{"id":12169,"date":"2020-01-30T10:00:25","date_gmt":"2020-01-30T18:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/?p=12169"},"modified":"2020-01-29T09:06:54","modified_gmt":"2020-01-29T17:06:54","slug":"when-there-is-no-normal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/when-there-is-no-normal\/","title":{"rendered":"When There Is No Normal"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One of the ancient and modern critiques of democracy is that radicals destroy norms for short-term political gain, norms that they themselves often later seek as refuge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Schadenfreude, irony, paradox, and karma are various descriptions of what happens to revolutionaries, and unfortunately the innocent, who suffer their collateral damage when radicals of any stripe use any means necessary to achieve supposedly exalted ends.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Three of the most moving \u2014 and terrifying \u2014 passages in Greek literature involve such ironic payback. In the third book of Thucydides\u2019 history, the historian relates a murderous civil war (stasis) between oligarchs and democrats on the island of Corcyra (modern Corfu). He laments how morals and laws are destroyed in a cycle of madness, all to achieve short-term gain while depriving both parties of sanctuary when the tide one day turns against them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When extremism becomes normal, there is no prior normal. In his fifth book, Thucydides describes the destruction of the small island city-state of Melos, in a riveting dialogue between the Athenian invaders and the Melian defenders. After concluding his account with the Athenians\u2019 destruction of Melos, Thucydides immediately, in books six and seven, describes the Athenian catastrophe on Sicily, in which the invading and soon-to-be-trapped Athenians play a similar role to that of the doomed Melians, and the victorious Sicilians are no more magnanimous to the defeated than were the once-victorious Athenians.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.nationalreview.com\/2020\/01\/when-there-is-no-normal-radicals-eventually-need-what-theyve-gleefully-destroyed\/\">Read the full article here <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review One of the ancient and modern critiques of democracy is that radicals destroy norms for short-term political gain, norms that they themselves often later seek as refuge. Schadenfreude, irony, paradox, and karma are various descriptions of what happens to revolutionaries, and unfortunately the innocent, who suffer their collateral damage [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-3ah","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":12154,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/progressive-petards\/","url_meta":{"origin":12169,"position":0},"title":"Progressive Petards","author":"victorhanson","date":"January 23, 2020","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ American Greatness Since at least 2016, CNN has mostly ceased being a news agency, but that hasn\u2019t stopped it from being an active participant in #TheResistance. The network is so caught up in the fervor of this movement that many of its guests and regular hosts\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11571,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-rise-of-the-new-old-left\/","url_meta":{"origin":12169,"position":1},"title":"The Rise Of The New Old Left","author":"victorhanson","date":"December 10, 2018","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ Hoover Institution In the 1960s, campus radicals were branded the New Left. The media saw the m\u00e9lange of radicals like Bill Ayers, David Delinger, Jane Fonda, Allen Ginsberg, Abbie Hoffman, Herbert Marcuse, Jerry Rubin\u2014as well as hippies, the Black Panthers, the gay liberation movement, La Raza,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;The Left&quot;","block_context":{"text":"The Left","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-left\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7280,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-perils-of-international-idealism\/","url_meta":{"origin":12169,"position":2},"title":"The Perils of International Idealism","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 1, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"American foreign policy could use a does of hard-nosed realism. by Bruce S. Thornton \/\/\u00a0Defining Ideas\u00a0 United States foreign policy has been defined lately by serial failures. Russian President Vladimir Putin annexed Crimea and appears to be preparing a reprise in eastern Ukraine, and possibly in the Baltic states. Syrian\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Bruce S. Thornton&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Bruce S. Thornton","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/our-contributors\/bruce-s-thornton\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3658,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/beyond-iraq\/","url_meta":{"origin":12169,"position":3},"title":"Beyond Iraq","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 2, 2007","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services The threat from radical Islamic terrorists will not vanish when President Bush leaves office, or if funds for the Iraq war are cut off in 2008. A frequent charge is that we are bringing terrorists to Iraq. That is true in the sense\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;April 2007&quot;","block_context":{"text":"April 2007","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2007\/april-2007\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":647,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/calls-for-hearings-on-radicalization-of-white-christian-women\/","url_meta":{"origin":12169,"position":4},"title":"Calls for Hearings on &#8216;Radicalization&#8217; of White Christian Women","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 14, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Raymond Ibrahim FrontPage Magazine During a Homeland Security committee hearing last month on the \"Radicalization of Muslim-Americans,\" Texas Congressman Al Green (D) criticized the hearings as biased and unfair to Muslims, suggesting that the only way to justify them is if Congress would also conduct a \"hearing on the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Religion&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Religion","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/religion\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":13520,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/this-isnt-your-fathers-left-wing-revolution\/","url_meta":{"origin":12169,"position":5},"title":"This Isn&#8217;t Your Father&#8217;s Left-Wing Revolution","author":"victorhanson","date":"June 10, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Image by Darren415 iStock Getty Images Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ American Greatness Starry-eyed radicals in the 1960s and 1970s dreamed that they either were going to take over America or destroy it.\u00a0 One of their favorite psychodramatic mottos was \u201cChange it or Lose it,\u201d even as protests focused on drugs,\u2026","rel":"","context":"With 1 comment","block_context":{"text":"With 1 comment","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/this-isnt-your-fathers-left-wing-revolution\/#comments"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/iStock-1289282832-e1623340140911.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/iStock-1289282832-e1623340140911.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/iStock-1289282832-e1623340140911.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/iStock-1289282832-e1623340140911.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/iStock-1289282832-e1623340140911.jpg?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x"},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12169"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12169"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12169\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12170,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12169\/revisions\/12170"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12169"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12169"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12169"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}