Hace unos días preguntaba qué medidas liberales introdujo la Revolución Americana. Bryan Caplan cree que, pese a su reputación de "liberal", nadie es capaz de dar una respuesta satisfactoria citando reformas liberales específicas. Tiendo a estar de acuerdo: se habla mucho de los valores que inspiró (o que la motivaron), pero muy poco o nada de las políticas concretas que introdujo. Por algo será.
Mencius Moldbug, uno de los bloggers más perspicaces y estimulantes de la blogosfera anglosajona, ha escrito sobre el mito de la Revolución Americana dentro de su serie de posts "introduciendo" su cosmovisión política y social. Es posible leer el post y varias de las fuentes originales que recomienda sin estar convencido del todo de la tesis anti-revolucionaria, pero es imposible hacerlo sin que te suscite serias dudas, matices tu postura o cambies tus premisas ideológicas.
La primera fuente original que Mencius recomienda es Strictures upon the Declaration of the Congress at Philadelphia, un arrollador "fisking" de la Declaración de Independencia, escrito en 1776 por el ex Gobernador de Massachusets Thomas Hutchinson. Después de leerlo recientemente os lo recomiendo yo a vosotros. No es muy largo, aunque es un inglés difícil. Los que os interese el tema lo suficiente, tengáis un poco de tiempo y buen inglés sabréis apreciarlo.
Mencius pregunta qué es lo que notas después de leer el texto de Hutchinson. Tres cosas:
- Es la primera vez que has oído hablar de Strictures o de su autor.
Well, the first thing you notice is: before today, you had never read it. Or even heard of it. Or probably even its author. What is the ratio of the number of people who have read the Declaration to the number who have read the Strictures? 10^5? 10^6? Something like that. Isn't that just slightly creepy?
- El tono es muy distinto. Strictures nos habla. La Declaración nos chilla.
The second thing we notice about the Strictures is its tone - very different from the Declaration. The Declaration shouts at us. The Strictures talk to us. Hutchinson speaks quietly, with just the occasional touch of snark. He adopts the general manner of a sober adult trapped in an elevator with a drunk, knife-wielding teenager.
Of course, as Patriots (we are still Patriots, aren't we? Sorry - just checking), we would expect some cleverness from the Devil. Everyone knows this is the way you win an argument, right or wrong. Pay no attention to Darth Hutchinson's little Sith mind tricks. But still - why would Congress make it so easy? Why are we getting stomped like this? Because ouch, man, that was painful.
- Strictures explica la Declaración.
The third thing we notice is that Hutchinson actually explains the Declaration. As he begins: "The last time I had the honour of being in your Lordship's company, you observed that you were utterly at a loss as to what facts many parts of the Declaration of Independence published by the Philadelphia Congress referred..."
In other words: these Congress people are so whack-a-doodle-doo, half the time your Lordship can't even tell what they're talking about. Presumably "your Lordship" is Lord Germain. Dear reader, how does your own knowledge of the Declaration compare to Lord Germain's?
Mencius continúa:
But suffice it to say that you, personally, do not have the knowledge to produce any kind of coherent response to Hutchinson's brutal fisking of our sacred founding document. You can't say: "actually, Governor Hutchinson, I was in Boston in 1768, and I can tell you exactly why the Assembly was moved to Cambridge. What really happened is that..." For all you or I know about Boston in 1768, of course, Hutchinson could just as easily be the one yanking our chains. But why, then, are we so sure he's wrong?
Of course, you don't really think of the Declaration as a list of factual particulars. You think of it as a deep moral statement, about humanity, or something. Nonetheless, it does contain a list of particulars. Isn't it odd that it strikes us as odd to see these particulars closely examined? One simply doesn't expect to see the Declaration argued with in this way. And, reading the Strictures, one gets the impression that the authors of the Declaration didn't, either.
Which should not surprise us. What we learn from the Strictures is that, as in the rest of American history, there is absolutely no guarantee that a detailed and rational argument about a substantive factual question will prevail, whether through means military, political, or educational, over a meretricious tissue of lies. So why bother - especially if you're the one peddling the lies? Perhaps Hutchinson is yanking our chain, and King George really did dispatch hordes of ravenous bureaucrats to America, etc, etc. But one would expect to have seen the point at least disputed.
Leed el fisking de Hutchinson (y ya puestos la entrada entera de Mencius) y decidme si no os hace replantear algunas asunciones previas sobre la Revolución Americana. ¿Valía la independencia en esas circunstancias el precio de una guerra? (No hace falta decir que el hecho de que no valga el precio de una guerra no implica que valga el precio de luchar por la causa lealista. La neutralidad es una opción válida y noble cuando ninguno de los dos bandos es en realidad el tuyo).
Copio el párrafo que cierra Strictures:
Suffer me, my Lord, before I close this Letter, to observe, that though the professed reason for publishing the Declaration was a decent respect to the opinions of mankind, yet the real design was to reconcile the people of America to that Independence, which always before, they had been made to believe was not [32] intended. This design has too well succeeded. The people have not observed the fallacy in reasoning from the whole to part; nor the absurdity of making the governed to be governors. From a disposition to receive willingly complaints against Rulers, facts misrepresented have passed without examining. Discerning men have concealed their sentiments, because under the present free government in America, no man may, by writing or speaking, contradict any part of this Declaration, without being deemed an enemy to his country, and exposed to the rage and fury of the populace.
