The Case Against Cafeteria Libertarianism | Lib Lib Report

Reactionary populism is not compatible with a sincere commitment to classical liberal values.

Welcome to the Lib Lib Report, i.e. the Liberal Libertarian Report, where we talk about news and current affairs from a liberal libertarian point of view. We aim for a practical pro-liberty politics encouraging things like free speech and free thought in the here and now, while aiming to make the social contract of Western society more libertarian moving towards the future.

Today, I want to talk about a disturbing trend: what I think could be called 'cafeteria libertarianism'. This term obviously borrows from the common saying of 'cafeteria Christianity', and just like cafeteria Christians, cafeteria libertarians pick and choose what issues they want to be libertarian on, while ignoring other issues, or even having sympathies to outrightly authoritarian stances on other issues. The ultimate effect of this is that anyone could claim to be 'libertarian' because every kind of politics has its libertarian areas, and thus people who actually have highly authoritarian agendas can falsely claim to be friends of liberty.

My regular audience would know that I am a 'libertarian gradualist', as opposed to the immediatists that make up the bulk of the mainstream libertarian movement. Libertarian gradualists, while not supporting immediate libertarianism in every policy area, are not 'cafeteria libertarians', because we are sincere about advancing liberty overall. What makes a 'cafeteria libertarian' is their lack of a wish or vision to progress things overall to the side of liberty. Instead, they identify as 'libertarian' as a reaction to something they don't like, for example wokeness, cancel culture, or some kind of government regulation. In other areas, however, they are totally OK with authoritarian policies, to the extent of heaping praise on people who are taking action to move the Overton Window towards authoritarianism. You know, like cheering on Ron DeSantis using his state power to punish Disney for disagreeing with him. Or nodding in agreement to online influencers who promote a populist 'post-liberal conservatism'.

I guess the reason why we have 'cafeteria libertarianism' is because of the mistaken belief that the status quo, minus the woke, is already libertarian, or even worse, that Western society used to be truly free in some past golden age. This attitude is basically reactionary conservatism. The fact is that Western society, up until now, has always been somewhat authoritarian, especially towards those who don't agree with the majority. Anyone who has read any history, political science or law would recognize this. A sincere commitment to classical liberal values simply isn't compatible with a reactionary populism that defends traditionally popular freedoms but denies or even opposes less traditionally popular freedoms. There was a reason why John Locke, Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill were all progressives in their time, who argued for things that weren't necessarily popular. This was because their vision was one that hadn't been realized yet. Even today, we still aren't there yet. I believe that recognizing we aren't there yet is the key to building a sincere progressive libertarianism, and rejecting reactionary 'cafeteria libertarianism'.

Recognizing that the classical liberal project is one that still has a long way to go would also allow us to keep being committed to our long term goals of more freedom, and remember to play the long game in response to current events. For example, free trade and globalization as it existed in the past four decades has had unfairly negative effects on many working people. Global corporates benefitted at the expense of working families, and this has created massive backlash. Refusing to deal with these problems would be irresponsible, and politically suicidal for any movement. However, that doesn't mean that we should suddenly be allies with people denouncing free trade as inherently evil, promoting conspiracy theories about globalization, and advocating for a return to the regressive 'clash of civilizations' attitude towards the world. Instead, we should continue to maintain that free trade and globalization are good because they make the world freer, but also acknowledge that how it is executed matters. Ultimately, it needs to be made to benefit working people rather than global corporates, which I believe is very doable. Similarly, while we can acknowledge that liberals need to do more to acknowledge the importance of families and the social fabric, we still need to firmly argue against the absurd claim that liberal thinking, going all the way back to Locke, is to be blamed for current social problems like low birth rates and high divorce rates. Anti-liberal forces both Left and Right want the liberal project to fail, and they are going to blame everything on there being too much freedom, as if there was such a thing. To fight back, we need to have a clear vision of what we actually believe in, and why it will lead to good outcomes.

Why Conservatism and Liberalism are Actually Cousins | TE Cons Report

The polarization is artificial, and we just have to see through it.

Welcome to the TaraElla Cons Report, where we talk about things from an intellectual conservative point of view, and how we can apply this philosophy in the 21st century West. I come from a moderate, centrist viewpoint, which means I appreciate conservative philosophy and try to balance it with the need for progress.

In our mainstream politics, the concepts of 'liberal' and 'conservative' are often pitted against each other. However, anyone familiar with political philosophy would know that this binary opposition is not necessarily true. Moreover, just a few years ago, some moderate conservatives tried getting under the 'classical liberal' umbrella, while some liberals campaigning for gay marriage emphasized the conservative case for their reform. This kind of crossover messaging seems to have disappeared in recent times, but there is an important truth in there: there is plenty of room for liberalism in conservatism, and vice versa.

Conservatism is concerned with preserving traditional values, institutions and elements of the social fabric. However, we live in a world where circumstances inevitably change, and adaptive reforms are required to keep these things alive. Moreover, conservatives generally want society to function according to good order, and free speech and rational debate are conducive to building and maintaining good order. A framework that emphasizes free speech and freedom of conscience would allow adaptive changes to be made, in a safe and balanced way. Meanwhile, such a framework would also be very effective in resisting grand utopian schemes to remake society, because it would be impossible to get a majority of people to agree to such schemes under conditions of freedom. I believe upholding the liberal framework is a much more effective way to preserve the good things we have for future generations, compared to a reactionary culture war style approach. Furthermore, classical liberal values have been part of the mainstream political consensus of the West for more than a century, and it has served us well. Therefore, a conservatism dedicated to conserving the fundamentals of our social contract would also conserve these values. The so-called 'post-liberal conservatives' are actually radicals!

The case for liberalism having a conservative side is perhaps less often heard of, but in our current context, it is perhaps no less important. Firstly, core liberal values like free speech, freedom of conscience, equality regardless of immutable characteristics and so on require a conscious attempt to conserve, or else they get eroded quickly. Right now, forces on both the Left and the Right want to compromise these values when it suits them, and we need to actively defend these values. Secondly, I recently came to the realization that liberal values only make sense if we assume there is at least something worth preserving in the status quo. The freedom afforded by liberalism enables debates and experiments about what to preserve, and what to change. Postmodern critical theory activism has shown us that, if every existing structure is oppressive and needs to be dismantled, liberal values would actually be a hindrance. This actually makes sense, because the liberal framework resists radical change. Logically then, to be liberal would imply believing that at least some things are worth conserving.

The reason why I want to emphasize the philosophical common ground between liberals and conservatives is because the current polarization is making people lose perspective of the bigger picture. The polarization is created by both traditional and social media, and actively encouraged by those with various agendas, as well as those who stand to gain in one way or another. But if you take a step back and look at the bigger picture, it suddenly looks more artificial, and even sort of ridiculous. I think this realization can be useful for disrupting the echo chambers on both sides.

Two Perspectives: Moral Panics and Hysteria | TER Post Woke

It's a universal problem we need to talk about more

Welcome to TaraElla Report Post Woke, where we consciously aim to move beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars, and towards a post-woke model of culture and politics.

Perspective 1: As a progressive, I am dismayed at the way our culture is evolving. Twenty years ago, progressives used to be the cool ones. Conservatives used to get upset about everything from hip-hop music to gay marriage, from video games to Harry Potter, and we used to laugh at that. In recent years, many people say that we have become like how the conservatives used to be like, and I honestly can't disagree with that. As an old-school progressive, I think that overreacting to everything and having a problem with people having fun is stupid, because it makes us unpopular and discredits us. I wonder how we became this way.

Perspective 2: As a conservative, my biggest problem with mainstream conservative politics is its tendency to embrace collective moral panics and hysteria over artificially amplified non-issues. This also seems to happen in cycles. For example, the 90s and 2000s conservatives were really bad in this regard, but things got more rational in the 2010s. I fear that we are seeing things turn bad again now. I wonder if there is a way to break free from this toxic tendency.

I guess the tendency towards collective panic and hysteria is present among both progressives and conservatives. While there have been better and worse times in the past for both sides, it seems that, right now, both sides are getting worse. Therefore, it really is a problem that we need to actively address. The fact that it is on both sides makes it somewhat easier, because this means we won't be targeting only some people in our criticisms.

The first thing we need to do is to acknowledge that the problem exists in the first place. We need to talk about it enough, so that it is firmly in the consciousness of most people. This way, when certain people want to encourage more hysteria for whatever reason, enough people can consciously say no to it, and put up a resistance that hopefully gets stronger over time. We also need to remember that, history has taught us that it takes bravery and courage to take a stand against moral panics.

The other thing we need to do is, of course, to address the problem of echo chambers. In the past, I've said quite a lot about the need to break the echo chambers and how we might do that, in the context of addressing political polarization. Breaking the echo chambers is also important for addressing collective hysteria, because it is easiest to build hysteria in an environment where everyone is under pressure to agree with certain viewpoints. I guess this is why the problem is getting worse on both sides, with the echo chamber effect being made worse by social media. This is why the hysteria problem is ultimately linked to the many other problems affecting the social and political landscape of the Western world right now.

We're all Conservatives, to Some Extent. And that's a Good Thing. | TE Cons Report

Why the c-word is unfairly maligned, and why this must change.

Welcome to the new TaraElla Cons Report, the counterpart to my Lib Lib Report. In the Lib Lib Report, I talk about liberal and libertarian ideas and visions, and how we can apply them in the 21st century West. In this new series, I will focus on conservative philosophy, in a similar way.

I think one of the things the early 21st century West is lacking is a robust and healthy intellectual discussion on conservative philosophy. Now, some of you might be surprised that I am saying this. After all, I have identified as a liberal, a Moral Libertarian, a moderate, a centrist, a practical progressive, but I have never identified as a conservative. Moreover, I have many disagreements with what is considered conservative politics in the contemporary West. So why would I have any use for conservative philosophy?

Let's be honest. If you are a moderate or a centrist of any kind, you are at least partially conservative, because you essentially believe in balancing conservatism with progressivism. If you are a liberal, then you are committed to be open-minded to conservative points of view, and if they are indeed the most sound views, you would allow them to win in the marketplace of ideas via the natural process of competition. If you consider yourself an evidence-based person, then you have to at least acknowledge that institutions and values based on many centuries of evidence at least count for something. Finally, if you are a practical progressive, you would base your progressive ideas at least partially on what has worked well in the past. Therefore, one can certainly be liberal or moderate and still be conservative to a significant extent. Indeed, without acknowledging the conservative parts of our philosophy, we would be left with a very weak defense against those who want to radically remake society using untested and unsound theories.

I guess the reason so many of us are reluctant to acknowledge the conservative parts of our philosophy is because conservatism doesn't exactly have a good reputation in intellectual circles right now. Indeed, I have the feeling that, if I told some of my acquaintances that there is a conservative part to my philosophy, they might react all weird, like 'so you're a conservative'? In the minds of many people out there, the word 'conservative' is associated with racism, homophobia, and other forms of bigotry. However, this does not have to be true. It is only this way because reactionary politicians have had a near monopoly on the term 'conservative' for too long. And this monopoly is undeserved too, because in recent years, reactionary politics have often been anything but conservative, in the original sense of the word.

Another reason why we shouldn't shy away from acknowledging our own conservatism, is that the ongoing lack of a healthy appreciation for conservative philosophy has led to the rise of a deeply reactionary style of 'conservative' politics. This is actually the biggest reason why I am speaking out on this topic now. Conservatism is part of the natural temperament of many people, and if it isn't allowed to be acknowledged and respected in a healthy way, it is going to be expressed in a deeply reactionary way, one that reflexively blocks all proposals for progress, and even yearns to turn the clock back by decades. The lack of a healthy conservatism, one that can reassure people that the fundamental things about their society are safe, will leave many people with no option but to embrace a reactionary attitude.

I think the lack of a healthy intellectual conservatism is not just a coincidence, nor is it just an accident of history. Rather, back in the 1960s and 70s, a generation of students became so disillusioned with society, they thought that everything radical was great, and everything conservative was evil. Some of them eventually became very influential among intellectual circles, and their efforts shifted the Overton Window there so far to the radical side that any kind of conservatism essentially became marginalized. I believe it's time we addressed this error, and actively seek to welcome a healthy dose of conservative philosophy back into mainstream intellectualism.

Our Culture is Meaningless. Let's change this. | TaraElla Culture

Why challenging popular culture should be part of the post-woke mission

Welcome to TaraElla Report Culture, where I take a step back from the more political talk, and look at things from the wider cultural perspective.

To explain the purpose behind this new series, we need to start by acknowledging the fact that political, philosophical, and sociological debates do not occur in a vacuum, but are immersed in, and strongly affected by, the mood of the wider culture. Of course, the process goes both ways, for example the toxic culture wars that originated in politics have also had a negative effect on the wider culture. The important thing is, the wider culture, including the popular culture, is an overlooked potential site of action, if we want to end the toxic culture wars.

When I first started blogging nearly 20 years ago, I actually focused on popular culture. As a singer songwriter, I was very plugged into the news of the music world. From there, it was natural to also be plugged into the world of movies, television, celebrities and so on. When I was a teenager, I actually thought these things were having a positive impact on people, simply because it made them happy, and made life easier for people in difficult times. I thought that, by somewhat 'participating' in that world and making it even better, I would be contributing to making people's lives better. Back then, I thought that the adults were underestimating the value of popular culture.

As I grew older, I became more passionate about important social issues. The 2003 Iraq War, which I strongly opposed, was the first time I passionately got involved in politics. Soon after, I also got passionate about several other things. The politics around the Iraq War got me interested in the impact of religion on politics, which was part of what led me to become passionate about gay marriage. There was also this big evolution vs intelligent design debate back then, which made me realize the importance of respecting scientific facts. I also realized that I really liked being immersed in these debates, which were debates about fundamental worldviews, morals, and truth. For me, these meaningful debates contrasted sharply with the lack of such meaning in the popular cultural world, and as the years went by, I gradually drifted away from popular culture.

During the late 2000s to the mid 2010s, I actually drifted in and out of popular culture for a while. While in earlier times, popular culture would generally avoid the big controversial questions of our time, things appeared to be changing by 2008 or so. More and more, movies and TV shows started dealing with these questions, and some celebrities started to take strong stances. At that time, I honestly thought it was an improvement. But later on, I would be disappointed again, because a lot of this would be superficial and therefore even counter-productive sometimes. In the case of celebrities taking stances, it honestly felt like virtue signalling a lot of the time, whether this was their actual intention or not. I realized that the superficialness of our popular culture meant that we couldn't actually be having truly meaningful debates within it. This was when I finally 'gave up' on popular culture.

Since then, popular culture has only gotten more superficial, with the rise of viral videos, meaningless trends, and influencers who don't stand for anything. In this world, popularity is about how you look, and not what you stand for, and taking a stance on anything would only alienate your fans. Some people have said that this is an inevitable consequence of the internet. However, is this superficial culture really inevitable? Or could we try to turn it around? I believe it's worth at least trying, because I think the toxic woke vs anti-woke politics ultimately stems from our culture being very superficial. I once thought that I could escape the superficialness by leaving popular culture behind, but now I realize that the superficialness is everywhere, because culture, politics and intellectualism are not separate things. This is why I believe the antidote to the current polarization is to bring back in-depth thinking and discussion. We need to do it across all of our culture, especially popular culture, which remains a strong influence in many people's lives. I still believe we shouldn't underestimate the value of popular culture, in terms of healing the social fabric, after all.

How to Build the Post Woke Movement | TER Post Woke

It won't be easy, and we need a plan.

Welcome to TaraElla Report Post Woke, where we consciously aim to move beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars, and towards a post-woke model of culture and politics. Previously, I have outlined what a post-woke alternative would look like. Today, I want to talk about how we can advance the post-woke alternative in the cultural discourse.

As I said before, the current cultural and political discourse of the West is dominated by two echo chambers, the so-called woke and anti-woke. The existence of these echo chambers essentially keep other ways of thinking at the margins, severely limiting the influence of any post-woke ideas. Moreover, the echo chambers are maintained by everything from confirmation bias and habitual behavioral patterns, to cancel culture, to deliberate organization and interests backed by lots of money. Therefore, the key to building a successful post-woke alternative is to pierce and disrupt the echo chambers on both sides. If we can do this, then we can truly end the woke vs anti-woke wars. If not, then post-wokeism will remain no more than a nice theoretical idea, with very little practical influence in the real world.

I guess the first thing to do is to accept that we are not operating on a level playing field, compared to the media personalities and influencers on both sides, who use their big platforms to reinforce the dominant ideas of the echo chambers. This means that we have to start small, be patient, and wait for it to snowball into something bigger over time. We need to insist on talking about the post-woke alternative, and providing the post-woke voice when it comes to various social and cultural debates. Some days we might get very frustrated, feeling like we are essentially shouting into the void. Other days it might all feel futile, as our well-reasoned positions get drowned out by the loud culture warriors on both sides. But we need to keep going, if we are to have any chance of changing things at all.

Next, we need to recognize that many people who are trapped in the echo chambers actually feel uncomfortable with the status quo too. This even includes people whose work are essential to holding up the dominant narratives of the echo chambers, like journalists, media personalities, intellectuals, influencers and more. They might be quietly questioning the dominant narrative in their echo chambers, the echo chambers they are otherwise helping to maintain. We need to help that questioning process along. For example, whenever a culture war flare up occurs between the two sides, it actually provides a good opportunity to intervene, to help people question the soundness of the whole thing.

Finally, we need to be able to regularly come up with unique and innovative solutions to the problems and controversies that make up the fault lines of our cultural landscape. This is the best way to demonstrate the advantages of the post-woke approach compared to both the woke and anti-woke orthodoxies. People generally pay attention to something new, and prefer fresh ideas to talking points that have been repeated over and over again. Moreover, many people out there are actually looking for ways to build bridges across factions, perhaps because they want society to function again, or perhaps just because they don't want their family and friends to keep fighting the same old fights all the time. Anyway, the post-woke movement should provide these answers, when the woke and anti-woke factions can't and won't. Many people will appreciate it, and it will make our movement bigger and stronger over time.

Summing up, this is my three step plan for building the post-woke alternative: firstly, we need a lot of patience and perseverence, and recognition that this isn't going to be easy. Secondly, we need to seek opportunities to help more people question the status quo. Finally, we need to provide solutions to build bridges and resolve conflicts where the woke and anti-woke won't.

Two Perspectives: The Need for a Post Woke Alternative | TER Post Woke

Welcome to TaraElla Report Post Woke, where we consciously aim to move beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars, and towards a post-woke model of culture and politics.

Perspective 1: I have long been passionate about equality for minorities, addressing climate change, and being open-minded about different ways to solve our social problems. That is why I've always identified as a progressive. However, in recent years, I feel like progressives have been shooting ourselves in the foot. For some reason, the most divisive, counter-productive and literally stupid so-called 'solutions' are given the most attention, and the most controversial voices are often given the biggest platforms, as if the more controversial the better. This has generated nothing but backlash, which has prevented the necessary consensus building to make reforms possible. What I want is for there to be a way to move beyond this tragic situation.

Perspective 2: I believe in the value of traditions and traditional institutions. This is why I'm a conservative. However, I also believe that traditions must remain adaptive to remain relevant and maintain widespread support. The way to achieve this is to have good faith and respectful discussions about how we should move into the future, and to resolve our differences. The problem is that, modern conservatism is more like a culture war tribe that reinforces each others' existing views, and is not that interested in having productive discussions. The result is that they often hold onto maladaptive solutions and policies, which can ultimately lead to the discrediting of traditional values and institutions.

I think the problem with the current social and political discourse is that people are divided into two main tribes, each tribe exists in its own echo chamber, and the worst ideas in each echo chamber are allowed to become dominant, because of the lack of real challenge from other perspectives. Call it progressive vs conservative, woke vs anti-woke, or whatever, this is actually very unhealthy, and will certainly not lead our society towards good outcomes. This is why we need a post-woke alternative, where we acknowledge all that has gone wrong since the rise of the current round of the culture wars about a decade ago, and come together for a sincere discussion on how we can do better going forward.

The key to this is to puncture and disrupt the echo chambers that are the root cause of the current dynamic. The trouble is, this won't be an easy task, because the echo chambers are maintained by everything from confirmation bias and habitual behavioral patterns, to cancel culture, to deliberate organization and interests backed by lots of money. This means we need to consciously aim to disrupt the echo chambers, especially the dominant narratives in each echo chamber that are repeatedly reinforced. This disruption will be key to building the post-woke alternative. This is why, going forward, I will be talking a lot more about the strategies we can use to disrupt the echo chambers.

On Wokeness, Anti-Woke and Intellectualism | TER Post Woke

Why we need to bring back sincere intellectuals

Welcome to TaraElla Report Post Woke, where we consciously aim to move beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars, and towards a post-woke model of culture and politics. Today, I want to talk about why both the woke and anti-woke positions are insufficiently intellectual, and why a truly intellectual atmosphere is essential for a post-woke movement.

Let's start with the woke position first. As we have previously established, wokeness is actually rooted in philosophy and theory that came out of academia. This is why, to some people, it has the veneer of being intellectual. However, since the woke theories are not products of unbiased discussion and debate, truly open-minded truth seeking, and a commitment to objectivity, I would have to say that they are not truly 'intellectual' in the traditional sense. Rather, I think they are more like activists' wishes phrased in intellectual language. Indeed, one could argue that a worldview that fundamentally sees language, knowledge and discourse as products of power, and objectivity as nothing more than pretense, would actually be incompatible with being 'intellectual' in the traditional sense.

Given the intellectual deficiencies of wokeness, the anti-woke position could naturally have been built on a foundation of restoring the meaning of being an 'intellectual' in the traditional sense. And to some extent, the early anti-woke movement did go a bit in that direction. There was plenty of discussion about the values of the Enlightenment, why free speech is essential, and so on. But ultimately, the anti-woke movement came to be dominated by culture warriors, who had no patience for proper intellectual exploration and argumentation either. I believe this is why anti-woke intellectual projects like the Intellectual Dark Web (IDW) ultimately ended up quite hollow and unattractive after a while. The same talking points are repeated again and again, and the discourse seems to not be very open to unexplored possibilities. To be honest, I think many IDW figures sound more like culture warriors than sincere intellectuals nowadays.

I believe an important part of moving beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars is to actually bring back sincere intellectualism. We need people who are dedicated to exploring the objective truth of the world, rather than just seeing the world as they wish, or worse, selectively picking and choosing facts to build a biased narrative to suit their political agenda. We need people who actually want to have open-minded discussions about the important issues, rather than just wanting their side to 'win' and their 'enemies' to lose. A sincere intellectual today should be able to easily tell that both the woke and anti-woke positions are unsound. Sadly, too many people can't even see that right now.

The Problem with Anti-Woke and Anti-Anti-Woke | TER Post Woke

Why reaction is maladaptive, and will just perpetuate the problem

Welcome to TaraElla Report Post Woke, where we consciously aim to move beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars, and towards a post-woke model of culture and politics.

Today, I want to talk about two movements or perspectives that have arisen as a consequence of the rise of woke culture: anti-woke, and anti-anti-woke. I believe the 'reactive' nature of these movements have ultimately meant that they have just perpetuated the problems that were started by woke culture. I will illustrate how this happens, and what we should do instead to break the vicious cycle.

From what I see, the default stance of the anti-woke is to basically do the opposite of what woke culture demands every time, believing that this is an effective way to resist woke culture. Instead of critizing wokeness where it goes wrong, anti-woke culture prefers to 'trigger' the woke, by doing the opposite of what they want. For example, whatever woke culture wants to ban people from saying, the anti-woke will deliberately say it. Whatever groups woke culture upholds as 'oppressed' and hence worthy of special consideration above others, the anti-woke will deliberately dismiss their issues. The problem with this is, woke culture's enabling of the mistreatment of people based on immutable characteristics and group membership also transfers to anti-woke culture, because of its 'equal but opposite' response to everything woke. This inevitably leads to withholding decency, compassion and fairness from people by immutable characteristics and group membership sometimes. Furthermore, over time, because of its lazy reactionary posture, anti-woke has also developed into an increasingly conformist and predictable movement, and it has become effectively as unwelcoming of independent thinking as woke culture itself. Hence, anti-woke culture has replicated the two biggest errors of woke culture, i.e. the lack of independent thinking, and the normalization of dehumanizing people based on group membership.

The problems of anti-woke culture, and its ongoing association with elements of the authoritarian right, have led some people to adopt an anti-anti-woke stance in reaction. Anti-anti-woke starts with the position that the anti-woke movement is inherently bad, and whatever points they raise are inherently invalid or even dangerous. The problem with this, however, is that it leads to deliberately ignoring the problems brought by woke culture, and hence the normalization of these problems. This means that anti-anti-woke is basically complicit in the normalization of dehumanizing people based on group membership, and the erosion of the Enlightenment values of freedom of conscience, independent thinking and objectivity. Even if there are problems with the anti-woke movement, the answer is clearly not to ignore or suppress whatever they say.

The examples of anti-woke and anti-anti-woke demonstrate how taking a reactionary or oppositional stance is ultimately counter-productive. This is why it is better to go back to the roots of where woke culture went wrong, and address those problems directly. This way, we can be constructive rather than reactive. As I previously said, woke culture basically turned the desire for social justice into its opposite, through the application of theories rooted in postmodernism and critical theory. The way to stop this happening is to prevent those passionate about social justice from embracing these theories, and we can do that by upholding what I call the core post-woke values: decency, fairness and genuineness. By emphasizing these values, we can shine a light on how postmodernism and critical theory are flawed worldviews at their core, and hence begin to undo the problems that woke culture brought.

The Real Problem With Wokeness | TER Post Woke

How Wokeness Misdirected the Desire for Social Justice

Welcome to TaraElla Report Post Woke, where we consciously aim to move beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars, and towards a post-woke model of culture and politics.

I believe that, to truly move beyond wokeness, we need to understand where it went wrong. In my mind, the main difference between an anti-woke stance and a post-woke stance is that anti-woke only tries to 'attack' wokeness by doing the opposite of what it appears to demand, while post-woke actually aims to resolve the problem by correcting where wokeness went wrong, and putting things right again, so that we can move forward having conquered this obstacle.

So what is wokeness? While the term is now overused and has lost much of its clarity, going back to the way it was used before, we can argue that it refers to approaches to social change and activism rooted in postmodernism, critical theory, and adjacent ideas. These ideas are problematic because they often pit one group against another, and provide excuses for practices like cancel culture. The reason why they became popular was because they were offered as a ticket to improving social justice, even though this is clearly a false promise that can never be fulfilled. Hence, looking at it from a bigger picture perspective, wokeness is a misdirection of the impulse for social justice, that has driven a desire for compassion and fairness into its opposite, via a lot of misguided theory and philosophy. The misdirection of social justice into its opposite has caused both a well-justified backlash to postmodernism and critical theory, as well as a reactionary backlash to all social justice aims in general, with both parts of the backlash packaged into a broad 'anti-woke' movement. The overall effect of wokeness is therefore the confusion and defeat of social justice, as well as things like cancel culture, polarization, and the division of people by immutable characteristics.

As I just said, the biggest problem with wokeness is that it has turned the desire for social justice into its opposite. One of the most important ways this happens is through the routine description of certain groups as 'privileged', as in 'white privilege' or 'male privilege'. This is morally wrong for two reasons: firstly, to label a whole group of people, based on an immutable characteristic, is effectively an act of deliberately obscuring the differences in individual cases, which is very dehumanizing. This is clearly harmful from a justice point of view, if we are to truly care about there being justice for every individual. But even more importantly, to label a whole group of people as having unearned privilege is effectively an act of inviting people to treat them less favorably. To label people as privileged effectively says it is OK to treat them less well, less decently, less fairly. This psychological effect is undeniable, and is indeed consistent with some of what has been observed in real life in 'very woke' social circles in recent years.

The negative effects of calling people 'privileged' based on immutable characteristics may start with the groups being called privileged, but it surely doesn't end there either. Ultimately, the important thing here isn't which specific groups are being called 'privileged'. Rather, the important thing is that the normative value of treating everyone with the same decency and compassion, and the taboo against differential treatment of people based on membership of groups, are shattered. Once it becomes acceptable to treat people badly based on group-based perceptions, it can then apply in any direction, towards any group. Postmodern critical theory itself of course doesn't intend to allow this, as it clearly defines which groups are supposed to be 'oppressors' and which are 'oppressed' based on its analysis of history. However, human nature doesn't work like that, and there are strong evolutionary psychology reasons why people generally insist that the same rules and same conditions apply to everyone. Therefore, once postmodern critical theory breaks the normative values of liberalism, it unavoidably opens the floodgates to racism and bigotry in every direction. This is why, I believe, the rise of woke culture is the actual cause behind the recent rise in racism and bigotry across the Western world. This actually means we must put an end to woke culture if we want to end the current wave of bigotry targeted at minorities. This kind of analysis has sometimes been rendered taboo in so-called progressive circles, but it is clearly well justified, and I believe we need to give it much more attention if we want to make things better.

The other main problem with wokeness is that it often disrespects people's freedom of conscience and independent thinking. This is where things like cancel culture and deplatforming come from. This phenomenon, again, is rooted in theories based on postmodernism and critical theory. The overall worldview of these theories is that almost everything is changeable because they are all 'social constructs', and the barrier to radical progress is the current culture and its institutions, which form a power structure serving the interests of the oppressor groups against the oppressed. In this worldview, there is effectively no respect for the fact that people have an ability to think for themselves, and also no respect for the fact that people have reliable ways to discern the objective truth, even if they might be imperfect and might take some time. The denial of free thinking and free speech, as well as the denial of the importance of objectivity, are all clearly bad for justice, as history has shown.

As you can see, woke culture has been able to turn the desire of social justice into its opposite, through the application of theories rooted in the philosophies broadly described as postmodernism and critical theory. Therefore, the solution to stop this process from happening is to stop people who are passionate about social justice from embracing these faulty theories and believing in what they have to say. I think this can be best achieved by emphasizing certain values, which are a natural part of pro-social justice thinking, but are also an antidote to what is proposed in these theories. The values I propose are decency, fairness and genuineness. By demanding that decency and fairness be upheld at all times, there will be no room for things like calling people 'privileged' based solely on group membership. By demanding that genuineness and fairness be respected, there will be no room for things like cancel culture. The rise of woke culture reflects the failure of social justice advocates to uphold these values in the recent past, and the unconditional re-embrace of these values will rectify the problem. Therefore, I believe that decency, fairness and genuineness should be the three core post-woke values, the values that will lead us away from the mess created by woke culture.

How the Woke Wars Could Derail Libertarianism Again | Lib Lib Report

People are rightly concerned about history repeating itself

Welcome to the Lib Lib Report, i.e. the Liberal Libertarian Report, where we talk about news and current affairs from a liberal libertarian point of view. We aim for a practical pro-liberty politics encouraging things like free speech and free thought in the here and now, while aiming to make the social contract of Western society more libertarian moving towards the future.

Today, I want to talk about a crisis that is unfolding within libertarianism. Let's start with the controversy over the recent takeover of the US Libertarian Party by the Mises Caucus, although that's not what I really want to discuss. As I've said before, I'm not a big fan of the libertarian immediatism that the Libertarian Party insists on having as its platform, and given that I'm not a supporter of that party, I have generally not been interested in its internal politics. However, the current controversy seems more significant, because it goes to the heart of what libertarianism is, and hence implicitly what liberty is too. I mean, some libertarians, including both members and non-members of the party alike, are worried that this could ruin the commonly accepted view of what libertarianism is, and I'm sorry to say that I share their concerns too.

Let's start with the controversy itself. The Mises Caucus is a right-leaning faction within the Libertarian Party. Officially, they have a conventional right-libertarian platform, and there is quite a bit of diversity among their membership in terms of social views. However, it is the broader strategy of some members of the caucus that have gotten people concerned. To put it simply, prominent members of the Mises Caucus have been enthusiastically embracing the anti-woke side of the 'woke' culture wars, and other associated culture wars in the American political landscape. They are also not shy about their intention to attract new members and supporters that are really into these culture wars. The problem with this is that authoritarian conservatives and other right-wing authoritarians are also often participants in the anti-woke movement, and their ideas could dilute or even confuse libertarian positions. Indeed, non-Mises members of the Libertarian Party have accused the Mises Caucus of watering down traditional libertarian positions to make the party a more comfortable place for the authoritarian right, should they want to join. They cite the caucus's removal of the pro-choice plank in the party platform as evidence of this, for example.

Having experienced the horror show that was the 'paleo' strategy of the 1990s, many libertarians fear that this could be similar, or even worse. Even those who aren't totally opposed to the Mises Caucus fear that their methods will leave the party and the movement vulnerable to a further takeover by elements of the authoritarian right. I think this possibility, rather than the Mises Caucus itself, is what many people are actually worried about. In other words, I think the controversy over the Mises Caucus takeover is situated in a larger crisis, rooted in the fear of a more general authoritarian right takeover. The fallout is a symptom of the larger problem, one that people must be able to talk about openly.

Basically, I have two thoughts about this. Firstly, the libertarian movement is small and weak, and is able to be easily taken over by outside forces with their own agenda. The current fear simply reflects this reality, unfortunately. This is of course not new, as niche groups have often tried to insert their niche issues into various minor party platforms around the world, including libertarian parties. (Nor is it limited to the libertarian movement. The trans community has experienced a similar phenomenon in the past decade, for example.) This is also an important reason why I'm not a libertarian immediatist. For me, the important thing right now is to build a movement that will support and promote individual liberty, because a movement that is dedicated to this idea, rather than cutting government per se, would be much more resilient. By emphasizing practical liberty and rejecting libertarian immediatism, the liberty movement can also attract much more mainstream support, thereby making it much harder to take over.

Of course, what we are worried about right now is not just a niche group trying to insert itself into libertarianism, but a total takeover of libertarianism by bigger forces that could be described as authoritarian right-adjacent at least, if not in the authoritarian right itself. Given the situation we are potentially facing, I would even say that building a broad-based practical liberty movement is likely to be the only way to save the reputation of libertarianism going forward. And this is important, because in the Western political landscape, libertarians are the only players who consistently and credibly advance an anti-war agenda. The fall of libertarianism could lead to the total victory of the interventionists that brought us Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Secondly, the 'woke wars' in general, and the anti-woke movement in particular, have spiraled out of control in some ways. As I have recently said, the word 'woke' has lost its original meaning and much of the 'woke wars' are now basically empty tribal culture wars. And because the anti-woke alliance was an alliance of convenience in the first place, and an alliance that stood against rather than for something, its meaning and future are now up for grabs by whoever has the best organization, numbers and money. This could allow the anti-woke movement to be dominated by the authoritarian right rather than old-school liberals or libertarians, because the authoritarian right are simply better at organizing and fundraising. This is why I fear that woke vs anti-woke dynamics could work against liberals in both directions going forward, and the only way to take a stand for liberty is to find a way to transcend the tribalist 'woke wars' now.

That's why, going forward, I believe we should be 'post woke'. We should look at all issues objectively, on their own merits, rather than see them in a 'woke wars' state of mind. We should still be opposing postmodernism and critical theory, but we should do so on well reasoned grounds. And I will definitely call out people who use the 'woke' word as an empty insult, as a tribalist culture war thing. Because this certainly won't help to advance individual liberty.

Why It's Time We Moved to a Post-Woke Culture and Politics | TER Post Woke

On the limitations of Woke vs Anti-Woke, and why we need to change course now.

Welcome to TaraElla Report Post Woke, a new series where we consciously aim to move beyond the woke vs anti-woke culture wars, and towards a post-woke model of culture and politics.

In recent years, much has been said about there being a 'woke vs anti-woke' divide in Western culture and politics. It all started about a decade ago, when, due to a combination of factors, ideas from postmodernism and critical theory began to increasingly influence parts of the progressive side of politics. Over the course of just a few years, practices that challenged traditional liberal values, like deplatforming speakers, cancel culture, oppressor vs oppressed models of identity politics, thinking of people as pieces in a system rather than equal individuals, and skepticism towards science and objectivity, began to influence progressive movements like feminism, environmentalism, and LGBT equality. These ideas also found their way into progressive-adjacent cultures like atheism and veganism. They have been received controversially in all of these areas, dividing people in these communities into being for them or against them, which later came to be known as woke and anti-woke respectively.

I guess there was a time when having an 'anti-woke coalition', as it was originally understood, actually made sense. Back when postmodernism and critical theory were poorly understood by most, it was probably the most effective way to push back against this rise of illiberalism on the Left that seemed to have come out of nowhere. If anything, having a strong coalition aligned against these ideas was an effective method of raising awareness, and we needed to do so quickly, because of the rapid rise of this new illiberal faction in the Left. Besides, in those days, it was mainly progressive, liberal and moderate people involved in the coalition, which meant the reactionary faction wasn't dominant.

However, we are now in a different place. There is now plenty of awareness and resistance towards postmodernism, critical theory, and their associated ideas and methods. I mean, critical race theory has gone from obscurity to a widely discussed topic in just two years, and I think it is great that we are discussing these ideas and their faults so openly and so frequently. However, we also need to realize that the so-called 'woke' ideas aren't entirely going away anytime soon. For those hoping for a complete victory, I need to burst your bubble. These ideas have been established in parts of academia and activism for so long that they would be here in some form for the foreseeable future, and we will just have to live with it while not letting it take over, until perhaps one or two more generations down the line, when the intellectual landscape of the West would have had enough time to organically evolve away from these ideas. Therefore, I believe we need to think in terms of the long term, as to what we should do next.

The problem I see with the 'woke vs anti-woke' model right now is that it is evolving rapidly into an 'us vs them' game, and likely a successor to the old-school left vs right culture wars. As many of us already know, the left vs right culture wars were pretty unhealthy, because it divided people into opposing camps in an unsound way, thus encouraging tribalism. If we are to seriously sort people out by their political views, we would need at least three axes, namely economic, capitalist vs socialist; social, progressive vs conservative; and governmental, libertarian vs authoritarian. Given the issues of particular importance in contemporary Western politics, we might also need pro-globalization vs nationalist, pro-peace vs hawkish, and pro-establishment vs anti-establishment, since the three basic axes don't capture these views very well. In other words, any simplistic dichotomous model would just be encouraging tribalism while not being actually useful. This applies equally to the old-school left vs right and the new woke vs anti-woke.

And we are already seeing the unhealthy and counterproductive results of the 'woke vs anti-woke' model's evolution into a tribalist politics. People are already using the word 'woke' to describe things they don't like which have nothing to do with postmodernism or critical theory. As I previously said, 'woke' now effectively means whatever you don't like. Hence the old-school liberals can call the criticalists 'woke', but the hardline conservatives can also call the old-school liberals 'woke'. The problem with this is that 'woke' effectively becomes a lazy insult, and this is not good for independent thinking and pursuit of the objective truth. Moreover, if 'woke' means nothing solid, its meaning becomes vulnerable to constant change, essentially defined by the prevailing political fashions and alliances of the moment. This, in turn, can cause anti-woke culture to become a backdoor for authoritarian elements to take over pro-liberty movements, as some members and supporters of the US Libertarian party have recently begun to worry about.

To sum up, the 'anti-woke coalition' of the 2010s have already achieved their purpose, and that was to shine a spotlight on the faulty ideas of postmodernism and critical theory, and put this issue into the mainstream of Western political discourse. However, the 'woke vs anti-woke' model of politics has also inevitably become tribal and is rapidly losing its original meaning, and could even be vulnerable to takeover by authoritarian forces, which means that we must question its utility going forward. This is an important question because postmodernism and critical theory are not going to disappear any time soon, and we will need to live with these ideas while continuing to argue against them for the foreseeable future. The question then becomes, firstly, is the 'woke vs anti-woke' model a good model for the long term, and if not, what model should we choose instead. Given that effective arguments against postmodernism and critical theory must be philosophically sound and rooted in a commitment to the objective reality to be successful, a tribalist model like 'woke vs anti-woke' is probably not the best choice for making those arguments, especially in the longer term.

Therefore, I think it's time we start actively moving to a 'post woke' mode, where we remain very conscious of the faulty ideas of postmodernism and critical theory, and their adverse influence on contemporary Western culture and politics, but instead of just being negative about these ideas, we should start being more constructive, and more thoughtful about building alternatives that actually fulfill the yearning for progress and inclusion, and still reinforce the heritage of the liberalism rooted in the Western Enlightenment. The awareness that the anti-woke moment brought has been essential to getting us to where we are, and will be essential to ensure that whatever we come up with in the future isn't contaminated by postmodernism and critical theory. However, I believe we need to change course now, and go more positive rather than negative, to actually stand for something rather than just against something.

The other thing that differentiates post-woke from anti-woke is that, having learned from how postmodernism and critical theory misdirect the desire for social justice, the post-woke mind is much more alert to other movements that could try to misdirect our inherent impulse towards good things like individualism, fairness, compassion and so on. The post-woke continues to oppose wokeism, as originally defined, but they also turn the same critical analysis on other political factions and movements, including those which claim to be anti-woke, because they are aware that bad ideas, the lure of authoritarianism, and politics with an intent to manipulate people emotionally, don't just come in one flavor. 

The Obsessions of the Illiberal Left and the Illiberal Right | Lib Lib Report

The Illiberal Left is about deconstruction, and the Illiberal Right is about literalism.

Welcome to the Lib Lib Report, i.e. the Liberal Libertarian Report, where we talk about news and current affairs from a liberal libertarian point of view. We aim for a practical pro-liberty politics encouraging things like free speech and free thought in the here and now, while looking for more libertarian solutions moving towards the future.

Recently, I have been talking about how the illiberal left and the illiberal right are similar in many ways, including their blind faith in utopian fantasies, and the influence of critical theory on both movements. Today, however, I am going to look at a key difference between the illiberal left and the illiberal right. I think it is because of this difference that the two can't ever be united.

From what I see, the biggest difference between the illiberal left and the illiberal right is what they are most obsessed about. The illiberal left is obsessed with deconstruction. For the illiberal left, every part of the status quo, every structure and every institution, is a product of oppressive power relations, and needs to be deconstructed to bring about liberation. The illiberal left is illiberal because they believe the freedoms guaranteed by liberalism are part of the oppressive structure to maintain the status quo, to prevent the dismantling of the status quo. I believe this view is illustrated most clearly in Herbert Marcuse's infamous essay Repressive Tolerance, where he essentially says that liberalism's universal tolerance leads to the upholding of the repressive and oppressive status quo, and that a truly liberating tolerance must be selectively intolerant to some ideas, i.e. illiberal at least some of the time. Hence, the basic logic of the illiberal left looks like this: the freedoms guaranteed by liberalism make the liberated utopia they desire impossible to achieve, so they must be knocked down.

Meanwhile, the illiberal right is obsessed with literalism, as in the literal reading of statements and rules, and the rigid obedience to such rules. We all know that conservative Christianity often insists on a literal reading of the Bible. However, this worldview is not limited to religion. Conservative legal academics and judges approach the law with the same literalism, for example. I think some conservatives' attitudes on LGBT issues also stem from their worldview that everything should function according to rigid rules, and their discomfort about LGBT rights could stem from their discomfort about what are clearly exceptions to the rule. For the authoritarian right, liberalism is bad because it allows people the freedom of conscience to interpret the rules of life, and to potentially break the rules some regard as sacred. When they speak of the 'common good', it is really the society-wide obedience to the sacred rules that they have in mind. Which, of course, is not what many of us would consider to be the common good.

A recent concern is that the illiberal right could start using judicial literalism to read down legal rights to liberty, so that the government could have more scope to legislate morality. This is in fact my biggest concern about the recent leaked US Supreme Court opinion on abortion and Roe v. Wade. This is not about whether Roe itself was the correct legal decision or not, but rather, the logic used to overturn Roe in the opinion. From what I understand, the logic is that, since the right to privacy is not explicitly stated in the US constitution, there is no rule that it must be respected by governments, at least not to the extent implied in Roe. Many people are concerned that this could set a precedent to roll back other rights, and I agree with them. The authoritarian right clearly intends to take a very narrow, literalist view on the guarantees to liberty in Western liberal democracies. Under their worldview, government action could be justified as long as it does not literally violate the word of the constitution. There is no respect for the broader spirit of liberty at all. For the authoritarian right, only the literal words of the law matter, the broader values of liberty don't. I guess this is why they think they can transform the West to resemble illiberal democracies like Hungary, while still being true to the traditions of the West.

In conclusion, while the illiberal left and the illiberal right are similarly unrealistic, utopian, disrespectful to others' freedoms, and influenced by critical theory, their ultimate objective is different, and this is why they can't really unite to form a firm anti-liberal bloc. The illiberal left's objective is to dismantle the status quo, while the illiberal right's objective is to remake society into one that is rigidly bound by black and white rules that are often religiously inspired. These two goals are clearly incompatible with each other. I think certain personality traits, e.g. perfectionism and black and white thinking, could predispose a person towards both goals, and I think this could explain why there are so many people who switch from the illiberal left to the illiberal right, and vice versa. But one can only be committed to either goal at one time. Therefore, while illiberal people can and do switch camps, the two camps can't ever be combined into one.

A Libertarian Argument for the Pro-Choice Position | Lib Lib Report

It doesn't even depend on your moral views on abortion itself.

Welcome to the Lib Lib Report, i.e. the Liberal Libertarian Report, where we talk about news and current affairs from a liberal libertarian point of view. We aim for a practical pro-liberty politics encouraging things like free speech and free thought in the here and now, while looking for more libertarian solutions moving towards the future.

The leak of a US Supreme Court draft opinion suggesting the overturn of Roe v. Wade earlier this month has reignited the long standing debate between pro-choice libertarians and pro-life libertarians. At the heart of the matter is whether the proper libertarian position regarding abortion should be pro-choice or pro-life. I want to talk about my thoughts on this matter, and how this might inform the liberal libertarian orientation in politics in the here and now. Before we start, I have to make it clear that what I'm going to talk about does not directly concern the legal merits of Roe itself, or the leaked opinion. It is about pro-life vs pro-choice positions in libertarianism, and the arguments are equally applicable in other situations. I must also say that I don't pretend to speak for other libertarians, and these are just my own thoughts. As they say, if there are ten libertarians in the room, there is likely going to be ten different positions taken on an issue. And this diversity is certainly something I welcome.

Let's start with this story about a friend of mine. She is a religious person, and she certainly believes that abortion is morally equivalent to taking an innocent life. But then, she has never been a fan of getting the government involved in this issue. Given that the most vocal pro-life activists often like to equate abortion with murder, and hence equate legal abortion with the absurd position of legalizing murder, my friend has never been one to voice her opinions in public, because she was worried that they might ask her something like 'so you think murder should be legal?' My friend used to think that her views were deeply unpopular until this month, when the heated debate over Roe v. Wade revealed that there were indeed plenty of people who shared her views. Apparently, even among those who believe abortion is morally equivalent to taking an innocent life, they don't necessarily have to equate it with murder, at least legally speaking.

To understand this, I think we should step back and take a look at the larger picture. The argument of the staunchest pro-life activists basically goes like this: given abortion is morally equivalent to murder in their view, how can it be acceptable that murder is generally punishable by the maximum penalty available, while abortion is legally allowed? However, the assumption of that argument is that the government's role in society is that of moral enforcer, and it should always punish behavior that is immoral. This view is basically rooted in the social contract of the pre-Enlightenment West, where everyone lived by and agreed to moral values that were determined by the authorities, which was generally the church, based on religious tradition and scripture. The problem with this model was that everyone had to agree to be bound by the the laws of Christianity in the first place, and also the authority of the church in interpreting the religious law. This was not that much of a problem in pre-Enlightenment times, given that the vast majority of people in Europe were Christians, and they also closely obeyed the decisions of the church hierarchy in matters of faith.

The Enlightenment challenged the absolute authority of the church, and this was where things changed. As I liked to say, liberalism is basically rooted in freedom of religion. Liberalism represented a new social contract, one that was necessary to maintain the peace, in a Western world that no longer universally accepted the supremacy of a unified religious authority. Given that morality was deeply tied to religion, the end of religious agreement would, at least to some extent, also mean the end of moral agreement on many issues. This made the old social contract where the government was society's enforcer of morality unacceptable, and indeed oppressive, to a significant number of people in society. The horrible religious conflicts in Europe back then demonstrated this point very well. Hence, liberalism arose to give Western society a different social contract: one where the government plays no role in determining and enforcing standards of morality, but instead functions to guarantee that every citizen has an equal right to live life according to their own moral conscience, as long as other citizens' rights to do the same is equally respected. Of course, social change is slow, and this idea, while already long firmly embedded into the legal traditions and institutions of the Western world, is still yet to be fully implemented, or to fully supplant pre-Enlightenment cultural views. Hence, even today, both the authoritarian Left and the authoritarian Right continue to demand that governments legislate for the common good, or react swiftly to moral panics of all kinds, without much regard for the requirements of the liberal social contract. This, I believe, is where a lot of the unnecessary culture war style political conflicts come from. Libertarianism is basically a movement to end this state of confusion, and move the Enlightenment's ideals forward to their logical conclusion, by fully realizing the implementation of the liberal social contract in the Western world.

It follows that, in a fully libertarianized society, with a fully liberal social contract, the government simply can't legislate against something because people find it morally wrong. They can only legislate to ensure the equal standing of parties to the social contract. Murder would still be illegal because it violates the rights of another party to the social contract. Abortion, however, would be different. Countries cannot practically consider fetuses to be citizens with full rights of citizenship. For practical reasons, citizenship can only begin at birth. There is a reason that our documents have our date of birth, not our date of fertilization. Even when abortion was illegal, fetuses were not considered citizens. Therefore, fetuses cannot be considered parties to the social contract. This means that abortion cannot be considered a violation of the rights of a party to the social contract, and cannot be outlawed on these grounds. It can only be considered a matter of morality, which under a libertarian social contract, the government should have no ability to legislate over. Therefore, abortion and murder are indeed very different, no matter what your moral views on abortion are. From this, it can also be concluded that the correct libertarian position on the matter of abortion is the pro-choice position. Again, this doesn't even have to depend on your moral views on abortion itself.

Of course, here on the Lib Lib Report, we are not libertarian immediatists. While we want to move society towards the libertarian destination in the long run, we recognize that this is not where we are at right now, which is why we practice a more pragmatic liberalism in the here and now. We recognize that the current social contract of Western liberal democracy is not yet the libertarian one, and calls to legislate based on morality and the common good are not universally considered illegitimate in the West at this time. However, given that we are Liberal Libertarians, with a libertarian destination for society in mind, I think we should aim to move towards, and not away from, that destination as much as possible, in the policy positions we support. Especially given that abortion has already been legal in America and most other Western democracies for decades, to outlaw abortion now would be to take a big leap backwards, away from the libertarian destination, something that is simply not acceptable for those of us committed to taking society towards the libertarian destination. This, I think, is a very good justification for taking the pro-choice position in the politics of the here and now.

The Justice Argument Against Critical Theory | Lib Lib Report

Welcome to the Lib Lib Report, i.e. the Liberal Libertarian Report, where we talk about news and current affairs from a liberal libertarian point of view. We aim for a practical pro-liberty politics encouraging things like free speech and free thought in the here and now, while looking for more libertarian solutions moving towards the future.

In this episode, I want to talk about how we can more effectively argue against critical theory, while holding the ground of justice. The arguments I will make here can apply to critical race theory or any other form of critical theory. Therefore, I am going to use the neutral descriptors 'group A' and 'group B' to make my argument.

To do this, we really need to dissect the core argument of critical theory opponents. Basically, the form of the argument is like this: the average outcomes of group A and group B are different. If you believe that the people in group A and group B are equally capable, then you must acknowledge that it is discrimination and oppression, including historical oppression, that has caused the difference. To not acknowledge that means that you either don't care about oppression, or worse, you don't actually believe that group A and group B are equal.

However, there is a major flaw with this argument. Even if we acknowledge historical disadvantages as important contributors to the inequality we observe, it doesn't mean we should conclude that all of group A is privileged over group B, and the right way to address oppression is to pit group B against group A. For example, the better average outcomes in group A could be due to a minority of people from group A having had access to certain advantages that people in group B couldn't access. However, the majority of people in group A also didn't have access to these advantages. Moreover, while people in group B might have experienced a specific form of historical injustice, many in group A might have experienced other forms of historical injustice. Therefore, to label the whole group A as 'privileged' would be unfair, and to enact policies based on this view would be against justice. The fact is, if people in group B deserve redress for their historical oppression, so do many people in group A!

This doesn't mean we can't do anything about historical injustice. While I do acknowledge the importance of acknowledging historical circumstances, it would generally be unfair to consider people in groups or pseudo-classes according to immutable characteristics when we are doing that. Instead, we need to make the playing field as equal as possible for everyone. This is best done using universally applied policies. For example, a universal basic income (UBI) scheme would provide an economic safety net for everyone, and allow people the space to pursue opportunities in life. This would help in leveling the playing field for everyone disadvantaged by historical circumstances, regardless of race, gender or other immutable characteristics. It would help cancel out the historical injustice people suffer, regardless of demographics.