Liberal hypocrisy can be a good thing

I'm awfully critical of Ellen Goodman's political and moral ideals. Nonetheless, I find myself quite attracted to her personal life, when she writes about it. She wrote one article about how gardening makes her feel close to the land and more involved with her food. It was beautiful. I even mostly agree with the economic and political statement that she made in this article supporting locally grown food and environmentally friendly eating practices, though I also keep in my thoughts those men and women who make a difficult living transporting our food and other goods across the nation.

This past Friday, Ms. Goodman wrote about the island on which she and her husband have their summer home. The island community recently received established a local government, whereas they had previously been governed as an extension of the mainland community. The island's reasons for wanting local government (and we can assume Ms. Goodman's reasons as well) rang true of our Founding Fathers - a distant government cannot govern for local needs. In Catholic social teaching, the term for this principle is subsidiarity, and it holds as true for families and local communities as it does for colonies and island communities.

Ms. Goodman also opines,

ELLEN GOODMAN: Secession a miniature experiment in democracy -- OrlandoSentinel.com

There are places in America where schoolchildren are increasingly seen as an expensive luxury or a tax burden. But here, everyone understood that the island's 20-plus schoolchildren were the difference between being a community and a summer resort. So, what made fiscal sense to a suburb was lethal to an island. The desire to control our destiny took hold and grew into the plan for home rule.

Could I agree any more? Our culture increasingly sees children as a sometimes pleasurable liability, much like a car. If you find pleasure in it, you need to weigh the costs as well. If you are able to live without the luxury, you are better off doing so. It's healthier to ride a bike to work - and to enjoy sex without consequences. But the reality is that children are in every community the difference between being a community and a "summer resort."

But wait a second! Does anyone else sense a bit of hypocrisy here? Isn't there a major disconnect between Ms. Goodman's public ideals and her private ones?

1. Publicly, Ms. Goodman pushes for public health care. Privately she pushes for the privatization of food production.
2. Publicly, Ms. Goodman, with all political liberals, pushes for government oversight of everything from childcare to welfare. Privately, she supports the principle of subsidiarity.
3. Publicly, Ms. Goodman treats children as an expensive luxury, telling us that they are only enjoyable when they are wanted and that they are otherwise nothing more than a liability. Privately, she embraces children (and one would assume family) as the cornerstone of community.

In the same article, she says,

Some who opposed secession wanted to keep government "over there." What will happen, they worried, when problems can't be blamed on "them" and must be resolved by "us"?

Doesn't this sound strangely contrary to the liberal idea that government should take care of everything?

Another fascinating quotation - same article:

Indeed many islanders spent long hours thinking about the balance of "trust and constraints" that go into self-governing. Herb Maine still wonders about the right proportions for a place where people leave their doors unlocked and feel sure that the volunteer rescue and firefighters will come as needed. "We hope to build a community on trust," he says, "not on rules and regulations."

I couldn't agree more.

Again,

ELLEN GOODMAN: Secession a miniature experiment in democracy -- OrlandoSentinel.com

On the mainland, the national political culture has become carelessly fractured. People who disagree go to the polar ends of their arguments and hurl opinions at each other. They live in cul-de-sacs of like-minded people as if they had no ground in common. How many Americans think of government as something imposed from Washington, not created at home?

These last two sentiments are not embraced by either political party. However, they were embraced by our Founding Fathers and they are embraced by Catholic social teaching.

Ms. Goodman joins other liberals (and modernists) in decrying hypocrisy. However, she is herself guilty of the same sin. However, there is one big difference. Whereas for those striving to live the moral life, hypocrisy is a travesty, for people like Ellen Goodman it can be a sign of hope. Like one of my modernist college professors said, "post-modernism is a wonderful philosophy, but you can't really live it can you?"

Exactly.

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