As part of my Air Force flight training, I was introduced to the Barany chair. The chair was used to demonstrate how a rapid movement in one direction followed by a slowdown to a halt tricked the trainee’s mind into thinking the movement had reversed to the other direction. I believe that is what is happening to the view of many Americans regarding the present cultural upheaval.
The Barany chair taught pilots that they must rely on their aircraft instruments rather than their minds for maintaining proper control of the aircraft. Here’s how it works. The chair pictured above rotated as controlled by the instructor. The student in the chair lowered his head and closed his eyes. As the speed of the rotation increased, the student easily perceived the correct direction of rotation. When the chair was gradually slowed, the student felt that the direction had reversed. As rotation speed decreased further, the student stated that the speed was increasing in the other direction. Finally, when the chair stops, the student was asked what was happening, and he would describe very rapid movement in the opposite direction. Later the student watched a video that showed how confused he was. It’s all physiological having to do with the middle ear sensors and the messages to the brain, but that’s another subject.
Most of the current chaos in America is a desperation response to perceptions by the leftists and many moderates that the conservatives’ halt to the nation’s socialist trend is a radical reverse to the right. They talk of losing their country. They have become unhinged in a crazed backlash that takes many bizarre and sometimes dangerous forms. However, like the Barany chair experience, what is actually happening is simply a return to the center–to the cultural and political underpinning that made America great. Around the 1960’s, we began to depart from the norms that made America the greatest nation in the world. Those trends of moral and cultural decay increased exponentially over the last eight years. Therefore, the current rejection of the leftists’ agenda is giving them whiplash as if it were a head-on collision.
Think of where we were about a half-century ago in the areas of the economy, work ethic, nationalism, education, faith, family, morals, and civility. President Trump, the Congress, and the Supreme Court–all three branches of government–are now combined to be the most conservative government in American history. The systematic return to conservative values that began last month is convincing the left half of our nation that the country is out of control in the wrong direction, and we are all doomed.
We conservatives just need to encourage and support our leaders, be thankful to God for this change of course, and let the left implode as we return to the rightful center that has served our great nation so well. I invite your comments.
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