Intrigue

Civilization in the Danger Zone's renowned scholars and culture critics examine the threats to Judeo-Christian values and offer insights into how to reverse the tide of our civilizational decline.

In Civilization in the Danger Zone, documentary filmmaker Gloria Z Greenfield explores through public intellectuals like Victor Davis Hanson how it is that, within one generation, liberal education has disappeared from our schools to be replaced by various forms of Marxism and other fundamentally anti-democratic ideologies like "trans-humanism." Greenfield has done so from her own American-Jewish perspective, which under normal circumstances in a color-blind and ethnically blind America, would go unremarked, as the Constitution is so heavily influenced by the Hebrew Bible. These are the thinkers that she has brought together in her wonderful film, leaving the viewer wanting more. They serve as our contemporary "Guide to the Perplexed." In addition to Professor Victor Davis Hanson of the Hoover Institution, these gifted scholars and cultural critics include Kenneth L. Marcus, Larry P. Arnn, John Hinderaker, Heather Mac Donald, Moshe Koppel, Ruth Wisse, Eric Cohen, Rod Dreher, Christopher Rufo, Carol Swain, Peter Wyatt Wood, and others. Following the cold open, the film is organized in discrete but related sections: the fundamental family; the power of faith; the need for national identity; the legitimacy of national pride; the indoctrination of today's youth; the "hollowed out" university curricula; the manipulation of language and the rise of woke ideology and its doublespeak; a rising totalitarian tide aided and abetted by foreign powers; and finally, the need for clarity during a time of declining intellectual diversity.

Gloria Z. Greenfield's new film Civilization in the Danger Zone begins with a prologue featuring Kenneth Marcus of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, warning that we are facing an organized and deliberate effort to undermine our identity as a nation and a civilization. We are being made to forget the Judeo-Christian heritage that has made America great, and to believe instead that all that makes us exceptional is past injustices like slavery and Jim Crow laws. "What is truly at stake here," Marcus says, "is that we're losing the ability to transmit to our children the very values and fundamental liberties that protect us as a country and as a civilization." In the film's first "chapter" - "Fundamental Family" - Eric Cohen of the Tikvah Fund, Rod Dreher of The American Conservative, Peter Wood of the National Association of Scholars, David Brog of the Maccabee Task Force, and Victor Davis Hanson of the Hoover Institution all make variations on the point that the future is shaped by the legacy we pass down through the family. But Dreher warns that the fabric of the family unit has been eroded ever since the sexual revolution of the 1960s became a dominant cultural force. Wood adds that some people today are even advocating for the abolition of the family, an idea as old as Plato and revived by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. Brog explains that the low birthrate in Western countries is also leading inevitably to civilizational decline. Cohen believes this is the biggest threat we face in terms of sustaining our civilization. In "Power of Faith," Moshe Koppel of the Kohelet Policy Forum asserts that religion gives meaning to our lives and a purpose to our civilization. Dreher notes that people of faith in America are in decline, and Marcus points out that a decline in faith unfortunately means a decline in respect for people of faith. Ruth Wisse of Harvard University adds that believing in something transcendent, something larger than ourselves, is of critical importance, and reveals that she resolved her own struggle with faith by reconnecting with her Jewish traditions. Dreher warns that we have inverted faith in the modern world to make God our servant and to justify clinging to comforting falsehoods. Dreher, Koppel, and Cohen all say they believe the tide of secularization can be reversed, but it's going to take serious commitment by Christians and Jews to strengthen their religious communities on a local level. In "National Identity," Rich Lowry of National Review joins Dreher, Koppel, and Cohen in discussing why a robust sense of nationalism strengthens our sense of identity as a people. Cohen states that what we need to do in the face of attacks on the idea of nationalism is to recover a sense of its noble possibilities and to recognize that a nation with defined, secure borders grants us a sovereignty that is necessary for a healthy culture. In "National Pride," Wisse, Koppel, and Hanson remind us that democracy is not biologically transmitted; it is our responsibility to ensure that we pass down our civic values to the next generation, as well as an appreciation for what is good about our civilization. But Dreher believes we live in a time in which patriotic feelings are viewed as wicked, because our nation has committed evils in the past. Marcus stresses that patriotism is not the same as my-country-right-or-wrong jingoism, and that it requires a willingness to fight if necessary for your country's values. Then he poses the question to American viewers, "Would Americans fight if our country were in danger?" In "Indoctrination," the scholars and culture critics warn that we're witnessing the politicization of American schools from kindergarten on up, the indoctrination of children with values that are completely antithetical to the American way of life. They discuss the rise of "anti-racism" ideologies that purport to address discrimination, but which instead teach a subversive racial consciousness. John Hinderaker of the Center of the American Experiment and Nicole Neily of Parents Defending Education describe how this divisive, anti-American indoctrination is everywhere now, teaching kids to view themselves and each other through the lens of group identity, and then to hate each other and their country. Hinderaker, Marcus, and Neily also point to the rise of gender ideology as a threat to parental rights, a threat that pits school boards and administrators against concerned parents, who are kept in the dark about the subversion being taught to their children. In "Hollowed Curricula," Heather Mac Donald of the Manhattan Institute stresses that the mission of the university should be to transmit to students the incredible legacy of our civilization. Jason Hill of DePaul University describes the "decolonization" of college courses, including his own, to rid the curricula of the great European thinkers of the past who are now deemed oppressive and racist. Robert Paquette of the Alexander Hamilton Institute and Larry Arnn of Hillsdale College warn that we are being cut off from our nation's true, glorious history because we have been lied to that our nation's founding was grounded in evil. The balkanization of our curricula, the emphasis of personal subjectivity over scientific objectivity, and the replacement of standard survey courses with narrowly focused "boutique" courses that suit a professor's personal interests mean that students don't learn broader lessons about the complexity and fallibility of the great figures of our past, such as Thomas Jefferson. In "Doublespeak," Mac Donald and Marcus are joined by Christopher Rufo of the Manhattan Institute and Mark Tapson of the David Horowitz Freedom Center discussing the ways free speech is being controlled by Big Tech and language is being manipulated to promote division and create a false reality. Dreher notes that under Communism, everyone knew that the state was twisting language to suit its agenda, but in the West today, our young people don't realize that manipulation is happening. Hinderaker adds that the focus of language today is narrative and agenda, not information and accuracy. If we surrender our pursuit of the truth and pursue comfortable lies instead, Dreher concludes, then we surrender our civilization. Rufo and Carol Swain of the Texas Public Policy Foundation summarize the background of critical race theory, and Dave Rubin of The Rubin Report points out the dangers of the collectivist thinking pushed by "wokeness." In "Totalitarian Tide," Wisse explains Hannah Arendt's idea of the twin totalitarianisms of Nazism and Soviet Communism and warns that while we have emphasized the evil of the former for the best of reasons, we have neglected to recognize the evil of the latter. Lowry, Hanson, Ben Weingarten of the Claremont Institute, Frank Gaffney of the Center for Security Policy, and Rachelle Peterson of the National Association of Scholars warn of Communist China's goal of global domination, and its penetration and infiltration into our economic, political, educational, and cultural institutions. Weingarten and Michael Medved of The Michael Medved Show point out China's influence on Hollywood messaging, and Weingarten warns that the West's lack of clarity and will to survive poses an existential threat to the West and to the United States, which leads the West. Concluding with "Clarity," viewers are urged to protect intellectual diversity, strengthen our family lives and communities, remember the greatness of Western civilization and pass that legacy on to our children, take action to protect our values and liberties, reject our current culture of grievance and restore a culture of gratitude.