The Political Dialectic versus the True Dialectic

Anyone who has been paying attention to politics in the West within living memory is aware of the split in politics between the Right and the Left. In summary, the Left are considered the progressives and the liberals whereas the Right are considered the conservatives and "regressives" (the latter used mainly as a pejorative). These categories may seem amorphous and history-and-context-dependent, but that's because they are.

One of the things that I tried to grok when I was a wee lad was "What are the progressives progressing towards?" At the time, all that I could understand was that they were obsessed with equality. As an immigrant living in the United States, equality had its appeal to me, but at the same time, I had an aversion to what little I knew about the ecumenical movement (religious equality) and I lacked the chip on my shoulder all liberals assumed "persons of color" had (racial equality). To put all of this into context, this was the era just after 9/11 where on the one hand, Islam (appeared to) emerge from its slumber to threaten Christendom once again, but on the other, secular leftists (save maybe Christopher Hitchens) and GWB-style "compassionate conservatives" were assuring us that Islam is a "religion of peace."

(As an aside: in this COVID-crazed era, I now recognize these reassurances regarding Islam as the psychological abuse tactic known as gaslighting).

Right away, I recognized that 1.) equality was based on a falsehood and 2.) when both sides of the political divide agree on something that is objectively false, there must be another divide that separates the liars/lie believers from everyone else.

That is the True Dialectic.

The Left-Right paradigm of politics emerged after the French Revolution, supporters of the Revolution sat on the left side of the National Assembly and supporters of Crown and Church sat on the right. Or as one observer said,

We began to recognize each other: those who were loyal to religion and the king took up positions to the right of the chair so as to avoid the shouts, oaths, and indecencies that enjoyed free rein in the opposing camp (1).

 Many thinkers on the Dissident Right have observed that in the centuries since the Revolutionary Era, the Left has moved from strength to strength while the Right has barely managed to hold on to anything that resembles the old order. To this day, the Left is self-assured that the history moves like a ratchet, never moving backwards and that progress is inevitable. But again, what is that direction that all of history lumbers like a juggernaut towards? And why has the Right been unable to stop them?

The direction is against God. Because a movement based on any Lie is by definition (John 14:6) against God.

People have gotten so lost in the weeds attempting to justify describe what the Left is because they think it is purely an economic or social stance. This is incorrect. Economics, society, culture or sexuality can be used as any of the Left's weapons of choice and jettisoned as soon as they prove ineffectual. Just take a look at how in 2020, the traditionally Big Corp-averse Left have reveled in all these huge companies toeing the ideological lines regarding racism, COVID and "wokeness" in general. Whatever is best suited to oppose God and His created order at the time is whatever posture the Left will take.

The Right have been so helpless in stopping the Left because at the heart, a part of them cosigns with the Left's agenda. They may oppose using tax dollars for foreign welfare, but only because they want welfare at home. They may oppose Muslim immigration, but only because it threatens homosexuals and feminists. They may oppose transgenderism, but only to defend women in sports and the workplace. In short, today's Right is yesterday's Left.

Bruce Charlton has helped elucidate that the true difference between the Left and the Right (the True Dialectic) is the primacy of God and religion in life. Or more accurately, there is no Left and Right, but rather there is only Left and Religion.

In my next post, I will discuss the snare that entraps the Right and unites them (spiritually, but not politically) with the Left.

(1) Geoffrey M. Hodgson (2018). Wrong Turnings: How the Left Got Lost. University of Chicago Press. p. 32. ISBN 978-0-226-50591-6.