free societies and moral societies

There’s always an obvious trade-off between freedom and security but there’s another equally significant trade-off – that between morality and freedom.

Can you have a moral society that is also a free society? Can you have a free society that is also a moral society? I think the obvious answer is no to both questions.

My personal preference is for a free society, for a number of reasons. But a preference for a free society is a deeply unfashionable view today, on both the Left and the Right. What’s interesting is that over the past couple of decades the Left has totally switched its position on the question of freedom.

There are of course costs either way. I’m happy to admit that a free society comes at a price. One has to put up with many things that one finds distasteful and disturbing. And there are plenty of things that I personally find distasteful and disturbing. I do think however that the price to be paid for a moral society is much higher, and is in fact too high.

The problem with a moral society is that no two people agree on what constitutes moral behaviour, or immoral behaviour. I’m afraid I have to admit to being a moral relativist which is of course a very unpalatable view to many on the Right. And it’s a very unpalatable view indeed to most Christians. The fact is, however, that we have a secular society and whether we like it or not there’s nothing we can do about that. Christians (and some non-Christian social conservatives) might intensely dislike the idea of moral relativism but I honestly don’t see any other position as being viable.

Even if it were possible to get general agreement on what constitutes a moral society I still don’t see how such a society could function in the long term without becoming oppressive and without imposing morality by means of force or at least coercion. And I’m very dubious as to whether morality imposed by force or coercion is ever a good thing.

I do not object to people holding strong moral views and living by them, and in fact I strongly support their right to do so. I strongly support their right to choose morality over freedom, as long as they do not force others to make that choice. If a person wants to live by a very strict Christian moral code then I have absolutely no problems with that.

The objection might be made that it’s not possible to have either a completely moral society or a completely free society. That is of quite true but it doesn’t trouble me. I’m not interested in aiming for perfection because a perfect society is entirely impossible. I’d be content with a society that is much closer to the free end of the spectrum.

There are those on the Right who look back to the 1950s as a golden age of liberty, but like most golden ages it’s more myth than reality. If you didn’t conform then life could get very unpleasant.

The Right (and by this I mean the Cultural Right rather than the Economic Right) has never had much genuine liking for freedom although they have always been fond of talking about liberty.

What we’re seeing today with Social Justice and Wokeness is another attempt to impose a moral society on us. It’s strikingly similar to previous attempts to impose a Christian moral society on us. Social Justice and Wokeness represent a return to the mindset of the 17th century, with its religious sects imposing total conformity.

It does now appear that the period from the 1960s to the 1980s, during which people enjoyed a high degree of personal freedom, was an anomaly in human history. We’re heading back to the norm, which is enforced conformity.