liberalism what it should be,,,

[undergroundpanther]

"In popular discussion today, the goal of almost everything, including the university, is said to be diversity. To the extent that this is not merely a means to avoid discussing what is good, we mean that in a free society many high or noble ways of life must exist for men and women to choose among. But the concentration on diversity as such is self-defeating… The quest can never be for diversity but must be for the truth – the truth about the highest good and the end of life.

Diversity will take care of itself, given the various talents and characters of human beings. Never has there been so much talk about diversity and so little difference among persons… We are diverse in quantitative sense, but intelligent observers can call us conformists, for a certain way of life derived from our political and economic system settles itself on most of us. It does so, faute de mieux, because we are ignorant of alternatives or because we are told that all alternatives are equally true or untrue." (CLE)

"he only true diversity comes from difference of principle about the final ends – serious thought and conviction about whether, for example, salvation, wisdom, or glory is best. This we lack, and it is the function of the university to maintain the awareness of these alternatives in their highest forms. We have all the negative conditions of freedom.

Our young can think or do almost anything they please. But in order to act differently one must have ideas, and this is what they lack. They have access to all the thought of the past and all of its glorious examples. But they are not taught to take them seriously as living possibilities for themselves…" (CLE)



Read more...
http://the-reaction.blogspot.com/2005/05/diversity-and-conformity-what-it-means.html