What’s Wrong with the World

The men signed of the cross of Christ go gaily in the dark.

About

What’s Wrong with the World is dedicated to the defense of what remains of Christendom, the civilization made by the men of the Cross of Christ. Athwart two hostile Powers we stand: the Jihad and Liberalism...read more

Someone Who Noticed

There was a great Marxist named Lenin
Who did two or three million men in.
—That’s a lot to have done in,
But where he did one in
That grand Marxist Stalin did ten in.
-- Robert Conquest

It may be easy for us to forget that many, many people in the West vociferously denied that the Soviet communists were evil, denied that they were murdering millions of people, denied that they were deliberately starving their own people by the tens of millions.

They denied that there were Soviet spies in the U.S. Government. They denied that Alger Hiss was among them. They denied that leading leftist intellectuals, such as Izzy Stone, were Soviet agents. They denied that the Soviets meant it when they threatened to bury us.

They felt that America should be more like the Soviet Union. For what we now call social justice, and for brotherhood, and for freedom. 

Today, there's a different kind of denial going on: of lawless demagoguery leading to greater tyranny, of jealousy leading to hatred, of centralizing power leading to centralized corruption, of the self-perpetuating and unhuman natures of the bloated bureacracies that dominate our bodies, wills, and minds. For social justice, and for non-gender-specific siblinghood, and for freedom.

May we outlive the latest insanity. 

Thank you and fare well, Robert Conquest. 

Comments (24)

Requiescat in pace.

Robert Conquest never ceased to be a liberal.
To my knowledge; unlike Whitaker Chambers, Robert Conquest had no religious epiphany associated with his break from the totalitarian left.
Robert Conquest was, as the Jake Freivald so aptly put it; someone who noticed.
Robert Conquest was also someone who would not be quiet about what he noticed.

The insanity of the individualist tendency must not be denied either as especially
the great social issues of abortion and SSM are most often justified on the grounds of self-ownership and that the society has no right to intrude on these private and personal matters.

In India and China, abortion may be justified on collective grounds- that overpopulation is bad for the country. But has it been ever so justified in America? It is precisely libertarianism and capitalism that are greatly implicit in the American insanity, and definitely not collectivism.

Today at Postmodern Conservative:
The ideology of our time is libertarian securitarianism. We demand to be free to define the mystery of our personal identities, to live as we please. But we don’t do so in the spirit of the cowboys of old, who thought of individualism as a rugged and dangerously nonconformist adventure. We demand that the world be a safe space for our personal expression, free from not only from being assaulted and bullied but even from being criticized. I demand the security that comes with being affirmed, and I might even demand that my free choices be branded with the virtue of courage. That’s why libertarianism is morphing “left” among the young. It’s not as much about dismantling the entitlements of the welfare state as wanting the security of government (or campus safety!) without accepting the responsibilities of being a citizen or, more generally, of being oppressed by the relational duties that make a community a community. The most extreme or consistent libertarian securitarians are the highly intentional and philosophic Silicon Valley transhumanists, such as Peter Thiel.

Are we on the road to serfdom? Well, the good news is that demographic crisis (too many old people and not enough kids) will implode our system of fairly minimalist entitlements, producing “a new birth of freedom” that no libertarian securitarian wants. So on that front, the road to serfdom never gets to serfdom. But there’s another road to serfdom paved with obsession about health and safety

What exactly does all this have to do with Robert Conquest and his exposure of Soviet savagery?

Given how many abortions we've had, one could make a case that the US is now one of the most murderous countries in the history of the world. I suppose that's one of the reasons why a lot of the more moderate people on the pro-life have difficulty jumping from "outlawing it" to "treating it like a true category of murder."

(I can't speak for BI, not even to the extent that that is what he was trying to get across, but I think the only natural outcome of calling abortion murder is to seek a system where it is prosecuted as such. That should, ideally, result in the execution of the mother and the workers who performed or facilitated it [under the same grounds used for a professional contract killing.])

I admit with some shame to being ignorant of Robert Conquest until now, and now of course only slightly less ignorant through the magic of the Internet.

Jake's post raises the sad and interesting question: At what point in future history will the denials of our own time, similar to the denials and coverups of the atrocities of the Soviets, be widely recognized and admitted? To be sure, there are still those die-hards who try to donwplay what was done by the Soviets, to the point that the hammer and sickle is still considered chic in some European and South American venues. But there has been, for many, a reckoning, even for many on the left, and Conquest was part of that reckoning. For those in denial about the abortion atrocities of our own time, we still await that reckoning of history. Will it come? And when?

Mike, I agree that abortion should be prosecuted as a category of homicide; but most of the moderate pro-lifers you refer to are operating under the constraints of current legislative and democratic circumstances, where even the most mild restrictions on abortion are a heavy lift for governors, legislators, etc. Just look at the furious opposition that Gov. Walker had to overcome with the ultrasound-required bill that Wisconsin passed. And before you go all BI on us, I'm going to remind you of what Lydia has written repeatedly: the Supreme Court usurpation that precipitated the whole scourge of abortion-on-demand was not, in fact, the effect of authentic democracy but rather the reverse.

I'm aware of all of that. I'm saying that I get the feeling that a lot of pro-lifers who talk about abortion actually reject the idea of at least executing the medical staff involved. I understand why politicians don't talk about that, but when I read blog posts, articles, comments, etc. that's the impression I get.

the Supreme Court usurpation that precipitated the whole scourge of abortion-on-demand was not, in fact, the effect of authentic democracy but rather the reverse.

Right. And it helped change cultural perspectives. Given a 42 year period in which people have been teaching that abortion is legal and "a right", even people who actually believe the act is murder don't automatically ALSO expect the rest of society to call the act murder. There was in fact a gradual change in public perception about the rightness of the act, and there can be a gradual change in imposing more and more appropriate penalties for the act (should we ever turn things around). I would be OK with imposing lesser penalties on the road to eventually getting the crime treated as homicide.

Before 1973, as I understand it, in most states abortion was in fact treated as a crime and the abortionist was actually pursued for a felony. However, throughout history the crime was not normally named a "homicide" and was virtually never prosecuted as such. The crime of "abortion" was normally handled as a separate crime from that of murder. That this thinking was perhaps not entirely consistent with itself doesn't mean it didn't happen - people are inconsistent.

Given how many abortions we've had, one could make a case that the US is now one of the most murderous countries in the history of the world.

Such a case would rely on a rather narrow view of both history and law.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Infanticide
In short, while it is true that monotheistic religions have prohibited infanticide and a few pagan societies did as well during various time periods, they have been the rare exceptions rather than the rule. It unofficially still continues today in some regions.

That should, ideally, result in the execution of the mother and the workers who performed or facilitated it [under the same grounds used for a professional contract killing.

http://www.aul.org/2010/04/why-the-states-did-not-prosecute-women-for-abortion-before-roe-v-wade/

Tony,

I was called out on this very blog by Jeff Culbreath, if I remember correctly, as a "hard man" for wanting a system in which a woman seeking an abortion (especially one that can simply not even be argued is necessary to save her life) is charged with murder in the first degree and prosecuted accordingly. That's not the first time I've had people who claim to be staunchly pro-choice call me names for wanting a system in which execution or life in prison, not a slap on the wrist, is the ordinary state sanction for abortion.

I'm aware of the fact that anecdote is not the singular of data, but it is a datum in its own right and leads me to suspect that it is rather more common than I care to think that many "serious pro-lifers" would balk at imposing serious sanctions if they had the power to do so.

...staunchly pro-choice(sic) call me names...

You have bragged *on this very blog* about having a well-deserved reputation for violence.

the Supreme Court usurpation that precipitated the whole scourge

It might be closer to the truth to say that the SC was merely tracking public opinion. Same with SSM.
And by public opinion I do not mean opinion polls but the opinion of the people who actually matter.

How it was an usurpation if those usurped did not protest being usurped?

It would be easier to say that if, at the time of Obergefell, more than half the states had SSM laws in place. Or if it hadn't been courts - rather than legislatures or public referenda - that were the prime agents of it in more than half of the states that did allow SSM before Obergefell. There's no question that public opinion changed greatly between 1994 and 2014, but it was still far short of a commanding majority in favor of SSM.

And by public opinion I do not mean opinion polls but the opinion of the people who actually matter.

You mean, the elites, right? Because the elites matter and the hoi polloi don't. Let them eat cake. And all that stuff. By definition, the it is the opinions of the "opinion leaders" and "leading opinion makers" in positions of power that make policy, so if policy changes it is essentially their opinion that "matters" in formulating policy changes. Tautologies usually are true.

How it was an usurpation if those usurped did not protest being usurped?

I am trying to figure out whether the Jews who died at Masada had their rights usurped. I guess they must not have, because they protested. Good on them. Glad they kept their rights.

Pro-lifers generally ignore the pro-choice self-ownership argument and pretend as if abortion has been driven by some collectivist mentality. This attitude has not worked. People do not have a collectivist drive to commit abortion.

One can only assume that the pro-lifers are wary of answering the argument from self-ownership (notice that this argument does not assume that the unborn is not a person)
because the refutation or indeed any criticism of the self-ownership has unwelcome implications to the conservative world view. In particular, the conservative economics is build over the self-ownership axiom.

"In particular, the conservative economics is build over the self-ownership axiom."

One can own a thing, but not a person. Children are people. They are never owned.

The Chicken

Pro-lifers generally ignore the pro-choice self-ownership argument and pretend as if abortion has been driven by some collectivist mentality. This attitude has not worked. People do not have a collectivist drive to commit abortion.

First off, it's actually worked quite well since Roe v. Wade

Second off...what? What on earth are you going on about?

Tony, you make the obvious response to Bedarz, who is literally capable of saying in one breath that the "opinion" he's talking about is that of an elite and in the next breath of questioning whether the imposition of an elite's opinion contrary to the duly passed laws of an entire nation is a usurpation. In other words he is not open to reason on this topic.

I still can't help wondering how we ended up talking about what either Bedarz or Mike wants to talk about in *this* thread. (The alleged evils of democracy and capitalism. How pro-lifers should support executing women who procure abortions. And various other forms of sniping against allegedly stupid or classically liberal pro-lifers and conservatives.) Perhaps they are as ignorant of Robert Conquest as I was until Jake wrote this fine post. I could come up with other theories, especially about someone who takes a thread about the evils of communism and someone who noticed (ahem) and uses it as a soapbox for preaching the alleged evils of individualism in economics. But I'll refrain.

I still can't help wondering how we ended up talking about what either Bedarz or Mike wants to talk about in *this* thread.

Note that what I brought up initially was an attempt at deciphering what BI appeared to be saying. I take reduced responsibility for where that lead.

I have actually read Conquest--the period of Stalinist illegality fascinates me. But it is not relevant to the situation now. America is unlikely to suffer either a Great Terror or a Harvest of Sorrow.

What actual answer does a pro-lifer has to Self-ownership argument. This argument does not say that children can be owned.
The argument is that the woman owns her body and is not obliged to suffer a parasite.

The argument can only be replied with the concept of nature of things. But the nature of things is under attack itself. So given sexual revolution and little understanding of "natural"--plenty of conservatives say "natural is what occurs in nature"--there is little hope of countering this argument on its own terms.

PS I had absolutely nothing to say about the due punishment for abortion.

Lydia,
Public opinion is elite opinion practically by definition. It is the opinion of those that think and write. Common man is not that public-spirited. Naturally his opinion does not count. He does not make the requisite effort.

As for usurpation. If it is claimed that the states' rights were usurped, then
why didn't we see states seriously protesting violation of their rights? It does seem that the states did not mind this "judicial usurpation" much. Even the Republican leadership has been generally relieved that SSM has been taken off the political field.

SC was merely tracking public opinion
It is Mark Steyn who made this point. In 1986, the SC Chief Justice could declare that there is no right to commit sodomy in Constitution. In a few years, this right appears, a few years more right to SSM appears--all following public opinion.

I have actually read Conquest--the period of Stalinist illegality fascinates me. But it is not relevant to the situation now.

I think I've figured BI out: he thinks our comments section is his blog.

Robert Conquest is literally relevant because Jake, a contributor here, posted an elegant obituary of the late Prof. Conquest.

If you have read Conquest, and found fascination in his topics, perhaps rather than your vague dissatisfaction with our blog, and cynicism of the American right, some insights or reminiscences from that reading, likewise that fascination with the (now in your opinion irrelevant) times in which he lived and wrote, would comprise a more promising comment.

It's not like abortion threads are uncommon at What's Wrong with the World, so the courtesy of staying close to the topic at hand is hardly unbearable.

Post a comment


Bold Italic Underline Quote

Note: In order to limit duplicate comments, please submit a comment only once. A comment may take a few minutes to appear beneath the article.

Although this site does not actively hold comments for moderation, some comments are automatically held by the blog system. For best results, limit the number of links (including links in your signature line to your own website) to under 3 per comment as all comments with a large number of links will be automatically held. If your comment is held for any reason, please be patient and an author or administrator will approve it. Do not resubmit the same comment as subsequent submissions of the same comment will be held as well.