Thursday, March 05, 2009
What killed localism?
Rod Dreher quotes a Patrick Deneen article which accuses the "new isolationists" of free-riding. Deneen says we are taking advantage of the system that made it possible for us to have the luxurious choice of opting out.
I wrote this comment on Dreher's blog, and want to preserve it here for my own reference if nothing else:
= = = = =
Deneen is, as always, deep and unique. But there's a timeline problem in his accusation of free-riding against the localists. He says we are taking advantage of all the goodies (mobility, communication, occupational choice) provided by modernity, while trying to escape from deracination. He has conflated two different "packages".
Occupational choice has been an American feature from the start. Mobility and communication came in 1860 with the telegraph and railroad. But local institutions and Tocqueville's "mediators" were still perfectly strong and vibrant in 1950. It wasn't mobility and communication that killed the lodge and the church. It was a Leninist Sabotage Weapon called "The Supreme Court" that killed the lodge and the church.
If we want to restore localism, we don't need to eliminate the telegraph, the railroad and the internet. We do need to eliminate the Leninist Sabotage Weapon, or more precisely we need to escape the clutches of its secret police.
(i.e. plaintiff lawyers, social workers, public schools.)
Since both political "parties" are solidly Leninist (as you [Rod] brilliantly pointed
out in your discussion of Rush's CPAC speech) the answer must be either a third party determined to repeal bad laws, or secession. ¶ 7:49 AM
I wrote this comment on Dreher's blog, and want to preserve it here for my own reference if nothing else:
= = = = =
Deneen is, as always, deep and unique. But there's a timeline problem in his accusation of free-riding against the localists. He says we are taking advantage of all the goodies (mobility, communication, occupational choice) provided by modernity, while trying to escape from deracination. He has conflated two different "packages".
Occupational choice has been an American feature from the start. Mobility and communication came in 1860 with the telegraph and railroad. But local institutions and Tocqueville's "mediators" were still perfectly strong and vibrant in 1950. It wasn't mobility and communication that killed the lodge and the church. It was a Leninist Sabotage Weapon called "The Supreme Court" that killed the lodge and the church.
If we want to restore localism, we don't need to eliminate the telegraph, the railroad and the internet. We do need to eliminate the Leninist Sabotage Weapon, or more precisely we need to escape the clutches of its secret police.
(i.e. plaintiff lawyers, social workers, public schools.)
Since both political "parties" are solidly Leninist (as you [Rod] brilliantly pointed
out in your discussion of Rush's CPAC speech) the answer must be either a third party determined to repeal bad laws, or secession. ¶ 7:49 AM
