The Daily Drool

Lakoff, conservatism, liberalism, and dialogue

I just wanted to send a link to an article that I found fascinating, and I think is one of the most important I’ve read in a while. It has been passed around several times in my group of friends and I finally took a look at it.

http://www.wwcd.org/issues/Lakoff.html

Lakoff is a cognitive scientist at Berkeley who has looked closely at the metaphors for morality that liberals and conservatives use. I think he has touched upon the “source code” of the difference between conservatives and liberals. He also articulates very well why conservatives are so much more unified and coherent politically, and why liberals keep getting in their own way.

The quick summary is that Conservatism draws on a “Strict Father” view of morality and a Nation-as-Family metaphor that draws on that foundation. A complex of metaphors and policies built around a notion of “Moral Strength” comprise their basic ethos. Liberalism works from the same Nation-as-Family metaphor but works from a “Nurturant Parent” model, with “Morality as Nurturance” and “Morality as Empathy” at the core. The trouble is that liberals don’t understand this underlying unity, and therefore have composed their political system as a hodge podge of fragmented interest groups. To the extent that liberals can understand their own coherence, articulate it, counter the attacks from conservatives, and highlight inconsistencies and flaws in the conservative system, they will be much stronger politically.

Of course, all of us draw on a mix of these, and I think ideally there is a Yin-Yang synthesis to be had. What interests me most is the kind of personal and collective inquiry that this line of reasoning promotes – to examine our own deep mental models and habitual uses of language about morality, love, strength, empathy, family, power, and politics.
How are my views of the state and the family connected?
What are my own experiences as a son or daughter? As an aspiring or actual parent?
How has my own moral development been affected by people holding these different models? How have others I know?
Are my views based on my prejudices about these different models, or based on mindful, empirical evaluation of their results in society?

I think from a place of this kind of self-awareness, we might actually be able to engage in some dialogue across the lines.