The War Against Civility

Book excerpt: This book addresses the mayhem that has been sweeping America. Life is imperiled, philosophy is denigrated, and churches are under attack. The agents of correction are paralyzed. Leaders are not leading. The Media is adding fuel to the fire. The words of William Butler Yeats come to mind: Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world. The blood-dimmed tide is loosed. . .The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.The war against civility (and civilization itself) is the inevitable consequence of moral bankruptcy on a pandemic scale. The solution is a return to virtue, a road that will be extremely difficult to reconstruct. Nonetheless, an understanding of the situation, if only a partial one, is the first step toward a return to civility.