Cultures are not the same as the philosophies that undergird them. Classical liberalism taken to its logical end would seem to suggest it compete with any and all other ideas in the marketplace of ideas, when left to those who don't believe in limiting principles. I see no reason to let ideas completely at odds with the structural imperatives of our own system "compete". Equity can't exist with individual freedom. So it has no place in our system.
Ok, agree that we can and should opt out of progressive language games. But what about Classical Liberalism’s devotion to “individualism”? How do we draw a limit around that, as it seems to buttress much of the progressive agenda?
I’d have to know your concerns with individualism to answer that. Individualism as it relates to natural rights is a positive. It acts as a corrective against official group narratives gaining too much power — though the left gets around this by replacing individual w “inauthentic” when it suits them. From my perspective we don’t rely enough on the promotion of the individual as he exists within a system of ordered liberty. You need not go fully Ayn Rand just as you need not go fully David French.
Individualism and perversion of individualism are not one in the same. John Milton's expressions of his individualism in Paradise Lost can't be equated with Jack The Ripper's expressions of his own murderous brand of individualist liberty. The same sort of Jack The Ripper perversion is at work in the transsexual movement and its torture and mutilation of innocents. The sick sex stuff is most obvious. The Left's pool of perversions applied to normal individualism is wide, dark and deep.
It's kind of like a difference between individualism and atomism. Atomism is kind of a strange form of collectivism (of one) by treating each individual as a perfectly self-interested and rational being. In my thinking, atomism would operate under the assumption that because man is a perfectly rational being, all the interactions an adult makes are perfectly rational and operating from their own self-interest. And we know this fails when introduced to David Hume's ideas. Individualism, and humanism before it, is much more interested in the inherent self-worth of the individual. Lockean liberalism defeats the trans movement right from the start with the core tenets. "no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions." And beyond that the core tenet was that this right was inherent, meaning the person cannot even give this right away. My two cents.
Didn't Thomas Hobbs with his 'war of all against all' define the secular view of a human individual? I-want-what-I-want-when-I-want-it is the way the Sixties philosophers suggested up & coming Boomers should live. 'Tune in, turn on, drop out. Don't trust anyone over thirty. If it feels good do it...' sounds like the Everything I Want Ticket to a teenager. Hobbs solution for that natural, unabated blood-lust was Leviathan, a government bureaucracy which (of course) would be served only by the best and the brightest who would always make the best, most rational and compassionate decisions for the collective of blood-lusty individuals; an elite leadership class led by people like Bill Gates and George Soros and Anthony Fauci and Mitch McConnell, et cetera, etc. Here's an idea of where this elite leadership is leading: https://chroniclesmagazine.org/society-culture/the-future-of-war/
Individualism has its roots in humanism, which is about 200 years older than Hobbes. So I can't say for sure if Hobbes defined that any better than Locke or Rousseau. None of them were completely correct, but Locke got the closest in my opinion. In any case, Hobbes and his Leviathan are a rehashing of the Platonic ideal society with the enlightened administrator at the top. Locke addresses that directly in the Second Treatise in the chapter On Prerogative in particular. It's great when a wise king acts outside the law for the benefit of the people...until you no longer have a wise king...
Nothing in classical liberalism requires one to view all cultures and ideas as having equal value. Cultures compete, and some are better than others.
Cultures are not the same as the philosophies that undergird them. Classical liberalism taken to its logical end would seem to suggest it compete with any and all other ideas in the marketplace of ideas, when left to those who don't believe in limiting principles. I see no reason to let ideas completely at odds with the structural imperatives of our own system "compete". Equity can't exist with individual freedom. So it has no place in our system.
Ok, agree that we can and should opt out of progressive language games. But what about Classical Liberalism’s devotion to “individualism”? How do we draw a limit around that, as it seems to buttress much of the progressive agenda?
I’d have to know your concerns with individualism to answer that. Individualism as it relates to natural rights is a positive. It acts as a corrective against official group narratives gaining too much power — though the left gets around this by replacing individual w “inauthentic” when it suits them. From my perspective we don’t rely enough on the promotion of the individual as he exists within a system of ordered liberty. You need not go fully Ayn Rand just as you need not go fully David French.
Individualism and perversion of individualism are not one in the same. John Milton's expressions of his individualism in Paradise Lost can't be equated with Jack The Ripper's expressions of his own murderous brand of individualist liberty. The same sort of Jack The Ripper perversion is at work in the transsexual movement and its torture and mutilation of innocents. The sick sex stuff is most obvious. The Left's pool of perversions applied to normal individualism is wide, dark and deep.
It's kind of like a difference between individualism and atomism. Atomism is kind of a strange form of collectivism (of one) by treating each individual as a perfectly self-interested and rational being. In my thinking, atomism would operate under the assumption that because man is a perfectly rational being, all the interactions an adult makes are perfectly rational and operating from their own self-interest. And we know this fails when introduced to David Hume's ideas. Individualism, and humanism before it, is much more interested in the inherent self-worth of the individual. Lockean liberalism defeats the trans movement right from the start with the core tenets. "no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions." And beyond that the core tenet was that this right was inherent, meaning the person cannot even give this right away. My two cents.
Didn't Thomas Hobbs with his 'war of all against all' define the secular view of a human individual? I-want-what-I-want-when-I-want-it is the way the Sixties philosophers suggested up & coming Boomers should live. 'Tune in, turn on, drop out. Don't trust anyone over thirty. If it feels good do it...' sounds like the Everything I Want Ticket to a teenager. Hobbs solution for that natural, unabated blood-lust was Leviathan, a government bureaucracy which (of course) would be served only by the best and the brightest who would always make the best, most rational and compassionate decisions for the collective of blood-lusty individuals; an elite leadership class led by people like Bill Gates and George Soros and Anthony Fauci and Mitch McConnell, et cetera, etc. Here's an idea of where this elite leadership is leading: https://chroniclesmagazine.org/society-culture/the-future-of-war/
Individualism has its roots in humanism, which is about 200 years older than Hobbes. So I can't say for sure if Hobbes defined that any better than Locke or Rousseau. None of them were completely correct, but Locke got the closest in my opinion. In any case, Hobbes and his Leviathan are a rehashing of the Platonic ideal society with the enlightened administrator at the top. Locke addresses that directly in the Second Treatise in the chapter On Prerogative in particular. It's great when a wise king acts outside the law for the benefit of the people...until you no longer have a wise king...
Trade subscriptions?
It can be defeated in the way I've outlined here. It just takes will.
It would appear, then, that if you are not a leftist, you have two options: submission, or suicide.
Were humanity in general that nihilistic, it would have exited the scene a very long time ago.