Progressivism and compassion
I have a theory that the driving force behind progressivism is compassion. Therefore, progressives who have no compassion are fooling themselves. They're just trying to own the higher moral ground without the morality to go with it.
True?
True?
Comments (62)
For the majority of politicians, doubtful. Even if the all say they do it to improve the lives of the people, I don't think it is out of compassion.
I think compassion is a driving force behind progressivism (and at times this is perhaps more aptly called "empathy"). But I disagree with this:
Quoting frank
Of course one could make such an argument, but every group value is susceptible to being transformed into untethered taboo, and this is also true of compassion. So if a group of compassionate people win the day and their program becomes established as a societal norm, then the reification of compassion will begin to present the same problems that attend the reification of any other societal norm.
As an example, a group or individual might become vegan on the basis of compassion, but then once that connection between veganism and compassion becomes ossified such people can easily fall into the trap of imposing their veganism on communities which are reliant on animal products. The taboo ushers in black and white thinking, "Everyone who is vegan is compassionate and therefore good; everyone who is not vegan lacks compassion and is therefore bad," and this in turn provides the groundwork for the second-order virtue signaling that you reference.
In that example there ends up being a limited compassion (i.e. compassion for animals but not for the communities that rely on animals). That double-standard endpoint can be extrapolated, and this is because "compassion" is too vague and undirected to function as a sound value (or in Aristotelian terms, as a central virtue). In real life to be compassionate towards one group is also to be uncompassionate towards an opposed group, at least where political action is concerned.
...and I should add that although the modern mind balks at the explicit claim, "Everyone who is X is good and everyone who is not is bad" (even though that claim is constantly being made implicitly), the formula itself is not the problem. The problem is a superficial X. For example, Aristotle's X would be "just, temperate, prudent, and courageous," and it is precisely the complexity and robustness of the cardinal virtues that make such an X plausible. "Compassion" is too one-dimensional to serve that role.
No, but the driving force of conservatism isn't compassion. It's practicality.
They are political positions, wouldn't the driving force be political change?
Also, compassion can be a driving force but be tempered by practicality, they aren’t mutually exclusive.
Im trying to understand how you have boiled progressivism and conservatism down to these particular “driving force’s”.
If you are a right-wing libertarian and believe in free market, rights of the individual and limited government making the best society possible, why wouldn't that also be compassionate? Libertarians believe that their way makes the society function better, so why wouldn't that be compassion too? There's no hidden sinister agenda behind to have some "social darwinism" to eradicate the people libertarians hate. Libertarians look at Switzerland and think it works just fine.
I think the real issue is collectivism and the role of the government that make progressives differ from others. Government, the state and legislation are there tools to address social problems and inequality for the progressives. Not the market mechanism and choices of the individual. I think this is the core in progressivism.
Conservatives of any generation tend to be suspicious of change. If they embrace it, they probably do so because they see the change as a return to a traditional state.
Progressives feel comfortable stepping into the unknown. That comfort level is bolstered by moral conviction tied to a sense of righting old wrongs. The downtrodden are always in their sights, whereas the conservative says the downtrodden will always be with us and stability is the highest good.
Quoting DingoJones
I didn't say they were mutually exclusive, but note the next time you're looking at progressives, how interested they are in matters of practicality. This isn't a good time in history to observe conservatives in the US because they're in the shadows of a populist who has taken over their party.
Because it leaves a chunk of the population with no safety net.
Quoting ssu
Conservatives are usually willing to let nature take care of social problems. They think that when we interfere with nature (due to an overload of compassion), we inevitably undermine a process that leads to social health and well-being. This process happens to be brutal, but conservatives are ok with that. This is because compassion isn't their driving value.
That might be true for some Americans, but for example in my country (or in the Nordic countries in generals), this doesn't hold for the conservatives. They are totally OK and do appreciate the welfare state, but do point out that in order for there to be a welfare state, one has to have a well functioning healthy private sector and economy.
Absolute poverty, especially rural poverty has been solved and is non-existent, when just hundred years ago it still was around in my country. People don't live in the streets and beg for food or money. That's something that conservatives in my country value. Yes, they are full aware of the free rider problem and the negative aspects of a welfare state, but they understand that these are little compared to the negative effects of not having social security net. Yet the welfare state hasn't been just a leftist program as there has been a political consensus about it. This is something hard to fathom, if people think that politics in other places is totally similar to US politics and political discourse.
As you should notice, conservatism in Nordic countries is quite different from what it is in the US. Yet even in the US there's a difference between ideology and actual reality: when we actually look at what even the Republicans think about social security or Medicare/Medicaid, they actually are totally OK with these programs, even if the ideological think tanks oppose these. The actual policies implemented by Republican administrations show this.
Just one example:
So is it really that conservatives are willing to let nature take care of social problems? Everybody is for themselves?
I live in an insignificant little state and it's population is twice that of Finland. Could I see half my state become socialist? Sure, especially if it didn't have to defend itself.
Quoting ssu
In general, yes. Sometimes conservatives live in a politically moderate climate. They make adjustments.
"Progressives" is a very broad term.
As a fundamental definition, progressives merely represent a focus on changing society from a set of humane moral values. Placing people and their wellbeing before industry. It's focus is to try and establish what is true about the human condition and change society based on it.
Conservatives on the other hand rather want to decide on a set of rules and principles that are more rigid over time.
While progressives focus on change to find the best system, conservatives think that having rigid rules and principles is what leads to the best system.
And there are problems with both forms of thinking. Progressives might fall into bias as they try to argue for a newly established truth, and through it miss finding a balance in the change they argue for. Conservatives on the other hand, fail to recognize systemic problems that their rules and principles uphold, and they become ignorant of criticism of those rules and principles they hold close. Most ironically, conservatives sometimes are just the progressives in youth becoming so attached to the principles they fought for that they become conservatives around it, arguing their, in their era, progressive ideas, were universal truths.
A healthy society is, I think leaning more towards progressive thinking, because it is a realization that "truth" requires dedication to figuring it out. Conservative ideas of preservation of certain rules and principles usually comes from an ignorance of how reality works, not seeing that society change all the time and it changes with new knowledge and discovery about the human condition.
But equally, unchecked progressive thinking leads to a chaos you can't build a society on, because there's not a lot of room to establish those new ideas into practice.
So a society leaning more towards progressive thinking, but still utilizing the conservative concept of a rigid system, might be the best path through history. Constantly establishing new conditions of being based on new knowledge and dedication to truth, but with the rigor of establishing a longer lasting practical reality through preservation of the best ideas.
As if minimizing the number of downtrodden while increasing the amount of Americans with plenty of spendable income somehow does not result in tremendous stability?
:smirk:
This is true.
Quoting Christoffer
I'd like to define a healthy society empirically. Is it flexible enough to survive crises? Or does it shatter against the rocks, leaving the population to suffer in turmoil? There are times when a progressive outlook, one ready to embrace change, is optimal because old strategies have been tried and failed. But when thing are stable, conservatives seek to protect hard-earned wisdom, so they really should prevail during those times.
That's an interesting question, and history answers that it definitely does not produce stability. When the general population is fat and happy, the labor market becomes costly and inflexible. If 1970s labor unions in the US and the UK would have had the ability to stop grandstanding and work with employers, it would have been harder for neoliberals like Reagan and Thatcher to take control. The neoliberal solution was to bring labor to its knees and make them beholden for every crumb. That produced stability.
What would this "socialism" mean in this case?
Opting for something equivalent to the labour government of Keir Starmer in the UK?
Opting for social-democracy like in Sweden? This would be I think closest to what Democratic Socialists in the US dream of.
Or something closer to Venezuela, left-wing populism and authoritarianism? Because it will hardly be old-school Marxism-Leninism.
And just what that defend themselves means? Or do mean to defend the turn to left-wing politics? Remember that it was social-democrat lead administrations in Sweden and Finland that opted to join NATO and got rid off the last remnants of the neutrality doctrine. That leftist don't care about defense issues is a right-wing myth.
(These progressive social-democrat women decided that NATO membership was better than neutrality for their countries.)
All X's are ossified by tribes, whether they be political, religious, or whatever.
You think? Crashes and all, huh? Those are signs of stability? I think not.
Evidently, we're measuring different things. The stability of everyday working-class American lives, generation after generation was never better than the period between Roosevelt and Kennedy/Nixon. You must be talking about the stability of something else. The stock market was also far more stable when corporations had an expressed obligation to the livelihoods of employees rather than shareholders. In addition, the stability of that the same stock market and American lives in general was far more stable when antitrust laws were enacted and enforced.
Just thinking out loud. Isn't the way conservatism functions different across cultures and contexts? There are conservatives on the left, for example, old-school class warriors who dislike the identity politics of the current left. They hope to conserve the left of the early to mid 20th century. In Australia, political conservatives generally support community welfare programs, such as pensions, unemployment benefits and free healthcare, while the radical right (a small boutique group) might oppose such programs. Perhaps the majority of Australians actually favor a form of progressive politics, so conservatism here may resemble the left in countries with a more libertarian (?) ethos. I'm not sure many lefties I know are especially compassionate. How does one gauge that? I don’t always go by their politics. I go by their behaviors toward others in real life. I think a lot of the left take a kind of rights-based perspective, which is somewhat separate from compassion.
I think you mean working-class white men.
I wasn't arguing that conservative people are any less compassionate than their progressive brothers and sisters. My point was if you look at the rudder of a progressive boat, it's compassion. We shouldn't just let people suffer when we can help, and the government is the best way to coordinate that care.
You're right that conservatism is going to look different in different times and places, but isn't it true that conservatism is best typified by an older person? An older person has lost some of the compassion she might have felt earlier in life because she's been through hardship and survived. Hardship doesn't breed compassion ironically. It fosters a less romantic, more practical attitude. We don't need a perfect world. We need people who will buck up and figure out how to survive the world we have. If that world isn't too bad in terms of survivability, then why change it?
I'm thinking of elderly black people I know who, as you say, have the same political views they always did. But now that they're older, they're actually irritated by the complaints of young people. Maybe it's obvious why.
Quoting frank
Maybe it’s less about compassion then and more about the role of government in society?
Quoting frank
Could it be that the complaints have changed and that identity politics is annoying to them?
Right, and that's the misalignment I was talking about in the OP. They're part of a political force that's trying to help people, but they actually despise people.
Quoting Tom Storm
It's definitely about the role of government, but they want a government that recognizes people's rights. They want a social safety net.
Quoting Tom Storm
Honestly, identity politics is heavily embedded in the older black people I know. They'll go to their graves that way.
I'm a fan of welfare safety nets and we have reasonable ones in operation here in Oz. Rights based thinking is not as interesting to me and I am often turned off by activists.
Quoting frank
Good to know. I have had almost zero contact with black folk, so there's that. I know a lot of First Nations Australians and what you say is true there too.
The older left (people my age) here are often somewhat snooty about identity politics. Needless to say they are mainly white. They see it as what happens when the reformist left is undermined by corporate power and replaced with a form of politics that atomises or divides people into smaller interest groups, which ultimately serves those in power rather than challenging them en bloc.
I can see all these arguments and am unsure what I personally believe any more. The older I get, the less certain I am. And the less I care, to be honest...
I can see that.
Quoting Tom Storm
:up:
Well, no. I meant what I said. Although, your point is taken, and those years were definitely far more beneficial to whites than minorities. That's beside the point though, and irrelevant. The point was about the wealth distribution and the protections of working class Americans providing stability to the overall economic landscape. Stability was the point. You claimed Reagan created stability. I'm calling utter bullshit.
When those protections and the wealth distribution returns to becoming more in line with what's best for the overwhelming majority of Americans again, the racial and gender disparities between working class people will hopefully become more palatable with far more minorities and genders being able to reap the same benefits that mainly white men reaped back then.
I was talking about the stagflation crisis of the 1970s, which set the stage for the rise of Reaganomics, also called neoliberalism.
State your goals first. Otherwise, nothing is clear.
If you state your goals first, one can assess whether your policies are likely to achieve the goal. This is a practical consideration.
But the goals, and the understanding of each other's goals, requires both empathy and compassion. It is highly unlikely there is a lack of either within the goal-setting habits of either side. Its compassion for whom that gets people's nickers in a twist: Vulnerable young British women, or illegal economic migrants? You can see how these phrase angry up the blood. But the goal can be compassion, or practicality, themselves, imo.
This says to me 'progressive' is not based on compassion, but liberality as a concept. "allow" is essentially the mode until one doesn't like something. That's another discussion.
It also seems that conservatives are either marginally, or largely depending on sex, more tolerate of opposing views than progressives. In the last 24 months, that seems obviously true. Perhaps even the last five years. BLM was certainly not, in any sense of the word, a compassionate movement.
Was somebody trying to be compassionate toward vulnerable British women?
Wouldn't you say that there is a sense in which Marxist or Marxist-inspired ideologies are supposed to be based on compassion for the victim or the oppressed or the disenfranchised? Whether they actually succeed in helping such people, it does seem that there is a sense in which the concept of compassion is especially operative within such ideologies.
That's a good question. Strictly speaking, Marx was an apocalyptic prophet, not advising about how things should be, but predicting what will be. The proletariat are weaponized against the bourgeoisie with little regard for whether they're actually capable of running the world.
Maybe Marxism could be valued by someone who has compassion, but is it really based on compassion?
Quoting Leontiskos
No. All you need do is read their texts to note the 'person' is not, at any point, the driving force behind policies. Its concepts. That is (somewhat uniquely) anti-human. It can be framed that way, but misleadingly.
I agree. True Marxism is about throwing the baby out with the bathwater, that is, everything we've done up to now has served its purpose and we're on our way to a new world.
Quoting Revelations 21:4
Note "the new heaven and new earth" is a quote from Isaiah.
Certainly not. An ideology that depicts a "class enemy", with Marxism the capitalists and the bourgeoisie, and preaches about a violent revolution to overthrow these, is certainly not compassionate. One has to understand that there's a huge void between the socialism that Marxism (Marxism-Leninism) and modern social-democracy talks about.
Anyway, I would pool together all ideologies that start from the reasoning that societal problems are being caused by a certain group of people, be they jews, muslims, the liberal-elites or capitalists, and then continue to argue on that the eradiction of these people is the answer to build a better world, to be extremely dangerous ideologies that just create more problems. They all should be resisted at all costs, be they from the left or from the right. One should judge individuals if the commit wrongdoing, but not accuse groups like ethnic minorities altogether. These ideologies and movements don't have any amount of compassion in them.
Bullshit. You're too much.
Quoting frank
You claimed Reagan's policies produced stability. Again. I call bullshit. We must be measuring very different things. Now, you've taken it a step farther...
As if working class people are responsible for both, not increasing their own earnings and raising the price of essential goods and services.
I suppose on that account, they're still to blame - for today's stagflation - even when the wages remained stagnant for nearly 50 years.
Less than 24 hours after the Reiners were found stabbed to death in their Brentwood home on Sunday, Trump –– the leader of the Conservative Party –– lambasted Rob Reiner for his political beliefs, posting on Truth Social that his death was “reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME” and that Reiner “was known to have driven people CRAZY by his raging obsession of President Donald J. Trump.”
Yet, this is not the party line. Individuals will always be individuals. And that was a shitty response from trump to say the least. But that is not the party line. He is just incapable of acting like a President.
The difference is that Trump is the chosen leader of the Conservative Party.
You can distance yourself from your side's foibles all you want, but you cannot do that and then also pretend any one who is right of center must also share Trump's views. I suggest its highly unlikely most voters share the personal views of their chosen leaders. I mean, Biden literally, more than one, suggested he would try to physically assault Trump if given the chance, and not a President.
The fact that leaders are dickheads is not an argument. They almost all, almost always are.
The fact is and has always been that the vast majority of both sides are normal people. That you seem to want that to not be the case on the right, but be the case on the left is exactly illustrative of the type of bias that makes these things so difficult to talk about. "right" does not mean "stupid", it does not mean "bigoted", it does not mean "uncompassionate". These are horrible myths that perpetuate the exact kind of division that keeps getting people like Trump elected (and Biden for that matter, but the comparison is obviously not one of parity. Trump is a far worse person., Biden was a worse President.. and they overlap). I challenge you to go to some 'right leaning' places (bars, clubs, whatever.. ) and actually talk to some real human beings. I can guarantee you'll be surprised as long as you don't actively look for MAGA merch or whatever.
Oh, you're being serious?
My reaction to this entire thread. Especially the comments about Marx. Good god.
I was seriously hoping that you were joking.
:up:
I like his Trump/Reiner and Biden/Kirk compassion comparison. Reiner was a harsh critic of Trump and Kirk was a harsh critic of Biden so I think it's a fair equivalency.
Reiner said that Trump is a mentally unstable sociopath, a traitor, and similar comments.
Kirk said that Biden was a corrupt tyrant and should be given the death penalty for crimes against America, in addition to other criticisms and calls to action.
When Kirk was murdered Biden posted the following statement:
When Reiner was murdered Trump posted the following statement:
I think it's fair to say that the Trump response does not express compassion and that the Biden response does.
Also, no elected Democrat official, formal Democratic Party leader, or political pundit publicly celebrated the death of Charlie?Kirk.
Quoting AmadeusD
This is a blatant lie. Biden said something about giving Trump a beating behind the gym in High School, presumably to beat the lecherous 'pussy grabbing' out of him. Apparently Biden has more compassion for victims of sexual harassment than for creepy men who use their status to sexually assault women.
Does lying about it express a bias and is it [i]"the type of bias that makes these things so difficult to talk about"[/I]? I think any bias can hinder communication.
Sometimes trolls try really hard to get you to respond to them. Toxic stuff.
Pretty clear to anyone without an agenda. Trump really has no compassion or empathy, but that’s been known for decades. Whether that extends to his followers— Yes, of course it does. What percentage? Who knows.
Anyway, this thread is Twitter-like nonsense anyway, so I’ll leave it there.
yep
There is literally no chance that Biden can go back in time to high school and beat Trumps ass. :lol:
It’s rather telling that AmadeusD doesn’t take issue with Trump boasting about sexual assault (pussy grabbing) but does take issue with Biden’s condemnation of sexual assault and his hypothetical punishment for it.
It’s silly to think that anyone other than a sociopath can be without compassion or morality. My theory is that people on the top should be conservative because they should want to conserve a system that works for them and people on the bottom should be progressive because they should want to change a system that's not working for them. In accordance with this theory we should be highly skeptical of rich progressives and we should pity the foolishness of poor conservatives.
At an anti-sexual assault event in 2018 Biden said, in context of Trump boasting about pussy grabbing, "They asked me if I’d like to debate this gentleman, and I said 'no.' I said, 'If we were in high school, I’d take him behind the gym and beat the hell out of him.'"
You claimed that [i]"Biden literally, more than one, suggested he would try to physically assault Trump if given the chance."[/I]
Do you understand the difference between "if we were in high school" and [i]"assault Trump if given the chance"[/I]? The former is an impossible hypothetical scenario. To those not biased against Biden it's simply a way of expressing condemnation of Trump boasting about sexual assault.
A 2023 trial by a jury of his peers found that Trump had sexually assaulted author E. Jean Carrol, if you recall.
It's astonishing that you think Biden is the bad guy in this situation.
Well put. The context makes it crystal clear.