The Whole World Is Watching

Back in the day, in 1968, protesters at the Democratic National Convention coined a slogan-- The whole world is watching.

They were referring to the oppressive tactics of the Chicago police department and were trying to shame Mayor Richard Daley and other Democratic officials.

Nowadays, as the United States descends into cultural senescence, the whole world is not just watching. It is also laughing at us.

For reasons that defy reason, we pride ourselves on our capacity for empathy, but we are completely incapable of judging how we look to other people. Of course, empathy is about feeling someone’s feelings. It takes more than sanctimoniously blubbering about feelings.

We have no idea of how we look to others because we are so chock full of self-esteem that we think that it doesn’t matter what other people think. We lack the analytic capacity to see ourselves through the world’s eyes.

Or else, we do not want to recognize that the rest of the world sees us as a broken and declining civilization. And that they do not want any part of it. Considering how poorly democracy works here it should surprise no one that other nations around the world are not buying it. 

We should have long since overcome the Hegelian illusion that the arc of history is inexorably moving toward liberal democracy. Apparently, we have not.

We recall that French intellectuals, seconded by the government of President Emmanuel Macron have labeled American wokeism a threat to everything they value. Their message to America-- keep your woke nonsense to yourself.

And now there is Baizuo. Tucker Carlson reported the other evening that the Chinese state media has a special name for wokeness. It’s Baizuo. Carlson said that it translates roughly as “white liberal” and it is not considered to be a compliment.

Some of us have been trying to warn others of us against adopting this mental deformity, to little avail. What constitutes Baizuo. Carlson explained:

“Here’s how Chinese state media describe baizuo,” Tucker began, quoting, “‘They are people who only care about topics such as immigration, minorities, LGBT and the environment, who have no sense of real problems in the real world, who only advocate for peace and equality to satisfy their own feelings of moral superiority and who are so obsessed with political correctness that they tolerate backward Islamic values for the sake of multiculturalism.'”

Hmmm. Sums it up well, don’t you think. We call it virtue signaling, and the Chinese understand it better than we do. Incapable of addressing the real problems of the real world-- which might those be?-- we are tolerant of backward Islamic values because we are multiculturalists.

Which values might they be? For instance, try the rape culture that Islamic migrants brought to Sweden. And what about the grooming gangs in England, the drug traffickers in Western Europe, the No-Go zones, the honor killings and female genital mutilation practiced in America and Europe. Let's not forget, even though it has nothing to do with Islamic values, but we are happy to mutilate children.

It’s not how we feel about ourselves. We feel great about ourselves. We have done lots and lots of therapy and we have learned to feel great about ourselves-- while the good ship USA is floundering on the reefs of multiculturalism.

Better yet, the Chinese state media has mocked us for refusing to tolerate differences of opinion. One might ask whether the Chinese media tolerates differences of opinion, but one does not read it often enough to have an opinion. One suspects that it is about as tolerant as the propaganda media in America. 

Carlson explains:

Carlson said that Chinese state media has criticized woke liberals in America because “they advocate inclusiveness and anti-discrimination but cannot tolerate different opinions. Baizuo political opinions are quote ‘so shallow that they tend to maintain social equality by embracing ideologies that run against the basic concept of equality.’ Amazing.”

Carlson concluded:

The Fox News host noted another description of baizuo as “phony and hypocritical and will make the situation in the West go from bad to worse.”

“Talk about insightful: they know our leaders well,” Carlson said. “So whatever you think of the Chinese, they’re definitely not stupid. And they’re on to something here,” he concluded.

Definitely not stupid. But, what does that make us?

As for the American propaganda media, why not introduce a few words from a dissent offered by a federal judge named Laurence Silberman last week. For the record he was echoing arguments offered by Justice Clarence Thomas.

His description of the one-sided and one-minded American media correlates well with the Chinese view. For the record he was addressing the Supreme Court decision, Sullivan v. The New York Times which allowed the media to defame public figures with near impunity. It was the story of the Trump presidency.

While we are mentioning the unprecedented abuse the American media heaped on Donald Trump, we will again remind readers that the magical mystical powers of empathy caused many of Trump's supporters to feel empathy for him. And that has led them to feel righteously angry at the media and Democratic politicians for their abusive behavior.

Back to the Sullivan case, the defendant in a defamation or libel has to prove actual malice. Judge Silberman explained his position, arguing that the Sullivan decision should be reconsidered:

The increased power of the press is so dangerous today because we are very close to one-party control of these institutions. Our court was once concerned about the institutional consolidation of the press leading to a “bland and homogenous” marketplace of ideas. 

While we deplore the one-party control of the Chinese media, we are not very far from it ourselves:

Although the bias against the Republican Party—not just controversial individuals—is rather shocking today, this is not new; it is a long-term, secular trend going back at least to the ’70s. (I do not mean to defend or criticize the behavior of any particular politician). Two of the three most influential papers (at least historically), The New York Times and The Washington Post, are virtually Democratic Party broadsheets. And the news section of The Wall Street Journal leans in the same direction. The orientation of these three papers is followed by The Associated Press and most large papers across the country (such as the Los Angeles Times, Miami Herald, and Boston Globe). Nearly all television—network and cable—is a Democratic Party trumpet. Even the government-supported National Public Radio follows along.

As has become apparent, Silicon Valley also has an enormous influence over the distribution of news. And it similarly filters news delivery in ways favorable to the Democratic Party. See Kaitlyn Tiffany, Twitter Goofed It, The Atlantic (2020) (“Within a few hours, Facebook announced that it would limit [a New York Post] story’s spread on its platform while its third-party fact-checkers somehow investigated the information. Soon after, Twitter took an even more dramatic stance: Without immediate public explanation, it completely banned users from posting the link to the story.”).

It is well-accepted that viewpoint discrimination “raises the specter that the Government may effectively drive certain ideas or viewpoints from the marketplace.” R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul, Minn., 505 U.S. 377, 387 (1992). But ideological homogeneity in the media—or in the channels of information distribution—risks repressing certain ideas from the public consciousness just as surely as if access were restricted by the government.

To be sure, there are a few notable exceptions to Democratic Party ideological control: Fox News, The New York Post, and The Wall Street Journal’s editorial page. It should be sobering for those concerned about news bias that these institutions are controlled by a single man and his son. Will a lone holdout remain in what is otherwise a frighteningly orthodox media culture? After all, there are serious efforts to muzzle Fox News. And although upstart (mainly online) conservative networks have emerged in recent years, their visibility has been decidedly curtailed by Social Media, either by direct bans or content-based censorship.

Judge Silberman concludes:

The First Amendment guarantees a free press to foster a vibrant trade in ideas. But a biased press can distort the marketplace. And when the media has proven its willingness—if not eagerness—to so distort, it is a profound mistake to stand by unjustified legal rules that serve only to enhance the press’ power.

Democracy dies in darkness, the Washington Post tells us, but why then is it actively working to turn out the lights on the free marketplace of ideas.