By now the lesson should have sunk in. The examples set by the horse and dog whisperers should have entered the liberal consciousness, but have not Although the model provided by these animal trainers is much admired in liberal circles, its insights are not applied to human beings.
The horse whisperers, for instance, counsel that horses are prey animals. As such, they are hard-wired to be alert to potential predators. This means that a trainer must avoid looking directly at a horse’s eyes lest he be confused with a wolf. Dog whisperers similarly advise that dogs are pack animals and hence dog owners should set themselves up as pack leaders.
Both of these sorts of trainers understand that their subjects are particular sorts of animal. They know that they are genetically programmed to exhibit certain behaviors, but not others. As a result, they operate within these limits.
Liberals, in contrast, seem to imagine that people are completely plastic. Therefore, when they recommend political or economic reforms, they let their imaginations run wild. As long as they can conceive of a particular social program, they assume they can impose it.
Thus, they think they can oblige everyone to love everyone else. They also believe they can impose complete equality. Both of these goals are parts of the Liberal Dream; nonetheless both are contrary to human nature.
And there is a human nature. Violate it and no matter how elevated an ambition, it cannot be realized. As a consequence, promises to implement the impossible eventually fall to the ground unfulfilled. Having aroused unsustainable hopes, they breed cynicism not contentment.
This scenario also applies to another aspect of the Liberal Dream. Liberals believe that once they establish universal love and complete equality, people will be able to flourish as never before. They will become “self-actualizing” individuals who personally achieve their highest aspirations.
This philosophy as infiltrated public education systems to such an extent that they produce ever more ignorant graduates. According to progressive education (i.e., liberal education), learning must always be fun. Students must be allowed to choose what they want to learn, while teachers must encourage them to be their highest selves.
This sounds like it allows students to be themselves, whereas it merely permits them to remain uninformed. We human beings are biologically programmed to learn; including many very difficult lessons. This means that working hard is also part of our nature.
Indeed, one of the things that separates us from other animals is the length of our childhoods. These extend for many years because there is so much to be soaked up. Part of this, it is true, is learned through play, but part must be acquired by conscious effort.
Nowadays, with the emphasis on play, too many students refuse to read books if they are difficult. They would rather engage in computer games or go on FaceBook.
Accordingly, the self they actualize is simpleminded and incompetent. They never become the self-motivated experts required by a techno-commercial society because it has falsely been assumed that learning and personal growth are automatic.
A modern middle class society depends on personal responsibility, but a sense of responsibility takes effort to develop. This is dictated by the ways our minds and emotions work. Human nature is such that we can create the complex behavioral repertoires upon which we rely only dedicating many years to doing so.
One more reason the Liberal Dream is dying is thus that it does not acknowledge this simple fact. It takes for granted that people will inevitably become what they must in order to sustain our current prosperity, this is, if the proper social conditions are provided.
This is wrong on two counts. First, liberals cannot furnish the love and equality they promise. And second, even it they could, responsible competence takes years of genuine effort to achieve.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Monday, October 18, 2010
Monday, October 11, 2010
Why the Liberal Dream is Dying
This electoral season does not look good for liberal Democrats. By all current measures, ordinary voters are disillusioned with left-wing policies. They are looking for smaller government, while Obama and his supporters keep promising additional programs.
As a result, the Liberal Dream is dying. Almost everyone, except those on the extreme left, has noticed the trend. But why is this so? Why has a perennially popular set of ideas gone into so drastic a decline?
The answer is found in the contents of the Dream. Its attractions fade as it becomes evident that it cannot make good on its promises. These in brief are:
· Universal Love
That is Government Mediated, and
Led by the Best and Brightest,
So as to banish War, Discrimination, Pollution, Disease, Ignorance, and Poverty.
This will ultimately achieve complete Equality,
By protecting the Underdog, and
Encouraging Self-actualization,
And Total Niceness.
In an earlier column I argued that we cannot become a big happy family because there are too many of us. I also maintained that liberals, far from being the best and brightest, have revealed feet of clay. Here I want to focus on the goal of complete equality—for it too is bogus.
When you ask a young child if everyone is equal, he or she may answer: yes. But ask a college student the same question and the response is a categorical: no. By the late teens, almost everyone learns that life is not evenhanded—that some people make out far better than others.
On the other hand, many of my students at Kennesaw State answer in the affirmative when I inquire into whether they would like me to give everyone an A. As might be expected, the least able students are particularly emphatic in their assent.
The better students, of course, are less energetic. They realize that this would do away with their grade advantage. Nevertheless, not quite sure they want to antagonize their less academically successful peers, they go along with the crowd—but just barely.
When, however, asked about the consequences of eliminating grade disparities, the majority in favor of equality goes weak in the knees. Happy to have their own status upgraded, they are less sure this is a good idea if made universal.
Would they want to be treated by a physician who made straight A’s despite never having attended a class? Or would they appoint a general to lead the army if he never demonstrated superior strategic or tactical skills? In these cases, they are less sure.
Absolute equality sounds good in the abstract, but failing to distinguish between the competent and incompetent would place us at the mercy of inept individuals more frequently than we might prefer. Ranking may not be fair, but it, at least, increases the prospect of expert leadership.
Contrary to what first graders think, the Untied States was not founded on the principle of complete equality, but of legal equality. From the beginning, its laws were supposed to apply impartially to everyone. Even though this is largely unobtainable, it can, in fact, be approached. Total equality cannot—and should not.
Barack Obama and company have demonstrated that they were serious when they argued it was a good idea to transfer resources from the rich to the poor. If anything, they have exhibited a seething hostility to the more prosperous.
But maybe voters are catching on that taking this philosophy to the extreme would be disastrous. If we truly treated everyone as equal, it would not be long before we were all equally poor and oppressed. Total equality would not translate into total democracy, but into an unmitigated thugocracy.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
As a result, the Liberal Dream is dying. Almost everyone, except those on the extreme left, has noticed the trend. But why is this so? Why has a perennially popular set of ideas gone into so drastic a decline?
The answer is found in the contents of the Dream. Its attractions fade as it becomes evident that it cannot make good on its promises. These in brief are:
· Universal Love
That is Government Mediated, and
Led by the Best and Brightest,
So as to banish War, Discrimination, Pollution, Disease, Ignorance, and Poverty.
This will ultimately achieve complete Equality,
By protecting the Underdog, and
Encouraging Self-actualization,
And Total Niceness.
In an earlier column I argued that we cannot become a big happy family because there are too many of us. I also maintained that liberals, far from being the best and brightest, have revealed feet of clay. Here I want to focus on the goal of complete equality—for it too is bogus.
When you ask a young child if everyone is equal, he or she may answer: yes. But ask a college student the same question and the response is a categorical: no. By the late teens, almost everyone learns that life is not evenhanded—that some people make out far better than others.
On the other hand, many of my students at Kennesaw State answer in the affirmative when I inquire into whether they would like me to give everyone an A. As might be expected, the least able students are particularly emphatic in their assent.
The better students, of course, are less energetic. They realize that this would do away with their grade advantage. Nevertheless, not quite sure they want to antagonize their less academically successful peers, they go along with the crowd—but just barely.
When, however, asked about the consequences of eliminating grade disparities, the majority in favor of equality goes weak in the knees. Happy to have their own status upgraded, they are less sure this is a good idea if made universal.
Would they want to be treated by a physician who made straight A’s despite never having attended a class? Or would they appoint a general to lead the army if he never demonstrated superior strategic or tactical skills? In these cases, they are less sure.
Absolute equality sounds good in the abstract, but failing to distinguish between the competent and incompetent would place us at the mercy of inept individuals more frequently than we might prefer. Ranking may not be fair, but it, at least, increases the prospect of expert leadership.
Contrary to what first graders think, the Untied States was not founded on the principle of complete equality, but of legal equality. From the beginning, its laws were supposed to apply impartially to everyone. Even though this is largely unobtainable, it can, in fact, be approached. Total equality cannot—and should not.
Barack Obama and company have demonstrated that they were serious when they argued it was a good idea to transfer resources from the rich to the poor. If anything, they have exhibited a seething hostility to the more prosperous.
But maybe voters are catching on that taking this philosophy to the extreme would be disastrous. If we truly treated everyone as equal, it would not be long before we were all equally poor and oppressed. Total equality would not translate into total democracy, but into an unmitigated thugocracy.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Monday, October 4, 2010
Post-Liberalism: The Death of a Dream
Ted Kennedy is gone now. Many fondly remember him, yet his passing marked an historic inflexion point. With him, vanished many of the furthermost hopes of American liberals.
Kennedy is remembered, for among other things, insisting that “the dream will never die.” The dream, of course, was The Liberal Dream. It is what animated his political career and what still serves as a cynosure for many on the left wing of the Democratic Party.
Nevertheless, that dream is dying. It is failing right before our eyes. Despite the efforts of legions of brave liberal warriors, the next election is liable to prove that its attraction has declined. Thanks to the over-reaching of the Obama administration, the electorate has discovered a renewed affection for smaller government.
The Liberal Dream is, in fact, a complex of ideas. Two of its most important tenets are first, that we as a nation must become one, huge loving family and second, that we must do so under the leadership of the “best and brightest.”
As for the notion that we must unite as if we were members of a single family, this is fatuous. There are too many of us for this to happen. The president periodically insists that we must be each other’s keepers, but how can we be when most of us do not know each other?
A nation of over three hundred million is of necessity a nation of strangers. We may be mutually interdependent, but cannot be personally acquainted with each other. As a result, we cannot literally love one another. We may be respectful and even helpful, yet we cannot experience a genuine affection for others we never encounter.
This is one of the challenges of our modern society. How do we work effectively with so many strangers? Obviously we do, and can probably learn to do so more successfully, but not because we are individually devoted to each other.
Nor can we expect our political leaders always to be among the “best and brightest.” Certainly Obama and his crowd have demonstrated that they are the gang that cannot shoot straight. They were able to win a remarkable political victory, but since then have exhibited a tin ear. Once sensitive to what the public wanted, they subsequently disrespected the complaints of ordinary voters.
Liberals, such as Obama, believe they must protect people from themselves. Presumably only they, the liberals, understand the sort of health care people need. Only they are sufficiently motivated to protect the planet from environmental disaster. Left to their own devices, ordinary citizens would evidently smoke themselves to death, even as they drowned in rising oceanic floods.
Liberals believe they are smarter, better informed, and nicer than the mass of humankind. If some, such as Obama, are indeed very smart, they are certainly not better informed or more moral. Obama himself, for instance, is an economic illiterate. He genuinely seems unaware of the damage chronic deficits can inflict.
Worse than this are our president’s moral lapses. Beyond his arrogant Keynesianism lies a willingness to deceive whomever might interfere with his plans. Rod Blagojevich complained that Obama is “all take and no give,” but he is also all false promises and no delivery. He invariably says what he must in order to manipulate susceptible listeners—the truth be darned.
This is not what liberalism was supposed to be. It was expected to make our lives more satisfying. Unfortunately, it has not—and will not—because it is based on fallacious premises. Liberals are not smarter, or more moral, or more family-oriented. They are merely self-important politicians in search of power.
Liberals have deluded themselves into believing they are whom they claim to be, but their recent failures have sown doubts. And it is these that will be their undoing.
Liberalism is dying because it is faltering. It is dying because more people have noticed it is on life support. The faith that kept it alive is becoming a thing of the past; hence it must rely on ever more grandiose fictions.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Kennedy is remembered, for among other things, insisting that “the dream will never die.” The dream, of course, was The Liberal Dream. It is what animated his political career and what still serves as a cynosure for many on the left wing of the Democratic Party.
Nevertheless, that dream is dying. It is failing right before our eyes. Despite the efforts of legions of brave liberal warriors, the next election is liable to prove that its attraction has declined. Thanks to the over-reaching of the Obama administration, the electorate has discovered a renewed affection for smaller government.
The Liberal Dream is, in fact, a complex of ideas. Two of its most important tenets are first, that we as a nation must become one, huge loving family and second, that we must do so under the leadership of the “best and brightest.”
As for the notion that we must unite as if we were members of a single family, this is fatuous. There are too many of us for this to happen. The president periodically insists that we must be each other’s keepers, but how can we be when most of us do not know each other?
A nation of over three hundred million is of necessity a nation of strangers. We may be mutually interdependent, but cannot be personally acquainted with each other. As a result, we cannot literally love one another. We may be respectful and even helpful, yet we cannot experience a genuine affection for others we never encounter.
This is one of the challenges of our modern society. How do we work effectively with so many strangers? Obviously we do, and can probably learn to do so more successfully, but not because we are individually devoted to each other.
Nor can we expect our political leaders always to be among the “best and brightest.” Certainly Obama and his crowd have demonstrated that they are the gang that cannot shoot straight. They were able to win a remarkable political victory, but since then have exhibited a tin ear. Once sensitive to what the public wanted, they subsequently disrespected the complaints of ordinary voters.
Liberals, such as Obama, believe they must protect people from themselves. Presumably only they, the liberals, understand the sort of health care people need. Only they are sufficiently motivated to protect the planet from environmental disaster. Left to their own devices, ordinary citizens would evidently smoke themselves to death, even as they drowned in rising oceanic floods.
Liberals believe they are smarter, better informed, and nicer than the mass of humankind. If some, such as Obama, are indeed very smart, they are certainly not better informed or more moral. Obama himself, for instance, is an economic illiterate. He genuinely seems unaware of the damage chronic deficits can inflict.
Worse than this are our president’s moral lapses. Beyond his arrogant Keynesianism lies a willingness to deceive whomever might interfere with his plans. Rod Blagojevich complained that Obama is “all take and no give,” but he is also all false promises and no delivery. He invariably says what he must in order to manipulate susceptible listeners—the truth be darned.
This is not what liberalism was supposed to be. It was expected to make our lives more satisfying. Unfortunately, it has not—and will not—because it is based on fallacious premises. Liberals are not smarter, or more moral, or more family-oriented. They are merely self-important politicians in search of power.
Liberals have deluded themselves into believing they are whom they claim to be, but their recent failures have sown doubts. And it is these that will be their undoing.
Liberalism is dying because it is faltering. It is dying because more people have noticed it is on life support. The faith that kept it alive is becoming a thing of the past; hence it must rely on ever more grandiose fictions.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Sunday, September 26, 2010
A Professionalized Society: Our Real Future
When I asked my wife, she suggested that most people do not want to become professionals in the sociological sense. She was not even sure that a majority of persons are capable of it.
When I brought the subject up with Dan Papp, President of Kennesaw State University, he replied that he thought a great many people did aspire to become professionals. That’s why they came to college.
When my literary agent referred my manuscript “A Professionalized Society: Our Real Future” to a publisher, she wrote back that she didn’t believe there was a market for the work. According to her, it was “too intelligent.”
As for myself, I remain convinced that we are headed toward a more professionalized society. We may be getting there slowly— at an almost glacial pace—but I think we are inexorably moving in this direction.
Professionals are “self-motivated experts”. Almost everyone agrees that doctors fit this definition. They spend many years learning how the human body works and studying what is needed to fix it when it stops functioning. But more than this; when they apply their knowledge, they are expected to do so of their own accord.
When a physician arrives at a diagnosis, he or she is supposed to get it right because he or she is personally committed to helping patients. Doing so to please a supervisor would be considered a dereliction of duty. So would prescribing a particular treatment merely because this is demanded by an insurance company.
Doctors are supposed to pursue competence because they care—and by and large they do. To engage in shoddy work, or to make a particular choice solely because they were ordered to, would violate their sense of professional integrity. It would reduce them to the level of a manual laborer, which would cancel out the many years of effort expended to achieve their exalted status.
Nowadays, this attitude also extends to nurses. Where once they were the dutiful handmaidens of physicians, they have risen to become semi-independent practitioners. Although still less prestigious than doctors, they are often delegated tasks that require both substantial competence and personal responsibility.
To illustrate, last year I suffered a lung infection that required the insertion of a PICC line (that is, a peripherally inserted central catheter). This thin plastic tube was introduced into a vein in my upper right arm and then threaded down into the center of my chest. The procedure, though delicate, was entirely entrusted to two nurses.
Fortunately, the nurses who attended me were experts in what they did. At no time did they require a physician to directly supervise their activities. Moreover, they were professionally dedicated to getting the procedure done correctly—which they did.
This greater professionalization of nurses is reflected in the training they receive at colleges such as Kennesaw State University. Before being accepted to one of these programs, they must demonstrate academic abilities and a personal maturity much in excess of the average student.
So challenging is KSU’s nursing program that, as with physicians, our graduates take pride in their accomplishments. They feel like professionals because they have indeed become self-motivated experts; experts who are perfectly capable of independent courses of action.
I contend that this is becoming more the norm for business managers, accountants, police officers, architects, air conditioner technicians, engineers, educators, computer programmers, and social workers. All have become more professionalized and therefore more capable of supervising their own work.
If this is true, then we as a society are becoming more capable of true democracy. We can literally be more self-governing in our daily activities because we are better able to make high-quality choices—for ourselves and others.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
When I brought the subject up with Dan Papp, President of Kennesaw State University, he replied that he thought a great many people did aspire to become professionals. That’s why they came to college.
When my literary agent referred my manuscript “A Professionalized Society: Our Real Future” to a publisher, she wrote back that she didn’t believe there was a market for the work. According to her, it was “too intelligent.”
As for myself, I remain convinced that we are headed toward a more professionalized society. We may be getting there slowly— at an almost glacial pace—but I think we are inexorably moving in this direction.
Professionals are “self-motivated experts”. Almost everyone agrees that doctors fit this definition. They spend many years learning how the human body works and studying what is needed to fix it when it stops functioning. But more than this; when they apply their knowledge, they are expected to do so of their own accord.
When a physician arrives at a diagnosis, he or she is supposed to get it right because he or she is personally committed to helping patients. Doing so to please a supervisor would be considered a dereliction of duty. So would prescribing a particular treatment merely because this is demanded by an insurance company.
Doctors are supposed to pursue competence because they care—and by and large they do. To engage in shoddy work, or to make a particular choice solely because they were ordered to, would violate their sense of professional integrity. It would reduce them to the level of a manual laborer, which would cancel out the many years of effort expended to achieve their exalted status.
Nowadays, this attitude also extends to nurses. Where once they were the dutiful handmaidens of physicians, they have risen to become semi-independent practitioners. Although still less prestigious than doctors, they are often delegated tasks that require both substantial competence and personal responsibility.
To illustrate, last year I suffered a lung infection that required the insertion of a PICC line (that is, a peripherally inserted central catheter). This thin plastic tube was introduced into a vein in my upper right arm and then threaded down into the center of my chest. The procedure, though delicate, was entirely entrusted to two nurses.
Fortunately, the nurses who attended me were experts in what they did. At no time did they require a physician to directly supervise their activities. Moreover, they were professionally dedicated to getting the procedure done correctly—which they did.
This greater professionalization of nurses is reflected in the training they receive at colleges such as Kennesaw State University. Before being accepted to one of these programs, they must demonstrate academic abilities and a personal maturity much in excess of the average student.
So challenging is KSU’s nursing program that, as with physicians, our graduates take pride in their accomplishments. They feel like professionals because they have indeed become self-motivated experts; experts who are perfectly capable of independent courses of action.
I contend that this is becoming more the norm for business managers, accountants, police officers, architects, air conditioner technicians, engineers, educators, computer programmers, and social workers. All have become more professionalized and therefore more capable of supervising their own work.
If this is true, then we as a society are becoming more capable of true democracy. We can literally be more self-governing in our daily activities because we are better able to make high-quality choices—for ourselves and others.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Monday, September 20, 2010
A Third Great Awakening?
Glenn Beck is a wonder!
Who else, on his own hook, could have attracted over a half million Americans to the Washington mall to celebrate the nation’s heritage? Who else could have convinced so many people to travel so far to listen to message promoting honor and character?
And no wonder. Beck has done some of the best investigative reporting in recent memory. His exposes about Van Jones, Jeff Jones, and Acorn alerted many millions of television viewers to the radical fringe surrounding Barack Obama. Similarly, his defense of the American Constitution awakened a love of country in many more.
But Beck is wrong about one thing. He believes the nation is about to undergo a Third Great Awakening. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the United States was swept by two massive religious revivals. All up and down the East Coast, ordinary people renewed their faith by attending mass rallies led by inspirational preachers.
Beck may himself be inspirational, but the religious fires that fed these earlier conflagrations have long since died down. Thus, although efforts to renew our moral fiber are undoubtedly worthy, they cannot depend on restoring a comparable religious fervor.
Mind you, religious principles have been essential to creating our nation and maintaining its core values. No doubt too, they will continue to hold many of us to honest and virtuous standards.
Even so, religion cannot supplant the secular practices that have become the norm. It can supplement, but not displace them. I see evidence of this daily in my classrooms.
When I ask my students at Kennesaw State University if they believe in God, between ninety and ninety-five per cent assert they do. This is in line with surveys that show the same for the nation at large. Indeed, the United State is probably the most religious large country in the world.
But when I ask these same students to identify the first or last of the Ten Commandments, most cannot. The few who do are almost always among the oldest in the class. Nor when I ask how many of them are Protestant do any hands go up. Amazingly, though a majority are Baptists and Methodists, they have never heard the term “Protestant.”
Meanwhile, if I ask how many students are on facebook, every hand shoots up. Similarly, were I to spy on their laptops, they would likely be watching youtube, not reading passages from the scriptures.
Like it or not, ours has become a secular country. Though most people have faith, few are seriously devout. They believe in a loving God who created the world. They are also sure He will eventually save them and that they personally will go to heaven. That, however, is about it. Ask them about the specific tenets of their own churches, and they are flummoxed.
None of this bodes well for another Great Awakening. Exhortations to do what is right may be met with enthusiastic applause, but this does not presage a return to an old time religion based on fire and brimstone.
Nevertheless, Americans are by and large good people. Most want to do right. They are merely less likely to seek direct guidance from theological sources.
If Beck himself is motivated by strong religious commitments, the rest of us are apt to benefit from his courageous integrity. Nonetheless, we are unlikely to join him. We too may be distressed by the low standards set by politicians, but our response will probably be less spiritual.
So what lies ahead? Maybe there will be a “conservative” awakening. Perhaps there will be a “democratic” restoration. People may even become better educated about the need to defend the Constitution or reign in astronomical budget deficits. Expecting more, however, is only a remote possibility.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Who else, on his own hook, could have attracted over a half million Americans to the Washington mall to celebrate the nation’s heritage? Who else could have convinced so many people to travel so far to listen to message promoting honor and character?
And no wonder. Beck has done some of the best investigative reporting in recent memory. His exposes about Van Jones, Jeff Jones, and Acorn alerted many millions of television viewers to the radical fringe surrounding Barack Obama. Similarly, his defense of the American Constitution awakened a love of country in many more.
But Beck is wrong about one thing. He believes the nation is about to undergo a Third Great Awakening. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the United States was swept by two massive religious revivals. All up and down the East Coast, ordinary people renewed their faith by attending mass rallies led by inspirational preachers.
Beck may himself be inspirational, but the religious fires that fed these earlier conflagrations have long since died down. Thus, although efforts to renew our moral fiber are undoubtedly worthy, they cannot depend on restoring a comparable religious fervor.
Mind you, religious principles have been essential to creating our nation and maintaining its core values. No doubt too, they will continue to hold many of us to honest and virtuous standards.
Even so, religion cannot supplant the secular practices that have become the norm. It can supplement, but not displace them. I see evidence of this daily in my classrooms.
When I ask my students at Kennesaw State University if they believe in God, between ninety and ninety-five per cent assert they do. This is in line with surveys that show the same for the nation at large. Indeed, the United State is probably the most religious large country in the world.
But when I ask these same students to identify the first or last of the Ten Commandments, most cannot. The few who do are almost always among the oldest in the class. Nor when I ask how many of them are Protestant do any hands go up. Amazingly, though a majority are Baptists and Methodists, they have never heard the term “Protestant.”
Meanwhile, if I ask how many students are on facebook, every hand shoots up. Similarly, were I to spy on their laptops, they would likely be watching youtube, not reading passages from the scriptures.
Like it or not, ours has become a secular country. Though most people have faith, few are seriously devout. They believe in a loving God who created the world. They are also sure He will eventually save them and that they personally will go to heaven. That, however, is about it. Ask them about the specific tenets of their own churches, and they are flummoxed.
None of this bodes well for another Great Awakening. Exhortations to do what is right may be met with enthusiastic applause, but this does not presage a return to an old time religion based on fire and brimstone.
Nevertheless, Americans are by and large good people. Most want to do right. They are merely less likely to seek direct guidance from theological sources.
If Beck himself is motivated by strong religious commitments, the rest of us are apt to benefit from his courageous integrity. Nonetheless, we are unlikely to join him. We too may be distressed by the low standards set by politicians, but our response will probably be less spiritual.
So what lies ahead? Maybe there will be a “conservative” awakening. Perhaps there will be a “democratic” restoration. People may even become better educated about the need to defend the Constitution or reign in astronomical budget deficits. Expecting more, however, is only a remote possibility.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Sunday, September 12, 2010
Correcting Mistakes
My father was very strict. He did not allow his children to make mistakes. We were supposed to get things right the first time and every time thereafter. He also insisted that we learn from his mistakes. We were to do as he told us so that we did not have to repeat his errors.
As an adult, I have discovered that Dad was wrong on two counts. First, mistakes cannot be avoided. If we are to learn new things, we must expect stumbles along the way. Second, almost no one learns from the mistakes of others. We seem to have a need to learn from our own. Only these drive home the lessons that must be internalized.
Which brings us to President Barack Obama. His spending binge has been a colossal mistake. Whatever his aspirations, he is in the process of driving the nation into bankruptcy for the sake of economic and social policies that are destined to fail.
He could, of course, have realized this had he looked back to the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Roosevelt’s Keynesian programs, far from lifting us out of The Great Depression, extended it for nearly a decade. Millions remained persistently unemployed until WWII came along.
But Obama did not look back. So convinced is he of his left-liberal ideologies that he continues to celebrate the creation of millions of non-existent jobs. But neither does Obama learn from his own experience. He continues to blame George W. Bush for our economic woes a year and a half after he passed his own stimulus bill.
The question is how bad do things have to get before the president recognizes he has made some blunders. How many people must remain unemployed for how many years? Likewise, how high do health insurance premiums have to go before he acknowledges that ObamaCare will not bend the cost curve down?
Given the president’s demonstrated obstinacy, the answer may be never. But what of the Democratic politicians who walked over a cliff on his behalf? Couldn’t they have foreseen a downside to voting for an unpopular health care program or an equally disliked energy program? Wasn’t what happened to Bill Clinton during his first term sufficient warning?
Then too couldn’t they have recognized that they might be mistaken by observing the political tempest aroused by their actions? The anger of the tea party crowd was there to be seen, but it was dismissed as Astroturf. It was declared artificial and therefore unworthy of being taken into account.
For many congresspersons, this is a mistake from which they will not recover. It is likely that dozens of them will be forced to take an early retirement come November. For the sin of keeping their eyes closed because they wanted to believe their party leaders whatever the evidence showed, they will be denied reelection.
Finally, we come to the public. Millions of people trusted Barack Obama when he touted “change you can believe in.” They assumed he was a moderate who sometimes exaggerated his promises because he was a politician. They could have looked back the failed presidency of Jimmy Carter for proof that too much idealism can be dangerous, but they didn’t. They too wanted to believe.
Many moderates are beginning to regret their choice, but a majority of Democratic voters have yet to reach this conclusion. The fact that taxes are going up, not down, isn’t yet on their radar screens. That the president’s energy policies will result in exporting jobs, not in creating millions of good ones that remain here at home, continues to strike them as implausible.
People cannot learn from mistakes they do not perceive. Some moderates have had their eyes opened, but many members of the president’s party have not. Their aspirations continue to be governed by their hopes rather than by the evidence of their senses.
Let us hope that this does not apply to the electorate at large. Obama is an expert at rationalizing his errors, but let us keep our fingers crossed that most voters can see these for what they are. Unacknowledged mistakes have a way of making things worse, whereas those that are admitted can be fixed.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
As an adult, I have discovered that Dad was wrong on two counts. First, mistakes cannot be avoided. If we are to learn new things, we must expect stumbles along the way. Second, almost no one learns from the mistakes of others. We seem to have a need to learn from our own. Only these drive home the lessons that must be internalized.
Which brings us to President Barack Obama. His spending binge has been a colossal mistake. Whatever his aspirations, he is in the process of driving the nation into bankruptcy for the sake of economic and social policies that are destined to fail.
He could, of course, have realized this had he looked back to the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. Roosevelt’s Keynesian programs, far from lifting us out of The Great Depression, extended it for nearly a decade. Millions remained persistently unemployed until WWII came along.
But Obama did not look back. So convinced is he of his left-liberal ideologies that he continues to celebrate the creation of millions of non-existent jobs. But neither does Obama learn from his own experience. He continues to blame George W. Bush for our economic woes a year and a half after he passed his own stimulus bill.
The question is how bad do things have to get before the president recognizes he has made some blunders. How many people must remain unemployed for how many years? Likewise, how high do health insurance premiums have to go before he acknowledges that ObamaCare will not bend the cost curve down?
Given the president’s demonstrated obstinacy, the answer may be never. But what of the Democratic politicians who walked over a cliff on his behalf? Couldn’t they have foreseen a downside to voting for an unpopular health care program or an equally disliked energy program? Wasn’t what happened to Bill Clinton during his first term sufficient warning?
Then too couldn’t they have recognized that they might be mistaken by observing the political tempest aroused by their actions? The anger of the tea party crowd was there to be seen, but it was dismissed as Astroturf. It was declared artificial and therefore unworthy of being taken into account.
For many congresspersons, this is a mistake from which they will not recover. It is likely that dozens of them will be forced to take an early retirement come November. For the sin of keeping their eyes closed because they wanted to believe their party leaders whatever the evidence showed, they will be denied reelection.
Finally, we come to the public. Millions of people trusted Barack Obama when he touted “change you can believe in.” They assumed he was a moderate who sometimes exaggerated his promises because he was a politician. They could have looked back the failed presidency of Jimmy Carter for proof that too much idealism can be dangerous, but they didn’t. They too wanted to believe.
Many moderates are beginning to regret their choice, but a majority of Democratic voters have yet to reach this conclusion. The fact that taxes are going up, not down, isn’t yet on their radar screens. That the president’s energy policies will result in exporting jobs, not in creating millions of good ones that remain here at home, continues to strike them as implausible.
People cannot learn from mistakes they do not perceive. Some moderates have had their eyes opened, but many members of the president’s party have not. Their aspirations continue to be governed by their hopes rather than by the evidence of their senses.
Let us hope that this does not apply to the electorate at large. Obama is an expert at rationalizing his errors, but let us keep our fingers crossed that most voters can see these for what they are. Unacknowledged mistakes have a way of making things worse, whereas those that are admitted can be fixed.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Monday, September 6, 2010
The Mosque, the Politicians and the Jews
To be or not to be, that is the question about building a mosque in the shadow of ground zero. During the dog days of August this issue has ignited a minor firestorm. Nevertheless, it is very revealing of the state of relations between Americans and the Moslem world.
Those who propose building the mosque claim their goal is to build bridges between Islam and Americans. Moreover, they insist it is their right, under the constitution and laws of New York State, to build where they desire.
Politicians such as president Barack Obama and Michael Bloomberg have since weighed in on their side. They stress our need to uphold freedom of religion. According to them, no one should be denied the ability to pray just because he or she belongs to a minority denomination.
So far so good. Even opponents of the mosque admit its proponents have a legal “right” to do what they are doing. These critics, however, question the wisdom of doing so. Why, they ask, when there are so many other potential sites available, do Muslims need to desecrate the hollowed ground of 9/11?
President Obama’s motives seem fairly clear. Once more he is pandering to Muslims in the hope of healing the breach opened by terrorist assaults. His goal is to foster reconciliation by being mindful of their sensibilities. In other words, he bends over backwards not to offend them.
That this reveals a double standard does not seem to trouble the president. He asks us to be respectful of Muslim sensibilities, but why are they not supposed to be respectful of ours? Why, if the intention is to build bridges, are they kicking Americans in the groin?
More perplexing is the attitude of mayor Bloomberg and assorted New York politicians. They too have insisted on maintaining the legalities in the face of significant public opposition. What do they have to gain?
The answer is tied to another curious fact. Obama has been tilting away from Israel and in favor of Islam for his entire presidency. He demands that the Israelis stop building settlements in Jerusalem, but makes no comparable demands of the Palestinians. He makes a half-hearted defense of Israeli efforts to prevent arms from being imported into the Gaza Strip, but says virtually nothing about rocket strikes into Israel. And, of course, he makes an obsequious speech in Cairo during which he apologizes for imaginary American offences against Middle Eastern countries.
Obama is clearly not pro-Israel or even pro-United States. What is especially curious is that American Jews have not been offended by this performance. They continue to support him despite numerous actions that would seem to be against their interests. Even Jewish politicians in the New York, New Jersey area are tongue-tied when it comes to criticizing him about matters such as the mosque. But why?
The answer lies in deep-seated Jewish commitments to left-liberal politics. Yet this too requires explanation. Why, when so many American Jews are so prosperous, and so patriotic, do they endorse anti-American and anti-Jewish policies?
The solution is to be found in history. The roots of most American Jews go back to Eastern Europe, where they were systematically discriminated against for centuries. They could not buy land; they could not enter politics; they could not even live where they desired.
Given these handicaps, salvation seemed to lie with a then new political innovation: socialism. It promised to end discrimination by turning all of humanity into a single extended family. If everyone were equally valued, then they too would be liberated.
Unfortunately, this attitude has been carried forward to influence decisions where it is no longer appropriate. The ground-zero mosque is an offence against common decency and deserves to be opposed. Likewise, president Obama’s waffling encouragement of people who are not our friends does not deserve to be countenanced under the false assumption that this reduces international or inter-religious tensions.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
Those who propose building the mosque claim their goal is to build bridges between Islam and Americans. Moreover, they insist it is their right, under the constitution and laws of New York State, to build where they desire.
Politicians such as president Barack Obama and Michael Bloomberg have since weighed in on their side. They stress our need to uphold freedom of religion. According to them, no one should be denied the ability to pray just because he or she belongs to a minority denomination.
So far so good. Even opponents of the mosque admit its proponents have a legal “right” to do what they are doing. These critics, however, question the wisdom of doing so. Why, they ask, when there are so many other potential sites available, do Muslims need to desecrate the hollowed ground of 9/11?
President Obama’s motives seem fairly clear. Once more he is pandering to Muslims in the hope of healing the breach opened by terrorist assaults. His goal is to foster reconciliation by being mindful of their sensibilities. In other words, he bends over backwards not to offend them.
That this reveals a double standard does not seem to trouble the president. He asks us to be respectful of Muslim sensibilities, but why are they not supposed to be respectful of ours? Why, if the intention is to build bridges, are they kicking Americans in the groin?
More perplexing is the attitude of mayor Bloomberg and assorted New York politicians. They too have insisted on maintaining the legalities in the face of significant public opposition. What do they have to gain?
The answer is tied to another curious fact. Obama has been tilting away from Israel and in favor of Islam for his entire presidency. He demands that the Israelis stop building settlements in Jerusalem, but makes no comparable demands of the Palestinians. He makes a half-hearted defense of Israeli efforts to prevent arms from being imported into the Gaza Strip, but says virtually nothing about rocket strikes into Israel. And, of course, he makes an obsequious speech in Cairo during which he apologizes for imaginary American offences against Middle Eastern countries.
Obama is clearly not pro-Israel or even pro-United States. What is especially curious is that American Jews have not been offended by this performance. They continue to support him despite numerous actions that would seem to be against their interests. Even Jewish politicians in the New York, New Jersey area are tongue-tied when it comes to criticizing him about matters such as the mosque. But why?
The answer lies in deep-seated Jewish commitments to left-liberal politics. Yet this too requires explanation. Why, when so many American Jews are so prosperous, and so patriotic, do they endorse anti-American and anti-Jewish policies?
The solution is to be found in history. The roots of most American Jews go back to Eastern Europe, where they were systematically discriminated against for centuries. They could not buy land; they could not enter politics; they could not even live where they desired.
Given these handicaps, salvation seemed to lie with a then new political innovation: socialism. It promised to end discrimination by turning all of humanity into a single extended family. If everyone were equally valued, then they too would be liberated.
Unfortunately, this attitude has been carried forward to influence decisions where it is no longer appropriate. The ground-zero mosque is an offence against common decency and deserves to be opposed. Likewise, president Obama’s waffling encouragement of people who are not our friends does not deserve to be countenanced under the false assumption that this reduces international or inter-religious tensions.
Melvyn L. Fein. Ph.D.
Professor of Sociology
Kennesaw State University
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