GK Chesterton On The Confederate Flag

Chesterton With David On Confederate Flag

Mandeville, LA – Exclusive Transcript – “So Chesterton writes Heretics first and is wondering where the heresy of modernism or modernity is going to take us.  Of course, he saw nothing good coming of it and warned about what was to happen, which, as you and I have talked about, is a descent into barbarism.”  Check out today’s transcript for the rest….

Begin Mike Church Show Transcript

Mike:  To the issue of the flags, which the ceremony was last week and there were millions upon millions of hits on the YouTube video of the thing being taken down and mass celebration, [mocking] “This is the greatest day ever.”  While this is going on, this woman at these Planned Parenthood clinics is dismembering black children, soon-to-be-born, dismembering them.  No one spoke out against this.  A majority of abortions that happen on Manhattan Island are performed against black children.  That is a matter of CDC record.  It’s not me saying that.  It’s not some pro-life promoting agenda wacko.  That’s a matter of CDC medical record.  The minorities suffer – as a percentage, the black minority suffers more or is subject to more abortions than the white so-called majority is.

Now, while all this is going on, all these mass celebrations.  We have these calls to exhume Nathan Bedford Forrest now.  That’s not enough.  The mayor from Memphis didn’t just say remove the statue.  Exhume his body and his wife.

David Simpson:  You know I’m out of the loop here.  Is this really going on?

Mike:  Yes.  Mrs. Bedford Forrest must be exhumed as well.  I’ll give you the story.  “Memphis Mayor Wants to Dig Up Dead Confederate War General.”

[reading]

Memphis Mayor A.C. Wharton wants to dig up the bodies of Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest and his wife . . .

[end reading]

Mike:  Not only are they going after Nathan Bedford, now it’s the wife, too.

Simpson:  Well, she was complicit, Mike.

Mike:  Of course she was.

[private FP-Monthly|FP-Yearly|FP-Yearly-WLK|FP-Yearly-So76]

[reading]

. . . and remove them from a city park in the latest and perhaps most despicable example of the anti-Southern cleansing spreading across the nation. “Which African-American wants to have a picnic in the shadow of Nathan Bedford Forrest?”

[end reading]

Mike:  I have a question for you, Mr. Mayor.  Which African-American wants to have a picnic in the shadow of Margaret Sanger?  Is there a Planned Parenthood clinic anywhere in Memphis?  Probably.

Simpson:  I bet you there is.  Probably more than one.

Mike:  Here’s the advantage that the mob radicals have on this particular issue.  Dead men tell no tales, and the dead cannot defend themselves.

Simpson:  That’s a great – I never – I just read that article that you’re about to talk about.  I never thought about it from that angle, Mike.  That’s an excellent point.

Mike:  Now, let’s bring GK Chesterton in, our buddy, on this.  I’m reading now from Orthodoxy.  Orthodoxy, which as I found out was written in response to his book Heretics – so he comes out with Heretics first.  He writes about how: You people are all crazy.  I read a bio of Chesterton, a brief bio while I was on vacation.  Apparently Chesterton was able to actually maintain very robust friendships with Wells –

Simpson:  I think they all loved him actually.

Mike:  Yeah, with Wells and George Bernard Shaw.  These were the heretics.  These were the guys that he was pointing out but apparently they loved him.  So Chesterton writes Heretics first and is wondering where the heresy of modernism or modernity is going to take us.  Of course, he saw nothing good coming of it and warned about what was to happen, which, as you and I have talked about, is a descent into barbarism.

Simpson:  If you ask me, I think he named it Heretics for the very reason that you can’t use that word anymore.  That word either has no meeting or people –

Mike:  People don’t know what it means.

Simpson:  – have a vitriolic response to it, right?  I think he used that word intentionally knowing that there’s a fundamental loss of belief and you can only have a heresy if you have a belief system.

Mike:  So it would be impossible for us to have heresies today because we don’t believe.

Simpson:  We don’t believe in anything.

Mike:  I use the word heretic all the time, and that’s why maybe no one has come after me for it, because they don’t know what it means.

Simpson:  You’re calling them pooky monster or something.  What does that mean?  I don’t know.

Mike:  In Orthodoxy – all these people come out against Chesterton and then Chesterton says: I’ll explain to you.  What is my answer to this?  What is my orthodoxy or my solution?  I’ll write it down.  He wrote it down.

On the subject of tradition, which is what the Confederate flag is, which is what the fleur-de-lis is – of course, Mitch Landrieu wants to come out and get rid of the fleur-de-lis now.  It came up at a city council meeting.  Read the minutes of the council meeting.  You had people saying that the statue of Iberville has to come down because he was a French slaveholder, and Bienville has to come down.  The imbeciles at the meeting apparently didn’t know that Poydras Avenue is named after Julien de Lallande Poydras.  How do I know that?  Because I research the Louisiana Constitution.  That’s how I know that.  Who was Poydras?  A French plantation slave owner.  Why doesn’t Poydras have to come down?  [mocking] “You give us time.  We’ll get to it.”  These are all traditions.  Of course, the fleur-de-lis is Trinitarian.

Simpson:  And French monarchy.

Mike:  I also pointed out to the audience in the first hour that you guys are behind the ball again.  What do you think Bourbon is named after?  It’s not named after booze; it’s named after the House of Bourbon, you imbecile.  It’s named after the House of Bourbon.  What’s that?

Simpson:  Don’t start breaking those bottles.  If you break those bottles, I’ll be so upset.  I just read an article about how good it is to drink.  If they get rid of the bottles, I’m out of here.

Mike:  That’s Louis the King.  He’s the one who imported the French slaves.  Bourbon Street has got to go.  What we’re talking about here, what it boils down to is that these names and the use of them and the flag and the other symbols are traditional to some people.  True, it may be offensive to some, but for others it is tradition.  Chesterton, in Orthodoxy, wrote about tradition.  Here’s what he wrote in part:

[reading]

If we attach great importance to the opinion of ordinary men in great unanimity when we are dealing with daily matters, there’s no reason why we should disregard it when we are dealing with history or fable. Tradition may be defined as an extension of this franchise. Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man’s opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man’s opinion, even if he is our father. I, at any rate, cannot separate the two ideas of democracy and tradition; it seems evident to me that they are the same idea. We will have the dead at our councils. The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot papers, are marked with a cross.

[end reading]

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Simpson:  Brilliant as usual.  Can we just trying to show off, Mike? It’s time to go home.  Let’s go have breakfast.

Mike:  I have no answer to that.

Simpson:  And neither would the modernist who’s walking around right now trying to tear down General Lee.  General Lee should have a vote.  As a matter of fact, the people already voted in General Lee’s time.  They put a monument to him in the middle of New Orleans.  Lee Circle should remain and General Lee should remain up there for good and for bad.  We learn both things from him.  What’s wrong with that?

Mike:  That’s a great point.

Simpson:  I learn something about leadership from Robert E. Lee and I also learn something about the errors of racism.  Good for me and good for he.  What’s the difference?

Mike:  To the point of the people voted for it, and they might have voted with their money, they might have voted with their vote.  They might have voted just as a vote of civics or whatever the case may have been.  I was actually born in the city of New Orleans.  Are you a native?

Simpson:  I am.

Mike:  We are born there.

Simpson:  Baptist Hospital.

Mike:  Hotel-Dieu.  How dare Mitch Landrieu, the current Democrat walking about, how dare he rob from me and from my fathers that which is part of what made the City of New Orleans the City of New Orleans.  Anybody that has ever visited here knows where Lee Circle is.  If you change the name of it, does that mean it’s not going to be Lee Circle anymore?

Simpson:  The Circle.  Let’s go to The Circle, Mike.

Mike:  If you go to The Circle, what’s the point of going to New Orleans?  I have a circle in my town.

Simpson:  There’s a traffic circle in the middle of the street.

Mike:  There’s a Circle K down the street if I need a coffee or a donut or something.  Our ancestors – and this is when I found Chesterton as I’m reading this.  I started getting mad.  I told Mrs. Church, this is just an outrage.

Simpson:  Yes, it is.

Mike:  Where is everyone else here that was born, like I was, in the city who says: No, you’re not going to tear that down.  No, that is part of the heritage of the city.

End Mike Church Show Transcript