Not Cool: The Hipster Elite and Their War on You by Greg Gutfeld Page B

layer to the story begins to appear. A rocker’s family objects to an uncool politician, one demeaned by our media to be a religious freak (because just being religious makes you a freak). Who wouldn’t agree with the family? Me? I think it’s cooler to live a semi-healthy life, one long enough to provide goods and services to the loved ones around you. That’s cooler than dying from an overdose, whether you’re gay, straight, or whatever Andy Dick is.
    And so I offer one objection. The fact is the Romney family would have gotten way more love from our shallow society if they were champions of a liberal, ephemeral social consciousness instead of real, actual charity.
    My friend Walter Kirn, a tremendous writer, and also a Mormon, will help me explain what most people don’t know about that dorky, uncool religion. “Mormonism is the greatest example I know of an organization whose charitable work is neither denigrating to the recipient nor unduly guilt-inducing for the giver.” He cites an example that I never heard of, because the media ignores it: Deseret Industries, a division of welfare services of the Mormon Church. “Deseret Industries is a kind of in-house Goodwill store–network that performs all the functions of Goodwill—job training, low-cost used goods—with none of the fanfare.” (I know—imagine that—an honest-to-God charity the networks never bothered to trumpet. If Mitt were a liberal, and the charity focused on sex workers with webbed feet, we’d be organizing Live Aid II).
    That’s the key. Real charity has no fanfare. Social consciousness, however, is often nothing but that. It’s fanfare designed to create fans for those publicly displaying their concern. Says Kirnof the side of Mormonism none of us heard about because no one in the media wanted to: “Combined with various schemes that can and do distribute foodstuffs and other household staples, the church offers members a comprehensive in-house welfare system that is underwritten by the ten percent tithing done by all faithful members.” Ten percent—on
top
of what Mormons pay in normal taxes. Those evil, greedy religious nuts strike again!
    I can’t think of a more uncool word than “tithing.” It’s like the opposite of “social consciousness.” But, in reality, why isn’t tithing cool? John Lennon did it. It’s charity, pure and simple. And it’s charity that works.
    And let’s remember how this tithing is possible. Someone has to
make
money to make money for tithing available. Yep, it’s the boring businessmen like Mitt Romney who supply the green to make that real, comprehensive charity possible. “This tithing obligation,” says Kirn, “also supports a global missionary program, a worldwide temple-building program. Talk about efficiency. And the wonder of it is that by pooling their resources and doing so cheerfully and voluntarily, church members receive a sense of security, pride, and usefulness that causes them to give even more for specific projects as they come up.” Amazing, right? This is how government is supposed to work. Instead, we get Obama phones, ACORN, and California.
    Talk about uncool. Far better for those who ridicule people like Romney to embrace superficial “caring” than to admit that good men in suits with boring personalities are better at it than you. Better not to know the facts beyond the frosting. Fake caring is that frosting—no cake, just a sweet momentary sugar rush that makes you feel good without accomplishing anything but an ego thrill. It’s way more exciting than tithing, so why bother with the real thing?
    I bother, because we’re now watching a false morality replacing a real one. I’m not a religious person. I’m half atheist, half agnostic (and all sexy). Meaning, in the daytime, I don’t believe in God. But at night, alone with my thoughts, facing that gaping, terrifying maw without a rail to hold on to, I drift toward something less certain than nothing. Especially