48 Comments
User's avatar
Michael Clay's avatar

Voting with your dollars is important. Unfortunately, most aren’t even willing to give up something as simple as a cup of Starbucks coffee for their values. We are all dyed in the wool American, liberal, materialists.

Simple Man's avatar

Very true. I fail at this myself. But I've found just being aware of who I'm supporting with my money allows me to make better decisions. Definitely an uphill battle in a world that often appears completely conquered.

Brandon Wilborn's avatar

This was proposed years ago as the Benedict option, and a lot of people have stepped up to open a sort of parallel economy based on more traditional values. Every encouragement helps.

Simple Man's avatar

So true, even those small endorsements can make all the difference.

CrisHood's avatar

¿De casualidad estuviste en In Altum? Yo estuve en el de finales de julio

Juan Domínguez del Corral's avatar

Así es hermano! Estuve dos veces este año, en Marzo y a mediados de Julio. Este post hace referencia a una charla que nos dieron en el Heritage Foundation.

CrisHood's avatar

Excelente Juan, también me resonó la charla en Heritage. A propósito, muy buenos artículos en todas tus cuentas. Un abrazo, Dios te bendiga.

Simple Man's avatar

Gracias por todo el apoyo hermano! Un abrazo y Dios te bendiga tambien.

Josh Kelso's avatar

Amen, great article. This is very difficult in places like here Portland Oregon too where there’s a trans flag hanging in front of every restaurant and grocery store. Worth the effort though. I need to be better about this.

Simple Man's avatar

Thanks brother, and yeah I feel you. I think many big cities are like that nowadays. It definitely takes a lot of effort to avoid those places, and I absolutely could be better about it too. I think the most important thing is being aware of it, and taking steps to remove our support, however slowly.

Lisa Nicholson's avatar

I have been saying something similar for years, where and how you spend your money matters. There are quite a few companies I refused to spend a penny with.

Simple Man's avatar

Absolutely right. Most companies also aren’t neutral so we’re always supporting either one side or the other. It’s key to choose correctly

Verminator's avatar

Does there exist a list of companies that aren’t engaging in this?

As an example, I’ll eventually need to replace my iPhone, and if I dump Apple, what are my options besides Android? Is Android possibly as bad as or worse than Apple?

Simple Man's avatar

I genuinely don't know, I've been looking for something similar myself. I think sometimes it's about choosing the least of two evils, sadly. One thing that's happening which is a great sign is that there's sort of an "alternative economy" being built, with people of actual values building alternatives to mainstream companies. It'll take a while before their alternatives are widely adopted and easy to find though.

Mark Paalman's avatar

The answer for us: classical education.

1. Chesterton Academy for high school.

2. St. John’s College, or other similar small liberal arts, classical education schools. or Hillsdale, which accepts no government money.

Simple Man's avatar

Love to see the return of classical education. I was given a talk about it in the program in DC that I mention in this article.

Jaime's avatar

Yes👆🏻.

Origen Adamantius's avatar

I find myself caught here.

My university isn't THAT bad with the poz (only in some courses and with some professors), and long story short, I probably won't graduate with any overbearing amount of debt.

I'm gonna have to stay that course, it'd be absurd for me to suddenly think 'oh well student debt isn't as bad as funding mongoloids.'

Simple Man's avatar

Yeah, I have also involuntarily funded lots of institutions that I shouldn't have. I think we all do this nowadays, precisely because for it to be otherwise, you have to be very aware, which we usually aren't.

It takes prudence to know which battles to fight too, so I also understand you staying the course with your current university.

EightCharacters's avatar

Great advice twenty years too late. That shipped has long sailed and what is here now is a large population dependent on corporations for survival. Green activists riding on airplanes and cars to a protest against climate change, while stopping at McDonalds for lunch along the way. Buying food at Walmart and getting your pharmaceuticals delivered by mail. Its too late my friend.

Simple Man's avatar

I see your point, but it's absolutely not too late. We fight with God on our side. And God always wins. He put us on earth right now for a reason, and that is not to roll over and give up. The Bible shows that God's people always overcome difficult odds. We can do the same.

Marc Miller's avatar

Yep. But is it too late, (for what exactly?) or should we engage in the battle on a different front entirely?

Is the battle about beating back the encroaching new system OR is the real battle for the hearts and minds of our neighbors, friends, families? So that they are least, at least, get to hear the Gospel message of eternal life?

I have good friends with whom I spend time discussing this very topic. It goes like this: "Let's build and or support a parallel economy so we don't support the enemy."

I ask, how long will this take and how much of our resources will it require?

They respond, "Why do you insist on throwing cold water on our vigor?"

I ask, is this really what serves God's purposes or does it serve man's purposes, appetites and desires?

They respond, "I guess you have a point there!"

So, by too late do you mean too late to create a robust, fair system? And if so, I think it was too late for that going back to Cain and Abel in Genesis.

Just some food for thought. Not trying to start a war on Juan's page.

Jack Ditch's avatar

“Do not resist an evildoer. But if anyone strikes you on the right cheek, turn the other also, and if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, give your coat as well, and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Give to the one who asks of you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you...Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you"

If this strategy sounds counterproductive to your goals, I'm skeptical that your goals are truly Christ's goals.

Simple Man's avatar

What does that passage have to do with the article?

Jack Ditch's avatar

That passage is like the exact opposite of your article.

Simple Man's avatar

That’s a stunning misunderstanding of both the passage and the article.

Jack Ditch's avatar

The passage seems fairly straightforward to me.

Simple Man's avatar

It doesn't matter if it "seems" straightforward to you. You're just wrong.

Jack Ditch's avatar

Idunno, getting you to quote that passage to all of your followers feels very right to me. I'm happy to let them read it and decide for themselves. Love ya!

Tobías's avatar

Are you, like, using the Bible to suggest that we, like, double down on our support for the coming of the anti-Christ?

Simple Man's avatar

Apparently that's what that passage means, according to Jack

Jack Ditch's avatar

I'm suggesting you do as that passage I quoted plainly says.

Tobías's avatar

It’s one thing to show patience and mercy to an evildoer who is attacking you, an individual, in a way that can be tolerated and eventually overcome. It’s wholly another to show patience and mercy to a (satanic) ideology that is attacking souls en masse and leading them astray from God. Don’t be retarded.

Jack Ditch's avatar

I assume your "in a way that can be tolerated and eventually overcome" has an implicit "in the afterlife" because Christ wants us to show patience and mercy to evildoers as they drive nails through our hands to hold us up to the cross they intend for us to die on.

I don't know how one goes about showing anything to an ideology. I'm just talking about what we show to our fellow sinners.

Marc Miller's avatar

I read this post just at bedtime last eve. It stirred my thinking but sleep prevailed.

This morning I will weigh in on Juan's topic, a deep one, one I've given much thought to over the years.

As a filmmaker for over 50 years I have been privileged to be invited behind the scenes of many corporate communications productions. Meaning, as part of a film crew I have been present for interviews and presentations made by CEOs, COOs, CFOs, HR Dept heads and much more. There were themes and information disseminated by these people to their personnel on a local, national or global basis.

Through observation I saw a distinct shift in messaging take place. There were the themes of the 70s. Themes of the 80s, 90s and the new millennium beginning in Y2K and moving forward from there.

Now, as I’m in semi-retirement I don’t get to be in these production environments any longer. In fact, being there doesn’t matter because of mass communication technology, the internet, YouTube and video everywhere all one has to do is pay attention to corporate messaging. It’s out there for all to see in 2025. Take an accounting of the messaging and you’ll notice exactly where the corporate mind is today.

A drastic shift happened in 2020 when the ‘peaceful demonstrations’ were happening around the country in the wake of covid, wokeness and the George Floyd death. At that time, in mid-summer somewhere in the neighborhood of a few hundred companies announced their support of BLM through funding and other forms of affirmative action. It was sobering to see them all announce in a relatively small window of time. Almost as if it were planned this way. It was this mass announcement that confirmed in my mind that corporate America/Global had been fully co-opted by the ‘enemy’ (the enemy Juan points out in this article).

It’s not that all the efforts are inherently bad, worthless or to be ignored. Some have a little goodness in them (“a little spoonful of sugar makes the medicine go down”). What it was is that over those decades I mentioned above a new purpose had poked it’s head out of the sand in big business. The new purpose became “how do we change behavior?” which replaced “How do we provide the best products and services at affordable prices?”

“Today's corporate landscape reflects this evolution: companies routinely weigh social and political considerations alongside traditional business metrics. Marketing campaigns frequently emphasize corporate values over product attributes. Hiring, promotion, and partnership decisions often incorporate diversity and inclusion criteria.”

“This shift represents perhaps the most significant change in corporate behavior since the rise of consumer protection movements in the 1960s, fundamentally altering how American businesses define success and engage with society.”

Who instigated this shift and why?

I imagine the timing was calculated to be right and in lock step with other behavior modifications happening at the same time. It’s as if the entire world was engaged in a mass formational trance, where uniform compliance was the goal of the corporate overlords. (I won’t enumerate it all here, but you know what i’m referencing).

We’ve been manipulated, coerced and terrorized by forces invisible and visible. Juan is correct in advocating for a mass push back against this co-ordinated effort to beat us into submission. To force us to support businesses and initiatives that go against what we say are our core beliefs. Should we fight with our wallets and if so how is it possible to get enough people to join the effort so it makes a difference?

First, we must raise awareness. After people become aware, they must respond to what should result in their thinking: A crisis of faith, a call to action. Will people rise up to engage or will they keep stuffing their faces with burgers, fries and super-sized Coca Cola? Curling up with their bankeys, muttering “I just wanna be left alone!”

You won’t be left alone. Trust me. Evil never sleeps. If you don’t believe me just read today’s headlines, or tomorrow’s. There’s plenty of evidence to support my assertion.

Time to step up and step out.