When the first comment below was written, the article had a comment section though no comments were posted. That may no longer be the case.
Nov 14
To Kevin DeYoung and his blogpost on the recent revelations of the sexual sins of harassment and molestation that accompany our public figures. This appeared in the Gospel Coalition website
As with other social sins, what we are seeing with the all of the sexual sins from harassment to molestation is an all-or-nothing approach to the the problem. For a long time, it was tolerated and now all forms of sexual misbehavior from an inappropriate sexual comment to blatant molestation are receiving the same degree of public condemnation. And with that all-or-nothing approach is practiced by a society that is very punitively oriented. And it is that reliance on punishment that all but guarantees the problem will continue at levels that are too high. For the all-or-nothing approach to punishment will inhibit people from admitting they need help in controlling their behavior. And the all-or-nothing approach to punishment will give others a sense of well-earned self-righteousness.
My attack on our misuse of punishment should not be interpreted as a desire to tolerate sexual harassment and molestation. Nor should it be construed as a rejection of ever using punishment in responding to these sexual sins. However, we need to address our overuse of punishment in society. Inappropriate sexual behavior is not the only problem behavior that is promoted by our faulty approach to punishment, racism is another sin that is enabled by our overuse of punishment.
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Dec 4
To Rev Ben Johnson and his blogpost that says because the Puritans survived by trade, we should follow their example and employ free market and trade polices. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
What can really be learned from the Puritans' experience with collectivism and trade? Can we conclude that collectivism never works because it didn't work for the Puritans? Those who know logic would look at the question as a ridiculously rhetorical question. For how does one example prove that collectivism never works? This is especially true since collectivism vs individualism exists on a continuum so that most nations employ neither a purely individualistic free market systems nor a collectivist system. We should also note that there are a number of different collectivists systems. So what can we conclude from the Puritans who eventually used the Bible to justify the taking of land from the Native Americans they use to trade with?
What do the Puritans trade or market experiments teach us? They can only teach us how their trade and market practices worked for them in their particular situation. We should note that from near the beginning of the nation, the US embraced protectionist trade policies and those policies helped the US develop industries that eventually became competitive with their counterparts from other nations. The US employed protectionist policies from its beginning as a sovereign state through WW II and even employed protectionist policies during the Reagan Administration. So what does the above lesson teach us about free trade and markets in general?
We should note that free markets foster the idea of comparative advantage where each nation's economy should revolve around its current strengths. And such works great for developed nations like the US. The problem comes when a nation wants to develop for whatever reason. For development flies in the face of maintaining comparative advantage and protectionism allows that development to take place. To prohibit nations from employing protectionism in order to develop not only "kicks away the ladder," as some refer to it, that allowed currently advanced nations to grow and diversify their economies. It enforces an economic caste system on the developing countries. In other words, strict adherence to free trade only serves those nations that are wealthy and developed. And what we have to realize in the light of Johnson's attempt to use the Puritan's situation as an example for all to follow, the situation in which the Puritans and their Native American neighbors does not consist of the complex relationships that exist between developed and undeveloped nations in today's world.
Finally, we should note the difference between free markets and trade with Democracy. For the more that Free markets and trade limit government intervention, then the more they limit democracy when a government is a working democracy. We should note that not all governments that profess to be democracies are actual democracies. An example showing how free markets and trade limit democracy can be seen in the WTO threat to put exorbitant sanctions on the US because the US used the democratic process to require meat manufactures to label the country of origin each product was from. Thus, the WTO worked against the democratically expressed wishes of the American people. Another example could have been seen if the US joined the TPP. For the TPP allowed corporations to sue governments if governments passed laws that were perceived as costing corporations profits. And those lawsuits would be heard not in a nation's court of laws, but in TPP tribunals. Also we should note that the coup that replaced a democratically elected leader in Chilé with a military dictator did so, in part, in order install a free market system in that nation. Such is another example of free markets butting heads with democracy. Of course, we should note that since the US has become more and more a free market nation, not only has wealth disparity in America increases, but the US is now classified by some as an oligarchy rather than a democracy (see http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-27074746 ).
We should note that the Puritans' relationship with its neighboring Native Americans up until the Puritans took land from them did not show all fo the complex relationships that nations, both developed and undeveloped, can have. Thus, using the Puritans as a sole example for how we should act today while forgeting how our nation relied on protectionism in order to develop its industries is not conducive to employing sound logic.
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To Joe Carter and his blogpost praying the profit system as the only viable economic system despite any injustices it incurs. This appeared in the Acton Blog.
The above article by Joe Carter is saying that because of the growth and development that the profit system enables, justice is no longer a relevant issue when determining economic policies. We should note that Carter is following the words of the economist Arnold King in saying that.
Yes, there are many problems with Carter's article. But perhaps, the greatest problem is seen when comparing what Carter says with a statement made by Martin Luther King Jr when he spoke against the Vietnam War (see http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2564.htm ):
I am convinced that if we are to get on the right side of the world revolution, we as a nation must undergo a radical revolution of values. We must rapidly begin the shift from a "thing-oriented" society to a "person-oriented" society. When machines and computers, profit motives and property rights are considered more important than people, the giant triplets of racism, materialism, and militarism are incapable of being conquered.
We should compare this quote with what Carter is advocating because the criteria Carter is using is purely materialistic. This goes back to a comparison King made between Communism and Capitalism. While King denounce Lenin's materialism, he noted that Capitalism has its own kind of destructive materialism that is different than Lenin's. Carter's criteria for measuring the value of the profit system is purely materialistic and does not include the different kinds of harmful relationships, such as racism and war, that being so focused on things can cause between people. Thus, perhaps materialistic criteria should note be the only criteria used in determining the value of the profit system.
We could also add that we could employ the profit system in some areas of our economy and society rather than in all. Such would recognize that, like all other systems, the profit system carries tradeoffs and thus does not provide the sole solution to all of our economic problems.
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To James Kalb and his blogpost that pits the Left against a sound understanding of human nature. This appeared in the Imaginative Conservative blog.
The first problem with Kalb's article is that it oversimplifies as much as it misidentifies the left. Hope and Change was not the left, it was liberal. In addition, what the left observed about conservative Christianity is that it sides with wealth and power while claiming that it has all the answers to the ultimate questions of life.
The second problem with Kalb's article is that his conservatism becomes comparable with how Martin Luther King Jr saw the West when he spoke against the Vietnam War (see http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article2564.htm ):
The Western arrogance of feeling that it has everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them is not just.
With the way Kalb writes about the left in the article above, could we not easily substitute the word 'conservative' for the word 'Western.' And if so, don't conservative who would agree with Kalb join him as he speaks just like the pharisee from the parable of the two men praying spoke (see https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+18%3A9-14&version=NIV)? When we consider all of the violence that has been visited on others in the name of Christ, can conservatives who believe they are the vanguards for Christianity honestly believe that they have everything to teach others and nothing to learn from them while maintaining a significant degree of mental health?
Finally, when we talk about the left and human nature, aren't also dealing with how we should share society with others? The Conservative answer to that question is that we must share society as having a privileged status that entitles them to exercise some degree of supremacy over others. But how does such a self- image not promote violence?
But we might also want to question the conservative grasp of reality. For isn't their emphasis on limited government merely code for saying that they want to elect a government they can ignore. In addition, doesn't their emphasis on limited government carry with it the idea that when human nature can contain such vast amounts of greed, that those with the most wealth and power require the least accountability? Isn't such an idea contradicted by history?
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