← Return to search results
Back to Prindle Institute

ideology

Posted on

Fighting Fire with Fire

Last week, I saw Paul Thomas Anderson’s One Battle After Another. While the film deserves its own article, I want to focus on one aspect of the film’s themes, and that is the use of violence in the service of political ideology. (Spoiler Alert: I talk about some details of the film that go beyond what trailers have shown.)

What is striking about the film is that it follows two very different types of people from distinct political ideologies. On the one hand, you have Bob Ferguson and Perfidia Beverly Hills, two radical revolutionaries who are a part of the French 75. They use violent tactics to resist the state and rescue captive immigrants. On the other hand, you have Col. Steven J. Lockjaw, a white supremacist military man who uses violent and oppressive tactics to hunt down his possible daughter and kill her to ensure entry into his white supremacist club, The Christmas Adventurers.

Both sets of people adhere to different ideological positions. But, one common point between the two is that each side acknowledges that violence is, in their minds, a justifiable means to bring about their preferred political ends. While the film highlights this similarity, it sets up the French 75 as the protagonists and state power embodied by Lockjaw as the antagonist.

Although One Battle After Another takes a relatively clear stance on whose violence is “better,” it also clearly communicates an uncomfortable truth about violence in general: violence can be used in service of just about anything. Save for the highly dedicated pacifist, no political ideology is immune to the use of violence.

To understand why most political ideologies are in some way violent, we need only ask a simple question: does the ideology accept that states are permitted to use coercion in order to enforce the law? When you accept that a legitimate state can sometimes use violence, your ideology must have provisions for violence. In order to purify one’s political ideology of all violence, one would need to reject state sanctioned coercion, which is fairly difficult to do at both a theoretical and practical level.

While violence can emerge from nearly all ideological corners, a recent presidential memorandum would have us believe otherwise. On September 25, President Trump released a memorandum on domestic terrorism and organized political violence. It mentions several instances of political violence-among them the assassination of Charlie Kirk, the attempted assassinations on President Trump, the murder of Brian Thompson, and an attempt to kill Brett Kavanaugh. It then goes on to outline several ideological themes that, according to the current administration, unify the motivations for political violence:

“Common threads animating this violent conduct include anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and anti-Christianity; support for the overthrow of the United States Government; extremism on migration, race, and gender; and hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.”

Trump’s administration has framed the issue of political violence in the United States as primarily a problem of radical left-wing extremism. As it turns out, there is some research that supports the claim that left-wing violence has increased. However, the very same research also reveals something else: between the years 1994 and 2025, the majority of politically motivated violent attacks have come from the right. So, although left-wing violence may be rising more rapidly relative to right-wing violence in 2025, right-wing violence has long outpaced left-wing violence.

There are also several glaring omissions in Trump’s memorandum. For instance, he fails to mention the attempted violent insurrection on January 6th, the killing of Melissa Hortman in June of 2025, or the attack on Nancy and Paul Pelosi, which are just a few examples of right-wing extremism. He also omits political violence motivated by anti-Jewish or anti-Muslim sentiment, or by violence towards the LGBTQ+ community.

Given the flexible nature of violence, one might wish to simply argue that any ideologies that lead to violence should be abandoned. However, this position fails to recognize some difficult truths about violence.

First, we must constantly remember that modern political entities are violent by nature. It is why the police and military have weapons. It is why most modern nations invest money into defense budgets and one of the motivating reasons for why many international alliances are struck. It is why, in the U.S. in particular, we spend more money on our own military than any other nation. It is why nations come up with rules that regulate the ways in which states can legally use violent means to enforce rules. It is why a majority of U.S. states still have the death penalty. Any time power changes hands in the U.S., so too does the capacity to shift how the violent means are used. But no party in the U.S. has gotten rid of the means of violence, and it is hard to imagine anyone doing so in the near future.

The reason why violence and state power are commingled has been the subject of political philosophy, social contract theory, critical theory, sociology, and history for a long time. It is widely acknowledged that where there is a state, there follows state-backed violence. Indeed, one of the defining features of a state is that it makes rules and is allowed to enforce those rules using the force of violence. Whether one accepts a social contract theory that legitimizes state violence, or opposes its legitimacy on anarchist grounds, all can clearly see that the state’s supreme power comes from its ability to use the coercive threat of violence.

In addition to the strong bond between state power and violence, we must also acknowledge that it is difficult to eschew ideological positions that justify violence because most of us are committed to some version of the right to life and the right to self-defense. These two rights often come together. The right to life generally states that one has a moral right to their life, which at the very least demands that others not wrongfully take your life from you. From this one can derive the right to self-defense, which generally says that if another fails to respect your right to life, then you may do what is necessary to protect your own life, even if that means using violence.

Given the common belief that states are defined by their use of violence and the general commitment that many have towards the use of violence in self-defense cases, we cannot easily say that all violent ideologies must be abandoned. So, when we evaluate a “violent ideology,” the crucial question is not whether an ideology can justify violence, but under what conditions it does. Framing the issue this way forces us to examine our own ideological commitments and to acknowledge the fundamental seriousness of politics.

And this is precisely why Trump’s memorandum is troubling. His failure to recognize clearly demonstrated forms of right-wing political violence in his memorandum or in his public speeches gives us little reason to believe he genuinely cares about solving the problem of “violent ideologies.” Even more concerning is the way he frames the issue as a “war from within.” In harmony with this warlike rhetoric, Trump has responded accordingly: deploying the National Guard to U.S. cities, empowering police departments to collaborate with ICE, encouraging top military officials to use U.S. cities as training grounds, and routinely citing the insurrection act.

Trump is employing a rhetorical sleight of hand that demands scrutiny. In order to justify the increased militarization of law enforcement, he has selectively highlighted instances of political violence with ambiguous or left-leaning motives. At the same time he ignores, pardons, and uses violence motivated by right-wing beliefs with confidence. This selective framing not only distorts the reality of political violence in the U.S., it also actively makes it worse by deepening the divide between the left and the right.

While many ideologies have room for the use of violence, it is crucial that we do not conflate this point with the idea that all justifications of violence count for the same, or the idea that violence is to be celebrated and used flippantly. Violence is gravely serious and we have good reason to avoid resorting to it unless absolutely necessary. Violence violates bodily autonomy, and often leads to serious injury and death. Taking the life of another is at the top of the list of most immoral things one can do to another human, and for good reason. However, we cannot evaluate the justifications for the use of violence when we fail to acknowledge the fact that violence is used by a wide range of political ideologies.

Asking whether or not an ideology is violent will only ever answer part of our question about its moral value. If we accept the possibility that some violence is justifiable, but that it needs serious justification, knowing that an ideology is violent only tells you that you must scrutinize the ideology more closely. What we need to know next is why an ideology justifies the use of violence. This brings us swiftly one of life’s great moral quandaries: when, if ever, is violence justified?

Answering this question is no small feat, but there are a few principles we can start with to constrain the possible justifications for violence.

First, we can ask whether or not all non-violent means have been pursued. Given a commitment to the moral seriousness of violence, it is imperative to know whether non-violent means cannot bring about the same result. Famously, Martin Luther King advocated for civil disobedience using a similar logic; first exhaust all legal means at your disposal, and then after those routes have failed, engage in non-violent civil disobedience as a way to bring about change. This condition can constrain the use of violence in a similar way,  to only those cases where there are no non-violent means available.

Second, given the moral seriousness of violence and the risk of being wrong about one’s reason for using violence, violence should be kept to an absolute minimum, i.e., one should never use more violence than is necessary to fulfill the justified end of violence. If someone poses a moderate threat to you, but does not threaten your life, it would be wrong to use lethal force when non-lethal force would do. This follows from a commitment to the idea that violence requires justification in the first place. Given that not all violence produces the same amount of harm (e.g., sprained wrists, broken bones, and death are all outcomes of violence), one needs not only a justification for using violence in general, but also for the specific type of violence used.

Third, we should ask ourselves how an ideology frames violence in the first place. Does the ideology glorify violence or does it frame violence as a regrettable necessity? Does the ideology acknowledge the seriousness of violence or does it try to minimize it? Does the ideology dehumanize others? Or, does the ideology recognize the importance of a principle of moral equality? Does the ideology recognize a fundamental right to be protected from violence? The answers to these questions can tell us more about whether the violence is in the realm of justifiable.

While this list is not exhaustive, it outlines some ways we can think about violence that pull us beyond often unhelpful binaries. It is not as simple as saying we should simply reject all violent ideologies. Political ideologies need to address the question of violence and we need to grapple with the way that violence can arise from every direction of the political spectrum. Failure to acknowledge this is a failure to take the discussion about violence seriously.

Posted on

What Is Cancel Culture?

image of Socrates drinking hemlock

There has been much bemoaning of “cancel culture” in recent years. The fear seems to be that there is a growing trend coming from the left to “cancel” ideas and even people that fall out of favor with proponents of left-wing political ideology. Social media and online bullying contribute to this phenomenon; people leave comments shaming “bad actors” into either apologizing, leaving social media, or sometimes just digging in further.

It’s worth taking some time to think about the history of “cancellation.” For better or for worse, cancellation is a political tool that can be used either to entrench or to disrupt the dominant power hierarchy. Ideas and people have been “canceled” as long as there have been social creatures with reactive attitudes. Humans aren’t even the only species to engage in cancel behavior. In communities of animals in which cooperative behavior is important, groups will often shun members who behave selfishly. In other cases, groups of animals may ostracize members that do not seem to respect the authority of the alpha male. What we now call “cancel culture” is just one form of the general practice of using sentiments such as approval or disapproval or praise and blame to influence behavior and shape social interactions.

One of history’s most famous cancellations was the trial and execution of Socrates, who was “canceled” in the most extreme of ways because the influence that he had over the youth of Athens posed an existential threat to those with the power in that community. The challenge that he presented was that he might encourage the younger generation to reassess values and construct a new picture of what their communities might look like. At his trial, Socrates says,

“For I do nothing but go about persuading you all, old and young alike, not to take thought for your persons and your properties, but first and chiefly to care about the greatest improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is not given by money, but that from virtue come money and every other good of man, public as well as private. This is my teaching, and if this is the doctrine which corrupts the youth, my influence is ruinous indeed.”

For this, he was made to drink hemlock.

Galileo was canceled for the heresy of advancing the idea that the earth revolved around the sun rather than the other way around. This view of the universe was in conflict with the view endorsed by the Catholic Church, so Galileo’s book of dialogues was prohibited, and he lived out the rest of his life under house arrest.

In the more recent past, Martin Luther King Jr. was canceled — not only on his assassination, but prior to that, when many of his former compatriots in the struggle for civil rights broke ranks with him over his opposition to the Vietnam War and his battle to end poverty.

Through the years, people have been “canceled” for being Christian, Pagan, Catholic, Protestant, Atheist, Gay, Female, Transgender, Communist, and Socialist. They’ve been canceled for speaking up too much or too little, for being too authentic or not authentic enough. Books have been burned, ideas have been suppressed, people’s reputations have changed with the direction of the prevailing winds. Cancellation belongs to no single political party or ideology.

Nevertheless, “cancellation” in the 21st century is presented to us as a new and nebulous phenomenon — a liberal fog that has drifted in to vaporize the flesh of anyone who harbors conservative ideas. But what does it mean, exactly, to “cancel” a person? Perhaps the most common use of the word “cancel” in an ordinary context has to do with events. If I get a cold and I cancel my philosophy courses for the day, then those courses are no longer taking place. Similarly, in the most extreme cases, to “cancel” someone is to get rid of them forever — to kill them. Socrates, Hypatia, and even Jesus were “canceled” in this way.

There are other cases of cancellation which are pretty extreme, even if they don’t result in death. Instead, the person or group might be imprisoned or otherwise punished by the government. For example, during World War II, many Japanese Americans were “canceled” and put in internment camps just for being Japanese during a time when Americans were prone to xenophobia against that particular group. Then, of course, there was the McCarthy era, when people all across the country had to worry about their lives or livelihoods being destroyed if it were discovered or even suspected that they were sympathetic to communism. This cancel culture witch hunt affected the careers of stars like Charlie Chaplin, Langston Hughes, and Orson Wells. Positive proof of membership in the party wasn’t even necessary. Of one case Joseph McCarthy famously said, “I do not have much information on this except the general statement of the agency…that there is nothing in the files to disprove his Communist connections.”

Thankfully, when we use the word “cancel” these days, we are usually referring to something less extreme. We tend to mean that a certain segment of society will no longer support the “canceled” person in various ways — they will not consume their products, enjoy their art, listen to their thoughts, or otherwise support their general platform. The most common cases are those of politicians and artists of various types. Many people no longer watch Kevin Spacey movies after learning that he frequently engaged in sexual harassment of co-workers.

The linchpin — and the feature that makes it tricky — is that cancel culture is one of the consequences of the display of people’s reactive attitudes. It is these very reactive attitudes — guilt, shame, praise, blame — that are involved in moral judgments. Such judgments also involve assessment of harm. People often point out, when attempting to hold a bad actor responsible, that the bad actor’s behavior is resulting in a serious set of bad consequences for their community. These kinds of considerations are important — they make the world a better place. We don’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater; we don’t want to give up holding people morally responsible for their actions because we are too afraid of “canceling” the wrong person. There are cases in which cancellation seems like precisely the correct course of action. We shouldn’t continue to hold in high regard rapists and serial harassers like Bill Cosby and Harvey Weinstein. We shouldn’t support the platforms of racists and child molesters.

For these reasons, cancel culture shouldn’t be depicted as the emerging new villain in the plot of the 2020s. This culture has always been around and always will be, though, granted, it is amplified by social media and the internet. Sometimes it does some real good. The reality is that this has all been so politicized that it is unlikely that they’ll be much ideological shift on these issues. If we allow Socrates’ ancient ideas to “corrupt” our minds, we’ll keep asking questions: “Is this a power play?” “Should this behavior be tolerated?” “Is this a case that calls for compassion and understanding?” Improvement of the soul calls for nuance.

Posted on

We’ve Got Politics Wrong

photograph of democratic and republican party figurines atop the American flag

In the heat of partisan divisions, it is tempting to think different sides of the dispute are deeply committed to distinct and irreconcilable political and moral principles and values that explain their disagreement: partisan rifts are about ideology, not party affiliation. However, despite the intuitive appeal of this view, we have good evidence that it’s backwards: party affiliation trumps ideology. Understanding why will clarify our thinking about politics.

First, let’s begin with an unnerving fact: your single vote doesn’t matter to the outcome of an election (except in astronomically rare cases). It isn’t hard to see why: in a large democracy, for your vote to count, it must break a tie. But there are scant opportunities for your individual vote to break any ties. As a Louisiana resident, voting in the upcoming presidential election is highly unlikely to make a difference; the state will be carried by the Republican. And the same holds, to varying degrees, up and down the ballot.

You may object that “even if an individual vote doesn’t matter in deeply blue and red states, the same isn’t true of swing states.” A swing state is likely the best chance one has to decide an election outcome with a single vote. Even this is highly unlikely: an optimistic estimate is that an individual vote has a 1-in-10 million chance, and on average about a 1-in-60 million chance, of deciding the outcome of an election. Just to get a feel for the odds: this is roughly equivalent to the odds of winning a state lottery twice. (Since no one rationally thinks that will happen, we should think the same of deciding an election with a single vote).

When I bring this point up, people often cite the U.S. Presidential election in 2000 as a case where a few votes mattered a lot. However, this is a poor response for a couple reasons. First, the fate of that election was ultimately decided by the courts; so there’s a sense in which even in that rare case, individual votes didn’t matter. Second, the fact that something unlikely happens — like someone winning the lottery — doesn’t show it will likely happen again. The fact that we focus on that particular example, at least in American politics, is itself revealing.

Partisan affiliation trumps ideology partly because a single vote doesn’t effectively influence policy; but it can signal allegiance to those in one’s tribe. The incentives at play are revealing: voters are rationally ignorant because it is rational for them to be politically ignorant. Indeed, the average voter lacks the most basic of political knowledge: which party controls the White House; which party is in favor of banning abortion; which party supports free trade. There are many examples like this. There are poor incentives to be politically informed: if an individual vote is incredibly unlikely to decide the outcome of an election, voters lack the incentive to be politically informed. It would make sense to be informed if an individual vote would likely make a difference; one would want to study to ensure their vote had the desired impact.

Sometimes political commentators argue voting only takes a few hours: one must register, pick their preferred candidates, and then vote. This is nonsense. It would only make sense if voting didn’t require knowledge. However, we should vote well if we’re going to vote; even if a single vote won’t influence the outcome of an election, voting badly in aggregate does. And voting well requires substantial expertise in economics, foreign affairs, and educational policy, to name but a few. Voting well is costly too: it is hard to undertake, requiring thousands of hours, and with high opportunity costs.

Worse still, even if someone is informed enough to vote well, there is no guarantee that they will; there’s a good chance they’ll vote badly for reasons unrelated to how informed they are. We are susceptible to what psychologists call ‘motivated reasoning’: the unconscious tendency to find arguments for conclusions we want to believe stronger than arguments for conclusions we dislike. A creationist may require a low level of evidence for her view, but require that evidence for evolution meet a much higher evidential bar. Likewise, a smoker may dismiss studies showing a link between cigarette smoke and cancer, but accept similar studies showing a relationship between trans-fat and heart disease. Consider a real-time example: the partisan divide over police and teachers’ unions. Democrats favor the latter, but not the former; Republicans are the reverse. This is odd: if one thinks police unions are corrupt because it is very hard to fire a bad cop, then by similar reasoning they should think teachers’ unions corrupt too (and vice versa). If, however, support for one’s preferred union were an exercise in signaling partisan affiliation, this strange mix of policy positions would make sense.

Everyone engages in motivated reasoning; but the more politically informed someone is, the more likely they are to engage in such reasoning. Perhaps greater political knowledge enables one to better defend their prior convictions. This speaks to an epistemic paradox at the heart of democracy: we can’t vote well without sufficient expertise; but the more politically informed we are, the more likely we are to engage in politically motivated reasoning. This is why some philosophers argue it would often be morally better to ignore politics. We lack the incentives and psychological objectivity to vote well. And given the opportunities costs of voting well, and that an individual vote isn’t worth much, civic-minded citizens among us, who sincerely want to make the world a better place, would be better off doing something other than voting, like say, working at a homeless shelter.

Posted on

Who Owns Climate Change?

Two days after the 2016 presidential election, John Abraham published an article on the Guardian titled “Conservatives elected Trump; Now They Own Climate Change.” In the article, Abraham claims that conservatives now “own” climate change due to Trump’s victory and the lack of action from conservative politicians, both in the United States and around the world. But is it fair to blame any person, group, or ideology for climate change? And if so, how can we determine who we should hold accountable?

Continue reading “Who Owns Climate Change?”