This seemed apt
I thought this comment at In Mala Fide was particularly on target in light of the ongoing discussion at Wängsty's place:
History has always been cyclical and it is not different this time. I pointed out that peak atheism corresponded pretty closely with the tech boom, and I think it is safe to conclude that we have likely passed the peak of social liberalism and multiculturalism as well. The problem, of course, is that while some left-liberals will return to sanity, many more will move to the hard left, or what the Communists call "the fascist right" and all of the violence that necessarily entails.
It's worth noting that according to Haidt, the only arguments to which liberals are likely to convincing are utility-based. You'll note that those are the sorts of arguments upon which I tend to heavily rely when engaging in discourse with them.
Jonathan Haidt has shown that most liberals are simply people who only care about care/harm and fairness, while discounting loyalty, respect for authority, and purity/sanctity. For liberals there are no transcendent moral values, only utility and fairness. Furthermore, other scholars have found that most people tend to rely less on those latter three moral foundations when they are comfortable and safe. Which means that liberalism is the natural and spontaneous result of living in a safe and prosperous society. Haidt has also found that liberals can’t even understand loyalty, respect for authority and purity/sanctity. So they tend to think their political opponents are just being massive dicks.The landmark performance of the National Front in France yesterday makes it very clear that conventional left-liberalism can't survive economic hard times. As unemployment continues to rise and economic pressure intensifies, people will quite naturally become far less indulgent of the various absurdities that the Left continues to push on the populations of the West. It's simply not credible to argue "immigration is good for the economy" when the youth unemployment rate is north of 50 percent and 50 percent of college graduates are either unemployed or working at jobs for which their degrees are absolutely unnecessary.
History has always been cyclical and it is not different this time. I pointed out that peak atheism corresponded pretty closely with the tech boom, and I think it is safe to conclude that we have likely passed the peak of social liberalism and multiculturalism as well. The problem, of course, is that while some left-liberals will return to sanity, many more will move to the hard left, or what the Communists call "the fascist right" and all of the violence that necessarily entails.
It's worth noting that according to Haidt, the only arguments to which liberals are likely to convincing are utility-based. You'll note that those are the sorts of arguments upon which I tend to heavily rely when engaging in discourse with them.
32 Comments:
>>>that while some left-liberals will return to sanity, many more will move to the hard left, or what the Communists call "the fascist right" and all of the violence that necessarily entails.
History repeats. Meet "Liberal Fascism 2.0"...
Denying that his program was socialist, Long stated that his ideological inspiration for the plan came not from Karl Marx but from the Bible and the Declaration of Independence. "Communism? Hell no!" he said, "This plan is the only defense this country's got against communism."
So what you're saying is, when trying to convince an SWPL liberal that Policy X is bad, I need to incorporate 'Policy X = No More New IPads/Phones For You!' into the formula somewhere, somehow.
For liberals there are no transcendent moral values, only utility and fairness.
In fairness, liberals almost unilaterally conflate those to things for morals, so they think they are indeed being more moral than the rest.
I was just thinking that, since Vox is so smart, when he makes fun of midwits would that be the same as me making fun of retards?
> ...when he makes fun of midwits would that be the same as me making fun of retards?
No. The midwits are smart enough to learn from the experience.
I agree and have long since tried to convince people that liberalism (though "leftism" might be more accurate) is a toxic byproduct of a society grown accustomed to being fat and happy, like diabetes. The problem is that as society crumbles from all the erosion liberalism has caused, those living through the collapse WILL NOT learn their lesson because their mindset was forged in ease and is cemented. Indeed, as society collapses the liberals will become even more strident and lunatic in their liberalism, blaming the few remnants of virtue as the culprits.
This is very similar to the collapse and supernova of a giant star once it starts fusing iron (i.e., liberals) in its core, since iron consumes more energy than it produces. As the star collapses, the iron and the heavier elements go right on consuming more energy than they produce until the whole thing blows up. There is no reversing the chain reaction of collapse, only picking up the pieces afterwards.
At least the progressives of a hundred years ago wanted to use government power to increase the material well being of everyone. Now they actively promote things like the global warming/climate change cult that seeks to destroy civilization, and mass migration.
No. The midwits are smart enough to learn from the experience.
I wouldn't be so sure of that....
FUBAR Nation (Ben) April 23, 2012 12:53 PM
At least the progressives of a hundred years ago wanted to use government power to increase the material well being of everyone.
Now what exactly makes your think that?
> I wouldn't be so sure of that....
I didn't say they would chose to do so, Vox, only that they were capable. :)
Jonathan Haidt has shown that most liberals are simply people who only care about care/harm and fairness, while discounting loyalty, respect for authority, and purity/sanctity. For liberals there are no transcendent moral values, only utility and fairness. Furthermore, other scholars have found that most people tend to rely less on those latter three moral foundations when they are comfortable and safe. Which means that liberalism is the natural and spontaneous result of living in a safe and prosperous society. Haidt has also found that liberals can’t even understand loyalty, respect for authority and purity/sanctity. So they tend to think their political opponents are just being massive dicks.
This is non-sense. Liberals desire power. They push care and harm because and if they are in charge of it. They push fairness because and if they dispense it. They most certainly are hypersensitive to loyalty to them while disdaining any notion of their own loyalty. They most certainly impose to respect for their authority while angrily rejecting any notion of their respect for any authority at all. And they most certainly mandate purity and sanctity in pursuit of their own ideals and advancement while angrily denouncing any other notion of purity and sanctity as mere slavery.
They seek control. Anything short of that they experience as harm unfairness disloyalty disrespect slavery and sin.
It's worth noting that according to Haidt, the only arguments to which liberals are likely to convincing are utility-based. You'll note that those are the sorts of arguments upon which I tend to heavily rely when engaging in discourse with them.
They are goal-oriented. Will utility-based arguments have any bearing on their choice of goals?
FUBAR Nation (Ben) April 23, 2012 12:53 PM ... At least the progressives of a hundred years ago wanted to use government power to increase the material well being of everyone.
Even then they tended to do things that primarily increased their own power. Progressives then simultaneously pushed for direct election of senators* and the implementation of unelected commissions to rule large swaths of the economy. On the one hand, they appear to put power in voters' hands, with the other, they removed power from those whom the voters elected, turning it over to hyper-educated technocrats who would rule for the good of all**. It would be better to say that they wanted to use the promise of material well-being in exchange for power.
There is no difference in kind between those who seek to remove the Electoral college while putting the US under Kyoto today and those who worked for one-man one-vote and the implementation of the Federal Reserve a century ago. They only look different because we have grown used to the Fed.
* Power to the people, man!
** Meaning mostly for those doing the ruling, themselves.
What's amazing is how far the peak went, it really may be a major turning point. People always turn "xenophobic" when mood declines, but think of how negatively viewed even mild "xenophobia" has become and how far the opposite opinion went. Americans are being told to treat illegal aliens as regular immigrants and Europe mass imported a foreign religion and culture that was an existential threat only 400 years earlier, and to this day, those who decry Islam in Europe are almost always on the fringe.
This is why radical ideas will win the day in many countries. On immigration, whereas before a country would swing from open to closed borders, now even the idea of closed borders is taboo. Politics and culture moved to an extreme point and the snap-back will be epic because negative mood makes people want to fight. There will be no incentive to stop at a rational spot somewhere in the middle and only political systems such as the US (to the extent it still functions) that put brakes on popular will have a shot at avoiding the depths of radicalism.
... liberals are simply people who only care about care/harm and fairness, while discounting loyalty, respect for authority, and purity/sanctity.
This is also highly descriptive of women in general, which is why liberals come across as feminized to non-liberals. In fact, liberalism is inherently feminine for this very reason. As to why liberals don't understand loyalty, respect for authority*, and purity/sanctity, perhaps Nietzsche explained it best (you can easily substitute "liberal" wherever he says "woman"):
Are you a slave? If so, you cannot be a friend. Are you a tyrant? If so, you cannot have friends. In woman, a slave and a tyrant have all too long been concealed. For that reason, woman is not yet capable of friendship: she knows only love. In a woman's love is injustice and blindness towards all that she does not love. And in the enlightened love of a woman, too, there is still the unexpected attack and lightning and night, along with the light.
[* Women/liberals respect authority when it's imposed on them, i.e. when there's an obvious Alpha in control; but they don't have any regard for it as an abstract concept.]
Politics and culture moved to an extreme point and the snap-back will be epic because negative mood makes people want to fight. There will be no incentive to stop at a rational spot somewhere in the middle and only political systems such as the US (to the extent it still functions) that put brakes on popular will have a shot at avoiding the depths of radicalism.
The snap-back you're talking about is more than a bit tardy in the U.S., considering that the trend leftward has been going on for more than 100 years and the FDR Supreme Court essentially destroyed what was left of the old United States of America.
There is something massively incorrect in that comment. Suggesting that liberals don't respect isn't just a falsehood... it is claiming that liberals dislike the very foundation of their belief system. After all... what has more utility than the force of government?
How often do we here the liberals bellow that the government must do the job because only the government can do the job?
And its not just government... its all authority... its systems. Liberals love systems. That is why academia is virtually a religion to them. Show me a liberal soccer mom... and I'll show you a neighborhood community covenant nazi.
FUBAR Nation (Ben)
At least the progressives of a hundred years ago wanted to use government power to increase the material well being of everyone.
Uhh...everyone selected to survive and lead their programs of institutionalization, sterilization, coercion, infanticide, maleducation and disease testing.
Maybe.
Progressives haven't become more evil. They've only become more efficient.
What Haidt is describing is a form of aggressive de-Christianised Christianity.
Liberals are, quite literally, fanatics. They are like Christian fundamentalists, but without the Christianity.
Liberals subscribe to a moral system of humanistic values derived from Judeo-Christianity.
Stip away the Judeo-Christian packaging, and what is left is liberalism.
@Laguna Beach Fogey
"The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is shattered, it is not merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone."
G.K. Chesterton
The point I'm making is that the old progressives actually believed in the idea of human progress. Obviously, the results that sprung out of the old progressive ideas are disastrous and we are living with their legacy today. In contrast, the progressives of today are actively seeking to destroy civilization in the name of the environment and other causes like mass migration that are turning us into a tower of babel.
How often do we here the liberals bellow that the government must do the job because only the government can do the job?
Liberals like the government to have authority over other people. Like Buffet claiming millionaires don't pay enough tax while he owes hundreds of millions of dollars. Or Bill Clinton deducting the cost of donating used underwear and socks. They like the system, but they have no compunction about gaming it. Or like Obama, ignoring it when it doesn't go their way.
They are also in favor of the government forcing other people to do what they already do voluntarily. Like drive Priuses, financially support abortion. Your covenant Nazi fits here, because she wants everyone to conform to her tastes.
I wonder if they love the government because they don't see it having much effect on themselves. Unless it is run by Bush.
Fred Reed has a rather apt commentary on what can only be described as one of the fruits of the leftist utopian mindset--race relations in America:
The response of whites to riots by blacks has always been to back away. This prudence, as it is thought to be, has been enforced by the government. If a minority in Russia started burning cities, the army would shoot the rioters on sight. America doesn’t work that way, or hasn’t recently. The lack of consequences for beatings and flash-mobbings, the history of saying “racism” and walking, produces a sense of untouchability in blacks. It could be a mistake.
A spring is being wound. On one hand, when you live in a sprawling tightly packed concentration of people like yourself, it is easy to forget that you are very much a minority, that the majority holds all the high cards, and that food doesn’t really come from Safeway.
On the other hand, via the internet whites now know of the racial attacks, and grow quietly very sick of them. There is among many white men an undercurrent of “Bring it on.” This is not confined merely to cops, soldiers, conservatives, Southerners, westerners, the rural and the blue-collar. You can find it, carefully hidden, in federal offices and even among men in newsrooms. The extent of this sentiment is easy to underestimate. Those who share it don’t dare express it, and most journalists live in ideological bubbles.
We must lynch Zimmerman.
The confluence of Peak Liberalism, Peak Feminism, Peak Keynesianism, and Peak Stupid will produce a reaction of epic proportions in the next few years.
I wonder if they love the government because they don't see it having much effect on themselves. Unless it is run by Bush.
Rules for thee, but none for me.
As unemployment continues to rise and economic pressure intensifies, people will quite naturally become far less indulgent of the various absurdities that the Left continues
And yet Hollande will probably get in.
How often do we here the liberals bellow that the government must do the job because only the government can do the job?
As often as they themselves are in charge.
And "can" must be replaced with "should."
STILICHO-Zimmerman attempted to become a cop three times, but failed. Why? He lacked the sense to have a .25 cal.'saturday night special' on hand to plant on the kid to justify shooting him. Just like too many cops.
Not that GOD approves.
I wonder in good faith how many of the dread ilk have had to face a judge. It changhed my life.
im sorry, im been lurking aboot for awhile; but im E.C.Mississippistan.
I didn't notice your previous comment about the peak of the tech boom. Technically the tech boom has been going on at least since the invention of the printing press and I doubt if it's nearly over. It certainly waxes and wanes and I would not be surprised if internet start ups slow down considerably as the larger providers take over. But you can look back at the invention of the automobile or electricity or other new technologies and see the same sort of pattern we are seeing with internet start ups right now. If I were more of a historian I could probably take this argument back to cultivated crops and the iron age. But I don't think we are anywhere near the end. The game will change but not end.
IN re-reading your comment it is fairly obvious you are using a narrower definition of tech and are actually speaking about atheism and other liberal concepts rather than tech, but what the heck. I already typed this, so here's my take on tech.
What a fallout, why won't Wangst stop while he is not ahead but severely embarrassing?
Judges and lawyers...The law is an unjust arse. I know some people who faced a judge or two during the Charlotte banking scandal. No one was interested in mortgage fraud until it went GLOBAL.
No matter what my politics are, economic realities cannot be ignored or silenced. It is very clear that the IMF (and company), unemployment and multi-culti immigration policies are not conducive for a prosperous society.
The French election is my recent entertainment. The candidate bio's are interesting and more compelling than our 2012 election.
OT: Post American Times in FL - I was greatly alarmed and saddened to hear how many Americans are calling for the deaths of GZ and the judge surrounding the FL case. The threats have expanded to anyone in even in court room per TMZ.
There is no sanity, sanctity or purity (goodness) in the political spectrum.
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