I do not believe in God.
I do believe in religion, and on its impact on our behavior.
With respect to basic human nature, my point of view is similar to what Thomas Paine described in Common Sense. Humans start out with good intentions. But as our communities grow, the odds are that some of our fellow citizens will succumb to the temptation to act badly. At that point, somebody has to impose order. In Paine’s world, that’s the reason we put up with the necessary evil of government.
Thousands of years ago, a few wise people recognized what Paine saw. The saw the need to create an orderly society. So, those wise people started to tell stories about unseen higher powers that could exact a price for bad acts. Order suits everybody to an extent, especially the people who have the most property. When the state’s ability to know what goes on and inject itself into daily life is limited, as it was thousands of years ago, it makes sense that anyone with an interest in order would try to find some alternate way to project authority, and consequences.
Consider the Ten Commandments. The authors were attempting to make life bearable and sustainable by encouraging us to treat our fellow humans with care. They seem to have been onto the Natural Rights concept a few thousand years ahead of their time. The Commandments needed to define the behaviors that can’t be tolerated if people are going to live peacefully prosperous lives. Let’s call that stuff “sin”.
Thou shalt not kill. Life. Thou shalt not bear false witness against the neighbor. Liberty. Thou shalt not covet the neighbor’s (wife, house, property, animals, etc). Property. The world will be a pretty unpleasant, unsustainable place if people’s worst impulses are not restrained. So, let’s just imagine that some omnipotent unseen force commands you to behave in a way that makes societal relations sustainable. Commandments are a pretty powerful notion. Mr. Potential Bad Actor, do you want to bet that this unseen God is not real?
This story of serious repercussions for anti-social behavior is believable only if there is an escape hatch. We know that people will break the rules periodically. So, if bad people do not stop dropping like flies, then the rest of us probably will not believe that there is anything to this whole God business. The solution to that problem is the concept of redemption. Well - said the wise folks who created these stories - if you tell God you are sorry, and you really mean it, you can be forgiven. You can get a clean slate, and we can all move on. Redemption is absolutely brilliant, because it preserves the possibility that the story one is being told about God is true and presents a totally practical path to continuing to move forward after people err (and are not immediately struck by lightning).
Generally, when Marxists are fortunate to put their hands on the levers of power, one of the first institutions they attack is religion. They replace the church with the state.
As part of their illiberal mindset, today’s Woke Neo-Marxists reject redemption. Any original sin is unforgivable. All of the concepts of the Enlightenment are invalid, in their mindset, because so many of them were promulgated by slaveowners. The original construction of America is invalid because the democracy that emerged and the protections of that democracy applied primarily to white, male property owners. The whole concept of objectivity is invalid because the concept was created by and suits the needs of oppressors. Witness the end of graduation requirements for Oregon High School students or the movement to end the notion in mathematics that there is a “correct” answer. In the Woke world view, the evolution of our system, our relentless search for a “more perfect union”, is irrelevant because of the defects that were present in our founding.
Redemption also has a critical economic implication. A society filled with debtor’s prisons is not going to be one that generates a lot of technological innovation. The law, and our culture, need to give space for mistakes, contrition and the clearing of accounts. Through the bankruptcy process, and our culture of risk-taking, the US stigmatizes entrepreneurial failure less than any other country on earth. We learn the most when we make mistakes. Empowering people to put those lessons to use is a powerful cultural advantage for us.
My favorite economic concept is sunk cost. Sunk cost describes investments that have been made in the past that should have no bearing on investments made in the future. As an example, you need a new house. You are in the middle of building one that has already cost you $1mm and needs $3mm more to be finished, but there is another house for sale that you like just as much that you can buy for $2mm and you can sell the lot with the unfinished house on it for $500k. Many people would trudge ahead and spend the additional $3mm finishing the house because they can’t let go of the idea of the $1mm already spent, when the second option gets them what they want - a new house - for $500k less. The best decision is made by looking forward, rather than backward.
You are probably wondering why the concept of sunk cost is coming up in the middle of this piece. One cannot embrace the notion, I think, unless one has absorbed the concept of redemption. The trader who holds his position waiting for it to go back up to what he originally paid is a classic example of ignoring the concept of sunk cost. He does so because he is filled with regret and cannot forgive himself for the mistake he made in the original purchase. Better to engage in a quick confession, wipe the slate clean, start fresh and sell that sucker.
The Left’s obsession with perpetual victimhood is a classic example of ignoring sunk cost. They do so because the leaders, especially those who say they speak for the Palestinians, seem to enjoy the fruits of that victimhood more than they would enjoy ultimate success. Look at the Jews, Italians, Irish and other immigrants who came to the United States in the late 1800s and early 1900s. They were excluded from certain neighborhoods, professions and universities. What did they do? They put their heads down, went to work, got educated, and eventually overcame those unfair obstacles to succeed both in terms of economics as well as mainstream acceptance. As the Alabama Crimson Tide under Nick Sabin do - Play the Next Play!
The Judeo-Christian tradition sets us up for a sustainable, prosperous possibility. We value each other’s lives, liberty and property - we value each individual’s humanity. Either through religion, or the law, we attempt to impose a perceived cost for failing to adhere to those values. The concepts of sin and redemption create the conditions for making this life as bearable as it can be.
The flip side of sin is Jihad. Jihad seems to have been invented as a way to motivate ordinary people to serve the imperialistic impulses of their leaders. Jihad is a political concept that devalues the present in service of eternal rewards. In the army of Jihad, one is told that the best possible outcome is martyrdom which leads to a blissful eternity. In recruiting potential martyrs, the jihadists are served well by the fact that for many of their soldiers, the opportunity to experience liberty, or liberation, does not exist. As Bob Dylan said “When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose.” Jihad uses eternity as the incentive to de-emphasize the now, while the concept of sin uses eternity as the incentive to create the best possible version of our lives in the here and now.
We are six weeks post October 7. There are signs that we will look back on the present moment as a critical turning point for the United States, Israel, and the West.
Almost of all the pro-Palestinian demonstrations are orchestrated by far left or jihadist organizations. The gatherings are not grass-roots driven. They will flame out as quickly as they magically appeared.
Almost all of the people attending these demonstrations have an incredibly flimsy hold on the facts, and are not actually terribly invested in doing anything other than going to demonstrations, which are kind of “exhilarating”.
Saudi Arabia and Israel will still make peace in the near future, after the dust settles, as the Saudis view what Israel is doing as being in their interest.
We have an opportunity to take attendance and find out which people in the world have a really hard time thinking clearly and distinguishing facts or understanding right and wrong. They are doing us the favor of proudly identifying themselves. The free speech that permits the worst people to raise their hands and show themselves has never been more of an asset than it is now.
Some intelligent Democrats are having an awakening on Woke. Remember all politics are about the margins. We do not need everybody to wake up, just a few…and a few are coming to their senses. The insanity of “LGBTQ for Palestine” is enough to make most people realize that whatever process created that paradoxical social justice warrior must be deeply flawed.
Israel has also had an awakening. They will no longer restrain themselves in order to placate their “friends” in the international community. The cost of that restraint became all too apparent on October 7.
The US and other Western powers will pay lip service to restraining Israel, but will not restrict Israel in any meaningful way.
Israel will finish most of their operations in Gaza soon. The number of civilians actually killed will turn out to be a tiny fraction of the Palestinian Health Authority estimates (not that anyone will know or care). A new regime will emerge that is considerably better for the well-being of the people of Gaza (not that any demonstrators for a “free” Palestine will care about this outbreak of freedom).
Israel will move thoughtfully and relentlessly down their list of threats, which means you don’t want to live at the Four Seasons in Qatar, or in Southern Lebanon, or next to Iran’s nuclear sites or oil infrastructure.
Thoughtful people will stop biting our tongues. In social, educational and business settings we will question the anti-liberal at every turn. We must all note those moments when we previously might have held back. Too much is at stake to hold back any more.
In the longer term, we are going to have to focus on changing a number of structures.
a. We need transparency from the social media companies on the ways in which they manipulate what we see in search and social feeds.
b. We need to look carefully at how college faculty are hired, and especially, how they are granted tenure.
c. We need transparency on the funding of our educational institutions, especially when the sources are foreign.
d. We need to look at extracting the US from the UN and the UN from New York City because it is such a waste of time and money for truly civilized people.
e. We need runoff elections instead of primaries to reduce the influence of the fringes in the major political parties.
In the meantime, remember that the fight here is against anti-liberalism. The reason to fight the fight is because anti-liberal solutions to problems, whether those problems are real or imagined, make the world worse. If you are trying to figure out who the bad guys are, there’s a good chance they are the ones wearing masks.