By Ilana Mercer
The voluntary free market is a sacred extension of life itself. The free market—it has not been unfettered for a very long time—is really a spontaneously synchronized order comprising trillions upon trillions of voluntary acts that individuals perform in order to make a living. Introduce government force and coercion into this rhythm and you get life-threatening arrhythmia. Under increasing state control, this marketplace—this magic, organic agora—starts to splutter, and people suffer.
While the argument against the free market presses its case with an impressive array of economic fallacies—even the Hollywood “Idiocracy” is hip to the logic of the free market.
Just for a change, the menstruation lobby is moaning about the movies and its members’ representation therein. By Variety Magazine’s telling, “[Female] characters are still significantly under-represented on the big screen. … The numbers for minority females are even lower. African-American female representation on screen [has] climbed to 14 percent, from 8 percent in 2011, but [is] down from 15 percent in 2012.”
The presence of minorities in movies often signals a two-hour long, oppressive racial lecture. Most movie-goers are no more inclined to turn to “12 Years A Slave” for fun, than they are to subject themselves to Oprah Winfrey and her M.O.P.E. (Most Oppressed Person Ever) “Butler.”
Anti-man moaning notwithstanding, the general public must be on to this, because it is quite clear that Hollywood is giving viewers what they want to see: men in lead roles. If film executives listened to the loathsome Lena Dunham, rather than to the demands of consumers—the industry would go under.
Alas, most liberals (and that includes “conservatives” aplenty) are foolish enough to lump business with government as an eternal source of disappointment to Americans. Noodles Ron Fournier of National Journal:
“Steadily, over the past four decades, the nation has lost faith in virtually every American institution: banks, schools, colleges, charities, unions, police departments, organized religion, big businesses, small businesses and, of course, politics and government.”
As I type, I consume a plate of seven different fruits topped with nuts. Many of the ingredients on my plate are organic. These used to be exorbitantly priced; out of reach. But as demand for organic produce has grown, production has increased and prices have dropped dramatically.
Each day I give thanks to the businessmen who, against all odds, bring such abundance to market and provide such plenty. There is nothing in my home that comes courtesy of the blessings of bureaucrats. I guarantee that it’s the same in your home.
If you, like Fournier, fail to distinguish the blessings of the private economy from the blight of government—you deserve none of the former and all of the latter.
Ilana Mercer is author of Into the Cannibal's Pot: Lessons for America from Post-Apartheid South Africa. ©2014 By ILANA MERCER
"The voluntary free market is a sacred extension of life itself." That is a beautiful and profound statement. Although I don't believe that words can save us from the mentally handicapped in positions of power, they can be uplifting, even inspiring. Thank you Ilana Mercer.
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