Capitalism and the Culture War

www.patricksamuels.com blog ^

[Mikey76]

The imminent departure of Justice Souter has brought all the old issues to the forefront as the sides gear up for the battle over the next judicial appointment. The issues of the “culture war”, as most people understand it, will fill the pages of what newspapers are left, and become endless fodder for the talking heads on television. They will discuss abortion, gay rights and marriage, school prayer, civil rights and a whole host of other issues. For now, however, we are going to forget the fact that giving so much power to these nine people, and the judiciary in general, was not the intention of the founders of this country. What I am going to propose to the reader is the idea that the culture war cannot be won without reestablishing the individual freedom that is part and parcel of free market capitalism. The free market economic system, by its very nature, encourages the development of values that make societies vibrant, healthy and successful. It is cause and effect. In a free society where individuals are empowered and there is little government interference or control, people are responsible and innovative and local communities are strong. They have to be because there is no outside entity to rely on. In societies where power and wealth is concentrated at the top and the people are powerless, there is no incentive for people to be responsible or industrious because there is no reward or upward mobility. Those at the top are manipulative and corrupt politicians who care only about the maintenance of their power. This creates a stagnant society that produces nothing of value and soon enters the dustbin of history.

I will offer a few cases to illustrate my point. In the ancient world, the democracies of Greece and the republic of Rome created societies that grew into empires. The empires and the dictatorships they degenerated into were their downfall but in their heyday the free citizens of these nations achieved great things. The outnumbered Greeks defeated the Persians again and again. The Roman republic rose from a small city state to an empire that surrounded the Mediterranean and beyond. A more recent example, other than our own in America, was the rise of the British empire. Although smaller in land area and more recent in organization than many of the nations of the continent, Britain limited its monarchy, empowered its citizens and rose to become a world power. In opposition to nations like Spain, who achieved power and wealth through conquest and enslavement, Britain achieved her wealth and power primarily through trade, that is free market capitalism. Growth through conquest, by its very nature, is limited, which is why Spain’s exploitation of the New World did not create staying power on the world stage. Britain's empire, on the other hand, was based primarily on trade, free market capitalism. However, the traits made these nations great and powerful were abandoned and resulted in their downfall. Power became concentrated at the top whether in the person of an emperor or king or, the case of Britain, the government as a whole. Moral and literal corruption set in among the people and decline became inevitable.

What does this have to do with the culture war, you may be asking? Everything. For a society to be successful for the long term, it must have citizens that make it so. A great leader may make a nation powerful in the short run but for a nation to have staying power, success measured in centuries, not years or decades, that nation must have successful people. Those kinds of people are developed in societies that value individual liberty and economic freedom and are suppressed by totalitarian societies. This applies to all areas of the culture, not just military prowess. Most societies throughout history, because the individuals in that society were responsible for the consequences of their actions, developed a set of mores and values, a moral code, that enabled the individual within that society to thrive within the confines of his political and economic environment. The central position of the family, nuclear and extended, respect and honesty in dealing with others, frugality and forethought in economics, organization and charity in the local community, the need to be self educated, respect for life and religious devotion, these are all things that people one hundred and fifty years ago took for granted as the norm.

I would argue the reason for these norms is not primarily due to religious or ideological input but that they came about as a result of trial and error through the centuries. At a basic level, people are motivated by one thing, their own self interest. The reason this does not create a society of narcissists is because people realize that if they are to survive and thrive, it is in their self interest to follow the norms and values previously listed. It makes their lives better in the long run because everyone understands the consequences of violating those values. To illustrate this, let’s look at a typical family one hundred and fifty years ago. When a child is born to a poor family, as soon as he is able he begins to work on the family farm or in the family business. His parents are strict but fair because they know that he and his brothers and sisters are their security in the old age. So raising those children to accept the “civil religion” is a necessity for their prosperity because it encourages hard work, frugality, honesty and responsibility. The parents take care of their parents until they die and those parents pass down their wealth and values to their children. The married couple knows infidelity would destroy the family they all depend on. The children would be harmed and in the future, they could have no one to care for them. “Neither a borrower nor a lender be” was the basis for their economic decisions because if they went under, they would lose everything they, and their parents, had worked for. In order to be prosperous, they needed to show themselves honest and trustworthy to their neighbors and community, which was central in meeting needs that could not be met by the individual.

Now, remove the consequences of ignoring those values. Hundreds of years ago, it was the “ruling class”, secure in their economic circumstances, that could string along a series of mistresses, consider children a nuisance, gamble and treat all those around them with contempt. Then came the industrial revolution and the migration into the cities, which resulted in the deterioration of these values among more of the poor and working class. Moving to the cities changed the circumstances that created the previous values and produced a new set. The extended family was no longer part of the equation because people left their families to go to the cities. The anonymity of a city loosened the bonds of the community and its ability to censure behavior. Without community censure, people could engage in all kinds of personal and economic activities that would have been frowned upon in a small community and the mobility of a rootless existence allowed people to escape some of the consequences of their behavior. It is in cities where civil society takes a few steps backwards and crime and corruption become the rule rather than the exception.

Move forward to the present. Because of the mobility and anonymity of a society in which only a very small percentage of the people live in rural circumstances, the previous trends have become widespread. What makes it exponentially worse is that we now have a government that has inserted itself into the mix and removed any economic consequences from behavior that was previously understood as negative. In fact, they now subsidize that behavior and by doing so, encourage it. Once upon a time, unwed, teenage pregnancy was a stigma to be avoided, and an economic disaster. Now, the government subsidizes that behavior and, lo and behold, we have more of it. As we get more of it, society begins to accept it and now we have a whole generation of young people who see nothing wrong with it and a government that is expected to help for the sake of the “children”. Too lazy to work? There is welfare. Got in over your head with debt? The government will rescue you too. Tired of your spouse? No fault divorce if for you. Children a nuisance? The government has day care, pre-school and K-12 education to keep them out of your hair and remove the pesky responsibility of actually raising them from you, if you can just put up with a few evenings and weekends. Community and individual relationships deteriorate because and individual's primary relationship, in all the areas that really matter, is with the state. We no longer depend on each other for help, we depend on the government. This is a disaster because our self interest is no longer directed at our neighbors. We see no reason to be civil, honest or compassionate toward them because there is no longer the mutual expectation of assistance strong communities once fostered. Now we are interested only in “pleasing” the state because that is where our needs for assistance are met.

Any government that inserts itself to such an extent and takes on this much responsibility also takes control and creates a distorted and unhealthy society. Common sense would indicate that this is counterintuitive, so why do governments choose paths that support detrimental behavior? Because it creates dependency and by doing so, enhances the state’s power. Politicians in such a state are willing to sacrifice the long term health of society for the short term gains they experience. There is one other motivation we can ascribe to politicians who proscribe destructive policies on the country they are supposed to be serving. They are doing it with the full knowledge that what they are doing is destructive and that destruction is the objective, not an unfortunate side effect of their pursuit of power. In the United States there is a certain segment of society that has been taught that America is the root of all evil in society, that free market capitalism is the cause of all injustice, that American military might is responsible for all the oppression in the world and therefore, America, as we know it, needs to be destroyed so something better can grow in its place. Unfortunately, many of the people who think this way are now in charge. It is a lethal combination. On the one hand you have people adopting policies that will destroy what made this country great. On the other hand, there are people that are adopting statist policies because they enhance their own power. The policies are the same and the two groups make a majority. It would appear that we are now on a rapidly accelerated path to a totalitarian state and it is we who have placed the bonds on ourselves.

So what does such a society look like, what will we look like very soon? For the masses, that would be you and I, we become like the people of the Roman Empire in its decline. The emperors who ruled absolutely with just a sham of a republic kept the people happy with free bread and entertainment. The people themselves, in a society in which they are basically powerless, have no incentive for being responsible, industrious or ambitious. There are no rewards for acting in such a way for there is no possibility of moving up and improving one’s lot, nor is there a downside to acting irresponsibly because the free bread is always there.

Even worse than this is the way one actually does achieve anything of value. When the government controls everything significant, politically and economically, the only way to get ahead is to do so in the context of the governmental system. Within the artificial construct of the political system the way to get ahead is through favors, backstabbing and corruption. This has always been true and will always be true. Power corrupts, which is why the founders of this country did their best to limit government, they wanted to limit its corruptive influence. But with an unlimited government the corruption is unlimited because everything is within the sphere of a system that by its very nature encourages corruption.

This then becomes the nature of a totalitarian society, and I use that term in its true sense-there is no cultural, economic or individual sphere of activity that exists outside of the government’s interest and control. The masses of people are reduced to serfs, occupying space until the state has need of their labor or blood. They are kept stupid and left lazy for the state takes care of all their needs and the state controlled media convinces them they have the best life they can expect, the best life the government can give them. People are reduced to commodities to be used rather than individuals who have value in and of themselves. Those who rise up economically or politically do so according to the corruption endemic to such a system. Those who do achieve prominence do so not because they are the best and the brightest but because they play the political game better than anyone else. They lie, cheat, steal and deceive better than their countrymen. The rule of law means nothing, it is rule according to the whims of those in power and they achieve their aims through intimidation and violence. This was life in the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. It is a losing hand. Why did Hitler lose the war when he had achieved such great conquests? Because a statist society is limited by those at the top and the free societies of America and Britain had the depth to recover from their deficiencies at the beginning of the war and utilize their resources, material and intellectual, more efficiently. The Soviet system collapsed under the weight of its own inefficiency after decades of state control. Under the communists they produced nothing of value for the rest of the world in any area of endeavor. It was the system and the kind of citizen it produced that led to their downfall. In every other nation that has adopted the statist vision under whatever name-socialism, fascism or communism-their societies have stagnated or they are torn by unrest due to the oppression. There has never been a statist society that was a long term success. Its very nature leads to its destruction.

In the age of Obama the choices are becoming more clear on the surface but in many ways, we have lost the battle for the soul of our nation. The founders were very wise men who understood the nature of individuals and governments better than most. The knew that within some men, the desire to control was insatiable and such men would choose to use the power of government to achieve their aims. By specifically limiting government, the tools of the would be despot would be limited and blunt. It was also understood that one cannot have just a “little bit” of statism/socialism just like one cannot have a little bit of cancer. It is freedom, economic and political, that makes a strong society and statism is a cancer that eats away at that freedom. It needs to be destroyed as soon as it becomes apparent. The sooner it is eliminated, the easier it is and the better the prognosis of the patient.

Today, however, we have allowed the cancer to spread unchecked, and have embraced it. The cancer of statist control, that is totalitarianism, has wrapped its evil tentacles around every area of society. By allowing it to do so we have shifted the battle lines from whether statism is good or not to what degree of statism is good or bad. We now argue about how to “reform” statist programs like Social Security, Medicare and welfare. That is not the argument we should be having. These programs are bankrupting the country, morally and economically, and a tweak here or there will do nothing except delay the inevitable because the programs themselves, like a cancer, are bad for the country. The cultural issues we opened with are another example. We argue about where the state should come down on the issues of gay marriage, abortion, gun rights, school prayer and a host of other issues. The argument should really be about whether the state should have any say in these issues at all! But the vast majority of people in this country have conceded that ground, they have come to accept the statist vision and all we are left with is the debate over the terms of liberty’s surrender.

Of course, I can hear the chorus of critics now. You hate old people, you want people to be sick, you have no compassion! There is the buzz word for our time. We must be “compassionate” which means we must allow the state to take our money and spend it on programs that are supposed to heal all our social ills. How’s that working out? Have we eliminated poverty through our government forced charity? No. Government welfare has created a permanent underclass in this country and destroyed the black family. Is that compassion? Is it compassionate to rob the productive of future generations to pay a pittance to senior citizens today? Is it compassionate to ration health care, denying people treatment because a bureaucrat has decided that it isn’t “cost effective”? Is it compassionate to force children to attend dangerous schools where they are taught few, if any, skills necessary to assist them in the “real world”? Most cities are run by statists and are rife with crime and corruption. Is it compassionate to create such an environment for people to live in? Liberty is the most compassionate thing of all because it empowers people to be self sufficient in meeting their needs, it does not put us in the straightjacket of government acceptability. It empowers communities to effectively meet the needs of the “poorest” among us with innovation and effectiveness. It strengthens familles to work together to provide loving, nurturing environments for children and senior citizens. Liberty does not rob our children and grandchildren to pay for our stupidity. Liberty does not create dependency through lies and deceit. Liberty brings out the best in people, it encourages real compassion. Liberty puts the power and responsibility for your life where it belongs, with you.

By forcing our hand, perhaps President Obama has given some degree of hope to those that love liberty. He is forcing the American people to look at the statist vision in stark terms. We are asking the question as never before, “Do we really want the state in charge of every aspect of our lives?” People are looking at the spending, the waste, the lies, the corruption and the total lack of common sense that is endemic to Washington and wondering if this is really the path we want to go down. The monumental task before the sons of liberty is to convince the people that stopping here is not the solution. Sure, we want to fight government run health care and illegal immigration but hasn’t the last forty years taught us anything? The statist will just come back and try again, hoping new language or a new generation will accept their vision. Statism is a cancer, probing, growing and expanding into every area it can. If it is stopped in one place, it will find another. Stopping the growth of a cancer is only a stopgap measure, it will grow again as soon as the pressure is off or it will grow unseen in other areas. The cancer must be taken out, piece by piece until it is gone. If government health care is bad, why do we put up with Medicare? If welfare destroys families and encourage negative behavior, why should we have it at all? Why should we allow the government to take our income throughout our lives and then give us a pittance to live on when we could do much better on our own? Most people still believe the government doesn’t do anything well outside its constitutionally enumerated powers. For those of us who love liberty, we must encourage that sentiment and push it to its logical conclusion. The very survival of our nation and society is in the balance and President Obama and the statists with him are trying hard to push it over the edge, past the point of no return. These are the times in which the true measure of a man is revealed. Will we go quietly into the long night of statism, sacrificing what little liberty remains for the empty promises of state security? Or will we grasp the robes of lady liberty and embrace and exercise the freedom and responsibility we were created with and entrusted with by the men who founded this nation? The choice is ours and the whole world, literally, awaits our decision.

www.patricksamuels.com

[willgolfforfood]

REALLY excellent article. Nice post!