We've Moved!

The New Moderate needed room to grow, and we were starting to feel cramped in our old accommodations here. Blogger gave us a handsome design and easy-to-use software, but the strictly chronological blog format never really suited our needs and ambitions.

The new site, newmoderate.com, gives us ample space to spread out and blossom into a one-stop resource for concerned moderates. Check it out, get involved and watch us grow into a movement to be reckoned with!

Stay centered,
Rick Bayan

Morality

Righty: Everything we need to know about morality is conveniently contained in the Bible. For those of us with short attention spans, God even summarized His moral laws on a couple of stone tablets. We call them the Ten Commandments, and they’re as relevant today as they were back in Moses’ time. Don’t kill. Don’t covet. Don’t commit adultery. Don’t eat uncooked shellfish. And the other seven, too. Of course, our cultivated, upper-middle class "progressives" think they know better than God, and that’s precisely what’s wrong with the world today.

Lefty: Morality is in the eye of the beholder. Some of us (are you listening, Righty?) still believe that it consists of rigid laws supposedly dictated by the bloodthirsty god of an ancient desert tribe. If they still want to believe in their myths three thousand years later, that’s fine. But it’s immoral for them to impose their moral delusions upon the rest of us. For me, true morality means taking collective action to improve life for the oppressed. It means loving our fellow humans regardless of race, creed or sexual orientation. Morality has nothing to do with the bedroom, as long as we’re dealing with consenting adults. If it feels right, chances are it IS right.

The New Moderate:

Once upon a time, our religions supplied us with all the morality we needed. And regardless of whether those morals were divinely inspired, most of their principles are still surprisingly sound. (That goes for the teachings of Confucius, Buddha and Lao-tse, too.) But what happens when ancient religious dictates lose their grip over the educated classes, as we’re witnessing in our time?

Here’s what happens: we see a great, gaping rift between the pious folks who still swear allegiance to the Good Book... and the more self-consciously "enlightened" crowd who essentially create their own morals as they go along. Of course it’s moral to love your fellow humans, but is it OK to make love in a public park? Shouldn’t we insist on moral absolutes that govern our actions? It’s a tricky question.

Most of us can agree that child abuse is morally wrong, for example. But what constitutes child abuse? If your kid sets off a cherry bomb inside the house, is it abusive to administer a few sharp whacks to the posterior? Fifty years ago such punishment would have been considered a character-building experience; today a progressive-minded witness might notify the child welfare authorities. (Naturally, that same progressive witness might also have the poor kid suspended from school for possession of aspirin.) In short, whose values do we honor?

Until the social upheaval of the late 1960s, Western society took its moral guidance from the Bible: no agonizing over values, no shades of gray; everything was laid out for us on the printed page, including the all-important ban on fornication.

Sexual morality is a universe unto itself, of course. The ‘60s liberated millions of libidos in a massive wave of sexual self-indulgence -- much of it healthy, some of it excessive or downright kinky. Suddenly any private act between consenting adults was considered kosher, even if it involved buggy whips and Nazi uniforms.

Are sex fetishists immoral even if they confine their peculiar appetites to the bedroom? We’ve lost the authority to say so in public, though we’re still free to conclude privately that a lust for being handcuffed while wearing a chicken costume says something important about a person’s character.

That right to private judgment might be the key. We can’t legislate morality, but we can internalize it. We can set good examples. (When I asked a wise friend how to raise a decent kid, he told me, "Morals are caught, not taught.") We can reject the cult of "cool" and create a culture that once again encourages honor and kindness and all the other noble virtues.

We might think we live in depraved times, but we still have the ability to recognize when something grates against our moral principles. That instinct is called a moral compass, and it comes in handy when we’re lost in the woods. I was encouraged by the mass revulsion we felt toward the Wall Street honchos who made billions for themselves while they gambled away our life savings. Maybe we’re not so close to perdition after all.

Summary: We can’t force our moral principles on others, but we can lead by setting positive examples in our own conduct.

Nationalized Healthcare in the U.S.

Righty: The U.S. healthcare system is the finest in the world: the best doctors, the best facilities, the best research. To tamper with it and bring it under federal control would be a disaster. Doctors are already smarting from HMO red tape and absurd amounts of paperwork. Do we want our medical facilities to be staffed by doctors or bureaucrats? The best healthcare isn't cheap, and it shouldn't be. But why should people who watch their diet and take time to exercise (like me) have to pay for the follies of chronic smokers and couch potatoes who stuff themselves with corn chips? Typical socialism: just dump everyone into the same pot without regard to individual habits or initiative. Grrr... why don't you malcontents just move to Sweden?

Lefty: Nobody should ever have to face bankruptcy because of illness, but that's precisely what's happening to millions of Americans under the current system. Our health insurance system is an international disgrace: profit-hungry insurers routinely deny coverage to the people who need it most and gouge those who have to pay for it themselves. It almost seems as if they go out of their way to make life miserable for the sick and needy among us. There's your social Darwinism in action, Righty! Ain't it grand? We need a sweeping reform of our entire medical establishment, and we need it now. No more delays!

The New Moderate:

I have an important question, and now is the time to ask it: why do we have to choose between totally nationalized healthcare and our current "too bad if you can't pay" system? These seem to be the only two options under discussion, and they're both unacceptable. Why can't we simply opt for nationalized, universal health insurance? Seems sensible enough, doesn't it? But nobody's even talking about it.

Here's the perfect centrist solution to our healthcare crisis. We'd let the doctors practice medicine the way they've been practicing, and we'd let patients see their doctors at will -- without having to wait six months for a tonsillectomy. But we'd fund the health insurance system with our taxes to create a safety net for those who aren't covered by an employer. That way, no individuals are denied coverage and nobody is forced into bankruptcy.

Under this plan, we wouldn't have to nationalize the insurance companies (even though this irate moderate thinks they deserve to be nationalized!). We'd simply nationalize the payment of premiums. End of story. We're long overdue for universal coverage, and we can't wait any longer as our population continues to age. Wake up, Washington!

Summary: Let's stop pushing for a totally revamped, nationalized healthcare bureaucracy and simply fix the system where it needs to be fixed: by providing tax-funded health insurance for those who don't already receive it from their employers. That way, nobody gets left out.

Censorship

Righty: I might disagree with Lefty’s pronouncements 93 percent of the time, but I’d defend to the death Lefty’s right to pronounce those pronouncements. All right, maybe not to the death, but I’d take a good kick in the brisket rather than stifle our progressive friend. Like our Founding Fathers, I believe in the free marketplace of ideas. For example, if some left-wing nutjob advocated monetary reparations for women (oh, the pain of all those centuries of forced domesticity!), I’d trust the wisdom of the people to heckle the nutjob off the podium. That’s democracy in action.

Lefty: Censorship has no place in a free society, but neither do hate-spewing, small-minded demagogues whose virulent ideas can cause actual harm to others. I see nothing wrong with banning neo-Nazis or Rush Limbaugh from airing their repugnant tirades in public. In such extreme cases, we owe the people a measure of protection from the dangers of rabid demagoguery. That means banning hate speech over the airwaves and monitoring who gets to speak on campus. As Fidel Castro said, "The universities are open only to those who share my beliefs."

The New Moderate:

When it comes to free speech, our stand should be staunch and uncompromising: all ideas, however objectionable, deserve a hearing. And, as the good Dr. Johnson used to say, "There’s an end on’t!"

But I have a confession to make. The woeful state of our culture has convinced me that the free marketplace occasionally goes awry. I have no objection to even the most objectionable ideas, and I would never push for censorship in the realm of words -- whether printed, broadcast or delivered in person. It’s the sounds and images that are starting to rankle me and fill me with dread -- the dark, satanic ugliness of cultural artifacts aimed at adolescent boys, in particular. Rap music that lures young minds into fantasies of rape, domination, thuggery and murder. Video games (like the vile and alarmingly popular Grand Theft Auto 4) that glorify a brutal, soulless, survivor-take-all mentality. Over-the-top pornographic images, available by the thousands online, that would sicken Hugh Hefner and even the Marquis de Sade. Not to mention all the atrocious "shock art," replete with sliced corpses and bodily effluvia, aimed at more discerning audiences.

I'm really not a prude, but all my instincts tell me to fight the spread of brutalism and degeneracy. I'm old enough to remember when our culture actually promoted nobility of character (what a concept!) along with the charm and easygoing laughter of a more innocent time. Something has to be done before we slide irreversibly into a bottomless cesspool.

Too late, you say? Not really. But have we reached the point at which we need to start imposing restrictions on the purveyors of shabby culture? If so, do we risk becoming an authoritarian society that suppresses freedom of expression? Whose standards do we honor?

As usual, I think there’s a middle ground. And there's a precedent.

From 1934 to 1968, Hollywood effectively censored its own productions to avoid possible government intervention. The Hays Code, which went a little overboard in limiting our glimpses of ladies’ thighs, underwear and other charming sights, nevertheless coincided with a golden age of American popular culture. The films of this era still enchant us today, and they did it all without a single F-word. By aiming up instead of down, Hollywood appealed to the best instincts of its audiences. This was self-censorship par excellence.

We’ll never return to the squeaky-clean standards of the Hays Code era, and I don’t think we should. But if we value our souls, and the soul of our civilization, we need to start exerting some pressure on the folks who deliver our cultural goods. Even in the Internet era, most of our commercial movies, TV fare, music and games come to us from a handful of giant media corporations. We need to convince them to stop the flow of cultural sewage. Let’s not dictate what they can produce, but let’s call them to account when they bombard us with repellent dreck. Let's urge them to examine why they feel compelled to produce such dreck, and whether they could survive -- whether, in fact, they might even thrive -- if they appealed to our better natures. So far, we’ve managed to convince them that sleaze sells. Let's do the opposite.

In the end, of course, we get the culture we deserve. It won't be easy to stuff all those evils back into Pandora's Box. But I think we deserve better, and I hope Righty and Lefty would agree.

Summary: We should never ban ideas, even when the free marketplace seems to be enamored of the worst of them. But the ever-spreading ugliness of contemporary pop culture calls for serious soul-searching and just possibly a new wave of self-censorship on the part of our cultural establishment.