How traditionalism grows from understanding and opposing liberalism

John D. writes:

I’ve spent some time in the last few days re-reading some of your previous posts and other articles from Front Page that I’ve bookmarked as some of your most important and relevant (to me) work. Back in January I sent you a link to an article by George MacDonald Fraser in which he decried the effects of PC on our culture. You replied with this post. I believe it is probably one of your most paramount, succinct articulations of the problem of liberalism that I’ve had the privilege of reading. In the first sentence of your closing paragraph your wrote:

“Once we understand what liberalism is, and what liberalism is not, we can start building up a counter vision to liberalism—the seeds and cells of a new society.”

I think this is an important statement with regards to the thread about building a traditionalist “alternative” (the quotation marks around the word alternative is my protest to the fact that truth should not be called alternative but instead, an imperative) to liberalism. A prerequisite to the traditionalist manifesto is the need to give liberalism a good thorough thrashing and debunking (a gift that has mightily been bestowed upon you). Unless liberalism can be deconstructed and discredited and shown to be the false but highly organized threat to the overall health and perpetuation of our society that it is, why should anyone who is currently a believer in that worldview opt to accept the tenets of a traditionalist perspective? I think we need to tear down before we can build up. However, an articulation of a certain degree of the traditionalist perspective will most necessarily be part of the bulldozer. What a great thread. Thanks for resurrecting it.

LA replies:

Thank you very much.

On one hand, as was discussed in the traditionalism thread, our main purpose is not to persuade liberals that liberalism is no good. Our main purpose is to convert conservatives from their present conservatism (which is immersed in liberalism) to real conservatism or traditionalism, which is the opposite of liberalism, as it stands for the things that liberalism destroys. That involves the critique of liberalism that you speak of, but it’s a critique of liberalism aimed at conservatives, not at liberals. Once there is a body of traditionalists, they can perhaps begin to exert an influence on the larger liberal society. But that is not our initial goal. Our initial goal is to build up a community of traditionalists.

Again, liberalism is aimed at destroying our social and spiritual goods. To stop it, as you say, we must first understand the destructive thing that liberalism is. Out of that understanding comes the opposite of liberalism, traditionalism, which affirms and protects those things.

And now maybe I’m about to reverse myself, because it seems to me that an effective anti-liberal argument could be made to liberals, not just conservatives. It’s like this. To the extent that a liberal is attached to some non-liberal aspects of reality, all we have to do is show him that the principles of liberalism, consistently applied, must destroy the things he loves. He must see that it’s an either/or choice between liberalism and the thing he cares about. I’ve made this sort of argument to liberals on a few occasions in the past, but I don’t remember ever really following through on it and pinning the liberal down. In any case I don’t think this argument has ever been made in a systematic way.

One reason conservatives rarely make this kind of argument to liberals is as follows. Say a conservative is chatting with a liberal friend or relative at a social gathering and the liberal suddenly affirms some non-liberal value. The conservative rejoices to find (for once) some common ground with a liberal; he thinks it’s a victory for conservatism. So he enjoys the moment. But he fails to do what he really ought to do, which is to point out to the liberal that his non-liberal value is in conflict with his liberal principles and must ultimately be destroyed by them. In other words, because consistent liberalism attacks all concrete and particular values, as “unequal,” liberalism (and a humanly endurable life) can only survive through lots of unprincipled exceptions to liberalism. So our liberal is indulging in an unprincipled exception to his liberalism, and the conservative, by enjoying his “conservative moment of victory” and his moment of fellow feeling with the liberal, is actually affirming the liberal in his unprincipled exception and thus helping him maintain his liberalism. What the conservatives ought to be doing is pinning the liberal down on the fact that he is making an unprincipled exception which he has no right to make, since it contradicts his principles, e.g., “What right have you to like that beautiful building and want to landmark it? You were just saying that everything in our society is the product of inequality, racism, and oppression.” We can come up with better examples of what I’m talking about.

However, while this type of argument aimed at liberals could possibly work in some cases, our main object must still be to convert conservatives. I hardly ever have an intellectual conversation with a liberal. My experience has been that since about 1995, communication between liberals and conservatives basically came to an end. They were too far apart to communicate.

I’m curious to know what Alan Roebuck thinks of this, since, as I understand it, his anti-liberal apologetics is aimed primarily at liberals.

Stewart W. writes:

You wrote: “To the extent that a liberal is attached to some non-liberal aspects of reality, all we have to do is show him that the principles of liberalism, consistently applied, must destroy the things he loves.”

I have always thought that, when the moment is right, we can convert any number of liberals by means of just such methods. Think of the number of liberal intellectuals (admittedly, mostly older) who are strongly attached to Western culture; classical music, literature, theater, folk and bluegrass music, history, or art. Their passion is the lever by which they can be moved into traditionalism, once they see that the principles of liberalism are specifically designed to destroy and bury the objects of their passion. Although I could never have been described as a committed liberal, it was through my love of classical music and history, even from high school, that I found my way to being a traditionalist conservative.

Think of the iconic “old professor of literature”, Monsieur Calgués, from “Camp of the Saints.” There is the liberal upon whom we can work. Our job as traditionalists is to hone our arguments and reasoning, so as to be able to guide such people into traditionalism when the opportunity presents itself.

Thanks again for all you do.

Alan Roebuck writes:

You asked about my views on arguing with liberals vs. arguing with conservatives.

Since arguing for conservatism is a form of religious persuasion, I look to the well-developed theories of Christian apologetics for guidance in the fundamentals. And these theories say that Christian apologetics is intended for everyone, although the tactics vary: Apologetics strengthens the faith (faith meaning trust based on knowledge) of the believer, it intrigues the sympathetic unbeliever and it shakes the confidence of the hostile unbeliever (those who declare themselves to be neutral I count among the hostile.)

I see conservative apologetics as similar. There are many conservatives who know little about conservatism; they only know there’s something seriously wrong with liberalism Such a person still thinks like a liberal on the most fundamental issues, because he has not yet “been transformed by the renewing of his mind,” to paraphrase the Apostle Paul.

And just as many new Christians are “picked off” by the various pseudo-Christian cults (including the biggest cult of all, liberal Christianity), many new conservatives never progress beyond a facile rejection of liberalism’s obviously foolish policies. These people need to learn that there is more to conservatism than having the courage to say “no” to policies that are obviously wrong. The one who has made some commitment to conservatism has at least an intuition of the true order of being, but this intuition has to be developed by proper instruction.

These “mainstream” conservatives are to be likened to new Christians: They have enough courage and insight to go against the status quo to at least a certain extent, but they have yet to know and believe the full truth. Although we must expect some resistance from this group (because when push comes to shove, many of them will cling to their liberal principles), I see this group as the main one to be evangelized, because they have indicated a willingness to oppose liberalism.

But since liberalism is the overwhelmingly dominant way of thinking, we will be appealing mainly to liberals. Of course there is a vast difference between the one who has made a conscious commitment to liberalism, and the one who goes along with liberalism because that’s all he’s ever heard. The second category contains many more people than the first, and it includes most “conservatives.” We will make our appeal mainly to liberals in this second category, and our interactions with the relatively small group of liberals in the first category mainly will be to demonstrate to onlookers that these leftists do not have the truth.

In this taxonomy, the large group of nominal liberals who have not made a move toward conservatism are to be likened to sympathetic unbelievers in Christianity. Such people often can be reached by, as you have said, showing them the contradiction between some concrete good they love and the demands of liberalism. Just about everybody loves something that is threatened by liberalism.

In connection with this, one key is to show that liberalism is both knowable (not just a mysterious force with no discernable source or structure) and a threat. People often think that the most basic principles of society are beyond criticism and change. Arguing the big picture, not just case-by-case, makes a strong impression. And to show that liberalism is a threat, we need to show that liberalism is not just “being nice to people.” That is, we need to uncover liberalism.

Conservatives in the proper sense of the word, of course, are already on our side. But since apologetics is also for believers, we will have something to say to them also, if only to help equip them to be more effective evangelists.

Alan Roebuck continues:

To summarize the above points: we publicly rebuke the hard core leftist; we appeal to the liberal-by-default by clarifying his liberalism and showing that it leads to absurdity and danger; and we appeal to the conservative (mainstream or otherwise) to be true to his conservative instincts and principles.

LA writes to Paul Gottfried:

Do you have any particular reaction to my article on the possibility of a true resistance to liberalism? (My article proper begins after my long quotation from George Fraser’s article.)

Do you see the principles I’ve stated here as being distinct from or similar to existing and recognized beliefs and principles in conservative politics? If distinct, in what way? If similar, in what way?

Paul Gottfried replies:

You seem to be going over ground that I cover in encyclopedic fashion in my last four books. The problem, I argue, is not liberalism properly understood, which was the “idea” of the predominantly Protestant bourgeoisie in the nineteenth century. What we are suffering from is the combination of managerial control and mass democracy. The very notion of “liberal democracy,” which the neocons now enshrine, is a leftist concept invented during the Progressive era. In any case we don’t have the resources to make any difference in this struggle. the Right has been marginalized, and after looking at the Counterreformation Catholics trying to restore the Papal States circa 1830 who have taken over on the paleo side, I can’t say I’m surprised. Actually, the entire media class here and in Western and Central Europe look pretty much the same, post-Marxist Left with a sprinkling of global democratic, neo-Wilsonian opposition. Contrary to what Irving Kristol has said, neoconservatism has been thriving in Europe. It is the only permitted (bogus) opposition to the multicultural Left.

LA replies:

I don’t see any overlap between our approaches. I don’t say anything about the Protestant bourgeoisie, managerial control, mass democracy, and other such factors. My focus is entirely on the core idea of what I call modern liberalism or post World War II liberalism, namely, the belief in non-discrimination as the highest and ruling principle of society. I wonder if you’re reading my article through the filter of your work and not seeing that I’m saying something different.

Second, you seem to feel entirely hopeless about the possibility of opposing liberalism, while my position is that the dominant liberalism can be opposed but that such opposition has never been seriously tried.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 05, 2008 02:12 AM | Send