Below is a guest post by Phil Anthropis, our most prolific commenter.
As I read about the teachings of Milton Friedman in his Herald obituary today, I noted with interest his encouragement of reduction of government paternalism including abolition of rules about taking drugs, drivers’ licenses and other social laws and standards.
I know someone involved in a political movement called the Liberal Democratic Party (www.ldp.com.au). “The LDP is an Australian libertarian style party promoting individual liberty, free markets and small government.”
Check out their web site – some of it makes sense. But then, with that liberalism, they encourage legislators butting out of people’s relationships – they call it the ‘consenting adults’ principle.
This is interesting to me, because reduction of government interference in business and personal life, (allegedly being anathema to modern progressive governments everywhere) has also been a very important tenet of many successful LDS people that I have known.
Long ago I recognized a contradiction between the economic liberalism and self-regulation that seems to be the modern way, and the propensity of LDS to favour conservative social and moral laws.
It makes sense that many multinational-business people take a libertarian approach. Openness is the modern way and progress can’t really be stopped – only slowed down.
Now, in the ‘War in Heaven’, which side would have been considered the liberal, and which side the protectionists? The answer seems clear to me – Satan’s side wanted to force everyone to do right while God’s side – us – were intelligent and free risk takers, willing to chance falling down in the hope of achieving glory.
Do you see a relationship here with the self-regulation of liberalism as against the unproductive evil of state control?
Now, let’s take this a step further. I have said many times that the church would look a lot different today had we truly been granted religious, political and economic freedom in the early days.
However, regulation against LDS forms of marriage, LDS political interference and against LDS church-controlled business’s vertical integration all amounted to state interference.
LDS plural marriage became fodder for US legislators to enforce the Victorian ideal of marriage onto society – in an era where four fifths of the world tolerated other marriage forms.
Therefore, the state took on the big government paternalistic role, while the LDS church would have enjoyed better freedom under a more libertarian regime.
But remember the pilgrims? How they fled Mother England to find a place where they could freely believe? The very establishment of the church was tolerated under a context of religious freedom, enshrined in the
US constitution.
So in this context I find it interesting that LDS are generally against the legalisation of gay marriage. I can almost hear your dismay at drawing a link between restrictions on celestial plural marriage and gay unions. I only do it to point out that they have a common enemy – repressive Victorian-based marriage law. Believe me, the guys who are banning gay marriage would do Joseph Smith no favors either.
When studying sociology, we were shown how property and inheritance were a driving force behind formation of Victorian marriage laws. Today, property, tax and inheritance make Victorian-era marriage a preferable option from a regulatory point of view.
So what do you think? Has the devil got it right in this instance? Should we outlaw gay marriage? Or should we encourage self-regulation, freedom of choice and facing your own consequences?
If you can show me rationalizations for liberalism of trade, I can use the same philosophical points for showing you liberalization of marriage styles. After all, the current Victorian-era marriage structure, as we have learned, is by no means ‘the right and only one’. Over-regulation is holding back progress which enforces contradictions and abuses, and freedom of choice with facing your own consequences is a correct principle under the gospel.
It may astound you to hear me say that I could favour economic liberalism, if any government truly has the guts to really carry through with real liberalism. But none will. All democratic governments have to survive politically, and play the advantage for their constituents. So my reluctance to subscribe to Friedman’s extremes is merely a survival tactic until the Saviour comes to show us what freedom is all about, when, ‘without compulsory means’, truth and power shall become part of my crown.
