An essay written by a Navy Seal.
I can’t say I agree with everything in it (although I do agree with most) but it is worth a read.
An essay written by a Navy Seal.
I can’t say I agree with everything in it (although I do agree with most) but it is worth a read.
Interesting stuff.
Progressivism and Socialism however are different, and everybody needs to learn this. He thinks that all progressives are Fabian Socialists (some are). This isn’t true.
Progressivism is about using the state to redeem or fix society, it is like fascism, but it is still different from that also. It has to do with some of the changes in christian philosophy in 19th century America.
The roots of what we know today a “Evangelicalism” or “Christian Fundamentalism” preached salvation via the salvation of others. The idea was that in order to be saved, one needed to help maximize the salvation of someone else. This necessarily leads to nasty collectivism. Many progressive leaders, secular and not, were actually raised or influenced heavily by ministers from these sorts of churches. They were concentrated on fixing man, and they were willing to use violence to do this.
Socialism can mean two different things.
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Control of industry by the state (Basically most actualized forms of socialism). The kind that arises in the third world in response to the certain kinds of intellectuals and the plight caused by European colonialism.
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Control of industry by workers. (Arguably the Paris Commune and Catalonia). Basically your Howard Zen and Noam Chomsky types.
Progressivism is not the same as socialism in the second sense.
Progressivism could be argued to lead to socialism in the first sense. That does not make it socialism though, for the same reason that me arguing that Anarcho-Syndicalism leads to free market capitalism does not make Anarcho-Syndicalism free market capitalism.