Beware the Conservatives of the Soul

Jim Peron

[babyface00]

I now see as well. That's definitely consistent with the other two.

However, i don't think it is conservatives who are advocating this. Of course, by the comments so far, its obvious that the terms "conservative" and "liberal" have vastly different meanings to various people - so much so as to be worse than meaningless.

[ggekko]

The author of this post is living in a 19th century fantasy world. The reality of American society today is that the Socialist left attempts to use the coercive power of the State not only to impose economic socialism but to impose nihislistic libertinism as well. This effort is seen in the form of compulsory sex education devoid of moral content, in radical intolerance for those holding Chritian religious convictions in political activities, in the imposition of racial and sexual employment quotas, in court mandated desegration efforts, and in "human rights" laws that grant special protections to homosexuals.

The "religious right" portion of the conservative movement favors restrictions on pornography, drug use, and homsexuality because these behaviors are not victimless crimes and they extract real monetary costs from society. I only wish that Libertarians would be more intellectually consistent and face the fact that a strung out , unemployed heroin addict, for example, cannot be a productive member of society and will eventually turn to violent crime in order to feed his habit. Polical actors with Christian religious convictions realize that there is a distinction between "Malum in se" (universal morallly evil) behaviors versus "Malum in re" (behaviors declared to bad by law) behaviors. There should always be a recognition that the legal is not coextensive with the moral.

The welfare state unnecessarily politicizes many moral questions because undesirable behaviors will eventually result in the consquences of such behavior becoming an expense that the entire body politic must bear. I would favor a partial legalization of drugs IF anyone who became an addict was not allowed by law to seek state assitance in treating his habit. I think we all know how unlikely such a scenario would be to be enacted into law.

Given the existence of the welfare state it is only just that such behaviors that lead citizens to become wards of the state should be legally proscribed.

[Lysander]

I can't think of a single person who calls themself a conservative who wants to impose their moral view on others.

Have not been around here much eh? Get on to some of the homosexual or drug threads.

"conservative" read Republican.
"clasic liberal" read Libertarian
"socialist" read Democrat.

[Lysander]

A 2 party system is only 2x better than a 1 party system.

We actually have a one party system with two factions. There is a set of rules for the demopublicans and another set of rules for everyone else as far as campaign laws go.

[x]

Socialism was formulated in the first half of the 19th century, barely after the beneficial results of the industrial revolution were being felt by the masses. As Archibald Roosevelt said, "...school textbooks create the impression that socialistic theories arose out of the conditions brought about by the industrial revolution. This is a gross misstatement from which the left-wing has reaped tremendous political capital. The truth is that the period during which the basic socialist tenets were fashioned was a period when society was throwing off the chains of medievalism."

If you're looking for the origins of socialism, you'll find they go further back that nineteenth century. For example there was the communism of the peasant revolts in the 16th century. And there's much more to take into account throughout history: Plato, Jesuits in Paraguay, radicals in the English Civil War and the French Revolution.

But it looks pretty certain that the conditions of industrialism greatly increased the appeal of socialism. I don't think anyone's seriously suggested that socialism was invented because of industrialism, just that the conflicts, strains and discontent of the industrial revolution increased the appeal of socialism. Moreover, industrial and craft workers didn't usually have the vote in most countries which had elections until later on in the 19th (or even the 20th century), so the effect of socialist ideas in political life increased as the nineteenth century went on. So it looks like the author is trying to twist the facts about the period to fit his thesis.

There's no doubt that late nineteenth century European conservatives wanted to use the state to improve the living and working conditions of the masses so as to prevent revolutions. And medieval models played a role in the thinking of 19th century European conservative theorists. In practice, though, what Disraeli or Bismarck left behind was probably more capitalist than socialist. Their argument, agree or disagree, was that ameliorative and social security measures prevented revolution. If they were right, it made it possible for a capitalist society to develop more fully than would otherwise have been the case.

But what this has to do with late 20th and early 21st century conservatism and its free market orientation or with the moral legislation that all governments adopt to one degree or another is unclear. There will always be moments when any political movement has to modify its ideology to cope with contemporary strains and crises, but American conservatives aren't followers of Bismarck, but rather of Washington -- Whigs rather than Tories, as has already been noted.

[Taliesan]

Conservatives only desire is to not have to subsidize behavior which offends them.

Most self described "conservatives" favor sodomy laws, because that behavior is morally repugnant. It has nothing to do with whether or not they are forced to subsidize it.

[Consort]

Sort of sounds like:

Beware the Ides of March or Beware the monsters from the id.

[brownie]

The author of this post is living in a 19th century fantasy world. The reality of American society today is that the Socialist left attempts to use the coercive power of the State not only to impose economic socialism but to impose nihislistic libertinism as well.

Not to mention big-daddyism, i.e. all kinds of regulations regarding everything and anything, such as safety at work, safety at home, and safety for the environment based on questionable science.

[William McKinley]

I am pretty sure many 'classic liberals' would highly object to your characterization of them as libertarians. A good historic example would be Robert A. Taft, who clearly was the former and called himself such, and definitely wasn't the latter and never called himself one.

[sasportas]

Jim Peron has judged us all, sorting us into nice little catagories. And what makes pointyheaded Peron the authority on anything?

My authority on morality is not Jim Peron. I learn from a higher authority the basic Theistic principle of good and evil. Right and wrong. There is your real catagories.

Theism as opposed to pagan Pantheism. In pantheism all is one, no good and evil, the lines between good and evil become blurred.

"Woe unto them who call good evil, and evil good." Anti-God Democrats, Socialists, Liberals, and Libertarians embrace paganism for their guiding philosophy. Almost everything they stand for is evil. And they call what they stand for good.

Sodomites and Sadaamites are both evil. Let this pointyhead Peron label me a "Conservative of the Soul" or whatever. I know a higher authority than he.

You folks do know don't you what underlies the the new age, cumbayah, environmentalist, antiwar crowd? Pagan pantheism. They are all pagans. They detest moral distinctions of good and evil. Were they Theist, their moral code of right and wrong would label Sadaam as evil.

[inquest]

I'd say that even without the existence of the welfare state, there still needs to be laws protecting the morals of society, and most of the classical liberals would seem to have implicitly accepted that understanding, given the lack of clamor on their part to have such laws repealed.

There is simply no comparison between "conservatives of the soul" and socialists, regardless of whatever strained attempts on the part of the author to establish one.

[KDD]

Much of pro big government conservativism can be traced to thinkers like Thomas Hobbes, who in 1651, labeled the state Leviathan “our mortal God.”

And Jean Jacques Rousseau who wrote..."The sovereign, being formed wholly of the individuals who compose it, neither has nor can have any interest contrary to theirs; and consequently the sovereign power need give no guarantee to its subjects, because it is impossible for the body to wish to hurt all its members.... The sovereign, merely by virtue of what it is, is always what it should be.

Rousseau’s doctrine of the “general will” also created the perfect pretext to pretend that government is not coercive: the people were willing, whatever government did to them. Rousseau recommended that a lawgiver “ought to feel himself capable ... of changing human nature, of transforming each individual ... into part of a greater whole from which he in a manner receives his life and being.”

While Rousseau’s romantic glorification of democracy is well-known, his passion for unlimited government power is less recognized. In a short essay entitled “On Public Happiness,” Rousseau declared in 1767, “Give man entirely to the State or leave him entirely to himself.” And Rousseau clearly believed that men could not be left to themselves.

Rousseau also foresaw the need for the government to nullify private property. In an essay on a proposed constitution for Corsica, he declared,

"In a word, I want the property of the state to be as great and powerful, and that of the citizens as small and weak, as possible. With private property being so weak and so dependent, the Government will need to use very little force, and will lead the people, so to speak, with a movement of the finger."

In The Social Contract, he declared,...
The citizen is no longer the judge of the dangers to which the law desires him to expose himself; and when the prince says to him: “It is expedient for the State that you should die,” he ought to die, because it is only on that condition that he has been living in security up to the present, and because his life is no longer a mere bounty of nature, but a gift made conditionally by the State.
Rousseau implied that people should be grateful that the government had not yet killed them. Thus, he vested in the state more power over the lives of the citizens than many Southern states in the United States vested in slaveowners. (It was a crime for a slaveowner to wrongfully kill one of his slaves, though such killings were not often punished.) He based his political philosophy on his own peculiar version of the “social contract”:"The State, in relation to its members, is master of all their goods by the social contract, which, within the State, is the basis of all rights.
But Rousseau never explained why people would voluntarily put their heads on a political chopping block.

Rousseau’s consecration of government power had vast influence on subsequent philosophers. German philosophers zeroed in on some of his more absurd ideas and refined them into sufficiently obscure language that they commanded respect among academics for generations to follow.

Johann Gottlieb Fichte declared in 1809 in his “Addresses to the German Nation”: “The State is the superior power, ultimate and beyond appeal, absolutely independent.” Fichte had earlier advocated sharply limiting government power. But as German humiliation grew over Napoleon’s conquest and occupation of the German states, Fichte deified the state in order to give it the power to drive the French out of the German lands — and to purify the German people so that they would never again be conquered. He wrote, “The end of the State is none other than that of the human species itself: namely that all its [humanity’s] relations should be ordered according to the laws of Reason.”

And since the government alone was able to know what reason dictated, that meant that it must have unlimited power to “rationalize” the citizenry. Fichte lifted the State above traditional moral standards:

It is the necessary tendency of every civilized State to expand in every direction.... Always, without exception, the most civilized State is the most aggressive.
Thus, the fact that a state successfully attacked its neighbors proved its moral superiority over its victims.

G.W.F. Hegel, renowned as the “Royal Prussian Court Philosopher” at the University of Berlin, matched Fichte and raised the ante of glorified servitude. According to Hegel, “The State is the Divine Idea as it exists on earth.” He praised the state as the “realization of the ethical idea” and asserted that “all the worth which the human being possesses — all spiritual reality, he possesses only through the State.” He revealed that the state is “the shape which the perfect embodiment of Spirit assumes.” He opposed any limits on government power: “The State is the self-certain absolute mind which recognizes no authority but its own, which acknowledges no abstract rules of good and bad, shameful and mean, cunning and deceit.”

Hegel also declared that “the State is ... the ultimate end which has the highest right against the individual, whose highest duty is to be a member of the State.” He stressed the benefits of war, and stated that “sacrificing oneself for the individuality of the State is ... a general duty.” He was also an early advocate of positive thinking: “In considering the idea of the State, one must not think of particular states, nor of particular institutions, but one must contemplate the idea, this actual God, by itself.”

Before you write your article you may want to read this.

http://www.fff.org/freedom/0800d.asp

Ping me when you write it.

Regards

[ggekko]

Every infringement against liberty in the last eighty years has emmanated from the "Religious left": FDR's New Deal, Lyndon Johnson's Great Society Programs, all the outrageous rulings from the Warren court and other infringements ad nauseum. The Conservatives should wear the collar for the excesses of the Drug War and some excesses of the National Security apparatus. On balance, however, the Left has been all too eager to destroy liberty for the sake of equality.

Anyone at this point in American history who is worried about the Religious Right is like a man who house has just been robbed who worries about losing the change in his suit he just took to the cleaners.

[William McKinley]

Rousseau is not someone I would associate with conservative thought. I am not sure why anyone would.

[inquest]

Anyone at this point in American history who is worried about the Religious Right is like a man who house has just been robbed who worries about losing the change in his suit he just took to the cleaners.

It's not even a difference of degree, but a complete difference of character. Conservatives, even the "religious right", believe in the rule of law. One can debate whether some laws are too oppressive, or counterproductive, or whatever. But that's not even in the same category of the ideology of the left, which is active state management of our lives, not just laws restricting our actions.

[inquest]

Rousseau is not someone I would associate with conservative thought.

Strike Hegel off that list also. He was the direct forerunner of Marx. None of these quotations represent conservatism, either now or at the time they were written.

[ggekko]

"But that's not even in the same category of the ideology of the left, which is active state management of our lives,..."

The Left no longer believes in the rule of Law or the consent of the Governed. Their approach of using the courts to impose their "vision of the annointed" on an unwilling public is indistinguishable from Facism.

While Libertarians often aggravate me to the point of distraction I still know they believe in the Rule of Law and the Consent of the Governed. Libertarians should also remember the Conservatives commitment to the Rule of Law makes them their only true ideological allies.

[Doctor Stochastic]

I can't think of a single person who calls themself a conservative who wants to impose their moral view on others.

Funny. I can't think of a single one who doesn't.

The difference between Liberals and Conservatives is in their chosen targets of government suppression. Questions have moved from "Is it legitimate for the government to wiretap without a search warrant?" to "Who should the government wiretap without a search warrant?"

[babyface00]

Funny. I can't think of a single one who doesn't.

You're posting this on a self-described conservative site " an online gathering place for independent, grass-roots conservatism on the web. ".

I doubt you could find anything more than a minority here who would advocate imposing their moral views on others. The policies advocated by Republicans is not necessarily that of conservatives.