There are significant logical flaws cloaked in words that masquerade as “logical” in John Donegan’s opinion piece (“Political pragmatism,” Sept. 24).
First, one’s ideology, or raison d’etre, whether one is conscious of it or not, is the driving force for all of human beings’ activity. Namely, it is the need to survive. The first sentence, “No matter how wedded we may be to our ideology, there are times when it should yield to pragmatic concerns,” is fundamentally flawed. What is pragmatic is what works under the current circumstances. What is pragmatic today may not have been pragmatic in the past nor in the future. Ideology, or our point of view on an issue—what ought to be, what ought not to be—is affected by our understanding of what is “pragmatic” or “not pragmatic.” That evaluation is based on an individual’s experience. One’s experience is a combination of one’s will and choice, but also how one is treated by one’s external environment: laws, people, community, etc.
We, or Donegan, would like to think that people are completely free to do as they please, and to take responsibility for the repercussions of their actions. Yes, to an extent, that logic upholds, but when the laws, external factors such as authority figures, and the system bar one from doing what they want, a logical person cannot say that person is able to exercise free will.
I do not want to blame or judge Donegan or other conservatives and libertarians for their lack of logic to politics, but I must uphold the view that he and other conservatives and libertarians attack. Donegan says, “In my idealized libertarian world all adults are free to live their lives as they choose, providing that it doesn’t hurt others. In return, they all must endure the consequences of their foolish choices.” Does this idealized libertarian world apply to all adults? Does it apply equally to George Floyd and Donald Trump? Are Donald Trump or any of the Big Bank CEOs who were caught in fiscal fraud paying for their crimes? Is Derek Chauvin “enduring the consequences” for murdering George Floyd?
When justice is on the side of a privileged sector, which in the United States of America is white and male, the ideal libertarian world that Donegan envisions is not valid. I will bet dollars that Donegan is white and male and thus has the luxury of idealizing his utopian world as a government-free, do-as-I-please world.
Donegan doesn’t realize that what he hears as scary music foreboding something horrible about to happen, is something that others don’t even have the luxury of hearing, because they cannot afford a television, speakers, or don’t have the time to watch a scary movie because they have to work to pay rent or pay hospital bills for their kids.
We have to look outside of our personal lives and see that the world is bigger than that. It holds a lot more dilemmas and complexities than Donegan and many libertarians, conservatives, and supporters of Trump realize. Δ
Stephanie Lee from Los Osos took the time to respond to John Donegan. What are you going to do with your opinion? Send a letter to letters@newtimesslo.com.
This article appears in Oct 22 – Nov 1, 2020.
Thanks to Stephanie for this thoughtful and articulate piece. It made me think instead of emotionally react. Maybe this is where true discussions between librals and conseratives begin.
Big business interests are definitely pulling governmental stringssome of which extend further to our police and militaryto access land and/or the accompanying natural resources, perhaps to which they perceive a political-economic thus ethical right.
Although many of us tell our elected officials to simply say no to, as a good example, the fossil fuel industrys plans for further expansion, the governing representatives unfortunately are not so free to deny the politically and economically potent resource extractors their big profit ambitions.
I’ve observed over decades that the only language our capitalist-system politicians speak and understand every time is big moneybe it in promises of economic and job creation; or, conversely, implicit/explicit threats of job/economic regression and big business efforts to have a leader re-elected as opposed to voted out of office.
Not helping matters, almost all of our information is still produced and/or shared with us by concentrated corporate-owned news-media seemingly preoccupied with the economy and job creation and losses.
In summation, Western democracy elected state heads appear confined to being but symbolically in charge of the most power entrenched and saturated national interests and institutions.
I took the time to reply to John’s article.
Both by email to the New Times and here in a comment.
However, it seems having a long time Libertarian respond is not worthy of the New Times’ notice.
After all, our candidates are either denied ballot access or , even it on the ballot in all 50 states and D.C., they cannot win so why bother with what any Libertarian has to say.
The beauty of opinion writing is that any opinion is acceptable to me, albeit it is supported with reasons. I appreciate everyone who takes the time to listen and read my opinion. Diversity of opinion is enriching, and is something I value even if I differ in opinion, because it reveals new possibilities I had not entertained before. I was surprised New Times published my response.
I felt I had an obligation to defend and advocate for the so-called liberals which John Donegan was criticizing for not being “pragmatic”. It was my understanding from his opinion that Donegan aligned himself with Libertarians and Conservatives. I was disagreeing with his notion of individual freedom without a government. It doesn’t seem realistic, especially now, with many Americans needing and waiting for, hopefully, a second stimulus package.
I am forced to admire Stephanie Lee’s wide range and creative insights into my article. From my small cautionary piece advising people to step away from their personal ideology, and to instead take a clear eyed look at the likely consequences of the political policies advocated, she was able to incorporate George Floyd, bank CEO’s, families struggling with medical bills, white privilege, and a range of things which I had never mentioned. I am sure she could have worked in zombies and Elvis if the New Times wasn’t so miserly with the space they allow. Her piece does remind me of the old saw that “if the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail”.
” … others don’t even have the luxury of hearing, because they cannot afford a television, speakers, or don’t have the time to watch a scary movie because they have to work to pay rent or pay hospital bills for their kids.”
I always say: It’s undoubtedly convenient for the fossil fuel industry to have such a large portion of mainstream society simply too worried, exhausted and preoccupied with protecting against COVID-19, feeding and housing their families on a substandard, if not below the poverty line, income to criticize Big Fossil Fool for the great damage it has been doing to our planet’s natural environment and therefore our health, particularly when that damage may not be immediately observable.
(Really, who needs ‘carbon sinks’ when, as the subconscious general mentality allows us, Earth’s entire atmosphere and water systems can be and are used as our carbon dumps?!)
To have almost everyone addicted to driving their own fossil-fuel-powered single occupant vehicle (etcetera) surely helps keep their collective mouths shut about the planet’s greatest and still very profitable polluter, lest they feel like and/or be publicly deemed hypocrites.