Trumpism

Discussion of science, technology, politics, and other topics that aren't strictly philosophical.
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Santiago Odo
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Re: Trumpism

Post by Santiago Odo »

Diebert wrote:Cultural Marxism is used to describe the political-identity infused struggle against ingrained, first world "social constructs" which are held responsible for suppression or discrimination of minorities or otherwise vulnerable groups. The reason the term "Marxism" is used has a lot to do with a perceived link between class or gender relations and social conflicts or suppression, the general liberation movements of the political Left, the emphasis on "social transformation" within that framework and the implicit link with Communism like the suggested break-down of social classes and money or the various power dynamics created by wealth accumulation.
This could be the base-point for a definition. But I think it could be useful, also, to give it a context by expressly locating it, for example, in American Cultural Marxism, and then -- are not you happy and bouncy? -- you could integrate Baudrillardian ironies into your definition of CM!

I think you also are not putting proper emphasis on Cultural Marxism and the degree that it has been adopted, courted, entertained, or incorporated into the corporate culture of America, and hence into a governmental praxis or philosophy. Whereas Marxism would have remained fiercely critical of capital and its machinations, Cultural Marxism is far more plastic and adaptable. Cultural Marxism also seems to operate in concert with emotions and *social hysteria*.
Jupi wrote:Like calling Marxism/leftism evil, connecting it with Jews and blaming it for creating all the problems by ruining traditional and/or natural identity? That is essentially what Cultural Marxism means.
If one were to accept, for example, E Michael Jones' foundational definition (one that circulates in Cyberspace), it is that
  • The Jews rejected Jesus as savior and Messiah right there at the foot of the cross, and as a result 'rejected Logos' in a grand metaphysical sense; and in 'rejecting Logos' became, by necessity, revolutionaries and subversives.
It is an interesting, if reductive, theory. I suppose it must be seen as being fairly classically antisemitic. And that means, in essence, that The Jews are bound up with terrestrial forces; with terrestrial power; with resistance to -- certainly in Europe -- a ruling civilizational structure that would keep them, by necessity, in abeyance.

Jews were always oppressed by these European structures, but antisemitism came into focus especially in the Emancipation. Then, Jews began to cease to be shtetl Jews and began to develop an incorporated identity. From thence all the issues, questions and problems of Jewish power. The *JQ* therefore, has come back on the scene as that echo. It is very peculiar. At the base level it is virulent, and mindless, antisemitism. It is a demonology. But at the upper levels it really has to do with ideas. And a demonology at another level . . .

The so-called Frankfurt School, migrating to the US for a time, became so enmeshed with and also responsible for setting in motion different levels and octaves of critical theory that their influence cannot be underestimated. Fromm for example. And all the work on The Authoritarian Personality. If one wants to be fair one wants to avoid irrational Judenhass. But one must hold in the mind that the Jews suffered extraordinarily in Europe and during a time that allowed for maximum consciousness and processing of the event. Cultural Marxism, then, must also be linked with a profound ressentiment and a desire to avenge oneself. It can't do this openly though and must use other means . . .

Cultural Marxism is then a different and more complex animal. It is a being, an entity, involved in self-devouring. It is critique that destroys all the boundaries and leaps into radical action.

Consider this.
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Diebert van Rhijn
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Re: Trumpism

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

Santiago Odo wrote: Wed Jan 02, 2019 12:17 amDiebert, if there were an antidote to Jean Baudrillard, what would it be? C'mon, give it a shot!
It's like asking about the opposite of a remainder.
Santiago Odo wrote: Wed Jan 02, 2019 9:58 amI think you also are not putting proper emphasis on Cultural Marxism and the degree that it has been adopted, courted, entertained, or incorporated into the corporate culture of America, and hence into a governmental praxis or philosophy.
I do think the base definition allows for exactly that or at least it was written with that in mind. The term Marxism is not the best pick in my view, unless it's related to materialist, quantitive philosophies on human nature or history which might explain why it matches so well with so much of the corporate system and consuming masses.
Cultural Marxism is then a different and more complex animal. It is a being, an entity, involved in self-devouring. It is critique that destroys all the boundaries and leaps into radical action.
Isn't the term for that nihilism? The problem of keeping adding complexities to a term, to any entity, is to create a monster that can be used for all circumstances, a horse by committee which will go nowhere. That's also the best criticism I've seen on those using the term "Cultural Marxism", that it quickly becomes nonsensical in a given context and in itself a nihilistic tool that way.
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Santiago Odo
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Re: Trumpism

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Diebert wrote:I do think the base definition allows for exactly that or at least it was written with that in mind. The term Marxism is not the best pick in my view, unless it's related to materialist, quantitive philosophies on human nature or history which might explain why it matches so well with so much of the corporate system and consuming masses.
You make some fair points. Reluctantly, I bow before your idol.
It's like asking about the opposite of a remainder.
No, sir. It is not. It really isn't. I cannot find much utility in Baudrillard, but I do find entertainment. My question is not really fair (naturally) because I am actually stating something with it. And you likely can't answer it because *utility* has little importance for you.

Philosophical labyrinths, much use. Do you agree?
Isn't the term for that nihilism? The problem of keeping adding complexities to a term, to any entity, is to create a monster that can be used for all circumstances, a horse by committee which will go nowhere. That's also the best criticism I've seen on those using the term "Cultural Marxism", that it quickly becomes nonsensical in a given context and in itself a nihilistic tool that way.
I guess such ACM has nihilistic elements, but I am supposing that whatever it is, is uniquely Américan. That is how I am seeing it. It can only be spoken of in the American context.

How shall we defeat the horse that will go nowhere?
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Diebert van Rhijn
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Re: Trumpism

Post by Diebert van Rhijn »

Santiago Odo wrote: Thu Jan 03, 2019 9:34 am
It's like asking about the opposite of a remainder.
No, sir. It is not. It really isn't. I cannot find much utility in Baudrillard, but I do find entertainment. My question is not really fair (naturally) because I am actually stating something with it. And you likely can't answer it because *utility* has little importance for you.
Sure, I was just playing here as I answered by paraphrasing Baudrillard. The irony was all that was left to give.

Not sure why you want to discuss this one author with me. I never really asked any one to read him or agree. Occasionally I provide a quote like you quoted many people on culture, nihilism and the big social problems. We are not discussing those authors endlessly either. They are not here.

There's little doubt about the influence of Baudrillard in the world of thought and social theory and what his own influences were. It's a bit silly to talk about the personal utility of any author. You need air and food, some warmth and safety perhaps to survive. Nothing to do with deeper thought or mazes.
. That is how I am seeing it. It can only be spoken of in the American context.
And I have little argument with that. But I cannot see modernity outside of any American context, including modern Europe.
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Re: Trumpism

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Diebert wrote:The irony was all that was left to give.
Ah, the irony was thus the remainder. Now I see!

Well played.
Not sure why you want to discuss this one author with me. I never really asked any one to read him or agree. Occasionally I provide a quote like you quoted many people on culture, nihilism and the big social problems. We are not discussing those authors endlessly either. They are not here.
I guess I have been under a spell. I have had this recurring sense that you are Baudrillard. With bad teeth however and with a certain ressentiment toward American teeth and American toothy expertise.

You have disabused me of this notion. Sort of.
You need air and food, some warmth and safety perhaps to survive. Nothing to do with deeper thought or mazes.
A pragmatic turn! How welcome. Taoism, some fashy Weininger, and soup recipes. Nice!
But I cannot see modernity outside of any American context, including modern Europe.
You are going to be surprised when we invade you and set up Europe all over again.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

Post by Santiago Odo »

Funny, I am just now reading Greg Johnson's The White Nationalist Manifesto.
A specter is haunting the world, the specter of White Nationalism.

Trump, Brexit, Le Pen, Orbán, Salvini: white identity politics is on the rise. Even though the entire political establishment, Left and Right, is committed to globalism, populist nationalism is sweeping Europe and put Donald Trump in the White House.

In The White Nationalist Manifesto, Greg Johnson defends the most radical form of white identity politics: White Nationalism, which upholds the right of all white peoples to self-determination.

Multiculturalism is a social experiment imposed by international elites on unwilling nations. That experiment has failed. Diversity is not a source of strength, but of alienation, hatred, and violence. But even those problems pale before the fact that the white race in all its historical homelands is on the road to biological extinction—unless there is radical political change.

White Nationalists aim to end multiculturalism; restore unified, national cultures; reverse non-white immigration and white demographic decline; and affirm the right of all peoples to self-determination in racially and ethnically homogeneous homelands.

Written with great simplicity and clarity, The White Nationalist Manifesto offers a compelling moral case for White Nationalism, presenting it as a logical extension of endangered species conservation policy to the human realm. The Manifesto also clarifies fundamental White Nationalist ideas, patiently refutes common objections, outlines broad policy objectives, and maps a path to power. Once again, Greg Johnson shows he is a master of making radical ideas sweetly reasonable.

The White Nationalist Manifesto is required reading for anyone who wants to understand both the origins and ultimate aims of the rising resistance to globalism, multiculturalism, and liberal democracy.
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Santiago Odo
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Mahatma Quinn wrote:It’s a direct description of what an enlightened person experiences. No resistance in any aspect of his life. His every movement flows without impediment. In contrast, the average person is permanently locked within a state of frustration, misery and fear, which means that his every movement has to battle through these impediments before it can actually begin to accomplish something.
It is odd that you refer to this 'other person'. Whereas when I speak of my enlightenment, I say:
Sri Sri Santiago Odo wrote:I am telling you what enlightenment is like because I am enlightened. I live it every day. It is a 24 hour unavoidable experience. If you knew it, you would understand, but since you don't you have to rely on second and third-hand accounts. There is no longer any of what you understand as *resistance* in any part of my life. Every moment flows in me without impediment. In contrast to the freedom that I live every moment of every day, the average person -- you for example -- is locked permanently within frustration, misery and fear. Now, I am free of these and this is why I can accomplish great things, like schooling Diebert & Jupi & Avolith and, when I have spare time, assailing Trump and the Hyper-rich and listening to Jonathan Bowden talks
Last edited by Santiago Odo on Mon Jan 07, 2019 11:51 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Mon Jan 07, 2019 9:53 am
David Quinn wrote: Mon Jan 07, 2019 9:38 am
I am starting to feel relieved that the Trump administration and the vile alt-right movement in general are beginning to collapse under the weight of their own bullshit. About time. Now perhaps the human race can start to deal with far more serious issues like climate change, lack of education, and the malignant nihilism of the ultra-rich.
So you're still single-mindlessly determined on that evil alt-right Trump thing then?
For me, it is more to do with what the “evil alt-right Trump thing" embodies - namely, a regression towards African tribalism, a malignant short-sightedness that does not care about future generations, a turning way from science and facts, a deliberate stoking of people's bigotry and fear, a sustained assault on A=A as a means of confusing and disorientating the populace, etc. I have always considered such things to be evil.

Fighting climate change, more education and redistributing wealth never saved any one from idiocy.
Becoming more educated or having more leisure time through increased wealth has never saved anyone from idiocy?

I had thought you were more educated than that.

So what have you accomplished then which would bring the human race closer to what you stated to be "serious issues" like battling climate change, general education and fighting the rich. I mean, what does that differ from for example the SJW?
One constitutes a serious threat to the continued existence and well-being of the human species, while the other is a minor issue blown all out of proportion by hysterical on-line hordes who have nothing better to do with their lives.

Of course I know you have played an important part in re-appropriating wisdom of the absolute but the average person is not interested in all of that and seems happy to entertain, work, live and die for their beliefs.
That may be so, but we can still encourage people to value lower level forms of rationality such as education, the scientific method, evidence-based arguments, personal introspection, etc, and refrain from the hysteria, paranoia, demonization and conspiracy-theorizing that has unfortunately taken over large segments of the (older, white) population.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Santiago Odo wrote: Mon Jan 07, 2019 11:44 am White Nationalists aim to end multiculturalism; restore unified, national cultures; reverse non-white immigration and white demographic decline; and affirm the right of all peoples to self-determination in racially and ethnically homogeneous homelands.
And in other news, White Nationalists plan to halt the evolution of the world's species, legislate the location and frequency of rain, and return all bacteria to their native countries.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Well, that’s a bit of an exaggeration.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

Post by jupiviv »

Diebert van Rhijn wrote:
David Quinn wrote:In contrast, the average person is permanently locked within a state of frustration, misery and fear, which means that his every movement has to battle through these impediments before it can actually begin to accomplish something.
So what have you accomplished then which would bring the human race closer to what you stated to be "serious issues" like battling climate change, general education and fighting the rich. I mean, what does that differ from for example the SJW? Or my old mother's concerns about the world ?
The issue is not of a lack of difference in political talking points with SJWs, but of the inability to properly connect whatever wisdom one has to one's perspective of the current state of the world. On that account, there is no difference between calling for Steven Pinker-esque utopias driven by tech/science/welfare capitalist magic and spinning yarns about how SJWs are deeply connected to the metaphysical death of modernism.

Feb '17:
jupiviv wrote:
David Quinn wrote:I realized that behind all the buffoonery, Trump was actually very cunning and malignant.
Lol...seriously? I'm going on record - his legacy will be one of irrelevance, and may God smite me down if it turns out otherwise. Of course, it really depends what you mean by "irrelevance". Trump is absolutely correct about immigration, jobs being outsourced and some other things. But who isn't! These problems were identified by intelligent people years ago. The reason they were not fixed is because, as Trump says, the US government and other western governments are corrupt. But that isn't the only reason - at this point, they *can't* be fixed. Actually, they could never have been fixed, because the people who created them (hint - not Trump) worshiped science and technology without understanding the first thing about them.

Will Trump drain the swamp? He hasn't, judging by his cabinet picks. Will he rein in the FED? No. Will he reduce debt? He'll probably break Obongo's record of increasing it. Will he rejuvenate the economy? No. Will he implement a fascist state? It already existed, and has since people decided to let experts tend to their affairs and corporate marketing and PR do their thinking for them.

The only thing Trump is determined to do is build the Wall because it is the stone that hits two campaign promises - jobs and stopping illegal immigration. It will be as effective at stopping invasions as all of the other famous walls of history.
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Re: Trumpism

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Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Wed Jan 02, 2019 7:33 amAs for the institutions, they always have been distrusted, especially when decline was being perceived, morally or economically. In that sense, it's surely a common theme in history's discourse.
That theme is evident in Augustine's "On Lying". He understandably felt the need for total honesty as the world of Antiquity collapsed around him. The other early fathers of Christianity also placed the same desperate emphasis on the importance of whatever virtues they considered crucial to the stability and prosperity of the Roman state.
However, the perception is certainly not always justified and might simple express the will to an ending, a death desire waiting to re-surge and unleash its tragedy.
Or it can be, or rather generally is, both. The collapse of institutions and material circumstances bringing about the "death instinct".
No that's how scared children in the media and twit-twit-world have defined it for you.
But *I* define scared children and Twitter as sources of brilliant insight about the Daedalian workings of the white trans-male fascists who are using their nonviolent support for free speech ideals to goad me into genitally mutilating little girls! Wait...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dvj3JIIxhI
diebert wrote:Cultural Marxism is used to describe the political-identity infused struggle against ingrained, first world "social constructs" which are held responsible for suppression or discrimination of minorities or otherwise vulnerable groups.
And I shall repeat my response to this argument without the rhetorical fluff: according to this definition of Cultural Marxism, it is a first world "social construct" (etc.) and hence opposition to it is also an instance of Cultural Marxism.
The reason the term "Marxism" is used has a lot to do with a perceived link between class or gender relations and social conflicts or suppression, the general liberation movements of the political Left, the emphasis on "social transformation" within that framework and the implicit link with Communism like the suggested break-down of social classes and money or the various power dynamics created by wealth accumulation.
Yes, and usually it is those on the far right who make this connection between the mere fact of Marxist opposition to a certain historical-economic regime and the *actual* changes occurring within any society. So you still have to either explain why those people are not on the far right, or give an example of someone not on the far right making a similar connection.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Jupi wrote:The issue is not of a lack of difference in political talking points with SJWs, but of the inability to properly connect whatever wisdom one has to one's perspective of the current state of the world.
On that account, there is no difference between calling for Steven Pinker-esque utopias driven by tech/science/welfare capitalist magic and spinning yarns about how SJWs are deeply connected to the metaphysical death of modernism.
I am inclined to consider these Jupi-offerings as necessary and useful if they are modified through some Bjornstrandian intellectual computations.

When discussing the world right now, and naturally American power and empire, one will quickly wind up in a very confusing landscape. That 'landscape' is the intersection of vast material power and the systems of conceptual mediation which show us that world. That is, the imagined world received into our own imagined world: our being as imagining beings.

I would like to mention the topic of hermeneutics in this context: interpretation. I read recently Michel Barkun's A Culture of Conspiracy: Apocalyptic Visions in Contemporary America (University of California, 2003).

From a Psychology Today article (for what it is worth) commenting on Barkun's work:
According to prominent social psychologists and political scientists, conspiracy “theories” are a species of magical thinking. (The shudder quotes around the word ‘theories’ is required since conspiracy “theories” are not real theories. Consequently, conspiracists are not “conspiracy theorists”.) Magical thinking consists of seeing intentional agents behind almost everything (Thor the Thunder God owes his existence to magical thinking). Magical thinking allows us to explain what may otherwise be inexplicable. And when we explain, we understand (or believe we do). And when we understand we feel better, in part because understanding reduces uncertainty (see my blog The Truth Shall Set You Free).

Conspiracy “theories” arise when certain people see large socially relevant events, especially disasters, as being due to intentional agents behind the scene causing the event. Conspiracists tend to have a low tolerance for uncertainty or the role of mere bad luck in such disasters. That the Twin Towers and 7 World Trade Center collapsed due to the extreme heat of the fires is simply unbelievable to many conspiracists. Ergo something must have helped the buildings collapse. What? Bombs. (This is reinforced by the fact that the buildings’ collapse was something that the terrorists could not have reasonably expected, though they might have hoped for it.) That a lone gunman could effect such large change in the U.S. is unbelievable. Ergo he must have had a lot of help.
The first paragraph makes sense. One sees *the world* from within one's limited corner and one does the best that one can to 'interpret' it. But, one cannot have enough access to all the bits and pieces of information that are necessary to accurately *see* and thoroughly define, yet one still is forced to make a run at it.

But let's contextualize *our situation*. That is, as people who are driven to make interpretations within a modern context, and let us add into this bizarre mix the entire capsule of everything that you-plural talk about in relation to Enlightenment.

Right? You get it? Diebert, Avy, Jupi? David? You here with me? Come! let me guide you little ones to Safe Harbor!

One has to take into account, doesn't one? the psychological pressure in a cultural environment of uncertainty, confusion and nihilism that produce 'the desperate act' which leads to rash interpretations but also to what may be called 'the sage's escape' into elaborate phantasies such as David weaves. One has to take into account the desperation of the soul, the personality, as it struggles to make sense of all that moves around one which one is not competent to adequately or fully interpret. One has to take into consideration, if you will permit me to say it like this, the soul's tendency to 'split' in cognitive dissonance when facing this insurmountable problem: its incapacity to make a full and comprehensive interpretation, and its *leap* into some sort of resolving decisiveness.

Here, I suggest that I have presented a way to bridge on the one hand this near-lunatic 'Enlightenment' fixation -- based in sheer phantasy, in adolescent will, hope and desire -- and a phantasy-structure of Interpretation. I want to stress, my dear beloved little children! ::: snuggle snuggle kiss kiss ::: that the entire interpretive project in both dimensions (the political and the spiritual) depends totally in metaphysics. That is, 'our imagined world' or as Weaver puts it 'our metaphysical dream of the world'.

This is important as we examine the most neurotic among us: David certainly with his unconscious declarations about hyper-consciousness and his asserted/non-asserted declarations of his enlightened status which, as it happens, are totally non-helpful to him when he externalizes the content of his 'imagined world' about the surrounding political world. But one must *interpret* even this. That is, the situation of cognitive dissonance that produces the desperate act of forcing 'enlightenment' on oneself (the neurotic game) within the context of justifiable and perhaps even realistic angst about *the world* and surrounding events.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

Post by Santiago Odo »

"Here are your waters and your watering place.
Drink and be whole again beyond confusion."

___________________________

A further Midrash on the Psychology Today article:
Conspiracy “theories” arise when certain people see large socially relevant events, especially disasters, as being due to intentional agents behind the scene causing the event. Conspiracists tend to have a low tolerance for uncertainty or the role of mere bad luck in such disasters. That the Twin Towers and 7 World Trade Center collapsed due to the extreme heat of the fires is simply unbelievable to many conspiracists. Ergo something must have helped the buildings collapse. What? Bombs. (This is reinforced by the fact that the buildings’ collapse was something that the terrorists could not have reasonably expected, though they might have hoped for it.) That a lone gunman could effect such large change in the U.S. is unbelievable. Ergo he must have had a lot of help.
I have to make this plain. I have examined a great deal of the evidence in respect to 9/11 that points to conspiracy. Hundreds and hundreds of serious people (for what that is worth but surely something) have arrived at the understanding that the entirety of the 'official story' is false through-and-through. If someone asked me: "Do you really believe that the event was planned and executed by para-military forces?" I would answer affirmatively but always with a caveat: "I am bound to make an interpretation. I do not have a choice in the matter. By its very nature the event is shrouded in layers of impenetrability. And a great deal of its mystifying power is just there!"

So, while it is true beyond all doubt that amazing and creative Conspiracy Theories exist, are communicated, morph and travel from mind to mind (from PW.com):
Many people assume that the X-Files conspiracy theory--malevolent space aliens in cahoots with shadowy government agencies--is the brainchild of caffeinated scriptwriters with an overnight deadline. But according to this fascinating cultural study, such scenarios have a long and disturbing intellectual pedigree. Political scientist Barkun (Religion and the Racist Right: The Origins of the Christian Identity Movement) traces them to a venerable tradition of 'New World Order' conspiracy theories combining fundamentalist dread of the Antichrist with secular right-wing suspicions that the powers that be are controlled by Masons, Jesuits, Jews and, above all, the Illuminati.

Starting in the 1980s, extraterrestrials began to appear at the summits of these conspiracy-theory hierarchies, a process accelerated by the Internet's anarchic dissemination and recombination of myths and rumors. The resulting 'improvisational millennialism' has yielded any number of baroque 'superconspiracies' (one theory yokes together UFOs, the Gestapo, the Mafia and the Wobblies), but Barkun contends there are serious repercussions. As New World Order themes have infiltrated the previously apolitical UFO subculture, he argues, they have become more respectable and widespread: racialist and anti-Semitic ideologies have resurfaced in the coded guise of alien cabals, and a vast popular audience has been introduced by Hollywood to the notion that the government is a totalitarian clique in black helicopters--a view once confined to right-wing extremists.

Scholarly but fluently written and free of excessive jargon, Barkun's exploration of the conspiratorial worldview combines sociological depth with a deadpan appreciation of pop culture and raises serious questions about the replacement of democracy by conspiracy as the dominant paradigm of political action in the public mind.
... I am also forced to notice that the psychological interpretation is also a kind of shield and a technique to avoid actual sight, and thereby avoiding good and proper interpretation or the necessary attempt as Alexis Jacobi used to say.

Now Avolith, harken unto me my gorgeous little one. I remember with tremendous nostalgia -- I was a child quite like you -- when Bjornstrand first sat me on his paternal knee. He said then, and has repeated time and again since then, these lines. I now bequeath them to you:
Gustav Bjornstrand wrote:“Not till we are lost, in other words not till we have lost the world, do we begin to find ourselves, and realize where we are and the infinite extent of our relations.”
Give up the contrived certainties of those too found / and come along to become irremediably lost.
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Re: Trumpism

Post by Santiago Odo »

Jupi wrote:. . . according to this definition of Cultural Marxism, it is a first world 'social construct' (etc.) and hence opposition to it is also an instance of Cultural Marxism.
I do not think that is a fair conclusion. I think 'Cultural Marxism' is a reference, well or badly conceived, well or badly understood, to what we could understand as ressentiment-en-action. The Old Marxists unhappily found that their Marxian projects did not make headway as planned. So, they had to modify the message and the intentionality of the message. Instead, shall we say, of an incisive blade (traditional Marxism in an ideological sense), many little blades and cutting tools arise and were put to use. There was and there is a certain genius in all that.

Cultural Marxism is an array of tools to attack and to undermine resilient structures. Marxism lost a directive ideology and instead became an inevitable psychological mechanism that then lost control of itself. Cultural Marxism in this sense became American Cultural Marxism: a new and virulent beast.

Opposition to it is multivalent. Since on one hand it is emotional and unconscious, but yet infects all of us, the turn *against* it is complex and fraught.

Take as an example for study your fine self. A Little Brown Hindu, educated by Christians, deeply torn and resentful, and who acts constantly as an irritating little woman. You are infused by Occidental categories -- indeed they define you -- and yet you must gnaw at your own limbs like a fox in a steel trap.

You illustrate in some way the strangeness of the Cultural Marxist project. But though I beat on you I also see that we are all infected, in one degree or another. You undermine what defines you. But so does David! And to a definite extent Diebert (et cetera).

And to become yourself you must strike out at what has made you you. Quite bizarre really! (And yet I can help).

Since it is emotional and hysterical, it spreads like a contagion and controlling it, or restraining it, is not at all easy. Just imagine you having to restrain your waspish tongue!

What would opposition to it be? Well, within the New Right the Radical Right or the Philosophical Right (and within Traditionalism too) this is conceived as a return to sensible definitions, sensible categories. It is imagined first and often a bit romantically. One has to turn to some pattern, right? It might mean resistance to 'feminism' by women themselves who choose to assume traditional roles. This in fact is going on.

It could mean men coming forward and taking a 'manly stand' in the face of emotionalized, weaponized Cultural Marxism through feminisms Harpies. Take for a good example Jordan Peterson. This is exactly what he does and he does it 'paternalistically'. He does successfully counter the lies about woman's disempowerment, etc., within our culture. He does a pretty good job and too he is having a great effect.

I think the rise of more traditional religious power-structures in Poland and Hungary give an example of 'resistance to Cultural Marxism' through a refusal to entertain them and steering a different path. But, its all new. You can't go back, you can only go forward.

And then there is all the reactive and counter-propositional material -- thought, essays, discourses -- that are being promulgated by, for example, Counter-Currents and other clearing-houses.

I think that where I might agree with you [opposition to it is also an instance of Cultural Marxism] is in the recognition that those on the Philosophical Right see themselves in a position of weakness in respect to the System, and therefore choose a Gramscian strategy of, for want of a better word, ideological infiltration and idea-dissemination. They recognize that the Cultural Marixsts 'marched through the institutions' and by holding the institutions, specifically the University, they were able to greatly influence culture far beyond their numbers.

Greg Johnson for example refers to the Gramscian manoeuvre and in his writings recommends it as the proper course. In short this means retaking the idea-plane. This is why David and Dan's bizarro declarations made no sense to me. I thought they would naturally incline toward the philosophical and traditional Right (as distinct from the systemic 'Right'). That they didn't was, for me. evidence of how fundamentally deranged they are philosophically and spiritually.

But it is definitely a mistake to frame this in any sort of traditionally misunderstood opposition between Left and Right. This would be the message I'd provide to David Quinn if he had 'ears to hear'. The New Right is in no sense an ally of the existing System and its exiting structures. Unfortunately for the New Right it shares some common concerns with the Left and also with Anarchists. But, and I think this is universal, it demands to dismantle the 'multiculturalism' project of cultural and racial blending through a retreat into 'traditional categories'.

The White Nationalist Manifesto is a good title to study if one wishes to grasp how resistance is structured and understood.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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David? I want to help. I want to help you better understand many many things you do not understand at all. Don't be afraid to ask for help as you come, slowly, out of orbit.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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I do not interpret Trump's coming as the coming of evil as does David -- why? -- because it is solid reasoning to reason that because the shadow world of idea-fixation is caused, that it is meant to be, and because it is meant to be, that it is good and only good (real, true, has purpose).
David is quite deranged and can’t be referred to and be taken seriously. He suffers from delusions of grandeur.

What is truly dangerous in our present is the operation of para-govermental para-industrial power and their coercion. It is hard to see and describe that, harder to hold to the understanding that shadow powers dominate and have great power in shaping perception. We simply have to see where all this goes | is going.

Alex - Santiago and of course Gustav Bjornstrand ( ::: genuflections ::: ) desires only to lighten the world’s load. To carry some of the burden. To infuse screamingly interesting tidbits into the Great Soup of discourse.

Won’t you come along, hand in hand, with us? I’d be so happy. We’d be so happy!
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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David Quinn wrote: Mon Jan 07, 2019 11:50 amFor me, it is more to do with what the “evil alt-right Trump thing" embodies - namely, a regression towards African tribalism, a malignant short-sightedness that does not care about future generations, a turning way from science and facts, a deliberate stoking of people's bigotry and fear, a sustained assault on A=A as a means of confusing and disorientating the populace, etc. I have always considered such things to be evil.
But you are not describing the campaign of one president! You sound like you're in need of a wake up call on what the world has become, how any message, any positioning is colored by the very things you name. Trump seems often enough just very good at it, like a fish in water. He does not care about "facts" because he is not as naive to think that facts get people elected or that facts will make a government work, any modern government. A whole other game is out there, a universe which in not yours. It's pretty insane and you don't want to have any part of that but somehow you seem to think one "side", some element needs to be favored. That's all pretty much illusion these days and it seems like you're harking back to a world of past centuries long gone and just want the myth to be true that it's still alright, rational and good-willing, like some semi-enlightened civic, civil society there which the wise can build upon and improve. It's something you might what to reconsider. Perhaps travel or live in Western Europe or the US for a few years, participate in the industries, politics,the academia (and I did all that) and see if it offers you more perspective.
Fighting climate change, more education and redistributing wealth never saved any one from idiocy.
Becoming more educated or having more leisure time through increased wealth has never saved anyone from idiocy?
I had thought you were more educated than that.
That's a bit lowering the bar for the quality of exchange. Perhaps you do show a bit more bitterness these years, some old age? That said, I am not negative even when describing modernity, there's no sin in dying or death as there's new growth as well.

As for being educated, it all depends on the quality and topics of the education. it all depends what a person desires to do with free time. If the current world would serve as an indication of that, it's perfectly reasonable to say that delusion or ignorance are not cured or even get worse by simply following education or having the time. In your own case time was important but you self-educated in a very specific way. Which then still has little to do with "dealing with climate change" or calling the richest people "evil" because they don't share enough (or that's how I interpreted your statements, you might have something else in mind).
One constitutes a serious threat to the continued existence and well-being of the human species
Then again, if people just halved the population by limiting procreation, there would be no threat of CO2, pollution or scarcity and all science based reduction targets will be achieved easily. So there's only a threat because everyone wants to continue their existence, their tribe and their offspring. Everyone. An existence itself (inherently) is not the thing to protect, a wise man could muse, and he now has more time to address real issues instead of bringing up political topics or end-of-the-world fears into discussions about so much bigger things.
That may be so, but we can still encourage people to value lower level forms of rationality such as education, the scientific method, evidence-based arguments, personal introspection, etc, and refrain from the hysteria, paranoia, demonization and conspiracy-theorizing that has unfortunately taken over large segments of the (older, white) population.
You have never achieved making a case of how that would be under threat by one or more, single passing administrations across the ocean from where you live. Could that by itself perhaps be a prime example of a similar hysteria, hyperbole, demonization and so on? The white segment myth is just another one. Where I live so much of the fantasy and hysteria on nearly every topic comes from affluent, young or multicultural participants inside government and media.

All these differing perspectives... can bite you in the back sometimes!
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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jupiviv wrote: Mon Jan 07, 2019 4:32 pmOn that account, there is no difference between calling for Steven Pinker-esque utopias driven by tech/science/welfare capitalist magic and spinning yarns about how SJWs are deeply connected to the metaphysical death of modernism.
There's a major difference between the phenomena. For example the term SJW is used to describe a motive, like actually pursuing personal validation, attention or channel some energy instead of actually having a point. That way, it's very close to ignorance of self and ego games. That case is harder to make when being more convinced of one system of government or economics than another, although not impossible. Just harder and way more complicated and very hard to navigate that topic outside specialist fora, let alone link it to some psychology.
Feb '17:The only thing Trump is determined to do is build the Wall because it is the stone that hits two campaign promises - jobs and stopping illegal immigration. It will be as effective at stopping invasions as all of the other famous walls of history.
You forgot a few things started or done: renegotiating NAFTA, stopping TPP, approving Keystone XL, redoing Iran deal, US embassy to Jerusalem, cancel Paris climate agreement, deploying major tariffs, partially or wholly reversing some other Obama stuff etc.

Now there are dozens more broken but the above list are major actions for a first year. Nobody doubts he acted on what he said, no matter how much agreement or disagreement on the sanity one might have. That said, it's mostly about stopping and reversing, always the easier path. Although, not for an addict..,,,
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Diebert wrote:That's all pretty much illusion these days and it seems like you're harking back to a world of past centuries long gone and just want the myth to be true that it's still alright, rational and good-willing, like some semi-enlightened civic, civil society there which the wise can build upon and improve. It's something you might what to reconsider.
Well, I have gotten the sense in your general philosophy, Diebert, that you are largely pessimistic. It is just something I have noticed. Modernity, nihilism, the powers & potentialities that operate in the present: against them there is little a person could do. You seem to have developed your own strategy based in that pessimism. What is it? More or less to play within the postmodern forms. For all that I can be, at times, a little forward in giving my opinion, I don't think I would condemn you. Yet I do perceive that, if only in idea-form, there is something rising up to the surface. I mean, an idea-movement which is not pessimistic.

My interjections and impositions -- I understand why David might not find them welcome -- is to attempt to point out that some of the people in the New Right could be very interesting to David and would open up new categories of thought. Take for example even a very radical specimen: Savitri Devi. She also had written a rather interesting essay The Impeachment of Man. The ur-text of Deep Ecology. There is also René Guenón and Julius Evola. No one of these could be considered either liberal or leftist and yet, in fairness to them, many of their ideas are definitely in accord with 'radical spirituality'.

The Postwar Mess and the strange state of confusion and chaos in which we now find ourselves may continue into some explosive event, and may render any activism impossible, but there is developing activism, and people are thinking about ways to counter the Hyper-Liberal *agenda*.
Diebert wrote:As for being educated, it all depends on the quality and topics of the education. It all depends what a person desires to do with free time. If the current world would serve as an indication of that, it's perfectly reasonable to say that delusion or ignorance are not cured or even get worse by simply following education or having the time. In your own case time was important but you self-educated in a very specific way.
I have no idea what David means by education. But I defintely have an idea what a renewed Occidental education must be. Not *should be* but *must be*. It must involve all the categories of paideia as defined (catalogued) by Werner Jaeger.
Jaeger is known primarily for his work on Aristotle and Hellenistic culture and education. Paideia eventually comprised three volumes of seminal work (the first published in 1934) on education, culture and the ideals that formed Greek civilization from Homer to Demosthenes. He called it his ‘three-volume history of the Greek mind’. Jaeger wrote over twenty books and numerous articles in all, including a massive project editing the works of Gregory of Nyssa. As was the case for so many Gifford lecturers, Jaeger’s interests in Hellenism and Christianity often criss-crossed. More than a lonely scholar (though he was that), Jaeger complemented his written work with a deep, abiding commitment to teaching.
A base for education has to be reestablished. And for those of us inclined to or called toward the idea of renovation, we must act as we are able to. I suppose even if the work is in vain or if it fails.

This is what I'd have imagined that the GF philosophy would have inclined one.
David wrote:One constitutes a serious threat to the continued existence and well-being of the human species.
Odd how this paranoid view fits in to a general hysterical and irrational view that infects our present and that, at least today, largely animates the Left. Temps have gone up and down radically planet-wise, and life and the planet are still here. It will all happen again at one time or another. I've examined material that indicates the present warming is connected with sunspot activity. And increased heating is not the end of the world.
David wrote:That may be so, but we can still encourage people to value lower level forms of rationality such as education, the scientific method, evidence-based arguments, personal introspection, etc, and refrain from the hysteria, paranoia, demonization and conspiracy-theorizing that has unfortunately taken over large segments of the (older, white) population.
This is why you could do yourself a service by reading the authors I listed. For example The Crisis of the Modern World by Guenón. Were you to do that you would see that his concerns -- and we on the developing Traditionalist Right or New Right -- are extremely concerned for your catalogue of concerns. What you are unable to recognize -- even to consider -- is that your whole list is at least right now the set of values the Hyper-Liberal Left is dismantling.

The sober alternative is not more hyper-liberalism, but a profound and culture-wide shift into real conservatism. A philosophical and moral conservatism that brings hyper-liberal excesses to a halt.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:26 am
David Quinn wrote: Mon Jan 07, 2019 11:50 amFor me, it is more to do with what the “evil alt-right Trump thing" embodies - namely, a regression towards African tribalism, a malignant short-sightedness that does not care about future generations, a turning way from science and facts, a deliberate stoking of people's bigotry and fear, a sustained assault on A=A as a means of confusing and disorientating the populace, etc. I have always considered such things to be evil.
But you are not describing the campaign of one president! You sound like you're in need of a wake up call on what the world has become, how any message, any positioning is colored by the very things you name. Trump seems often enough just very good at it, like a fish in water. He does not care about "facts" because he is not as naive to think that facts get people elected or that facts will make a government work, any modern government.
This is nonsense, Diebert. A government cannot function without facts, no matter how much propaganda and spin they engage in, any more than a corporation can. It might be able to get away with it for a while, but it is not sustainable. Trump will soon come to understand this at his own cost.

The trouble with your whole approach is that you are determined to downplay Trump’s insane behaviour and magnify everyone else’s, so as to pretend that the two are on the same level. It is like comparing a serial killer with a pickpocket and saying they are equal as they are both criminals. I reject that kind of thinking.

There is a massive double standard going on here. When, say, a Democrat or a journalist opposes Trump they are criticized on the basis they are not perfect saints. When Trump or his Republican cronies engage in their daily vile behaviour, they are praised for not falling into full-blown psychosis.

Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:26 amA whole other game is out there, a universe which in not yours. It's pretty insane and you don't want to have any part of that but somehow you seem to think one "side", some element needs to be favored.
We all do that, don’t we?

For me, I favour sanity, hard facts, solid reasoning, and a benovelant spirit. I make no apologies for that. These qualities are just as relevant as ever. I reject your assertion that they are old-fashioned and disposable, or that they are being dismissed by everyone engaged in the world.

Again, I believe that you are determined to think the very worst of people so as to inwardly justify your support for the complete nutter who resides in the White House.

Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:26 amThat's all pretty much illusion these days and it seems like you're harking back to a world of past centuries long gone and just want the myth to be true that it's still alright, rational and good-willing, like some semi-enlightened civic, civil society there which the wise can build upon and improve. It's something you might what to reconsider. Perhaps travel or live in Western Europe or the US for a few years, participate in the industries, politics,the academia (and I did all that) and see if it offers you more perspective.
You're only seeing what you want to see, Diebert.

Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:26 am Then again, if people just halved the population by limiting procreation, there would be no threat of CO2, pollution or scarcity and all science based reduction targets will be achieved easily. So there's only a threat because everyone wants to continue their existence, their tribe and their offspring. Everyone.
True, but we are way past that point. Even if we managed to successfully implement limits to procreation, it would still take decades before the population began to significantly fall. We don’t have the luxury of decades.

Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:26 am An existence itself (inherently) is not the thing to protect, a wise man could muse, and he now has more time to address real issues instead of bringing up political topics or end-of-the-world fears into discussions about so much bigger things.
For me at least, the survival of wisdom is an existence worth protecting and fighting for.

David Quinn wrote: Mon Jan 07, 2019 11:50 am
Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:26 amThat may be so, but we can still encourage people to value lower level forms of rationality such as education, the scientific method, evidence-based arguments, personal introspection, etc, and refrain from the hysteria, paranoia, demonization and conspiracy-theorizing that has unfortunately taken over large segments of the (older, white) population.
You have never achieved making a case of how that would be under threat by one or more, single passing administrations across the ocean from where you live.
I believe I have. But to recap in succinct form:

The Trump administration is the culmination of decades of anti-intellectualism from the American right, encompassing a rejection of science (evolution, climate change, vaccines, etc) and modern reality (the enlarging of human perspective beyond traditional tribalism). The medieval beliefs of right-wing people have long been eroded by modern scientific thinking, and now they are reacting violently towards it. Hence the current push to install an authoritarian government in the hope that it can repress or reverse this trend. Hence the bid to undermine science, facts, expertise, logic, etc, in any way possible. Given that America is still by far the most dominant culture, this is having a rippling effect right across the world.

Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:26 am Could that by itself perhaps be a prime example of a similar hysteria, hyperbole, demonization and so on? The white segment myth is just another one.
Not here in Australia. I often meet Trump supporters and they are usually over 60, white, religious, uneducated, fearful, obsessed with Muslims, dull as dishwater and completely joyless.

I have noticed that you have sometimes mocked my stance as being a product of my "old age". Well, boo hoo to you. I completely reject that. Indeed, in my experience, the support for Trump and the alt-right is primarily an old people’s movement. Young people generally cannot stand him or it.

Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:26 amWhere I live so much of the fantasy and hysteria on nearly every topic comes from affluent, young or multicultural participants inside government and media.
What’s an example?
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Santiago Odo wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 9:45 am
David wrote:One constitutes a serious threat to the continued existence and well-being of the human species.
Odd how this paranoid view fits in to a general hysterical and irrational view that infects our present and that, at least today, largely animates the Left. Temps have gone up and down radically planet-wise, and life and the planet are still here. It will all happen again at one time or another. I've examined material that indicates the present warming is connected with sunspot activity. And increased heating is not the end of the world.
You have no idea what you are talking about. Parroting right-wing propaganda makes you look ridiculous.

Try reading what real experts have to say on the subject - IPCC Special Report

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Re: To compare is to judge?

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As to climate change, I start from this position: I have noticed that *experts* are not to be trusted. Because the information has to be assembled, given a narrative structure, and disseminated. It seems to have become just another trope that is sent out. This does not necessarily mean that the science is wrong though. Or that human activity is not a contributing factor. It means that the climate change mission has become politicized. But more: it feeds into certain near-apocalyptic fears. A profound disquiet. I think it fair to say that you show how this functions, how it can capture. You blend a group of apprehensions together and charge them with reactive energy. Lots and lots of people are involved in this. It is a mental and psychological contagion.

There is a good deal to be gotten from *stopping* oneself and examining these currents.

Why? How has this come about? Well, it is a hermeneutical question. It requires interpretation. Some say that today is 'like 1930 in Europe'. I listened to a man who said that it is more like the time when the printing press was invented and information began to circulate. Now, this has increased itself more than a thousand-fold. The average person with a smartphone is receiving ideas and interpretive narratives that sway him from one extreme to another. Ideas and views so contrary, so absurd really in their contradictions, that it bends people's minds.

Climate change, like the magical thinking that underpins extreme and outrageous conspiracy mongering, could have mythical aspects. That is, the anger of the atmospheric gods. I mean, the entire world -- the kosmos -- is getting so upset with man, not to mention the Republicans ... and then Trump! The very face of a demon. The surrounding atmosphere becomes violent.

I think it is fair to consider that people are unstable and then too they are emotionally unsatisfied. Or deeply distraught. You know, the loss of solid family relationships. The estrangement people feel from each other. Divisions that arise in race-conflicts. And then The Culture Wars. Add to that the psychological impact of 9/11 and other psy-ops. There are very strange things going on. It is not anormal that there are all sorts of strange manifestations of reaction.

It drives people to the edge. I would say that a person must pay attention to this. What other alternative do we have?

Also, in regard to the climate change issue, there are opposing groups of experts who bring out what have seemed to me to be potent arguments against the one operating in the mainstream.

I have noticed that climate change hysteria operates in tandem with a group of hysterias. They seem to be part of a whole and to reinforce each other.

I did not know that the view -- also one that is supported by scientific analysis -- that sunspot activity is a contributing factor to warming trends was specifically a rightwing theory. It seems to me entirely possible that sunspot activity is now and has often been one cause of cycles of atmospheric change. It may be a confluence of causes.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Santiago Odo wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 1:01 pm As to climate change, I start from this position: I have noticed that *experts* are not to be trusted.
I guess this means that you become extremely fearful whenever you hop on a plane. Or drive over a bridge. Or eat a meal in a restaurant. Your life must be hell.

Or perhaps your distrust of experts is selective.

Who are we going to trust if we don’t trust experts? Amateur diletentes? Radio shock jocks? The internet? Anyone who writes a book?

What a mad world we are currently living in.

Because the information has to be assembled, given a narrative structure, and disseminated. It seems to have become just another trope that is sent out. This does not necessarily mean that the science is wrong though. Or that human activity is not a contributing factor. It means that the climate change mission has become politicized.
More accurately, the populist reaction to the science of climate change has become politicized, and that is simply due to the fact that it is the one branch of science that is making demands on people to change their lives. In order to push away these demands, many people are trying to pretend that it is some sort of hoax, or a left-wing conspiracy, or sunspots. It’s a deflection.

But more: it feeds into certain near-apocalyptic fears. A profound disquiet. I think it fair to say that you show how this functions, how it can capture. You blend a group of apprehensions together and charge them with reactive energy. Lots and lots of people are involved in this. It is a mental and psychological contagion.
I am the last person to fall victim to “near-apocalyptic fears”, but it is impossible to ignore the science, which is very solid.

Climate change, like the magical thinking that underpins extreme and outrageous conspiracy mongering, could have mythical aspects. That is, the anger of the atmospheric gods. I mean, the entire world -- the kosmos -- is getting so upset with man, not to mention the Republicans ... and then Trump! The very face of a demon. The surrounding atmosphere becomes violent.
What a load of rubbish.

Also, in regard to the climate change issue, there are opposing groups of experts who bring out what have seemed to me to be potent arguments against the one operating in the mainstream.
This is an illusion. The science of climate change has near universal consensus in the scientific community, which places it squarely in the same camp as every other branch of science. You are always going to get a minority of dissent in every branch of science, but until they can come up with an alternative theory that is both compelling and backed with strong evidence, their dissent is meaningless.

There is fame and fortune and Nobel Prizes to be won by anyone who can successfully disprove the current thinking on climate change. Nothing would excite the scientific community more than for it to be overturned by a more compelling alternative theory. That this hasn’t happened yet indicates that the current “opposing groups of experts" have nothing of substance to offer. They are loud, though. I'll give them that.

I did not know that the view -- also one that is supported by scientific analysis -- that sunspot activity is a contributing factor to warming trends was specifically a rightwing theory. It seems to me entirely possible that sunspot activity is now and has often been one cause of cycles of atmospheric change. It may be a confluence of causes.
There does appear to be some influence on climate by sunspot activity, but scientific consensus currently believes that it is minor compared to human activity. Sunspot activity fluctuates, whereas the temperature of the earth’s biosphere has been steadily increasing over the past few decades, accelerating over the past few years.

The whole issue is not unlike that of smoking cigarettes. At first, when scientists began to make the claim that smoking causes cancer, many people did not want to believe it and the vested interests ran propaganda campaigns in an attempt to undermine the scientific message. They used to say that science couldn’t prove a direct link between smoking and cancer, which we now know to be false. Back then, people would had to have made a choice: "Do I trust the experts on this one? Are they part of a left-wing conspiracy to deny me pleasure in life? Are they wowsers who have given themselves over to mob hysteria? " I’m sure many people ended up regretting the decisions they made back then.
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Re: To compare is to judge?

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Diebert van Rhijn wrote: Tue Jan 08, 2019 7:53 amThere's a major difference between the phenomena. For example the term SJW is used to describe a motive, like actually pursuing personal validation, attention or channel some energy instead of actually having a point.
You just made up that definition to suit your argument. If SJW referred to a particular character trait regardless of political affiliation, it wouldn't make sense use "SJW" because it is also a political epithet and there are other, apolitical terms denoting the same thing.
You forgot a few things started or done: renegotiating NAFTA, stopping TPP, approving Keystone XL, redoing Iran deal, US embassy to Jerusalem, cancel Paris climate agreement, deploying major tariffs, partially or wholly reversing some other Obama stuff etc.
All of that falls in the category of irrelevance/gong show. NAFTA 2 hasn't and won't bring back any jobs (quite the opposite from what I've read, and the trade deficit with Mexico-Canada was inconsequential to begin with), ending TPP = proverbial closing of barn door (China's importance to the US supply chain dwarfs the US' trade deficit with China, which is why the trade war has widened it further), Paris Accord was pointless anyway. I don't and refuse to attempt to understand the religious/other significance of moving an embassy to a place.
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