It’s an apt description of liberalism, of which progressivism is a species, which is defined by an open pluralism regarding what counts as the good.
That’s classical liberalism and I don’t count contemporary progressives, at least in the US, as belonging to it. The contemporary progressives have very… fixed ideas about what counts as good and are quite intolerant of people who dare to think otherwise.
Not to mention that they have a love affair with state power.
All three projects—liberalism, socialism and progressivism—are related by common commitments that have their origins in Enlightenment political philosophy. Because progressives believe in systemic oppression, they have to alleviate systemic oppression in order to achieve liberty: we won’t be truly free until we’re free from racism, sexism, etc. They’re still committed to value pluralism. All three projects faced the (paradoxical) issue of having to attain state power in order to enforce their vision. Liberal democracy was often created on the back of violent revolution, for example.
Libertarians typically identify with classical liberalism and decry progressivism as statist and oppressive, it’s true, but that doesn’t mean that progressives aren’t committed to liberty and value pluralism on their own terms. They have a different notion of what those things mean, they don’t reject them.
Yes, the common thread is the Enlightenment. See my response to Lumifer regarding who are the “progressives” I am talking about. They are not necessarily the people in America who flock to the Democratic Party. I don’t think neoreactionaries are just complaining about democrats when they go after “progressivism.” They have a far more broad target in mind—the Enlightenment, I guess, more or less.
rejecting the Enlightenment is one of the big NR themes...
It’s also a big thing in modern Progressivism on the grounds that the Enlightenment was a bunch of dead white men. The difference, and this is the reason why it’s so easy to get confused by the relationship between the Enlightenment and Progressivism, is that modern Progressives seek to reject the Enlightenment in the name of the Enlightenment.
...decry progressivism as statist and oppressive, it’s true, but that doesn’t mean that progressives aren’t committed to liberty and value pluralism on their own terms. They have a different notion of what those things mean
Ah yes, we’ve been there. War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength.
Why, yes. To start with, it is not a slap in the face. To continue, it’s a reminder that people who are “committed to liberty … on their own terms” and “have a different notion of what those things mean” are usually committed to something other than what most people call liberty.
1984 is about Ingsoc, isn’t it? English socialism.
I think the distinctions we’re drawing here are a teensy weensy bit more subtle than the distinction between liberty and ‘a boot stamping on a human face, forever’.
Like, if an employer wants to fire a transgender person on account of that fact, does it better preserve liberty to let them do that, or not let them do that?
Any debate on this issue will be about just what is meant by ‘Liberty’, and from there the answer will fall directly.
Plus, there is little doubt that among other things, it IS a slap in the face - you quote something about different definitions by progressives and then say we’ve been there and quote a fictional totalitarian regime whose most salient feature is manipulating language. The interpretation that progressives have their definitions that twisted is, well, pretty direct and if you were not trying to make that implication, you should have been much much clearer.
I think the distinctions we’re drawing here are a teensy weensy bit more subtle than the distinction between liberty and ‘a boot stamping on a human face, forever’.
Nah. Given that the OP has explicitly said that the Soviet communists are the most full-blooded progressives and given that 1984 was written looking at Stalinist Russia, no, I don’t think there is any need to pretend the distinctions here are subtle. They are not.
That… that’s an incredibly lazy line of reasoning.
The OP is not Word of God on other peoples’ politics. Moreover, if the OP said that, it wasn’t here, so I can’t see context. The intensifier ‘full-blooded’ is very suspect in particular.
You see we almost all agree on a lot of things… and so, these things cease to be considered political. In the space of what people want, to a great extent we’re co-linear, with subtle deviations. Political movements define themselves by the difference from other political movements, and pull in a particular direction. So, two people can appear to be the same politically because they are pulling the same way. Alice, however, would stop after reaching her goal, which is close enough that she is still in substantial agreement with the common values, while Bob, who is more ‘full-blooded’ would continue pulling the same way until EVERYTHING was the difference he had from the common values, quite possibly orthogonal or facing the opposite way. Murder less important than keeping the soft boiled egg pointy side down, so to say.
Being ‘full-blooded’ in politics means you’re a misguided horrible freak, no matter the party.
That being seen, it doesn’t even stop there. The Stalinist Soviet Union was not even an over-extrapolation of Progressive values. What happened to the progressives in the Soviet Union?
They were murdered. Purged. They weren’t even necessarily specifically targeted—almost everyone political was killed, jailed permanently, or (understandably) intimidated during the rise of Stalin. So by the time you get to Stalin, there are no movements allowed other than ‘Whatever the State Says, Goes’ and Stalin decides what the state says. This is undesirable for any political movement, and Stalinist-Russia is a cautionary tale to them all.
But if you don’t buy that and think there were still political movements afloat, then… let’s look at what Stalin did and compare it to Progressive values.
Stalin’s most objectionable policies—murdering/imprisoning the opposition, and even people who had no political opinions for the crime of being inadequately productive, forcing people to work in specific ways, banning private ownership, preventing people from leaving or even having free movement...
These are diametrically opposite progressive values, by their own definitions.
The only one that comes even vaguely close is a regrettable tendency for some Progressives to place a low premium on privacy from the state. And that has become less popular lately (check progressive reactions to the NSA some time, you might be surprised).
ETA:
1) there are some who believe that Stalin was lied-about and misrepresented in the west. For them, they may support their imaginary version of Stalin, but they don’t actually support what everyone else means when they think of Stalin)
2) Movements change over time. 80 years ago, a noticeable portion of progressives were eugenicists. Merely 35 years ago, Republicans’ expectations of the proper tax rate were what modern Republicans now call Socialist.
3) Orwell wasn’t simply recounting Stalinist Soviet Union—he was extrapolating out even from there. So even if your facts and opinions were all correct, it was an exaggeration. When playing on hard mode such as we are, avoid exaggeration.
That’s classical liberalism and I don’t count contemporary progressives, at least in the US, as belonging to it. The contemporary progressives have very… fixed ideas about what counts as good and are quite intolerant of people who dare to think otherwise.
Not to mention that they have a love affair with state power.
All three projects—liberalism, socialism and progressivism—are related by common commitments that have their origins in Enlightenment political philosophy. Because progressives believe in systemic oppression, they have to alleviate systemic oppression in order to achieve liberty: we won’t be truly free until we’re free from racism, sexism, etc. They’re still committed to value pluralism. All three projects faced the (paradoxical) issue of having to attain state power in order to enforce their vision. Liberal democracy was often created on the back of violent revolution, for example.
Libertarians typically identify with classical liberalism and decry progressivism as statist and oppressive, it’s true, but that doesn’t mean that progressives aren’t committed to liberty and value pluralism on their own terms. They have a different notion of what those things mean, they don’t reject them.
Yes, the common thread is the Enlightenment. See my response to Lumifer regarding who are the “progressives” I am talking about. They are not necessarily the people in America who flock to the Democratic Party. I don’t think neoreactionaries are just complaining about democrats when they go after “progressivism.” They have a far more broad target in mind—the Enlightenment, I guess, more or less.
No need to guess, rejecting the Enlightenment is one of the big NR themes...
It’s also a big thing in modern Progressivism on the grounds that the Enlightenment was a bunch of dead white men. The difference, and this is the reason why it’s so easy to get confused by the relationship between the Enlightenment and Progressivism, is that modern Progressives seek to reject the Enlightenment in the name of the Enlightenment.
Ah yes, we’ve been there. War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength.
Is this post anything other than a slap in the face?
Heh. It is interesting that you choose to interpret it solely in this way. Do you have a point, by any chance?
Actually, I don’t know what you mean, but that was all that occurred to me. IS it anything other than a slap in the face?
Why, yes. To start with, it is not a slap in the face. To continue, it’s a reminder that people who are “committed to liberty … on their own terms” and “have a different notion of what those things mean” are usually committed to something other than what most people call liberty.
1984 is about Ingsoc, isn’t it? English socialism.
I think the distinctions we’re drawing here are a teensy weensy bit more subtle than the distinction between liberty and ‘a boot stamping on a human face, forever’.
Like, if an employer wants to fire a transgender person on account of that fact, does it better preserve liberty to let them do that, or not let them do that?
Any debate on this issue will be about just what is meant by ‘Liberty’, and from there the answer will fall directly.
Plus, there is little doubt that among other things, it IS a slap in the face - you quote something about different definitions by progressives and then say we’ve been there and quote a fictional totalitarian regime whose most salient feature is manipulating language. The interpretation that progressives have their definitions that twisted is, well, pretty direct and if you were not trying to make that implication, you should have been much much clearer.
Nah. Given that the OP has explicitly said that the Soviet communists are the most full-blooded progressives and given that 1984 was written looking at Stalinist Russia, no, I don’t think there is any need to pretend the distinctions here are subtle. They are not.
That… that’s an incredibly lazy line of reasoning.
The OP is not Word of God on other peoples’ politics. Moreover, if the OP said that, it wasn’t here, so I can’t see context. The intensifier ‘full-blooded’ is very suspect in particular.
You see we almost all agree on a lot of things… and so, these things cease to be considered political. In the space of what people want, to a great extent we’re co-linear, with subtle deviations. Political movements define themselves by the difference from other political movements, and pull in a particular direction. So, two people can appear to be the same politically because they are pulling the same way. Alice, however, would stop after reaching her goal, which is close enough that she is still in substantial agreement with the common values, while Bob, who is more ‘full-blooded’ would continue pulling the same way until EVERYTHING was the difference he had from the common values, quite possibly orthogonal or facing the opposite way. Murder less important than keeping the soft boiled egg pointy side down, so to say.
Being ‘full-blooded’ in politics means you’re a misguided horrible freak, no matter the party.
That being seen, it doesn’t even stop there. The Stalinist Soviet Union was not even an over-extrapolation of Progressive values. What happened to the progressives in the Soviet Union?
They were murdered. Purged. They weren’t even necessarily specifically targeted—almost everyone political was killed, jailed permanently, or (understandably) intimidated during the rise of Stalin. So by the time you get to Stalin, there are no movements allowed other than ‘Whatever the State Says, Goes’ and Stalin decides what the state says. This is undesirable for any political movement, and Stalinist-Russia is a cautionary tale to them all.
But if you don’t buy that and think there were still political movements afloat, then… let’s look at what Stalin did and compare it to Progressive values.
Stalin’s most objectionable policies—murdering/imprisoning the opposition, and even people who had no political opinions for the crime of being inadequately productive, forcing people to work in specific ways, banning private ownership, preventing people from leaving or even having free movement...
These are diametrically opposite progressive values, by their own definitions.
The only one that comes even vaguely close is a regrettable tendency for some Progressives to place a low premium on privacy from the state. And that has become less popular lately (check progressive reactions to the NSA some time, you might be surprised).
ETA:
1) there are some who believe that Stalin was lied-about and misrepresented in the west. For them, they may support their imaginary version of Stalin, but they don’t actually support what everyone else means when they think of Stalin)
2) Movements change over time. 80 years ago, a noticeable portion of progressives were eugenicists. Merely 35 years ago, Republicans’ expectations of the proper tax rate were what modern Republicans now call Socialist.
3) Orwell wasn’t simply recounting Stalinist Soviet Union—he was extrapolating out even from there. So even if your facts and opinions were all correct, it was an exaggeration. When playing on hard mode such as we are, avoid exaggeration.