Culture is the Key

I’m a big Gad Saad fan (and not just because he is at Ole Miss now).

In a discussion with Jordan Peterson, Saad noted that there is no limit to people trying to maintain the coherence of their current belief system irrespective to the amount of contrary evidence to which they are exposed. Contradiction triggers discomfort brought about by cognitive dissonance and paradoxically, when exposed to contrary evidence, rather than causing people to rethink their positions, it hardens their defenses.

I get accused of this all the time and honestly, I have alienated friends due to it.

But what people don’t understand about me is that I was taught a long time ago by family, teachers, professors and mentors, that when you take a position, you should be prepared to be wrong - and I am. I don’t dismiss contrary evidence easily or casually, but I do compare it to what I know, have observed and consequently have adopted and practiced - and generally, my life choices, beliefs and behaviors have benefited me personally, and continue to benefit my family and friends.

There are also supernatural beliefs I hold that I cannot logically or empirically explain, but I do see empirical evidence of their results and their value as living and organizing principles. I don’t care if you are Christian or not, but to live by the Golden Rule and the Ten Commandments has legitimate benefits to believers and non-believers alike.

I’m not demanding you live the way I believe but what I am doing is recognizing success. That’s my measuring stick; I measure how things work in practice rather than rely on someone’s theories and predictions of the future.

I’m not always right about everything, sometimes I am right about nothing.

So, if you are confident I am wrong, make your argument.

My granddaddy used to say, “Make sure you are right, then go ahead.” He also said if you aren’t making mistakes, you are likely in a coma or dead.

I do believe I can successfully argue there exist basic principles and values that work, have significant meaning and worth, and are key factors to how we live as individuals, communities, cultures and civilizations.

My arguments never really have been that Western civilization was, is, or ever has been perfect. There is no perfect civilization, and just as the inimitable Thomas Sowell commented that there are no complete economic or political solutions, and there are only trade-offs, the same applies to civilizations.

Maybe Western civilization is the least bad of all, but that still means it is still the best option available.

I happen to believe there are certain sets of behaviors and beliefs that made Western civilization successful. These behaviors and beliefs are embedded in Christianity, free market capitalism, a recognition of the individual as a civilizational unit, the idea of private ownership of property, and the right to defend all the above.

Critics would add other essential ingredients: the Greco-Roman intellectual tradition, scientific inquiry, the rule of law, constitutional government, and the Enlightenment, and I agree, I never meant my starting point to be the endpoint of the thought process.

Christianity and capitalism alone do not fully explain why Western Europe and its offshoots developed differently than other civilizations, but they are undeniably a significant contributor.

Christianity without property rights can become otherworldly and politically passive. Markets without moral constraints can devolve into cronyism or exploitation. Individualism without a shared moral framework can become atomization and social fragmentation. Property rights without legal equality can become oligarchy. The right of self-defense without civic virtue can become lawlessness.

The success of the West may therefore lie less in any single principle than in the tension between them and the balance among them all. This particular combination of beliefs has undeniably produced more freedom, wealth, scientific advancement, and human flourishing than any alternative system yet demonstrated at scale.

While that is a claim that can be debated, it is also one that has considerable historical evidence behind it.

I think we can look to Europe for proof.

By refusing to bend the knee to the EU technocrats in Brussels on allowing mass importation of third world “migrants” with no Western traditions, the people and leadership of countries like Hungary and Poland have been accused of racism, xenophobia, Islamophobia and just about every other phobia and ism that offends the spirit of the age and opposes the current thing.

But these countries are some of the most productive and host the most stable and safe societies. That indicates to me that it isn’t about race, it is – and always has been – about culture.

Still, if I were forced to identify the foundational ideas that most clearly distinguish the civilization that produced constitutional government, modern science, industrial prosperity, and broad political liberty, this is where I would start. Not because the ideas I mentioned have always existed perfectly in practice, but because they established a framework in which individuals could act, create, innovate, worship, own, exchange, and defend what was theirs – and the freedom to be wrong and then to make adjustments.