The great moral difficulty with communitarianism is that, if taken to extremes, it treats individuals as though they were little more than cells of a larger organism. Just as when doctors kill cells to prevent cancer from spreading, communitarianism readily justifies state intrusion into the private sphere in the name of some communal good...Worse yet, communitarian societies require a standard of behavior more demanding than most members of an unredeemed society are unable or unwilling to meet most of the time, and that all are unable to meet all of the time. Hence, it is hardly surprising that world history is littered with the failures of communitarian utopia. The communitarian agenda simply cannot be attained without invoking the state's monopoly on coercive force....The Communitarian Conundrum, Stephen Bainbridge, TCS Daily, 10/13/2006
It is rare that such an excellent philosophical & ideological review of the conflict between the Left and the Right appears. Bainbridge's article in TCS Daily deserves careful study. The observation on the Left and the abuse of state power for "the good" is hardly a new insight. Ask any survivor of Stalin or Hitler. But it bears repetition. Sometimes repeating the truth over and over again as, for example, that men and women are NOT the same sex, will get through to a readership.
Luther
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