Dear Friends,
It seems to me, for a civilization to be functional, it must have thriving liberal, as well as conservative factions. A culture with only a liberal or conservative faction is doomed. Why? Because if a people only try new things, and never hold to anything discovered, it will eventually run off a cliff. While a people who are too conservative, stultify, so that any disaster shatters them. The liberal element gives a society robustness and advancement while the conservative gives that society security and foundation. Like a person who is impetuous and thrill seeking probably will not live long, the person who stays at a dead end job, will never get ahead. The elite today have decided our system needs to abandon both conservatism and liberalism, going all in on progressivism.
Liberalism is defined as a system of thought intertwined with the Enlightenment. Liberalism embraces all the secular advances of the Enlightenment. Liberals believe in freedom of speech, debate as the arbiter of truth, not appeal to authority, individualism, capitalism and all the other freedoms we have come to understand. These are noble ideas and have served us well over the last few hundred years. Conservatism is defined as a system of thought, where the advances of the past are protected and kept alive, so as not to spin back… like a pawl. Both are important to a people as I showed above. Progressivism is divorced from liberalism and is much closer to a perversion of conservatism. It is a mix of ultra cynicism, hubris, and ignorance, with a dose of political violence to give it leavening.
Progressivism is not liberalism at all, in fact, progressivism, while sounding like liberalism is diametrically opposed to it. Progressivism is post modern while liberalism is modern. In other words, liberalism embraces Secular Enlightenment ideals while progressivism post modernism rejects that philosophy for a more archaic one. Progressives do not believe in debate, they believe in appeal to “legitimate” authority as the arbiter of truth. They reject the entire idea of individualism and embrace tribalism instead. Progressives do not believe in freedom of religion, they demand everyone accept and bow to their state established religion of atheism. Progressivism is not even like modern conservatism at all. Liberals are tolerant to a fault while progressives are intolerant to the extreme.
Culture and society are complex systems. They, like all complex systems, thrive when there is diversity and become sickly when they lose that diversity. Complex systems can be poisoned. By the units in that system behaving erratically or out of character. Like arsenic imitates phosphorous in the body. Liberalism and conservatism go hand in hand, to give the complex system of our civilization toughness, wealth, a rising standard of living, liberty, technological advancement, philosophical advancement and safety. Progressivism on the other hand stifles the advancement that liberalism gives, as it undermines the foundation that conservatism provides. Progressivism is poison to the complex system of our culture, nations and humanity itself. It is arsenic to our civilization.
The elite have become enamored with the poison of progressivism, and have abandoned liberalism and conservatism, for archaic ultra conservatism. Progressives are so conservative, they despise freedom of speech, religion, thought and debate, but love tribalism. While at the same time imposing societal innovations that sow chaos. Where a liberal would die to protect your right to say something he disagrees with… a progressive would kill you for that disagreement. Progressives are the opposite of both conservatives and liberals…. yet they are poised to become a one party administrative state. An all powerful government that rejects both liberalism and conservatism, for a despotic echo chamber of arbitrary power, run by unaccountable bureaucrats. The very definition of a doomed society.
Sincerely,
John Pepin
