The parallel frauds of liberalism and conservatism

The war against “Islamofascism” is to conservatives what Sam Francis’s “anarcho-tyranny” is to liberals.

Liberals are unwilling to do anything to stop the actual moral anarchy in our society, since that would require them to abandon the liberal belief in the total moral autonomy of the individual self. Yet, in order to maintain some moral legitimacy in their own eyes, the liberals must exercise moral disapproval and control over something. So they mount tyrannical campaigns against such morally neutral activities as smoking. They are moral anarchists when it comes to sexual and expressive behavior, and moral absolutists when it comes to health issues.

Similarly, conservatives are unwilling to do anything to stop the actual Islamic penetration and takeover of America and the West, since that would require them to abandon the liberal belief in non-discrimination. Yet, in order to maintain their self-image as conservatives and patriots, they need to oppose something about Islam. So they mount a hysterical crusade against a fictional entity called Islamofascism. They practice liberal openness toward our actual mortal enemy, and wage a war to the death against a figment of their imagination.

Bob Dylan captured the same idea in his 1961 song “Talking New York Blues”:

A lot of people don’t have much food on their table.
But they’ve got a lot of forks, and knives,
And they’ve gotta cut somethin’.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at September 23, 2007 03:07 PM | Send