Eff Rules, Do Good: Towards A New Liberalism

Be Super, Man

Superman: “People Were Going To Die!”

There’s a very important scene in James Gunn’s “Superman” where Lois Lane quizzes Superman in an interview about his decision to weigh in and protect the citizens of Jarhanpur (a poor country) against the aggression of its neighbor Boravia (a U.S.-backed dictatorship).

Lois agrees with Superman, but she wants him to understand how his decision can be spun in the court of public opinion. She points out that his actions are seen as representative of U.S. foreign policy and that many hold suspicions about him because he has the powers of a literal god. This unnerves Superman, who grows increasingly frustrated because the machinations of modern media and politics are so antithetical to the way he sees the world. Ultimately, he gets very angry and screams at Lois, “PEOPLE WERE GOING TO DIE!”

Mild spoilers but by the end of the film it becomes clear that Superman absolutely did the right thing, and his choice to do what he did works as a catalyst to push other more powerful people to do what they can to make the world a better place.

Which leads me to the modern Democratic Party. For decades now the party has been trying to please everyone under the sun. It has become consensus within the party and liberalism at large, that rules and procedures must be followed and by doing so, the party and its affiliated ideological movement will have maximum legitimacy – leading to more good things and a better future. Donald Trump’s time in the presidency seems to validate this approach, because Trump is a bigoted fascist who doesn’t believe in rules and procedure, so the restoration of norms has become a rallying cry for Democrats opposing Trump.

The problem is that rules and procedure play a big role in how things got so bad in the first place. Trump, Republicans and the conservative movement didn’t get to the pinnacle of power out of nowhere. They worked the system, via the media and modern politics, ignoring tradition and barely holding on to the rules (totally obliterating them in some instances). Trump’s second term has especially eschewed the rules, and he has put a sledgehammer to the American way of life.

In contrast, by clutching the rules and procedures so tightly throughout all this, the Democrats have exuded impotence. And again, this isn’t new. We have seen Democrats roll over for the Reagan revolution, the Gingrich insurgency, and George W. Bush’s deployment of fascism lite, among many other episodes. The Democratic Party’s unwillingness to fight – and then its unwillingness to pursue justice once it has fallen backwards into power – has become an unfortunate default position in American politics.

That inability to have a pulse does nearly as much to suppress the vote as conservative voter suppression schemes. When the Democrats aren’t led by a charismatic wunderkind like Barack Obama or Bill Clinton or they don’t have a very clear hate object like Bush Jr. or Trump, the party limps along like a wounded animal – barely opposing anything let alone defeating clear evil.

What Democrats and liberals need to understand, as Superman did, is that sometimes the rules are dumb. Sometimes, the procedures and methods that we relied upon in the past are not adequate for modern times. If people are going to die or be hurt, they need to act.

Just get it done. Find a way. Use creative interpretations of the rules and laws. Get right up to the line if that means, ultimately, that people are going to benefit. People are tired of hearing that great things cannot be done because of arcane Senate procedures that nobody truly understands. People are so over hearing about appeals to decorum and comity that have long outlived their usefulness.

The opposition is filled with cruel villains who wouldn’t blink twice in accepting a course of action designed to do maximum harm, so why would the people who are purportedly fighting for good allow themselves to be hamstrung by something as insipid as tradition?

They shouldn’t. Liberalism needs to be a fighting liberalism, not a legion of status quo defenders. Defending how things “ought” to be or excusing inaction because it runs up against “norms” inspires nobody.

American society is facing its biggest threat since the Civil War. There is no point in preserving the way things were and sticking to the rules if we’re just going to end up in a repeat of this very bad place.

People were going to die – so do whatever is possible to prevent that, even if it makes people upset. The worst that could happen is too many people have a better life, too many people live longer, too many people have an overabundance of love and hope in their lives.

That is liberal excess I’m willing to live with. In fact, I think its Super.

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— Oliver

Follow me, Oliver Willis, on BlueSky @owillis.bsky.social

Exclusive Kal-El Photo

Went into the archives for some vintage Kal from 2019 when he was still a puppy and a little more gangly.