#Civic Virtue

[newyorkthegoldenage]

Gust Lessis as "Civic Virtue" shows how a man would look in the same predicament, represented by the famous statue at City Hall, Brighton Beach, September 13, 1922.

Photo: Bettmann Archives/Getty Images/Fine Art America

[kemetic-dreams]

Civic virtue is morality or a standard of righteous behavior in relationship to a citizen's involvement in society. An individual may exhibit civic virtue by voting, volunteering, organizing a book group, or attending a PTA meeting. Historic Roots.

What is ethical reasoning in politics?

Political ethics deals with realizing moral values in democratic societies where citizens (and philosophers) disagree about what ideal justice is. In a pluralist society, governments attempt to justify policies such as progressive taxation, affirmative action, the right to abortion, and universal healthcare.

[compassionmattersmost]

Voices from History Are Whispering to Us, Still

To Hold Steady and Seek the Wisdom They Once Prayed For As I begin to read and reflect on the birth of our nation, I find myself drawn to The Debate on the Constitution, edited by Bernard Bailyn. In this remarkable collection, voices from the founding era come alive through letters, speeches, and passionate exchanges over the very principles that would shape America’s future. My journey through…

[girlzoot]

He spent part of last year working in Canada, and I think it rubbed off on him, diminishing his innate American ability to celebrate the civic virtue of idiocy. —Sarah Vowell/The Partly Cloudy Patriot(Pop-A-Shot)

[paradife-loft]

skill issue

[drusill-a]

What if one happens to be possessed of a heart that can’t be trusted? What if the heart, for its own unfathomable reasons, leads one willfully and in a cloud of unspeakable radiance away from health, domesticity, civic responsibility and strong social connections and all the blandly-held common virtues and instead straight toward a beautiful flare of ruin, self-immolation, disaster? If your deepest self is singing and coaxing you straight toward the bonfire, is it better to turn away? Stop your ears with wax? Ignore all the perverse glory your heart is screaming at you? Set yourself on the course that will lead you dutifully towards the norm, reasonable hours and regular medical check-ups, stable relationships and steady career advancement the New York Times and brunch on Sunday, all with the promise of being somehow a better person? Or… is it better to throw yourself head first and laughing into the holy rage calling your name?

june gehringer, I get so jealous of euthanized dogs / joan tierney, dear 4am / caluco, maggots / margaret atwood, [you fit into me] / cameron barnett, murmur / lindsey drager, the archive of alternative endings / @mobydyke / donna tartt, goldfinch / trista mateer, honeybee / michelle zauner, crying in h mart / sylvie baumgartel, pink / joan didion, blue nights / john irving, a prayer for owen meany / brian eno / patrick james errington, after all this small talk, you’d think there’d be no weather left / madeline miller, circe / richard siken, a primer for the small weird loves / the lumineers, ophelia / jeanette winterson, written on the body / fariha róisín, how to cure a ghost / hayley williams, watch me while I bloom / lori gottlieb, maybe you should talk to someone / margaret atwood, cat’s eye / @preschooldr0pout / natalie díaz, postcolonial love poem / donna tartt, goldfinch

[ARMAND] [CLAUDIA]

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: Character Traits (Virtues)

When describing someone, we often describe the virtues or values they exhibit, which are aligned to their character.

Virtues - positive personal strengths and behaviors that demonstrate an individual’s moral standards.

Can be considered the foundation of character and can be categorized as moral virtues, civic virtues, intellectual virtues, or performance virtues.

Types of Virtues

INTELLECTUAL VIRTUES

Can be considered habits of mind, enabling individuals to become critical thinkers who ask the right questions and seek answers from evidence-based resources.

These virtues support discernment, right action and the pursuit of knowledge while enabling problem-solving.

MORAL VIRTUES

Can be considered habits of the heart.

Moral character guides decision making from multiple perspectives allowing individuals to evaluate situations and respond in a meaningful and responsible manner that keeps the betterment of society and all stakeholders in the forefront.

These virtues guide social connections and ethical decision making.

CIVIC VIRTUES

Can be considered habits of service.

Civic character supports a collaborative approach to solving systemic problems to contribute to the well-being of others and serve the public good.

These virtues ultimately support citizenship and community.

PERFORMANCE VIRTUES

Can be considered habits of action and will, enabling us to marry the quality of our actions to the strength of our convictions.

These virtues equip and enable one to navigate life and uncertainty for success.

Performance virtues are informed by intellectual, moral, and civic virtues.

In collaboration, the virtue types allow individuals space to develop a deeper sense of virtuous behavior and growth through personal experiences and reflection when the virtues collide, known as practical wisdom, furthering our good sense.

Practical wisdom

Also known as phronesis, is the meta-virtue that guides individuals in making decisions when two or more virtues collide.

This helps us determine what is morally right in a given situation so we can discern which virtue to put into action.

Intellectual Virtues: Are my actions in pursuit of knowledge, truth and understanding?

Examples

Reflection

Resourcefulness

Communication

Critical Thinking

Curiosity

Reasoning

Moral Virtues: Do I respond ethically and with heart?

Examples

Honesty

Humility

Compassion

Integrity

Kindness

Empathy

Civic Virtues: Do I engage in responsible citizenship?

Examples

Service

Citizenship

Community Awareness

Neighborliness

Civility

Performance Virtues: Do I have the tools to navigate life and uncertainty?

Examples

Resilience

Determination

Perseverance

Leadership

Self-discipline

Motivation

Source ⚜ More: Writing Notes & References ⚜ +600 Personality Traits

[liberalsarecool]

John Bolton, of all people, calling out Republicans' Russian agenda. 'No character' and 'no civic virtue' describes the heart and soul of conservative politics.

'No competence' is Trump litmus test.

[wilwheaton]

When they drafted the Constitution, the Founders’ greatest fear was that a populist demagogue would flatter the mob, subvert American democracy and establish authoritarian rule. “The only path to a subversion of the republican system of the Country is, by flattering the prejudices of the people, and exciting their jealousies and apprehensions, to throw affairs into confusion, and bring on civil commotion,” Alexander Hamilton wrote to George Washington in 1792. “When a man unprincipled in private life[,] desperate in his fortune, bold in his temper … is seen to mount the hobby horse of popularity … It may justly be suspected that his object is to throw things into confusion that he may ‘ride the storm and direct the whirlwind.’”

 The Founding Fathers feared demagogues and hoped for civic virtue

[pmamtraveller]

PETER PAUL RUBENS - JUDITH WITH THE HEAD OF HOLOFERNES, 1616

In the painting, Judith has just severed the head of the Assyrian warlord Holofernes using a sword. The maid gazes at it with a blend of wonder and fear. Shortly after, Judith's besieged city, Bethulia, would display the head on its walls.

Judith, a beautiful widow, rescues her city under siege, Bethulia, by infiltrating the camp of Holofernes. Using her charm, she gains his trust and, after intoxicating him, beheads him in his tent. This act inspired her people to defeat the Assyrians and secure their freedom.

The painting symbolizes civic virtue and the triumph of good over evil. Judith represents a powerful figure who defies tyranny, reflecting themes of heroism and female strength.

Peter Paul Rubens was experiencing a period of significant artistic and personal activity at the time of creating this painting. He had recently returned to Antwerp, and this era marked a flourishing of his workshop, allowing him to produce monumental works

[kvetcher2]

the reason so many leftists are willing to not vote, and potentially let trump win, over whatever issue they’ve decided kamala is not progressive enough on, is because they don’t see voting for what it is. they don’t see it as a civic duty, or an incremental effort towards improving their own government. they definitely don’t see it as a social responsibility that they have toward other people, especially those who will be the most negatively affected by trump’s policies. no, there’s a massive subset of mostly young leftists who see voting as a form of self-expression. as a public display of their own enlightened political virtuousness. that’s why so many leftists will not vote for a candidate that they think is imperfect in any way, even if they have no other options. in their eyes, voting, like anything else, is an opportunity to virtue signal and proudly display that they’re the most leftist of leftists in their unwashed polycule. it’s somehow more progressive to protest <insert political issue> by refusing to vote for the woman who is indisputably more progressive on said political issue than trump… simply because she doesn’t go far enough? these are the same people that romanticize violent revolution but panic over calling the dentist. be fucking for real you’re not voting because it would mean you have to go outside 🙄

[newyorkthegoldenage]

Boys prepare for a swim at the base of the Statue of Civic Virtue Triumphant Over Unrighteousness at City Hall Park, July 8, 1932. Mayor LaGuardia disliked it; he resented being confronted with the male figure's bare posterior every day when he left City Hall. When Queens opened a new Borough Hall in 1940, LaGuardia seized the opportunity and gave the fountain to Queens, where it was moved in February 1941. He wasn't the only opponent: in 1987 Claire Shulman, the borough's first female president, said it should be moved because "A municipal building is not an appropriate place for a statue that portrays women as evil and treacherous." Eventually, in 2012, it was moved to Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn.

Photo: Associated Press via Pinterest

[anotherhumaninthisworld]

Rare women have in ancient republics risen to the height of public virtues; they knew how to combine the modesty of their sex with the civic courage which is a duty for ours. Republican France, during the first storms of the revolution, saw these glorious examples multiply in its midst, a single one of which would have made another people proud. It crowned the heroines of October 5; it saw French women in popular societies, eager to hear, from the mouths of their brothers and their husbands, the interesting lessons of patriotism that they had to engrave in the souls of their children. The homeland, in the crises of liberty, smiled on the generous efforts of a few intrepid citoyennes. The cowardly architects of our discord have despised this type of merit; they wanted there to exist among us a permanent society of women clothed exclusively with the modest title of revolutionaries, nobly separated from the male sex, like long ago, in the mysteries of the good goddess. They reduced to silence the estimable citoyennes whom the love of the public good had led there, they entrusted the scepter to the hands of some female Demosthenes, inspired by these English and Austrian sylphs. Their primary occupation is to cry out for famine, to push the people into despair, to denounce the imperturbable friends of liberty. They are the ones who came in the wake of Jacques Roux and Leclerc, to insult the Mountain and the Jacobins, to insult and threaten the representatives of the people. They are responsible for teaching the universe that modesty is a prejudice, that the distinction between the talents and occupations of the two sexes is nothing other than an invention of the aristocracy; that men must abandon the tribune and the seats of the senate to women; and all men's clubs must appear before the tribunal of revolutionary presidents. Porcia was only an imbecile, with her virtue revered in Rome; she should have played the role of Cato. Cornelia only played a vulgar role, instructing her sons, still children, to defend the rights of the people; Cornelia should have mounted the rostrum for harangues: instead of offering their jewels to the homeland; they will not cry out when they learn of their glorious death: I had given birth to him to serve the homeland; this merit is too vulgar; they are sterile like vice; but on the other hand, they will declaim against the founders of the republic, and slander the representatives of the people. Such is the sublime instrument that the agents of the enemies of the homeland keep in reserve to incite trouble if necessary, at the first moment of embarrassment or disaster with which the republic would be threatened.

Rapport écrit de la main de Robespierre, sur la faction de l’étranger, cited in Pièces trouvées dans les papiers de Robespierre et complices (24 September 1794).

[anarchywoofwoof]

play stupid games win stupid prizes. fuck around and find out. leopards eating faces. made your bed now lie in it. cognitive dissonance. virtue signalling. got what you wanted. elections have consequences. gaslighting. did you vote? just vote. you can't complain if you don't vote. who did you vote for? voting third party is the same as not voting. vote blue no matter who. there is no perfect candidate. work to push them left. lesser evil. easier to protest. most important election. trying to save democracy. Trump will be worse. you're gonna love Trump. good luck under Trump. Trump is gonna deport you. Trump is gonna flatten Gaza. someone didn't take civics class. sorry you hate women. sorry you hate Black people. sorry you hate America. sorry you hate white people. i guess you hate liberals more than Trump. i guess you hate everything. i guess you hate everyone. after all, "bOtH sIdEs ArE bAd." communist revolution. radical left. tankie. anarkiddy. lazy children. privileged white leftist. horseshoe theory. firebomb a walmart. violence is not the answer. thanks Chappell Roan. China bad. Mao killed 50,000,000 people. Russia bad. Stalin killed 50,000,000 people. Russian bot identified. Cuba bad. Castro evil. Venezeula bad. North Korea bad. North Korea hungry and horny. no gay people in Palestine. this is like Avengers. this is like Star Wars. this is like Harry Potter. this is like Lord of the Rings.

[max1461]

So it’s well known that I don’t really believe in voting, not for any sort of ideological reason but just because I think the math says it doesn’t do anything. But if you accept expected utility maximization as your decision-theoretic principle, which most arguments in favor of voting as a concept basically do (even if you think that voting specifically doesn’t matter in bourgeois democracies, or so on!) you basically have to admit that not voting is equivalent to giving half a vote to both candidates.

I don’t know, if you’re a virtue ethicist about civic duty or something go off, but if you would ever make an essentially consequentialist case for voting in a large election under any political circumstances (including e.g. in regards to union leadership, or party-internal voting in your favorite Marxist-Leninist state, or whatever), I find arguments like “I refuse to vote even for the lesser of two evils!” to be uncompelling.

[critical-skeptic]

Does Democracy Have a Chance Or Is This America's Epilogue?

The fact that Democratic leaders are still clashing over who gets to run where, while the entire system teeters, should tell you everything you need to know: they’re too distracted to prioritize survival. We are watching a slow-motion collapse, and they’re backstage arguing about who deserves top billing in a dying show. The world isn’t just metaphorically burning; it’s openly smoldering on every front—authoritarian power grabs, oligarchic entrenchment, and populist fanatics are tearing down our civic infrastructure. Instead of shoring up defenses, Democrats obsess over which identity group to appease next, as though chanting different verses of “Kumbaya” at each other will somehow hold back the tide.

This is what passes for strategy: endless purity tests, virtue signals, and factional infighting. Ironically, the only consensus they seem to reach is on the need to prove how morally superior they are, as if righteousness alone can stop an actual coup. Meanwhile, those who prefer the world in ashes—authoritarians, demagogues, and billionaires whose wealth has quadrupled—are more than happy to watch the left’s self-immolation. Every progressive ritual that excludes potential allies or demonizes pragmatic solutions only strengthens those who thrive on chaos. Look hard at this pattern: the paralysis, the obsession with optics, the refusal to excise the extremists on the left’s own fringes. It’s a gift to the right’s war machine.

Let’s be blunt: this insistence on ideological purity is killing any real chance at countering the onslaught. The movement has become so terrified of offending its own fringe elements that it stifles legitimate criticism, lets crucial battles go unfought, and alienates both moderates and the millions trapped between two dysfunctional extremes. What’s the result? Resentment from centrists, disillusionment among would-be allies, and a public image of a party too busy with ego contests to mount an effective defense against the very real threat of authoritarian rule. Instead of building a broad, disciplined coalition, Democrats play theater, as if moral posturing alone can halt the steady erosion of democracy.

This isn’t a plea for centrism, nor a capitulation to the status quo. It’s a demand for backbone and disciplined action. Ideals mean nothing if we can’t secure the structural integrity of the system long enough to implement them. There is no point in preaching progressive values while extremists and oligarchs set about dismantling the very framework needed to enact those values. Without a stable foundation, justice is impossible; without a functional government, ideals remain slogans on placards, easily swept away when stronger forces kick down the door.

If the left wants to outmaneuver the extremism consuming our institutions, it must learn to prioritize. It must stop pretending that endless internal rituals of moral one-upmanship lead anywhere but ruin. Dumping the dead weight of performative purity and facing the hard truth—yes, that means telling some factions “no”—is the only way to stand firm. Embrace strategic pragmatism. Form alliances that, while imperfect, get the job done. Focus on immediate existential threats rather than fighting over who’s the purest progressive in the room.

The stakes could not be higher. Our institutions are under siege by forces that thrive on division, and every minute spent in self-indulgent squabbling grants them another inch. Morality without strategy is self-sabotage. If Democrats—and anyone who values an open, stable society—want to survive this era, they need to step off their soapboxes, kick out the elements that corrode cohesion, and line up behind a ruthless pragmatism that prioritizes lasting stability.

Stop performing and start governing. The time for elegant speeches and tribal ceremonies ended long ago. If the left can’t bring itself to mature beyond these theatrics, then it’s simply inviting the collapse that its enemies are counting on. The world needs action, not another round of self-righteous pageantry. It needs leaders who can confront threats head-on, who understand that protecting a future worth having requires getting their hands dirty now. It needs a movement ready to fight fires, not argue over who holds the hose.