Column #449         April 5, 2024Rachel Levine

Societies are built on traditions and rituals. Michelle Langley, Associate Professor of Archaeology, Griffith University, defines them thusly.

In scientific terms, a “tradition” refers to the passing down of customs and beliefs from one generation to the next. A “ritual,” on the other hand, is a series of actions performed according to a prescribed order, and which is often embedded in a larger symbolic system, such as religion or philosophy.

For example, while celebrating birthdays is a tradition, blowing out the candles on a cake is a ritual. Similarly, while getting married is a tradition, exchanging vows is a ritual.1

All of us have minor daily rituals that we perform. These rituals may be as minor as how we make our coffee in the morning. More significantly, we all have traditions that are shared within our family, our community, our state, our country, and with people all over the world.

I’ve lived in many different states. I was a nomad because before graduating from Oregon State University I was an “Air Force brat.” The other was that after graduating from college I sought out better economic and environmental conditions in which to live. That caused me to move my ranching and other businesses from originally being in Oregon, to Nevada, and then to Texas. Now I reside in Florida—a lifelong dream.2

While a school-age youngster I lived in Oregon, Idaho, California, Nebraska, Texas, and Georgia. By the time I had graduated from Benedictine Military School in Savannah, Georgia, in 1962, I had been in 12 different schools. Amazingly, the last four years were in the same high school. Over the years I’ve visited all the states, except for two or three NE states, and many foreign countries in Asia, Europe, Central America, various island nations in the Atlantic, and of course Canada and Mexico.

Everywhere I’ve been, people are people. But even in the different states of the USA they speak differently, dress differently, eat differently, have different traditions and rituals, yet amazingly similar moral codes. Most citizens of every region want peace, they don’t like crime, and they cling to their traditions and rituals. Generally speaking, people everywhere are family oriented. They get married and want to raise children and eventually have grandchildren and great grandchildren. And they all want their descendants to be successful and carry on with their same religions, traditions, and rituals.

Involved in the development of religions, traditions, and rituals is also history—which can muck up the works. For instances there are disagreements between Muslims and Christians that date back to medieval times. In some countries Catholics and Protestants have battled. Some Arabs and the Jews have been at each others throat for thousands of years. Then there are the many cases where regions in Africa were divided up and traditionally warring tribes were made to live together. I could go on, but the point is made. Not all traditions, rituals, and religions mix well.

There are some things about people that I don’t recall as universal desires. One is that they are uncomfortable when it comes to changing traditions, rituals, religions, and environments. It’s hard enough when they have to move to a new area where they’re a very small minority. But it’s especially difficult for new comers to adopt the traditions and rituals of new regions when they continue to live in a separate community of their peers. That’s unfortunate because assimilation is always a key for harmony when moving into a new society. Without it resentment often develops between the natives and the “interlopers.”

But in all the various regions throughout the world, I don’t know of one where the population runs off the rails and their traditions and rituals become centered with depravity as their goal. Instead they want honesty, integrity, peace, children, grand children, healthy families, food and shelter, privacy, respectable trades, private property rights, and free speech.

I don’t know of one country where the majority of citizens promote the idea that if a man calls himself a woman, or vice versa, accepting his myth is what’s required for building uplifting family-centered communities. That’s because to believe in a transgender’s myth demotes integrity, demands that others accept a lie, represents a mental disease, won’t result in children or healthy families, and therefore is far from constructive. Insisting on people believing what’s not true is indoctrination. And then for the government, athletic institutions, and school sport programs to follow through on the madness by insisting that a transgender man can compete in women’s sports—is a sign of mass insanity.

In spite of all this, our government is striving to get all citizens to adopt new “religions” such as atheism or secularism. It wants us to teach our children that transgenderism, homosexuality, bodily mutilation, DEI, socialism, and biological nonsense are the modern way of life. (It’s the LGBTQQIP2SAA community—whatever those letters and numbers mean—our government wants our citizens to embrace.)

Our government has opened the border and more than ten million illegal migrants have poured across it. These illegals know little to nothing regarding our traditions and rituals—except many are willing to work cheap or get benefits and vote Democrat. They have brought with them illnesses and amongst them are criminals and terrorists.

Our leaders are also pushing unscientific climate agendas to exact more control over all economic aspects of the economy. They have dictated that vehicles, stoves, and yard tools must be electric. They want us to eat bugs instead of meat. The nonsense of it all is staggering.

Our government, in conjunction with the elitists in our universities and schools, has been teaching for years that our country’s heritage is shameful. If your skin color isn’t white, you’re being exploited. When it comes to finances, restraint is totally gone to the point where spending and the resulting price inflation knows no bounds. The Federal government as well as many local governments have debased the rule of law. Lawfare is the order of the day and criminals are released back into the population while their crimes are essentially unpunished.3

The agenda of the far left is for self loathing of the highest order. It’s a dumbing down of students at all grade levels and the populous generally. The current leadership offers no positive vision for the future. Instead, just by looking at them and listening to what they say, we know they can only offer more of the same bureaucratically, socially-destructive ideas that history has proven to never work in the past.

Our nation’s current leaders are “freaks” that belong in circus sideshows or in vaudeville as impersonators. Instead, they are presented to the world as our nation’s best and brightest for all our citizens and their children to emulate. Tragically, the number of useful idiots being taken in by the debauchery is growing every day.4 5

To your health.

Ted Slanker

Ted Slanker has been reporting on the fundamentals of nutritional research in publications, television and radio appearances, and at conferences since 1999. He condenses complex studies into the basics required for health and well-being. His eBook, The Real Diet of Man, is available online.

For additional reading:

1. Rituals Have Been Crucial for Humans Throughout History—and We Still Need Them by Michelle Langley from The Conversation

2. Military Brat from Wikipedia

3. Secular, Atheist, and Agnostic from Merriam-Webster, Inc.

4. New Study on ‘Rise’ in Transgenderism Shows It’s a Fad, Especially among Young Girls by Bethany Mandel from NY Post

5. Vast Majority Of Children Grow Out Of Gender Confusion by Steve Watson from Modernity.news