The fatal flaw of Liberalism–aside from its failure to secure long-term material prosperity, never mind maintain the West’s social cohesion–is that it’s based on the false notion that freedom is an absolute good to be pursued for its own sake.
What gives the game away is that any appeal to freedom is susceptible to the question, “Freedom to do what?” Absent an objective good toward which it’s directed, the concept of freedom is without content. The value of a given freedom entirely depends on the inherent value of the goods you can get with it.
Freedom detached from any grounding in the good has no limiting principle. That’s the slippery slope the West has slid down from yeoman farmers defending private property to men in dresses demanding everyone call them Ma’am. If freedom is absolute, then any boundaries placed on individual self-expression–even the truth–must be a tyrannical imposition.
That’s why the real opponents of Liberalism aren’t Conservatives, but what author David Stewart has termed Optimates–men who primarily seek the common good. The Optimate response to wacko Liberal demands isn’t, “How does this promote freedom?” It’s, “How does this advance the common good and help people cultivate virtue?”
Inevitably, when this question is asked on social media, sufferers of a mutant strain of Liberalism will come out of the woodwork to utter predictable knee-jerk objections. The most common names for this disorder are Classical Liberalism and Libertarianism, but they both boil down to selfishness masquerading as a political philosophy.
A reliable way to set your watch is to make an argument for the common good and wait till a Liberal shows up to disqualify the whole concept on the basis that different people define the common good differently.
Anyone who outgrew the Gen X coffee house hipster phase will immediately recognize this objection as an appeal to moral relativism, and a self-defeating one, at that. The whole point of politics is to decide how best to order society for the common good. By declaring their ignorance of what constitutes the common good, Liberals admit that their political philosophy has no idea how to achieve the common end of all political philosophies. They forfeit the match before they even take the field.
Next, the Liberal–especially the Libertarian variety–will try to handwave his way out of the corner he painted himself into by pointing out that a lot of evil has been done in the name of the common good. After all, that’s how the government justifies the covid mandates.
This is an even more glaring self-contradiction, since evil can’t by definition be good. In effect, this argument is another appeal to ignorance bundled with a straw man that tries to conflate pursuit of the good with evils committed under the false flag of the good. It’s the category error of equating abuse with legitimate use.
To throw a wrench in the gears, simply point out the evils enabled by gun ownership.
As a last ditch defense, the Liberal will try to define away any distinction between Liberalism and the Optimate position by redefining the common good as the cumulative result of each individual pursuing his own self-interest. Rather than resolving any problems, this argument only multiplies them.
First and foremost, this tactic is simply dishonest. It pretends that the Liberal and the Optimate differ only on matters of semantics, not substance. That claim is ridiculous on its face, since one side bases its whole worldview on the premise that individual freedom is absolute, and the other insists that freedom is contingent upon the good. Attempting to equate the two just demonstrates the Liberal’s inability to critically examine his a priori assumptions.
Related to the preceding, the claimed equivalence is just plain false. When an Optimate argues for the common good, he doesn’t mean the aggregate good of each individual in the society under discussion. The Liberal views society as an epiphenomenon of individuals pursuing their own preferences, that is, as a social construct. In contrast, the Optimate recognizes that society is not a social construct. He knows that families, neighborhoods, and nations are real things with their own purposes and destinies above and beyond those of their individual constituents.
Another fundamental difference between Liberals and Optimates is that the latter rightly acknowledges the basic unit of society as the family, not the individual. Just as no amount of free electrons can form an atom, no number of individuals acting for their own exclusive ends can form a society.
This where the Liberal will jump up and accuse the Optimate of wanting to impose tyranny on him by coercing him into subordinating his will to the whims of the mob. But that’s another straw man–one that hinges on a false binary.
The Optimate affirms both that the common good is more than aggregate enlightened self-interest and that it is fully compatible with the individual’s good. He squares this circle by rejecting the Liberal conceit that each individual lives solely for himself. Instead, the Optimate affirms that each man’s life is naturally ordered toward the good of others. Unlike the Liberal, the Optimate can define the good and consistently assert that the individual good at least partly consists of serving the common good.
Think of a sports team. The New York Yankees are a ball club–a small but real society composed of individual players, coaches, and support personnel. Yankees society is directed toward achieving a particular common good–victory in baseball games. The individual players engage in activities such as practice, exercise, and dieting which advance each man’s particular good while helping the club attain the common good of winning games. There’s no contradiction between the two.
That’s why Liberalism can’t produce the conditions required for human flourishing in the long run. The Clown World we currently live in is the direct result of that inevitable failure.
To break through the societal dead end we’ve run into, we’ll need a political force capable of shifting the paradigm away from the figment of absolute freedom and toward the reality of the common good.
You can make a small but significant start by withholding money from those who hate you and supporting people who are committed to your good.
We should have the freedom to do good works.
There are so many good things we are able to do. We should use our freedom to choose something that is good. Whether it is plant a garden, pray, talk to a neighbor, get restful sleep, etc, that is what we should be using our freedom to do. Not indulging our most degenerate fantasies.
That’s what liberty really means.
John,
Would this freedom include for example tutoring, exercising and building models?
For example Jon (Mollison)’s Twitter posts many photos of his wargame models and dioramas. I share his delight as I’m a modeller too.
I’m reflecting how I can do good works and what how to do it properly.
Thanks!
xavier
That’s what those Communists who retain the presence of mind to denounce the USSR invoke. The question is: is this “good” something which, in fact, is a perennial invitation to evil? A shoddy compromise on a matter of bitter division, say? A welcome mat to the barbarians on the border? A messianic State?
So, on those grounds: I don’t think anyone can honestly say that bans on no-fault divorce and abortion would create worse evils than no-fault divorce and abortion themselves are. At least, not without assuming all the Margaret Atwood Taliban-flavored add-ons.
You assume that communism pursues the common good in the first place. Communists are indignant and selfish; they spit upon God and His Church, and they seek to evolve mankind via SCIENCE! (TM).
But other-orientation and unincentivized altruism can only be achieved through the pursuit of the divine. This is why communist nations become stuck in secular socialism and speak of socialism as an end unto itself. They’ll say, “Our nation’s socialism is the only way forward! It will keep away the Americans, industrialize us, and feed us with a steady diet of potatoes. There are no greater goods for our people than our glorious leader and his socialism!”
And that’s what they get for trading the Kingdom of God for “the workers’ paradise”: getting rid of their kings and getting stuck with dictators.
“Good”, in socialism (or Randianism), means “material prosperity.” In Covidiocy, it means “physical health and longevity.” (Which can only be maintained by extreme gullibility, but that’s a side issue.) “Virtue” is really the key word of the Optimate position, and anyone who pretends not to understand what virtue is can just stand outside, thanks.
What if we started a campaign to cancel Christmas. Not the actual Christian observation, of course, but the commercial holiday. Call it “White Supremacy” and bait every corporation into turning Black Friday into Bankruptcy. Isn’t it ironic that the saving grace each year for most of the demonic oligarchs are the prime Christian holiday that they have long since hijacked into a mandatory global consumer holiday? Why are these atheists celebrating Christ anyways? How come Al Gore has never suggested skipping buying a bunch of pointless crap each year? How come none of these scientists or ExTinCtIoN rEbElLiOn people have considered campaigns against consuming? How about consume less? We can’t have a Greta Thunberg telling you not to buy that next iPhone? Isn’t it weird she would never suggest that? It is just, “vote for these people, and give these people more of your money!”
The caveat is that Jesus is Asian.
Exactly. “Muh evil done in the name of the common good!” argument is the worst.
Clearly the aim being sought was not good, nor were the people involved. This is akin saying “You should never be a tight end because Aaron Hernandez murdered people!”
Maybe not a perfect 1:1 analogy, but I’m sure you catch my drift.
Indeed. A good response is to turn the tables on critics of appeals to the common good by asking them to state their position in terms that in no way appeal to it.