Straining At Truths, Swallowing Lies

Consider it the new Puritanism. It's the new state religion manifested in great public displays of pain, shock, and disgust. It's as common as news print; as rarefied as membership in the Myopia Hunt Club. In short, it's everywhere, and it is ruining our lives. For it's the moral shock, the umbrage, at the wrong things.

Take two examples. The first, from a small New Hampshire town, is the story of a police chief who arrested a known illegal alien for trespassing. In minutes, it seems, human rights groups, on Monday, descended upon New Ipswich, New Hampshire, to protest the abuse of a Mexican illegal wanton in his dislike of America's immigration laws. Protesters screamed and squirmed about 'profiling' and the alleged abuse profiling invokes.

In short, the police chief is evil, though he did nothing wrong; and the lawbreaker is good. (One protester's sign read: "No human is illegal"; while a letter drafted by the Human Rights Task Force stated that "Everyone in the United States of America, regardless of immigration status, is entitled to equal protection under our nation's laws." Everyone, apparently, except a person who enforces those laws.)

The second example was reported moments ago. A 97-year-old Massachusetts woman, from Boston's Jamaica Plain, was found beaten to death in her home. Her "LifeLine" button had been pressed to alert authorities of trouble. When police arrived, she was found wrapped in a rug.

The juxtaposition of these stories is telling. For there is not, nor will there be, ANY protest outside this woman's home by the Human Rights Task Force. She might as well have died at the hands of Muslim terrorists.

But arrest a Mexican for committing a crime prompts the 'sensitive', truly moral among us to cry out against 'racism' and 'profiling'. Of course, no one screams about the profiling done by criminals against 'women' alone at night or the elderly 'rollovers' whose cashed Social Security checks are easy pickings. After all, profiling is fairly standard practice for criminals.

There is a slew of other glaring examples of America's increased Puritan fastidiousness. Here are a few more presented in no meaningful order:

1) Americans are concerned that the Koran was mishandled by US military servicemen at Guantanamo Bay, with even the commanding Brigadier General speaking in apologetic tones. Of course, desecration of the religious rights of Christians in Africa, of Buddhist artifacts in Afghanistan, or of crucifixes (soaked in urine) in American art circles prompts a mere callous dismissal. Moreover, no one reproaches Muslim fanatics for abusing the Koran in order to justify murder.

2) That Abu Ghraib abuses were considered "atrocities" (by Hillary Clinton, no less), and yet there is nary a candlelight vigil for beheaded Americans and Europeans (they deserve it, apparently, since they should not have been there in the first place, sort of like any woman raped in a dark alley at night), proves that we are increasingly morally indignant at the wrong behaviors.

3) Americans mock a President for stumbling over his words, but are apparently sophisticated enough to permit former KKK-member, and now senior senator Robert Byrd, a Democrat from West Virginia (in 2001, on FOX News): "My old mom told me, 'Robert, you can't go to heaven if you hate anybody.' We practice that. There are white n*ggers. I've seen a lot of white n*ggers in my time. I'm going to use that word...."† Misspell 'potato' or misspeak 'nuclear', and you're an idiot. But if you're a Democrat racist, that's not worth a single placard. When Trent Lott praised the former Dixiecrat Strom Thurmond, his remarks led to a lynching. And his words were innocuous. But Byrd keeps on flapping without a a single Democrat crowing about his impropriety.

4) While attending the consecration of the first elected openly gay bishop in Christendom, I witnessed a dissenter read before the thousands gathered a description, replete with statistics and clinical terminology, of the behaviors of homosexual men. In short, the dissenter was reading MERE WORDS, you know, he was MAKING SOUNDS WITH HIS MOUTH. Suddenly the presiding bishop, the titular head of the American Episcopal Church, raised his hand and said, "Spare us the details and get to the substance." Odd, don't you think, that speaking of homosexuality in words is offensive, but the acts of homosexuals are not? If the details in words offend us, then why not the acts themselves? In other words, it is OK to do what no one wants to talk about it; but it's evil to talk about it.

5) Related to number 4, if a person ever expects a homosexual to 'change', note that such a person is instantly vilified as homophobic and abusive. However, no one seems to mind DEMANDING that homophobes MUST change. Of course homosexuals are born and homophobes are made, or so goes the new Puritanism. That few rarely point out that socio-biologists have insisted for decades that a person's genes are selfishly interested in procreation to preserve themselves in perpetuity; indicating that a strong aversion to homosexuality might actually be genetic, you know, in-born; reveals that the new Puritanism is only open to certain limited types of thinking.

6) When Reverend Jerry Falwell talks about making America great again, he is censured by the new Puritans who believe that religion has no place in politics. But when Reverend Barry Lynn, the executive director of Americans United For Separation of Church and State, speaks on America's greatness, the new Puritans fall dumbly silent. (No one notices, it seems, the colossal irony that Barry Lynn is a REVEREND interested in protecting America from religion.) They stop their ears to Falwell's evil rhetoric, and stand mute when Lynn rants with contradictions.

These are but a few of the many examples of the new puritanism. No one protested when Andrea Dworkin (now deceased) argued that men and women were different, essentially (and that women are better); but Harvard's faculty reeled and wailed when its president recently suggested that men and women MIGHT be different; proving that the new Puritanism is in the highest places.

It seems the Koran flushed down the toilet has prompted some, at least in spirit, to fly the American flag at half-staff, nay, to even burn it (Muslims burn our flag daily. Burned a Koran lately?). But the death of a pope, the head-of-state of the Vatican, a true defender of peace and justice, prompts many to wonder whether flying the flag at half-staff in his honor violates the U.S. Constitution. Muslims can flush American skulls down toilets in the name of the Koran; but Americans are to feel ashamed that their soldiers have not worn gloves when handling the same book. You get the picture, and that picture is a mess.

Welcome to the new Puritanism, where we strain at gnats and swallow camels. Or, more accurately, we strain at truth, swallowing everything else.

Peace.

©Bill Gnade 2005/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

†For the Byrd quote, see this link. Yes, Byrd did apologize publicly for his slur and gaffe. So too did Trent Lott. But Lott remains marginalized.