Friday, September 4, 2009

The Deplorable Word

In the story "The Magician's Nephew" by C.S. Lewis, we find out the origins of the White Witch from the Narnia series.
When two children use magic to enter the dying world of Charn, they awaken the powerful Queen Jadis who tells the children how she destroyed every living thing in her world.
She tried to take the throne from her sister by force, but was defeated. When her sister declared victory, Queen Jadis spoke "The Deplorable Word" at the last moment and all life was destroyed.

What was the "Deplorable Word"?

(From the book)
"That was the secret of secrets," said the Queen Jadis. "It had long been known to the great Kings of our race that there was a word which, if spoken with the proper ceremonies, would destroy all living things except the one who spoke it. But the ancient kings were weak and soft-hearted and bound themselves and all who should come after them with great oaths never even to seek after the knowledge of that word. But I learned it in a secret place and paid a terrible price to learn it."

I took a facebook poll on this question:
"Should President Obama be allowed to give a nationwide address to school children without parental consent".
Now the question's importance lies in the "without parental consent" part, and out of the 160 thousand who took that poll, over sixty percent voted "no".
And every reason written in the comment section revealed their disfavor with the President overriding parental consent...pretty simple.
Presidents don't get to tell our children how to think, feel or act without our say-so.

But the majority of comments revealed a word that popped up continuously from those who voted in favor of Obama's speech without parental consent.

The word was "racist" or "racism", directed at those who disagreed with the President.

I read conservative websites daily and I've never read one single article from a journalist or blogger who wrote against Obama's policies because of his race.
In fact, one would be hard-pressed to find out what our President's race is when reading arguments against any of his policies.
His race only comes to the fore when Obama himself brings it up...which is sadly, quite often.

Racist: The Deplorable Word

No one can fight such a charge.
It removes all focus from the real arguments and annhililates the person protesting Obama's policies.

Once said aloud, the Deplorable Word continues reverberate.

It spreads across the whole debate of whether something is right or wrong, constitutional or lawless and turns everything to dust.
And it no longer matters if Obama is wrong to bypass parent's wishes, because the Deplorable Word has elimnated the objectors.

If you object to the President's wealth-destroying, anti-capitalistic economic policies, he can use (or have his minions use) the Deplorable Word.
Poof!
His policies are all that's left standing afterwards.
See...I used two perfectly sound adjectives (with hyphens, no less) to describe Obama's policies and they have nothing to do with his race.

If you object to the President's naive and dangerous foreign policy, the Deplorable Word will eliminate your arguments and make you disappear.

If you object to the President's economy-crushing, life-endangering health care bill, he has only to speak the Deplorable Word and reduce a townhall meeting full of everyday Americans to rubble.

...but Americans have their own Deplorable Word: "ruler"

(From the Book)
"But the people?" gasped Digory.
"What people, boy?" asked the Queen.
"All the ordinary people," said Polly. "who'd never done you any harm. And the women, and the children, and the animals."
"Don't you understand?" said the Queen. "I was the Queen. They were all my people. What else were they there for but to do my will?"
"It was rather hard luck on them, all the same," said he.
"I had forgotten that you are only a common boy. How should you understand reasons of State? You must learn, child, that what would be wrong for you or for any of the common people is not wrong in a great Queen such as I. The weight of the world is on our shoulders. We must be freed from all rules. Ours is a high and lonely destiny."

"Digory suddenly remembered that Uncle Andrew had used exactly the same words. But they sounded much grander when Queen Jadis said them; perhaps because Uncle Andrew was not seven feet tall and dazzlingly beautiful."

(my translation...with apologies to Mr. Lewis)
Americans suddenly remembered that Stalin, Hitler, Kim Jong Il and Mao had used exactly the same words. But they sounded much grander when President Obama said them; perhaps because they were not tall and dazzlingly African-American.

redink

http://fc03.deviantart.com/fs21/f/2007/284/2/5/The_Magician__s_Nephew_by_suburbanbeatnik.jpg

2 comments:

  1. It actually refers to the atomic bomb.

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  2. You're right, Anonymous. C.S. Lewis lived during a time of great upheaval and fear. The atomic bomb must have scared the living daylights out of everyone who understood its power.
    But I think my illustration stands. Crying "racist" wipes out all debate or any argument against Obama's destructive policies.
    And a "ruler" would wipe out America's freedom.

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