Vincent Ryan RuggieroRemember the ancient story of the Trojan Horse? The Greeks filled a giant wooden horse with soldiers and left it outside the walls of their Trojan enemies, then sailed away. The Trojans, thinking the Greeks had given up battle, took the horse inside. During the night, the Greek soldiers left the horse and slaughtered their enemies. The strategy was brilliant but simple, taking only a few hours to accomplish its mission.
Since that time, millennia have come and gone, and today we are experiencing a more brilliant, clever, and deceptive scheme than the ancient one. And it has been carried out by several generations of people. Some have had a clear understanding of the mission and the strategies for advancing it; others have had little or no understanding but followed with much emotion and little thought. Let’s examine how this strategy has unfolded.
1) In mid-20th century it became popular for people to believe that they created their own truth and therefore could not be mistaken. People who believed this tended to reject humility and self-control and form their ideas and opinions on feelings rather than reasoning. But some people realized that the others were easily influenced—all that was necessary was to appeal to their emotions. This realization led many to exercise that influence for their benefit.
2) At about the same time, history began to lose its traditional place of honor in education. This change was understandable given the new belief in creating one’s own truth. After all, there seemed little reason to study past events and the understandings drawn from them when everyone could have his/her own personal and perfectly valid view. Historians, of course, understood the foolishness of such a development, but the view of popular culture was difficult to defeat, and curriculums changed accordingly. The unfortunate effect that has continued over half a century is that millions of people have been deprived of the insights and wisdom of their ancestors.
3) With history less understood, influencers found it easier to persuade the gullible of all manner of falsehoods. All they needed to do was appeal to common stereotypes, prejudices, or hatreds. The more outrageous their claims, the more plausible they would seem to the gullible. And the more frequently the lies were repeated, the more familiar they would be, and the angrier the gullible would become. In such cases, mere statements like, “We can’t let things go on like this, We’ve got to do something,” proved to be enough to spark violence.
4) As the effectiveness of the influencers’ persuasion techniques became more obvious, their numbers increased. Some deliberately sought to undermine the long-standing beliefs and values of the country, and they wreaked havoc doing so. Others genuinely believed they could create their own truth and had no need to be humble or embrace traditional values. Whichever the perspective, if they held positions of authority their impact was significant.
5) Many influencers in education became less focused on teaching the principles and insights of their fields of study, and more focused on teaching their personal “truths” and biases, including those unrelated to their field. Many influencers in journalism ignored their responsibility to separate facts from opinions and instead reported their personal “truths” and biases as if they were facts. Many political influencers were less concerned about their responsibilities to their constituents and the nation, and more about their own advancement. Many parents, even otherwise responsible ones, were too trusting of their children’s teachers, the journalists they watched, and the politicians they voted for. Thus, they unwittingly supported agendas detrimental to their families, fellow citizens, and the nation.
The impact of America’s version of the Trojan Horse continues today. Its present scope is breathtakingly broad and devoid of common sense. Here are a few examples:
Groups staging protests and riots against racism are louder than ever, despite the fact that the terrible racism that plagued this country in past centuries and decades has been largely overcome. Often as not, the same protestors against racism practice it in their treatment of those they dislike, for example Jews or Catholics.
People who commit heinous crimes, including carjacking, rape, murder, and the abuse of children, are given light sentences or no sentences at all. When they commit the same offences again, those who supported their release are at a loss for understanding why.
Those determined to shut down the discussion of important issues shout down campus speakers and demand that the colleges cancel other speakers they disagree with. Then college officials do as asked and credit themselves for maintaining peace on campus while ignoring the dangerous consequences of their actions.
Election after election, citizens vote again for the very politicians that have publicly lied to them and failed to keep their promises. They do the same even if the politicians have been proven dishonest and/or ineffectual. Then, between elections, these same voters lament the dishonesty and poor performance of elected officials.
Reporters stand in front of a building set on fire by protesters, while reporting that the protest was “peaceful.”
A TV guest argues that a male transgender athlete has no advantage over female athletes. The host points out that the male in question has soundly defeated every female competitor but significantly lost every competition with males. The guest then accuses the host of bias.
Thousands of illegals, male and female, old and young, stream across the border day and night for months and years. Vivid photos of their journeys are presented daily on a number of TV channels. Despite the drama of the migration, other channels ignore it completely. Some channels in fact feature guests who maintain that the border is perfectly secure! Their audiences either have no friends who tell and show them that they are being lied to, or they choose to embrace the lies. In the latter case, they may be conditioned to believe that they are entitled to “their own truth.”
The problem of illegal immigration is especially revealing. As time went on, the numbers of illegals grew larger and larger—hundreds, then thousands, then millions—and logic demanded that political influencers admit their error. After all, by this time numerous cities had declared themselves “sanctuaries” for the illegals, and buses had been moving them from Texas to other parts of the country, so pretending they didn’t exist was no longer feasible. Yet few political influencers acknowledged that fact. They instead pretended that the border had always been closed, which absurdly implied that the millions of illegals around the country had arrived magically.
Then the political influencers shifted their focus to the plight of those poor people. They now called them “our neighbors” and argued that decency required that all Americans welcome and help them. Influencer educators and journalists joined the politicians and encouraged others to join the cause. But an even greater group of influencers was the many religious leaders who saw the references to helping one’s neighbor as a spiritual requirement that believers must follow, and thus gave at least tacit support to the influx of illegals. (Other religious leaders found that thinking to be mistaken, but their views were less publicized.)
Despite the clever rhetoric by the open-border believers however, the illegal immigrants have remained just that, illegal. And the U.S. has a border law which cannot be ignored without both undermining the rule of law, denying common sense, and continuing to endanger citizens. The political influencers surely saw the problems they created and realized that the next administration would have to solve them, and that meant dealing with the lawbreakers and returning the border to responsible order. But instead of acknowledging these facts and cooperating, they maligned virtually every member or employee of the new administration who followed the very law that they themselves had pledged to honor.
The result of the political influencers’ irresponsible behavior, and the support of it by the other influencers has been an increase in alienation, destruction, threatened harm, and violence. Taken with the other examples shown above, it suggests a cultural decline that may be too fundamental, broad, and advanced to be overcome.
Copyright © 2026 by Vincent Ryan Ruggiero. All rights reserved.
Fr Joseph Esper
