‘Their Collective’ Comes for Our Republic
America is a revolutionary experiment in self-government, one established as a constitutional republic in which democracy is the means to ensure the consent of the governed. The method of that democracy—i.e., voting—is detailed by the federal and state constitutions in order to safeguard the unalienable rights of citizens that the majority may neither infringe nor eradicate.
Tellingly, the leftists who use the prog-whistle “Our Democracy” tend to focus on the procedural right within our constitutional republic by which they delegate power to their elected servants rather than on the substantive right they have to “consent of the governed.”
If you enquire why the Left uses said prog-whistle of “Our Democracy™” and, ergo, shortchanges itself (and everyone else) you will be met with invective and accusations—everything but an answer. When one notes we are supposed to live in a constitutional republic, one affirms and asserts the totality of his rights, privileges, and protections as a citizen. But when the Left prog-whistles “Our Democracy™,” they are really talking about “Their Collective.”
During the pandemic, the Left’s rationale for this language trick is patent. It’s not just the U.S. Senate’s filibuster rule the Left loathes. They believe the U.S. Constitution, which prescribes the limited powers of the federal government, is an obstructive document that must be overcome to attain their radical socialist aims. Indeed, this is one of the reasons the American Left so admires and seeks to emulate European nations, which do not recognize unalienable rights that parliaments, et al., cannot vitiate.
Collectivist to its core, the Left believes the will of the majority—when in sync with its own ideological aims—must prevail, regardless of federal and state constitutions designed to protect unalienable individual rights. In fact, in abhorring unalienable constitutional rights, such as the right to keep and bear arms, the Left argues on behalf of collective rights such as “safety” instead. Majoritarian onslaughts on behalf of approved collectivist objectives take precedence over individual rights. Thus, by messaging “Our Democracy™,” the Left is endeavoring to propagate the fiction that the tyranny of the majority is a blessing rather than a bane of liberty and equality.
The COVID-19 pandemic reveals the Left’s collectivist, post-constitutional agenda. The exacerbation and exploitation of fear has coerced America into a collectivist mindset. Every message is one of collectivization, such as “we are all in this together” (sure we are . . . unless you’re a Democratic elected official). Individual risk management straying from the governmentally approved dictates (scientifically warranted or not) is discouraged, rebuked, and/or punished. For over a year and a half, federal and state governments have had only to argue from authority that they’re keeping you “safe” in order to infringe or violate wholesale your constitutional rights. How? Because a frightened majority supports tyrannizing the rights of dissenters—the collective has cancelled the individual.
Yet, even as politicians, pandemic policy “experts,” and their corporatist and media cohorts find new pretexts to prevent a return of normalcy and a reduction in their powers, the pandemic’s end is in sight. Aware of this, the Left and their “experts” and media cronies are making a desperate final bid to consolidate the collectivist mindset and establish the initial foundations of a social credit system, a la the genocidal, totalitarian Chinese Communist Party.
The current demand for vaccine mandates and passports are the epitome of the Left’s insidious “Our Democracy™” mantra at work. Pitting Americans against each other and dividing them along the lines of “vaccinated” and “unvaccinated,” the rights of individuals who seek to manage their own healthcare by not getting vaccinated are deemed dangerous; and they must be segregated into and accorded with steerage class citizenship. (Doubtless, this is why the Left refuses to admit people of color are among the least likely to be vaccinated.) Every argument and action is premised upon the collective’s power to coerce the individual into compliance, regardless of their rights. “Their Collective” lusts to trump and trammel “Our Republic.”
Yes, many—and not just leftists—will contend COVID-19 is a “once in a lifetime” pandemic, and that there is no slippery slope into the Left’s collectivist, socialist hellscape called “Our Democracy™.” These individuals miss the crux of the matter: the Left wants the pandemic to be the slippery slope into their collectivist, socialist hellscape of “Their Collective.”
But “Their Collective” must not be allowed to use the pandemic to invert the foundation of our free republic, which is the recognition and respect for an individual’s God-given, unalienable rights; and the consent and delegation of the sovereign citizens’ power to a servant government. Thus, the only path forward that will heal the rift in our nation is not blind obedience to “Their Collective’s” pandemic diktats. Indeed, it is to oppose governmental mandates for vaccines and passports; and staunchly defend the rights of all Americans to make their own decisions about how to manage their health care precautions.
This is not to say one need reflexively oppose any and all suggestions offered by pandemic policymakers. It is to recognize the difference between making one’s own determination; and imposing your personal decision upon someone else. (And, yes, COVID commissars, I am vaccinated.)
As citizens of our free republic, we must reciprocally, dutifully, and staunchly defend the liberty and freedom of conscience of our fellow citizens against the onslaught of the authoritarian leftist collective. Securing liberty for those the collective deems disfavored has always been difficult, and it remains so today when “Their Collective” is forging an authoritarian template to impose upon us. But defending the rights of the disfavored remains the first, best, and last protection against collectivism. When the individual, God-given, unalienable rights of all Americans are staunchly defended, the result is voluntary community, not coerced collectivism. And, as history instructs, without coerced collectivism the crimes of authoritarianism and totalitarianism would never have been committed.
Through the efforts of our founding generation, liberty and equality under the law became the core of our revolutionary legacy. It is that which we must bequeath to future generations of Americans. Defending the rights of the disfavored and demeaned is to defend the rights of all.
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