The American exceptionalism bit is weird here. (Also you’re not American so shouldn’t have been indoctrinated in that.)
The ‘conquering’ wasn’t done ‘by democracy/goodness’, nor in its name (further, democracy isn’t an American invention or export, and isn’t exactly thriving in America now). The earlier constitutional moments of the US came long after the original colonies, and long before the eventual complete colonisation. The later constitutional moments occurred after colonisation was already history.
The American exceptionalism bit is weird here. (Also you’re not American so shouldn’t have been indoctrinated in that.)
This might be a hint that it’s not all indoctrination? This is kind of a tangent, but I continue to be dismayed by the degree to which so many people have tacitly flattened political and moral goodness to “America bad”, or even “America unexceptional” in the age of Trump and the GWT.
The US has made some serious mistakes, and (especially lately, but not only because of Trump) strayed from the shining beacon of classical liberal principles that made it great, but I don’t know any other country or culture that comes close to replacing us as a standard bearer.
There are individual European leaders who are more competent, ethical, and principled than Trump, but the European project as a whole has gone off-the-rails in various ways. (I don’t think you have to accept @Richard_Ngo’s entire worldview to acknowledge this.)
Beyond Europe, I think it is important to acknowledge that there is a hierarchy of evil and goodness in the world, and grappling with this hierarchy is a central prerequisite to making sense of politics. There are multiple dimensions and considerations that people will have deep and genuine disagreements over, but as a starting point, I think it is important to take into account a power / faction’s ideals and principles (stated and revealed), how well individual leaders live up to those principles, and the actual consequences and impact that each faction has had (or is likely to have) on the world, taking into account second-order effects and counterfactuals (i.e. avoiding naive consequentialism).
So you can line up the IRGC, Kim Jong Un, Putin, the CCP, the Chavistas, the US (or various factions within it), Israel, Western Europe, etc. in this hierarchy, and not everyone will agree on the exact place of everyone in the line or even what the dimensions / criteria should be, but I claim (a) there will probably be some common and important patterns that align imperfectly with standard ideological / political factions and (b) this will get closer to the heart of actual political disagreements than arguing narrowly about whether the first-order consequences of historical colonialism or revolutions were good on net or not.
Eh, I think America really has been the bastion of classical liberalism in the past 200+ years, and my guess is history would be a lot worse without it. I grew up in Germany, and certainly have much less respect for the history of that country.
I do think nationalism is tricky and somewhat mindkilly so I toned down some of the language in the OP.
(Also you’re not American so shouldn’t have been indoctrinated in that.)
I went through all the effort to immigrate to the US, so of course I think it’s pretty great! It’s true I’ve experienced close to zero indoctrination about American greatness though (indeed my high-school education for some reason really kept emphasizing the french revolution as the birthplace of western democracy, weirdly downplaying the American revolution, despite the timing really not checking out).
Macrohistory of this kind is pretty tricky, so all of this should be taken with a lot of grains of salt. Unfortunately, I don’t really know how to avoid it if I want actual data about how to build good and lasting institutions.
The ‘conquering’ wasn’t done ‘by democracy/goodness’, nor in its name
Yep, indeed. Trying to figure out how to relate to being part of an effort where much of what is being done and achieved is not done in the name of goodness is one of the key things I am trying to figure out in the essay. Most things are done in the name of self-interest and profit and various other things. This does not make them automatically opposed to the good, or something you should not engage with.
(further, democracy isn’t an American invention or export, and isn’t exactly thriving in America now).
Yep, both true. Indeed, I think I am pretty explicit in the post that there is a broader civilization that it is an outgrowth off. Sorry if that didn’t come across! And I certainly am finding myself very quite deeply dismayed at the lack of thriving of democracy in America.
The earlier constitutional moments of the US came long after the original colonies, and long before the eventual complete colonisation. The later constitutional moments occurred after colonisation was already history.
Yep, there was a lot of period in-between, and this makes this all tricky to analyze. I think it’s a reasonable structural objection to the argument to go “but some of these things you are saying were part of the same effort are like 150+ years apart, and done by very different people, what is the point of putting them in the same bucket?”.
Yep, I think the United States was a straightforward example of France and Britain conquering something they cannot defend! And again, that makes it a particularly interesting example to analyze the maxim of yesterday’s post through. This post is intentionally designed as being an antithesis to a lot of the vibe’s of yesterday’s post, so of course it’s going to be substantially in tension with it.
The American exceptionalism bit is weird here. (Also you’re not American so shouldn’t have been indoctrinated in that.)
The ‘conquering’ wasn’t done ‘by democracy/goodness’, nor in its name (further, democracy isn’t an American invention or export, and isn’t exactly thriving in America now). The earlier constitutional moments of the US came long after the original colonies, and long before the eventual complete colonisation. The later constitutional moments occurred after colonisation was already history.
I don’t get how it fits the argument. Arguably (a little tongue in cheek) the revolutionary US was a case of a smart man (France etc) creating a big thing (angry states) to throw at a big problem (Great Britain) and that big thing growing legs (revolutionary sentiment) and beating the smart man.
This might be a hint that it’s not all indoctrination? This is kind of a tangent, but I continue to be dismayed by the degree to which so many people have tacitly flattened political and moral goodness to “America bad”, or even “America unexceptional” in the age of Trump and the GWT.
The US has made some serious mistakes, and (especially lately, but not only because of Trump) strayed from the shining beacon of classical liberal principles that made it great, but I don’t know any other country or culture that comes close to replacing us as a standard bearer.
There are individual European leaders who are more competent, ethical, and principled than Trump, but the European project as a whole has gone off-the-rails in various ways. (I don’t think you have to accept @Richard_Ngo’s entire worldview to acknowledge this.)
Beyond Europe, I think it is important to acknowledge that there is a hierarchy of evil and goodness in the world, and grappling with this hierarchy is a central prerequisite to making sense of politics. There are multiple dimensions and considerations that people will have deep and genuine disagreements over, but as a starting point, I think it is important to take into account a power / faction’s ideals and principles (stated and revealed), how well individual leaders live up to those principles, and the actual consequences and impact that each faction has had (or is likely to have) on the world, taking into account second-order effects and counterfactuals (i.e. avoiding naive consequentialism).
So you can line up the IRGC, Kim Jong Un, Putin, the CCP, the Chavistas, the US (or various factions within it), Israel, Western Europe, etc. in this hierarchy, and not everyone will agree on the exact place of everyone in the line or even what the dimensions / criteria should be, but I claim (a) there will probably be some common and important patterns that align imperfectly with standard ideological / political factions and (b) this will get closer to the heart of actual political disagreements than arguing narrowly about whether the first-order consequences of historical colonialism or revolutions were good on net or not.
Eh, I think America really has been the bastion of classical liberalism in the past 200+ years, and my guess is history would be a lot worse without it. I grew up in Germany, and certainly have much less respect for the history of that country.
I do think nationalism is tricky and somewhat mindkilly so I toned down some of the language in the OP.
I went through all the effort to immigrate to the US, so of course I think it’s pretty great! It’s true I’ve experienced close to zero indoctrination about American greatness though (indeed my high-school education for some reason really kept emphasizing the french revolution as the birthplace of western democracy, weirdly downplaying the American revolution, despite the timing really not checking out).
Macrohistory of this kind is pretty tricky, so all of this should be taken with a lot of grains of salt. Unfortunately, I don’t really know how to avoid it if I want actual data about how to build good and lasting institutions.
Yep, indeed. Trying to figure out how to relate to being part of an effort where much of what is being done and achieved is not done in the name of goodness is one of the key things I am trying to figure out in the essay. Most things are done in the name of self-interest and profit and various other things. This does not make them automatically opposed to the good, or something you should not engage with.
Yep, both true. Indeed, I think I am pretty explicit in the post that there is a broader civilization that it is an outgrowth off. Sorry if that didn’t come across! And I certainly am finding myself very quite deeply dismayed at the lack of thriving of democracy in America.
Yep, there was a lot of period in-between, and this makes this all tricky to analyze. I think it’s a reasonable structural objection to the argument to go “but some of these things you are saying were part of the same effort are like 150+ years apart, and done by very different people, what is the point of putting them in the same bucket?”.
Yep, I think the United States was a straightforward example of France and Britain conquering something they cannot defend! And again, that makes it a particularly interesting example to analyze the maxim of yesterday’s post through. This post is intentionally designed as being an antithesis to a lot of the vibe’s of yesterday’s post, so of course it’s going to be substantially in tension with it.