The New Blasphemy
May 14, 2014
JOHN D. writes:
Blasphemy, traditionally conceived, is a statement which is derisive of God. In the past, society punished blasphemous statements both formally (through law) and informally (through societal censure). Of course, we are now free to make blasphemous comments about God without any adverse social or legal consequence. Indeed, such comments are often praised as courageous and thoughtful. They litter our public airways. No one would dare censure such comments. While society has abandoned the traditional object of blasphemy (God), it has not, it turns out, abandoned the concept of blasphemy altogether. However, its concept of what is sacred has changed.
Negative comments about black people or homosexuals are the new blasphemy. I say this because the type of outrage such comments evoke are similar to the outrage a Christian feels when his God is maligned. It is not that someone has said something wrong, or even offensive. It is that something sacred has been violated. People making negative comments about black people and homosexuals are not mistaken, but are evil to the core. Because offenders are not just mistaken, but evil, society sanctions the loss of the offenders’ livelihood and property. One thing is clear, as a society we are very serious about protecting the feelings of black people and homosexuals.
But I have to ask, are black people and homosexuals really an appropriate object of divine reverence? What kind of society replaces God with these groups? We all know we’ve ended up in the wrong place. But how did we get here? A place where we must remain silent in the face of black violence directed against whites. A place where the grossest forms of homosexual conduct are regarded as not just permissible, but praiseworthy. Where expressing revulsion at a public homosexual act is the sin, not the homosexual act. We can no longer evade what we have become, a society that venerates blacks and homosexuals, but permits and encourages blasphemy against God.
Laura writes:
Bravo!
Just as the Nazis idolized the German race, the new racialists idolize blacks. And the new Puritans rigorously defend homosexuality. “What kind of society replaces God with these groups?” A society that pretends it believes in a complete separation of Church and State. It’s a masquerade. We have an established Church. It just doesn’t believe in God.
— Comments —
Alan Roebuck writes:
John D. makes a good point. And I have a persistent memory, which I’ve not been able to confirm, that Alan Bloom, in The Closing of the American Mind, says that the racist is the modern equivalent of the medieval heretic. Whoever said it, it’s quite true. And “racist” could be replaced with “homophobe,” “sexist.” and so on. The bigot is the modern heretic.
But whereas the medieval heretic could be restored to fellowship if he publicly recanted his heresy, the modern heretic has no such hope. No matter how often he publicly and obsequiously recants, he can never be restored to his former position. I think that that’s because his bigotry concerns what he is, not just what he says or believes. One strike and you’re out.
James N. writes:
It will be interesting to see what happens to this unfortunate man. The actually interesting part of the story is the Red Guard block captain who overheard this – last March. How many times did she have to tell this story before she got noticed? Who did she tell? Who are the secret racists who declined to publish this gossip before today?
Names, please. None shall escape. Forward!
Shlomo Maistre writes:
As a long-time reader, I should note that your writings have for years provided me with spiritual rejuvenation. I’m always happy to read your thoughts and, though unable to confess agreement with everything you write, I certainly concur with your perspective on things in a broad sense.
You noted that:
We have an established Church. It just doesn’t believe in God.
Indeed. I’d like to offer a few points on this most crucial matter. I’d appreciate any thoughts you or your readers might have in response.
I think claiming that Progressivism is the prevailing established religion of the modern West is accurate with respect to both the spiritual and temporal implications of doing so. Would you agree? I’ll elaborate as to what exactly I mean.
I think that ideology is a synonym for religion, but that any ideology devoid of religious pretense is a form of Progressivism. In other words, any ought statements that are justified on a universal basis without reference to a spiritual order that implies realities beyond human comprehension is a type of Progressivism.
I view any movement or ideology that claims (usually unwittingly) that man is in any fundamental sense rational or free to be a flavor of Progressivism, for no ideology but one with man (naked, divorced from his Creator) at its center and helm could ever imply such an irresponsible, indecent, and inaccurate claim – intentionally or not.
Progressivism is marked by the destruction of social order. I think that many harmful trends in the West, such as its rising rates of divorce, third-world immigration, and indebtedness are all not only related to each other and traceable to earlier movements in favor of purportedly rational ideals (feminism and, yes, democracy) but have been more or less inevitable for centuries given the spiritual breakdown of the West that came to fruition with the Protestant Reformation.
Before going further, I should note that I am a Jew – a proud Jew and an increasingly religious Jew. While on matters of theology Catholicism is… not something I subscribe to, I have found in reading such Catholic (and wonderfully monarchist!) thinkers as Joseph de Maistre and Louis de Bonald abiding affection for and deep interest in the spiritual claims, patterns of thought, and ideological perspective of traditional Catholicism.
We see in Western history two salient trends since the Protestant Reformation. First, we observe the accelerated erosion of social cohesion – the degradation of hierarchy primarily by way of a kind of demonic populism that seeks – by releasing us from our communal obligations – to render each of us our own master. Second, we notice the increasingly irreligious character of Western cultural mores and social institutions – first by conjuring out of thin air increasingly absurd notions – ‘all men are created equal’, ‘social science’, ‘free speech’, ‘the right to gay marriage’ – and then, in ascribing to these absurdities a degree of merit, implying that they actually are real. As if, by any definition, two men can be equal, science can be social, or speech can be free. These are now religious dogmas (in all but name) that were fabricated out of spiritual emptiness to fill a void, which, while necessarily there by virtue of the original rebellion of Eden, has undoubtedly grown in recent centuries by orders of magnitude as a result of several particularly egregious temporal rebellions against his Providence – in 1517, 1789, etc.
I’d add that Progressivism is not so much a system of beliefs as it is a process of forming them; it is the unleashing of ravenous reason, which, by abandoning the prejudice, tradition, and culture that extend from the past by design, leads to the destruction of those religious/political associations that restrain, pattern, and channel human action in an orderly manner.
To understand just how monstrous Progressivism really is one must first recognize that there has never been a human society that does not have an established state religion. There cannot be a nation or perhaps even a community without a dominant, public religion. Any ideological movement that assumes the contrary is bound to eventually wreck havoc upon society.
Laura writes:
Thank you for your note. A religious Jew who reads de Maistre and de Bonald is a rarity.
One minor suggested revision:
I view any movement or ideology that claims (usually unwittingly) that man is in any fundamental sense entirely rational or free to be a flavor of Progressivism … (word in bold added)
I basically agree with your observations about Progressivism and think you have phrased the problem eloquently.
Neil P. writes:
Based on the Donald Sterling and Michael Sam incidents, it would seem that the worship of the black male athlete is the new state church of the U.S.
