Larison identifies the traditionalist conservative dilemma: to be in a position to move the culture, you probably will have to violate your traditionalist principles. Excerpt:
Conservatives who don’t eschew pursuing professional and academic degrees are said to lack authenticity and credibility when they make arguments to go home, and the temperamental conservatives who don’t pursue such paths find themselves arrayed against institutions dominated entirely by people who valorize constant mobility and who embrace political and cultural values antithetical to everything the conservatives treasure.
It's a real problem. How credible are traditionalists who advise people to stay home, develop roots, etc., from comfortable positions in the academy, in the think tanks, or, well, in newsrooms -- all far from their homes? Aren't we really saying, "Don't be like us!"? Or: "Do as we say, not as we do"?
Wendell Berry has managed to be a farmer, a localist and an important writer. How many of us are Wendell Berry? Or could be? Thoughts?
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"Wendell Berry has managed to be a farmer, a localist and an important writer."
The closest modern parallel to Berry on those three criteria is Victor Davis Hanson. ;)
Re: Wendell Berry: wasn't he for some time a professor of English as well, at the University of Kentucky? (I think he left the academic life in the early '80s, IIRC. When I heard him speak at Purdue University around that time, he was introduced as affiliated w/ the U of K.)
Not suggesting that it makes him a hypocrite or anything; just pointing out that a lot of his writing was accomplished, recognition obtained, and farming initiated while he had a "day job." For a lot of people, that's going to be the stark reality - at least at first, they're not going to support themselves entirely on a small agrarian homestead.
Doesn't make it a valueless enterprise at all, though.
"'Yeah, good idea, let's phase that in slowly and safely'. Instead, they say it's a horrible idea, that the people proposing the change are degenerate scum, and society will be destroyed."
Granted some overreact, but some new ideas actually are bad. Also in some cases it's unclear if an idea is good or bad.
Like the environment. I think many conservatives believe in switching to alternative energy and reducing emissions. However they fear if it's done too fast it'll do more harm than good. Or Mexican immigtation. I think at least some of those who complain of illegal immigrants aren't against all Mexicans coming here. They just think it should be legal and slower rather than what they see as "a deluge." (I favor more Mexican immigration than most of them)
"I'll ask, as an example: In what year should gay people be allowed to get married?"
When the majority in an individual state votes to have it. I have problems with same-sex marriage and the Church should never allow it. However on a civil level I think if the people of a state want to try allowing it they should be able to make that choice. Provided certain protections are allowed for dissenters.
However this is not what is done. Neither side portrays Gay-marriage as a new contractual system that can be rationally tested and found useful or negative. Fact or research has almost nothing to do with it. Instead the pro-side holds gay marriage up as an inalienable right that must be done no matter what anyone thinks because everyone must acknowledge or even celebrate their love. While the opponents act like same-sex marriage will lead to every perversion imaginable, end procreation, destroy the family, or summon the wrath of God. It's all emotion-based praise or panic.
My problem with it on a civil level is that the union of two men, the union of two women, and an opposite sexed union really shouldn't be the same. Because if they are the same it means that men and women are interchangeable in all respects. I just don't think that's the case. I'm open to contractual arrangements between two men or two women, but they deem this unacceptable because it tells them "they're different." Well they are different. I'm different, so what? I'm 3 foot 6 with scoliosis. Telling me I can play in Major League Baseball or climb the Matterhorn is just patronizing, it doesn't help me at all. I'm also attracted to men about half the time and it's not the same. My attraction to men is not like my attraction to women. (I've chosen celibacy so act on neither) And besides that if gays want to use the word "marriage" they can do so now. Gays can have a Liberal Quaker or Unitarian ceremony done and be "married." Until there's a popular urge for the state to validate this new variant on marriage i don't see why it has to.
"just as no credible or relevant person who identifies as a liberal would support Robbespiere's regime or the deranged-RIGHTWING fantasies of Ms. Rand."
Perhaps not, but many liberals still support an almost unlimited amount of freedom especially over the body. It's been more liberals than right in support of abortion, euthanasia, and drug legalization. If a person believes in "My Body, My Choice" where does it stop? Can she get circumcised? Sell a kidney? Go in for voluntary amputation? Should no one try to stop her if she is suicidal?
And yes Rand, in the classical sense, is an outgrowth of liberalism not conservatism. She despised tradition and religion. She believed in the absolute autonomy of the self. Those are not conservative positions.
Are Berry critics on this page aware of the fact that Berry spent about four years of his life away from Kentucky before returning there for the last forty-five? And if you're looking to get a handle on the four years he was away, try reading his essay in HOME ECONOMICS, "The Loss of the University." He argues that the historical purpose of education has been to take our youth away from their homes, educate them, and return them to their places with an appreciation of the need that they have of the place--and that the place has of them. (See The Odyssey) Through our education away from home, we learn critical means (pun intended) of assessing and improving our places--means which would be both unavailable to us without having left home in the first place, and useless to us without a local culture to which we might apply them.
For the more narrative-of-heart, try Berry's short story in FIDELITY, "Making It Home."
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