Stephen Roney's Blog, page 110

The Limits of Private Property

 

My friend Xerxes posts a comment from a Muslim reader, advertising it as “a different value system, for most of us.” The Muslim explains that, according to shariah law, it is not illegal to steal food if you are starving.

It is a sad commentary on how we’ve lost touch with our moral traditions, in the modern era, that this should appear to be “a different value system.” This is traditional Christian morality. The right to life trumps the right to property, and God put food here for us all. An ancient Christian maxim: "If I have two coats and my neighbor has none, I am a thief." St. John Crysostom: "Not to enable the poor to share in our goods is to steal from them and deprive them of life. The goods we possess are not ours, but theirs." 

You have to realize this to understand Les Miserables. Valjean is persecuted for stealing a loaf of bread to feed a starving child. He is in the right, the government is in the wrong, and is thereby shown to be oppressive.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Exonerating Goneril and Regan

 

Looking for discussion questions online for a class on MacBeth, I came on this, in paraphrase: if MacBeth is the villain of the play, who is the hero? Is it Banquo, or MacDuff?

False premise. Looking for heroes and villains makes sense in the main them of the tale is man versus man. But that is one of several, traditionally seven, possibilities. Tragedies are not man versus man; they are always man versus fate, or man versus God/the gods, which is the same thing. Witness the Three Witches in MacBeth—the Three Fates.

There can be villains in tragedy—Iago—but usually the case is unclear. Often deliberately unclear, so as not to obscure the main conflict. Given the notion of hubris, technically, the same main character is both hero and villain. And more villain than hero in the end. He is always responsible for his own fate.

This made it occur to me that I too have been misreading King Lear. I had always taken Regan and Goneril as the villains. They treat their father so disrespectfully, right? In contrast to the good and dutiful Cordelia. “Sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child,” as Lear laments, and all that.

Still, it always struck me as a little confusing that Shakespeare has Lear at first unreasonably favour Cordelia, before then unreasonably favouring Regan and Goneril. 

“I loved her most, and thought to set my rest…”

His favouritism is apparently notorious, and it is his fatal flaw. The play begins by pointing it out:

“I thought the king had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall.”

He didn’t have to invent that, were he trying to affirm Lear’s claim. It is not so clearly a case of favoured children being ungrateful; for most of their lives, Regan and Goneril were apparently less favoured.

And Shakespeare shows the same pattern in Gloucester’s family. Edgar was first favoured, then Edmund.

This makes Regan and Goneril’s treatment of their father seem more reasonable; even if they are flatterers, and opportunists. Their sin is refusing to allow their father a standing army. No responsible government should allow a standing, independent army. It is axiomatic that, to keep the peace, the government claims a monopoly on force.

This is all the more important since we and they know Lear’s judgement is unreliable and capricious. He might at any time, in some fit of anger, rise up and start a civil war. Governments exist to prevent just this sort of thing. 

Wise of them, therefore, to agree on one common front to handle Lear. Lear might otherwise throw his weight at any moment on one or the other side of an evenly divided country, giving those who want insurrection an ideal opportunity.

"You see how full of changes his age is; the observation we have made of it hath not been little: he always loved our sister most; and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off appears too grossly."

Regan and Goneril are unsympathetic characters, no doubt, but, in the mold of the classic tragic hero, Lear is responsible for his own troubles.

It is his own pride and rage, and not his two daughters, who drive him out onto the heath:

"REGAN: For his particular, I'll receive him gladly, but not one follower.

GONERI: So am I purposed."

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

China Erupts

 

Woke up this morning to things suddenly happening in China. Protests everywhere, demanding the resignation of Xi Jinping, even the end of the CCP. I hear Wuhan, Chongqing, Shanghai, Beijing, Guangdong, Urumqi, reputedly every university and college campus. This has happened so suddenly there is no telling how far it might spread. My favourite China experts are saying this is the most significant event since Tiananmen Square. I’d say, if it persists, it is more significant than Tiananmen Square. That, after all, had a single focus, and so was easier to suppress. Yet it came very close to overthrowing the government.

As always, the tipping point, if it comes, will be when security forces refuse to fight, and join the crowds. Then the mandate of heaven has passed.

Imagine if the Chinese government falls; and the Iranian government; and the Russian government; in rapid succession. It would be as epochal as the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Revolutions are usually a bad idea. Any government is better than none. Yet some succeed. There was no reign of terror after the fall of the Berlin Wall; The Philippines transitioned well from Marcos, and Portugal from Caetano; America turned out okay. 

There is hope here for a better world.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

True Love Ways

 

Jesus and the woman taken in adultery

The Catholic Church attracts a lot of hostility for condemning abortion; not to mention this, that, or the other peccadillo. This is supposedly “hypocrisy.” Didn’t Jesus say “Judge not, lest ye be judged”? Didn’t he say “Let him who is without sin cast the first stone”?

He did; this is an illustration of Shakespeare’s principle that Satan himself can quote scripture to his advantage. This is “proof-texting,” pulling quotes out of context to distort their meaning. Perhaps the perfect example is the fact that the Bible says in so many words that there is no God. “There is no God.” Psalm 14:1.

Of course, the full verse reads “The fool says in his heart, ‘There is no God.’ They are corrupt, their deeds are vile; there is no one who does good.”

Context matters.

Of course, even without any context, we can see that this strict "judge not" interpretation of Jesus's words is impossible. If it is wrong to judge anyone, then it is wrong to judge the Catholic Church for judging you. You are ipso facto a hypocrite.

Let’s look at the immediate context of these verses, so often quoted by atheists and evildoers against Christians.

In the NIV: Matthew 7:

“1 Do not judge, or you too will be judged. 2 For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.

3 “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.”

It ends with the obligation to, in fact, judge. And the analogy, of removing a speck from your brother’s eye, shows judgement as an act of kindness. The issue is that you must be able to “see clearly,” to judge clearly.

The caution is against hypocrisy, meaning judging another by a different standard than yourself, applying different rules to them.

Now let’s look at the woman taken in adultery, and casting stones:

John 8

3 The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery. They made her stand before the group 4 and said to Jesus, “Teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery. 5 In the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. Now what do you say?” 6 They were using this question as a trap, in order to have a basis for accusing him.

But Jesus bent down and started to write on the ground with his finger. 7 When they kept on questioning him, he straightened up and said to them, “Let any one of you who is without sin be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 Again he stooped down and wrote on the ground.

9 At this, those who heard began to go away one at a time, the older ones first, until only Jesus was left, with the woman still standing there. 10 Jesus straightened up and asked her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?”

11 “No one, sir,” she said.

“Then neither do I condemn you,” Jesus declared. “Go now and leave your life of sin.”

It ends with Jesus judging her, referring to her life of sin. He is simply refusing to enforce the legal punishment, which I think we can agree to be extreme.

Our attention is drawn to another detail, because it is so odd: asked a question, he looks down at the ground, and appears to be writing something. He is deliberately looking away. Then he looks up, and all the men are gone, but the woman is still standing there. 

Although she faced death, she did not take the opportunity to slip away.

It shows that the woman admits her fault and accepts punishment, even one we might consider extreme. She is prepared to sacrifice her life if that is what is just. 

This is what is essential to forgiveness; it is the same in the sacrament of confession. It is what keeps us out of hell. In order not to be punished for one’s sin, one must fully admit it, and be fully prepared to accept justice. Only then can one receive mercy.

Rather than hypocrisy, pointing out that another is doing or has done wrong, to you, to themselves, or to a third party, is both a virtue and an obligation. 

See Catechism of the Catholic Church, paragraph 1829:

The fruits of charity are joy, peace, and mercy; charity demands beneficence and fraternal correction…

For “charity” one can also read “love.” Pointing out the faults of others is an act of love. If we do not do it, we do not love them. We want them to go to hell, and we are prepared to frog-march them there for our own benefit.

Consider the case of an alcoholic. That is a vice we all can understand. Who is it who loves the alcoholic, the one who warns him he is drinking too much, or the one who smiles, slaps him on the back, joins him in a toast, pours him another drink?

The Catholic Encyclopedia gives the following definition for “fraternal correction”:

“Fraternal correction is here taken to mean the admonishing of one's neighbor by a private individual with the purpose of reforming him or, if possible, preventing his sinful indulgence.”

It goes on to say:

“That there is … an obligation to administer fraternal correction there can be no doubt. This is a conclusion not only deducible from the natural law binding us to love and to assist one another, but also explicitly contained in positive precept such as the inculcation of Christ: ‘If thy brother shall offend against thee, go, and rebuke him between thee and him alone. If he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain thy brother’ (Matthew 18:15). Given a sufficiently grave condition of spiritual distress calling for succour in this way, this commandment may exact fulfilment under pain of mortal sin.

It can be a mortal sin, if someone is sinning, not to tell him so. It is always a virtue to tell him.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Madness and MacBeth

 

Erinyes

Going through MacBeth with a student—the play that made me first love Shakespeare. And it occurred to me this time through that Shakespeare’s theory of madness is quite different from that of modern psychiatry. 

They treat it as if a physical illness. He thinks it is a spiritual, a moral, problem.

“Unnatural deeds

Do breed unnatural troubles: infected minds

To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets.

More needs she the divine than the physician.”

“Consider it not so deeply….These deeds must not be thought

After these ways; so, it will make us mad.”

Shakespeare must be listened to, because he is the greatest psychiatrist who ever lived. His greatest accomplishment as a writer is how he gets into the minds of all his characters, even the darkest villains, and expresses so clearly and sympathetically how they think. He knows the human soul.

MacBeth and Lady MacBeth go schizophrenic in classic fashion. MacBeth starts hallucinating as soon as he contemplates the crime. Lady MacBeth eventually sleepwalks and talks to herself. I once stayed in a schizophrenic’s apartment. He did too.

Not to say all schizophrenics go mad due to a guilty conscience. Shakespeare himself suggests not all. “Yet I have known those which have walked in their sleep, who have died holily in their beds.” 

The reason this particular sort of schizophrenic goes “schizophrenic” is from a guilty conscience. They have committed a sin so serious their conscience will not leave them alone. This conforms too with the Ancient Greek idea of the Erinyes. They will track you down for vengeance no matter where you go and what you do.

Of course, in a Christian world, there is no sin as such so serious. Lady MacBeth, or MacBeth,  are Christian, and presumably know this. The problem is that they have so committed their very fate to the sin; they cannot accept the consequences of repentance. It would mean, in their case, by law, losing the crown, and losing their lives.

That is perhaps how narcissists feel. This particular type of “schizophrenia” comes from narcissism. Whether or not literally so, the typical narcissist cannot admit fault, for in their own mind it would mean losing their imaginary crown, having crowned themselves, and losing their life, their settled self-identity.

What modern psychiatry calls narcissism is really vice. Formulaically pride, the chief of all the vices, but it could also be any of the others. This is how vice works. The perp gets so committed to the sin they decide there is no way out. Then they start to hear footsteps, Erinyes, behind them.

“Fie, my lord, fie! a soldier, and afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our power to account?”

“No more o’ that, my lord, no more o’ that: you mar all with this starting.”

There is fear in that statement.

MacBeth when he hears Fleance, Banquo’s son, has escaped his assassin:

“Then comes my fit again: I had else been perfect;

Whole as the marble, founded as the rock,

As broad and general as the casing air:

But now I am cabin’d, cribb’d, confin’d, bound in

To saucy doubts and fears.”

And he promptly begins to hallucinate the ghost of Banquo. Fear and doubt are the triggers.

The same thing happens to King Lear. Lear is obviously a “narcissist,” in modern psychiatric terms. When his self-image as king is rocked, he goes mad. Here too there is, or ought to be, a guilty conscience. He has grossly played favourites among his children.

That too is perhaps, in cosmic terms, so great a sin it commonly cannot be admitted.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

The Know Nothings

 

It is interesting to scan the comments on the latest column by Xerxes, my leftist columnist friend. They are a window into the leftward mind.

The first reader writes, most revealingly, “I cannot see any MAGA Republicans subscribing to your columns.”

This shows us that leftists only read opinions and columns with which they agree.

This means they can be easily led about by the nose. They do not want the truth, they want whatever comforts them. They risk being easily blindsided.

I am not a “MAGA Republican”: I do not live in the USA. But I read Xerxes’s columns precisely because I disagree. This is typical of those on the right; you need to know both sides of an argument.

Next comment:

“I think Biden will go down in history as one of the most successful Presidents ever. …. He brought in policies that people liked, like increases in health care and forgiveness of student loans. He got things done.”

It does not occur to this commentator that these policies could have been disliked by anyone. Another artifact of selective reading. After all, it’s free money. Right?

Instead, of course, it has to be taken in taxes. The government takes it from one pocket, deducts some of it as operating expenses, and returns the remainder to the other pocket.

Apparently the left does not grasp or want to grasp this simple dynamic. “Free money” is more comforting.

            “I think that most Americans were tired of the drama and divisiveness of Politics.  They voted for quiet efficiency and national unity instead. I think they’re telling their politicians to scrap the divisive rhetoric and get on with the job they were elected to do.”

The shambolic evacuation of Afghanistan does not look like quiet efficiency. Neither does a government that boosts spending to unprecedented levels during a supply chain crisis, and denies that inflation is possible. Wars, fuel shortages, and recessions do not seem quiet or efficient.

As for national unity, it is not much helped along by pitting ethnic group against ethnic group, gender against gender, class against class; or by declaring those who support your chief opponent a “threat to democracy.”

Spending endless time and resources on impeachments and collusion investigations against your opponent, all of which turn out to be based on false accounts and trivialities, instead of spending that time on legislation, does not look like getting on with the job they were elected to do.

Another reader writes: “I don’t understand why so many on this planet continue in awe of a nation that is so destructive, that pretends to have other nations’ well-being at heart when it is the exact opposite.  We need to realize that, even without the U.S., the world continues to rotate.”

This is akin to the leftist drive to “Defund the police.” For the sake of world peace and prosperity, it is a good thing for one power to be dominant, for the same reason it is better to have any government than anarchy. A dominant power enforces peace: Pax Romana, Pax Britannica, Pax Americana.

Given one dominant power, there is no luckier choice than the USA: a nation uniquely founded on the principles of human rights and human equality. With no modern territorial ambitions.

As Leonard Cohen observed, “You’re not going to like what comes after America.”

Another respondent wrote of Trump’s making another run, “Trump isn't interested in anything except himself. Any political operative would seek other's opinions before announcing a run for office.”

This assumes that Trump asked no one for their opinion before declaring. Why?

Another artifact of the leftist refusal to read anything they disagree with. This writer presumes that “everybody” was saying Trump should not run. Those blinders never come off.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Guilty Silence

 

I count as a professional communicator. I have written professionally for many years. I teach students how to write. I have some success as a poet, having won international prizes. That counts as communication on an especially deep level. I am a past president of the Editors’ Association of Canada.

Indeed, challenges in communication are my special joy. I have lived abroad, and prided myself on establishing deep and honest communications with people of diverse cultural backgrounds very different from my own. I also do well at deep and honest communications with small children; and even with schizophrenics.

This is what comes from growing up in a family where there was no honest communication. But that is a story for another day.

Yet there is still forever one group with which I am never able to communicate. Those who fear communication, due to a guilty conscience. Here, there is nothing I can do.

Any attempt to speak openly and honestly with such people will lead to being personally attacked, either openly or subtly or in the back; or, if you are lucky, the other party will only cut off communications abruptly. They will, in the social media context, “unfriend you.”

The alert reader, will realize that this is a growing problem in our society. This is cancel culture, deplatforming, shouting speakers down, and all that. This is also "denial."

Anyone who resorts to that is admitting their own guilt over the issue; they have something they desperately want to hide.

Nobody demands a contrary view be silenced, or refuses to listen, because they think it is wrong. Nobody gets upset about claims that black Africans built the pyramids, the Chinese discovered America in 1442, the earth is flat, or the sun revolves around it. All these theses are merrily published without objection. One only seeks to silence views one cannot counter.

This being so, what do we know?

The left’s insistence that claiming fraud in the 2020 election, or the 2022 election, is “attacking our sacred democracy,” an “insurrection,” and must be banned on social media platforms, is proof that, if the 2020 and 2022 elections were not stolen, the left at least did their best to steal them, and do not want this investigated. Conversely, the fact that the Republicans did not become agitated when Hillary Clinton claimed the 2016 election was stolen from her, or Stacey Abrams the governorship of Georgia, shows the expected reaction from someone who has not in fact been engaged in fraud.

Similarly, the insistence by “Trans” people that they be referred to by their preferred pronouns, and they not be “dead maned” is proof they know they have not changed their gender.

Other examples are ready to hand: the extreme overreaction to the trucker convoy by the Trudeau government shows they know their vaccine mandates and vaccine passports were unwarranted and done through an ulterior motive.

And so it goes; we must not be naïve here.

This issue of guilty consciences and the resultant attempt to prevent communication is an especially serious problem for the arts; for the arts are all about deep and serious communication. This is why the arts these days are moribund. Anyone who dares to say anything deep and honest, interesting or important is sure to face severe headwinds at every level. And there is no art without this.

Why is this a growing problem? One reason, I expect, is that thanks to Alice Miller and other psychiatrists and psychologists, or the past several generations we have raised our children to be narcissists. But that piggybacks on another fatal problem: abortion; which rides in turn on the move to uninhibited recreational sex that started in about the 1950s.

Perhaps we have the psychologists and psychiatrists to blame for that as well.

The way past this, individually or as a society, must be an initial admission of having done wrong. When it is your conscience condemning you, you cannot receive absolution by silencing others. And there is nothing they can even say or do to absolve you. This follows the formula familiar from the Catholic rite of confession. You must admit that you did wrong, sincerely repent, and make every effort at reparations if possible.

How likely is that to happen? On an individual level, it can happen. Ask Alcoholics Anonymous.

It seems likely to be harder on a social level. Yet perhaps Germany is an example. They seem to have mostly gotten past their guilt in the Nazi period; even if the Nazi period itself was prompted by a refusal to accept guilt for the first Great War. The US seems to have gotten past their guilt for slavery; even if the era or segregation in the South was a refusal to accept that guilt for a century.

This, at least, is something to pray for. Perhaps hope for, for our grandchildren or great-grandchildren.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

Canada and the Irish

 

The Black Rock, Montreal

Enjoying reading Apartment Seven, a collection of essays—partly memoirs—by Canadian poet Miriam Waddington. She writes at length about her alienation from the Canadian mainstream, growing up as a Jew.

It makes me think of my own ambiguous relation to the Canadian mainstream, as an Irish Catholic. 

Significantly, I notice being invisible to Waddington. To Waddington, other than Jews, there were two groups in Canada: the French and the English. Both were “Christian.”

Yet since before Confedertation, and up until her time, there would have been more Irish than English in “English Canada”; and the last thing they would have seen themselves as is “English.” Even if most of them spoke the language--as Waddington herself did. Not to mention the 25% or so of “French-Canadians” who were Irish.

And to them—to us—the dividing line between Protestant and Catholic was far more significant in our thoughts, in our lives, and in our politics than Christian and Jew.

Waddington here is typical. It is the signature experience of the Irish in Canada. We are not acknowledged to exist. We are the invisible people.

There is a Black Rock in Montreal, dredged up during the construction of the Victoria Bridge. It now marks the unmarked mass grave of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Irish immigrants who died there and were hastily buried where they died in 1847, without service or acknowledgement; as they did in Quebec, in Ottawa, in Kingston, in Toronto, where there are similar mass graves. The Black Rock is now considered the premiere monument to the Irish experience in Canada.

And on it, the Irish are not mentioned. Just “immigrants.” It was consecrated by an Anglican bishop. No Catholic priests were invited to attend.

Most Canadians are oblivious to this; including the Irish themselves. But growing up in Quebec, the Francophones always identified me as “Anglais.” An outsider. The English were, at the same time, generally well aware that I was Irish, and Catholic, and therefore not one of them, and suspect. In either case, an outsider in my own country.

Widely dispersed and largely in the countryside, without cultural power, we had little intercommunication. Therefore our actual numbers were largely invisible even to ourselves. Most of us probably assumed we were a small minority. And at the same time, most of us probably identified optimistically as "Canadian," not "Irish."

But it is also true that being Irish in Canada has always meant keeping your head down and often hiding or denying your ethnic ties and trying to “pass.” The English openly despised us, and they were in command. As we and they read of constant rebellions against English rule in Ireland, and as the Fenians raided, it did not do to admit you were Irish or openly fly that ethnic flag.

Yet the Irish in Canada did not rebel. They agitated for representative government, but the moment that took on the character of rebellion, the Irish, to a man, withdrew. They kept silent, and tried to appear model citizens. For they had nowhere else to go if Canada did not work out. They had escaped a hellish condition in Ireland. They had no money for further immigration. Most came over on “coffin ships,” followed by sharks hoping to dine on the next Irish corpse jettisoned. Those who did not die on the docks had to seek any paying work they could get. 

In Canada, while not treated as equals, while still facing “no Irish need apply” attitudes, they could own land, could vote and run for office, could build churches, educate their children, practice their faith, pass inheritance to their children; and they probably would not starve. Some who managed the money moved on to the US, but those who did found anti-Catholic attitudes stronger there; in Canada they were protected in part by the need for the British to keep quiescent the large French Catholic presence.

Knowing far worse, this was not an applecart the Canadian Irish wanted to overturn. They kept their mouths shut and heads down, and sought opportunities, as in World War I, to prove their loyalty.

Their inevitable strategy was to seek here a distinctive new identity: not Irish, not French, and not English. Canada was largely their project. This was the great project of D’Arcy McGee, and this for him and them was the ultimate objective of Confederation.

This project always struggled against the colonial mentality. Waddington laments that, in her day, members of English faculties were always either English or American, not Canadian, and they scoffed at the idea of including Canadian writing on the curriculum. They looked down on anything produced by mere locals. I experienced the same going through English Lit at Queen’s in the seventies. There were no courses available in Canadian literature, even as electives, and no Canadian writing was included in any of the courses offered. The message was that no decent literature had been or could be written in Canada, by Canadians.

Yet at about that time, it looked as though we might soon break through. We had a generation of writers who seemed to be getting things going: Waddington’s generation. We had almost-famous names like Irving Layton, Mordecai Richler, Al Purdy, Margaret Atwood, Robertson Davies, Timothy Findlay, Alice Munro, W.O. Mitchell, … A distinctive Canadian literature in English seemed to be emerging.

And then the empire struck back. The colonial mentality is hard to overcome. Now the only writers allowed on the curriculum are indigenous, or, again, have been born abroad. And they do not write about Canada; they write only of their own ethnicity and its differences and difficulties. No “mainstream” Canadian culture is recognized to exist.

The Irish still seem, as always, to get it in the ear.

I had a chat with a relatively prominent Canadian poet recently. He had never heard of Emile Nelligan or Al Purdy. He might have known of other Canadian poets of a previous generation; I do not know. These are the only two Canadian poets who happened to come up.

He wrote mostly about Iran, the country of his birth.

As a Canadian, as an Irish Canadian, I still wait for Canada to be born.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

So Trump is running for president.I’m sorry to hear that...

 

So Trump is running for president.

I’m sorry to hear that. I think he was a great president, and he has every right to run again, and expect support. But I don’t think he can win.

While many folks love Trump, many people loathe him. He probably has a hard ceiling for his support, and 2020 and 2022 suggest it is less than a majority. 

And there are almost no undecideds who might simply sit on their hands.

And if they were prepared to cheat to ensure he was not president in 2020, why wouldn't they prevent it at all costs this time?

Then again, I thought Trump was a disastrous choice for the Republican nomination in 2016 as well, and was proven wrong. 

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.

The Distinction between Republicans and Democrats: Two Views

 

The Political Zoo: Courtesy of Pew Research

Friend Xerxes introduces me to the work of Jonathan Haidt, who defines the innate tendencies of “liberals” and “conservatives.” Haidt found that what he called “liberal” voters were mainly influenced by two social values: “fairness” and “care”. Haidt’s “conservatives” had three core values: authority, purity, and loyalty.

Haidt’s analysis makes some sense, but not if you try to identify his “conservative” and “liberal” with current political parties in either the US or Canada. What Haidt calls “liberal” is really the Marxist-socialist position, and closer to classic conservatism than to classic liberalism. For “conservative,” Haidt is indeed describing the classic conservative position, but the modern Republican party, or the Conservative party in Canada, is actually more classically liberal. 

Pretty confusing, granted. Politics, as George Orwell noted, is largely about falsifying terms to get away with murder. We need to keep the terms straight to prevent this.

The modern Republican party is no respecter of authority. It is in more or less open rebellion against the “elites.” So too with Poilievre ‘s Conservatives in Canada. It is the Democrats, or the Liberals in Canada, who regularly appeal to authority and oppose questioning it. “Follow the science.” Don’t doubt the integrity of the mainstream media. Don’t doubt the integrity of the academics, or the climate scientists, or the teachers and ed schools; of the professions generally.

Purity? Nobody believes in racial purity as a value, but last time anyone did, it was the Democrats. Or, in Canada, the Liberals and Clear Grits. It is also the Democrats who are concerned with ideological purity: with “political correctness.” Political views in the Conservative or Republican parties are much more diverse, and diversity is much better tolerated.

If by “purity” Haidt actually means morality, he is right that morality is a classic conservative value, and it is also a modern Republican and Canadian Conservative value; and not a Democratic or Liberal value. Fair enough. But Christian morality is not “purity.” It is acknowledgement and remorse for sin when committed, not never sinning, and especially not claiming to have never sinned. Innocence ended in the Garden.

Loyalty? The Republican primary voters in 2016 rejected loyalty to their party leaders in nominating Trump. They were supposed to vote for Jeb Bush. In Canada, the Conservatives have ousted two leaders in about four years. Look, too, at the Conservatives in Britain.

By contrast, the Democratic primary voters obediently accepted the backroom deal to hand the nomination to Biden, four years after accepting the backroom deal handing the nomination to Hillary Clinton. The Democratic Party has always been the party of machine politics, party bosses, and client groups who will vote for a yellow dog out of party loyalty. Or are expected to, out of group loyalty, or “you ain’t black.” 

Haidt does not seem to even be aware of classic liberal values, but those are the values of the modern Republicans or Canadian Conservatives: freedom, the rights of the individual, free markets, equality. He misses half the political equation.

'Od's Blog: Catholic comments on the passing parade.