Two Philosophical Arguments Against 'New Left' Politics

The Enlightenment liberal tradition provides the most apparent arguments to rebut the postmodern critical theory worldview. That free speech is conducive to understanding the objective truth, and that understanding the truth is necessary for practical progress, is itself a self-evident truth that is provable by the study of history alone. It is for this reason that we must always stand firm for free speech. Also, there are good reasons why we should require objective evidence before we can agree that claims being made are sound. Postmodern critical theory's insistence that society is made up of interlocking systems of oppression simply doesn't meet this standard, and thus should be rejected. Besides, viewing society as being made up of interlocking systems of oppression is simply counterproductive, if we want to bring people together to resolve society's most sensitive conflicts, by finding solutions that would be satisfactory for every party. 

The conservative philosophical tradition, going back to thinkers like Edmund Burke, also provide important arguments against the postmodern critical theory worldview. It speaks to how the top-down, inorganic imposition of social change, driven by abstract philosophical doctrine, can be harmful to freedom, and also make things worse in unexpected ways in reality. This is why change must be gradual, rooted in practical need rather than abstract philosophy, and implemented in a way that respects society's long-standing values as much as possible. This lesson is one that progressives would do well to learn. This, in turn, is why I have long argued that the philosophical insights of the conservative cannon should be re-integrated into progressive thinking, and this would make for a good foundation for a sustainable reformist politics. Note that the conservative philosophical tradition is very different from what is wrongly called 'conservative' politics in the contemporary West, which is clearly more authoritarian-reactionary than conservative. True conservative philosophy would lead to a moderate reformist politics. 

Why Moderates are Necessary for Free Speech

It is an objective fact that both the left and the right have gotten more extreme in the past decade. Ideas previously considered taboo have been increasingly mainstreamed from both directions. What all these ideologies have in common is that they have no use for studying the objective truth as it is, or learning from the viewpoints of other people. They are already certain of their own correctness and righteousness, and the only thing left to do is to impose their vision on the rest of society, by force or other illiberal means if necessary. Such ideologies have no use for free speech.

On the other hand, moderates have a consistent interest in defending free speech. This is because moderates don’t have a pre-established commitment to an extreme ideology. This makes it more possible to be truly open to the different viewpoints that exist out there. After all, it is only natural that, when coming to a topic without preconceived commitments, one would want to gather as much evidence as possible, in order to arrive at a more accurate understanding of the objective truth. Moreover, given the lack of commitment to an overarching view of how things must be, moderates don’t always agree with the ideas of any one tribe. I mean, moderates don’t even always agree with each other on every topic! The fact that moderates don’t ever feel comfortable to join a tribe, and that disagreements are a normal part of life for moderates, also mean that they would have more incentive to embrace free speech. This is because free speech is both a mechanism for resolving our differences, and also a way to agree to disagree peacefully when we must.

Herein lies an important paradox: free speech allows people to reject moderation. Putting it another way, free speech must allow people to not be moderates, but if too few committed and outspoken moderates remain, free speech itself might cease to exist. In this way, some doomers might even say it is inevitable that free speech eventually digs its own grave.

Is there a way we can resolve this paradox, so that free speech doesn’t end up digging its own grave? I guess we can both uphold free speech, and also promote the virtues of political moderation within the bounds of respect for free speech. There is no contradiction in these things, as long as we are using the free market of ideas to promote moderation, rather than using censorship to force people to be moderate. Indeed, I believe one of the biggest mistakes of the 2010s free speech movement was a lack of discussion about the virtues of the kind of political moderation which would naturally support a culture of free speech. In the 2010s, free speech activists often talked about things like respecting the ‘marketplace of ideas’ when we opposed de-platforming and cancel culture, but we didn’t talk enough about why we should respect the marketplace of ideas. This, in turn, allowed bad faith actors to pretend to be one of us, in order to defend the speech of people they agreed with, only to later turn around to support anti-free speech actions from their own tribe, thus discrediting the whole movement, and setting the cause of free speech back even further.