From the savaging being administered below the
line to John Rentoul, to the non-appearance of Nick Cohen's Observer
column this week, they are either in retreat or in hiding.
Except perhaps behind the Murdoch paywall, and who cares what might occur in that parallel universe?
Except perhaps behind the Murdoch paywall, and who cares what might occur in that parallel universe?
But they will be back. Honestly, what has to
happen for these people to be replaced with those who have been right all
along?
That is not a question solely, or even primarily,
for the Left, however broadly conceived. Here is Andrew
Roberts in the Mail on Sunday, on utterly hysterical form even by
his standards.
The supposed Great White Hope of cerebral
Toryism, Michael Gove, nearly came to blows with the Labour MP and Henry
Jackson Society colleague, Dai Havard, after calling him a Nazi for having
voted against war. Yes, you read that aright.
Gove also exchanged very strong words indeed with the Shadow Defence Secretary, Jim Murphy, also of the HJS.
Gove also exchanged very strong words indeed with the Shadow Defence Secretary, Jim Murphy, also of the HJS.
And so on.
If a new, more classically Tory intelligentsia is
going to emerge, then those who have waited long on the Old Right need to ask
why they themselves are never permitted to produce it.
As much as neoconservatives, paleoconservatives are expected to be converts from either or both of the general culture defined by the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, and of the full-blown Left, or increasingly from the Lost World of New Labour.
As much as neoconservatives, paleoconservatives are expected to be converts from either or both of the general culture defined by the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, and of the full-blown Left, or increasingly from the Lost World of New Labour.
Even Peter Hitchens has admitted to illegal drug
use and generally to having been a bit of a lad back in the day, in addition to
his well-known history as a Trotskyist, and then as a member of the London
Labour Party in the late 1970s and early 1980s.
I do not doubt that he has changed his views. But, I only ask paleocons to question, why should one necessarily ever have held them?
I do not doubt that he has changed his views. But, I only ask paleocons to question, why should one necessarily ever have held them?
The rising star, Tim Stanley, was a Labour
parliamentary candidate as recently as 2005. Ed West used to work for Nuts,
and once, in 2006 rather than decades ago, published a book entitled How To
Pull Women, based on his experiences there.
Again, water under the bridge and we all have some. But why should it always have to be those particular rivers?
Again, water under the bridge and we all have some. But why should it always have to be those particular rivers?
I am admirer of all three of Hitchens, Stanley
and West, as well as an interested, not unsympathetic observer and interlocutor
of the Old Right both in the Commonwealth and, where it is much more
part of the cultural and political mainstream, in the United States, on the
Continent and in the Latin world.
Far more rarely in the United States, and hardly at all on the Continent or in the Latin world, does it expect its opponents to produce its own guiding lights. That does happen, but not terribly often.
Far more rarely in the United States, and hardly at all on the Continent or in the Latin world, does it expect its opponents to produce its own guiding lights. That does happen, but not terribly often.
In Britain, however, it just seems to be
presupposed. Why?
You have to have been a bit of a lad to get into the Paleocon Club (Owen Jones would never get in...you can tell he was the type who squandered his student loan on books, instead of on drink.
ReplyDeleteHe probably attended every lecture in Freshers Year.
Oh, I doubt it. Mind you, I am thinking of Durham rather than Cambridge.
ReplyDeleteBut my question is why that should be so?
For example, why can no one take the right-wing strongly anti-drugs line (the left-wing strongly anti-drugs line, which certainly does exist and is at least as common including in both Houses of Parliament, is one of those things which stand no chance of ever being given a media hearing these days) without having to work in that of course they indulged a bit, or even a lot, in their youth?
Why can it never be someone who says that they have never taken an illegal drug and that they have never wanted to do so, which is the overwhelming majority of the population of the United Kingdom in general and of Toryland in particular?
Similarly, paleocon spokesmen can have political backgrounds in that radical libertarianism within or beyond the Conservative Party, or they can have started out on the Left and been very active there for years, but they are never allowed to have come up through the conservative wing of the Conservative Party. Why not? And what becomes of the people who do?
Anon 00:16 makes your point for you, why should Old Right representatives always be people who don't read books or who pretend not to? As you correctly mention that doesn't happen so much in America and it's unthinkable in the rest of Europe. As a result conservative thought and opinion are taken seriously even by people who don't agree with them.
ReplyDeleteI was just kidding.
ReplyDeleteIt's a great question. It may well be because of the old saying that "the path of excess is the road to the palace of wisdom".
Hitchens, for example, says he understands the enemies of conservatism much better than most conservatives because he was a leftist, once.
Wisdom is, usually, the sum total of all we've learned from our past mistakes.
The British have a healthy suspicion of intellectuals, dating back to Burke (who is often blamed for this, but is not the cause of it).
We saw what 'intellectuals' and their various ideologies had done to Continental Europe, and decided we preferred tradition to individual reason.
Ah, the Stupid Party.
ReplyDeleteAmong the striking things about such conservative intellectuals as there are over here is how many of them are Catholics.
You also see that in America, around things like The American Conservative. But they try and convince themselves that uncritical fidelity to the Revolution, at least as they understand the Revolution, is compatible with very traditional Catholicism. Of course, it is not.
Whereas here, there is no attempt made to pretend that Catholic orthodoxy can be uncritical of any constitutional or political system simply as such, still less of the one bequeathed by the Whigs. At that point, the Newmans, Chestertons and the rest, right down to the present day, step outside Toryism and can rarely, if ever, hope to influence it.
Moreover, unlike in America, such figures here are almost always converts, while the rest almost, if almost, always have what may be seen as non-standard backgrounds for British Catholics in terms of ties to the Continent, such as Belloc's French father and birthplace.
Another, rather starker feature is that British and American elite universities still widely admit on non-academic criteria: legacies in America, and in both countries attendance at certain fee-charging schools, sporting prowess, and so on.
The people who were supposed to come out of them as the keepers of high culture and of historical memory have often never experienced much of either, because there was so obviously no point in exposing them to such things.
The British have a healthy suspicion of intellectuals
ReplyDeleteIt is not healthy at all.
And it is upper-class and lower-middle-class English, rather than being British. Historically, well into the post-War period, it coexisted with large minorities at the opposite extreme even within those two groups.
Those minorities, though occasionally still Liberal in either class, were mostly Labour-voting, or very left-wing, or both. But they are mostly gone now.
Thanks to this allegedly healthy anti-intellectualism, consciousness of which in any case falsifies and negates it, the people who are supposed to keep the flame do not even know where or what it is, while the people who might keep it in their stead are not allowed anywhere near it.
As a result, it is very close to going out.
Very interesting.
ReplyDeleteI think Burke's "the individual is foolish but the species is wise" sums up British conservatism (or 'anti-intellectualism' as the Continentals call it) better than anyone else ever has.
Conservatism was once like slavery-it needed no defenders because it had no critics. Its precepts were just the accepted wisdom of the masses, reinforced by Protestant Christianity and
The problem is that conservatives have to start thinking now because conservative ideas have ceased to be habits of mind enshrined in "prejudice", (as Burke called it) and every conservative notion and institution, from inheritance to the married family to national independence itself is now under sustained assault.
A 'disposition not a dogma' is no longer good enough, when it has ceased to be a disposition.
Its precepts were just the accepted wisdom of the masses, reinforced by Protestant Christianity
ReplyDeleteThat is an extremely brief historical period.
And even then it assumes that Protestantism, certainly if you mean the C of E, has ever been "the accepted wisdom of the masses".
Following on from that, all of the Church of England's many Protestant competitors, and it has had some for as long as it itself has existed, have been powerhouses of Radicalism. Even the Methodists, who were founded by a Tory.
ReplyDeleteThe first time that the matter was examined, in the middle of the nineteenth century, there were already found to be as many Nonconformists as Anglicans in England, with the former massively outnumbering the latter across great swathes of the country.
Ignoring the inaccuracy of 'reinforced by Protestant Christianity, I do think anon has a point. The intellectual case for much of conservativism has had much less developmental thought given to it precisely because it is only in relatively recent times it has needed to be made.
ReplyDeleteOn another note, great news that Osborne and Hague have ruled out any second vote on Syria if Assad is found to have used chemical weapons.
ReplyDeleteI can just see the 'false flag operation' being lined up. It is increasingly clear that, as with the Iraq War, Israel is the real elephant in the room here.
David,
ReplyDeleteIt's a closed shop. Aren't they illegal?