Hacker News Reader

Comment by eanzenberg | Hacker News Reader

Not sure if they’re correlated though by timing? Authoritarianism has been increasing before Covid.

Authoritarianism is a reaction to the perceived failures of (classical) liberalism to address modern challenges.

Authoritarianism is a naked grab for power for personal gain.

It definitely is on the part of would-be tyrants, but a popular shift to it is due to perceived failures. There's a really cool quote from the (second book of?) the Three Body Problem, which goes something like "alone in the emptiness of space, fascism becomes everyone's first resort".

Note that I do not think we were doing that badly before Trump and other authoritarians. It's just that a lot of people perceived the world was getting dangerous for them (probably because it became more inclusive, and also because they watch Fox news).

Can certainly be both.

> Authoritarianism is a reaction to the perceived failures of (classical) liberalism to address modern challenges.

Or authoritarianism is a reaction to the perceived failures of (classical) liberalism to counter modern realities that are perceived as challenges because it suits would-be authoritarians to present them that way.

If you're on the left, I'm talking about immigration, and if you're on the right, I'm talking about climate change...

Liberalism can’t fail on its own - it can only be taken advantage of via subterfuge. Mainstream politicization of critical theory has deceived liberalism by using its freedoms but not respecting its counter-freedoms. Authoritarianism is the reaction to this abuse.

And really if by critical theory’s definitions that everything is relativist then what’s the problem?

Nah, it’s a reaction to critical theory / PC convention dominating the culture. This philosophy of everything is socially constructed and nothing is objectively true has fueled a reaction that at least feels like our feet are on solid ground. This has nothing to do with classical liberalism.

Classical liberalism can under attack from critical theory over the last 40 years and has manifested in mainstream adoption of this type of thinking. This betrayal and dismissal of classical liberalism has forced the right into authoritarianism as the norms of liberal democracy have been dismantled.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com