How the New Right Betrays Conservatives and Conservatism
Last week we asked how new is the New Right thanks to Vanity Fair’s exposé on the movement. This week the Washington Post’s Greg Sargent interviews David French and French pokes holes in the metanarrative the New Right uses to stir up their base. David French is a “conservative Christian writer and First Amendment lawyer.” French is also no friend to the New Right, “arguing that they betray classically liberal principles and liberal democratic constitutionalism.”
Sargent and French start their discussion quickly, launching into ways that David French stands apart from the New Right’s current obsession with limiting freedom of speech. With a history as a First Amendment lawyer, there are few better to read on what freedom of speech is and means than David French. He cogently traces how self-described “conservatives,” led by pro-Trump politicians like Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, have recently done an about-face from arguing for robust protections of free speech to using government power to punish the speech of individuals and businesses that conservatives do not like.
While French is correct to focus on this reversal regarding how the New Right views using the government to punish certain speech, his most compelling point has to do with the motivation behind this change. French points out that things are trending up for conservative desires, such as lowering teen pregnancy rates, abortions, divorce rates, and increasing how many kids grow up in two-parent households. Going beyond that, he notes that churches, or Christians at large, have a considerable amount of influence on culture in many parts of the country. While those like DeSantis might be stirring up hostility against corporations like Disney or Ivy League elites, those institutions do not hold much sway in the most conservative parts of the United States.
So why do some on the Right, particularly those on the New Right, want it to seem as if conservative values are under attack? Because the fight is the point. Gov. DeSantis and JD Vance, who gets a brief mention in this interview, are not running on a platform to help all of America’s citizens. They are not striving to work for the common good of America as a whole. They are using what David French calls “a sense of perpetual persecution and victimization” to win power for themselves and those like them.
There is no civic virtue being won by the New Right. Their policies do little to help achieve the goals of conservatism David French outlined above. Indeed, DeSantis’ stripping Disney of special tax status will likely raise taxes on Floridians. It’s reckless and cruel for elected politicians of any party to not offer concrete solutions to their constituents. For the New Right, cruelty seems to be the point or at least a happy coincidence. They do not appear to have anything of substance to offer, so instead, the New Right settles for the lowest hanging, most rotten fruit. America deserves better, and thankfully David French continues to point this out.
4 More Things
1) Andy Stanley, pastor of North Point Church in Georgia, has a new book that looks interesting based on the title alone, Not In It To Win It: Why Choosing Sides Sidelines the Church. If that doesn’t pique your interest, the Baptist News reports on a talk Stanley gave to the Georgia House of Representatives where Stanley asked, “Do you love the state of Georgia more than you love your party? If not, maybe you should do something else.”
2) All Sides has a report from the Center for Humane Technology on the eight ways social media distorts our reality, its impact, and ways we can avoid the distortion. The method for “revealing perception gaps and ‘alternate’ realities” seems like it could be especially illuminating. They suggest you “participate in a ‘reality swap’ where you swap feeds with another person to see how the reality presented to them differs from the reality you see.”
3) NPR has a heartbreaking story of a family who lost a mother and wife to Covid-19 because she bought into conspiracy theories that kept her from being vaccinated or taking appropriate treatments. The piece shows the real, human toll that conspiracy videos and articles on social media have had on society.
4) The New York Times has a new 3 part story out on Tucker Carlson. Part one, How Tucker Carlson Stoked White Fear to Conquer Cable, traces Carlson’s rise, fall, and rise again to become the host of Fox’s number one primetime show. It is a long read, but worthwhile as the piece follows how Tucker Carlson became the man behind “Tucker Carlson Tonight,” a journey that he has not taken alone as his ratings demonstrate.