Modern Politics is All Mixed Up

because it finds itself treating moral monsters as enemies

Let’s mix up a bunch of ideas and see what comes out.

First, there is the notion advanced by Henry Kissinger in his Diplomacy that inter-state politics, diplomacy, became two-track after World War I. First there was the traditional Realpolitik of my state against yours. Then there was the moral dimension, that he characterized as human rights and self-determination. In other words, some people think of diplomacy as purely a power game between states, while others think that moral issues need to be considered.

Second, there is Nazi jurist Carl Schmitt and his notion that the political is the distinction between friend and enemy, and that the moral is the distinction between good and evil.

Third, there is the concept in Honor: a History by James Bowman that honor for men is courage, and honor for women is chastity. In other words for men honor is the courage to fight the enemy, and for women it is to be clean and pure, morally.

Do you see that there are two dimensions in today’s politics? One is the simple fight against the enemy, call it Realpolitik or the courage to fight the foe. The other is the moral dimension, being on the right side of history, or morality, or justice.

Need I say that the political is a male thing; the moral is a female thing?

Why is this? I would have thought it was obvious.

Primitive men have nothing to do except hunt for meat and defend the border. Thus nothing matters except courage against the foe or the charging mega-fauna and having your friend’s back in a tight spot. When a man has a problem with the other men in the community he can leave and join another one. Or he can fight, as in a duel. A man that is reluctant to confront another man that has insulted him is considered a coward. Our modern rulers and intellectuals insist that men have oppressed and dominated women since the dawn of time, but I suspect it is more likely that men know to keep their heads down in the neighborhood because you don’t want to get the neighborhood women mad at you.

Primitive women are stuck in their community, and have to deal with the people there whether they like them or not. So women put a lot of store in their relations with the other women in the community and whether they are good women that do their part in making the community safe and free from harm. Safety? Harm? Where did I hear that before? When a woman has a problem with another woman she doesn’t fight with the other woman. She just says that she is never going to speak to her again. Our rulers and intellectuals like to insist that women have been helpless victims of the patriarchy since the dawn of time, but I have my doubts.

In the modern era, with women voting, I say that politics has become two-track, just as Henry Kissinger says up top. There is the fight against the enemy part, and there is the moral question of doing the right thing.

Let us use Donald Trump to illustrate this. There is no question that, for far-white MAGA extremist insurrectionists, Trump is the guy that has their back. For liberal men Trump is the enemy that must be defeated at all costs, or we lose Our Democracy. There is also no question that for liberal women he is a moral nightmare, with his lies and his insults and his crudities. I wonder what conservative women think about Trump. Yes, what do far-white MAGA extremist insurrectionist women — the kind that get arrested in from of abortion clinics — think about Trump?

Now I believe that when you mix Realpolitik and human rights, you have a problem. When you mix the political and the moral, you have a problem. When you mix the culture of courage and the culture of chastity, you have a problem.

You see, I think we can all agree that it is a good thing to help the helpless and succor the poor. But if you get government into the game then you create a program that forces everyone to help the helpless. And if you refuse then you are a criminal and the IRS will come looking for you — of maybe the FBI. Do you see the point? “Force” is applicable to the vitally important job of defeating the enemies of the community. So when you create a government social program you are no longer dealing with the moral issue of helping the poor. You are dealing with the political problem of how to force people to contribute and what to do with people that refuse to contribute. And are people that don’t want to give money to the homeless enemies of the state, or what?

Yes, but how to we look after people that can’t look after themselves? Well, back in the day, before the Enlightenment, there were lots of intermediary institutions between the warrior king and his kingly power and the ordinary individual. The king didn’t have the power to tax the peasants to finance his wars. And he didn’t have the power to draft the peasants into his army.

Of course, the local lord did have the power to enroll his peasants in his feudal army. And the peasant had the right to apply to become a slave to the lord. “Head for food,” it was called. according to Lacey and Danziger in The Year 1000.

So, would it be a good idea to confine politics to the guy stuff of defending the territory from enemies foreign and domestic? And giving the women free rein to determine who is good and who is evil?

OK, it’s not quite that simple. But how complicated does it need to be, Kemosabe?

At least, let’s try to tease apart the fight against the enemy from the shame of the immoral. And begin to agree that men are programmed for the fight against the enemy, and women are programmed to shame the immoral. And ne’er the twain shall meet.