Liberalism wants this to work:
In order to achieve this result:
Well, the heck with it. It's what liberalism always was. It was always a lie. Hindsight and common sense should see that clearly. Heck, common sense then should have seen that. When Christians were told to stop telling people their religion is wrong because that's evil, it should have dawned on us.
Nonetheless, it's now crystal clear. So haggle over words if we want, but it's the same. An emerging world order that seeks to destroy all ability to resist.
"It was always a lie."
ReplyDeleteBingo.
I wish we could one day have a serious discussion about the general rules that should govern the separation of one region from the country claiming control over it. That bit about governments "deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed" should be taken into account, but so should long-standing historical claims. For instance, China may have moved a lot of Han Chinese into Tibet, and these immigrants might want Tibet to be a part of China -- but does that legitimize the Chinese takeover of Tibet? (And what about Texas and Hawaii?)
ReplyDeleteWe will never have that discussion, because for a long time -- since the Civil War at least, and probably back to the Whiskey Rebellion -- the policy of the US central government has been that governments derive their just powers from the consent of the president of the United States.
That, by the way, explains why Kosovo breaking away from Serbia was "good", but Donbass breaking away from Ukraine is "bad".
Politicians make the history books most schools use. Depending on your politics, you might want to downplay Tienemin Square or the CIA's operation Condor. Governments tend to be hypocritical by nature.
DeleteThat's so hard to reckon, to rethink entire movements and developments in history. For instance, where do we begin looking backwards? My Irish ancestors, at least on my paternal grandmother's side, were actually Scots who were displaced centuries ago. That means similar things were happening then. But do we go back? I think it's to use the history of such developments to then question what is happening now. We can't turn the clocks back so easily, but we can use the clocks to avoid similar developments today.
DeleteSo because the problem is hard, you just give up. Well, that's on you. That's a certain kind of American thinking, with its individualism disconnected from place and history. It's a part of why America will probably not exist, except maybe in name, by the end of the century. It is certainly not the Catholic way of thinking, which believes that certain places like Jerusalem and Rome have enduring meanings and enduring importance, and that families and nations are something real, not merely nominal.
DeleteNot give up. But are we sure it's time to reshuffle entire swaths of societies and nations in order to right the wrong of all those Scots who were put into Irish lands all those centuries ago? There are some things we just can't redress, but we must move on learning from the past, not repeating the mistakes. The current push toward 'equity' is a fine example. We can't undo the racism of the past. But we sure can try to fix residual problems without appealing to new racisms of the present.
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