Why the Critical Theory-based Model of Change is Counterproductive | The Fault in the Left

Attempts to remake society to satisfy theoretical needs are often anti-utilitarian

Welcome to The Fault In The Left, a series where I will examine the major faults in today's Western Left. I intend for this series to run parallel to my other series, The Fault In The Right, in order to ensure balanced criticism of both the left and the right.

Today, I will start the series by discussing what I have long believed to be the biggest problem with the Western Left today: the dominance of philosophical theory, and the selective inattention to realities that are not consistent with these theories. It seems that these days, there is a theory on the left for everything: critical race theory and postcolonial theory for issues concerning race, the various forms of feminist theory for gender issues, queer theory for LGBT issues, disability theory for disability issues, and so on. Many of these theories are rooted in postmodernism and critical theory, which I have specifically criticized previously. This time, however, I will focus on the issue of redefining social justice as the fulfillment of the requirements of philosophical theory, and why this model of change is ultimately counterproductive.

Attempts at encouraging the use of 'Latinx' to replace 'Latino' as a neutral, plural noun to refer to Latinos is a good example of what's wrong with the Western Left today. As you would expect, it has been overwhelmingly rejected by the Latino community, because it is both unnecessary and an unnatural imposition. It is unnecessary because, in Romance languages, the masculine form already acts as the neutral when necessary. Indeed, French President Emmanuel Macron made a point of this last year, during a debate about the use of non-gendered terms in French government documents. Macron is certainly no right-wing reactionary, yet he recognizes that it is not a good idea to unnecessarily change the rules of a language radically. In the case of 'Latinx', it is also a very unnatural imposition, because it violates Spanish grammar rules, and can't even be pronounced in Spanish! This means that it is just impossible that it would ever have been adopted organically by Spanish speakers. I have long argued that people are justifiably skeptical towards inorganic change, because it is, by definition, not something that has been well considered by multiple sections of society.

The other problem with theory-based change is that it is often anti-utilitarian, i.e. it leaves society less happy as a result. This is because, unlike changes intended to alleviate suffering or solve specific practical problems, theory-based change tends to require the complete implementation of a radical set of changes across a wide-range of contexts to be considered successful, because this is what would need to happen to make the real world conform to the demands of philosophical theory. Compare gay marriage and the 'gender neutral language' movement, for example. The legalization of gay marriage required only the change of laws specific to marriage, and it generally doesn't impact the lives of those who don't wish to enter into a same-sex marriage. It doesn't demand society-wide radical change. The fact that gay couples get to be happier, and the rest of society isn't affected much, means that the change is justified on utilitarian grounds, because net happiness is increased. On the other hand, if some theory tells us that all language, in all contexts, must be made 'gender neutral' in order to get rid of the 'patriarchal' language, then to fulfill this theory, changes would need to be made everywhere, including in places most people have never thought about. Given that the vast majority of these changes would not result in making anyone happier, but some of the changes would really upset traditionalists, the net effect would be anti-utilitarian. Unlike the legalization of gay marriage, the attempt to impose 'gender neutral language' universally is clearly unjustifiable from a utilitarian point of view.

The left's insistence on imposing changes that are unnecessary, inorganic, and anti-utilitarian to satisfy their philosophical theory has been divisive, and it has led to a backlash to many legitimate causes, that has made rational, productive change more difficult. The frustrations towards activists imposing clearly anti-utilitarian changes has also led to a general increase in reactionary sentiment, which has been harvested by the reactionary populist right to win elections in many places across the West. I think the experience of the past ten years provides a strong and conclusive case that this theory-dominant form of 'progressive' thinking is very counterproductive, and a return to a more practical model of change is in order.

The Politics of Forever Despair vs Constant Outrage

I think that, sooner or later, people are going to realize that the left and the right both have nothing good to offer us. What they offer is basically the politics of forever despair vs the politics of constant outrage.

The problem with the left is that, because of their ideological commitments and philosophical obsessions, nothing is ever going to be good enough for them, or even sort of good. Everything is oppressive, all the time, and remains just as oppressive and bad even after reforms are achieved. This leads to a state of constant despair, and ultimately burnout. This, I think, is why many people who start out as commited left-wing activists when they are young eventually end up withdrawing from politics altogether, or in a few odd cases, defect to the hard right. The left effectively burns up the passions of generation after generation of young people, and yet achieves nothing in the end.

On the other hand, what the right offers is not really better either. The right, especially the populist New Right, likes to get people constantly outraged with no end. The goal of the right seems to be to get people disproportionally outraged towards everything, including things that are really small and insigificant. For the right, every change is always bad, and every move must have a hidden radical agenda. This leaves not much room for rational thinking, or indeed, optimism for the future. To join the ranks of the right is therefore to give up on the hope that a better future is possible, and also to give up on rational thinking, which I think is a very sad thing.

I refuse to have to choose between forever despair and constant outrage. This is why I refuse to choose between left vs right. I think there is a better way, and I think more people are realizing this.

We Need to Develop the Philosophy to Support a Centrist Politics | New Centrist View

The center cannot hold unless we revive its intellectual side

Welcome to New Centrist View, a new series where I will try to contribute to the development of philosophical positions that could support a sustainable centrist politics.

Previously on Moral Libertarian View, I discussed how the Western political landscape is currently divided into four main ideologies, namely constructionism and utilitarianism on the left, and organicism and reactionism on the right. I also discussed why constructionism, the ideology of the postmodern-critical theory far-left, and reactionism, the ideology of the populist New Right, are inherently anti-freedom, while liberal utilitarianism and organicist conservatism are much more compatible with freedom. The key to defending freedom, then, would be to uphold liberal utilitarianism as well as organicist conservatism, which are the core ideologies of the center-left and the center-right respectively. Freedom will hold if the center holds. If the center does not hold, freedom might indeed be less than a generation away from extinction.

It is truly a difficult time to be a centrist right now. Just look at the fact that there are many more far-left and far-right influencers, podcasters, writers and personalities than centrist ones. Most people wouldn't want the thankless task of trying to recover sanity in a world gone mad, when they could be much more popular, and indeed chase after lucrative career opportunities, by choosing one of the extremes and catering exclusively to its supporters. As a centrist, not only are you likely to have a much smaller audience and no income for your hard work, you are also likely to be labelled as a weak, stupid, brainwashed, privileged defender of the status quo. Trust me, I've been called all of these things.

One of the major reasons why centrist politics is in this state is because it lacks a strong philosophical backing. At least in the past seventy years or so, center-left and center-right ideologies have been defined mostly not by intellectual thinkers who think about issues on principle, but by politicians who take politically calculated positions and make unprincipled deals all the time. In contrast, both far-left constructionism and far-right reactionism were marginalized ideologies without much formal political power until recently, and their recent history was thus dominated by thinkers rather than politicians. This, in turn, means that their stances appear to be much more intellectual and principled, at least to certain people. This is a major reason why centrism is seen as unprincipled, perhaps even untenable in the long run, by more and more people. I truly fear that the center cannot hold if we don't develop a robust intellectual tradition to support it again.

Looking at the ideologies we consider moderate or centrist, which is mainly liberal utilitarianism and organicist conservative-reformism, they once were intellectual powerhouses that had to contend with a very different status quo in times past, in order to gain support. For example, once upon a time, the human pursuit of happiness was not considered a legitimate goal, rather, people were expected to obey religious laws as interpreted by the official state church, whether they liked it or not. To argue against this could lead to charges of heresy. Similarly, people were expected to know and accept their place in the very hierarchical order of society. Any disobedience against this hierarchical order could be seen as a sign of rebellion, which was generally punishable by death. Thankfully, we don't live in a society like this anymore, because more liberal ideas about how society should be organized ultimately won out. Since then, however, the development of liberal, utilitarian and organicist philosophy and thinking seems to have slowly come to a stop. Liberal reformism became the status quo, which then became stale and despised. What needs to happen is a renewal on the philosophical, intellectual side. Given that the philosophies which underpin liberal reformism once won the battle of ideas, I'm sure it can happen again, but we really need to work to make it happen.

Given the resurgence of essentially medieval ideas about how society should be organized on the far-right, we really need to revive the arguments our predecessors used to defeat the ancien regime of arbitrary power, and update them for the 21st century. On the other hand, 'progressive' intellectualism has come to be dominated by ideas that are basically revolutionary rather than reformist, and often anarchist-adjacent, which share the common assumption that tradition is inherently oppressive, and challenging and dismantling tradition is necessary for progress. However, history has demonstrated that this is not necessarily true. A liberal reformist program that aims to preserve and respect the spirit of traditions, underpinned by an organicist conservative philosophy, can also effectively advance social justice, and a radical rupture with long-standing norms might not be necessary. It is up to us to make this argument, if only to balance out the excessive and counterproductive radicalism that has become the fashion of the day in many 'progressive' circles.

On Pro-Freedom vs Anti-Freedom Views of Society | Moral Libertarian Talk

We need to argue for utilitarianism and organicism against the anti-freedom ideologies

One thing that I have repeatedly emphasized and explored in recent months is that freedom does not exist in a vacuum. You can't just talk about freedom in a theoretical sense, and expect it to apply well to the real world. Instead, we need to look at what is happening in the real world, and think about how we can advance freedom in the specific context of our society, in the here and now.

Today, I want to build upon my recent observation that there are actually four competing ideologies or philosophies in the Western political landscape right now, and discuss how we can defend and advance the cause of freedom in this particular landscape. Basically, the four ideologies are constructionism and utilitarianism on the 'progressive' or 'left' side, and  organicism and reactionism on the 'conservative' or 'right' side. Constructionism is the belief that society is made up of interlocking systems of oppression which are socially constructed, and the dismantling of these social constructs is required for the liberation of women and minorities. Utilitarianism is the belief that policy decisions should be aimed at increasing happiness, or at least reducing suffering, as much as possible. Utilitarian liberalism has a long history, going back to the 19th century British thinkers Jeremy Bentham and John Stuart Mill. Organicism is the belief that society, as it exists, is the product of many centuries of lived experience and wisdom, and on this ground it opposes attempts to abruptly and radically change society, especially if it is rooted in abstract philosophy alone. It is the core essence of classical conservative thinking, going back to thinkers like Edmund Burke. Finally, reactionism is the belief that society is fallen, and nothing good can come out of it, so all proposals for change must be rejected, except for proposals to turn back the clock to a previous glorious age. Given that reactionaries think that modern society, with its guarantees of individual freedom, is a fallen state, they have no problem with trampling on long-standing guarantees of freedom to achieve their backwards-looking utopia. So this is a summary of the four ideologies we have. You can read my previous article if you want a more detailed explanation.

Of the four ideologies, constructionism and reactionism are fundamentally illiberal. Constructionism demands that existing society, as a whole, be deconstructed for the sake of what they see as justice for women and minorities. This would include radically changing the language we use, the social norms we have, the way we see historical events, and so on. Given that their demands are put in terms of justice and ending oppression, there can be no compromise with those that don't want it to happen, even if they are the vast majority of the population. Therefore, such a program must be enforceable via undemocratic and illiberal means, including by limiting free speech if necessary. On the other extreme, reactionism fundamentally sees our present society as fallen, which leads to the view that 'rescuing' society back to a previous glorious state should take precedence over respecting the preferences of those currently living in, and shaped by, the 'fallen' society. Therefore, reactionism does not have any respect for freedom, democracy, or indeed anything else that stands in the way of their glorious restoration. There have been no successful 'glorious restorations' yet in the West, but I guess Iran's 20th century Islamic Revolution, or alternatively the fictional utopia of Gilead in The Handmaid's Tale, could give us insights as to what it would look like. It is clear that both constructionism and reactionism are enemies of freedom.

Luckily, the other two ideologies are much more compatible with freedom. Although utilitarianism and liberalism are fundamentally different as one emphasizes maximizing happiness and the other emphasizes maximizing freedom, there has been a strand of liberalism justified on utilitarianism going all the way back to John Stuart Mill, which just shows how liberalism and utilitarianism, and their core ideals of freedom and happiness, usually go hand in hand. After all, you can't really make people happy without respecting their freedom. When one says that gay marriage should be legal because gay couples deserve to be happy too, one is making both a utilitarian and a libertarian argument, for example. On the other hand, organicism strives to protect the long-standing values and institutions we have, because they represent many generations of lived experience and wisdom. At least in the English-speaking West, this would have to include a long tradition of guarantees of basic freedoms, going all the way back to the Magna Carta. Putting it simply, utilitarianism seeks to advance happiness, and in the process often advances freedom, and organicism seeks to protect the freedoms we already have from attacks by authoritarian forces. Therefore, in many ways, utilitarianism and organicism largely overlap with the concepts of 'positive libertarianism' and 'critical libertarianism' that I talked about last time as constituting a 'dialectic of freedom'. This is to say, in our current society and political landscape, 'positive libertarianism' is mostly represented by utilitarians, and 'critical libertarianism' is mostly represented by organicists. This means if we can get utilitarians and organicists to work together in a productive dialogue, we would have the best hope of maintaining and advancing freedom.

In conclusion, the hope for freedom in the West right now, and for the foreseeable future, lies in promoting both utilitarianism and organicism, and especially a productive dialogue between the two, and also in successfully arguing against both constructionism and reactionism, the ideologies promoted by the illiberal-left and the illiberal-right respectively. Going forward, I will be looking at how we can achieve this in further detail, from multiple angles. In particular, I will be looking at the intra-left argument for utilitarianism over constructionism, the intra-right argument for organicism over reactionism, as well as the very important but often overlooked arguments of organicism vs constructionism, and utilitarianism vs reactionism. I think getting to the bottom of all this is essential for building a 21st-century framework to defend and advance freedom.

The Key to Deradicalizing People is to Give Them Hope

The proliferation of extreme political ideologies on both the left and the right is a serious problem. One thing many people don't seem to realize is that the lack of hope is perhaps the most important reason behind this. Many people lack hope in their lives, and the extreme political ideologies give them hope. Of course, it is false hope, but it gives them what they crave in life right now. Therefore, the key to preventing more people from being radicalized is to give people hope in their lives. We really need to think about how to do that. Firstly, we need to get rid of all the fear, and the negativity, from our discourse. Then we need to start thinking about how to inject hope into people's lives. We need to think about what they want from life, and how we can help them achieve it. I think that if people had more hope of achieving meaningful goals in their own lives, political extermism would be much less popular.