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SCI LIBRARY

It's Fun to Fight

Frank Chodorov


[Originally published in analysis, 1944. Reprinted from Fragments, October-December 1964]


It's fun to fight -- when what you are fighting for stirs your imagination. Fondly adhering to the ideal of individual dignity, striving to keep alive the embers of that hope which was fired by the American Declaration of Independence, those who are making this paper possible expect only a measure of enjoyment in return. It is in that spirit that I, while I manage to rub along by other means, assume my editorial duties.

For, to point up the State's encroachment upon social power, to expose the insidious economic forces which are robbing the individual of his will to resist the trend, to suggest a way by which this degradation of man might be stopped short of State-slavery, seems in the light of what is happening, a fatuous undertaking. What of it? There is a lot of spiritual profit in being true to one's self.

In carrying on for principle, self-respect at least is preserved. The loser is he who quits; what material advantages or conveniences he might gain by compromise is paid for with the currency of manhood. A pig accommodates himself to the environment imposed on him, and that is why we ascribe to the pig no soul worth speaking about.

There is further "profit" which this voice-of-individualism hopes to render its supporters. It is that imponderable value which is derived from communion with kindred spirits. Every reader of this highly opinionated journal becomes ipso facto a member of a fraternity of individualists, held together by the greatest of human bonds -- a common ideal, a common hope. To know that one has the moral support of a host who, in their hearts at least, protest and proclaim with him, is a real comfort.

That comfort will be as big as the membership of the fraternity, and every reader is able to add to the one by swelling the other. Get into the fight -- have some fun -- get a subscription.

It's fun to fight!