Has the Left Stopped Thinking? Part 5: Peter Hitchens
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- Опубліковано 13 кві 2008
- To mark the announcement of the 2008 Shortlists, the Orwell Prize hosted a debate (sponsored by Reuters) entitled 'Has the Left Stopped Thinking?'. The panellists were Matthew Parris (former Conservative MP, Times columnist and former Orwell Prize winner), Jean Seaton (Chair of the Orwell Prize, professor of media history at the University of Westminster), Greg Clark MP (Conservative, Shadow Cabinet Office Minister), Dr Denis MacShane MP (Labour, former Europe Minister), Peter Hitchens (columnist, The Mail on Sunday) and Will Hutton (chief executive of the Work Foundation, and Observer columnist and former editor). The debate was chaired by Sean Maguire (Editor -- Political and General News, Reuters). Filmed by Jack Lancaster, edited by Jack Lancaster and Amy Downes. Further editing by Gavin Freeguard.
Some would say they never started...
Hitchen's arguments are better understood after reading The Abolition of Britain: they aren't simple and need elaboration.
And then he got the prize. One just needs to insist in a very subtle way....
" ... their response is a blank refusal to listen and a characterisation of the critic as pathologically deformed"
Haha very funny. Also very true.
I find it hard to believe that anyone - including those panelists - could truthfully disagree with Peter's analysis of the Modern Left. A very incisive speech.
Legendary
when i emtnioned free speech codes, I was not only referring to national legislation, but rather the baleful influence of political correctness on the speech codes in,for example,college campuses, where Professors have been sacked,speakers prevented from speaking,and students taken off student radio/newspapers, for expressing the "wrong" view on feminism, abortion or gay marriage, this is a disgusting left-wing attack on free thought
Thank you!
It's not about what he looks like it's about what he's saying, and what he's saying is true. Personally I don't care how he came to these conclusion, but the accuracy of those conclusions is enough for me.
If I may provide an example. My mother was not married to my father and I was an accident. My father left her as soon as he discovered that. She remarried a man she met on a hippie commune a year later and he adopted me. I proudly have his last name and he has always treated me as his son and I love him and consider him my father in every way. I was born out of wedlock but a good man came along and gave me a father, not because I was his child but because he is a good man.
In my country, free speech is most often attacked by religious groups. Those on the Left will often exercise their free speech by protesting someone, but that isn't the same as legal censorship. The closest parallel is hate speech, which is only ever used if it can be said to incite someone to violence. This kind of law could just as easily be used on a black man, a muslim or an eco/animal-rights activist, and has been.
Leftism by Erik Von Kuenneldt Leddihn explains perfectly the black void at the heart of this movement
I just listened to the clip of Peter Hitchens attacking David Milliband about the war on terror. I noticed you had a comment there to, so you must have listened to it. Its amazing how everything Hitchens said could just have come, verbatim, out of the mouth of most leftists in my country. I myself have said just what he did many times. You should realize that, if you're honestly opposed to the things he says, there are millions on the Left you could join with.
Not moving FAR ENOUGH to the Right has nothing to do with not moving to the Right at all. Especially on economic issues, he definitely moved to the Right.
You got that entire story screwed up. Larry Summers RESIGNED MORE THAN A YEAR after making an offhand statement. Steven Pinker, who defended Summers' statement as intellectually sound, faced no censure as a reuslt of defense. Summers' resignation followed a vote of no-confidence by the faculty. Though the faculty may have been swayed by their PC feelings, they are free to vote as they wish.
My stance on the war is very normative for someone on the Right in my country.I didnt say gay people abuse children any more than heterosexuals..I never said any group of people were morally superior to any other group.Rather,it is marriage, the insitution, that has "moral superiority" over any other type of relationship,because it alone provides a framework in which children can be conceived in lifelong union,and in which adults must make and keep, promises to each other,and their kids.
I did not say biology was essential to a married family. Thats why I said I support married couples adopting children! It is possible for a loving married couple, to raise a child, even if they are not its biological parents. But a child does deserve, and need, a mother and father figure, an alternative male and female role model, and a family who will remain with that child throughout his childhood, rather than the terrible broken homes we have today!
the point is a child needs role-models of both genders,(preferably loving parents)to fulfil different needs.A mother acts as a female role-model to the young girl, while the father is a male role-model to the young boy,showing him how to be a man.and the young girl needs a stable,loving father figure,to enable her to build trusting relationships with men in adulthood.studies show fatherelss girls are more likely to fall pregnant as teens!
yes,I am offended by the cases you mentioned, though a seminary is different from a University,as seminaries require adherence to a set of beliefs which Universities do not! But Larry Summers did not even argue that women were different from men,even though research confirms this,he merely called for more research into it! and thats enough to get forced out of Harvard? what kind of an academic institution gets rid of someone who calls for academic research?
I haven't defended Summers' resignation. I simply point out that to attack it as an example of political correctness is dishonest. People overreacted because he offended their sensibilities long before he ever made the remark (Cornel West, ROTC, getting wealthy off globalization at the expense of the poor & the World Bank report on exporting polluting companies to poor countries), but he was not forced from his job. Like any leader who has lost the confidence of his flock, he stepped down.
Feel free to send me the links. I'm never adverse to learning a little bit.
Peter Hitchens - one of the few journalists with any genuine insight into British society. Its a shame he writes for the Mail; I dont agree on his views on abortion, etc. But I think there is a great deal of truth in what he talks about. The cancer of the British society began with Thatcherism - and its glorification needs to be ended.
I can give you the facts proving it.the London School Of Economics found social mobility declined since the creation of a British welfare state.Welfare states encourage dependency on the state,thus reducing personal responsibility for making money,trapping people in poverty, killing aspiration, and incentivising irresponsible behaviour, by rewarding people for bad choices (such as not working, or having kids by different dads)Meynard Keyens once said "if you pay people to be poor they stay poor"
In nearly all of those cases, he simply maintained the status quo or made smaller reductions. He was able to balance the budget primarily because he made defense cuts to the taxpayer funded welfare state for arms companies, since the Cold War was over. Every Republican president in my lifetime has not been able to do that, though admittedly because there have been external reasons.
I never said I didn't know that, I just said that its hypocritical to deny homosexuals the right to promise commitment than call them out for lacking that commitment. Perhaps if homosexuals were given the right to that commitment, they would be more likely to commit? Its worth a thought, at least.
the state shouldn't "regulate" who lives together,private life is up to individuals,the point is the state should not give priveleges to any kind of relationship,it should recognise a moral hierarchy.Supporting marriage,is key to supporting small government,if people have kids within marriage,they can raise them,and pay for them,without needing state interference,single-mother benefit,state childcare,and state carers replacing fathers! if people live morally they can be free from the state!
They also clash with the liberal movement, one that has been traditionally very anti-war. The reason neocons left their liberal brethren behind is that the liberals were too soft on crime and war. Wars, or shows of military power, were specifically the issue on which they clashed with the Left.
Well, I'm glad to hear that. I can see we disagree on some things, but I prioritize my political beliefs. #1 on that list is my country and the rights, freedoms, checks and balances that must exist for the free citizen to remain a free citizen.
In 1688, the State was the Monarchy (remember Louis XIV's famous line: "L'etat, c'est moi"), so they were limiting the power of the monarch. I agree, the state, like every power structure, must be limited in its power. Thats why I oppose such things as the Patriot Act, banning guns & identity cards maintained by a private corporation. Ensuring children get a decent education (home-schooling is an entirely legal alternative) is hardly tyrannical.
The Founding Fathers didn't "object to" the huge centralised state agencies,like the the Education Department,as they didnt exist then.the point is,their principles oppose such things! Because the Founding Fathers believed in liberty from the state, that was the whole point of the Constitution,based on the 1688 English Bill Of Rights, it specifically limits the power,and reach of the state,(which socialists always try to increase)and is a protection against power becoming centralised.
What can't limiting the power of the govt to regulate who gets married and who gets adopted be included in there?
I understand that. I mentioned my adoptive father, and I'm sure I'm better off as a person because of it. But I can attest to that fact that poverty is destructive to children. Although I took my parents work ethic to heart and worked hard to get out of poverty, I saw the effect on those around me, including those with two parents. Drug abuse, crime and fucked up views of sexualities.
because Eirefrance, their origins are all liberal, as the Wikipedia entry says "many of the founders were socialists or liberals", if you look at the history of the movement, its ideas, and how they clash with traditionalist paleocons, you will see they are a liberal movement
No gay adoption/lesbian IVF being against the law has nothing to do with "legislating morality", rather with protecting the rights of children. The law should recognise an innocent childs rights,(which is why abortion-on-demand should not be legal either). And one of the fundamental rights adoption agencies/IVF clinics should legislate for, is the child's right to a father and mother.This wouldnt just stop gays adopting/conceiving, but would also,quite rightly, stop single mothers having IVF!
Thats how you respond to a joke? Okay, then.
the reason "abstinence" hasnt worked,is that with the prevailing laws/culture in the US,opposed to the idea of abstinence,education cant work coz it sends a contradictory message!On the one hand,the law says you can divorce as soon as you feel like it,have as many abortions as you like,(after casual sex), and TV and music is telling you sex outside marriage is great,but then your school is teaching you "abstinence-only"!And the breakdown of the family makes makes abstinence harder for children!
None of that in any way discounts what I said earlier. I've never said Democrats/Liberals were blameless, only that the Right deserves equal blame.
You probably didn't understand most of what he was saying in that clip.
How would you respond to the case of Bristol Palin, the daughter of a true Christian social conservative, pregnant at the age of 17?
How is it any different for you to reject neocons as false conservatives than for me to reject them as false liberals?
I can't find the cases your referring to, but would you be equally offended by a professor fired from Mormon BYU for suggesting that gay marriage should be legal or a tenured theologian be fired from a Seminary for arguing that women should be ordained?
Here's some more links.National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles,"children from lone-parent households were more likely to have had intercourse before the age of 16 when compared with children from two-natural-parent households.Boys were 1.8 times as likely (42.3% versus 23%)girls were 1.5 times as likely (36.5% versus 23.6%)."Girls from lone-parent households were 1.6 times as likely to become mothers before the age of 18 (11% versus 6.8%)."
That is pretty contrived. Bigamy and polygamy are unions capable of producing children and non-married, non-hetero couples are as capable of keeping promises to each other as anyone else. My point about the child abuse is that it is not the institution but the individuals that make something 'morally superior'.
I recently had an argument with a lesbian who was defending sexual violence against men on the grounds that men would then better understand what women feel. In your book, I suppose the PC thing would have been to agree. Instead, I called her out and said that was bullshit. I'm still a liberal and in full support of gay rights, but I can think for myself and disagree with my fellow pinkos.
People are born deaf, dumb and blind, just as they are born gay. And when deaf parents CHOOSE to have a child, they are making the selfish choice to raise a child in unideal circumstances. Will that child be as communicative as 'normal' children? What about parents who are too poor to provide the best nutrition or education for their children? Growing up in poverty is actually incrediby damaging (see the Brooks-Gunn/Duncan study from 2005).
I agree parents (particularly mums)should raise their kids,but the solution is NOT to raise the minimum wage,this would lead to job losses,and reduce OVERALL wages,as money for higher minimum wage,has to come from somewhere else,so it would be lower-income earners who would sufer wage cuts,as the fat-cat bosses wouldnt cut their own wages to pay for it!The solution to help families,is to cut income tax,as Ron Paul says,enablin parents not to have to work to pay such huge taxes
If people lived morally, the state would never have come into existence. Anyway, I suppose thats the difference between you and I. To me, freedom is ethically superior (I prefer ethical to moral, it seems less subjective and arbitrary) and the traditional family unit is not surviving the pressures of globalization and abused, unchecked employers. Thus, allowing more people to become families would seem to help the long term survival of families.
Yes people are widowed,or born deaf/dumb blind etc,but there's one crucial difference, the lack of choice! these unfortunate kids parents didnt CHOOSE their circumstances,the widow wanted her son to have a Dad,but he died! if eg,a divorced Mum denied the father contact with his child,I agree the law should force her to allow the kid to see his dad!But a lesbian couple are CHOOSING to conceive a child,without a father! That child is not a victim of circumstances,but of selfish adults choices!
And liberals don't necessarily support those who sneer at their own culture. Some do, just as some conservatives are racist jingoists. I think marriage is important enough that I believe homosexuals should have equal access to it. Certainly, having two parents is important in the raising of children. That is why I support higher minimum wages, so families can afford to work fewer hours and spend more time with each other in the 'natural' way the human species needs.
The Hitler parallel wasn't absurd. The things I mentioned are issues that conservatives traditionally support and things that Hitler believed. Yet, I would never assume that any paleo-con supported him. The newsmedia is a business run by educated, urbane, wealthy, worldly people. This may give the impression that they are, for instance, pro-multicultural, but its not universal. Lou Dobbs, for instance, a major US based broadcaster speaks loudly and forcefully against illegal immigration.
You have it all the wrong way round.If people cannot raise their own kids,and live according to a common set of values,they cant be free in the first place! Because the more morality,and consequently the family unit, breaks down,the more the state has to intervene!and the stronger the state grows. That means more state social workers,carers, benefits,etc replacing absent fathers! Marriage is the best protection of private life,and liberty
Single parentss cannot provide a mother/father relationship. We do not deny them the right to raise their children. Anyway, I'm not equivicating anti-gay bias with slavery, I'm stating that there are certainly some human 'rights' that it is wrong to deny anyone. The right to personal freedom is the prime right, especially if it hurts noone. The right to marry falls so clearly on the side of hurting noone that I can understand no argument against it.
Oh come on, I don't want McCain/Palin to win, but lets be serious. Her children's names mean nothing.
It seems that you are talking about studies on children of single parents, which is not the same as having two parents of the same gender. Would you agree that having two mothers is better than having one mother? As I've already said, the ideal mother-father relationship will not happen all the time.
No, marriage between man and woman is important enough that it needs a unique place in the hierarchy of society, above any other relationship because the purpose of marriage,is a stable,loving home for children,and children,as all social studies show, need mothers and fathers, which gay marriage cant provide. marriage involves unique sacrifice, for your partner AND your potential children,and can thus only survive if it is uniquely valued and rewarded above anything else
the right to marry removes priveleges,and uniqueness from heterosexual marriage, which should be at the pinnacle of the moral hierarchy, distributing the priveleges of marriage, to single mums, unmarried heterosexuals, and homosexuals means they cease to be unique priveleges, and marriage ceases to be unique! crucially the point of marriage is the raising of children with two parents,therefore the inevitable progression from gay marriage is gay adoption,which is wrong, I explain why below..
How did he move to the Right? He still ran a huge taxpayer-funded welfare state for US arms companies,maintained protectionist policies,entirely opposed to conservative principles of free trade, massive immigration, and huge centralised state agencies like the education Department etc, which true conservatives like Ron Paul, and Pat Buchanan want dismantled!
it is not dishonest to say Summers treatment is an example of PC,everybody agreed it was! The whole point is he did NOT lose the confidence of the University,that was the excuse the Faculty used,but other Professors admitted he was being forced out because he had dared to express a politically-incorect view!Harvard feminists demanded he apologise, as if one shoud apologise for asking an academic question,at a University!it has happened many times in America,one Prof sacked for being pro-life!
I'd love to speak with a posh upper-middle class English accent like Pete does here.
He just speaks properly
He isn't posh
Not to mention that you are proposing that parents meet a variety of suitability requirements to raise children, otherwise you're just picking on homosexuals because of your personal feelings. And, how hypocritical is it to deny homosexuals the right to commit to each other, than say "oh, they don't commit to each other"?
Except I'm a leftist, and although I'm not very familiar with British politics, I know that the media in the US don't speak for me. I often hear that these media dinner-party leftists speak for me, but I never actually hear it. Just because they don't agree with you doesn't mean they agree with me.
But marriage has never prevented infidelity, no-one ever said it did! Human nature is such,that we are always bound to be weak and selfish. The point is, marriage is the best insitution ever created, for enshrining love,encouraging selfessness,and giving children a home with the security of a permanent family..This doesnt mean some marriages wont fail, or that some arent unfaithful, but statistics prove,far less married parents break up, than unmarried parents!
eirefrance you obviously didnt even read the Wikipedia entry on neocons which you referenced.If you had you would have read that the "forerunners of the neocon movement were often liberals or socialists" and only disagreed with the Left on capitalism,how historia Michael Lind found the "ideology of the neocon movement has left-liberal origins", and founder Irving Kristol cited leftists as his inspiration
To say the Founding Fathers of my country believed in the principles of small government is to entirely misunderstand their position. They were replacing monarchy, the only govt they knew, with a new system of govt. They were concerned with limiting the power of the govt in the lives of individuals, but the size was never relevant. I might add that, in our conversation, you have not shown that you support limiting govt intervention in the lives of citizens.
Straight woman IVF does not necessarily mean a child will be born to a mother & father. Sperm banks do exist and they have business. When I am talking about a abstinence only agenda, I'm talking about education, not law. In the past decade, federal funding has been tied to teaching abstinence as the only form of safe sex. In that time, teenage sex has not dropped and teen pregancy has risen. You may oppose it, but effect is effect.
He's not a nutcase, he just comes from a very different perspective from the liberal consensus, but he's quite serious. And quite wrong in my opinion. :) But read him seriously.
He had a strained relationship with his faculty before that happened, for the reasons I gave. They did not like him, and this comment perhaps provided the final nail to his coffin. Did the faculty display an intolerant side in this issue? On the surface, it would appear so. Still, to call thsi PC is to misunderstand the situation and political correctness.
Teen pregnancy rates in the US peaked in the 1950s and steadily dropped through the sexual revolution of the 60s and 70s. Knowledge about sex and access to birth control are undoubtedly part of that decline. Not educating didn't work, either. Sex is a powerful drug and being ignorant of the consequences has not kept kids away.
Granted, that may be true. I only know what I've read concerning the rate of poverty in this country. I'm not going to take Meynard Keynes' word as gospel, just as I wouldn't take Milton Friedman's (the biggest problem with the Austrian School is that they base their studies on the obviously wrong assumption that everyone acts in their own rational interest all the time). Still, I'm no economist and if less welfare is shown to reduce poverty, so be it.
By the way, have you ever read Steven Leavitt's Freakonomics? There is a chapter in there on the drop in crime in the US in the 1990s. His analysis shows that abortion is most likely the cause of that (fewer young men growing up in poverty/broken homes). I understand that a pro-life position is a moral absolute and I'm not going to argue you on that point, but its worth noting when you're talking about social cohesion.
Just as increasing knowledge and freedom about sex meant some abused it, decreasing knowledge and restrictions on it will allow some to abuse those who don't meet the standard. Conservative muslim society has strict controls on sexual relations, and that allows men the freedom to commit horrible sexual abuse against women (such as female circumcision). When restrictions are put in place, someone must enforce them, and that person is given great power to abuse those restrictions.
I dont propose a return to the worst of the past,rather bringing back some of what we lost.Some things are worse now than they were then Eg more children grow up in broken homes today, since the collapse of sexual morality, than did then..Back-alley abortions did happen,but there were better ways of helping single mothers raise children, than changing the whole moral culture, and undermining marriage itself, which has only led to more single mothers/fatherless children, and more abortions!
Homosexual monogamy is not a way of indulging a desire for infidelity. Considering that homosexuals are unlikely to change their desires, why not reinforce fidelity within the community?
Eirefrance,even marriage doesnt "necessarily mean the child will have a Mum and Dad", because one parent might die! But the point is lesbian IVF means a child certainly WONT have a mother and father! And it should not be legal to conceive a child,without any possibility of a father! Sociologists/child psychologists are all agreed children need fathers, and the loss of male role-models from the home,has been disastrous for young boys,and for young girls adult relationships with men!
Of course the moral superiority of heterosexual marriage is open to interpretation. Heterosexual married couples are not immune to abusing their children. You're replacing normative with superior. Just because something isn't normative doesn't make it inferior. After all, your stance on the war is non-normative for someone on the Right. ;)
But I dont propose the Moslem model,the Western model of morality,is based on SELF-restraint,arising from universally-held common values,NOT imposed by the law,as it is in Moslem countries!We havent increased knowledge about sex,we've just got rid of necessary restrictions,based on ancient wisdom! Children grow up best,when they come from a stable,two-parent family,and our society encourages people to be selfish, rather than altruistic,leaving more children growing up without families!
Bigmay/polygamy do not require the same self-sacrifice,for one person,or love that marriage does,and are disatrously unstable,as humans arent designed to share partners,with others,so jealousy always ensues! Gays can comitt to each other,the point is their relationship shouldnt have the same status, as lifelong heterosexual union,as they arent going to conceive,or raise kids together,so they dont realy need to be bound together for life!There is much more promiscuity among them for this reason
Bygamy/polygamy dont require the same self-sacrifice for a simple reason, because they do not involve lifelong devotion to the person you love,but instead allow you to keep multiple sexual partners,like married "swingers". the whole point of marriage is maintaining fidelity to the one person you love, and raising children in a stable home,not a sexually-promiscuous abode where the children have to cope with having different mothers and fathers,and have no conept of stable family life
Part Two..People have always had sex outside marriage,but less people did,when the moral culture opposed it.Human nature can be bettered,by aspiring to higher values, rather than aiming for the gutter,by undermining mariage.Since mass contraception,and abortion-on-demand,teen pregnancy has risen in Western nations,coz contraception/abortion strips sex of significance,severing the link between sex and procreation,thus reducing what was once a unique expression of love,to a mere act of recreation!
well I am glad you can think independently but PC certainly makes it harder for people to do so,because it attaches mroality to personal opinions, so someone's goodness is now judged on the "correctness" of their personal views, and it demands painful conformism, to left-wing ideals by smearing opponents views, for example what do you mean by gay rights? has it occured to you that to assume something is a human "right" is to assume anyone with a different view is not only wrong,but immoral?
You're making an assumption that someone who disagrees with you is unrepresentative of real people (whatever that even means. Does hunting make someone more 'real' than supporting equal housing markets?) and that they agreed with someone on the Left automatically.
Including such liberal, left-wing ideals as support for the Iraq War and denunciation on Barack Obama.
Of course, I would assume someone who defends slavery is wrong. I think denying homosexuals ANYTHING heterosexuals receive, on the basis of their homosexuality along, is wrong. Thus, you are free to hold that opinion, but I do consider it worng. I would say it is unethical, as opposed to immoral, but thats a small difference.
you mention single parents, but they are of course denied the right to have children, as they cant conceive alone! however single mothers should not be allowed to adopt either,if there is the alternative of a married couple. Similarly if people waited till they were married before conceiving, there would be less single parents! gay couples should be denied the right to adopt, because this infringes on a child's right to a natural alternative male/female role model, and can confuse a young child!
I have no doubt that having gay parents affects a child, in the same way that having parents that are different races, deaf, blind or poor (or a single parent) affects children. Nonetheless, these parents are not denied parenthood (despite what you claim, there are numerous single parents, both by design and accident. Would you advocate taking away the children of a widowed mother?).
do you need me to direct you to the social studies showing children raised without fathers dont do as well as those raised with mums and dads?There's unanimous consensus among experts on the child's need for a father and mother,it has nothing to do with "artificial roles"its because the sexes ARE diferent,and mum/dads each provide children with something the other cannot,eg a father teaches a boy how to be a man,and girls need loving fathers to have stable adult relationships with men
You're putting on rosy glasses and ignoring back alley abortions and Magdalene houses. The world you are describing meant that a woman impregnated by rape had her life ruined while the rapist got off after a few years in prison.
Of course the Republicans opposed the Kosovo invasion. It was run by a president they already hated, so anything he did was going be wrong whether it was wrong or not. Its not as if Republicans are against invading small countries, as I pointed out. Therefore, your point is not that the Right is anti-war, but rather anti-some wars. What you're left with is the principle of the individual not the philosophy, which has been my point all along.
eirefrance political correctness can induce piliteness, and disguise itself as politeness, but it is nothing of the sort, if you want to see it in action, look at what happened to Larry Summers, the liberal President of Harvard, sacked for daring to ask for research into whether men and women think differently, which the evidence actually proves!this was a disgusting stifling of a necessary academic debate, at a supposedly academic American institution!
But I'm not wrong at all. That is what I said, its not the philosophy, its the individual. Where do the people on the Left who protested the many invasions we have mentioned fall in your scale? That is what I have been saying all along. War has nothing to do with the Left or the Right. Claiming the Left created these wars because some small % of the Right agrees with you is entirely dishonest. They aren't 'true' conservatives and neo-cons aren't secret Leftists. Everyone is an individual.
Again, its a stretch to say that marriage has traditionally been about children, but I'll go with that argument. What you are talking about is legislating a relationship so that heterosexual couples who can and will have children can marry and noone else. Noone is proposing a law that would make it illegal to refuse to marry gays, rather allowing those who would anyway. Your logic means anyone who cannot or does not want to have children should not be allowed to marry.
As for the other things, I can only assume you don't watch much US based news. As I said, I don't watch much, but I have never seen a newscaster be pro-radical feminist, pro-abortion, anti-Christian or anti-marriage. Perhaps its because newscasters don't explicitly take the opposite position on all of those things that you somehow imagine that they support them. I know what anti-Christianity is, and no newscaster has ever displayed it. He or whe would lose their job the second they did.
You're talking about legislating morality, that is making it against the law for homosexuals to marry and adopt children. Self-restraint is fine, but your entire argument here has been government imposed restraint.
I think you're inventing philosophies here. How much of Britain's empire came through the back door of 'humanitarian intervention'? Caring about your fellow human beings isn't a 'left-wing' trait, its a human trait. And since technology has given us both the means to kill greater numbers and to graphically show that killing to the world, human heartstrings get tugged and people get angry. Nothing makes me angrier than hearing about helpless people getting abused, be they German Jews or kids.
Nixon: Vietnam & Cambodia
Reagan: Grenada, Nicaragua & Lebanon
George H.W. Bush: Panama & Gulf War
George W. Bush: Afghanistan & Iraq
Certainly, Republicans have been no better on not invading small countries.
lots of trendy liberals support the Iraq War. David Aoronovitch, Nick Cohen, Johann Hari, of the Independent, Nick Cohen, of the Observer etc etc. And lots of conservatives oppose the Iraq War, from Pat Buchanan, and Peter Oborne, and, of course, Peter Hitchens.
Thats an interesting philosophical position, but it doesn't jive with the facts. Poverty rates in the US lowered after the creation of the welfare state and have gone up since welfare reform. You can legitimatly object to being taxed so that others can receive welfare, but you'd have a tough time arguing facts with philosophical positions.
Wait, you can't have it both ways. You called Hitchens a trendy liberal and an Iraq War supporter. What other trendy liberals support the Iraq War?
@darkfox85
Pay more attention to your grammar, sir.
You imply that the successes of Blair\Brown are also due to what you -ignorantly- call "Thatcherite bile".
And you should think more carefully about what you mock before seeking its erasure.
An incalculably large store of social capital rests on the "family" and every time it takes a blow you can be sure that a rise in entropy soon follows.
Oh, and the trends towards our present moral bankruptcy began long before the bogey era of Thatcherism.
thats what limiting the power of government in the lives of individuals means! You have entirely misunderstood my views,and conservatism, if you didnt know I believe in limiting government intervention in private life! Thats why I support low taxes, limiting the power of the state to take peoples earnings by force!I oppose socialism,which takes away liberty,and a welfare state,which makes people less responsible..if we are not responsible we cannot be free!
@kzearo I do imply that the successes of Blair\Brown are due to being to the Right as much as the failures (which outweigh.) You seem to think this is unintentional. But I definitely feel that it’s bile and should be undone.
And the trend towards our “moral bankruptcy” did indeed begin before Thatcherism. It’s always been with us and it’s played for scares- like what this evolution denying fool bangs on about.
The only thing I disagree with is the implication that my grammar is poor.