My good friend, a highly educated, life-long Democrat, informed me a few days ago that President Trump was an ego-maniacal, narcissist liar and that he had made a complete botch of dealing with the coronavirus pandemic. A short time before, at a family gathering, one of our dear relatives let slip that Donald Trump was nothing but a rapist (not racist, rapist!) and to add insult to injury, she apotheosized Michelle Obama’s “Becoming.” I felt myself becoming nauseous, so dashed to the bathroom.

The political animosity characterizing our society has taken a heavy toll on that quality of “respect” due to each of us, despite our opinions. Respect for the human qua human, is not an assessment of someone’s ideology or values. It is a mutually agreed, unwritten contract guiding the courteous conduct of interpersonal relations. However, the left presumes if we do not support their agenda, then we have defiantly forfeited claims to respect as humans. Nancy Pelosi demonstrated this by tearing up the President’s State of the Union address on camera. Conservatives no longer qualify.

For some time, I’ve struggled on, trying to maintain friendly communication (out of love), yet feeling intense frustration at the disguise I need to assume, in order not to offend my leftwing family and friends. One whiff of pro-Trumpism is enough to send them into a pandemic of hysteria.

Yet, if respect is established on a concept of human nature inherited from the legacy of Moses, Plato, Aristotle and Christ, through to the natural law and humanism of the Renaissance, it is a notion the left (via post-modernism) has chosen to deconstruct and possibly even eradicate. They have gutted it. All that remains for them is a mawkish, kitsch, Hollywood sentimentality reserved for those who share their Globalist, Left, LGBT+, victim-worshiping program, and hatefully excludes the rest of the population.

Central to respect is the traditional understanding of human nature based on truth. But, “Truth is not a left-wing value”, as Denis Prager reminds us weekly. Post-Modernism doesn’t accept there is such a thing. Truth has been demoted to mere opinion.  So, for as long as the fraudulent MSM enjoys their freedom to lie, for as long as the rule of law is a dissimulation and academia no more than a propaganda sheep-wash, there is no longer a foundation for respect!

The fate of former eminent, conservative British philosopher Roger Scruton is a case in point. In 2019 he was publicly slandered by “New Statesman” deputy editor, George Eaton and as a result there was a PC feeding frenzy and the elderly Scruton was instantly deprived of his position on a government advisory body. But the good man fought back, was re-instated and Eaton lost his job.

As conservative writer, James Delingpole remarked,

“For these leftists, the end always justifies the means. What does it matter if you use lies and subterfuge to trash a man’s reputation and get him sacked if it means you can claim a conservative scalp at the end of it? It is time we reclaimed our culture from these scumbags. They are a poisonous minority and we have surrendered to their bullying for far too long.”

But fighting back places a severe strain on one’s health. Sir Roger Scruton died of cancer less than 12 months later. He was only 75. Tragic!

Russian born British academic Svetlana Lokhora was smeared by Stefan Halper of Spygate. She brought a defamation suit against him, and the WSJ, NYT, “The Post”, NBC (MSNBC), “The Guardian” and “The Times”.  Sadly, her case was thrown out in February by Clinton-appointed Federal judge, Leonie Brinkema, who was also responsible for blocking President Trump’s temporary travel ban on refugees and people from seven majority-Muslim nations.

It is clear that reconciliation with the left is a pipedream! They reject reciprocal respect, based on a mutual agreement about human nature. They can’t have it both ways. They can’t demand our politeness while we are insulted by them. They can’t fabricate “crimes”, knock together “evidence” and call it “justice”, as Sidney Powell exposes. They can’t pathologize human nature into a slew of “selfdoms” and bank on us accepting those contortions as the new norm and conventional standard. They can’t butcher the record to fit in with their slanted ideology and pretend it’s “history”. They can’t stake out adolescent absurdity as the correct response to the world, and expect us not to interrogate their wisdom.  

If honorableness in communication is the shining standard we aim for between human beings, it has suffered the same fate as every other aspect of culture the left touches. It’s been destroyed. And that ought to make us very angry indeed.

Photo credit: Composita