We've Only Just Begun

The same people who told us we couldn’t be there to hold our parents’ hands in their final moments because it was dangerous, unlawful, and would place the whole of humanity in danger, are now actively applauding and cheering on mass riots, lootings, debauchery, and anarchy. The same people who ordered the arrests of fathers playing in the park with their children are now turning a blind eye to people being murdered in cold blood over a television or some worthless trinkets.

Call it what you will, but this has turned into anything other than a peaceful protest. Revolution, insurrection, revolt, rebellion, uprising, there are many applicable adjectives, but peaceful protest isn’t one of them.  We are a nation teetering over an abyss of chaos, the likes of which the world has yet to see. Even though it’s difficult to put a shattered nation back together, it becomes downright impossible if it’s also been burned to ash.

The best-case scenario at this point is that it all subsides, and we get a few more months to try and rebuild what has been destroyed before it’s burned down again. I know that sounds bleak and dire, but it’s the reality with which we are confronted at this point. I am not one given to catastrophizing, but no matter how many scenarios I go through in my head, the only conclusion I can come to is that we’ve only just begun.

If you think it’s bad now, imagine this dragging on for a few more days or weeks. Imagine truckers no longer being willing to deliver food to these hot spots, both because there’s a high probability that they’ll be burglarized, but also because the stores they would be delivering to are smoldering heaps of ash.

What you’ve got then is concentrated population centers with nothing to eat, because they’ve burned down all the outlets that sold them essentials like beans and rice. It’s one thing to fake outrage just because you think you can get your hands on a new pair of sneakers. It’s quite another when the survival instinct kicks in.

If the newly minted heroes of the hour are willing to take another human life for baubles, and trinkets, imagine what they’d be willing to do if their survival was in the balance.

All of these pandering sycophants bailing arsonists, looters, and criminals out of jail believe that their virtue signaling will protect them or grant them some exemption from being pillaged, not as yet realizing that the law of the jungle does not allow for friendships or loyalties. If you have something they want, you having pretended there was nobility in clubbing old ladies with wood beams or laughing as someone bled out for the high crime of trying to defend their life’s work, will make no never mind to them.

We are witnessing a clash between nihilism and civil society, and those charged with being overseers of civil society seem to be perfectly content with nihilism winning the day as long as they can be the ones atop the ash pile when the smoke clears.

I promised myself I wouldn’t write angry this morning, but I’m getting there. To keep my promise to myself, the following are the three likeliest scenarios that will play out both in the short term and the long term.

1. As I said, the best case scenario, cooler heads prevail, and the madness subsides. If this is the case, it will only buy us a bit more time, because the decision to up the charge from third-degree to second-degree murder almost ensures a hung jury, which will restart the tilt-a-world all over again.

2. Having run out of things to loot in the cities, marauders will expand to the suburbs where they will be met with overwhelming and brutal force by the 99% of people who say little but act decisively when they must. If we get to this stage, then it’s a civil war, and we’re closer to the end of this drama than any of us hoped.

3. Due to their monumental failure, trust in law enforcement by the average citizen is, at this stage, irreparable. With every looter, arsonist, and rioter being released from jail, the overarching belief that if you work hard, play by the rules, and are a decent human being, you can have a decent life in America is being dismantled. The unchecked actions of nihilists, and criminality without repercussions, only serve to create more criminals and nihilists.

Is this it? Is this the moment we tip over into the abyss? I don’t know, but it sure does look like we’re mighty close. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.

With love in Christ,

Michael Boldea Jr.