#Voting for Biden or Trump? Either way, you’re not on the right side of history.

Joe Biden and Donald Trump voters alike believe that it’ll spell doom if their opponent wins. Putting aside for a moment the legitimacy of those fears, consider the voter who casts their ballot believing they’re on the right side of history. 

This phrase provides comfort at times of deep uncertainty. It’s how people feel more confident in their convictions: They believe that when the history of this chapter is written, their views will be vindicated, even if they were controversial or disputed at the time. After all, no one wants to be on the wrong side of history. 

Yet the passage of time itself is incapable of proving one side right and another mistaken. Believing that one has chosen the correct position based on history’s ultimate judgment is just a superstition, says Jacob Levy, the Tomlinson professor of political theory at McGill University, and a senior fellow at the Niskanen Center and the Institute for Humane Studies, two libertarian think tanks. It’s how people confer their convictions with “unshakeable rightness.” 

Levy has written about the fallacy of this rhetorical device. He argues that the idea of a right side of history is rooted in the false notion that social and political progress is linear. When we assume that such progress is inevitable because humans must become smarter, wiser, and kinder over time, and that history will reflect such forward momentum, it actually keeps well-intentioned people from sticking with fights they think have long been settled. Perhaps the point is to consider ourselves on the right side of the current moment, based on our values and the facts available to us. 

Otherwise, the concept of the right side of history helps convince us that we’re somehow superior or more enlightened than those who came before. We like to play the “moral hero” when in fact most people are “morally ordinary.” While we can use history as a corrective, perhaps imagining how we’d behave differently in Nazi Germany or its modern-day equivalent, Levy says people don’t vary too wildly from the moral consensus of the society they live in. 

This may sound defeatist — and contrary to the intense liberal and moderate resistance against President Trump’s extreme policies and authoritarian maneuvers — but it’s meant to be humbling. Instead of placing ourselves on the right side of history, Levy says we must balance trusting we’re right and doing the best to advocate for our moral beliefs while recognizing we might be wrong. A conviction shouldn’t be swallowed by doubt, but the doubt shouldn’t be swamped by the conviction, says Levy. 

This doesn’t mean, however, that both sides of an argument are equally right and wrong. That can amount to mushy bipartisan unity for the sake of coming together without much purpose besides restrained centrism. Some people will adopt opinions and back political candidates seen as cruel and inhumane. Others will insist on a shared humanity, as well as laws and policies to enshrine that principle.

False equivalence between opposing sides feels particularly dangerous now, when the media portrays election-related fears as universally justified. Pundits might take at face value claims that a moderate-to-liberal Biden administration would do more damage than an unchecked Trump who’s won a second term. As Republicans devise their legal strategy around disqualifying as many Democratic-leaning votes as possible, or halting the vote count altogether at an arbitrary cutoff, this is no time to pretend politics comprises two sides with a simple philosophical disagreement over how elections are run. Even some Republican lawyers and former officials find the situation alarming. 

Given the high stakes, trusting in the concept of the right side of history feels edifying. But it conceals a painful reality: The most cherished political successes aren’t permanent.

The most cherished political successes aren’t permanent.

Take, for example, the Civil Rights movement, which Levy says holds a “tremendous place in our political imaginations.” It’s now depicted in popular culture as a story of struggle and triumph. The temptation to see the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts as unassailable victories is strong. It also makes us more inclined to see political progress as a story about the oppressed battling for and ultimately winning essential rights, putting an end to their suffering and strife. But that’s not how history works. 

“Things backslide, and the backsliding can go on forever,” says Levy. 

Less than a decade ago, the Supreme Court gutted the Voting Rights Act, which was passed in 1965 to prevent racial discrimination at the polls.  

“Whatever our cause is, it’s going to lose a lot of the time,” says Levy. 

When we believe that progress is inevitable over time, we’re poorly equipped to think about how to react when the opposite happens. We might feel betrayed by history. We might fail to see a triumph as only temporary, abandoning those on the frontlines, desperate to keep their hard-won rights. 

As we face the end of this long, grueling election, the right side of history may well send many people into the streets on November 4th. Whatever is won or lost in the coming week, Levy says what matters is understanding that no victory is indelible — it’ll always require the guardianship of those who believes in it. 

Rather than assuming history will render the final judgment, and that we’ll get it right in ways our predecessors didn’t, we must admit that’s not automatically our fate. 

In other words, there’s no proof to be had that our convictions should prevail — only the persistent, grinding work to see that they do.