Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ American Greatness<\/p>\n
W<\/span>hen the human experience is simplistically divided into two worlds, then things increasingly do\u00a0not easily fit.<\/p>\n Specifically, what happens when the number of victims begins to outnumber the pool of oppressors? At that point can the oppressed become victims of the oppressed?<\/p>\n The following news stories illustrate the increasingly incoherent world of the aggrieved and their aggressors:<\/p>\n Item:<\/b>\u00a0Nancy Pelosi is on a tour to blast the new tax reform and reduction law, whose savings often will result in $1,000 or more per annum to families. The law already had encouraged private enterprise bonuses to employees due to employer savings. Pelosi habitually scoffs that such savings are \u201ccrumbs.\u201d At a recent speech, after she intoned that income inequality would be exacerbated, a woman in the audience shouted out,\u00a0\u201cHow much are you worth, Nancy?\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Fair question. She and her husband, a developer and property investor (with apparently good connections within the bureaucracy of federal construction, land sales, and property acquisitions) are worth over $100 million. They own more than one multimillion-dollar home. And soon the Pelosis are likely to pay tens of thousands of dollars more in California property and income taxes that are no longer fully deductible under the new law that she so energetically despises.<\/p>\n Could that banal fact explain why Pelosi is so heated about a reform that gives the middle class more take-home pay, and will create more jobs and bonuses from the private sector\u2014partly at the expense of blue-state, high-income professionals like herself?<\/p>\n From this teachable moment, we could conclude that progressivism is so often promoted by the very rich. They are best positioned to game the system and seek exemption through virtue-signaling about the poor. The Pelosis of our postmodern world assume that they are not to be subject to the ramification of their ideologies (she dismissed the rude questioning without answering). And they so often exhibit a peculiar contempt for the working middle classes. The latter are clueless, in need of guidance, and supposedly deluded by the promise of \u201ccrumbs\u201d\u2014given their lack of education and sophistication, and the absence of the romance accorded to the distant poor. How did we ever get to a point where a progressive politician on the barricades, worth $100 million, lectures the middle class that their extra $200-300 a month are crumbs?<\/p>\n Item:\u00a0<\/b>Tavis Smiley is now suing PBS for supposedly \u201cracially hostile\u201d motives in abruptly firing him. His dismissal came in the wake of other fallen NPR and PBS kingpins like Garrison Keillor and Charlie Rose. The latter two allegedly either groped and grossed out female subordinates or leveraged their asymmetrical power to coerce sex.<\/p>\n As of yet, we have no idea whether PBS acted properly in firing Smiley. His severance was predicated on the results of an outside law firm\u2019s investigation that public television commissioned. Legal eagles supposedly found Smiley culpable of numerous liaisons with workplace subordinates (\u201cmultiple sexual encounters with subordinates over many years and yielded credible allegations of additional misconduct inconsistent with the values and standards of PBS\u201d). In the old days, he would be presumed innocent until proven guilty, or would have shrugged that two consenting adults are responsible enough to know the often-dicey parameters of either a romantic or merely carnal relationship.<\/p>\n But the point is that these are the new days. PBS has been extraordinary generous to Smiley in giving him show for some 14 years and showcasing his often provocative attacks on conservatives and those whom he claims manipulate to their advantage so-called white supremacy.<\/p>\n But Smiley should know that when one divides the human experience simplistically into victims and oppressors, a progressive hierarchy of supposed exploitation is inevitable. In Smiley\u2019s case, he must also appreciate the always changing calibrations among the vying oppressed.<\/p>\n In the wake of Harvey Weinstein and #MeToo movement, Smiley\u2019s own sense of victimization\u00a0for now must unfortunately come in a distant second. Indeed, racially based grievances cannot provide exemption from the present climate, in which even unsubstantiated sexual assault charges are treated as convictions requiring only sentencing.<\/p>\n Item:<\/b>\u00a0The new \u201cBlack Panther\u201d Marvel Comics movie is hailed as both a milestone in the genre and a sign of a new Hollywood. Black screenwriters, producers, and directors not only are supplanting the incestuous old-boy network of Hollywood, but are doing so in spectacularly profitable fashion and entirely on the basis of merit, as adjudicated by profits from audience receipts.<\/p>\n While the film\u2019s noble characters are predominately gifted African-Americans and powerful women, some are now irate that not only are there no gay characters, but rumors persist that an edgy lesbian scene was cut out. Or, as actress Florence\u00a0Karumba put it of a few lost gay flirtation moments:\u00a0\u201cThe final result that we\u2019ve seen, there were a few scenes that have been cut. Different scenes, also. They didn\u2019t make it into the movie for certain reasons, and at that point, I have to say: What their reason is, I can\u2019t tell you, because nobody told me about whether it\u2019s in or not.\u201d In sum, are all movies supposed to find ways to proportionally represent characters on the basis of gender, sexual orientation, race, and national origin?<\/p>\n From this silly minor kerfuffle, one might infer that the core targeted audience of the comics action film may be African-American youth, males especially. If the lyrics of rap music, the sermonizing of the many of the black churches, or the riffs of African-American comedians are any indication, there is a popular perception that overt homosexuality is not really seen as a civil rights question.<\/p>\n So a cynic might conclude that profits outweighed progressive solidarity: the lesbian edgy parts were cut for fear of offending moviegoers\u2014in a way that might have provoked outrage had the film been a suburban blue-state psychodrama.<\/p>\n