Neo-progressivism paves the path to nihilism and an intellectual dark age. Pursuing prosperity means having individual liberty.
When I was in my 20s and early 30s, I considered myself a liberal. In fact, I thought the idea of conservatism was mismatched with modern times. How can one fight so hard to keep the status quo in a world where new technology seeps into our lives and impacts us on such a regular basis?
First world navel gazing aside, we now have tremendous power to right wrongs, solve complex problems and sculpt the world around us in unprecedented ways. Such potential is ripe to be seized by the capable hands of open-minded, well-meaning and vigorous optimists. That’s what being a liberal is all about: the idea of harnessing unlimited potential to do great things and move the human species forward.
Reading about the history of progressivism and its roots in the European Enlightenment, I became convinced of the idea that we live in a dichotic world, in which each person has only the choice between progress and darkness. Very little existed in between. Not that there was anything wrong with being politically conservative — I knew plenty of brilliant and accomplished conservatives — but the earth’s future was not theirs to inherit.
Things changed, of course. I got older and experienced a number of personal developments related to family, career, spirituality, health and social life that altered my perspective. I lived overseas and traveled more extensively, seeing the world through a different lens. My income rose.
Perhaps more than anything, though, traditional 20th Century American liberalism evolved into something far more complicated and dangerous. While social justice and compassion for the poor and vulnerable have always been liberal values, the willingness to pursue related goals by all means necessary is new. Or at least, the social revolution aspects of liberalism were formerly championed only on the fringe. Not so today.
Meanwhile, belief that America is a great country used to be a quality shared by liberals and conservatives alike. Far too often today it seems that American patriotism is considered the province of the lesser educated, or should be passed off as rank nationalism. On the other hand, recognition of the numberless sins and missteps that characterize U.S. history is a prerequisite for carrying a liberal card. Support for the idea of a flawed, apologetic America has become en vogue.
Even more chillingly, the idea of liberalism today has morphed into neo-progressivism. Defined culturally by its rallying cry of overthrowing the rigged establishment (a trait shared by many on the fascist right), its signature political features include the collectivist ideas running through Western European social democracy and, at worst, 19th Century Marxist labor theory.
But beyond philosophy, the two worst signs of liberalism losing its way are the new mass movement, daily exemplified on college campuses, to limit or shut down unpopular free speech, and the complete lack of concern — perhaps better described as enthusiastic support for — an ever-metastasizing size of government bureaucracy. The reason these issues present such a problem for the contemporary liberal movement is that both are decidedly not liberal. By definition, both work at odds with some of the most crucial ideas in which American liberalism has its roots, including freedom of the individual, civil liberty, and faith in a market-based, if mixed, economy.
Obviously, finding the balance between maximizing individual freedoms and what’s good for the community has always been a challenge. But the American liberal prided himself on striking that balance with unwavering commitment to the welfare of human beings. Today, that proud aim along with all others have become subordinate to state-sanctioned social engineering.
Perhaps the clearest way to demonstrate this conversion of mainstream liberalism to a virulent strain of neo-progressivism is to look at the official platform website of Hillary Clinton. Currently, as of August 2016, there are 38 primary issues highlighted, each of which has anywhere from a small handful to a dozen sub-issues under it, numbering her campaign’s government priorities well into the hundreds.
Where she stands on the issues themselves is beside the point. The more important question is where the rights of individuals end and those of the state begin. Hillary’s veritable grab bag of ideas includes policies on:
- Animal protection during natural disasters
- College campus sexual assault disciplinary reform
- Funding for youth homeless welcoming shelters
- Federal protection for gender identity discrimination
- Connecting recreation centers with high speed internet
- Addressing the unemployment of disabled persons
- Increased investment in condoms for HIV-negative gay men
That’s just a sampling. Granted, these issues are important to many Americans. Rational, civil arguments can be made to support government action on any number of these fronts (as well as the many, many other policy ideas that Hillary’s team champions). However, it is beyond dispute that for every action that a government takes, resources must be made available to support it, meaning something else must be given up to get it. Never mind whether or not the founding fathers would have been comfortable with a federal government that has its hands into so many dimensions of American life.
Unfortunately, the level of discourse in this country has reached such a point of ideological extremism that protesting these ideas often means being met with accusations of prejudice and all its relatives: racism, misogyny, homophobia, xenophobia, etc. Dissenters of the new liberal orthodoxy are often labeled bigots on the front page of some of this country’s most esteemed media outlets, including the Washington Post and the New York Times — thereby giving intellectual sanctuary to narrowness of thought.
The natural progression of a government goliath and its accompanying censors is the need to segregate people into categories so that each can be pandered to and promised its “entitled by rights” special treatment, thereby giving license to more bureaucratic bloat. Not surprisingly, today’s Democratic Party, the traditional home of the American liberal, has become an official vehicle for statism and identity politics. These are not forward facing ideas, and have instead been historically efficient guarantors of subjugation and disunity.
We should rightly regard this as ominous news. When the signature organization of liberalism has become nearly as regressive as its conservative opposition, the nation’s political alignment may be on the brink of a tectonic shift.
It’s not the first time this has happened. The original liberals whose ideas fomented the American Revolution — John Locke and Voltaire, among others — and the classical liberals of the late 19th Century — including John Stuart Mill, who pushed libertarian ideas of rational self-interest — eventually gave way to perverse forms of early 20th Century progressivism, including the Eugenics movement. Arguably the deadliest ideology in human history, communism, had underpinnings in early forms of liberalism.
Regardless, what’s needed now more than ever is open conversation, honest exploration of issues and face-to-face dialogue rather than last word arguments and social media trolling. If liberalism is ever going to count on the support of folks like myself, it will need to get back to its founding tenets, which revolve around the unrestricted freedom of ideas and belief in the social contract.
The strength of this country, while aided along the way by a powerful and principled government, always lay in a people that believed in their own freedom. Only through that continued commitment to freedom — to think, talk and act on their conscience — can any of us seize our innate potential. And only then can we pursue a greater good, whether it be via scientific discovery, academic inquiry, or economic opportunity. That is what liberals are supposed to stand for.
Image courtesy of Flickr user Scott Wylle.