The War on Truth, in the Name of Empathy

Hillary Clinton has written an op-ed for The Atlantic that is permeated with moral indignation. She decries “MAGA’s War on Empathy” and then engages in a one-woman war on Truth. Her piece may remind readers of the older rhetoric of the political Left, which they don’t use as much anymore, wherein they proclaim that those on the Right are immoral monsters and those on the Left are heroically trying to protect the victims and institute virtuous policies.

Hillary claims that the conservative movement is morally descending. Thus, she laments the lost era of Reagan’s optimism and cheery personality, but her entire essay stands in testament to his reminder that “the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they’re ignorant; it’s just that they know so much that isn’t so.”

In the article, Hillary states, “Empathy does not overwhelm our critical thinking or blind us to moral clarity. It opens our eyes to moral complexity. It’s not a sign of weakness; it’s a source of strength.”

She heralds empathy like a lost art but utilizes it selectively. She comfortably applies it to the illegal immigrant facing deportation but not to those raped, brutalized, and murdered by illegals—many of whom had extensive criminal records beforehand. She employs her empathy to rape victims when she is encouraging abortion but never to the children born of rape—whom she wishes to slaughter.

She talks about those affected by AIDS with an empathetic tone, but then she whitewashes over how Democrats in multiple jurisdictions have eliminated or reduced penalties for knowingly exposing others to HIV. Likewise, she seems to lack all empathy for the victims of criminals who are immediately released without bail and allowed to revictimize their prey.

She seems to believe that mainstream Democratic policies are victimless; not only is that untrue but the policies she decries most are a result of victimization by Democratic policies. Americans voted for President Trump and supported his plans for mass deportations as a part of a pendulum effect against decades of lax enforcement. Is it so inconceivable that Americans would be tired of sky-high insurance rates that are made to cover collisions by uninsured alien drivers; excessive medical costs to cover immigrants who don’t have insurance but need emergency medical care; poor job opportunities, especially among the lower economic strata; and reports of unimaginable crimes by people who should not have been here?

Through this lens, it is not difficult to see how the policies being enacted now are compassionate. Perhaps better said: they are just. They seek to protect the innocent and to give to each man what is his due. They aim to make America safer for families while simultaneously relieving burdensome financial obstacles. One could say that they demonstrate empathy for American victims of abhorrent policies, if that is the verbiage we must use. Why must we assert that these Americans and their suffering are somehow less important?

Hillary goes on to say, “Other recent presidents, including Joe Biden, Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and Bill Clinton, managed to deport millions of undocumented immigrants without turning American cities into battlegrounds or making a show of keeping children in cages.”

It’s true—other recent presidents did deport without protests and riots, but it is not the establishment that is prompting these battles. There wasn’t politically driven hysteria surrounding Obama’s deportations (or his policies that are newly decried as “family separations”). Immigration agents were not being physically attacked for enforcing laws enacted by Congress. There were no assertions that properly done deportations amounted to brutality.

For decades, there have been debates on changing immigration laws, but they have been largely stagnant due to lobbying groups on both sides being desirous of immigrants for very different reasons (cheap labor vs. votes). What has changed is not the immigration law but the political bombast that now treats the enforcement of law as moral barbarism.

Hillary describes herself as a Christian throughout her essay, even while admitting that some “might find this surprising.” What is entirely unsurprising is that she rewrites and re-understands the Christian faith that she professes to hold. Thus, her description of changes within various Christian sects is blatantly ahistorical. Such as when she says: “It has pained me to see my own United Methodist Church split by deep disagreements over gay rights. Many conservative American congregations seceded and joined with traditionalist congregations in Africa and elsewhere to form a separate, less inclusive Church.”

This falsely implies that the “less inclusive” church was the newer Methodist church, but it is the older church, keeping with its founding. The pro-homosexual, pro-female-clergy church is the newer body that is always adapting to the demands of the world.

Hillary likewise attempts to co-opt the Christian faith for the support of abortion and homosexual acts and imply that this is somehow true Christianity. Not only have these moral evils been condemned since the beginning but, in fact, it is one of the ways that Christians really stood apart from pagan Rome—in rejection of infanticide and unnatural sex acts.

In all of this distorted talk about emotionalism, Hillary’s misdirection dismisses real victims and fails to acknowledge the policies that make them. Christianity is not centered upon one’s feelings. Instead, it has always valued protection of the innocent, which is why it opposed abortion and exploitation from the beginning (not because those things gave us the wrong emotional response). We ought to celebrate the policies that protect the innocent, advocate for justice, and promote the good.

We should have empathy for those who were victimized when they were too young to protect themselves—such as all of those children who were misled in their most confused moments, used as political pawns, and had their sex organs sterilized.

Empathy untethered from truth is not compassion but sentimentality with a body count. Therefore, Hillary’s weaponized emotionalism under the auspices of empathy does not bring us to a better world; it merely makes a different set of victims. Justice, rightly understood, will always feel cruel to those whose power depends on the denial of victims.

We must avoid the temptation to minimize the suffering of the innocent whose causes are not on the picket signs of rioters but whose wounds are no less real. Hillary Clinton’s advocation of selective empathy does not lead us toward moral clarity but to a hierarchy of preferred sacrifices. What is really under assault today is not empathy but truth, and that is not a trade any just society should be willing to make.