The Liberating Power of Truth - Victor Davis Hanson review of "South Park Conservatives"

VICTOR HANSON.COM ^ | JUNE 23, 2005 | VICTOR DAVIS HANSON

[CHARLITE]

In the sixties, many of us were pulled to the left because we thought it was the ideology of liberty. Duped by a false caricature of the conformist fifties as a neo-Puritan, repressed enemy of the individual, we were attracted by the spontaneous, exuberant celebration of individual freedom we thought characterized that decade.

Those of us with intellectual pretensions further asserted that the sixties sensibility was squarely in the American tradition of autonomous individualism. Surely, as the movie Easy Rider suggested, the hippy was the new mountain man, the new Huck Finn, the new frontiersman — and so, more quintessentially American than that conformist, buttoned-down "company man" worried that he'd get fired for folding, spindling, or mutilating something.

Well, we were wrong for many reasons. We ignored the confusion of license and liberty, ignored the destructive consequences of liberating the appetites from social restraints, and most of all, ignored the simple fact that the hippy "if it feels good, do it" creed had been appropriated by a totalitarian ideology that has been history's greatest enemy of freedom and the individual. By the early seventies it was clear that the New Left's hijacking of the hippy movement had resulted in a new conformity, one more sinister and destructive than what we thought was so oppressive in the fifties.

[dixiechick2000]

Thanks for the ping and the post.

I love VDH, but he didn't write this piece.
It was written by Bruce Thornton.

I enjoyed it, though. ;o)

[dixiechick2000]

"Or arrested for tearing the tag off a mattress!!!"


LOL! Now, you're talking some series bidness. ;o)

[LibertarianInExile]

WTF are you TALKING about?

[derheimwill]

do a Google search for
"victor davis hanson" " positive thinking"
I have no desire to debate facts.

[derheimwill]

Still reading? I can't hear you!

[ModelBreaker]

I did. The site I think you are referring to is maintained by someone other than Hanson. It merely cites a discussion by Hanson on Alexander cutting the Gordian Knot. It cites it as an example of the power of positive thinking.

Really, Hanson is one of the best writers on world affairs and culture out there now.

[derheimwill]

Says you.

[derheimwill]

"The site..."? How dare you ? There are a whole range of sites, all supporting my position.

[Oztrich Boy]

Are you confusing him with Mark Victor Hansen?

Thank you. If you hadn't posted that we would have thought derheimwill was just nuts.

[Brett66]

I don't know what your talking about, I searched it in Google and I came up with the same thing- an anti-war liberal site that was criticizing VDH.

[Alamo-Girl]

Thanks for the ping!

[Oztrich Boy]

I have no desire to debate facts.

24 posted on 06/23/2005 7:45:44 PM PDT by derheimwill

OK

[headsonpikes]

RE:

your tagline ....

We're all feelin' the looovve!

[Oztrich Boy]

Like the case of a debate I was involved with on another board with a gun-grabber who claimed the National Rifle Assosiation were liars - 'Just you Google "NRA lies"'

Result hits in the low three figures - most to do with National Recreation Areas "The Snake River HRA lies on the Snake River ..."

[derheimwill]

Everything VDH says here is correct and none of it addresses point. IOW, Post- Modernist siren song!

[headsonpikes]

When you're in a hole, stop digging!

[CHARLITE]

Thanks, knews_hound. You tell 'em!

You're "my kinda guy!!"

Char :)

[knews_hound]

I still do.

Cheers,

knews hound

http://knewshound.blogspot.com/

[LibertarianInExile]

Hey, derheimwill--Do a Google search for "cognizant" and "derheimwill." I have no desire to debate clueless people. You're obviously making a mistake about who VDH is, and too dumb to recognize or acknowledge it.

[Lloyd227]

Lighten up, it's a good article regardless of who wrote it.