Attack against the concept of free will results in an almost total degradation of human dignity

Needless to say that every successful attack against the concept of free will results in an almost total degradation of human dignity.’ It puts us beyond good and evil and fosters a fantastic quietism or an even more fantastic irresponsibility. It is nevertheless amusing to see determinists of all heretical denominations — Calvinists, Marxists, Behaviorists — flocking to clubs and leagues defending civil liberties. Liberties to be enjoyed without free will! One sees how far the prostitution of logic has led many of us. This great confusion is also apparent in the standing phrase that “democracy stands for equality before the law,” whereas the law is largely interested in iniquities and inequalities.16 There is, of course, one great excuse for these confused minds and that is that they all have continued in the bottom of their hearts to believe in free will. Determinism is too inhuman and suicidal to be generally and sincerely accepted and the charge which remains is largely that of hypocrisy.17

16 “But, one would say, where then is justice?
“It is not in egalitarianism. Egalitarianism is only the counterfeit of justice; it can be the exact opposite, we have seen that. Neither are all inequalities injust. Which means that equality or inequality are one thing and justice is another. Justice consists in giving everybody his due.” — Agénor de Gasparin, L’Égalité, Paris.

17 Dean Inge in his Protestantism admits that the calvinistic belief in predestination drove many people into suicide. Yet everybody who reads Luther’s De Servo Arbitrio will be impressed by the fact that this reformer was, not less than Calvin, a bitter enemy of the concept of free will which he considered to be more or less some sort of optical delusion.

“Ah, Lord! Why should we boast of our free will as if we were able to do anything,  ever so small, in divine and spiritual matters.” CCLXII. Table Talks of Martin Luther, trans, and ed. by William Hazlitt, Esq., London, 1857.

Erik Maria Ritter von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
The Menace of the Herd or
Procrustes at Large