Items Posted by Jim Kalb
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Jan 7 06:15:28 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: Moslems bring ruin everywhere
References: <000201c1972e$ab343620$6d5a580c@h6l3p>
Status: RO
"la" writes:
la> The writer V. S. Naipaul has
la> recently pointed out that the destructiveness of the Moslem
la> Conquest is at the root of India's appalling poverty today.=20
This seems unreasonable to me. The Mughal empire was established about
500 years ago and they were in power until the Brits arrived, so the
conquest he's talking about must have been before then. Whatever caused
India's poverty it wasn't destructive acts 500+ years ago. And if it was
Islam in general rather than specific events then Muslim parts of India
should be more impoverished than Hindu parts, which I don't think is the
case.
In his book on India Naipaul also writes *extremely* negatively about
some Hindu kingdom in Southern India that succeeded in fending off the
Moslems for several hundred years. He doesn't make it clear what his
objection is, just that he thinks they were somehow weird. I don't think
he's completely sensible on these subjects. He is far more sensible than
most people who write about colonialism etc. but I think it's difficult
for him as for others to keep personal issues altogether out of the mix.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Jan 8 06:50:23 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: more on UN and a world without power, without war, without victory, and without peace
References: <002e01c197f9$79b76ec0$7e5c580c@h6l3p>
Status: RO
"la" writes:
la> The UN ideology doesn't believe
la> in power. It believes in a world without power and seeks to
la> banish all legitimate power holders. As a result, it ends up in
la> a world of eternally simmering disorder, "administered" over by UN
la> bureaucrats.
Another consequence is that "root causes" must be addressed, if they
aren't then "the cycle of violence" is inevitable, so the UN bureaucrats
have to have power over everything in the interests of transforming all
social reality.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Jan 8 07:28:23 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: Fw: your NRO article "What Are We Fighting For?"
References: <000601c197b7$869e1180$2a73580c@h6l3p>
Status: RO
In re Hanson:
It seems to me there's a problem with ever-expanding multiracialism,
even assuming assimilation.
There are limits to assimilation. Do people change their religion? What
their history is? Who their ancestors are? If ever-expanding
multiracialism is essential to America then it seems to me such things
must tend to become irrelevant. The result is that America is
irresistably driven toward an abstract radically individualistic
universalizing hedonistic ideology as its principle of being. So
Hanson's view leads to the reinvention of multiculturalism.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Jan 8 23:05:11 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jkalb@nyx.net
Subject: [kalb@aya.yale.edu: Re: Fw: fascists]
Status: RO
Fascism seems to me an attempted mean between acceptance of the
transcendent and its abolition. The state as a sort of aesthetic object
or the race or nation becomes a this-worldly transcendent, the
transcendence of which, with respect to utilitarian reasoning and
everyday social relations, is established by violence and irrationality.
To a liberal, who rejects the transcendent, any appeal to the
transcendent naturally appears to be a form of fascism. Hence, for
example, the attitude toward "fundamentalism," understood as any form of
transcendental religion.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Wed Jan 9 10:29:19 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jkalb@nyx.net
Subject: [kalb@aya.yale.edu: Re: Fw: your NRO article "What Are We Fighting For?"]
Status: RO
We may be arguing about perspective and nuance here rather than anything
substantive. It seems to me though that the official recognition
multiculturalism gives to various cultures is a way of making them
qualities of individuals rather than ways of living together and
understanding the world. The effect and social function of doing so,
since culture is necessarily communal, is to destroy culture in the
interests of radical individualism and a technocratic organization of
society. I don't think rhetoric and subsidiary aspects of implementation
are nearly as important.
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Wed Jan 9 07:16:32 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: Fw: your NRO article "What Are We Fighting For?"
References: <000201c198c4$7b433aa0$0d75580c@h6l3p>
Status: RO
1. Multiculturalism is the principle that particular culture shouldn't
matter. It shouldn't matter that A has WASP culture, B Chinese culture,
C Jivaro culture. If there are social arrangements that make the work
environment more favorable for WASPs than Jivaros, then those
arrangements should change.
2. Radical individualism also means particular culture shouldn't matter,
since particular culture is something shared with a group of people. If
it matters that A has connections to the WASP community, B to the
Chinese community, and C to the Jivaro community, then radical
individualism is affronted. To promote radical individualism therefore
involves promoting the irrelevance of culture.
3. Radical individualism and multiculturalism therefore go together.
They are aspects of the same thing and not opposites.
"la" writes:
la> How is this phenemenon of radical individualism a "reinvention
la> of multiculturalism"? It seems the exact opposite of
la> multiculturalism.
>> There are limits to assimilation. Do people change their religion?
>> What their history is? Who their ancestors are? If ever-expanding
>> multiracialism is essential to America then it seems to me such
>> things must tend to become irrelevant. The result is that America
>> is irresistably driven toward an abstract radically individualistic
>> universalizing hedonistic ideology as its principle of being. So
>> Hanson's view leads to the reinvention of multiculturalism.
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Wed Jan 9 14:53:32 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: Fw: your NRO article "What Are We Fighting For?"
References: <003001c1993f$c91e9aa0$c95b580c@h6l3p>
Status: RO
Sorry if I repeated an old argument. To me the fundamental tendency is
radical individualism and multiculti is a way of advancing that tendency
while appealing to certain other interests and appearing to advance them
while betraying them. But then we differ in cast of mind and this is an
issue on which it comes through. I'm more ready to look for a simple
principle or process not always evident on the surface and explain
things by reference to it.
I'm not sure of what "a society organized along strictly multicultural
lines" would be, by the way. It seems to me multiculti is too incoherent
to be made strict. That's one reason I want to explain it by reference
to something outside itself that seems opposed to it.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Thu Jan 17 07:59:10 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: st
Subject: Re: Masculinism(tm)
Status: RO
"steve" writes:
>> "PC and the Crisis of Liberalism". Grand analysis: liberalism has
>> reached a totalitarian dead end. Too bad, because it's the only
>> public philosophy going.
steve> Not any more
Hello!
Thanks for the note and will look at your site.
It seems to me though that the short essay you sent is consistent with
liberalism - its point seems to be that we are all purely individual, so
notions like masculinity and femininity are oppressive and should be
done away with.
My own outlook is that those things are rooted in nature and are part of
what makes us what we are. To try to get rid of them is to try to get
rid of human nature. What's bad about feminist use of expressions like
"laddish" is that it's one-sided (they object to "womanish,"
"effeminate," etc.), and more importantly it fails to accept the whole
picture - that laddishness is an aspect or sometimes a degenerate form
of masculinity, which like femininity is essential to human life and so
is a good thing.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Wed Jan 30 15:09:38 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: cdleo@yahoogroups.com
Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2002 17:09:22 -0500
X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
In-Reply-To:
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Subject: Re: [cdleo] Crime and Punishment
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Status: RO
01/30/2002 3:51:40 PM, rhodes wrote:
>It should be noted that what lurks behind this debate is the conservative's
>unease that retribution has dropped out from the Church Teaching on Capital
>Punishment. The reason for this is simple. The modern state understands
>its authority as being derived naturally and not supernaturally.
>Retribution can only be understood supernaturally, otherwise it is nothing
>more than bloodthirsty vengeance. Therefore, since the modern state cannot
>justly enact retributive punishment, it must settle with punishment for the
>sake of either rehabilitation (sp.?) or protection.
I agree with this analysis. A problem is that if retribution--infliction of just deserts on
wrongdoers--drops out, then the criminal justice system becomes a behavior modification
system entitled to seize people, lock them up, and force them to undergo various forms of
processing if it's thought such treatment will advance overall social well-being. Whether
they actually committed a crime and how serious the crime was seem irrelevant in the
absence of any retributive function. I find that alarming.
To me what the line of thought shows is that legitimate state authority cannot be derived
naturally. Liberal political thought tries to derive political order from individual consent but
that obviously doesn't work--if you already have individual consent why would you need
compulsion? But if you don't need compulsion it seems that the state is unnecessary.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Fri Feb 1 05:32:09 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: La
Date: Fri, 01 Feb 2002 07:31:54 -0500
X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
Message-Id: <4WFCJGZA6F1ZNITQFBUSC8D06SMIE.3c5a8aba@L0648349>
Subject: Re: question on immigration policy
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Status: RO
I'd say radical reduction in total immigration is the most important point. We aren't going to
get many immigrants from Sweden anyway and it could be presented in a less
inflammatory way. If there aren't continual new arrivals there would be more of a setting in
which e pluribus could come more of an unum and the unum could be based on
something more satisfying and substantive than individualism mitigated by PC.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Wed Feb 13 12:53:29 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jb
Subject: Re:
Status: RO
Thanks for the comments.
It's hard to put together a good theory of liberalism, because
liberalism is internally incoherent. Also, its understanding of human
life is grossly inadequate, so the views of any actual liberal who's not
completely braindead will always have an antiliberal component.
So what to do? My approach is to look for a simple principle that
accounts for the tendency of events. What are the arguments that always
win within liberalism, so that in the long run they have given us what
we have now? Why do those arguments seem so strong? Presumably,
liberalism is based on some understanding of what the world is like that
makes some arguments seem plausible and others weak, wrong, arbitrary,
whatever. What is that understanding?
I think of liberalism as the political tradition anchored by John Locke
at one end and John Rawls at the other. Both were enormously influential
in their own times because each gave a philosophical presentation of
dominant understandings of political life. Locke strongly influenced the
American Founding (there's argument about that) and Rawls the modern
welfare state, to the extent philosophical thought is relevant to it.
Locke supports limited government and private property, Rawls the
welfare state and socialism. Nonetheless at bottom their views are
similar. Both, for example, think of political obligation as a contract
made by individuals to advance what the individuals consider their own
interests.
Why would anyone take that view? Individual self-interest seems
extraordinarily unpromising as an ultimate basis of obligation. The
answer seems to be that each is a skeptic as to authoritative goods that
transcend individual desire. Each fundamentally believes that our
wanting something is what makes it good for us. "What I want" is the
only conceivable basis for morality, apparently because it's the only
basis for doing anything.
With Rawls and other contemporary liberals I think that's pretty clear.
In Locke it comes out most clearly in his comments on religion: every
man, he says, is orthodox to himself. The idea seems to be that we know
what we see and we know what we want, but beyond that we don't have
knowledge (including moral knowledge). As he says in his Essay
Concerning Human Understanding, there are no innate moral ideas, we just
want to be happy. It also comes out in his account of the goods
government is to advance: men's civil interests, their life, liberty,
property, security, health, etc. What those things are used for is
strictly up to the individual.
The same ideas come out in other liberals between Locke and Rawls. In
his Utilitarianism JS Mill, for example, explicitly identifies the
"desired" with the "desirable" (that is, the good).
It seems to me the consequence of such a view of values is that the
argument that wins within liberalism is that people should be free to do
what they want as long as it doesn't conflict with the equal freedom of
others to do the same, and protecting that equal freedom is the function
of government. Liberals both classical and contemporary say as much.
How do you apply that general principle though? It seems to me the
diffence between classical and contemporary liberalism is that the
latter has learned to apply it more comprehensively. It also seems to me
that the more comprehensive application is more consistent with the
denial of any transcendent moral reality that can be known and applied
within human life other than equal freeedom.
As to your particular points, I don't have to draw a line from James
Madison et al to Karl Marx. to John Rawls. I do think the line from John
Locke to John Rawls passes reasonably close to James Madison.
Jefferson's Declaration claims self evident rights granted by the
Creator, but the Creator doesn't have to tell us much. He just implants
desires in us, lets us pursue them, and gives us reason that tells us my
desires are on the same plane as yours, so if we want the cooperation we
need we'll have to accommodate each other on the basis of equality. It
seems to me freedom as an ideal isn't really separable from equality, by
the way; the reason we should respect each other's freedom in liberal
thought is that what you want is as good as what I want, so you should
have the same ability to go after it that I do.
The original Constitution and Bill of Rights set up a republican system
of government limited powers and created private spheres, but why? It
seems to me it was for a purpose and not because people thought there
was something intrinsically holy about property or private spheres. The
purpose, I think, was to make it easier for people to go after what they
want. Why shouldn't those institutions of government be tested by that
purpose, as contemporary liberals do?
So what do you do with conservatism? I think you have to go to something
deeper in our civilization than the American Founding, to the idea of
Christendom, a potentially universally order of things that incorporates
localism and particularity and diversity and recognition of the need for
limits but also recognition of the transcendent purpose of human life. I
think some such conception is needed to preserve what has been valuable
in liberalism--freedom, equality, law, limited government, the dignity
of the individual, and so on. In order to remain valuable those things
must be subordinated to a more complex and multilayered system. I think
the problem with liberal thought is that it's tried to make them
absolutes so as to create a finished self-contained system and that
hasn't worked.
You said:
"Here, I look to Burke's analysis as someone who generally supported the
American independence but abhorred the French movement. His argument, as
I take it, was that the American ideal was created within the existing
social order and tradition of the Colonies, whereas the French ideal
sought to overthrow society in favor of a new order."
I'm quite sympathic with this view, actually. A problem I think is that
the Americans left the subordination of their new institutions to the
existing social order and tradition unstated and deniable. They said
they were creating an novus ordo seclorum based on self-evident truths
independent of tradition and revealed religion. They explicitly
excluded the latter from their national constitution. There was
therefore nothing to prevent the progressive radicalization of the
system they set up. And that's what's happened.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu) http://counterrevolution.net and
http://rightsreform.net
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jb
Subject: Re:
Status: RO
I think that's right. They correctly saw that some things like freedom
were good but tried to make them ultimate self-contained standards and
that didn't work. You simply can't avoid questions of ultimate ends. If
you do then you'll implicitly adopt an ultimate end that doesn't make
sense and that will take you places no sensible person would want to go.
Like contemporary liberalism for example. Actually at the moment I'm
trying to put together an essay on what Catholic social teaching ought
to be that draws as much as possible on JPII.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Wed Feb 13 16:55:57 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: "J"
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 18:55:42 -0500
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The ultimate end of conservatism is the ultimate good known through the tradition it
conserves. For societies rooted in European Christendom that would be the good known
through Christianity--virtue in community in this world and beatitude in the next.
What is permanently useful in liberalism is the recognition that government--which
essentially involves the organized use of force--has limited abillity to advance such things
directly. Nonethess it is necessary for government like any system of action to have some
ultimate reference point in order to remain rational even if most of the time that reference
point remains somewhat in the background.
02/13/2002 5:28:02 PM, "Jake Bebber" wrote:
>I just converted to Catholicism, something that seems to be popular among
>Conservatives these days. (I was raised Lutheran, and contrary to popular
>belief, there IS a difference!) Much of my reason had to do with reading
>George Weider's biography on the Pope, "Witness to Hope". After reading
>something that powerful, conversion seemed so easy.
>
>But getting back to the discussion ... here's the million dollar question.
>You've established the inherent contradictions of liberalism, pointing out
>that by ignoring the question of "ultimate ends" as you put it, they engage
>in what I would call "totalitarian creep" and the managerial/nanny state.
>
>That being said, what is the "ultimate end" of conservatism?
>
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Wed Feb 13 17:59:27 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: ma
Date: Wed, 13 Feb 2002 19:59:13 -0500
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Status: RO
Hello,
I think nominalism is close to the root of the matter. I just wrote an essay to that effect--I'll
send you a copy if you want.
Conspiracy may be part of events but when the events stretch over centuries and
continents and they consistently move in the same direction it seems to me that
concentrating on that aspect of things is a diversion. It is evident that if what has
happened is due to conspiracy then conditions continually recreate and favor the
success of that kind of conspiracy. Get rid of one set of conspirators and another will pop
up. So there may be some benefit to awareness of that aspect of things but it is more
general conditions that are of decisive importance.
I'm dubious of Fascism as a remedy for a dying civilization. It seems to me that it tried to
create a sort of this-worldly substitute for God that couldn't work. For that matter I'm
dubious of the European New Right pagans too. You can't create a religion for a political
or cultural purpose or in accordance with a theory of history or cultural evolution. Politics
and culture requires something that is more important than politics and culture.
Actually I'm not a Roman Catholic but am considering conversion. Until very recently I
attended an Anglican church, mostly because of an attachment to the particular parish
and its members. The parish has problems that have been getting worse and worse
though and there is nothing in the larger organization that I want any connection with. So
I am considering what to do. The logical thing is the Church of Rome, I have many
theories why it is the right choice, but as you know it has very serious problems too and
the decision to trust it is a difficult one. There is a weekly Tridentine mass celebrated a 15
minute walk from where I live so in that respect anyway I am lucky.
I agree that at some point something like the Masons but in the opposite direction could
be useful. To my mind a great deal of intellectual work and agitation must come first. The
antiliberal cause is just too fragmented to support that degree of organized common
action. At least that is the way the situation appears to me in America. In Europe or in the
Catholic Church with Opus Dei the situation may be different.
Really it seems to me our best hope is that the current order of things is intrinsically
corrupt and will only become more so. An order of things that cannot motivate sacrifice,
that cannot even reproduce itself, won't be well enough organized to root out ways of life
at odds with it that are capable of attracting serious loyalty. So the most important single
thing for those who don't like the current way of life is to develop a better way of life and
live it. The other things are developing and defending a coherent alternative to the
accepted outlook on society etc. and confronting our rulers with it. These things can be
done legally and openly and in fact draw their strength from that.
I am enjoying this exchange, by the way. To the extent we see things differently it
provides my thoughts with a different setting and raises issues that I haven't thought
about much. I hope it is of some use to you as well.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Thu Feb 14 04:57:21 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: "J"
Date: Thu, 14 Feb 2002 06:57:16 -0500
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02/13/2002 8:18:07 PM, "Jake Bebber" wrote:
>It seems to me then that the Left will never recognize that society is
>ordered on two levels
Actually, it's multilevel. Life in society is biological, social, spiritualual, voluntary,
compulsory, individual, social, stable, changing, novel, historical, rational, natural,
artificial, etc., etc., etc.
>But does that leave conseratism in danger of becoming a theocracy or
>advocating theocracy over republican/limited government?
There are always dangers from all directions. If you get rid of God in public life then
there's more of a danger of secular totalitarianism. Part of the point of talking about God is
that there are things we can't construct or control. Theocracy is the attempt to construct
and control them. So I don't think the danger of theocracy is intrinsic.
jk
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jkalb@nyx.net
Subject: [kalb@aya.yale.edu: Re: contact]
Status: RO
Hello!
Thanks for your note.
I include the "extreme right" slogan on the index page because I think
the expression is abused to the point of absurdity. Anyone who thinks
the sexes are distinct and should be thought of that way, that man is a
social animal who rightly lives by particular and also transcendent
loyalties, that the cultural left is wrong about human nature, is now an
"extreme rightist." Human life as it has always existed is an "extreme
right" cause.
Names have power to control what is discussed. Attempting to avoid them
distorts positions and arguments. So on the index page I accept the
designation as a way of depriving it of its power and signalling that I
don't accept the way things are discussed. On that page I don't make any
assertions or link to anything that could be reasonably called
extremist. I even give an explicit explanation of the contentious tone.
If the expression is a problem for you--and I understand it may be in
Europe--why not connect through the traditionalist conservatism page,
which is presented in a more neutral way? More people link to that
anyway.
I should say that the resource list as its introduction states includes
things from a variety of sources to some of which I have no particular
commitment. The Jews and the Masons are not my big concern. They don't
have magical powers. If things many of them favor achieve success after
success it is because the general social and intellectual orientation
favors them. Somebody will always be the leader in promoting the further
development of a dominant tendency. It may be true that Bugnini was a
Mason (Pope Paul VI apparently thought he was) and that may have
affected the New Mass, but if all the Masons quit and the Jews all moved
to Madegascar I nonetheless don't think things would change that much.
There would be new leaders of the same movement. Plato was able to
describe a devolution similar to the one we see around us without
reference to Jews or Masons. So the most important thing I think is to
understand the general orientation of things, how it comes about, and
its consequences.
It seems to me that if Roman Catholicism survives it will survive by
recognizing the assimilation to modernity that Vatican II symbolizes as
a mistake. There are signs that may happen--the direction of a group
tends to be determined by its most committed and active members, and I
think there is a growing traditionalism among such people in
Catholicism. After all, why bother with Catholicism if it is the same as
secular modernity? Also, it is much harder today to mistake the
distinctive nature of modernity and its necessary opposition to any form
of transcendent religion than it was in the early '60s.
As to Roman Catholicism and cultural (and therefore ethnic)
particularism, I think there is a problem today but not one that goes to
the heart of things. The Catholics accept subsidiarity and the
legitimacy of cultural particularity (otherwise "inculturation" of the
liturgy would be pointless). Such things make no sense unless ethnic
communities, and therefore ethnic boundaries, are permitted to exist.
Also, fundamental doctrines like Original Sin and the centrality of the
Crucifixion, as well as the Church's need to remain independent of the
state, put Catholicism necessarily at odds with secular utopianism. It
is therefore pushed by its own principles to be more accepting than
present day secular thinkers of the ways human life has always been
carried on. You'd hardly guess that from some of the "peace and justice"
pronouncements that have come out of the Church, but I think fundamental
doctrine has a strong logic in the long run.
It seems to me Vatican II was an attempt by the Western Church to retain
the role in public life to which it had been accustomed for 1500 years.
I think it will give it up--if it doesn't secular modernity will swallow
it up rather than the reverse--and become in many ways more like the
Protestant sects and Orthodox churches, which have experience living as
disfavored minorities. One consequence will be greater acceptance and in
fact insistance on particularism. Of course there will be bad
consequences as well--a less favorable environment for science and
philosophy, for example. I think that is inevitable in the future
anyway. I'm working on an essay on what Christian social thought should
be that covers some of these issues.
At least in America I don't see much need for secrecy. The most
important things are developing a comprehensive independent perspective,
rectifying one's own life, and establishing connections with others who
have a similar orientation. After that comes the war of thought--finding
situations in which we can confront and confute the understandings
currently dominant and set forth something better. Perhaps the
Enlightenment could be the model--it didn't start with secret societies
or indeed with any sort of overt political action, but with literary and
philosophical works that stood for growing common understandings.
- --
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Fri Feb 15 07:23:39 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: "Ja
Date: Fri, 15 Feb 2002 09:23:28 -0500
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>Would you say that this liberal versus conservative argument goes back
>further than the French Revolution/and the Enlightenment? I'm thinking of
>Plater versus Aristotle. The Platonic state would be totalitarian, while
>the Aristotelian would probably be best described as aristocratic I suppose.
>Of course, both were concerned about the virtue of man and society, and not
>necessarily the best utilitarian distribution of resources and fulfillment
>of human wants, so perhaps that parallel doesn't apply.
The essay I sent you suggests it's a matter of realism v. nominalism, so on that view it
would go back to William of Ockham (1280-1349). Plato does suggest the notion of a
comprehensively planned society, which has some connection to the technological
approach to social issues characteristic of modernity and liberalism. Still, I think his views
were non-technological--he didn't claim there was a method for achieving his Republic,
he thought it very unlikely it would ever exist, and it depended on suprarational insight
into transcendent good achieved through disciplined contemplation.
jk
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: campaign finance reform
References: <000a01c1b6aa$b95d9ca0$633afea9@h6l3p>
Status: RO
Part of it's the invisibility factor. If IBM or National Right to Life
runs an ad saying "Sen. X done wrong" then that's an attempt by an
interest group to influence politics. If the NYT or CBS does the same
thing and calls it news, analysis or even editorializing that's
different, it's the discharge of a social function by those charged with
it. It's the difference between arming flight crews and putting armed
marshalls on flights. Power is a bad thing, but professional discharge
of a function isn't power.
You're right, of course, that that means the abolition of politics.
jk
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: Comments
References: <002801c1b721$73fc4180$3c03fea9@h6l3p>
Status: RO
la> The main point is that there now still exists living elements of
la> the majority culture, even though mixed with other cultural
la> elements, so there is plenty to be attached to. My idea is the
Agreed, that has to be so. A society can exist only by reason of what is
good in it, so there is always plenty to be attached to in any social
order. And ordinary conservatives are in fact attached and loyal to many
good things in their lives. But you want the living elements also to
form a whole distinct from what lies without that can be identified with
and collectively asserted. For that there has to be some sort of
rebirth.
Janet may be able to go back home, look around, and say, "yes, these are
my people, and there is something fundamentally good and worth defending
in how we live." I doubt she could say that about white America as a
whole though, including the blue as well red parts. And I very much
doubt that I could see my way to saying it with regard to white people
here in NY today.
la> the "Anglo-European" American people, meaning the European
la> America that still existed when we grew up, it was religiously
la> Cathholic, Protestant and Jew; ethnically European; culturally
la> Anglo-American. New agers, Wiccans, gay activists and so forth
la> are on the left and would not support this in any case.
Look at polls etc. on people's moral and political commitments. My guess
is that among American white people today on average they're more like
those of New agers, Wiccans and gay activists than those generally
accepted in 1960 among Catholics, Protestants and Jews.
I suppose my concern is that "white culture" as a whole and as it is
does not at present seem to be a possible object of loyalty. If that's
so then white people as a whole aren't either.
la> The European American majority culture is not "everything," but it
la> is a great deal. But in our current system, it is, formally,
la> nothing. It WANTS to be the majority culture again. But even
la> asserting its existence as SOMETHING would transform our current
la> political reality, which is dependent on the majority culture
la> never asserting its existence as such.
But it seems to me the actual EA culture leads to and supports the
present system. Not in its best aspects maybe, but in its concrete
reality. Maybe what you mean is that traditional EA culture wants to be
the majority culture as it once was? That's so, but it's not something
held as a coherent system by even the majority of EAs.
I suppose my thought is that it's hard to start by asserting something
that isn't coherently there. Maybe it's just a matter of emphasis. I
agree that the tabu against discrimination is horribly destructive
because it extirpates the very possibility of particular culture, and
that whites should be able to assert themselves no less than others. It
just seems to me that a lot more has to happen before whites
collectively have something to assert collectively as a worthwhile
majority culture.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Sat Feb 16 15:07:44 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: Conservatives adopt universal equality as defining value of America
References: <001801c1b728$7b23c080$3c03fea9@h6l3p>
Status: RO
This is appalling.
The abolition of particular culture as a constitutive feature of social
life is, it appears, a good and even morally necessary thing. Each
individual can I suppose make up his own and live by it in the privacy
of his room. One question though: if American political society (except
for residual flaws) is based simply and directly on universal principles
of right and justice, equally applicable to all persons, where is the
legitimacy in opposing Universal America? Since wanting the American
order is the same as wanting to breathe free, opposing its universal
extension must be by definition oppressive.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Sun Feb 17 07:29:44 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: "La
Date: Sun, 17 Feb 2002 09:29:32 -0500
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Subject: Re: Conservatives adopt universal equality as defining value of America
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Status: RO
I don't think I said we can't assert any particularity.
I'd say America is a complex concrete historical people (maybe like
"Europe" or "India") and not a universal principle, that what we are
fighting for is to defend that people and its way of life against
attack, that its way of life is a complex of particular ways and
groups that can be knit together--if free government is to be
maintained--only by local control, mutual accommodation and overall
public acceptance of a basically European and Christian outlook, that
there is indeed something universally significant in that way of life,
that "universally significant" does not mean "ideologically necessary"
or "universally applicable," that America has shown it can absorb new
entrants but not without limit, that the 45-year holiday from mass
immigration was a good thing for America as a free, diverse and
unified society, and that we are ready for another such holiday so
that our diversity can become more knit together in historic unity.
> Jim, based on your objections to my manifesto in the other thread, what
> public arguments would you make against this universalist-conservative
> manifesto from the Institute for American Values? Regarding my statement,
> you said we're not in a position to assert any particularity because white
> America is not a whole that anyone can believe in. So, on that basis, what
> public arguments would you have against the view that America is only
> universal?
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Sun Feb 17 12:12:34 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: "L
Date: Sun, 17 Feb 2002 14:12:29 -0500
X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
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Subject: Re: Conservatives adopt universal equality as defining value of America
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Status: O
I think the response has to be multifaceted. There's a big problem if
the particularity of Lubbock and other coherent particularities that
people can actually live by don't assert themselves. One can't live by
his status as a member of a complex historical people that includes
Christians, Jews, whites, blacks, etc., and today in American one
can't live simply as a white man by white man's standards. So the
national response has to build on particular assertions, justify them,
say they're legitimate, and show how they can live together in a
complex order that cannot itself be purely formal.
I think we have to be able to present an overall solution that we can
claim with a straight face is really in everyone's best interest or
almost everyone's--whites, blacks, protestants, Catholics, Jews. In
order to have free and orderly government, which is to almost
everyone's advantage, there has to be a substantive and therefore at
least somewhat particularistic national public order. In America that
can only be ultimately European and Christian in nature. Then to the
extent people want something more definite to live by or something
fundamentally distinct there has to be decentralization and local
rule. For the whole thing to work there has to be a limit on diversity
and time for mutual accommodations to be worked out. Hence
restrictions on immigrations. They make the complex balance impossible
and so lead to cosmopolitan despotism.
Then once those two points are achieved--an assertion of an overall
theory about the common American good and the common American public
order and local particularistic assertions--intermediate assertions
like assertions of Euro-Am culture in general could take on a limited
and comprehensible role.
Naturally objections could be made to all these assertions. My main
concern is to make the primary assertion one that has good responses
to the objections that show how it's something everyone or almost
everyone can and should support as the best hope for a stable free
thriving society.
>I think your e-mail, mailed at 9:29 a.m., is a better response to the immigration problem
than the one sent at 9:13 a.m. I don't see how asserting the particularity of Lubbock
would be terribly applicable in a national discussion of immigration policy. But talking
about defending a complex concrete historical American people who have a basically
European and Christian outlook is viable. That's basically been my approach all along.
It's this "majority asserting itself as the majority" idea that is somewhat new.
>
>So, if I understand the drift of this thread correctly, what you object to is my idea of the
majority culture asserting itself as such. You don't object to the assertion of an overall
American particularity.
>
>However, it seems to me that the latter formulation is only marginally less problematic
than the former, since some of the same objections could be raised to it: who am I to say
that America has a particular culture with an overall European and Christian outlook?
America is a diverse country, with lots of non-Christians and non-Europeans. So one
would still have to assert a majoritarian character of America in response to that
challenge. However, the main advantage of the latter formulation is that it doesn't
involve the difficulty of whites saying, as whites, WE are the majority culture, which was
what you found particularly objejctionable. But in both cases the assertion would have to
be made that America is a basically European Christian country and ought to remain so.
>
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Feb 18 09:13:27 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: M
Subject: Re: Hi
References: <10d.da02da1.29a2573c@aol.com>
Status: O
I'm not depressed, really, I've just concluded that the way the
episcopal church is set up doesn't work in a basically non-Christian and
anti-republican (lower case "r"!) environment, which is what we have
now. I don't expect anything good to come out of it. The EC doesn't like
to define doctrine, because it's originally a state church that likes to
defuse conflicts, and it likes to be respected in the larger society.
That means that what the episcopal church thinks eventually turns out to
be identical with whatever respectable people in the world at large
think, only with different phrasing and costuming to make it seem more
inspirational. And since the trend in the world is away from self
government and toward big managed amoral institutions mitigated by
people doing their own individual thing whatever that happens to be you
get the same thing in the church. You get management (bishops etc.), you
get careerists whose basic alignment is with management, and you get
people with projects.
Naturally not all personal projects are bad, and not all managers are
corrupt and oppressive, so you can have some local situations that are
tolerable. Do I want to invest effort into that though when I'm not
already in the midst of a local situation? Where's the stability if it's
truly just a matter of the particular people involved? Isn't it odd that
what's good in the situation (Christians gathered together in a local
community) is so much at odds with the form (emphasis on liturgy,
hierarchy, etc.)? Why would someone become an episcopal priest today and
what does that mean about the future? Anyway, those are my current
thoughts. Some of these things I probably take more seriously than you
do just because I think about things differently.
Jim
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Feb 19 08:32:12 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: M
Subject: Re: EC
References: <112.cc9a4e6.29a316be@aol.com>
Status: O
Everyone has to do things in his own way. Some people are impressed by
grand theory, others keep things going in concrete ways. People who keep
things going usually do more good I think but the others sometimes add
something too. And anyway we can't help ourselves.
So to continue with grand theory, it does seem to me you need some sort
of organization and hierarchy in Christianity since everything people do
that they take seriously and for which they think there are better and
worse ways develops some sort of hierarchy. Otherwise you end up having
to make up your own religion and that's impossible. If I have the choice
I prefer republican organization but what's needed first of all is
something that works.
The problem with the Episcopal Church and all the protestant mainline
churches is that the ultimate standard the hierarchy looks to isn't
really distinguishable from themselves and the general ways of thinking
in society at large. It can't be, because that's where their ties and
loyalties are, and the way they've developed of interpreting scripture,
tradition, doctrine etc. always gives them the answer they're looking
for.
That is not true of every religious group. It's not true of the Southern
Baptists, the Roman Catholics, the various Orthodox churches, or I
suppose the various Episcopal spinoffs, although small groups that split
off and can't unite are suspicious--they begin to look like someone's
private project. There are other groups as well, like the Missouri Synod
Lutherans. All these other churches have issues too, of course, but
something--almost anything--seems better than nothing, and that's what I
see at the center of the Episcopal Church.
So anyway right now I'm thinking mostly about the Catholics and
Orthodox. Most of Christianity is within them and always has been, so if
what's needed is something that's been thought through and stands up and
has worked for a lot of very different people for a long time and has
resisted being swallowed up by the world without sectarian fanaticism
those groups have advantages. I know they have problems also and I'm
thinking about those too.
Jim
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Feb 19 08:29:36 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jkalb@nyx.net
Subject: [kalb@aya.yale.edu: Re: Conservatives adopt universal equality as defining value of America]
Status: O
Subject: Re: Conservatives adopt universal equality as defining value of America
I suppose I have two points: (1) the ultimate argument has to be based
on justice and the common good, and (2) particular particulaties like
the white baptists in Lubbock have to play an important role.
Jim
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Feb 25 05:15:33 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jkalb@nyx.net
Subject: [kalb@aya.yale.edu: Re: Culture Wars]
Status: O
I'm not sure why you're upset. People use "progressive" to mean
"liberal." All I did was explain how that usage arises.
Once again--to believe in "progress" is to believe that there is a
tendency in things and the tendency is toward what is better. For a long
time, however, the actual tendency has been away from family and toward
abortion, homosexuality, etc. Therefore the people who call themselves
"progressive" are people who think it is a good thing to get away from
family and toward abortion, homosexuality, etc. Those who call
themselves "conservative" are those who think something important is
being lost by the process and want to keep it. They therefore oppose
much of what is called "progress."
"dc" writes:
dc> I thought your website had a bias. What you said is a bunch of
dc> crap. The liberals are mired in that "crap" with homosexuality,
dc> abortion and all the other evils of the day. Conservatives are
dc> family oriented and believe in life and all that is good in man.
dc> That always leads to one heck of a lot of progress. Thank God for
dc> Bush and his cabinet, and good riddance to Slick Willy, Inventor
dc> Gore and "Get all you can out of everyone" Hillary.
dc> Why did you call the liberals progressive?
>> It's the term people use, so I use it too. Also it makes some
>> sense. A "progressive" is someone who believes in "progress," and
>> that's more true of liberals than anyone else.
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Feb 25 05:15:43 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jkalb@nyx.net
Subject: [kalb@aya.yale.edu: Re: Church Alternatives]
Status: O
All institutions are imperfect and have officials and members who are
the same. One question though is whether the institution stands for
anything apart from the particular people involved and whatever they
happen to be doing. I don't think the episcopal church does even though
it's set up to look as if it did. That adds an additional layer of
pretence and opportunity of abuse beyond what's inevitable in every
organization. What could conceivably justify the position of an
episcopal bishop for example? It's obviously based on the church
pretending to be a different sort of institution from what it is. The
result is that when things are bad it's much harder to point to anything
in the overall situation worth staying and fighting for or anything
likely to come in the future worth waiting for.
Haven't looked into the Singapore connection--don't think there's
anything in NY. Almost anything else can be found here though. It's the
big city after all.
Jim
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Feb 26 06:05:35 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: "G"
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2002 08:05:24 -0500
X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
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Status: O
La wrote:
>
> but in some respects the neocons are seriously dishonest people. And it's
> not unintentional. I get the feeling that they know exactly what they're up
> to.
This is one of the great mysteries of life. To what extent are people
who are not stupid in any ordinary sense aware that they're doing what
they're obviously doing and doing quite effectively and apparently
intelligently?
To some extent the "I'm right because I'm me and those other people
don't count" theory accounts for a lot of it. If you hold that theory
you're not obliged to be rational or consistent or answer objections
because in a dispute with people who don't count you can simply appeal
to your own authority. Everyone knows you don't have to be "fair" to
racists.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Feb 26 07:02:32 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: la
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2002 09:02:25 -0500
X-Priority: 3 (Normal)
In-Reply-To: <84.23c57924.29a7a429@aol.com>
Message-Id: <98BSRVQRN984Z4TPHC93VRGFONUSA0.3c7b9571@L0648349>
Subject: Re: ethnic identity thicker than ideology
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Status: O
02/22/2002 8:39:53 AM, G wrote:
>So, even if I agree with your conclusions about race and ethnicity, Larry, and even if I
>agree (as I do), that immigration needs to be stopped in order to assimilate those we
>have, there is still disagreement about: (1) the relative importance of ethnici
>ty in creating a "culture" as opposed to say, religion; and (2) whether a given ethnic or
>racial group's culture is only innate to itself.
It's hard to define all these issues since "culture" is so
all-embracing. It seems to me though that ethnicity and religion are
different dimensions of culture. Religion is the aspect of culture
that has to do with ultimate issues and the transcendent, ethnicity
the aspect that has to do with long life in common and its
consequences for common habits, attitudes, memories, loyalties, blood
relationships, etc.
Each needs the other--without ethnicity religion has trouble
establishing itself throughout life except by being fanatical or
sectarian. I think that's why Christ told the apostles to preach to
all nations rather than to men of all nations. And without religion
ethnicity disintegrates because ultimately the ethnic community has no
common understanding of what life is about and so all its other
commonalities fall into disorder. The Nazis tried to solve the problem
by making ethnic self-assertion a self-contained abstract absolute but
the idea didn't work out. So it's hard to talk about the relative
importance of religion and ethnicity since both are necessary for
culture.
As to how much separateness is needed for culture to thrive, it's hard
to give a single rule. Certainly the combination of mass immigration,
mass society and mass democracy is catastrophic since it basically
means there can't be culture. There can only be radically separate
individuals, the market, and bureaucracy. Also violence, manipulation,
despotism, etc. That's the problem we have now.
One lurking problem in this discussion I think has been the
significance of biological race. I think it does have some. The usual
view that Ashkenazi Jews are smarter than Chinese are smarter than
European whites are smarter than African blacks seems right to me. I
think there are also other differences in behavioral tendencies. I
can't imagine why there shouldn't be such things, it would be amazing
if all groups turned out to be the same in these ways, and on the face
of it they do seem to exist. Even though the overlap among groups is
no doubt greater than the differences average tendencies matter when
behavior of collectivities is the issue.
In addition to that kind of genetic issue different race means
different grand history which makes it extremely likely that
fundamental memories and loyalties will differ as well. People want to
sanitize culture by making it disembodied but I don't think it can be
done.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Feb 26 10:45:12 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: ca
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2002 12:45:01 -0500
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02/26/2002 12:13:56 PM, "L" wrote:
>The problem comes from separating biological race out from the whole of things and
>either making a cult of it or demonizing it.
That's an example of the modern political pathology--everything must
be turned into a single perspicuously rational self-contained system
that we can possess in its entirety. Therefore there can be only one
ultimate principle, and that has to be something we can grasp
completely along with all its implications. Race is one possibility;
another is whatever people happen to want as the summum bonum. Still
another is the Will of Allah as manifested in the Koran and the
Shariah and worked out in its rational implications by the
ulema. That's why liberals think if you're not a liberal you must be
either a nazi or a fundie. Those are the other possibilites given what
is understood as the nature of political thought. I suppose you could
also be a greedhead if you take satisfaction of desire as the summum
bonum and choose formal rather than substantive equality.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Feb 26 11:46:39 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: la
Date: Tue, 26 Feb 2002 13:46:01 -0500
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It is difficult to separate out different influences since cultural
variables play such an enormous role and since racial differences
usually correlate with cultural differences so that it is hard to say
what causes what. Nonetheless,
1. The Japanese/British/European comparison seems a stretch to me if
intended to support the idea that culture is altogether independent of
race. Particular institutional similarities do not show that cultures
are particularly similar. Otherwise the example would also show that
culture is independent of religion.
2. A people of mixed race could certainly evolve a highly developed
common culture. All someone who thinks biological race as such is
significant would have to claim is that that the particular mixture
would have some influence on the directions in which the culture
developed, that a people descended from 60% Ashkenazi Jews and 40% Han
Chinese would end up with a different culture than one descended from
60% West Africans and 40% South American Indians, even if (somehow)
they were subjected to all the same influences.
3. The discussion is complicated by the circumstance that culture is a
collective thing. I would think that a baby kidnapped anywhere in the
world and brought up in small town Nebraska would become culturally a
small town Nebraskan, since variations within racial groups generally
exceed those between racial groups and the kid would most likely have
tendencies that put him somewhere in the normal range for Nebraska
whites. It doesn't follow that if the whole next generation of the
town consisted of kidnapped Jivaro babies that nothing would
change. It seems to me likely that different average propensities
would have collective consequences that matter.
4. How banal is all this? Depends on the setting. If it's true then
the banality may be in the eye of the beholder. If someone says "it
would make no difference to American civilization if it became
majority South American Indian/African Black, with a sizable East
Asian minority, since everyone could be assimilated to the same common
culture" it becomes practically relevant and therefore not banal. And
people actually do say that sort of thing.
5. In a way all this is irrelevant, since if 5 million Bengalis, 5
million Hmong, 5 million Xhosa and 5 million Mayans moved into town
they would bring with them cultural peculiarities that would transform
all aspects of local life. Any "American culture" to which they were
assimilated would I think of necessity become a collection of abstract
universalisms designed mostly to keep the economy going and keep
people from offending each other. I think the effect would be less if
20 million assorted Europeans moved into town. Admittedly there would
be an effect, and the large immigration from Southern and Eastern
Europe transformed America in somewhat the same direction. Is the idea
that since America has been transformed before then why not have it be
transformed even more now? The transformations to date have not I
think been good for self-government and maintenance of a tolerable
common culture. Why continue them and make them much much bigger?
Jim
From James.B.Kalb.69@Alum.Dartmouth.ORG Sat Mar 2 21:05:44 2002
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Date: 02 Mar 2002 23:05:33 EST
From: James.B.Kalb.69@Alum.Dartmouth.ORG (James B. Kalb 69)
Subject: Re: I wish he hadn't apologized
To: la
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How can we break out of all this? In a mass society, in
which independence is hard to come by and everything is
carried on by big institutions that depend on reputation or
at least respectability, how can the balloon ever get
pricked? I suppose that was the point of my essay on
radical traditionalism and the NWO--if a small but
significant number of people, presumably those with no
position to lose, would speak truth insistently in and out
of season then the system eventually would have difficulty
maintaining itself. It's not going to be the Billy Grahams
who do it though at least not for a while.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Thu Mar 7 09:48:37 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jf
Subject: Re: Dissertation
References: <8949376@doc.Dartmouth.ORG> <3C865E89.3F7F0DD6@abo.fi>
Status: O
Hello!
Thanks for your note and comments.
jf> The role of nominalism is an interseting track that I will study.
jf> But is it all that dominant in modern thought? From where comes
jf> all this talk about humankind and universal brotherhood?
jf> Globalism, as well as the ecumenical spirit, seem to be more
jf> connected with realism. Modern non-figurative art is concerned
jf> with the universals. And important progressive people like Pierce
jf> and Dewey were realists.
But the emphasis on humankind, universal brotherhood, etc. seems to come
from the notion that it's wrong to discriminate, to make distinctions,
because distinctions--our conceptual categories--are artificial
constructions established for particular human purposes. To classify
someone, to distinguish him from others, is therefore an aggressive act,
an attempt to force him into some category with which he may not agree
so that we can make use of him. Such an attempt is thought to diminish
his humanity, which consists in his ability to define what he is in
accordance with his own freely-chosen goals. That tendency of thought
seems nominalistic to me.
Modern art raises interesting issues. Much of it seems to me to be about
technique, or shape, color and texture, or the particular object--the
paint on the canvas. To the extent it has content the content is often
something that can't be articulated. All these features seem consistent
with nominalism to me.
I would call Dewey a nominalist. He denied essences and thought creation
of concepts is simply a human activity carried on for human purposes. I
know less about Pierce, but it seems to me that pragmatism generally
tends toward anti-realism.
jf> Maybe the rennaisance humanism and its successors could be the
jf> unifying principle behind modernism? With the idea of man as
jf> everything's measure the gate was open for relativism and the
jf> humility, piety and reverence of the medieval temper gave way for
jf> pride.
But it seems to me renaissance humanism thought there was an essence of
man, which modernism denies. Or rather, modernism at most says the
essence of man is freedom, understood as the ability and even necessity
of choosing one's own essence. To claim we choose rather than recognize
an essence is a denial of metaphysical realism though. And in fact the
identification of the human essence with freedom tends to degenerate
into its identification with the pursuit of pleasure, since
self-defining freedom cannot be distinguished from freedom to do what
pleases one. The end result is that it becomes impossible to maintain
man's superiority over the lower animals. Modernism is in the long run
not at all humanistic--think about animal rights, environmentalist
mysticism, etc.
jf> Ultimately, it seems to me, the crucial question is the flight
jf> from God, which has deprived modernism of any anchoring for values
jf> or truth, which become subjective. And without a unified field of
jf> knowledge, God tends to become unreal, as the world of concrete
jf> things, perceived by the senses or realized by reason, appear more
jf> reliable and real. Thus, the degradation of revelation makes it
jf> difficult to maintain a view where virtue, meaning and truth makes
jf> sense.
I agree, but connect the denial of God with nominalism. To say value and
truth and meaning are subjective is to say we create them rather than
recognize them, which is a denial of metaphysical realism. And I would
add that if God isn't real, and truth is subjective, and the concepts
through which we might know things are also subjective, then even the
world of concrete objects becomes unreal. It is difficult to keep
subjectivism from becoming ever more radical, and eventually the ego
disintegrates as well. The works of Samuel Beckett explore that process.
jf> I suppose it is true that modernism can't work, as it destroys
jf> society; it lives on thanks to the traditional capital that
jf> lingers on. But how do we make use of this capital for the
jf> restoration and renewal of society? We need to identify the
jf> non-liberal traditions and explain why these are the true
jf> tradition and strengthen them while we discard the newer liberal
jf> traditions. But what means do we have for sorting out the good
jf> traditions?
Traditionalism is not a technique. It is the natural state of man and
that will return when faith in the omnicompetence of technique gives way
to acceptance that there are things we rely on that we cannot fully
grasp but can come to know through humility and living rightly. So
what's most needed is a basic spiritual conversion.
For the rest, I'd say recurrete ad fontes! All basic reform begins I
think. by returning to the sources. We must ask what our fundamental
concerns and loyalties have been. How have the good and necessary things
in the life of our people come about? What changes have been destructive
from that standpoint? The social sciences can be turned against the
political and moral views of most of their practitioners. Criticize the
critics!
jf> It seems to be an intriquate question how to put the genuine
jf> traditions back in function so that they eliminate modernism.
jf> After all, how much of conservative elements are left in
jf> traditional institutions? These, it seems, can function also in
jf> the service of liberalism. For instance, intact families may pass
jf> on liberal convictions and ideology, schools with reasonable
jf> standard and discipline may indoctrinate the youth with
jf> secularism, individualism etc. (that's what they often did before
jf> the obvious decay had started), church attendance is of dubious
jf> value if it means exposition to the liberal theology dominant in
jf> the mainline churches and the Roman church, or if it entails
jf> nothing but the superficial experience-religion prevalent in much
jf> of evangelicalism.
Since matters are so intricate they must be dealt with simply. Returning
to the souces means grasping what is fundamentally at issue and striving
for integrrity. The principles on which family life is carried on should
be consistent with the continuance of family life, and academic and
religious life must accept truth that transcends individual knowledge
and desire. Experience has made it much more easy to see when one is not
doing so. One can always try to live well oneself and point out the
obvious to others, and we learn how to deal with details by keeping
basics in mind.
I've appended an essay I wrote touching on some of these issues. The
essay has not yet been published but should see print in the next few
months.
jf> Apart from finding the right ideas that are a prerequisite for
jf> restoring civilization, there is also the pressing question wether
jf> ideas have much consequenses any more. Mass media, urbanization,
jf> technology and material well-being seem to dehumanize people and
jf> make them uninteresting in aquiring virtue. Even if good ideas are
jf> widely accepted, it will be a tough task to make people take their
jf> values seriously.
Life must be rebuilt, it's true. Since modernity will not last it will
happen. It cannot be rebuilt by a technique. Nonetheless there are
obvious needs and possibilities. One thing needed is close-knit small
communities. They are possible even today--the Amish and strictly
orthodox Jews are examples, and both are growing rapidly. If that is the
only kind of close-knit small community that can exist under modern
conditions then in 200 years everyone will live like that. Or other
forms may be possible. I would hope so. Time will tell.
jf> How do traditions and symbols help us to get a grip of the essence
jf> of things? What do you mean with symbols? Looking for
jf> long-standing traditions may lead us to a functionalism that
jf> accepts infanticide, slavery, cruelty and other things that
jf> history knows. Functionalism is hardly a complete ethical theory.
jf> Is there a corrective for such phenomena? To me, revelation is,
jf> but then the question will be: why not start from revelation right
jf> from the beginning? As long as we confine ourselves to
jf> traditionalism, which concrete values can we affirm?
We care about tradition and symbols less because they serve a function
than because they connect us to things we cannot otherwise articulate.
Revelation of things that transcend us comes through traditions and
symbols. The latter are not about themselves but about realities that
cannot be fully expressed in bald propositional language. We therefore
develop ways over time--symbols and traditions--of making them concrete
and so practically available to us. Language about God for example is
partly propositional--statements about God can be true or false--but
mainly analogous and therefore symbolic. But symbols exist and carry
meaning only through traditions.
The best and clearest example I know of the use of symbol and tradition
to convey truths that transcend ordinary experience and language is the
Tridentine Mass. I don't believe any are offered in Finland but the
Orthodox liturgy is no doubt similar and may be available.
jf> By the way, a concrete example of how conservatives defend
jf> typically liberal ideas is Robert Nisbet's defense of abortion in
jf> Encyclopedia of Prejudice. His argumentation is flawed at least
jf> regarding the position of the church, which in fact has been a
jf> resolute opponent of abortion until quite recently when the
jf> protestants have gave in, but maybe his case can be plausible
jf> regarding newer (19th century) traditions of judicial flegmatism,
jf> which may have developed into a general toleration, unless the
jf> Supreme Court had mobilized the pro-life movement. He also
jf> castigates the fight against alcoholism. Except for the
jf> prohibition debacle, however, this movement did a good job, as far
jf> as I can see.
I agree about Nisbet and abortion. I think he was being willful. I
suppose he wouldn't have adopted his overall view of things unless he
was happy to reject the views of those around him. The habit of
disagreement can be a difficult one to limit.
jf> Evidently, conservatism stands for loyalty, responsibility,
jf> reverence, piety, dignity etc., which liberalism has little room
jf> for. But these notions are rather vague; to reconstitute society
jf> we need to formulate more specific values, and explain how we go
jf> from the former to the latter.
Again, I think it's most important to grasp fundamentals. What is the
nature of man and the moral world? As they say in baseball, keep your
eye on the ball [and all the details of how to stand, when to swing the
bat, etc. will fall into place]. Or as the Bible says, seek ye first the
Kingdom of God and all else will be added.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From James.B.Kalb.69@Alum.Dartmouth.ORG Thu Mar 7 14:20:50 2002
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From: James.B.Kalb.69@Alum.Dartmouth.ORG (James B. Kalb 69)
Subject: Re: an article directed to the racialist right
To: la
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A few comments:
> order. Our political
> and
> cultural order is based on the belief in transcendent
> truth, specifically
> Christian and philosophical truth, and cannot survive
> without it. Materialist
> science is not a sufficient definition of the West.
> Western man existed for 1500
> or 2000 years before the advent of modern science. The
> Chinese and Japanese
> believe in science.
Do you want to continue to count philosophical truth (Plato,
Aristotle)--at least for purposes of beginning the discussion--as a
possible basis for the West? It seems to me a possible way of getting
a foot in the door. At times it seems you do that, as wh en you talk
below about noetic truth. At other times it seems to drop out or
become indistinct.
> But if
> that is your
> position, you are saying that the very thing that you
> most believe in—Western civilization—is
> based on a pious lie. That's an unsustainable position.
Might say why. For one thing, free societies aren't based on lies. For
another, no-one is willing to die for a lie. It's a view that makes
citizenship and honor and free intellectual life impossible. If that's
the position it's the end of what made the We st the greatest of all
civilizations anyway. So why bother?
> Ultimately, you
> cannot sincerely and effectively believe in the
> civilization of European Man if
> you deny the truths that are the basis of that
> civilization. But you do deny
> those truths. Therefore your belief in the West is
> imperfect, incomplete,
> hypocritical, and parasitical. In fact your position is
> just like that
> of
> liberals: You want to possess and enjoy the formal and
> material products
> of
> transcendent truth, while denying the truth itself. As
> Fr. Seraphim Rose said,
> this is the first step on the path to nihilism.
Another point is that this is just what religious liberals want to do
and Nietzsche protested against. So if they want to be on the side of
the National Council of Churches and against Nietzsche they can go
ahead if they think there's a future in it. They
should drop the tough guy act though.
> The very flaw in your world view implies the solution.
> Truly to
> know and love Western civilization is to know and love
> the truths that are its
> foundation.
Maybe put in some noble names and images (Charlemagne, Shakespeare,
Michaelangelo, Bach, chivalry, etc.) and ask what was necessary for
such admirable things to be.
jk
From James.B.Kalb.69@Alum.Dartmouth.ORG Thu Mar 7 14:35:34 2002
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Date: 07 Mar 2002 16:35:28 EST
From: James.B.Kalb.69@Alum.Dartmouth.ORG (James B. Kalb 69)
Subject: Re: Fw: Wildavsky schema
To: la
MIME-Version: 1.0
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Thanks for forwarding.
Don't think Islam is particularly hierarchical though. There is no
nation or nobility in Islam. The Umma is a single people equally
subject to the same universal law that is open to everyone
everywhere. The religious "hierarchy" is not priestly but a matt er of
recognized expertise, as is the case in liberalism. It's believers and
not unbelievers who are in control but the same is true in
liberalism. The only hierarchical feature is that Islam accepts that
men and not women rule, as is in fact the case in all societies, and
makes the relevant rules rigid in accordance with its usual practice.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Sat Mar 9 06:06:34 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: sy
Date: Sat, 09 Mar 2002 08:06:25 -0500
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Ree's letter was interesting. Another academic example was the claim
of some in the Dartmouth College English Department in the mid-80s
that the *existence* of the Dartmouth Review, a right-wing student
weekly, was the thing that made their professional lives most
difficult. A non-academic example would be the 1997 assertion by
Archbishop Weakland, a prominent "progressive," that the 1984 papal
decision to allow bishops to permit the celebration of the old
Tridentine mass "totally derailed" liturgical renewal in the
Church. (The Tridentine mass remains extremely rare and is still not
permitted in many dioceses.)
If views at odds with their own are even allowed to exist then many
liberals feel that their world is shaken. I think part of it is the
abandonment of objective truth. If truth is simply a matter of social
consensus then by challenging the consensus you literally change the
world. The coherence of reality depends on extirpating all
disagreement.
All the best,
Jim Kalb
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Sat Mar 9 07:14:40 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: La
Date: Sat, 09 Mar 2002 09:08:22 -0500
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I'm uncertain about how useful the distinction between those who like
and those who don't like America can be. Can it be applied effectively
when we have a radical mainstream? I saw a lead article in a gardening
newsletter recently denouncing a movement to plant native species as
tainted by xenophobia and racism. For that matter eminent conservative
Jonah Goldberg in the eminently conservative NRO (I think) says he
doesn't like purebred dogs because they're Nazi.
So except for a few extremists it seems that particularism is simply
unacceptable. Attempts to save and justify our national heritage take
the form of portraying it as a developing universalistic radical
egalitarianism that is continually purifying itself of any
particularistic taint. If growing native plants or raising purebred
dogs is now ideologically unacceptable among the nonpolitical and the
conservative then what else can patriotism be? Richard Rorty says he's
a strong American patriot. So do the People for the American Way. John
Dewey is considered a pre-eminently American thinker. How can they be
disputed without getting rid of too much in actual American history
and society to be believable?
I suppose my point is that I don't think the distinction can be
rhetorically effective now. There's something to your point about
institutional and social justice values but it's not the same as the
distinction beween liking and disliking the historical American
heritage. The neocons are a good example of liberals who are concerned
with institutional issues. They don't have much use for particularism
though.
Maybe my more basic point is that I doubt that Americanism is now a
possible basis for going forward.
What would current examples of your true liberalism be?
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Mar 11 06:06:56 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: Ss
In-reply-to: <175.4d2480b.29bc2ffb@cs.com> (Sscrapper1234@cs.com)
Subject: Re: (no subject)
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Status: O
There's a lot to what you say. Still, a country can't be altogether
corrupt any more than a man can be altogether sick. If a man weren't
mostly healthy he'd die instantly, and the same goes for a country.
America includes a lot that is very bad but also my family, friends,
ancestors, the language I speak, the place I live and the food I eat.
How can I say it means nothing to me or fail to wish it well?
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Mar 11 09:09:32 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
Subject: Meeting tomorrow
Status: O
Hello All!
We've mostly been discussing problems, so maybe it would be a good idea
to turn to goals. So in honor of Rush Limbaugh, Hubert Humphrey, Richard
Rorty, and www.godhatesamerica.com, the topic will be:
AMERICA: THE RIGHT WAY!
Which leads to issues like what is America?
Some of us oldsters remember the idea of America as a somewhat
particular people unified nationally. The national history was the story
of building the nation--colonization, the war for independence, the
constitution, pioneer days. the civil war/war between the states was a
tragic mistake, or something. the story of immigrants was the story of
their Americanization.
But that seemed overly monolithic, and the monolith didn't seem to have
any very satisfying purpose. So America became defined in a more
individualized way, as a nation of immigrants in which everyone could
make a new life. Various groups came and converted their old-world ties
(ethnicity, religion, family) to necessary aids for making it. It wasn't
clear what happened to them once they make it, but then it hadn't been
clear under the old view what the point of all the nation-building was
going to be. Like John Dewey said, it's the process and not the goal,
and he should know.
But then why define success as making it a la Podhoretz? How many people
can that apply to? Why shouldn't success consist in whatever you define
it to be? So America became redefined once again as a universal nation
or perhaps environment where anyone of any sort could be what he defined
himself to be with equal social support and approval for his goals.
That definition of America has turned out to have lots of problems.
However, it can point to a certain amount of support in American
history. The group's discussions to date have suggested that the basic
problem may be the tendency to define the purpose of politics as peace,
prosperity, and self-defining freedom. The group has therefore talked
about "Christendom" as the overall form of what's needed to correct
that. So it seems that "America: the Right Way" turns out to be
something like "Christian America."
Perhaps the time has come to return to the question of what that would
mean moving forward. What concrete political issues should be
emphasized? Who are the good guys? How do we do any of this? Some
thoughts:
1. Christendom is antiutopian (if Christianity were utopian the
crucifixion would not be its central image) and does not believe that
everything can be administered. It recognizes that in politics opposing
considerations must be balanced, and there is no uniquely right way to
do so. It offers however a way of achieving unity in diversity, but that
becomes impossible when diversity is limitless. So Christendom seems
consistent with or even to require the usual paleoconservative
positions--limited government, federalism, local moralism, restrictions
on immigration, etc. Is there anything though in paleoconservatism that
should be changed, apart from the ill humor of some of the people
involved?
2. Are any neocons convertible? Is there some line of thought that if
well presented would lead some of them to restructure their positions?
Can anyone who signed that horrible statement from the Institute for
American Values be saved?
Also, here are some possibilities for grand strategy:
1. Reform starts at home. Christians should be more Christian. There's
lots of drugs, drunkenness and divorce in the Bible Belt, and Catholics
get as many abortions as anyone else.
2. Natural law. The Catholics have always emphasized the degree to which
moral rules can be justified by natural reason. Robert George is a
current example. And to the extent pure natural reason gives out appeal
could be made to the judeo-Christian heritage, the Abrahmic religions,
etc.
3. Make the path by walking on it. Openly appeal to religion in
politics. If someone protests then say that there are all sorts of
reasons and motives for supporting one policy or another and why isn't
this as good as any?
4. Emphasize again and again that secularism is not neutral.
These are big questions, and my thoughts have rambled. If anyone wants
to post other questions or issues related to the general topic before
the meeting that would be fine.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Mar 12 13:59:05 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: la
Subject: Re: the article is published with AR masthead
References: <000b01c1ca01$9fbe2020$8285fea9@h6l3p>
Status: O
I'm inclined to think that people get nutty about race and about Jews
but the answer isn't to suppress discussion or pretend there are no
issues because then the nuttiness just takes a different form--people
get nutty about racism etc. I really think that it's the absence of an
overall transcendent scheme of things that seems stable and reliable
that makes absolute opposition seem like the natural response to
differences. It's the disappearance of God that gives evil its glamor.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Thu Mar 14 14:35:11 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: Ga
Date: Thu, 14 Mar 2002 16:35:02 -0500
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Status: O
Hello!
An additional point--another reason it's a bad idea to ordain men
suffering from a homosexual orientation is that one disorder in sexual
psychology makes it likely there will be others. A homosexual has
broken fundamentally--in his impulses if not his actions-- with a
whole network of things that helps us keep sex civil. Homosexual
impulses are by nature more liberated from context than opposite-sex
ones. As a result it's likely to be more difficult for a homosexual to
act as he should. That's certainly the impression I get from what
passes for homosexual culture.
As you suggest, this is not a theological point but a practical
one. And it's not necessarily one to play up in a short column
intended to cast the light of reason on a charged topic. Still, it
seemed worth raising since there is so little open discussion of these
issues.
Jim Kalb
From James.B.Kalb.69@alum.dartmouth.org Sat Mar 16 09:33:45 2002
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From: James.B.Kalb.69@alum.dartmouth.org
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Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2002 11:33:34 -0500
To: la
Subject: Re: we define ourselves by the future
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Status: O
I also find it horrible. It's essentially aggressive and imperialistic.
It places all value in the triumph of the radical will. If anything
but struggle and the moment of triumph had value then the past
could not help but dominate through the accumulation of realized
values. It means the unlimited will to destruction, because the
future exists in independence of the past by destroying it, and
the goal of the destruction cannot be any good except the struggle
to achieve the goal and the moment of its triumphant attainment.
Who is this Jas Carroll? Not the Constantine's Sword guy?
jk
= = = Original message = = =
What a horrifying statement; it strikes a chill into the heart,
because it means nothing is allowed to exist and be preserved,
everything is up for grabs.
Uniquely among nations, we define ourselves by the future, not
the past. This is the source of our optimism, key to our greatness.
James Carroll, America as Sparta, Boston globe.com, 3/12/2002
___________________________________________________________
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From James.B.Kalb.69@alum.dartmouth.org Sat Mar 16 10:37:36 2002
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From: James.B.Kalb.69@alum.dartmouth.org
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To: la
Subject: Re: Fw: we define ourselves by the future
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Status: O
It's somehow reminiscent of the Stalinist "As is well known,
[some novel and outrageous--usually defamatory--claim]". Whoever
has power to establish such a statement as true has power to
establish anything as true. If "we" believe in the future, and
*I'm* the one who can say what the future is, then what possible
grounds do you have to oppose me?
= = = Original message = = =
I would even call Carrolls' comment (which is a standard sentiment
today) a terrorist statement, in Thomas Molnar's sense of "verbal
terrorism:" "the collapse of the old order, the sudden realization
that the universe of a given community has lost its center."
Uniquely among nations, we define ourselves by the future, not
the past. This is the source of our optimism, key to our greatness.
James Carroll, America as Sparta, Boston globe.com, 3/12/2002
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Mar 18 05:45:38 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: briarl@earthlink.net
Date: Mon, 18 Mar 2002 07:45:30 -0500
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Subject: No Guns In The Cockpits
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Status: RO
Dear Mr. Reese,
Thanks for pushing this issue--I don't read the papers much, but have
friends who are news junkies, and no one I've talked to has been able
to point to an actual argument that's been presented anywhere against
arming pilots.
Since those in authority uniformly oppose doing so, and none of them
can explain why, it looks like the opposition is based on something
very basic in the outlook of people in American public life.
I don't think it's elitism, exactly. Sky marshalls are lower class
than pilots. Instead, I think it's the basic demand of liberalism that
force disappear, or if it can't be made to disappear that it seem to
disappear by becoming something else--expertise, "help," sensitivity,
discharge of a professional function, whatever.
If a pilot has a gun he's plainly a man prepared to use force so he
can keep on doing what he's always done and protect people to whom he
has a particular obligation. That makes the use of force personal and
particular, and so alarmingly real. In the case of a sky marshall the
man disappears in the function--people don't care about a policeman's
personal qualities, he's just a policeman--and the function is
vindicating the rule of law against violent attack. The personal
aspect of using force disappears, so force becomes an abstract
consequence of the concept of law as such and loses its disquieting
violent and unpredictable quality.
This may seem a strange line of thought, but I do think that when a
group of people all insist on something odd the explanation is likely
to be an odd feature of how they understand the world in general. And
liberalism, as a philosophy of government that pretends to oppose
coercion, does have its odd features.
Best wishes from a long-time admirer,
Jim Kalb
From James.B.Kalb.69@alum.dartmouth.org Mon Mar 18 11:28:39 2002
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To: la
Subject: Re: No Guns In The Cockpits
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Status: RO
If a cop does it it's normal functioning of the system, and normal
functioning of the system isn't violence. The personal qualities
of a police officer disappear--he wears a uniform, he's addressed
by a title rather than a name. His function is to uphold the
rule of law against violent attack and assert nothing other than
universal order.
Concrete experience isn't that important. It isn't the man on
the spot who thinks it's OK to have air marshalls but not armed
pilots, it's high-ranking officials and public safety and transportation
professionals. They are policymakers who look at these things
from the standpoint of overall concept.
Jim
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Thu Mar 21 07:02:25 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: Ja
Date: Thu, 21 Mar 2002 09:02:19 -0500
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Status: RO
03/20/2002 2:11:10 PM, "La" wrote:
> Rorty's revealing line about "taking advantage" of
> traditional American patriotism in order to change it into its radical
> opposite—specifically, to replace individual freedom (one of Vasjony's four
> principles of America) by "social justice." This shows the conscious bad
> faith at work in the left, and the dynamics at work in the construction of a
> "radical mainstream."
An odd feature of the situation is that it's unclear that Rorty could
distinguish good from bad faith, since a liberal ironist can't really
make assertions. All there can be is rhetoric in support of one's own
projects, whatever they may happen to be. There can't be a true
interpretation of anything.
Back when I used to read constitutional theorizing they used to talk
about "charitable interpretation" of constitutional principles. That
meant, basically, understanding them to mean the same as whatever you
think is right. Liberal theologians do that with religious texts and
traditions--if Paul had understood X, which is something we now know,
and realized Y, then his fundamental principle of Z would have made
him an unbending proponent of homosexuality etc.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Mar 25 10:32:40 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: wo
Subject: Catholic Social Teaching
Status: RO
I certainly agree that the notion that you can simply will some
economic result and have the result follow does a lot of damage.
It seems to me though that those of us who take economic law to heart
should explain what to do with the moral aspirations behind the various
papal etc. pronouncements. If we don't then our view will never be
accepted no matter how right it is. Do any of the Austrians deal with
that kind of issue in a way you think helpful?
Some things are obvious--a free market leads to more employment and
more production, and those are good things. Some things aren't so
obvious, though. For example, to what extent is it right for a person
or enterprise simply to try to maximize profit within the limits of
honesty? How about obligations to workers who have given loyal service
for a long time and grown dependent on their positions? Is their
treatment legitimately a simple matter of maximizing profits? What are
the moral considerations relevant to advertising? Also, to what extent
is it good for enterprises to have primary goals other than profit,
with the need to make money and so be able to stay in business a
limitation rather than a main purpose? I'm told that at Caterpillar
for example they view (or viewed--these things can change) engineering
and quality as primary goals and assumed economic success would
follow. I'm told some college professors are willing to put truth over
career. Should something of the same principle apply to making
bulldozers?
I suppose I'm asking more about moral considerations regarding how one
should pursue economic life than about legislation. Still there must be
some overlap between the two, and certainly they have to be considered
in relation to each other. I don't know of an adequate treatment of the
area though. Can you suggest anything?
One point--it seems to me subsidiarity ought to be the key to Catholic
social teaching but at present it's woefully undeveloped. I've drafted
a Q&A that tries to develop that issue and will add it to the end of
this email. If you have time to look at it and give me any comments
that come to mind I'd be greatful.
Jim
Q&A on Catholicism and Conservatism:
What does political conservatism have to do with Catholicism?
Political conservatism is the rejection of political modernism,
otherwise known as liberalism. As such, Catholicism requires it.
Political modernism is the attempt to establish a wholly rational and
this-worldly social order. The world is to be re-created and redeemed
through man's will. Political modernism thus substitutes belief in man
for belief in God. As such, it is a denial of the nature of God, man,
and the world. Its natural consequences are anarchy, tyranny, or both.
Part of the reason man collectively cannot control the world is that
individual men make choices. Catholicism tells us that moral evil exists
because every man is free to err and so do serious injury to himself and
others. Without that freedom men would lose their dignity, and since
it's a real freedom it is sometimes acted on. If human freedom were a
collective possession that could be used to choose utopia Catholicism
would have no function. The point of the Crucifixion--God abandoned,
humiliated and tortured to death--would disappear if evil could be
managed and made innocuous, and that would be the case if it were a
matter of social structure. Accordingly, there are severe limits to the
possibilities of social reform.
Conservatism is rejection of the possibility of a self-contained and
wholly rational social order. It therefore means rejection of utopianism
and acceptance of the complexity and necessary imperfection of all
social arrangements. In opposition to the mechanizing tendencies of
modernism it makes it possible to recognize the irreducible freedom and
responsibility of the human soul, and therefore not only the unavoidable
reality of human evil but also the ever-present possibilities of hope
and action. Conservatism is thus liberating and completely Catholic.
What then are Catholic politics?
Catholicism views man both as an individual and as part of the natural,
social, and transcendent orders. It accepts that the individuals and to
some extent institutions that make up society, by reason of their
relationship to an order of things transcending human purposes, have an
integrity that cannot be violated for the sake of this-worldly goals. As
a consequence, Catholicism rejects both the collectivism that abolishes
the distinctiveness of the individual and of the particular institutions
and relationships in which he takes part, and the individualism and
egalitarianism that deny man's essential ordered participation in a
variety of larger wholes.
Catholicism therefore has room for the individual soul, and also for
hierarchy, ethnic and cultural particularity, distinct roles for men and
women, and civic and occupational distinctions and connections. What
allows all these things to combine is the principle of
"subsidiarity"--localism within unity--which is absolutely fundamental
to Catholic social thought.
Catholic social thought begins with individual morality. Man is always
this particular man in this setting with these connections. Catholicism
therefore takes personal morality, especially the morals relating to our
most intimate relations with others, with the utmost seriousness. Its
profound concern with family and sexual life has nothing narrow or
obsessive about it but is a direct consequence of the primacy of the
individual person, and therefore of the habits, attitudes,
understandings and attachments that make him what he is. Chastity is a
statement of the sacredness of the human body and intimate human ties,
monogamy of the absolute value of the particular individual. Who would
want a morality that slights such things, that does not interpret them
to us and so help us establish our lives on a sound footing?
What we are depends not only on family connections but also on our
connections to far broader groups with whom we share the habits and
attitudes that form what is called culture. Culture is learned from the
family and the family is molded by culture, so the two cannot be
separated altogether. Nonetheless, there is a difference in emphasis:
family is more a matter of nature, culture of history. The significance
of culture and the ethnic, class and regional groupings to which it is
tied is therefore more conditional than that of family. Nonetheless,
culture and ethnicity are also part of what we are and so should be
respected. In addition, there are civic, occupational, avocational and
other groupings, all of which are important to human life and which
Catholicism also respects.
Man realizes his social and moral nature and the world becomes human
through the participation of each man in governance, both as ruler and
ruled. Man would lack dignity if he could not effectually choose good
and so make things better in the lives of others as well as his own, and
he would make himself the center of his own world if he did not take
direction from others. The effect of subsidiarity is that each person
rules and is ruled in turn through individual moral life and
participation in the variety of groupings of which he is a member. Even
the most eminent person has limited authority and must often submit to
others, and even the most subordinate is responsible for himself, and
will sometimes find settings in which he is responsible for others as
well.
Catholicism thus rejects the comprehensive system of compulsion demanded
by modern systems of reform. It proposes subsidiarity as the mode of
political life best fitted to the coming of the Kingdom. Christ does not
rule through comprehensive schemes. Instead, he makes his people the
salt of the earth, the leaven that transforms all things without
apparent force. God's omnipresence means action everywhere. Christ
governs less through Caesar than by transforming human relations; in the
end, however, that transformation makes Caesar himself different from
what he was.
What about discrimination?
The social complexity native to Catholicism means differentiation and
thus inequalities. While rejecting extremes that deny fundamental rights
to life, liberty and property, Catholicism thus accepts forms of
discrimination that political modernism condemns. The Catholic position
on women priests is an obvious current example, but only one of many.
The modern mind believes discrimination always wrong because to
categorize and so limit the individual seems to violate his rights. It
is thought that universal humanity is the only quality that can rightly
be used to determine what a man is, and that all others are arbitrary
impositions. From the Catholic point of view, however, what is most
important is neither the isolated individual nor universal humanity,
but the individual participating in things that transcend him. Since
those things differ from individual to individual, simple-minded
opposition to all discrimination is out of place in Catholicism.
Political modernism denies man's participation in things that transcend
him and therefore denies the reality and significance of specific human
qualities. To the contrary, it requires that man define and so control
what things are and the significance of differences. The ability to do
so is basic, for example, to the current understanding of sex and
gender, which treats customary roles and stereotypes as unjust and
oppressive and demands their abolition in favor of comprehensive radical
equality and the right of self-definition.
Catholicism rejects such demands; they are not only tyrannical, but make
God irrelevant to the world. God is relevant to the world because the
world means something. If God made it and called it good, and if he
means something by his actions in it, then man is not free to make of it
what he chooses. He must accept things and their significance as God
made them, and in particular must accept that human qualities have an
objective meaning with implications for how we should act.
The Incarnation means that God has revealed himself as a specific
historical person whom we follow not by abolishing our particularity
but by transfiguring it. The society in which we live becomes Christian
when it reflects that transfigured particularity. The things that touch
us most deeply--our humanity, but also sex, family relationships,
culture, and ethnic, professional and other connections--are not
abolished but transformed by Christ, and as transformed become the
principles and institutions that govern the world. The hierarchical
family remains the hierarchical family, but takes on a new meaning, and
similarly in other spheres of social life. The social world thereby
becomes at the same time more related to us, since it is ordered by the
qualities that make us what we are, and more related to God.
What about the preferential option for the poor?
It is a good thing to follow Christ in remembering the poor.
Nonetheless, respect for the poor and concern for their well-being
requires rejection of the view that sin is basically social and that
poverty and oppression can be abolished in some comprehensive way. The
temptation of Christ is enough to demonstrate that the point of
Christianity is no more the solution of political and economic problems
than it is the conquest of natural necessity.
To emphasize sinful social arrangements at the expense of individual sin
is to say that at bottom it is others who make man what he is, and so to
make him the creature of those in power. The result is to diminish those
the preferential option intends to benefit. How does it help the poor
and suffering to be told that the truly human life is one of secure
comfort? What they need is God's immediate presence, and it is the
Crucifixion, prayer and the Real Presence that give it to them. By
comparison social reform is a promise of pie in the sky from their
social betters. As a primary standard it is antihuman, and the Catholic
is always the truly human.
From James.B.Kalb.69@alum.dartmouth.org Tue Mar 26 07:56:29 2002
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Status: RO
Agreed on the insistence on using the P word and not the H word.
The article itself seems to downplay the extent of homosexual
interest in teenage boys. My impression is that it's not a personal
peculiarity of some immature homosexuals but something much more
central.
It's also my impression that bishops (those not actively working
for the subversion of the Church) have been acting like present-day
college presidents. Their main job has been hushing things up
and papering things over--things that are altogether at odds
with the mission of the institution but have become thoroughly
established.
It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. Two possibilities
are overthrowing oppressive patriarchal structures that impose
a culture of silence etc. etc. or overthrowing accommodationist
structures that impose a culture of papering over and hushing
up.
Jim
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From kalb@aya.yale.edu Wed Mar 27 07:54:28 2002
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From: James Kalb
To: Aa
Date: Wed, 27 Mar 2002 09:54:19 -0500
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03/26/2002 9:32:53 PM, Aa wrote:
>But you conveniently set aside this
>analysis and use a euro-centric viewpoint when talking about the state and
>private property. Ignoring the most obvious--->the native American Indians
>had no concept of the "state" or "private property" (whom had to be killed
>off to create this illegitimate government to create private property).
>Also these two words "private property" are used to mean economic private
>property, which does not include 'personal property' to the anarchist (for
>libertarian reasons). Most people are already property-LESS, and most
>people don't have much control over their govt. Two things you say we love,
>most people don't really even have!
I don't say we love them, just that they're essential to human social
life under present and foreseeable conditions and that attempts to
abolish them make things worse. I don't go into the details because
the point is tangential--my basic point of course, which I make
explicitly, is that gender is much more fundamental and therefore
attempts to abolish it even more destructive.
What does Eurocentrism have to do with it? The Muslims, Hindus,
Chinese, Japanese had states that didn't depend on the European
model. The Aztecs, Mayas, Incas etc. like all large complex societies
had states. The Incas as I understand the matter had a sort of state
communism in which the Grand Inca or whatever he was called basically
owned everything. Not a good precedent for an anarchist. I agree
American Indian hunter- gatherers, like other hunter-gatherers, didn't
have states. The most complicated stateless society I know of was
early Medieval Iceland, which I've written about
(http://counterrevolution.net/kalb_texts/icelandic_order.html). Anything
more complex and extensive than that I think needs a state.
As to private property, don't even hunter-gatherers own whatever there
is to own? Not land, except maybe to the extent fishermen own the sea
(there can be customary rights to fish in particular places), but
certainly bows and arrows (which are the means of production),
household goods etc.
>And I think this may be a contradiction. How can feminism be both
>anti-authoritarian and at the same time use "the force of law" to implement
>feminism through the state?
I make the same point. I don't defend feminism against charges that it
is contradictory.
More generally, it seems to me a basic problem of modern (liberal)
political thought that it is anti-authoritarian, because it tries to
make individual desire the basis of moral and political obligation,
and also requires a comprehensive apparatus of coercion to bring about
its social reengineering. The solution to the problem is to say people
who fundamentally reject liberalism are bigots, fundamentalists,
greedheads or whatever whose views don't have to be taken into
account, and to present the liberal state as a universal aid in
achieving legititimate personal goals. PC is one manifestation of this
solution--if you disagree with the program there's something really
wrong and hateful about you, even voicing what you think is an attack
on all goodness, so you have to be silenced.
jk
From James.B.Kalb.69@alum.dartmouth.org Thu Mar 28 05:41:23 2002
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Status: RO
Thanks for the note.
On anarchism--it seems to me that the anarchocapitalists, who
base a stateless system on private property, the right of contract,
and the right of self-defense, make the most sense. If there's
no government to supervise things then there has to be some system
of social conventions that clearly sets forth who makes decisions
about what. The way that can be done with respect to land, physical
objects, contractual obligations etc. is through a strict system
of private property rights. I don't see any other way to do it.
The left anarchists seem to want to have a communal approach
instead of an individualistic one. Then communes would be the
property holders. It seems to me though that most of the communes
would end up dividing their communal property among the individual
members so you'd be back to anarchocapitalism. I think it's worth
studying the history of intentional communities in this connection.
Most of them break up rather quickly and the members go their
own way.
jk
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From kalb@aya.yale.edu Tue Apr 2 06:32:59 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: jm
Subject: Re: The SSJ at St. Gregory's Academy
Status: RO
I certainly agree that radically disordered people are harder to deal
with when there is also institutional disorder. After all, if people
complain about obvious disorder, where will it stop? It's better not to
see problems.
My impression is that many Catholic bishops are like many college
presidents--they're in charge of big, influential and prestigious
organizations that they want to remain big, influential and prestigious.
However, many parts of the organization are dominated by people who
don't like the purpose and guiding theory behind it, and in any event
those things are difficult to present effectively in the accepted
language of public discussion today. So the job of the custodian of the
organization becomes a matter of papering over impossible conflicts.
Serious problems simply cannot be recognized.
Jim Kalb
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Sat Apr 13 10:54:38 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: future-of-christianity@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [paleo-right] Re: Future of Christianity
References:
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"ck" == KOPFF E CHRISTIAN writes:
ck> There have never been
ck> significant communist or nazi parties in the United States,
ck> Canada, Great Britain or the Scandinavian countries. Communism
ck> ruled "Orthodox" Russia. There were powerful communist parties in
ck> France and Italy and in Italy the communists (under another name)
ck> are the head of the no .2 coalition. (The fascists, under another
ck> name, are junior partners in the ruling coalition.)
An important point, that free government and Protestantism seem to go
together. That could mean several things:
1. If you like freedom you like the idea of a direct individual
connection to ultimate truth and don't like prelacy, priestcraft,
Romish mummeries, etc.
2. If conditions are disposed toward tyranny Catholicism and Orthodoxy
will survive, for centuries even, because there's a definite
structure of authority that cannot in fact or concept be reduced to
the authority of the state. So all chronically tyrannical Christian
societies will be Catholic or Orthodox rather than Protestant.
3. In his new book Paul Gottfried claims I think that Protestantism is
behind PC and managerial liberalism generally. So maybe Protestantism
as the comparatively new arrival mostly existing on the fringes of
Europe just hasn't had as much of an opportunity to show all the bad
things it is consistent with and to some degree at least lends
support to. It will though.
There must be other possibilities as well. Suggestions?
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Sat Apr 13 10:59:39 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: future-of-christianity@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [paleo-right] Re: Future of Christianity
References: <005401c1e2eb$81a12c60$c32bf7a5@com>
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"mr" == Matthew Richer writes:
mr> I think American Protestants are more resistant to tyranny than
mr> American Catholics. The situation is somewhat different here than
mr> in Europe.
There are varieties of American Protestantism. The mainstream
denominations are I think more thoroughly PC, socialist, and absorbed by
whatever the dominant constellation of power happens to be than the RCs.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From James.B.Kalb.69@alum.dartmouth.org Sat Apr 13 11:04:42 2002
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Hello!
I don't take the current crisis as much to heart as a lot of
people. It seems to me bishops have become like university
presidents--heads of big wealthy respectable institutions with lots of
well-placed and vocal members who reject the theory on which the
institution is founded. The only thing the head of the institution
can do without a catastrophic blowup is devote his life to papering
things over in the interests of the institution's wealth, reputation,
etc. It's just as well for that sort of thing to come to an end, but
when it does it's messy. If the institution has a function worth
performing that some people consider supremely important it will
regroup and be the better for it.
Part of the issue on Protestant/Catholic/Orthodox is what sort of
thing the Church was in the beginning. It seems to me it was something
rather concrete held together by apostolic authority, unity of
communion and doctrine, and continuity of ritual passing on membership
and office (baptism and laying on of hands). It also seems to me
something of the sort, as well as an authoritative way of resolving
disputes, is necessary for Christianity to remain a particular thing
rather than a collection of tendencies of thought that can combine in
various proportions with other tendencies to produce almost anything.
So from that perspective, and also from the perspective of historical
continuity, it seems to me the Roman view is strongest. It's true
there have been developments in Catholicism and Orthodoxy that
distinguish it from practices in the earliest church, but it seems to
me those developments reflect tendencies that were there from the
beginning and needed by changing circumstances. You don't need icons
to help make saints, apostles, incidents in the life of Jesus etc seem
concretely real to you when it all happened recently and to people to
whom you are joined by a short chain of personal contacts. You don't
need a celibate clergy, monks, elaborate ritual in a foreign language
etc. to make the church seem separate from the world and holy when
there aren't many members and you can be killed for being one. And so
on.
As to the role of religion in America it seems to me things have
rather fallen apart to the extent that we have to start from basic
principles, meaning starting more from the side of religion rather
than from the side of an existing American constitution that we're
trying to maintain with the aid of religion. Politics can't be made
the most important thing. It does seem to me though that Catholic
political thought needs some development. "Subsidiarity" for example
is said to be basic to it, and the Pope has said some helpful things
on the welfare state, but a lot more has to be done. -- Jim Kalb
(kalb@aya.yale.edu) http://counterrevolution.net and
http://rightsreform.net
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From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Apr 15 05:48:21 2002
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Newsgroups: tnn.religion.catholic
Subject: Re: Genes? say Christ was not white.
cc: jkalb@nyx.net
References:
From: Jim Kalb
Date: 15 Apr 2002 07:47:51 -0400
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Status: RO
The following message is a courtesy copy of an article
that has been posted to tnn.religion.catholic as well.
The article is remarkably stupid even for something associated with the
mass electronic media:
1. It seems to confuse race and suntan.
2. Men of mediterranean type are usually referred to as "white" even
after they've been out in the sun a lot.
3. Caravaggio and Rembrant didn't do delicate Christs and I wouldn't
call any Christ I can think of by a non-schlock artist "porcelaine"
or "feminine."
4. They can't even get Velazquez' name right.
5. Velazquez' Jesus isn't all that paler than the latest BBC version.
6. Jesus as the beardless (and fair-complexioned) Good Shepard preceded
the cross in early Christian iconography.
7. What do the crusades have to do with all this? Was it just another PC
stereotype they wanted to drag in.
8. Etc., etc., etc.
jk
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Apr 15 07:23:06 2002
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From: Jim Kalb
To: future-of-christianity@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [paleo-right] Re: Future of Christianity
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"ck" == KOPFF E CHRISTIAN writes:
ck> I consider attacks on their
ck> religious traditions attacks on them. America was founded by
ck> Protestants steeped in the classical tradition. Why aren't attacks
ck> on America's Protestant traditions just as much disloyalty to
ck> America as attacks on Orthodoxy in Greece are attacks on Greece
ck> and contempt for Italian Roman Catholicism contempt for Italy?
America or at least New England and Pennsylvania was founded by
protestants who thought religion more important than secular social
affiliation. Maryland I thought was founded by Lord Baltimore, a
Catholic. Deism influenced the Founders. What all that implies for
America today can of course be discussed. I don't think it supports
identification of protestant religion with the American way as the
ultimate object of loyalty.
The relation between religious and secular loyalties is always a problem
for Christianity, I think one with no secure solution this side of
Kingdom Come. It seems to me one weakness of Protestantism is its
tendency in mainstream forms to be absorbed by national culture and in
non-mainstream forms to become narrow, sectarian, anti-intellectual. The
Catholics and Orthodox have their weaknesses as well. It's not an area
in which weaknesses can be avoided.
ck> The American version of the
ck> Separation of Church and State is clearly within the Protestant
ck> tradition. If the Orthodox and RCs consider it correct
I for one don't see what's correct about it. Like almost any
accomodation it's better than some other versions of Church/State
relations in some settings but it doesn't have the conceptual clarity
and rationality, or the stability, that it claims and so can be expected
to run into problems as circumstances change. And in fact that's
happened.
--
Jim Kalb (kalb@aya.yale.edu)
http://counterrevolution.net and http://rightsreform.net
From kalb@aya.yale.edu Mon Apr 15 10:12:06 2002
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Subject: Re: Mortification
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From: Jim Kalb