The Price of Liberty

Western civilization is in danger of a “Final Collapse.” Like cultures, civilizations, societies, nations, and empires before us in the planet’s history, collapse is inevitable. Maybe slowly, maybe much faster than expected or even realized. Even keen observers may not realize it has happened for decades.

Thirteen elements are the foundation of western civilization, though no one has achieved perfection in them. It has survived for more than 500 years. These elements are threatened. We (and others) believe the likelihood of Final Collapse in the next few years is high.

1. Free thought: Today, the Orwellian concept of thought crime is replacing the idea that people should be taught and allowed to form their own opinions, understandings, and beliefs. (And act on those beliefs as long as they did not harm or threaten to harm others: physically harm, not “offend” or “scare” others.)
2. Free speech: Many today reject defending others’ right to speak even though you disagree with them, and deny the right to hear (and responsibility to listen to) opinions and ideas you find distasteful.
3. Free markets: It is dark humor to call today’s system “free markets” when every economic activity is tightly regulated, virtually all licensed, and milked for every mil by taxes, fees, and fines. It is not just a push into more and more socialism, it is increasingly separating “ownership” from control.
4. Limited government: As TPOL has pointed out recently, governments at all levels have rejected and ignored limits on their powers, grasping constantly for more and more. Even those who loudly protest and claim that limited government is essential strive constantly to gain more control for governments.
5. Individualism (versus group identity): Society and governments more and more push for “cookie-cutter” personalities. Oh, yes, we have subcultures and counter-culture thinking and behavior, but such activities just make us part of a group, to be coddled and recruited by politicians and political leaders – and corporations (as customers/consumers and employees). Anyone who is a square peg in a round hole is forcibly trimmed to fit. Even if they are destroyed.
6. Rationality, including science, logic, and fact (not superstition). Groupthink replaces all of this: consensus supersedes understanding of natural processes and humans. These fundamental ways of viewing the universe and ourselves are rejected as racist, elitist, and demeaning to others.
7. Liberty is seen as a danger. Snowflakes need shelter in safe spaces for fear of being triggered. Unconstrained people free to do what they want, are viewed as evil to be feared and destroyed or kept away from others.
8. Progress. The West’s always strived to make progress: to improve our own condition and that of others. Even when efforts to make progress in medicine, science, technology, agriculture, and politics were misguided, it was a laudable goal. No longer: progress is feared even more than Luddites did, because it will change lives and potentially impact those who are disadvantaged and disabled.
9. Privacy. “Mind your own business” is no longer a watchword for more and more of society. Everything must be known: transparency is mandatory. We are pushed into the Chinese Social Credit model. Not just free thinking, but anything which is outside the norm for your assigned group in society, must be suppressed.
10. Property Rights: Nothing belongs to you: certainly not land, resources, or for that matter, your own time, labor, and body. “Society” (government), and disadvantaged groups can call on you to provide any and all of these for their benefit at any time.
11. Rule of Law. Even in most of the monarchies of Europe in the 1500s and 1600s, this was an essential element of life and society. But even the most tyrannical and absolute of monarchs, dukes, counts, bishops and the like did not attempt to micro-manage the daily and hourly activities of their subjects (even their serfs and slaves) the way modern “democratic” governments at all levels do. And today, perhaps even more than back in the early days of western civilization, “who you know” and not what you know or what the laws are seems to be a crushing burden on the common people and ordinary businesses.  Regulatory abuse is far greater with wicked judges than with honest ones.
12. Industry and private enterprise: Like free speech and progress, today industry (in both the sense of manufacturing and the idea of working hard for specific objectives) is viewed as unacceptable and against the interests and wishes of the people. (By the politically-correct enemies of liberty and wannabe rulers.) Private enterprise (true capitalism, like free markets) is intolerable: all must bend the knee to the Woke.
13. A biblical understanding of morality: we understand that some lovers of liberty may find this odd. But most nonbelievers in deity and at least some people of other faiths (Muslims, Hindu, etc.) understand the basics: the sanctity of human life, the Golden Rule (Zero Aggression Prinicple), the need to balance liberty with responsibility, even the need to love one another. Today, in addition to sexual immorality and destruction of the family by governments and individuals, we see a breakdown in morality in both public and private lives. Especially dealing with honesty, a work ethic, and immorally dealing with the above twelve items. The elements that bind society together and insulate against both inside and outside have or are failing.

All these foundational principles are challenged today in many ways. The solutions to these are simple but difficult to complete. We must teach these fundamentals, we must provide examples of doing so to those around us, and we must help ourselves and other accountable.

Playing the games of those who seek destruction will fail: civilization will fall. If we push back and struggle for these ideals boldly, civilization may still fall, but a new and better one will arise.