Great read. In the abstract, I view fusionism much the same way that I do, say, the economic prescriptions o( Friedman (e.g. Capitalism & Freedom, monetarism), or the sociopolitical commentaries of Thatcher (“there is no such thing as society” and so forth) - an impactful set of principles and ideas, tuned for the context in which they were delivered, but not to be merely copied or resurrected for a very different world (or have their shortcomings ignored). If anything, it’s a disservice to the legacy of the great conservative intellectuals of the 20th century to simply try and revive their ideas as zombie fusionism.
(I say this as someone who still sometimes calls himself a “first-generation neoconservative”, so… take my prescriptions as you will)
Nonetheless, I still liked Slade’s book. If for nothing else, it might get a few people to read more about the rich history of conservative intellectualism in the United States, which I can always appreciate.
Also:
“And apparently I’ve transmitted that love across generations, because the art here is actually a copy of the famous Meyer photograph, done in art class by one of my sons. He’s a fan too.”
You are right that these thinkers, as abstracted from Republican politics, were thoughtful, mildly alarmist, very much worth reading. Plenty of conservatives were outragted by the high divorce rates in the 1930s, 40s, and beyond. If, however, we think instead of "Reaganism"--and I was a young enthusiast--it was a disaster for the social conservatives and should be a lesson for us. He brought us terrible, awful, results that only the "extreme" warned us about. I remember at my first March for Life, in 1983, hearing some of the crabby pro-life people complaining about "lip service," and I thought they were needlessly gloomy, and adversarial. They were right in many ways: Reagan, the godfather of no-fault-divorce and lax abortion laws in California, was not a reliable friend. The Reagan years got us tax cuts, deregulation, sound money, big defense buildup, victory in the Cold War...and Casey and then Obergefell, courtesy of his appointments that upheld and accelerated the anti-family policies that Reagan had championed. What was in his heart, what did he really hope, intend--I don't know, but the results speak for themselves.
Is there any country in the West that has not seen similar trends? I don’t think we can blame Reagan for the sexual revolution and its aftermath; that was pretty well baked into the twentieth century cake. Not saying he was perfect, or that we shouldn’t criticize him, but seeing the Reaganites as the problem just doesn’t make much sense.
I don’t know about “mildly.” They were extremely alarmist.
After WWII, there was really no country truly independent of our cultural dominance. Impossible to do some true comparison. If America had become more religious, socially conservative, the rest of the world would have followed. And as for the culture v. law--now that I'm teaching family law I see again and again the judiciary's obnovious role in accelerating rather than moderating vicious trends. Roe was the worst example, but many other instances. No-fault divorce was a violent revolution, not just stuff that happened.
A heavy partisan of team “sexual revolution destroyed Christendom” I see. As I’ve mentioned before, I think that’s far too monocausal, and I suspect you’re attributing way too much causal power to American courts (to unravel the social fabric of the entire world?). But, I don’t deny that it’s somewhere in the mix and I certainly believe that some jurists and legal theorists were zealous about pressing for social changes.
Great read. In the abstract, I view fusionism much the same way that I do, say, the economic prescriptions o( Friedman (e.g. Capitalism & Freedom, monetarism), or the sociopolitical commentaries of Thatcher (“there is no such thing as society” and so forth) - an impactful set of principles and ideas, tuned for the context in which they were delivered, but not to be merely copied or resurrected for a very different world (or have their shortcomings ignored). If anything, it’s a disservice to the legacy of the great conservative intellectuals of the 20th century to simply try and revive their ideas as zombie fusionism.
(I say this as someone who still sometimes calls himself a “first-generation neoconservative”, so… take my prescriptions as you will)
Nonetheless, I still liked Slade’s book. If for nothing else, it might get a few people to read more about the rich history of conservative intellectualism in the United States, which I can always appreciate.
Also:
“And apparently I’ve transmitted that love across generations, because the art here is actually a copy of the famous Meyer photograph, done in art class by one of my sons. He’s a fan too.”
Adorable. Good recreation, too!
You are right that these thinkers, as abstracted from Republican politics, were thoughtful, mildly alarmist, very much worth reading. Plenty of conservatives were outragted by the high divorce rates in the 1930s, 40s, and beyond. If, however, we think instead of "Reaganism"--and I was a young enthusiast--it was a disaster for the social conservatives and should be a lesson for us. He brought us terrible, awful, results that only the "extreme" warned us about. I remember at my first March for Life, in 1983, hearing some of the crabby pro-life people complaining about "lip service," and I thought they were needlessly gloomy, and adversarial. They were right in many ways: Reagan, the godfather of no-fault-divorce and lax abortion laws in California, was not a reliable friend. The Reagan years got us tax cuts, deregulation, sound money, big defense buildup, victory in the Cold War...and Casey and then Obergefell, courtesy of his appointments that upheld and accelerated the anti-family policies that Reagan had championed. What was in his heart, what did he really hope, intend--I don't know, but the results speak for themselves.
Is there any country in the West that has not seen similar trends? I don’t think we can blame Reagan for the sexual revolution and its aftermath; that was pretty well baked into the twentieth century cake. Not saying he was perfect, or that we shouldn’t criticize him, but seeing the Reaganites as the problem just doesn’t make much sense.
I don’t know about “mildly.” They were extremely alarmist.
After WWII, there was really no country truly independent of our cultural dominance. Impossible to do some true comparison. If America had become more religious, socially conservative, the rest of the world would have followed. And as for the culture v. law--now that I'm teaching family law I see again and again the judiciary's obnovious role in accelerating rather than moderating vicious trends. Roe was the worst example, but many other instances. No-fault divorce was a violent revolution, not just stuff that happened.
A heavy partisan of team “sexual revolution destroyed Christendom” I see. As I’ve mentioned before, I think that’s far too monocausal, and I suspect you’re attributing way too much causal power to American courts (to unravel the social fabric of the entire world?). But, I don’t deny that it’s somewhere in the mix and I certainly believe that some jurists and legal theorists were zealous about pressing for social changes.