Expecting Heroism
Even in appreciation, temperance and contemplation remain virtues. Ridgeview, with its emphasis on self-reflection and rational inquiry, is loath to surrender to the sorts of emotivism that make blind reverence possible. Ridgeview, in addition to being dedicated to truth and virtue, celebrates independence, self-reliance, and freedom. As these are not always appealing or attainable for the mass man in popular culture, he would instead prefer hyperbolic superlatives to be delivered in a circus-like environment while being whipped into a sycophantic fervor. There is nothing historically novel in this, but to appeal to such a preference is faddish and ultimately demagogic.
Contrarily, Ridgeview’s mission is to transform the mass man who would otherwise result from educational neglect into a select man capable of contemplating not only himself, but the society and government he gives rise to as an extension of his sovereign will. The government, both in its power and the authority that gives the exercise of that power legitimacy, derives its authority from the sovereignty of individuals. “The Constitution” wrote Patrick Henry, “is not an instrument for the government to restrain the people, it is an instrument for the people to restrain the government—lest it come to dominate our lives and interests.” It is not difficult to understand how or why government grows beyond its initial purposes or bounds, but over the course of successive generations, when security and comfort are found to be more compelling interests than individual liberty and responsibility, it is difficult to prevent its uninhibited growth. As the author Frédéric Bastiat pointed out, “Government is not slow to perceive the advantages it may derive from the part which is entrusted to it by the public. It is glad to be the judge and the master of the destinies of all; it will take much, for then a large share will remain for itself; it will multiply the number of its agents; it will enlarge the circle of its privileges; it will end by appropriating a ruinous proportion.” Pusillanimity in the defense of limiting government is a thing to be reviled, and the unrestrained celebration of its agents more appropriate to totalitarian regimes in which such agents hold daily sway over every life.
Such is, perhaps, the least charitable view of these agents—agents who are essentially the functionaries of a despotic regime. “Thus the despot subdues his subjects, some of them by means of others, and thus is he protected by those from whom, if they were decent men, he would have to guard himself; just as, in order to split wood, one has to use a wedge of the wood itself.” So writes the celebrated sixteenth-century author of Voluntary Servitude Etienne de la Boétie. “Such are his archers, his guards, his halberdiers; not that they themselves do not suffer occasionally at his hands, but this riff-raff, abandoned alike by God and man, can be led to endure evil if permitted to commit it, not against him who exploits them, but against those who like themselves submit, but are helpless. Nevertheless, observing those men who painfully serve the tyrant in order to win some profit from his tyranny and from the subjection of the populace, I am often overcome with amazement at their wickedness and sometimes by pity for their folly.”
If we want better, we should demand better, or at least not treat the guards of our homes as though they were instead its masters. In trying to strike an optimal balance, a preliminary question is one concerning the type of society we give rise to. Thomas Paine put the matter well and plainly in Common Sense:
“SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher. Society in every state is a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one: for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries BY A GOVERNMENT, which we might expect in a country WITHOUT GOVERNMENT, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer.
Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built upon the ruins of the bowers of paradise. For were the impulses of conscience clear, uniform and irresistibly obeyed, man would need no other lawgiver; but that not being the case, he finds it necessary to surrender up a part of his property to furnish means for the protection of the rest; and this he is induced to do by the same prudence which in every other case advises him, out of two evils to choose the least. Wherefore, security being the true design and end of government, it unanswerably follows that whatever form thereof appears most likely to ensure it to us, with the least expense and greatest benefit, is preferable to all others.”
All of this begs the question, are we, in celebrating first responders, celebrating government?
Each and every one serving in such a capacity, after all, is its agents in one way or another. If we conceive of government as Burke, Paine, Henry, Madison, Jefferson, Adams, Boétie, or Bastiat, which we historically have, or at least pretended to have, celebrating government or its agents is awfully strange. The transmogrification of public servants, elected or appointed, into celebrities is the degrading conduct of subjects and slaves.
Here is the compromise, the distinction, and the difference: what we celebrate is not government, or the lionization of power or the tools of coercion, but the noble, and sometimes self-abnegating and sacrificial, choices of individuals to serve their society. Such a celebration is not a self-imposed ignorance of the grotesque mistakes sometimes made, of the baffling mixture of arrogance and incompetence we pay for from our earnings, or the selective enforcement of politically convenient laws by those entrusted to behave impartially. There is so much for the sensitive, intelligent, and honest person to revile that the animating goodness of others is too easily lost sight of. In condemning the institutions of a government run amok, we lose sight of the humble man or woman who goes to work, and by acts largely unacknowledged, cause our lives as citizens to become better. Occasionally, such agents not only better our lives, but save our lives. How can such a thing be repaid? Is it all handled through contractual agreement for services rendered? How is it that heroism is compensated?
There is an interesting psychology and history at work here: there are times in which we expect heroism, though we privately recognize that there can be no just compensation for it. Society can only render awards, rewards, and recognition—perhaps even celebration. Yet, when those who have been entrusted to act heroically fail, their infamy is equally well earned. There is not enough that a fellow citizen can give a hero, and not enough that can be taken from the hero manqué—there is only approbation and opprobration.
This is not simply a history lesson or a libertarian tract—it is a warning neither to surrender to evil nor to give up hope in the goodness of your fellows. In our outrage at the injustices, it is easy to be blinded to all that has gone right simply because we expected it to, and altogether too easy to overlook the many instances of quiet heroism simply because they were expected.
This coming Friday is a celebration of individuals and the choices they make. It is an opportunity for Ridgeview students to not only thank first responders for the services they have rendered to their communities, but to converse and discover why such a life may have rewards beyond mere monetary remuneration. While the smaller children will alight on firetrucks and police vehicles with understandable glee, there is a larger purpose at work here, and that is the celebration of the individual who serves a cause greater than himself. Such commendable things are worth shining a light on even, and perhaps especially, in darker times.
D. Anderson
Headmaster
