A few weeks ago, Andy McCarthy, in a post on the election of Sadiq Khan as mayor of London, quoted from an incisive essay by Daniel Johnson in Standpoint. To my chagrin, I only recently became aware of the magazine and Johnson, its editor. Since then, I have had the pleasure of lunching with Johnson in London and the privilege of contributing to Standpoint.
Setting aside my own minor articles that have appeared, to say that Standpoint is one of the finest periodicals currently being published today is an understatement. It is an ideological and literary soulmate of NR, which I have on good authority — Wikipedia – greeted the appearance of Standpoint with an article that concluded, “Rejoice, and subscribe!” (as they say on Wikipedia, “citation needed”). Taking up the cudgels from William F. Buckley, Jr., Johnson is attempting to keep alive a trans-Atlantic conversation unapologetically to “celebrate our civilization, its arts and its values.” In that, it is a fellow soldier in the war against anti-Western, anti-liberal movements. Central to Standpoint’s mission is reminding us that as important as is politics, there is so much more to the cultured life that we value as a shared heritage, including the literature, music, fine arts, and the like that regularly are subjects of wonderful essays. Both in its quality and scope, it can compare with any journal of contemporary social, political, and cultural affairs.
Founded only in 2008 and beautifully produced, its roster of hundreds of contributors is truly impressive, including Bishop Michael Nazir-Ali, Paul Johnson (the editor’s father), Roger Scruton, the late Robert Conquest, Douglas Murray, Jeremy Black, and names familiar to the NR family, among them David Pryce-Jones, Amity Shlaes, and Andrew Stuttaford. Andy McCarthy rightly called Johnson “invaluable,” an approbation that can be applied to Standpoint as a whole. For those able to do so, supporting Standpoint is a direct contribution to the front lines of the war for the West, on which Britain once again uneasily sits. Supporting both NR and Standpoint is vital part of the struggle to pass intact to our children a world in which individualism, free markets, religion, and a strong defense are not washed away by utopias old and new.