Often times we have referred to the Commentariat. Some folk have inquired as to what this is. Is it a club? A secret society?
Not at all. It is an informal college of institutions and people who presume incessantly to tell us who we are, what we should be like, proclaim what ought to be done and declaim what ought not to be. This loose collective is a self-reinforcing group who see themselves as leaders and intellectuals, a cut above the ordinary Joe. The appellation "Commentariat" refers to the tiresome fact they these folk are always commenting upon public issues, deigning to tell us what we should think, how we should act, and what we should be like. Needless to say, the Commentariat reflects Orwellian "group-think".
David Farrar has made reference to a publication by the Centre for Independent Studies which has put out a number of essays on the erosion of free speech in the West and the growing group-think which we often call "political correctness". One of these essays by Thilo Sarrazin, a German politician describes how the Commentariat can be identified.
The code of conduct in a society, which is not laid down by law, changes over time. It is to a large degree implicit and not subject to formal—or even openly discussed—rules. But those members who do not observe the code run the risk of being excluded from ‘the good society.’Media people listen to other commentators, which more often than not, are other media folk. And politicians. And intellectuals. This self-reinforcing network presents a view of life and of society which the Commentariat believes is self-evident simply because "everybody" agrees and thinks the same way. It represents the group-think mindset of a self-serving, self-identified, self-perpetuating elite.
Having and expressing the ‘right’ set of opinions about certain scientific, social and political questions is an important part of this code of conduct. Most people want to observe the prevailing code of conduct, but being busy with jobs and families they have no informed opinion of their own on most matters. So they think and believe what the media say they should think and believe. Politicians, on the other hand, read public opinion solely based on media opinions. Most politicians sincerely believe that voters think what the media write or say.
Media are made by people, and media people recruit themselves in a process of self-selection, much as lawyers, doctors or engineers do. Polls show that media people mainly listen to other media people. Endorsed by this self-selection, media people on the whole have a set of opinions that tend to be on the left of mainstream society.
Sarrazin summarises the Commentariat creed as he has experienced it in Germany:
Here is the list of political correctness in Germany. I think it describes the truth, but it takes some irony or humour to fully appreciate the list. The problem lies not in any single item on this list but in their combination and rigid application to political thinking:We could add to the creed. The Commentariat believes that religious people are feeble minded, credulous, anti-rational fools. It believes that state actions are always morally superior and efficacious than private actions. It believes in principle that the state is omni-competent; when the state is ineffective it is due only to resource constraints such as technological limitations or a lack of money. These can (and must) be overcome.
1. Inequality is bad, equality is good.
2. Secondary virtues like industriousness, precision and punctuality are of no particular value. Competition is morally questionable (except in sports) because it promotes inequality.
3. The rich should feel guilty. Exception: Rich people who have earned their money as athletes or pop stars.
4. Different conditions of life have nothing to do with people’s choices but with the circumstances they are in.
5. All cultures are of equal rank and value. Especially, the values and ways of life of the Christian occident and Western industrialised nations should not enjoy any preference. Those who think differently are provincial and xenophobic.
6. Islam is a religion of peace. Those who see any problems with immigration from Islamic countries are guilty of Islamophobia. This is nearly as bad as anti-Semitism.
7. Western industrialised nations carry the main responsibility for poverty and backwardness in other parts of the world.
8. Men and women have no natural differences, except for the physical signs of their sex.
9. Human abilities depend mainly on training and education; inherited differences hardly play any role.
10. There are no differences between peoples and races, except for their physical appearance.
11. The nation-state is an outdated model. National identities and peculiarities have no particular value. The national element as such is rather bad; it is at any rate not worth preserving. The future belongs to the global society.
12. All people in the world not only have equal rights, they are in fact equal. They should at least all be eligible for the benefits of the German welfare state.
13. Children are an entirely private affair. Immigration takes care of the labour market and of any other demographic problems.
That’s the list. In this condensed form, it sounds like a joke. But it’s not a joke. These are the hidden axioms of political correctness in Germany (and probably elsewhere) as I see them.
Every item on the list has a high emotional value for those who believe in it. The core of the problem is that partly moral and partly ideological attitudes are taken at face value and mixed with reality.
The Commentariat believes that the God revealed in Scriptures of the Old and New Testament does not exist. It believes that evolution is infallibly true. And so forth.
Contradict or argue against any of these statements of faith and you have become politically incorrect. It is only a matter of time before the Commentariat calls for "re-education camps" for the truculent and the stubborn.
God is a jealous God. It is far more only a matter of time before the house of the Commentariat is left to it desolate.
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