Saturday February 19, 2005

Let’s Leave Hobbes Out of This

Kurt Andersen falls into a common misusage in his recent New York article about liberals’ reaction to the apparent success of the Iraqi elections. He writes:

Each of us has a Hobbesian choice concerning Iraq; either we hope for the vindication of Bush’s risky, very possibly reckless policy, or we are in a de facto alliance with the killers of American soldiers and Iraqi civilians.

Clever, although there is no such thing as a “Hobbesian choice,” which perhaps proves Andersen’s point that New Yorker’s are wrong when they think they’re smarter than everyone else.

“Hobbesian choice” is often used — go ahead Google it — to mean an intolerable choice between anarchy and tyranny. It appears, however, to be a bastardization of “Hobson’s choice” — a choice with no alternative, named for Thomas Hobson, the 16th century owner of a livery stable in Cambridge who offered customers the horse nearest the door or no horse at all.

The permutation is an interesting case of an archaic phrase trying to save itself. A phrase that depends on an allusion to a 16th century horse monger isn’t of much referential use. The irony is that “Hobbesian choice” is used as a marker of intellectual subtlety, despite the fact that it is — well — wrong. With Hobson long forgotten, it’s the usage equivalent of grabbing the horse nearest the door. So from now on, people, make it a Hobson’s choice or nothing.