Fewer Politicians?

I never thought I would agree with a member of The Green Party. But today I do. Eamon Ryan, in today's Irish Times, complains about Fine Gael's campaign posters that urge a "Yes" vote in the referendum to abolish the Seanad. One of the benefits the posters promise is "fewer politians".

Mr. Ryan says: "What populist illness has overcome Fine Gael and Labour whereby the only campaign argument they can muster is that politics is in itself a bad thing? Their only line is that having 30 per cent fewer politicians is by definition good. Where does that argument end? Should we all just bow out and let the Civil Service, judiciary or media take control? Having abolished a whole layer of local democracy and having centralised Government decision-making in a subcommittee of four, they now want rid of the Seanad. I am afraid I don’t trust them with yet more power. I think we should take some back and give the people the power to elect the Seanad."

I think many Irish people would agree that, if they want something done, contacting their local TD or councillor is probably a much better approach than actually trying to deal with the bureacracy of the civil service.

But, even aside from that, this "fewer politicians" business really bothers me. Presumably every minister, TD and councillor in Fine Gael wanted to become a politician-- they weren't press-ganged into it. It was their ambition, perhaps their burning ambition. Now they want to shut the door to other people who want to get into politics-- or, at least, to narrow it. It seems mean-spirited.

Although there are some industries I don't have much tenderness for-- bookmakers, for instance-- I don't understand why anyone would want there to be fewer career options out there. Such a person may claim that Senators, and other professions who are paid from the public purse, are being paid out of our pockets, and that if we didn't have such a burden of public spending, then we would spend our money on other things and that would create more jobs and thus more career choices. This seems suspiciously simplistic to me. I think there are many jobs and careers that simply wouldn't be there at all if it was left to the play of market forces. We might have any amount of computer programmers and management consultants, but next to no museum curators or philosophy lecturers. So even if the only thing the Senate achieved was to employ a few dozen politicians I would be all in favour of retaining it for that reason.

(Reading Anthony Trollope's Barchester novels makes me think the same thing about religion. Of course, I am a Catholic and I believe Catholicism to be true. But I can't help thinking that, if I was an atheist or an agnostic, I would think that having an established church, religious services and a clerical class was a good in itself, well worth the money put into the collection on Sundays, or the support of an occasional raffle. Organized religion fulfils a social role that nothing else can really fill. A society without seems curiously denuded. Clergy are nearly always a cultured and serious-minded class of people. If the same people had to become solicitors or company directors or engineers, they would inevitably become, in general, narrower-minded and duller people.)

The Springs of Socialism

Sometimes I fall into a certain mood in which it is easy to see why someone would be a socialist. By "socialist" I don't just mean a social democrat. I mean a person who thinks that the government should, more or less, take command of all economic activity. I am certainly not a socialist in this sense (or in any other sense), but I do feel a certain sympathy with this way of looking at the world, and I find it hard to understand how somebody would feel no sympathy with it. Never mind that communism has been a disaster wherever it has been tried; I am merely talking about an idea here, not a reality.

I think the appeal of socialism lies in an awareness of the potential of humanity. A human being is the paragon of the animals, the "heir of all the ages" in the words of Tennyson. Even if you are a materialist without any spiritual beliefs, you do at least believe that mankind is matter made self-aware, the universe grown capable of marvelling at itself.

Through the windows of the five senses, the human intellect can, in a sense, become united to all things. It can apprehend history, science, literature, philosophy, mathematics. It can take reality into itself. It can escape from the prison of the self into the boundless country of the actual. In the few years between infancy and death, it can come to some understanding-- how small an understanding, but how immense also!-- of billions of years of cosmic history, and centuries of human civilization, and all the furthest horizons of speculative thought.

How extraordinarily wasteful, then, seem all the activites that drain away this human potential! Human beings pouring their utmost effort into cornering the fizzy drinks market seems, not just ignoble, but a criminal waste of human ingenuity and human attention. Man was born for higher things.

In this mood, it doesn't seem like sinister social engineering for the government and schools and universities to try to root out certain tendencies and instil others. Somebody has to! Somebody has to try to turn people away from gambling, and chat shows, and an obsession with spectator sports, and soap operas, and conspicuous consumption, and all the rubbishy things they spend their precious leisure moments upon. Look at what they're missing! Think of what society could be if all that waste-- all that scrabbling for a living, all that anxiety about medical care and transport and the basic needs of life, all that addiction to stupid activities-- could be cut out, and if people could concentrate on being properly, fully human!

And even if people had to live in smaller apartments, and swap a car for a bus or a bicycle, or even if they had a narrower choice of careers, if they had access to better museums and nature reserves and art galleries and free lectures and safe streets and free hospitals, how could anyone complain about such a sacrifice?

As I say, I have some sympathy with such an attitude, though I don't share it. I understand the perils of paternalism (though a socialist State probably wouldn't call it anything so sexist) and the fact that even the most sincere and talented human beings tend to be untrustworthy when it comes choosing what's best for other people. I know that, though capitalism seems wasteful beyond belief, the planned economy tends to be even more wasteful in practice. I know that our ills are not to be blamed upon an economic system, but upon original sin.

But sometimes, when I pass a billboard for a betting shop, or I see teenagers wearing heavy metal t-shirts, or I flick through the channels on the television and see the utter bilge that is on offer, I momentarily become a redder-than-red Marxist.

(In fairness, I should admit that there are also moments when the openness of our "open society" appears to me, not only as a crucial safeguard against tyranny, but as something sublime and wildly exciting in itself-- when even the very messiness of our uncoordinated, competitive, ideologically-divided, patchwork civilization seems like something inherently good.)

That Good Old, Bad Old Capitalist System

When I was younger, I used to be very left-wing. This is hardly a surprising admission. Most people are very left-wing in their teens, if they spend time thinking about such things at all. One could speculate all day about the reasons for this. Perhaps it is youthful idealism. Perhaps it is because people who have not started upon a career yet don't know where they will end up in the economic pecking order, and so it makes good self-interested sense to support a fair deal for those at the bottom. (Then again, most young people are said to think the world is their oyster and would therefore, one presumes, expect to end up at the top of the pile-- though I certainly never mistook the world for such a shell-fish myself.)

I can remember (and not so very long ago) regularly fantasizing about posing the following disdainful question to some passing business executives: "Have you made anyone redundant today?". In my fantasy, the question was usually followed by a sudden and violent profanity (on my part), which would startle the business-men out of their smug complacency and leave them in no doubt of my disgust for them.

It never occurred to me, back then, that I might as well have asked the question: "Have you created any jobs today?". Where jobs actually came from wasn't something I thought about much.

All the same, I think there is something perfectly natural and healthy in this antipathy towards business, and towards "capitalism". A society couldn't function without money of some kind, and yet money is obscene. It's obscene because it fixes (as it must) a value upon things which should be considered invaluable-- peoples' time, effort, talents, health, peace of mind, and so forth. I find it interesting that Our Lord describes money as "tainted" in the Parable of the Unjust Steward, despite the fact that his discourses are steeped in commercial and monetary imagery.

I think this is a tension we just have to live with-- knowing that capitalism is never going to be "smashed", that trade and commerce are utterly indispensable, that the business-man is a benefactor to the community, while at the same time preserving the teenagers' unreasonable antagonism towards the whole set-up.

I can't see the faintest prospect for the de-commercialization (so to speak) of our society, and certainly I can't afford to sneer at it since I am as much a part of that commercialization as anybody else. But I do think we should preserve a sense of its wrongness, of all the decencies that it outrages.

Faith Communities Have A Right to Have Their Voices Heard on How the World Should Be

That is the headline of an opinion piece by Fr. Patrick Claffey, a theology professor in Trinity College Dublin, in today's Irish Times.

The piece itself is entirely unobjectionable, but the headline makes me grind my teeth. "Faith community?" When did this word slip into currency? I suppose it is an effort to avoid using the term "church", since this rather excludes non-Christian religions. But what on earth is wrong with the noun "religion?". "Faith community" is a wishy-washy word.

But then again, I object to the way the word "community" has been captured, knocked about, dragged through the dust on the back of a donkey cart, and generally abused. Why couldn't we have kept the word "community" to mean a group of people who live in the same place, and share a common life? It has been stretched to mean any group of people whatsoever, rendering it meaningless. Now we have the gay community, the science fiction community, the diabetes community, the Scrabble community.

To my mind, a community is something very specific and very special. It means people who share all the casual, banal experiences of life as well as (possibly) the more intense and purposeful ones; people who hear the same birdsong and building work; who have all seen the eccentric fellow who stands outside the pub shaking everybody's hand; who will all be plunged into darkness if there's a local blackout. A shared interest or a shared plight with somebody who lives on the other side of the world just isn't the same thing. It may be more meaningful, but it's not the same. It's not a community.

Nor do we need to abuse the word "community" in this way. When it comes to Christianity, we have an equally beautiful word to describe the commonality that a Roman Catholic in Palmerstown shares with a Roman Catholic in Peking. That word is communion.

As for the sentiment of the headline, I find myself exasperated by the plea that religious believers "have a right to be heard". Christians should not speak to the world on the ground that they have a right to be heard; they should do so on the grounds that they are right. The "right to be heard" rhetoric suggests that Christians "bring something to the table", possibly a kind of folk wisdom that comes sugared with mythology and allegorical tales, and which will complement the other "voices" in the "conversation". I don't think Christians should be strident or pugnacious, but I do think that the only hearing we deserve is based on the claim that we bear a revelation from God. The more gingerish we are about that, the less the world will want to hear us-- and rightly so.

Why Can't We Condemn Vulgarity as Vulgarity?

The redoubtable David Norris makes a series of smutty witticisms in the Senate, and the victim of his scorn complains about his "sexist and deeply inappropriate language". Why not just condemn his witticisms for what they were-- crude and vulgar? (A man who entitles his biography A Kick Against the Pricks, taking snide refuge in a Biblical allusion, can hardly be expected to be anything else.)

Having said that, I am on his side in this instance. I am all in favour of keeping the Seanad-- although the matter seems trivial indeed compared to the much more weighty controversy that has been embroiling the country in recent months.

One Hundred and Thirty to Twenty Four

The number at the head of this post was the outcome in the Dáil today of the vote on whether to delete the amendment to the creepily-named Protection of Human Life During Pregnancy Bill that allows for abortion in cases where the mother is deemed to be at risk from suicide.

One hundred and thirty of our elected representatives-- deliberately and after months of debate-- voted that one person's mental state should be allowed to determine the life or death of another.

Only twenty four had both the courage and the conviction to vote for the amendment.

This is a shameful day for our country. The Irish people voted for these politicians-- and, in all likelihood, will keep voting for them. It's a nice fantasy that the pro-abortion TD's will all be wiped out at the next election, but it's almost certainly not going to happen.

More Market Romanticism from George Weigel

The man makes lots of sense, except when he starts spouting about the miracles of the free market and the (modified Catholic version of) the prosperity gospel.

Here is a snippet from his latest syndicated column:

And that, from a Catholic social doctrine point of view, is the key to understanding the demise of the post-World War II social welfare state: it’s eroded the moral culture that makes free and responsible citizenship in self-governing democracies possible. Yuval Levin again: “The attempt to rescue the citizen from the burdens of responsibility has undermined the family, self-reliance and self-government”—and it has done this, not from a lack of compassion or resources, but because the social welfare state by its nature creates dependencies that erode the virtues necessary for genuine human flourishing.

Yes, the social welfare system creates dependencies. And bureaucracies. But guess what? Those things are features of modern life anyway. Ask the cubicle slave in a gigantic multinational, the kid doing unpaid work experience because it's the only way to break into his chosen profession, or the woman desperately trying to use her bank's helpline but unable to get past the pre-recorded menu, none of whose options have anything to do with what she wants to ask about.

How about this-- untrammeled commercialism has undermined the family (parents who never see their kids because they're working all hours), self-reliance (how will that look on my CV?) and self-government (give me some more of that addictive Happy Meal NOW!). That seems to make just as much sense to me as Weigel's finger-pointing at government. What about the evils of big business, Mr. Weigel?

People like George Weigel talk as though social welfare is the only thing holding an unemployed man back from marching to the unowned virgin forest ten miles from his home and carving out a plantation for himself. Piffle, pure and simple.

Those who believe the social doctrine of the Church is compatible with neoliberal economics, anarcho-capitalism, or other laissez-faire social philosophies seem to be simply ignoring the actual teachings of the Church to which they belong. Take, for instance, John Paul the Second's enyclical Centesimus Annus, itself drawing on Leo XIII's famous Rerum Novarum, the definitive anti-free market pronouncement of the Church's magisterium:

Rerum novarum is opposed to State control of the means of production, which would reduce every citizen to being a "cog" in the State machine. It is no less forceful in criticizing a concept of the State which completely excludes the economic sector from the State's range of interest and action. There is certainly a legitimate sphere of autonomy in economic life which the State should not enter. The State, however, has the task of determining the juridical framework within which economic affairs are to be conducted, and thus of safeguarding the prerequisites of a free economy, which presumes a certain equality between the parties, such that one party would not be so powerful as practically to reduce the other to subservience.

In this regard, Rerum Novarum points the way to just reforms which can restore dignity to work as the free activity of man. These reforms imply that society and the State will both assume responsibility, especially for protecting the worker from the nightmare of unemployment...

Furthermore, society and the State must ensure wage levels adequate for the maintenance of the worker and his family, including a certain amount for savings...

Finally, "humane" working hours and adequate free-time need to be guaranteed, as well as the right to express one's own personality at the work-place without suffering any affront to one's conscience or personal dignity. This is the place to mention once more the role of trade unions, not only in negotiating contracts, but also as "places" where workers can express themselves. They serve the development of an authentic culture of work and help workers to share in a fully human way in the life of their place of employment.

No mention of social welfare, you might say. But I think you would also agree the whole tone and rhetoric is very different from the "get the Jerry Springer-watching bums off their asses and let the laws of supply and demand do their miraculous work" style language of of market romanticists.

Yes, perhaps my reaction is emotional. But if the champions of the free market (including other Catholics such as Thomas E. Woods and Ireland's own Gerard Casey) ever mentioned the evils of impersonal market forces and the need to balance them with other (not necessarily governmental) institutions, I would be a lot less suspicious.

I'm with the Popes, not the Catholic market romanticists.

P.S. Even though I am a Chestertonian, I am not a Distributist, though I sympathise with the goals and vision of the Distributists. I just don't find their programme convincing. Nor do I claim to understand economics, but I don't think you have to understand economics to be highly sceptical of this rather mystical faith in market forces that seems more and more prevalent in our era-- even amongst Catholics, who should be immune to superstition.

What Will Happen to the Non-Libertarian Right?

Recently I wrote the first part of a three-part post called Why I am a Conservative, which I thoroughly enjoyed writing even if nobody else is especially interested. Using the title made me curious as to what other articles and posts appeared on an internet search if I entered in those words.

I found the results depressing. In virtually all cases, with one or two welcome exceptions, "conservative" meant free market, libertarian, anti-government, and sometimes a US foreign policy "hawk". The concentration was virtually always upon economic matters, sometimes to the exclusion of any others.

Some of the articles were by former leftists who had kept their anti-establishment, anti-traditional, lifestyle libertarian views intact but had come to the view-- naturally, I think-- that anti-statism and free market economics fit these better than their hitherto socialistic opinions.

Yesterday, while browsing the magazine rack in Eason's, I came across a magazine called Total Politics whose cover story was an interview with Jacob Rees-Mogg, the Conservative backbencher who is often hailed as an "old-fashioned" Tory. He looks the part and he sounds the part, with his upper-class accent, air of refinement, and cultural allusions. But a quick skim through the article showed he had little to say about the preservation of Englishness, the bolstering of family life, the importance of community, religion, or any classically High Tory subjects. It was pretty much all to do with money.

And that's your conservative today. I have had one protracted debate with a correspondent who insists he is a solid Catholic but who also insists that "greed is good" and that Rerum Novarum was "a rush of blood to the head". (One of these "Why I am Conservative" essays was written by a Christian who described his priorities as "God, my family, and my country, in that order" but who also said, "I don’t resent wealthy people. To the contrary, I want to become one of them one day.")

Some residual elements of traditional conservatism might survive alongside this passion for the free market and radical individualism-- most of these essays mentioned an opposition to abortion and same-sex marriage, as well as a commitment to patriotism.

But can these hangovers long survive when individual choice has become an idol? My guess is that social and cultural conservatism will become more and more irrelevant as the political landscape is increasingly dominated by the liberal left on one side and the libertarian right on the other.

Why I am a Monarchist

As a fairly keen monarchist, I have sometimes found myself visiting monarchist blogs and the websites of monarchist groups. A lot of these sites, probably a majority, tend to have Roman Catholic authors. This isn't too surprising, I suppose. Monarchism and Catholicism both fit with a temper that could be described as "traditionalist" or "reactionary" (depending on who is speaking). The connection also harks back to the political philosophy of Joseph de Maistre, the philosopher of "Throne and Altar" conservatism, who wrote in the wake of the French Revolution.

Sometimes I worry that this link between monarchism and Catholicism might tempt non-Catholics to take the Faith less seriously. They might get the idea that Catholics are simply panting for ceremony and tradition, for croziers and mitres and crowns and birettas. Or that Catholicism is nothing but reaction, an allergic response to the disenchanted, utiltarian, egalitarian modern age.

I think there is some truth to the perception. Certainly, in my case, the ritual and ceremony and historical continuity of the Church appeals to me greatly. It's not that the whiff of incense lured me into the Church, but it seems fitting to me that God's presence on Earth would be heralded by such beauty and pageantry. It seems right. It makes sense.

But I'm not a monarchist because I'm a Catholic. And would I bet most Catholics aren't monarchists at all.

So why am I a monarchist?

First of all, I should clarify what kind of monarchist I am-- that is, a constitutional monarchist. I like the idea of a monarch as the ceremonial head of State. I don't care much about what powers the monarch holds, although I think it is generally a good idea to have a separation of constitutional powers, and the monarch-- being both an ordinary person and (hopefully) one brought up to feel a strong sense of duty-- might have a valid role as a brake on the legislative power. I think the powers and privileges of the English monarch are about right, although it would be better if the Queen actually used those powers more extensively-- for instance, in writing her own Christmas Speech (it has to better than the annual servings of pabulum written by her Government), and to call conferences of political leaders in times of crisis-- similar to the role King George V played in engineering the Irish Truce of 1921.

There are a fair few Catholics, at least ones I've encountered in cyberspace, who are bona fide royal absolutists. I respect their beliefs but they do rather baffle me. Would they like to live in the reigns of Henry VIII or Elizabeth I? Dictatorship opens up great possibilities, if you happen to get a Philosopher King or benevolent despot, but the risks are infinitely greater.

To me, the real importance of monarchy is the tone that it sets. A nation that styles itself The Kingdom of Such-and-Such seems to be on a much healthier footing than a nation that styles itself The Republic of Such-and-Such.The Kingdom is, from the very start (to use two evocative phrases from Edmund Burke) declaring that is not the "fly of a summer's day" but "a contract between the living, the dead and the unborn."

The Kingdom looks to the past and the future, since it has at least one old tradition-- monarchy-- which it has taken to its heart and sought to hand on to its posterity.

The Kingdom has a poetic, particular image in its very title-- it may evoke in your mind a crown, or a throne, or a man on a throne wearing a crown, or perhaps a coat of arms. A Republic is simply an abstraction, and who can love an abstraction? Even the flags of Republics tend to be ugly, like our own lacklustre and uninspired tricolour. (Yes, seeing the tricolour billowing in the breeze above the GPO makes my heart leap-- but not for the sake of the design.)

A Kingdom measures its epochs in a poetical and human way-- aren't the Elizabethan and Victorian and Edwardian eras of British history more "user-friendly" and appealing than the ante-bellum, post-bellum, Depression, inter-war and New Deal eras of American history?

The keynote of a Kingdom is reverence, while they keynote of a Republic is resentment. The guiding idea of a Kingdom is that, for all our ideological and social and philosophical differences, we express our aspiration to harmony by honouring the Queen or King, by setting one institution above the affray. I can't but believe that this simple act of graciousness ripples outwards through the national life. The guiding idea of a Republic is "nobody is better than me; nobody is to be privileged over me; nobody is to look down on me". And I know from experience where that mentality takes us-- a drive towards equality as sameness, towards stripping the public square naked of any vestige of history or heritage or the sacred.

A Kingdom is a family. A Republic is a hotel. And even the worst family is better than the most opulent hotel, after a while.

But, for me, the ultimate argument is the argument of the sauce bottle label. A humble bottle of Worcester Sauce attains a sort of grandeur by having the Royal coat of arms and the words, "By Appointment to Her Majesty the Queen" printed on it. The dingiest pub gains in dignity by having the name The King's Head emblazoned over its door.

I think C.S. Lewis put it extremely well, when he tried to point out the folly of judging monarchy by a utiltarian calculus: "It would be much more rational to abolish the English monarchy. But how if, by doing so, you leave out the one element in our state which matters most? How if the Monarchy is the channel through which all the vital elements of citizenship – loyalty, the consecration of secular life, the hierarchical principal, splendour, ceremony, continuity – still trickle down to irrigate the dustbowl of modern economic Statecraft?”

So, having written all of this, I must be a pretty ardent monarchist, right?

Well, not really. I don't have a portrait of King Charles the First hanging over my bed. I know less about the English Royals than does the average reader of Hello! magazine. I stood outside Buckingham Palace not so long ago and found the whole thing a little bit garish, to be honest. I doubt it would even be worth a single human life to preserve a monarchy from destruction. As a Christian, I view all worldly things as ephemeral and even trivial, against the backdrop of Eternity.

 But, for all that, I am a convinced monarchist. And if there is ever a cry to restore the line of Brian Boru to Tara, I will happily raise my voice along with it.

No Catholic should ever vote for Sinn Féin

They rarely miss an opportunity to take a pop at the Church, and today they voted in favour of the Private Members' Bill to legislate for abortion.

From RTE's website:

Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams said he was personally not in favour of abortion, but said he was against judging or criminalising women who opted for terminations.

He said he had to set aside his personal convictions and face up to his legislative duties.

In the same way, no doubt, that all the Sinn Féin MP's who refused to take their seats in Westminster "set aside their personal convictions" in favour of "legislative duties". I wonder if Adams leaves his republican and nationalist convictions outside the door of the Dáil? Why take two sets of convictions into the chamber?

The right to life: much easier to overthrow than international capitalism

So TDs from the Socialist Party and the People Before Profit Alliance have introduced a Private Members' Bill to the Dáil, looking for abortion services to be made available here. They want legislation in this case to act upon the "X case" ruling of the Supreme Court in 1992, but one of the authors of the Bill, Socialist Party TD Clare Daly, says that this "is only a first step for abortion to be legalised in all circumstances".

I find it interesting that a member of the People before Profit Alliance is involved. The Socialist Party are not shy about their socially revolutionary opinions, but the election posters of the People Before Profit Alliance convey the image of a bunch of ordinary Joes worried about bread-and-butter issues like jobs and public transport. Nothing subversive to see here! They pose as a movement of the masses against the elites, but the majority in Ireland are clearly opposed to abortion.

Radical left-wing parties will always enjoy more success, and in practice focus more of their energies ("concentrate on the battles we can win"), upon socially liberal measures rather than wealth redistribution or bringing about some new economic model. A sprinkling of socialists in a national parliament are not going to "smash capitalism". Even a far-left government would not be able to "smash capitalism" in their own country, in today's globalized world. But they can certainly help smash the traditions, social bonds, and way of life of their own socities-- not to mention helping to strip the most helpless, disenfranchised and vulnerable section of the community of their most basic right.

Social liberalism and economic liberalism go together. The radical "lifestyle" individualists of the far left are the natural allies of the radical economic individualists of the free market. Why don't they see it?

Left wing? Right wing? Barbecue wings?

Sometimes I think I am going to stop calling myself conservative, since "conservative", "liberal", "left-wing" and "right-wing" don't really seem to have any substantive meaning.

There is a short news item in this week's Catholic Herald (the UK publication) with the headline "Think Tank: Religious are more Left-wing."

The think tank in question is called Demos, and their recent report Faithful Citizens found that "55 per cent of religious believers placed themselves on the Left of politics, compared with 40 per cent who put themselves on the Right." That's fair enough, but this is the bit that got me: "They also found that religious people were more likely to value equality over freedom."

What does that even mean? What sort of freedom? What sort of equality?

Personally, I believe in the freedom that comes from peace and security, social stability, strong communities and families, a respect for eccentricity, and a modicum of wealth and leisure. I don't believe in the "freedom" that means radical individualism, rampant consumerism, transgression as self-expression, and relentless peer pressure.

I believe in equality to the extent that I believe in a spirit of fraternity, a social awareness that a man is more than his job or class or status, a chivalry between men and women and high and low. I don't believe in the egalitarianism that obsesses about symbolic differences, looks under every bush for evidence of discrimination, and aspires towards a bland sameness.

So where does that leave me? And why is the crucial opposition posited as being between freedom and equality, anyway?

If I were to choose a single word to define my own conservatism, it would be "tradition", not "freedom". I doubt any ideal has been as abused in recent generations, by both left and right, as the ideal of freedom.