AMERICANS ON THE LEFT seem to delight in the evils of American culture. There is nothing to be proud of. There is nothing exceptional about the U.S. of A. Many of us are aghast. Yes, the U.S. has problems. Yes, we are imperfect. But how can well educated people be so negative about the culture that rebuilt its enemies after WWII, that is the first nation in history with the power to dominate, rule, and enslave the earth but has not.
If you are like me, you just don’t get it.
There is an explanation, and in his important book, Emancipating the World, author, Darrow Miller nails it. Cultural “self-loathing,” Miller explains, “is rooted in cultural relativism, which undermines the importance of a given culture’s unique identity and strengths and maximizes that culture’s weaknesses. Cultural relativism denies an objective moral and metaphysical order that leads to freedom, economic sufficiency, social health, and public justice. Cultural relativists seem embarrassed by their national identity. Somali political refugee Ayaan Hirsi Ali noted this tendency in her adoptive homeland of Holland: ‘(The Dutch) saw nationalism almost the same as racism. Nobody seemed proud to be Dutch.’ A logical consequence of cultural relativism is the denial of the uniqueness of one’s own culture. Thus, cultural relativists do not recognize the problem of Islamic terrorism and instead lay the world’s problems at the feet of freedom-seeking theists who believe in absolutes.”
Cultural relativism is dogma in academia. It is foundational to the worldview of the left. It is rampant in the corridors of power.
Cultural relativism is the descendant of moral relativism. The rejection of moral relativism is the only cure. There is transcendent, absolute moral truth, and we must embrace it to survive as a nation. This “truth” is worldview penicillin for the moral infection of cultural relativism.
