While cutting up a downed maple tree today, ( the pond was frozen), I was musing about the subtlety of modern slavery. An editorial in the Sunday paper cited some very brief quotes from Alexis de Tocqueville regarding freedom and the benevolent dictatorship of the modern state. De Tocqueville’s concerns about the tyranny of the modern state seemed an apt topic for a prepper to muse on for MLK Day.
Below are extended quotes from Alexis de Tocqueville’s “Democracy in America” (1840), Volume II, Section 4, Chapter IV. The title of that chapter is: “WHAT SORT OF DESPOTISM DEMOCRATIC NATIONS HAVE TO FEAR”. De Tocqueville muses about how the democracy he saw in America (1840) might be subverted. His musings are almost creepily descriptive of today. Here’s a link to the full text (http://xroads.virginia.edu/~Hyper/DETOC/ch4_06.htm). I encourage you to go read it for yourself. But, for brevity, here are some excerpts.
“It would seem that if despotism were to be established among the democratic nations of our days, it might assume a different character; it would be more extensive and more mild; it would degrade men without tormenting them…”
“…collecting all political power into their own (governmental) hands and might interfere more habitually and decidedly with the circle of private interests than any sovereign of antiquity could ever do….”
Note: that’s how he imagined that government would degrade you. They would meddle in your private interests, insisting on micromanaging your personal decisions — telling you what you can’t eat (soda in NYC), what your kids can eat (the Obama lunch rules), what you are allowed to think, etc.(PC culture)
“When no member of the community has much power or much wealth, tyranny is, as it were, without opportunities and a field of action. As all fortunes are scanty, the passions of men are naturally circumscribed, their imagination limited, their pleasures simple…”
Note: if the government can keep everyone (else) relatively poor, the people won’t have enough resources to DO anything (to jeopardize government power). All the people have, then, are the simple/cheap creature pleasures. “Bread and circuses,” or the modern equivalent: pizza and reality-TV.
“… an innumerable multitude of men, all equal and alike, incessantly endeavoring to procure the petty and paltry pleasures with which they glut their lives.”
Note: de Tocqueville saw the “equality” (of fortune and opportunity) devolving into the lowest common denominator — the base “pleasures” of human beings. What else would there be? Kardashians and gluten-free pizza. That would be all that mattered. Then, once the people had become surrendered to mere basal gratifications, the government would step in to make sure your “rights” to plenty of Kardashians and fast-easy gluten-free pizza were met.
“Above this race of men stands an immense and tutelary power, which takes upon itself alone to secure their gratifications and to watch over their fate. That power is absolute, minute, regular, provident, and mild. It would be like the authority of a parent if, like that authority, its object was to prepare men for manhood; but it seeks, on the contrary, to keep them in perpetual childhood:”
In a related a side note, while researching some potential replacements for the wife’s car, what stood out was how all of the car ads had as a common denominator: young adults having fun. None of them were shown doing anything productive. Today’s car buyers are depicted as big children with disposable income. Note the new Toyota ad campaign for their pickup truck (below) vs. a Ford ad from the 60s.
Truck as tool for ‘grownup work’ or truck as boy’s toy. One carries lumber to build someone’s house. The other carried lumber to build a bicycle ramp. Perpetual childhood is becoming normalized. People expect (if not demand) a life of perpetual childhood. They see it as a “right.” Few balk at the soft chains.
You can see the “perpetual childhood,” in that recent story about the 28-year-old “gamer” in Northern California who killed his mother in a rage over a broken headset. 28 years old and living in his childhood bedroom, playing video games. American culture has embraced the perpetual childhood goal of The State, thereby enabling it. Many parents nowadays seek perpetual childhood for their kids as if it were ‘best’ for them.
“(the government) provides for their security, foresees and supplies their necessities, facilitates their pleasures, manages their principal concerns, directs their industry, regulates the descent of property, and subdivides their inheritances: what remains, but to spare them all the care of thinking and all the trouble of living?”
“The will of man is not shattered, but softened, bent, and guided; men are seldom forced by it to act, but they are constantly restrained from acting. Such a power does not destroy, but it prevents existence; it does not tyrannize, but it compresses, enervates, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the government is the shepherd.”
This is the “benign” slavery which the modern state seeks for everyone — for their own good, of course. The modern Statist seeks to be The Good Shepherd, leading its flock to lie down in trivial pastures, beside the offense-free waters.
The political party that appointed itself guardian of MLK’s “Dream,” subtly and insistently imposes its own soft slavery: the slavery of dependence upon The State. How does one go about breaking such soft chains?
Perhaps one can work toward MLK’s Dream, by refusing to be the perpetual child. Choose to build, create, improve, rather than seek amusement. Accepting responsibility for one’s own fate rather than accept being managed by another. Expect to provide for oneself, rather than be a dependent (slave) of the State. Be real adults, not timid animals. Do not long for the trivial pastures, nor demand the offense-free waters. Build, create. Sustain yourself so you can help others.
—