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The Celebration of Ignorance
One of the great joys of my life is watching speeches and interviews given by great intellectuals. It was in pursuing this pleasure that I happened upon an episode of the ABC’s panel discussion show, Question and Answers. Coming out of the Festival of Dangerous Ideas, the four people on the panel – the traditional conservative, Peter Hitchens; the feminist writer, Germaine Greer; the American writer, Hanna Rosin; and the gay rights activist, Dan Savage – spent an hour discussing tops ranging from western civilisation to modern hook-up culture.
It became quickly apparent that the intellectual stature of the four panellists was not evenly matched. Hanna Rosin and Dan Savage were less rational, less mature, and more ignorant than Peter Hitchens and Germaine Greer. By comparison, Hitchens and Greer gave carefully considered answers to most of the questions asked. Hitchens, in particular, gave responses based on careful consideration, rational thought, fact, and wisdom. (This is not to say one is required to agree with him)
It was the behaviour of the audience that proved the most alarming, however. Like most Questions and Answers audiences, it was comprised mostly of idealistically left-wing youth. Their primary purpose for being there was to have their ideological presuppositions reinforced. With no apparent motivation to listen to the answers to their questions, these youngsters would clap and cheer like trained seals whenever someone makes an ideologically-correct statement.
How has our society become so stupid? Why do we no longer see being wise and knowledgeable as virtues in and of themselves? Part of the answer comes from a culture of self-hate and contempt promulgated by left-wing intellectuals. Accordingly, Christianity is regarded as archaic (unless, of course, it promotes left-wing beliefs), inequality is caused by capitalism, and the problems of women come as the result of the “patriarchy.” Even the Killing Fields of the Khmer Rouge are rather conveniently blamed on “trauma” emanating from the Vietnam War (rather than the actions of Pol Pot and his band of murderous, communist brutes).
This continuous, unrelenting assault on Western civilisation has led to a general estrangement from Western culture. The common people have been robbed of their inheritance because scholars and intellectuals have reduced their culture into a caricature to be dismantled at will. As a result, they are no longer exposed to the great works of art, architecture, literature, music, philosophy, poetry, sculpture, theology, and theatre that the Western world has produced.
The modern proclivity for ignorance and stupidity comes out of a very special kind of arrogance. It is the kind of arrogance that makes people believe that all those who came before them must be dumber than they are. It does not acknowledge that our modern “enlightenment” is built on the works of those who came before us. Our forebears would be dumbfounded to find a world where, despite having greater access to information than anyone else in history, people have closed their minds to learning.
What all this boils down to is a rejection of wisdom. If you believe that all those who came before you are dumber than yourself you are unlikely to believe they have anything worthwhile to contribute. As such, you are unlikely to believe in wisdom as a universal good. As Neel Burton over at Psychology Today pointed out: “in an age dominated by science and technology, by specialisation and compartmentalisation, it [wisdom] is too loose, too grand, and too mysterious a concept.”
We have made phenomenal advancements in all areas of human knowledge. Sadly, our successes have also made us arrogant and self-righteous. If we are to take full advantage of our potential, we need to reignite our cultural past and find the humility to learn from those who went before us.
Whatever Happened to Personal Responsibility
There is an old adage which states that you do not know how big a tree is until you try and cut it down. Today, as cultural forces slowly destroy it, we are beginning to understand that the same thing can be said about personal responsibility.
Society no longer believes that people ought to bear their suffering with dignity and grace. Rather, it now believes that the problems of the individual ought to be made the problems of the community. Individual problems are no longer the consequence of individual decisions, but come as the result of race, gender, class, and so forth.
The result of this move towards collective responsibility has been the invention of victim culture. According to this culture, non-whites are the victims of racism and white privilege, women are the victims of the patriarchy, homosexuals are the victims of a heteronormative society.
The 20th century is a perfect example of what happens when responsibility is taken from the hands of the individual and placed in the hands of the mob. The twin evils of communism and Nazism – which blamed the problems of the individual on economic and racial factors, respectively – led to the deaths of tens of millions of people.
Furthermore, such ideologies led otherwise decent individuals to commit acts of unspeakable violence. Whilst observing the trial of Adolf Eichmann, a former SS soldier who had been one of the architects of the Holocaust, the writer, Hannah Arendt was struck by the “banality of evil” that had characterised German war atrocities. Arendt noted that the men who conspired to commit genocide were not raving lunatics foaming at the mouth, but rather dull individuals inspired to commit evil due to a sense of duty to a toxic and corrupt ideology.
The Bolsheviks taught the Russian people that their misfortune had been caused by the wealthy. And that the wealth was gained through theft and exploitation. Likewise, the Nazis convinced the German people that their problems could be blamed on the Jews. It is not difficult to see how this philosophy led, step by step, to the gulags and the concentration camps.
The same thing is happening today. The only difference is that those who play it have become more sophisticated. Today people are encouraged to identify with identity groups ranked by so-called social privilege. Then they are taught to despise those with more social privilege than them.
Under this philosophy, crime is not caused by the actions of the individual, but by social forces like poverty, racism, and upbringing. Advocates claim that women should not be forced to take responsibility for their sexual behaviour by allowing them to essentially murder their unborn children. Sexually transmitted diseases like HIV is caused by homophobia rather than immoral and socially irresponsible behaviour. And alcoholism and drug addiction are treated as a disease rather than a behaviour the addict is supposed to take responsibility for. The list is endless.
Personal responsibility helps us take control of our lives. It means that the individual can take a certain amount of control over his own life even when the obstacles he is facing seem insurmountable.
No one, least of all me, is going to argue that individuals don’t face hardships that are not their fault. What I am going to argue, however, is that other people will respect you more if you take responsibility for your problems, especially if those problems are not your fault. Charity for aids sufferers, the impoverished, or reformed criminals is all perfectly acceptable. But we only make their plight worse by taking their personal responsibility from them.
Responsibility justifies a person’s life and helps them find meaning in their suffering. Central to the Christian faith is the idea that individuals are duty bound to bear their suffering with dignity and grace and to struggle towards being a good person. To force a man to take responsibility for himself is to treat him as one of God’s creations.
You cannot be free if other people have to take responsibility for your decisions. When you take responsibility from the hands of the individual you tarnish his soul and steal his freedom.
Freedom from responsibility is slavery, not freedom. Freedom is the ability to make decisions according to the dictates of own’s own conscience and live with the consequences of that decision. Freedom means having the choice to engage in the kind immoral behaviour that leads to an unwanted pregnancy or AIDS. What it does not do is absolve you from responsibility for those actions. Slavery disguised as kindness and compassion is still slavery.
Television and Culture
“She’s television generation, she learnt life from Bugs Bunny” muses William Holden in Network, as he confesses his affair with a younger woman to his long-suffering wife. Love it or hate it, television has shaped the way we see the world. And it has been used for years to engineer social change.
It is because of their values that the left has come to dominate the culture. While conservatives value objective facts, those on the left value narrative. This is an important distinction. People develop their worldview based on the stories they are told, not the facts that are presented to them. And while conservatives choose to focus on facts, the left is creating the narrative references that define the world we live in.
As a consequence, left-wing assumptions have come to dominate film and television. And, by extension, it is these assumptions that create the parameters for public discourse. It was through the positive depiction of gay characters in shows like Will and Grace that homosexual relationships came to be more widely accepted. It would be difficult to argue that such depictions played no role in the public’s acceptance of gay marriage. Today shows like Orange is the New Black presents sympathetic transgender characters in an attempt to engineer public acceptance of transgenderism. The left produces television shows and movies that are anti-capitalism, anti-Christian, and anti-West. Unfortunately, the right fails to produce television shows and movies in their defence.
The left embeds its messages through seemingly innocuous narratives and likeable characters. Otherwise morally reprehensible and disagreeable characters are presented in a sympathetic light. By doing this, the creators of these characters are able to coax us into accepting things we otherwise would not. Max Black, one of the protagonists of Two Broke Girls, is a rude, unmotivated, and immoral drug and alcohol user, but she is presented to the audience as a positive role model for women.
Television’s primary power lies in the fact that it allows individuals and organisations to manipulate images, facts, and stories to suit their own purposes. It is through the distortion of facts, impelling narratives, and the creation of morally reprehensible yet sympathetic characters that those who control television have been able to manipulate the public. Whether or not this trend will continue with the advent of the internet is yet to be seen.
THE RAVEN
The writings of Edgar Allan Poe (1809 – 1849) evokes images of murderers, madmen, premature burials, and mysterious women who return from the dead. Our common image of him is of a mysterious, somewhat melancholy figure who frequents cemeteries and other creepy places. However, his influence extends far beyond the gothic and the macabre, he is credited with the invention of the modern detective story and with innovating the science fiction genre. Over the course of his lifetime, Poe wrote hundreds of essays, books on scientific theory, short stories, poems, book reviews, and novels. His classics, like The Tell-Tale Heart and The Fall of the House of Usher, have thrilled readers for nigh-on two centuries. For this week’s cultural article, we will be examining his poem, The Raven.
BIOGRAPHY
Edgar Allen Poe was born on January 19th, 1809 in Boston, Massachusetts. Both his father, David Poe, Jr. (1784 – 1811), and mother, Elizabeth Arnold Hopkins Poe (1787 – 1811), were travelling actors who died by the time Poe was three-years-old. While his siblings, William Henry Leonard Poe (1807 – 1831) and Rosalie Poe (1810 – 1874), were sent to live with other families, Poe was adopted by the wealthy tobacco merchant, John Allan (1779 – 1834), and his wife, Frances Valentine Allan (1784 – 1829), in Richmond, Virginia.
In 1826, Poe left home to study ancient and modern languages at the University of Virginia. Unfortunately, John Allan had provided Poe with only a third of the funds he would need to support himself at the university. Although Poe excelled in his classes, he managed to accumulate a considerable amount of debt. By the end of his first term, Poe’s financial situation had become so dire that he was forced to burn his furniture to keep warm.
Poe left the university after just a year and returned home. Back in Richmond, Poe discovered that his fiancée, Elmira Royster (1810 – 1888), had become engaged to Alexander Shelton (1807 – 1844). He lived in John Allan’s home, but animosity between the two caused him to leave after only a few months.
John Allan had raised his adopted son with the intention that he would become a businessman and gentleman. Poe, however, rejected his adoptive father’s aspirations and set out to emulate his hero, Lord Byron (1788 – 1824), by making himself a great writer and adventurer. He achieved the former with the publication of his first book, Tamerlane, at the age of eighteen. The latter he achieved by enlisting in the United States Army. Two years later, he was accepted into the United States Military Academy at West Point.
Following his expulsion from West Point after only eight months, Poe travelled to Baltimore, Maryland – the home of his biological father – to seek help from relatives. Although one of his relatives robbed him in the middle of the night, Poe was able to find refuge in the home of his aunt, Maria Clemm (1790 – 1871). It was there that Poe met and fell in love with his cousin, Virginia Eliza Clemm (1822 – 1847). Around the same time, Poe’s adoptive father, John Allan, died. Poe, who was living in poverty at the time, was left out of Allan’s estate.
Despite this, Poe’s writing career was progressing at a steady pace. He was already publishing his short stories and was able to gain an editorial position at the Southern Literary Messenger in Richmond. The combination of Poe’s scathing book reviews and his sensational stories made the Southern Literary Messenger the most popular magazine in the southern United States.
In 1835, the twenty-six-year-old Poe married the thirteen-year-old Virginia and brought her and her mother with him to Richmond. Later, dissatisfaction with his pay at the Southern Literary Messenger would cause Poe and his young wife to move to New York, and later Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he would write for numerous magazine publications.
Poe wrote his most famous poem, The Raven (1845), whilst living in New York. Its publication made him a household name and provided him with the funds and opportunities to buy the Broadway Journal, publish two books, and demand higher wages. However, rumours of an extra-marital affair, financial difficulties, and Virginia declining health forced Poe to leave the city in 1846. Poe moved to a country cottage where, in 1847, Virginia succumbed to tuberculosis.
Poe slipped into a deep depression and lost the ability to write for several months. Then, in the summer of 1849, he returned to Richmond and rekindled his relationship with his former fiancée, Elmira Royster Shelton. Elmira, like Poe, was a widow. The pair became engaged and planned to marry when Poe returned from a trip to Philadelphia and New York.
On his way to Philadelphia, Poe disappeared in Baltimore for five days. He was found in the bar room of a public house (which had been used as a polling station in a recent election) in a state of delirium. Poe was taken to Washington College Hospital. Edgar Allen Poe died there, aged forty, on October 7th, 1849.
POEM
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore—
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
“’Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door—
Only this and nothing more.”
Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore—
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore—
Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
“’Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door—
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;—
This it is and nothing more.”
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
“Sir,” said I, “or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you”—here I opened wide the door;—
Darkness there and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, “Lenore?”
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, “Lenore!”—
Merely this and nothing more.
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
“Surely,” said I, “surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore—
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;—
’Tis the wind and nothing more!”
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore;
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door—
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door—
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore—
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door—
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as “Nevermore.”
But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing farther then he uttered—not a feather then he fluttered—
Till I scarcely more than muttered “Other friends have flown before—
On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes have flown before.”
Then the bird said “Nevermore.”
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
“Doubtless,” said I, “what it utters is its only stock and store
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore—
Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore
Of ‘Never—nevermore’.”
But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore—
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking “Nevermore.”
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom’s core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion’s velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o’er,
But whose velvet-violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o’er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
“Wretch,” I cried, “thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore;
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”
“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!—
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted—
On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—
Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”
“Prophet!” said I, “thing of evil!—prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore—
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore—
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore.”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”
“Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!” I shrieked, upstarting—
“Get thee back into the tempest and the Night’s Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!”
Quoth the Raven “Nevermore.”
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon’s that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o’er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted—nevermore!
POEM ANALYSIS
The Raven is characterised by the nightmarish nature of its images and themes. There is talk of wild dreams, burning souls, and imaginary perfumes. The poem’s most vivid image, that of the stately raven, tortures the narrator with its continuous repetition of the word, “Nevermore” (whether or not this is just a figment of the narrator’s imagination is never established). Similarly, the poem mentions “quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore” as a reference to antiquated, and forgotten, books of antiquated traditions and knowledge (who knows? maybe the narrator was experimenting with pagan or occult practices). Elsewhere, the poem mentions “a bust of Pallas”, a reference to the Greek titan Pallas, and “Night’s Plutonian shore”, referring to the underworld of Roman mythology.
WHEN ARE WE GOING TO TREAT DIVORCE AND FATHERLESSNESS AS THE ISSUE IT REALLY IS?
Since the sexual revolution, society’s attitudes towards sex and the family have been shifting more and more to the left. Today’s sexual philosophy has its roots in the prevailing social forces of the 1960s and 1970s. These forces have challenged the traditional institutions of monogamous marriage and the traditional family, seeking to replace them with their own utopian values.
The introduction of No Fault Divorce in America in 1970 signalled the most immediate sign of the cultural shift. Previously, people got married young and stayed married. Divorce was a social taboo. Shifting cultural philosophies and changing laws have altered this reality. Conservative commentator and Daily Wire editor, Ben Shapiro, blames the rise of divorce on a lack of religious fervour among young people, and the existence of a ‘divorce culture’ which celebrates serial monogamy and single parenthood.
A natural consequence of the decline of monogamous marriage and the traditional household has been the rise of the single parent family. In the past children were born within the confines of marriage. This is no longer the case, as statistical comparisons reveal: in 2015, 40.2% of live births were to unwed mothers, compared to only 5.30% in 1960. Similarly, in the United Kingdom in 2013, 46.5% of children were born to unwed mothers, compared to 11% in 1979. In 2014, a Pew Research poll found that fewer than half of American kids lived in a home with their mother and father, compared to sixty-one percent in 1980, and seventy-three percent in 1960. Across the pond in the United Kingdom, it is believed that a quarter of all families are single parent families.
Of course, single parent families are never going to be a concern for the left. The traditional family represents an obstacle to the vision of socialist utopia the left holds so dear because individuals care more about their own families than they do about the wider community. Furthermore, it is much more difficult for the state to control a woman who has the financial, social, and emotional support of a loving husband. As Ben Shapiro notes: “the left is never going to recognise that broken families are a problem because it is one of the goals of the left to break families. Historically speaking, if you read [Karl] Marx and [Friedrich] Engels [authors of the Communist Manifesto], they do not like the traditional family, they think that the traditional family is a bulwark against an overarching, brutal state.”
A further manifestation of the decline of monogamous marriage and the traditional family has been the increase in fatherless children. Fathers today have been relegated to the role of ‘accessory parent.’ We no longer recognise the spiritual and psychological influence fathers have on their children. As a consequence, fathers are considered people children spend time with on designated visitation days rather than a permanent and necessary influence in their lives. The consequences of this attitude have been disastrous.
Psychologically, children from single parent and fatherless families are more likely to suffer cognitive, social, and emotional problems and are more likely to be emotionally, physically, or sexually abused. Fatherless children often struggle with their emotions and suffer episodic bouts of self-loathing along with a diminished sense of self and a lack of emotional and physical security. Many fatherless children have reported feeling abandoned because their fathers were not in their lives. No wonder drug and alcohol use and rates of incarceration soar in children whose fathers are absent.
Fatherless children also suffer socially: not only in the wider community but in their personal relationships as well. Children are often left to fend for themselves because their sole parent and breadwinner is away from home. This has several consequences: it forces the child to take on adult roles prematurely. Older siblings are expected to take care of younger siblings, and younger siblings are expected to learn from their older siblings. Young boys often feel the need to assert themselves and take on the role of the “man of the house” causing power struggles between himself and his mother. Girls often feel more maternal earlier in life (especially when they’ve been tasked with looking after younger siblings). As adults, these children struggle to maintain long-term relationships and, in a cruel twist of fate, are more likely to end up divorced or as single parents themselves. Both men and women are more likely to engage in promiscuous behaviour. A natural consequence of this is an increased risk of pregnancy in teenage girls. Often they struggle to raise their own children because they do not have two parents upon which to base their parenting style. In the wider scheme of things, fatherless children are more likely to struggle at school and drop out.
Economically, they are significantly more likely to suffer economic disadvantage and, in extreme cases, outright poverty (including homelessness). As a result, many of these children live in poorer neighbourhoods, struggle to have their basic needs met, and are disadvantaged in school. As adults, fatherless children are four times more likely to experience long-term unemployment, remain welfare dependent, and have low incomes.
It should be clear that our current relationship system is not working. We must destroy the cancerous influences of feminism and Marxism in the social sphere. We must use cultural means – media, TV shows, movies, novels, magazines, etc. – to properly educate the masses about relationships and sex. On the legal and political front, divorce must be made harder to obtain. No Fault divorce, a cancerous law, must be replaced with a system of Fault Divorce which is fair to both men and women, and which dignifies and upholds the integrity of the institution of marriage.
