The Inquisition was a Good Thing

I hadn't heard about the Nazi-wanna-be group "Youth for Western Civilization" until I heard about Tom Tancredo getting run out of UNC-CH by a broken window, that I wrote about yesterday. The founder of the chapter of that group at UNC-CH, Riley Matheson, gave an interview before that whole fiasco, going on about the views and goals of the group. The one thing that struck me as absurd above all the others, of course I love medieval history, so it might just be me, was his comments about the Inquisition.

At the same time, YWC promotes a celebration of western European culture. On the YWC Web site and Facebook group, there are numerous historical references to European culture. I was wondering how that plays into your role at UNC.

"The problem with university students and faculty is that there is basically, in our opinion, a deep mistrust and hatred of Western heritage. We're constantly focusing on the sins of our past. It's not to say they weren't sins. It's just to say that we need to revitalize our culture and not constantly talk about mistakes we might have made. We've long since made up for the sins we might have committed."

Do you mean slavery and the Inquisition?

"I can definitely say that slavery's one of the sins. When it comes to things like the Inquisition, I'd rather not comment—I don't want to condemn it. That's a personal opinion, and not really a club opinion."

You have got to be kidding me. You don't want to condemn the torture and murder of hundreds of thousands of people because of thought crimes? WTF are these people smoking? The Inquisition tortured people to extract confessions. They wanted to know if anyone else might be heretics or were skiving off of their Catholic duties. They used waterboarding, the rack, and in certain times and places, things worse than that. The Spanish Inquisition, which is probably the most well known thanks to Monty Python's Flying Circus, was apparently renowned for their creative torturing of prisoners. But they weren't the only Inquisition. There were plenty of others that operated all over Europe from the mid-13th century when it was founded to combat Catharism in the Languedoc to the 19th century. In fact, the Holy Office of the Inquisition still exists to this day in Catholicism, albeit under a different name, The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

When someone wouldn't give in under torture and condemn other people, and renounce any thoughts that they had that were contrary to the "good" teachings of the Catholic church, they were turned over to the secular arm of the government and burned at the stake, or in certain other times and places drawn and quartered, dragged by horses and/or hanged. Sometimes if the "crime" was a small one, they were given penance, and if they relapsed into their heresy, they didn't get a third chance. The second trial was a certain death sentence. And this stupid bastard doesn't want to condemn any of that, indeed, it seems that he wasn't keen on telling the interviewer what he really thought about it since he didn't want to comment on it. I wonder why? Could it be because he fancies doing that sort of thing to people?

What Has the Government Ever Done for Us?

You know, besides the roads, the schools, the scholarships, the public grants to fund students, health care research, promote the arts (as any reasonable society should), the sanitation, the (horribly underfunded) public transportation. You know, what have they ever done for us?

And why are the right wing, racist fanatics the ones who are raving about this? Could it be because they feel disenfranchised because a black kid gets to go to college with public money? That must really be a kick in the balls to them. Stupid fuckers. That's the problem with this world. No matter what happens, what cruel lessons are played out and suffered by humanity, nothing changes. We don't learn a damned thing.

"Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most times he will pick himself up and carry on."--Winston Churchill

We have to pay taxes. It's part of being in an advanced and democratic civilization. Nothing would get done if we didn't. Indeed, we probably don't spend enough money funding the stuff that should be funded, like our crumbling infrastructures, and our schools that date from the turn of the century before last where students use books from before I was born.

And yes, a lot of money gets wasted, some of it on atrocity. But where the hell were these tax protesters when G. Dubya Bush was throwing billions of our money down a fox hole in Iraq? Where were they then? Oh, I know, we blow up brown people, and that's just fine and dandy. That doesn't fucking matter, because they ain't white and they ain't Christian, so why should we give a damn? Excuse the sarcasm. I've had just about enough stupidity for all my lifetimes, thank you.