How to Be a Decent Person With Rational Political Beliefs (Part 1)
If We Can Agree on the Following Principles, We Might Be Able to Actually Improve Our Country
Most people want to improve society so most people hold political beliefs that they think will best accomplish that goal. But, since most people arrive at their beliefs this way, why is there so much ugly political conflict these days?
Shouldn’t people who want to improve society be able to have a civil discussion with each other about their differing beliefs? Seemingly, if their motives are true, they’d actually welcome disagreement because they’d recognize that the only way to be sure of the most beneficial policies is to see if they withstand challenge.
In his essay “Utopia and Violence,” Philosopher Sir Karl Popper defined rationalism like this:
I think I am right, but I may be wrong and you may be right, and in any case let us discuss it, for in this way we are likely to get nearer to a true understanding than if we merely insist that we are right.
Clearly, rationalism ought to be a basic principle of politics. However, more and more often it seems to be cast aside, which is a major reason for the widening political divide in America.
Without recognizing that others could be right, it becomes all too easy to see anyone who disagrees with you as the enemy, bent on destroying society instead of improving it. And if the other side means to destroy society, then everything must be done to defeat them, which is how violence becomes justified.
There are other principles as well that too many people have now forsaken. Without accepting them again, I don’t see much chance today for those on opposite ends of the political spectrum to see each other as decent people, let alone as necessary partners in the political process, which is how we should view each other.
Here are some of the principles I think are the most important, and currently the most forgotten, sometimes by myself even, to be a decent person with rational political beliefs:
Don’t make judgments without evidence:
The legal standard of someone being innocent until proven guilty falls under this broader principle; the most infamous recent example of it being thrown out the window was with the accusations of sexual assault again Brett Kavanaugh. Many decided Kavanaugh was an evil person simply because he’d been accused, even despite the suspiciousness of the allegations, and thoroughly harmed his reputation for it.
Thankfully, this standard of justice was mostly readopted when Joe Biden was similarly accused, but we must continue to remember it, and the broader principle behind it, at all times. The problem of judging any situation without evidence is that it can potentially create a false reality in your mind. If your judgment is wrong, your beliefs won’t align with reality, so your attempts to improve an imagined society will be futile at best while the real problems in society go unaddressed.
Many people engaging in the Black Lives Matter protests of late are expressing their belief that policing needs to be abolished because systemic racism in law enforcement is resulting in black people being killed. The evidence I’ve seen shows that this isn’t the case at all, and those who disagree have yet to provide evidence proving otherwise. The result of some people making this judgment without evidence is their belief that to solve an imaginary problem they must drastically change society in a way that will exacerbate a real problem, crime.
Rational conversations about policy to improve society can only be had when we agree on the society we live in, and to do that we need to look at the evidence. We can and should still have rational conversations when we disagree about reality, but that step has to come before getting into policy choices.
Recognize others’ autonomy and freedom:
This principle isn’t easy to define, but it can best be portrayed as a rejection of cancel culture, a movement, as this article modestly puts it, “to enforce political and social conformism, making political correctness a criterion for employment.” Conformism goes completely against rationalism, which is bad enough in itself, but to link acceptance of your political beliefs to someone else's livelihood is an especially indecent stance to take.
Even if, let’s say, someone holds political beliefs not based on evidence that are counter to your own which are, and therefore you think their beliefs are harmful to society, you have no right to try and harm them back because A) this is still a free country where people can believe what they want, B) no one is the authority on what the correct beliefs are, C) people are innocent until proven guilty when it comes to determining if they’ve harmed society, D) you are not an authorized judge of harm done to society, and E) you are not an authorized distributor of justice.
To decide that you need to ruin someone’s life because they disagree with you is akin to supporting the concept of thoughtcrime, and to decide that you need to ruin someone’s life because you think they’ve harmed society is akin to supporting vigilantism, neither of which will improve society at all. In fact, if your goal really is to improve society, then you’d actually want to convince those who disagree with you of your position; no one’s going to agree with you if you get them fired for disagreeing with you.
Popper presents a good analogy for the problem of cancel culture in his aforementioned essay:
You may not be able to argue with an admirer of violence [conformism]. He has a way of answering an argument with a bullet [cancelation] if he is not kept under control by the threat of counter-violence.
Those who begin the use of cancel culture shouldn't then be surprised if it turns on them because, unfortunately, like violence, the only real way to prevent it is with the threat of retaliation and not rationalism.
Part II will promote further principles such as respect for history…
More on similar topics:
…Let’s heed Jay’s advice and strive for a more unified country, to protect from threats both internal and external…
…education works best when teachers and students experiment to find the best ways to reach their shared goals…
…If an unborn child is a living human being, no one has the right to choose to kill them…
