At the start of the year, I was invited to join the Advisory Board for the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship. Spearheaded by Jordan Peterson of Canada, John Anderson of Australia, and Philippa Stroud of the UK, the Alliance for Responsible Citizenship is “an international community with a vision for a better world where every citizen can prosper, contribute and flourish.”
In their words, ARC aims to develop “a better narrative in response to life’s most fundamental social, economic, philosophical and cultural questions.”
In my words, ARC is the righteous inverse of the World Economic Forum.
We are seeking the same level of global influence as the WEF, but we are focused on solutions that see humans as inherently valuable, not as parasites on the globe. We want to strengthen, rather than destroy the social fabric. We want to steward our planet’s resources in ways that maximize prosperity for everyone, especially the global poor. We want to deconstruct the administrative state and vest power in individual citizens. It’s an organization not focused on top-down elite dictates, but bottom-up solutions predicated on voluntary adoption of responsibility.
The message and work of ARC has six expressions, and Advisory Board members generally specialize in one of these areas:
- Vision and Story
- Responsible Citizenship
- Family and Social Fabric
- Free Enterprise and Good Governance
- Energy and Resources
- Environmental Stewardship
Them Before Us has played a central role in the conversation and materials that ARC developed in relation to the social fabric. Here’s how:
We first created a video back in April, making plain the connection between prioritizing, the rights of children, and responsible citizenship. You can view it here.
Then, we wrote a 20-page, meticulously footnoted research paper titled Them Before Us: Putting Children First, which identified the cultural, legal, and technological threats to children’s rights to their mother and father and responsible family formation. We then lay out prescriptions for how to use culture, law, and technology to restore children to their rightful place as primary stakeholders in all of these conversations. Here’s a video teaser for the research paper, and a summary of our research paper.
Then, ARC sent a film crew to my house to tape an overview of how culture specifically can be deployed to tell a better story about marriage, family and children.
From that footage, they created a beautiful 3 minute video that they screened at the ARC conference. We will link to that video when it’s available on Youtube.
During the three-day conference in London Oct 30-Nov 2, Them Before Us sponsored the official Social Fabric dinner for 240 ARC delegates working to strengthen families across the West. It was held at the Royal Horseguard Hotel, in the historic Gladstone Library.
The dinner was MC’ed by British MP Danny Kruger. While the speeches were not recorded, I kicked off the night with an overview of the importance of centering the child in every conversation of marriage and family.
And to the cheers of the diners, I announced how Them Before Us planned to go on offense against #BigCorp’s efforts to dismantle the family. Them Before Us advisor Jeff Shafer then outlined the legal threats to children, the brilliant Mary Harrington discussed technological threats to children, and courageous Scottish MP Kate Forbes discussed the cultural challenges related to advocating for strong families.
Beyond the honor of having our research paper available to the 1,500 conference delegates and our video viewed by leaders from 72 countries, my greatest delight was meeting the dozens of pro-family champions across North America, Australia, the UK, and Europe who have been influenced by our work. From the courageous Moira Deeming and Amanda Stoker in Australia, to Bob McCoskrie in New Zealand, to the woman spearheading the Casablanca Declaration for whom we produced a video, and to pro-family leaders in Lithuania we assisted two years ago.
We met so many allies in Italy, Albania, Austria, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Sweden, Germany, Slovenia, Greece, the Netherlands, Spain, and Lithuania that we are considering some kind of European conference or tour next year. These smaller nations are often overwhelmed by the well-monied, well-organized LGBTQ machine and would greatly benefit from Them Before Us support and strategy to fight back.
Where does ARC go from here? The road map is still being drafted. But what is certain is that building a community of like-minded people who can advance human flourishing, impossible without child flourishing, is a high priority. Them Before Us is committed to supporting ARC in the years ahead, in whatever capacity necessary.
If you want to stay updated on our involvement in ARC, and the many other projects ahead, subscribe to our newsletter.