The best way to improve quality of life is scientific inventions that lower the price of basic goods, or create exceptional new goods like cars, planes, spaceships, etc. There are some things the government can do to support these improvements, like colleges, universal education, government funded research, or whatever. But really this depends on the quality of the individual scientists, and science can only go at its own pace. Sometimes scientific progress is agonizingly slow, and all the rest of us can do is wait. Who would have thought we would still be shooting up shuttles, that can barely hold together anymore and two of which have already exploded, killing everyone on board, 30 years after they first came into service?
The same is true for artists. The government can do some things, like allow free speech and give starving artists a citizen's dividend so they can concentrate on their artistic self-expression instead of flipping burgers, but in the end it is up to artists to improve the quality of our art. Art is probably the second best way to improve quality of life, but it's up to the individual artists, and not us, when these blessings emerge and when they don't. Obviously philistines who don't enjoy good art have only themselves to blame, but there's always room for improvement on the artist's side as well.
The preamble to the constitution says our government was instituted to ensure 'the general welfare,' so it does seem like people desire their governments to improve the quality of life of its citizens somehow. How, then, if we can't depend on science or art? How indeed.
The third best way to improve quality of life is virtuous behavior. Crime, corruption, dishonesty, decadence, can spoil anyone's life. Sometimes like lightning out of the blue, sometimes like a creeping acid that chips away over time. Either way, virtue is the only cure. A country's standard of living, its quality of life, stands or falls on whether it can prevent crime, corruption, dishonesty, and decadence within its populous. Since science and art can move from any country to any other freely, there is little marginal gain in being the 'best scientists' or the 'best artists' in the world. We could leave that to others and still reap all of their productivity. But virtue can't be exported. Virtue can't be imported. Every nation is stuck with what it has. Therefore making sure your country is virtuous is the highest priority for any country that wishes for a high quality of life. The enormous range of behavior we find around the world, even between white countries, should inspire hope. It is obviously subject to external influences and not absolute human nature how people behave. America does not have Russia's corruption or crime, their alcoholism or their brutality. The Russians uniquely make their country as intolerable as possible through their own lifestyle choices. The Russian government buttresses all the evil tendencies in its people's hearts, and suppresses all of the good tendencies. It rewards corruption, dishonesty, and crime, and either betrays or neglects its virtuous citizenry who are victims of all these acts. It's like the anti-christ of good governance.
In other words, the highest priority of the state is to enact laws that reward virtue and punish vice.
How do we reward virtue in our hypothetical state? The state has many good tools. We can give those who abide by our laws a citizen's dividend. A straight-out monetary 'bribe,' if you like. (Though I would have done this for the sake of human dignity and compassion anyway, it remains a powerful incentive.) We can praise the virtuous in our history textbooks, our schools, our media, our monuments, and our daily living. If kids grow up seeing what draws admiration and what draws scorn, they tend to emulate whatever they are told is admirable and avoid whatever they are told is despicable. This isn't rocket science. We can provide a unique environment where everyone can trust each other, in relationships, in business, and in governance, because we know the quality of our fellow man. We can give people a sense of pride in how good they are, as they reflect on how loving, honest, and pure we are compared to the rest of mankind. This may not sound like much, but it's nearly impossible to be unhappy if you are financially secure, admired by your peers, proud of yourself, and in a stable loving relationship. It takes a mentally ill person to mess up from there.
Men are the most attracted to traditionalism, but this is not because we are giving women the short end of the stick. I think most women would prefer this way of life to the one they lead today. Their freedom comes at a high price. For one thing, they aren't financially secure. For another, they don't have a stable loving relationship at any point in their lives. For a third, they aren't safe from criminals. Lastly, they are ashamed of the mistakes they've made throughout their life, but couldn't resist making when push came to shove. Women today have chosen the world they live in, but this is not the world they would have chosen. If we could hit the reset button, and raise young girls with a new set of expectations, (You don't need to be a career woman because even housewives earn a citizen's dividend, children are a blessing not a mistake to be aborted, marriage is for life not until you find someone better, women can still express themselves and achieve greatness within the context of marriage, children, and virtue.) I don't think they would be crying themselves to bed every night about their missed opportunities at raves, drunken orgies, lesbian experimentation, or black eyes from jealous boyfriends they cheated on. Rather, I suspect a lot of women raised today are crying tonight over their missed opportunity at a natural and healthy life.
However, in every soul, there is a little demon aching to burst out and ruin everything. Humans have a lot of animal instincts, many of which are simply evil. Unrestrained, they can emerge just once, and still manage to ruin the rest of your life. Taking an addictive drug for the first time, for instance. Or cheating. Or namecalling. Even though people know it is wrong, even though they know that there are many wonderful rewards for acting virtuously, at the time of trial their heart wavers. This is because instincts, feelings, are generally stronger than all human logic. Perhaps a few heroic saints can resist all temptations. Designing a country is not for them though. It's for everyone. It's for the people who can't resist temptation too.
This is why a state so needs to punish vice. It needs to alter the equation. It is no longer a direct pleasant feeling, like slandering someone you hate, or having a sexually romantic fling with an attractive newcomer, or getting high on some strange chemical, versus an indirect nebulous 'pride' or 'safe environment.' Many times people can rationalize these conflicts away, saying to themselves that they can have both, that they can keep it secret, that it's not really all that bad, and so on. Logic isn't at its best in the midst of a moral crisis.
In a state that forbids and punishes vice, it is no longer certain happiness vs. nebulous harm. It is certain happiness versus certain, even worse pain. It's hard to rationalize away "Do I really want to be executed for this? Do I really want to be exiled for this? Do I really want my hand chopped off for this? Do I really want to be whipped for this?" The reason why everyone just does whatever they like in the world today, is because there aren't sufficient punishments to deter it. Freedom is in direct conflict with virtue. The West chose freedom over the last century, and lost its virtue in turn. It used to choose virtue, with severe checks on people's freedom. The West has not wholly abandoned its pro-virtue laws for the sake of freedom -- the laws against organ donations, the 8 hour workday/40 hour workweek, the law against child labor, laws against gay marriage, drug laws, alcohol regulations, smoking regulations, laws against trans-fats, decency laws (no public urination, nudity, etc) are all examples of public virtue coming at the expense of private freedom. In some corner of the populace, sanity remains on these issues and people balk at allowing the libertarian dream of perfect freedom for all, with no state interference on how an individual behaves (short of assaulting another person or their property). But these rudimentary protections are too few and too spineless. The punishments attached to these crimes aren't severe enough to deter the behavior. Some behavior which is just as bad or worse isn't deterred at all. Divorce is an absolutely unacceptable behavior, both in terms to the betrayed partner, and the betrayed children, who deserve a mother and a father. It is unbelievable that this immoral act completely passes under the radar. Abortion is abhorrent. That deprives the baby of their entire life, presumably what would have been a good one, and deprives the father of his child without even a by-your-leave. If someone walked into your home and killed your five year old, that's murder. But if they kill your zero year old, somehow that's all right. Do parents not love their children before they're born? Adultery is unacceptable, period. Sodomy is a wretched and contagious deathstyle. If gays simply cannot be attracted to members of the opposite sex, they can practice abstinence, just like I ask out of everyone before marriage. It isn't that hard. Or they can leave. We don't want them here, suggesting in whispers or on our public airwaves to our 15 year olds that it's 'really wonderful once you get used to it.'
Drug sellers are murderers. Pimps are rapists and slavers. It's that simple. Just because people fall to temptation for these evil goods, does not mean those who tempted them are blameless. Anyone can fall to temptation. The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. This is why people pray to God to remove them from temptation, because they know they can't oppose it alone. For those of us without God, the state will do just fine. Please State, remove us from temptation, provide us this day our daily bread -- you get the idea. The State can remove temptations and clear the stumbling-block strewn path of life for our sheep. Maybe not as well as an all powerful, all loving, all knowing God. But we can do our best. We can do everything we can. Anything less is abandoning our flock to the wolves. Drug dealers and pimps are wolves. They are modern-day Lucifers, Serpents that convince our Adams and Eves to partake of forbidden fruits. They must be crushed. Singapore doesn't put up with drug dealers, it executes them. Singapore does not have a drug problem.
Obesity is a choice. So is fitness. We need to enact whatever measures it takes to return people to a natural weight. Until a wonder-drug is invented to do this pain-free, the state must do what it can. Obesity is an epidemic in America, it's disgusting, it's unhealthy, it's ugly, it's innervating, and it's expensive. Obese mothers pass their obesity, and their diabetes, on to helpless children -- just like mothers who drink, smoke, or take drugs while pregnant.
Alcohol and tobacco have various benefits, but the cost is too high. Their reign of terror should end here. Alcohol promotes crime, drunk driving, cheating, and bad judgment in general. It often substitutes for genuine spiritual goods like love or beauty. It appeals to the very worst parts of our soul. Smoking is extremely addictive, deadly, smells awful, and makes everyone else around you sick. Chewing tobacco is ugly and messy, against all public hygiene, as well as causing all the same tooth decays and cancers. These unnecessary hobbies are like infections. If only we could get away from them once, the next generation would never even know about them, so it would be impossible for kids to take a liking to them. Tobacco was America's gift to the world, the first product we exported back for a profit. It is not natural, it is not inevitable. It didn't even exist for the majority of history. We don't need it in our future.
Gambling institutions are dens of thievery. They prey on people's weakness to steal them blind. Many people go bankrupt, or even go into debt, trying to keep up with their gambling habits. Sadly, the poor and the stupid are the most prone to not understand the odds, and think they'll somehow emerge winners in these fixed games. Robbing our most vulnerable and weakest elements in order to enrich some cigar smoking fat cat is despicable. It must end. Casinos and lotteries must go.
Spinsterhood is unnatural and unwelcome. For every spinster is a bachelor, many who didn't want to be but can't avoid their fate because it's not up to them. For every unattached man or woman there is an overwhelming urge to have casual sex and roller coaster relationships. A nation of spinsters and bachelors is dead on the vine, because its birth rate steadily decreases to invisibly low levels. Much of the West is simply emptying out, dying from spinsterhood. This must be reversed. This is an existential threat. The depopulation in various countries has already been worse than the black plague. Worse, bachelors and spinsters lack any responsibility or any purpose on this earth, and end up leading frivolous lives. The moment they have someone to take care of, their priorities shift, and they become better people. They grow up. If this is permanently delayed, their growth is permanently forestalled. It's a pity because life has so much more than shopping and video games. People need to take that next step, however scary, and see the rest of life's grand and beautiful design. Marriage isn't hard, even though under 50% of 30 year olds do it anymore. It used to be a given. It can become a given again.
Fighting words need to become fighting words again. People should not be allowed to say whatever they like about someone else if it isn't true. Insults hurt. Being cut down in front of others, such that you lose your friend's or acquaintance's trust or admiration, hurts. Humiliation hurts. President Bush just said that the worst moment in his presidency was being called a racist when it wasn't true. Witnessing 9/11 on his watch pales in comparison to the pain of being called an unfair name. If someone can be proven to have slandered someone else, via witnesses, video cameras, documents, or what have you, you should be allowed to take it to the State and have the State punish the offender accordingly. Just the knowledge that people could be punished for the nasty things they say about each other, could clean up the atmosphere very quickly. Most tears don't fall because of bruised shins. They fall because of bruised feelings. It's ridiculous to ban physical assaults but not verbal ones. Pain is pain. In fact, verbal assaults tend to be worse.
Remember, if it is hard to recall, that in the past men would kill you if you called them a bad name. Romeo duelled and killed Tibalt for being called a 'villain.' Compared to the imaginative and sweeping insults of today, like "you son of a terrorist whore," Zidane was called in the middle of a World Cup final, it's clear how far into the gutter we have now gone. Women were considered sacrosanct and no one would insult them at all. Insults to a woman's honor were simply off limits. If anyone dared, they would answer to that woman's husband, brother, or father shortly. Women didn't tend to insult men either, for fear of a swift beating. (But this is an instance where private, vigilante justice should be replaced with public justice. We can be more civilized than the past. What we can't do is completely ignore the loss of civility the freedom to insult has generated. There is a middle course.)
A dress code is already existent, people can't wear nothing, or just underwear, or just bathing suits, etc. It wouldn't hurt to extend that into expecting people to be a little better dressed than they are today. Sweat pants and flip-flops just don't cut it. As a service to others, we should dress attractively. Moreover, souls tend to be uplifted by beautiful people and environments, and depressed by ugly environments and people. Living in a slum full of unkempt fat people makes one not want to do anything or take care of themselves. It's like being surrounded by broken down houses or stale, unpainted concrete apartments as far as the eye can see. It saps the life out of you. It is a quiet disease of despair. Cleanliness, attractive dress, staying within normal weight ranges, all of this goes together and creates a better individual, and a better society. Women should dress in skirts, like women, not in jeans like fake men. If they want jeans or shorts or whatever underneath their skirts, that's fine. But the skirt is an important distinction that reminds people who and what we are. It accentuates femininity and female beauty, two traits we want to encourage. It was foolish to abandon it. A short skirt with shorts underneath does not impair a woman's ability to run marathons or do any other silly thing they want. I'm not asking for foot-binding or ankle length petticoats. Just something to divide girl and boy again, like the girl's and boy's bathroom signs.
Physical violence, sexual violence, vandalism, arson, and theft must be met with swift, certain, and terrible reprisal. We will commit any amount of resources to catch every single criminal, and once caught, they will never be released to do crime again. Execution, exile, life imprisonment, whatever. There is no reason to tolerate jackals or lions who devour human beings in our streets. Human jackals or lions are no exception. Mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent.
With the proper punishments, and more importantly, the proper will to punish in place, people who would misbehave will think twice, suppress their urges, squirm a bit inside, take a deep breath, and do the right thing. This can never happen in a sappy candy land which only rewards virtue but is too squeamish to punish vice. And when it's all over, they'll thank you. It protects the individual to forestall the mistakes of other individuals around them, just like the requirements protect the rest of society from the individual. But it also protects people from themselves. It protects their inner angels from their inner demons. It protects their honor, their purity, and their pride. Most of all, it protects a parent's children, who they love with all their heart and have spent the last twenty years giving all they had to raise. Helplessly watching one's child fall into an abyss of misery and death is a pain we've inflicted on too many parents. It must stop.
Once we've put everyone through the spiritual wringer, or the spiritual forge, if you will, a new nation can emerge. Life will never be perfect, but that's what eugenics and genetic engineering are for. All we want right now is breathing room. The breathing room to restore our birth rates, our family bonds, and our spiritually fulfilling lives. A quiet place for God to breathe his Holy Spirit back into. A refuge for holiness, if you will. Everyone else can go on sinning on the outside, snorting or sucking anything they like. But our people don't have to -- they can be so pure they wouldn't even know what the words meant. They could be achingly sweet, gentle, and true compared to those of us who live in the world of today. Like the Northwest Quartet kept pointing out, the people who won the revolutionary war were moral and spiritual dwarfs compared to the children and grandchildren who inherited the victorious war's fruits. Maybe we aren't good enough for our country, but they can be. And maybe like the mormons, they can baptize their ancestors and save our souls long after we're gone, through their own sanctifying deeds.
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