Some people apparently think there are no fake victims, only real ones.
They believe that if all the oppression in the world were magically lifted tomorrow, people would suddenly become independent.
This is not my conclusion.
When I went to junior high school (it wasn't "middle school" then and
"junior" wasn't considered a dangerous pejorative that could ruin young
minds), the concept of a victim, as we use it now, didn't exist.
Can you imagine it? There was no special ed. There were no federal
funds paid out for each "specially abled" child. No one used the word
"victim." There was no such thing as ADHD. There was no such thing as a
clinically depressed child. There were no shrinks hovering around
ready to make diagnoses and dispense drugs.
This junior high had a cross-section of kids from different economic and ethnic backgrounds.
Did cruel things occasionally happen? Were there a few bullies? Yes.
Was it paradise every day? No. Were there injustices? Yes. But all
in all, it was a good school. Kids learned. Most of the teachers were
fair and just.
Beyond a shadow of a doubt, more learning took place in that school than
in a comparable school today. It wasn't even close, by any reasonable
standard of measurement, like literacy.
And in terms of the kids feeling safe and free (as free as anyone can be
in a school), again it was no contest. Things were better then than
they are now.
The word victim was never used. Kids didn't wear victimhood like a
badge. It didn't take a village. We didn't have the incomparable
advantage of knowing we were all on Spaceship Earth, and yet we did
well.
We somehow managed to struggle through without being taught about sex in
the classroom. No one told us about the need to respect every point of
view. In fact, there was no social training at all. We never sat
around in class and had group discussions with the teacher.
We all knew the principal was an idiot. We knew who the bad teachers were and who the good teachers were.
No one promoted "sharing and caring." No one.
By today's standards, we were living in the Stone Age. Yet, we got
through it. We weren't ever treated as victims, and we didn't know what
victims were. Kids understood they either succeeded or failed. If
they failed, they didn't make it to the next grade. It was stark and
simple. No one objected.
Yes, in some respects, school was a real pain in the neck, but we bit the bullet and kept on going.
If someone from the future had showed up and told us about ADHD and what
it was, and what the drugs were, we would have called him crazy. We
would have laughed him into oblivion.
Flash forward 60 years...
"Oh, but now there are so many more distractions. TV, computers, the
Internet, cell phones. And drugs, porn, divorced parents, guns, junk
food, advertising. Kids today need more help. They need more caring
adults."
No, actually, kids need schools where the rules are simple and stark.
You learn or you don't learn. You behave or you don't behave. You
aren't a victim.
Over the last 60 years, a culture of victimhood has become a major
industry. This culture, as it turns out, doesn't really solve very much
at all. It engenders more problems. It invents endless excuses. It
piles up baloney to the level of every kid's eyes. It gives a kid an
out.
The people who promote victimhood make their living by promoting victimhood. That's the clue. They're hustlers.
There are a few fuzzy boundaries when you differentiate between a real
victim and a phony one. It isn't perfect. Nothing is. There is no
system that can protect everybody. But, all in all, you're far better
off unloading the victim culture than you are expanding it.
And expanding it is what happens when the pros and hustlers take over. They're liars right down to their shoes.
Many parents are complicit. They're looking for an out, too. They want
to have outside people make sure their kids are all right.
The federal government and its allies take this point of view: if you
don't go along with the culture of victimhood, you're a monkey wrench in
the machinery of progress. You're standing up for yourself.
Once upon a time, self-reliance was a given. In order for it to be a
given, there had to be a concomitant principle: if you don't rely on
yourself, you're going to be in trouble. The two ideas go together.
People accepted this.
You pass your courses or you fail and repeat the grade.
That wasn't considered an onerous burden. It was a fact of life.
Then, there was a change. "I" was replaced by "we." That was the "new
idea." It sounded good. It sounded interesting. It sounded hopeful.
But it was a con. The "we" was fake. It wasn't about cooperation in a
family or in a real community. It was high-flying and political and
vague.
It was an out. It was a way to choose victimhood. In fact, it became,
over time, a way for voluntary victims to bond with one another. "We're
in bad shape, and we demand help."
And help arrived. It arrived, along many fronts, in the form of the removal of the need to be a strong individual.
That was the key in the lock that opened the door, so the old culture of self-reliance could flow into the sea and disappear.
"But there are real victims!" people say. Of course there are. Since
there are oppressors, there are victims. But I'm not talking about
that. I'm not talking about that at all. I'm talking about choice,
about choosing to enter the dim realm of the put-upon.
And if you don't think many, many people have made that choice, you're not watching.
When I was in ninth grade, my teacher told us what deus ex machina
meant. God from the machine. It was a dramatic device through which,
in a play, the characters were rescued from their terrible troubles, at
the last minute, from Above. It was a cheap trick.
Well, there are millions of people who, after choosing victimhood, have
come to believe in deus ex machina. One way or another, the cavalry
will come over the hill. They count on this. The cosmic lottery ticket
will turn up.
Just wait long enough, and the payoff will appear.
This has NOTHING to do with cooperation in small groups or families. It has everything to do with a gathering malaise.
This whole culture is designed to provide people with a way to fall back
on their weakest instincts. This culture becomes more violent and
vicious, because it encourages massive self-esteem based on nothing.
There is a ready excuse for every shortfall, an excuse for every
shortcoming and every crime---with parasitic intellectuals inventing
newer and newer reasons to exonerate all behaviors everywhere, under the
flag of tolerance and understanding and even freedom.
Do we need liberation from actual oppressive criminals and their systems? Of course.
Do we need liberation from people who surrender themselves to victimhood?
More than ever.
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