A Conflict of Values

by

Gadfly

                Yesterday, I received a report about a member of the U.S. Navy who was discharged for dishonoring our National Anthem.  According to The Florida Times-Union,

On Sept. 19, [2017] Petty Officer 2nd Class Janaye Ervin reportedly refused to salute during “morning colors,” a daily 8 a.m. raising of the flag, a Navy spokesman told The Washington Post. . . .

She gave an interview to International Business Times in which she said she was checking the latest news before starting work for government contractor Leidos at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickham in Hawaii and saw a report on the death of a black man who was shot and killed by a local police officer on a road in Tulsa, Okla.

“That was the last story I saw before the song started playing, and I was really sad and I just didn’t want to stand at that moment,” Ervin said

.

She thought, “I can’t stand for this song knowing that the song isn’t for me, being black. The song doesn’t represent me at all.”

Obviously, Ervin experienced a serious conflict of values.  One can only infer that the values in conflict were patriotism and group identity.  Ervin’s notion of patriotism was to a more perfect union, one that promotes equality and retributive justice based on the ghost of slavery.

 

The institution of slavery is too often demagogued without the historical context.  Slavery was a global institution at the time.  Our nation’s Founders recognized the immorality of this institution, and in the Declaration of Independence declared “all men are created equal.”  There were no qualifiers.  They were optimistic that, in time, the slavery issue would be resolved.

The other value is group identity.  This is very tribal.  It also reflects a distinction Hayek makes in Fatal Conceit:  The Errors of Socialism.  That is, societies reflect a set of behaviors that span a continuum from instinct to reason.  To manage the tension between these ends of the spectrum, customs, norms, and traditions are created.  Thus, to base an analysis of the world from a group identity perspective reflects an “instinct” orientation that is resistant to facts contrary to reason in favor of what one wants to believe.

Ervin’s little episode brought back a memory from 1976.  My wife, two daughters and I were stationed at Goodfellow Air Force Base in San Angelo, Texas.  I was a first lieutenant serving as a personnel officer in the group that supported the School of Cryptological Sciences (a training unit in support of the United States Security Service, now known as the National Security Agency [NSA]).

The episode involved a conversation during a master’s degree course. About a third of the class were blacks assigned to the Social Actions Office (focused on instilling a nondiscriminatory culture).  Somehow, the discussion evolved to patriotism and the black students became critical of the concept.  I suggested that as members of the armed forces, not being patriotic seemed contrary to what was expected of the profession.  They disagreed.

  

So, I confronted them:  "Do you feel respect for the American flag and the Constitution and way of life it represents?"  They said no.  Then all raised a fist and said “our allegiance is to black power.”

  

I warned them that if I were to report this incident, they might be subject to disciplinary action if not dismissal from the military; but since this was a classroom, I would grant them the anonymity of academic non-attribution.  Further, if they had any pride in not being a hypocrite, they needed to adjust their attitudes or leave the profession of arms.

 

They were respectful and appeared to be listening to what I had to say.  So, I acknowledged that racism remained an issue and this rightfully justified the Social Actions Office they populated.  The key, I believed, was to identify racist comments and acts and then to educate when possible or hold incorrigible violators accountable when necessary.  After all is done and said, tit-for-tat moral reasoning will make us no better than we have ever been.

Ironically, shortly after this episode, I was appointed as an investigating officer for a racial incident at one of the two gates that allowed access to the base.  My preparatory interview with the Wing Commander, Colonel Norma Brown (first female commander of an active duty wing in the United States Air Force and later a major general), was interesting.  After a few moments, she leaned forward and bluntly asked me if I was a chauvinist.  I told her, “Ma’am, I do not know what the word means, so maybe yes or maybe no.”  She then asked if I resented working for a woman.  I said, “No Ma’am, I’m just uncomfortable working for a full bird colonel.”

To make a long story short, the car full of black civilians sought access to the base to meet up with friends at the Noncommissioned Officer’s Club on a Friday night.  None of the civilians in the car had a military identification card that would allow entry.  The gate guard turned them away and then alerted the only other gate guard with a description of the car and occupants.  A few minutes later, the car arrived at the other gate.  Instead of turning the occupants of the car away, a young airman began to intimidate each member in the car, eventually having them exit the vehicle to be frisked.  The frisking was completely unjustified. The supervising noncommissioned officer (NCO) never intervened.

There were issues with this incident that stemmed from a lack of respect for rules (trying to get unauthorized access to a heavily protected facility) and racism, but more so from a violation of other principles, such as discipline, accountability, and so forth.  Upon my recommendations, each black civilian involved received a personal apology from Colonel Brown, three NCOs received letters of reprimand (which kept them from promotion for two years), and the security forces squadron commander received an Article 15 (administrative punishment in lieu of a court martial—which kept this officer from promotion) for allowing an unhealthy and unprofessional culture in the security forces squadron.

There were no winners in the Goodfellow case.  In different ways, all the players involved made decisions based on personal interest that was not congruent with the common good.

As we observe the current jockeying of Democrat presidential candidates, some boldly push for reparations for slavery.  At least one now calls for reparations to members of the LGBT community who were earlier denied equal rights, such as marriage.  Sadly, the motivation for these calls is to generate votes.  “If you vote for me, I’m going to give you something.”  This involves robbing Peter (taxation) to pay Paul (redistribution of wealth).

What values are in play with these candidates?

 

Certainly, no single living black person in America is or has ever been a slave.  Nor has any nonblack living person in America ever owned a slave.  Yet, the notion of reparations implies that nonblacks (we hear a lot about “white privilege”) should pay for the crime of slavery to benefit blacks who have never been a slave.  The value at play here is equality.  Therefore, to achieve equality based on historical behaviors, today’s blacks must be made to be more equal than nonblacks.  Does this sound like tit for tat reasoning?  Absolutely; except today’s Americans—both black and nonblack--get to be used as pawns in order for presidential candidates to achieve political power.

To further argue the absurdity of today’s political left, a new movement is spreading across America, called civic religion.  In a New York Times article, “Preaching Faith in Democracy,” we learn that after the election of Donald Trump, co-founders Eric Liu and Jena Cane, formed a nonprofit organization called Citizen University.  As an example of the training, one of the disciples of the first cohort “asked those in attendance to raise their hands if they thought that liberty was a core American value.  Then she asked them to raise their hands if they thought equality was a core American value.  Then she said: ‘Think of liberty and equality on a continuum.  What’s more important to you?’”

This is the type of dichotomy the left likes to create:  liberty versus equality; socialism versus capitalism.  They make us think we can have either liberty or equality.  One or the other; not both.  In a socialist system, this is true.  This is why individual liberty is taken away to ensure equality for the masses by a ruling elite.

 

This dichotomy also explains why the left pushes socialism as a remedy for the evils of capitalism.  In their narrative, capitalism results in inequality.  Yet, even a socialist system requires capitalism for any production of goods.  The difference is who controls the production.  Greed exists in any system.  In socialist regimes, the ruling elite live like kings and queens.  Politically, capitalism is exploited by those on the entire political spectrum through the phenomenon of crony capitalism.  Socialism cannot solve these problems—but it exacerbates them.  On the other hand, a more comprehensive manifestation of classical liberalism mitigates them, especially within the framework of a Constitutional Republic.

As Hayek explains in The Road to Serfdom, socialists use capitalism as the foil in advancing their cause, when in reality, the enemy of socialism is [classical] liberalism—individual liberty, private property, limited government, and free markets/free enterprise.  I contend that respect for a Judeo-Christian tradition was inherent in the classical liberal political philosophy.  Is it any surprise then that the left tends toward atheism in addition to its criticism of individual liberty, private property, and limited government? The left also believes that our economy is best managed through government control, such as minimum wages and the various forms of price control, and through fiscal and monetary policy.

Many Americans aligned with the left do not know for what the left really stands, except as the liberator of the oppressed.  In Dedication and Leadership, Douglas Hyde (former 20-year British communist and news editor of The Daily Worker) asserts that socialism can not gain any momentum without minorities because they are the easiest to agitate as victims of a nonsocialist system.  This is why the left needs minorities and they amplify this notion through identity groups.  The training, which communists call education, is actual propaganda in so far as it inspires the recruits into adopting a different set of values.  They do this by creating a new language.  This is why words like liberal, gay, and so forth have different meanings in today’s leftist-controlled public narrative.  We are now learning that AOC’s green deal was never about the climate—it was a push for socialism.

The great political division we are now experiencing is a wake-up call and an opportunity to really understand what is at stake for America.  Even Jesus was tempted to find his kingdom in this mortal life (Matthew 4:1-11)—as we are tempted to believe in a socialist utopia.  Those who have faith in God and seek the truth, which is liberating (John 8:32-36), can overcome the illusions and delusions of those who preach faith in secular humanism and the perceived benevolence of ruling elite.

We should be respectful and compassionate to the maximum extent possible while taking a stand for the life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness given to us by our Creator.  Much of the anger and contempt for America comes from the left.  While we are expected to respect the innate human dignity in each person, we are also expected to admonish and rebuke behaviors contrary to the notion that all are created equal and each is endowed with the inalienable right to life, liberty, and happiness.  We protect these inalienable rights through truth (currently obfuscated by fake news), the rule of law (ordered liberty; moral duty in the pursuit of happiness, including the ability to forego special interests for a greater good), and justice (adherence to the principle: “to each his due”).

   

In the process, we need to discuss values:  what they mean and how they apply within our communities.  Yet, none of this will be useful if we do not have a fundamental idea of what America is.  This idea is based on the inspiration of the Declaration of Independence and codified in a system of government--a republic--articulated in our Constitution.

 

This knowledge has not been passed along for at least three generations.  Shame on us for letting this happen.  We can change this.  We have work to be done.  Let’s roll!!