I started this blog as an arena in which I could vent frustrations - frustrations in my personal life, with politics, with religion and with society at large. It seemed that I was spending too much time (and far too much money) discussing these matters in the bar; and of course, I was pushing away a number of friends by doing so. So I decided to air my consciousness online, away from the distractions inherent in social situations and through a medium that might actually reach more people.
So far I've done very little blogging. I wrote a few pieces on the nature of faith and its relationship to reason; I published a couple of numbers on the "politics" of sexuality; and I certainly spilled my emotions here and there. But throughout all this probing and digging, I've been missing the root of a number of problems that affect my day-to-day life. After a very enlightening experience I had last night, I think myself able to dig up that root.
I watched a documentary by Adam Curtis called "The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear." It was an extremely interesting exposé on the Neo-Conservative movement in America, as well as the radical Islamic movement in the Middle East. It traced the philosophical growth of both movements and their political implementations from the middle of the 20th century up until just a few years ago. The main thrust of the argument (and very well made it was) is that both movements employed very much the same means to achieve (or fail to achieve) their goals, and that both movements grew out of the same philosophical assumptions. It is the philosophical assumptions, discussed but not explored in the film, that I wish to explore here.
Leo Strauss and Sayyid Qutb - an German-American academic and an Egyptian civil servant, respectively - are the originators of the political philosophies that have grown into American Neo-Conservativism and radical Islam (again, respectively). Both of these men were avid critics of American society during the post-war period, and both established a cause and root for the problems they perceived: it was Liberalism.
Now let's make one thing clear here: by "Liberalism," I do not mean, and they did not mean, "leftist politics." That is a very contemporary definition of the word, and a very bad one at that. By "Liberalism," I am (and they were) referring to "Classical Liberalism" - the unquestionable freedom of the individual, the worship of democracy, the belief in equality and the critique of traditional values. They believed that Liberalism had led to a veritable decomposition of society: a relativistic, morally decaying heap of self-centered individuals, all of whom were constantly engaged in selfish, superficial, unproductive activities. I ask you to momentarily consider the "sins" with which radical Islam has charged America, and the "sins" with which the Religious Right has charged America - they are almost identical, and can be summed up in a few words: Jersey Shore, Toddlers and Tiaras, midget wrestling, daytime television, "Forever Lazy," Brittany Spears, O.J. Simpson, ready-to-eat bacon - etc, etc, etc. It was believed by these men that Liberalism, in its classical formulations, was the real and hidden sickness of which these few examples were mere symptoms.
This is the point in our exploration where I am going to go further than Curtis's documentary (again, it was superb and should be watched) - for I am going to join the two aforementioned men for a moment and dig up that root that's been evading me for so long. I wish to criticize, for just a bloody second, the concept and logical conclusion of Classical Liberalism itself; because, though we as a society still wholeheartedly embrace the concept, we refuse to admit that we are living in its logical conclusion.
Though Wikipedia will tell you that Classical Liberalism was developed in the 19th century, one must look back another three hundred years to find its earliest formulations - we see them in the writings of Sir Francis Bacon, René Descartes, John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, David Hume and Adam Smith, to name only the most famous authors. And while Descartes believed in freedom of the mind, whereas Locke promoted freedom of action - there are a number of such discrepancies - one can read the entire catalogue of the Enlightenment philosophers (and their progeny) as a vast break with the dogmatic tradition of the Middle Ages in favor of a more modern, individualistic perspective.
There are three tenets on which Classical Liberalism rests, and they are all developed in the philosophical movement (called "Modern Philosophy") that stems from the Enlightenment. Reason - that which Descartes claimed is the most common trait shared among men - is first and foremost, and is praised at the expense of Faith; Science is its logical outcome, and is increasingly viewed as a more "reasonable" replacement for Religion; and Democracy, finally, steps in to replace the age-old concept of God.
Let me take a minute and explain the last of these three, for it seems odd to compare a political ideology to the most sacred word in the history of Western society. Let us take as our first instance the concept of "truth." In the philosophy of the Middle Ages and Antiquity, "truth" carried many of the same connotations it does today: it suggests a bundle of ideas, including "irrefutable fact," "that which is known certainly," "that which is right and not wrong," etc. The difference between "truth" in the Liberal sense and "truth" in the pre-Enlightenment sense is the source from whence truth comes: in olden days, Truth came from God; today, Truth comes from the Majority. How many times have you seen an argument settled by Wikipedia; how many times have you seen a poll of x-number of individuals cited as a credible source? And how many times - this is a hard question, because it will make you uncomfortable - how many times have you seen the beliefs and principles of men change, in favor of the beliefs and principles of the Majority?
One last digression on Democracy as God, and we'll get back to the critique of Liberalism. In old-timey politics, a king or queen was respected as such because they were believed to receive their power from God himself. In today's democratic societies, a President or Prime Minister is respected as such because he is believed to receive his power directly from - the Majority vote. With respect to the art of yesteryears, an artist was thought to receive his talent from God; in today's world, an artist is talented based on the sole fact that he is popular. I leave it to you to think more about this matter - my digression is becoming lengthy.
So throughout the past five hundred years, we have the three tenets of Classical Liberalism - Reason, Science and Democracy - growing to fill the roles once filled by Faith, Religion and God, respectively. And if we wanted one word to describe the very human trait that Classical Liberalism sought to eradicate, we would be quite right in saying that Reason, Science and Democracy are three grand steps on the road to eradicating piety.
This thing, this "piety," was something the Enlightenment philosophers rightfully viewed as dangerous: an overly pious society could be easily subjected and ruthlessly taken advantage of - for "piety," of course, is another word for "respect." Plato describes piety as a self-serving, self-aggrandizing mode of thought and behavior: to think piously did nothing more than to make one more pious; to act piously made one more likely to commit pious acts. Karen Armstrong describes religion as a thought process as well as a practice, the one reinforcing the other and making one stronger in one's faith. Finally, South Park suggests (from the mouth of an otter) that perhaps the mere belief in God makes God exist. These are all different descriptions of the same phenomenon, namely that one's having respect for something reinforces one's respect for that something - a positive feedback loop in its most simple manifestation.
Both Leo Strauss and Sayyid Qutb were distressed by American society, and their distress stemmed from this observation: they saw that Americans had almost no sense of piety or respect. But this is where these men were wrong. It is true that Americans don't have any piety or respect for traditional, pre-Enlightenment values - Liberalism saw to it that piety of that sort was eliminated. But the goal of the Enlightenment philosophers - to eradicate piety itself - was not achieved by any means. For what we have today is Faith in Reason; Science as Religion; and Democracy as God. Strauss and Qutb made the mistake of believing that Liberalism's original intention of destroying piety had been achieved; but what has actually been achieved is a momentary displacement of piety from the mystical to the rational.
It is my contention that piety, in moderation and in harmony with a sense of individual freedom, is not at all a danger - it is, in fact, an extremely healthy mode of operation. Neither is a healthy respect for the mystical and the unknown, with an equal respect for the concrete and the known - both form parts of the human condition without which we cannot function. What is dangerous - what the Enlightenment philosophers knew and saw as dangerous - is too much piety, unchecked by freedom of thought and originality. But what is even more dangerous - what I see as dangerous today - is the pious belief that piety itself is poisonous. When men put their Faith in Reason, and then turn around to decry Faith; when men follow Science religiously, and decry Religion in all shapes and forms; when men follow the edicts of the Majority as though they were the edicts of God, and scream at the top of their lungs that God does not exist - well, then these men have become hypocrites.
Liberalism has redirected our sense of respect from the sphere of the divine to the sphere of the human. And this would be quite alright if you would all realize that we are all mere humans - all too human.
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