Our culture idolizes personal autonomy, but few ever reach that standard and it is a good thing, according to author and speaker Leah Libresco Sargeant.
“Dependence is the only thing we’re guaranteed in a human life,” Sargeant said. “Striving for an autonomous life, a life where our strengths are equal to our duties and our choices, necessarily means opting for a smaller life. The fewer people who can make demands of us, the more likely we are to be autonomous for a greater period of our life.”
Sargeant is the author of the books “Arriving at Amen” and “Building the Benedict Option” and owns the substack “Other Feminisms.” Sargeant, hosted on campus March 25 by the education, English, theology and philosophy, and history departments, gave a talk on her newest book “The Dignity of Dependence: A Feminist Manifesto,” in the Hoynak Room.
“No one is autonomous, and no one will achieve full autonomy,” Sargeant said. “That game is already forfeit.”
Her thesis: Autonomy is an empty goal to begin with. Sargeant said people today attempt to increase and expand the categories to be eligible for human euthanasia. This begins with understanding what an autonomous life is.
“In Canada at present, one out of every 20 Canadian deaths comes at a doctor’s hands,” Sargeant said. “There are some human lives that are not worth living, and they’re not worth living because of their dependence, and it turns out to encompass a surprisingly large proportion of the human population.”
Sargeant cited the most common reason for people requesting elective euthanasia — they do not want to burden their families. People are adopting the belief that living without total autonomy abdicates them of being truly alive, she said.
Modern feminism reflects the same pattern, Sargeant argued. Men can voluntarily walk away from fatherhood, while women cannot physically separate themselves from pregnancy. Abortion becomes the tool women need to achieve the same autonomy men already enjoy, and babies depending on their mother for life is an unfair standard for women, according to Sargeant.
“Factually, all of us will spend some of our lives dependent. It’s impossible to begin your life at all without a period of dependency,” Sargeant said.
If the goal to achieve autonomy is no dependence or being depended upon, then most people never reach that waterline. Babies lost before birth, people with severe congenital disabilities never cross the waterline, and therefore, by culture’s standards, will never fully be alive, Sargeant argued.
The lecture challenged the idea that independence drives success, senior Paul Landry said.
“I think it’s important for college students, because we think of our value as how much we’re producing and how independent we are, instead of just the fact that we’re created because of God,” Landry said. “It’s good to get different perspectives that don’t fit perfectly in the box of what every Hillsdale student agrees with. That’s kind of the value of our education.”
According to senior Ashley Poole, Sergeant’s talk was insightful for understanding how the feminist thesis can be reinterpreted.
“She skillfully articulated that neither men nor women can thrive alone,” Poole said. “We are equal in our dependence. Sargeant’s talk pushes us to accept our need for one another and to prioritize healthy dialogue about the role of women at Hillsdale and beyond.”
Sargeant closed by arguing that humans are dependent on God, and cultural rejection of this devalues human dignity, especially for women.
“What we have to offer is the additional good news that when we feel the lack of our own strength, that when we observe our loves can go beyond our abilities, we do not live in a world where that is the end of the story,” Sargeant said. “Admitting that is true, and being willing to be free of the burden of lying, concealing, and making ourselves smaller is very good news indeed.”
