In this time of moral and political
crises, it is the responsibility of the youth of America to
affirm certain eternal truths. - The Sharon Statement, September 11, 1960
"When
bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by
one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle." - Edmund Burke
We
grew up in the midst of the aftermath of turmoil and revolution of the
1960s and 1970s only to find that the radicals were now high school
teachers and at university faculty members and Administrators. Using
their positions to indoctrinate and continue to advance a radical agenda
that had been rejected at the ballot box through the institutions. In
the case of Florida International University years later in 2007 a couple were arrested by the FBI and revealed to be agents of Fidel Castro's communist dictatorship. Apparently, this was not an isolated incident.
It
was our natural reaction against this that led a group of college
students of different backgrounds to seek out and form a chapter of Young Americans for Freedom at Florida International University back in 1992. The first president of YAF-FIU was Craig Herrero, followed by John Suarez, and Cesar Vasquez.
Throughout
our years of existence, YAF-FIU attended Florida conventions
hosted by the Young America's Foundation, attended Leadership
Institute trainings as well as Phyllis Schlafly's Eagle Forum
Collegiate's first annual leadership seminar. YAF-FIU also
lobbied to bring conservative speakers starting with Phyllis Schlafly, with the help of Young Americas Foundation, Jack Kemp, and later Pat Buchanan.
Aside from our own newsletter, VOX LIBERTAS, which was regularly distributed, YAF-FIU also distributed CAMPUS: AMERICA'S STUDENT NEWSPAPER, Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI) publications and Campus Report, produced by Accuracy in Academia.
FIU-YAF
fought battles on the cultural and political front for more than a
decade before the increasingly restrictive university policies nibbling
away at student freedoms finally took their toll. FIU-YAF fought the
battles greatly outnumbered at times by faculty and administration with
an apathetic student body untroubled by the loss of their freedoms on
campus, and a student newspaper with a left-wing tilt.
"The true danger is when liberty is nibbled away, for expedients, and by parts." -Edmund Burke
In
many ways what took place at Florida International University mirrors
what has happened both in Miami-Dade County and in the country at large.
The question that gnaws is what can be done about this?
"We
must all obey the great law of change. It is the most powerful law of
nature, and the means perhaps of its conservation." -Edmund Burke
There
are a number of texts and thinkers out there that provide a diagnosis
of the crisis and the onslaught against American freedoms and the West in general.
Identifying the problem and recognizing that the America we group up in
is disappearing replaced with new generations that are much more
passive and obedient to bureaucratic controls. Continued mass
immigration combined with multiculturalism is fracturing the American
identity and whatever homogeneity existed before which is perfect for
the managerial elite because it gives them excuses for more bureaucracy
and more controls.
"If you set
out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any
time, and you would achieve nothing." - Margaret Thatcher
Much
of these revolutions undermining the United States have taken place
under Republican presidents and were not reversed even when both the
executive and the legislative were controlled by the Republican party.
"Whenever a separation is made between liberty and justice, neither, in my opinion, is safe." -Edmund Burke
Add
to that conservatives going along with the party line defending George
W. Bush as he trashed America's reputation abroad and demonstrated
incompetence (one hopes) domestically ending with massive federal bail
outs of companies "too big to fail" and as Herbert Hoover prepared the
ground for Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1930s so Bush did for Obama
today.
"People will not look forward to posterity, who never look backward to their ancestors." - Edmund Burke
These failures on the political front pale in comparison to the failure to transmit American traditions
and concepts of liberty to the new generations in the public schools.
Conservatives have retreated into home schooling that is doing the job
with a select few children, but the vast majority have been lobotomized
by the education establishment and an increasingly toxic popular culture. This is what Gramsci described as the long march through the institutions by cultural Marxism.
Sadly these trends are not new William F. Buckley Jr.
identified it in 1955 stating "The largest cultural menace in America
is the conformity of the intellectual cliques which, in education as
well as the arts, are out to impose upon the nation their modish fads
and fallacies, and have nearly succeeded in doing so. In this cultural
issue, we are, without reservations, on the side of excellence (rather
than "newness") and of honest intellectual combat (rather than
conformity)."*
The buzz word of today's Utopian is globalization but what is being globalized? Vaclav Havel offered the following observation last week:
"We are living in the first truly global civilization. That means that
whatever comes into existence on its soil can very quickly and easily
span the whole world. But we are also living in the first atheistic
civilization, in other words, a civilization that has lost its
connection with the infinite and eternity. For that reason it prefers
short-term profit to long-term profit. What is important is whether an
investment will provide a return in ten or fifteen years; how it will
affect the lives of our descendants in a hundred years is less
important. However, the most dangerous aspect of this global atheistic
civilization is its pride. The pride of someone who is driven by the
very logic of his wealth to stop respecting the contribution of nature
and our forebears, to stop respecting it on principle and respect it
only as a further potential source of profit." What Havel is describing
is the triumph of cultural Marxism.
Finally, the Sharon Statement
is as relevant today as it was in 1960 including its plank on
international communism. A large part of humanity continues to live
under Marxist-Leninist despots in China,
North Korea, Cuba, Vietnam and are threatened by executives that would
like to impose it in Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Ecuador undermining
basic political freedoms. Jesse Helms in his memoirs
written long after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the disappearance of
the Soviet Union in 2005 said it best: "It was never a mistake to give
our support to the person or group who did not embrace Communism
rather than a person or faction who did. Communism has been tried and
found wanting in countries around the world. In every case, the rule of
Communism brought the death of dissidents, the banning of religion,
the destruction of revered cultures and the devaluation of human life. …
Communism is not truly dead.”
Dear friends you are in my thoughts as you observe the six decade mark of Young Americans for Freedom but frankly there is much left to do if the United States is to be saved and if Western Civilization is to survive. A suggestion: pick up copies of Richard Viguerie's Conservatives Betrayed and M. Stanton Evan's Blacklisted by History and read both carefully. Young Americans for Freedom can still save the day.
Today, we are witnessing Maoists carrying out struggle sessions on the streets of the United States, and new generations of young Americans drawn to the siren call of communism. It can happen here, and friends of freedom of all generations need to step up.There is a link between the Black Panthers and the Maoists. William F. Buckley Jr. engaged some of their leaders back in the 1960s and is worth watching today.
We failed to contain and defeat our adversaries on college campuses and they are now wreaking havoc in the larger world off campus. Although YAF has not won the struggle for freedom in the United States, new generations of young conservatives continue to join the fight, and gives us OAFS (Old Americans for Freedom) hope for the future. Today, they are organizing acts of remembrance on the 19th anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center.
Congress has no planned moment of remembrance on the 19th anniversary of 9/11.
— Spencer Brown (@itsSpencerBrown) September 10, 2020
Instead, @YAF will place 2,977 American flags in the lawn on the East Front—one for each victim—on Friday from 7:30am until 2:00pm.
Stop by if you're in DC. #NeverForget🇺🇸https://t.co/AJry6Xi4GP
*William F. Buckley Jr. "Our Mission Statement" in National Review (19 November 1955)
