The Institute of Fear
Despite the eloquent words so famously spoken by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in his first inaugural address of early March 1933, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself“, the genuine implication or appropriate connotation of the statement is totally bull. The reason for Roosevelt’s inspirational words was merely to provide encouragement and optimism to the American citizens who were mired in the dismal depths of the Great Depression.
In reality, fear is the great capitulator. In fear many people surrender. In fear, most every living thing will acquiesce. Panic is simply fear exacerbated. In fear, people begin to relent to authority and relinquish power and control. The coronavirus is a prime example of surrendering to power. Out of fear, people abandoned civil liberties, followed orders never, ever commanded previously and many have even cast themselves willingly into the throws of poverty.
Governors, mayors, and commissioners have enacted laws and decrees well beyond their capacity to do so. Irrespective of condition, situation, or circumstance, none of these people had or have the authority, sanction, or right to defy the Constitution of the United States and the guaranteed rights within them. Yet they did, and most people abdicated - at least and certainly in the beginning.
The political community at all levels metamorphosed into a case of civil disobedience. Guidelines based on the best science can be issued, recommendations made and strategies suggested, but disregarding the constitution is illegal – it is why ”We the People” is a just and rightful American institution. I am less familiar with Canada’s Charter of Rights and Freedoms, but I am confident it holds some of these same unbreakable assurances and supported values.
As a result, I suspect, that once the panic subsides, and all the truth is revealed many politicians will be facing lawsuits. Then there are the people of false virtue. They shame and disgrace others in the name of their own self-made goodness and righteousness. They collect at the well of their self-proclaimed rectitude and lay humiliation and indignities on those they disagree with.
They feel good about their own goodness and how others of different thought are somehow wicked and evil. Compromise, consideration, and compassion in hearing out those proclaimed as impious relative to their virtuous groupthink must never be an option. How sad they will feel if the realization ever strikes - the likelihood of such is most unlikely.
This is also the exact same political path of the climate change folly. Fear has effectively reared its ugly head and many turn to those that know not the power of love, but only the love of power.
Perhaps FDR’s quote should have been “The thing we have to fear is the fiendish things that fear often brings.”