The Iron Cage: The Liberal Backbone, Chapter 10
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
Release Date: 05/21/2025
The Iron Cage: The Liberal Backbone, Chapter 10
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
Between 1933 and 1981, there were 24 sessions of Congress. For 22 of those 24, Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate. During the same time there were 12 presidential terms. Eight were served by Democrats. Now Democrats can lose, twice, to a party led by Donald Trump, whose campaigns have been natural experiments in just how bad a candidate can be and still beat the Democrats. What happened? They got caught in what Max Weber called the Iron Cage: stuck in their rationalistic heads, Democrats have become alienated from much of America. Find the full transcript at .
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How We Became Aliens: The Liberal Backbone, Chapter 9
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
Last time, I argued that if liberals still believe in an open society — free, equal, and pluralistic — we must defend reason. It’s the shared “meeting space” that makes the open society possible. But we must also understand that reason alone isn’t enough. If we filter all our experience through rationality, we become separated from it, as if we’re not living life, but observing it with scientific instruments. We become alienated. It’s a condition familiar to anyone who’s had a modern, reason-based education, especially in the humanities. It has come to define life within the...
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Defending Enlightenment: The Liberal Backbone, Chapter 8
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
It’s a fundamental assumption of liberal democracy that we debate our differences with reason. But now that assumption looks like a relic of a bygone age — specifically, the Age of Enlightenment, from the late 17th to early 19th centuries. The Enlightenment produced more scientific progress than all of previous history — the very idea of progress comes to us from the Enlightenment. It had the same impact on the generation of wealth: Compared to economic growth since the Enlightenment, there was almost none during all the millennia before. And the Enlightenment gave us liberalism,...
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Meet the New Boss: Chapter 7 of The Liberal Backbone
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
Woke theory aims to liberate our minds, but imposes limits on how we think: Many ideas are judged oppressive, and therefore "problematic." Liberal tolerance is seen as potentially oppressive too, for the same reason. Will liberals stand up for what they believe in? Should they? This episode: We begin to see if liberals can take their own side in a quarrel.
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What Liberals DON'T Stand For — Chapter 6 of The Liberal Backbone
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
Liberals and the woke left see many of the same problems in society, from structural oppression to alienation. And yet the ideology of the woke left is incompatible with liberalism. For liberals, it starts with the very idea of wokeness, as an awakening from illusions, or false consciousness. The goal is supposed to be liberation. But it can look more like tyranny. It boils down to this: If I’m woke and you’re not, I see everything more clearly than you do. I have escaped from the prison of oppressive illusions in which you are still trapped. That means that if you disagree with me, I may...
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What (and Where) Is the Liberal Backbone? Spencer on WCPT Chicago with Joan Esposito
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
As you know if you’ve been following my posts and podcast episodes lately, I’m writing and releasing the chapters of my new book The Liberal Backbone in real time. When Joan Esposito of WCPT Chicago heard about it, she had an idea: a "radio book club," with me coming on her show to talk about the book as it comes together, chapter by chapter, with her and her listeners. On December 13, we had the first episode, and I thought it went great — Joan is one of my favorite interviewers. We explored the book's big themes: what liberals actually stand for and how they can stand up for it a...
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From Marx to Theory to Wokeness: The Liberal Backbone Chapter 5
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
The first draft of Chapter 5 of my next book, The Liberal Backbone. It's a brief summary of the roots of woke thinking, which should make the woke left more understandable, especially for liberals trying to sort out what they do and don't stand for. More at Dastardly Cleverness.com/liberal-backbone-chapter-5 and at Substack.com/@spencercritchley. — Spencer
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We Need to Talk About Marx: The Liberal Backbone, Chapter 4
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
Are the woke just a bunch of Marxists? No, but that claim isn’t based on nothing. The Theory behind wokeness is complicated, but some of its key concepts are inherited from Marx, in modified form. And it becomes much easier to understand Theory if you understand something about Marx — which few people do, because Marx doesn't make it easy. In this fourth chapter of The Liberal Backbone, I explain two key Marxist concepts I plain language: structural oppression, and how a structure of ideas can make oppression seem normal. Marx was sure he'd discovered an infallible "science" of history....
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What DOES It Mean to Be Woke? The Liberal Backbone, Chapter 3
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
The word "woke" has at least two meanings — and they’re so different, they contradict each other. By one of them, any liberal can be proud to be called woke, because to be woke in this sense is to recognize bigotry and oppose it. But by the other meaning, liberals can’t be woke, even if they want to. That’s because if you’re this kind of woke, you reject liberalism. Spencer explains in this chapter of The Liberal Backbone. Find the full text and links at .
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The Liberal Backbone, Chapter 2: Why Nothing Makes Sense
Dastardly Cleverness in the Service of Good
It’s hard to stand for something if you’re not even sure what that something is. And many liberals have become unsure what liberalism is. For a long time, few of us had to think much about it. Liberalism was just default political reality. It was like water is for the young fish in David Foster Wallace’s famous parable: They can’t see the water, because it’s everywhere. Let’s remember that the word “liberalism” doesn’t only refer to beliefs on the left. It’s also the name of the philosophy of freedom on which the United States and every other liberal democracy were founded....
info_outlineBetween 1933 and 1981, there were 24 sessions of Congress. For 22 of those 24, Democrats controlled both the House and the Senate. During the same time there were 12 presidential terms. Eight were served by Democrats.
Now Democrats can lose, twice, to a party led by Donald Trump, whose campaigns have been natural experiments in just how bad a candidate can be and still beat the Democrats.
What happened?
They got caught in what Max Weber called the Iron Cage: stuck in their rationalistic heads, Democrats have become alienated from much of America.
Find the full transcript at dastardlycleverness.com.