I came across this article in my draft file, but I do not recall if I ever posted it. If I have, this is a re-post.
There is a pattern in leftist thinking I have seen often enough to disturb me, but not often enough to declare it by any means universal.
They act like dumb people who desperately want to be thought bright; they act like immoral people looking for some easy way to clothe themselves in the mantle of morality, but not a morality that makes any demands or imposes any duties.
One way a dumb person makes himself look smart, is by talking about pseudo-science as if it were real science: hence they read Rachel Carson and Paul Erlich and Margaret Mead, notorious frauds, and consider it scientific to conclude that banning DDT preserves birds. Either they do not know about or do not care about deaths from malaria in Africa. They consider it scientific to conclude that the world will enter a period of mass starvation and death by 1980, with England and India perishing. That this date passed twenty years ago with no sign of the Malthusian chaos makes no dent in their credulity. Indeed, respectable arguments can be made that the West suffers from underpopulation: Europe is not reproducing at replacement rates.
They consider it scientific to conclude that gender roles are not based in biology, and that only social artifice ties sexual reproduction (the sex act) to sexual reproduction (the reproductive act). This a conclusion so absurd that it cannot be uttered in English without a paradox.
They consider studies showing a link between high gun ownership rates and low crime rates to be heresy; scientific findings on the difference between male and female neural chemistry and psychology to be anathema; scientific studies suggesting a minor difference in the average IQ test scores between the races to be too abominable to bear discussion in public.
At the same time, this same confidence in pseudo-science tells us that Darwinian evolution can explain the moral nature of mankind, that altruism is a matter of selfish genes in an uncle protecting a percentage of like genes in a nephew. We are also told that aborting one`s own children is moral. Two propositions cannot be more clearly in direct logical contradiction: abortion must have a negative effect in the Darwinian statistics related to passing one`s traits on to the next generation, except in the limited case that overpopulation results in more deaths of one`s offspring than the proposed abortions.
None of them are `scientific` enough to draw the obvious conclusion that, if Darwinism is the sole justification for morality, then abortion and gay marriage are immoral, being sterile; whereas any socially-imposed sexual rules that urge or force women to have as many children as possible are amply justified, such as chastity, disenfranchisement, polygamy, concubinage, anything. By this logic, lobotomizing women, if it increased the numbers in the next generation would be justified; likewise educating women, if it increased the number in the next generation would be justified, but only if it increased numbers, not as a good in and of itself.
Please note, those of you who have actually read Darwin (something I find as rare as people who have actually read the holding in Roe v. Wade) that Darwin says nothing of the kind. He speaks of inheritable characteristics being passed to the next generation in greater numbers in situations where variations in the breed have, for whatever reason, found a better adaptation to the circumstances: his significant claim is that breeds differentiate into species by this means, hence the name of his work, ORIGIN OF SPECIES.
That morality is an inheritable characteristic is a speculation, and even if true, it would seem to be a rarefied inheritance. The moral natures of great leaders, even of Philosopher-Kings, are not always passed to sons; just ask Marcus Aurelius. Or a preacher s kid. We would have to be discussing a mere tendency, which in some cases a man`s virtue can overturn, in which case, we are merely discussing the different strengths of certain temptations universal to the human`species; whereupon Darwinian selection becomes, not the fountainhead of moral reasoning, but of the very things reason tells us are immoral.
Beside, if moral natures were inherited properties, then the sons of thieves would be thievish, the sons of greedy men would be greedy, the lusty sons of polygamists would be polygamists, and so on. What was true for families would be true for tribes and races: every racist stereotype would be, if not confirmed, then at least the subject of legitimate scientific study. Can you imagine any Leftist approving a scientific study to identify the genes that made Blacks thievish, Jews greedy, or Turk lusty? Would anyone, Left or Right, pretend such an idea is scientific? One cannot even write the sentence without provoking howls of outrage. Yet the Outraged do not realize that the outrage is not directed against those who believe man`s moral character is his own responsibility; it is directed against those who believe this pseudo-Darwinian argle-bargle trying to explain morals as instinctive animalistic behaviors.
Bright people who are actually bright exhibit two characteristics: their thoughts are unconventional, and they react with curiosity to ideas that offer legitimate challenge to their own. Dim people who are pretending to be bright impersonate the behavior without understanding it. Instead of being unconventional, they adopt a pre-written script of the shopworn fashionable ideas, which they praise for being a bold and controversial challenge to the dullness of Bourgeoisie parochialism and hypocrisy. That this is itself hypocrisy of the most transparent stripe escapes their notice.
They cannot and do not even express their ideas in a new way, but must use the same tired slogans and catch-phrases, and, above all, the same maddening Orwellian euphemisms; so much so that this behavior has become a commonplace, and been given its own name, Political Correctness. Political Correctness has many rules, but just one theme: one must never identify the object of speech. The best example of this is the names the left select for themselves, which they must pick with a particular ear toward hypocrisy.
`Liberal` literally mean one who favors human freedom, such as, for example, the right to bear arms, the ability to select a toilet bowl of a proper size, the ability to hire and fire such workers as please you, the ability to select a school and a schooling for your child, the ability to speak on campus without fear of language police, and so on.
`Liberal` literally mean one who favors human freedom, such as, for example, the right to bear arms, the ability to select a toilet bowl of a proper size, the ability to hire and fire such workers as please you, the ability to select a school and a schooling for your child, the ability to speak on campus without fear of language police, and so on.
`Liberal` literally mean one who favors human freedom, such as, for example, the right to bear arms, the ability to select a toilet bowl of a proper size, the ability to hire and fire such workers as please you, the ability to select a school and a schooling for your child, the ability to speak on campus without fear of language police, and so on.
`Progressive` literally means one who favors human progress, such things as anti-slavery, and the growth of the sciences, useful arts, and industries. Progress means capitalism, a word which itself was invented as a slur against liberty to buy and sell.
`Democrat` means one who favors democracy, such as who would allow the nation to vote on the question of abortion, rather than have it be decided for us by unelected Justices, or who would abide by the outcome of election results without arguing about dangling chads.
`Egalitarian` means one who believes in the equality of man, not a rule by a self-appointed, self-anointed elite.
Even to use the term `Leftist` as I have done here, is mildly inaccurate: the idea of the Left-Right spectrum is a socialist idea, premised on the notion that the Left favors the dictatorship of the proletarians, destroying the free market in the name of the World Revolution and the Right favors the dictatorship of the Throne and Altar, or a military dictatorship, destroying the free market in the name of National Supremacy. Nowhere in the spectrum is there a place for someone who favors equal and neutral laws for both rich and poor, a free market, and no dictatorship of any kind.
The second characteristic, that of welcoming debate and dissent … well, I cannot even finish this sentence. The facts speak for themselves. I have yet to debate a single one of them, a single one, who did not use personal attacks instead of addressing the issue. No matter how the argument is presented, no matter what facts are brought to the fore, the only response I get is inarticulate outpourings telling me what a stupid, evil, crazy, bad man I am. I have been called a fascist and a racist, for no other reason than I do not think the laws should discriminate on the basis of race, and that the government must step aside and not interfere in an inviolate private sphere of human life. But, not to worry, the words `fascist` and `racist` no longer mean anything but `one who is winning an argument with a Leftist.`
As with intelligence, so with morals: they seek the most cost-effective way to wrap themselves in a mantle of moral superiority, so they can look down on the rest of us, without actually undertaking the turmoil of moral calculation, the difficulty of being just, the weight of shouldering difficult moral obligations. Here is where Freud come to the rescue: the modern notion of moral reasoning is the opposite of the norm, which said that self-command and habits of virtue were need to hold man`s natural evil impulses in check. Freudians (who know as little of Freud as Darwinists know of Darwin. Freud s writings, at least what few I ve read, make claims far less dramatic than what is ascribed to his name) reversed this, claiming all natural impulses by definition good, and all exercise of shame and self-command bad, a repression that lead to mental disease. Following this, the new morality was invented which consists of nothing more than repudiating morality as old-fashioned, repressive, racist, sexist, double-plus ungood: all word-noises of no particular meaning. Anyone who cannot live up to a high standard, but who strives to nonetheless is dismissed as a hypocrite. Only those with no standards escape this condemnation. Hence, to be authentic, means to give into one`s impulses without forethought or concern for consequences; it means to be rude, to prey on gullible women, or, if your taste runs in that direction, gullible boys.
Whatever is done is ascribed to the flaws of society. The guilty are pardoned, protected, and released (I will only mention the example of Willie Horton in passing) and the victims who suffer real harm, as at the hands of violence criminals, do not appear anywhere in the Leftist moral calculation: they are unpersons. The Left do not hate them, as much as drift without awareness that actions have consequences, and that releasing violent criminals into society increases violent crime. The innocent, when they are not ignored, are condemned (I will mention the victims of 9/11 condemned as `little Eichmanns` by Ward Churchill, or Michael Moore`s ghoulish comment wishing the deaths had been visited on Bush voters).
Those who are not victims except in an imaginary sense receive the full protection of the Leftist moral outrage. Muslims, for example, are protected to the extent that even when they go through the pantomime of preparing another high-jacking, their claim to be the victims of anti-Arab racism is treated with grave respect. But when? They have not been the subject of any discriminatory laws banning them from public restrooms, voting, or sitting in the front of the bus, to my knowledge. Even the miscegenation laws once on the books in Maryland and Virginia (Yes, I looked them up) do not mention Arabs as being on the prohibited list. We are not talking about what blacks or even Jews suffered in this country`s history. Those of you who remember the heady days after 9/11 might recall how the newspapers were filled to the brim with furrowed brows fretting over hate crimes and backlashes, and the crime rate against Arabs in the country instead was dropping. When I brought this up in a conversation, the sweet young Leftist with whom I spoke earnestly (they are so very earnest, when they are young) told me the facts did not matter, only the perception. I pointed out the perception, or, to call it by its right name, hysteria, was entirely a fiction produced by an irresponsible press.
The reason, friends, why the Left reacts with such blinding malice when challenged, is, of course, deep down they know they are putting on an act. They are no more qualified to teach, to lecture, to preach, to pontificate, than a Jerry Lewis character who stumbles into a lectern by mistake. They are not qualified to hold an intellectually serious conversation, because the core of their world is based on a presumption of intellectual superiority: a profoundly unserious pose. They know its fragility, and hence the vehemence of their reactions.
