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Why did you need to make this political? It's just a matter of minutes before someone points out that conservatives love the Chesterton's Fence analogy because
by mnsc 5y ago
Why did you need to make this political? It's just a matter of minutes before someone points out that conservatives love the Chesterton's Fence analogy because most fences are built to keep _those people_ out. And then we're off to the races.
- emodendroket 5y agoWasn’t the point of Chesterton coming up with this metaphor political? His whole point was that conservatism was, in his view, wise.
- jpitz 5y agoI thought that his point was "there's no substitute for understanding why" ?
- emodendroket 5y agoIf every change demands first a detailed study, a logical consequence is fewer things will ever be changed.
- deltarholamda 5y ago>because most fences are built to keep _those people_ out. A fine example of how the warning of Chesterton's Fence is ignored by inferring the worst possible motive without evidence or reason, and using that unsupported aspersion as a reason to rip something up.
- slowhand09 5y agoAnd there you go pulling the quote out of its context, changing its meaning completely. You ignored Chesterton's intentionally to make a point, or MISSED the point by not reading it thoroughly, or something I may have missed. But I'm attempting to understand before changing anything.
- mark-r 5y agoJust because you attempted, doesn't mean you succeeded.
- nescioquid 5y agoI'm suspicious of seductively clever writers like Chesterton. You'll find this quote on his wikipedia page: > "The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected." Having read some of his Christian apologetic essays, I suspected the fence argument was fundamentally motivated by religion, and again from the wiki page, it originated in from his book "The Thing: Why I Am a Catholic". EDIT: GP said "Progressives tend to be very dismissive of the Chesterton's Fence analogy, because they think change is an unalloyed good." to which parent complained "Why did you need to make this political?". I found Chesterton's own words both relevant and sufficient warrant to broaden the discussion along the lines of the GP.
- dccoolgai 5y agoI read "Man Who was Thursday" and some of his other works... He always struck me as more of a "contrarian" than anything else. If he lived in a time when Christianity/Church was gaining popularity I think he would have declared himself a devout atheist. Reminds me of the "true neutral" alignment from the old Dungeons and Dragons rulebooks.
- anthonygd 5y agoYou're right. A conservative is a contrarian. They fight change. Chesterton's fence is a rational argument in favor of being conservative.
- dccoolgai 5y agoI don't completely agree. A contrarian, by definition, is responsive to the political context they are in. In Chesterton's time, there was a wave of anarchism finding purchase in academic and philosophical circles: hence he appeared as a conservative. A "conservative" from Chesterton's time doesn't necessarily map cleanly onto the modern notion of the same name... Supposing the allegorical "fence" to be something like clean air or water regulation, one could argue that it's modern "conservatives" more often than not arguing to disturb things without considering second-order effects.