Obama's Wall

I was just listening to Pink Floyd's "The Wall," and I was suddenly struck by how much it reminded me of Obama's Freedom of Choice Act. You see, "The Wall" is about isolation. Although it is a depiction of Roger Water's own experiences of isolation, we can derive from it Orwellian inferences of thought policing and such things that 1984's Ministry of Truth would consider, well, truth.

Totalitarian regimes seek protectionist isolation in two ways. They seek to conserve their way of life by shunning outside influences. They can accomplish this by limiting the media, controlling the information taught in various educational sectors, and by defaming their opponents.


However, such regimes also guard their rule by isolating dissidents. In Orwell's dystopian Oceania, thought and choice are controlled to such a degree that a dissident would find himself intellectually, emotionally, and psychologically alone. This loneliness, this type of isolation is insidiously used to further the party's rule and promote their seemingly omniscient ideology. To be isolated in this way dehumanizes an individual, since he is unable to embrace his social environment with his whole being. Thus, the isolated individual finds that he must become void of thought, void of passion, and void of freedom in order to be accepted as a valued and respected citizen.


Obama's autocratic Freedom of Choice Act is just as conniving. What it affectively accomplishes is isolating dissident doctors from their human community. It demands that one tow the party line or face isolation. It is dehumanizing in the sense that one's intellect has no more value within the public market. The only choice for doctors and health practitioners to make is to have no choice, no critical thought that may dispute Obama's freedom machine. In this sense, then, labeling the restriction of intellectual and religious liberty as the essence of freedom, subverts what it means to be free and, ultimately, to be human.


Furthermore, Obama's neo-freedom policy destabilizes the meaning and value of "fundamental human rights." What it effectively says is that we no longer have the right to certain things, but that we have the might to seize them. That is, things like conscience and religion, or thought and expression, no longer belong to the essence of humanity, but by equating such inalienable rights with the subjective whims of the ruling majority, we, in effect, subvert the value and worth of such freedoms within the polis. Peter Kreeft's "Apple Argument Against Abortion" touches on this tyranny of the majority in section eight, but I highly recommend reading his argument in full. Nevertheless, here is section eight:

All these examples so far are controversial. How to apply moral principles to these issues is controversial. What is not controversial, I hope, is the principle itself that human rights are possessed by human beings because of what they are, because of their being—and not because some other human beings have the power to enforce their will. That would be, literally, "might makes right." Instead of putting might into the hands of right, that would be pinning the label of "right" on the face of might: justifying force instead of fortifying justice. But that is the only alternative, no matter what the political power structure, no matter who or how many hold the power, whether a single tyrant, or an aristocracy, or a majority of the freely voting public, or the vague sentiment of what Rousseau called "the general will." The political form does not change the principle. A constitutional monarchy, in which the king and the people are subject to the same law, is a rule of law, not of power; a lawless democracy, in which the will of the majority is unchecked, is a rule of power, not of law.

It must be remembered, however, that Obama's tyranny isn't all that new. As I said in another post, despite his engaging speeches, his charismatic personality, and his appeal to the heart-strings of the public, on the issue of human life and social conservatism, in general, Obama is merely a product of a political machine.