I'm a political animal. This week I was referred to on a
Canadian political Internet forum as "the best known social
conservative in the Atlantic provinces," which may or may not be
true, and I've just been invited by the leader of the Christian
Heritage Party, which is pretty conservative, to run as a candidate
in the next Canadian federal election.
Consequently, the topic of how Macs relate to politics always
grabs my attention. Last week on Low End
Mac, Dirk Pilat asked the rhetorical question: Are Apple Users Lefties? Well, the short
answer is that I'm living proof that not all Mac users are lefties,
but Dirk raised some other interesting points in his column.
Speaking of British newspapers in particular, Dirk notes, "If
you look through the computer and Internet features, the
conservative press [e.g.: Times and Telegraph] denies the existence
of Apple: Everything is Windoze and Wintel, Linux is the OS for
loonies, Apple doesn't exist or should be warned of.
"On the other hand, you'll find colorful full page features
about the introduction of OS X, the new iBook, and holy
Steve's latest whim in the [left-leaning] Guardian and the
Independent."
He wonders: "Is this just a British phenomenon, or are Apple
users around the world a bunch of liberal left-wingers? Is it the
concept of 'being different' that attracts people with
social-democratic and green ideas, or does it mean that being
creative automatically means being a member of the communist party?
Is it maybe Apple's 'hippie' history?"
There is certainly considerable reason for such inquisitive
speculation. Take, for example, a ZDNet news story (Democrats
endorse Mac at convention) from last summer that began:
- If it weren't for the huge banner draped across the front of
the convention center, you would think this week's Democratic
National Convention in Los Angeles was a Macworld Expo convention
in disguise. With more than 450 iMacs and Power Mac G4s in use, the
convention . . . was jam-packed with Apple
hardware.
"It's unbelievable," David Kornhauser, a researcher and producer
for Nippon Television, told MacCentral. "This place is wall-to-wall
Macs."
And, interestingly, the convention's director of technologies,
Naz Nageer, commented, "All I know is that when we approached
Apple, they were very interested in being a part of this
operation." It is a matter of public record that Steve Jobs is a
financial contributor to the Democratic Party.
On the other hand, arch-conservative TV and radio talk-show host
and commentator Rush Limbaugh is an enthusiastic Mac fan. A
November, 1999 MacCentral news
item notes that on a show about the Microsoft antitrust
verdict, Limbaugh said that if Bill Gates thinks he has problems
now, just wait until Internet computers take hold. Then came the
clincher: "Think Macintosh."
Not all lefties are Mac fans either. On this very left-wing
Things That
Suck Web page, the Mac is listed second, after the Rushster
himself.
And in a Media Bias Web
Site Review, David H.
Citron notes:
- You've heard Rush Limbaugh and other conservatives saying that
Streisand's fame makes her no authority on politics and that she
should shut up? (Paraphrase, of course.)
Well, refusing to listen to his own advice, Rush Limbaugh spent
most of today's (8/9) program telling folks that the Macintosh - 10
years ago - did everything that WinDoze 95 will do...
Furthermore, boasting that he refuses to learn DOS, he acted like
anyone who doesn't recognize the superiority of the Mac was just
following the crowd...
Sounds like Good ol' Rush is a Politically Correct anti-PC
MacBigot!!!
A couple of years ago I ran across an essay by Rodney O. Lain on
the theimac.com Website entitled: Are all Mac users
left-wing Liberals?
"My more conservative, PC-using friends claim that I'm just a
wild-eyed liberal in love with a 'liberal's computer,'" Rodney
lamented, and went on to quote (not necessarily with approval) a
famous aphorism:
- If you're not a liberal by age 20, you have no
heartÖ
If you're not a conservative by age 40, you have no
brainÖ
I think that the original statement used "socialist" or
"communist" rather than "liberal," the first time I heard it (Time
magazine quoting Angolan rebel leader Jonas Savimbi, as I
recall).
"Many people even go so far as saying that the Mac is a liberal
computer (the implied thought being that Liberal is wrong)," Rodney
continued. "I've often thought of the Mac as a liberal computer
myself. Until I started rubbing elbows with a wider variety of Mac
users."
"Sure there are many people who choose the Mac because they are
left-brained romantics (or is that right-brained?)," observed
Rodney, "but I'm seeing that just as many buy Macs after their
right-brained analysis (or is that left-brained?) removes any doubt
that the Mac is superior to Wintel PC. "
That certainly squares with my unscientific observation that a
preference for Macs (at least in most cases) has nothing to do with
politics, and everything to do with aesthetic sensibility and an
appreciation for quality, which neither political polarity has a
monopoly on. The Mac offers an extraordinarily high-quality
computing experience.
However, it true that Macintosh computers, like Volvo
automobiles, are superb products that have respectively become
saddled with a reputation for being favorites of upscale yuppie
types, who tend to be politically liberal. This may be considered a
blessing or a curse, depending upon your politics, I guess, but in
neither case it is factually accurate. It's the total Mac
experience that makes Mac-users - liberals and conservatives - fall
in love with their computers.
I know lots of PC-using, Mac-scorning, professed liberals, and
conservative Mac-users, and a significant number of conservative
Volvo drivers, too. Come to think of it, most of the Volvo owners I
know are relatively conservative in their political outlook. Most
of my liberal friends drive Toyotas and Hondas, for whatever that's
worth. I lean toward Chrysler products myself, but currently the
workhorse family bus is a Toyota Camry.
Most of the Mac-users I know are conservatives, too, although it
may be that I just know more conservatives, tending toward that
persuasion myself. When Canada's most right-leaning national
newspaper, The National Post, (founded and part-owned by Conrad
Black who also owns the London Daily Telegraph, which Dirk Pilat
describes as "ultra right-wing") cranked up its presses a couple of
years back, each reporter was offered their choice of either a
desktop Mac or a PowerBook, according to National Post reporter
David Akin in a letter to Macworld.
A couple of other reasons for the Mac being characterized as a
"liberal's computer" are its low penetration of the business
computing market and fact that it is spectacularly popular among
members of the entertainment industry, and with other creative,
artistic types, who more often than not tend to be liberal in their
political views.
The Mac is simply an excellent machine, which does not commend
it as a liberal's device, according to the late American
philosopher Richard Weaver, who noted the liberal "tendency to look
with suspicion upon excellence, both intellectual and moral, as
'undemocratic...'"
Which brings me to something Rodney Lain wrote that I must
respectfully take issue with: "Maybe Apple's goal, under Steve
Jobs," Rodney mused in his essay, "is to show that being a 'liberal
computer' isn't such a bad thing after all. If the Mac symbolizes
the liberal ideology, then Windows and the Wintel PC represent the
Conservative zeitgeist: conformity, sameness, and that corporate IS
mantra known as 'standardization.'"
Here I perceive both a profound misunderstanding and a negative
stereotyping of conservatism - precisely the thing Mr. Lain accuses
those who disdainfully call the Mac a "liberal computer" of doing.
Surely there can be few more aggressively fundamentalist mantras of
conformity and sameness than the so-called "political correctness"
movement, which advocates nominally liberal causes and
positions.
Liberals like to think of themselves as freethinkers, but the
impression most of most self-styled liberals I've encountered over
the past four decades have impressed upon me is of fearful
conformity to whatever version of political-correctness happens
to be the trend du jour. There are exceptions, of course, but in my
experience as a veteran of the culture wars, it is a fair
generalization. These observations leave me to deduce that the
largest proportion of liberals actually must be lemming-like PC
users, and this also explains to my satisfaction why so many
conservatives I know are Mac-users. As the inimitable Rush puts it,
"It's the easiest thing in the world to be a liberal; all you have
to do is say 'yes' to everything.... In order to be a conservative
you have to think [different?]."
I know what Rodney is getting at in terms of corporate-think
about "standardization," and I am no more patient with that than he
is, but please don't call that conservatism, because it isn't.
Indeed the standard late-90s corporate mindset has a lot more to do
with classical laissez-faire liberalism than it does with
conservatism.
Part of the confusion lies, I think, in the fact that the
classical definition of "liberal" has been inverted over the past
40 years to mean "conservative," while what most people perceive as
"liberal" now pertains more to neo-Marxist, socialist, radical
existentialist, and postmodern nihilist schools of thought.
According to the "New Webster's Dictionary and Thesaurus:"
- Liberalism is critical of institutions, whether political or
religious, which tend to restrict individual liberty and places its
faith in man's goodness and rationality. This has often expressed
itself in demands for freedom of expression, equality of
opportunity and universal education.
I am paleo-conservative enough to have little faith in man's
inherent "goodness and rationality," based on experience,
observation, and a reading of history. Note also that the classic
liberal principles of freedom of expression and equality of
opportunity (but not necessarily equality of outcomes), are
embraced by most people these days who categorize themselves as
conservatives - and denigrated by speech-policing, affirmative
action advocating, politically correct "liberals."
The "New Webster's Dictionary and Thesaurus" goes on to say:
- Economic liberalism has its roots in the laissez-faire
doctrines of Adam Smith, Malthus, and Ricardo [all 19th Century
economists]. As it developed in the 19th Century, it was
essentially a phenomenon of the commercial and industrial classes,
favoring free trade and fixing of wages and prices by competition,
and opposing state intervention.
In this context, the late 20th Century muddling of
liberal/conservative terminology becomes glaringly clear, with our
postmodern neo-conservatives enthusiastically advocating less
government and free markets as the purest expressions of true
economic freedom and bulwarks supporting political liberty - all
central tenets of classic economic liberalism.
Meanwhile, our Marxist/socialist-influenced neo-liberals
illiberally preach big government and planned markets. Having
abandoned the historical liberal principle of opposition to state
interference in the affairs of individuals, neo-liberals now affirm
a new political orthodoxy of protecting the weak and oppressed (as
defined by neo-liberals) against the supposed evils of private
interest through a mechanism of topdown state intervention,
favoring collective remedies over individual ones - surely the
antithesis of "thinking different."
Classical liberal philosophy implied the denial of all coerced
relationships and affirmed that all true relationships are formed
in freedom. However, contemporary neo-liberal political correctness
has taken the noble ideal of tolerance and perverted it into a
rigid ethos in which all ideas, cultures, and behaviors must not
only be tolerated, but also accepted and approved regardless of
their quality or character. Neo-liberal multiculturalism has
replaced the classic liberal concept that all persons should be
treated fairly and equally under the law, with the notion that all
cultures are equal.
Thus, any sort of criticism or disapproval of particular ideas,
cultures, or behaviors is deemed "intolerance," which is the one
thing neo-liberals will not tolerate, turning the classical liberal
opposition to coerced relationships on its head. Approval of
anything is regarded as neutral and unbiased, while disapproval
is deemed intolerant and bigoted.
On the other hand, when business-oriented neo-conservatives beat
the drums for unrestricted individualism and unregulated
capitalism, they are affirming the principles of classic economic
liberalism - not classic conservatism. In that sense,
neo-conservatives like Rush Limbaugh, William F. Buckley, and the
Bush administration are not really advocating conservatism at all
in the classic sense of the term, but are actually a species of
liberal.
In the contemporary North American political and economic
context, both nominally "conservative" and nominally "liberal"
beliefs are somewhat adulterated downstream products of the
post-Enlightenment liberal ethos. While they disagree on a number
of important nuances, neo-conservatives and neo-liberals share in
common the essentially liberal notions that individual
self-interest, material comfort and acquisition, and economic
growth are the correct and self-sufficient ends of human endeavor.
Both place their faith in science, technology, and industrial
prosperity as the satisfactory means to achieving these ends. Their
biggest disagreement is over who or what will be in control -
government bureaucracies or individuals operating in a free
market.
The late Canadian conservative philosopher George Grant observed
that:
- Americans who call themselves conservatives have the right to
that title only in a particular sense. In fact they are
old-fashioned liberals... Their concentration on freedom from
governmental interference has more to do with 19th century
liberalism than with traditional conservatism, which asserts the
right of the community to restrain freedom in the name of common
good.
Seymour Martin Lipsit of George Mason University in Virginia
similarly pointed out in his "American Exceptionalism:"
- To understand the exceptional nature of American politics, it
is necessary to recognize that conservatism, as defined outside the
United States, is particularly weak in this country. Conservatism
in Europe and Canada, derived from the historic alliance of church
and government, is associated with the emergence of the welfare
state.
The two names most identified with it are [Otto von] Bismarck and
[Benjamin] Disraeli.... They represented the rural and autocratic
elements, sectors which disdained capitalism, disliked the
bourgeoisie, and rejected materialistic values. Their politics
reflected the values of noblesse oblige, the obligations of the
leaders of society and the economy to protect the less
fortunate."
Or as P. J. O'Rourke has more recently observed:
- In fact, charity is an axiom of conservatism. Charity is one of
the great responsibilities of freedom. But, in order for us to be
responsible - and therefore free - that responsibility must be
personal.
There is no virtue in compulsory government charity, and there is
no virtue in advocating it. A politician who portrays himself as
"caring" and "sensitive" because he wants to expand the
government's charitable programs is merely saying that he's willing
to try to do good with other people's money. Well, who isn't? And a
voter who takes pride in supporting such programs is telling us
that he'll do good with his own money - if a gun is held to his
head."
Confused yet? I ruminate a great deal myself over where I fit in
this dialectic, and I find myself personally embracing a tapestry
of classic conservative and classic liberal values. For example, I
am a strong advocate of free speech and expression for everyone -
even those whose opinions I and/or others may find offensive and
objectionable. Does that make me a conservative or a liberal?
I believe that every person is of equal worth in the sight of
God, and that there should be no social, legal, or cultural
obstacles to anyone realizing their full potential based on merit
and hard work, and I have no patience with racial or ethno-cultural
prejudice, but I also strongly oppose the reverse discrimination of
race and/or gender preferences and quotas in employment hiring and
educational opportunities. Conservative or liberal?
I also believe that the "invisible hand" of the market operating
with a minimum of government intervention is the most powerful and
efficient engine of economic prosperity for the greatest number,
and I'm a free trader, but I'm also a staunch environmentalist and
I don't object to government environmental regulations or to
antitrust initiatives (a la Microsoft) to ensure the maintenance of
market competition. Conservative or liberal?
I agree with Abraham Lincoln and Margaret Thatcher that the
state ought not do for people what they are capable for doing for
themselves, and I am generally opposed to indiscriminate and
dependence-creating welfare entitlements, but I believe that the
better-off in society have a responsibility to help the genuinely
troubled and needy, preferably giving them a hand up rather then a
handout. Conservative or liberal?
Finally, I like Macintosh computers, and I celebrate the
inclination to "think different," with the accent strongly on the
"think" part.
One of the things I think is that Apple Computer is ill-advised
to feed and perpetuate the "liberal computer" stereotype with
things like supplying Macs to the Democratic Party Convention -
which they obviously do in their advertising. Much better to
project a more balanced philosophical perspective.
How about putting ol' Rush or National Post/Telegraph publisher
Conrad Black up there on some of those "Think Different"
billboards? I'm serious, but of course the constituency Apple
chooses to cultivate would never stand for having someone who
thinks that differently from them, die-hard Mac fan or not,
representing their favorite computer.
Begs the question of just who is "intolerant," doesn't it?
