Monday, July 2, 2018

The Right That Went Unmentioned Part 2

     In response to Part 1, commenter Glenda said:

     It takes a certain degree of callousness to not consider for one second the life of the unborn in regards to abortion. That is a stepping stone to far worse.

     The numbness to killing is something that has been noted in people who have been in wars or have experienced death repeatedly. The left is hoping that the American society will become equally as numb to their elective Eugenics and the Obamacare laws will at some time in the near future empower bureaucrats to make decisions over life and death for individuals as opposed to merely policy issues.

     That well focused and stingingly relevant observation put me in mind of this passage from Which Art In Hope:

     The lecture hall had emptied, but Armand and Teresza remained in their seats. Armand had not moved since the closing bell, and Teresza was afraid to nudge him. She simply sat, his big hand between hers, and waited for him to return from his private space.
     They'd sat in complete silence for several minutes when he murmured, "I think I see."
     "What, Armand?" She chafed his hand gently.
     "Where he's going with this." He looked straight ahead, toward the lectern but not at it, a true thousand-yard stare. "He's been hinting at a unified theory of society, like they're looking for in physics. I think I see what it is."
     He doesn't look happy about it.
     "There's only two forces that really matter," he said. "Life and death. Everything else is a sideshow. When we work to live, and to make more life, and to take pleasure in life and help others do the same, that's healthy. That's freedom. But the people of Earth weren't free. They were surrounded by their States. By death. And the States never let up for a moment. So they couldn't make more life, or take a lot of pleasure in it. They had to distract themselves from all the death hemming them in. All the bodies piled up around them." He rose and turned to her at last, and she rose in response. Tears trickled down his face. "But our ancestors chose life. The Spoonerites made the Great Sacrifice and broke the circle, so our ancestors could get free." He wiped at his tears and smiled, a peculiar compound of pity for those who had died in bondage and gratitude that he and she and their compatriots would not. "We are so lucky."
     She spread her arms, and he pressed her tenderly against him.
     "Armand..."
     "Hm?"
     "There's something I should have told you."
     "What's that?"
     "My father's a genetic engineer." She tried to smile, but it didn't work. "Probably the best on Hope. He designed me from the genes up. I didn't have a mother. I was born from an incubator." She closed her eyes against her fear. "He says we're genetically incompatible...that I can't conceive by you."
     "I know, Terry. I knew before I proposed to you. It doesn't matter."
     "What?" She pushed him back and stared at him, incapable of believing what she'd heard. His face was free of any guile. "How did you know?"
     "Grandpere Alain told me. He's known your father for a long time."

     As a fiction writer, I don’t always know when I’m “on a roll.” But I think I was, the day I wrote that passage.

2 comments:

Mark said...

"The numbness to killing is something that has been noted in people who have been in wars or have experienced death repeatedly."

We now have a generation or two of children that have grown up being told that their lives (at least up to birth) are disposable. That their own parents (especially their mothers) not only approve of, but actively FIGHT for the right to killed their offspring for any reason. And these generations. And these generations now also fight for the right to kill off their children as a matter of "women's rights."

They have been raised with a constant drumbeat that lives -- even their own lives -- are so unimportant that they could have been disposed of before they were born for reasons of convenience.

What does that do to form the thought patterns of children as they grow and develop? Is it coincidence that we are seeing more mass murders than ever before -- most committed by young people? Or is it because they have been trained to believe that life is unimportant... and, thus, feel no repulsion about taking lives for any perceived slights?

I'm sure I'm not the first to have these thoughts.

Glenda T Goode said...

It is not difficult to make the leap from abortion and eugenics to managed genetic profiles. Once you abandon long held values and beliefs typically Christian in nature you enter the world of scientific conjecture and social planning. There is much to be afraid of looking at this type of future.

Our past ways of living were built the support of family and community working together. In many cases the community was represented by a church or fellowship. The government governed the nation or state. The combined community raised the children and managed the affairs of the community based on their shared values and needs. Each community had its own traditions and practices creating unique pockets of humanity that added to the fabric of man.

The progressive philosophy of life will gradually erode the value of family and the traditions therein. They will claim that we will no longer need them. At least that is what they will tell us despite the fact that they really do not know if they are right.

Part of what has given mankind the confidence to evolve and grow are these foundations we have built upon our long held traditions. Once these are gone, our unity starts to fade as we no longer are linked by heritage but are, instead, linked only by consensus and data and the organization that we look to for guidance. There is little to celebrate in such mundane concepts.

The future is full of questions. By eliminating the core values that brought our civilization to where we are there is the risk of losing our individuality. By encouraging the ‘Hive’ (drone) mindset we may see the death of that which made us great.