On Independence Day of 2023, it is appropriate to question if we are willing to maintain our freedom and independence. A perfect metaphor might be the significant number of instances when someone is being criminally abused and all of the bystanders are taking videos of the act instead of providing assistance.
As we watch our nation exhibiting signs of self-destruction, we also see a large segment of the population paralyzed to respond.
Can you muster the courage?
In the middle of turbulent times with disaster at our doorstep, John F. Kennedy summoned the nation’s attention and its conscience with, “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country?”
We are raising generations under the “government is your sugar daddy” mentality. Government at every level knows the more numb the citizens are the more control it has over every aspect of your life.
I watched a father on the internet read a passage from a book found in his daughter’s elementary school library at a local school board meeting. The segment was so vulgar and pornographic that the school board chairman shouted the man down and commanded that he stop reading from the book immediately.
Of course, the school board demonstrated hypocritical behavior, planting the books in elementary school libraries but were too embarrassed to have them read aloud. However, what bothered me the most was only a handful of parents in a huge school system were complaining about the situation.
There are cities and states making it legal for schools and social workers to manipulate the minds of young children, leading them to surgical mutilation and long-term physical damage from chemicals without ever notifying the parents. We are talking about elementary and middle school children.
Some parents have held signs in protest of harming their children, but where are the masses crowding the state capitols and city halls, demanding respect for parental authority and the innocence of the children?
In the United Kingdom, an East Sussex student was reprimanded for not recognizing a fellow student who identified as a cat. Angry parents bringing the matter forward got media coverage and sparked a government investigation.
In colleges and universities across the United States, words are banned on campus. Michigan State University, for example, will suspend a student from uttering words such as “Christmas tree, gifts, bunnies, eggs, obese, overweight.” So where in the heck are the alumni and student activists demanding a repeal of these idiotic rules?
Your journey away from victimhood
Please do not claim to be a victim in the future if you fail to act today. If you want freedom and independence, fight to keep it.
How many of you fail to vote in local elections? How many of you are the bystanders who metaphorically pull out your cell phone to video the local government wrecking a fantastic place to live, doing nothing to prevent it from happening?
Do you not like the traffic congestion on Highways 74 and 54 heading to Coweta County? That debacle was caused by a series of very poor local government decisions. Yes, it could have been prevented. Did you ever attend a council meeting to complain? Did you ever send an email to the mayor and council to complain?
Do you want more stacked apartment complexes built all over the city? Have you ever voiced your opposition to the local government on the subject?
Do you not want to see the city council destroy one of our natural wonders, the Flat Creek Boardwalk? Did you email the mayor and council at council@peachtree-city.org?
Are you happy that over $10 million worth of needed infrastructure projects were never proposed for the Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax list for selection and now our taxes are going to be raised again another 12 percent to cover those costs?
It’s up to you. If you cannot bother to vote and respond to potentially negative government action locally, do not expect anything to ever happen nationally.
Fight for your freedom and independence.
[Brown is a former mayor of Peachtree City and served two terms on the Fayette County Board of Commissioners. You can read all his columns by clicking on his photo below.]
Hey, Steve. Why don’t you include standing up for women’s rights to their own body? That’s as fundamental a freedom as you can get and it is being taken away.
Thank you, Steve. We all need to exercise our civic duties if we want to continue to enjoy our freedoms.