In our last Open Thread, our resident liberal gadfly Peter, a.k.a. ‘The One Eyed Man’, left a comment citing the late Richard Hofstadter to the effect that the political Right (in particular, the “dissident” Right whose views are often summarized in these pages), exhibits a “paranoid style”.
Several of us responded in the ensuing discussion. But each time I read the original comment, and the Hofstadter passages it quotes, the more perfectly paradigmatic it all seems of the unreflective perceptual biases of the Left.
In particular, where the analysis goes off the rails is in the way that it mischaracterizes the traditionalist Right’s view of the Left in this conflict of ideologies:
“The enemy [i.e., as cited here, the influential man of the Left] is clearly delineated: he is a perfect model of malice, a kind of amoral superman — sinister, ubiquitous, powerful, cruel, sensual, luxury-loving. Unlike the rest of us, the enemy is not caught in the toils of the vast mechanism of history, himself a victim of his past, his desires, his limitations. He wills, indeed, he manufactures, the mechanism of history, or tries to deflect the normal course of history in an evil way.”
But this is not how those of us on the dissident Right see this at all. Correctly understood, the core features of modern Leftism are not an exogenous historical anomaly, brought about by the individual will of aberrant masterminds to “deflect the normal course of history”, but are instead an entirely predictable social and historical force, perfectly consistent with a coherent understanding of human nature and the pitfalls of democracy. A movement toward the Left, and ultimately toward despotism and collapse, is the “normal course” of history, in exactly the same way that the “normal course” of a river is to run downhill.
Indeed, the phenomenon is even more general than either history or human nature: in conformance with the Second Law of Thermodynamics, it is in fact a manifestation of entropy — of the wearing down of complex and specific structures, the destruction of the particular in favor of the general, and the relentless erosion of all of the gradients, distinctions, and disequilibria that are the only possible source of usable energy, and therefore useful work, in any system.
The ‘One Eyed Man’ quotes, as an example of right-wing “paranoia”, our commenter Whitewall’s likening of the Left to “termites, roaches, bed bugs, ticks, mold, radon’. But these comparisons are more than an expression of simple revulsion: all of these things are agents of decay, of disorder (in radon’s case, the actual decay of atoms themselves). In this way, Whitewall’s remark reveals an implicit understanding of the Left as, above all, an entropic historical force.
So: if the Right seems Manichaean, it is because the Right correctly perceives its role not as one side in a contest between two equally contingent, and arbitrarily chosen, approaches to government, but rather as a bulwark against entropy itself: against disorder, decay, and the “heat death” of the civilization it seeks to defend. Hofstadter’s emphasis (like Peter’s) is on political compromise, and to this he owes his reputation as a level-headed centrist. But the historically literate Right understands that any compromise with entropy is ultimately futile, because all such compromises are necessarily a unidirectional movement toward greater disorder. (We understand also, to our sorrow, that disorder always wins in the end — but to preserve what we can, for as long as we can, clearly requires nothing less than our best efforts.)
None of this is to say, of course, that there aren’t clever, charismatic, and extremely dangerous people on the Left, with resentful or self-serving motives and destructive intentions. But they are specific, particular, contingent phenomena — opportunistic infections. The focus of the reactionary Right, on the other hand, is on a universal, natural process, by which order yields to disorder; the political Left is merely its aspect in human societies.
8 Comments
“The enemy [i.e., as cited here, the influential man of the Left] is clearly delineated: he is a perfect model of malice, a kind of amoral superman – sinister, ubiquitous, powerful, cruel, sensual, luxury-loving. Unlike the rest of us, the enemy is not caught in the toils of the vast mechanism of history, himself a victim of his past, his desires, his limitations. He wills, indeed, he manufactures, the mechanism of history, or tries to deflect the normal course of history in an evil way.”
Hofstadter is quite obviously identifying the Right with National Socialism. I haven’t read Hofstadter in years, so I don’t recall – does he also claim that the Right is antisemitic? If so, Hofstadter has the Left standing in for “the Jews” in Rightist ‘paranoia.’
Jeffery Hodges
* * *
Nicely done, Malcolm. The thing about entropy (a measure of disorder) that makes it the ultimate destructive force is its relentlessness. Though localized spatial and temporal fluctuations are possible, the total entropy of a closed system can only increase (by the Second Law). Hence, the ultimate fate of all systems, including the universe itself, is total destruction via the complete dissipation of useful energy.
The best that a conservative worldview can accomplish vis-a-vis its politically opposite worldview (whatever the latter’s nom du jour happens to be) is to slow the rate of destruction.
Humorous allusions to the leftward careening of the Overton window aside, the old dictum of “no enemies to the left” would appear to be telling. This leftward drift is emblematic of the underlying entropic forces at work. It is my impression, though, that these forces have accelerated of late, shedding its once linear progression for a pace far more geometric in nature. Having reached a critical velocity the conservative force of friction is failing to act as a brake on the machine. As the Left observes its movement advance without effective opposition it appears to whet its appetite for more, and faster, change. Positions held by the Democratic leadership only ten years ago are today seen by many of the same leaders as terribly retrograde. They are unencumbered by principle and lend themselves freely to the entropy.
We finally have our house back after weekend company. Wow! What a shoot out on the prior thread!
It all started with Henry’s “house” and “termites” as the Left being a threat to the entire civilization and culture that is the symbolic “house”.
It was interesting to see the difference between “justification” for tearing down this perfectly good house vs maintaining the same house for its intended purpose.
Once the house is beyond repair…then what? To one side of the political aisle, this is victory. To the other side it is ruin.
Epicaric
The speed you refer to among Democrats is a result of the occupant in the White House. It is his goal to transform-destroy-as much of traditional America as possible “by any means necessary” Constitutional or not.
Democrats are being dragged along, seemingly unable to muster the integrity to help stop him. They are to be condemned. The aiders and abettors in the Republican party are no better, because they get their “cut” by the perks of leadership and committee chairmanships.
With Obama, the “snakes” are out of their holes…government, media, academia and elsewhere. That’s the bad news. The good news–the “snakes” are out of their holes.
Speaking of Leftist snake holes..http://pjmedia.com/eddriscoll/2015/03/02/lets-destroy-liberal-academia/
Providing Progressives don’t manage to destroy it themselves.
As I have also said on Twitter (I followed you here via Nick Land), you have made a testable prediction and we have a good model test. There’s something called the “Ideological Turing Test,” which is an annual contest held between Christians and non-Christians (mostly atheists) on a blog called Unequally Yoked. The contest is quite simple: the Christians and atheists each argue for both sides and the readership attempt to determine whether a Christian or atheist wrote any given text. Best imitator wins. So just organise a similar contest between Left and Right.
Nathan, I can see where that exercise could be thought provoking and even fight provoking.