1 00:00:00,620 --> 00:00:06,580 "The wrong side of history:" it's one of President Barack Obama's favorite expressions. 2 00:00:06,580 --> 00:00:10,900 He's not alone, of course. It's a perennial favorite of liberal politicians and activists. 3 00:00:10,900 --> 00:00:15,540 Oppose gay marriage? You're on the wrong side of history. Against pot legalization? 4 00:00:15,540 --> 00:00:17,620 You're stuck in the past. 5 00:00:17,620 --> 00:00:22,340 It's used a lot in foreign policy, too. In his first inaugural address, for example, 6 00:00:22,340 --> 00:00:27,300 President Obama said, "To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit 7 00:00:27,300 --> 00:00:32,380 and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history..." 8 00:00:32,380 --> 00:00:38,780 As Hosni Mubarak's regime in Egypt disintegrated in 2011 and the United States stood by and watched, 9 00:00:38,780 --> 00:00:43,440 Obama fell back on the comforting thought that "History will end up recording 10 00:00:43,449 --> 00:00:49,129 that at every juncture ... we were on the right side of history." As Libyan dictator, 11 00:00:49,129 --> 00:00:54,120 Muammar Qaddafi's chapter on this earth came to an end, President Obama justified American 12 00:00:54,120 --> 00:01:00,079 policy in Libya by saying, "I believe that Qaddafi is on the wrong side of history." 13 00:01:00,079 --> 00:01:05,239 Speaking more broadly about the then still young "Arab Spring" he said, "I think that 14 00:01:05,240 --> 00:01:09,640 the region will be watching carefully to make sure we're on the right side of history." 15 00:01:09,640 --> 00:01:14,380 When Vladimir Putin started carving up Ukraine, the president insisted that America wouldn't 16 00:01:14,390 --> 00:01:19,830 actually do anything about it, but fear not -- because Putin is on the wrong side of history. 17 00:01:19,830 --> 00:01:24,920 The "long moral arc of the universe" -- another of Obama's favorite phrases -- will "bend 18 00:01:24,920 --> 00:01:29,380 toward justice." In the meantime: Tough luck, Ukrainians. 19 00:01:29,380 --> 00:01:34,460 You may not have noticed, but the phrase has opposite meanings when used at home and abroad. 20 00:01:34,469 --> 00:01:38,369 Domestically, telling someone they are on "the wrong side of history" means 21 00:01:38,369 --> 00:01:45,080 "You're going to lose eventually, so why don't you give up now?" But in foreign policy, it means, 22 00:01:45,090 --> 00:01:51,200 "I'm powerless to stop you, but one day, long after I have any responsibility to do anything at all, 23 00:01:51,200 --> 00:01:54,420 someone else will say you were wrong." 24 00:01:54,420 --> 00:01:59,380 In other words, when used at home "the wrong side of history" is a sign of strength 25 00:01:59,380 --> 00:02:05,420 -- our activism is vindicated; things are going our way! -- But internationally 26 00:02:05,420 --> 00:02:12,180 the phrase is a sign of weakness -- "you're winning and I can't, or won't stop you!" 27 00:02:12,180 --> 00:02:17,320 What unites both terms is arrogance -- actually, arrogance and cowardice. 28 00:02:17,320 --> 00:02:23,140 The notion that History is moving in an inevitable direction is ancient, but in modern times 29 00:02:23,150 --> 00:02:29,620 its main champion was Karl Marx. Marx argued that socialism was inevitable according to 30 00:02:29,620 --> 00:02:36,590 some scientific principle. Therefore any objection to its unstoppable triumph was not only morally 31 00:02:36,590 --> 00:02:40,870 wrong but anti-intellectual and even unscientific. 32 00:02:40,870 --> 00:02:45,470 This is what the great historian of Communism, Robert Conquest, meant when he said that the 33 00:02:45,470 --> 00:02:51,959 phrase "the wrong side of history" has a "Marxist twang" to it. It was the atheist's answer 34 00:02:51,959 --> 00:02:58,069 to the religious notion that "God is on our side," and it led to millions dying as socialists 35 00:02:58,069 --> 00:03:03,429 desperately tried to steam roll the future with the Wheel of History. 36 00:03:03,429 --> 00:03:08,209 The idea has non-Marxist proponents, too. There is what the renowned Cambridge historian, 37 00:03:08,209 --> 00:03:13,109 Herbert Butterfield, called the "Whig School of history" which holds that democracy 38 00:03:13,109 --> 00:03:16,709 -- though not necessarily socialism -- is inevitable. 39 00:03:16,709 --> 00:03:23,000 This is a much nicer thought, to be sure. But being nicer doesn't make it any more true 40 00:03:23,000 --> 00:03:27,700 and, to be honest, many people have died in service to this idea as well. 41 00:03:27,700 --> 00:03:34,019 At home and abroad, for socialists and democrats alike, the problem is the same: The future 42 00:03:34,019 --> 00:03:40,479 is a blank page and we don't know what will be written on it. But one thing is certain: 43 00:03:40,480 --> 00:03:45,880 when people come to believe that they are not masters of their own fate -- because history 44 00:03:45,890 --> 00:03:52,060 is not on their side -- they will be less likely to take their fate into their own hands. 45 00:03:52,060 --> 00:03:56,890 Pick your issue: It may well be true that same-sex marriage is here to stay, that Americans 46 00:03:56,890 --> 00:03:59,210 will never relinquish their gun rights or, heck, 47 00:03:59,210 --> 00:04:02,690 that soccer might actually become America's pastime. 48 00:04:02,690 --> 00:04:09,570 But the only way such victories are assured is if those opposing them preemptively surrender 49 00:04:09,570 --> 00:04:16,520 based upon some potted assertions that defeat is inevitable. That is what is so undemocratic 50 00:04:16,530 --> 00:04:22,410 about the idea that there is a right side to history -- it amounts to saying "shut up" 51 00:04:22,410 --> 00:04:25,410 to anyone who wants to keep the argument going. 52 00:04:25,410 --> 00:04:30,180 Freedom has no meaning if we give over to the idea that we are powerless against the 53 00:04:30,190 --> 00:04:37,050 cold impersonal forces that shape our destiny. In life, but particularly in a democracy, 54 00:04:37,050 --> 00:04:41,520 defeat only comes when the losing side accepts defeat. 55 00:04:41,520 --> 00:04:47,000 For generations those on the right side of slavery and civil rights were told they were 56 00:04:47,000 --> 00:04:54,260 on the wrong side of history. They proved history wrong by refusing to surrender to it. 57 00:04:54,260 --> 00:05:00,360 To paraphrase the English poet, T.S. Eliot, "There is no such thing as a truly lost cause 58 00:05:00,370 --> 00:05:04,870 because there is no such thing as a truly won cause." So long as you are willing to 59 00:05:04,870 --> 00:05:09,480 fight for what you believe in, the cause endures. 60 00:05:09,480 --> 00:05:12,380 Let history take care of itself. 61 00:05:12,380 --> 00:05:17,660 I'm Jonah Goldberg of the American Enterprise Institute for Prager University.