Time and time again, it has been said that Joe Biden’s run for the U.S. presidency is little more than a Trojan Horse, and this may be the very issue that sees him lose to President Trump in November. Voters worry that Biden – a man with over 40 years’ service at the top of the Swamp heap – is really just a placeholder, a door if you will, to allow the far left progressives in his party access to the levers of power without having campaigned on their divisive and destructive platform.
We are all no doubt familiar with the story of the Trojan Horse, but there are perhaps one or two aspects that might surprise you. When we retell this story, it’s difficult not to think about how gullible the Trojans must have been to accept their gift from the Greeks, but that’s because we may have taken on board the wrong story.
The tale of the Greeks and the Trojans is covered by multiple sources from Homer’s Iliad to Virgil’s Aeneid. It tells of a war sparked by the “stealing” of Helen, the most beautiful of women, by Paris of Troy. Helen was the wife of a Spartan king, and so the major players of the region banded together to “rescue” her and, of course, seek revenge. Odysseus, Achilles, Agamemnon, Ajax, and their mighty force set sail to do battle against Hector and Paris.
For ten long years, they tried to take down the city of Troy, but couldn’t quite secure a victory. They then came up with a tricky plan. Hiding the forces away on a nearby island, the Greeks left behind a wooden horse as a gift – the horse being the symbol of Troy. The Trojans took it inside, and while they celebrated their apparent victory, 30 men, secluded inside the horse, crept out to open the gates to the newly returned Greek army. Troy was burned to the ground.
Not Such a Simple Tale
It seems such a simple tale, and one that we, with our modern sophistication, would certainly never fall for, right?
There are a few elements that are rarely discussed when we hear the retelling. The first being that people were suspicious. A Trojan priest, Laocoon, tries to convince the city that to take in the horse is a folly. He says, “Timeo Danaos et dona ferentes,” or in English “I fear Greeks, even those bearing gifts.” But before he can make his case, Poseidon sends a sea serpent to strangle him and his two sons. And the infamous Cassandra, she who is blessed to always speak true prophecies but cursed never to be believed, she too realizes what is afoot. But, of course, no one believes her.
If such things were to happen today, without the gods and prophecy elements, we might assume that Laocoon was murdered by someone who was working with the Greeks and that Cassandra was smeared by the press to make her seem untrustworthy. But perhaps the most important point to make when asking ourselves how the Trojans could have been so blind, is that it’s possible the horse wasn’t even a horse. We may ask ourselves, why on earth would the Trojans take in a gigantic wooden horse? But what if it was a boat, or what if it was a siege engine or a battering ram?
In Homer’s Odyssey and other texts, boats are referred to as “sea-horses.” Would it be so strange to bring in an enemy boat? Huge battering rams were often decorated or carved to look like they had animal heads. Remember, in those days, symbolism was everything. Troy’s symbol being the horse, what better than to carve your battering ram in that way?
The point here is that perhaps the Trojans weren’t as gullible as we may first think. The Greeks were subtle, and a series of events, denials, and trickery led ultimately to the Trojan horse being accepted – which brings us to today.
The Trojan Horses of Today
There are very real Trojan horse operations taking place across the world today. They are agendas under a guise, they are a wolf in sheep’s clothing, and they are – as all Trojan horses are – subterfuge for a dangerous and damaging event or ideology.
In the United Kingdom, there is a new political party called Taking the Initiative Party; the initials TTIP, which should set alarm bells ringing. It is headed up by a young black lady named Sasha Johnson and has a fairly run-of-the-mill constitution. The aim is to increase the diversity of cultures and to “help people.” All well and good. But this is the trick of Trojan horses: they present an image that can be accepted, whether as a gift or as part of a seemingly normal procedure, when in fact, they hold a dark and dangerous secret inside.
Ms. Johnson, the party leader, describes herself as the “Oxford Black Panther,” an apparent nod to the American, Marxist-backed Black Panther group so prominent in the ’60s. She has openly stated that white people would be excluded from leading roles in the party and sees nothing wrong with having “The white man will not be our equal but our slave” pinned to her Twitter page. She presents her new party as a party of reform for the working class and receives hugely positive media attention for her support and organization within the Black Lives Matter movement. But she is a danger. She is a racist, but due to her association with BLM, she has become almost untouchable.
Imagine if you will for a moment, that a white person starts a political party in which black people will be excluded from leadership roles and openly states that black people will not be our equals but our slaves. How far would such a party get? How soon would the media rightly attack and denounce it? Johnson has wrapped her hatred in a widely-accepted cause. She seeks to be the ghost in the machine.
And what of the response by world governments to the Coronavirus? H.L. Mencken wrote:
“The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary.”
Sound familiar? New laws and restrictions on our liberties are being imposed almost daily. Innocent people are being arrested, harassed, and even publicly shamed for not submitting to government-sponsored fear. In Australia, pregnant mothers are dragged out of their homes for sharing a social media post about a lockdown protest. People are picked up and manhandled by police officers for not wearing masks. Around the world, people have faced fines or cuts to benefits for not complying with rules that have no basis whatsoever in science or fact. Doctors are silenced and scientific methods denied.
But it is all in the name of public safety from the Coronavirus. The dreaded COVID-19 somehow managed to strip liberties and tank the world economy despite being far less dangerous than we were initially told. Is it possible that the Coronavirus is merely a vehicle – a Trojan Horse if you will – for the usurpation of individual power and liberty? And if we allow it, are we not as gullible, and doomed, as we considered the Trojans to be?
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Read more from Mark Angelides.
