tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post5087497712122187474..comments2024-03-25T19:48:24.624+11:00Comments on Oz Conservative: A more critical take than expectedUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-60538116986186262132010-11-27T05:32:29.455+11:002010-11-27T05:32:29.455+11:00Liberalism will eventually self-destroy. By dint o...Liberalism will eventually self-destroy. By dint of confusing genuine, moderate liberty for licentiousness--and licentiousness for liberty, for that matter--liberals are creating an unbearable divide in society. They transfer morality to individuals, and refuse to acknowledge shared values as they would be a burden on the sacrosanct individual autonomy. The lack of shared value is causing and will continue to cause significant issues. If people do not even agree to some extent on what is good or evil, if every individual gets to determine what its own morality is, then liberalism will collapse and what is left of society will descend into anarchy. My only fear is that it will be replaced by yet another spiritual and material dictatorship to clean up the mess. This was anticipated by both Edmund Burke and John Adams at the end of the eighteenth century. They have displayed considerable prescience in their works on the whole, hopefully they are wrong on this one, and a more balanced form of society will arise out of the ashes of liberalism instead of downright military dictatorship. The backlash will be terrible, liberalism has caused such chaos already...Southern Crossnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-49610166716095994632010-11-27T04:51:32.918+11:002010-11-27T04:51:32.918+11:00Very interesting, thanks Mark. I've long felt...Very interesting, thanks Mark. I've long felt that our society needs to recognise a legitimate tension between Liberal and Conservative interests to function. Instead we have All Liberal All The Time.Simon in Londonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-39508729886176598172010-11-26T23:30:42.529+11:002010-11-26T23:30:42.529+11:00The point you make is valid Mark. Why would a libe...The point you make is valid Mark. Why would a liberal thinking Male of European background accept the demonisation of his own group if given the free choice that liberalism supposedly advocates?<br /><br />I would argue that this is because late 20th to early 21st century liberalism is s different beast to classical liberalism of the left or right.<br /><br />It is a new ideology based less on ideas than on "feelings". And the main "feeling" being expressed is one left over from cold war propaganda: that the West is inherently evil and responsible for all the evils in the world.<br /><br />Since European Males created the West which is the cause of all the worlds problems, then this group must be inherently evil themselves. <br /><br />Modern left-liberal thought is a mishmash of conflicting ideologies, many of which openly contradict each other. <br /><br />This is probably why in Europe you see proud left-wing "anti-fascists" marching alongside radical Muslims who advocate the slaughter of Jews.Jamesnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-38102839237370135242010-11-26T19:19:23.198+11:002010-11-26T19:19:23.198+11:00George, interesting, thanks for the link.
He is p...George, interesting, thanks for the link.<br /><br />He is predictably libertarian in his views on drugs and gay marriage.<br /><br />But he does make criticisms of feminism, seeing it as part of the reason for men abandoning a commitment to marriage and family:<br /><br /><i>"A global Men's Rights Movement has been gathering considerable steam since 2007, and will likely hit mainstream within the next 5 to 10 years. Especially as more men get fed up with the family law courts, and as fewer disillusioned young men get married or start families."</i><br /><br />I'd point to this as evidence of how it's possible to make a difference politically.<br /><br />The men's rights movement was very small even five years ago. Now it's influential enough to be appearing in the political manifesto of an otherwise orthodox libertarian.<br /><br />It shows that there does exist a "tipping point" at which people will no longer accept political doctrines that are demonstrably false.<br /><br />Why would a young man today accept the idea that he is a privileged oppressor? After all, young women seem to have the upper hand in education, in sexual power, in marriage and divorce laws and, increasingly, in professional employment.<br /><br />And so we get what began as a tiny movement (of which I was a part back in the late 1990s) which has grown steadily on the internet and which appears now to be gaining a bit of traction. <br /><br />Maybe it won't last, but I'm guessing that it will be difficult to dislodge, now that it's spread even to liberal and libertarian young men.Mark Richardsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15961688379656119701noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-46115308931267619092010-11-26T19:04:18.037+11:002010-11-26T19:04:18.037+11:00Jesse, you've explained in clear terms, I thin...Jesse, you've explained in clear terms, I think, the rise of the "new liberalism" (i.e. left-liberalism) later in the 1800s. <br /><br />Your second point is similar to the argument made by Professor Carroll in his book on humanism. He sees political modernism as having originally existed in "fusion" with other sources of value and authority, e.g. with Protestantism or with aristocratic values of honour and duty. <br /><br />But during the course of the twentieth century, political moderns abandoned fusion in favour of going it alone in a more pure and radical form.Mark Richardsonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15961688379656119701noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-48380044273153914362010-11-26T18:49:05.902+11:002010-11-26T18:49:05.902+11:00As a general point Mark, you might like to take a ...As a general point Mark, you might like to take a look at the campaign website of Glyn Baker, a libertarian independent running in the Victorian election for Morwell: www.glynbaker.com.au<br /><br />Obviously he is a radical liberal who wants to basically abolish marriage (the libertarian gay marriage idea), allow euthanasia, and some abortion. But his abortion page also includes references to encouraging mens' rights activism that you might like to look at.georgenoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6832901.post-91520687324302448842010-11-26T14:41:42.327+11:002010-11-26T14:41:42.327+11:00In economic terms we can look at economic lassiez ...In economic terms we can look at economic lassiez faire liberalism of the C19th century in terms of freedom of contract. You are two autonomous individuals (or groups) and you can come together and decide on the terms of your arrangement. If you don't like it you can refuse to agree. In such a set up rational decision making and autonomy is of great importance. <br /><br />So for instance if there is a work contract and the workplace is unsafe, the worker should have realised this situation and then either stayed or left. If they stayed they were voluntarily accepting the risk as part of the contract and consequently if they were injured they were not entitled to compensation.<br /><br />The left criticised this as a false situation where the worker and the boss didn't actually have an equal ability to negotiate their workplace conditions, or the option of taking it or leaving it. Consequently they argued that the ideal of individual rational decision making was an illusion justifying the existence of unequal workplace environments. In such an environment the idea of older feudal norms of mutual obligations amongst the strata of society were supported by the left and you can see from them a deal of sympathy for these older feudal practices, eg trade guilds. There is a degree of this left attitude in the Oxford discussion. <br /><br />Liberal ideas in the C19th century or older took place in an environment where Western norms were the accepted ideal and society was generally ordered. Today with immigration this can no longer be as easily taken for granted and we’re also less ordered I would suggest. Liberal ideas I believe can also be seen to be an addition onto an existing environment, but we see today what happens when the intellectual line has been continually followed so that they have the potential to be a replacement for the existing environment.Jesse_7https://www.blogger.com/profile/08732509086253241748noreply@blogger.com