Antifa at Charlottesville. Take care what you say about theses guys. According to the MSM, business leaders, and all right thinking people everywhere, these fine gentlemen are freedom fighters and above reproach.
A little over a week has passed since the Charlottesville riot on August 12, enough time for further reflection and for further details to emerge. For these reasons, and due to the controversy arising over president Trump’s comments on the riot, it seemed good to me to write a follow up to last week’s post, Charlottesville – A Few Thoughts.
Racism Is Sin
It really shouldn’t be necessary to state the obvious truth that racism is incompatible with Christianity, that it is a sin, that it represents a failure to love our neighbor as ourselves. God is not a respecter of persons, and neither should be the followers of Christ.
But while it shouldn’t be necessary to decry racism, and doing so almost feels a bit like virtue signaling, in today’s world of PC intolerance it probably is a reasonable first step, especially for any writer whose views do not comport with the straightjacket orthodoxies of the cultural Marxist goon squads that control public discourse at the moment.
The Heroic Alternate Media
The alternate media – or perhaps better, the truth media – has really grown up over the past few years. And by alternate media, I mean the network of bloggers, podcasters and YouTubers who do their work outside the mainstream corporate media.
These folks have done an amazing service to anyone, Christian or not, who is dissatisfied with the tired, statist line proffered by the approved outlets of the establishment.
Take Greg Hunter’s work, for example. Hunter is a Christian and by trade an investigative journalist, who, for several years now, has run his own one-man news organization USA Watchdog. The work he does on his YouTube channel is far better and more interesting than anything you’ll get from ABC, NBC and CBS. Below is his video from Friday, in which he provides analysis of the events in Charlottesville.
For an eyewitness account of the Charlottesville riot, I also recommend Stefan Molyneux’s interview with Rebel Media’s Faith Goldy. Thanks to reader Eric for pointing me to this video.
One of the major takeaways from both videos is that, yes, the white nationalists were violent and their worldview is reprehensible, but Black Lives Matter and Antifa aren’t so great either.
The MSM, on the other hand, wants very badly to push the meme that only the KKK is to blame for the violence in Charlottesville and that no fault attaches to anyone else. And woe to anyone who doesn’t swallow their propaganda, hook, line and sinker.
Which brings me to…
Donald Trump’s Reaction
At his press conference last Saturday, Donald Trump correctly decried the violence on both sides of the Charlottesville’s riot. This trigged the MSM to a degree that I’m not sure I’ve ever seen before.
The echoes of his press conference had scarcely died away before the hate started flowing. On Monday, Trump gave a more formal statement, apparently one written by professional PR types, that was intended to smooth things over. But the very next day he held an epic press conference at Trump Tower in which he again blamed both sides – the white nationalists and the Black Lives Matter / Antifa counter protesters – for the violence.
If you accept the MSM’s account of the presser, you’d think Trump was some racist, Nazi sympathizing freak show. But this is simply so much hooey.
Trump never defended the ideas of the neo Nazis. In fact, he specifically said at one point during the press conference, “I’m not talking about the neo-Nazis and white nationalists, because they should be condemned totally.”
What he did say is that the neo-Nazis were not solely to blame for the violence, but that there was violence on both sides. This is objectively true as eyewitness accounts and photos clearly show. But the cult Marxists in the MSM, and the cowards in the corporate C-Suites aren’t interested in hearing the truth. They want propaganda that will push their narrative.
At one point, Trump challenged one the reporters attacking his statements to define the term “alt-right.” Trump has been attacked of being sympathetic to the alt-right, but it’s doubtful if many of his accusers have a clear idea in mind of what the alt-right even is. The folks in the MSM just know it’s evil. They also think that anyone so foolish as to disagree with their self-evidently righteous opinions must also be an evil alt-righter himself.
At any rate, Trump was clearly the intellectual superior to the gaggle of MSM geese at his press conference. But you’ll never hear that from the New York Times. And don’t take my word for it. Here’s the video of Trump’s Tuesday press conference.
The Pathetic MSM
If the alternate media at times can be heroic, what shall I say of the MSM other than that they are generally pathetic and evil propagandists?
When it comes to the corporate MSM, any deviance by a public figure from the unwritten ritual incantations expected from them is immediately met by a shriek-o-meter cranked up to the max, with the poor fool who made the “gaff” mercilessly pummeled until he cries uncle and swears not to utter such foolishness ever again, cross his heart, hope to die, stick a needle in his eye.
It almost reminds one of the scene in Luther where one of Cardinal Cajetan’s henchman tells Luther, who is about to appear before the Cardinal, that he is not to argue with Cajetan. The only word that Luther is expected or allowed to say, so he is told, is “revoco,” I recant.
Well Luther didn’t stick to the prescribed script, and neither did Trump.
And just like the corrupt and evil Roman Church-State sought to excommunicate and burn Luther, so too does the corrupt and evil MSM seek to, in a manner of speaking, excommunicate and burn the Donald.
One of the funniest reactions I saw was a push alert that came through on my cell phone following Trump’s Tuesday press conference from the Wall Street Journal which read, “”During combative press conference, President Trump again blamed both sides for Virginia violence.” Perhaps it’s just me, but it sounded almost as if the WSJ was exasperated with Trump who again failed to get the ritual incantation right. You know, the one where all the evil in the world is laid at the feet of white racists, while opposition groups, no matter how violent or foul-mouthed, are never called to account.
The New York Times ran the asinine headline “Trump Gives White Supremacists an Unequivocal Boost,” as if he were somehow wrong to equate violent, “activists protesting racism with the neo-Nazis and white supremacists.” Here’s a couple of pictures from the Charlottesville demonstrations. Isn’t the difference between them just obvious (sarcasm alert)?
White Nationalists at Charlottesville
Antifa at Charlottesville
Okay, the neo-Nazis do seem to have better shields, but neither group looks like the sort of people I’d want to hang out with. Here’s another picture of the lovely folks of Antifa, one of whom is throwing a newspaper box. Doubtless, model citizens all.
In all fairness, there are some MSM reporters who attempt to tell the truth, but they quickly find themselves the targets of the SJW thought police.
The New York Time’s Sheryl Gay Stolberg came under attack last week for her tweet that accused Antifa of being just as hated filled as the alt-right demonstrators. She even noted that Antifa was beating the demonstrators as they were being led out of the park.
It didn’t take long for her to feel the wrath of the SJW left and backtrack on her original tweet.
C-Suite Virtue Signalers
When Trump failed to say the magic words at his initial press conference on Saturday, the business community was quick to bail on him.
Merck CEO Kenneth C. Frazier, the first of a number a CEOs who resigned from Trump’s American Manufacturing Council, said, “America’s leaders must honor our fundamental values by clearly rejecting expression of hatred, bigotry and group supremacy, which run counter to the American ideal that all people (sic) are created equal.”
Well, if all people (sic) are created equal, then all are equally liable for criticism when they go wrong. If it’s right to condemn the KKK for violence and hatred, it’s right to condemn Black Lives Matter and Antifa for spreading violence and hatred.
Globalist ne’er-do-well Larry Summers helpfully chimed in that CEOs who did remain on Trump’s council were “on the wrong side of history.” He also went on to say that Trump’s remarks constituted “traducing basic American traditions of justice, inclusion, and fairness.” Apparently “fairness” in the mind of Summers means violent leftists never being called to account or having to say they’re sorry.
Possible 2020 presidential candidate and tech-left crown prince Mark Zuckerberg noted “It’s a disgrace that we still need to say that neo-Nazis and white supremacists are wrong – as if this is somehow not obvious.” It is obvious, on that we would agree. But it’s disturbing to this author that apparently it is not obvious to Zuckerberg that Antifa and Black Lives Matter are likewise wrong. It would seem that their calls for, and actual carrying out of, violence is just find with him.
The Uselessness of Mainstream Conservatives
Mainstream conservatives are generally useless when it comes to defending liberty. That this is the case was driven home once again by Charles Krauthammer’s comments on a Fox News broadcast last week. Krauthammer, incensed at Trump’s comments in his Tuesday press conference where he blamed both sides for the violence in Charlottesville, noted that all modern presidents, Woodrow Wilson excepted, understood that here was something unique about white supremacy, the KKK and Nazism, and that this uniqueness – Krauthammer never explained exactly what he meant by uniqueness – and that this unexplained uniqueness meant that Trump’s comments, which ignored said unexplained uniqueness, were a moral disgrace.
This is exactly the sort of fuzzy, imprecise, unsystematic conservative thinking that John Robbins criticized in his essay Conservatism: An Autopsy. If it is right to criticize the KKK for their putrid philosophy and hateful words and behavior, it is right to criticize Antifa anarchists for their tyrannical ideas and thuggish ways. This mystic, ineffable “something unique” that Krauthammer uses to justify his criticism of Trump is so much nonsense.
God is not a respecter of persons. From this idea we get the Christian concept of equality before the law. What is wrong for one person is wrong for another person. Murder is murder, theft is theft, and thuggery is thuggery. And it is no sin to point this out.
The Attack On Free Speech
The most alarming fallout from the Charlottesville riot is not actual or potential racial violence that has or may come as a result of the confrontation, as bad as that is. Rather, it’s the attack on free speech coming from the so-called progressive left that’s really chilling.
The Bible tells us the job of the civil magistrate is to punish evil-doers, not evil thinkers or evil speakers. Free speech is there, not to protect the speech you love, but the speech you hate. There was a time when liberal understood this. But the age of the Safe Space has once again brought calls for censorship.
A Minor Legal Point
Lost in all the hoopla over the Charlottesville riot is that the white nationalists had a legal permit to hold a demonstration, the Antifa / Black Lives Matter counter protesters did not.
According to Faith Goldy in the interview video above, the police pretty much vanished after the Unite the Right crowd was dispersed and let the counter protesters go about “unmarshalled” in her words. It was at that point that the notorious car attack took place, the one that killed one of the counter demonstrators.
Just why the police left, no one seems to know.
And even during the time when the police were present, it appears there was little done by them to stop the fighting between the two groups.
This has led some to suggest that someone wanted things to get out of hand in Charlottesville. While this is speculative, it is a possibility that should be kept in mind.
The Gospel Alone Can Heal This Nation
In the end, there are no political programs that can heal the growing divisions in this nation. It’s not a matter of electing this senator or that representative or passing healthcare reform.
Beginning in the 16th century, Western Civilization was created by the widespread preaching of and belief in the Gospel of Justification by Faith Alone. But in the 19th century, the West made the fatal error of rejecting Christ in favor of secular philosophy, and has been in collapse mode ever since. Today, few people in the West believe the doctrines of grace as taught by Luther, Calvin and others, so it should come as no surprise that the whole Western enterprise is collapsing around us. After all, when the very thing that created and sustained the West has all but disappeared, no one should be surprised when the civilization itself begins to vanish.
As Christians, we are called not to political action, but to preaching the truth. Perhaps God will once again bring Reformation to the West and push back the darkening night. Or perhaps God is done with the West and is preparing to judge it. This writer is not in a position to say one way or another.
But whether the United States and the West are preserved or whether they collapses into ruin, as Christians we must speak the truth of the Gospel and of the whole counsel of God.
Lux Lucet 
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