Thread by @jholbo1

No force on earth can induce philosophical Burkeans to be Burkeans about philosophy itself. They have to fly off the handle about philosophical threats. For one touch of common sense and the gig is up. 1/

This paradox, back to Burke, is a steady feature of the rhetoric of reaction & we see it today in all the 'Woke' and CRT panic. Leftist, 'progressive' philosophy must be depicted luridly as implacably efficient, causally, yet inhuman, despite the unlikelihood this is true. 2/

James Lindsay is not getting any saner. But he really isn't SO much wilder than old Edmund Burke, back in the day. There is a conspicuous lack of interest in discerning likely motives on the other side. 3/

Burke had the excuse that the Terror was unfolding across the water. Still, his account of the origins of the French Revolution - i.e. it was largely born of an eerie, icy, alien metaphysical impulse to torture for torture's sake - has difficulty passing the giggle test. 4/

Today all the indictments of Wokeness and CRT have the same basic defect. 'It is all a 100-year long plot by Theodor Adorno to destroy Western Civilization just because' doesn't cut it. For: is this at all likely to be true? 5/

To paraphrase a famous philosopher, these critics of Woke have gotten so twisted up, worrying about whether anyone should destroy Western Civilization, that they fail to consider whether the likes of Adorno would - or could. 6/

To put it another way: the whole business neglects an obvious corollary of Chesterton's fence. Namely, suppose that a regular feature of modern life is that people keep regularly trying to knock down certain fences. 7/

More la-de-da modern flighty types - Burke and his conservative descendants, including Chesterton - will respond by saying they don't see the point of knocking down so many fences. Let us just keep them all up! 8/

Whereas more practical-minded, sober thinkers - progressives - will rightly reply: 'if you don't see why someone might want to knock these fences down, then I certainly won't let you just keep them up. 9/

Go away, and, after you have given it some thought, and can tell me why one might want to knock the fences down, then we shall see whether perhaps, after all, we may keep some of them up. But until you can do that, all this blitheness is premature.' 10/

And this conservative lesson applies, full force, to 'conservative' critiques of Wokeness and CRT. Until you can see why someone might think 'Woke' has a point, and it's good, there's not much point in denouncing it as just a threat. That's so unlikely, in a human sense! 11/

But am I now just doing the same thing: lampooning the opposition as mooncalves, rather than addressing their anti-Woke worries? I don't think so. Because, in all seriousness, I don't think they are fools. I'm kidding! I think they are sophistically shrewd. 12/

If the Woke have half a point, but you don't like it, because it's a threat to your privilege, obviously you have a strong motive to try to tar them with as broad a brush as possible. This is a very likely motive. People are loss-averse and have status quo bias. 13/

Note that there is no similar, plausible motive on the other side. Why do leftists keep fighting for 'social justice' if it's so obvious everything they ask for is vicious & hateful & destructive to all that is fair & beautiful? You could say: they are resentful. 14/

But: is it likely that one half of the political sphere is moved primarily by baseless resentment (because we have to factor out any legit justice claims that might be inducing anger)? Baseless resentment just is not all that basic a mainspring of human attitudes & action. 15/

So: if your theory of the left is that they are a few alien metaphysicians - like H.G. Wells' Martians: "intellects vast, cool and unsympathetic" - heading a vicious mass of people who are, it seems, just bile ducts with feet, then you lack a plausible political psychology. 16/

By contrast, the leftist view of the right - they are mostly confabulating in defense of privilege - is more 'based', as the kids say. 17/

In response to reasonable corrections by @delong I should soften 'defense of privilege' to 'status quo bias' and 'reflexive moral defensiveness in the face of criticism'. These are all plausible motives, whereas constant, free-floating resentment at nothing is less so. 18/