First things first.
I admire and adore Nevi. Not only does she speak better Yiddish than I do — she is one of the strongest, smartest, bravest, funniest and awesomest women I’ve ever met. (She’s also one of the most entrenched proponents of the catriarchy, but hey, everybody needs a hobby.)
I kid, of course. But there’s almost no one better at calling me on my privilege; as a straight white guy (OK, not strictly — I’m Jewish, but I’ve been passing), there are obstacles I simply never have to face. As someone recently put it, it’s like playing the life game with the difficulty on the lowest setting. And it’s because of what I’ve learned from her that I’ve become more aware of things like sexism, racism, homophobia, gender bias, classism, inequality, barriers to getting out of poverty, and other cultural, social and institutional dysfunctions. Moreover, it’s thanks to friends like her that I’m more inclined to defer to people of colour, women, LGBT people, and other traditionally marginalized citizens when it comes to those questions. It’s not rocket surgery, really. I don’t experience them the same way (or even at all, for the most part), so I don’t get to tell them what is or isn’t racism or sexism or whatever. It’s a long journey, and god knows I backslide sometimes, but I’m lucky to have her as an interlocutor, and greatly honoured to be considered an ally (to the extent that I am).
So let’s talk about conservatism. Those of you bored enough to read my wankery may know of my wish to reclaim and rescue it. Even if I don’t identify as a conservative, that doesn’t mean I can’t acknowledge genuine, principled conservatism as an honourable and established intellectual tradition from which we can learn much of value.
Allied to that is a consistent focus (obsession, more like — ed.) on the meanings of words. Words are the basis for civil discourse, which is, in turn, the most basic currency of citizenship and civic engagement. They are the means whereby we define ourselves, that which we value, and communicate with one another. Essential to that is a common agreement upon their meaning; if we cannot agree upon the definitions of the words we are using, we cannot communicate rationally and effectively. Hence my obsession; one of the most important hallmarks of integrity and good citizenship is vigilance regarding the meanings of the words we use.
@sol_chrom @HeerJeet Please ignore Sol, he has a bizarre sexual fetish for the word "conservatism".
— Neville Park (@neville_park) March 14, 2013
@sol_chrom @HeerJeet Sol, you know I love you, but stop it.
— Neville Park (@neville_park) March 14, 2013
This is part of the background for our disagreement. It’s because of this that I insist on distinguishing genuine conservatism from the contemporary right, which has enjoyed a great deal of political success by stripping words of their meanings and repurposing them for its own nefarious ends. It’s why it’s so important to insist on safeguarding definitions. It’s not just a matter of controlling connotations and the greater discursive turf; there’s a strategic imperative as well. If we allow our adversaries to define the terms of the discussion, we’ve lost before we even begin.
@sol_chrom @KristinEff @junctionette Never in history has "conservatism" meant what you want it to mean
— Neville Park (@neville_park) March 21, 2013
And this is the heart of my disagreement with Nevi (whom I nevertheless adore). In fact, I would actually agree with her to a certain extent, but I’d amend her argument thusly: conservatism has never meant solely what I want it to mean. Admittedly, by opening myself up to accusations of picking and choosing only parts of a term’s definition, I may be stumbling backwards into a rhetorical or logical trap of my own making, so let me set out some fundamentals.
At its heart, conservatism, as I understand it, means identifying and working to preserve those parts of our history and tradition that are worthwhile and decent and honourable. It carries elements of generosity, civic engagement, commitment to our communities and our neighbours, and above all, a recognition of our obligations to our fellow citizens. In sum, it’s tied in with the acceptance of something greater than atomized individuals sinking or swimming in some mythical “free market.”
Applied to current circumstances: Canada has a generous and extensive system of public services and social-safety net: not just community safety services like fire and police, or public infrastructure like roads, hydro and water, but also health care, social assistance, employment insurance, the right to unionize, and more. I’d argue that those are integral, in fact, to the Canadian character and to the notion of citizenship itself. Is the system perfect? Does it extend far enough? No, of course not. Does it mean it’s not organically infused with elements of race, class, gender, privilege, and even myth? No, of course not. These are, however, things that have been built up over generations by Canadians who struggled and fought and sometimes died for them. And they need to be preserved, cultivated, and protected from those who would tear them down for ideological or financial reasons. That, I’d submit, is very much consistent with the conservative tradition.
Moreover, I don’t believe I’m alone in that. I’m not talking merely about upper-case Party Labels here, so much as the Red Tory tradition. There are plenty of decent and honourable people in Canadian political life who have carried the conservative label. Were they perfect? No, and I don’t believe that anyone’s arguing that they were. But it’s important to distinguish them from the people currently calling themselves Conservatives. It’s part of my ongoing project to rescue and reclaim conservatism, by making reference to its elemental impulses of generosity, community spirit, and respect for what the people who preceded us worked to build. You don’t get to waltz in and attack the fabric of society and foundations of community with meat cleavers, blowtorches, and sledgehammers, and call yourselves “conservatives.”
Now, does that mean that conservatism hasn’t arisen from systems of privilege and repression? Does it mean that conservatism hasn’t always been, in part, about preserving those privileges, along with their overarching elements of race, class, gender and so on? No, of course not, and I’m not arguing otherwise; I have to approach this honestly and acknowledge that those who point this out are absolutely right.
But does it mean, by the same token, that those things are always and eternally integral to conservatism? I don’t believe that it does. It’s kind of like The Force that way; it can have its Good Side and its Dark Side. But in my naivete, I like to think that people, institutions, and intellectual traditions can grow, develop, and transcend their origins. In that sense, conservatism isn’t incompatible with being progressive, or feminist, or even socialist.
Come at me, internetz.
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As a word nerd myself, I agree wholeheartedly that the naming of things is all-important. George Orwell captured so brilliantly what happens when we reduce vocabulary and use 180 degree euphemisms (such as the ‘Ministry of Love’). The challenge to us all, then, is to come up with a name or term to describe the current political nasties who have coopted the word ‘conservative’ even as they wield their meat cleavers, blowtorches and sledgehammers. Nev started with ‘arse-pimples’, which is commendable but possibly not for everyday conversation.
Actually, “arse-pimples” was mine, but I agree with you.
CITE, PLZ
name names
you mention social services, unions, etc. ok great. name the conservatives who have E V E R supported social services, unions, public infrastructure, the needs of the public over corporations, etc. let’s look at why unions and labour are so vilified today. maybe it has to do with reagan who afaik was a conservative. or thatcher who oh my god also a conservative. jfc sol i love you but get your head out of your ass and take up model trains or something ok
Bill Davis. Stopped the Spadina Expressway, thus preserving established neighbourhoods from the wrecking ball. Ontario Place: a commitment to public space and public infrastructure.
David Crombie. 45-foot height bylaw, thus preserving a sense of proportion, neighbourhood preservation, and limiting strain on infrastructure in the face of private pressures to build higher and higher.
Those are just off the top of my head.
I agree with you, absolutely, about the current attacks on unions and the public sphere, and about the historical context for those attacks. I just don’t think those people should get to call themselves conservatives. Genuine, principled conservatives believe, as I do, in building, protecting, and preserving, not in tearing things apart for the sake of tearing things apart. And when I talk about the things that I’m committed to protecting, I’m including a social-safety net, labour-friendly legislation, and other playing-field-levelling measures that took decades to establish. You can argue about the extent to which those things actually level the playing field, or the extent to which the people I name were friends of organized labour or the disadvantaged, and I probably wouldn’t disagree with you on that either, but I simply wouldn’t put them in the same room as the people currently calling themselves Conservatives.
Either you believe in an inclusive vision of society, community, and citizenship, or you don’t. Again, this is my naivete speaking, but I believe that for all their faults, Red Tories do. This bunch does not. And it’s for that reason that I don’t think they should get a free pass in appropriating the mantle of conservatism.
ziskayt. if reagan, thatcher, harper, your typical CPAC attendee, etc., don’t count as conservatives, your model is broken. enough of this “no true scotsman” nonsense. like, i can say, “if you’re racist you’re not really a feminist,” but that would rule out so many prominent feminists, from “founding mothers” of the first wave to a really shocking number still doing their thing today, that it’s essentially meaningless. i have to accept and DEAL WITH the fact that racism, along with many other things, is a part of feminism. the same with, say, militant right-wing zionism and judaism. and i will argue that white supremacy, free-market capitalism, etc., are as deeply ingrained in conservatism as zionism is in judaism.
if you’ve got to add this long disclaimer explaining what you REALLY mean by conservative every time you use that political label, and you don’t want to sit at the conservative lunch table, maybe conservatism isn’t really worth identifying with. that’s the point i reached with feminism, anyway.
Thatcher and Reagan were not conservatives. They may have been Conservatives but their policies and world views were anything but conservative. They were free-market, monetarist evangelical fundamentalists and had all the zeal that accompanied that position. It was with the advent of Maggie and Ronnie that the Conservatives ceased any pretense at being conservative and basically became the political wing of the globalised economy and the corporations. Heck they even stopped actually caring about their electorate and actively sought to disenfranchise anyone who opposed them and as such were/are barely democratic in nature.
The issue is the conflation of Conservative and conservative and a lazy willingness to accept stuff people say uncritically. The Conservatives have for years been trying to conflate fascism with socialism, because there was socialism in the name in the same lazy brain dead manner. Actions are what determines position and the Conservatives are a radical bunch of simplistic puppets who would sell out their country at the drop of a hat all the while wrapping themselves in the flag. The real defining statement for me is that conservatives will go and fight to preserve (conserve) our freedoms and way of life; Conservatives will happily send everyone else off to fight while doing the enemy’s work for them, by reducing our freedoms and destroying our way of life. Conservatives are unprincipled cowards while conservatives are principled people who walk the walk.
But ketseleh. If racism is part of feminism, as you argue, wouldn’t you, as a feminist, want to rescue feminism from racism? Just because it’s got racism ingrained in it, does that mean it can’t evolve and, one hopes, transcend its racist elements? Through dialogue, action, and patient conversation, can we not eventually filter out the bad stuff and keep the good?
I’m not saying it’s a quick or easy process. It’s a long, wrenching, and arduous thing, but that’s what we do when we’re committed to things we believe to be worthwhile. And one of the reasons I love you is because you’ve got the energy and intelligence to do that.
We all make our own decisions about whether it’s worth staying and fighting, I guess. But at this point I think, well, calling myself “feminist” would simply give people the wrong impression because I’ve diverged so far from the mainstream feminist movement (primarily helmed/represented by white straight cis middle class women at non-profits/think tanks). And I primarily want to work and make community with the people whose backs those women walked over to get to where they are, and for whom “feminist” is an immediate red flag.
So I suppose the question is, who do you want to appeal to by calling yourself a conservative? Conservatives, or the people conservatives have very materially oppressed—with everything from legislation to lynch mobs—for decades?
Edit—pursuant to my last comment—I don’t want to “rescue feminism from racism”. I do not think that there is a feminism independent of the people who practice it, we must judge a tree by its fruits, etc.—and we are grown-ups here and it is up to each of us to examine how we are complicit in white supremacy. I am not interested in helping anyone be less racist. I would rather work with people who are already not racist.
Above you take Sol to task for his supposed naivete over his view on the word “conservative,” Your naivete is displayed in your last two sentences here.
“I am not interested in helping anyone be less racist. I would rather work with people who are already not racist.”
How can you in all reality to believe that is even remotely possible if you want things to change?
Unless you are happy with the status quo, surely dialogue with those who are racist is the only way of changing the situation one person at a time if necessary? Otherwise all you have is an self-righteous, echo chamber smugly satisfied that they are enlightened, but willing to let the oppressed continue to be oppressed because confronting the oppressors is beneath them.
I know Nevi’s perfectly capable of speaking for herself, but naive, smug, and satisfied are some of the last terms I’d use to characterize her.
I’ll cop to the naive but not to the others, they described a situation that could evolve and were not directed at anyone other than to describe a kind of unhelpful and unproductive end result.
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Apparently, I’ve hit upon your writings all in one fell swoop, so I apologize for responding so often. I have no background in philosophy or debate, so bear with me trying to work through your writing and your points.
I note your concern about the meanings of words, but I keep running up against what I see in dictionary references, and your interpretation of various words in your posts.
In this case, conservatism: You said that it means…preserve those parts of our history and tradition (agreed)…
But I’m not sure where I’ve been able to find that it means that those ‘parts are worthwhile and decent and honourable…elements of generosity, civic engagement, commitment to our communities and our neighbours…obligations to our fellow citizens.’…at least in the present dictionaries I’ve been able to access.
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