Barry Rubin: The Freedom-Loving Rebels Become Reactionary Oppressors

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The Freedom-Loving Rebels Become Reactionary Oppressors

“You say you got a real solution
Well, you know
We’d all love to see the plan….
But when you want money
for people with minds that hate
All I can tell is brother you have to wait ”

–”Revolution,” The Beatles

One of the best ways to understand our current mess in intellectual life is through what I call the three option situation. In the past, something has been unfair (position one). What should be done according to democracy and Enlightenment values is to correct it by fairness (position two). But instead the dominant ideology wants to make it unfair in the opposite direction (position three). Thus, the situation remains arguably just as bad instead of being made better. The dominant idea of justice is merely to switch victims rather than try to make nobody a victim.


America was founded on the basis that government should be limited, individuals should have the maximum possible rights, and all were created equal. When those precepts were not properly kept — as with slavery or denial of the vote to women — the proper goal was to correct inconsistencies, to treat everyone alike. Liberalism arose in the nineteenth century as a protest against the power of the rulers and in favor of freedom from regime and social controls. How ironic that the word has now been turned into its exact opposite.

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Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). His latest book is Israel: An Introduction, to be published by Yale University Press later this year. You can read more of Barry Rubin's posts at Rubin Reports, and now on his new blog, Rubin Reports, on Pajamas Media


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