liberals like yourself [sic] believe that such things as religious, ethnic, gender, national, class, or cultural identity don’t matter….

really says it all about the great divide between what are being referred to (in this debate) as liberals and conservatives. My understanding (as one who is definitely in what would be described as the “Liberal” camp – and please correct me if you think I am wrong) of this distinction – between “Liberals” and “Conservatives” – is that these factors do matter. It is their origin that is the main area of disagreement, with “Liberals” believing that much of the social, political and cultural significance of these factors is arbitrary and historically determined. As such, “Liberals” are suspicious of anyone who claims that they may be natural in the sense that they have always existed, and thus will always exist. These factors – religious, ethnic, gender, national, class, or cultural identity – are not the same thing as many other things that ARE natural. They are not phenomena like rainfall, the dispersal of species, or the seasons. It seems to me that these factors – religious, ethnic, gender, national, class, or cultural identity – are the result of human decisions and actions throughout history, and that thus we can decide and act to make them different from the waqy they are currently defined and perceived.
Anyway. There is more that we could say about things, but as a “Liberal”, I will always believe that the social, political, cultural and economic world is the way it is because it has been made that way as a result of human belief and action. Thus, (it would seem to me) that it is entirely possible and feasible (indeed, necessary) to remake and reform the social, political, cultural and economic world that we inhabit…
Cheers…

Mark argues that the problem is that the sources of identity targeted by liberals can’t in reality be eliminated. Therefore, a more realistic goal would be the adoption of international norms in which important sources of identity could exist without friction or strife.

Forgive me if I’m wrong, but isn’t this “more realistic goal”, a, *cough*, liberal one?

If people have no religious, ethnic, gender, national, class or cultural identity, then they are empty men fit only to observe and admire the “colourful” life they witness in the non-liberal subject, in the “other”. They lack a “self” to carry confidently into the world. They have too little to project on their own account.

To argue that someone is “empty” simply because they believe that their religious, ethnic, gender, national, class, or cultural, identity, should not be used as a basis for coercion of, or discrimination against, “the other” is a pretty “empty” argument, if you ask me. The basis for liberal reasoning on these factors is not that they should be “erased”, but that they should not serve as a basis for political action, inclusion or exclusion, because of, not despite, the fact that they are such powerful and basic determinants of an individual’s identity. Religion, for example, is so strongly based in the conscience and identity of citizens, that to make religion a substantial factor in politics could only result in conflict. Liberalism is not about erasing the non-negotiable factors in one’s identity, but about basing politics upon the negotiable factors, because only by doing so, can peace in a pluralist society be assured. If a liberal wanted to erase religion, ethnic and national identities etc in society, he would be defeating his own logic because he would be making these factors a basis for coercion. Whilst it is true that Liberalism has a “neutralizing” tendency, its neutrality is based on intersubjectivity, not subjectivity. If a liberal argues that, in our political and social relationships, religion should not be a basis for our inclusion or exclusion of others, this does not mean that a Liberal is themselves devoid of religion. Mark1 and 2 should pay a visit to another Mark we know well here at LP, who is both a committed liberal AND a committed Roman Catholic. Go figure Mr Richardson.

I think Mark and Mark (not Mark, but the other Marks) fall for the same, tired, and annoying, semantic, psychological, and ideological confinement and impoverishment of the term “liberalism”. Its easy to attack liberalism if you simply inject into its definition factors and features of its philosophy with which you disagree. But liberalism is more than that. It, and its ethical, economic, and political tenets form one of the firmest foundations of modern western civilization. It is not simply opposed to some traditionalized, hypostatized notions of “culture” or “religion”. It is a PART of our culture and religion. It often pisses me off that so called “conservatives” more often than not attack so called “liberalism” from a liberal perspective. It betrays as much forgetfulness and semantic solipsism as is charged of “postmodern relativism” or whatever other bogeyman is supposedly taking over the world.

According to the Marks liberalism can be defined by an absence, an essential hollowness. Liberals lack:

religious, ethnic, gender, national, class, or cultural identity

Having made this killing observation, conservatives imagine that it’s “case closed”.

But is it?

Look at this list of attributes allegedly lacking in liberals. Is it a complete list of the “essential” features of humanity? Might, for example, handedness (left or right) be another essential distinguishing feature between individuals?

Once conservatives are forced to concede that their models of humanity are incomplete, then their confidence about what attributes constitutute the “essential” human condition collapses.

The corollary of this observation is that conservatives are forced to attempt to construct a closed and completed description of what is “essentially” human.

But this project is impossible.

Liberals, on the other hand, recognise the impossibility of this project, and the injustice and undesirability of even attempting it.

Therefore, open-ended liberals have the only logical, consistent, though necessarily incomplete, description of the human condition.

And conservatives are obscuratist, crypto-totalitarians.

In fact, I’ll go further: I think Mark is one of the most thoughtful and consistent (nb. NOT monotonous) writers in the Oz Blogosphere, and unlike most blogozens his posts and comments are refreshingly free of bile.

I find his arguments unconvincing, but credit where it’s due: At least he raises the tone.

a) I don’t know why you should think it so noteworthy that one conservative might agree with another conservative’s argument and attempt to expand on it.

b) The argument “from nature” isn’t circular as you present it.

If liberals argue, for example, that our identity as men and women is unnatural and oppressive and exists as a social construct to shore up gender privilege, then there is a reason for conservatives to counter with the argument that such identities have a basis in nature, being hardwired into human biology, and are often experienced positively, rather than as a restrictive oppression.

It’s possible now to support such a conservative position not only with appeals to our own experience; or to various forms of social scientific research; or to patterns within history; but also to developments within modern science.

c) You claim that conservatives have tried to justify a whole series of things, including genital mutiliation, witch burning, polygamy, gay bashing, and ethnic cleansing. Many things on your list I don’t think conservatives have supported at all. Others haven’t been the critical point of debate between conservatives and liberals.

d) Your comment did, though, confirm the basic point of my posts, namely that liberals like yourself believe that such things as religious, ethnic, gender, national, class, or cultural identity don’t matter.

Professor Rat, I’ve never heard the STASI described as a traditionalist conservative organisation. I think you’ll find that they did what they did in the service of a modernist political ideology, not through a defence of traditional identity.

I’m sorry you can only conceive of love and attachment to forms of tradition as a lie. I think you’re missing out on a very broad current of human experience in this.

This reminds me of the head of the STASI who said they did what they did through LOVE

So to me Mark = Markus Wolf

Mark take yr ‘love and attachment’ and shove them up yr fucking arsehole mate. Thank you T. G ( and Mercurio) for exposing this rancid lying little shit.
We won’t have to step on it.