Hi, Liberals

The Impossible Contradictions of Liberalism

The foetus is a parasite.

The foetus is not a person.

These two pro-abortion arguments try so hard to remain true to the no-harm principle since it excuses whatever harm done to the foetus since they've defined it as categorically not sentient or, worse, as something deleterious. Yet the no-harm principle also requires that they allow other people to keep their parasites and not-persons in exchange for protecting the choices of the people who don't want to. From this, it's clear that the potential "harm" a foetus holds to its mother is second to another important requirement — her autonomy. A goal. A motive. We must inquire into it.

This landscape has already been much too investigated. The consensus is that people's autonomy should be protected. But when their autonomy interferes with other people's autonomies, then that invalidates the moral basis of the former. The state's autonomy? Well, it should be secondary to individual autonomies. How then does it police autonomies in the first place? By being able to override and punish them from a position of primacy and in the interest of acceptable autonomies. But how do we decide which autonomies should be accepted? Should it be majority opinion? But it can't be since that would mean transgenderism and feminist women are immoral for being minorities. Should it be minority opinion? But it can't be since that would be tyrannical and would imply the wealthy 1% are saints whose desires should dictate the norms of society.

Can we rescue ourselves from this dilemma by invoking our moral rational sensibilities? We can try. It is not only good but also rational (let us investigate the premises) that women should have the same rights and privileges as men. This is not because women are a majority (immoral, as argued above) nor because they are a minority (that would be tyrannical). It is because women are human beings and as such should be equally autonomous. But "autonomy" can be easily replaced with "right," and the question in contention is whether they should have it — both — in the first place. "Women should have equal rights because women should have rights" is tautological.

But, hold on, let us grant that we are capable of moving past it. Women have autonomy now. Who should be allowed to restrict it? Not the state, not anyone. Who should be allowed to restrict anyone who tries to restrict it? Not just anyone, but the state. Why? Because one autonomy harms the other. But a lot of autonomies harm other autonomies. For instance, the autonomies (I will not repeat my argument against the right-autonomy distinction) of people to live in a lawful society, wherefore absent is vice and disorder, cannot exist without suppressing the autonomies of villains and knaves.

What? Do I hear an argument concerning this? Ah, yes. Those autonomies constitute PHYSICAL harm. That is always abhorrent. But, hold on now, the restriction of the autonomy of women to have careers does not harm them physically. But well, it harms them emotionally and morally. That kind of harm is also abhorrent.

If it seems that we have found a surefooted clarification for the argument, let us not be too hasty in our judgement. If not just physical harm, but emotional and moral harm, be prevented, then the powers of the state magnifies proportionally. What is not clear, however, is its role as a defender of individual autonomy.

Back to the board it is. We must prevent all harms to autonomies that do not cause harm to other autonomies. But the granting of an autonomy can in some cases mean the negation of another. Say, the autonomy to life is granted to an animal, then a lover of meat is necessarily harmed since he would be unable to live his life as would have otherwise have been possible. He is harmed (for a variation of the argument to the reader that is a vegan: if the autonomy to demand minimum wage is prevented the worker, it would be a boon to the capitalist while harming the worker).

So we must harm to prevent harm. Indeed, harm is an inescapable, intractable fact of this social contract. Let us then attend to the earlier issue. The state still doesn't know whom it should be harming!

Now then! Suppose we were to reframe the argument for women equality of rights. Suppose we were to argue that this is in the interest of the woman since she is allowed to develop herself intellectually, economically, morally and emotionally, to the betterment of herself and the society she lives in. Suppose we were to argue that the alternative to this, brutal repression, has not brought any social good whatsoever, while contending that our new value — a world where the strengths of men and women are utilized, their weaknesses amply complemented — is superior to that hitherto. This would imply a utilitarian argument.

Utilitarianism has its flaws. All “utilities” are not equally desirable. We cannot also argue that the minority should be subservient to the majority since we would, in good sense, exemplify some “universal” morality over the impulses of the masses. The task of developing this morality is, for the unbeliever, clear and straightforward. Interests and philosophies, beliefs and psyches — all of these come into our judgements of what is desirable. Is this not then why we are often at odds with one another, namely for the reason that one or more of these are not universally shared?

So we do not escape morality and its slippery, slippery slope. All of what has been written can be summarised thus: “We are moral creatures. Not only that, we are selfishly so. We believe that our morals should take precedence over its alternatives, be they be of minorities or majorities. We also demand the exclusive right to have our morals and values protected and above interference from the state, while we, very consciously, intend that this privilege be restricted to only people we agree with us.”

Why does liberalism claim to be any different? What is autonomy if not right, what is right if not autonomy, and how can one defend the other? If this contradiction is intractable, how then can the protection autonomy be superior to all moralities? If autonomy is not superior to goal-motivated morality, from whence liberalism’s claim to a more refined mode of solving these dilemmas?

But I have diverged very widely from the matter at hand. I do not apologize. This issue requires being spoken about. If this analysis is correct, then all “universalities” derived from the principle of autonomy bear looking at (including the issue at hand). We must investigate them with new, critical eyes, eyes that will not dismiss their faults or over exaggerate their implied sacredness. It is this task which we turn to next.