MacIntyre: The intentional demolition of American identity

Joe Biden, or whatever communications flunky operates his social media accounts, took to Twitter this week to inform the nation that “Muslim culture has been woven throughout American culture from the very start.” This is an obvious and absurd lie, but Biden is not the first president to make such a claim. Barack Obama and several other Democratic politicians have asserted that Islam has been present in America since its founding and is a natural part of our nation.

What possible purpose could the telling of such a blatant lie serve? What does the left gain by pushing a historical narrative that is so provably false? The answer is simple: The left understands that history is the foundation of identity. It seeks to demolish American identity and remake it in its own image.

The most basic investigation into the American founding reveals that Islam was not just completely absent from the formation of the United States but was the young nation’s direct adversary. The first military action that the U.S. took after winning its independence was the defense of American sailors against the Barbary pirates. These Muslim raiders were enslaving and ransoming Americans in accordance with their religion, and the nation spent a large percentage of its budget paying those pirates off before finally sending its newly formed navy to put an end to the raiding. This is why the Marine Hymn contains the line “From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli.” Claiming that Muslim culture was part of America from the beginning is not only a lie; it is a direct and deliberate inversion of the historical facts.

The general lack of knowledge about this period of American history is unsurprising, as it is omitted from most school curriculums. The conflict was significant and shaped America’s approach to both foreign policy and a standing military, but very few teachers bother to cover it. This is, in no small part, due to our progressive education system’s attempt to cast slavery as a uniquely American institution. While Muslim civilizations were some of history’s most prolific slavers, this fact is barely mentioned, as history texts fall over themselves to praise Islam as a religion of tolerance and peace.

The relentless focus on American slavery and careful avoidance of its practice in other cultures is intentional. The progressive effort to manufacture this narrative has been largely successful. As a former high school teacher, I can tell you that many young people believe that slavery was an American invention, and this notion is particularly popular among minority students.

The most impressive thing about the left’s revisionist history is how often it is at odds with its own foundational claims. America is uniquely evil because it was founded by straight white Christian men who were basically genocidal religious puritans, but America has also been a multiracial melting pot that wove foreign religions into its culture from the very beginning. The progressive believes simultaneously that this nation was founded by an oppressive racist patriarchy and that inclusion and diversity defined America from the very outset. Apparently, America was ruled by tiny proto-Hitlers who were just bad at their jobs, and the forces of diversity, equity, and inclusion managed to allow the country to flourish in spite of its inept evil overloads.

The narrative is convoluted and contradictory, but that hardly seems to matter. Strict adherence to this narrative is key to obtaining degrees and maintaining employment in any major corporation. The facts do not matter; history is simply one more ideological litmus test for the institutions that underpin our current regime. Sure, Muslims did not found America, but is that fact really worth losing your job over? Probably best to nod politely and move on.

The left’s historical revisionism has successfully created a population that is completely unmoored from the reality of its past and therefore has no way to legitimately evaluate assertions about its current identity. Is America a nation founded on democratic principles? Are we a nation of immigrants? Was the Civil War just about slavery? Did the founders truly want religious values separated from political and legal decisions? Was Islam always a part of American culture?

All of these modern narratives are taken at face value as history is reshaped by progressive newspeak operations like the 1619 Project, and these assertions are not chosen by the left at random. Each one is pregnant with political meaning and shapes the thought process of the modern voter. Human identity is not formed by the individual but is instead shaped by the historical narrative and social context into which people are born and must live their lives. To control the historical narrative is to control the identity of the nation, and that identity is what shapes the nation’s vision of the future. As Orwell famously wrote, “Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past.” If you can warp a nation’s understanding of its past, you own the entire frame in which discussions about its present and future take place.

When popular sovereignty is the mechanism by which your ruling class is legitimated, control over identity is key. We are told that people vote their wallets or key single issues, but these are only proxies for identity. This is why the left invests so heavily in the social engineering required to manufacture identities that are dependent on progressive politics.

Whether they are lying about the Muslim origins of the United States or telling 6-year-old boys that they can become girls, the motivation is the same. Progressives use their control over consensus-manufacturing institutions to socially engineer and advance identities that are dependent on the leftist political apparatus. There is no need to persuade a voting bloc that sees the Democratic Party as its only defense against forces that threaten their right to exist. If the very existence of the identity is contingent on progressives holding power, then its adherents will be committed supporters of that political movement no matter what. That kind of loyalty is far more valuable than some vague commitment to historical accuracy, and the Democrats will secure it at any cost.

When an individual is stripped of his historical, familial, religious, and even biological context, he can be manipulated into holding any belief. The leftist project seeks to strip Americans of their connection to the past as well as the organic communities and institutions to which they would naturally belong in the hopes of manufacturing an identity that is wholly dependent on the progressive political apparatus.

It does not matter how conflicted or contradictory the narratives become, as long as they continually bind voters into a coalition that elevates Democratic Party apparatchiks as our permanent ruling class. Institutional hegemony is used to reshape the voting public in the image of progressive social engineers, securing support for not just one election cycle, but for generations to come.

If the right is to combat these tactics, it must understand the need to make long-term investments in alternative institutions that can reconnect Americans to their real history, family, and faith. It is only by rejecting the progressive narrative and reconnecting to their true heritage that Americans will be able to once again chart a future not just for themselves, but for their posterity.