Are modern Americans tough enough to survive in united nation?

By David McElroy · August 9, 2012

The United States is the only country in world history (so far) to use nuclear weapons. In bombing two Japanese cities, the U.S. government killed close to a quarter of a million people — the vast majority of them innocent civilians. At the time, almost all Americans were thrilled at the slaughter and heartily approved. Today, a lot of us believe that what happened was unjustified murder of innocents. Which view is best?

When I was growing up, I believed the atomic bombings were justified. I know all the standard arguments in favor of them, because I used to agree with them completely. (Here’s a sampling of arguments on both sides of the issue.) I came to see the bombings in a very different way, though, as I started questioning the legitimacy of coercive governments.

Before I started seeing the world in a different way, I saw every person living in a land as part of the organism of a nation-state, so they were collectively guilty for their government’s actions. Now, I see those people as individuals, most of whom couldn’t change “their” government’s actions if they wanted to. (And I realize now that many of them would have wanted to.)

The 60th anniversary of the bombing of Hiroshima has been a backdrop for some thinking I’ve been doing for the past few days about the question of national toughness. It was sparked by an episode of a history podcast called Hardcore History on the question of how national toughness affects history. Host Dan Carlin talked about the issue of whether we could defeat our grandparents in a fight with equal weapons. Whether it’s a good thing or not, they were tougher-minded than we are.

By historical standards, modern Americans might seem like a pretty wimpy bunch. A greater percentage of us worry about privacy rights and civil rights and war crimes than ever before. As a result, our own government at least gives lip service to caring about innocent civilians in war zones and some elements of it try to figure out how to “balance” privacy rights with what they’re going to do anyway insofar as spying on us.

Most of those of a few generations back weren’t concerned about a few — or even a lot — of dead Japanese, German or Italian civilians. The attitude was, “If we didn’t do it to them, they would do it to us.” It was purely a mentality that saw groups competing to the death. It didn’t see the world as a collection of individuals.

I believe the more modern way of looking at things is more accurate and more moral, but it’s also less likely to allow a group to survive and defeat another group in a existential conflict. Does that mean that as people get more moral, a nation is more likely to fall to someone else — all because too many people care about doing what’s morally right? It’s a disturbing dilemma.

Many of the leaders and common people of the past weren’t concerned with the things we care about today. In fact, those who cared about basic freedoms were frequently seen as enemies. A frequently cited example is from a 1938 speech by Mayor Frank Hague of Jersey City, N.J., to his city’s Chamber of Commerce.

“We hear about constitutional rights, free speech and the free press,” Hague said. “Every time I hear these words I say to myself, ‘That man is a Red; that man is a Communist.’ You never hear a real American talk like that.”

Most of the people of that era weren’t concerned about constitutional rights. They also weren’t concerned when the U.S. military and its allies carpet bombed cities in Germany toward the end of World War II. In the bombing of Dresden, for instance, at least 25,000 civilians were killed in a heavy bombardment that served little military purpose. Our grandparents and great-grandparents didn’t much care. They just wanted to win a war — and that meant killing all the Germans and Japanese that could be killed.

So are we too soft and moral today? Is it going to lead to our downfall? Would we be better off if we still retained more of the barbarian in us than we appear to have kept?

It depends on what you value, I suppose. If you value national survival, the kind of barbarism associated with toughness is a great thing. If you care about morality, though, we’re moving in the right direction (very slowly). So which is more important to you?

For me, I’m on the side of morality and seeing people as individuals. If that view means that this nation can’t survive as a political entity, is that so bad? Based on what I’ve said about it before, you know that it’s not a prospect that worries me.

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If you have problems with high blood pressure, I’d like to encourage you to consider making serious changes to your diet. There might be some people who don’t have any choice but to start taking prescription medications for high blood pressure, but I’d like to tell you that I have completely eliminated my issue by eliminating all sugar and almost all carbohydrates. (A couple of months ago, my blood pressure hit 185/144, which was dangerously high — considered stage 3 hypertension.) By completely changing my eating habits, I’m down 22 pounds and my blood pressure is now in the “ideal” range — without taking any medication. In addition, I sleep better and I have more energy. Getting away from the sugar-laden mess that we generally refer to as “highly processed food” has been a life-changer for me. Now my challenge is to avoid slipping back into old habits — by eating in the dangerous ways that almost everyone in our society has come to see as normal.

When I first heard about this, I thought it must be satire. When I discovered it was real, I was appalled, but I still thought it must be a one-time thing from some nutty activist. But it turns out it’s the latest bit of pandering to a bunch of far-left activists who believe that a man can become a woman if he decides to claim he’s a woman. As everybody knows, men have prostate glands. Women do not. Period. End of story. Men can get prostate cancer. Women cannot. But political activists are so eager to pretend that a man claiming to be a “trans woman” is really a woman that they are insisting that “women” be included in public health messages about the issue. This is nothing but political virtue-signaling. If you’re a man, you know which parts you have. You know that you ought to be screened. Nobody is made any safer by dragging far-left gender ideology into simple medical reality.

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A state legislator in Maine has been stripped of the ability to speak in the state Legislature — and her votes are not being counted on legislative issues — all because she made a truthful social media post. Rep. Laurel Libby (R-Auburn, Maine) opposes allowing boys to compete against girls’ teams in school athletics and she’s become known for making an issue of it. On Feb. 17, she posted on Facebook about a recent example that she found outrageous. She posted side-by-side photos of a boy named John who competed last year in a state track event and won fifth place against other boys two years ago — and a photo of the same boy (now called Katie) who won first place in the same event this year against girls. Whether you find this outrageous or not, Libby is clearly being honest and truthful about the objective facts of an issue of public importance. But the state Legislature censured her. Democrats decreed that she could not speak in the House and that her votes would not count on legislation — until she apologized for the outrage of telling the truth. She refused and her constituents have been unrepresented in the state House since then. The people who promote this ideology are out of touch with reality and won’t rest until they force the rest of us to join them in this delusion. But even if you agree with “trans” ideology, you should be appalled at this heavy-handed attack on political speech.

The late Steve Jobs was at the center of our culture’s transition from analog to digital. He co-founded Apple Computer. He led the team that revolutionized personal computing with the first Macintosh. As CEO of Apple, he led the development of the iPhone and later the iPad. You would think the children of such a man would be surrounded by technology. But Jobs and his wife Laureen didn’t let their children use iPads. Their home had few screens of any kind. Even though Jobs spent most of his time developing and selling Macs and iPhones and iPads, he was home with his wife and children for dinner when he was in town. The family ate together at a simple wooden table in their kitchen — and there were no digital devices or focus on popular culture. Instead, he’s said to have guided his family toward deep discussions of art, philosophy and education — with no iPads to be found. If the man who guided the development of such products chose a different path for his own children, does that suggest that his digital experience taught him that children need human connection, not screens? And does it suggest the possibility that we might be better off if we made the same choice for our families?

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