Civilization is not the natural state of man. It is a fragile achievement, painstakingly constructed over thousands of years through laws, customs, certitudes, and discipline. Barbarism, by contrast, requires no effort. All a society has to do to achieve barbarism is abandon its laws and generally accepted code of conduct.
Which brings me to 2026 America. The great choice confronting Americans today is between a civilized society and an anything-goes culture, one in which sympathy for perpetrators takes precedence over protection of innocent people.
Evolutionary psychologist Gad Saad refers to this phenomenon as “suicidal empathy.” The term refers to compassion carried to such an irrational extreme that people become willing to sacrifice themselves, their families, and their civilization in order to avoid appearing cruel or judgmental.
The Lindsay Clancy murder trial offers a chilling example of the moral confusion that suicidal empathy produces. Clancy admitted to killing her three young children by strangling them with exercise bands, so that is not in dispute. But her defense attorney argued that postpartum psychosis rendered her not criminally responsible.
As the whole world now knows, the trial ended in a mistrial after the jury deadlocked. Eleven jurors favored finding Clancy not criminally responsible, while one juror sided with the prosecution. The charges remain pending, and prosecutors may retry the case.
The issue is not whether there is such a thing as mental illness. Obviously, mental illness exists. Nor is there any doubt that postpartum psychosis can have devastating effects on a woman’s mind. The issue is whether empathy for an offender should become so strong that his or her victims become little more than an afterthought.
In the case of Lindsay Clancy, what is not debatable is that three small children are dead. They did not receive a second chance, psychiatric treatment, or endless analysis of their “state of mind.” Their lives were permanently extinguished by the one person upon whom they were completely dependent.
Without question, mental illness is a serious problem, but a civilized society should be able to protect the public and have compassion for victims and their families while also recognizing the seriousness of mental illness. Of course, a verdict of not guilty by reason of insanity does not necessarily mean immediate freedom. It normally results in a psychiatric commitment, but the moral danger lies in the emotional habit of explaining away barbaric conduct until explanation morphs into exoneration.
Another example of inversion of sympathy appears whenever an illegal alien commits a violent crime. Rather than focusing on the murdered woman, the assaulted child, or the family whose life has been destroyed, politicians and media commentators often rush to warn everyone against “stigmatizing” illegal immigrants.
Obviously, most illegal immigrants are not violent criminals, but that is not the point. The point is that any serious crime committed by someone who had no legal right to be in the country in the first place was preventable in the most literal sense. Had the immigration laws been enforced, that particular offender would not have been present to commit that particular crime.
Unfortunately, suicidal empathy demands that Americans ignore this obvious fact. Instead, we are told to focus on the hardships that caused the offender to cross the border, such as the poverty in his homeland. The suffering of the victim becomes secondary to preserving the moral self-image of the people who refused to enforce the law.
We also see suicidal empathy in the so-called “teen takeovers” that have become increasingly common in major cities. Hundreds of young people, often organized through social media, descend on downtown districts, block streets, twerk on police cars, vandalize businesses, and terrorize residents.
How do the apostles of suicidal empathy respond? They talk about young people needing recreational opportunities, community investment, social workers, and “safe spaces.” I’m all for building more recreation centers, but restoring order should be the first priority of a civilized society. No teenager has a civil right to take over a street, smash a store window, attack a motorist, or frighten an elderly couple. A difficult childhood may explain bad conduct, but it does not give anyone ownership of the public square.
The point modern merchants of compassion refuse to understand is that rights cannot survive without responsibilities, and freedom cannot survive without law and order. A civilized society draws clear lines. It says you may protest, but you may not riot. You may immigrate, but you must follow the law. You may suffer from mental illness, but society must still protect others from your mental issues. You may be young, disadvantaged, angry, or alienated, but you cannot prey upon innocent people.
An anything-goes society erases these constraints. It treats standards as oppression, punishment as cruelty, borders as bigotry, and personal responsibility as “white supremacy.” It endlessly searches for reasons why the aggressor should not be blamed while expecting law-abiding citizens to quietly accept the consequences.
True compassion is directed first toward innocent people. It protects children from violent adults, pedestrians from mobs, shopkeepers from looters, and citizens from criminals who should never have been allowed into the country in the first place. Compassion without judgment is not morality. It is unreasoned sentimentality, and when sentimentality prevents a society from defending its people, the result is an anything-goes society.
Americans must decide what kind of country they want. If they want a civilized society, they must accept the fact that civilization requires boundaries, enforcement, and consequences. It requires the courage to say that some conduct is unacceptable, regardless of the offender’s resume.
If, however, Americans continue to elevate empathy above truth, safety, and justice, they should not be surprised when barbarism begins to take hold. History teaches us that civilization does not usually end in a dramatic explosion. More often than not, it dies slowly, one certitude at a time.
When a juror in the Lindsay Clancy case publicly stated, “He (the dissenting juror) had the hardest time getting off the fact that Lindsay viciously killed her children,” another certitude had died. In modern-day America, suicidal empathy demands that people not dwell on the inconvenient fact that three small children are dead at the hands of their mother.
Copyright © 2020 Robert Ringer
ROBERT RINGER is a New York Times #1 bestselling author who has appeared on numerous national radio and television shows, including The Tonight Show, Today, The Dennis Miller Show, Good Morning America, ABC Nightline, The Charlie Rose Show, as well as Fox News and Fox Business. To sign up for a free subscription to his mind-expanding daily insights, visit www.robertringer.com.
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