Seeing the most recent political ads, where the Democrat candidate accuses the Republican candidate of being insensitive because the Republican is in a wheelchair and allegedly does not pay enough attention to other “victims,” I started thinking about victims and who they are.
We are all victims. Yes, it is true. We may be victims of something large or something small, but we are victims nonetheless. For example, we may be the victim of an unkind comment. We may be a victim of a rude car driver. We may be a victim of an abusive relationship. We may be a victim of an absent father or mother. We may be a victim of a bad job, or a bad boss, or a bad co-worker. We may be the victim of a poor, boring sermon. We may be the victim of knowing too little, or knowing too much. We may be victim of a poor education system or a bad teacher or counselor. We may be the victim of poor health, a debilitating disease, a car accident, an incapacity we were born with, a virus, a falling tree, a burning house. We may be the victim of rape or incest.
We may be victims of something large or something small, but we are victims nonetheless.
So what differentiates us? How we deal with it.
See, there are two ways we can respond to being a victim. One is rise above it, grow to be better than the perpetrator, persevere, or fight against the odds or the naysayers. These kinds of people take their victimhood and turn it into opportunities to grow and develop, and gain a good life in spite of the injury, the loss, the bad opportunities, the negativity, or the lowly condition in which they find themselves.
The other way we can respond to being a victim is to rest in it, to use it as our favorite excuse for why we don’t do this or that, why we “need” things instead of “provide” things, or why we “feel” bad. This direction leads to despair and loss of self-respect, but it is hard to see what is happening to you when you wallow in the sea of “victimhood.” For these people, there are no options because they believe there are no options. For these people, the idea of helping themselves is a foreign concept. For the people resting in victimhood, there are always the people to blame – “They did this to me.” So rather than see hope and blessing, they see only despair, misery, and curses.
It is sometimes hard to figure out what separates Republicans and Democrats, but how they treat themselves as victims is not so hard. Republicans believe that you can do it – with help, great, but with no help if there is no help to be had. Republicans believe that the human spirit, made in the image of God, is a noble thing, and that nobility, honor, decency, opportunity and a good life can cut through and rise above the greatest loss.
Democrats believe that you can’t do it without government’s help because there are no options unless the government provides them. Their programs reinforce the sense of victimhood in this second group; their programs foster dependency. By helping them remain victims, the Democrats do these people no good. The kind of “help” offered by the Democrats through the government is really a disguised form of entrapment, where the person receiving the “help” becomes dependent upon the help. The War on Poverty can never be won by the Democrats because they have the wrong ideas. The way the Democrats wage the War on Poverty is to create not only poverty in economic terms for the people being “helped” by them, but also to create poverty of spirit, resulting in more, not less, despair.
We are all victims, but how we respond is what separates us. The ones who see hope and opportunity know that the Republicans and Republican philosophy, grounded in individual liberty and limited government, are their friends…their real friends. The Republicans are the ones who offer true “help” to those who want it. It is true help because it is help that works, that lifts, that promotes, that encourages, and that says – “We are all victims but we don’t have to act that way. Let us show you how.”
