Thursday, June 25, 2020

"We won’t cure what is wrong with society by further empowering those who have sickened it at the expense of our own liberty."

Kurt Schlichter writes in part in Town Hall,
...The politicians we support should be aggressively pushing regulation and legislation to protect our rights. “BUT CONSERVATIVES ARE SUPPOSED TO HATE REGULATION!” Yeah, maybe, but we definitely hate being oppressed. After all, any principle that is construed in a manner that makes us second-class citizens, unable to speak without the threat of retaliation, is not a principle worth having.

...As I have pointed out before, there are three scenarios in descending order of preferability.

Option 1: We all live freely and say what we wish and no one gets canceled.

Option 2: Conservatives get canceled, but liberals get canceled too.

Option 3: Conservatives get canceled, but liberals never get canceled.

My preference is Option 1, everyone says whatever they want and no one gets canceled. This seems like the best arrangement, and until recently it seemed to be the one that we had adopted as a society. If we can’t have Option 1, then we will take Option 2, mutually assured destruction. But Option 3, liberals do whatever they want and we get gagged, is a non-starter. They do not get to win.

Principles are nice things to have. They are a marker of a healthy society. But today our society is not healthy, and we are not morally obligated to pretend that it is by observing to our own detriment norms and rules that are not universally applicable. And we won’t cure what is wrong with society by further empowering those who have sickened it at the expense of our own liberty.

My principle is freedom, and any principle that doesn’t make me freer is not a principle worth having.
Read more here.

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