The rise of coercive progressivism

According to Himmelfarb, ‘the heart of Victorian morality’ was ‘self-control, self-help, self-reliance, self-discipline’. For the Victorians, ‘a liberal society… depended upon a moral citizenry. The stronger the voluntary exercise of morality on the part of each individual — the more internalized that morality — the weaker need be the external, coercive instruments of the state’. Successor projects to that of the Victorians either neglected the individual or rationalized away his moral worth or free will. They displayed the reforming ardor but not the liberal ideals of Victorian England.

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Coercive progressivism is the latest incarnation of this tendency. Those currently seizing power are trying to morally improve us by regulating speech, ideas and behavior so that we can stop replicating the sins of liberalism: racism, privilege and exploitation. They too recognize that manners can be a substitute for morality but for them lip service is not enough. They demand total compliance with their moral code. They are in the business of forced conversion.

The religious character of coercive progressivism is central to understanding its relentless, missionary vigor. Antonia Senior has observed how identity politics functions as ‘Christianity without redemption’, and the faith espoused by the coercive progressives is just such a creed, as its response to George Floyd’s killing demonstrates. There are rituals, hymns and almsgiving. In place of justice, there is martyrdom; baptisms are now conducted at the site of Floyd’s death. There is original sin in the form of ‘white privilege’ and heritable guilt. Iniquities are confessed and, by way of penance, apologies given for the actions of others and patronizing genuflections made to shine the shoes of black people. Heretics are shunned or browbeaten into repenting and even the insufficiently pious are damned.

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