Brooks (note, not David) writes,
each of us must aspire to what the Dalai Lama calls “warmheartedness” toward those with whom we disagree. This might sound squishy, but it is actually tough and practical advice. As he has stated, “I defeat my enemies when I make them my friends.” He is not advocating surrender to the views of those with whom we disagree. Liberals should be liberals and conservatives should be conservatives. But our duty is to be respectful, fair and friendly to all, even those with whom we have great differences.
Is there any higher authority?
Arthur Brooks is a guy who’s worked as a french horn and in Bruce Kovner’s think tank his entire life and he wrote a book on working hard. Truly the authority on putting in the hard hours, Mr. French Horn and sinecure-for-life man. I bet they even hand out free lunches in the AEI cafeteria!
It’s funny, but I just read two long posts from two different authors pointing out the Dalai Lama is a sell out con artist, Tibetan Buddhism was backwards nonsense from the start, and western fans of the Dalai Lama pathetic losers.
Here’s one. Though the better one I’d have to see if the person wants to share:
https://meaningness.wordpress.com/2015/10/05/buddhist-ethics-is-advertising/
The appeal to authority is real.
This is like one of those toy-model game theory problems you see in an introductory text.
There is a tit-for-tat / eye-for-an-eye equilibrium, which is ok, but has some ugly moments.
There is a a higher equilibrium with no tats at all, and I do want to get there, if it’s possible.
But if genuine expression of commitment to the principles of the higher equilibrium means I have to unilaterally disarm my ability to tat by credible renunciation, and that you are likely to immediately defect and tat on me at will, mischaracterize my advocacy or mere expressions of disagreement as vicious and threatening tats, and call me a hypocrite and use my words against me for trying to go back to the tit-for-tat equilibrium and tatting in response, then that is the worst equilibrium of all. I don’t want to go there.
So, I agree with the sentiment, but I really wish it wouldn’t predictably be used in double-standard ways against less culturally-powerful parties.
The Marquess of Queensberry rules are great for fair fights between evenly matched opponents. They are not great if they mean only the smaller guy has to fight with one arm tied behind his back. It doesn’t take long for the small guy’s side to get awfully sick of that game.
Remember the whole ‘civility’ thing? That’s what happened there. One side ended up using it browbeat the other to shut them up, and meanwhile, one noticed members of the first side were hardly being very civil to their opponents.
Loyalty to the Constitution is another great example in our politics. Progressives look at the written Constitution as an empty canvas on which to paint whatever picture of the higher law which they happen to like and find most useful at the moment. But meanwhile they are eager to use conservative loyalty to the principle of constitutional obsequiousness to suppress resistance to their jurisprudential innovations and to encourage them to pressure their own side’s politicians to refrain from using the same extra-constitutional tactics as the progressives do in turn.
One is therefore torn between two conflicting human impulses, which I think anyone familiar with the subject would see has been a theme of tension throughout the history of Christianity.
On the one hand, I deeply admire the actual practice of restrained and ever respectful comportment since it requires discipline, gentlemanliness, stoic thick skin, magnanimity, and courage in the face of the risk that adherence to one’s principles will be used against them to their detriment. That’s quite noble.
One the other hand, one never likes to see a bully get away with his unjust depredations without consequence when the other guy is getting the stuffing kicked out of him and won’t fight back. It’s just as normal to want to see the bully deterred, and to want to see the other guy stand up for himself.
How do you manage being “respectful” and “friendly” to someone who’s calling you racist, a warmonger, somebody who wants to starve babies, somebody who wants to make the world uninhabitable, a xenophobe, a troglodyte, a Neanderthal, etc?
And, yes, twice, I’ve heard nice people, who would probably mischaracterize themselves as “liberals,” casually refer to Republicans/conservatives as Neanderthals. On neither occasion did it seem worthwhile to object.
Also, I haven’t noticed the Dalai Lama winning anything lately. Although I guess he gets taken out to dinner a lot.
This is one of the few places that tries. It certainly isn’t the places that get paid to do it.
NPR’s story on Republicans today is how some Republican mayors astonishingly believe in global warming because they are beach front. Maybe it isn’t that weird or newsworthy for Republicans to have independent opinions. Or Maybe NPR is just trying to push a wedge issue. I can be fair, I can even rationalize some interpretations of Jesus’ “love your enemy,” but good luck getting me to be warmhearted. Like Trump and Clinton, they really deserve to be never heard from again, and their continued existence is just an oddity of a flawed syste that rewards one side for how bad the other side is, and vice versa.