St. Maximos' Hut

In cleaning up some old emails, I found a link that led me to a post by James Bennett, author of the fascinating book, The Anglosphere Challenge, with some interesting comments on the idea of a Captive Nations day for Islamic populations under the heel of "corrupt kleptocrats and failed ideologues."

Max Borders has an excellent article on TCS on equality that concludes with this gem:

Liberal Societies and Stone Age Baggage


So what does all this mean for a truly liberal society? A society of freedom, private property, and markets? Of complexity, pluralism, and personal responsibility?


It means we are likely to remain in a protracted struggle against Paleolithic instincts -- which, of course, translate into the zigzag of everyday politics. None of this is to argue that guilt, envy, or indignation are emotions we would always be better off without in contemporary Western society. But I would suggest that we'd all be better off localizing these urges in the confines of family and community. And we should continually ask ourselves in precisely what contexts these emotions are appropriate.


Given the tremendous good that is brought about by self-interested market exchange, it seems we'll have to teach ourselves time-and-again the intellectual lessons of prosperity in a complex economic order. We will also have to fight turf wars with those who think the sentiments of Stone Age Trinity can be wrapped up in intellectual claptrap (like Marxism), force fed to our students in the ivory towers, sold to us on the evening news, or foisted upon us inside marble domes.