Opus 2023-051: An Oppressor in Every Pot

The act of oppression is almost universal.  It isn’t even usually a desire to oppress.  It is a desire to win, to be in control, to show what great ideas you have.  It is an expression of your ego.  Oppression is just part of the chips from all the hammering.

I think of my grandchildren.  The older is always trying to tell the younger what to do.  If she is clever then everyone is happy and she is in charge.  If she gets too cocky or he is having a bad day then she will up the ante until an adult gets involved.  

We never grow out of that tendency.  

What brought this to mind was a conversation between Os Guinness and Eric Metaxas on a program called Socrates in the City.  They were talking about the difference between the French Revolution and the American Revolution and relating the French format to the Marxists trying to take over our country.  The Proregressives* have been at it for generations.  One of the forces keeping them at bay has been the nature of the American church.  The First Amendment makes a state church illegal and so religion has thrived with hundreds of independent churches.  None of them were able to get the government to empower them.  The founders recognized that a religious foundation was important and it could only thrive in freedom.

In Europe it was different.  Consider the corruption of the European state churches and how they colluded with the kings in oppressing the people.  Guinness said the reformation set us on the path to individual religious freedom.  Not really.  Luther wanted control as much as the pope did.  The Lutheran church became a state church.  The cycle continued.  Non-state churches were persecuted to the point of death.  Only in the American colonies and later in the Constitution did the idea of religious freedom emerge.  It has paid big dividends.

New Churches start up because the rebels want liberty.  So far so good.  Church splits can cause an increase in spiritual liberty.  After each split the cycle starts again.  One of the first things new churches do is force people to conform to their vision.  Maybe that is necessary and a good thing.  It seems to be inevitable.

We are entering a new era, or else we are firmly entrenched.  For a long time the oppressed could leave home and come to America.  Then they could leave home and move west.  At the present we leave home and move to Texas.  The problem is that the oppressors also don’t like the world they create and move to Texas with us.  And of course they know what is best for us and start working to establish what they ran away from.

There is no place left to run.  We need to take a stand and insist on liberty.  It needs to start on the local leve with city councils or maybe even more local with your HMO.  Get elected to the local board.  Go to meetings.  Start nipping the oppressors in the bud.  It will make them happy because they can feel sorry for themselves and make you happy because they are thwarted.

Get out and run.

homo unius libri