TTSR Twisted History

Discussion on The Thomas Sowell Reader by Thomas Sowell, Twisted History 

  

     One reason why our children do not measure up with those in other countries is because precious classroom time is spent twisting American history.  They hear things like “How would you feel if you were a Native American who saw the European invaders taking away you land?”.  This question makes kids look at the past with ignorant assumptions of the present.  You see, today we take it for granted that it is ‘wrong to take other peoples land’.  That was not the way the Native Americans or the Europeans saw things.  Battles were what settled land boundaries and other disputes.  The Asian, Africans, Arabs and others thought the same way too.  The Native Americans doubtless did not want to lose their territory, but that is different from not wanting to fight for it.

     Today’s child cannot possibly put himself or herself in the mindset of Indians centuries ago, without infinitely more knowledge of history than our schools have ever taught ^[1].  

     Comprehension however, is not the reason for such a question.  It is asked to score points against Western society and thus, propaganda replaces education.

     Schools are not the only history twisters for ideological points.  The headline for The New York Times’s book review section in its December 14, 2004 issue was “Never Forget That They Owned Lots of Slaves”.  An indictment of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson was on the inside.

     Every race has practiced enslavement ^[A]. Even after the American blacks were freed, white people were still being enslaved in the Ottoman Empire.

     Now no one liked the idea of becoming a slave, but few had any objections to making them.  Slavery itself was not an issue until the 18^th century, and even then it was a Western issue only.  When it did become a dispute, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Patrick Henry were among the most outstanding freedom fighters at the time. You could research all of 18^th century Africa or Asia or the Middle East without finding any comparable rejection of slavery there ^[2].

     In 1862, the US Navy captured a full slave ship sailing from Africa to Cuba.  The crew was imprisoned and the captain was hung in the United State because of his violation of the ban on international slave trade.  At this time slavery was still legal in both Africa and Cuba ^[A]. This tells us that enslavement was such an absolute abomination to Americans at this time. 

     Even though the US had an answer for enslavement, they did not have an answer to the millions of slaves they already had. That answer finally came in the Revolutionary War where one life was lost for every six that were freed ^[B].  Perhaps that was the only way.  “But don’t pretend today that it was an easy answer--- or that those who grappled with the dilemma in the 18^th century were some special villains, when most leaders and most people around the world at that time saw nothing wrong with slaver.”

Sowell, Thomas. The Thomas Sowell Reader.  United States of America: Basic Books, 2011.

^{[1][A] Thomas, Sowell, The Thomas Sowell Reader, (United States of America: Basic Books, 2011) 18}

^{[2][A][B] Thomas, Sowell, The Thomas Sowell Reader, (United States of America: Basic Books, 2011) 19}

2 Peter 3:16  “…There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures.”

2 Chronicles 14:6  “He built fortified cities in Judah, for the land had rest. He had no war in those years, for the Lord gave him peace.”

John 8:34  “Jesus answered them, “Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.””

Galatians 4:7 
”So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God.”

Psalm 5:6

”You destroy those who speak lies; the Lord abhors the bloodthirsty and deceitful man.”


Proverbs 22:6  ”Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.”


TTSR Life At The Bottom

Discussion on The Thomas Sowell Reader by Thomas Sowell, Life At The Bottom

     Poverty used to mean a lack of food and means to protect your body while dealing with long hours of hard, unpleasant work.  Today, most of those living under the official poverty line are well fed to the point where they are more likely to be obese[1].   As far as work goes, the well-to-do people work more than those in low-income households.  

     Poverty is nowhere near as widespread as it once was, but at the same time, life at the bottom is no picnic, more often, it is a nightmare. 

     “A recently published book Life At The Bottom paints a brilliantly insightful, but very painful, picture of the underclass---its emptiness, agonies, violence and moral squalor.”  This book is about the British underclass district where the author, Theodore Dalrymple, practices medicine.  He is an emergency specialist that sometimes treats children that have been beaten severely because they tried to do well in school.  This happens in American slums where victims often get accused of “acting white” for trying to get an education.  Occurrences like this happen in areas where both the victim and hoodlum are white.

     Dalrymple’s own father was born in the slums, but not under the same conditions as today.  His father received a high education from materials that would be considered, by our present day Teachers Union, as too tough for the dumbed-down education system.  

     His father was given the tools to rise out of poverty while today’s under-class are denied them and excused for being in their present state.  They blame their plight on others who they continue to envy and resent.  The result is a poor generation that has trouble spelling simple words or doing elementary math, with no intentions of building good job skills.

    At the same time, their needs are being met by the Welfare State, while they are left with “A life emptied of meaning,” as Dalrymple says.  Indeed, if they cannot take pride in providing for themselves because they have no sense of responsibility, that is what they are with left.

     A summery does not do justice to vibrant examples and sharp insights in Life at the Bottom.  It must be read--- with the knowledge that its story, is our story[2].

[1] Thomas, Sowell, The Thomas Sowell Reader, (United States of America: Basic Books, 2011) 16.

[2] Thomas, Sowell, The Thomas Sowell Reader, (United States of America: Basic Books, 2011) 17.

Sowell, Thomas. The Thomas Sowell Reader.  United States of America: Basic Books, 2011.

Proverbs 24:30-34 “I passed by the field of a sluggard, by the vineyard of a man lacking sense, and behold, it was all overgrown with thorns; the ground was covered with nettles, and its stone wall was broken down. .... A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest, and poverty will come upon you like a robber, and want like an armed man.”

Proverbs 21:25 “The desire of the sluggard kills him, for his hands refuse to labor.”

Proverbs 28:27 “Whoever gives to the poor will not want, but he who hides his eyes will get many a curse.”

Matthew 26:11”For you always have the poor with you, but you will not always have me.”

Matthew 25:35 and 40 “For I was hungry and you gave me food…I was a stranger and you welcomed me…Truly I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me.”

TTSR Is The Family Becoming Extinct?

"The Thomas Sowell Reader" by Thomas Sowell, pg. 14,  Is The Family Becoming Extinct?

     For the intelligentsia, the family ---or “traditional family” as they say--- is only one of many lifestyles.  They seem to enjoy periodically announcing that the traditional family is in a decline, but is it?

     A recent census showed that traditional families--- a married couple and their children--- are just a little less than one fourth of all households.  That is no huge decline being that a decade ago they were a little more than one fourth.   So the doom and gloom reports on the traditional families declining are greatly exaggerated.
     Something to consider is that families never stay the same.  Kids grow up and move away.  Newlyweds usually wait to have children, if they have them.  Even if everyone got married and had kids, it still would  not add up to 100% of households.  

     These days, marriages are occurring later in life and many people choose not to get married at all.  Still, 53% of all households today contain married couples without in-house children.  

     Regardless of popular opinions, there are more benefits to marriages than to “domestic partners”.  Married people generally have longer lives, better health, less violence, less alcohol, higher incomes, and less poverty.  These are all stats that can be looked up, one place of which is the book “The Case for Marriage” by Linda Waite and Maggie Gallagher.  Although this is only one example of many, you don’t hear a lot about the positives of marriage because they are not considered to be “politically correct” by the media, academia, courts, and politicians that are trying to make everything sound equal.  

     A new census report on “America’s Families and Living Arrangements” shows statistics on just about every aspect of family, but not the basic data on the average income of married-couple families vs. “other family households” or “non-family households”.  Looks like the Census Bureau didn’t want to seem “politically incorrect”.

Family Statistics:

A woman that is shacking up is four times more likely to become a victim of violence.  Her children are 40 times more likely to be abused by live-in boyfriends as by their parents.

Family Income Statistics:

“The bracket with the largest number of men who are unmarried partners is the bracket between $30,000 and$40,000.”

“The bracket with the largest number of husbands is between $50,000 and $75,000.”

“Among married-couple households, the bracket with the largest number of households is $75,000.”

“Among “other family groups,” the bracket with the largest number of households is under $10,000.”

Sowell, Thomas. The Thomas Sowell Reader.  United State of America: Basic Books, 2011.

Hebrews 13:4  “Let marriage be held in honor among all, and let the marriage bed be undefiled, for God will judge the sexually immoral and adulterous.”

1 Corinthians 7:38  

“So then he who marries his betrothed does well, and he who refrains from marriage will do even better.”

Jeremiah 33:6

“Behold, I will bring to it health and healing, and I will heal them and reveal to them abundance of prosperity and security.”

Matthew 9:3-6 

“Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’?  So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together let not man separate.”

     There is no real marriage outside what God brings together.  When you marry someone, the oaths you make are to God, not man.   And that is what keeps two people so strongly united.  In Hebrew, the first letter of the words bride (כלה) and bridegroom (חתן) make the word כח , which means ‘power’.  God will give power (success) to the two that are made one.  Outside His marriage, there is no blessing of power.

TTSR Boomers and Boomerangs

"The Thomas Sowell Reader" by Thomas Sowell, pg. 12, Boomers and Boomerangs

     There was a time when Grandparents would move in with their children and grandchildren if they were widowed or had financial issues, but that time has past away.  Now it is very common for children to move back in with their parents once they have left.  Adults that left home only to return, used to feel ashamed that they were living with their parents.  Now it is becoming more popular for them to come back, unashamed, and with a family of their own.  Such people are known as “Boomerangs”.

     In 1970, there were about 2 million under aged children living with their grandparents.  Twenty seven years later, there were nearly 4 million.  This is a growing family circumstance in which 33% of the time parents are leaving their children with grandma and grandpa.

     If this is the way things are turning, what will happen when the last of the responsible generation, those who are taking care of the aged and the young, pass away?  The ‘Me’ generation will be left on their own with no one else to throw responsibilities at. 

     In homes where parents and children are living together, there are many kids raising themselves because their parents are to busy.  In other words, mom and dad are both out working on their own careers while their kids are growing up alone.  When asked about this, the most popular answer among parents is that they are both working to “make ends meet”.   “Yet, within living memory, it was common in working-class families---black and white--- for the husband to work and the wife to stay home to raise the children.”  Seems like it wasn’t a problem for them to “make ends meet”

     Are people so much poorer today than they were then?  Absolutely not, the poor people of today have luxuries that those middle class people couldn’t afford.  It is just that “Making ends meet” is an easy way for couples to avoid the responsibility of raising a child.  They do not want to because there is a system where kids get sent off to school and other responsibilities are taken care of by others.  Should we be surprised when there is no sense of parental responsibility?

Sowell, Thomas. The Thomas Sowell Reader.  United State of America: Basic Books, 2011.

1 Samuel 3:13  “For I told him that I would judge his family forever because of the sin he knew about; his sons made themselves contemptible, and he failed to restrain them.”

Proverbs 22:6  “Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.”

Galatians 6:7  “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.”

Psalms 127:3-5  “Sons are a heritage from the Lord, children a reward from him. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are sons born in one’s youth. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. They will not be put to shame when they contend with their enemies in the gate.”

TTSR The Words Of Fools

Discussion on The Thomas Sowell Reader by Thomas Sowell, The Words Of Fools

"The Thomas Sowell Reader" by Thomas Sowell, pg. 10, The Words Of Fools

    There are few statements that are as true today as they were when they were written, however, the statement “Words are wise men's counters*, but they are the money of fools” by Thomas Hobbes, has proven to be one of them.  

     Speaking words to convey a point or an idea is considerably different from taking the literal meaning of words so far that they are out of context.  “Take the simple phrase "rent control." If you take these words literally, you get a complete distortion of reality.”  The city with the oldest and strongest rent control laws in America is New York, but it is also the city with the highest average rent.  Evidently the “rent control” laws are not controlling the rent.  It is the same with government ‘Stimulus’.  The spending doesn’t stimulate the economy; so has the literal meaning become the words of a fool?

     Take the phrase “social justice’ for example. It is a term used frequently in politics because it has no specific meaning, yet, it brings up the idea that something is ‘not right’, ‘unjust’, or that some people are so much better off than others.  

     Some “social justice” supporters would argue that it is unfair for a person to be born into circumstances that make his or her life vastly different from that of someone else.  Maybe it’s true.  Suppose the kid that goofed off his years of tax paid education would have done differently if he had been born into a different home with different standards.  This is not society’s fault unless society is supposed to make sure that everything is fair and equal. 

     Every year a person will have numerous encounters with people, events, and opportunities that will shape their future.  None of these things are equal or can be made equal.  If this is unjust, it is not a “social” issue because there is nothing society can do about it. If someone wants to go far in life, it is their responsibility, no one else’s, to work hard, apply themselves to knowledge, and do the very best that they can do.

*Counters: speak or act in opposition to, response to, parry, hit back at.

Sowell, Thomas. The Thomas Sowell Reader.  United State of America: Basic Books, 2011.

Proverbs 17:16
"Why should a fool have money in his hand to buy wisdom when he has no sense?"

Proverbs 14:7 
"Leave the presence of a fool, for there you do not meet words of knowledge."

Proverbs 23:9  

"Do not speak in the hearing of a fool, for he will despise the good sense of your words."

Jeremiah 17:11
"Like the partridge that gathers a brood that she did not hatch, so is he who gets riches but not by justice; in the midst of his days they will leave him, and at his end he will be a fool."

TTSR A "Duty to Die"?

Discussion on The Thomas Sowell Reader by Thomas Sowell,  A "Duty to Die"?

"The Thomas Sowell Reader" by Thomas Sowell, page 8, ‘A "Duty to Die"?’     

     This chapter is centered on the idea that has caught on among some of the intellectuals that the aged have “a duty to die,” instead of becoming a burden to others. The government sees things this way, in health care particularly.  Take the UK for example, the elderly are given less care (homecare, medicine, operations, ect.) and they are also looked down upon in society.  If government Medicare spending is going to be cut back, it’s almost certainly going to be by sacrificing the elderly.

     So theres the governments reasoning behind a “Duty to die”, but how is it that some of the highly educated people have started to think the same way? Thomas Sowell relates the story of his Aunt Nance Ann and how, although she was homeless and moved from relative to relative, never once did anyone ever say she had such duty to fulfill.  So if very uneducated people back in the time of Aunt Nance Ann would never think about such a thing, and exceptionally schooled individuals today are thinking about it, not only freely but with a clear conscience, it would appear that it is the indoctrination of the government education system that is leading people to believe in “A duty to die”. 

     

     In society today, who do you see the elderly as?  Do you see them as people like everybody else, only older and less mobile?  Do you think of them as wise councelors or experienced learners?  This is how I see not only my grandparents but their whole generation.  And yes, they do need more healthcare than most of us do but they are the ones who have worked the hardest for it.  They have worked more and paid more taxes than we (the younger generations) have, so why should they be denied it after so many years of service?

Sowell, Thomas. The Thomas Sowell Reader.  United State of America: Basic Books, 2011.

Job 12:12  “Wisdom is with the ages, and understanding in length of days.”

1 Timothy 5:4 "...These should learn first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents, for this is pleasing to God"

1 Timothy 5:16  “If any woman who is a believer has widows in her care, she should continue to help them and not let the church be burdened with them, so that the church can help those widows who are really in need.”