Dalmrymple nails it.
We’re circling the bowl at this point.
I have a family, and it scares me that everything I do to prepare is probably not sufficient to insulate them from this.
Question to FReepers: Some folks say that with the accelerating and inevitable decay of our society we should, at this point, seek to further the process so we can start the rebuilding process all the sooner.
The belief is that we are too far gone, and only a complete collapse can allow us to wrench power from the entrenched elites and thus bring about a new era of personal freedom.
Thoughts?
While I understand this sentiment, and would normally agree with it, it won't work. There are other, much more powerful, forces at work here that will seize the power that these people are talking about. It will not be pretty.
The good news is that I have read the end of the book, and I have heard of some intermediate steps, and the good guys win.
What specific actions might you take to accelerate the decline of society? Can you think of any such actions that wouldn't be totally stupid?
That is related to the idea of cycles, where as a people we could see our mistakes and self adjust over a period of a couple of decades, but we aren’t a people, and there are no cycles anymore.
Endless mass immigration supplies the left with millions of new voters, fresh to their ideas and methods, every year that conservatism or Christianity wins over a few hundred thousand converts to our side, the left counters that growth with immigration, we can’t catch up.
People say “what happened to my Americans, when did they start voting like this?” Well they didn’t, they still vote pretty much like they did in the past, but the democrats brought in a replacement population, that overwhelms their vote, and which makes getting any cultural footing, or a Christian revival going, impossible.
If all the remaining believing Christians and Jews were to pick an issue we could agree on and all go on a walkout until that issue was resolved in our favor, that might be a statement that the powers that be would listen to.
For example, those that own businesses would shutter them, and those that have salaried jobs would stop working until the congress and state legislatures pass a religious liberty amendment. Normally amendments take years to work through the process, but if 10-20% of the working population absents itself from the marketplace all at once, then we might get some action.
What I'm suggesting sounds radical. Many people who would like to join in would bow out for financial reasons or fears of losing their businesses or losing their jobs and never being employed again.
My take is that everything is now based on money. No amount of picketing or protesting or letter-writing is going to move our country back in the right direction. The only thing that the elites seem to care about is the bottom line. If a huge portion of the working population goes on strike, that might put some fear into them.
If we as a group are not willing to do something like this, then I fear that we are ultimately all on our own. Each family will need to fend for itself with the help of friends, fellow churchgoers, etc. The end game will be small enclaves of like believers trying to isolate themselves as much as possible from the culture while still trying to maintain a way of life, i.e. something like what the Amish are doing.
I fear that those enclaves will not only be bitter at the culture that has abandoned them, but at all the other enclaves that don't believe as they do. They will believe the other enclaves were just as much at fault as the culture itself. Basically the various Protestant enclaves and Catholic enclaves will spend as much time criticizing each other as they do the culture at large. There will be little or no inter-enclave interaction or support.
If we don't all stick together and act in a way that causes the elites to take notice, then we might as well start looking for property in remote parts of West Virginia, West Texas, or the Nevada desert.
I think it's wrong to accelerate or actively further the process of social decay. The only power the elites have is the power we cede to them. I don't want the power they wield, so have no interest in "taking" anything from them. Lords of the Flies, they are.
“The belief is that we are too far gone, and only a complete collapse can allow us to wrench power from the entrenched elites and thus bring about a new era of personal freedom.”
This was the premise in the 1950’s Sci Fi fiction author Isaac Asimov’s trilogy “The Foundation, The Foundation and the Empire, and The Second Foundation”
It was one of Newt Gingrich’s favorite books.