Eric Johnson: February 2006 Archives

In Foreign Policy, of all places, there's a long article by Phillip Longman called "The Return of Patriarchy." The thesis paragraph is near the end:

Advanced societies are growing more patriarchal, whether they like it or not. In addition to the greater fertility of conservative segments of society, the rollback of the welfare state forced by population aging and decline will give these elements an additional survival advantage, and therefore spur even higher fertility. As governments hand back functions they once appropriated from the family, notably support in old age, people will find that they need more children to insure their golden years, and they will seek to bind their children to them through inculcating traditional religious values akin to the Bible’s injunction to honor thy mother and father.

I find this encouraging, particularly since I've been more than a little frustrated by money lately. The Washington area is a tough place to raise kids for a variety of reasons, not least financially. But if my four children are going to promote a patriarchal way of life in America, it's worth it!

It's a question that rarely gets asked, since it's almost always framed in terms of "rights," either the baby's or the mothers. The wisest columnist in the world, Mark Steyn, takes on that question:

...So, whether or not her remarks were "outrageous" (the Democrats' Lyn Allison), "insensitive" (the Greens' Rachel Siewert), "offensively discriminatory" (Sydney's Daily Telegraph) and "bigoted" (this newspaper), I salute Danna Vale. You don't have to agree with her argument that Australia's aborting itself out of recognition and that therefore Islam will inherit by default to think it's worth asking a couple of questions:

* Is abortion in society's interest?

* Can a society become more Muslim in its demographic character without also becoming more Muslim in its political and civil character?

The first one's easy: One can understand that 17-year-old Glenys working the late shift at Burger King and knocked up by some bloke who scrammed 10 minutes after conception may believe it's in her interest to exercise "a woman's right to choose", but the state has absolutely no interest in encouraging women in general to exercise that choice.

Quite the opposite: given that today's wee bairns are tomorrow's funders of otherwise unsustainable social programs, all responsible governments should be seriously natalist. The reason Europe, Russia and Japan are doomed boils down to a big lack of babies. Abortion isn't solely responsible for that but it's certainly part of the problem.

In their encyclicals from 1789 until Vatican II, the popes frequently insinuate that the object of the Enlightenment wasn't to increase human liberty, but to destroy Christian civilization. To modern ears, they can seem grumpy and intemperate (think of Leo XIII's Syllabus of Errors), filled with passionate denunciations instead of calm refutations. For this reason, they were often dismissed as hopeless reactionaries.

It would be wrong to wholly dismiss the entire project of the Enlightenment -- and indeed, the encyclicals do no such thing, identifying positive developments while they condemn errors and half-truths. Men of the Enlightenment improved man's earthly life by emphasizing natural rights and forcing governments to recognize them. This is particularly true in the Anglo-American strain, much less so in the French, which begot mass bloodletting, vicious and supremely arrogant colonialism, and violent repression of the Church.

Common to all Enlightenment schools of thought was the belief in the right to free speech. At its noblest, this was a recognition that no human institution could long survive without honest criticism, protected from reprisals such as arrest or confiscation of property.

For most of the modern era, this belief has been loudly proclaimed by all of those who claim the Enlightenment as their intellectual lineage, most particularly by those who call themselves "liberals." These classical liberals had an honorable record of defending the rights of the despised, particularly those who wanted to advance an unpopular view against powerful interests.

But those kinds of liberals were eclipsed in the 1960s by the New Left, which saw classical liberals as the enemy. In the New Left's view, Western society was irredeemably corrupt, as it bore evil fruits such as colonialism and racism. Liberals, they thought, were much more dangerous to "progress" because they gave a veneer of legitimacy for Western values, most prominently Christianity, and thus they had to be destroyed.

After some initial resistance, the New Left triumphed in a rout. They now lead the left-leaning political parties in every Western nation. In the academy and the arts, they enjoy near-total dominance; whole communions of Protestant churches were given over to them. Thus, most of the people we call "liberals" today aren't really liberals, they are the New Leftists and their progeny. They continue to belive that Western society must be undermined, but now they wield real power and influence.

I don't think I ever had before tonight, when they played it for some Italian athletes (I don't remember the event they won.) Listen to it here -- it sounds like a chorus from a Rossini opera. Apparently, it was composed by a contemporary of Rossini in 1847. The fifth verse seems a little outdated; I confess that I don't know a single historical reference in the fourth verse (that is, unless "the heart
and hand of Ferruccio" refers to Ferruccio Lamborghini, the car guy.)

My vote is for Wang Manli.