The "Liberal Fascism" Fallacy (a.k.a, Conservatives Immanentize The Eschaton)

21.04.2008

At the start of the conservative movement, William F. Buckley his colleagues at the National Review developed a standard explanation for the presence of evil in the world. Evil, they said, comes from attempts to create God's kingdom on earth--to "immanentize the eschaton," as they put it.

This criticism was supposed to explain why both communists--who wanted to create a worker's paradise--and liberals, who believed in applying reason and pragmatism to improve man's estate on earth, were leading the world towards godless tyranny. It was a unified theory of evil, which conveniently allowed conservatives to conflate their two greatest enemies.

Conservatives venerate this principle to this very day. For example, Jonah Goldberg's book Liberal Fascism insists that liberalism is totalitarianism simply because it believes in man's ability to make the world better through reason. In other words, liberalism is fascism because it immanentizes.

But, in the print edition of The New Republic, Damon Linker's superb review of Wayward Christian Soldiers: Freeing the Gospel from Political Captivity, highlights how George W. Bush--by applying his starkly Manichaean worldview to American politics--has come close to being a rabid immanentizer himself:

Consider Bush's speech at Ellis Island on the first anniversary of the September 11 attacks. In his remarks, the president described the United States as the "hope of all mankind" and asserted that this "hope still lights our way. And the light shines in the darkness. And the darkness will not overcome it." Marsh bristles at this passage, which alludes to the prologue to the Gospel of John but modifies its message in a crucially important respect.

Whereas the New Testament describes God as the light that will not be overcome by the darkness that surrounds it, Bush ascribed divine agency to America. For Marsh, this substitution is unforgivable--nothing less than the idolatrous "identification of the United States with Christian revelation."

By identifying American nationalism with God's will, and insisting that we are locked in an apocalyptic battle with evil, George W. Bush has committed something akin to the very heresy that conservatives call the root of all evil. And it's not just Bush. This Manichaean, good-versus-evil worldview has been integral to the conservative movement since Buckley founded National Review. (Check out Peter Scoblic's U.S. vs Them for a closer look at this phenomenon.)

So conservative moralism doesn't just obscure reality, it obscures morality as well.

--Barron YoungSmith

Posted: Monday, April 21, 2008 9:33 AM with 7 comment(s)

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Robert Powell said:

Of course George Bush is a rampant, not to say rabid, immanentizer. It's part of the job specs for POTUS, and has been apparent in nearly every administration one can name.

It's an interesting subject, but in this post it serves to reinforce the tactical malfeasance of so many Democrats, who seem to think every problem in the world can be effectively dealt with by, "yeah, man, but George Bush is really an idiot!!"

April 21, 2008 9:58 AM

dbhuff said:

Yeah, isn't this Manifest Destiny in new clothes? While liberals may abhor the appropriation of God to our political will, it has been there for quite some time. Of course, the difference now is hearing it from the pulpit, not just the politicians.

April 21, 2008 10:17 AM

roidubouloi said:

Conservatism does not merely obscure morality, it immanentizes immorality as it provides justification for any action, no matter how heinous or disastrous in its consequences, if it is undertaken with the intention to "fight evil."

There really is no difference between Buckley's "conservatism" and the radical left in this regard. Both regard the proper intentions (meaning desired outcome) as sufficient justification for any action. True liberalism (using the term in its traditional way) is highly attentive to the pragmatic concern for outcomes. Its guiding principle is not ideology, but rational discernment of what works in the world.

Bush is not merely an idiot, but an immoral idiot, supported by a structure of "conservative" thought that is just as bad as communism in its ambition and indistinguishable from communism in its ambition to immanentize its unique vision of "the good."

April 21, 2008 10:20 AM

Rhubarbs said:

Marsh is right that the conservative association of the nation with the sacred is a form of idolatry. (As is evangelical biblical literalism, to the extent that biblical text differs with observable natural phenomenon; it is idolatry to privilege a book written by men, even a divinely inspired book written by men, over the actual handiwork of God.) The clearest example is how Reagan completely reversed the true meaning of John Winthrop's metaphor of America as a "city on a hill." For Winthrop, it was a warning: America is so exceptional an experiment that all the world will be watching, and should the experiment not succeed, the failure will be used as evidence against God and the Christian faith. For Reagan, it was a blessing: America rocks, man!

It goes hand-in-hand with the resurgence of the dreadful "God Bless America" at ballgames and whatnot. It's not a patriotic song: Not once does it assert any characteristic that makes America deserve blessing or loyalty. Instead, it merely begs God for blessings, and names physical attributes of the nation's landmass (mountains, prairies, oceans) that are themselves God's blessing if you believe in that sort of thing. Contra "America the Beautiful," which is a prayer that the nation might through character and conduct continue to be worthy of the blessings God has offered us. America is a great country not because God blesses us, but because we strive to make ourselves worthy of divine blessing. (If you believe that sort of thing; the secularist equivalent is "America is a great nation not because we say so, but because we try to do good things." To the extent that conservatism is in principle against trying to do good things, to that extent conservatism is essentially un-American.)

Conservatism: Not just wrong about America, but also wrong about God.

April 21, 2008 10:48 AM

boxofrox said:

Temporal and transcendent. Faith and works. Ever the contenders. Do unto fully implies do not unto. Collective v individual. What is individually sacrosanct and what is shared? So goes the world.

Roid. All sensible pragmatics affirmed one must still allow that such a view is in itself an evangelical disposition with it's own tenents if not enumerated then implied. It is the baggage of such implications which meet with resistance among those who would contend.

Any follow up will have to wait until the morrow....if so inclined as I'm out of pocket and will be for the duration.

April 21, 2008 10:54 AM

ratnerstar said:

Of the last five Barron YoungSmith Plank posts, four have had a reference and link to "U.S. vs. Them." I'm sure it's a great book, but I'm starting to wonder if there's some sort of royalty sharing agreement going on here.

April 21, 2008 11:10 AM

ironyroad said:

Rhubarbs is right: the continual misappropriation and misunderstanding of Winthrop's "city on a hill" declaration is almost pathological.

April 21, 2008 11:39 AM