≡ Menu

“Did you finish it?” (Nods silently in the affirmative)


Father: There are three types of people in this world:  Sheep, Wolves and Sheepdogs. Now, some people prefer to believe that evil doesn’t exist in the world, and if it ever darkened their doorstep, they wouldn’t know how to protect themselves. Those are the sheep.  And then you’ve got predators.  They use violence to prey on the weak  — they’re the wolves.  And then there are those who have been blessed with the gift of aggression and the overpowering need to protect the flock.  These men are the rare breed, that live to confront the wolf. They are the sheepdog. Now we’re not raising any sheep in this family, and I WILL WHUP YOUR ASS if you turn into a wolf  — but we protect our own. Now if someone tries to fight you, or tries to bully your little brother, you have my permission to finish it.

Elder Son: The guy was picking on Jeff.

Father: Is that true?

Younger Son, Jeff: Yessir. Yes, he was.

Father: Did you finish it?

(Elder Son nods silently in the affirmative)

Father: Well then, you know who you are.  You know your purpose.

VIA Ann Barnhardt who then commments on it in On Servile Fear, Filial Fear and Meekness | Barnhardt

“Finally, we see in the eyes of both of the boys the love and respect they have for their father, and their desire to be good in his eyes, to make him proud, to be good for his sake.  Note how even while the boys just a few seconds before jumped in servile fear of their father, they continue to look him dead in the eye, and look him in the eye when they answer his questions.  The younger son answers his father with a genuinely respectful, “Yessir”, and then the older son answers his father with a nod, looking him dead in the eye.  This is filial fear.  Because their father is a strong man, a meek man, and a highly moral man, they boys respect him and thus LOVE HIM, and do not want to disappoint him because to disappoint him would hurt him deeply, and they know it, and can’t stand the thought of letting him down.”

Comments on this entry are closed.

  • Monty James February 20, 2018, 4:54 PM

    The sheep have demanded equal time:

    The Time for Civilians to Own AR-15s Is Over

    “But for the life of me, I cannot see why any American civilians need an AR-15 or any other military-style semi-automatic rifle. I understand why people want them. It makes your ordinary nerdy guy seem like he’s tough and rough and ready. It makes him feel as if he’s got some part of him that’s always steely and ready for action. But that’s not enough reason to own a gun that just begs to be used against people.”

    Straight from the cuck’s mouth. An excellent example of why Buckleyite mystery cult movement conservatism never conserved anything except cushy think-tank sinecures, talk show appearances, and cruise ship cabins.

  • ed in texas February 20, 2018, 4:55 PM

    I hate to piss in pool, but…
    You DO realize these people are actors, don’t you? (movie camera, director, etc)

  • edaddy February 20, 2018, 5:54 PM

    I hate that “sheep dog” analogy! Anytime there’s a sheep dog, there’s got to be a shepherd instructing the sheep dog.

    I’m raising my boys to be shepherds.

  • billo February 20, 2018, 6:25 PM

    Heh. I remember the first “real” fight I ever got into as a little kid. I came back home with a bunch of bruises and covered in grass stains and mud. My father looked at me and the conversation looked like this:

    Dad: Are you OK?
    Me: Yeah, I’m OK.

    Dad: Good. Did you win?
    Me: Yeah.

    Dad: Good. You know, you shouldn’t get into fights. You’re grounded for the rest of the week. If you get in another fight you’ll be punished again. But if you get in a fight and lose, I’ll whip your ass myself. Now go get cleaned up.

  • John A. Fleming February 21, 2018, 12:51 AM

    There are different kinds of sheepdogs: herding and guard. Herding dogs must be trained by shepherds. Guards like the Great Pyrenees not so much. After they are puppied out, the shepherd sets them out with the flock. The pyrs identify with the flock, and repel strangers. They are normally quite passive and watchful, but don’t hop the fence into a flock if the pyr doesn’t know you.

    I met a flock in Wyoming, with several Peruvian shepherds. They had a pyr. I was glad I was in close proximity to the shepherds, or in a car. Very noble animals. Like a chivalrous knight.

    For instance, in B.C. the shepherds will have three pyrs with a large flock. When the grizz come calling looking for a easy-pickings meal, the shepherd goes into the middle of the flock. The three pyrs run over and harry the bear until it runs away. A hundred-pound pyr running top-speed right at you with his loud barking and teeth bared, is a sight to behold only once. Three 100-lb pyrs are more than a match for an 800-lb grizz.

  • JoeDaddy February 21, 2018, 3:21 AM

    There is only ONE true Shepherd. We are His flock, and His flock requires sheepdogs.

  • Scullman February 21, 2018, 4:14 AM

    There is no evil in the world. Nothing will ever happen to you.

    All is well. All is well. Quiet now. Settle down. No need to get riled up about about bad people. Someone else will take care of it. Not you.

  • ghostsniper February 21, 2018, 4:24 AM

    My brother was 9 and I was 10, at little league practice, and Leroy Brenneman who was in my class was sitting on my brothers chest hitting him in the face. I saw this from a distance and came running. I grabbed a rather large rock off the ground, maybe 8″ across, and slammed Leroy on the side of the head bringing his assault on my brother to an immediate end. Leroy fell off to the side screaming and holding his head with blood running down. My brother and I got scared and jumped on our Stingrays and laid rubber for the house about a mile or so away. In route the Little League president, Reed Peeler, a cuck, drove past and slowed down and said, “You boys better get home right now.” When we got there Reed was standing in the driveway talking to my dad. My dad told us to get in the house, we did. A little while later my dad came in an lauded me for coming to the aid of my brother. The next evening my dad hauled my brother and me over to Leroy’s house to apologize to him. Leroy was in bed with his head all wrapped up and the TV had been rolled into his bedroom. My brother and I told Leroy we were sorry but I don’t think we were sincere because both of us were busy watching “Flipper” on TV. The following year my dad threw all of us in the stationwagon and we moved to Florida, the land of Flipper.

    Leroy Brenneman’s grandfather had been my grandfathers barber for many years and then his son was my dad’s barber for many years. Leroy’s dad had given each of us boys (3 of us) our first baby haircuts and every one after that. There was long family history between us, that’s the way it was done in small rural Gettysburg in the mid 1960’s, where everybody knew everybody else for all of their lives. Kids behaved, parents were good, and society functioned like a well oiled machine, but today the first 2 things failed and the last thing is failing too as a result.

    About 1964 a couple that were friends with my parents got a divorce and it shattered the whole community. Divorce was unheard of. A moral failure on the part of the participants. My dad told my mother he didn’t want “that woman” over here any more. What would the neighbors think? She was a fallen woman and the husband was a loser of course. They were the talk of the town for awhile and were ostracized. Not outright, but they were not welcome. 15 years later, after we moved to a much larger community in Florida, a place where people were not raised with each other, and everybody was from someplace else, a “modern place”, my parents got divorced when all of us kids were over the age of 18. I suspect if we had stayed in Gettysburg that wouldn’t have happened. Looking at the map today I see that Gettysburg now is about the same size as Fort Myers, FL was back then in the late 1970’s, so most likely divorce is common there now too. Society overall has evolved and sometimes I’m not sure that’s a good thing.

  • Snakepit Kansas February 21, 2018, 4:41 AM

    Ed in TX,
    Police up your winkie and stay away from the pool. Yes they were actors, but a movie based on actual events. If you have not read the book you should.

    Two years ago a boy was picking on my daughter at school. She gave him one solid punch to the nose and he never bothered her again. The school only mildly complained about what happened as I think they knew the situation. I took my daughter out for ice cream.

  • Doug February 21, 2018, 5:41 AM

    @edaddy look up the Hungarian Komondor. It’s all instinct.

  • Roy Lofquist February 21, 2018, 6:01 AM

    I first encountered this allegory on Bill Whittle’s old blog Eject! Eject! Eject! in an essay titled “Tribes”. It caused quite a stir and was Whittle’s coming out party. It is no longer available for free, but you can buy a copy for $5. Think about it. An essay written on an obscure blog in 2005 is getting $5 a pop 13 years later. That’s how good it was.

  • Howard Nelson February 21, 2018, 8:20 AM
  • Roy Lofquist February 21, 2018, 10:14 AM

    @Howard,

    Thank you. I haven’t read it in the last couple of years and it pops into my head every once in a while.

  • waitingForTheStorm February 21, 2018, 5:45 PM

    Years ago, I had to travel constantly for work. The two boys were mid teens. Their mother called me in tears, saying that the boys were being rude and mean. I told her: tell the boys we are going to lunch on Saturday, but they would not like the experience. I gave them a choice; they chose a high class burger joint. We ate, we chatted. We finished. I spent then next half hour or so explaining the standard of behavior that I expected them to exhibit. I explained that I would be very disappointed if they failed to meet the standard. Mid week, my wife called me. She asked: what did I do? The boys were polite, helpful, respectful, and obedient. I explained: I clearly told them what was required. No overt threats, just plain and clear statements.

  • edaddy February 21, 2018, 7:54 PM

    ghostsniper, I’m on board with divorce. I remember a time when our women considered a “divorcée” a problem and treated as a threat to their men. I’d like to see that day again … when divorced women were ostracized by the women in their own community. Now, women treat them as heroines.

    I blame it on Oprah.

  • edaddy February 21, 2018, 8:23 PM

    So, how do you make your children Shepherds and not Sheep Dogs?

    From the wife of my youth I have a lot of children, half of them are sons. The oldest son is seventeen and works full time doing man’s work. (He goes to college next fall with $25k of his own money in the bank.) He’s big, strong, honest and leads a construction crew of men, some three times his age. When they have a problem or there’s trouble, they come to him.

    Scripture is being fulfilled. King David said of children in Psalms 127, “Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.”

    Mine are like that. They handle trouble before it gets too far … They meet he enemies in the gate. My older children counsel the younger children on what G-d, Mom and Dad expect … They meet the enemy at the gate.

    When my first son was born, I remember kneeling beside the bed that night. I cried for wisdom to raise him to become a man worthy to be given back to Him. So, the only credit I can take is crying out to Him. I embraced the responsibility and He helped me through the years to create a Shepherd.

    It’s easy to create angry, steely-eyed sheep dogs. It’s much harder creating shepherds to lead them.

  • ghostsniper February 22, 2018, 4:29 AM

    Regarding the divorce situation I believe it swings both ways, neither gender is fully to blame.
    I also believe people do not make the effort to properly evaluate a prospective life-mate.
    You will not make a long term spouse out of people met in bars.
    I’m not convinced religion is the answer for there are many divorces in people from that strata too.
    But undermining all of it, once again, is the overbearing hand of the gov’t skewing the whole thing.

    Last Sat marks the 34th year my wife and I have been married but we lived together for about a year prior. Today, I would not marry with the overall situation being what it is. I believe the gov’t has no place in the relationships between people regarding marriage. I also believe the gov’t laws encourage women to file for divorce.

    Lastly, the aura of marriage doesn’t have the same appeal that it did 50 years ago, nor does divorce receive the same scorn. Other than my oldest sister and oldest brother in law, everybody I know has been divorced at least once. It is that common. Both my parents are dead and I can’t imagine referring to them as parents along with other people after the fact. It would seem strange to think of my dad’s “new wife” or my mothers “new husband”. And the idea of step brothers or step sisters is like a trip into the Twilight Zone. This world sure has become strange, and estranged, from that which I grew up in. All in a span of about 50 years or so. Can all of this distortion last another 50 years? I think not.

    A machine is not a collection of parts but rather a collection of parts properly assembled and working in harmony with proper and ongoing maintenance, so is civilization. If neglected or abused it will fail. Every time.

  • Monty James February 22, 2018, 10:52 AM

    There’s a reason the Parable of the Sheepdog became so widespread that people started making fun of it. It concisely describes the implications of the assumption of a duty to protect the defenseless. It works because it’s so streamlined. Layering a “Shepherd” on top of that is just sort of clunky, like a piano with dead keys. A “shepherd” is assumed for the sake of the metaphor, it doesn’t actually add anything.

    It’s easy to create angry, steely-eyed sheep dogs.” No, it isn’t easy. Many sheep, one lonely sheep dog. That was one of the points of the parable. Less than 0.5 percent of the population of the country are currently serving under arms.

    LTC Grossman’s original essay, in aid of the conversation.

    Edaddy, I’m glad you raised up good men that you can be proud of. That’s good for all of us. Thank you.

  • twolaneflash February 23, 2018, 8:57 AM

    In the real world sheepdog analogy, the shepherd is a politician who will feed the dogs but shear the sheep & make lamp chops of the offspring. Sounds a lot like America with Government in charge.

    My son, FastlaneFlash, currently in Iraq, is no angry, steely-eyed dog, nor are the men I’ve known who’ve served with him over the last 15 years. Kinder, gentler souls will be hard to find, but they will not hesitate to confront evil, nor will they wait outside while evil does its work.

  • BJM February 25, 2018, 9:26 PM

    Whittle made an excellent point on Afterburner in 2008 that appears to no longer be online; we have a choice to run with the herd or the pack…always choose the pack, never the herd.

    Why is the media spreading fear?

    “Collective fear stimulates herd instinct, and tends to produce ferocity toward those who are not regarded as members of the herd.” – Bertrand Russell.

    SJW mob hysteria is neither new nor original…but as day follows night, the Thermidorian Reaction will follow Comité De Salut Public.