{"id":1807248,"date":"2023-01-16T11:05:06","date_gmt":"2023-01-16T16:05:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1807248"},"modified":"2023-01-16T11:09:10","modified_gmt":"2023-01-16T16:09:10","slug":"sin-city-speaks-to-our-truth-challenged-age","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/sin-city-speaks-to-our-truth-challenged-age\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cSin City\u201d Speaks to Our Truth-challenged Age"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">14<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fsin-city-speaks-to-our-truth-challenged-age%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1807248&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47-->\n<div><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/01\/sin-city-mickey-Rourke-2.jpg\" class=\"ff-og-image-inserted\" alt=\"image\"   style=\"display:none\"><\/div>\n<p><strong>It&#8217;s never fun to be sick. When I was struck down by a virus some weeks back, I decided to take the time to see one of the greatest pulp action movies of 2000s.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u201cSin City\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The film adaptation of Frank Miller\u2019s graphic novels is one of the most visually stunning movies ever made. Directed by Miller and Quentin Tarantino collaborator Robert Rodriguez, it contains plenty of sex and violence\u2014but it\u2019s done with style and story, which makes it feel more artistic than gratuitous.<\/p>\n<p>Among a star-studded cast that includes Bruce Willis, Jessica Alba, Clive Owen, Benicio Del Toro, Rosario Dawson, and Elijah Wood, it\u2019s still Mickey Rourke who stands out above the rest.<\/p>\n<p>The onetime pretty boy of the \u201980s plays Marv, a tough-as-nails hard case who exacts revenge against the crime lords of Sin City who murdered a young prostitute. Marv\u2019s murderous methods of revenge are unjust, and he pays the ultimate price for his actions.<\/p>\n<p>Rourke excels as a street tough who fights against the evil men of Sin City: corrupt politicians, and a wicked police force.<\/p>\n<p>Here is where I found something new. \u201cSin City,\u201d A movie that I hadn&#8217;t seen for at least a decade (probably longer).<\/p>\n<h2>Senator Roark\u2019s Speech<\/h2>\n<p>Powers Boothe, who died in 2017, played the role of corrupt Senator Ethan Roark Sr. Though he\u2019s the primary antagonist in the Sin City comics, Senator Roark isn\u2019t seen much in Sin City the movie, unlike Roark\u2019s son (\u2018That Yellow Bastard,\u2019 played by Nick Stahl) and the senator\u2019s brother (Cardinal Roark, played by Rutger Hauer).<\/p>\n<p>The film&#8217;s villains both experience unceremonious endings. Senator Roark is not the case. Marv kills Cardinal Roark after discovering that the religious leader was killing prostitutes and consuming them.<\/p>\n<p>Roark Junior, a criminal and pedophile is castrated in Hartigan (Bruce Willis), an ex-cop who wrongfully kept him behind bars until he signs a false confession.<\/p>\n<p>Though he\u2019s featured less prominently than his evil relatives, Senator Roark makes an even larger impression in some ways. He may not be as sexually depraved as his son or as barbaric as his brother, but he\u2019s just as bad and more real.<\/p>\n<p>He\u2019s a politician that cares for nothing but power, and in an epic monologue to Hartigan\u2014who\u2019s lying in a hospital bed after saving a little girl from Roark Junior\u2014Roark explains the source of his power.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPower don\u2019t come from a badge or a gun. Power comes from lying. Lying big, and gettin\u2019 the whole damn world to play along with you \u2026 Once you got everybody agreeing with what they know in their hearts ain\u2019t true, you\u2019ve got \u2019em by the balls.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hartigan is then told by the senator that he could. \u201cpump you full of bullets right now\u201d You won&#8217;t be held responsible.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEveryone would lie for me, everyone who counts,\u201d Roark tells Hartigan at gunpoint.<\/p>\n<h2>Do not live by lies<\/h2>\n<p>Roark\u2019s speech didn\u2019t make much of an impression when I first watched \u201cSin City\u201d In 2005. Seventeen years later, in 2005. \u201cThe Gulag Archipelago\u201d Other great works by Russian writers <a href=\"https:\/\/www.britannica.com\/biography\/Aleksandr-Solzhenitsyn\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn<\/a>Now I understand the meaning of the monologue.<\/p>\n<p>It scares me.<\/p>\n<p>Solzhenitsyn was sentenced to many years in the Gulag for making a joke about Stalin in private letters to friends. He understood that lies and violence go hand in hand. In \u201cLive Not By Lies,\u201d He said that violence is not possible without lying, as it exhausts itself quickly.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen violence intrudes into peaceful life, its face glows with self-confidence, as if it were carrying a banner and shouting: \u2018I am violence. Run away, make way for me \u2014 I will crush you.\u2019 But violence quickly grows old,\u201d Solzhenitsyn wrote.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAfter only a few years it loses confidence in itself, and in order to maintain a respectable face it summons falsehood as its ally\u2014since violence can conceal itself with nothing except lies, and the lies can be maintained only by violence.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>This is how violence changes. It can&#8217;t sustain itself for long, so it pivots.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt demands of its subjects only that they pledge allegiance to lies, that they participate in falsehood.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodintoto.com\/end-of-violence-review\/\"><strong>RELATED: \u2018END OF VIOLENCE\u2019 IS SHOCKINGLY RELEVANT TODAY<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Roark is referring to this when he says it. \u201cOnce you got everybody agreeing with what they know in their hearts ain\u2019t true, you\u2019ve got \u2019em by the balls.\u201d True power is the ability to get the rest of the globe to join in the deceit.<\/p>\n<p>Solzhenitsyn in his 1972 Nobel speech urged people to do something extraordinary: not engage in falsehood.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe simple act of an ordinary brave man is not to participate in lies, not to support false actions! His rule: Let that come into the world, let it even reign supreme\u2014only not through me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Although the first sentence receives the most attention, it is not the only one that deserves it. Solzhenitsyn admits that lies will be out there, and may even come to the rescue of innocent people. \u201creign supreme\u201d For a moment. However, he calls for individuals to refrain from participating in these activities.<\/p>\n<p>This was Solzhenitsyn\u2019s message to all brave men and women, and it\u2019s the key to defeating the Senator Roarks of the world.<\/p>\n<p>I have no idea if Miller or Rodriguez ever read Solzhenitsyn, but it\u2019s clear they understand political power and violence are intertwined with falsehood. When I see the decay of truth today, it scares me a little.<\/p>\n<p><em>This article first appeared on the <a href=\"https:\/\/fee.org\/articles\/the-most-important-scene-in-sin-city-reveals-a-dark-truth-about-violence-and-power\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Foundation for Economic Education.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Jon Miltimore manages Fee.org.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s never fun to be sick. When I was struck down by a virus some weeks back, I decided to take the time to see one of the greatest pulp action movies of 2000s. \u201cSin City\u201d The film adaptation of Frank Miller\u2019s graphic novels is one of the most visually stunning movies ever made. Directed &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1807251,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[547],"tags":[8808,5458,5269,3819,9214,3625,15098],"class_list":["post-1807248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-bongino-report","tag-age","tag-bongino","tag-city","tag-report","tag-sin","tag-speaks","tag-truth-challenged"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/cndimages.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com\/breaking-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/01\/IMG_2758-scaled-1.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1807248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1807248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1807248\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1807251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1807248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1807248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1807248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}