Tea at Trianon: The Crime Of Noticing

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Sunday, February 11, 2024

The Crime Of Noticing

From Jan Greenhawk at The Easton Gazette:

As I ask questions in my town, advocate for parental rights in my state, and generally speak out through my writing I have often wondered, "Why are people so angry with those of us who do these things?" Then he said that and I realized. We have committed the crime of noticing.

You see, the people in government in the town, county, state, and country know they are doing things the wrong way. In some cases they are committing crimes or ethical violations. They've been doing it for a while and make no secret about it. In our town, they ignored the admonitions of their auditor to split the financial duties between two employees and left it all with one staff member. They allowed nepotism, obstruction of facts from citizens, etc. They didn't keep it a secret. They did it and hoped no one would notice.

The State thought we wouldn't notice the increase of crime in our cities or the lack of basic services for taxpayers. The Feds thought we wouldn't notice that the southern border is wide open and all kinds of people are flowing in, even terrorists, cartel members, and military age young men just looking for an army; millions of them.

And now that we did notice, they accuse us of doing wrong. How dare we question the actions of a bureaucrat or elected official? Don't we know that to NOTICE what they are doing wrong is a "crime?" We are supposed to sit here and pretend everything is okay, that our leaders local, state and national, are doing what is best for us. (Read more.)