Beck and Plato on Politics and Aesthetics
Glenn Beck’s bizarre Connect Four antics Thursday afternoon were amusing, but the best part of that segment was actually Beck’s thoughts on the relationship between art and politics:
Landsman gave an interesting description of his job interview with Valerie Jarrett saying he’d “use art to change the world.” I don’t know about you, but I don’t want art to change the world. I’d like people to change the world. Together, and out in the open. Not through some painting that makes me feel like that’s a great idea. Fox viewers are always called zombies and idiots. But who are the zombies, somebody who’s are getting real political discussion every day, or somebody making their decision through a painting or a broadway show?
At first glance, this seems like part of Glenn Beck’s continuing effort to get people to ensure the continuing relevance of Richard Hofstadter, by melding the paranoid style with anti-intellectualism. But another way of looking at it is that Beck is recapitulating an argument Plato makes in The Republic about the inferiority of art to philosophy. The complaint, essentially, is that art is a kind of cheating that bypasses the faculty of reason and can mislead the people. This leads him to the conclusion that poetry ought to be banned in a well-governed society.
In contrast to Plato, Beck at least superficially has a strong libertarian streak. But I think there’s reason to believe that authoritarianism is the main driver of right-wing politics in the contemporary United States. That’s part of the reason why these days some libertarians are strangely enthusiastic about unlimited government surveillance power (see also Jonah Goldberg who thinks cigarette taxes are fascism, but torture and indefinite detention are great) while others don’t seem very right-wing.
45 Responses to “Beck and Plato on Politics and Aesthetics”
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October 31st, 2009 at 10:06 am
Someone strangely enthusiastic about unlimited government surveillance (thanks Obama) is not a libertarian.
And yes, authoritarianism is the main driver of right-wing politics in the contemporary United States.
So, Little Matty, instead of thinking, simply conflate the authoritarians with true libertarians. Oh, and who is anti-intellectual?
By the way, Phillip Girardi explains J Street at the very libertarian and pro-Austrian School antiwar.com.
October 31st, 2009 at 10:08 am
Typo: I meant Phillip Giraldi, nor Girardi.
October 31st, 2009 at 10:21 am
“In contrast to Plato, Beck…”
Wow. I never thought I’d see these words strung together in a sentence. At least not outside the Onion.
But Matt makes a good point. Authoritarian has become the main driver of right wing politics in the US (something we should be very, very concerned about). Libertarians have tended to move to the left or are simply poseurs.
October 31st, 2009 at 10:22 am
How do libertarians and authoritarians co-exist? Quite easily since ideological zealotry is next of kin. How else do you explain the rather dismaying but easy congress of social conservatives and libertarians? Both tend to anti-scientific know-nothingism. Both tend to put belief above empiricism. And both are heavily dependent on groupthink in their dogmatic assertions.
There are honest libertarians but the rank and file are as idiotic as any fundamentalist in a revival tent.
October 31st, 2009 at 10:24 am
Isn’t authoritarianism the standard interpretation of The Republic? Platonism in politics devolves to the sophistry of “What’s better than what’s best?”
October 31st, 2009 at 10:25 am
It’s fun to see MY find Beck similar in a way to Plato, then (as if in a panic) hurriedly run back to shore up his core convictions with reference to Jonah Goldberg and others.
October 31st, 2009 at 10:28 am
I meant not similar to Plato but an improvement on Plato.
October 31st, 2009 at 10:45 am
Matt, weren’t you a philosophy major? If so you should have known that Plato (or, more accurately, Socrates) quickly backtracks on his claim that most poets would be banned from his ideal society: he admits he has felt “Homer’s spell” and allows poets and non-poets to write a defense of poetry.
Of course, it’s also odd that Plato uses the literary format of the dialogue to talk about the superiority of philosophy.
October 31st, 2009 at 10:45 am
I think there are very few people who have both strong economic libertarian beliefs and strong civil libertarian beliefs. It seems to me that most people who tend to think of themselves as libertarians are actually pretty much believers in “keep government away from my money and property (economic libertarians) and don’t have anywhere near the same passion for consisting of keeping government from infringing on many freedom (often twisting freedoms like freedom of religion to actually try to get government to prefer one religion over other religions or the freedom to live without having religion foisted on you).
October 31st, 2009 at 10:48 am
Oops, I meant “…same passion for consistently keeping government from infringing on many freedoms…”
October 31st, 2009 at 11:02 am
I think Matt’s basically right. Lots of right-wingers, especially of the talk-show ilk, call themselves libertarians, but are highly selective libertarians. They certainly speak (scream) about Freedom!! a lot. Guns, the press (Fox), talk radio (fairness doctrine), taxes, tea drinking, driving big cars, etc.
Mostly redneck libertarianism.
And they conveniently ignore freedoms that may not affect them. Control of your body, sexual orientation, privacy, religions other than Christianity. And they certainly don’t worry much about freedom of folks who aren’t white or don’t live in the US.
Bob Roddis: the reason “little Matty” conflates authoritarians with true libertarians is that it’s what the right wingers do themselves. That’s the point he is trying to make. They are authoritarians, but call themselves libertarians. Listen to talk radio for about 10 minutes; every right wing nut calls himself or herself a libertarian.
October 31st, 2009 at 11:03 am
So to illustrate the point that “some libertarians” are authoritarian, you link to a post by a libertarian slamming another libertarian for being authoritatiran. In this article, we learn that hardly anyone, if anyone at all, at the Cato Institute agrees with Pilon on this issue. And that, in fact, the libertarian community, writ large, is pissed off about the op-ed.
Does this mean I can say “progressives want to Free Mumia” because I saw some guy with a sign somewhere?
YOu could rephrase you comment more accurately by saying, “Given the overwhelmingly negative reaction libertarians have had to Pilon’s piece, it is safe to say that the vast majority of libertarians are no authoritarian.”
October 31st, 2009 at 11:37 am
But the vast majority of ‘libertarians’ are not libertarian… and there are a lot more of them than the kind without inverted commas. And some of them have impressive megaphones.
October 31st, 2009 at 11:50 am
But the vast majority of ‘libertarians’ are not libertarian… and there are a lot more of them than the kind without inverted commas. And some of them have impressive megaphones.
This seems to be fairly accurate.
October 31st, 2009 at 11:53 am
Does this mean I can say “progressives want to Free Mumia” because I saw some guy with a sign somewhere?
You’re comparing the head of the Cato institute to “some guy with a sign”? Cato, in any case, depends on the largesse of big business and wealthy members of the Republican party to stay in business and thus the leadership is always going to be aligned with their interests.
I don’t really think you can call Beck libertarian at all. It’s typical authoritarianism that always promises “freedom” for “his kind” and the boot-heel of authoritarianism for “them”, who need to be kept under control. Promoting Beck is simply a recognition by authoritarianism that people like Beck offer the best way to control “his kind.”
October 31st, 2009 at 11:56 am
Mr. Yglesias,
That wasn’t Plato’s primary objection to art/poetry. His primary objection, as I understand it, stemmed from his conviction that the things of the visible material universe are imperfect reflections and copies of ideal forms. The poet, by conjuring things up out of his mind inspired by the things of the physical world, is producing copies of copies, and is therefore leading us away from the ideal forms, not towards them.
October 31st, 2009 at 11:58 am
Libertarians are not right wing. One libertarian arguing for FISA is not some libertarians arguing for FISA. It’s one libertarian arguing for FISA.
October 31st, 2009 at 12:20 pm
“But the vast majority of ‘libertarians’ are not libertarian… and there are a lot more of them than the kind without inverted commas. And some of them have impressive megaphones.”
Do you mean the people at the Cato insttute have impressive megaphones? OK. We will agree on that.
What the link MY provided shows is that one guy from the Cato institute used that megaphone to push for authoritarianism. And that every other person at the Cato Institute was “pissed off about it.” And that everyone else in the libertarian universe (the people with the megaphones) were bashing the hell out of Pilon for his opinion.
And from this, the larger conclusion to draw is…
“Some libertarians are authoritarian.”
Weird.
Not, “Hey, look at these anti-authoritarian libertarians plicing their own ranks, going after ROGER PILON!”
Nope. The thing to do is to use the anecdote to support a larger claim that right-wingers are authoritarian. You know, because Roger Pilon is a leader of libertarianism. An authority, if you will. And this shows all the other libertarians bowing to his opinion.
Or… wait… no.
October 31st, 2009 at 12:22 pm
[...] here: Matthew Yglesias » Beck and Plato on Politics and Aesthetics Comments [...]
October 31st, 2009 at 12:41 pm
Yes, I also think that Plato’s claim is stronger (as Hector suggests) and not weaker (as DiTurno suggests). Plato doesn’t just think that poetry misleads, but that it necessarily does so (at least given the realities of the human situation). This is (in part) because we have expectations about how good people should act that (since most of us aren’t ourselves good) are not accurate. But art has to cater to those expectations in its portrayal of supposedly admirable people, in order to draw us in. Plato’s examples are perhaps a bit brutal for our tastes: we don’t really want to see a guy *not* being grief-stricken when his wife or child dies (which is what’s appropriate, according to Plato). We would rather see him get all vengeful or whatever. Enough movies in that vein and we forget that vengeance is bad.
October 31st, 2009 at 1:02 pm
What’s bizarre about Beck’s argument is that HE was the clown finding some massive significance in the 1930s artwork at Rockefeller Center and implying that it proves something about today’s progressives.
Does he ever listen to himself?
October 31st, 2009 at 1:41 pm
“Hey, look at these anti-authoritarian libertarians plicing their own ranks, going after ROGER PILON!”
Yes, they policed him so vigorously that he’s… still the director of Cato’s Center for Constitutional Studies. That’s some impressive policing!
Of course Pilon isn’t the only person generally considered a libertarian hero to endorse government surveillance. Richard Posner enthusiastically endorsed the warrantless wiretaps and the Pentagon’s domestic intelligence activities. I don’t know if Milton Friedman endorsed the warrantless wiretaps, but he refused to condemn the PATRIOT Act on the grounds that “[t]he restrictions that are necessary in order to get rid of the terrorists are a burden to your freedom.”
Now, you might say that these guys can’t be considered real libertarians, because a real libertarian wouldn’t take those positions. And there’s something to be said for that. But it doesn’t change Yglesias’s point, which is that some people who identify as libertarians have a strong authoritarian streak.
October 31st, 2009 at 1:43 pm
Yeah, but Plato also advocates infanticide in the Republic, so I think it’s safe to say many of his prescriptions were in an ironic spirit.
And actually, I’m not totally convinced that what Beck is doing isn’t some very elaborate ironic performance art.
October 31st, 2009 at 1:50 pm
Beck almost certainly doesn’t think that literature is inferior to philosophy, but that both are inferior to populist wisdom. It’s another way of telling Fox viewers, who read nothing and are barely acquainted even with their neighbors, that they are just as qualified to make judgments about the world as people who are well-read, well-traveled, and have open minds.
October 31st, 2009 at 2:09 pm
It’s not really odd — the open-ended discussion among equals in pursuit of reason and enlightenment is the hallmark of the Greek humanistic contribution to Western Civilization.
October 31st, 2009 at 2:16 pm
I thought that Matthew missed the most important part of Glenn Beck’s statement:
“Fox viewers are always called zombies and idiots. ”
Nice to know that Beck has researched his market.
October 31st, 2009 at 2:23 pm
IN some ways this is what Robert Pirsig was getting at in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. Plato sought to discredit the Sophists, who more than anything else were concerned with Quality. This would of course be related to appreciation of the arts. In Pirsig’s view this makes Plato one of the great intellectual villians of Western Civilization, which makes sense if you can see Glenn Beck as an heir to Plato.
October 31st, 2009 at 2:33 pm
It’s very hard to determine what Plato thought of art (he could not have been unaware of the literary merits of his own writings, as has already been mentioned). It should certainly be remembered that when he talked about poetry he was always talking about the Greek religious tradition, which was passed on in poetic form. I think it’s also clear that in the dialogues Socrates carefully tailors his message to his audience, and it seems to me that in Republic he wanted to condemn Homer in every possible way he could come up with, because his audience was so thoroughly under Homer’s spell in so many different ways.
Certainly I find it bizarre that almost everybody calls the city described at length in Republic “Plato’s ideal city,” and accuses Plato of authoritarianism on that basis, when it is introduced as the luxurious city, a city suffering from some sort of fever, in contrast to the healthy community Socrates had briefly described just before. It is, of course, possible to argue that Plato thought this feverish city was as good as a city in the real world could get, but I don’t understand why so many people don’t even notice that you do need an argument to get there; the text certainly doesn’t give you any explicit indication that this is the intent.
October 31st, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Re Jason at 27: “In Pirsig’s view this makes Plato one of the great intellectual villians of Western Civilization, which makes sense if you can see Glenn Beck as an heir to Plato.”
Well, Socrate’s analogy of Prisoners in a Cave re how Democracy can be undermined by deceit practiced on the gullible herd certainly makes sense when you watch a Glenn Beck show.
But what is interesting is the question of why so many powerful and self-avowed champions of the National Interest on the Left have been so resolutely silent — have refused to expose Fox News’s deceit.
It is almost as if the Democratic leaders have a pact with the Republican leaders –kinda “We won’t interfere while you con YOUR base — provided you don’t expose the lies we will tell OUR base”.
Professional courtesy, as it were.
So you never see a real debate of ideas — only a posed Kabuki Dance. Or what is increasingly looking like a Greek Tragedy.
October 31st, 2009 at 3:48 pm
You mean its the hallmark of the Renaissance humanist interpretation of ancient Greece.
Plato, himself, in the Laws,, advocated drinking parties. Those philosophers could get pretty sloshed.
BTW: the alchemists maintained that they were superior to the artists because they weren’t just imitating nature but reproducing it outright. There’s a lot of hocus pocus tied up with Platonism.
October 31st, 2009 at 4:15 pm
I’m guessing it’s the guy who’s railing against the very idea that art might have meaning.
October 31st, 2009 at 4:49 pm
Conservatism is about “freedom for me, but not for thee”. That’s very simple.
October 31st, 2009 at 8:10 pm
Comparing Beck to Plato is audacious, I’ll give you that. However, I think you have achieved the very difficult task of slandering (or libeling) Glenn Beck. To criticize something is not to propose that it be banned.
Hmmm yes you are like Glenn Beck (I see your Beck = Plato and raise you a let’s make it personal). Beck and other Foxers claimed that, when Dunn censured Fox News, she was censoring it. It seems that you are doing the same with Beck.
By the way how about a censor censure typo one of these days ? Not a homonym but easy to miss type.
October 31st, 2009 at 8:31 pm
Hector has pretty much go it here. Poetry is grouped with rhetoric as forms of discourse (can’t stand that phrase, but it works here) that pull the mind away from contemplating the Forms and toward contemplation of propositions that aren’t even true of the material world.
And I agree with Beck. I want people to change the world, not works of art. I don’t want autonomous works of art doing anything, for that matter.
Bob Roddis: Lose the insults. They don’t become you.
October 31st, 2009 at 9:19 pm
I can’t believe that people are falling into the trap of assuming Glen Beck rationally thinks ANYTHING out. He’s admitted himself that his rants are basically free association.
On the larger scale, trying to reconcile Movement Conservatism with any rational philosophy is a waste of time. It isn’t based on rational philosophy, it is based on rationalized resentment by the populist masses and disingenuous fear-mongering by the manipulative Randian corporate elite.
One faction is hysterically grasping at any verbal weapon at hand to strike at their enemies, the other is egging them with the same weapons on to maximize its hold on wealth and power.
There isn’t any need for consistency, there isn’t any interest in consistency, so why search for it?
October 31st, 2009 at 9:30 pm
“But it doesn’t change Yglesias’s point, which is that some people who identify as libertarians have a strong authoritarian streak.”
Oh. Well then.
Some people who support the public option are vegans.
I suppose.
But I see no reason to draw a causal relationship between these positions.
I would see even LESS reason to draw this conclusion if a prominent vegan had taken this position, and the response of the wider vegan community was to trash that position.
But it doesn’t matter. Because I am still thrilled with my new conclusion that Democrats like to diddle interns. Because the most prominent Democrat did that.
This new kind of political analysis is awesome. For instance, now I can arttribute all of Michael Moore’s views to all progressives.
Sweet.
November 1st, 2009 at 12:39 am
I think you’re a little late to the Richard Hofstader connection. Better late than never.
November 1st, 2009 at 1:24 am
[...] Melissa Clouthier wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptBut I think there’s reason to believe that authoritarianism is the main driver of right-wing politics in the contemporary United States. That’s part of the reason why these days some libertarians are strangely enthusiastic about … [...]
November 1st, 2009 at 2:38 am
MY and Hector have it wrong about Plato. In the Republic specifically, the critique is first not of poetry per se but *poets*, specifically the traditional Greek ones who tell bad lies about the gods and heroes. Socrates proposes not abolishing poetry but making it morally uplifting by censoring the bad parts. He even makes up some of his own, acceptable stories. Later there is a critique of imitative art as a sham version of the truth, which is close to what Hector is talking about. I don’t really see the connection with Beck.
“Beck at least superficially has a strong libertarian streak.”
Et tu, Yglesias? This is the last place I thought I’d hear the claim that Glenn Beck is a libertarian. He demagogued the immigration issue and called Mexico a “dirtbag country” during the immigration reform debate. He made fun of and attacked critics of the PATRIOT Act, Bush torture policies, and Bush surveillance policies. He said after the invasion of Iraq that we should engage in even more military adventures. He’s pro-life. He thinks the real problem with America is not enough religion. His heroes are military leaders.
“Glenn Beck’s continuing effort to get people to ensure the continuing relevance of Richard Hofstadter.”
He’s actually doing a good job of making references to the “paranoid style” into a really hackneyed cliche. You can’t read anything about Beck anymore without being informed that there was this guy Richard Hofstadter and–you’ll never believe it–he wrote a book which applies very well to our times!
November 1st, 2009 at 2:39 am
@Aaron Boyden:
“Plato’s ideal city,” and accuses Plato of authoritarianism on that basis, when it is introduced as the luxurious city, a city suffering from some sort of fever, in contrast to the healthy community Socrates had briefly described just before.”
It’s called a feverish city in Book 2 before the guardians appear on the scene. The guardians turn out to be the ruling part, i.e. the most important part of the city and soul! So it’s strange for you to equate the city ruled by guardians with the “feverish city” described before guardians are ever mentuioned. The city is later called the best possible city–many, many times throughout the book. In Book 4 it’s concluded that the city is the just city and that it proves why justice is better than injustice. In Book 8 it’s the best city, ruled by the best people, from which all the inferior kinds of regimes emerge.
I don’t know what *Plato’s* intent was in having Socrates make this argument. But it’s very clear in the conversation that the city described is agreed to be the best. It seems like you’re making a very arcane point or just trying to be pedantic.
November 1st, 2009 at 2:10 pm
The guardians are introduced initially as something that only the feverish city would require. I admit that the description of the city mutates as you go along, and it is certainly interesting how many of the elements which were added to the feverish city seem to be set aside later. Still, it seems to me to consistently remain a compromise city, with Socrates constantly trying to push it back toward his genuine views by trying to erode the problematic additions Glaucon and Adeimantus insist on, and so I think the fact that they never get all the way back indicates something about Socrates’ audience, rather than indicating that he’s changed his mind. I disagree with the Straussians about a lot (obviously), but I do think that one of the most critical points in Republic is in book I, where Socrates says that justice does not require one to tell the truth to someone who is out of his mind. There are plenty of clues sprinkled about that Socrates has grave doubts about the mental health of some of his interlocutors, and is applying this principle liberally.
November 2nd, 2009 at 2:39 am
Don Williams
But what is interesting is the question of why so many powerful and self-avowed champions of the National Interest on the Left have been so resolutely silent — have refused to expose Fox News’s deceit.
Liberals bitch all of the time about Faux News and spend half of their waking hours thinking of ways to expose them. The president himself has used the power of the White House denounce them. What do you want Don, for Obama launch a Predator strike on Faux News headquarters? Do you even think about the shit you type before you post it. Damn.
November 2nd, 2009 at 11:01 am
[...] Yglesias draws the comparison to Plato, whose disdain for “poets” and their capacity for political subversion led him [...]
November 3rd, 2009 at 8:41 am
In vino veritas. Socrates could hold his liquor.
In any case, it was not odd that the conversation (drunk or not) was the chosen medium for a work about philosophy. Philosophy was supposed to mediate between reason and the divine (hence the liquor?). We are told that Aristotle would have written polished dialogs as well, but either didn’t have time, or they are lost. What we have are notes by his students.
In the Renaissance Comus was the god of virtuous drinking parties (or drinking parties for the virtuous).
November 4th, 2009 at 1:08 am
Per the Platonic ideal, can we also bring back eugenics? Pretty please?