Zack Beauchamp

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

I get that Kant and Rawls are extremely dense and boring but you can't understand contemporary liberalism without them so suck it up and do your job, public intellectuals — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

Only two out of these five would make my list of top five liberal thinkers of all time (Locke and Mill). It's a list that also betrays a lack of engagement with the many, many different flavors of liberalism both historically and contemporary — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

One thing I've noticed about bad popular treatments of liberalism, at least in the US, is that they cite the same four or five sources as canon: Locke, the Federalists, Tocqueville, Mill, and (curiously) Isaiah Berlin — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

This is not only offensive on its face to TP and the people who worked there, but also (as many have noted) straight up union busting that should appall progressives https://t.co/Idb3pNlDff — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@LeahLibresco @MichaelRWear @DouthatNYT @samuelmoyn That's part of what I loved about having a Jewish wedding. The traditions gave us an intellectual and emotional grounding while simultaneously admitting of so many meanings we could use them to express our own (theologically progressive) vision for our marriage — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

Trump mistagged a random pastor with 400 followers in a rage tweet, and then the pastor wrote an absolutely delightful essay about it https://t.co/HnR8ik1QuF https://t.co/t99rELIxgP — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

RT @ne0liberal: Interesting piece from podcast alum @zackbeauchamp about liberalism's challenges. The conclusions are in line with how I t… — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@OMTorah i tend to agree with the piece, but then again i am the author :) — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

One more time, for those who prefer afternoons to mornings — why liberalism is in crisis, why its critics are winning, and what a path out of that crisis might look like https://t.co/oxppmWNrjH — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@Vermeullarmine Gotcha. And I appreciate the kind words in the other tweet, looking forward to chatting more in the future (I v. much enjoyed watching your Sacramental Liberalism lecture during the reporting process for this!) — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@Vermeullarmine I appreciate all Wittgenstein references, but I don't think the opening is inaccurate in its current form — just necessarily incomplete, setting the table for the fuller discussion later on in the piece — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@MichaelRWear @DouthatNYT @samuelmoyn My hope is to do a kind of follow up on this point eventually, specifically on the need for a liberalism that affirms identity politics — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@Vermeullarmine What I was trying to do there is pull out the root targets of today's anti-liberal critiques. The left critique of liberalism aims squarely at economic doctrines, whereas the right's target is philosophically deeper. Hard to summarize in a few opening grafs! — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@Vermeullarmine I dunno, Adrian. My piece very explicitly argues that there's a right-wing critique of the market out there right now https://t.co/oxppmWNrjH https://t.co/n0Bs1FPMF6 — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@KateAronoff when are review copies going to be available? i'm super excited to read — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@dbessner I didn't really get into it in the piece, but I find the Schmitt revival disturbing for similar reasons. Liberals *shouldn't* like Schmitt as anything but a descriptive explanation of certain strands of illiberalism — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@DamonLinker @DouthatNYT Honestly, few things have changed my outlook on the world more than my wife's conversion to my birth faith (Judaism) and our significantly increased religiosity afterwards — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@DouthatNYT I see your point. I think my disagreements are twofold. First, I think @samuelmoyn is right that liberalism is less historically dependent from Christianity than you suggest. Second, I think pluralism itself — not post-Christianity — can serve as an engine of meaning creation. — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@DamonLinker I think that's broadly right, and a point I try to make in the piece at times. These arguments aren't new in the sense of philosophically unprecedented, but old arguments that have been strategically repurposed to fit contemporary realities. — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

This essay isn't about identifying solutions so much as it is outlining the nature of the crisis. It boils down to this — illiberals on the left and right have built new philosophical arguments that fit our scary political reality, while liberals haven't https://t.co/oxppmWNrjH — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

I'm a liberal. It's my deepest and most fundamental political identity. But I fear too many of my fellow travelers are out of intellectual gas https://t.co/oxppmWNrjH https://t.co/wsddXasEkz — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@DouthatNYT @ThePlumLineGS @BCAppelbaum What part of non-economic liberalism, exactly, do you think is responsible for that? There are a few different sub-arguments here (for ex., Deneen's variant isn't the same as Vermuele's) and I'm curious what yours is. — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

RT @DouthatNYT: The question I'm left with at the end of this interesting @zackbeauchamp crisis-of-liberalism survey is whether he thinks t… — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@DouthatNYT I think a healthier liberalism is one that purges itself of New Atheism style sneering at religion and instead tries to protect pluralism. At a deeper level, liberals need to attune to what religious communities, particularly traditional ones, offer their adherents — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

@DouthatNYT I guess it depends on what you mean by "from the right" here. I do say in the piece that there are lessons to be learned about the importance of community, thought I don't get into what they are. If I were to be more specific, I'd say the importance of *faith* communities. — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

RT @samuelmoyn: In this terrific piece @zackbeauchamp argues that if it's to survive liberalism will need to see "the world for what it is,… — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

And liberal defenses don’t seem up to the challenge. They either insist everything is actually fine, or else inexplicably attack the wrong enemies. The seeds of liberal renewal, I argue, can actually be found in what so many liberals claim to hate — “identity politics” https://t.co/RF8NliXU9L — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

Political crises in the actual world have bred a philosophical crisis. Liberals are beset by new twists on old arguments — Marxism on the left, Catholic-inflected reactionaryism on the right — that explain why it feels like the liberal order is failing so many people https://t.co/xFjREgmlKs — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

This is a piece I’ve been working on for a long time — an analysis of the contemporary crisis of liberalism, and why it feels like the liberal response has been so weak https://t.co/oxppmWNrjH — PolitiTweet.org

Zack Beauchamp @zackbeauchamp

I know “imagine what Republicans would say if Obama had done it” tweets are a little stale. But imagine Obama had invited the Taliban to Camp David literally days before the 9/11 anniversary. Just fucking imagine. — PolitiTweet.org