Love this. Great framing of the issue. I think the most alarming thing the plandemic has revealed is the sheer number of latent tyrants and useful idiots roaming about the world. It's truly terrifying.
"“I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life.”
This line from the Great Gatsby has stuck with me for the 30 years since I read it the first time. My mind is having a hard time coming to grips with the fact that 1) there were so many closeted authoritarians among us and 2) how few people recognize it, especially now that the authoritarians are overtly bragging about their open hostility to individual rights and freedom.
I am enchanted by the brilliance of people like Gato and others (team reality) that I found in desperation on twitter as I instinctively knew things were going off the rails in late spring 2020.
I am repelled by the evil within people and their heartless and ruthless disregard for the the rights of their fellow man.
I now understand how the revolutionaries of the 1770s found the courage to say "no more" and what they were being subjected to was far less than what is being forced upon us now.
My first reaction to your post was: 1) you are my tribe. Thank God there are enlightened folk like you still out there. I have walked the same path of shock, revelation and incredulity since late spring 2020.
My second reaction to your post was: 2) I'm starting to think we have more in common with the 1770 revolutionaries than you might think. They were threatened with banishment from known civilization, military invasion, imprisonment or death, loss of their life's work, the death of their families/children.... I would say that's about what we're facing today (for those of us "awake" enough to see where this road leads).
In the last two years I often recall those 1770s revolutionaries admiring them: they got organized and gathered and went and cut the kings' heads... without Twitter, internet nor any tech media. Now with all our stunning communication methods we do nothing more than complaining in chats, well unorganized.
Agree with your two points. Especially #2. I can’t figure out how most people are so clueless, even when the shenanigans are being done in plain sight for all to see. I keep asking myself what’s wrong with me. What am I not seeing.
In totalitarian societies, you'll find that less than 10% will be enthusiastically taking part in the tyranny, less than 5-10% will resist even at great risk and cost to themselves, while the vast majority (>80%) will go along with it, with varying degrees of reluctance. I don't think there are more tyrants now, they're just more visible. How I wish that social media had never been invented.
Silly Gato, assuming we share a goal of freedom in the first place.
We've seen enough rhetoric expressing outright contempt for "freedom" as a value that it should no longer surprise us when policies seem aimed at curtailing it. People like Arnold Schwarzenegger have been surprisingly transparent about what they think of freedom. Freedom is not even a value they pretend, through platitudes, to support now. Rather it is on its face something that runs counter to "safety" and "justice."
This is the bullet the petty tyrants have been shooting for at least decades. COVID heated the furnace and let them refine and forge it into a magical, silver, armor-piercing round: "your freedom puts me at risk."
And wasn’t Arnold just recently going viral for a video in which, with the sentimentality cranked to 11, he told of his father’s terrible mood at the end of the day as a Nazi sergeant? Funny that video (an anti-trump “we’re all in this together“ maudlin piece) ends with Arnold saying “To those who have tried to overthrow the Constitution of the United States, I say this: you will never win.”
Hmm. Yet now he is pissing all over it in favor of the mandates.
Some of these people make the crucial mistake of conflating the *Constitution* of the US with the *people* who happen to be installed in positions of power in the US.
Which was exactly what the Founding Fathers were trying to avoid when they set up a system of Lex Rex (the law is king) instead of Rex Lex (the king is law).
The ticklish thing about all of this is the morality. The U.S. was founded on a certain set of morals: Christian morals. That was our backbone, and what inspired our founders to stand up to tyranny, even at the cost of their own lives. We still call ourselves a Christian country, but the truth is, most Americans don’t seem to believe in a universal truth or a higher authority than the state. We’re too in love with our little luxuries, and too dependent on our oppressive state.
And that is just how the state likes it. There is no bigger threat to a totalitarian state than Christians who truly believe that all authority is Christ’s, and that it is a *moral imperative* to stand up against tyrants. Unfortunately we don’t seem to have the faith or the courage to do that anymore. We just want to “be nice” and get along with everyone, and I fear that this niceness will be the death of all of us.
What I'm seeing in sincere Christian circles is this extreme focus on verses that tell us to obey the governing authority. It's making everyone paralyzed and unable to see that they have become the new pharisees: prizing rules over rightness.
I am coming to believe those verses are telling the early Christians to be law-abiding citizens. Fair enough - that's good! However, those words were spoken to people that had NO democratic principles to protect. Good citizens under our constitution stand up for the freedoms of others! It's not about selfish disobedience.
Susanna - I fear there is a great deal of truth in your comment. The Bible does have verses telling us to obey the local authorities (eg: render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's) but there are also verses telling us that "man's laws" are unquestionably subserviant to God's laws. One of my favorite passages illustrates that in the courage of three men in the Old Testament. Most folks are familiar with the story, if not these verses found in Daniel 3. I only hope I have the courage of these three friends of Daniel's if/when the time comes.
4Then the herald loudly proclaimed, “This is what you are commanded to do, O peoples, nations and men of every language: 5As soon as you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipes and all kinds of music, you must fall down and worship the image of gold that King Nebuchadnezzar has set up. 6Whoever does not fall down and worship will immediately be thrown into a blazing furnace.”
16Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. 17If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. 18But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”
I this read somewhere recently - “Christian churches have spent 40 years preaching to look in the mirror instead of looking at Jesus.” The amillenial churches are missing what is going on.
One of the stalwarts of the progressive movement, Pauli Murray, is perhaps most famous for saying this: "If you rip away everything, oppression is the business of not respecting one's personhood." I've reminded several of my "progressive" acquaintances of this statement in light of vaccine mandates and it's fun to watch the cognitive dissonance appear on their face. But that's about the only fun to be had in this otherwise Brave New World.
Nailed it. The combination of woke, safe-space Academia and TDS (trump derangement syndrome) has reduced people to carnal homicidal maniacs who’d love to see their neighbors in prison for being unvaccinated or having a MAGA hat.
matters of employment, in general in usa, the relationship is more like a loose contract. the term is "at will" which means either party can terminate the "at will" contract" for any matter.
nuremberg infers the same is true for military 'contracts', if the order is illegal or unconscionable the subordinate has duty to refuse/resign.....
if the boss gives an unlawful or heinously stupid order like 'get the vax' the worker has right and duty to self to resign.
i have resigned on a friday effective monday when i could not in conscience stay in the job.... not related to dangerous, experimental jabs that use new variants to hide their ineffectiveness.
Many Christians site Romans 13 as a reason to ALWAYS obey government, no matter what. So they shuttered their churches, or masked their congregation, or limited singing and worship. But God’s word is specific about government’s role to punish evil and reward good. If they role is not honored it is illegitimate.
Out government: killing babies good, using correct pronouns BAD. Rapists and criminals should be released GOOD, kids without masks or vaccinated BAD. Casual sex and porn GOOD, marriage between man and woman BAD.
This is not a Biblical government, it should not be honored.
And also our government structure expects the citizens to take a role in protecting the rights is provided. So good Christians should be good citizens in a democracy by protecting that democracy.
You are right, it’s laughable to interpret Romans 13 in that way. St. Paul wrote those words, and he was also executed for not obeying the Roman government. Was he a hypocrite?
No. Romans 13 is prescriptive, describing how government SHOULD be, not descriptive of all (or even most) governments.
I also think he was just telling the Christians to be law abiding. That does not in any way preclude a spirit-led decision for civil disobedience.
Thank you for discussing this. Christians need to wake up and shake off the rules over rightness mentality - it's like modern Christians are just the new Pharisees. "Don't heal on the sabbath" has become "make your 2 year old wear the mask."
I agree. Law abiding—but first to God’s law, and then to the laws of men. If a man makes a law that goes against God’s law, then it is not a true law, and must be resisted. Even at the cost of life, liberty, or happiness.
Americans used to understand this, and this concept has defeated numerous totalitarian regimes in the past, but somewhere along the way we got lost.
Evangelical Christians have reversed the order of the two “greatest” commandments: they’ve prioritized “love they neighbor” (even that they get wrong) over “you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart soul and mind…”
It’s all over the social gospel heresy and now the Branch Covidians…
Absolutely agree. I've been using this analogy for awhile....it even involves penetration of an object and release of a liquid into my body against my will. It's fundamentally offensive and wrong.
Yes its exactly submission and the infliction of pain and degradation.
Also, the vaccine works from that standpoint, from any other standpoint its very dangerous. This is the most dangerous vaccine ever, and probably the most dangerous medicine since Oxycontin.
As a New Yorker who has photographed street protests & marches since long before Occupy and witness to more than a few NYPD acts of unprovoked aggression it has been wonderful to feel the unspoken NYPD support for the No Vax Mandate marchers. It's the first time since post 9-11 subway search policy was instituted that the sight of the uniforms makes me smile. Of course FDNY has always been universally loved but engines flicking lights and adding friendly toots as they pass marchers is appreciated too. It's inspiring to see every other difference set aside and freedom become the unifying issue.
There are many who would much rather go along with whatever comes their way because they are emotionally opposed to creating a fuss as it were in order to maintain their own integrity. Unfortunately these lessons are lost quickly once the first person memory begins to die out. There is a good book about this phenomena as it relates to WW2 and the police force the Nazis used in Poland called "Ordinary Men; Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland". Unfortunately people can be convinced to do horrible things to one another if two premises can be met, make someone 'the other' and create a legality requiring said roughshod treatment. If one no longer believes in the others humanity, it is easy to convince someone to move towards more and more reprehensible treatment sadly
Here you have scratched the surface of the real threat these mandates pose. Indeed, it appears this is exactly what they’re designed for: to weed out any who might refuse to blindly enforce unjust and tyrannical dictates. It’s happening in law enforcement, the military, and every institution that might ultimately be needed to suppress an unruly populace.
This reflects the flaw in the design. The techno-utopian media/state considers its monopoly on force to be superfluous to its power. In reality the "state" ceases to exist as soon as it no longer has police, or has lost authorship of the police's will.
In Chicago you "sow the wind and reap the whirlwind." The criminals are above the law and so is the mayor. Hypocrisy is the law of the day in the Windy city.
Let me see if I can understand the logic of the left... When General Milley went behind Trump's back to talk to the Chinese, he was considered a hero of the left (when clearly he is a traitor). When men and women who serve bravely stand up for their right to deny forced vaccinations by a wicked despot, they are unfit to serve because they are violating the "law." Yeah... that makes perfect sense.
Love this. Great framing of the issue. I think the most alarming thing the plandemic has revealed is the sheer number of latent tyrants and useful idiots roaming about the world. It's truly terrifying.
"“I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life.”
This line from the Great Gatsby has stuck with me for the 30 years since I read it the first time. My mind is having a hard time coming to grips with the fact that 1) there were so many closeted authoritarians among us and 2) how few people recognize it, especially now that the authoritarians are overtly bragging about their open hostility to individual rights and freedom.
I am enchanted by the brilliance of people like Gato and others (team reality) that I found in desperation on twitter as I instinctively knew things were going off the rails in late spring 2020.
I am repelled by the evil within people and their heartless and ruthless disregard for the the rights of their fellow man.
I now understand how the revolutionaries of the 1770s found the courage to say "no more" and what they were being subjected to was far less than what is being forced upon us now.
My first reaction to your post was: 1) you are my tribe. Thank God there are enlightened folk like you still out there. I have walked the same path of shock, revelation and incredulity since late spring 2020.
My second reaction to your post was: 2) I'm starting to think we have more in common with the 1770 revolutionaries than you might think. They were threatened with banishment from known civilization, military invasion, imprisonment or death, loss of their life's work, the death of their families/children.... I would say that's about what we're facing today (for those of us "awake" enough to see where this road leads).
In the last two years I often recall those 1770s revolutionaries admiring them: they got organized and gathered and went and cut the kings' heads... without Twitter, internet nor any tech media. Now with all our stunning communication methods we do nothing more than complaining in chats, well unorganized.
Agree with your two points. Especially #2. I can’t figure out how most people are so clueless, even when the shenanigans are being done in plain sight for all to see. I keep asking myself what’s wrong with me. What am I not seeing.
Check out the Tytler Cycle. It explains a lot.
the totalitarianism of the intentionally ignorant, frightened lemmingsthat haunt the, progressive 'movement' is outed.
Yes.yes.yes.
In totalitarian societies, you'll find that less than 10% will be enthusiastically taking part in the tyranny, less than 5-10% will resist even at great risk and cost to themselves, while the vast majority (>80%) will go along with it, with varying degrees of reluctance. I don't think there are more tyrants now, they're just more visible. How I wish that social media had never been invented.
Yes, evil on both sides, both parties. Fascism does not know blue from red, get over thinking you have a party that's any better than the other.
Silly Gato, assuming we share a goal of freedom in the first place.
We've seen enough rhetoric expressing outright contempt for "freedom" as a value that it should no longer surprise us when policies seem aimed at curtailing it. People like Arnold Schwarzenegger have been surprisingly transparent about what they think of freedom. Freedom is not even a value they pretend, through platitudes, to support now. Rather it is on its face something that runs counter to "safety" and "justice."
This is the bullet the petty tyrants have been shooting for at least decades. COVID heated the furnace and let them refine and forge it into a magical, silver, armor-piercing round: "your freedom puts me at risk."
Well, Arnold is an Austrian....
Unfortunately more to the point he is illustrative of a popular (anti-)American mindset.
And wasn’t Arnold just recently going viral for a video in which, with the sentimentality cranked to 11, he told of his father’s terrible mood at the end of the day as a Nazi sergeant? Funny that video (an anti-trump “we’re all in this together“ maudlin piece) ends with Arnold saying “To those who have tried to overthrow the Constitution of the United States, I say this: you will never win.”
Hmm. Yet now he is pissing all over it in favor of the mandates.
I love the smell of hypocrisy in the morning.
Some of these people make the crucial mistake of conflating the *Constitution* of the US with the *people* who happen to be installed in positions of power in the US.
Which was exactly what the Founding Fathers were trying to avoid when they set up a system of Lex Rex (the law is king) instead of Rex Lex (the king is law).
Probably should take into account Arnolds county of ancestory...
The ticklish thing about all of this is the morality. The U.S. was founded on a certain set of morals: Christian morals. That was our backbone, and what inspired our founders to stand up to tyranny, even at the cost of their own lives. We still call ourselves a Christian country, but the truth is, most Americans don’t seem to believe in a universal truth or a higher authority than the state. We’re too in love with our little luxuries, and too dependent on our oppressive state.
And that is just how the state likes it. There is no bigger threat to a totalitarian state than Christians who truly believe that all authority is Christ’s, and that it is a *moral imperative* to stand up against tyrants. Unfortunately we don’t seem to have the faith or the courage to do that anymore. We just want to “be nice” and get along with everyone, and I fear that this niceness will be the death of all of us.
“too in love with our little luxuries…” Yep. Aldous Huxley was a prophet.
What I'm seeing in sincere Christian circles is this extreme focus on verses that tell us to obey the governing authority. It's making everyone paralyzed and unable to see that they have become the new pharisees: prizing rules over rightness.
I am coming to believe those verses are telling the early Christians to be law-abiding citizens. Fair enough - that's good! However, those words were spoken to people that had NO democratic principles to protect. Good citizens under our constitution stand up for the freedoms of others! It's not about selfish disobedience.
Susanna - I fear there is a great deal of truth in your comment. The Bible does have verses telling us to obey the local authorities (eg: render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's) but there are also verses telling us that "man's laws" are unquestionably subserviant to God's laws. One of my favorite passages illustrates that in the courage of three men in the Old Testament. Most folks are familiar with the story, if not these verses found in Daniel 3. I only hope I have the courage of these three friends of Daniel's if/when the time comes.
4Then the herald loudly proclaimed, “This is what you are commanded to do, O peoples, nations and men of every language: 5As soon as you hear the sound of the horn, flute, zither, lyre, harp, pipes and all kinds of music, you must fall down and worship the image of gold that King Nebuchadnezzar has set up. 6Whoever does not fall down and worship will immediately be thrown into a blazing furnace.”
16Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. 17If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. 18But even if he does not, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”
That gives me shivers! Amazing faith and courage
Amen. Big time!
I simply cannot fathom their faith and courage demonstrated by the verses 16-17.
We, in our present day world, are approaching the time when we may need the same faith and the same courage.
I think this is where I read that Christians have been taught to lookin the mirror and not at Jesus. This lawyer has a good substack series to include negotiating mandates but his posts on the church, fear, etc. were excellent https://www.coffeeandcovid.com/p/what-the-church-needs-to-know-about-covid-19-2307dc2a111c
Thanks for this resource
KatLee - I agree: thanks for this resource. It is, indeed, a good one.
Pastor/Professor Voddie Baucham wrote Fault Lines: The Social Justice Movement and Evangelicalism’s Looming Catastrophe. I highly recommend it.
Bless up 🙏
I this read somewhere recently - “Christian churches have spent 40 years preaching to look in the mirror instead of looking at Jesus.” The amillenial churches are missing what is going on.
One of the stalwarts of the progressive movement, Pauli Murray, is perhaps most famous for saying this: "If you rip away everything, oppression is the business of not respecting one's personhood." I've reminded several of my "progressive" acquaintances of this statement in light of vaccine mandates and it's fun to watch the cognitive dissonance appear on their face. But that's about the only fun to be had in this otherwise Brave New World.
Nailed it. The combination of woke, safe-space Academia and TDS (trump derangement syndrome) has reduced people to carnal homicidal maniacs who’d love to see their neighbors in prison for being unvaccinated or having a MAGA hat.
Great points. If one wants to see what blind police obedience looks like, please see the jack-booted thugs in Australia.
matters of employment, in general in usa, the relationship is more like a loose contract. the term is "at will" which means either party can terminate the "at will" contract" for any matter.
nuremberg infers the same is true for military 'contracts', if the order is illegal or unconscionable the subordinate has duty to refuse/resign.....
if the boss gives an unlawful or heinously stupid order like 'get the vax' the worker has right and duty to self to resign.
i have resigned on a friday effective monday when i could not in conscience stay in the job.... not related to dangerous, experimental jabs that use new variants to hide their ineffectiveness.
Thank you for standing up, Ed! Too few are.
Good for you! Hope things worked out! 👍
Thank you for telling us. We support you.
Many Christians site Romans 13 as a reason to ALWAYS obey government, no matter what. So they shuttered their churches, or masked their congregation, or limited singing and worship. But God’s word is specific about government’s role to punish evil and reward good. If they role is not honored it is illegitimate.
Out government: killing babies good, using correct pronouns BAD. Rapists and criminals should be released GOOD, kids without masks or vaccinated BAD. Casual sex and porn GOOD, marriage between man and woman BAD.
This is not a Biblical government, it should not be honored.
“Then he said to them, ‘Then render to Caesar what is of Caesar; and to God what is of God.’” Matthew 22:21.
This is one of the reasons Progressives hate our founding documents—our life, liberty and pursuit of happiness are of God, not of Government.
You might argue that you can’t be Progressive/Communist/whatever and still be “biblical.” The teachings are contradictory.
Exactly. John 15:18
They hate you because they hated ME first…
Great comment - thank you.
And also our government structure expects the citizens to take a role in protecting the rights is provided. So good Christians should be good citizens in a democracy by protecting that democracy.
Yes absolutely!
You are right, it’s laughable to interpret Romans 13 in that way. St. Paul wrote those words, and he was also executed for not obeying the Roman government. Was he a hypocrite?
No. Romans 13 is prescriptive, describing how government SHOULD be, not descriptive of all (or even most) governments.
I also think he was just telling the Christians to be law abiding. That does not in any way preclude a spirit-led decision for civil disobedience.
Thank you for discussing this. Christians need to wake up and shake off the rules over rightness mentality - it's like modern Christians are just the new Pharisees. "Don't heal on the sabbath" has become "make your 2 year old wear the mask."
I agree. Law abiding—but first to God’s law, and then to the laws of men. If a man makes a law that goes against God’s law, then it is not a true law, and must be resisted. Even at the cost of life, liberty, or happiness.
Americans used to understand this, and this concept has defeated numerous totalitarian regimes in the past, but somewhere along the way we got lost.
Academia is like cancerous bone marrow pumping never-ending propaganda into every vein and organ that we need to stay alive as a nation
The liberal seminaries that we call American universities have eliminated that concept from curriculum
This is such an important point, and Biblical.
Evangelical Christians have reversed the order of the two “greatest” commandments: they’ve prioritized “love they neighbor” (even that they get wrong) over “you shall love the LORD your God with all your heart soul and mind…”
It’s all over the social gospel heresy and now the Branch Covidians…
Nailed it
these vaccine pushers are just like rapists.
They do not take no for an answer.
They do not listen to reason.
If you oppose them they use force to get their way.
And just like rape is not about sex, it is about power
these vaccine pushers are not interested in medical treatments it is about power.
If someone doesn't want you or what you are pushing you force them to do as you want.
Absolutely agree. I've been using this analogy for awhile....it even involves penetration of an object and release of a liquid into my body against my will. It's fundamentally offensive and wrong.
Eeew. But accurate.
Yes its exactly submission and the infliction of pain and degradation.
Also, the vaccine works from that standpoint, from any other standpoint its very dangerous. This is the most dangerous vaccine ever, and probably the most dangerous medicine since Oxycontin.
As a New Yorker who has photographed street protests & marches since long before Occupy and witness to more than a few NYPD acts of unprovoked aggression it has been wonderful to feel the unspoken NYPD support for the No Vax Mandate marchers. It's the first time since post 9-11 subway search policy was instituted that the sight of the uniforms makes me smile. Of course FDNY has always been universally loved but engines flicking lights and adding friendly toots as they pass marchers is appreciated too. It's inspiring to see every other difference set aside and freedom become the unifying issue.
Emerson to Thoreau, who is in the town jail for civil disobedience—“What are you doing in here?” Thoreau’s response: “What are YOU doing OUT THERE?”
There are many who would much rather go along with whatever comes their way because they are emotionally opposed to creating a fuss as it were in order to maintain their own integrity. Unfortunately these lessons are lost quickly once the first person memory begins to die out. There is a good book about this phenomena as it relates to WW2 and the police force the Nazis used in Poland called "Ordinary Men; Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland". Unfortunately people can be convinced to do horrible things to one another if two premises can be met, make someone 'the other' and create a legality requiring said roughshod treatment. If one no longer believes in the others humanity, it is easy to convince someone to move towards more and more reprehensible treatment sadly
There's also a 1996 debate between Goldhagen and Browning, with a very good afterward by Wieseltier that is worth a read, it's up online https://www.ushmm.org/m/pdfs/Publication_OP_1996-01.pdf
Here you have scratched the surface of the real threat these mandates pose. Indeed, it appears this is exactly what they’re designed for: to weed out any who might refuse to blindly enforce unjust and tyrannical dictates. It’s happening in law enforcement, the military, and every institution that might ultimately be needed to suppress an unruly populace.
Exactly the case! What will the 'leaders' demand of these people next?
This reflects the flaw in the design. The techno-utopian media/state considers its monopoly on force to be superfluous to its power. In reality the "state" ceases to exist as soon as it no longer has police, or has lost authorship of the police's will.
Exactly.
Jenni‘s comments in your screenshot of Twitter proves that this is a pandemic of the uneducated
In Chicago you "sow the wind and reap the whirlwind." The criminals are above the law and so is the mayor. Hypocrisy is the law of the day in the Windy city.
Let me see if I can understand the logic of the left... When General Milley went behind Trump's back to talk to the Chinese, he was considered a hero of the left (when clearly he is a traitor). When men and women who serve bravely stand up for their right to deny forced vaccinations by a wicked despot, they are unfit to serve because they are violating the "law." Yeah... that makes perfect sense.