Liberty of Thought
Jim Geraghty at The Kerry Spot posts some of the e-mails he has received about the Terri Schiavo case. He notes that, after posting several e-mails from conservatives opposed to what has become the Republican orthodoxy in the case, other conservatives suggested he was being "Moby-ed", that those challenging the orthodoxy were not really conservatives, but liberal in disguise, or maybe just RINOs. To his credit, Jim says he doesn't think so. Still, he refers to us as "disgruntled" conservatives. Charles Johnson at LGF has noted the same problem.
This post is not to rehash the merits of the Schiavo issue. That has been endlessly debated elsewhere. Suffice it to say, I am opposed to the actions Congress has taken, and I have respect for the difficult decisions which the Florida court has been forced to make.
I post today about liberty, the liberty of thought. I post in protest of the idea that I must defend myself as a true Republican or a real conservative simply because my opinion differs from that of Hugh Hewitt, Michelle Malkin, PoliPundit, and all the others. These are good people, incisive thinkers, and I agree with them so often, and on so many issues. But they are not always right. And if we are to be a party and a movement which values truth above all else, we must be free to debate even the deepest and thorniest issues without fear of being shunned when we disagree.
I’m for life. I’m against abortion. I’m against euthanasia. But I’m also against continuing to force feed a body whose mind and soul have left it. Now, whether Terri Schiavo’s mind and soul have left is obviously something where there are differences of opinion. But differences of opinion over questions of fact should not be assumed (as so many on the right have done of their critics) to be differences of opinion over ideology. That I accept the court's findings of fact does not mean that I am in favor of euthanasia, assisted suicide, or the mass killing of the useless and functionless. At the moment, it feels most of the right believes that it does.
This is a difficult issue, and even among those who wish to overturn the Florida court's decisions, there are differences of opinion. Some say that removing the feeding tube, even if that's what Terri would truly want, would be assisted suicide. Others use the term "murder". Those positions are fundamentally opposed to those who say that Terri's wishes should be respected, but only if there were a living will. But murder and assisted suicide are wrong whether the dying person agrees or not. Those who use the most exterme terms, then, believe that those in favor of living wills are wrong. Both positions can be rationally supported, but they contradict each other. Which side is the orthodox opinion? For now, they are united because they share a common goal. What will happen after Terri dies and actual legislation is on the table? Who will be orthodox then?
Whatever solution is ultimately crafted, those in leadership in the conservative movement and the Republican party must realize that this is an intensely personal issue to most people. Like many deeply personal issues, beliefs here do not break easily into left and right, Republican and Democrat. For every person who viewed an evil Michael, there was someone who saw selfish parents who couldn’t let go of their daughter who had long since departed. For every person who thinks life should be forced to prolong at all costs, strapped to the bed regardless of human liberty, there are many who feel that difficult decisions such as these should be left to the families and, if they cannot agree, to the courts rather than to politicians.
As conservatives, we believe in liberty, and we believe in liberty of thought and speech above all else (for are we not willing to sacrifice life in war and as Christian martyrs to protect our own liberty and bring it to others?). We must respect, then, liberty of thought within our own ranks.
Do not demonize (or force to prove our loyalty) intelligent people of good will who happen to have strong feelings opposite from the orthodoxy. Do not assume that we share different beliefs simply because we differ in how we apply those beliefs to a particular case. In the words of my namesake, different men often see the same subject in different lights.
This is right, and it is also pragmatic. For myself, I will remain a Republican, because that is who I am, and my views overlap with Republican beliefs much more often than not. But no political party will ever reflect all of the views of all of its members all of the time. In picking our party, we all must decide which party’s positions our views overlap with most of the time. We lose elections when we are divided, but we lose core members and threaten schism when our tests of loyalty are too strict, and set by too few. Look at what has happened to the Democrats since they marginalized or ran off the Zell Millers and Joseph Liebermans of their party.
So I will remain a Republican, and I will speak to how I see the truth, popular or not among the conservative powers. But others may not be so loyal. They may decide that a party and a movement which labels them as supporters of murder and euthanasia when they disagree with the orthodoxy has deprived them of their liberty of thought, and they may find another home.
This post is not to rehash the merits of the Schiavo issue. That has been endlessly debated elsewhere. Suffice it to say, I am opposed to the actions Congress has taken, and I have respect for the difficult decisions which the Florida court has been forced to make.
I post today about liberty, the liberty of thought. I post in protest of the idea that I must defend myself as a true Republican or a real conservative simply because my opinion differs from that of Hugh Hewitt, Michelle Malkin, PoliPundit, and all the others. These are good people, incisive thinkers, and I agree with them so often, and on so many issues. But they are not always right. And if we are to be a party and a movement which values truth above all else, we must be free to debate even the deepest and thorniest issues without fear of being shunned when we disagree.
I’m for life. I’m against abortion. I’m against euthanasia. But I’m also against continuing to force feed a body whose mind and soul have left it. Now, whether Terri Schiavo’s mind and soul have left is obviously something where there are differences of opinion. But differences of opinion over questions of fact should not be assumed (as so many on the right have done of their critics) to be differences of opinion over ideology. That I accept the court's findings of fact does not mean that I am in favor of euthanasia, assisted suicide, or the mass killing of the useless and functionless. At the moment, it feels most of the right believes that it does.
This is a difficult issue, and even among those who wish to overturn the Florida court's decisions, there are differences of opinion. Some say that removing the feeding tube, even if that's what Terri would truly want, would be assisted suicide. Others use the term "murder". Those positions are fundamentally opposed to those who say that Terri's wishes should be respected, but only if there were a living will. But murder and assisted suicide are wrong whether the dying person agrees or not. Those who use the most exterme terms, then, believe that those in favor of living wills are wrong. Both positions can be rationally supported, but they contradict each other. Which side is the orthodox opinion? For now, they are united because they share a common goal. What will happen after Terri dies and actual legislation is on the table? Who will be orthodox then?
Whatever solution is ultimately crafted, those in leadership in the conservative movement and the Republican party must realize that this is an intensely personal issue to most people. Like many deeply personal issues, beliefs here do not break easily into left and right, Republican and Democrat. For every person who viewed an evil Michael, there was someone who saw selfish parents who couldn’t let go of their daughter who had long since departed. For every person who thinks life should be forced to prolong at all costs, strapped to the bed regardless of human liberty, there are many who feel that difficult decisions such as these should be left to the families and, if they cannot agree, to the courts rather than to politicians.
As conservatives, we believe in liberty, and we believe in liberty of thought and speech above all else (for are we not willing to sacrifice life in war and as Christian martyrs to protect our own liberty and bring it to others?). We must respect, then, liberty of thought within our own ranks.
Do not demonize (or force to prove our loyalty) intelligent people of good will who happen to have strong feelings opposite from the orthodoxy. Do not assume that we share different beliefs simply because we differ in how we apply those beliefs to a particular case. In the words of my namesake, different men often see the same subject in different lights.
This is right, and it is also pragmatic. For myself, I will remain a Republican, because that is who I am, and my views overlap with Republican beliefs much more often than not. But no political party will ever reflect all of the views of all of its members all of the time. In picking our party, we all must decide which party’s positions our views overlap with most of the time. We lose elections when we are divided, but we lose core members and threaten schism when our tests of loyalty are too strict, and set by too few. Look at what has happened to the Democrats since they marginalized or ran off the Zell Millers and Joseph Liebermans of their party.
So I will remain a Republican, and I will speak to how I see the truth, popular or not among the conservative powers. But others may not be so loyal. They may decide that a party and a movement which labels them as supporters of murder and euthanasia when they disagree with the orthodoxy has deprived them of their liberty of thought, and they may find another home.
2 Comments:
Patrick,
How would you distinguish between Republicans who are "disgruntled" on this, or another, issue and those who truly appear not to be Republican at all. Sen. Specter and Sen. Jeffords (before the switch) come to mind.
SouthernGent,
That's the hard part, of course. My solution is to focus as much as possible on the merits of particular issues, rather than on labelling individuals. I agree with President Bush and disagree with a lot of conservative bloggers on the immigration issue, for example, but that doesn't make any of us less "conservative", in my mind. And it's good to have a debate about what the "conservative" position on immigration ought to be.
So then the issue with Sen. Specter is, not whether he is a "conservative" or not, but whether he was the right person to handle the judiciary committee at this point in time.
Any political movement is a tent, containing people with vary believes. I want a big tent, but not so big that it has no meaning. I have no supreme wisdom about exactly how big that is.
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