After the tragic Saturday shooting that claimed 11 lives at a Pittsburgh synagogue, there has been, lamentably, a predictable response. Seizing upon the incident, leftists are blaming President Trump and his supporters for creating a “climate of hate.” In response to this and the notion that it justifies suppression of speech, others will say that only one man is responsible, mass murderer Robert Bowers. Yet there’s far more to this matter than either position indicates.
Let’s start by acknowledging that words can influence others. Sayings such as “The pen is mightier than the sword” attest to this, and it’s why we offer opinion and render commentary: We’re hoping to influence people, to spur them on to proper remedial action.
It follows from this, however, that some unstable individuals may take improper action, especially in a disparate nation 328-million strong. This is true no matter what is said. If you rail against thievery, someone may go out and murder a reformed ex-thief.
Now, killer Bowers was clear on his motivation: He was upset about the continual illegal migration wave into the United States. As to the influence of speech, if there had been a complete blackout these last years on talk of illegal migration, would Bowers have committed his crime?
Most likely not.
Yet it’s also possible that Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, wouldn’t have perpetrated his crimes had there been a blackout on discussion of the threats posed by technology.
In addition, it’s highly probable that
• “revenge” attacks on whites wouldn’t have occurred following the George Zimmerman/Trayvon Martin affair if the media hadn’t intensely focused on the case;
• the 2017 congressional-baseball shooting, the sending of ricin to Trump and leading Republicans, the attacks on GOP offices and the more than 600 cases of assault or harassment of conservatives wouldn’t have occurred had the media not expressed anti-Trump views;
• the Boston Tea Party and War for Independence wouldn’t have occurred if revolutionaries hadn’t espoused anti-British sentiment;
• the War between the States wouldn’t have occurred if abolitionists didn’t rail against slavery; and
• attacks on innocent priests wouldn’t have occurred had the media not focused on the Catholic Church sex scandal.
So should we just shut up and discuss nothing? After all, expressing beliefs on serious matters is “divisive.” Yet since there can’t be division without at least two opposing sides, the question is: Who is morally responsible for the division and the violent by-products of it? Is it the person who by espousing Truth angers lovers of lies?
Or is it espousers of lies who anger both lovers of Truth and misguided adherents of other lies?
This brings us back to Trump-hating Bowers and illegal migration. The leftist immigrationists would like patriots to just shut up and stop complaining about the influx of what they call “undocumented immigrants seeking a better life.” Patriots would prefer that they’d shut up, stop opposing border security and immigration enforcement, and cease abetting what we may call an invasion. One side is right and the other wrong.
It is the wrong one that’s morally responsible, indirectly, for inciting people such as Bowers.
Note that there are many good reasons to oppose the invasion. These include the monetary costs associated with illegal migrants; the crimes they commit and diseases they bring; the strain on our resources; and, most significantly, the nation-rending effect of rapid and irreversible demographic and cultural change.
In contrast, the immigrationists are dishonest about their motives. They claim to care about poor migrants, but what really animates them is power. Eighty-five to 90 percent of our post-1968 immigrants have hailed from the Third World, and the Left knows full well that 70 to 90 percent of them vote Democrat upon naturalization. Leftists are cementing power by importing voters.
The principle is, if you can’t get the people to change the government, change the people. It’s the most ignoble of things, using a foreign army to overcome the will of patriots.
Moreover, immigrationists throw salt in the wound by attacking those opposing the invasion as xenophobes, as uncompassionate, as white supremacists. It’s as if someone helps a criminal break into your home and then castigates you for complaining. It’s maddening. Certain unhinged people find it so, too — only, they may resort not to the ballot box but the ammo box, targeting innocents in the process.
Unfortunately, this division can’t be wished away, and there is no common ground. Whether or not the immigrationists believe in their hearts they’re right, they certainly act as if they were and won’t relent. As for patriots, we are right and know that the importation of a vast foreign electoral army to help destroy Americanism’s last vestiges cannot be accepted. These are irreconcilable differences.
Obviously, Robert Bowers is directly responsible for his evil actions. But insofar as there is indirect responsibility for an irrational act relating to an issue, it lies with those pushing an irrational position on the issue.
Virtually all the last years’ violent rhetoric and actions have originated with the Left. We’ll see more of this, too, since leftists won’t stop being what they are. At times, there’ll also be what the liberals called “blowback” when the issue was Muslim terrorism (the Florida bomber may be such as example). Then there’ll be the occasional unhinged, terroristic individual who blames innocents for what the guilty have done. That’s life in a divided nation.
Whether hot and international or cold and cultural, war involves having at least two opposing sides. Who is to blame? It’s never those speaking and advancing Truth with a civil tongue.
Contact Selwyn Duke, follow him on Twitter or log on to SelwynDuke.com
