Frederick Meekins -- Markedly Naive: Tragedy Used to Market One of the Future’s Most Infamous Technologies

MARKEDLY NAIVE: TRAGEDY USED TO MARKET ONE OF THE FUTURE'S MOST INFAMOUS TECHNOLOGIES

By Frederick Meekins
August 11, 2002
NewsWithViews.com

On "The Simpson’s", the wife of Springfield's resident clergyman Reverend Lovejoy is known to rally support for initiatives of questionable logic by injecting herself into a scene and intoning in a shrill voice, "Think of the children." While this recurring gag has provided a sense of comedy throughout the run of this classic series, it’s humor, unfortunately, is derived from the often ludicrous nature of contemporary political discourse.

Over the past several months, Americans have watched in abject horror the spate of grizzly child abductions and murders. Yet before the nation could finishing mourning, voices rushed forward suggesting we dramatically alter our way of life to prevent these kinds of tragedies. Instead of emphasizing what parents can do to protect their children like not befriending vagrants as in the cases of Elizabeth Smart and Cassandra Williamson or the dangers of married women propositioning equally kinky men in bars, some would rather use these incidents to promote the pet causes of the New World Order.

Considerable Evangelical eschatological speculation centers around the so-called "Mark of the Beast". Of it, Revelation 13:16-17 tells us, “And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand or in their foreheads; And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.”

Bible scholars and religious futurists conjecture that this passage foretells of a global political system so all-encompassing that its rulers catalog every single human being and track every economic transaction. In exercising such a degree of control, this regime hopes to take the place of God in the process.

It is normally assumed that the totalitarian computer surveillance system needed to carry out this task will suddenly be imposed during the Tribulation, of which Matthew 24:21-22 says, "For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be. And except those days should be shortened, there should be no flesh saved: but for the elect’s sake, those days shall be shortened."

While the system will take on its most spiritually damning form during that particular historical period, there is nothing in Scripture indicating that the groundwork for this system couldn’t be set into motion beforehand. Events of this magnitude seldom occur overnight. As with the attack on the World Trade Center, these machinations are set into motion years before, regardless of whether the masses are too distracted by media debauchery to realize it.

It has been emphasized that at this time participation in these computer monitoring programs is completely voluntary. However, just because the technology is not compulsory today does not mean it won’t be tomorrow or that it won’t be enforced through sanctions slightly less binding than law but somewhat more coercive than uninhibited economic exchange.

Seems the minions of the New World Order now intend to wrap themselves in the assuring garments of child safety. At first, these chips will be a novelty providing those who install them in their children an additional peace of mind. But as they grow in popularity, those who refuse to participate on the grounds of religious conviction or civil liberties concerns will be seen with the same contempt and derision now reserved for those who don’t own microwave ovens or telephone answering machines.

Eventually, parents refusing to electronically brand their progeny will in all likelihood be sanctioned as negligent or unfit. Those in the public questioning the wisdom of this strategy will be labeled as supporters of child abduction, molestation, and just about every other brand of abhorrent violence on the books.

While Evangelical Christians might find common cause with Libertarians in standing up to this issue, their usual establishmentarian Conservative allies will likely be of little help. Frankly, Sean Hannity has come out as one of the most enthusiastic supporters of the technology I have ever seen, gushing on his Fox News Channel program of his eagerness to invest in the company developing these nightmarish location and identification devices. And anyone thinking Ollie North will stand up for the Constitution are in for a rude awakening in light of a Sydney Morning Herald story implicating him as a key architect in the elaborate web of presidential executive orders that could one day set aside America’s constitutional guarantees in favor of an arbitrary military dictatorship.

Benjamin Franklin once said those who favor security over liberty deserve neither liberty nor security. While all of us grieve over the ghastly child abductions grabbing the headlines, we must also be as careful of solutions as evil in nature as these horrifying crimes these peddlers of indenturehood are claiming to prevent.

Frederick Meekins is a student in the distance education program of Trinity Theological Seminiary pursuing an MA in Apologetics and Philosophy. He has published commentaries on websites such as WorthyNews.Com, The Freedom of Religion Coalition of Maryland, and the Christian Portal Homepage and in newspapers such as the Prince George's Journal.

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