Radicalism in retrograde

This is the dawning of the age of…Cancer?

Ok, I don’t believe in horoscopes or astrology, but the sign of “Cancer” does seem to fit in a couple of ways. First, according to Brittanica, Cancer is “related to the crab in Greek mythology that pinched Heracles while he was fighting the Lernaean hydra”. Heracles (Hercules) then crushed the crab. Thus, the crab’s actions were, essentially, self-defeating.

Secondly, the sign fits because of…cancer. What is cancer? It’s the body’s own cells that mutate and eat away at the body from the inside out. It’s a self-defeating disease both in that the body is destroying itself by replicating the malformed cells, and in that the disease kills off that which supports it (the body), thus ending its own existence.

Activists today behave similarly. Not considering the consequences, or perhaps even the endgame, they participate in a style of obtuse oppositionalism that leads to self-destruction.

While such groups and actions have existed to some degree for ages, it seems to have escalated to a whole new level with the advent of modern activist groups.

For instance, in the wake of the police shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, MO, Black Lives Matter took center stage. Despite investigations and studies launched by a (part?) black president, investigations and studies which concluded with no findings of racism on the part of police across the nation, BLM still burned Ferguson down. Later, BLM ushered in the summer of fiery but mostly peaceful protests. This anti-racist movement, allegedly fighting for the rights of blacks, looted businesses and burned cities owned and populated predominantly by…you guessed it…blacks. And what has BLM accomplished to help those for whom it claims to stand? Nothing other than chaos (and a few million dollars and fancy homes for Patrisse Cullors, one of the co-founders of the movement).

Following in BLM’s footsteps, Antifa rose to some prominence during the presidency of Donald Trump. This group’s main purpose, according to those involved, is to fight against Fascism, as is indicated by the meaning of the name, which, according to Merriam-Webster is “borrowed from German Antifa, short for antifaschistisch "anti-fascist," in Antifaschistische Aktion.” Just how does this organization go about standing righteously against Fascism? By using the fascist tactics of violence, intimidation, and opposing those they claim to be fascist while supporting those who actually behave fascistically.

During all of this, we’ve witnessed the proliferation of CRT and DEI devotees, who claim that life isn’t fair, so we need laws to make things “equitable” (in other words, provide everyone equal outcomes regardless of merit). These are those who hire people based on skin color, gender, sexual preference, or any number of other identifiers that have nothing to do with a person’s ability to do a job. Thus we see experimental submarines imploding, parts falling off of airplanes while in flight, and Supreme Court Justices who, while tasked with upholding women’s rights cannot tell you what is a woman. The abject failure of DEI in the real world has universities reversing their past decisions to eliminate standardized tests from their entrance requirements, as well as eliminating DEI requirements for hiring.

Add to these all the Covid Karens and climate cultists each shouting their cause from the rooftops. Whether railing at people to mimic them in taking non-protective but dangerous experimental shots (“you need to take it to protect me”), as so many of the now-deceased Branch Covidians did, or screaming about the environmental atrocities of fossil fuels while strip-mining the earth to obtain precious metals for car batteries and razing forests to put up windmills, these irascible ideologues will stop at nothing short of self-destruction to get you on board with their cause.

This leads us to the most recent rash of radicals, the pro-Palestine proselytes taking up residence in tents on college campus swards. While they protest Israel’s alleged genocide of the residents of Gaza, they chant the Israeli Jew-directed genocidal mantra, “from the river to the sea.” They shriek “death to America” and “down with capitalism,” utterly tone-deaf to the reality that it is America and American capitalism that has provided them both the affluence and opportunity to do so. These blowsy boosters of backwardness believe the democratic state, Israel, in which Jews, Christians, and Muslims live peaceably side-by-side, and everyone has equal rights, are supposedly oppressing the “Palestinians” in Gaza (there is, and has never been, a state called “Palestine,” as my friend Michael over at the Unlicensed Punditry substack has rightly explained); these righteous heroes of the oppressed ignore the facts that the “Palestinians” they are defending are unwelcome and unwanted in neighboring Muslim countries, that they have repeatedly committed terrorist acts against Israel, and that they are governed (and actually oppressed) by the terrorist group Hamas whom they themselves elected. The reality that most of these midwits seem to overlook is that, were they themselves to go to Gaza, they would likely be readily dispatched.

All of these movements have many aspects in common, the most readily apparent of which are hypocrisy, a complete lack of self-awareness, and the suicidal (both figuratively and literally: see Spontaneous combustion for a cause and hunger strikes by protestors) nature of their actions. In their ignorance, they unwittingly beg for that which they decry. Most of them wear masks, as thugs so often do, but the most critical aspect underlying each of these movements, of which so may participants seem completely unawares, is Marxism.

Marxism - the gift which keeps on giving. Marxism - the malicious movement pitting class against class, identity group against identity group. Marxism - the political philosophy that champions equality, making everyone under it equally poor and equally miserable (save those in charge, of course). Marxism - the societal equivalent of wholesale hari-kari.

Though the adherents of these causes claim to be “woke,” they stumble around in a stuporous slumber like a sleepwalker approaching a cliff. If those of us who are awake fail to rouse them, they will drag us along with them over that ledge, and any recovery, if there can be one, will be long and difficult.