Freedom & Virtue Institute-Page 8

25 May

0

Yes, I am Black!

Recently, a politician’s words gave occasion to pondering on the meaning of identity using the now infamous phrase “you ain’t black.” His words are not unique to him but a reflection of a double standard where ethnic identity is tied to political affiliation or ideology. This connection affects also questions of poverty, where the poor and those who want to help also are expected to toe a certain line. It appears that what is primary is an ideological goal and various causes are merely instrumental toward the said ideological end.

There is a history of ideologues, mostly but not exclusively of the left, immersing themselves into causes. Since the late 1800s, for example, Progressives were at the forefront of otherwise commendable causes but not intent on amending or reforming the system. Instead, they saw the cause as useful toward the end of destroying capitalism—the only true goal for ideologues using Marxist readings of history. Causes are mere emblems showcasing the inherent alienations in the capitalist system. The causes are the proximate instrumental end, but the total transformation of the system is the ultimate end.

Progressives were involved in the abolitionist, women’s rights, universal suffrage, unionization, civil rights, social work, workers’ rights, gay rights, the sexual liberation, and now in the gender ideology. These involvements were not attempting at making the present order better, although in their conception each was a positive step toward the all-encompassing end but attempts at destroying it and bring about a new one. Their aim was to create liberation fronts that would increase the consciousness of those seen as “oppressed” by forces inherent in the class structure of the social order.

Having placed this framework, let us discuss the politician’s words and the larger ideological understanding that informs the words and ties blackness to the support of a given political party or ideology. To insult a black person whose political allegiances are on the Progressive sphere would be racist and abhorrent because that stance advances their ideology. However, when the insult is proffered against a black conservative or black libertarian or even one who wants to debate whether or not he is to align with Progressivism, is not seen as offensive, as supporting that individual does not advance the Progressive ideological goal. After all, in the Progressive understanding of what is a priority, individual affronts or needs are not at the center—as classes move history. Each person is but a drop within the great wave of revolution. In fact, it might be advisable to attack a drop who seen as nonconforming.

A similar situation occurs when a black person does not place ethnic identity as primary, at the core of his individual identity. To deny centrality to the core collectivist understanding of identity for a person of an “oppressed” group is to deny the importance of his ethnic identity—thus worthy of excoriation and isolation. Class consciousness takes precedence over individual consciousness.

That is a clever use of the straw man fallacy but perfectly consistent with the Progressive view of society, parasitic as it is of the Marxist understanding of history. What blacks whose ideology is not of the left say, especially those akin to the natural law tradition, is that race or ethnicity are not at the heart of identity. The individuality of every human being comes first and the elements of identity intrinsic to their humanity take precedence over social constructs. We are human beings—male or female—and that sexual identity is primary and intrinsic. Further, before sin enters the scenario, we are given each other in the biblical narrative—taken as a pre-historical anthropology, not as a religious account. Marriage and the family are the most basic and important communities, communities of love and life which are natural spontaneous orders, not mere social constructs.

One thing is to discuss the relative place of ethnic identity as a social construct within the constellation of “identities,” or better, “identifiers” that make up our social being and another thing is to deny that one is black. Often, people who deny ethnic identity as the primary identifier say that they are Americans, instead of African Americans. That also is a discussion of the relative place of ethnic ancestry vis a vis other identifier, such as national identity. It is not a negation of the anyone’s ethnic (say cultural) heritage. The idea that one’s blackness or African ancestry must be affirmed at every turn is a linguistic subset of the false narrative of Afrocentrism placing blacks as in eternal Diaspora, foreigners in the American exile, and not rightful members of the only society they have ever known, America. If one perceives the collective identity and destiny of blacks through that prism, insulting some nonconforming members is a duty.

However, what black conservatives and other non-Progressives affirm is that their identity is not determined by ethnic self-appointed gatekeepers of blackness. Each person stands sui generis as an individual in the midst—not apart from—any group. His individuality is injected with a history and a culture, but such is thus not exhaustively. As our individuality as persons does not disappear, there flows from such magnificent personalist anthropology an intellectual diversity that enriches the group. Such anthropology, however, is anathema for the Progressive. That we have a right to affirm who we are as Americans and as black people and we have a right to dissent from the political majority within the community and from the theories of race advocated by others remains a truth that we shall not surrender. We concede to no one the right to determine who we are as individuals or to shape for us what it means to belong.

25 May

0

Liberty and Justice, Not Reparations

by Kevin Schmiesing in Articles

Columbia University recently announced the 2020 winners of the Pulitzer Prize. The awardee in the field of history is Sweet Taste of Liberty by W. Caleb McDaniel. It is, in the words of the Pulitzer Prize description, “a masterfully researched meditation on reparations based on the remarkable story of a 19th century woman who survived kidnapping and re-enslavement to sue her captor.” The title of a 2019 New Republic review of the book styles it “an early case for reparations.”

This commentary is not meant to be a review of the book itself, which I haven’t yet read. It is by all accounts an impressive achievement—a well-crafted narrative built upon original research into what had been a little-known episode in the post-Civil War period. It tells the remarkable story of Henrietta Wood, a freed slave who was kidnapped back into slavery in 1853 and later successfully sued her captor for damages and lost wages.

Woodcut style expressionist image of a bankers hand pouring coins on a group of people.

The problem is not the historical accuracy of the account but the uses to which it has been put. The author has encouraged the application of his work to the contemporary debate over reparations—the financial payment to African-Americans to atone for the slavery, racism, and discrimination that have suppressed black economic progress throughout American history. In a New York Times editorial, McDaniel suggested that Henrietta Wood’s story “challenges the primary way that Americans have tried to repair slavery and segregation since: apologies without checks.”

For those who advocate “checks” (reparations) along with apologies, the Emancipation Proclamation, Reconstruction and its constitutional amendments (13th, 14th, and 15th), and the victories of the Civil Rights Movements are not enough. Outlawing discrimination based on race is not enough. Even demonstrably altered attitudes—polling since the 1950s shows that racism has declined dramatically in the United States—are not enough. Slavery and racism, in their view, have had a substantial and lasting negative effect on the ability of black Americans to accumulate wealth and achieve economic progress. Thus payment of damages from that part of American society (white) that has benefited to that part of American society (black) that has suffered is one necessary ingredient of any recipe for reaching justice and resolution to the country’s persistent racial tension.

The case for reparations is not without foundation. Slavery and racism did damage black economic prospects is grave and lasting ways. Many conservatives rightly point to the prevalence of family dysfunction among African-Americans as the primary cause of racial disparities in economic wellbeing but fail to acknowledge that the institution of slavery, in which fathers and mothers and children could be torn from each other at will, did catastrophic damage to the integrity of black families. Similarly, those who are skeptical about the idea of “systematic racism” would do well to explore the history of the interplay of financial institutions and government in mortgage and insurance practices in American cities in the post-World War II era. White home buyers and business owners did enjoy systematic advantages in their quest to build wealth in the prosperous postwar period. There are lessons to be learned from this history.

But it doesn’t necessarily follow that it would be just, prudent, or even feasible for “white America” to pay “black America” in restitution for slavery and its legacy. In the Henrietta Wood case, a specific person suffered specific damages and the person who inflicted those damages paid compensation. The contemporary case is much different. To begin, there are—as some reparations advocates concede—enormous challenges of definition and delineation. Who pays whom? Are all Americans of non-African descent “white”? Are all Americans of African descent entitled to reparations? There may be a (weak) argument that a recent immigrant from Nigeria suffers in a vague, indirect way from the racism that is endemic in American culture, but surely that case is far different from that of a direct descendant of slaves. What if that Nigerian is the descendant of a tribal chief who raided competing West African tribes and sold his captives to British slave traders doing business in the New World? It gets complicated.

Looking at the other side of the ledger, how do we justify payment from “white” Americans whose ancestors were not slaveholders but serfs in Russia, farmers in Ireland, or shopkeepers in England? Reparations argue that racist structures have nonetheless benefited these whites, but again, it’s hard to justify lumping these groups together with white families whose wealth is inherited from slave plantations.

These complications point to the problematic nature of the whole project of reparations for distant and general wrongs. Justice is difficult enough to achieve when the parties to conflict are still alive, the harm is fresh, and evidence and witnesses abound. This is one of the reasons for statutes of limitation: As time passes, it is increasingly difficult to perform an accurate assessment of wrongdoing, its effects, and appropriate restitution.

The current push for reparations is an example of what Thomas Sowell called “the quest for cosmic justice”—an attempt to right the wrongs of centuries of history and redress the evils of human nature. If we’re out for justice, why stop at antebellum slavery? There have been a lot of other injustices in American history. Those suffering economic damage at the hands of other Americans would include (among many other options) Native Americans, Chinese-Americans, Japanese-Americans, Irish-Americans, and Hispanic-Americans. Moving from ethnic to religious identification, it would include Roman Catholics, Jews, and Muslims.

The list is endless, and so the quest never ends. Cosmic justice can’t be achieved and the attempt to do so will simply generate more conflict. Black Americans, like all people, deserve the “sweet taste of liberty,” but reparations are a bitter fruit.

ismael & cover — Can be purchased at Amazon

There is a better way forward. Freedom and Virtue Institute president Ismael Hernandez describes it in his book, Not Tragically Colored. When he first arrived in the United States from Puerto Rico as a college student, he carried along the baggage of victimhood: “American whites had not yet had the opportunity to oppress me, and I was already considered a victim, a wounded casualty of a race war that tied my future to an identity as victim.” Through reading (Thomas Sowell among others) and experiencing the generosity and freedom of American culture, Ismael came to see his new home as a land of opportunity. America didn’t change but Ismael’s attitude toward it did.

He understood well the ugly underbelly of American history and the harsh, enduring evil of racism, but he chose not to be defined by his racial status. “Race consciousness is offered as an infallible sign of authenticity, luring us to abdicate responsibility and liberty.” Rejecting group identity, he embraced a Christian anthropology that upheld individual dignity and the power of human choice. “No matter how many times we are shamed by those telling us that the boundary of race must not be crossed, we must press forward. The call is to affirm our individuality and our capacity to choose our path in life in spite of social pressures. The task is to be free.”

18 May

0

The Way Forward on the Race Question

by Crystal Hernandez in Articles

How easily we blame others for our shadows. The boundary between wholeness and alienation runs straight through our hearts, through our consciences, through our beliefs and our actions. But the force of a contrary understanding is winning the day. It was Rousseau the one who started the modern “Age of Alibi”, its precursor being Adam who blamed God; “That woman you gave me…” Rousseau placed the origin of human corruption in the social order—he was the first to propagate the idea of “structural oppression” later given formal analysis by Marx and recently becoming the central tenet of the racialist ideology.

We are good, society corrupts us is the substance of the modern understandings of history and social reality in America. If we fail to achieve the state of nirvana from where we claim to have been unjustly removed, we find an alibi —evil forces lurking around and planning against us are the culprit. Powers beyond our control prevent our integral fulfillment.

The task of self-discovery is further complicated when actual historic wrongs have been inflicted on a group. As one can always point out to the historic fact of injustice, we can always trace back our present demise to that original sin and deny the possibility of meaningful agency. Calling for an alternative explanation where we have meaningful autonomous social space is easily dismissible as an instance of blaming the victim. The perennial question of race and racism today remains parasitic to ignorance of the primary source of our problems, the abandonment of a sound anthropology able to us toward sound social understanding.

But, as it remains the case that the matrix of social understanding in the here and now runs through the heart of every life lived, we can easily engulf ourselves in a vicious cycle of victimization, one that some scholars have called the utopian syndrome. A utopian is one who sees a solution where there is none and one who favors extremism in the pursuit of that solution. Once one believes to have found the ultimate explanatory element for a condition, the resulting behavior is what we call the utopian syndrome. Interestingly, the opposite to the utopian syndrome is the “terrible simplicateur”, the one who never sees a problem. There are many simpletons who disregard the question of race as a mere fabrication of leftist ideologues or as a historical datum devoid of present relevance. The problem is that both the utopian and the simpleton disregard anyone who dares to detract from their paradigms. The easy accusation against those who dare to question their pattern is that of being “ignorant” by complicating the obvious or by disregarding the momentous.

Racism in America and bigotry in the USA concept as the tear of an American minority washing away a flag of the United States painted on a face as a civil rights and discrimination metaphor in a 3D illustration style.

The utopian syndrome has had three main expressions. The first is self-pity, where people feel sorry for themselves and invite commiseration—a “poor me and damn them” stance. The second is nihilism. A nihilistic life is where immediate gratification as a way to “opt-out” of society into a world of ecstasy and momentary euphoria (sex, drugs, petty crime) is a common expression of the syndrome. The third expression is rabid activism. Rabid activism has become the main political expression of the syndrome and has many engaging on a virtuous crusade to destroy the source of the problem, “them.” Grabbing the higher ground of the concept of justice, the activist has a “by any means necessary” attitude whereas the pursuit of radical changes justified about any action. Radical movements and even terroristic actions can grow out of this expression.

But there is a milder form of this third utopian expression. Most people do not become fervent activists but end up aligning with a vision of the problem shaped by the assumptions of the activist. They do not descend head on into the world of fervent mobilization but become a vanguard that offers activism an imprimatur. This type of stance is projective, a moral stance of righteous indignation that claims special insight—based on the conviction of having found the all-encompassing truth. The adherent to this mild-mannered activism engages the problem of race not as an attempt at analyzing it but as a proselytizing and pedagogic crusade. Consequently, those who do not embrace their insights must be benighted, must be acting on bad faith, must be currying favors with “them”, or must be the sad sufferers of unsolvable ignorance.

The prevailing answer to the question of race is built this mild mannered form of the activist utopian syndrome that has a whole group of people buying into the affirmation that the ultimate explanatory element for the problem of race today is “white supremacy.” This element serves to interpret the roots of our founding as a nation, the history of American racism, and the present problems of our people. Any detraction from that fundamental matrix of understanding is a failure to empathize with a struggling people, a failure to understand and a denial of the problem. Any detraction is seen as a form of the aforementioned “simplifier”, a simplistic and ignorant explanation serving as a justification to deny the full humanity of non-whites.

In effect, the premises for the explanation have become more real than reality itself. Reality must conform to the premise, as there is no other way that it could be. Let’s hammer the premise in! The 1619 Project is a very influential campaign built on the mild-mannered utopian syndrome whereas the very existence of our society is presented as having its inception and its continuation in the sin of racial oppression. That sin is said to be ingrained in the very fabric of the nation and can only be extirpated by a renunciation of the values that formed the basis of our republic. That renunciation is presented as a cleansing when in reality it is based on a radically different conception of social being. It keeps alive the “Age of Alibi,” as we remain innocent victims of Americanism and prevents us from fully embracing our subjectivity as persons with the radical capacity to change our condition through our choices.

There are no real choices as long as we don’t discover the truth about the foundations of what needs to be burnt to the ground. In the end, it makes us victims of forces outside of our control as long as we remain within the sphere of the “white supremacist” ethos. Of course, the revolution will not effect without a reaction—a synthesis cannot emerge without an anti-thesis. The reactionary terrible simplificateur is the response, “Get over it! Racism is over. It is only in your head. In fact, blacks are more racist now.”

We are drowning as a nation between these two destructive narratives missing the necessary balance to become effective change agents. I came across this unbalanced approach upon arriving to America and found myself often warned to expect a negative experience, when I was advised to beware of the whites (yes, “them”) and when I saw that the law itself already had built-in “remedies” for my discrimination. I was told that Zi belonged to “protected communities,” as if our people were an endangered species arranged in a taxonomy. This is why discussions on what “really happened” in a given case involving race are unproductive. In reality, they are not much more than gambles for power. There is nothing to learn from them. We supposedly “already know” that the nature of our society is intrinsically racist, built intentionally for the purpose of perpetuating white dominance. Or, on the flip side, we “already know” that nothing happened, and the media is just arranging things to perpetuate the narrative of racism.

How to get out of this destructive false dualism? In fear and trembling but with courage. We must also see the futility of attempting at a solution within the frameworks of false and unrealistic alternatives. I am aware that my proposal is the one considered unrealistic, but false closed systems reject anything not in their orbit. As we are not utopians, nothing anyone can propose is going to be a facile or comprehensive alternative, only a signal in the right direction for a thorny journey. I am convinced that the great new step of an authentic civil rights movement begins with severing our destiny from the clutches of race-consciousness, where race is seen at central to our very existence.

The rediscovery and embrace of our individuality as persons (notice, as persons, not as islands unto ourselves) is the main first step. The second, is a return to an understanding of the civil rights movement as being within the affirmation of the values and principles of the Christian understanding of natural law as embedded in the Declaration of Independence. Our recognition of blacks as quintessentially American, not Africans in diaspora.

About the Author

Ismael Hernandez, is president of the Freedom & Virtue Institute, an organization dedicated to the promotion of the ideas of liberty, faith, and self-reliance. Ismael is a regular lecturer with the Acton Institute in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and has spoken at Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, the Foundation for Economic Education and many other organizations. He is a regular speaker at service clubs around the country and is the author of the acclaimed book Not Tragically Colored: Freedom, Personhood, and the Renewal of Black America. He is a noted expert on questions of effectively serving the poor and race relations. Ismael is also the host of the podcast Freedom & Virtue – The Podcast, available on iTunes, Spotify and RSS feeds.

17 May

0

Work is More than Labor

by Kevin Schmiesing in Articles

As the COVID-19 health catastrophe begins to recede, other problems that it caused will take center stage. With more Americans out of work now than at any time since the Great Depression, unemployment will no doubt become one of the chief concerns of the coming months, if not years. It may be an opportune time to ask a basic question: Why does it matter?

Some will scoff at the question. The answer is obvious, they’ll say. Unemployment means that people who want jobs can’t get them. Jobs provide income; income provides goods and services; goods and services provide sustenance, shelter, entertainment, pleasure. Employment is the means to the good life.

That answer is satisfactory, as far as it goes. But a full answer goes farther. Human work is more than remunerative labor, a path to a paycheck. It is a source of human dignity.

The economic pain imposed by the pandemic has highlighted this fact. The employment crisis came suddenly: In two months the US went from a booming economy with millions of unfilled jobs to an economic death spiral with millions of Americans idled by business closures, layoffs, and furloughs. This is more than a material, financial problem. It is a spiritual, human problem.

Work, wrote the Reformed theologian Lester DeKoster, “is the form in which we make ourselves useful to others.” Work thus includes remunerative labor—what we do for a paycheck—but it also includes unpaid labor in the home, charity and volunteer service, and avocations that add beauty and enjoyment to the world.

DeKoster’s quote also captures the other-directed nature of work. To be genuine work it must take into account the needs and wants of other people. A free economy helps to ensure this though the market mechanism. People’s needs are expressed as demand in the market, and those who supply the goods and services to meet those needs are rewarded financially.

The monetary rewards attached to serving others reflects one part of the paradox of the other-directed character or work. That is, by meeting others’ needs we are able to meet our own. But the paradox is deeper. It is in labor for others that we find meaning for ourselves. While it’s true that most people seek careers that are suited to them—that fit their talents and interests—doing something solely because it interests us is not enough. Our passion for our work only finds genuine fulfillment when others appreciate that work.

Again, the social isolation of the pandemic has underlined this truth. Many people who have been forced out of work have been able to do things that interest them: watching movies, gardening, reading, playing games, home improvement. But they also sense that these activities are limited in their scope and impact. They want to put their training and talents to full use once again, to the benefit of society. There is a natural yearning to cooperate with others in the creation of things of value to others.

For Christians, work has a theological dimension as well. “Ora et labora,” prayer and work, is the centuries-old motto of the Benedictine monastic tradition. The Lutheran theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer expressed the same idea in his reflection on Paul’s exhortation to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess. 5:17): “The prayer of the Christian reaches, therefore, beyond the time allocated to it and extends into the midst of the work. It surrounds the whole day, and in so doing, it does not hinder the work; it promotes work, affirms work, gives work great significance and joyfulness.”

From these observations we can see the falsity of the dichotomy set up by some between “health” and “the economy.” The economy is not merely—not even primarily—a matrix of financial transactions or a system for the exchange of material goods. It is the cooperative-competitive interaction of human persons, striving for the welfare of each and all. It is life itself. Work is at its heart. Even in the midst of fear and disease, we must find a way to empower people to work. If we don’t, we will be undermining rather than saving life, health, and human dignity.

About the Author

Kevin Schmiesing is director of research at the Freedom and Virtue Institute and a research associate at the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life. He has published many books and articles in the fields of Christian social thought and religious and economic history and has served as executive editor of the Journal of Markets & Morality and the Catholic Social Science Review. He talks about Church history as a regular guest on the EWTN global Catholic radio network. He is a native of Ohio, where he currently resides with his wife and children.

11 May

0

People are Still the Solution

by Kevin Schmiesing in Articles

The spread of COVID-19 continues to dominate the headlines as governments, businesses, and individuals grapple with how best to combat the pandemic. Face masks, physical distancing, and gathering limits are everywhere. In this environment, it’s easy to begin forming the mindset that the dominant role played by other people in our lives is that of threat to our own health and survival. We should resist the temptation to adopt this view, because it isn’t true.

The extraordinary health crisis has affected every aspect of our daily lives. Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and one of the most recognizable public figures during this episode, has said that the pandemic “is going to be imprinted on the personality of our nation for a very long time.” What will the character of this imprint be? We should be attentive not only to the way that we react physically to the threat of infection but also how we react psychologically and spiritually.

A friend complained recently that, when he ventured out, the social distancing practiced by fellow walkers and shoppers made it feel as though everyone perceived everyone else chiefly as a potential source of infection. In a pandemic, this is to some extent inevitable and understandable. Leaving aside legitimate questions about whether all current practices are prudent or necessary, even widely accepted and reasonable efforts to prevent the spread of disease and to protect vulnerable people can feel strange, off-putting, even offensive.

Yet we should be careful not to let the unusual practical exigencies of the current crisis negatively influence our attitude toward our neighbors. Everyone we meet in the park, at the office, or at the store, whether infected or not, is just as much a child of God with inherent dignity as he or she was before. Every person remains laden with potential for cultivating talents, creating value, and contributing to society. The Christian worldview, Pope Francis affirmed in his encyclical Laudato Si’, “inculcates esteem for each person and respect for others.” It is, moreover, “openness to others, each of whom is a ‘thou’ capable of knowing, loving and entering into dialogue,” that “remains the source of our nobility as human persons.”

There is another, contradictory perspective. “Hell is other people,” the French existentialist Jean-Paul Sartre famously wrote. Let’s not take even a step down the perilous path that ends in that destructive conclusion.

In the late decades of the last century, the economist Julian Simon gained notoriety for arguing against the claims of those who viewed human population increase as an impending catastrophe. “Adding more people causes problems,” he wrote, “but people are also the means to solve these problems.” Simon’s predictions concerning the future of humanity and the adequacy of our planet’s natural resources proved far more accurate than those of his opponents. We do well to remember this lesson, even in times of stress and conflict.

Yes, human beings will continue to be vehicles for the transmission of disease. But it’s also human beings who will take care of us at home or hospital, who will discover a vaccine, who will grow, process, transport, and sell the food we need to survive. Our fellow citizens will analyze the benefits and costs in the contemporary reaction to pandemic conditions and formulate more effective, less painful methods to implement the next time a similar challenge confronts us.

Even so, these positive outcomes do not happen automatically. We must foster inherent potential by ensuring certain conditions. People thrive in a climate of freedom, social support, and responsibility. In a genuine crisis, certain restrictions may be necessary, but we should not underestimate the necessity of preserving basic rights and the fundamental connection between actions and consequences. People are naturally problem-solvers, but their natural inclinations can be thwarted by social dysfunction such as an abusive family life, by overweening government regulation, or by a perverse system of incentives that rewards indolence rather than hard work and creativity. Even in the face of a pandemic, it’s possible to apply a “cure worse than the disease” and we must all be wary of that danger.

“People are the means to solve these problems.”
Simon’s Rule

A pandemic is no exception to Simon’s rule. Disease is a problem. Unemployment is a problem. Social isolation is a problem. People are the solution.

About the Author

Kevin Schmiesing is director of research at the Freedom and Virtue Institute and a research associate at the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life. He has published many books and articles in the fields of Christian social thought and religious and economic history and has served as executive editor of the Journal of Markets & Morality and the Catholic Social Science Review. He talks about Church history as a regular guest on the EWTN global Catholic radio network. He is a native of Ohio, where he currently resides with his wife and children.

11 May

0

A Beautiful Mother’s Day Message

by fvAdmin in Articles

Executive Director Ismael Hernandez recently shared an article with The Stream for Mother’s Day. The Stream is a national daily championing freedom, smaller government and human dignity. Offering both original content and the best from across the web, The Stream challenges the worst in the mainstream media while offering a rich and lively source for breaking news, inspiration, analysis and entertainment.

An excerpt from the article:

My mother was a beautiful, humble Puerto Rican woman for whom the whole of life revolved around her children. She was an intelligent woman with only a fifth grade education, having to abandon school in the late 1920s as mitigating poverty was a more pressing family concern.

Read the whole article HERE

14 Apr

0

Freedom, Not Fear!

by Crystal Hernandez in Articles

As our nation and the world fight an invisible, deadly disease, it is important to raise our prayers to God and focus on the most meaningful things: life itself, those we love, basic necessities, loving each other. It is important to note that a crisis is a two-edged sword. It can help us grow and flourish as human beings by searching for wisdom or it can bring about the worst in us, the triumph of basic instincts for survival and raw utilitarian calculations at the expense even of the good of others.

A crisis is also a tried and trusted tool for those with statist aspirations. A crisis brings about fear and fear is the triumph of feelings over reason. No wonder statism conquers the day during a crisis! Fear seems now to be the true pandemic instrumentalized to dim the light of freedom. The worse consequence of statist intervention during a crisis is that it has an effect in the collective mind, easing the furthering and permanence of interventionism as a necessary action. It becomes more difficult to convince people that freedom works better.

Here at the Freedom & Virtue Institute, even during a crisis, we insist that the entrepreneurial vocation is an intrinsic feature of the good society. God was the first entrepreneur! Entrepreneurs are co-operators with God as they put their hands in the created landscape to produce wealth. It is only in freedom that they can mobilize their creativity. They mobilize economies away from the fears of crisis that promote passivity, isolation, and the search for the mirage of security. Only productive societies survive and thrive. In fact, entrepreneurs are the ones who solve the main problems created during a crisis.

Here at the Institute we still defend, more than ever, the free market. That system consisting of an array of voluntary exchanges between people. Individuals (or agents) exchange either tangible commodities or nontangible services and promote with their exchange, the good of all. I give up money, and I receive a good or service. Or I exchange my labor services, in a mutually agreed way, for a monetary salary. Or I use my imagination and creativity to solve problems such as, say, killing a virus.

The exchange happens because each expects to gain from it. Trade, or exchange, is engaged in precisely because both parties benefit. If they did not expect to gain, they would not agree to the exchange. The assumption is of a win-win situation, a “positive-sum” rather than a “zero-sum” or “negative-sum” one. If that does not occur, I will not trade again. If we don’t soon return to unleash the potentials of such system, the consequences for our world will be more harmful than any pandemic. This system necessitates free individuals exchanging goods, items, commodities, labor, services—it necessitates activity and risk, not passivity and fear. And it has proven to be the best economic system humans have created because it is built on individual freedom, not on top-down plans and the clever concoctions of the apparatchik. The results of free and voluntary exchange are just by definition and they are good for society.

Some people have come with all sorts of distortions to “improve” on freedom: confiscatory taxes, tariffs, excessive regulations, government power to benefit some, price controls, state-controlled corporations, the welfare state, intervention on top of intervention. A classical liberal affirms the tenets of a society informed by political, economic, and individual liberty. The individual bears rights and the space of his autonomy, that space which belongs to him, is inviolable. Some of us who affirm these tenets also affirm a Christian/Natural Law embodiment of these rights, an overarching realm of values and principles that help us place each liberty in its proper social context.

Image from Yanti Santoso The Classic Liberal Tradition PowerPoint

A Natural Law Classical Liberal must believe in limited government. We understand that basic communities are most important and that alongside these, government plays a secondary role. That is, we affirm that the said basic communities, those to which individuals belong directly, are primary, while communities of a higher order, such as the state, are secondary. These are matters of principle, not of utility. Affirming that one believes a community of a higher order can better perform a task is of no value to us if the task belongs to a basic community that can perform that task.

Yes, let us be prudent at a time when our health is at risk. Let us also be prudent in not letting fear kill the health of a free society. No, it is not true that the only institution strong enough, causative enough, is the state. We commit to not let fear conquer the day. We commit to reaffirming our trust in the free and virtuous society even at a time of crisis when statists see blood on the waters of liberty.

About the Author: Ismael Hernandez is the founder and executive director of the Freedom & Virtue Institute. an organization dedicated to the promotion of the ideas of liberty, faith, and self-reliance. Ismael is a regular lecturer with the Acton Institute in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and has spoken at Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, the Foundation for Economic Education and many other organizations. He is a regular speaker at service clubs around the country and is the author of the acclaimed book Not Tragically Colored: Freedom, Personhood, and the Renewal of Black America. He is a noted expert on questions of effectively serving the poor and race relations.

03 Sep

0

The Hubris of Expanded Possibilities Hinders Our Social Life

by Crystal Hernandez in Articles

The standard definition of privilege is a special right, advantage, or immunity granted or available only to a particular person or group. Using that definition, we can say a few things about the use of the concept on areas such as race—an example being the in theory of “white privilege.”

First, as there are no two persons who are equal biologically, advantages and immunities are part of the human condition. We are all privileged as compared to some and “disadvantaged” as compared to others. Some humans are taller or shorter, of one color or another, with different drives, basic tenor or character and a diversity of mental powers. I do not see a duty for society as a whole to equalize every difference, as such would be to deny human nature and engage in an impossible task. The diversity of endowments among humans is a gift, not a hindrance. But this diversity implies, to use the term we are discussing, privileges or advantages and disadvantages. Our task is to accept them, not to create social contraptions that attempt at reworking the realities of existence.

When it comes to social privileges, they exist and they are impossible to quantify. If you were born in the year 2000 instead of, say, 1400, you would live longer and better (technology privilege); if you are born in America instead of Europe, you will have a number of social privileges and also disadvantages; if you were born to a black middle class family, you will have a number of privileges as compared to a poor white family; if you are a citizen, you will have some privileges as compared to non-citizens; if you are studious, you will have a privilege over those who choose not to study. Even on the said dichotomies we can invert the relationships depending on a number of geographic, demographic and contextual elements. We can add literally thousands of cases.

Even in areas of life, and pertaining to specific groups, where we can observe obvious differences to others in social life it is not always easy to pinpoint the reasons and even less to find solutions. We know, for example, that intact families tend to do better. But that is not always the case. More importantly, we don’t necessarily know how to fix the problem!

What is interesting is that in some respects, we are all privileged and we are underprivileged in other respects. Yes, due to remnants of historical injustices one might say that certain classes, in general, will have certain social obstacles while other classes will not. It is also true that a number of social realities and possibilities can offset or exacerbate the advantage/disadvantage relationship. Some of these advantages are now cultural and at times they hinder certain groups (such as races) and at times they benefit the same groups.

As cultures develop, we can hope that whatever attitudes remain in the culture and might be coated with injustice will disappear. We can do more than hope, we can strive to change such attitudes. But there should not be any type of formal top-down arrangement to eliminate these differences. One reason is that there is a diversity of opinions on how to address these situations and what is the substantive reality being addressed. Another is that government possess certain powers that instead of facilitating the necessary systemic processes of dialogue and encounter, tend to hammer down solutions based on who holds power. The possession of power to impose an agenda only hinders the very process of finding solutions.

We cannot unscramble the intricacies of social reality. I know that is not what many want to hear, we prefer to entertain the thought that we have what it takes. Utopian expectations for our own capacities to discern are not helpful. That means we don’t really know where to place every piece of the social process because culture—and men acting in culture—is an inscrutable maze of antecedent and actual interactions and influences. We do not possess the mental capacity to fix reality—even less, the knowledge that where we want reality to go is where it should be. One thing is to pontificate, as John Rawls did in his famous Theory of Justice, saying that undeserved inequalities call for redress” and another is to proclaim that we know how to do it.

What are our real options instead of the cosmic alternative? The option is a society of formal rights. We should strive for equality under the law and for equal treatment in terms of the same rules for everyone under the same circumstances. Formal equality is very different than disparate impact equality. That latter sort of equality, also termed absolute or substantial, is the kind that assumes we can unscramble the egg of history and causality on the basis of ideological presuppositions. It is not based on possessing the knowledge of how to do accomplish the task of eliminating injustice but on having certain ideological attachments. This is dangerous territory that never accomplishes its intended goal and often inaugurated deeper inequalities and injustices.

Should we surrender a desire to help beyond striving for a more perfect system of formal rights? No. But we should surrender the belief that the state and the law is the one that must strive in that direction. It is the task of voluntary, private associations to find ways to help each other and transform the culture. The problem with the state performing that task is that it often ends imposing on all the ideological bent of those in power. In the American context, the federal government is the one whose interventions ought be more limited in terms of the quest for cosmic solutions, as it is the more detached, less local structure of governance

09 Aug

0

The “Us” Against “Them” Fallacy: But, Oh, It Feels So Good!

by Crystal Hernandez in Articles

Article by Ismael Hernandez

“Us” against “them” is the narrative of our times because it feels so good. It offers a simple answer for why things are they way they are, absolving us and condemning them. This type of pseudo-sacramental understanding of social processes offers what so many desire, an alibi.

A good example of a pseudo-sacramental view of life is the insistence on “income inequality.” The rationalization goes like this: “We” are poor because “they” are “rich.” All we need to do is punish them by confiscating what belongs to us. This understanding blames U.S. policy for having facilitated over time an upward redistribution of wealth. The underlying narrative assumes that wealth is a function of systemic injustice instead of a function of a system that rewards risk, inventiveness, response to opportunity, and economic initiative.

No, economic policy that protects the rich is the culprit. Over time, economic policy has supported the rick who tamper with the system and that is why we need state intervention to “level the playing field.” It is irrelevant that in effect policies that penalize investment has risen from 15% to 23.8% in this century when we factor in the Affordable Care Act surcharge.^[i]

What do we get when economic policy punishes investment? We get slow growth. What is a tax on investments if not a penalty for putting wealth in motion to create more wealth and jobs? More important here is how the economy as a whole is understood as a battle for the distribution of resources instead of a working field for the creation of these resources. Anyone with a mindset of warring parties will be less inclined to become a producer, to become active. Instead, the incentive is for passivity and activism—aiming to mobilize others to change rules to benefit me.

What has created great wealth in the past decades has not been economic policy aimed at benefiting the “haves” and injure the “have-nots.” Such wealth is an effect of amazing technological advances—the internet, online companies, communications advances, changes in the service industry—which started in the mind of entrepreneurs who took great risks.Wealth was created by brilliant minds whose capacity to observe and decipher the great field of human needs and wants and find answers never envisioned before and has created better conditions for all. So amazing is this system that we have today a mass of people having access for cheap to things that were only accessible to a very few yesterday. We even thumb our noses to things today that only the “rich” could brag about a decade ago.

Penalizing great minds can only produce sorrows for all but it seems “fair.” Let us all get a “fair share” of a shrinking universe, is the idea. As long as the space between “them” and “us” shrinks, I’ll be happy to know that, although I’m not better off, they are not as well as I imagined. In reality, they will remain well-off, just not mobilizing their resources to create more wealth. This is a slippery-slope that only ends by the total collapse of a system that works in favor of a centralist system of unitary power that completely eliminates the enemy” the entrepreneur.

There will be no wealth gap to shrink when there is no more wealth. In the insatiable desire to harm a whole class of people, the benighted “rich”, no one will be lifted up.

^[i]Tamny, John. Surging Wealth Inequality Is Poverty’s Greatest Enemy. Mises Institute, February 6, 2019, https://mises.org/wire/surging-wealth-inequality-povertys-greatest-enemy. Access on May 30, 2019.

17 Mar

0

A Great Chasm

by Crystal Hernandez in Articles

The more I work in ministry and service to those in need and the more I interact with people in the same field, the more I am convinced of the existence of a fundamental chasm between those of us who don’t see the “state” as the primary agent of care and those who do.

So many people in the field have been trained in social work. That area is a minefield of a collectivist anthropology and statist sociology, that directly or subtly collapses the basic communities of society within the affairs and institutions of the state. To them, the problem is structural and systemic. The momentary solutions that are developed, are based on changes in policy, changes in systems, and more funding for agencies (both public and private).

They appear convinced that if we just had more funding, we could attend more needs, and that will solve the problems. They distrust and scoff at organic solutions that do not require planning, agencies, and redistribution. Ultimately, they inevitably radicalize because their answers do not solve the problems and they call for a totally new social arrangement as the only final solution—never caring to question their foundational assumptions.

But, what if we could foster attitudes and lead initiatives that create liberty, self-reliance, and human dignity? We invite you to work with us to empower those that wish to better their situations and live a dignified, self-sustainable life.

Ismael Hernandez, Is executive director of the Freedom & Virtue Institute, an organization dedicated to the promotion of the ideas of liberty, faith, and self-reliance. Ismael is a regular lecturer with the Acton Institute in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and has spoken at Heritage Foundation, the Cato Institute, the Foundation for Economic Education and many other organizations. He is a regular speaker at service clubs around the country and is the author of the acclaimed book Not Tragically Colored: Freedom, Personhood, and the Renewal of Black America. He is a noted expert on questions of effectively serving the poor and race relations.

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The Hubris of Expanded Possibilities Hinders Our Social Life

The “Us” Against “Them” Fallacy: But, Oh, It Feels So Good!

Article by Ismael Hernandez

A Great Chasm