Marshall Sutherland

Thu, 20 Oct 2022 17:46:35 -0400

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

#^EP19: Authoritarianism, Polarization, and Illiberalism - Gracearchy with Jim Babka

The article from Reason Magazine that they are discussing:

#^Both left and right are converging on authoritarianism

Something is broken in our politics. Just about everyone knows it, but it can be hard to put your finger on what it is.

As the media attempt to grapple with this felt reality, they reach over and over for the same word: polarization. That, we're told, is the shorthand for what has gone wrong. Where once the country had its share of conservative Democrats, liberal Republicans, and mushy moderates, today the two parties are more internally consolidated—and further apart from each other—than ever.

But what if that explanation is missing something? What if there's a sense in which left and right are actually converging, and the nature of that convergence is the real source of the perception that something isn't right?

politics podcast

Fri, 21 Oct 2022 21:02:54 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

Perhaps as far back as high school, I has this idea that if you went far enough left and far enough right politically, you'd meet. Decades later, I'm getting to watch it happen...

Sat, 22 Oct 2022 13:28:17 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

The basic idea is that both extremes end up being authoritarian. Sure, one is "left authoritarianism" and one is "right authoritarianism", but the only difference is which choices they impose on us. Is the prison green walls really any better then the prison with beige walls?

Sat, 22 Oct 2022 15:39:29 -0400

Marshall Sutherland

dwatney@hub.farthinghalearms.com

From the article:

This is what feels most broken in our politics. It's not the ways left and right are further apart than ever; it's the ways they're closer together, with powerful elements on each side having jettisoned the longstanding liberal ideal of respecting the rights of even those with whom you strongly disagree.

The two camps, of course, have different substantive moral visions for the society they wish to construct. But each views a broad conception of individual liberty as a barrier to achieving that vision.

Economic liberty, including international trade and private property rights, stands in the way of progressives' desire for an egalitarian and democratic order in which no one is ever again expected to work for someone else—and in the way of natcons' desire for a revivified American manufacturing sector in which male breadwinners can support a large family on a single income. Speech protections prevent both sides from controlling the conversation as they wish. Religious freedom is seen as either a cover for rank bigotry or a rationalization for excluding God from the public square. And liberal toleration, with its norms of fair play and civility, is at odds with the reigning conception of politics as total war.

But if it's clear that left and right radicals have turned on liberal values and institutions, there is less evidence that the country as a whole has done so. Until now, this article has used the left and the right to stand in mostly for the activist and intellectual class, along with a few politicians here or there. The American people, on the other hand, are instinctual liberals by and large—not in the sense of being left of center but in the sense of believing at a deep level that even one's fiercest opponents have rights.

I think we would be a lot better off of we all told extremist activists from both sides to fuck off.