Thursday, March 19, 2015

From A Wrinkle in Time to Red Dawn

As I watch the decline of our nation, I often wonder, how did we get here?  How, in my lifetime, just two short generations, did we go from a freedom loving nation to one of totally apathy?

Remember the book "A Wrinkle in Time" by Madeleine L'Engle?  The book won the Newbery Medal.  It used to be required reading.  My daughter had to read it when we were homeschooling.  So, I read it again, too.

The book describes a great evil, the evil has captured the heroine's father.  He is fighting the evil.  They arrive in the town where the father is imprisoned.  Each house is exactly the same, each child is bouncing a ball the exact same way, each mother calls in each child at the exact same time.  One child doesn't do it right and is taken away to be reprogrammed.  The heroine and company are horrified.

That evil, the one that the dad is fighting, is communism.  He won't allow his brain to succumb to the evil message of, "Just relax, we will take care of you, don't worry about anything, just let go, we know better anyway."

That book wouldn't win a Newbury Medal now!  It sounds like the current government play book!  We have actually fallen so far that the message of this book is a joke.  Many, many Americans see nothing wrong with the idea that they should just let go and that the government will take care of them.

What has happened to us?

Last night I watched the new, 2012 version of "Red Dawn."  (Yes, my husband beat me to the remote.)

It shows the total apathy of young Americans living their ordinary lives.  Then, their town is invaded by North Korea and these young people are forced to fight for their freedoms and their lives.

Many of their friends just give up and become communist.  It is so much easier, right?  The band of misfits, reluctantly, fights the North Koreans to take back their town.

One thing was noticeably missing from the film and it is missing from our lives - the reason to fight.  What makes this nation worth fighting for?

The United States of America is the greatest country the world has ever known.  She has produced more freedom, more justice, more prosperity, more equality, more wealth and more generosity, in just over 200 years than any other country on the face of this earth, ever.

Because of that, we have real enemies that hate us, hate our freedoms and want to take us over.  First, they want to lull us into a sense of comfort.  "Stop fighting, nothing is worth fighting for, sheesh, chill out, smoke some pot, don't work so hard, the government will take care of you, you deserve it."

Second, they want to demonize America and all of her successes.  The message is either, "you don't deserve all of that great stuff, you didn't earn it, so someone else should have it" or "America isn't perfect, so she isn't worth anything."

Either way, the question is then raised - is our way of life actually worth fighting for?

Finally, once we are convinced of our mediocrity and lulled into a complete sense of apathy, evil will just waltz right in the door and take over, kinda like they did in "Red Dawn."

Oh, hey!  Kinda like right now.

No comments:

Post a Comment