OPINION:
In the past few weeks, Uri Berliner, a 25-year veteran of NPR, blew the whistle on the state-funded media giant’s pervasive liberal bias. In response, NPR’s new CEO, Katherine Maher, suspended the senior editor without pay for telling the truth about the company. This ultimately led to Mr. Berliner’s resignation.
NPR’s heavy-handedness in suppressing truthful dissent should surprise no one. Ms. Maher, after all, has been clear in saying that “truth” is not important to her. Consider her comments in a recent TED Talk:
“Seeking the truth and seeking to convince others of the truth might not be the right place to start. In fact, our reverence for the truth might just be in the way of finding common ground and getting things done. … I am certain the truth exists for you and probably the person sitting next to you. But this may not be the same truth. … [W]e all have different truths.”
The consequences of Ms. Maher’s worldview have had a devastating impact on the media. But it doesn’t stop there. Almost every aspect of our lives has been corrupted by this lie.
Our nation’s schools are falling further and further behind by nearly every measure and every scorecard.
Women have lost their privacy, their dignity, and even their identity at the hands of those who deny the truth of what it means to be female. Children have lost their childhood, serving now as pawns in an ugly game of social engineering. Freedom of speech is mocked. Religious freedom is lost. Socialism is on the rise, while constitutional liberty is maligned. It seems the list is nearly endless.
If we dig deeper, however, into this cultural collapse, we find that what Ms. Maher and her ilk are actually rejecting is the source of truth more than the truth’s actual existence.
History, as well as common sense, teaches us that truth must come from somewhere beyond the individual. It is more than just a collection of opinions. Truth doesn’t care about your feelings. This is why Lady Justice is blind. She knows the trial cannot be judged by emotions. Justice can be administered only when she closes her eyes to the subjective agendas of the case and lets the facts speak for themselves.
The Declaration of Independence suggests something similar. Truth is given to us by our Creator, not made up by a bunch of elite media oligarchs featured in TED Talks. Truth is not a construct of the crowd or the product of public consensus. Truth is revealed from above, not made up from within.
Since the founding of America, the self-evident truths and unalienable rights that form the building blocks of our society have found their source in God and the Bible. Rejecting this foundation goes hand in hand with rejecting objective truth and consequently losing our corresponding rights and freedoms.
Moses, St. Paul, Thomas Jefferson and de Tocqueville all assumed a source of truth bigger, better and wiser than themselves. Ms. Maher, on the other hand (who doesn’t believe truth is as relative as she claims, for if she did, on what grounds is Mr. Berliner’s suspension justified?), believes her source of truth is herself.
The progressives at NPR proclaim that they, mere mortals, know more than all of those who have gone before them and more than even God himself. As Barack Obama boldly proclaimed, “They are the ones we’ve been waiting for, and they are the change we seek.”
They can stem the ocean’s tide, calm the nation’s storms, and control the world’s climate. They can redefine biology and ignore genetics. Through their social programs, they can eliminate the natural distinction between men and women and cleanse the world of the “toxicity” of men such as Mr. Berliner. Why? When it comes down to it, Ms. Maher’s “truth” trumps all those who disagree with her.
This progressive arrogance is not limited to editing rooms in mainstream media. Thanks to the mindless complicity of our nation’s schools, it’s a worldview that many Americans now share. Every person who parrots Ms. Maher’s progressive pablum that “it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as it works for you” mimics her self-refuting nonsense. By rejecting any authority outside of ourselves, we have turned America into a nation of narcissists.
But this is far worse than the vanity of Narcissus, for this is not the stuff of Greek mythology. It is real. These people who claim to be God walk and talk among us as actual human beings.
• Everett Piper (dreverettpiper.com, @dreverettpiper), a columnist for The Washington Times, is a former university president and radio host.
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