Late last winter and into the spring this weblog was dominated by discussion of Rod Dreher’s book Crunchy Cons. This was only natural: not only did the book discuss many things dear to Caelum et Terra readers, but it also quoted our own Maclin Horton at length, and he spoke well indeed.
If you recall, I had to wait a while for the book to come in on interlibrary loan, and in the meantime I investigated this Rod Dreher fellow, whose name was new to me.
I was not impressed.
A former employee of National Review, I found his writings to be pretty standard expressions of Republican orthodoxy, more of the usual polemics.
So I was skeptical.
But also hopeful: from what I was hearing of his book it sounded like he was a man in transition, questioning many of his conventional conservative presuppositions.
So when the book came in I read it with a mixture of suspicion and hope.
And annoyance, beginning with the title. If someone has the luxury of self-designation, why on earth would he choose such and infelicitous term as “crunchy con”? To do so is to beg for wisecracks and bad puns.
The book has many shortcomings, not least the “gee whiz” tone; Mr. Dreher fancies that he is the discoverer and proclaimer of a new phenomenon, a synthesis of conservative ideology and earth-friendly, granola-crunching aesthetic wholeness.
Then there is his caution, his tenacious insistance that he is a conservative no matter what. He may strain at the leash but he dare not break free.
I am not, as I have said, a conservative. But I have many conservative friends, Catholic and otherwise, who live earthy, look funky, grow their own vegetables, make soap, throw clay pots and otherwise defy the buttoned-down, wingtip right wing stereotype. And have done so for decades.
Indeed, I would guess that a plurality at least of C&T subscribers fit this description, and endured the magazine’s occasional forays into more radical territories in light of a shared lived praxis.
So there was not much new in Mr. Dreher’s discovery, except to him.
Still, as I said at the time, there was more good than bad in the book. I even said, in a bit of hyperbolic praise, that Crunchy Cons was perhaps a signpost on the road to a new populism, or something like that. I said this as a sort of olive branch, as it prefaced an unflattering comparison of Mr.Dreher’s book with Bill Kauffman’s, and I realized after I wrote it that it was one of
the dumber things I have ever written: whatever its merits, Crunchy Cons appeals to instincts that are anything but populist. Listen to this, the first of the ten statements in the book’s “Crunchy Con Manifesto”:
1) We are conservatives who stand outside the mainstream; therefore we can see things more clearly.
Huh? Elitist in sentiment, the claim is utter nonsense. The Aryan Nation volk are outside the conservative mainstream; do they therefore see things more clearly?
And so my mixed feelings about Mr. Dreher and his project endured, until a couple of weeks ago, when I ventured onto his Crunchy Con blog at Beliefnet.
There had been a Crunchy Con blog at National Review Online after the book’s publication, which discussed and argued its thesis. After conventional and crunchy cons had beat each other silly that site was retired and Dreher launched his independent blog.
This site does not limit itself to discussing the book, but in more typical blogger fashion discusses all and everything.
I wonder how these people find the time to do this. Don’t they have jobs? Families? Dogs to walk?
And Rod Dreher the blogger reveals more of himself than Rod Dreher the author ever did.
There is a lot of typical Republican carping, in spite of the occasional wistful nod to the need for a politics that transcends the Right/Left dichotomy.
I am not too hard on him for this; it takes time to overcome longstanding bad habits, after all. I always said that Rod Dreher seemed like someone on the first steps of a journey on the way to he knows not where. And who among us consistently conforms to his higher aspirations?
However, it is when his attention turns to foreign affairs, especially in light of the recent conflict in Lebanon, that my annoyance turned to alarm.
To Dreher, the situation is stark: Israel is good, Muslims are evil.
In his manichean world there is no mention of Israel’s abysmal human rights record, no acknowledgement of the suffering of the Palestinians, no nod to the idea that the thing is other than high melodrama. All nuance is lost, and in Dreher’s words, “the terrorist fanatics of Hezbollah launched a war that is destroying Lebanon.”
To give some feel for his tendency to demonize Muslims, I note a recent post entitled “How do you say ‘Sieg Heil’ in Arabic?”
This post was a reaction to a photo in Time magazine last week that showed a group of young Hezbollah recruits extending their hands in an open-palmed salute.
Now when I saw this photo my first reaction was “Geez; that looks like the Nazi salute.” Unlike Dreher, who took that initial reaction and created an inflammatory post, I had a second thought:”Wait a minute; I really don’t have enough knowledge to draw any conclusion”. Perhaps the young Arabs in the photo did mean to emulate a fascist salute- itself an adaptation of the Imperial Roman salute- or perhaps not. I rather doubt a Muslim would consider himself a Nazi,
with that ideology’s weird mix of pseudo-scientific racialism and Nordic myth. Perhaps the gesture had a different meaning within Shi’ia culture. I once saw a commentator, after all, who described a group of charismatic Christians, their arms outstretched in blessing, as offering a fascist salute!
Or take another example: if I saw a photo of a man holding up two fingers in a “V” shape how do I know if he is giving the Churchillian “victory” sign, the sixties “peace” sign, or merely indicating the number “two”? I don’t, if I don’t know the context.
I have googled “Hezbollah salute” and found a lot of people jumping to conclusions and precisely no one offering information about the actual intentions of the militants in the photo. In fact, it turns out that this is how Shi’a pray, just like penecostals raise their hands.
But no matter, it is grist for the mill, fuel for the fire.
But it gets worse.
While most of the debate over Israel’s recent attack on Lebanon revolves around the question of whether or not bombing cities and killing civilians by the hundreds- so far- is a disproportionate response to Hezbollah’s capturing and killing a few Israeli soldiers, Dreher will have none of that: “I see a disproportionate response from Israel as justifiable in principle.”
He links to an article by Washington Post writer Richard Cohen, which he captions “Proportionality is Madness”, where Cohen argues that the idea of proportionality should be scrapped, that total war is justified. (Cohen, who seems to me the epitome of the dumb ugly wing of the Left, might seem an unlikely presence on a conservative blog, crunchy or no, but then war makes
strange bedfellows.)
Dreher links, too, to Charles Krauthammer, who argues the same, justifying indiscriminate killing by invoking Hiroshima: “That’s what it took with Japan.”
And Dreher quotes neoconservative bigshot John Podhoretz at length on the lesson of the Second World War: “Didn’t the willingness of [American and British] leaders to inflict mass casualties on civilians indicate a cold-eyed singleness of purpose that helped break the will and back of their enemies?
“What if the tactical mistake we made in Iraq was that we didn’t kill enough Sunnis in the early going to intimidate them and make them so afraid of us they would go along with anything? Wasn’t the survival of Sunni men between 15 and 35 the reason there was an insurgency and the basic cause of sectarian violence now?”
Allow, for a moment, the ramifications of that last sentence to sink in.
God spare us from cold-eyed singleness of purpose.
And God spare us the sight of Jewish pundits constructing a rationale for genocide.
That Rod Dreher, who only recently, in article 7 of his “manifesto” stated “Beauty is more important than efficiency” now invokes the efficiency of indiscriminate slaughter, of total war, reveals the shallowness of his crunchy conversion.
That the guy who not so long ago invoked Dorothy Day and Wendall Berry and who writes for the antiwar American Conservative now beats the drums of war and death and oils the engine of Empire with such glee shows a density of soul that is stunning.
Mr. Dreher: you may eat your vegetables, wear funny shoes, and live in a bungalow, but if your critique of the mainstream you claim to eschew does not go beyond such superficialities you are part of the problem.
In one recent post you criticized the Holy See’s measured response to the crisis in the Middle East; in others, you, a Catholic, want to jettison the Just War principles, at a time when the Church is trying to tighten them. If such moral heresy is not a justification for terrorism and genocide I don’t know what
is. To espouse such a thing is what a Thomist would call formal participation in mortal sin.
You claim to have second thoughts about Iraq and regrets for your support of that War, but you are apparently no wiser; indeed you seem to have grown in folly.
I have long thought that “crunchy con” sounded like some sort of swindle, a scam. Now I know it: when it comes to moral principle and foreign policy a crunchy con is just a neocon in sandals.
—Daniel Nichols
I’m obliged to dissociate myself from this post. While I also take issue with some of what Rod Dreher has said about the current situation in Lebanon, I think this attack is much too indiscriminate and personal.
I have to admit to having become disillusioned myself. I have to agree with Daniel; there just doesn’t appear to be much there. Rather than being a movement or an awakening of an older philosophy, Crunchy Conservatism seems to be a self-justification of the author for who is. Rather than embracing an agrarian philosophy or a family-first philosophy, it just seems to be borrowed philosophy to meet a certain end.
I suppose I should have been a little more skeptical like Dan and F.R. Salazar.
Although I don’t think Daniel is being fair to Israel (their bombing is simply NOT indiscriminate, nor is it simply in response to the capture–Hezbollah continues to rain bombs upon Israeli civilians–Jewish and Palestinian), I do think he is right to be alarmed at the invocation of disproportionality as a principle of warfare. I mean, Hiroshima was immoral. And, yes, you do have to put truth, beauty and goodness above efficiency. I think Mr. Dreher is still infected by the Randian underpinnings of the neoconservative movement, which WOULD put efficiency at a higher premium than it ought to be.
Also, I’d like to see more evidence that Rod thinks MUSLIMS are the bad guys. Dan didn’t show any evidence at all except the Sieg Heil comment, which strikes me as ambiguous when you consider that the Islamists claim to be acting in the name of Islam–which would obviously want to use Arabic, whether the Islamist is himself an Arab.
Oh, and also, there really is a strong connection between many of the terrorists and the Nazis, this has been documented for the PLO and for Saddamthe Ba
athists. And, no, this is not a conspiracy theory.
Rather than embracing an agrarian philosophy or a family-first philosophy, it just seems to be borrowed philosophy to meet a certain end.
I agree. I thoroughly enjoyed the NRO blog, and the discussions that the contributors held. But now, yes, I’m disillusioned. I know his BeliefNet blog is not supposed to the NRO blog (and Dreher has said as much), but I wish he would talk more about the themes in Crunchy Cons rather than rail endlessly against Islam.
And much like Mr. Nichols, I found Kauffman’s book far more enjoyable.
I haven’t read Dreher’s book, but I lived under Israeli occupation for two years and Daniel’s comments about Israel are right on.
Robert-
Hezbollah began lobbing missles at Israel after Israel attacked Lebanon. This is not to defend indiscriminate attacks, but it is an important thing to remember.Also important: early reports said that the Israeli troops who had been captured were inside Lebanese territory. This was changed after Israel denied the reports.
And in what way is Israel being discriminate? The UN estimated one third of the dead are children, the civilian infrastructure is under attack, and the longterm effects on the Lebanese is going to be terrible.
My evidence for Mr. Dreher regarding Muslims as the “bad guys”, as you put it, lies in the fact that he regularly attacks “Muslims” and “Islam” without distinction.
The “strong connection” between Islamists and the Nazis has been exaggerated {I do not speak of the secularist Baathists). In the 1930s and 40s a lot of people who found themselves on the losing end of history cozied up to the Nazis, including Catholic anticommunists, Orthodox monarchists, Islamists, and (yes) Jewish Zionists. That should be seen as an act of political expediency, not necessarily of ideological sympathy.
Husseini, the Mullah of Jerusalem, who is usually cited by those attempting to portray Islamists as Nazi sympathizers, after the War was recruited by British intelligence as their liason to the Muslim Brotherhood, who they and the CIA armed and financed as a counterforce to Marxism and Middle Eastern nationalism. But we never hear about that, do we?
Is it not true (I may well be wrong) that Hezbollah keeps its armaments in civilian areas with the express purpose of increasing civilian body count and making its attackers look like beasts?
Jeremy, If there’s one thing I learned from living in the Middle East and having a brother and best friend there for over 30 years is that we cannot trust what the news media in this country is feeding us.
I agree that in the past few weeks the Crunchy Con blog seems to have become slightly hysterical in its attitude to Islam. I never quite know if this is a cultural difference – if an English conservative paper, like The Spectator, was in favour of a particular war, it would also carry items sceptical of that war, and jokes about the war, and so on – we are less rational or logical than Americans, and, one likes to think, for that reason less manichean :) So I’m never quite sure if what I see as ‘hysteria’ is just a normal American way of expressing oneself. English people tend to be deprecating or ironic even about things we believe in, and take the absence of such gestures as a sign of hysteria or monomania.
But I would defend the comment which Dan finds peculiarly offensive, viz,
“What if the tactical mistake we made in Iraq was that we didn’t kill enough Sunnis in the early going to intimidate them and make them so afraid of us they would go along with anything? Wasn’t the survival of Sunni men between 15 and 35 the reason there was an insurgency and the basic cause of sectarian violence now?”
I don’t think Dan is reading that remark in a charitable way. Dreher can see the Iraq war isn’t working, and he’s wondering why. To me, all Dreher is saying is that we either had to fight the war in such a way as to win resoundingly, or not invade the country at all. Dreher is thinking outloud, which I suppose is what a blog is for, and so he expresses himself in a violent and blunt way – ‘kill enough men between 15 and 30 to prevent a later insurgency’. It is a horrible way to put it, but he seems to me to be raising a valid question – did we try to have a war without the tragedy of war, and end up producing a worse tragedy?
Maclin,
Daniel’s post may be too personal, but that seems to be a matter of tone. The horror of what seems to be Dreher’s support for targeting civilians to accomplish war aims, however, excuses the tone, in my opinion. What if Dreher were defending abortion as justifiable when it leads to a desirable end? Would Daniel’s tone, then, be excessive and indiscriminate? Dreher is apparently denying the inviolability of innocent human life, saying the lives of some are expendable when it is a question of preserving other lives. Countries, in order to defend themselves in war, may kill even women and children. I find this monstrous.
I am certain that you, Maclin, find this monstrous, too. But, in general (and not directed at you), I think people make too many allowances this kind of brutality. Too many Catholics too blithely ho-hum indiscriminate warfare. We would rail, even froth at the mouth, against the abortionist wielding his scalpal — and rightly so — but we think it is merely “too bad” when we hear of civilian casualties resulting from our wars. Where is the outrage that greets abortion? But if this ambivalence is bad, and indeed it is very bad, what are we to say of those who, while calling themselves Catholic, bless the killing of the innocent for expedience’s sake?
Now, whether it means Dreher was insincere in his book, is another question…
I could put my paraphrase of Dreher in another way. In the context, he was asking whether the neo-con project of spreading the light of freedom and democracy in the Middle East was such a great idea. He was asking whether it’s possible to fight a war except as a war of conquest. This presupposes that he *is* concerned about the civilian casualities brought about by our failure conclusively to win the Iraq war.
Ethics goes off me like water off a duck’s back, and I’ve never grasped Just War theory.
I don’t understand what number of casualties would count as ‘proportionate.’ We read Augustine’s City of God in our postgrad seminar a couple of years ago, and I must have been asleep when we got to the bit about Just War, because Augustine is supposed to be the source of it, and I can’t remember a single thing he said. So I don’t know if it is true, as several conservative commentators seem to be saying, that ‘classical’ just war theory was about one army lined up against another, and doesn’t take into account a war fought in and amongst civilians, as a war against terrorists – they say – has to be. Does Just War theory state one must not hit any civilians or that any number of civilian deaths is disproportionate? I don’t know if it is true or not that Hezbollah *deliberately* domiciles itself amongst civilians in order to make it impossible to attack them without hitting civilians. I do find it extremely puzzling to understand what would be a “proportionate” response to Hezbollah, if they are domiciled amongst civilians (deliberately or not), and if killing any number of innocent civilians is automatically disproportionate. Or does Just War theory permit a certain number of civilian casualties, but not a very high number?
I’d take the guess that ‘proportionate’ probably means ‘sufficient to disable the enemy’, where ‘the enemy’ = armed combatants. That could mean nearly an entire army, if you are dealing with very well disciplined and determined fellows, like the Germans in the last war, and just a few of the guys in front if one is dealing with persons who have no inclination to fight on to the bitter end.
The questions clearly begin when ‘the enemy’ are situated amongst innocents in such a way that one can’t kill one without killing the other. This is clearly the bit which is causing Catholics to disagree with each other.
Francesca,
The just war doctrine is based on two basic principles — the right of a polis to defend itself against unjust aggression and the inviolability of innocent life. Taking the second principle, any act of war directed at killing non-combatants is always forbidden. If innocents die as an incidental effect of a justifiable use of force, then the one exercising force has not violated the prohibition to kill innocents. Such a case would be if, a soldier, intending to to shoot any enemy combatant, accidentally hit a non-combatant who ran across the line of fire.
The means used, however, in any given circumstance, must be proportionate to the end. If one wants to take out an enemy antiaircraft gun in a neighborhood, for instance, he must use means that are basically proportionate to destroying such a target and only that target. Whatever innocents suffer from such a strike would be considered incidental victims, since they are not directly targeted. If, however, one, in order to take out an anti-aircraft gun in a neighborhood, uses means that are proportionate to taking out the entire neighborhood, then the effect of the destroyed neighborhood is not incidental to the means used but is its proper effect. If anything, the destruction of the gun is incidental in this case, since the gun is being destroyed as part of a whole. The direct target is the neighborhood.
If innocent life is inviolable, then the means necessary to preserving that life are also inviolable. Thus it is immoral to destroy infrastructure necessary to supporting a civilian population. Even if the military benefits from that infrastructure incidentally, it is still essentially civilian and so off limits.
Whether the nature of warfare has changed or not, the principle of the inviolability of innocent human life has not changed. If the character of modern war renders it impossible for us to act proportionately in war without basically losing the war in the process, then we cannot justly wage war.
It’s important to note, too, that we’re not playing a numbers game here. While it is true that war would not be considered proportionate if it even incidentally resulted in massive civilian deaths (for the costs would then outweigh the benefits), it is the character of the violence used that is key. If one uses means that in themselves target civilians, regardless of what one wishes, then justice in war is not preserved.
I don’t know if this helps. It was written on the sly.
Soggy Con
Mr. Nichols writes what Ive been thinking as Dreher continues to beat the war drums for Israel. I enjoyed the book, but its starts to lose its appeal when real events get in the way.
Mr. Dreher: you may eat your vegetables, wear f…
I haven’t read CC and I doubt I ever will but I think he’s onto something. However, I find his unabashed support for Israel to be very disappointing (although not surprising).
I don’t think he’s thought through his ideas completely but I don’t think he has to. He’s not giving us a complete philosophy.
To be honest, I suppose that I like Dreher because of the people who don’t like him. There’s got to be something good about someone who drives certain people absolutely crazy.
“Anti-Zionism = Anti-Semitism”
– Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
“. . . You declare, my friend, that you do not hate the Jews, you are merely ‘anti-Zionist.’ And I say, let the truth ring forth from the high mountain tops, let it echo through the valleys of God’s green earth: When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews–this is God’s own truth.
“Antisemitism, the hatred of the Jewish people, has been and remains a blot on the soul of mankind. In this we are in full agreement. So know also this: anti-Zionist is inherently antisemitic, and ever will be so.
“Why is this? You know that Zionism is nothing less than the dream and ideal of the Jewish people returning to live in their own land. The Jewish people, the Scriptures tell us, once enjoyed a flourishing Commonwealth in the Holy Land. From this they were expelled by the Roman tyrant, the same Romans who cruelly murdered Our Lord. Driven from their homeland, their nation in ashes, forced to wander the globe, the Jewish people time and again suffered the lash of whichever tyrant happened to rule over them.
“The Negro people, my friend, know what it is to suffer the torment of tyranny under rulers not of our choosing. Our brothers in Africa have begged, pleaded, requested–DEMANDED the recognition and realization of our inborn right to live in peace under our own sovereignty in our own country.
“How easy it should be, for anyone who holds dear this inalienable right of all mankind, to understand and support the right of the Jewish People to live in their ancient Land of Israel. All men of good will exult in the fulfilment of God’s promise, that his People should return in joy to rebuild their plundered land.
This is Zionism, nothing more, nothing less.
“And what is anti-Zionist? It is the denial to the Jewish people of a fundamental right that we justly claim for the people of Africa and freely accord all other nations of the Globe. It is discrimination against Jews, my friend, because they are Jews. In short, it is antisemitism.
“The antisemite rejoices at any opportunity to vent his malice. The times have made it unpopular, in the West, to proclaim openly a hatred of the Jews. This being the case, the antisemite must constantly seek new forms and forums for his poison. How he must revel in the new masquerade! He does not hate the Jews, he is just ‘anti-Zionist’!
“My friend, I do not accuse you of deliberate antisemitism. I know you feel, as I do, a deep love of truth and justice and a revulsion for racism, prejudice, and discrimination. But I know you have been misled–as others have been–into thinking you can be ‘anti-Zionist’ and yet remain true to these heartfelt principles that you and I share.
Let my words echo in the depths of your soul: When people criticize Zionism, they mean Jews–make no mistake about it.”
From M.L. King Jr., “Letter to an Anti-Zionist Friend,” Saturday Review_XLVII (Aug. 1967), p. 76.
Reprinted in M.L. King Jr., “This I Believe: Selections from the Writings of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.”
Martha, let me introduce you to these Orthodox Jews. http://www.zaman.com/?bl=international&alt=&hn=35268
and http://www.axisoflogic.com/artman/publish/article_22641.shtml
Whenever I would walk through Mea Sharim in Jerusalem, I would see a very large sign which read, “Judaism and Zionism are diametrically opposed”.
I second what Francesca is saying above.
Christopher says If the character of modern war renders it impossible for us to act proportionately in war without basically losing the war in the process, then we cannot justly wage war.
This is at the crux of what Dreher et.al. were getting at, albeit in a rather clumsy way. If these scruples are taken seriously by one side and not by the other, then the latter are in a position, with the aid of weapons that can strike at a distance, to make it impossible for the former to resist them. All they have to do is keep attacking indiscriminately (in fact preferring non-combatant targets as being more psychologically debilitating) while surrounding themselves with innocents. (I think this is Hezbollah’s strategy, or at least an important part of it.)
Obedience to the rules then demands a slow national suicide. Personal pacifism is, arguably, a demand of the Gospel (I know this is not magisterial teaching but the arguments for it are very strong). I’m not at all sure national pacifism is.
I don’t see a good way out of this dilemma.
I understand and share Mr. Nichols’ dissatisfaction with Rod’s views on the war in Lebanon. There is a clear disconnect between the humane, traditionalist conservatism of Kirk that Rod rightly champions (even if he is only relatively at the beginning of entering into that tradition, I do not fault him for that) and the foreign policy assumptions that he and the “mainstream conservatives,” whom he otherwise largely rightly criticises, seem to share. In his defense, I believe Rod operates here from the experience of being in NY on 9/11 and sees Israel fighting Hizbullah as an extension of that conflict (certainly, there are problems with that conclusion); my response to that is complicated (Hizbullah is not really our fight, but I can at least understand why one might sympathise with those fighting it). Because his response may be based in that experience, he is liable to cite the horrendous arguments of neocons who are arguing strenuously and ideologically for a position that he has instinctively reached. However, I must agree that a crunchy con abhorrence of ideology ought to make him more skeptical of their arguments, to say the least.
Kirk would be appalled at what is happening in Lebanon; Kirk’s daughter certainly is, and I believe that she is right and is proceeding from the teachings of her church. That is really where the biggest disconnect comes in: Rod makes strong claims that the crunchy con ethos stems from strong religious conviction, so it is does not exactly do to set aside the statements of either the Vatican or Orthodox hierarchs when they say that this attack is fundamentally wrong and misguided.
I am not willing to say that the entire thing was a sham or that a “crunchy con is just a neocon in sandals.” A neocon in sandals would not even begin to understand the need for humane, traditional society or local community or agrarian life, nor would he question the glory of state capitalism and its engine of “creative destruction.” Foreign policy is one area where a great many conservatives, crunchy or no, are surprisingly easily taken in by interventionist and reflexively pro-Israel rhetoric, perhaps because many of them mistakenly identify any and all policy decisions with national defense. It is regrettable that Rod has endorsed this campaign so eagerly, and we should, as I have tried to do, make the arguments to persuade him otherwise. What we do not need to do is start banishing people from our presence because they do not match up with all our views of foreign policy in the Near East. That way lies ideology and purges and all of the ugliness that has consumed the defunct conservative movement. Peter Hitchens is a Zionist of sorts, for reasons that I think are mistaken, but I don’t think we should write him off, either. We have the better arguments on the war in Lebanon; we do not need to berate people who agree with us about 90% of everything else because they seem to have gone off track with the remaining 10%. I absolutely share Mr. Nichols’ loathing for the neocons and all that they represent, and as much as anyone here I find the attack on Lebanon as outrageous, but I would ask that we not give anyone any reasons to go running off to join them if we can possibly help it.
Maclin,
National pacifism is of course not a demand of the gospel. But obedience on the part of nations as well as individuals to the moral law is a demand of both the gospel and the natural law. The fact that one side breaks the moral law — by waging war indiscriminately — does not permit the other side to do so as well. The duty we have to protect our innocents does not confer the right to kill other innocents.
Dreher et al. would have first to argue that, under certain circumstances, the targeting of noncombatants is permissible — which would mean, of course, that innocent human life is not always and everywhere inviolable. Otherwise they would have to change the first principle of the natural law to, “do good and avoid evil — except in extremely difficult situations.”
I do understand the dilemma. But the Gospel calls not just individuals but polities to a radical adherence to truth and virtue. It sometimes calls to martyrdom.
Not to be a wet blanket here, but if you take Just War theory to its logical conclusion, then there really is no such thing as a just war against Islamic terrorism.
What I mean by that is that the terrorists will never stop using civilian shields, often against their will, to either keep their ability to launch ordinance or keep civilian casualties high for CNN to report.
If this is the case, then it really isn’t feasible to attack such an enemy without *some* civilian casualties and actually accomplish anything meaningful that would end the unjust aggression of these NGO’s against Israel.
I think that while Just War theory has very valid points that need to be consulted in determining the reason for and manner in which war is fought. Ultimately in the notably complex situations that can arise in a war……more often than not the rhetoric of those proposing Just War be carried to it’s extreme are pacifists using the theory as their own shield to hide their cowardice.
The immediate causa belli of this war in Lebanon (or at least it is generally said -some claim Israel has been planning this invasion for a year)was Hizballoh capturing a couple Israeli soldiers (on which side of the border is not clear), therefore all the discussion about terrorists using “human shields” etc. is beside the point. Israel began devastating Lebanon not in response to missile attacks or suicide bombers, but to two soldiers being captured. For that they began to destroy a country. I do not understand how anyone could consider that to be proportionate.
Guerrilla warfare was first used by the Spanish against Napoleon’s troops, and I’ve never heard anyone condemn them for doing so, though no doubt they didn’t wear uniforms and melted into the general population. Did not we sponsor such warfare in Afghanistan against the Soviets, when we were funding the proto-Taliban and other such friendly groups? Were not the Italian partisans fighting against the Germans and Italian Fascists toward the end of WWII allies of ours? It seems to me that depending on whose ox is being gored, there is a lot or moralizing about things which we ourselves are willing to use when it’s someone else’ ox.
Moreover, as Christopher has already pointed out, nations as such are as much bound by the law of God as individuals. Leo XIII was absolutely clear on that point in his “political” encyclicals, Immortale Dei, Libertas, etc. Countries have a right to defend themselves, but not at the expense of offending God. Death, but not sin, was St. Dominic Savio’s motto.
Tom & Christopher,
Yes, nations are so bound. But I really am not convinced that the law requires martyrdom of a nation. This seems to me an unresolved question. Somehow I suspect that casuistry would find a way if, say, Rome were in the position of Israel (that’s assuming Israel is in fact in the position I think she’s in, which is another question).
Tom, I’ll register my disagreement with your assessment of the course of events in Lebanon and leave it at that–as I said in another thread a while back, I don’t see much point in going over that very well-plowed ground when we can all easily find the arguments for both views elsewhere.
Pedrito, you were doing fine till your last sentence–no need to accuse people of cowardice in this context.
And finally, thank you, Daniel Larison, for your advice against banishing people who are fundamentally on the same side. Yesterday I did a lot of reflection on why I was so distressed by Daniel N.’s attack on Rod Dreher, and I realized that it’s because I’ve come to detest the factionalism which seems to poison the atmosphere in the Church so much of the time, and I think this is an instance of it.
Mr. Larison,
At least for myself, the Israel/Lebanon situation has been a confirmation of the lack of depth of crunchy conservatism. If it was just one issue, such thinking would be rash.
The argument over religiosity I think is the clear departure. It is the sort of religiosity displayed often by Evangelicals, the outward display of fervor lacking any internal discipline. It is not the fervor of trying to consume all the church teaches, challenging oneself to conform. It is indeed just one step beyond “There is a God, His name is Jesus, and He loves me,” but it isn’t any deeper than that.
I’m not going to debate Orthodoxy/Catholicism, but I will say there were several Orthodox writers (over at Pontifications) who had varying levels of discomfort over having him as a posterchild for conversion. Not to be a prick about it, but this crunchy conservatism seems to have no room for it to be informed by bishops, Catholic or Orthodox. There are certainly redeeming things about crunch conservatism, but is purely a secular movement. In other words, there is nothing different between cruchy conservatism and First Things, other than a few disagreements over secular issues.
A couple of things.
First, of course Israel’s actions are not simply in response to the capture of the two soldiers (and the killing of others in the same raid). And, of course Israel has been preparing for this attack. Hezbollah has been building up and building up throughout Lebanon. H’s aim is clear. Their strength and audacity is becoming clear. The capture was simply the straw that broke the camel’s back.
Second, because I don’t believe Israel is intentionally targeting civilians, I understand this point to be the crux of the problem.: “If innocent life is inviolable, then the means necessary to preserving that life are also inviolable. Thus it is immoral to destroy infrastructure necessary to supporting a civilian population. Even if the military benefits from that infrastructure incidentally, it is still essentially civilian and so off limits.” I don’t see how this can make sense in war. Armies have always destroyed infrastructure (and most infrastructure used by militaries is “civilian”) as part of their attempts to weaken the enemy. Either one believes that no war is ever justifiable if civilians suffer because of it, or there is room for civilian suffering as an undesired side effect of the war effort. If you take the former position, no modern or ancient war has ever or could ever be justifiable. If you take the second position, then the issue becomes discrimination and proportionality. I’m willing to discuss the possibility that Israel is transgressing these two criteria in Lebanon, but I’m not willing to accept a view that says, “A civilian died or is suffering because of an attack on a Hezbollah stronghold or because of an attack on infrastructure, therefore THIS WAR IS UNJUST.” Imprudent, perhaps (and I’m leaning in that direction), but not strictly speaking unjust.
Thank you Mr. Zaehnder for a clear explanation of Just War Theory. I have a bit of difficulty with these sentences:
If, however, one, in order to take out an anti-aircraft gun in a neighborhood, uses means that are proportionate to taking out the entire neighborhood, then the effect of the destroyed neighborhood is not incidental to the means used but is its proper effect. If anything, the destruction of the gun is incidental in this case, since the gun is being destroyed as part of a whole. The direct target is the neighborhood.
Are you saying here that the anti-aircraft gun must be targetted so precisely that nothing else in the neighbourhood gets hit? Do we actually have weapons that can do that?
Of course it is right that such weapons should be used in urban areas, if they exist. I had the impression during the Iraq invasion that these smart missiles are a bit of a military fantasy.
Like Maclin, I thought a bit about why I feel defensive about Dreher. He can certainly be silly at times. As people have said in this thread, he is currently conflating Muslims and Islam and Islamism into one big ‘ball’ of wickedness. My brother, who does not belong to any religion, is currently in Turkey. He was a reporter for 20 years, so he notices things and asks questions. He told me yesterday that he’d been in a shop and saw the owner opening the till and taking out money and giving it to beggars. When my brother asked him why he did that, the man explained it was an Islamic proscription, and told him the Turkish word for it. My brother commented that the English word for this – alms-giving – is now obsolete in secular currency. Dreher is missing the point that Islam is a religious culture, and that ordinary Muslims are as good an example of ‘crunchies’ – and non-elitist ones at that – as one could find. I say this from observation of Muslim communities around Britain. I remarked a while back that Christian conservatives should not buy into the religiosity of secular conservativism, and in relation to Islam or to Muslim culture, Dreher seems to have done that without realizing it.
So why do I feel defensive about Dreher and his crunchy con idea? Three reasons.
The first is that he has been hit on from the ‘right’ of the conservative spectrum from the minute he entered the field. Many of his critics have been Catholics. As against those who say he is just a First Things type who eats more vegetables, I’d say go over to the FT site and google Dreher and see what you get – almost 100% negative criticism.
Second, the reason for the criticism seems to be that Dreher is trying to integrate his faith and his work far more than standard conservative Catholics feel comfortable with. I don’t know if it still exists, but at one time Bob Royal had a site called “Faith and Reason.” They held a debate on it once, about how far or in what way Catholicism should enter into journalism. A guy from the Catholic World Report (perhaps Philip Lawlor) said that one should report news stories from a Catholic moral perspective – eg, abortion, population control. Dreher described working for a number of different secular newspapers, like the New York Post, and spoke of the difficulties of integrating his faith and his journalist vocation, but of his desire to do so more. Joseph Bottom took the line that the influence of Catholicism should be moral. He p-ed me off by expressing wonderment that Dreher should make such a meal of it. His condescension was quite off putting, because Bottom worked at places like the Weekly Standard, where it’s OK to be a Catholic or Christian, whereas Dreher had been trying to be a fully-fledged Catholic in the ordinary secular press. Of the three, it seemed to me that Dreher was most serious about integrating his faith with a secular profession in the secular world.
And so thirdly, it seems to me that ‘Crunchy’ is an effort to develop a ‘mediating’ position. The idea of the importance of the environment and of animal rights, for instance, is mediatory with respect to the secular, environmentalist left. Even if it’s making him a bit one-sided at present, I think even Dreher’s philo-Semitism is a mediating position. To me anyway, what makes the old fashioned distributist and paleo-con Catholics unappealing is their anti-Semitism (eg, absolute unshakeable obtuseness about the anti-Semitism of Belloc and Chesterton). And conversely, what makes a Neo-Con like Novak appealing to me is his natural philo-Semitism. A philo-Semitic crunchy conservativism is a mediatory position, and one which cuts through my prejudices and distrust of the distributist ideas.
These mediatory positions are hard to find amongst Catholics these days. And yet they are crucial to apologetics. Like Dan, I was recently reading the multi-biography, “The Life You Save May Be Your Own.” One thing which struck me about it was that, for Day, Merton and Percy, Catholicism appealed to their ornery human idealism. “Crunchy Conservativism” may be old hat to People like Us, but I’d be surprised if it didn’t bring in some converts to Christianity, or at least make some people less hostile to it.
Another key theme of the book is the body of Christ. It seems to me that mediatory positions are easier to take up if one has a concrete sense of being a member of the body of Christ – because one’s attraction to Francis will be tempered by one’s attraction to Thomas, which will be tempered by one’s attraction to Augustine – and so on and on, and all because one is a member of a body larger than one’s own predelictions and feels a responsibility to others within the same body.
Maclin,
I would think the law of God would require the martyrdom of a nation if the only alternative were sin. Intentional targeting of civilians is sin; so, it seems to me, it may not be chosen no matter what the alternative.
Am I being overly ideological and banishing someone who is a natural comrade?
No; to violate the limits traditionally put on waging war is to advocate murder.
Murder.
This is no scruple. It is not a little thing, like if I argued that he is a moral heretic because he favored pesticide use in his garden.
Someone mentioned that by his own admission Mr Dreher is on his way out of the Catholic Church, heading for Orthodoxy.
But the Just War teaching is not some esoteric Catholic doctrine; it stems from the moral law and is accessible to reason. It is binding on all.
That Dreher wishes to jettison the tenet of proportionality is particularly tragic, as it is preciaely that which modern warfare most often -some of us would say always- violates.
As for Dreher’s sojourn into Orthodoxy, may I suggest the Antiochian Orthodox Church? Not only would he be worshipping with Middle Easterners, it would be a hoot that he would be praying to Allah, the Arabic name for God, used by Christians and Muslims alike.:)
Mr. Gotcher,
My point regarding incidental and intentional in regards to targets allowed for the fact that in a just war civilians might get killed. The point is, that civilians can never be the intentional target.
Civilian infrastructure, too, must fall under the same distinction. Intentional destruction of essentially civilian infrastructure would be immoral. One would not be held guilty for incidental destruction of the same.
I think there have been justifiable wars, at least of defense. I tend to think most wars have not been justifiable. The just war teaching only states that it is possible for a war to be just; it says nothing about whether any particular is just or whether there has ever been a just war.
++++++
Miss Francesca,
You ask:
Are you saying here that the anti-aircraft gun must be targetted so precisely that nothing else in the neighbourhood gets hit?
I respond:
I am saying that the targeting must be proportional to the end. One can almost surely bet that in any bombing there will be some incidental destruction (which is probably why the French bishops in the middle ages banned the cross bow and projectile weapons were considered infra dig.). One would not, I think, have to refrain from bombing for this reason. The question would be, is this means ordered to destroying a thing the size of our target, or is it actually ordered to destroying much more? I think that judgment can be made.
You asked:
Do we actually have weapons that can do that?
I respond:
I don’t know. But if we don’t, we would have find other means to take out the target.
Yo said:
Of course it is right that such weapons should be used in urban areas, if they exist. I had the impression during the Iraq invasion that these smart missiles are a bit of a military fantasy.
I respond:
Amen to that, sister!
Mr. Pedrito,
Suppose I frame you statement, this way:
I think that while [the Church’s teaching on the immorality of abortion] has very valid points that need to be consulted in determining the reason for [maintaining a pregnancy], ultimately in the notably complex situations that can arise in [the lives of individuals]…
Would you still hold to it?
Mr Zehnder,
I’m thinking about the Normandy Landings, and whether the Allied invasion was proportionate. I believe that several hundred thousand French people (civilians) died in the drive of the Allied forces through France. The TV series ‘Band of Brothers’ was an eye-opener to me. Although I had done WWII for O’ level, I somehow imagined that, after landing in Normandy, the Allies sort of formed a convoy and drove on up to Berlin. In “Band of Brothers” we see heavy bombardment of French villages. In one, the people in what’s become a hospital outline a cross that can be seen from above so they won’t get bombed. In a particularly dark episode, an American soldier falls for a French girl working in a hospital, and she is killed in that night’s aerial bombardment. It’s interesting that this problem has nothing to do with ‘terrorists’ – who are supposed to create the ‘new’ dilemma for Just War Theory. In WWII, the Germans armed forces are on the ground in and amongst the French who are on our side and innocent. We flattened entire French villages to get at the German enemy. Was this disproportionate on the JW theory?
I am well aware of the excuse which men, ever ingenious in devising mischief to themselves as well as others, offer in extenuation of their conduct in going to war. They allege, that they are compelled to it; that they are dragged against their will to war. I answer them, deal fairly; pull off the mask; throw away all false colours; consult your own heart, and you will find that anger, ambition, and folly are the compulsory force that has dragged you to war, and not any necessity; unless indeed you call the insatiable cravings of a covetous mind, necessity.
Reserve your outside pretences to deceive the thoughtless vulgar. God is not mocked with paint and varnish. Solemn days and forms of fasting, prayer, and thanksgiving, are appointed. Loud petitions are offered up to heaven for peace. The priests and the people roar out as vociferously as they can “give peace in our time, O Lord! We beseech thee to hear us, O Lord.” Might not the Lord very justly answer and say, “why mock ye me, ye hypocrites? You fast and pray that I would avert a calamity which you have brought upon your own heads. You are deprecating an evil, of which yourselves are the authors.”
…
There is scarcely any peace so unjust, but it is preferable, upon the whole, to the justest war. Sit down, before you draw the sword, weigh every article, omit none, and compute the expence of blood as well as treasure which war requires, and the evils which it of necessity brings with it; and then see at the bottom of the account whether, after the greatest success, there is likely to be a balance in your favour.
The authority of the Roman pontiff is allowed to be paramount and decisive.
…
The pontiff summons to war. He is obeyed. He summons to peace; why is he not obeyed as readily?
(From The Complaint of Peace, 1521)
I believe that I can reasonably doubt that Israel is indiscriminately targeting civilians, and I can reasonably believe that Hezbollah is taking totally blind potshots at civilians in Israel. It is entirely dumb luck that a tragedy like Qana has not occurred in Israel. Hezbollah is simply a terrorist organization which will not rest until Israel is gone. I believe that JP II used to say something like the Jews are our spiritual ancestors, although he did once scandalously kiss the Koran.
So, in the end, the real question is: Is Mr. Zehnder ever incorrest on anything, let alone his notions on how to apply just war theory in the particular? and what does Mr. Nichols think a conservative is, that he claims he is not one? If one wants to conserve what is good from the past, then isn’t that person a conservative? and what is so bad about that? isn’t that what all this back to the earth stuff is about, anyways? Well, back to Walmart … got to feed the kids at reasonable prices ….
I don’t think anyone here would deny that intentionally targeting civilians is wrong. And arguably (at least) a Christian nation would be obliged to surrender rather than, say, launch nukes at cities. The question which doesn’t necessarily have a clear answer in the abstract involves the attacker behind a human shield.
Maclin,
And the question about taking out infrastructure in such a way that civilians suffer.
I had no idea the principle of double effect was so important for JWT. In fact, I may have just grasped that principle for the first time. Hence, Hiroshima would be out, because we just deliberately hit civilians, whereas Dresden is debateable, because we were trying to hit the train station and the train lines.
Given that I’ve only just got the hang of the thing, thanks to Mr. Zehnder, it might be fair to Dreher to assume that, like me, he doesn’t really get JWT, and when he says stuff like ‘proportionality be damned’, he is simply expressing frustration with a theory which needs careful explanation and is difficult to apply.
This is not the first time these questions have been broached. As I’ve read elsewhere, the just war doctrine was written when yesterday’s terrorists (barbarians) were invading the Roman empire. WWI/WWII brought significant thoughts to what were civilian and military targets. (The distinction is not merely “can be used.” If something “is” being used, there is a different criteria.) The presense of civilians – sometimes human shields is used which seems to sound like the civilians are complicit in the act – is nothing new either.
Regardless, flying an aircraft 200 miles and dropping a 500 lb bomb on a missle launcher is not an act of last resort. It can certainly be a legitimate offensive action in a war. It cannot however be claimed that such an action is so essential to the preservation of life – which an action of last resort is – that the lives of innocents cannot be considered. Therefore, the noncombatants killed in such an action can only be considered likely and known and hence intended. While the rhetoric suggesting Israel is in a life-and-death struggle against Islam may be true over a permanent horizon, it is simply wrong to say that Israel’s actions are in the face of likely imminent death. It is on these grounds that Israel is attempting to be justified, and it is fallacious.
Mr Gotcher
I can see the point of the civilians being off-limits unless struck unintentionally (un-targetted), but I’m not buying into the infrastructure idea unless someone gives me a good reason other than that its part of the theory. Train lines are part of the infrastructure, and not only the English and American Allies, but the French resistants themselves took them out whenever they could, because they were used not only to transport essential goods but soldiers and military equipment.
Surely one reason why France, and especially Italy (remember Bicycle Thieves) were poor after WWII is that they lost infrastructure?
Trains may be valuable to civilians without being a necessity of life. But if one bombs, for example, waterworks, hospitals, and food distribution centers, one may very well be removing the ability for a civilian populate to survive, period.
Question: is it moral to threaten a civilian population with imminent death in the hope that they will turn on their own government, and insist on surrender to their attackers? If these were non-state actors, wouldn’t this be terrorism? If so, the argument that miserable Lebanese will turn on Hizbollah sounds morally questionable to me….
Francesca,
As you described the Normandy invasion, it does sound unjust to me. As for Dresden — if the bombing were directed with proportional means at particular military targets within the city, and some civilian deaths resulted incidentally, then it would have been just. But Dresden, or at least very large portions of it, were bombed in toto. The city was bombed, primarily, and whatever military targets, incidentally.
For double effect to be relevant, the unwanted consequence has to be an incidental or accidental effect of the primary act. The destruction of Dresden was not merely incidental to the bombing of the military targets. Intention of course governs means — we choose the means proportional to the end we have in view. If I want to dig a garden, I choose a spade, not a backhoe. Likewise, means determine intention. If I do use a backhoe, I cannot reasonbly think myself engaged in digging a garden, unless I’m stupid or mad. Likewise, the Allies could not have thought they were doing anything but destroying a city, given the means they chose to attack Dresden.
1) On the Normandy Landing – you say it was unjust (if I’m right that several hundred thousand French civilians died and that Spielberg’s semi-documentary account is accurate): but you don’t think the Allies should not have invaded?
2) I agree Dresden is highly debateable. I recently read a good book about it by Frederick Taylor (called “Dresden”), and he gives the best shot anyone could of defending the attack. He explains, for instance, that it’s not true that Dresden was militarily insignificant – they were using the light industry/factories for the manufacture of munitions. But he simultaneously describes precisely what happened, on the air and on the ground, and that is enough to leave it open.
Speaking of the principle of double effect, and unintentionally hitting an innocent target, one of the most moving scenes I’ve seen in a film was at the end of “The Straight Story” where Alvin Straight, who had been brought up on a farm and was a good shot, recalls sniping at a distant target toward the end of the War. It turned out to have been an American soldier. He hadn’t told anyone for 60 odd years – it was like a confession.
Francesca,
I confess I have more than doubts about the justice, not only of the Normandy invasion, but of the entire Allied effort in World War II. They arguably had a just cause, but the means chosen to carry out the war were unjust, as I see it. Further, I pretty much am convinced that today just war is all but impossible, given the means of modern warfare. And I am not alone in this: not only the like of Dorothy Day thought the same, but so did the great Cardinal Ottaviani. I understand, Cardinal Ratzinger has suggested this as well.
I thought Cardinal Ottaviani was a heretic in the modern day Church. After all he criticized the Novus Order Mass. Was he then a “great” heretic?
“Therefore, the noncombatants killed in such an action can only be considered likely and known and hence intended.” Sorry, this is not what the double effect reason says. Likely and known does NOT equal intended. Specifically, the end desired cannot come about BECAUSE of the intermediary effect–in this case the killing of civilians.
Mr Zehnder,
Miss Elizabeth Anscombe said that the fact that faith and reason have come unstuck over some issue was a sign that the world is coming to an end. Unfortunately, I can’t remember if the issue was Just War Theory :)
Unfortunately, you can only get away with making that remark and not being taken away by the men in white coats if you are Regius Professor of Philosophy in Cambridge.
It may simply be intellectual laziness on my part, especially with respect to ethics, but I sometimes wonder if faith and reason have now come unstuck with respect to war. This is because of a combination of the kinds of weapons we have had since WWI (when Germany pioneered aerial bombardment with the Zepplin) and the kinds of people in power, who aint Saint Louis. Reason therefore tells us one thing (that we must fight a Hitler, or a Hezbollah, if they intend to eliminate our state), but faith teaches us that the means which inevitably will be used are off-limits. Evil (Hitler) will be struck down by Evil (Hiroshima). Hence, last week Benedict XVI, who is not an heretic, was preaching on the non-violence of the cross.
I only sometimes think that faith and reason are now unstuck with respect to war. Most of the time I’m no pacificist. But I sympathise with your position, even if I couldn’t wholly entertain it.
I’m curious about the question of whether Hezbollah *deliberately* uses innocent human shields. How could we know that they do? I thought perhaps it was resolvable by seeing if Lebanon is the kind of place where there are lots of rural areas for terrorists to hang out in, or if they are compelled to stay in populated areas. I looked up Lebanon on googleearth, but it didn’t help much – it just looks sort of brown and green – actually, pretty rural, if you wanted to give Israel the benefit of the doubt. But I haven’t figured out how to home in, so I don’t know, and I didn’t get anything for ‘Qana’ – and probably the CIA took doubt of my search :)
Took note of my search.
It should be noted that Hezbollah members are themselves civilians, living with their families, making their living as cabdrivers, farmers, waiters, etc. They are not professional soldiers, and of course do not have forts or the other things a professional army would have.
Francesca says: I sometimes wonder if faith and reason have now come unstuck with respect to war.
Now that is a very pregnant suggestion. I think there is a lot to be said for the idea that modern high-explosive weaponry (to say nothing of nukes) has made almost any war unable to pass moral muster. That would have to include WWII. This leads inexorably to the conclusion that we must stand aside for the Hitlers of the world. And I can’t see that as a morally correct position, either.
We are a cat that has climbed a tree and can’t get down. Walker Percy fans may remember that this was his image for the metaphysical plight of the human race after the Fall, requiring that Someone Else climb the tree and get the cat down. Elisabeth Anscombe’s remark about the end of the world suddenly sounds ever so slightly plausible.
Miss Francesca,
I don’t think reason tells us one thing and faith another. I think the just war principles are derived from natural law and are accessible to reason. They are not revealed; at best the Church explicated that which was hidden from man’s darkened intellect. If anything, it is expedience that demands one thing and rightly ordered reason another.
And Maclin,
I don’t want to belabor this horse, but it may be that certain situations offer one only the alternative of death or sin. Or oppression and sin. The reason we would want to stop someone like Hitler is to keep the innocent safe — as well as our skins, of course. But what sense does it make to fight for the innocent by killing the innocent? Battling atrocities by committing atrocities? And is it ever permissible to do what is evil to achieve a good? At what point do we become what we are trying to fight?
Too, look at the fruits World War II. Hitler was destroyed, but Stalin was strengthened; half of Europe became communist by allied connivance; the United States developed the atomic bomb and dropped it on two civilian populations; the nuclear arms race began; the social fabric of the United States, in particular was laid waste, through the destruction of local authorities and economies in service to the central state; large sections of Europe were destroyed and millions of lives lost. I think it is hard to say that the world did not end up with something worse than what it destroyed. I think, at least, the character of us United Staters was diminished and brutalized — All of which, incidentally, was basically what Dorothy Day said would happen when she publicaly opposed the war. Pacifist prescience, perhaps?
Yes indeed, it is hard to say whether things would have been worse or better if we had not fought WWII. Very hard. Impossible, in fact. God help us.
Mr. Nichols wrote:
“Am I being overly ideological and banishing someone who is a natural comrade?
No; to violate the limits traditionally put on waging war is to advocate murder.
Murder.
This is no scruple. It is not a little thing, like if I argued that he is a moral heretic because he favored pesticide use in his garden.”
I appreciate that it is not a little thing. I think you are right on Lebanon, Mr. Nichols, and you are entirely right to take Rod to task very strongly. On that point, perhaps I have not been critical enough in my own posts. It is an extremely serious problem and a huge departure from the principles he espouses, but I do think you go too far in declaring everything else he believes to be a sham and to regard him as no better than a neocon.
I don’t pretend that I am a disinterested party in this, since I have been going to bat for Rod in one way or another for several months, because I have considered him to be sincere and because I think he sees most things more or less as many of us do, despite any problems of superficiality that there may be. If this were just a question of lifestyle choices differentiating him from the regular neocon set (i.e., he likes free-range chicken to go with his imperialism and anti-Christian prejudice), he would certainly have nothing to do with people like me or Caleb Stegall, nor would we have had any sympathy for Bill Kauffman’s ideas, as a neocon would almost have to regard all of us as enemies of the state. Twelve years ago I was a stupid, know-nothing kid who read the WSJ and Economist religiously and thought American hegemony, Netanyahu’s hard-line politics and bombing Serbs were great ideas, and then I learned a few things and woke up. It is possible for people to change their minds radically if they encounter the right arguments.
He is terribly wrong here, and I can appreciate why it has provoked you, but I think he would be open to persuasion. Writing him off as a neocon seems premature, to say the least. Instead of metaphorically running him out on a rail, we should reason with him. There was a time when he said equally obnoxious things about attacking Iraq, but he came to see that as a mistake, so it may be the case here as well.
“Reason therefore tells us one thing (that we must fight a Hitler, or a Hezbollah, if they intend to eliminate our state), but faith teaches us that the means which inevitably will be used are off-limits. Evil (Hitler) will be struck down by Evil (Hiroshima).”
Actually, reason can tell us when resistance is futile and unreasonable. (e.g. whether it would be permissible for the Dutch and the Belgians to resist German invasion and occupation, etc.)
It seems to me that to entertain the notion that `faith and reason have become unstuck’ indicates that one already has embraced a utilitarian notion of reason. As Catholics our reasoning has to include all data, including the data of revelation. Many of you are familiar, I suppose, with the saying of St. Dominic Savio, death but not sin. If the only way to repel an evil were immoral, then, yes, we have no choice, for we can never do evil that good may come of it, as St. Paul taught.
I’m not entirely sure what that “unstuck” thing might mean, but as it came from Elisabeth Anscombe I think we can assume it was written with a fully Catholic view of reason in mind.
Mr. Nichols:
“It should be noted that Hezbollah members are themselves civilians, living with their families, making their living as cabdrivers, farmers, waiters, etc. They are not professional soldiers, and of course do not have forts or the other things a professional army would have.”
I:
So?
Reason comes unstuck from faith whenever it acts as though the cosmos is wholly intelligible by the light of human reason. Since all ultimate things are supernatural mysteries in the strict sense–including human nature itself–autonomous reason cannot fully understand it. This is true whether there was a fall or not, but the fall makes the effect much worse. To the extent that humanity refuses to turn to the Lord for light and guidance, to that extent he will misinterpret reality and become destructive.
Most modern discourse, whether “conservative” or “liberal” relies on autonomous reason–Kant made sure it would be that way, and, unwittingly, Descartes before him. In fact, the unstuckness probably began with the nominalists in the late middle ages. This lead not only to aggressive secularism, but the Protestant reformation as well.
Congar made the point that after the Incarnation Paganism, no matter how noble, is a defect that must be overcome. Gaudium et Spes says:
I don’t think a pagan would think it was rational to allow one’s State to be wiped out because the only means of self-defence might prove disproportionate. I think it takes supernatural faith to imagine that it could be the duty of a state to undergo such a martyrdom.
When we speak of ‘faith’ and ‘reason’ in this context, ‘reason’ means unaided human reason, not reason which has the data of revelation available to it and uses it (otherwise ‘reason’ would not mean anything different from ‘faith thinking’). The mediaevals and modern Thomists often use the example of what a hypothetical pagan might think, to get at what ‘reason’ could know about something.
I don’t think Augustine, who is supposed to be the Father of ‘Just War Theory’ would have thought it was strictly ‘rational’ in this sense to require a State to undergo martyrdom rather than use means which might become disproportionate. It would undermine his distinction between the City of Man and the City of God to allow this. For Augustine, those in the City of Man (his perennial example is of course Rome) can do good things, but always for some benefit, even if it is a long term benefit which one might not see right away. Those in the City of God do good for God’s sake, not for a long or short term benefit accruing to themselves. They are enabled to do so by the grace of faith.
I am renouned in my family for asking my kids whether Aeneas should have killed Turnus at the end. They always say, “Yes, from the pagan perspective it made sense. Of course, we know better now.”
What if he had spared Turnus?
Miss Francesca,
I think the “unaided human reason” you speak of is perhaps better described as “unaided, fallen human reason” — the same reason that led Aristotle to conclude that it was a good to expose deformed infants. But in this case as well, the notion that this is wrong is not derived from principles known only by divine revelation. In other words, the truth of the inviolability of innocent human life is not a revealed truth but a principle of natural law.
In your last paragraph you seem to suggest that the City of Man is not bound by the laws of God. But, as the popes of the last two centuries have insisted, every human thing is to be subject, not only to the natural laws but to the revealed law of Christ. I do not think Augustin would have denied this.
Further, to say we can use disproportionate means in war when the alternative is utter defeat is to say, in effect, “lest the enemy kill my children, I’ll first kill his.” For that’s what disproportionate warfare is — it is war on the entire population — women, the old, and children.
No, it’s not that the pagan is not subject to the laws of God, it’s that there are some laws of God to which a pagan is blind.
Perhaps I’ve been misunderstanding the point of the most recent posts, but I thought we were speaking of reason and faith diverging, not of what pagans and unbelievers might think. Certainly it’s possible using worldly reasoning to justifty abortion, contraception, divorce, mass bombing in warfare, and so so, but what’s new about that? And if all we’re saying is that pagans reason and act like pagans, or better yet, post-Christians reason and act like post-Christians, I don’t see the point of the discussion. But I thought it had been suggested that on the question of using unjust means to defend one’s country, somehow the conclusions of reason were at variance with that taught by the Church. If someone has indeed suggested this, I would ask him if for the sake of saving the life of the mother reason and faith also diverge.
I’m also reminded of the Latin Averroists of the Middle Ages, who taught the double truth theory, that something could be true in philosophy and false in theology and vice versa. St. Thomas took a very dim view of them.
Perhaps we have been using “reason” equivocally. By reason I’ve meant simply the faculty by which man knows, drawing ideas from sense perception and understanding their relations — which, I contend, without the aid of divine revelation could conclude that using disproportionate means in war is immoral. I don’t mean by reason, how the pagan mind works. I fully admit that to a great number, if not most, pagan, modern, and postmodern minds, the just war teaching would seem nonsensical. But, I would argue, this is because their reason is deficient, their minds are darkened.
Christopher, yes, exactly. That is the distinction I was trying to state.
Elizabeth Anscombe was familiar with the double truth theory. That is why she thought it is a sign that the world is coming to an end that reason and faith are appearing to diverge.
You know…sorry for the obscurity and obtuseness, but it just now hit me that y’all are probably misinterpreting my sketchy remarks about reason and faith. It’s not the pagan reason that says “go ahead and kill whoever you need to” that’s making me uneasy in all this, or some attempt to reconcile that with Catholic faith, which obviously can’t be done. It’s the Catholic reason that would seem to make it impossible to act against, for instance, a Hitler.
Cross-posted with Francesca–Francesca, maybe you could elaborate a bit more on what Anscombe was getting at?
I don’t know if Anscombe meant this seriously or not. But my point is that it’s impossible for faith and reason to diverge. Faith can certainly go beyond reason, but reason itself, as opposed to my reasonings or your reasonings or worldly reasonings in general, can never contradict faith or reach a true and valid conclusion contrary to faith.
What I was trying to say really isn’t related to paganism at all, but reason closed in on itself–the fruit of the Cartesian philosophical revolution. One of the points Blondel makes, for instance, is that the possibillity of supernatural itself–and therefore the mysterious nature of existence–is knowable to human reason as such, although whether there really is a supernatural is not. Modern thinking mostly thinks and acts as if we know the supernatural doesn’t exist and therefore can create a perfectly rational natural this worldly paradise. That is the trap that the Neocons do and the Israelis are at risk of falling into.
Maclin, no, I did understand that was the thrust of your comments and, I must admit, they make me uneasy, since I think if you carry out the logic of what you are saying (which I don’t accuse you of doing) you ultimately make the Faith something of no relevance to the real world, much as Luther did.
But I do think we could justly act against Hitler, but not with any and every weapon that happened to be around.
Maclin, I can’t remember, and I don’t have Anscombe’s book here. I’m going to Edinburgh for the lay Dominicans tomorrow, but if the thread is still hot on Monday, I’ll look at it in the library – it’s interesting. I can’t even remember for certain that she’s talking about war.
Mr Zehnder makes a distinction between the classical Aristotelian and scholastic definition of reason (sense + understanding + judgement) and how reason actually works in practice. He says he’s talking about the former when he says reason could know that, in a situation in which military action would likely be disproportinate, military action must not be taken, even at the cost of the loss of one’s State. But a ‘definition’ never takes an action (or refuses to take action, or undergoes martyrdom). Only flesh and blood human beings do. Faith and reason are not a-historical, a-cultural essences – they exist in real human beings (plus angels). It’s not counter to the Catholic abhorrence of ‘two truths’ *theory* to say that, historically, in some human beings, especially for instance in a decadent culture, faith and reason are aslant.
Miss Anscombe is famous amongst ethicists for writing a paper against consequentialism.
Miss Francesca,
I did not mean to say that definitions do anything. I meant simply that human beings by reason can come to understand the moral character of an act. They then can either perform the act or not.
I grant that in certain persons or cultural situations, faith and reason can be aslant; but what I would mean by reason here is not the truths that one can arrive to by reason but what men actually think at a given time. It would be more accurate to say that, at certain times and in certain persons, faith and opinion can be aslant — or one’s opinions of the Faith can be at variance with truth, or vice versa.
Faith and truth are in a sense a-historical and a-cultural, if one means the actual content of the Faith or the natural law or the nature of being. Just as human nature does not change in its essence, so the truths derived from that nature do not change.
Mr. Gotcher,
Would you please expand on this statement: “One of the points Blondel makes, for instance, is that the possibillity of supernatural itself–and therefore the mysterious nature of existence–is knowable to human reason as such, although whether there really is a supernatural is not.” It does not sound correct to me, but maybe I do not understand it. I do find it intriguing.
Tom, I’m too distracted to think this through very coherently, but it may be that all I’m talking about is a sense that abstract logic alone doesn’t really suffice in a great many real life situations. Not that the reasoning is incorrect, but one may have to act without really knowing whether one has assigned every consideration its correct place and weight.
Maclin, certainly this is true, that often one has to act without being able to consider things thoroughly. But that is why in part we have things such as moral theology to prepare us so that when we must make a quick decision our consciences are truly formed by the Church. So that when the attending physician says, “The only way I can save your wife’s life is by aborting your baby and I’ve got to act right away,” we’re intellectually prepared to say, “If this means directly taking the baby’s life, I’m sorry, it’s not permitted.”
Interestingly, if one looks at the old moral theology manuals, and at St. Thomas too for that matter, there is a mixture of argument from reason and from revelation, often the two sources being used together to address the same question. This is part of what I meant earlier about a Catholic’s reason including the data of revelation, and the teaching of the Magisterium.
It strikes me as odd, moreover, and I don’t mean to insult anyone, but if this discussion were about abortion or contraception instead of just war, would anyone be so ready to suggest that reason and faith might reach divergent conclusions?Isn’t this the sort of approach that modernists have taken to undermine the Magisterium on many issues?
I have in mind situations that are more complex than a single abortion–more variables, less clarity. And don’t forget, I’ve been agreeing all along that intentional targeting of non-combatants is wrong. I don’t think anyone here has argued otherwise on that.
OK, but earlier you wrote “Somehow I suspect that casuistry would find a way if, say, Rome were in the position of Israel,” which, perhaps unjustly, I took to mean that you thought that the stated norms for conducting a just defense (e.g., in the Catechism) would or should be changed in the real world, if Rome ever got experience of real life. Which didn’t seem all that different from someone saying, “Well if it was your wife lying there you wouldn’t go on about how all abortions are wrong.”
No, I meant that concepts like double effect might be applied with more latitude–that sort of thing. Not changing the norms but finding more wiggle room in their application.
Mr Storck,
At the very dire risk of being blasted off the page as an evil person, let alone a heretic or a modernist, I would say that some ‘life’ issues actually have become more difficult to show on rational grounds than they were in the past. Please don’t get angry with my comments (*please*), and bear in mind that you’re talking to someone who has been a Catholic for 22 years and only got the principle of double effect 24 hours ago, thanks to Mr. Zehnder.
Just to clarify before I mention some examples:
1) It is my view, as it is of most people who post here, that all human life is sacred. I hold this by faith, in the sense that I did not hold it before conversion to the RC church, but do now.
2) When I talk about ‘reason’ here, I’m talking about making a convincing rational case to non-Christians, and possibly also convincing the rational side of a Christian’s mind.
As it seems to me, the thing which puts reason and faith aslant in relation to ‘life’ issues in the modern world, is the advance of modern medicine, and in particular, the ability we have achieved to keep physically weak people alive. Here are some specific examples:
1) There was a case of siamese twins who were born alive – but it seemed one was viable, because all the organs were on that side, but the other wasn’t, so if they separated them, the other would die. I can’t remember what happened, but I do remember that, of course, the pro-lifers fought a battle to prevent them separating the babies. Of course they had to fight this battle. The problem for me was that the pro-lifers found it appalling that anyone should think of separating them, and clearly considered this an ethically degenerate way of looking at the matter, as if only a modern, post-Christian doctor could think like that. But neither of those kids would have survived for 24 hours outside the womb without modern medicine. Neither would have lived for more than a month or two in the 13th century. But today Christian believers must fight to save their lives by preventing anyone from separating them. This is because what was once unsalvageable has become medically salvageable.
2) For adults, an example which occurs to me is the person who is severely disabled in an accident. I have heard ‘lifers’ express horror that anyone could question the ‘quality of life’ of paraplegic people. But again, the fact is that, even fifty years ago, most people who had similar accidents would have died. The stakes have actually been raised by our ability to figure out ways of keeping people going who don’t have working organs.
I can think of other examples, but I have probably raised enough hackles with those two. What troubles me is that, first medicine makes it much easier to keep people alive, which means, in effect, than far more physically wounded or unhealthy people live long lives, and these are often lives of suffering (which as Christians we believe are especially sacred lives), but that no-one seems to recognise that a special, and perhaps new case has to be made for the validity of the *rationality* of belief in the sacred of all human life.
Blondel’s point about the supernatural is that reason itself, that is philosophy, has enough power and information to affirm that it is possible that there is more to all this than all this. If that is true then we must take a much more humble attitude about the significance and consequences of our actions because we can’t be sure that we are dealing with something more than meets the eye. For instance, while philosophy can’t prove it that human beings are more than this worldly, it can demonstrate that they might be. If we were sure they were not, by the way, we would be justified in destroying them for the sake of improving this cosmos. If they are more than the universe, or even possibly so, we can’t intentionally destroy them for the sake of any this worldly goal.
Neocons, whatever their religious beliefs, are infected by a Randian rationalism in their moral analysis that allows them to be sure that the creation of an earthly paradise can be had at the expence of incidental human lives. This is no different than Communism–just a different, libertarian utopia.
Miss Francesca,
It is not clear to me from your examples that a new case has to be made for the sacredness of human life. You examples, at least the first, might create a unique quandry on how we ought to apply the principles derived from the principle that innocent life is inviolable. The case of the Siamese twins is a difficult one, and I would have to do some thinking before I would presume to express any opinion on it.
Basically, though, what the modern situation presents us is with new conundra as to the application of moral principles. I don’t see that it calls into question the principles themselves. The principles, actually, were called into question before the new technologies arrived. Those who would say, “kill the suffering,” are not so much responding to a new situation, as applying their own materialist and/or manichaen principles to a new situation.
Neocons, whatever their religious beliefs, are infected by a Randian rationalism in their moral analysis that allows them to be sure that the creation of an earthly paradise can be had at the expence of incidental human lives. This is no different than Communism–just a different, libertarian utopia.
Kindly produce a quotation (in context) at least one paragraph in length from any of the following individuals which would indicate that they regard it as ‘sure’ that an ‘earthly paradise’ may be had through implementing a program of libertarian political economy:
Irving Kristol
Norman Podhoretz
Joseph Epstein
Richard John Neuhaus
Jeane Kirkpatrick
Charles Krauthammer
Mr. Gotcher,
Your description of Blondel is interesting. It sounds basically right to me, since the supernatural is not the anti-natural. If men did not have the natural capacity to be elevated to the supernatural, then the supernatural would be contrary to the natural. But men do have that capacity, so it is reasonable that philosophy unaided by revelation could have a glimpse of the supernatural through recognizing a capacity in man for the supernatural. Reason can see or intuit this capacity in man, perhaps, given that it can conclude to an immaterial intellect, while it can not see an analogical capacity in beasts. Where beasts are finite, since they are purely material, man is not finite, since he is immaterial as well as material.
Forgive my random musings. But what you say of Blondel is interesting. Where does he treat of this?
I don’t think I expressed my problem very well. Nothing has changed in the sanctity of human life, of course. But today, we are asking people to do more to preserve it than we have ever done in the past. A severely disabled child that was born in 1900 died within a few months. A severely disabled child that is born today can live for 10 or 20 years. We must therefore ask a far greater sacrifice on the part of the parents than we did in the past. Of course the principle is the same (the sanctity of human life); but, because the medical means are far more efficient, so we now require of parents far greater dedication to the sanctity of human life than we have ever had to do in the past. This seems to me in some cases to lift the issue out of the range of rational belief in the sanctity of human life into faith in the sanctity of human life.
Daniel, it’s probably time to abandon the button-down, wing-tip stereotype you have of “conservatives” (that label is way too general, anyway). Those are country-club Republicans, who have only an incidental connection to true conservatism.
How’s the icon course going already? ;-)
Miss Francesca,
I think I understand what you are getting at. As our technology develops, we have ways of keeping people alive longer, e.g., which raise all sorts of ethical issues, and often the application of the Church’s teaching becomes harder and harder for people to understand. And the same might be true for teachings about war. Is this a fair summary of what you were saying?
I didn’t mean to suggest that it was always easy or perhaps even possible to justify the Church’s moral judgments to unbelievers in a convincing manner. I only meant that reason itself is never opposed to faith, even though, through the weakness of human reason and the Fall of man, it is often very difficult to see certain things by reason alone. That is the reason why we need revelation and the Church, as St. Thomas pointed out (any many others too).
I was only reacting to the notion that reason itself could ever be opposed to revelation. But certainly it is true that man’s fallible reasonings can and often are opposed to revealed truths. In chap. 1 of Romans Paul notes that the truths about God are clear to the human mind, but at the same time he says that this mind, as it becomes progressively darkened by sin, will be more and more unable to see those truths.
Hi, I just had an interesting email from my father. ‘Thought for the Day’ is a three minute religious broadcast on everyday on Radio 4. I never listen to it. Piety gives me the creeps. My father, a professed atheist, listens to it. This is what he heard today:
Unexpectedly, cleverest response on the israel
hezbollah topic was on this morning’s Thought for Day, by a guy at Lancaster
U theology dept, suggesting that christians and muslims might cooperate in
drawing up a code of morality for warfare in which the combatants on one
side was indistinguishable from civilians.
I just listened to it and it’s very good. The guy’s name is Alan Billings, and he actually says Jews, Christians and Muslims have got to get together to discuss the rules for asymmetrical warfare:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/thought/
To Art Deco,
I never said those fellows were Randian utopianists (of the libertarian variety). I just said they are infected or affected or influenced, or whatever you want to call it by that kind of thinking. Sometimes explicitly. As in Michael Medved (who admitted would rather be called a theocon rather than a neocon). This becomes clear to me when some pundits in the neocon camp defend torture as a means to maintain American “freedom” or give Israel a pass on human rights violations because Israel has a right to exist and defend itself. The overall tendency is, in issues of international realtions, to be mechanistic in one’s analysis and to rely too heavily on force to achieve one’s goals rather than on interior conversion and an invitation to a just society. Problem is, of course, if we actually live as if heaven were more important than earth, we would “lose” a lot on a purely earthly analysis. But we would gain oh so much more. Salvation and the glory of God, to be exact.
Chris Ryland- Nice point, but as I consider you the prototype of Dreher’s “crunchy con” I doubt your idea about what is or is not a real conservative would carry much weight at Republican National headquarters….
Chris refers to an inconography class that I am teaching this week(and which his son Peter is taking). It is going well, and offers me an excuse to not post much here after stirring things up. But then, as a tempermental Celt I am more suited for skirmishes than seiges, and generally bow out when things get into long drawn out Discussions on First Principles and such.
Mr. Gotcher:
I have examined a complex of H.W. Wilson databases as well as the searchable online site of several publications. Articles published by Ayn Rand, Barbara Branden, Nathaniel Branden, or Harry Binswanger in The Public Interest, Commentary, The American Scholar, Midstream, Policy Review, The New Republic, The American Enterprise, City Journal, and The Weekly Standard appear to sum to zero. Reviews of their published work in these periodicals begin and end with a review in Commentary of a book by Barbara Branden. The reviewer was Terry Teachout and it was published in 1986. The abstract reads as follows:
Although Mrs. Branden’s judgments are inevitably colored by the specifics of her troubled relationship with her subject, . . . it is hard not to feel on reading this book that she has been at some pains to give us the facts as honestly as emotion permits. To be sure, Barbara Branden is an excruciatingly bad stylist. . . . But Mrs. Branden’s hopeless style is offset by her intimate knowledge of the details of Ayn Rand’s personal life.”
The influence of objectivism on the neoconservative nexus must be subtle indeed.
A mechanistic analysis of international relations is characteristic of the ‘realist’ school of international political theory, which is not the exclusive property of the coterie of intellectuals to which you have referred. Hans Morgenthau’s Politics among Nations was published in 1948. By what accounts I have read, Dr. Morgenthau remained to the end of his life a critic of many of the applications of force by the U.S. Government in the subsequent 30 years and a social-democratic liberal in his political inclinations.
I agree with what Daniel Nichols has written. I think his comments are perceptive. I stopped looking at Rod Dreher’s website when he started “foaming at the mouth” about the Islamic conspiracy. Islam is a false religion and I have no sympathy for al-Qaeda terrorists, but Dreher’s endorsement of armed American and Israeli “righteousness” and his stirring up of fear seem indistinguishable from the neocon hucksters.
Although, to be fair, my criticism of Dreher is political and theological, not personal. I don’t think Dreher himself is a power-hungry huckster. I think he deserves credit for writing his book and making a partial break with the NR pack.
Crunchy Cons serves a good purpose even though Dreher’s writing style is not to my taste. I agree with J. LaLonde’s Amazon review of Bill Kauffman’s book Look Homeward, America: “At once discursive, discerning, gentle, bitter, nostalgic, and hopeful, it aptly describes the moral and spiritual emptiness of a far-flung empire of the deracinated, and the joys to be found instead in family and community life firmly rooted in place and history. It is also a nice antidote to Rod Dreher’s Crunchy Cons, which is a fine book and expresses some of the same sentiments but is a bit too prissy and pulls too many punches. Bill Kauffman doesn’t pull any punches.”
Christopher Zehnder writes:
Too, look at the fruits World War II. Hitler was destroyed, but Stalin was strengthened; half of Europe became communist by allied connivance; the United States developed the atomic bomb and dropped it on two civilian populations; the nuclear arms race began; the social fabric of the United States, in particular was laid waste, through the destruction of local authorities and economies in service to the central state; large sections of Europe were destroyed and millions of lives lost. I think it is hard to say that the world did not end up with something worse than what it destroyed. I think, at least, the character of us United Staters was diminished and brutalized — All of which, incidentally, was basically what Dorothy Day said would happen when she publicaly opposed the war. Pacifist prescience, perhaps?
Awesome post, Christopher. Thanks.
It is easy to condemn and criticize, but what where Day’s suggestions to stop Hitler? Obviously the Neville Chamberlain approach failed, so what are we to do with murderous zealots like Hitler and Emperor Hirohito? Pacifism is not the Just War Doctrine.
I’ve heard enough self-proclaimed “conservatives” (whether neocons or not) quote Ayn Rand approvingly to be very suspicious.
See
Oops, my previous post got truncated. I was going to mentione this site, which I cannot vouch for since I’m no Rand scholar:
http://www.ariwatch.com
How anyone can quote Ayn Rand on any moral question is beyond me.
If she lived according to her own philosophy- and it appeared she did- and died unrepentant she is at this moment in outer darkness.
As I have said before, if anyone can tell me how her philosophy differed from that of the Church of Satan founder, Anton Levay, I”d like to see it. Levay, of course did not believe in a living spiritual entity named Satan, but only used the image of the devil as a symbolic representation of his selfist ideal.
Matt,
How would Dorothy Day have stopped Hitler? She wouldn’t have tried to, even if she had armies to command. Hers was a more complete pacifism than I would embrace, but I think at least she would have said this: given modern war, it is not possible to have a just war. If one cannot fight a just war, then one may not fight. If one may not fight, then he must embrace suffering. In other words, if one’s action is a sin, then one is not permitted to act.
Just war is not pacifism, but if one cannot fight justly, then he may not fight at all. This is at least a corrollary of the just war doctrine. It does not say, you must fight justly — unless you are unable to.
And, by the way, were there not “murderous zealots” on the Allied side? The name of Stalin comes to mind — “Uncle Joe,” I believe, Roosevelt and Truman called him…
“How would Dorothy Day have stopped Hitler? She wouldn’t have tried to….”
Chris, so what do we do with madmen? I we supposed to sit by passively and watch them rape and murder? What is Day’s answer to this?
It’s worth noting that at least one committed pacifist, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, laid aside those beliefs in the face of Hitler and Nazism. Though it’s unclear whether Bonhoeffer himself would have pulled the trigger if given the chance, he was arrested and later executed by the Nazis for his work with the Abwehr resistance.
Matt,
I never said that we stand by and watch “madmen” (why can’t people be simply bad anymore)rape and murder. The point simply is that we may never do what is immoral even to stop rape and murder. If you want to say otherwise, then you must think that it is morally permissible at times to offend God. Do you think this?
“When the sinner deliberates whether he shall give or refuse his consent to sin, he takes the balance into his hands to decide which is the most value–the favor of God, some passion, some worldly interest or pleasure. When he yields to temptation, what does he do? He decides that some wretched gratification is more desirable than the favor of God. Thus it is that he dishonors God, declaring, by his consent, that a miserable pleasure is preferable to the divine friendship.” (St. Alphonsus Liguoris, Treatise on the Way of Salvation and of Perfection, Meditation II).
Mr. Gotcher:
The site you refer me to is maintained by an anonymous (and disgruntled) objectivist who contends that Ayn Rand’s legatees at the Ayn Rand Institute are trafficking in perversions of her philosophy. I am not sure what that has to do with the activities of the various publications and letter-heads that make up the neoconservative nexus, bar that it appears to be the contention of the operator of the site that Messrs. Peikoff and Binswanger are have adulterated objectivist literature with neoconservative notions.
I am not a student of Rand either. I have been reading opinion magazines for 28 years. The only references to Ayn Rand et al. I have ever seen are found in infrequent (and generally dismissively amused) book reviews.
Art Deco,
My point is not one of influence, but of shared perspective–specifically materialist earthly utopianism.
Mr. Gotcher,
The tendency of which you speak commenced with critiques midwifed by Irving Kristol (among others) of prevailing trends in social policy and foreign affairs. Edward Banfield’s The Unheavenly City and Robert W. Tucker’s The Inequality of Nations are not utopian tracts, but counsels to abandon certain idealistic expectations about the possibilities of social life. Dr. Banfield and Ben Wattenberg did criticize some of the jeremiads being published at that time, but that is not utopian in and of itself. Are you sure you have not confused ‘the neoconservatives’ with some other coterie?