Tyranny, broadly defined, is the use of power to dehumanize the individual and delegitimize his nature.  Political utopianism is tyranny disguised as a desirable, workable, and even paradisiacal governing ideology.  There are, of course, unlimited utopian constructs, for the mind is capable of  infinite fantasies. But there are common themes. The fantasies take the form of grand social plans or experiments, the impracticability and impossibility of which, in small ways and large, lead to the individual’s subjugation.

Utopianism is irrational in theory  and practice, for it ignores or attempts to control the planned and unplanned complexity of the individual, his nature, and  mankind generally.  It ignores, rejects, or perverts the teachings and knowledge that have come before- that is, man’s historical, cultural, and social experience and development.

Utopianism substitutes glorious predictions and unachievable promises for knowledge, science, and reason while laying claim to them all.  Yet there is nothing new in deception disguised as hope and nothing original in abstraction framed as progress.  A heavenly society is said to be within reach if only the individual surrenders more of his liberty and being for the general good, meaning the good as prescribed by the state.

Especially threatening, therefore are the industrious, independent, and successful, for they demonstrate what is actually possible under current social conditions- achievement, happiness, and fulfillment- thereby contradicting and endangering the utopian campaign what was or is.

From Ameritopia by Mark Levin (this is a collection of excerpts from the first chapter)

HKO comments

Levin wrote how the framers of the constitution rejected the political philosophies of Plato and Hobbes in favor of the new constructs (at their time) of Locke and Montesquieu, who favored a limited state oriented towards individual rights.

Those in our time who Levin would accuse of utopianism would likely reject the claim and would insist that they are simply trying to solve real problems that individuals and the market are unable to solve.  But their solutions too often presume a level of knowledge and understanding that they simply do not possess.

But even more likely the problems they pose to correct are either the result of various prior efforts of government to fix or perfect prior social issues, or the problems are eventually solved on a social level just given more time. This is not to insinuate that there is never a point where government involvement is needed, just that we should use this power very judiciously. (double entendre of the month)

The ideological fixated still refuse to see the government’s role in the housing collapse or the economic collapse that spun off of it. Nor do they see the government’s role in the escalating cost of health care.  In both of these examples the government attempted to correct market imperfections to attain a centrally decreed social ideal.  Rather than adjust their theory or their diagnosis to reality they seek to change the reality. That requires the awesome force of government and the tyranny that Levin attributes to utopianism.

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