The culture war is a political red herring | GARY COSBY JR.

The so-called "culture war" is a political red-herring. The more politicians get you to look at non-issues, the less you will look at and hold them responsible for the lack of real and responsible governance that is plaguing the country right now.

The culture war is real. The problem is that this iteration of the culture war, like every iteration before it, is already lost. The older generation always loses and the younger generation always wins.

Don’t believe me? Take a look back at entertainment. That’s an epic beat down if ever there were one. If it were a baseball game, the mercy rule would have been invoked. For instance, before the 1980s, nudity wasn’t seen on TV. Then a show named “Hill Street Blues” came on the air and we saw the naked back and partially naked buttocks of a lovely woman, something that would have caused Aunt Bee from "The Andy Griffith Show" to have a stroke, but also something that would not even register in our minds today.

And that is only one example. The culture war is constant, and it is constantly lost. This begs a very important question: Why, if it is already lost, are we paying so much attention to it?

Easy answer: Political leaders at the national level can scream about these issues, keep people all stirred up, and depend upon the fact that no one is really looking at the real policies that affect the well-being of the nation. The culture war is a smoke screen.

We should hold Washington politicians accountable for their horrific and out-of-control spending habits. We should focus on the often chaotic foreign policy issues we are continually fumbling around about and causing turmoil all over the world. We should focus on energy policies, the environment, the nearly bankrupt Social Security and Medicare systems. And the list goes on and on.

In truth, I would love for the electorate to hold politicians accountable on those issues. But the right is screaming about that minuscule percentage of transgender persons and the left is screaming that the right is disenfranchising American citizens. The louder they scream, the more they can keep the focus on politically meaningless issues and off what matters.

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The issues forming the culture war are moral issues, or at least personal issues, not political ones. Moral issues belong to the religions to deal with, personal issues belong to individuals, while public policy issues should be focused on things like budgets, defense, infrastructure and the like.

I know that caused many people a bit of distress, so I will take a minute to explain. Perhaps you have read the Old Testament of the Holy Bible. In all those books, and they comprise about two-thirds of the pages in the Bible, the reader sees how mankind, even when given laws inscribed by the hand of God himself, could not follow them.

As Paul would write in the New Testament, the law was good, but the law, taking occasion in the weakness of our flesh, produced in us every kind of lawlessness. In other words, a major portion of the Bible shows how ridiculous it is for governments to be charged with morality when even God himself could not impose a moral code on mankind that could be followed.

Does this mean we should simply stop fighting the culture war, throw up our hands and give in to the decadence of the younger generations or, God forbid, the damnable liberals? Of course not, but using a political party, or parties, to dictate the morality of a nation has never worked and will never work. Please do remember that one of the biggest reasons that people fled England to settle in America was to avoid just such nonsense.

How, then, does one fight a culture war if the government is ineffective as a means or as a weapon? Ah, back to the Holy Bible for the answer. Morality is not formed through laws but through relationships. That is the basic lesson of New Testament scripture. With that in mind, there is no way to morally reform a nation through law. We have tried. There was even a constitutional amendment in force for a few years, banning alcohol. We can all see how that went.

No, the answer comes down to a person making a decision based upon relationship with God to live a moral life. Take the basic principle of relationship over law and apply it without regard to religious belief. Accountability to a moral code comes through relationships with sound individuals who have their moral compasses fixed upon true north and who are passing along their morality to a younger generation.

When those people become the influencers of the day, they impact the lives of millions, abrogating the need for moral laws enacted by an amoral or immoral government. That impact is passed through one-on-one relationships, through social media, and ultimately through entertainment. The morality of the nation will never be determined by corrupt politicians in Washington unless, as the Bible indicates, we wish to reap the corruption sown by corrupt hands.

Gary Cosby Jr. is the photo editor of The Tuscaloosa News. Readers can email him at gary.cosby@tuscaloosanews.com.

This article originally appeared on The Tuscaloosa News: The culture war is a political red herring | GARY COSBY JR.