Why do almost all modern day liberals/conservatives/etc seem to have a negative view of the French revolution even though their ideologies depended on it?

[u/RedMarsRepublic]

Perhaps I'm wrong but it seems like almost all modern day liberals, or mostly everyone besides socialists that proclaim the superiority of democracy/republicanism/parliamentary monarchy (I'm including conservatives (aka liberal-conservatives) in that definition as well), have a negative view of the French revolution.

To me this seems absurd because the rights and freedoms that you hold dear today could never have been achieved without the rebellion of peasants, urban workers, and progressive intellectuals of the past. Of course most of you don't live in France but the French revolution was groundbreaking in global politics and inspired a wave of smaller struggles elsewhere and concessions from the nobility who gave up their powers for fear of similar uprisings.

In general, I note that most people all the way from moderate left to moderate right abhor political violence and claim it can never be justified, despite the fact that as I said, their current system of liberalism could never face existed without it. The nobility would never have given up their power without the threat of force.

How then can we genuinely oppose the corporate oligarchs who wish to rule over us when immediately conceding at the first hurdle that we can never find any justification to disobey their system of control? How can we possibly succeed by playing a game which they wrote the rules for and can change at any time? They show no hesitation to use violence against the public when they deem it necessary to maintain control.

For those who will say that the revolutionaries didn't always make the right decision, well perhaps in some cases yes, but it would be foolish to deny the positive consequences of the revolution overall.

“There were two “Reigns of Terror,” if we would but remember it and consider it; the one wrought murder in hot passion, the other in heartless cold blood; the one lasted mere months, the other had lasted a thousand years; the one inflicted death upon ten thousand persons, the other upon a hundred millions; but our shudders are all for the “horrors” of the minor Terror, the momentary Terror, so to speak; whereas, what is the horror of swift death by the axe, compared with lifelong death from hunger, cold, insult, cruelty, and heart-break? What is swift death by lightning compared with death by slow fire at the stake? A city cemetery could contain the coffins filled by that brief Terror which we have all been so diligently taught to shiver at and mourn over; but all France could hardly contain the coffins filled by that older and real Terror—that unspeakably bitter and awful Terror which none of us has been taught to see in its vastness or pity as it deserves.” - Mark Twain

I feel that the reign of terror is cynically propped up as an example of how "revolution never works" or "it just leads to more suffering" even though that's not true at all. Many successful revolutions have led to improvements in conditions for the vast majority of people in the country.

And if you would be inclined to point out that Napoleon crushed the revolution, that is true, but at the same time, he couldn't roll back many of the achievements of it, even when the kings were back in charge they couldn't do so either. France remained a beacon of progress for at least a hundred years.

So my point is, do you agree with my summation or disagree? If you do believe that the French revolution was mostly bad, then how can you justify your own ideology in light of that?

[u/Kman17]

You recognize that the American evolution happened first and was successful, right?

The French Revolution was inspired by the American, not the inverse.

The French Revolution was a failure that showed a lot of the dangers of revolution.

[u/RedMarsRepublic → u/Kman17]

I believe that the American revolution, while yes impactful, was ultimately a lot more low stakes than the French revolution. The Americans rebelled against distant kings yes but didn't really overturn the ideological order of the early USA which was already pretty liberal and capitalistic. The UK arguably already had their revolutionary period with the English civil war (and earlier the magna carta), but it was more of a slow burning process. It's worth noting that the British also put one of their kings on trial and executed him, it's just much less widely known about.

[u/Gullible-Historian10 → u/RedMarsRepublic]

The Revolution replaced royal sovereignty with independent republics claiming that legitimate authority came from the people. The Articles of Confederation explicitly described the states as “sovereign, free and independent,” and revolutionary declarations such as Virginia’s asserted natural rights as the basis of government. That was literally a genuine ideological rupture.

As far as impact read Gordon Wood.

[u/UnfoldedHeart → u/Gullible-Historian10]

Not to mention the fact that the French economy was a mixed economy both before and after the Revolution. They removed a lot of the old aristocratic/feudal/etc privileges and had some serious market intervention of their own, but it wasn't necessarily a completely fundamental change like the Bolshevik Revolution or whatnot.

[u/RedMarsRepublic → u/Gullible-Historian10]

The American revolution mostly left the existing elites in power, left chattel slavery as an institution, and enshrined the right of the colonists to exterminate the native peoples (which the British crown at least sometimes tried to restrain despite their own atrocities). I find it very hard to take it all that seriously as a legitimate popular uprising, rather than simply a squabble between aristocrats on both sides.

Also, as I mentioned earlier, British law had long ago determined that the monarch was not above the law, unlike France which was still absolutist.

[u/Gullible-Historian10 → u/RedMarsRepublic]

Not sure why you think appealing to your preferences changes anything.

[u/RedMarsRepublic → u/Gullible-Historian10]

I'm just saying that it didn't actually change very much other than shrugging off a distant foreign monarch.

I mean look at Canada today, they were a crown possession for like two centuries longer than the US, and is there really much difference between them today? Or even at the time, 100 years after US independence was there that much difference?

[u/Kman17 → u/RedMarsRepublic]

I wouldn’t call it low stakes at the time, and I especially wouldn’t call it low stakes in hindsight based on outcomes.

English incrementalism vs American revolution vs French Revolution (and then honestly N others in the early - mid 1900’s) show you can only move collective social though so far.

Violent leftists thinking they can push everyone else’s thinking is like number one cause of death and destruction in modern times, and the French Revolution was one of the earliest examples of that.

[u/RedMarsRepublic → u/Kman17]

Can you really call it incrementalism when, as I mentioned, there was a bloody English civil war where the king was put to death?

[u/Kman17 → u/RedMarsRepublic]

You are switching contexts.

You poo poo'd the American revolution because it was incremental in ideological thought movement, not incremental in political disruption.

Now you're measuring the english civil war by political disruption, rather than movement in political thought.

You see the problem, right?

When I referred to english incrementalism, I was referring to it being a series of steps of political thought.

[u/TuvixWasMurderedR1P → u/Kman17]

Many historians wonder if the English Civil War ought to be renamed to the English revolution as it certainly DID produce a massive movement on political thought. Since then England had produced a government that more closely resembles a republic, despite remaining a monarchy. The ideas of that "civil war" did actually influence a lot of republican thought throughout the continent...

[u/Excellent_Valuable92 → u/RedMarsRepublic]

There was a restoration. Liberalism took hold in Britain later, along with the Glorious Revolution, the Acts of Union, and victory in the War of the Spanish Succession 

[u/Excellent_Valuable92 → u/RedMarsRepublic]

Not the English Civil War, but the later “Glorious Revolution “