I’ve been doing the deconstruction of Levin’s Liberty and Tyranny for about a month now, including the background materials. That is enough time to gauge interest from readers to my blog. It appears that my best “blogging strategy” would be to limit such posts to once a week. Using my current method that would be an interminably long time that I do not want to spend on the topic, mainly for a reason I will allude to now.
My tenth misinformation principle, and to me the most important, is that vanity, cynicism and apprehension are the tools to sell us misinformation that we would not believe if we focused our attention on communal experiences. Together, these states of mind lend to an urgency in supporting the cause behind the misinformation. All the other misinformation stuff I can handle with a dispassionate, analytical eye. I even enjoy the deconstruction somewhat.
When I detect someone appealing to my vanities, cynicism and/or apprehensions I get disgusted. I feel like someone is trying to drag me through a cesspool, the overall feeling I got from reading Levin’s first chapter.
Levin sets up as his foil the Statist, a term he invents to represent the Modern Liberal. He can’t use the word “liberal,” of course, as that would lead to confusion in a work about “liberty.” His dogmatic representation of the Statist is one thing. Unlike his description of Conservatives, there appears to be only one variety of Statist in Levin’s view, which of course means there is only one variety of the Modern Liberal.
The bigger problem than the dogmatism is how he caricatures the Statist. Did you know that all Modern Liberals–excuse me, Statists–hate the individual? I could go on and on with the disparaging characterizations, but I would have to reread his caricatures for further verification/accuracy and get disgusted all over again. Levin paints a picture of a person that does not exist, let alone the entire membership of a changing ideology. Yet the most depressing thing is that many folks will run with this description and attach some urgency to countering the movement, no the mere existence, of these nefarious, misanthropic bogeymen.
Let’s take a deep breath and think about this calmly. Corporations would not support any Statist as described by Levin, thus there would be insufficient wealth support for Statists to remain in office. The public would not support any individual-hating Statist as described by Levin, which presents a wonderful conundrum. To be in office Statists would have to be pulling the wool over our eyes at a massive scale. Granted, you may think the public is a little gullible, I certainly do, but such gullibility would have to extend to the corporate world as well. It’s much more likely that Levin’s characterization of the Modern Liberal–er, Statist–is jingoistic fearmongering.
Historically, the Conservative has a dim view of the natural human condition, which is why they support paternal institutions such as centralized government and corporations. This was reversed somewhat in the Twentieth Century, with Conservatives pledging allegiance at times to states rights (my father was this type of Conservative), but since the seventies this reversal has halted. Throughout Liberty and Tyranny there is evidence that Levin supports federal authority over state or local authority, and certainly plenty of evidence, some already deconstructed and uncovered, that Levin supports a corporate economy. Those are symptoms of a person who does not trust what humans can do independently of paternal institutions. His fearmongering is a misinformation tactic to turn his own shortcomings in regards to Liberty into strengths.
My continued deconstruction of Liberty and Tyranny will be put on the fast track. Picking out dogma here and distortions there can be fun, but wading through sludge can weigh a person down. I believe, and hope, you will be just as glad as I will be that this deconstruction gets abbreviated.
Here is previous background material.
An overview of misinformation principles
A basic understanding of free markets
