I have to write an essay for Intro to Political Theory about the conflict with the Republican and Liberal arguments of public good(or as I see it, Moral Conformity) and Personal Liberty, respectively. Just so you know, I mean classic Republican and Liberal. Not their definition as they are known today(though there are still some similiarities). I would appreciate it if anyone knowledgable on this issue would read my more than 4 page essay(double spaced) and give me feed back. thank you.
note: I apologize for the poorly looking formatting. Massassi doesn't have much in that respect. Trust me, it looks better in Word.
note: I apologize for the poorly looking formatting. Massassi doesn't have much in that respect. Trust me, it looks better in Word.
Quote:
Moral Conformity or Individual Rights?
The argument between what is best for a nation, pursuing public good over personal freedom or vice versa, is a question that have been debated for centuries. I side mostly with classic liberals, especially John Stuart Mill, on this issue. The entire point of democracy is to provide liberty and freedom, and to take those things away which aren’t harmful to society is taking a step back in the line of progression. It is through this personal freedom that public good can be attained.
Republicanism and liberalism are different paralalls going in the same direction. Both idelogues want a prosperous society, but they go about it in different ways. Republicanism states that in order for a society to be a prosperous society, certain ethics must be followed. Liberalists are of the thought that personal liberty will make a truly free, and consequentally progressive, society. Both of these ideaologies have glaring weaknesses.
Republicans are of the opinion that public good is the ultimate goal. But what price should be paid for that ultimate goal, which in my opinion, is impossible to attain? How willing should people be to give up some of their freedom so that a near public good can be achieved? Freedoms should not be infringed upon just to make other people content that things are running the way they think they are supposed to. Now, obviously, there are some exceptions to this. If a nation were to be invaded, it is certainly right for a government to conscript it’s citizens to fight on the battlefield because everybody’s rights are in danger. This is a self-interest argument on a grander scale, which I shall go more in depth later. The same argument can be applied on outlawing mala in se(offense in itself) crimes such as homicide but it is on a smaller scale. Speaking of laws, one republican argument is that good laws make good people. Liberalists have debunked this argument because it is a catch twenty-two. The only way it can work, it has been argued, if for a virtuous “legislator” to create the laws that everyone has to follow. However, naturally virtuous men are few and far between, so waiting on one would be a waste of time. One thing I will about republicanism that I think could work is majority rule, but only in special circumstances. In a mostly homogenous society with little protection of basic rights, majority rule could be disasterous. It would just be the same people ruling because they all had the same values. However, in a heterogenous society with protection on basic rights, majority rule can be effective. If a society is heterogenous, that means that no one group is in the majority all the time because off all the tiny factions have to ally themselves with different factions on different issues. A prime example of this would be America. Now that I’ve addressed a few things I don’t like about republicanism, lets move on to some things I don’t like about liberalism.
The problem with most liberalists is that they are hopeless romantics. They see freedom and personal rights as something as naturally belonging to a person as if it were a heart or liver. But rights are not God-given, as Jefferson and Locke have said, but must be earned. Whither it is through spilling your blood on the battlefield or having the luck of being born in a place of liberal thought, is irrelevant. Both of those scenarios lead to the same consequences, which is all that matters. Now that I have defined what I do not like about the idealogue I subscribe to, I’ll explain what I do like and what I do support.
The whole idea of self-interest and other-interest I find valuable. The basic of it is that any action that is self-interested is no business of the government’s or any other people so it should not be infringed upon. Now, there are obvious examples I could use like someone who enjoys picking their nose until it bleeds or banging their head against the wall. Either one isn’t healthy, but it only regards the self. It is within a person’s right to hurt themselves like such if they wish and I don’t feel like playing nanny to everyone anyway. If they don’t have the common sense not to hurt themselves, then Darwin is just doing his job. However, things are very rarely so cut and dry. What about hard drugs? Hard drugs only hurt the self after all. If a person wants to get a high and can deal with the side effects of slowed reaction time, lowering of mental thinking capacities, or the complete twisting of sense and perception, what is wrong with that? It’s his choice to jack himself up, hence self-interest. But is it always a case of self-interest? What if the high person is driving a car or becomes paranoid and goes for the loaded revolver he has in the closet, intent on silencing those that, he thinks at the time, are talking behind his back? What if the extreme fear of cops in someone getting high off crack makes him do stupid and dangerous things to avoid them? Obviously, when other people’s freedom comes into the equation and is threatened, the issue becomes other-interested. Now, we could say that while your high you can’t drive a car, have to stay in your house, and you can’t get high at all if you have a family to support or some such. But how would we enforce that? That is a nearly impossible task to enforce. So, as it has been said before by other liberalists, all the variables have to be taken into account to determine if something to going to affect just the person doing it, or more than just the single person. You can’t take an issue at face value.
Now, I wish to come up with my own theory that I have developed, which is not to say I haven’t been influenced, because I have been. I also doubt I’m the first to say these things, but I have yet to see this theory stated. Whither that is the fault of circumstance or a failure of comprehension on my part will be determined. British law came up with a system in the court called an “adversarial system” which is implemented in many countries, including America. Basically this system relies on two opponents, the prosecutor and defendant, taking the biases of the facts they have and ramming them together and that through this process of hearing two different conflicting stories that fact and truth will be found. American economics work in a similar way. If you have two or more competing companies, they will continually try to make the best and most affordable product to get more money and in the end the consumer will benefit from this competition. This is something Adam Smith has illustrated. What I propose is we take this adversarial and capitalist system and apply it to freedoms. Allow all primarily self-interested freedoms to be exercised. Eventually, the damaging and harmful ones are going to be weeded out because no sane person would want to harm themselves and the people who do the harmful things will damage themselves to the point of extinction or near extinction. Heartless and unempathic, yes. But in the end, it would better society as whole. All the good acts would remain in society because they have good consequences. Now, this degeneration of bad acts wouldn’t happen over night. It would probably take decades but in the end it would be worth it.
Public good is something everybody wants, but not everybody is using the same map. That is why it is valuable to keep your mind open and look for the shortest route to the destination, whither it was on your map or someone elses. I think the liberal idealogue implements this principle the best.
Moral Conformity or Individual Rights?
The argument between what is best for a nation, pursuing public good over personal freedom or vice versa, is a question that have been debated for centuries. I side mostly with classic liberals, especially John Stuart Mill, on this issue. The entire point of democracy is to provide liberty and freedom, and to take those things away which aren’t harmful to society is taking a step back in the line of progression. It is through this personal freedom that public good can be attained.
Republicanism and liberalism are different paralalls going in the same direction. Both idelogues want a prosperous society, but they go about it in different ways. Republicanism states that in order for a society to be a prosperous society, certain ethics must be followed. Liberalists are of the thought that personal liberty will make a truly free, and consequentally progressive, society. Both of these ideaologies have glaring weaknesses.
Republicans are of the opinion that public good is the ultimate goal. But what price should be paid for that ultimate goal, which in my opinion, is impossible to attain? How willing should people be to give up some of their freedom so that a near public good can be achieved? Freedoms should not be infringed upon just to make other people content that things are running the way they think they are supposed to. Now, obviously, there are some exceptions to this. If a nation were to be invaded, it is certainly right for a government to conscript it’s citizens to fight on the battlefield because everybody’s rights are in danger. This is a self-interest argument on a grander scale, which I shall go more in depth later. The same argument can be applied on outlawing mala in se(offense in itself) crimes such as homicide but it is on a smaller scale. Speaking of laws, one republican argument is that good laws make good people. Liberalists have debunked this argument because it is a catch twenty-two. The only way it can work, it has been argued, if for a virtuous “legislator” to create the laws that everyone has to follow. However, naturally virtuous men are few and far between, so waiting on one would be a waste of time. One thing I will about republicanism that I think could work is majority rule, but only in special circumstances. In a mostly homogenous society with little protection of basic rights, majority rule could be disasterous. It would just be the same people ruling because they all had the same values. However, in a heterogenous society with protection on basic rights, majority rule can be effective. If a society is heterogenous, that means that no one group is in the majority all the time because off all the tiny factions have to ally themselves with different factions on different issues. A prime example of this would be America. Now that I’ve addressed a few things I don’t like about republicanism, lets move on to some things I don’t like about liberalism.
The problem with most liberalists is that they are hopeless romantics. They see freedom and personal rights as something as naturally belonging to a person as if it were a heart or liver. But rights are not God-given, as Jefferson and Locke have said, but must be earned. Whither it is through spilling your blood on the battlefield or having the luck of being born in a place of liberal thought, is irrelevant. Both of those scenarios lead to the same consequences, which is all that matters. Now that I have defined what I do not like about the idealogue I subscribe to, I’ll explain what I do like and what I do support.
The whole idea of self-interest and other-interest I find valuable. The basic of it is that any action that is self-interested is no business of the government’s or any other people so it should not be infringed upon. Now, there are obvious examples I could use like someone who enjoys picking their nose until it bleeds or banging their head against the wall. Either one isn’t healthy, but it only regards the self. It is within a person’s right to hurt themselves like such if they wish and I don’t feel like playing nanny to everyone anyway. If they don’t have the common sense not to hurt themselves, then Darwin is just doing his job. However, things are very rarely so cut and dry. What about hard drugs? Hard drugs only hurt the self after all. If a person wants to get a high and can deal with the side effects of slowed reaction time, lowering of mental thinking capacities, or the complete twisting of sense and perception, what is wrong with that? It’s his choice to jack himself up, hence self-interest. But is it always a case of self-interest? What if the high person is driving a car or becomes paranoid and goes for the loaded revolver he has in the closet, intent on silencing those that, he thinks at the time, are talking behind his back? What if the extreme fear of cops in someone getting high off crack makes him do stupid and dangerous things to avoid them? Obviously, when other people’s freedom comes into the equation and is threatened, the issue becomes other-interested. Now, we could say that while your high you can’t drive a car, have to stay in your house, and you can’t get high at all if you have a family to support or some such. But how would we enforce that? That is a nearly impossible task to enforce. So, as it has been said before by other liberalists, all the variables have to be taken into account to determine if something to going to affect just the person doing it, or more than just the single person. You can’t take an issue at face value.
Now, I wish to come up with my own theory that I have developed, which is not to say I haven’t been influenced, because I have been. I also doubt I’m the first to say these things, but I have yet to see this theory stated. Whither that is the fault of circumstance or a failure of comprehension on my part will be determined. British law came up with a system in the court called an “adversarial system” which is implemented in many countries, including America. Basically this system relies on two opponents, the prosecutor and defendant, taking the biases of the facts they have and ramming them together and that through this process of hearing two different conflicting stories that fact and truth will be found. American economics work in a similar way. If you have two or more competing companies, they will continually try to make the best and most affordable product to get more money and in the end the consumer will benefit from this competition. This is something Adam Smith has illustrated. What I propose is we take this adversarial and capitalist system and apply it to freedoms. Allow all primarily self-interested freedoms to be exercised. Eventually, the damaging and harmful ones are going to be weeded out because no sane person would want to harm themselves and the people who do the harmful things will damage themselves to the point of extinction or near extinction. Heartless and unempathic, yes. But in the end, it would better society as whole. All the good acts would remain in society because they have good consequences. Now, this degeneration of bad acts wouldn’t happen over night. It would probably take decades but in the end it would be worth it.
Public good is something everybody wants, but not everybody is using the same map. That is why it is valuable to keep your mind open and look for the shortest route to the destination, whither it was on your map or someone elses. I think the liberal idealogue implements this principle the best.
Democracy: rule by the stupid
![[http://img40.exs.cx/img40/6583/irony.jpg]](http://img40.exs.cx/img40/6583/irony.jpg "http://img40.exs.cx/img40/6583/irony.jpg")
