The Impotence of Humanism

One Man's Treasure Is Another Man's Trash

Well, well, well.  Who would have thought it.  The so-called Pride Parade has been torn apart.  That came out of left field.  The pretext for the Grand Dissolution has been the planned presence of the NZ police (in uniform) marching along with the grand Parade.  How did that Grand Dissolution happen to an event supposed to celebrate inclusiveness and tolerance by all to all?

It turns out there is an ostensibly "radical" group whose ideology calls for the complete dissolution of the Police.  Why?  Because in the view of this radical group's world-view violence begets violence.  Since the Police and the prison system use violence they must be declared VERBOTEN when it comes to their associating with the Pride Parade.

Here is a brief summary of the beliefs and ideology of  People Against Prisons Aotearoa ("PAPA"):

What We Believe

All the evidence shows that prisons don’t reduce crime. They take you away from your support networks, put you in an environment where violence is the only solution to your problems, and then expect you to come out a better person.

Prisons have never kept our communities safe and never will. They are places where people experience incredible violence every day. People take that violence out of prison when they leave and bring it home. Prisons make our communities less safe.

PAPA believes that everyone has the ability to change. No one is born a criminal. When someone has hurt others, that does not mean they are destined to keep hurting others for the rest of their lives. If people are treated with dignity and respect, and given the resources they need to survive and thrive, we can live in a less violent and more peaceful society.

We see prisons for what they are: a club to bash down poor people, brown people, and those who our society doesn’t want to make space for. Prisons across the world double down on inequality and make elites stronger. They are a fundamental obstacle to social justice and equality.

That’s why we are prison abolitionists. Abolitionists believe that prison itself is the problem and that prisons should not exist at all. We know that no matter how hard you try to change prisons to make them better, they still have the same effects.

We believe that there is a better way to achieve justice for everyone. Prisons can never be part of the way we get there.  

One can understand, then, with this particular world-view, why they have protested so vehemently against the NZ Police having anything to do with the sacrosanct Pride Parade.  For their part, the organizers of the Pride Parade apparently are split down the middle because they feel the pain of PAPA and don't want to exclude these revolutionary champions. 

There are plenty of enthusiastic would-be participants whose licentiousness wants to include anything and everybody, but they have hit a brick wall.   Or, to put it another way, they believe that in this particular instance the Pride Parade has gone a "bridge too far".   How deep and wide the split will be remains to be seen. 

But the whole shemozzle is very instructive.  Secular society has no core, no centre.  At best all its divisions and debates represent little more than perpetual clashes of cant, bias, and prejudice.  At best all it can offer is the rule of the plebiscite when any issue becomes controversial or divisive. 

Once upon a time Western societies would make a lame appeal to Reason to resolve disputes.  But Reason has turned out to be an utterly unreliable guide.  Reason is captive to premises.  PAPA, for example, has plenty of premises around which they duly reason.  All that society can say at this point to outliers like PAPA is, "Well, we like our premises and assumptions better than yours.  So there."

The Christian stands on an entirely distinct wall.  The Christian knows that all presuppositions rest upon the Absolute, Infinite, Eternal God.  Without this foundation, all debate, all reasoning, all claims from all types of ideologies, philosophies, and world-views are nothing more than cant.  Worse, one man's cant is another man's gospel.  So, have at it PAPA versus Pride Parade versus anyone and everyone else.  As Macbeth put it:

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more.

It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

Thus remains the discourse of fallen Man in full throated rebellion against God.  That, dear friends, is the real lesson of the Pride Parade and PAPA.