tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post1785687676087855183..comments2024-03-25T19:48:24.624+11:00Comments on Oz Conservative: The inner citadel of liberalismUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger8125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-58953081323093765092010-03-16T18:33:58.368+11:002010-03-16T18:33:58.368+11:00Liberalism has a nihilistic potential to be a mora...Liberalism has a nihilistic potential to be a morally empty vessel with loose cannons on its gun deck.<br /><br />Modernist liberalism worked alright for a few centuries because individual autonomy can be progressive when individuals have a moral compass based on time-tested values. This was provided by Christianity, and liberalism has been living off the accumulated moral capital of Christianity for centuries.<br /><br />But post-modern liberalism has a tendency to consume its moral foundations. It has an inherent tendency to attack larger traditional institutional authorities in favour of smaller, fashionable individual autonomies. So pillars of society like Constitutional regent, Christian religion and Caucasian family have been relentlessly attacked by unhinged liberals.<br /><br />The result is what Muggeridge called the Great Liberal Death Wish which reaches its perfect apext in the simultaneous demand to maximize abortion and euthanasia. Of course there are plenty of less pathological forms of feral liberalism such as gluttony and lust. <br /><br />The movie Seven provides an excellent critique of the perversions of post-modern liberalism by a somewhat deranged moralist serial killer. I certainly do not endorse the torture and murder of deadly sinners. <br /><br />But I think the killer had a point, that the greatest crime of the age is the way we waste our precious freedoms on idle or self-destructive pursuits.jack strocchihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17534084770633227131noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-17301803599748882252010-03-16T18:20:50.996+11:002010-03-16T18:20:50.996+11:00Liberalism is a philosophy that reconciles liberty...Liberalism is a philosophy that reconciles liberty with legality. That is making institutional authority accountable to individual autonomies. <br /><br />There is an obvious sense in which liberalism is foundational to the Enlightenment when industrial modernity hit 18thC Britain, because it would be impossible to decentralised enterprises without some accountability.<br /><br />But there is an important sense in which liberalism goes back to the Renaissance when sexual modernity hit 13th C Italy. Female sexual choice is the major driver of sexual selection. And female driven sexual selection is phenomenonly successful at driving Alpha-male status ambition.<br /><br />The birth of freedom came when Juliets elopement with the journeyman Romeo.jack strocchihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17534084770633227131noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-42493363506610539422010-03-16T18:06:50.780+11:002010-03-16T18:06:50.780+11:00The foundational philosopher of liberalism is Hobb...The foundational philosopher of liberalism is Hobbes. Oakeshotte is the man for Hobbes.jack strocchihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17534084770633227131noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-36545816714423513582010-03-16T16:43:54.020+11:002010-03-16T16:43:54.020+11:00My own view is that the liberal desire for "a...My own view is that the liberal desire for "autonomy" is a function of their need to destroy the existing (or heretofore existing) traditional power structures. Once these structures have been eliminated, then "autonomy" will become a Bad Thing in the liberal worldview.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-59695989064266676272010-03-16T08:20:26.248+11:002010-03-16T08:20:26.248+11:00JMSmith, thanks for the comment. It's difficul...JMSmith, thanks for the comment. It's difficult for liberals to gratefully accept what is given. What comes to matter instead is what is self-directed or even self-created. <br /><br />A love of one's own country and culture cannot therefore matter so much for a liberal. At best, it might be treated as something chosen by particular individuals, perhaps on 'sentimental' grounds, but which has no higher status within public policy.<br /><br />At worst, since it is not a product of a self-determining will and reason, it will be looked on suspiciously and fearfully as an irrational bigotry held by the non-enlightened sections of society.Mark Richardsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15961688379656119701noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-53720269851483970952010-03-16T07:52:30.829+11:002010-03-16T07:52:30.829+11:00One wonders what could possibly be egalitarian abo...<i>One wonders what could possibly be egalitarian about stealing from A and giving it to B.</i><br /><br />I believe that Kekes very much agrees with you on this.<br /><br />In the liberal mind, human dignity rests on our capacity to be autonomous. Being autonomous means choosing from a range of possible life options. If some people have more money than others they have more life options and therefore more autonomy. Some people then have more human dignity than others which is a breach of human equality. Social justice then requires the welfare state to intervene and restore an equality of human status via redistribution of wealth.<br /><br />That is the standpoint of egalitarian liberalism on the matter. Philosophically it seems to descend from some of Kant's ideas on autonomy and human dignity.Mark Richardsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15961688379656119701noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-4041112696616263062010-03-16T01:38:12.408+11:002010-03-16T01:38:12.408+11:00The core of egalitarian liberalism continues to be...<i> The core of egalitarian liberalism continues to be autonomy</i><br /><br />One wonders what could possibly be <i>egalitarian</i> about stealing from A and giving it to B.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-77993371237806620292010-03-16T00:29:48.950+11:002010-03-16T00:29:48.950+11:00Thanks for another provocative reflection. Placin...Thanks for another provocative reflection. Placing such high value on autonomy strikes me as an inversion (perhaps perversion) of what conservatives understand as piety. Writers like Richard Weaver and Roger Scruton define this as a grateful acceptance of what is given. It is expressed in things like loving one's mother, not because she is objectively better than all other mothers, but because she is yours, or in loving one's country or culture for the same reason. Liberals feel piety, but it is piety towards their own selves. For them it's not "my country, right or wrong," but rather "myself, right or wrong."JMSmithnoreply@blogger.com