The best of intellectual conservative thought, every Thursday
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CATEGORY: PHILOSOPHY (15 MIN)
Perverting their predecessor
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There are certainly many connections between the beliefs of Karl Marx and the efforts of modern woke social justice activists. The constant focus on those who are oppressed and those who are oppressing is one commonality. And both beliefs see disruption as the key to solving class distinctions.
But one writer believes the woke community has gone beyond even what Karl Marx could have imagined. For Chronicles
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, Paul Gottfried acknowledges the similarities between Marx and the current left, but he also argues that there are many differences between the two parties. Gottfried points out that Marx did not have the same social inclinations as his purported followers.
“Marx was not in the least concerned with nonbinary oppression, raging homophobia, or the inherently evil nature of being white,” Gottfried writes.
Instead, Gottfried says, modern leftists have stripped any vestiges of philosophical integrity from Marx’s thought and have turned to a weak, duplicitous version. Woke-ists no longer even try to argue for science or rationality, but rather seek to overturn nearly every existing institution in all fields.
Read Gottfried’s analysis, and his interactions with the thought of Yoram Hazony, right here
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CATEGORY: CULTURE (10 MIN)
All awoke at once
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Perhaps one of the most revealing phenomena resulting from the rise of wokeness in American culture is its timing. There were certain philosophical and ideological underpinnings that predicted its arrival, but after 2010, woke culture seemed to spread all at once. It’s probably not surprising, then, that the statistics bear this “coincidence” out.
In his Substack, Rozado’s Visual Analytics
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, scholar David Rozado unveils his research into the explosion of woke thought in the media. Most notably, he points out that mainstream American and British media started using certain phrases and words associated with the movement with sudden “striking synchronicity.”
For example, Rozado tracks the use of words like “racism,” “sexism,” and “homophobia” in the media, and the graphs show an exponential leap in their frequency in the New York Times, Washington Post, and Los Angeles Times shortly after 2010.
This isn’t a merely American experience. Rozado overviews more than 30 countries to see the same jump. In locations like Ethiopia and India, the trend is not as strong, but in nations like Spain, Brazil, and the UK, there are even stronger tendencies to use these terms than in the US.
Discover Rozado’s thorough research right here
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Gender: Who Decides?
A Debate on Transgenderism & Womanhood
What does it mean to be a man or a woman? Can you be born a man and actually become a woman? Is identity tangibly attached to something inherent in us, or is it intangible and subjective? Is it merely some social construct or is it embedded in our genes, in our biological identity itself? Can we actually conquer our human nature and identity in the same way we seemed to have conquered the other realms of nature? If we try, what are the consequences?
Join the Intercollegiate Studies Institute in Pittsburgh, PA, on April 18th at 7 PM as Michael Knowles debates womanhood and transgenderism. Register here to attend in-person
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or online
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Join us in Pittsburgh >>>
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Because our student editors and writers are bravely bringing conservative ideas to their campuses, we’re highlighting their efforts here.
The Trigger Warning Fiasco Proves the SA is Defunct
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via The Cornell Review
“Specifically, the requirement would force professors to anticipate and warn against countless potentially traumatic topics, limit students in their ability to explore ideas for fear of venturing into traumatic territory, and intellectually coddle students by allowing them not to engage with difficult topics.”
The Review Goes to Washington: My Testimony Before Congress
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via The Stanford Review
“In my testimony, I discussed the recent protests against Judge Kyle Duncan at Stanford Law School and reflected on my own experiences as a student. I shared with the committee what I have personally witnessed during my time here at Stanford: a suppression of open debate in classrooms out of a fear of standing out ideologically, a fear often fueled by the administrators themselves.”
CATEGORY: CONSERVATISM (27 MIN)
Reclaiming justice
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Speaking of the importance of words, the phrase “social justice” probably connotates certain ideas in your mind. You probably think of riots, progressive activism, and a very un-conservative philosophy. But the history of the phrase has largely gone forgotten… and its roots are fairly conservative according to one thinker.
For this week’s Intercollegiate Review
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archive, Thomas Patrick Burke writes about an 18th-century Italian scholar and priest named Luigi Taparelli d’Azeglio. Taparelli directed a Jesuit university in Rome, and he developed his own conception of “social justice” that had a very different meaning from today’s corruption.
According to Burke, Taparelli did not believe that social justice at all required the equalizing of every account or income level. Instead, he believed that true justice came from rewarding merit and punishing crime appropriately.
“Social justice requires us to accept inequality,” Burke declares.
To achieve this justice, Taparelli believes the government ought to protect the poor against the excesses of the powerful. But nowhere in Taparelli’s work, Burke says, does he define social justice as the manipulation of an economy to create equality regardless of merit.
Read Burke’s full description of Taparelli’s beliefs here
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Read Now
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Thought of the Day:
“It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things, that men of intemperate minds cannot be free. Their passions forge their fetters.”
- Edmund Burke
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