The Best Defense
The more we practice virtue and self-possession, the more security we will find in the world.
“What is the best defense against violence?” polymath entrepreneur Chris Rufer once asked me.
Though I’m not a gun enthusiast, my thoughts automatically turned to Messrs Smith and Wesson. In the U.S., after all, the Second Amendment is designed to encode our right to self-defense. But then I figured such an answer must be too obvious.
“The police?” I replied with a chuckle.
“Morality,” said Rufer. “The best defense against violence is to minimize the number of people in the world willing to use it.”
For a long time, that answer felt off somehow. Some people are just cruel or predatorial in a way that morality won’t change. But I have come around to Rufer’s perspective. I’m not saying people shouldn’t be prepared to defend themselves. Instead, we should give the idea of preemptive moral training due consideration. We have work to do to the extent there is something to it.
But let me not get ahead of myself.
The Moral Vacuum
I have argued elsewhere that most Americans have turned to The Church of State. And politics is where morality goes to die.
In other words, people are turning to politics as a kind of ersatz religion. They seem to think that identification with some party platform or platitudinous yard sign is enough. But the virtues and values of politics — to the extent these exist — are anemic at best, deadly at worst.
Instead of practicing compassion, politics prompts us to outsource our compassion to distant capitals.
Instead of being personally responsible, politics asks that we ship off our responsibilities to algorithmic tax and transfer schemes.
Instead of figuring out how to improve our lives, politics invites us to belly up to a trough of stolen goods.
Instead of facing our fears and addressing our community’s needs, we imagine that faceless bureaucracies are somehow protective daddies and caring mommies.
Instead of setting up good institutions for production and trade, politicians horse-trade with other people’s money.
Instead of creating value or sustainably serving others, politics legitimizes the expropriation of the productive classes.
Instead of doing good in person, politics prompts us to seem good online.
Instead of joining with our neighbors in solidarity or community, politics pushes people to engage in partisan warfare.
Politics offers little moral good, whatever your partisan affiliation, so most people consider it a necessary evil. However, we must consider the possibility that it’s just plain evil.
Persuasion or Compulsion Redux
We’ve argued that if you want someone to act, there are only two ways: persuasion and compulsion. At some level, persuasion is the language of morality, and compulsion is the language of politics.
“You ought to do X” is designed to persuade you. “You must do X, or else…” is a threat of violence, even if it’s encoded. As Yale law professor Stephen L. Carter reminds us:
“Law professors and lawyers instinctively shy away from considering the problem of law’s violence. Every law is violent. We try not to think about this, but we should. On the first day of law school, I tell my Contracts students never to argue for invoking the power of law except in a cause for which they are willing to kill.”
Carter’s admonition should extend well beyond lawyers. We must all be reminded that politics is inherently violent.
Politics and morality are what you might call overlapping magisteria. That is to say, each domain has certain qualities that make it distinct, but there are — or at least should be — important areas of overlap. More specifically, politics needs more morality, though it’s unclear that morality needs more politics.
Indeed, I am committed to a doctrine that includes minimizing politics to the greatest extent possible.
Why would anyone support such a doctrine?
Said simply: To engage in politics is to deal in the currency of threat. Therefore, it’s not hard to imagine how the world might be better for any given person if more human community members chose persuasive over compulsory means. The Vedics call this ahimsa, or nonviolence. We should always seek nonviolence, whether in our individual thoughts, words, and deeds or in architecting our governance systems.
It is the prime moral teaching.
So, I’m coming around to the view that market liberals have placed far too much emphasis on politics, policy, and punditry. It is time to emphasize morality, meaning, and mind control.
Morality, Meaning, and Mind Control
Morality is the discipline of being good. I believe that, at the most fundamental level, being good starts with a commitment to nonviolence. We should add the conscious, continuous practice of integrity, compassion, toleration, stewardship, and rationality upon that foundation. Perhaps there are more, but these six will take us very far. One might go as far as to say that if we could start a cult of these six spheres and make everyone a convert, we’d be far closer to heaven on earth than whatever image burns in the minds of ideologues.
Meaning is the stuff of life. It’s why we are engaged in our various pursuits, and it is how we see ourselves figuring into the bigger picture. When we reflect on our own lives, perhaps through the lens of the septem circumstantiae (who, what, where, when, how, and why), we can contextualize ourselves along several dimensions. In other words, by answering these questions about herself in silent reflection, she forms a certain picture of herself and her place in the world. While such an exercise is mostly subjective, it can confer meaning. Absent an individual search for meaning, one can feel cut adrift or become susceptible to groupthink and submission instincts.
Mind Control sounds nefarious, but I’m using the phrase in the literal sense. Specifically, I refer to our ability to control our emotions and behavior. We seek mastery in self-possession, that is, in equipoise. And through practice, we can expand that self-possession to grow and develop as moral beings. In a world saturated with victimhood narratives and sorry excuses for everything, there is little left to enlighten, ennoble, or inspire.
Part of the liberal project, then, must be to remind every person that she needn’t be a victim of systemic or structural anything. She is self-possessed–an agent capable of architecting meaning, practicing morality, and inspiring others to do the same. The more the rest of us engage in morality, meaning, and mind control, the fewer will look to politics for their place.
Then, she will add more of the best defense against the world’s violence as if washing her hair in a placid pool.
Prepare yourself. Anneal your spirit.
