The point is that, in the days when the medieval romance flourished there were no more knights searching in the undergrowth for damsels in distress. The knights and barons had all become courtiers in the courts of the absolute monarchs. The monarchs liked it that way; it kept the powerful feudal lords under their watchful eye.
Now comes Adam Ellwanger with "On the Decline of American 'Movements.'" He notes that today's "movements" are unlike the great movements of yesteryear.
America has a rich history of movements. No one in 2020 seriously disputes the moral clarity of the abolitionist movement, the women’s suffrage movement, or the civil rights movement (in its mid-century articulation). But somehow, today’s “movements” seem less weighty—less substantive—than their forebears. Why?
Well, he says, take Black Lives Matter.
The organization claims to be addressing “systemic racism” and injustice. As many commentators have observed, “systemic racism” is a nebulous concept—it can manifest itself anywhere, in virtually any way.
In all the current "movements" there is no clear articulation of what the problem is and what to do about it. You can see that the abolitionist movement was clearly about the abolition of slavery; the women's suffrage movement was clearly about votes for women. The civil rights movement was clearly about the prohibition of racial discrimination by the government and individuals.
And the point is that you could do all that by writing a law. Bliss was it to be in that day a political activist! To strike down with one blow, Siegfried, the evil dragon of the ages!
But what exactly does "systemic racism" mean? And what exactly would we do to end it?
What exactly does sexual harassment mean? And what would it mean to #BelieveAllWomen? In courts of law?
It seems clear that BLM activists and #MeToo activists are more nearly Live Action Role Playing, imagining themselves the glorious activists of yore, mounted on their palfreys, rescuing damsels in distress, and reveling in the heady experience of a mass movement and its mostly peaceful protests. Yeah! We are fighting against The Man!
So what has happened?
Suppose we say that the great injustices that we perceive in the age of the market economy have all been addressed?
It is relatively easy to suggest that everything will change, If Only we stop the government and evil corporations from discriminating against traditionally marginalized people.
But what do we do about police brutality against African American males, given that African American males in America commit about 50 percent of the murders? Defund the police? You mean in the face, already, of sharply increased urban violence and urban murders this year? Increase spending on social workers? But didn't we do that half a century ago with unclear results?
My point is that politics and government are very blunt instruments with which to do social surgery. Unless you are dealing with a pretty open-and-shut case, and a pretty clear goal of what to do, then politics and government are not the solution.
And, of course, very often politics and government fail to achieve beneficial goals even when the injustice is pretty clear and the proposed solution pretty simple.
So I say that the Age of Politics, of simple solutions to easily dramatized problems, is over. And the people that think that politics and "movements" and "activism" can solve our modern problems are reactionaries, nostalgically yearning for a simpler time when the problems seemed clear and simple.
Actually, I would argue, the problems were not simple, back in the day, nor did the political solutions do much to solve those problems. End slavery? Yeah! But in the century since, we have had gigantic wars into which elite politicians drafted -- enslaved -- young men as soldiers using the power of government and sent the enslaved young men to their deaths in the millions. But no slavery, no sir!
The answer, of course, is that we must look beyond the temptation of government and force, and look to the solution of religion and persuasion.
In a way, we are doing that. The Cancel Culture is recognizing that force is not the answer; naming and shaming and shunning is the way. But why not have a bunch of Cancel Cultures? Why should it just be a left-wing one? Hey, I know! Let's confine moral lecturing to within the culture of an actual religion that people join voluntarily?
In other words, for the really heinous stuff -- slavery, votes for women, racial discrimination -- we have laws and criminal penalties. But for merely moral questions we have religion: join the religious community of your choice. And, as we know, humans in a community tend to go along to get along. Maybe we encourage people to join the moral community of their choice by channeling various social benefits through them. Kinda like the mutual-aid societies and fraternal organizations back in the day.
Yes, Did you know that back in the 19th century, "everyone" belonged to a mutual-aid society or a fraternal organization? These organizations offered death benefits, life insurance, and "lodge doctors." Imagine.
For at the bottom of it all, we humans are social animals. All that means is that we have a ton of behaviors that avoid the resort to the dangerous and expensive solution of violence.
You can call the ton of behaviors: religion, tradition, culture, archetypes, community, whatever. But government and force? Not so much, because we are better than that.
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