Many of my civic minded friends have expressed gratitude over hearing President Bush's recent repeated references to his proud stance as a Communitarian -- one, according to him, who possesses those patriotic attributes of neighborly love, community-minded civic awareness, and volunteerism.

Those words troubled me, however, as did a related word, Communitarianism.  I wanted to know more about the words as well as their apparent state of being or doing, since I was not previously familiar with the concepts.

What I found troubled me.

Since The Garden, it seems, peoples and societies have striven to achieve some collective vision of a better place-- a Utopia. (see: part 6-- "out here...cows grazing").   Some have sought this end with God's help.  Some have attempted it autonomously of His auspices.   The desire itself transcends ethnic and geographic boundaries.   But the execution of such notions to fulfillment, seem to arise primarily in wealthier, educated countries.   Civil-ized countries.

Americans since their own beginnings have tolerated many of those visions of a better world (better than America?) due to the inherent reality of our own American ethnic and theological plurality, and, no doubt, our Constitution.  But, for the record, I found that utopia-building in our country seems to be as secularly inspired, as theologically.

Between 1663 and the present, numerous utopian communities have emerged in the US, differing in ideology and structure, most attempting to implement a collective vision for the perfect society here on earth.   This process is typically enabled by the vision of a single, passionate individual.  One apparently with a vision.  Some efforts have risen from a theological core, sometimes springing from varied and often misguided interpretations of biblical scripture.  But just as significant a number appear to have been rooted in non-religious ideologies, as well.  Peace and Love and Communes.  Living for the good of the commune, or community.  No longer living for self.   A collective vision; a collective future.  One for all and one for all.

While collective, communal visions may seem out of step in a nation valuing individualism,  the persistence of such notions reveals much about those deeper currents in American culture, particularly those of improved social change and people's role in it.  Yet no matter where we currently graze, we humans keep seeking better pasture.  Sometimes as a single cow; sometimes as a herd.    And we seem irrevocably drawn to that greener pasture that must be out there somewhere.

And if we can't find it, well, darn it--we can always create it.

In reality it would seem that we, even my atheist pals, are trying to create heaven right here on earth. Yet, to this day, no place ever stays exactly heavenly, for too long.  No job once secured remains ideal in the mind of most employees.  No amount of pay can't be improved upon.   No savings account is ever large enough.   No 401-K.  No one is ever truly satisfied with the way things are----we keep reaching for the way things might be, or should be, or could be.  Or we wax nostalgic for the way things were.

King Solomon said it pretty well, "man acquires silver, and silver is not enough."

I would add, "woman, too."

This lack of contentment seems to comes in waves or cycles, and most often follows hardship.  But not always.

There have been many socialist communes and communalists throughout history, but the best known U.S. experiments were those conducted in the 19th century, such as the Fourierists, Owen's New Harmony, and the Oneida Community. They were inspired by a variety of ideologies, religious and secular. Their largest modern descendants in the U.S. are the Fellowship for Intentional Community, and the Federation of Egalitarian Communities around the Virginia commune Twin Oaks.[1]

Utopian Communitarianism, therefore, appears to have strong roots in America, at least in terms of putting ideology into practice.

Historian Ronald G. Walters writes;

Americans... continued to build utopian communities on into the twentieth century; they ranged from coast to coast and from the South to the North. The new century brought an even greater proliferation of secular ones. Some were based on pseudoscientific doctrines, exemplified by Estero, which was founded in Florida in 1900 on the ideas of Cyrus R. Teed, who believed that, despite appearances, the earth is a hollow sphere with the sun in the center.

The next great wave of utopian communities, far surpassing the first, came in a brief span of years, from 1965 to roughly 1973. During that period, perhaps as many as two thousand communes appeared, with a membership of 250,000 or more. Many of these were little more than a half-dozen or so people in unconventional living arrangements. Others were larger, serious attempts to find alternative ways of life in an America then waging war in Vietnam and torn apart with racial strife. The majority were rural, but urban collectives and communes also existed. Clearly a part of the counterculture of the 1960s, these utopian communities sometimes emphasized a relatively new element: the notion of collective living as a form of self-fulfillment and personal growth, even therapy. Earlier utopias usually stressed collective goals and transcendent ideologies. The number of utopian communities had declined by the mid-1970s. Prosperity had made them possible, even though, in the minds of many members, they stood as critiques of a materialistic society run amok. In the end, they were victims of disillusion and economic distress.

Explaining the communitarian impulse is no easy matter, given the diversity of forms it has taken. To some extent, communitarian societies have existed in America because it has been relatively easy for them to do so in a generally tolerant, prosperous nation with abundant land. Those factors, however, better explain the persistence of utopian societies than the fluctuations in their attractiveness. A key to understanding their appeal may lie in the fact that the greatest peaks of communitarian activity correspond to periods of religious and social ferment. The Shakers grew in the wake of religious revivalism; secular communities before the Civil War were part of a heady mix of reform activity; and the most recent outburst of utopian societies coincided with the student activism of the 1960s. Communitarianism has been both a product and a critique of these larger movements. It partook of their sense that the world could - and should - be transformed; but it promised to do so by constructing a model society rather than engaging in direct political or social action of the sort swirling around it. [2]

The man behind the 1991 Communitarian movement--Amitai Etzioni, chief advisor to President Jimmy Carter in 79-80-- was truly the visionary of "New Communitarian" philosophy:

"The "Responsive Communitarian Platform," drafted by Etzioni, Mary Ann Glendon, and William Galston in November 1991, sketches out the basic framework. It urges that we start with the family and its central role in time-intensive moral education, ensuring that workplaces provide maximum supports for parents through working time innovations, and warning against avoidable divorces in the interests of children first. The second line of defense is reviving moral education in
schools at all levels, including the values of tolerance, peaceful conflict resolution, the superiority of democratic government, hard work and saving. It also argues for devolving government services to their appropriate levels, pursuing new kinds of public-private partnerships, and developing national and local service programs." [3]

Communitarians envision themselves as building a major social movement paralleling that of the Progressive movement in the early twentieth century. Communitarians believe deeply in preserving rights and extending them in regimes that, ironically, are non democratic, however, and/or practice discrimination. Communitarians  are openly critical of community institutions that are authoritarian and restrictive, that cannot bear scrutiny within a larger framework of human rights and equal opportunities.  Dominant liberal theories of justice, as well as much of economic and political theory, prevail. Communitarianism is deemed to be the social/political current which emphasizes the strengthening and importance of community or neighborhood — a kind of property-owners’ collectivism.

Communitarian  ideas are at least as old as the Roman Empire, have been very influential in academia, and were demonstrated early on in George Bush Sr.'s tour of office, the Clinton White House, and now overtly displayed in GWB's reign, starting with his inaugural address in 2001.  In fact, President Kennedy's, "Ask not what your country can do for you...", own inaugural address certainly qualified, as well, as similar communitarian bent.

Now I do not have anything at all against my country, or community-mindedness, or our own neighborhoods and communities.   But there is a dark side to all of this which I find troubling and politicians seem irrevocably drawn to.  It sounds viable, but has any utopian society ever truly succeeded with real individuality lost?   Once again I think of The Stepford Wives, or Farenheit 451, or The Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Some historians may attempt to call Communitarianism a by-product of one of the worst manifestations of Liberalism. I can't see where it doesn't cross back and forth between all party lines, given that even the above linked speeches are equally 2 parts Republican, 2 parts Democrat, and 2 parts Imperialism--the concept seems to appear wherever it is advantageous.
 

 "It is said that in a bourgeois society, the values of Liberalism, are the dominant values: individualism (autonomy) and democracy (bourgeois right). Liberalism is by no means the only ethical system of bourgeois society however, and Communitarianism, whose central values are community and social equality, is thought to be an important counter to liberalism. Although Communitarianism de-emphasizes social class as a potentially divisive factor in building community, where it takes root in working-class neighborhoods, Communitarianism is truly an important ally of socialism. The neighborhood movements of the 1960s/70s in the US, the Reclaim the Streets movements of the 1980/90s, and the Save Our Suburbs movement in Australia are examples of Communitarianism."
-- Source: "The Encyclopedia of Marxism"

http://www.marxists.org/glossary/terms/c/o.htm

You see, the thing which troubles me the most is, Communitarianism seems to replace loyalty to self, family, church and nation with loyalty to the local and global communities and to the communitarian leaders. Many well-meaning people are being used to advance communistic community-building efforts, without realizing the significance of what they are doing.

In its apparent attempt to obfuscate the American system, Communitarianism opposes individualism, individual initiative and enterprise, individual gain, private profit, private ownership, personal success, and the pursuit of one's own definition of  happiness. At the same time, it has saturated Americans with community values, including:

Under the spell of Communitarianism, one looks toward the community or the nation or the planet, as the center of being, with a sense of, "I am but a wave in search of the ocean," oriented to the purpose of the greater whole, the sum.

One for all, and one for all.

Erich Fromm, philosopher, psychologist and former disciple of Freud,  believed that productive prototype doesn't exist until recently. He calls it Humanistic Communitarian Socialism.

According to Fromm, humanism means orientation towards human beings and not some higher entity. And socialism means everybody is answerable to everybody's welfare.

Perhaps the events of 9-11 merely precipitated once more a favorable atmosphere for the proliferation of utopian community-based concepts in our own country.  Perhaps George Bush is just intuitively responding to a national need?

I found the following WorldNetDaily article of interest.

"Many people are trying to figure out where George Bush is coming from. On the one hand, he seems to stand up for conservatives by backing John Ashcroft and trying to subsidize religious charities -- but on the other hand, he's proposing to expand federal control over local schools, push the government further into health care and even expand Bill Clinton's AmeriCorps program.

Dana Milbank of The Washington Post says that these seemingly contradictory policies are actually consistent. According to Milbank, Bush is ignoring the old labels of "left and right" and embracing "the movement known as 'communitarianism,' which places the importance of society ahead of the unfettered rights of the individual." (I'll bet you didn't realize how "unfettered" your rights have been lately.)

                  On Jan. 31, Milbank wrote:

                       "Communitarianism," or "civil society"
                       thinking (the two have similar meanings)
                       has many interpretations, but at its center
                       is a notion that years of celebrating
                       individual freedom have weakened the
                       bonds of community and that the rights of
                       the individual must be balanced against
                       the interests of society as a whole. Inherent
                       in the philosophy is a return to values and
                       morality, which, the school of thought
                       believes, can best be fostered by
                       community organizations. ...

Bush's inaugural address, said George Washington University professor Amitai Etzioni (see above), a communitarian thinker, "was a  communitarian text," full of words like "civility," "responsibility" and "community." ... Bush has recruited some of the leading thinkers of the "civil society," or "communitarian," movements     to his White House. ...

Communitarianism seems to look good on the surface; decisions will be made for the good of the community. But, in fact, like any government-based philosophy it is a sham.

Communities don't make decisions. Communities don't think, don't believe, don't want, don't have needs, don't have interests and don't make decisions. Only individuals have  minds that generate desires and needs -- and only individuals can make choices and decisions.

Because "society" doesn't make decisions, the issue isn't a case of balancing individual rights against the interests of society. The question is:  Will you make the decisions that control your life or will someone else impose his way upon  you? That someone else won't be the community or society; it will be whoever seizes the power to run the community.

By subsidizing "faith-based" charities, for example, George Bush isn't acting on behalf of the community. He's confiscating your earnings and giving it to the charities that please him and his political associates. He may do it in the name of society, compassion, community, or Snickers Bars. But it is simply raw political power -- the same kind exercised by Bill Clinton and all his predecessors, preempting your right    to use the money you earn in the way you think best.

The Communitarians may say you've been enjoying too much individual freedom, and that you must give up some of that for the benefit of the community. But they really mean that they want more power over your life -- to force you to subsidize, obey and conform to their choices. "

"The [hard to find] book, "Time Bomb",  provides overwhelming documentation and detailed facts about the criminal conspiracy, about the Communitarian, or Communist, program to achieve global control as the NWO.

     - At the Sixth Party Congress held in Moscow in 1928, the Communists wrote and approved 'The Program' to bring in the New World Order. The 'Programme of the Communist International' called for a global environmental program and for the transformation of all people on earth to accept the new socio-political  order. An omnipotent one-world hierarchy of regional governances would control virtually every aspect of human life on earth. All the world's inhabitants would live in a world without nations, a world without nationalities, a world without borders, and a world without competition.

     - Vladimir Lenin said, 'First we will take Eastern Europe, then the masses of Asia. Then we will encircle the United States, which will be the last bastion of Capitalism. We shall not have to attack. It (the U.S.) Will fall  like a ripe grapefruit into our hands.' In Africa, Asia, and Latin America, Communists have sponsored 'wars  of national liberation.' They 'set up a timetable of conquest for the entire world' and have proceeded to take it country by country.

     - Architects of the New World Order have sought to make countries economically interdependent by
 creating new political entities and regional organizations, such as the European Union (EU), the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), finally
merging them all into a global government, first under the United Nations, then under a hierarchy of regional governments.

     - One of the Communists' first priorities was to change people's actual psychology. It was the mission of
Psychopolitics to condition or prepare men for the loss of individuality and identity, for submergence into the collective, for total limitation of individual freedom and for blind devotion to the will of the ruling elite or nomenklatura. In their attempt to gain unlimited control of the masses, the Communists began     deliberately and methodically to transform self- sufficient, independent individuals into selfless, obsequious members of local and global 'communities.'

     --They trained whole nations of people, including citizens of the Soviet Union and China, to regard individualism as an egregious sin, to stifle all personal aspects in others and in themselves, to fulfill their obligation to serve the community, and to cultivate a desire to strive, not for their own achievement,
enjoyment, or material well-being, but for 'the common good.'

In short, the Communists worked to saturate the people with a spirit of community, i.e., a spirit of collectivism, and community values. This movement to build strong communities and to instill Communist values, to effect in whole populations the creation of a submissive, self-destructive slave mentality, and to secure and maintain dominion over the thoughts and loyalties of all human inhabitants of the world is now known as Communitarianism.

For decades, the Soviets and the U.S. ruling elite have worked to build a community system in America. Like preceding communitarian administrations, the Bush-Cheney Administration and its Communist allies  promote communitarianism. The Communitarian (Communist) ruling elite has worked to transform your town (or city) into a Communist, Soviet- style 'community.' This book ['Time Bomb"] shows that it has established countless community programs and organizations and expanded community-building efforts in order to achieve its ultimate end: to control virtually every aspect of your life.

-- Communitarians are bent on replacing our constitutional republic with democracy. The Bush   Administration has worked to build a strong democracy because it permits the gradual transition from     capitalism into socialism and from socialism into Communism.
--To alienate and radicalize American youth, globalists have sought to discredit the U.S. Constitution, the Founding Fathers, and American institutions, traditions and beliefs." [5]

--author, Devvy Kidd , January 16, 2002

FYI,  the concept of non-elected councils is also Communist in origin.  It is one we will be hearing more of.

Our Williamson County Sheriff's Department is experiencing lowered budgets requiring the local police to take over some of the duties of that sheriff's department --this means citizens cannot vote those officials out of office should they fail to perform their duties, for they were never voted in. We can no longer regulate those who govern us through the power of our vote.  Check it out for yourselves.  We the people cannot remove officials, or councils, we did not vote in, nor can we control their behavior, but instead are, in fact, at the mercy of such councils.  Any appointed council, set up for whatever purpose, is NOT a body elected.  Volunteers are also neither voted nor salaried.  (Once, a famous music producer who was working au gratis on a project was heard to grouse loudly in response to being told he'd just been fired, "Why that is ridiculous!  You can't fire someone who is working for free!")

Sometimes sleepers slip in as cause-conscious individuals, appearing at town meetings or instigating such meetings on behalf of some environmental or community issue----and a council is subsequently appointed to look into the cause or issue.  And, the problem is, if we don't start looking at what is really happening to our neighborhoods and communities, states and country, we are going to begin experiencing irrevocable losses of control.  If a community or part of it is deemed a "protected habitat" -- like the wetlands -- then the government can secure that portion from us in order to protect endangered species, and is not required to compensate us in any way for taking the land.  At best, when humans allow others to lead us to unnaturally prioritize the environment above humanity, we drive the final nail in the coffin of sanity, and give up our American right to private property for the sake of some speckled skink, alleged to be "endangered."

(Preservation of the biosphere, along the lines set out by the environmental movement,  is the most important human value
and is of greater importance than human life or human rights. See, for example, the "Earth Charter Philosophy" written
by Gorbachev's Green Cross International. Follow this link: The Green Cross Philosophy and read it - especially points
12, 13, and 14, and the "Implementation" section.  After preservation of the biosphere, the most important values for human society and human behavior are equality, peace, and tolerance. Tradition, law, individual freedom, and property rights must not interfere with achieving these goals.)

Who or what, then, can be behind the merging of Communitarian consciousness phraseology, and the pseudo-environmental consciousness of Agenda 21*, into world-wide movements?  Who really coined "smart growth" and "sustainability" and "sustainable development," why do politcians love them, and what should these terms mean to us?

If the UN accomplishes the end it purports --the imposition of global control of land  and people through sustainability-- it will eradicate private land ownership and reduce worldwide population* ( *I didn't even get into THAT discussion). Its self-appointed, authoritarian role would be to plan and control each and all aspects of life:

"In 1993, President Clinton responded to Agenda 21’s call for 'national (unelected!!!!!) councils on sustainable development" using 'a new collaborative decision process' by issuing Executive Order #12852 on June 29, creating the President’s Council on Sustainable Development (PCSD). Control of the environmentally dominated Council’s agenda was maintained by Cochair Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute (WRI). It was the WRI that wrote the UN Global Biodiversity Assessment* (GBA), a totally antihuman foundational document for writing the implementing language for the Convention on Biological Diversity, one of the executing treaties to provide Agenda 21 with the force of law." [7]

If you think my views are jaded, biased, or just plain incorrect, try typing in any questionable word, phrase, or concept into your favorite search engine and compare and contrast data for yourself.

Folks, I truly have a problem when this earth and all created things on it are exalted above human life.  We become the thing hunted.  The notion that some spiny spotted slug's survival is to be elevated in scientific and theological significance above the humans of this planet, to me is utterly repugnant.  The notion that all but those rich are perceived as "weeds" that exhaust the earth's resources, makes my heart stop at the implications.  The current UN vision for the world, yes the world, is that of THE EARTH IS THE CENTER OF THE KNOWN UNIVERSE.  And the UN are the self-appointed emissaries of Earth.  This is also called the "Earth First" movement.   (Mother Earth---is our creator.)   And out of this dark well is springing a lot of deception about the order of things, nature, and our individual human rights.

In three weeks a document will be presented which attempts to entirely usurp the Judeo-Christian Ten Commandments (it does not oppose Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Scientology, etc., etc., only J-C), called The UN Earth Charter.  This document, which alleges to be the Earth First Movement's ten commandments of Mother Earth will be presented and placed into the bowels of the UN Ark of Hope, and dedicated at the 2002 Earth Summit being held in Johannesburg, South Africa, on August 23-27.

Don't believe me...try typing some of those underlined words (above) into a search engine and look what else crawls out.

And for a truly frightening look at its true light go to --  http://victorian.fortunecity.com/palette/187/misc.html
 

Finally, in my own most favorite book, it says that all who follow Christ also follow His two great commandments (Matthew 22:37-40): "' You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.'  This is the first and great commandment.  And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.'  On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets."  And He gave His disciples (all who follow Him) something else to clarify the second, which is important (John 13:34) -- "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another as I loved you; as I have loved you, that you also love one another."

1. http://dsausa.org/archive/Docs/Lingo.html
2. The Reader's Companion to American History. Eric Foner and John A. Garraty, Editors. Sponsored by
    the Society of American Historians. Copyright © 1991 by Houghton Mifflin Company. All Rights Reserved.
3. http://www.gwu.edu/~media/pressreleases/02-05-01-Etzioni.htm
4. http://www.cuttingedge.org/ce1064.html
5. Devvy Kidd. Advisory Board Member for The Wallace Institute. Founder and Director of POWER (Project on Winning Economic Reform). http://www.devvy.com/
6. ibid.
7. ibid.