The True Motives Of The Left
By Peter and Helen Evans (06/07/03)
In our last article (A New Class of Slaves - The Rich) we reported that "the poor" had enslaved "the rich," but it wasn't their fault.
The real oppressors of the rich are the left liberals (themselves usually rich, well-educated and privileged) who use the poor, manipulating them by their entitlement programs, to advance their own agenda. So, what is the motivation behind the left's cultivation of a dependent underclass? And if they feel sorry for the poor and unfortunate, why don't they feel a corresponding admiration for the rich and successful?
The answer is two-fold, but first, a little history (with the grateful acknowledgement of Michael Oakeshott's, "The Masses in Representative Democracy"). When the individual arose against the backdrop of Medieval society, the anti-individual also came into being. The anti-individual doesn't believe in himself and is afraid of his limitations. He seeks security in the collective herd and seeks relief from personal responsibility by surrendering his decision-making to the State. He becomes the mass man. He resents the free individual, and calls him "arrogant," because he is reminded of his own inadequacy. He considers the free individual a threat, and calls him "too powerful," because he is reminded of his own weakness. We've come a long way from Medieval times, and the mass man is still among us, in mass numbers.
You've heard it many times when someone says, "I feel important when I'm needed." Such people need someone else's problems to feel OK about themselves. These people are often the 'enablers' in our society. We bet you can remember such a 'friend' who displayed the dripping sympathy that tried to swallow you when times were tough, but turned into a hissing critic when you started to pull yourself up by the bootstraps. For what would happen if they couldn't feel superior to you anymore? Your success might actually become a threat to them.
When asked, the Left will respond that they create entitlement programs in the name of social justice and compassion for the needy. However, if we listen carefully, their definition of "the needy" is, actually, "they need me." Furthermore, if they actually helped the needy, the needy would become self-sufficient. Then, the helpers would no longer have the helpless looking up to them. They would no longer be needed. So, they have to maintain the dependency of their constituency to ward off their own feelings of inadequacy... not to mention getting re-elected.
By now it ought to be obvious why the Left can't sincerely admire the successful individuals in our society. Through some mass-mind failure of imagination, the Left cannot comfortably conceive of winners. Losers, yes. Victims... aren't we all? Exploiters, of course. But winners? No. That's too free, too dangerous, too much like getting away with something. It makes the rest of us looks bad. It needs to be kept under control, regulated and taxed.
So, one side of the Left agenda is to cultivate more of society that will make them feel needed, adequate and even superior. The other side is to regulate and limit those aspects of society that remind them of their inadequacy and weakness. Overall, their aim is to create a society that does not threaten their collective mentality.
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