Relativism: the new absolute

Sometime beginning in the late 1960s and to a greater extent every decade since, people turned from a confidence in absolute truths to a feeling that anyone’s beliefs and views were just as true as anyone else’s. Fearing to offend, or maybe because everyone has become so unschooled in the ability to separate truth from stupidity, we are forced to accept silly, politically correct and naïve judgments.

In spite of facts to the contrary, many in the media ridicule U.S. Rep. Peter King’s hearings into American Muslim radicalization and its effects on national security. Florida Republican Rep. Cliff Stearns’s investigation into the use of taxpayer dollars by Planned Parenthood for abortions is dismissed as politically motivated. No mention is made of the facts and the law involved. It seems to most of the media that if the Democrats are for it, it’s serious governing; if conservatives propose something, it’s right-wing demagoguery.

But politics is only one activity in today’s America where intolerance of traditional ideas is evident.

This is the age of polarization. Men and women, young and old, liberal and conservative, Democrat and Republican (and even GOP moderate and conservative), coastal and heartland, urban and rural, technically savvy and not, rich and poor, educated and less so, union and union-free, management and employees, everyone always seems to be at odds.

Once upon a time, faith and moral truths were respected, without ridicule, without condescension and without mockery. Speak of holiness or right and wrong now and many people, especially young people, get really uncomfortable. To believe in God and to publically express that belief is often thought of as weird, if not mocked.

What happened? Was it Vietnam? Free love? Drugs? Nixon? Clinton? Camelot’s dénouement? What has turned so many people away from the epistemological search for truth toward the feel-satisfied, lazy acceptance — even promotion — of the relatively inoffensive and good enough?