral or character based sense?  Not so much.  Neither man lived up to his Oath.  And then the questions about how they got into power are never asked by those same people who preach their greatness... 

So what has that to do with a greater theme in this life we live?  Well, if I was misled by those men, women and even the very system trusted to raise me by my parents, then I believe that many of us were. 

A man whom I respect solely for his honesty on this subject, once described how a monarchy was superior to a representative republic and in some ways he was right.  Kings are raised from birth to rule.  Presidents are chosen for their ability to successfully complete a race for power.  Both are clearly flawed and pathetic systems of providing for the protection of the Rights of a man.  Neither has any compelling reason to protect me and mine, instead the systems are both framed around the protection of the power they have acquired.

And to preserve that power, throughout time men have provided means of establishing and preserving for themselves and their kin that power they have seized, regardless of the manner of the actual taking.  Monarchs use a fallacy of hereditary succession and the police power of the state to convince the people that theirs is a true and just rule.  The so-called democratic republics of this world have invested us in the myth of free elections and the sovereign franchise of man while those who control the information control the results of those elections. 

“There are men, in all ages, who mean to exercise power usefully; but who mean to exercise it. They mean to govern well; but they mean to govern. They promise to be kind masters; but they mean to be masters.” -- Daniel Webster

Ok, so there are men who seek power and do actually rule over us.  Big deal.  I have everything I need.  Why should I care?  I’m free to come and go as I see fit.  I can buy homes and cars and computers.  I can get married and have a family.  I can seek my own fortune and if I wish it, I can even seek political power.  So I am free, right?  So why should we mess with the system?  Sure it’s corrupt but that doesn’t touch me.

 There was a day when that woman failing to protect her child may have said the same thing.  “The government is someone else’s problem, I have too many things to do.” 

 This man may have boasted of his freedom in years previous but now he kneels on the side of a pit, still holding his coat, with his neighbors bleeding and dead below him and with a government provided pistol being aimed at his head, about to die.  What is he thinking?  His face calls my eye and I find myself trying to fathom what that moment was to him.  And to those men surrounding him, born of woman just as he was, who wore a government’s uniform and carried the government’s guns but pulled the triggers with their own fingers and killed their neighbors.  I cannot find where Hitler or Stalin once pulled a trigger and personally killed a man or woman or child.  It was people, free-willed men and women who did these things.

 And these things.

And these things.

But that last one’s different?  Why?  I am sorry if it offends but there is no difference.  Some people choose to reject the government’s stance on a subject or fail to align with it and then are killed for their choice.  Pretty simple.  A monopoly of force in the hands of your rulers...

What do these horrible pictures have to do with a bigger plan?  They carry a simple message: ignoring the plan’s existence will kill either you or those around you.

Governments that are allowed to grow too large then become unresponsive to their people and will eventually turn on them.  And enslave them.  And kill them.  It’s just history.  And also our future if we sit and do nothing effective.