On Liberty

Back in the day when there were liberals on The Left, liberty was a concept that was much-valued by those who called themselves liberals. When I was but a lad, as the expression used to go, I exposed myself to John Stuart Mill’s essay On Liberty, which dealt not so much with liberty of conscience or of will but liberty as exercised by individuals within the civil realm, in the social order. Of course liberty of conscience and social liberty are closely related, but Mill made clear that freedom to express oneself in the marketplace of ideas was a different thing to liberty of conscience.

Those who call themselves liberals nowadays seem to have forgotten any kind of liberty in their pursuit of extirpating all discourse that challenges their dogma in the areas of

homosexual behavior/priviledges

pseudo-scientific dogma in everything from Darwinism to anthropogenic global warming

economic suppositions

statist control of private matters

property rights

education

religion

and just about all other areas that touch our lives.

Of several things that Mill said in his famous essay that influenced much of my behavior during my formative years, two stand out: his comment that truth need not fear debate and that we must always be wary of the tyranny of prevailing opinion stifling debate.

A simple example to demonstrate that the typical soi-disant “liberal” of today is no such critter is Algore’s response to those who would challenge his AGW position with… facts.

“There’s no more debate. We face a planetary emergency. . . . There is no more scientific debate among serious people who’ve looked at the evidence.”

Funny thing, that “no more debate” meme he seems intent, along with other AGW dogmatists, on making fact: real scientists (as opposed to AGW dogmatists) are debating it, examining the facts and the hypotheses. You can find links to quite a few real scientists (AGW dogmatists simply dismiss real scientists as “deniers”) who have some inconvenient facts to discuss with Mr. Gore here, although anyone who can type “google” can find many, many more references (including this one–pdf, and do note the creds the interviewee has that Algore lacks).

Cutting off (or shouting down) debate on an issue to avoid having to deal with facts is the mark of a weak argument, which says a lot about most fake liberals’ arguments.

I do encourage you to track down (there, that wasn’t so hard, was it?) and read a copy of Mill’s essay, On Liberty. I have my copy, first read as a wee lad *heh*, within reach of my right hand, as I have had for many years. You might find it useful to purchase a hardcopy for marking and note-taking (it’s interesting to me to go back and read my “arguments” with Mill and see how they have changed over the years).

BTW, Mill’s arguments concerning liberty bear very closely on an upcoming post on authority, one I keep deferring but need to write soon.

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