{"id":5314,"date":"2017-08-22T16:58:47","date_gmt":"2017-08-22T16:58:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/08\/22\/more-on-dreher-vs-buchanan-on-all-men-are-created-equal\/"},"modified":"2017-08-22T16:58:47","modified_gmt":"2017-08-22T16:58:47","slug":"more-on-dreher-vs-buchanan-on-all-men-are-created-equal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/2017\/08\/22\/more-on-dreher-vs-buchanan-on-all-men-are-created-equal\/","title":{"rendered":"More on Dreher vs Buchanan on “All Men are Created Equal” and White Supremacy"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dr. Patrick Toner<\/a> comments and I respond in blue:<\/span><\/p>\n

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Your piece<\/a> on Dreher and Buchanan accepts Dreher's overall reading (or misreading, as I see it) of Buchanan's argument — you seem to accept that Buchanan actually means to somehow call into doubt the metaphysical doctrine of the equality of men.  This seems clearly wrong to me.  <\/span><\/div>\n
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But before coming to that point, I want to check with you about another thing, namely, Dreher's accusation that Buchanan is openly endorsing white supremacy in his essay.  Things you've said elsewhere about the failure to define terms such as "white supremacy" make me hesitant to actually ascribe to you the belief that Buchanan is a white supremacist, but if that's right–if you aren't<\/em> accepting the white supremacy charge–at any rate nothing in Sunday's piece makes that explicit.  And when you end your piece by talking about Buchanan "apparently repudiating" the doctrine of equality, there is at least a hint that you're willing to accept the charge.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
BV: Thank you for these fine comments, Patrick. As a philosopher you understand the importance of defining terms. And yet you haven't offered us a definition of 'white supremacist.' Absent a definition, we cannot reasonably discuss whether or not Pitchfork Pat is a white supremacist, and whether the white supremacy charge is clearly bunk as you claim it is.<\/span><\/div>\n
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We could mean different things by the phrase 'white supremacist' and cognates.  I hope you will agree with me, however, that the phrase is actually used by most people emotively as a sort of semantic bludgeon or verbal cudgel for purely polemical purposes in much the same way that 'racist,' 'Islamophobe,' 'fascist,' and other emotive epithets are used.  On this usage, no morally decent and well-informed person could be a white supremacist.  The implication is that a white supremacist is a bigot, i.e., an unreasonably intolerant person who hates others just because they are different. It is a term of very serious disapprobation.<\/span><\/div>\n
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I would guess that you understand 'white supremacist' in something very close to this sense — which is why you take umbrage at Dreher's claim that Buchanan is a white supremacist. Bear in mind that that is Dreher's<\/em> claim. I don't make it. My point of agreement with Dreher is solely on the question of the meaning of "All men are created equal."  It is spectacularly clear that, in the piece in question, Buchanan shows a lack of understanding of the meaning of the sentence.  Buchanan reads it as an empirical claim subject to falsification by experience.  It is not, as I explain in my parent post. Here again is what he wrote:<\/span><\/div>\n
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\u201cAll men are created equal\u201d is an ideological statement. Where is the scientific or historic proof for it? Are we building our utopia on a sandpile of ideology and hope?<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
I was really surprised when I read that. It occurred to me that it might just be a slip occasioned by old age, anger at recent developments, or too much Irish whisky.<\/span><\/div>\n
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Now consider the following candidate definition of 'white supremacist.'<\/span><\/div>\n
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D1. A white supremacist is one who holds that the culture and civilization produced by whites is, on balance, superior to the cultures and civilizations produced by all other racial groups.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
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One could be a white supremacist in this sense and hold all of the following: (a) Slavery is a grave moral evil; (b) All men are created equal in the sense I explained; (c) No citizen should be excluded from the franchise because of race; (d) No citizen should be excluded from holding public office because of race; (e) All citizens regardless of race are equal before the law.<\/span><\/div>\n
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Buchanan might well be a white supremacist in the (D1)-sense.  Here is a bit of evidence: "Was not the British Empire, one of the great civilizing forces in human history, a manifestation of British racial superiority?"  Buchanan is not saying that the Brits merely thought themselves to be<\/em> racially superior but that they really were.<\/span> <\/span><\/div>\n
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I think the white supremacy charge is clearly bunk–or at any rate, I'll say this: nothing<\/em> in that particular column of Buchanan's can reasonably support a charge of white supremacy.  And I don't say that on the basis that "white supremacy" hasn't been adequately defined, or any other such technicality.  I just mean it should be clear that Buchanan's point is not <\/em>to endorse white supremacy, but simply to point out that if that charge applies to Lee and co, then it applies to Washington and Jefferson and co, and indeed then we need to throw out the whole western culture that gave us<\/em> the metaphysical doctrine of equality.  <\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
BV: Again, unless you tell us what you mean by 'white supremacy,' there is no way to evaluate what you are saying. The matter of definition is not a mere technicality; it is crucial. I sketched two senses of 'white supremacist,' the 'semantic bludgeon' sense and (D1).  Now I agree that Buchanan is not a white supremacist in the first sense, but it looks like he is in the second.  So I totally reject your claim that "nothing<\/em> in that particular column of Buchanan's can reasonably support a charge of white supremacy." <\/span><\/div>\n
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You are also failing to appreciate that, just like an alt-righty, he shows no understanding of "All men are created equal." He is clearly giving it an empirical sense. That's blindingly obvious. Now I am going just on this one column. Perhaps in other works he says something intelligent on this point.  This is why Dreher is right against Buchanan despite the former's over-the-top rhetoric.<\/span><\/div>\n
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And then on to the next point: having thrown out the grounding upon which that doctrine stands, upon what<\/em> shall we build our egalitarian utopia?  We can't re-establish the equality doctrine on some universally-acceptable empirical ground!  Buchanan doesn't doubt the equality doctrine: he points out that the iconoclasts seeking to build their new world on it, have no basis upon which to rationally accept it.  It's not a new or brilliant claim–it's pretty standard and obvious, I'd have thought.<\/span><\/div>\n
 <\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
BV: I am not quite sure what you are driving at here, but a tripartite distinction may help:<\/span><\/div>\n
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a) The Declaration sentence is empirical but false.<\/span><\/div>\n
b) The Declaration sentence is empirical and true.<\/span><\/div>\n
c)  The Declaration sentence is metaphysical, and thus non-empirical.<\/span><\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
 <\/div>\n
The alt-righties accept (a). The loons on the Left accept (b).  You and I accept (c).  You and I agree that the equality doctrine cannot be built on empirical ground.  I would guess that you and I also agree that if the Declaration sentence is making an empirical claim, then that claim is false.<\/span><\/div>\n
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I wrote this up yesterday in a little blog post<\/a>, and I'm encouraged a bit in my reading (not that, in truth, I doubted it before!) by finding this column<\/a> (not by Buchanan) posted today on Buchanan's website.  <\/span><\/div>\n
Generally, I try to follow the advice of Thoreau, "read not the Times, read the eternities," and so I ignore such issues.  But I do read your blog faithfully, and for some reason–maybe just a lingering respect for Buchanan, who has always struck me as a decent man–you prompted me to read a bit of political ephemera to try to sort it out.  :)  <\/span><\/div>\n
I hope you're doing well!  <\/span><\/div>\n
 <\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n
BV: Thank you, sir.  I think we agree on the main issues, except that I really think it is important to define 'white supremacist' and not bandy it about unclarified.<\/span><\/div>\n
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I too love the Thoreau aphorism (and I'll bet you found it on my site; if not, forgive me my presumption) but I would add that in dangerous times one has to attend to the Times lest our enemies win and make it impossible for us to read the Eternities. Boethius was able to do philosophy in a prison cell, but most of us lesser mortal are not Boethian in this regard.<\/span><\/div>\n
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Keep your powder dry! (May the loons of the Left vex themselves over whether this is some sort of 'dog whistle.' It does have a Pitchfork Pat, "locked and loaded" ring to it.)<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dr. Patrick Toner comments and I respond in blue: Your piece on Dreher and Buchanan accepts Dreher's overall reading (or misreading, as I see it) of Buchanan's argument — you seem to accept that Buchanan actually means to somehow call into doubt the metaphysical doctrine of the equality of men.  This seems clearly wrong to … Continue reading “More on Dreher vs Buchanan on “All Men are Created Equal” and White Supremacy”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,48,16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-race","category-social-and-political-philosophy","category-u-s-constitution"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5314\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maverickphilosopher.blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}