Today I want to share a talk that a friend of mine delivered the Sunday before Memorial Day in 2017. He used Apostle Dieter F. Uchtdorf’s General Conference address, “Perfect Love Casteth Out Fear,” to counter the endless bombardment of propaganda that takes place at this time. My friend told the truth about the pro-state, pro-military lies that inundate us, preached the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and focused on the Gospel’s demand that we renounce violence and fear as means to achieving our social, political, or economic ends. In turn he also talks about the War on Drugs, the War on Terror, the US military, the idolatry of worship weapons as if they can keep you safe, missionary work, serving our enemies, loving those who hate us, and the way to build Zion.
Tag: state idolatry
President Oaks Taught The Principles of Anarchy at General Conference
This past weekend was General Conference and President Dallin H. Oaks delivered an address where he outlined five inspired principles of government which he taught are what make the U.S. Constitution an inspired document and why Latter-day Saints should feel some special loyalty to the document. Outside of the typical American culturalism in his talk, what really astounded me was that the five principles he outlined are not unique to the U.S. Constitution. They’re not even fully realized in the Constitution because of how the violence of statism limits or altogether prevents these inspired principles from operating to their fullest. But they do in consensual, non-statist government systems such as those found in libertarianism, anarchism, and voluntaryism. In this article I explore each principle individually, demonstrate how they are hobbled in the U.S Constitution, and how they are actually principles of consensual governments like anarchy, libertarianism, and voluntaryism because those forms of government allow these divine principles to operate at their highest and holiest potentials. In teaching these divine principles as the basis for righteous governments, President Oaks has inadvertently made the strongest argument for the rejection of the U.S. Constitution and the embracing of anarchy I have heard from any General Authority.
The Ten Basic Principles of War Propaganda
While most people are familiar with the concept of propaganda, they actually have a very limited understanding of just what propaganda is and how it works. If pushed to provide an example they might talk about World War I posters or something akin to them, maybe even the idea that governments might lie to people. But very few have the ability to recognize what propaganda is, what makes it effective, and how it is used to manipulate them into doing what those in power want the masses to do. This article aims to correct this limitation by providing a tool that people can use to analyze the claims and actions of the State and recognize when it is using propaganda to try and mislead or exploit the people. In this article I outline ten basic principles of propaganda, explain each element, and provide examples of them in action both historically and currently. Then, recognizing when they’re being manipulated by those in power the reader will be able to resist such exploitation, refute the lies of those in power, be able to defend their liberties from the warmongers, and able to cause positive change in the world to truly establish peace for everyone living in it.
The Origins of The God-State
There are many historical works on the rise of the modern State and the origins of its power. Many of them trace the development of the modern state from the end of the Medieval all the way up through the present day, drawing attention to how particular national and global crises – mostly wars and economic collapses – have resulted in the growth of the power of the centralized state as a solution to these problems.
As with all history, understanding these facts is very important to understanding how we got to where we are today. But in answering how they all too often neglect the why things are the way they are today.
Why is it that people have turned to the State for temporal and material salvation?
Why is it that men and women lavish religious levels of adoration and faith upon the State and its operatives?
Why is it that people have given it so much power?
What about humans and the way we think has convinced us, seemingly en masse, to turn to the State for salvation?
Using the writings of eminent psychologist Dr. Carl Jung, I try here to answer these questions; I answer not how the God-State came to be, but why humans have created the God-State in the first place.
Why The Governments of Men Are the Enemies of God
A few weeks back I wrote an article based on the writings of Dr. Carl Jung and his insights into the way that the very nature of human psychology makes the slide of the State , no matter how minimal or minarchist, into oligarchy and autocracy inevitable. This week I continue to use Dr. Jung’s observations and insights into the human psyche in order to explain why the above described operation of the State sets it at opposition to religion, to explain why religion and the State are always enemies to one another and why the State always seeks to control, corrupt, or eliminate religion. Dr. Jung explores how the State operates as religion in the lives of the people, promising salvation in the material world in exchange for the people surrendering their individuality and liberty to the politicians who run the State. Religion provides the ability of the people to have morality outside of the power of the State to control and therefore provides a challenge to the authority of the State which it cannot allow.
Christians, Guns, and Killing in Self-Defense
In the United States guns are an inescapable part of everyday life. Depending on what state you live in you could be surrounded by people either carrying a gun secretly or openly. Even outside the USA it is a rare country that doesn’t glorify its military and soldiers as armed heroes of the nation who do the work of fighting and killing which all within the country’s borders. The entertainment of the world is awash with violent heroes whose solutions to the problems of the world is to kill anyone who stands in their way and not even ask questions about it later. They’re just assumed to be right. Everywhere we turn violence is idolized as the ideal and justified in endless ways. But are these ways of the world also the ways of Christ?
The short answer is no, they are not. A Christian should reject killing, even in self-defense, and should instead rely upon the power of God as the only true source of safety one can have in the world. Guns, bullets, and bombs will never keep you safe. They are merely idols whose worship demands human sacrifice – your life or theirs. Instead of of focusing on killing or getting vengeance upon his or her enemy the Christian should be working to forgive and redeem his or her enemy.
The U.S. Constitution: A Covenant With Death, An Agreement With Hell
In American Latter-day Saint circles there is much idolatry over the issue of the U.S. Constitution. Most of it has to do with a particularly willful misunderstanding of most statements on the Constitution found in the scriptures, the purpose of government, the rights of the people in the face of oppressive government laws, and the supremacy of God’s law to man’s in all cases. American Latter-day Saints also tend to idolize the American Founding Fathers. Much is made of the Lord’s statement, “by the hands of wise men whom I raised up unto this very purpose,” that is for writing the Constitution. (see D&C 101:80) It is without a doubt that they were intelligent men. The writings of Thomas Jefferson are still worth studying even today. But that doesn’t justify us in not creating something better now than they could envision then; that doesn’t justify us calcifying out social, spiritual, political, and economic development because they could not imagine the next step in liberty and individual freedom. It does not justify us in idolizing the Constitution (or your respective national charter), ignoring the many ways it has been wrong, corrupt, and evil form the very start, and choosing it over that which is better now.
Why Latter-day Saints Shouldn’t Vote
This past week I have been laying out both the ethical and practical arguments against voting. In a political system dominated by State power and control voting to use violence in order to force others to live how you think they should is evil and those in power are going to justify doing whatever they want whether the people support it or not so voting is meaningless. Here though I dig into the deeper, theological reasons against voting in a statist political system. The scriptures teach us that the power of the governments of the world come from Satan, not God. Likewise, the State sets itself into opposition to God by teaching men and women under its influence to defy and break the commandments of God in order to serve and follow it. Giving such a perverse and corrupt system even the appearance of your consent to it through voting, thereby legitimizing it in all its violence, oppression, and theft, should be something all people of all persuasions would avoid to do, especially the Saints of God who have consecrated themselves and all they have to God alone. The State is infernalistic and idolatrous and we should have no part in empowering it or promoting it.
The Modern Moloch: The Complete Series
The links to the seven parts of the Modern Moloch series- about the idolatrous nature of the State and the way that the government manipulates the minds and hearts of the public using religious rituals, ideals, and symbols- can be found herein. Additionally, there is an Addendum that summarizes some of my final thoughts (for now anyway) on the subject. Also included is a section of poetry about modern day “Molochism” from American poet Allen Ginsberg that gets to the true heart of the wickedness of the State and which serves as a fitting epilogue to the series.
On Signs, Symbols, and Statist Sacraments
In past parts of this series I have touched upon how governments use religious rituals to reinforce loyalty and obedience to it, such as with the Pledge of Allegiance, but haven’t gone into much depth on the subject. Here I really dig into the concept and explore some concrete examples of the ways that the government manipulates religious symbolism, religious architecture, and the natural feelings of the people to present itself and its officials as divine and to command obedience from the masses. For examples of this idolatry, I look at such religious artworks as The Apotheosis of George Washington and the Enthroned Washington and such religious architecture as the American temples, the Jefferson and Lincoln Memorials, and the religious messages thereof.