Why the liberal movement as we perceive it has made a fool of us all

Anonymous (Identity of writer protected)

Fight for your freedom. Challenge ideas. Free Speech. We’ve all heard it before. From the classroom to social media to every form of communication, the West has been overtaken in the past century by ideas of liberty. 

An ode to free expression sounds majestic. But in reality, it’s divided us. Let me explain. 

Ben Franklin once said, ‘It is the first responsibility of every citizen to question authority’. That is, a key component of liberalism is to use critical thought and to think for oneself. It is designed to challenge tyranny and oppression of minorities because tyranny occurs exactly when minorities and people in general are unable to express their feelings, opinions, and ideas. 

But this exact idea of liberalism has been used with a logical flaw in our generation today. We are so used to challenging narratives that it has become part of us to do so naturally. In being fed the exact idea of liberalism, we have been accustomed to disagree with whatever the status quo is, regardless of whether the status quo holds our belief or not. In other words, we disagree with traditional and past narratives in the name of liberalism, but not for the sake of liberalism. We disagree for the sake of purely disagreeing. 

The increasing resistance to religion in the past century (at least in the West) has served as a reminder for all of us. Socially conservative Christians who have grown up believing in God amongst a group of highly atheist peers now embrace tradition more as a form of rebellion for what they believe in. They do not need to engage in very traditional religious ways of worship to uphold their beliefs, but movements of young people engaging in Latin Mass showcase such. And of course, when this movement becomes too large, liberal offshoots will likely grow to counteract that counter-movement. 

To clarify, I’m not some discontented conservative frustrated with liberalism; I’m a liberal afraid of our diversion from the roots of liberalism, but arguing in its name, which seems to be taking over our generation by storm. It is good to ask questions. But when questioning past narratives becomes the norm, it creates dogma. Even if this dogma is against dangerous narratives, It is still dogma, making it discordant with independent thought.

This illiberalism has made us fools of ourselves. It has divided communities with opposing ideas who each disagree with each other for the sake of disagreeing, not for the sake of anything else. It has championed political polarisation, pitting us against each other. It has become a problem to be reckoned with. And until people start speaking up about it, I fear it will eventually destroy the human race.