{"id":2701911,"date":"2026-11-08T00:04:01","date_gmt":"2026-11-08T05:04:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/eating-ourselves-alive\/"},"modified":"2026-11-08T00:10:46","modified_gmt":"2026-11-08T05:10:46","slug":"eating-ourselves-alive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/eating-ourselves-alive\/","title":{"rendered":"Eating Ourselves Alive"},"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\">6<\/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%2Feating-ourselves-alive%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=2701911&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--><p>A writer recalls once being asked to testify in a libel case about allegations that Charles Taylor was a cannibal and remembers Taylor\u2019s use of child soldiers. Reading about Miatta Fahnbulleh\u2019s father reminded him of visiting besieged Monrovia in 1991 aboard the Steel Trader and captain Monty Jones\u2019 tales of drugged pirates. He describes thorough, symbolic iconoclasm-hospitals, libraries and a Steinway desecrated-and criticizes journalists who missed its meaning. he argues resentment of civilization drives destruction frequently enough disguised as political virtue, not true creativity.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div class=\"c-blog-post__content s-wysiwyg s-wysiwyg--blog\">\n<div style=\"margin-bottom:30px;\" id=\"elevenlabs-audionative-widget\" data-height=\"90\" data-width=\"100%\" data-frameborder=\"no\" data-scrolling=\"no\" data-publicuserid=\"cb0d9922301244fcc1aeafd0610a8e90a36a320754121ee126557a7416405662\" data-playerurl=\"https:\/\/elevenlabs.io\/player\/index.html\" >Loading the <a href=\"https:\/\/elevenlabs.io\/text-to-speech\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Elevenlabs Text to Speech<\/a> AudioNative Player&#8230;<\/div>\n<p><script src=\"https:\/\/elevenlabs.io\/player\/audioNativeHelper.js\" type=\"text\/javascript\"><\/script>                            <\/p>\n<p class=\"has-drop-cap wp-block-paragraph\">I have only once been asked to be a witness in a libel trial in which the plaintiff denied that he was a cannibal, contrary to the allegation made in print by the defendant, but I suppose that that is infinitely more times than the great majority of people have ever been asked to be such a witness. (I should add that I was to be a witness for the defendant, though my knowledge of the plaintiff\u2019s cannibalism was distinctly limited.) <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The plaintiff was Charles Taylor, the president of Liberia at the time. He dropped the case against Stephen Ellis, the author of the brilliant and definitive book about the Liberian Civil War. Taylor did so, he said, because of the cost involved, though no one believed this, as he was by then a very rich man. He would have had to testify in London, and in a libel trial all manner of evidence is allowed; it would not have been too difficult to prove that he had no reputation to lose, which is to say, good reputation. What was hardly beyond dispute was that he had used drugged-up children to fight in his guerrilla army in his determination to become president. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Memories of Liberia returned to me when I read recently an article in the <em>Spectator<\/em> about Miatta Fahnbulleh, daughter of a Liberian refugee to Britain, Henry Boima Fahnbulleh. She is now secretary of energy security and net zero in the current British government, and as such, as her very title suggests, almost certainly destined to assist and be partly responsible for the further impoverishment of the country. According to <a href=\"https:\/\/spectator.com\/article\/the-revolutionary-past-of-miatta-fahnbullehs-father\/?edition=us\">the article<\/a>, not yet and perhaps never to be the subject of an action for defamation, her father:<\/p>\n<p>                         <!-- \/22404337467,3946880\/theamericanconservative-Leaderboard-Top -->                         <\/p>\n<div id='div-gpt-ad-1742316429780-0' style='min-width: 300px; min-height: 50px; max-width: 100%; '>                         <\/div>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">was indeed foreign minister in Liberia in the 1980s, and latterly a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/breaking-president-trump-to-pardon-gen-michael-flynn-per-report\/\" title=\"BREAKING: ... Trump to Pardon Gen. Michael Flynn, Per Report\">national security adviser<\/a> to President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf. But he is also a Marxist radical who dedicated himself over a long career to the violent overthrow of those who got in his way. <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Unsurprisingly, this took me back to the time during a short lull in the civil war back in 1991 when I visited Monrovia, the capital of Liberia. You could reach the city at that time only by sea, for it was besieged by Charles Taylor\u2019s forces. I travelled on the <em>Steel Trader<\/em> under Captain Monty Jones, an estimable Welsh sea captain and entrepreneur who was almost solely (and heroically) responsible for the revictualling of the city under siege. He died, alas, in 2019, having been a staunch opponent of the pirates who operated in his West African theater of operations. I had the highest admiration for him and found an article about piracy in the area in which he was quoted:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThey [pirates] spray the wheelhouse with machine gun fire before trying to board. It is a normal military tactic: intimidate your enemy,\u201d said sea captain Jones, who has been hijacked several times.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Many pirates are armed with handguns and long guns, he said, and are often high on drugs. \u2018There is no way to reason with them.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The pirates had evidently turned on,\u00a0tuned in and dropped out, <em>\u00e0 la<\/em> Timothy Leary.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The destruction of Monrovia was complete and very thorough. This destruction was not merely the consequence of war or bombardment. That could not have explained why the medical records of the Maternity Hospital had been used as lavatory paper, why the books of the library of the University of Liberia had been pulled from the shelves on to the ground and trampled upon, or why the castor wheels had been carefully sawn off every single piece of hospital furniture of the now deserted, dark, and echoing John F. Kennedy Hospital (where open-heart surgery had once been performed), all at a considerable expense of effort. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In the Centennial Hall, where national events such as the inauguration of presidents took place, the body of what was possibly the only Steinway grand piano in the country rested on the floor, its legs sawn off, surrounded by a necklace of human faeces. Again, this could hardly be interpreted as destruction wrought by war: There was surely something more to it than that. The destruction was symbolic, as iconoclasm always has been symbolic. Iconoclasm speaks to a hatred of whatever is destroyed, in this case a civilization felt to be both alien and probably superior, or at any rate that regarded itself as superior. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This was not what appalled me most, however. It was when I spoke to two young British journalists about what I had seen, recommending that they went to see it for themselves, that I was most shocked.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They could not see any symbolic significance in the destruction of the piano, or for that matter of the hospital. Why was I worried about a few, ultimately replaceable inanimate objects when a quarter of a million people, something like a 12th to an eighth of the population, had been slaughtered in the war? What was the destruction of a mere piano to that? <\/p>\n<section class=\"c-subscribe-email\" >\n<div class=\"l-container\">\n<div class=\"c-subscribe-email__wrap\">\n<div class=\"c-subscribe-email__head\">\n<h4 class=\"c-subscribe-email__heading\">Subscribe Today<\/h4>\n<h5 class=\"c-subscribe-email__subheading\">Get daily emails in your inbox<\/h5>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<div class=\"c-subscribe-email__form-wrap\">      <!-- Begin Mailchimp Signup Form -->      <\/p>\n<div id=\"mc_embed_signup\">\n<form id=\"mc-embedded-subscribe-form\" class=\"validate\" action=\"https:\/\/theamericanconservative.us4.list-manage.com\/subscribe\/post?u=442e644c01f8e54e26e4ff3f8&#038;id=f7b67cac40\" method=\"post\" name=\"mc-embedded-subscribe-form\" novalidate target=\"_blank\">\n<div id=\"mc_embed_signup_scroll\">\n<div class=\"c-subscribe-email__fields\">              <label for=\"mce-EMAIL\" class=\"u-screenreader-text\">Email Address:<\/label>              <input id=\"mce-EMAIL\" class=\"c-subscribe-email__field\" name=\"EMAIL\" type=\"email\" value=\"\" placeholder=\"Your Email\" \/>              <input id=\"mc-embedded-subscribe\" class=\"c-subscribe-email__submit o-button o-button--red-500 o-button--solid\" name=\"subscribe\" type=\"submit\" value=\"Subscribe\" \/>            <\/div>\n<div id=\"mce-responses\" class=\"clear\">\n<div id=\"mce-error-response\" class=\"response\" style=\"display: none;\"><\/div>\n<div id=\"mce-success-response\" class=\"response\" style=\"display: none;\"><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>              <!-- real people should not fill this in and expect good things - do not remove this or risk form bot signups-->            <\/p>\n<div class=\"u-screenreader-text\" aria-hidden=\"true\">              <input tabindex=\"-1\" name=\"b_442e644c01f8e54e26e4ff3f8_f7b67cac40\" type=\"text\" value=\"\" \/>            <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/form>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>      <!--End mc_embed_signup-->          <\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/section>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">They could see no connection between the slaughter and the iconoclasm. This astounded and alarmed me. And I now see this obliviousness as a forerunner of what we now see in Europe, that is to say, a widespread iconoclasm masquerading as political purpose. <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The love of or respect for civilization is not universal or automatic. Insofar as the achievements of civilization are not equally accessible to all, it is often, and by many, as much hated as it is loved. It confronts people with their own insignificance or nullity, and they seek to take their revenge upon it. Of course, giving vent to their hatred can easily be given a patina of political virtue, such as the desire for equality or social justice, and demagogues are gifted precisely at the provision of this patina to masses of humanity. There are few joys greater than destruction in the name of higher purpose. Man is a destroyer almost as much as he is a creator.   <\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Russian anarchist, Mikhail Bakunin, an opponent of Karl Marx, said that the destructive urge is also a creative urge. No: This is not the creative destruction of capitalism as described by Schumpeter. This is destruction for the joy of destruction of what is hated.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I\u2019ve only ever been asked to testify once in a libel case where the plaintiff denied being a cannibal, despite print claims to the contrary. The defendant\u2019s side considered me a witness, though my knowledge of the plaintiff\u2019s cannibalism was limited. The plaintiff was Charles Taylor, Liberia\u2019s president at the time, who dropped the case against Stephen Ellis, the author of a landmark book on Liberia\u2019s civil war, supposedly for cost reasons-an explanation many doubted, since Taylor was very rich. It would have required testimony in London, and in a libel trial a wide range of evidence is admissible; it would have been hard to dispute that Taylor had nothing to lose in terms of reputation. What seemed indisputable was his use of drugged children in his guerrilla army as he sought the presidency.<\/p>\n<p>Reading about Miatta Fahnbulleh, daughter of a Liberian refugee in Britain and now a senior UK government official, reminded me of Liberia\u2019s past. Her father, Henry Boima Fahnbulleh, was Liberia\u2019s foreign minister in the 1980s and later a national security adviser, but he was also a Marxist radical who spent a long career violently opposing those in his way.<\/p>\n<p>This took me back to a 1991 visit to Monrovia during a brief lull in the civil war, when the city was under siege by Taylor\u2019s forces. I rode the Steel Trader with Captain Monty Jones, a principled Welsh captain who helped resupply the besieged city and who later opposed piracy in the region. He described pirates as often drugged and armed, with little to reason with.<\/p>\n<p>The destruction of Monrovia went beyond war: medical records were treated as waste, library books were trampled, hospital furniture was sabotaged, and in Centennial Hall a piano lay on the floor with its legs cut off, surrounded by human waste. This could hardly be explained as mere war damage; it was symbolic, an act of iconoclasm driven by a hatred of civilization itself-seen as alien or somehow superior.<\/p>\n<p>What shocked me most, however, was talking to two young British journalists who could not grasp any symbolic meaning in the piano\u2019s destruction-or in the hospital\u2019s ruin. They could not reconcile the slaughter-hundreds of thousands killed-with the idea of iconoclasm. Their obliviousness seemed to presage a broader European trend toward iconoclasm wrapped in political rhetoric. Civilization\u2019s achievements are not universally valued; when they are not accessible to all, they are often despised, and some people seek revenge through destruction, sometimes under the cover of justice or equality. Demagogues are adept at giving this hatred a noble fa\u00e7ade. Destruction, for many, can be a joy, a force for those who both create and annihilate. <\/p>\n<p>Mikhail Bakunin argued that the urge to destroy can be creative, but this is not Schumpeter\u2019s \u201ccreative destruction\u201d of capitalism. This is destruction for the sake of destroying what is hated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4464,"featured_media":2701912,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/tac.imgix.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Liberian-Civil-War.jpg?auto=compress&#038;crop=faces%2Centropy&#038;fit=crop&#038;fm=jpg&#038;h=630&#038;ixlib=php-3.3.1&#038;q=80&#038;w=1200","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[7513,4964,57924,28873,27333],"class_list":["post-2701911","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-habits","tag-health","tag-overeating","tag-psychology","tag-self-destructive"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/tac.imgix.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/11\/Liberian-Civil-War.jpg?auto=compress&#038;crop=faces%2Centropy&#038;fit=crop&#038;fm=jpg&#038;h=630&#038;ixlib=php-3.3.1&#038;q=80&#038;w=1200","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2701911","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\/4464"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2701911"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2701911\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2701915,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2701911\/revisions\/2701915"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2701912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2701911"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2701911"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2701911"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}