The Right of «Individual Freedom»: Subversion for the Less Daring (I)

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In the last two decades, progressive leftism has established what is often called «the dictatorship of political correctness». This includes measures such as censorship and persecution of critics of Islam, using taxpayer money to promote aberrant sexual behaviors, facilitating access to public positions for «oppressed minorities», imposing gender quotas in workplaces, denying the presumption of innocence to men accused by women, and arresting Catholics who pray outside abortion clinics. Simultaneously, the State neglects real crimes when the victims are not part of «oppressed minorities» (e.g., vandalized churches during feminist demonstrations) or when these crimes are committed by such minorities (e.g., sexual assaults by Muslim gangs).

People feel unjustly criminalized and coerced into treating certain groups as superior citizens. In this climate, many are drawn to right-wing liberalism, which promises freedom and equal treatment for all: making all «religions» equally open to criticism as Christianity, ensuring the State neither supports nor opposes any particular type of relationship or family, removing the fear of false accusations as a barrier to sexual freedom or equitable divorces, allowing people to continue pursuing profit-driven employment practices, making abortion and prayer equally legal, and promoting globalization without turning a blind eye to criminals.

Some naïve individuals believe this «politically incorrect» option is the antithesis of the woke dictatorship, embodying the archetypal forces of liberty versus totalitarianism. What they fail to grasp is that both paths share a common goal: building the same type of relativistic (dis)society. A society where all religions are valid, all sexual and familial lifestyles are equally respectable, no community is tied to a specific land more than any other individual, and local identities are just one option among many in a marketplace.

Though left and right may seem antagonistic, their only real difference lies in their views on what is necessary to achieve this society. For instance, the right believes a person is free to live as «transgender» as long as the law protects them from violence. The left, however, insists that true freedom for «transgender» individuals requires not only legal protections but also societal inclusion through labor policies, education, and subsidies. Both agree that society should accept living as transgender as equally valid as any other lifestyle; they only differ on the steps to get there. The left believes the State must do more to guarantee freedom by granting advantages to the marginalized to ensure equality. Thus, the left attracts the more rebellious and demanding subversives, while the right appeals to the more comfortable.

This makes the left more invasive and interventionist than the right, but not at the expense of modern values like freedom and equality — rather, because of them. Liberalism can justify any interpretation of freedom and equality: if everyone has the freedom of conscience to define what it means to be free and equal, and no view is superior to another, then the progressive interpretation is just as legitimate to enforce legally as the right-wing one.

Marx himself criticized liberal bourgeoisie by saying: «Do not measure the abolition of bourgeois property by your bourgeois notions of freedom, education, law, etc. […] Your law is merely your class’s will codified into law». Why should the «bourgeois» conception of freedom and equality be imposed rather than Marx’s? If these conceptions are subjective judgments and all subjective judgments are guided by personal interests, then isn’t enforcing the bourgeois version an arbitrary state endorsement of this class’s interests? As we see, the left simply takes liberalism to its logical conclusion: an ideology with infinite potential for self-redefinition. Anyone who believes that right-wing liberalism could ever be a «final stop» for the revolution is gravely mistaken. A liberal right can never exist without an equally coherent left ready to cry, «oppressor!»

Only in recent history (especially post-World War II) has the false notion been entrenched that these differences are not part of the same project. John Stuart Mill observed that «liberals encompass the entire spectrum of political opinions», from moderate to radical. Édouard de Laboulaye, one of liberalism’s most influential theorists, described liberals as «a universal church where anyone who believes in freedom belongs». Robert Owen called his socialist ideas «truly liberal», expecting to persuade men with habits of «broad, liberal thought». By the late 19th century, Léon Bourgeois, the foremost advocate of solidarism, was considered a «liberal socialist». Bernstein claimed that socialism was the heir and fulfillment of liberalism, while Leonard Hobhouse stated that «true socialism completes rather than destroys the main liberal ideas».¹ Indalecio Prieto, president of Spain’s PSOE from 1948 to 1950 and owner of El Liberal, declared, «I am a socialist because I am a liberal».

Marco Benítez, Círculo Cultural Alberto Ruiz de Galarreta (Valencia)

Translated by Daniel Alejandro Rodríguez Guerra

[1] For this and the previous quotes, see H. Rosenblatt, La historia olvidada del liberalismo (The Lost History of Liberalism), Barcelona, Crítica, 2020.