The New York Times Trashes Its Liberal Credentials

The New York Times needs to course-correct — now — before it further damages the liberal cause. The Times bears the mantle of America’s “newspaper of record,” of recorded event. It also sets the standards for the politics, culture, and criticism pursued by the Left, its constituent audience. So: What are we to make when the Times in its influential Sunday “Opinion” section, on August 27, devotes not one, not two, but three slots (as reinforcement?) to content truly meretricious. Leading off, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/08/25/opinion/bad-pleasures-virtues.html?campaign_id=2&emc=edit_th_20230825&instance_id=101220&nl=todaysheadlines&regi_id=62455693&segment_id=142942&user_id=a1d4d70d0324e5e6fc334e5d5c78f71f" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">“The Virtues of Being Bad,”</a> a multi-author section expounding on the joys of — wait for it — shoplifting(!), sleeping with friends(!), drugs(!), and other such ilk, all urging we get to that point where we “break the rules and don’t regret it.” Next, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/25/opinion/desires-good-person.html?campaign_id=2&emc=edit_th_20230825&instance_id=101220&nl=todaysheadlines&regi_id=62455693&segment_id=142942&user_id=a1d4d70d0324e5e6fc334e5d5c78f71f" rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">“I Don’t Need You to Be a ‘Good Person.’ Neither Do You”</a> (note the cynical scare-quotes around good person), an astonishingly irresponsible appeal by a clinician(!) touting the joys of “transgression,” teed up by the subhead: “Your secret desires can be a compass, leading you to freedom.” Finally, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/08/26/opinion/liberalism-trump-russia-china-cold-war.html#:~:text=The%20very%20fact%20that%20liberals,recommitting%20to%20its%20earlier%20impulses." rel="noopener ugc nofollow" target="_blank">“Can Liberalism Save Itself?,”</a> an analysis that endeavors to portray liberalism’s historic promise — freeing the individual from all oppression; that examines its present “error” (it’s now more fearful than hopeful); yet falls short by recommending only more emancipation, without calling for the responsible exercise of that emancipation. So much freedom, so little responsibility! How can the Times not understand the incalculable damage it inflicts on liberalism’s historic cause — by continuing to push, so assiduously and faux-daringly, at gates once marked forbidden but now long since wide open: i.e., the irresponsible rule-breaking, the transgression, the hurtful impact of one’s secret desires on the commonweal, the empty freedom of emancipation without the responsible exercise of that freedom? In its cultural coverage and criticism, the Times as our preeminent gatekeeper has been key to unlocking those gates — and unleashing so much damage. <a href="https://carlaseaquist.medium.com/the-new-york-times-trashes-its-liberal-credentials-846edca42fbc">Website</a>