In his most recent essay, H. Numan lamented what has been done to the word “liberalism”. In the piece below he expands on the topic, charting the demise of true liberalism and tracking the course of the Culture Wars.
I am a liberal, and so are you!
by H. Numan
That’s a of a bit controversial title, right? I have to be honest: it’s click-bait, so you folks will start reading it. Yes, I am a liberal. And proud of it. Much better: you, too, are liberal. Even though you probably don’t know it. Before you get offended by being called a liberal, do read on.
Socialism is like cancer: it takes everything. It took the name — and very little else — of its mortal enemy, liberalism. Especially in America, calling someone a liberal is calling him a commie. Nothing could be further from the truth. It’s close to calling a Jew a Nazi, or a black person a Klansman. It makes no sense at all. The same happened in Europe, but much more deviously. The liberal parties changed, or were changed, into full-blown socialist parties. They pretend to be liberal, but in reality are socialism light — at best.
According to Wikipedia, liberalism is a political and moral philosophy based on liberty, the consent of the governed and equality before the law. In short: the individual matters.
Wikipedia gives the definition for socialism as a political, social, and economic philosophy encompassing a range of economic and social systems characterized by complete, or mainly, social ownership, social control, socialization, or regulation of the means of production. It includes the political theories and movements associated with such systems. In short: the state matters.
These are the fundamental differences between the two. In the first case, you matter. The law is there to protect you. In the second case, you are nothing, the state is everything. The first quote is from Hitler. The well known and popular socialist John Fitzgerald Kennedy phrased it more subtly: Ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country. He said exactly the same as Hitler, only phrased it better.
See the enormous differences between the two ideologies?
Look at the definitions again. What does it cover? Liberalism doesn’t cover a lot. Certainly not economics. Socialism covers … everything! That is not a strength, but a weakness. Nothing can encompass everything.
Take any religion you want. Almost always economy is a very weak point in it. Seems like God or the gods are clueless how that should work. Also, ‘inherited sin’ is a concept that is legally impossible. Are you guilty of stealing horses if your great-great-great-granddaddy was a horse thief? Of course not. The concept of inherited sin has been taken by socialists from religion and used in a slightly different form on society. Whitey has done it! The patriarchy is evil! Mankind (especially white men) is responsible for global warming! All monotheistic religions have a concept of inherited sin, that’s why nobody even blinks an eye when it pops up in politics.
This is completely unthinkable for liberals. Real liberals, that is. You can’t inherit sin. One can be judged in a court for any actual crimes you committed yourself. That is a benefit, and also a severe weakness. As you are entitled to your own opinion, that includes being a socialist as well. What about McCarthyism? Even at its worst, it was nothing compared to what socialists invariably will do, given half a chance. Compare McCarthy (who wasn’t a liberal to begin with) with the Night of the Long Knives or Stalin’s Purges. It can get much worse, if you look at Mao’s Great Leap Forward or Pol Pot who killed 25% of his entire population.
Socialism is much older than liberalism. It began in the 18th and 19th centuries, as voluntary movements, loosely based on Christian ideas and some of its morality. Even then it always failed. A nice example is the Oneida Community. That was one of the more successful ones. It failed because humans aren’t ants.
Humans are social mammals. We need to interact with other humans to function. Solitary hermits are a rare exception. However, that is where the buck stops. We aren’t beavers who must build a dam, when they hear running water. The experiment has been done: beavers start building dams when they hear the sound of running water, even if it is a tape being played.
Some people like to lead, others do not. Some people like to excel. Most people like to do a reasonable job, for a reasonable wage. It’s just that everybody thinks he himself earns too little, while everybody else earns way too much. The problem isn’t the leaders who got the lion’s share in Oneida (or any other commune). Nor the people at the bottom who got little. The problem was in — and is — in the middle.
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French presidential candidate Eric Zemmour said that he supported the UK’s turning back of boats of illegal migrants trying to cross the English Channel. Meanwhile, the Italian coast guard rescued more than 300 migrants whose boat was in distress off the coast of Lampedusa.
My neighbor’s assailant was convicted, so justice was seen to be done. The point of this post, however, is a couple of ancillary incidents that I found interesting.
