The Insight of The Atheist

Nice essay here on Christopher Lasch, a noted atheist who inclined Left but thought Right.

...He was repelled by the destructive effects of late-stage capitalism and the wealth inequality it bred.  He was against easy divorce, a critic of the sexual revolution, distrustful of social-science elitism, and a strong supporter of intact, traditional marriages and families.  He preferred the small scale and the communitarian to globalist thinking; a life ruled by obligations as well as rights; and hope instead of optimism.

Lasch had a keen sense of social justice and the need for mature, engaged adults capable of unselfish action in sustaining the democratic process.  As a result, he had little use for progressive ideology because of its refusal to accept the tragic elements of life....

Ah, the goddess Progress.  What a silly goddess, indeed!

Lasch:  The idea of progress alone. . .weakens the spirit of sacrifice, nor does it give us an effective antidote to despair. . . .[H]ope does not demand a belief in progress.  It demands a belief in justice: a conviction that the wicked will suffer, that wrongs will be made right, that the underlying order of things will not be flouted with impunity.  Hope implies a deep-seated trust in life that appears absurd to those who lack it.  It rests on a confidence not so much in the future as in the past. . .

Oh?

Note that Lasch identifies "cause and effect" here:

“The worst is always what the hopeful are prepared for,” Lasch wrote, because:

    their trust in life would not be worth much if it had not survived disappointments in the past, while [their] knowledge that the future holds further disappointments demonstrates the continuing need for hope.  Believers in progress on the other hand, though they like to think of themselves as the party of hope, actually have little need of hope since they [assume] they have history on their side. But their lack of it incapacitates them for intelligent action.

Thus the Progressives' insistence that more of the same failed remedy will bring about a remedy.  You see that in public schools, in the 'More Spending' reflex, the 'Less God-talk/More Sex & Drugs' absurdities, their trampling of Justice in favor of "the poor darlings with daddy issues" who steal, rape, car-jack.....they cannot take intelligent action because they cannot and will not understand history.

His book "The Revolt of the Elites......." is worth the read.