By David Hegg
Several recent events have led pundits and observers to label certain actions “unconscionable.” The word defines what is considered unreasonable, wrong, or blatantly excessive. To engage in “unconscionable” activity is to go beyond the restraints of a reasonable person’s conscience. It is also code for what someone considers reprehensible that needs to be destroyed.
The assumption is there is a “societal conscience” that sets the standard for reasonable behavior. Those not aligned with the “societal conscience” are guilty of doing what is “unconscionable.” This raises two essential questions: Who gets to define “societal conscience,” and more importantly, who gets to inform and shape it ethically and morally?
Here’s my attempt to do so. First, as I’ve written previously, the conscience is like an alarm clock. It acts on whatever information is input. Like the clock, the human conscience acts according to the information it is given. You set the clock, you shape the conscience, and both will act accordingly.
Second, given that a conscience needs to be “set,” what do we do when opposing worldviews attempt to “set” it, to input their conflicting ideological data? It is clear that the war of conflicting worldviews is raging between those who define “reasonable” as aligned with propositional truth, and those who define it according to their desires. Our national conscience is being hijacked by those so addicted to personal happiness and political power, they brazenly replace truth and integrity with spin and expediency. They proclaim politicized anti-science as actual science and declare that those opposing their progressive ideology are on the wrong side of history. But if history is the referee, it will be clear most of the “new” ideology is baseless.
The truth is, those who believe a mutilated biological male can become a female are on the wrong side of genetics. Those who insist one’s nature is determined by skin color are on the wrong side of biology and psychology. Those who proclaim that unrestrained sexual activity paves the road to happiness are on the wrong side of sociology, whose experts have proven that the erosion of the nuclear family is a primary cause of myriad personal and societal challenges. And those who have excised God from their world and attempt to do so for the rest of us are not only ignorant of human religious history, but also the historic concept of religious pluralism. More importantly, if those who have pushed God to the margin and then off the page persist in their unbelief, they will find themselves on the wrong side of God for all eternity. Simply put, these progressive reformers are a weak and intellectually stunted minority masquerading as the powerful, intelligent forces who insist we conform to their words and ways even as they work aggressively to “re-set” our societal conscience, and cancel all who refuse to align. They champion their “woke” status but are actually hoping the rest of us stay asleep. At the same time, they go about replacing reality with the language of absurdity, our national honor with deep-seated self-condemnation, and our belief in God with the irrational insistence that we are only material beings, the product of chemical processes, devoid of an immaterial soul, and destined to live in a world where life sucks and then you die.
No thanks! I am on this Earth for something much better, much more useful and purposeful. I am here, and so are you, to build our beliefs on what is factual, not fanciful, and live out honorable values that benefit all, rather than contribute to an ideology designed to radicalize and divide our citizenry.
Integrity dictates that those who recognize a problem should present a possible solution. Here’s mine. It will not be hard to reject and replace the aggressive and absurd ideology that human nature is determined by skin color, that genetic sexuality can be authentically changed, that spending billions on a problem is a win even when the problem has increased exponentially. Their worst lie is that true freedom is found in replacing God with self. No, it will not be hard. We can do it if we lift our voices en masse, shouting “the emperor has no clothes!”
For too long, the reasonable, intelligent majority have been afraid to say “he’s naked” for fear of being canceled. But truth shines brightly, and those who overcome fear and silence to proclaim it have the most power because truth is on their side.
Truth will never be eclipsed, either by the opposition of its enemies or poor behavior of its friends. My prayer is we will never settle for a counterfeit narrative, no matter how it is dressed up; that we will not allow fear to overwhelm what our consciences know is good and right and essential to our wellbeing, and that of our children and our children’s children.