The End Of Enlightenment?

EDITOR’S NOTE: This published as a paywalled article a month ago. Offering it to free readers today, to show y’all what’s behind the green curtain.

There was this thing that began some time during the seventeenth century. Some mark its start in 1637 with the publication of Rene Descartes' Discourse on the Method, others fifty years later when Isaac Newton published his Principia Mathematica. Quibbles about its onset notwithstanding, the Age of Reason, aka the Enlightenment, was fundamental to the thinking, values, and morals that elevated the West and laid the bedrock upon which America was founded, grew, and prospered. The Enlightenment gave us individual liberty, the end of slavery, limited and constitutional government, the intrinsic value of every person, laws above men, the separation of church and state, and human progress.

Among the more vital attitudes that emerged was a distrust of government and a disbelief in authoritarianism. This was foundational to America's structure, and gave us a tripartite Federal government, a bicameral legislature, and a good bit of self-governing authority to the various states. Several factors, including the institution of slavery, made for an imperfect first realization and insufficient protections for individuals, but time and the ability to amend the Constitution moved things closer to Enlightenment ideals.

We are, I hate to report, in the midst of a derailment. What we may call Western values are in deep trouble, under attack from multiple sides.

In Western Europe, cultural elites have precipitated their own doom with an embrace of multiculturalism and an elevation of oppressive cultural values (brought in by the ironically named "oppressed") above their own. Supposed liberals defending the congenitally illiberal Islamism that rejects Western values in favor of a set of cultural mores that treat women like chattel, elevate religion above everything else, stoke violence, and reject any semblance of tolerance for others.

On the American Left, tolerance has come full-horseshoe to raging intolerance for anyone who does not bend the knee to a virulently authoritarian cultural elite. The championing of minorities has gone from advocating for their equal treatment to corralling them into identity siloes with rigid expectations of beliefs, opinions, and voting habits. Classical liberalism was thrown out the window in favor of technocracy and a Best-and-Brightest-driven progressivism. The more traditional liberals have been cowed into subservience and submission by socialists and other leftists, and the Constitution itself is now under siege because it stands in the way of their lust for unlimited power. Free speech is now subordinate to people's feelings, and the definition of "hate speech" grows daily. Good people are made villains, and bad people are made saints.

On the American Right, the subset of property rights that includes free trade has become quaint. Populist protectionism is the order of the day, with plans to slap tariffs on friend and foe alike. “Rebuild our cities” and “Strengthen our military” speak of more spending, and a blanket rejection of Social Security and Medicare reforms reinforces the conclusion of continued fiscal recklessness.

The smaller-government visions of such as Goldwater and Reagan have given way to a big-government approach that was dubbed "compassionate conservatism by GWBush and "America First" by Donald Trump. Defenders and apologists argue that it's not as "big-government" as the Left wants and has produced, but the Founders would be aghast at what the supposed party of smaller government embraces. Cultural conservatism, or more recently coined "religious populism," is seizing its moment with many seeking to inject religious attitudes into government, societal gains for long-oppressed populations are facing pushback and potential rollback, and some are even calling for banning gay marriage. The free (but managed) flow of people across our borders that was part of traditional conservatism has given way to a shut-the-door mindset, which, while an understandable overreaction to the Left's excesses, does the nation a disservice and sends some very bad signals.

Neither of today's major parties are your father's or grandfather's parties. The "party of Lincoln" gives much traditional conservatism the hairy eyeball, and the Left has dragged the Democratic Party well to the left of FDR and LBJ. The political sandbox is now dominated by left-populists and right-populists, with socialists sheepdogging their team and those of us who embrace classical liberalism and the values upon which the nation was founded kicked out of both clubs. When I saw Republicans pondering and rationalizing tax increases, I knew that things had taken a bad turn.

Political power is often considered a pendulum. Both sides have tried, for decades if not longer, to strategize and triangulate their way to permanent majority, but their repeated failures tells us that goal is unreachable. The pendulum always ends up swinging. But, it doesn't "swing back." Like Focault's pendulum, it precesses. As the world turns, its return swing goes to a different point. Every iteration of majority in our government looks different, and not just due to changing national or global landscape.

I look ahead to Trump 2.0, and hold little hope for policies that elevate liberty. While I expect some rollback of the Biden era excesses, I hear and see trade protectionism and corporatism on the economic front, and cultural conservatism on the societal front. Especially given his selection of JD Vance as his veep. Vance is no libertarian, nor is he libertarian-adjacent.

None of this aligns with the Enlightenment values that built the West, values that Europe had been walking away from for decades, but is now running full-tilt in the opposite direction, and values that have been given a lot of lip service but very little actual respect from either major American political party.

"Yeah, but the Democrats would be worse."

No argument here. The basket of "bad" that the Left offers is heavier than the basket of "bad" we'll get from Trump 2.0, and there are a few good nuggets in the GOP’s current platform. At this juncture, I think a rebuke to the Left in the form of a Dem wipeout would be a good thing.

Doesn't mean I'll be happy, just a bit less sad.

There have been a few imperfect blips in the direction of real liberty across the past century-plus, but the march has always been toward more government and more "majority imposing its will on the minority." The "leave us alone, we'll leave you alone" ethos once again takes a back seat to "we're in charge, we do what we want."