Wake Up America: Your Liberties Are In Danger!
Many sighed with relief at the election, assuming that the head of the dangerous snake had been cut, not realizing a Medusa-like operating system lay behind it. We may have believed civil rights violations only started with the lockdowns. But if you reflect, they started years before. While the latest iteration was fueled by Neo-Marxist authoritarianism, past violations were done on behalf of those waiving a conservative flag. Where did this tendency come from?
Arguably from the Ages of Reason and the Enlightenment. Both hoped to stamp out the dusty concepts of religion, viewing them as holding humans back from their full potential. They envisioned utopian societies using science and reason, with man as the Creator. Unwittingly, such operating systems erased humans' divine nature, leaving only existence.
Fast forward to much of the philosophy of the 20th century and human existence was reduced to merely a quest for power. Power is inevitably deemed a threat by governments, resulting in a need to squash its use. I appreciate my oversimplification; my goal is merely to make one ponder. But of this, I am certain, is the medusa of authoritarian tendencies that must be tamed - not the mere cutting off of venomous snakes that are only the consequences of the operating system.
Free Speech on Fire
Former VP candidate Tim Walz unleashed the oft-quoted phrase 'fire in a theatre.' Did he know the dark and sordid past of Schenck v. the United States from whence the phrase came? In 1917, Schenck, a socialist and pacifist (thus a "lefty"), circulated flyers that the WWI draft violated the 13th Amendment, which prohibits slavery and involuntary servitude. He was prosecuted under the Espionage Act of 1917. The above graphic includes his flyer's words. Schenck wasn't attempting to 'take down' the government he was trying to remind Americans that the Constitution was 'the greatest bulwark of political liberty' and the draft threatened its foundation. He also questioned whom or what benefited financially from the war.
While Schenck's questioning of the war was considered sedition, President Wilson, a mere three years earlier, argued similarly: Neutrality for the looming war was essential to maintain unifying and lasting peace. (August 19, 1914), SCOTUS upheld his conviction reasoning, "No First Amendment right if the congress finds such rhetoric would endanger the country" in an emergency situation such as war. It was in this context that Oliver Wendell Holmes compared the distribution of leaflets to falsely shouting "Fire!" in a crowded theater.
Fifteen years later, war hero General Smedley Butler published his short book 'War is a Racket' (1934) with blistering conclusions that he had often fought on behalf of monied interests. Such sentiments were no longer polemic as many Americans realized the dissident voices of WWI were not falsely shouting 'fire' after all. Timing is everything. For Schenck, it was bad timing, and he served 10 years. The Schenck decision would later be overturned as an impingement on Free Speech.
My body, my right - unless elites say otherwise
A few years later, another emergency arose. Poor people were having too many children draining limited resources. Eugenics (good birth) became the solution. It was developed by Francis Galton, a thoughtful and brilliant individual who made various groundbreaking contributions - just not this one. Eugenics aimed for better human livestock, selecting the right people to breed while preventing the wrong ones from doing so.
Volunteers seemed unlikely, so state-sanctioned coercion was sought. In Buck v. Bell, SCOTUS upheld forced sterilization for the collective good. It anchored its decision to Jacobson v. Massachusetts (1905), which upheld the right to issue a fine for refusing a vaccine. Connecting the two in a macabre spider web, Justice Holmes reasoned, "The principle that sustains compulsory vaccination is broad enough to cover cutting the Fallopian tubes."
To argue that Holmes was an immoral man twisting the logic of an early decision to justify a desired end would be wrong. Holmes was a respected jurist whose thoughtful analysis on, ironically, personal liberty and judicial restraint still hold sway in law schools. Current Supreme Court Justice Barrett is also considered a highly intelligent and thoughtful jurist.
However, as Holmes did in Buck v. Bell, Barrett took the government agencies' speculative theories as true, stating that irreversible medical interventions were essential for the health and welfare emergency. We are fortunate the Court found no right to strap us down to do so, finding the threat of loss of employment enough. Notably, the Court also used Massachusetts v. Jacobson to rationalize its holding but did not reference Buck v. Bell. Perhaps Nazis using it as part of their defense at the Nuremberg Trials proved problematic.
Surveillance for Safety: You are either with us or against US!
The Patriot Act was offered as an emergency necessity after 9/11. A weapon promised to point only outward quickly swung backward, striking US citizens like reckless friendly fire. Would the apparatus to follow and track citizens during COVID without the Patriot Act be possible? Was Biden's threat to those refusing the mandates, "We've been patient, but our patience is wearing thin," an inevitable outgrowth of the Patriot Act?
Around the same time, states were also enacting 'hate speech' enhancements for criminal actions. It had a great pitch. What caring person wouldn't be for added enhancements for crimes prompted by evil beliefs? Like the Patriot Act, hate speech and all its derivatives became the Swiss Army knife for Western Governments.
When in their interest, physical crimes stemming from right thoughts can be excused. And wrong thoughts against official agendas can be punishable crimes even though no physical act has been committed. In the UK, private prayer in the wrong place for the wrong reason is punishable. Social posts mocking officials are now a crime in Germany. Not to be left out, California, the home of big tech, now criminalizes political satire under the emergency guise of 'protecting electoral integrity.'
Swallowing up rights with one big gulp
In 1976, the government feared Swine flu would become an epidemic and wanted a vaccine pronto. Manufacturers were reluctant to bring something to market quickly, fearing lawsuits from an untested product. An agreement was reached; the government would provide cover for that particular vax - it injured many. The limitation would expand quickly like cheap lycra sweatpants, resulting in the broad 1986 vaccine liability exemption. Many blame Reagan, but of the 23 congressional members sponsoring it, 19 were Democrats.
And consider this. Throughout the 1970s, Aspartame was a failing poisonous sweetener that couldn't get approval for use as a food additive. That is until Donald Rumsfeld, the designated architect of the Iraq War under Bush, jr., fixed that problem the day after Reagan was sworn in. Sleaze and greed are human traits, not party identification.
We are fortunate our founding fathers borrowed the good things from the Enlightenment but kept the Creator. Without a reference to divinity, we risk following in the footsteps of many European countries where governments grant rights. And what they giveth they can taketh. But we must forever remain on guard that both official acts and commercial interests seek to reduce us to mere footprints of existence with our human essence no longer valued.
Wrong Speak is a free-expression platform that allows varying viewpoints. All views expressed in this article are the author's own.
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Minor quibble: Medusa (she with the hair of snakes and petrifying gaze) WAS successfully killed by decapitation. The mythological snake monster with multiple heads (cut one off, two grow in its place) is the Hydra. So that particular metaphor doesn't work here.