jdyoung
2020-08-05 23:48:32 UTC
by Dr. William Donohue
On August 1, sometime after midnight, anarchists in Portland once
again burned the American flag. But this time they did something
different: they engaged in book burning. The book they chose was the
Bible. They burned boxes full of them.
Weve waited a few days to see how many media outlets would report on
what happened. One did. There was not a single mention of it on any of
the broadcast or cable TV news shows. And aside from the New York
Post, no newspaper in the nation covered it. The only mention of it
was on the internet; a few TV commentators noted it as well.
Had it been the Quran that was burned, it is a sure bet the media
would have been all over it. Burning Islamic holy books would be
considered intolerant. But burning the Bible is not, and in some
quarters may even be seen as meritorious.
Besides the media blackout, the larger issue for Americans is what the
Bible burnings represent. What happened last weekend in Portland was a
mini-Hitlerian event, plain and simple.
On May 10, 1933, 40,000 people gathered in Berlin to hear Nazi
propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels instruct university students to burn
books deemed offensive to the regime. They proceeded to burn 25,000
volumes, including those written by Brecht, Einstein, Freud, and
Hemingway.
During Maos Zedongs Cultural Revolution, 1966-76, the Communists
went on a tear burning books that undermined their efforts at thought
control. That was then. Now book burning is back with a vengeance:
books were burned last December and as recently as last month. Reports
have surfaced saying the Communists are burning books and burying
Confucian scholars.
Why are the young people, most of whom are white, burning the Bible in
Portland? For the same reason fascists and communists burn booksto
cleanse society of any thought that is contrary to theirs.
Rebecca Knuth is the author of two books on this subject. Books are
burned, she says, because they are an embodiment of ideas and if you
hold extreme beliefs you cannot tolerate anything that contradicts
those beliefs or is in competition with them. She says that by
burning books, you are destroying your enemy and your enemys
beliefs.
The enemy of the Portland Hitlerians is American society, which is why
they burn the flag. They also hate the Judeo-Christian ethos upon
which it is based, which is why they burn the Bible.
What do they offer as an alternative? Nothing. They are intellectually
spent, morally bankrupt and culturally deracinated. That is why they
resort to nihilism. The only thing they have going for them are their
allies in the media.
J Young
***@ymail.com
On August 1, sometime after midnight, anarchists in Portland once
again burned the American flag. But this time they did something
different: they engaged in book burning. The book they chose was the
Bible. They burned boxes full of them.
Weve waited a few days to see how many media outlets would report on
what happened. One did. There was not a single mention of it on any of
the broadcast or cable TV news shows. And aside from the New York
Post, no newspaper in the nation covered it. The only mention of it
was on the internet; a few TV commentators noted it as well.
Had it been the Quran that was burned, it is a sure bet the media
would have been all over it. Burning Islamic holy books would be
considered intolerant. But burning the Bible is not, and in some
quarters may even be seen as meritorious.
Besides the media blackout, the larger issue for Americans is what the
Bible burnings represent. What happened last weekend in Portland was a
mini-Hitlerian event, plain and simple.
On May 10, 1933, 40,000 people gathered in Berlin to hear Nazi
propaganda chief Joseph Goebbels instruct university students to burn
books deemed offensive to the regime. They proceeded to burn 25,000
volumes, including those written by Brecht, Einstein, Freud, and
Hemingway.
During Maos Zedongs Cultural Revolution, 1966-76, the Communists
went on a tear burning books that undermined their efforts at thought
control. That was then. Now book burning is back with a vengeance:
books were burned last December and as recently as last month. Reports
have surfaced saying the Communists are burning books and burying
Confucian scholars.
Why are the young people, most of whom are white, burning the Bible in
Portland? For the same reason fascists and communists burn booksto
cleanse society of any thought that is contrary to theirs.
Rebecca Knuth is the author of two books on this subject. Books are
burned, she says, because they are an embodiment of ideas and if you
hold extreme beliefs you cannot tolerate anything that contradicts
those beliefs or is in competition with them. She says that by
burning books, you are destroying your enemy and your enemys
beliefs.
The enemy of the Portland Hitlerians is American society, which is why
they burn the flag. They also hate the Judeo-Christian ethos upon
which it is based, which is why they burn the Bible.
What do they offer as an alternative? Nothing. They are intellectually
spent, morally bankrupt and culturally deracinated. That is why they
resort to nihilism. The only thing they have going for them are their
allies in the media.
J Young
***@ymail.com
