Michael Ledeen says that you can't win a fight against an enemy you can't even name.
Over the pond, the Qulliam Foundation is trying to figure out how to talk about the dangers from political Islam and the far right. They propose a lexicon.
The section on Islam is reasonable, and it's nice to see a willingness to grapple with it. The section on the "far right" has similarly clear definitions for Neo-Nazis, but the definition of "far right" is suddenly much less clear and precise than the other definitions in the lexicon: "a far-right ideology characterised by extreme nationalistic beliefs or extreme, intolerant behaviour."
There are no wiggle-words like "extreme" in the other definitions. Islamists are those who want to impose "any version" of Islam over society, violently or nonviolently. We know exactly who they are from that definition.
So who is the "far right"? They give some examples, but examples are not definitions. Clarity would be helpful here, as I think there's a tendency to elide a lot of ordinary right wing people and groups into the category of "extreme nationalists." What's the point at which nationalism becomes extreme? Favoring trade policies that protect your country's interests? Being willing to fight to preserve your national territory from invasion? From unlawful immigration? Or does it only embrace expansionist nationalisms, like Russia's is currently?
I think any such attempt MUST abandon the terms left, right, liberal, and conservative. These are relative terms and inherently meaningless. We need to use genuinely descriptive terms with fixed meanings instead.
ReplyDeleteThat may be.
ReplyDeleteYou want to have a stab at trying to define groups like the KKK in a way that doesn't end up roping in anyone who doesn't deserve to be in the same bracket?
Well, I think for any group we could look at their goals, their rationale for those goals, and their methods. For the post-Civil War KKK, for example, we might say that they were violent, Southern, white supremacist, democratic, and believed states rights should be superior to federal power. This is a quick and imperfect attempt, but I think it works as an example of the types of labels we could use.
ReplyDeleteI don't know much about the present-day KKK, so I really can't describe them appropriately. That, of course, is part of the point in forgoing simplistic and misleading terms like right and left: You actually have to know something about the group to properly label it.
I think "supremacist" is a useful category -- one that doesn't need a modifier, even. It doesn't matter if you're a white supremacist or a Sunni Islam supremacist or a Communism supremacist. The desire to impose the rule of your kind (whatever kind you think you are) on the rest of humanity is a bad feature.
ReplyDeleteIt also isn't especially a right-wing feature, as the example of Communists is intended to suggest.
None of the other categories you mention strike me as very likely to capture all and only undesirables. For example, any sort of politics involves at least the threat of violence, as governments are themselves instruments of violence. Democracies have problems sometimes when they start voting themselves each other's property, but I don't take that to mean that favoring democracy over the other options is necessarily wicked.
It's the cumulative effect, not the individual labels, that is important. So, "Southern white supremacist democratic" might be people who sympathize with the KKK, but do not accept the use of violence to achieve their goals. On the other hand, "Southern democratic" is neither white supremacist nor violent, and "violent Southern black supremacist" might be Southern blacks who sympathize with the Nation of Islam.
ReplyDeleteI am using "violent" to mean "illegitimate violence." This is because most people accept violence in certain circumstances. I think you would have to add "pacifist" to indicate a group which rejected any and all violence.
And again, I'm not putting these particular labels out there as something I've seriously thought through. These are examples of the kind of rhetoric I think we should be using instead of right/left, conservative/liberal.
None of the other categories you mention strike me as very likely to capture all and only undesirables.
ReplyDeleteFirst you have to define "undesirables." How far is it necessary to peel this onion before we can talk usefully about this group vs that group? How exact is it necessary to be?
Oh, and define "usefully." And "exact."
Eric Hines
I think we should be using instead of right/left, conservative/liberal.
ReplyDeleteOr, we can define these terms--that might be a shorter chain. For instance, many folks understand "18th century Liberal" and even a term I've only heard myself use, "18th century Conservative," and recognize that, in the main (all the precision I think is necessary, given that we keep in mind the areas of imprecision) that today, the content of Conservative and Liberal are largely (another deliberately not-exact term) reversed.
Eric Hines
I already did explain what I meant by the usefulness or exactness of a term in this context: it captures all and only those we want captured. Their "Islamist" term is both useful and exact, because it captures all the bad actors (both al Qaeda and ISIS radicals, but also 'nonviolent' Hizb-ut Tahrir types) without roping in anyone else (apolitical Muslims who just want to live in peace).
ReplyDeleteI think it's interesting that they were able to do that with the Islamists, but not with their enemies on the right. I know exactly whom they oppose on the Islamist front, but not really what they think the proper borders are for the political right.
Or, we can define these terms ...
ReplyDeleteNo, I don't think we can. There are already too many definitions, they constantly change, and most people don't understand any of them very well. Not only are left and right, conservative and liberal, different between today and yesterday (and quite possibly they will be different yet again tomorrow) but they are different in the US and Europe.
Today it is the most conservative of us who are the most revolutionary precisely because they are truly liberal. It is the most liberal who are the least concerned about personal freedom and the most supportive of conserving a powerful centralized government and the status quo of the welfare state. To me, these things highlight the absurdity of continuing to use the terms if we want to have meaningful discussions across our society.
Of course, maybe we don't want to have such discussions. All four are very relativistic terms that have no political or social meaning in and of themselves. Consequently, they are often used to obscure rather than enlighten; they are often used to divide us into close-minded intellectual tribes instead of pushing us to deal with each other honestly as individuals and thinkers. To that extent, those terms are tools being used to divide and conquer the American people.
That said, I certainly don't think everyone uses them that way. But I do think they are now doing more harm than good. I don't see any reason to be attached to terms when they become harmful, and I don't see any real way to rehabilitate these terms. I think part of our revolution should be a new terminology.
Definitions change because language evolves--that's an aspect of the universe in which we live. I've no problem with redefining my terms of reference from time to time. On the other hand, I don't give a rat's patootie how a [Brit] defines [Conservative]; I'm not a Brit, nor am I talking to one. Were a Brit and I conversing, of course we would define our terms as part of the conversation.
ReplyDeleteThe terms are relativistic? Of course they are. English is contextual; all our words and definitions are relativistic.
I think part of our revolution should be a new terminology.
ReplyDeleteI also decline to cede my language to the other side. I'm done letting them define the debate or the battlefield.
Eric Hines
All language is contextual, but some words are more stable than others. For example, "tree" is a pretty stable term; it isn't very relativistic at all. I think it's likely that the technical definition of tree that botanists use has changed over the centuries, but I suspect I could jump back 400 years and people would still understand the word tree much as I do.
ReplyDeletePolitically, democracy and dictatorship are similarly fairly stable. Their meanings have changed, but there is some inherent meaning in the word roots and they are more stable than terms like left and right.
"Left" and "right" are purely relativistic terms. They have no inherent meaning, their definitions shift wildly from generation to generation, and they assume an opposition that may or may not reflect reality. I don't know if it was intentional, but this kind of dichotomy plays into a Hegelian and Marxist way of thinking in dialectical opposites, which I think is also harmful.
"Conservative" and "liberal" are a little less relativistic, but the examples I gave above about how absurd they have become show the problem. Although there is some inherent meaning in the roots, that has been stripped away and abused so much that the terms now mean the opposite of their roots in many cases.
And, if you don't care about communicating with Europeans, then why do you insist on using European terms like left, right, conservative, and liberal to describe your politics? It's time to cast off the tyranny of European political language and declare our independence with real American terms! Hoo-ah!
I do use real American terms. Terms like honor, while eschewing the nonsense of honour.
ReplyDeleteAnd, I'm not above a bit of cultural appropriation. I'm happy to use left and right--and use them properly, not in the French way.
And if the monarchist Burke (no friend of the colonials, he) talked of conservatism and liberalsim, I'm happy to appropriate those terms, too, and use them correctly.
Eric Hines
The inherent problem in trying to more accurately label the political 'spectrum' is that really, you'd need a three axis chart:
ReplyDelete-One axis being what Europeans define as left and right (Internationalist v. Nationalist- they're all socialist, and I'd argue both extremes are expansionist)
-One axis for Economic left and right (Central control v. individual control)
-One axis for Values- which doesn't correspond to traditional discussions of left and right. (The problem with this one is I'm not sure how to label the poles).
Some day I'm going to try to draw this up or 3-D model it and see what I come up with.
Oh, the other problem with most of these 'political spectrum' things is that the Left as SOP re-purposes and misdirects with it's language and labeling all the time, so many buy into the propaganda and place elements incorrectly on their charts. This is likely the root of much of the problem with modern political labels.
ReplyDeleteEric, I meant political terms. Also, I give up. Why don't you wave your magic wand and get all of us rowdy Americans on the same page as to the correct usage of right, left, liberal, and conservative? That would solve all of these problems.
ReplyDeletedouglas, I'm not sure we can fit a complete political worldview in a single graphic. And, you're right, many common labels have been bent all out of shape. That's one reason I think it's better to come up with new, descriptive ones. Then we can fight for their meanings going forward.
It's easier to go with a general term like "Leftist alliance" or "Islam", precisely because one cannot pin point it down. The Left is whomever the Left decides is part of them, since they are the ones exiling and punishing apostates on their side. Politically Hitler had issue with Communism, but their general totalitarian degree is concurrent, but they were enemies, so the Left considers Hitler "not Left".
ReplyDeleteThe Alternative Right considers conservative sell outs or various other American factions to be "cuckservatives". Meaning, they are hiding in somebody else's nest and getting fed resources intended for one's young, who had just been hijacked or replaced by foreign organisms.
Now of all times, people are coming up with new terms, precisely because the old terms like "Progress" means the opposite. Libertarian liberals that liked liberty, find it fun to call Progs, Regressives instead. While I tried that out, plus some other terms over the years, the "Leftist alliance" is very short, but also accurate because they are an alliance. It doesn't matter so much what their ideals or politics are, because half of them are mutually exclusive with the other half in their Leftist hierarchy.
Islam is a bit more consistent, yet still with the Sufi, Sunni, Shia, heresies, and what not. Which they can easily ignore in favor of killing infidels or foreigners.
It was relatively easy for Americans to see Iraqis as enemies, because they kept hearing about IEDs and what not. But Iraqis were not merely Sunni, Shia, Islamic, or Kurd/Yazidi. There was a lot more going on there. One couldn't say that Islam was our enemy in Iraq, because the Sunni tribes became our allies. And one can't say the Kurds are our allies in Iraq, because there's no status of forces agreement with them until the Shia/Sunni agree. Descriptions that are too specific, can often become erroneous, or manipulated for political purposes. General descriptions are easier to use, especially if the enemy is full of contradicting positions and ideals.
As for "political Islam", the majority are, because the majority are Sunni. That goes all the way back to the First Caliphate. The reason why all Sunni Muslims don't adhere to the same secular or religious hierarchy, is because of a lack of a Sunni Caliph. Which was deposed, last time, when the Ottomans went away. Now Turkey and or Islamic State, is attempting to use military power to appeal to Allah, to grant them the position by virtue of military jihad power. Jihad power is what demonstrates one's closeness to Allah, through Mohammed.
ReplyDeleteWhy don't you wave your magic wand....
ReplyDeleteTom, I have been, for a few years. See amazon.com.
Eric Hines
Dangit! Why didn't you tell me you had books on Amazon!? I would have gotten them sooner!
ReplyDeleteWell, it's on the link under my [Commenter] Said name, right there in hidden plain sight. [g]
ReplyDeleteAnd, the Hall is not my advertising broadsheet.
Eric Hines
That said, I probably do need to update the sidebar. If any of you who have posting privileges would like me to add your name and links to favored sources (which certainly could be any books you have authored or co-authored), I am happy to do that. Let me know.
ReplyDeleteWhat, it's obvious? Why would I check that!? ;-)
ReplyDeleteGrim, I would. I'll send you an email.