Our Society Needs Conservatives, Liberals AND Moderates
Society absolutely needs conservatives, liberals AND moderates. Don't imagine that if all those jerks on the other side just disappered we'd have a great country.
I can illustrate this truth on a small scale: Imagine you lived in a small hunting and gathering band--the way everyone lived until just a few thousand years ago. At any given moment, your little tribe's liberals would be itching to go over the next hill and see what's there. Conservatives would want to go back to the last place you were in. And moderates would waffle--but be open to either option--and ultimately would cast the deciding vote after the liberals and conservatives finished yelling at each other.
Sometimes if your tribe goves over the hill it gets annihilated by another, bigger, meaner tribe that lives there that you didn't know about. Sometimes if you go back you discover things have changed there and your once-comfortable existence turns into a hardscrabble life. Sometimes if you take too long to make up your mind all your options disappear. No one outlook is always right, unless you love your outlook so passionately you'd prefer mass suicide to changing that outlook. That's the path Jim Jones took in Guyana.
The liberal impulse is exploring, open to new things. The conservative impulse honors tradition and the things that have been proven to work. The moderate impuls is to think about pragmatic outcomes and profitable compromises. Liberals and conservatives think moderates are less principled, but that's only true if you think trying to reach compromise is somehow unprincipled. I think all three paths are principled.
A healthy society proceeds using a three-way dialogue. It fails when one outlook gains total dominance. Power corrupts, and keeping the three outlooks in the mix provides the most fundamental set of checks and balances a society can have.
It's easy to nod your head sagely as you read this and say Sure, okay. It's less easy in the throes of a political campaign when the other side has smeared yours in some despicable way. And the feelings of righteous rage and delectable reverge are far more powerful than the joys of sweet reason. But it's in the clinches that I most want you to remember what I've said here.
--Ehkzu
"To win you must have cold head and warm heart."
--Italian ice dancer at the Turin Olympics
I can illustrate this truth on a small scale: Imagine you lived in a small hunting and gathering band--the way everyone lived until just a few thousand years ago. At any given moment, your little tribe's liberals would be itching to go over the next hill and see what's there. Conservatives would want to go back to the last place you were in. And moderates would waffle--but be open to either option--and ultimately would cast the deciding vote after the liberals and conservatives finished yelling at each other.
Sometimes if your tribe goves over the hill it gets annihilated by another, bigger, meaner tribe that lives there that you didn't know about. Sometimes if you go back you discover things have changed there and your once-comfortable existence turns into a hardscrabble life. Sometimes if you take too long to make up your mind all your options disappear. No one outlook is always right, unless you love your outlook so passionately you'd prefer mass suicide to changing that outlook. That's the path Jim Jones took in Guyana.
The liberal impulse is exploring, open to new things. The conservative impulse honors tradition and the things that have been proven to work. The moderate impuls is to think about pragmatic outcomes and profitable compromises. Liberals and conservatives think moderates are less principled, but that's only true if you think trying to reach compromise is somehow unprincipled. I think all three paths are principled.
A healthy society proceeds using a three-way dialogue. It fails when one outlook gains total dominance. Power corrupts, and keeping the three outlooks in the mix provides the most fundamental set of checks and balances a society can have.
It's easy to nod your head sagely as you read this and say Sure, okay. It's less easy in the throes of a political campaign when the other side has smeared yours in some despicable way. And the feelings of righteous rage and delectable reverge are far more powerful than the joys of sweet reason. But it's in the clinches that I most want you to remember what I've said here.
--Ehkzu
"To win you must have cold head and warm heart."
--Italian ice dancer at the Turin Olympics
posted by Ehkzu at 9:20 PM
1 Comments:
I do agree we need conservatives and liberals and moderates around. Conservatives are needed for proper governance. Moderates to support the conservative agenda for the most part. And we need liberals around for breeding and observation purposes.
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