Tag: buddhism
Liberalism and Sympathetic Joy
One way to defend liberal institutions is to argue that they are value neutral. Thus a liberal government protects the persons and property of its citizens, but doesn’t coerce them into a particular conception of the good life. Under a liberal regime, you can be a teetotaler or a lush, a Christian or a Muslim, a hedonist or an ascetic. Thus liberalism is desirable, in part, because it supports robust pluralism. We needn’t fight with one another about how to live, because some narrow range of society’s diverse preferences won’t be codified into law.
Against a Life of Moderation
Last Sunday, Aaron Bushnell set himself on fire, his death an act of protest against Israel’s actions in Gaza. This self-immolation provoked much conversation, as was its intent, and one entry into that discourse comes from Graeme Wood at The Atlantic. His claim is that self-immolation is bad as a form of protest, because it is ineffective and socially contagious, and also, if the act is to be carried out, it should only be in service of a particularly acute and worthy cause, and Aaron Bushnell’s was not.