thegreatdivide wrote on Feb 12^th, 2022 at 11:27am:



This is moronic to an unbelievable degree.

The West invented almost everything in the modern world between the 17th and 20th centuries, including charitable organisations like hospitals, schools, animal welfare organisations, the welfare state, preservation of historically significant architecture, etc - all on the basis of free, sovereign individual's solidarity and common cause.
The West gave us almost all humane, cooperative gifts such as science, the universities, artistic and scientific societies, unmatched art, music, literature; exploration, recording of remote and unique languages and cultures; engineering feats like the railways, aviation, shipping.

The West is UNIQUELY humane, uniquely cooperative precisely because its sovereign individuals come together FREELY, in solidarity, in cooperative enterprises.


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Frank wrote on Feb 19^th, 2022 at 5:29pm:


Hmm....offering a debate, so let's read on.

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Well if you are talking about post ancient history (after Christ) , you need to acknowledge the contributions of the Islamic world in the 9th to 12th centuries, and China in the Tang and Song dynasties.

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Again, the West's contributions (post collapse of the Roman Empire) mainly developed from the European Renaissance (16th century on)....with concomitant  devastating wars and poverty. 

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Er....oh dear....the continuing slaughterhouse of history is every-bit as shameful in the West as in the East, because  "free, sovereign individuals" insist on taking the much abused concept of Law into their own hands, deluded fools that they are.

And the East abandoned Confucian 'benevolent authority' ages ago, for the same reason.

We need to learn from Pascal:

"What a chimera is Man! What a novelty, a monster, a chaos, a contradiction, a prodigy! Judge of all things, an imbecile worm; depository of truth, and sewer of error and doubt; the glory and refuse of the universe.” ― Blaise Pascal, Pensées.

Freedom can only exist if we are all free from war, poverty and disease.

 

Western individualism is a supreme positive and it started with the Socratic question of 'what is the good life?' and with the answer that still animates the West: the unexamined life is not worth living.  Western individualism is about virtue and vice, about character.

The stupid, materialistic Chinese communist propaganda, being spouted by ignorant fools, distorts it into what motivates them - materialistic avarice.  Fools like you always bang on about the size of the Chinese economy, as if materialism was everything to which you sacrifice your Chinese individuals.  As if Party propaganda was beyond examining.

And so, being Orientals, you lead  unexamined lives, full of self-contradictory bluster and bs.

Like classical liberalism, this conservatism opposes the petty dictates of a managerial state and the monstrous totalitarianisms of the 20th century. But it goes further, continuing to find a place for religion and high culture. Without sensible limits or conditions, liberalism is prone to follow the logic of liberation and emancipation to its bitter, self-defeating conclusion. Scruton is left ambivalent about the Enlightenment—neither adamantly opposing nor endorsing all its premises and conclusions.

He is also sensitive to modern conservatism’s “classical roots.” More than a defense of tradition, conservatism is an approach to life and politics that appreciates enduring truths about human nature. Its defense of moderation, constitutionalism, and the cardinal virtues (courage, prudence, justice and temperance) owes much to Aristotle, for example. As Scruton puts it, conservatism “calls upon aspects of the human condition that can be witnessed in every civilization and at every period of history.” His conservatism is Aristotelian, too, in its recognition that human beings are social and political animals “who live naturally in communities, bound together by mutual trust.”
https://claremontreviewofbooks.com/beyond-the-culture-of-repudiation/

Frank wrote on Feb 20^th, 2022 at 1:35pm:


Lies.

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past historical mistakes

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More lies.

Frank wrote on Feb 20^th, 2022 at 1:32pm:


"Petty dictates of a mangerial state" ...like the Singaporean success story?

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So true. And surely 'benevolent authority' (Confucius) is as moral as 'love God and love one-another' (Christ).

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That's because he can't perceive  the sovereign individual/inalienable rights delusion

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Waffle. Conservatism is witnessed in the human sacrifices of the Aztecs.

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More waffle. Humans are naturally self interested, requiring Law to engender well-ordered societies. 

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The "culture of repudiation"?

You mean the Right's fake 'culture wars', 'cancel culture' and repudiation of CRT?  (even if the Left is confused about these things. ...)

thegreatdivide wrote on Feb 20^th, 2022 at 2:57pm:




You sound like Bbwian's and Karnal's child, with mothra as the surrogate and Athos and Victor the godparents.