What is Liberalism? (or a history of Western thought)

Liberalism is our enemy and it is important to understand one's enemy.  Unfortunately, some traditionalists who have good values misunderstand liberalism.  To understand liberalism, one must look at the history of Western thought.

Judaism can be best understood by reading the Old Testament.  The God of the Old Testament is simply the God of the Jews.  This God isn't really much of a God for anyone else, and as such, this God is a tribal/community God.  The tribal thinking that was standard at this time (the time of the Old Testament) is quite alien for the modern Western mind.  Tribal loyalty was very strong and most thought was about what is best for one's tribe.  No one worried about humanity in general, neither about how they lived nor what they believed.

The Ancient Greeks arose in this tribal tradition.  The Athenians were highly intellectual and were interested in truth.  The Sophists were great thinkers who thought of many ways of viewing the world.  The dominant view was relativistic as expressed by Protagoras who said that man is the measure of all things.  This view fits with the tribal view where each tribe holds their own beliefs and values.  Plato rejected this view and advocated absolute universal objective truth as embodied by his concept of the universal form.  It is doubtful that Socrates shared Plato's view, based on Xenophon's writings about Socrates.  It is more likely that Plato simply put his words in Socrates' mouth since Socrates was respected and died for his beliefs.  Plato was an excellent writer and his views became dominant and were spread through Alexander's conquests to a large area.

Christ appears to have primarily been a Jewish reformer.  Modern Christianity was essentially founded by Paul.  The relationship between Paul and Christ is remarkably similar to the relationship between Plato and Socrates.  Just as Plato used Socrates as a vehicle for expressing his beliefs and took advantage of the respect that Socrates had as a martyr, so did Paul use Christ as a vehicle for expressing his beliefs and took advantage of the respect that Christ had as a martyr.  Paul developed his version of Christianity in the most Greek part of the Roman Empire, and that was the part most heavily influenced by the beliefs of Plato.  So Paul fused the Jewish idea of one God with the Platonic idea of absolute universal truth to create one absolute universal God. And this is the core of Christianity.

It is common in history that once a civilization becomes successful, the respect for the Gods of that civilization declines.  Once the people are wealthy and sated, they feel little need to make personal sacrifice for their Gods, their community, or anyone else.  This happened in both Athens and Rome.  It also happened in our culture, and we call this liberalism.  Liberalism is Christianity minus God.  The liberals still retain Plato's ideas of the absolute and universal, and they retain the Jewish ideas about moralizing.  But while Christians place God at the center of absolute universal truth and morality, liberals place people in this position.  In order to remove God, they have reassigned the characteristics of God to people.  Liberals are as evangelical as any Christian because they have faith in their beliefs and since they take their beliefs to be absolute and universal, they want to spread these beliefs to everyone.  Christians have humility because they place themselves below God and so the only truth that they are sure of is the belief in God himself, all other truths being only certain in the mind of God.  But liberals have no humility and believe that they are the ultimate authority on all questions of truth and morality for all of mankind.  This is why liberals are so intolerant.  This is also why liberals are such advocates of powerful central governments, because this allows their liberal truths and morals to be forced down the throats of large populations.

Some modern liberal philosophers call themselves "relativists".  Liberals are fond of misusing terms, and this is yet another example.  The liberal "relativists" say that because truth and morality are relative and subjective, no one point of view is superior to another in an objective sense.  And then they use this to attack all truths and morals that differ from their own.  (Note that liberals get quite indignant when their truths or morals are violated, but then consistency has never been strong point for liberals.)  Of course the fallacy here is that a real relativist (like me) doesn't believe there is an "objective sense" to begin with.  The statement that all beliefs are equal is, in itself, and absolutist/universal/objective statement, and as such contradicts relativism.

As a relativist, I am quite passionate about my beliefs and morals, but, as a relativist, I have no desire to impose my views on all of humanity.  All I want is a community that shares my values so that I, and my descendants, can live happily there.  The greatest enemy to my goal is clearly liberalism.

Reading your dust-up with the atheist and reading this link again reminded me that Thomas Sowell wrote a book on a similar theme, trying to differentiate between liberals and conservatives:
A Conflict of Visions.

Conservatives, particularly religious ones, have no humility and believe that their actions are sanctioned by God himself.  This, curiously, despite that fact that religious conservatives can't seem to agree on God's laws.  Each individual Christian has absolute faith that his or her particular version of morality is the one and only correct version, bestowed upon him by divine revelation and under no circumstances open to question or revision.
That is the ultimate arrogance, and is what leads to rampant intollerance among conservatives.
Liberals, particularly atheist ones, believe that we as groups and communities create our own standards.  We reap the benefits of the laws and principles we uphold, as well as suffer the consequences of our mistakes.  We are then free to change are societies for the better through iterations of revisions of our laws and principles.  That is what has fueled ever increasing prosperity, freedom, and tolerance throughout that past 2000 years.  Virtually all of it achieved in spite of conservative attitudes that sought to retain the status quo.

The god(s) of a society embody its morality.  When people of a culture study their god(s), they are effectively studying the moral traditions that made that society successful.  When people abandon their god(s), they also abandon traditions and morality.  In all of history, societies always went into decay after they abandoned their traditional god(s).  This happened to the Greeks and Romans.  The Old Testament chronicles how this happened to the Jews of Israel/Judah.  And this is happening today with liberalism.  Liberalism only fully expressed itself in the 1960s and I highly doubt that Western culture will survive a full century from then.

The gods of a society to not embody its morality.
mLiberalism did not "fully express itself" in the 1960s.  Cultures, all cultures, have become progressively more liberal over the last 2000 years, even as they have grown progressively more enlightened.  Unless you can provide some measuring stick for liberalism, its ridiculous to claim that it maxed out 40 years ago.

No idea what is going on with my keyboard....

The gods of society do not embody its morality.
The gods of society reflect its morality, and belief in these gods is no more a requirement for morality than one's presence in front of a mirror is a requirement for existence.

Why don't you define liberalism?  Then compare the liberalism of Hellenic Alexandria or the Roman Empire to England in the 1500s.  Actually, you could compare the liberalism of any conquered empire in history with that of its conquerors.  The conquered empire is almost invariably liberal while the conquerors are conservative.

TByte wrote

The gods of a society to not embody its morality.
mLiberalism did not "fully express itself" in the 1960s.  Cultures, all cultures, have become progressively more liberal over the last 2000 years, even as they have grown progressively more enlightened.  Unless you can provide some measuring stick for liberalism, its ridiculous to claim that it maxed out 40 years ago.

Societies alternate between trustee, domestic and atomistic cultures. This was explained in Family and Civilization. Society is not a linear hockey stick towards liberalism. Trustee societies are regulated by bloodlines, domestic societies are regulated by religions, atomistic societies are free for all's that have no unifying regulation mechanism. A liberal society is an atomistic society. Atomistic societies throughout history have lead to a specific set of traits, which weaken them against trustee societies. Among these traits are lower birth rate and no communal bonds. Trustee cultures will slowly erode America from the inside. Gangs are one amongst many examples of growing trustee cultures.

I'm satisfied with Wikipedia's definition:
"Liberalism (from the Latin liberalis, "of freedom") is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights."
There is ample evidence that societies have trended towards greater freedoms, liberties, and equal rights for their citizens throughout history.  Note drealm, that I said "trended".  This does not imply linear progression, so please read more carefully before posting responses.  (Not the first time I've asked you that....)
By the standard above, the 1960s did not "fully express liberalism".  We as a country, and the world in general, have greater liberties and rights than we had in the 1960s.
Regarding conquered empires being almost invariably liberal while conquerors are conservative, you'd have to show some hard statistics to support that.  You'd also need to account for the fact that conservative societies are more militaristic and liberal societies are less likely to engage in warfare as a means to settle disputes.  Liberal societies "conquer" economically and socially, rather than militaristically.  If one uses the simple evolutionary standard of success, liberalism has been conquering conservativism on a grand scale for thousands of years.

TByte wrote

There is ample evidence that societies have trended towards greater freedoms, liberties, and equal rights for their citizens throughout history.  Note drealm, that I said "trended".  This does not imply linear progression, so please read more carefully before posting responses.  (Not the first time I've asked you that....)

The quote is directly above, you did not say "trended" - you originally said "progressively". But if you're not implying that all societies stop at liberalism as a final stage, then we have no disagreement. Because as I said before, liberal societies are regularly overthrown are hollowed out by trustee bloodline societies. Societies are continually shifting up and down, there's no fixed point on a circle.

TByte wrote

You'd also need to account for the fact that conservative societies are more militaristic and liberal societies are less likely to engage in warfare as a means to settle disputes.  Liberal societies "conquer" economically and socially, rather than militaristically.  If one uses the simple evolutionary standard of success, liberalism has been conquering conservativism on a grand scale for thousands of years.

You diagnosed the symptom, but missed the attribution. Military's require high birth rates. Conservative societies have positive birth rates, while liberal societies often have replacement or negative birth rates.

It's true free markets are more associated with liberal societies. And free markets do conquer non-free markets. However both fiscal and social policy are intertwined. Eventually a bad social policy will lead to a less free market fiscal policy. Or worse a bad social policy will make a good fiscal policy irrelevant. So liberal societies can't count on their free-market fiscal policies forever. In the long run social policy leaves a bigger impact on culture than fiscal policy. Also western society has little impact on the rest of the world culturally. American's aren't immigrating abroad. It's the opposite, immigrants are coming to America. And when they come, they form cultural enclaves. These enclaves hollow out American culture.

No matter how often you assert that liberalism is a corrosive and damaging force on society, you're still left unable to explain the correlation between liberal advances and societal advances over the last 1000 years.
Liberal = advancement.
Conservative = stagnation.
Reactionary = regression.

TByte wrote

I'm satisfied with Wikipedia's definition:
"Liberalism (from the Latin liberalis, "of freedom") is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights."

I'm not.  This definition is about a century out of date.  Liberalism has become a synonym for "Progressivism" which Wikipedia defines as:

"Progressivism is a political attitude favoring or advocating changes or reform through governmental action. Progressivism is often viewed by some conservatives, constitutionalists, and libertarians to be in opposition to conservative or reactionary ideologies."

It is true that in some other countries the word "liberal" still has some of its old meaning.  But not in America where it is identical to "progressive".  I am sympathetic to old liberalism but not to progressivism.

Obviously it's pointless to debate if one doesn't agree on the meaning of words.

Maybe we should call it progressivism then, since liberalism is such a confusing term.

fschmidt wrote

Liberalism is our enemy and it is important to understand one's enemy.

fschmidt wrote

I am sympathetic to old liberalism but not to progressivism.

Huh?

fschmidt wrote

Obviously it's pointless to debate if one doesn't agree on the meaning of words.

Right.  Let me know when you get that figured out then.