Toward a principles-based approach to societal flourishing
The heterodox backlash to mainstream wokeness is inherently reactionary. Taibbi, Weiss, Peterson, Loury, Yarvin; even to some extent Dreher and Alexander all bemoan the current system and wish we could turn the clock back to ... 2008, or 1965, or 2015, or 1600.
There have been few real attempts to change the situation. Weiss is a small exception: she has helped contribute to the University of Austin, which, while I'm very skeptical of its success, is at least doing something. Desantis has perhaps the most success at a political level, though he is often criticized by many in the heterodox blogosphere.
Yet all these fights against wokeness whether merely verbal or actual do not propose a positive trajectory for our society; they merely reject the negative wokeness trajectory.
I want to help create a non-reactionary yet conservative vision for flourishing society. I want this vision to have the following elements:
Compelling and inspirational. I want people to be energized by the vision.
A call to action. This cannot be a passive "keep everything the same as it is right now" conservatism.
A call to a better self. I want this vision to have individual impacts even if society as a whole does not adopt this vision (yes, I know I'm channeling Peterson here).
I have articulated one such vision here: https://pyotrverkhovensky.substack.com/p/how-to-build-a-flourishing-society. I wrote it to at least provide one such vision of a flourishing society to demonstrate that I am not merely complaining but am willing to put some thought into this. I would love to have others (possibly y'all!) take the baton and make something more compelling and actionable.
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Toward a principles-based approach to societal flourishing
The heterodox backlash to mainstream wokeness is inherently reactionary. Taibbi, Weiss, Peterson, Loury, Yarvin; even to some extent Dreher and Alexander all bemoan the current system and wish we could turn the clock back to ... 2008, or 1965, or 2015, or 1600.
There have been few real attempts to change the situation. Weiss is a small exception: she has helped contribute to the University of Austin, which, while I'm very skeptical of its success, is at least doing something. Desantis has perhaps the most success at a political level, though he is often criticized by many in the heterodox blogosphere.
Yet all these fights against wokeness whether merely verbal or actual do not propose a positive trajectory for our society; they merely reject the negative wokeness trajectory.
I want to help create a non-reactionary yet conservative vision for flourishing society. I want this vision to have the following elements:
Compelling and inspirational. I want people to be energized by the vision.
A call to action. This cannot be a passive "keep everything the same as it is right now" conservatism.
A call to a better self. I want this vision to have individual impacts even if society as a whole does not adopt this vision (yes, I know I'm channeling Peterson here).
I have articulated one such vision here: https://pyotrverkhovensky.substack.com/p/how-to-build-a-flourishing-society. I wrote it to at least provide one such vision of a flourishing society to demonstrate that I am not merely complaining but am willing to put some thought into this. I would love to have others (possibly y'all!) take the baton and make something more compelling and actionable.
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