It was an opening salvo unseen since a young Bosnian terrorist rocked Europe's foundation in June of 1914. One young man, Luke Woodham, a Mississippi High school student armed only with a tool of reprisal and a mission of justice, fired straight into the heart of a nation consumed with its own madness and intellectual degradation. Luke's shots, as noble as they were, only managed to fell two wretched souls, but his effort, due to its boldness and moral authority, brought this nation one step closer to its realization of greatness. As the nation attempted to weigh the severity of the matter, it was revealed that six other teens, comprising what has come to be known as "The Group" were aligned in a conspiracy to murder the unenlightened and anti-intellectual. These strong young men, readers of philosophy and history, blessed with the minds of an elite class of thinkers, were at war with the typical American youth: the giggling, obnoxious monster obsessed with parties, drinking, popularity, Friday night football games, fashion, high fives, exaggerated tales of sexual conquest, and all that concerned with the elevation of the ego.
With this group of useless, expendable waste, we have come to justifiably fear a rotten future: navel-gazing narcissists with no conception of intellectual rigor and the development of the mind (for its own sake mind you, not in order to please equally vapid parents or to find a career that will allow one the further immersion in mind-numbing idiocy) leading this country into the depths of a hell created by those who sacrifice dignity, intelligence, and meaningful human interaction in favor of the hedonistic, self-absorbed payoff of the moment.
These seven men-Woodham, Sledge, Brownell, Brooks, Shaw, Thompson, Boyette-champions of a sort too often overlooked in a nation ill-equipped to deal with true genius. In this land of functional "knowledge" simpering yes-men, back-slapping company men, and humorless technocrats, have we not come to a time when the non-contributors, these replaceable parts of a decaying machine, must either surrender willingly or face systematic extermination? Will this blood feast not cleanse a dying country of its fecal matter, these rotting pseudo-minds with their cliched conversation and absence of wit or enlightenment? The silent applause that occurred in the circles of intellect must be transformed into a cascade, a virtual eruption, of unequivocal approval. These readers, these thinkers, these young symbols of courage-striking a blow against the superstitious; the anti-personalities without distinction in a country that has abandoned standards, hierarchy, and dare we say a healthy form of intellectual elitism in favor of a sick, sentimental egalitarianism that is in itself so perverse and so oppressive that all achievement and greatness are lost forever in a sea of self-esteem, emotional quotients, and forced togetherness.
We have come to expect so little from Mississippi, but they have now produced a martyr to the cause of American liberty and justice. As we know, Americans are notorious for their ignorance of all matters, especially in any area of cultural importance. So, it is not at all surprising that we tend to reward madness and blatant stupidity while punishing truth and intellectualism. Thinking is nerdish, or even worse "elitist", and we would rather not tax our minds more than it is necessary. Give us our unending banality, our shallowness, our pleasant-at-all-costs entertainment-do not challenge us, please, or we will banish, ridicule, and in the end, strip you of any hope for success. Now the tide has turned. This bloody battle ahead, this glorious war to strip these non-persons of their very lives, is the inevitable result, my friends, of decades of outright neglect. Given a culture of knaves and fools, it is only a matter of time before the small class of heroes, these intellectuals and thinkers, will temporarily put aside their books and studies in order to sweep the streets. Let us begin.
Matt Cale is a UCCS student and University Freethinkers member.