Philosophical Nazism in Canada

Thursday, June 9, In the year of our Lord 2011

Briercrest College, Caronport Saskatchewan

Finished this post, 4:14 PM

Weather = Cloudy but warm...ish

I have chipped away at this post every once and a while. I am now posting it.

I was talking with our new Philosophy professor, Jamie Muir, and the topic of the rebellious page in the House of Commons came up. It bothered me a little bit that I do not understand why Brigette DePape did this. I mean, I rationally understand that she has a different view than mine and that she acted on those views, but I don’t understand why she thinks so differently from me. Or, to put it more broadly, why so many people think so differently from each other.

Jamie said that Socrates and his students each came to the same conclusion; that people do not reason to understand but that they reason to affirm what they already believe is true. It’s an interesting concept, one that I can’t disagree with. All people are raised with certain messages and ideas repeated over and over and hailed as true. You never question these ideas; you just accept them on the authority that they are true. So things like human rights, multiculturalism, personal choice, and so on, are just accepted on the basis of authority and we never stop to look at the arguments behind them.

He also said that questioning these unquestioned foundations will usually cause a powerful and negative reaction. If you stop to question whether multiculturalism is a good idea, or dare to voice an opposing argument then society will quickly label you a racist and take action against you. Every society has these unquestioned and unchallenged popular beliefs that you dare not mess with lest the forces that be exile you or worse.

Every idealism group, be they right or left politically, is the same way. They start from unquestioned presuppositions and then filter everything in favor of those presuppositions. Anybody who disagrees with them then just isn’t thinking clearly or is insane. I thought he was joking, but he was not. The reason why so many extreme left or right wing idealists are so smug is because they actually think that everyone who disagrees with them is either stupid or has a mental disorder.

The militant idealists like the same-sex marriage lobby group and many of the women’s studies divisions in Canadian universities will use this this to shape society in how they want it. If you disagree with same-sex marriage then you are a homophobe, you have a mental disorder that creates an irrational bias against gay and lesbian people. If you disagree with feminism then you are a patriarchal chauvinist, you are so backwards and hateful that you need to be re-educated to understand reality, reality as the feminists choose to define it. I have heard stories pretty interesting stories about a specific University that has even started to ban certain literature that disagrees with the Feminist women's studies worldview. They will expel students who disagree with them and sue professors who speak contrary to what they teach. If you believe in God then our good pal Richard Dawkins has written an entire book about how you suffer from a delusion. This is the exact same philosophy and methodology of Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia, anyone who disagrees with them must be re-educated or put into a mental treatment center. The idea that the unquestioned presuppositions which they agree on could be questioned is unthinkable to them! But they do not start from a position of understanding the world as it is, and that is why they will always fail in the end. Popular presuppositions come and then they go, taking their ideological kingdoms with them.

So that’s all fine and good I guess, but then I started thinking about the church. How often do we do the exact same thing? If someone doesn’t agree with 6 day creation we call them Liberal and say that they need to be re-educated or that they are spiritually blind. How often do we do the exact same thing as the rest of society except in spiritual language? “The devil must have a very strong hold on this nation if even Bible Schools are questioning a literal 6 day creation! Those Liberal schools have gone mad! We need to make laws to ban every viewpoint except the one we have so that our children will never question our unquestionables and everything will stay as we see it.” After all, it’s not God’s truth can stand by itself or that God depends on us to make sure that nobody screws it up (that was sarcasm).

Troubling thoughts, interesting musings. Hmmm…

Not everyone can handle learning how to think freely. For a lot of people, questioning what they have always assumed to be true is a very frightening and even damaging thing that can cause great harm to the person. We all have ideas and concepts that we religiously hold to (regardless of your personal religion) and the possibility that these things not be true will naturally rock the boat more than we want. This is why Plato said that the philosopher should take great care not to harm others.