Kurt Schlicter is a conservative, an author and a trial lawyer, and all three of those factors are on display in his recent column for the conservative site Town Hall, titled, “The Left Hates You. Act Accordingly.” In saying that the essay is irresponsible and inflammatory does not mean that I think it is badly reasoned or argued. Schlicter is passionate, articulate and skilled at his craft, and as much as I wish I could, it is difficult to take issue with his assessment of the current political climate and its implications.
Nonetheless, this is a deeply unethical article, irresponsible, reckless, and divisive. It is true hate speech, in that it both is constructed on hate and designed to create hate. It is also, I fear, very persuasive.
The column has its uses. If there are members of the Angry Left (perhaps the label needs to be updated to “The Berserk Left”) who are capable of recognizing where their current path may lead, Schlicter’s screed points the way. For three months, the entire progressive/Democratic/mainstream media complex has displayed escalating contempt for anyone who does not accept their favored view of the world, and has simultaneous demonized and marginalized half the country for the crime of engaging in the essential civic act of voting. If the furious anti-Trump “resisters” didn’t think this despicable defiance of traditional American responses after an election would spark a backlash, and a furious one, they have allowed hate to delude them. Schlicter’s column provides an accurate taste of what that backlash will be like.
Some excerpts, of a piece that needs to be read in its entirety:
They hate you. Leftists don’t merely disagree with you. They don’t merely feel you are misguided. They don’t think you are merely wrong. They hate you. They want you enslaved and obedient, if not dead. Once you get that, everything that is happening now will make sense. And you will understand what you need to be ready to do.
***
Understand that when they call Donald Trump “illegitimate,” what they are really saying is that our desire to govern ourselves is illegitimate. Their beef isn’t with him – it’s with us, the normal people who dared rise up and demand their right to participate in the rule of this country and this culture.
***
Oh, there are different leftist sects. There are the social justice warriors who have manufactured a bizarre mythology and scripture of oppression, privilege, and intersectionality. Instead of robes, they dress up as genitals and kill babies as a blasphemous sacrament. Then there are the pagan weather religion oddballs convinced that the end is near and that we must repent by turning in our SUVs. Of course, the “we” is really “us” – high priests of the global warming cult like Leonardo DiCaprio will still jet around the world with supermodels while we do the ritual sacrificing of our modern comforts. Then there are the ones who simply worship themselves, the elitists who believe that all wisdom and morality has been invested in them merely because they went to the right college, think the right thoughts, and sneer at anyone living between I-5 and I-95.
***
They are fanatics, and by not surrendering, by not kneeling, and by not obeying, you have committed an unpardonable sin. You have defied the Left, and you must be broken. They will take your job, slander your name, even beat or kill you – whatever it takes to break you and terrify others by making you an example. Your defiance cannot stand; they cannot allow this whole Trump/GOP majority thing to get out of control. They must crush this rebellion of the normal, and absolutely nothing is off the table.
***
So the only outcome is that one side wins and the other loses. There’s no truce to be had, no possibility of a tie. And the frightening thing is that the Left is so foolish, so stuck in its bubble that it has no understanding that it can only push so far before the people with all the guns and all the training push back. That’s the problem with kids who were raised on participation trophies and who never got into a fistfight – they don’t consider the possibility that they will lose, and lose hard.
***
You get the idea. The problem is that in light of what we have been seeing and hearing, that idea does not seem as extreme or hyperbolic as it should.
Thus the hatefulness of this piece has a real chance of taking root, but if it does, Kurt Schlicter will not be the reason. The conduct of the Left clears the way for such feelings and beliefs, and they are feelings and beliefs that a unified, democratic nation can not survive. All Americans have an ethical obligation to restrain these fight-or-flight instincts, and to soothe and mellow the anger and emotion that feed them. At the same time, the Left must stop the dangerous activities and rhetoric that inspired Schlicter to write what he did. They will lead increasing numbers of citizens to find themselves nodding their heads as his words, or similar ones, cause the blood to rush to their faces.
All citizens have to accept their duty to be responsible, respectful, and intimately, to trust in each other, our shared heritage and values, and the far-from perfect but still vibrant and essential culture we have created together. We are careering, as one, toward a deadly precipice. Our leaders have failed us by surrendering to powerlust, narrow loyalties and vengeance, so we have to stop ourselves. Screeds like Schlicter’s do not help, but the catalyst for his screed has been an irresponsible and self-indulgent abandonment of ethics–fairness, respect, prudence, honesty and citizenship—from people who seem awfully recognizable as those the writer evoked when he wrote,
” [A]ccept the truth that if we let them win we will spend the rest of our lives on our backs with a giant Birkenstock pressed into our collective face.”
Kurt Schlicter’s column is, as I stated at the beginning, unethical and hateful. It is also a warning, ignored at our peril.
Ethics Alarms 
“Kurt Schlicter’s column is, as I stated at the beginning, unethical and hateful. It is also a warning, ignored at our peril.”
He also butchered, a wonderful quote from George Orwell’s 1984. That crime alone is unforgivable.
I read the article and, unfortunately, felt myself agreeing with many of his points. I’m hoping that cooler heads will prevail but I just don’t see the left backing off until people get hurt – really hurt. My gut tells me that if things continue on their current path we are headed for a mini civil war. God help me, I hope that I’m wrong.
John, you should read this: https://status451.com/2017/01/20/days-of-rage/
I think the writer of this book review/column agrees with your assessment and does an awesome job of putting it in historical context and describing why that place we’re going into in a handbasket is horrible.
Kurt Schlicter is describing what I like to call Traumatic Political Stress Disorder. What clear is that Liberal Hive Minds are participating in lots of Liberal Critical Thinking.
I’ll have more to say about this sometime tomorrow.
It shouldn’t have gotten to the point where an article like this seems reasonable, indeed IS reasonable. In the meantime I’m going to dust off my tricorn hat, cutaway coat, and musket. I will be blasted if generations fell so that the founding fathers could go the way of flat earthers.
Jack, do you really think that the left has any interest in soothing and mellowing the anger and emotion that feeds them? I would say no, absolutely not! Trump and his ilk may be a lightening rod for their vicious attacks but they have gone after Republicans that have tried to be more moderate in their speech and demeanor like Bush, Romney, McCain, and countless others. You cannot play using Marquise D’ Queensbury rules when you are up against street fighters.
“You cannot play using Marquise D’ Queensbury rules when you are up against street fighters.”
Or you have to be so damn good at boxing that, even in limiting yourself to playing by the Marquise of Queensbury rules, you can still beat the street fighters.
The real problem is the entrenched Left has pretty much shown its true colors and tipped its hand. Now that its revealed its inherent totalitarianism and featured extremism, it has no plans to ever slow its roll and will continue its assault by all means necessary.
How do you solve a problem like that?
Rolling over won’t work.
Meeting halfway won’t work, because it just demands a new half-way point.
…
As I have stated before, you have to present the teaching in a manner the student understands. Slapping the hand of a child who is reaching for a hot stove is not cruel, but necessary and the only method the child may understand. Indeed, this is the ethical course, as it inflict the least pain (in the long run) for a message that MUST be understood, for the teacher and students’ well being.
Angry Liberals (that is, most of them at this point) only understand force, having forgone debate, discussion, or tolerance. The ethical course is to deliver the lesson in such a manner that it will stick.
Yeah, when our 4 year old and our 2 year old act like the Left, our usual response is to just ignore them and they usually quit throwing their hissy fit in short order. If their conduct is truly disruptive or potentially dangerous to themselves or others and they insist on doing it, we react the only way petulant and intractable conduct can be treated.
When both sides decide there’s going to be a fight it will happen. Conservatives are generally in favor of civil solutions, but remember conservatives want to restore the United States to its constitutional roots. Fighting against tyranny is in their DNA.
I pray it doesn’t get to the point of a civil war, but if it does it won’t be pretty. Conservatives are not short of people willing to go to war for their convictions, and they see themselves as being backed into a corner. Progressive and left wing terrorists (which is what they are) have never really come up against angry violent conservative people, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen or that they will not be surprised when it happens. I don’t think the flame throwers they have the support of the proles that they imagine they have. Right wing fighters know how to do more than street fight, riot and burn things, and by now they don’t care about liberal people’s “feels.”
While I see this as very possible, frighteningly possible, I am terrified for my children and grandchildren when it happens. I’m just as angry with conservatives as I am with liberals and I think of Trump the way I think of a rattlesnake.
What do you think will happen if crime does go down in the inner cities. If jobs come back, if health care works better, and if terrorist attacks go down… then what will the left do? Do you think they will still hate him?
Very curious. If it’s not about that… what IS it about? When you all say it will be a war, what do you mean by that? What will that war look like? I have no idea.
I’d love to know what exactly it is the right fears. I Know what the left fears, they can’t do what they want, and things are too hard for people and things should be fair and nice and happy.
Would love your thoughts.
1. Yes. Success will make the Left hate him more. Ideology has little to do with results.
2. I still don’t think it will be a genuine war. I think the Left will isolate itself and become so unattractive that it will either become a long-term fringe agitating group, or find another form. This is repulsive.
3. They are lucky Trump isn’t smart enough, articulate enough or disciplined enough to really exploit their foolishness. But it may not matter.
4. The Right fears the nascent, unAmerican, totalitarian and divisive, group-favoring, censoring inclinations of the Left, as they have revealed these over time, and especially over the last six months.
5. Everyone should.
“3. They are lucky Trump isn’t smart enough, articulate enough or disciplined enough to really exploit their foolishness. But it may not matter.”
Why does everyone keep saying Trump is stupid? This is real life, Mr. Magoo did not win the presidency. Trump only seems to say stupid things. Every notice how hard everyone tries to nail him to a cross with those words. I notice that the nails he gives them are already blunted. To me that is the actions of a smart man.
Because he is. Stupid episodes like tweeting about, making the silly statements about terrorism incidents being covered up by the press, the representations about the crime rate, “we’re not so innocent,”and this is just a week’s worth!—-constantly cripple him. It’s ridiculous. He keeps punching himself in the groin. It makes him almost impossible to support.
And yet, he wins, and yet, it works for him. Do you really believe he got this far on dumb luck?
Not dumb luck, just chaos in a complex system. Sometimes the coin flips all come up heads. ANY TIME a President wins the Electoral College while losing the popular vote, it’s luck. Let’s see: Hillary’s e-mail stupidity. Her greed. The deplorables remark. That she was the candidate at all. CNN giving Trump so much free air. The incompetence of Bush, Christie and Rubio as candidates. Comey II. Weiner. Podesta. Brazile. Wasserman-Schultz. Black Live Matter. Bill’s own sexual predator proclivities finally biting him. Backlash against the news media. The polls. Clinton ignoring the Rust Belt. Bernie. The ridiculous campaigns of Stein and the Libertarians. The 9-11 Hillary pneumonia scandal. Obama’s awful performance as President. The absurd behavior of college students. Click on the “This will help elect Donald Trump” category. A perfect storm. And substantially luck that they all were in play at once, AND that the Democrats were so stupid that they didn’t see the clouds.
Then it would seem to follow from your analysis that Trump, by mistake essentially, by some random toss of the coins, just *happened* to have wound up in the presidential seat when he should not have.
But if that is true, and if he really should not have won, then it is inevitable and necessary that he be defeated so that the correct man can be found. Because Time chose the wrong man! (I know that I should also say ‘or woman’).
Therefor he is not the man of the Zeitgeist, but a man who turns agains the geist of the times.
I would agree that Trump seems reckless. But I have the sense, though I am cautious of believing my own sense, that he is responding to something ‘authentic’ within the polity and that what he will bring forward, or tries to bring forward, is more authentic to the Republic, if such a thing is possible and can be stated like that.
“Should not have” is not accurate. There is no “should.” Hillary Clinton shouldn’t have been a candidate, and our news media shouldn’t be corrupt, either. The point is that the result was in great part due to random chance. Moral luck. In the Super Bowl just completed, in which the Atlanta Falcons astounding loss after being ahead by a large margin late in the game, is being hailed as proof of Patriots QB Tom Brady’s greatness. That’s fine, but if a fluky tipped pass had been intercepted, or incomplete, or nicked the ground, instead of being luckily caught after multiple bobbles scant inches from the ground, there would have been no comeback, no choke, no incredible victory. Indeed, many have compared the Falcons’ fate to Clinton’s. And like Clinton, luck was an indispensable feature.
As the April, 2015 “Pied Piper” memo from the Clinton campaign to the DNC shows, Trump did have unusual help on the way to the White House from the Clintons, the DNC, and their friendly press. Trump’s one of those things that can happen when one side with overwhelming resources decides to use them to fix the game instead competing.
I don’t think Trump’s dumb. He had to at least realize in both the primaries and the general election that if he stayed in the game and kept talking, he’d have a reasonable chance.
This is a sad commentary on Trump, indeed. All he has to do is get out of their way, as they are working as hard as a brand-new ant colony to utterly destroy themselves and their brand.
But then again, maybe I’m seeing this a little wrong. Trump is working overtime to push their buttons, to drive them further into frenzy and self-marginalization. I don’t think either of us could argue that isn’t happening, and the Left responds to his every tweet with more and more reflexive rage.
Perhaps he’s crazy like a fox, after all.
Having said that, it’s not something to wish for, as satisfying as it would be. We all need a sane and principled opposition to Trump, desperately. However, this trajectory can only end in their abject destruction and ultimate marginalization.
I read a column today that crystallized some of this for me. The author pointed out that John F. Kennedy would be considered a warmongering one-percenter by the Left, a combination of the worst of George W. Bush and Mitt Romney. Also that Dr. Martin Luther King would be considered a traitor to his race by today’s standards.
Trump is leading the Left into a death-spiral, perhaps even a literal one. They seemingly cannot refuse his bait, and he’s chumming the water like mad. Not presidential at all, but undeniably effective, probably to the detriment of us all.
“Also that Dr. Martin Luther King would be considered a traitor to his race by today’s standards.”
What do you mean by this?
Glenn is right. King wanted true integration, and for African Americans to be judged on their conduct and character, not accorded special dispensation from accountability and privileges based on color. That would mark him as a complicit “Uncle Tom” today.
There is another way to look at ML King. As a dangerous religious zealot, stoned on Tolstoy and Gandhi, playing within the theater of Biblical Prophet, carrying forward a non-grounded idealism that will never, not ever, become established on the surface of the Earth, in any place, nor any time. Such attempts, in and of themselves, produce enmity and conflict.
An impraticable, intolerant ideaology that is bad for all parties concerned because it is not based on realism and sobriety but on idealisms, but yet is one that can be used an manipulated by socialistic-communistic interests, and that grabs hold of people through sentimentalism.
Therefor, to recover a conservative platform, one has to ‘defeat MLK’ within the mind and within the spirit.
I know that my assertion here is not too popular.
Damn, Alizia, you read like a segregationist there, at 10:42 am.
You said it, now you have to defend it: Was MLK merely a tool of “an impracticable, intolerant ideology?” What IS that ideology, and WHAT makes it impracticable and intolerant?
King is the social and ideological outcome that sprang from the Civil War and its choices. What is hard for most who read what I write to understand is that I try to see things in terms of ‘currents’ and ‘choices’ and actions taken.
I am also attempting to define a Conservative platform. And this is very very difficult because all our thinking is affected by Liberalism, radical Liberalism, and Progressive ideas. I have said this before, I say it again (because it is TRUE!) This is not a conservative blog (IMHO) but a less radically-inclined Liberal blog.
Conservatism, in its true form, was purged out by Liberal factions within conservatism. The ‘real conservatives’ went underground.
In order to define a ‘real conservatism’ one has to be able to define very hard-edged and realistic ideas. Those ideas have to do with hierarchy, difference, structured power relations, and many other topics that are very hard to defend today. No, they are impossible to defend because they are not tolerated.
If you follow forward the basic tenets of a post-Civil War ideology, they lead directly to a radicalism and a social egalitarianism which is, quite exactly, what is occurring in our present. What I do not understand is What exactly people are complaining about if this is the case? This is the outcome of those strains of ideas. They begin with smallish things, and then they go on to larger things.
If you want to live, and if you think it is inevitable and *good* to live in a multi-ethnic society and within multiculturalism, you cannot think its terms of race difference, or race-cultural difference, or in any of the hierarchies that are part and parcel of the older order of conception. This is the power, and the seeming inevitability, of the French and the American revolutions.
I said that King *could be looked at in a different way*. But I do not say that this is the only way. King, in my view, speaks from a specific Christian posture which sees the *soul* as the only relevancy. But the soul is separate from the body. They are distinct and different.
But in my view of things (a Christian revisionism, and a different view of Christian metaphysics) I see the body, the soul, the culture, the mind, and one’s Being as a singular entity. I resist a certain aspect of Christian dualism. But I do this because I am more conservative than most! My conservatism allows me to see and understand the differences between people, and culture, and also time, and to respect them.
King seems very definitely to have risen up in a specific time, in accord with a specific Geist, and to have carried forward a specific radical project in conjunction with numerous radical projects. Theoretically, I seek to defeat radicalism.
In the best of worlds, in my view, Blacks and those of African descent should have been allowed their own republic. I follow Lincoln’s conservatism in this specific sense. And I accept the hatred that it will inspire. There are ideas that are seen as so reprehensible, so morally debased, that they cannot be spoken. I explore a number of them and do not have regrets.
Alizia is a segregationist, lucky.
He is not making an untruthful statement, Mr Lucky. I define a position that turns against Radical Egalitarianism at a philosophical and a spiritual level. In this sense, it is very true and for *good* or for *evil* (depending on one’s perspective) that I turn against the Radical American Egalitarianism project. But not against the present rule of law.
I am linked, ideologically, to somewhat past views that a state and a region, a people and a community, has the right to define themselves. I am ‘radically opposed’ to a Federal government, or any government, assuming for itself the right and the power to social-engineer people into the society they feel is *best*.
Do that and you wind up exactly with what we have in our present.
(I define and I defend a White European identitarianism. I do this theoretically, and I am not an activist. I am a naturalized US citizen and formally a national of Venezuela. But I do not live now in the US though I did for a fair time. I live in Colombia and travel back and forth between Panama and Colombia and sometimes to Europe. My primary relationship is with a man of N European background and I live among people who share my views. A few are American, most European, Argentine, Chilean. I just try to be honest about what I am and what I see.)
Glenn is right. King wanted true integration, and for African Americans to be judged on their conduct and character, not accorded special dispensation from accountability and privileges based on color. That would mark him as a complicit “Uncle Tom” today.
This is bullshit.
MLK Jr. argued in favor of reparations and affirmative action. You are demonstrating that your knowledge of Martin Luther King, Jr. is limited to one line in one speech that is often cited out of context by conservatives in order to argue against policies that MLK Jr. advocated for.
I expect it from right-wing hacks. I don’t expect it from you.
So with your posting of that video, what are you saying, Alizia? Are you saying you agree with Chris, after all? Retracting something you said earlier? Pointing to the video as evidence that MLK opposed segregation? – or that he supported statist cronyism? No doubt, he was a leftist in the most modern American sense. Pro-egalitarian, even socialist? Definitely. Radicalized to the extent that today’s Left is? I don’t think so.
Alizia thinks integration itself is radical and Marxist, so even if Glenn and Jack’s depiction of MLK Jr. were accurate, she’d call him a radical.
But Glenn and Jack’s depiction of MLK Jr. was not accurate.
Chris, I appreciate being able to converse with you via comments. I trust Jack, and haven’t read enough of Glenn to feel informed on where he stands. I have to defer to Jack on his depiction of MLK, but not only because I trust Jack, but also because my own observations of King lead me to share what I believe is Jack’s perception of him. So far, I have to say that what you say of Alizia’s thinking on integration seems accurate. She may be too young to appreciate the post-1960s “Zeitgeist” of somewhat improved relations between races in the U.S. that I experienced personally. There was definite progress. Much of it has been undone.
Lucky, you may want to Google MLK’s views on reparations and affirmative action. He certainly did believe in what many would characterize as “special dispensations based on skin color” in order to redress wrongs. Conservatives use the “content of one’s character” line as if it represents the totality of what MLK Jr. said and fought for, but in reality, his views would not be universally accepted today.
But he did not advocate permanent affirmative action and privileges, nor did he ever utter the term “reparations.” He spoke of a societal debt, which is completely reasonable. He spoke of the legacy of slavery relating to poverty. That is also undeniable. People use MLK’s presumed positions half a century ago as authority for policies now, which is specious at best. The character quote does not date or expire; it is a universal principle or ethics.
But he did not advocate permanent affirmative action and privileges,
I don’t know what this means. Who is advocating permanent affirmative action and privileges now? How do you know MLK Jr. wouldn’t still support affirmative action today? You don’t. You didn’t use the word “permanent” in your original comment, and you said he would be labelled an “Uncle Tom” today, but you haven’t shown that he advocated any position not supported by the majority of black liberals today.
nor did he ever utter the term “reparations.”
I don’t care whether he used the word. What is he talking about here, if not reparations?
“In asking for something special, the Negro is not seeking charity.
He does not want to languish on welfare rolls any more than the next
man. He does not want to be given a job he cannot handle. Neither,
however, does he want to be told that there is no place where he can be
trained to handle it. Few people consider the fact that, in addition to
being enslaved for two centuries, the Negro was, during all those years, robbed of the wages of his toil. No amount of gold could provide an adequate compensation for the exploitation and humiliation of the Negro in America down through the centuries. Not all the wealth of this affluent society could meet the bill. Yet a price can be placed on unpaid wages.”
That sounds like reparations to me.
He spoke of a societal debt, which is completely reasonable.
Moderates of today always think the radical demands of yesteryear was reasonable. I guarantee you that there were white people in 1963 who said “Ending slavery was totally reasonable, but now they want to eat with us and be able to marry our women?”
He spoke of the legacy of slavery relating to poverty. That is also undeniable.
And yet many deny it today.
People use MLK’s presumed positions half a century ago as authority for policies now, which is specious at best.
That’s…literally exactly what you just did.
The character quote does not date or expire; it is a universal principle or ethics.
1. Nonsense. King didn’t specify policies at all, and neither did I.
2. Name me a single Civil Rights activist who has suggested that affirmative action should ever be ended, or described an imminent circumstance where ending it would be just.
King fought for equal rights and opportunities. He never advocated guaranteed outcomes, which has been the focus of the Civil Rights movement for at least 30 years. Assuming his integrity, he would oppose that as being an insult to the race.
1. Nonsense. King didn’t specify policies at all, and neither did I.
No, what you just said is nonsense. King absolutely specified policies. And so did you; ending affirmative action is a policy.
2. Name me a single Civil Rights activist who has suggested that affirmative action should ever be ended, or described an imminent circumstance where ending it would be just.
A non-sequiter.
King fought for equal rights and opportunities. He never advocated guaranteed outcomes, which has been the focus of the Civil Rights movement for at least 30 years. Assuming his integrity, he would oppose that as being an insult to the race.
What a vague, hack-ish, meaningless statement, and proves my point that you have no evidence that MLK Jr. would oppose the policies of civil rights activists today or that he would be labeled an “Uncle Tom.” Why can’t you just admit you overreached here?
That is a very clear and unambiguous statement. Having the same rights and opportunities is nothing like demanding equal outcomes guaranteed by the government. Quotas. “Disparate impact.” Not enough African Americans getting Oscar nominations whether there were worthy performances or not. King would be embarrassed by what the Civil Rights movement has become…a divisive racket seeking permanent grievances to stay in business. Unless you think he would have morphed into Sharpton or Jesse. I suppose it’s possible, but I don’t see it.
Chris writes: “Alizia thinks integration itself is radical and Marxist, so even if Glenn and Jack’s depiction of MLK Jr. were accurate, she’d call him a radical.”?
I have not been able to get through all of it, and I doubt that you would take up a reading recommendation from me, and so I telegraph this out to others who may be interested, but Eugene Genovese (with his wife) wrote a very thorough book which traces the philosophers and the philosophical ideas that were being thought about and considered in the South sometimes prior to the Civil War. The book is called ‘The Mind of the Master Class’.
You and I differ in our approach. I think that you are, in your way, an activist, and you have chosen (I guess) your profession as teacher to have a ways and means to have a tangible effect. Your idealism I suppose translates into actions and to a life-commitment.
I live in a more theoretical universe, and at the same time I look out and I see very different worlds. One, my upbringing in a stratafied society, and also my present locality in Latin America. But what you I think fail to see clearly is that I only desire, as I construct a theoretical platform, to be able to ‘see and understand things as they are’. I think this will define a difference between *people like you* and *people like me* and it will be a constant, it will keep coming up.
I think your idealism will tend to lead you away from the desire, and the capacity, to see in truthful terms. Idealisms, in my experience and my view, are not medicines, they are hallucinatory drugs. I think you will choose a lie over a truth if you sentimentally understand that the truth does not support your ideal. That can only be a statement for which you will never forgive me.
Integration comes — quite directly — out of the philosophical currents that were floating around and being thought about in the mid-Nineteenth century. The first chapter of Genovese’s book is named “Cradled in the Storms of Revolution” and the third chapter is called “Ancient Legacies, Medieval Sensibility, Modern man”. What I am sort of certain that you do not get here, is what are, in fact and in truth, the roots of American Egalitarianism and its connection, ideationally, to Europe and to European politics and philosophy. But previously I said ‘I just want to understand’ and ‘to see and understand things as they are’. For now, I leave activism to you, and people like you. I am a theorist.
Radical American Egalitarianism is very much indeed influenced by Marxism and Marxian economic theory. And a whole group fo strains came together which informed the North and brought the North to bear in military terms against the Southern section. The impetous toward ‘integration’ was spelled out in more direct terms than you are aware, for it was predicted — invited by some — that the American polity would and should become a ‘copper-colored nation’. There is a definite ‘radicalism’ that stands behind this willed statement. Even if you do not see it and understand it. This is a radical shift in how Anthropology — a science of man — is defined.
When certain radical philosophical and political strains blended with more intrinsic and ‘native’ American strains, and then got ‘filled with the Holy Spirit’ and an intense form of Northern piety and zealousness, and then got a dose of patriotic infusion and the whole State got behind it: there you have Radical American Egalitarianism in movement and motion as a historical current.
King is, so very obviously, so undeniably obviously, so very clearly and even self-evidently! a manifestation of these currents. Certainly in his Black Liberation Theology, but also in his radical Marxism, and then more simply as a natural voice of America.
This is what American Liberalism is. This is what informs it. It has now become the dominant ideology of the nation and there is no ‘conservative’ who will get any airtime or print-space in any media in this entire country who has not absorbed the tenets of Radical American Egalitarianism. The ‘real conservatives’, who hold to an ideological and a philosophical position (or even a religious and Christian position) that takes issue with this American Radical Egalitarianism are driven underground. They have been purged, though they most certainly did exist, graduated from Harvard and Yale, et cetera et cetera, and define and defend their notion of things at an ideological and philosophical level. Farily, coherently, ably, and also ethically and morally.
Did a transitor pop in your grey matter, m’boy? Sure it did. Because in your metaphysics there is no way to define any position except a radical American egalitarianism, and there is not one person on this Blog who can do it or will do it because there is not one ‘real conservative’ here.
There you have it.
Integration means, on one hand, and this by definition, the ending by blending of the Anglo-Saxon race of North America. Integration = mixing = mating = the creation of a copper-colored culture. It means the genocide of one culture — the original culture — as a result of the mental assimilation of radical ideas. This is simply a statement of fact.
Be fearless. Look at the facts. See them naked and unadorned by romantic impositions or sentimental idealisms. Understand what you advocate for. And then choose it with the full force of your being and your whole moral person.
I define and will seek to live in accord with a counter-radical hierarchical structure of view. We are indeed enemies. We are opposing currents. You are so much in the ascendency now (and this is something that can be talked about). My challenge is to define a position, philosophically, morally, spiritually, ethically, that opposes yours and can replace it. To do this I have to *see* you like with X-ray glasses! I have to understand not what you think but why you think it so, and how you came to think it so.
What do you mean by “equal outcomes?” Some people say that affirmative action is about “equal outcomes.” Some say the same thing about reparations. Some say the same thing about raising the minimum wage. Some say the same thing about an Economic Bill of Rights, and a guaranteed basic income.
King supported all of the above.
You still have not named a single policy of modern day progressives that MLK Jr. opposed, so your argument is built on a house of sand, Jack.
Sorry I missed all this, but it sure turned out to be an interesting thread.
There’s little left to offer at this point. Jack has accurately described with precision what was intended in my comment. My only further contribution is to point out that the MLK comment was not mine, it was a paraphrase of the author’s comments in the article I linked. I found it likely to be an accurate representation of what the Left today would think of MLK if he were suddenly transported to 2017.
King himself was, by today’s standard, a conservative. Not only that, he was a Baptist preacher who’s message was informed by his religious views. Even if no other characterization about him were accurate, that’s enough to make him anathema to the 2017 Left, no matter how articulate he was in exposing the plight of racism.
Finally, Dr. King led with love and peace, not the radical hate and desire for revenge that characterizes the Black Lives Matter movement and the rest of the Left. His failure to reject progress toward racial equality between Jim Crow and today would mark him as at least irrelevant in the Left’s world-view.
So in that sense, it seems clear to me that MLK’s words, if transplanted from the 1960’s to today, would at least fall on deaf ears, and would likely be seen as traitorous and insufficiently committed. That’s why I found the comments of the author I linked cogent, and persuasive. But I did want to point out that they weren’t mine, although I might wish they were.
[Reply to Alizia Feb 8 at 10:48 pm]
Alizia: To me, “integration” means diligent use of natural color consciousness to turn from color bias toward color inclusiveness, with ultimately, permanently diminished (“nearly zeroed”) color relevance. That is not “radical egalitarianism.” That is far from the cultural genocide I understand you’re aiming to prevent. Jeez! I never thought I’d write like such a “rainbow warrior!” What a liberal I am!
Is it a fact, or inevitability, that what integration means to me will result eventually in a completely color-homogenized population (a “mongrelization of the races,” to use old racists’ terms)? None of us knows, nor can anyone foreknow. But if you want to proceed with calling your conservatism inherently segregationist, and with attempting to prove that segregationism is a natural order which institutions of governance must never interfere with except to conserve it, then I think you are pitching for a repetition of history that is soulless indeed.
Lucky wrote: “To me, “integration” means diligent use of natural color consciousness to turn from color bias toward color inclusiveness, with ultimately, permanently diminished (“nearly zeroed”) color relevance. That is not “radical egalitarianism.” That is far from the cultural genocide I understand you’re aiming to prevent. Jeez! I never thought I’d write like such a “rainbow warrior!” What a liberal I am!”
Well, that seems to be true. You are making a statement which definitely follows from Liberal assumptions and notions. I never put those ideas down, but I only want to understand the logic and the thought-process behind them. In my view, when the ideas are laid out and looked at impassively, the Liberal idea and value-set is ultimately destructive. But I do recognize that the Liberal idea, the Progressive ideal, is compelling. I suggest that it is ‘sentimental’ and I define sentimentalism, in a negative sense, as an emotional bridging of two mutually exclusive idea-sets.
Is it a fact, or inevitability, that what integration means to me will result eventually in a completely color-homogenized population (a “mongrelization of the races,” to use old racists’ terms)? None of us knows, nor can anyone foreknow. But if you want to proceed with calling your conservatism inherently segregationist, and with attempting to prove that segregationism is a natural order which institutions of governance must never interfere with except to conserve it, then I think you are pitching for a repetition of history that is soulless indeed.
Here I suggest that you are wrong and very wrong. But I am also aware, rather acutely aware, that when I begin to speak about how I see things that I will be categorised into the worst category of the human sort that is imaginable. Lothrop Stoddard and Madison Grant have already scientifically mapped out what would happen. And what they mapped out and described, 1000 years ago, is exactly and precisely occuring, right now, today, in our present. See Madison Grant: ‘The Passing of the Great Race’ (1916). Stoddard has many titles but my impression is that his work stems from out of M Grant.
When radical egalitarianism came more strongly onto the scene, resulting from Communist and Marxian agitation and as a result too the the moral crisis following the Second War, no one could successfully think in those previously accepted terms (of Grant and Stoddard). I understand that as ‘a European grammar of self-intolerance’ in motion.
This has all been talked about, researched, mapped, defined, presented, concluded. There is no question, no debate, no ‘its all up in the air’. The fact is quite simple: the ideology of ‘integration’ is tied to a destructive ideology which whites have allowed to be installed in their thought-process. Just as I say this, as the words pass over my lips and teeth (so to speak), I am aware, as everyone reading is aware, that I have committed THOUGHT-CRIME. This is the most egregious statement that can be made today, especially in the climate of America and within earshot of its Angels of the Civic Religion. .
Please remember: I am a theorist. I am speaking about theory — true theory I say — but I am not an activist and I am not recommending any plan of action except self-consciousness. I reject hatred, violence, meanness, cruelty, revenge and any thing of that sort.
My purpose is not to articulate a defence or to be an activist, and certainly not to propagandize an ‘identitarian’ perspective. I say this sincerely. What really interests me, and firstly and foremostly, is How ideas are used to support the operative conclusions we have.
If one is going to define an Ethics, or a Morals, one is always better off understanding the idea-structure that supports it. That is why I have said to Comrade Chris: Know what the idea you support is, understand its consequence, and if you do Go forward in bringing it into manifestation with full MORAL force. But it has to be defended at the idea level, not the sentimental level.
100 years ago! not 1000 years!
King himself was, by today’s standard, a conservative.
Really? Conservatives today advocate an Economic Bill of Rights? Conservatives today advocate raising the minimum wage? Conservatives today advocate reparations? Conservatives today advocate affirmative action?
What conservative positions did MLK Jr. endorse? I want specific policies, not the vague platitudes about equality that you think more accurately fit today’s conservatives than today’s liberals, which is just your opinion.
You can’t name a single specific conservative policy endorsed by MLK Jr, and vice versa, and neither can Jack, which is why you both keep resorting to empty talking points like this one:
Not only that, he was a Baptist preacher who’s message was informed by his religious views. Even if no other characterization about him were accurate, that’s enough to make him anathema to the 2017 Left, no matter how articulate he was in exposing the plight of racism.
Ridiculous. Black religious leaders are “anathema” to the 2017 Left? Do you have any idea how many people involved in the BLM movement are black pastors? Of course you don’t. The black church is still very involved in liberal causes. Your position here is entirely based on ignorance and stereotypes.
Finally, Dr. King led with love and peace, not the radical hate and desire for revenge that characterizes the Black Lives Matter movement and the rest of the Left. His failure to reject progress toward racial equality between Jim Crow and today would mark him as at least irrelevant in the Left’s world-view.
Again, this says nothing of substance, and is pure partisan hackery.
I hate to wade into this tangential quagmire, but, I’m going to address a small section of your rebuttal that is a misconstruction of Alizia’s assertion.
Alizia’s comment
“Not only that, he was a Baptist preacher who’s message was informed by his religious views. Even if no other characterization about him were accurate, that’s enough to make him anathema to the 2017 Left, no matter how articulate he was in exposing the plight of racism.”
Your Response
“Ridiculous. Black religious leaders are “anathema” to the 2017 Left? Do you have any idea how many people involved in the BLM movement are black pastors? Of course you don’t. The black church is still very involved in liberal causes. Your position here is entirely based on ignorance and stereotypes.”
Alizia said he was a Baptist preacher who’s message was informed by his religious views. She then asserts that the 2017 Left would despise him for that. And evidence would support that the the contemporary left does despise leaders who’s political opinions derive or are informed by religious views.
Your response attacks an assertion that ignores the entire “was informed by his religious views” clause, and is therefore a Strawman.
Your actual burden, in attacking Alizia’s assertion is to prove that MLK’s political views WERE NOT informed by his religion OR that the modern Left wouldn’t have a problem if they were.
In your response, though misguided, to correct that, you would need to determine if modern black pastor’s political views driving their BLM participation are religiously derived or if they are independently derived. And whether or not they communicate such very vociferously. Mere participation in BLM by pastors isn’t enough to analogize them to MLK if those connections aren’t made.
Tex, that is someone else’s reaction not mine. Chris has the clearest view of King in my view.
Oops.
Jack, if you could change all the instances of “Alizia” to “Glenn” in my most recent comment.
The problem with this assertion:
“The fact is quite simple: the ideology of ‘integration’ is tied to a destructive ideology which whites have allowed to be installed in their thought-process.”
is that the following assertion is inherent to it, and not even derivative from it:
“The fact is quite simple: the ideology of ‘slavery’s indefensibility on ethical grounds’ is tied to a destructive ideology which whites have allowed to be installed in their thought-process.”
In closing my comments in this thread: I view successful integration in the “race-blind” sense as an outcome of the society’s successful progression toward a more perfect Union that offers more truly equal justice under the law for all – which is to say, constructive for all. Such is antithetical to a conservatism’s “assumptions and notions” that the work of integration is futile sentimentalism (as you, Alizia, defined sentimentalism), and/or a destructive product of European self-intolerance-plus-radical egalitarianism. White liberals’ awakening to their American society’s failures to redress the grievances of generations of large populations of harmed Americans (of all colors), where harm was both literally as well as intellectually institutionalized – and liberals’ response to their awakening – was and has been (even while certainly exploited in various cynical and nefarious ways) quite a bit more altruistic and constructive than just a part of a “Commie plot.”
Your actual burden, in attacking Alizia’s [actually Glenn’s] assertion is to prove that MLK’s political views WERE NOT informed by his religion OR that the modern Left wouldn’t have a problem if they were.
I don’t feel particularly burdened to do either, since Glenn did not provide any evidence that the modern Left would have a problem if they were. Doesn’t the burden lie on him to support that charge?
I have seen a lot of “What would Jesus do?” type responses from leftists opposing the ban on Syrian refugees. Lots of the posters at the protest I attended had a similar theme. So I don’t buy the notion that the 2017 left would despise MLK Jr. for using religious reasoning to support equality, given that I was just at a large gathering of the 2017 Left where people did exactly this, and were welcomed and cheered.
“I don’t feel particularly burdened to do either, since Glenn did not provide any evidence that the modern Left would have a problem if they were. Doesn’t the burden lie on him to support that charge?”
Just so we’re clear, you don’t care that 1) you engaged in a fallacious argument, 2) don’t care to correct yourself in hopes of improved debate skills.
Good to know.
“I have seen a lot of “What would Jesus do?” type responses from leftists opposing the ban on Syrian refugees. Lots of the posters at the protest I attended had a similar theme. So I don’t buy the notion that the 2017 left would despise MLK Jr. for using religious reasoning to support equality, given that I was just at a large gathering of the 2017 Left where people did exactly this, and were welcomed and cheered.”
All drivel.
I haven’t met a Leftist yet who does not use “What Would Jesus Do” as anything other than a cudgel to try to catch Right Wing Christians in a trap of their own supposed “rules”. It’s typical Left Wing fare: insist Right Wingers follow all the rules that Left Wingers don’t really care about; so much so as to make up what they think the rules are Right Wingers ought be following.
It’s hypocrisy at worst, outright ignorance at best.
So much so, that I doubt “What Would Jesus Do” would ever be mentioned if the opponents of the Left were *anything* other than professing Christians or even notional Christians.
tex:
“I don’t feel particularly burdened to do either, since Glenn did not provide any evidence that the modern Left would have a problem if they were. Doesn’t the burden lie on him to support that charge?”
Just so we’re clear, you don’t care that 1) you engaged in a fallacious argument, 2) don’t care to correct yourself in hopes of improved debate skills.
Good to know.
The fallacy was totally unrelated to this point, you ass. You were right that Glenn said “Not only that, he was a Baptist preacher who’s message was informed by his religious views,” and I should have responded to the totality of that, not just the point that he was a Baptist preacher.
Either way, I have no burden to disprove an allegation that hasn’t even been marginally supported.
I haven’t met a Leftist yet who does not use “What Would Jesus Do” as anything other than a cudgel to try to catch Right Wing Christians in a trap of their own supposed “rules”.
And as we all know, your personal experience reflects the totality of existence in the universe, as you are God.
My mother is a devout Christian, and she has over the past few years become a liberal because of her Christian beliefs. When she asks her friends who support the ban “What would Jesus do,” she is not using it as a “cudgel;” she lives by that principle, and expects other Christians to do so as well.
So far, no one has kicked her out of the Good Liberals Club.
The fact is that neither you, nor Jack, nor Glenn have any evidence that MLK Jr. would 1) identify as a conservative today, 2) support any conservative policies, or 3) be despised by other liberals for using his religion to inform his beliefs. But please, keep cherry-picking words from me in order to deflect attention from this.
“The fallacy was totally unrelated to this point, you ass. You were right that Glenn said “Not only that, he was a Baptist preacher who’s message was informed by his religious views,” and I should have responded to the totality of that, not just the point that he was a Baptist preacher.”
Pump the brakes on the emotion, Chris. You responded to Glen’s comment, so you must have considered it related. Just own your fallacy and humbly accept the correction.
“And as we all know, your personal experience reflects the totality of existence in the universe, as you are God.”
I was actually referring to how leadership and spokesmen are treated, not the experiences of lay Left wingers or the lay Right wingers, such as your mother or me. It seems to me anytime a Right winger mentions having their decisions and opinions informed by their faith, the usual suspects on the Left scream “Theocrat!”….”Separation of Church and State!”….”YAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGG!!!!!!”
“The fact is that neither you, nor Jack, nor Glenn have any evidence that MLK Jr. would 1) identify as a conservative today, 2) support any conservative policies, or 3) be despised by other liberals for using his religion to inform his beliefs. But please, keep cherry-picking words from me in order to deflect attention from this.”
When backed into a corner you move to association attacks. I haven’t even made an argument against your assertions. I’ve merely corrected an error in your methodology. You ought to be happy.
Lucky wrote: “The fact is quite simple: the ideology of ‘integration’ is tied to a destructive ideology which Whites have allowed to be installed in their thought-process.”
is that the following assertion is inherent to it, and not even derivative from it:
“The fact is quite simple: the ideology of ‘slavery’s indefensibility on ethical grounds’ is tied to a destructive ideology which Whites have allowed to be installed in their thought-process.”
I think a simple statement will show that the above-mentioned correspondence does not follow. I will use Abraham Lincoln as an example. Totally, absolutely and uncompromisingly opposed to slavery; saying ‘If this is not an evil then I do not know what evil is’ (I paraphrase), but recognizing the incompatability of *destinies* between the two very different racial, cultural and spiritual stock.
I recognize that this is the sort of statement that will land a person in a lot of trouble these days. You simply cannot say such a thing.
I want to say something about ‘sentimentalism’ since, as it happens, I am getting more clear about it as I go onward. I will even cite and example from something I noticed. Sentimentalism, IMHO, is a disease of the mind. It is a destructive agent. Sentimentalism allows for an emotional realization, or an emotional perception or feeling, to cause one not to be able to clearly distinguish aspects or facts. Sentimentalism in this sense *infects* reasoning and also intellect, but it is important (in my view) to define what we mean by ‘intellect’. Intellectus in Latin is a complex word and in fact it refers to higher levels of being. The ‘intellectual world’ is a world of higher (transcendental or higher metaphysical) being. The higher intellectual world, that is, within our own traditions and history, is the great achievement of the West. Everything that we value, and everything that has given strength and power to the Occidental mind and all its discoveries, derive out of this *mind*. What *it* is has to be preserved. This to me means, essentially, a spiritual preservation. What is being preserved is an aspect of the spirit, or the spirit’s strength. I might not yet be able to explain myself well about this but I try within my limitations.
What opposes ‘spirit’ in this sense is nothing else but mindless matter, and the chaos of random, mechanical processes. The elevation of a man (a person, whether man or woman) depends on spirit and intellect. The highest manifestations of the human being occur when this dichotomy is understood and taken seriously. Therefor, the issue is ultimately ‘spiritual cultivation’ when we speak of intellectual power. The great arts, the great literature, the great musics, the great science: all of these things are achievements of the spirit, and they all depend on spirit and spiritual discrimination. Intellect and discrimination are parts-and-parcels of the better manifestation of a human being. You will notice in what I write that what I write very certainly lends itself to hard definitions, to establishment of hierachical views, and to the discrimination between *high* and *low*. Intellect and discrimination and its use, in my way of seeing, is radical in and of itself. But to understand this one has to see what *opposes* it.
If ‘intellect’ corresponds to ‘Being’ in a metaphysical sense, then ‘sentiment’ and ’emotion’ correspond to ‘Becoming’. When one is subject to contingency and becoming (the mutability of biological life and life lived in a moment), one is necessarily outside and away from life within intellect. But only through intellect, and through the psyche, does man see, understand and do those things which we describe and understand as ‘higher things’. There is certainly a contrast between the Medieval notion of ‘intellect’ and that of scientific understanding (manipulation of quantity essentially) but you’ll have to wait patiently for an exposition on that theme (huar huar).
When man buries himself in his contingency and his immediacy, in his ‘voluptuousness’ and his sensual existence, it is a rule that he weakens and also destroys his link and relationship to ‘intellect-intellectus’. This is a spiritual truth and it runs through Greek philosophy, in Confusianism, and certainly to the Hindu Vedas. You have to cultivate the spiritual side and that means to sacrifice the sensual-contingent side. It is a hard rule and it is a solid, universal truth. It describes a basic dichotomy which, for we Westerners, is best illustrated in platonism (the Chariot metaphor and all that).
I would suggest that what our society (societies) now cultivate is quite precisely the ‘contingent’ and the immediate. Everything is geared to stimulate appetite and desire, and everything is measured by quantity of gratification. When one examines this, and when one examines the person, the subject, that is subject to these general processes, it is not hard to see that what is being cultivated, in stark terms, is not at all the intellect or the spiritual person nor the ‘higher man’ but in fact a lower, limitied, needy, desiring, appetite-motivated Self. I suggest that the primary *engine* as it happens that drives this Man (this human being) is the ‘desire-self’, and that the base or core of the desire-self is the sentimental and emotional Self.
Sentimentalism therefor is here given a solid definition, and other definitions follow from it.
I have my example to give, I hope it is not a bad one. Surely there are many. But this is one that interested me. In the NYT’s (a sentimental journal of opinion par excellence) they recently ran a story about a child, born in gender confusion, not fixed in being a boy or a girl, who was admitted into the Boy Scouts because, oh thank the Heavens, the BSOA organization has finally seen the ethical light and now is open to the transgender ‘community’ and, I assume, to the further penetration of gender-confusion into the social structure. OK, so you read the article, and you look at the photo of the poor child who can know nothing of the battles that surround him (her?), but is just a sweet little child and harmless. And the article is designed to hook you at a sentimental and emotional level, and thus trick you, mess with you, confuse you about the real understructure of issue. Sentimental people will side with the poor little child. “God Forbid that cruel bureaucracy, outdated Christian Boy Scoute organization, should purposefully inflict cruelty and harm on that poor innocent child! Evil men! How wrong that is! We are better than that! We have *evolved*! Over my dead body will this backwards cruelty be allowed to continue!”
Sentiment trumps (excuse the terrible inadvertent reference) intellect. A passing feeling, a mutable partial truth, trumps a greater, larger and more important truth. The ‘truth’ of course has to do with what happens when a culture abandons, under an assortment of pressure, the definition of ‘man’ and ‘woman’ and begins to sentimentally entertain any given deviation or mutation that serves a contingent moment. Carried to its ends, of course, definitions fracture, but so too has the intellectual mind fractured, and the acid that eats it away is, I suggest, linked strongly with sentimentalism and emotion. In our present, and for various reasons all of them that can be outlined, the social body, the social mind, is infected by emotionalism, desire, self-will, self-centeredness, et cetera, and culture encourages this, indeed it is now powerless against it. This is in a platonic sense the classic perversion to which democracy is subject.
If I can distinguish such things as this, then what I am doing is subjecting myself to higher discrimination. If I can do it in this category, if I can do it theoretically, then I can also apply such structured thinking to other things. And I can apply such structured, discriminating thinking to the subject of culture and race. I can actually think in eugenic terms. Or I can see and study and reason about what happens when the races mix together in a ‘contingent’ environment under the influence of people, or institutions, or ideologies, which are in their essence sentimentally-influenced. Not imposing on the individual, or culture, or man and woman, hard definitions that are difficult and demanding to live in accord with, which demand sacrifice and postponement of pleasure, but rather helping people to give in to the influence of seductions.
Seduction and emotionalism and sentimentalism all go hand in hand. They are blind, or dim-sighted, or ‘idealistic’, or confused, or they simply do not care, but yet they are highly willed, insistant, powefully motivated and also activist.
When I speak of ‘the white race’ or ‘identitarianism’ or of ‘Europe’ and ‘Occidentalism’ and the need for white people (a sinful term, forgive me!) to recover their strength and power, it is to this (what I have written here) and to much else that I refer to. I must also say that there is a movement in ideas that is taking shape in our present, mostly in Europe but increasingly in America, which is seeking to define such philosophical bases for the ‘European Renaissance’.
Now, to return to what I said about ‘integration’. The processes of so-called ‘integration’ can be and must be separated from slavery, the history of America, America’s relationship to Meso-America, to the Indigenous culture that it destroyed and displaced, and to many other stmbling blocks (sentimental stumbing blocks) to understanding. Because the issue is anthroplogical. It is spiritual. It has to do with Anglo-Saxon culture, with a specific and a discussable relationship between ‘the spiritual’ as I define it, and the contingent, mutable world. The issue has to be seen in the most, shall we say, cutting and ‘distinguished’ light, and to do this all sentimentality has to be excluded (insofar as one can).
There is an infinite array of influences now operating which will take ‘Europe’ off this track. In concert, they are a sort of acid which eats away at the psyche and Being as I have described it. There is not one isolatable influence but an array of them. And sorting through it all is demanding and difficult (excruciating) work.
If *you* are on tis side of the equation, and I do not care what specific race *you* are or what culture you come from, and if *you* as a result of this level of discrimination can see clear-sightedly and penetratingly, then I assume that you will also see and understand what I and what we mean when we speak of ‘Europe’, and the ‘white race’, and our sense of the need — the imperative! — to preserve and protect ourselves against an array of ‘acidic influences’. If you understand this, then you may come to serve similar realization.
But if you don’t, and if you operate against these discriminations, these realizations, these necessary spiritual definitions and the power of Being (which is metaphysics) that stands behind them conceptually, then I must break off from you. I must distinguish you from myself and be sure that it is not you who influence me, but that I avoid your influence.
The counter-current against the flow of time in our present is everything!
Question: What are you saying?
I do not have any reason to disagree with Chris (I refer to him as an example and because he often steps forward to oppose what he understands as my ‘evilness’).
I wanted to support Chris’ understanding of King as an activist seeking reparations and struggling to get things for his people. I believe that what Jack was trying to say is that King believed only in the soul-value of a person, and since souls are not bodies, the Black soul and the White soul must be the same and non-different.
I believe that I fully, maybe more fully than anyone else on this blog, understand him. Because I understand (or, to be humble, I believe I understand) ‘the ideas that inform him’. It is called ‘radical egalitarianism’ and his brand is a unique, but a strange, variety of it.
It arises out of Americanism, the tenets of the American Civil Religion, and is woven into the fabrics of the American psyche. It is the kind of *belief* you can sing about. Like for example in church, in a holy hymn of righteousness. I suggest that he is, and *they* are, largely unconscious of it and so *they* do not know what informs them. Only by having a point of comparison outside of oneself (or a belief-system) can one really see what informs oneself. I bored people months ago talking about the need of a ‘master metaphysician’ to decipher ourselves and our present. I think we need such a perspective to understand ourself and our present. It is a really interesting idea, and no one shows any interest in it.
King, in my own view, is a very dangerous sort. Because with him politics goes religious. Just in and of itself King needs to be thoroughly examined. Now, when social justice righteousness, and certain market forms, and deviant sexuality, become essentially religious expression, at that point I say there is something to watch out for. And when they become unified into a State and an education-system, I consider that something really to watch out about.
What I think confuses people about my approach (theoretical) is that they expect me to define some sort of Program. But all that I want to do is to get clear about what is what. King, the Black Panthers, the Hippy Movement, the Woman’s Movement, radical sexual libertinism, the radicalism of the Postwar generally: all these things represent bizarre configurations of ideas and they all need to be sorted out. The only way to sort them out is to look into them. To try to locate the ‘operative idea’.
I am interested in Meta-Politics, and this is a new definition of political and social value that, not now, but at some point in the future will become relevant.
“King…is a very dangerous sort. Because with him politics goes religious.”
No – you seem oblivious to where King came from, and the nature of the minority’s predominant culture at the time. King’s politics, despite his “Reverend-ness,” did not go any further “religious” than Lyndon Johnson did when he gave the speech citing a Bible verse: “Come, let us reason together.” This is clear to me because of my relations, and my family’s relations, with blacks at that time. King was not a theocrat.
Had King not been killed, I believe he might have been one of Nixon’s most vital allies – might have even “saved” Nixon from Watergate. I’ll admit, though, I know nothing of King’s connections, if any, to George McGovern or Hubert Humphrey. That’s one guy – McGovern – who could have made clear for all of us just how far left King was. Humphrey might have been able to team with King to win in ’68 instead of Nixon – but I doubt it. I had family insist that had the ’68 assassinations not happened, the White House would have been won by Robert Kennedy with MLK as his VP. That is almost believable to me, but then, I was young, and tight with my family.
King WAS “dangerous,” if for no other reason than his ability to split southern white Democrats. The old racist Democrats didn’t have anywhere else to go, except to George Wallace.
I cannot think of any one figure more vitally religious, and more activist toward social justice issues than MLK. I cannot see how you justify minimizing his training, his profession and calling, and his whole manifestation in the time period. He modelled his movement on Exodus.
You might not agree with me that he was ‘dangerous’, but this remains my assessment which I could back up. But it doesn’t sound like you’d have too much use for my views in this regard.
But I do want to say that when I use the word ‘dangerous’ I do not necessarily mean bad or wilfully bad.
It is a danger when the religious sentiment, conscious or unconscious, gets linked up with political movements.
And as I have said, but I don’t think you agree, I see the classic SJW as a manifestation of a submerged religious impulse. This is linked to my understanding of America as a Post-Christian Nation.
I know people on the left who knew after the election that they had gone astray, shifted their allegiances away from fellow Americans who were being passed over. That realization seems to have disappeared now, buried under the recount – Electoral College – Russian influence- immigration campaign. Everything is focused on Trump, not a word about reform among the Democrats.
I had not heard of this fellow and did a little research. He wrote a novel: ‘People’s Republic’ which is a sort of political, semi sci-fi fantasy about a country that continues in its division. The first review at the top of the page seems to encapsulate: https://www.amazon.com/Peoples-Republic-Kurt-Schlichter-ebook/dp/B01M0H7WQZ
It is not surprising that his novelistic fantasy, which must represent some aspect, in symbolic form, of what he really thinks, is expressed in his novel-creation.
As I have said, and think, Conservativism is in a revision process. The ‘old form’ of it is going to be transformed by a newer form, and the new form is what is now seen to be hovering out at the fringes.
Because the new form (of conservatism) will not ever be accepted by the present, and increasingly radical Left forms, more conflict is predicted. I guess it is sort of unethical to vocalize any sense as to what will come of that conflict. Perhaps because to predict something is also, in some way, to say what it is one desires will happen (and this might be the gist of Schlicter’s novel).
I do think it fair to say that the increasing militancy of the Left-Progressive set will force the Conservative faction to seek greater solidarity with those, such as myself, who are now defined as deviants and sickos.
Lately I have found myself to be largely marginalized on this blog and have stepped away from commenting. I still read non-political posts, and obviously, some political posts.
However, I couldn’t stay away from this post. I take deep exception to the characterization in Schlicter’s column, Jack’s response, and the resulting comments. I am, as all of you know, a liberal, and a progressive, and, God forbid, a Democrat (although I am loathe to admit that lately). I am not exceptional. I am representative of many, many, many people, good citizens all, who are of the same ilk. None of the characterizations above describe us. However, once again, as has been the case so often in the past, the broad brush of generalization has been applied to all of us. There are indeed some who call themselves liberal/progressive/whatever who are as described. But the vast, vast majority of us are working to find a way forward, including in the near future.
To be honest, so many of the commenters here engage in hateful generalizations. It seems to be that there is plenty of hatefulness on the Right as well. Welcome to the kettle.
As a rational Democrat, you’re not just marginalized, PAW, you are nearly extinct. Do you read the Facebook feeds of your friends? The article accurately describes what I’m reading. Did you notice the riots in DC and Berkeley? The straight party line votes on every cabinet nominee? (unprecedented…) The boycotts of committee votes? Elizabeth Warren’s rhetoric? The determination to block a Scotus nominee out of spite? The speeches at the DC Women’s March? It’s 3 months after the election! People aren’t making this stuff up. And it isn’t just a few crazies. Do you watch the talk shows? The defenses of “punching Nazis?” There are people like you but they are being loudly represented by a group that meets Schlicter’s description. So you are essentially denying reality because you don’t want to deal with its implications, which are unpleasant. That makes no sense at all.
UPDATE: How about THIS? http://www.campusreform.org/?ID=8741
OR this? http://www.dailycal.org/2017/02/07/violence-self-defense/
I don’t even have to look for this stuff. How come you are unaware of it?
Jack, your list conflates radicalism and actual violence with…procedural shenanigans that politicians routinely engage in? People voting in ways you don’t like?
This is why Patrice’s point about generalizations makes perfect sense to me, and why in all your talk about hysteria on the Left (which does exist) you are missing the hysteria on the Right, and even engaging in some of it yourself.
Not “voting as I don’t like,” Chris. Angry obstruction and inflammatory rhetoric. How Senators vote is of no interest to this blog. Why and how they vote as they do is. Was the boycott of the Inauguration by a third of Democratic House members “voting”? Was that conduct unrelated to death threats being used to intimidate performers? If the Democrats had accepted the results of the election and not sparked the media to join them in a 24-7 attempt to deny that this President is as “legitimate” as any other, do you really think we would be seeing this? You cannot seriously argue that the violence and hysteria isn’t being cultivated and mirrored by the conduct of the elected representatives. You are as much in denial as Patrice.
The EA post doesn’t endorse Schlicher, but it accurately describes why his take rings true in disturbing ways.
How Senators vote is of no interest to this blog. Why and how they vote as they do is.
They voted against cabinet nominees because they are unqualified.
Choosing to not go to an Inauguration is perfectly peaceful. This is my problem: conservatives keep telling us to protest peacefully, and when we do, we’re still accused of being hysterical. Popehat summed it up best on Twitter:
Schlicter’s argument is just as unhinged and hysterical as anything on the Left.
I think that was largely Jack’s point, Chris. Schlichter’s argument was an unethical reaction, no less potentially harmful than many similar columns on the left, but no more so, either. I disagree with your characterization of it as “unhinged,” because at least it attempts to have a nodding relationship with rationality, but ultimately failed.
Some of them, in their view, no doubt were, and I even agree in some cases. Most of them unambiguously are qualified, and they voted against them for partisan reasons.
This is very slippery of you, Chris. Boycotts are never peaceful, they are in their essence economic, or in this case, political warfare. They are intended to be seen as exactly that.
And methinks you totally misread Popehat. His position is reflective of mine above.
Note that the boycotting politicians didn’t say they were otherwise engaged, or simply didn’t show up. They made a big to-do about it, and some of them claimed Trump was an illegitimate president. That’s not peaceful, it is political violence and intended to be exactly that.
Can the congressmen’s refusal to appear be considered a boycott though? I don’t think so… boycotting is inherently a refusal to spend money at a place you otherwise *were definitely going to* spend money at based on an assumed principled and thought out stance…
Sure. It’s not an economic boycott, but it’s certainly a boycott. If the bride’s whole family announces that it is not attending the wedding to show its hatred of the groom, that’s a boycott, no?
Fair point, I suppose. It depends on the definition of the word. My view is that attendance is a form of political capital, a nod to the tradition of the United States presidency (not the man occupying the position). By “boycotting” (in their words, or at least those of their mouthpieces), they were refusing to spend the limited amount of political capital required to fulfill a traditional healing gesture.
Seems close enough to a boycott for me, but your mileage may vary.
They voted against cabinet nominees because they are unqualified.
I was going to ignore this ridiculous rationalization because I don’t want to make Chris feel like I’m harassing him, but thanks for raising it. The nominees were “unqualified” because they aren’t Democrats, and that’s it. No other party has taken this toxic position. If Democrats had a majority, they would literally force the President to choose between allowing the Senate to appoint the cabinet, or not having one. That’s not the system, but Democrats don’t care. Cue Schlicter.
There were some nominees who could be fairly called unqualified, notably Ben Carson, who isn’t qualified for any governmental leadership role whatsoever. But it made no difference to Democrats, did it? He got no more bi-partisan support than anyone else, thus making a contrast or real message other than partisan warfare impossible.
Until the Chrisses of the country stand up and call what their party and ideological colleagues are doing wrong and dangerous, which it is, this will get worse.
Note that the boycotting politicians didn’t say they were otherwise engaged, or simply didn’t show up. They made a big to-do about it, and some of them claimed Trump was an illegitimate president. That’s not peaceful, it is political violence and intended to be exactly that.
This is straight-up Orwellian. Violence is violence. A boycott is not violence. Characterizing it as such is an attempt to move the goalposts so far that almost no protest can be characterized as peaceful.
Chris wrote, “This is straight-up Orwellian.”
Orwellian, maybe; hyperbole, maybe; reasonably valid opinion, yes.
Here is a partial quote from What is Political Violence?
“Some political scientists see political violence as part of “contentious politics” or collective political struggle, which includes such things as revolutions, civil war, riots and strikes, but also more peaceful protest movements.”
The boycott was certainly contentious politics associated with a collective political struggle.
I think you attacking the opinion as you did was bordering on intellectually dishonesty.
It would be intellectual dishonesty if I agreed with those political scientists while attacking Glenn’s point. But I think they are both clearly wrong. Violence should only be used to describe actual violence. Calling a peaceful protest violence is Orwellian. “War is peace,” etc.
A question for Chris and Patrice
Should I believe your assurances, or my own eyes?
I’ve seen Prop 8 supporters harassed and threatened (including my best friend).
I’ve seen the IRS target Tea Party groups.
I’ve seen left-wing DAs in Wisconsin target political supporters of a governor they opposed (read “Wisconsin’s Shame” by David French).
I’ve seen the Boy Scouts bullied into changing their policy on LGBT issues – so much so, I am strongly considering returning my Eagle Scout badge in protest.
I’ve seen bakers, photographers, and florists targeted for punishment by the state for declining to use their creative talents in same-sex marriages.
I’ve seen violent protests when conservatives have been invited to speak at colleges.
I’ve seen supporters of Donald Trump attacked by rioters after attending a rally.
I’ve seen a Clinton aide say a major media outlet had no right to exist.
So, tell me again… do I believe you, or what I am seeing and hearing for myself?
I’ve seen Prop 8 supporters harassed and threatened (including my best friend).
That sucks. I’ve seen gay people harassed and threatened. Have you? If you have, did you blame everyone on the right for this?
I’ve seen the IRS target Tea Party groups.
I’ve seen the Boy Scouts bullied into changing their policy on LGBT issues – so much so, I am strongly considering returning my Eagle Scout badge in protest.
How were they bullied? Have those opposed to the Boy Scouts accepting LGBT people not also engaged in the same tactics?
I’ve seen supporters of Donald Trump attacked by rioters after attending a rally.
Have you also seen protesters of Donald Trump attacked by his fans at his speeches? I have; if you haven’t, Google is not hard.
I’ve seen a Clinton aide say a major media outlet had no right to exist.
Have you not also seen Trump aides saying similar things?
So, tell me again… do I believe you, or what I am seeing and hearing for myself?
Your question makes no sense. When did I tell you that these things did not happen? When did Patrice?
But you are denying the astoundingly obvious totality of what has been going on. That’s not helpful, and I think it enables this to get to the breaking point. The wave of anger, ridicule and violence from the Left, the denial of the election, the denigration of Trump voters, the threats, the violence, the efforts by elected officials to frame routine exercises of power, the fearmongering, the opne expression of a desire for vengeance, the idiotic Hitler comparisons, states and cities acting as if enforcing immigration laws was the equivalent of assisting the Fugitive Slave Act—come on. You can’t pretend that “but they haven’t been perfect!” is a rebuttal to this. It’s a dodge (intentional) or denial (unintentional.) The Left’s conduct is unique in American politics, dangerous, and wildly irresponsible without having a legitimate objective.
Well duh. It’s the usual ethics dodge when the Left is criticized – you guys did a lot worse, so we don’t wanna hear it! I can just hear Paul Reubens as Pee-Wee Herman saying “I know you are, but what am I?”
Except by no stretch of the imagination does “you guys did a lot worse” make sense here. Nobody has done anything close to this since South Carolina seceded. The Democrats are a couple steps away from Bleeding Kansas. In a debate on CNN, an anti-Trump activist was asked to name the last time conservatives had a violent protest about anything, and went into SLEEP MODE.
Of course it makes no sense. And if the Democrats WANT Bleeding Kansas, then I say bring it on! Most of the guns are NOT in Democratic hands and things will NOT go well for them.
Nobody has done anything close to this since South Carolina seceded.
That’s hysteria, Jack.
Of course it makes no sense. And if the Democrats WANT Bleeding Kansas, then I say bring it on! Most of the guns are NOT in Democratic hands and things will NOT go well for them.
And this is even worse, Steve. I don’t know any leftists who seem as excited for violence as you and lucky do, and I don’t visit any left-wing blogs where the rhetoric is common. Maybe you’re part of the problem?
Hey, Chris, maybe you and I should start a blog for the non-violent, reasonable, progressive Left, to prove to the Right how many of us there are.
I predict death threats and boycotts of all your activities and endeavors.
And maybe you don’t move in the same circles. I know and have seen plenty of both, hell, Howard Dean tweeted these rioters were the wave of the future and Hollywood writers, producers and actors have posted and tweeted how much cybercrap about hitting the streets and how we on the right better step aside or else. Well, we won’t step aside, and if the left tries to make us step aside, then the left, and that includes you is going to have a problem with us. And that is going to be a big, BIG problem for you.
… Chris is straining at a gnat, but swallowing a camel
Every now and again, someone compiles one of these charts together, and I always marvel at how despite out interconnectivity on social media, we’ve allowed ourselves to become so isolated by ideas. Take the example above regarding conversations on Climate Change Look at the connections between like minded people, the tenuous connections between the basic groups… It’s hard to escape terms like ‘bubble’ and ‘echo chamber’. And in my experience, it’s the most extreme of people that decide to interact with people outside their bubbles, the vast majority of people more than happy to be suckered in by the warm comfort of being surrounded by people who agree with them.
Which is why, Patrice, I understand where you are coming from, I can understand how someone who is fairly unusual by virtue of being willing to have discussions with people who think differently than you (especially without immediately resorting to name calling) might still come honestly to the perception that the average person on their side… It’s most probably what you see in the day to day grind. I even believe that you’re probably right, and a majority (although perhaps a gradually shrinking one) of left-leaning people are well behaved and adjusted. The problem is that the majority is almost irrelevant.
At the risk of breaking Godwin’s Law, the silent majority of German people in Hitler’s Germany who were not actually anti-semites were irrelevant. On a more local note: the 98% of Americans pre-civil war that were not slaveowners were irrelevant, And to carry it up to today: The left standing by and watching their compatriots melt down into a cesspool of petulant whinging and crybullying are irrelevant. Your crazies are running the train, and you’re getting pulled along for the ride…. I wonder if in 100 years, the history books won’t label people like you water carriers for a deeply damaging ideology, or if such books will even exist.
Unfortunately, people who just have the courage of their convictions are both rare and don’t make the headlines. I am a cherry-red Republican and a Reagan-era conservative, some call me a neocon. I make no bones about who and what I am and what I believe. However, I respect principled pacifists who want to keep the conflict and attendant collateral damage down in this world. I respect principled humanitarians who really want to help others. I respect principled liberals who stand for what Thomas Jefferson and FDR and JFK stood for. I respect them still more if they are reasonable.
I don’t respect attention whores who claim to be for peace but engage in vandalism and destruction which are ultimately meaningless and achieve little. I don’t respect powermongers who claim to want to help others but don’t like it when those others don’t need them anymore and choose to go their own way, maybe even don’t want them to not need them anymore. I don’t respect unprincipled politicians who call on supposed liberal ideas when they can score political points, but discard them when they are inconvenient.
I’ve had to use the unfollow button more times than I care to on social media just to keep my focus. I am tired of reading memes that make fun of the president’s hair or choice of nightwear, give half truths about his past, or just plain condemn him, often in foul language. I am tired of links to slanted and shrill articles with pithy comments like “Boom” “This” etc. I am tired of foul-mouthed rants by those I know who are on the other side politically. I am tired of verbal duels in which the goal is not to talk to each other, but AT each other. I am tired of pigeon chess.
There is no getting around what’s hit the news, and I’m pretty disgusted with that too. Party-line votes and impassioned speeches as to why someone should not be confirmed I can understand. Obnoxious and ultimately futile tactics that just ratchet up the obvious disdain both sides have for each other, like refusing to attend a scheduled meeting, 24 hour rant-a-thons that do nothing but delay the inevitable, and Elizabeth Warren’s pushing of the envelope (which is becoming sui generis and might backfire), I can’t. Out and out defiance of the Federal government after years of cramming its authority down the states’ and cities’ throats, I can’t. And actual rioting, complete with people getting injured and a fair amount of property damage, then PRAISE of that rioting, I can’t for the life of me understand.
Enough is enough, Patrice. As an adult I have never seen this kind of poor behavior from an entire political party and its adherents – not when Bush the elder kept the GOP train chugging 4 more years, not when Bush the younger was finally declared the winner after a thirty-some-odd-day crisis, heck, not even DURING that crisis, and definitely not when Bill or Barack sent their opponents packing, in at least Romney’s case after some rather ill treatment. The last time stuff like the riots and bombings went on was in the 1970s, when I was a boy, and so didn’t understand it much. Jack was an adult though, and I bet he remembers: the Fraunces Tavern attack, the Patty Hearst robberies, the Greenwich townhouse explosion that killed radicals who were planning to bomb a social event at Fort Dix, and, oh yes, Mumia’s ambush of a Philly cop for no real reason other than race hate (actually that was in 1981, but it came on the heels of the 1970s, with Reagan not even in office a year).
I will be blasted if I will let this nation slide back into that anarchy, and I will be doubly blasted if I will let one of our major political parties lead the way down that slide. We have enough enemies without that we don’t need the enemy within. I’m not one to advocate the outlawing of a political party, but in Germany the Nazi Party is now outlawed and in Russia the Communist Party is now outlawed, and for good reasons – they became enemies of the people they were supposed to protect. Ironically, in the aftermath of Obama’s victory, when the GOP was in the process of trudging out to the political wilderness, cartoonist, editorialist, and superlefty Ted Rall said the US should at that point consider outlawing the GOP based on all they had done during the Bush II years, citing to those same two examples. I would argue that the Democratic party did no better during Obama’s time, but, putting that aside, I would submit that their anti-democratic and proto-totalitarian actions during the past three months make them MORE worthy of being outlawed.
Upon reading this post, I drawn to a somewhat different theory. I suspect that there is indeed ill-intent and calculation to cause chaos, confusion and a weakening of the American culture.
After all the media hype over “The Russians” interfering in the American 2016 election, it occurs to me that indeed that may happened but not necessarily in the way that the media is suggesting, that being to hurt HRC and to help Trump.
Instead, I am theorizing that yes, the Russians… and maybe others as well… may have been engaged in certain activities NOT to throw the election one way or another BUT RATHER to throw the American culture into as much chaos and confusion as possible, in order to damage the strength, prestige, unity and influence of the American culture. This would have happened regardless of who won the election but the Trump victory was just gravy… almost too good to be true.
If my theory is correct, they (The Russians and maybe others) have succeeded immensely in a very short period of time since November 8th.
Consider too, it is highly probable that non-American aligned and anti-American factions have over the past several decades infiltrated into the United States significant numbers of human assets who may have unfriendly motivations towards the American government and indeed the American people. I am not saying that there are terrorists or Russians hiding behind every bush, only that there are people who live here who may not hold America’s interests in the highest of regard and who would love to throw a few hand-fulls of sand into the gears if they have the opportunity. (I am NOT implying in this theory that Muslims IN GENERAL are the villain as I believe that most American Muslims are good citizens.)
Not to be too ominous, but these unfriendly human assets may not represent enormous numbers but I would suggest that they do exist in significant numbers and do wield significant influence in entertainment, in news media, in academia, and in politics. Today’s incredibly toxic political environment is… according to my theory… the result in no small measure of the not so subtle efforts of these unfriendly “hidden hands” who live amongst us in plain sight and BLEND IN remarkably well with people who we think of as merely good left-wing, liberal progressives.
How’s that for a conspiracy theory?
Let’s name a few, Senator McCarthy: Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, Charles Blow, Jamelle Bouie, Bill Maher, John Oliver, Al Franken,
One does need a theory, doesn’t one? to make sense of the turmoil of the present. One looks for a ’cause’ because that is how our minds function. It stands to reason that there must be a cause and that it can be found.
I submit that it was the Civil War. According to my idea there is a connection between the Northern righteous attitude, underpinned by religious sentiment and Christian righteousness, and the classical SJW of today. They are not a deviation in American culture but a logical expression of American radicalism. Radical egalitarianism is what it is all about.
I know this will not go over well (I have a Kelvar helmet and a fireproof suit I got for just this reason) but the destruction of the South through the means of war, and all that it unleashed (terror, horror, enmity, death, wounds, disruption, destruction), is always right there close to the surface, and when enmity arises it tends to take brother-against-brother form.
I read in Bob Dylan’s biography that he used to go read old newspapers from the Civil War period at the NY library on microfilm and that he extracted out of the timbre of the articles the intensity he puts into his songs. Every generation takes them up as needed.
The Progressive Left is continuing the same battles, the same righteous struggle, that was expressed 150 years back.
What interests me, and when Winnogranny talks of ‘restoration of the Constitution’, she cannot mean the Original Republic’s constitution can she? The closer approximation of the original republic and its constitutionalism, I have at times thought, went down when the Olden South went down.
A new spirit of American Republicanism came on the scene, and a new definition of ‘the tenets of American civic religiosity’. It all became enshrined in a set of beliefs which are quasi-religious in nature.
It is true indeed that the Republic could never have remained, and should not ever have remained, a slave republic. Some say that there was an alternate solution and that slavery would have died out slowly. I wonder if that is true.
But it does seem to me that ‘northern radicalism’ is a real thing and that it can be isolated and talked about. If what we see among the Progressive Left is not the same Northern radicalism in motion, then someone will have to set me straight about what it is then.
This is an interesting analysis, but I think it misses the boat when it draws a parallel between the “Christian righteousness” of the abolitionists of the North and the “progressives” of today. For one, several countries in Europe had already abolished slavery including England prior to the Civil War and when novels like *Uncle Tom’s Cabin* were published in the North, it awakened the public to the evils of slavery. The “progressives” behavior and attempt to eliminate fundamental American rights, reminds me more of the Leninists and Stalinists of the former Soviet Union in their fanaticism and unwillingly to have a constructive dialogue with the right.
Some months back, I remember, TexAgg made an effort to correct me when I pointed out that I noticed a connection between Woodstock (‘children trying to get back to the Garden’ according to Jony Mitchel) and the American religious revivals that came out of Cane Ridge. I have to say that I extract a certain amount of my views on the matter from Harold Bloom.
I do not think I am wrong though in making this connection, Tex’s criticism was that the Woodstock kids were a ‘different demographic’, but I think and see in terms of the ‘soul’ of a country.
Hariett Beecher Stowe, I did some research on her, was just exactly a Northern religious zealot. Nothing come out of a vacuum. The religious zealots of the Burnt-Over District, overturning traditional forms and ‘reinterpreting’ things into the present, may have a correspondence to the New Age Movement. Ideas move from person to person. I wonder where the *spirit* behind the Living Constitution jurisprudential ideological movement comes from. What stands behind it? I mean, what ideas stand behind it? What stands behind Originalism?
You seem not to take into consideration that the South reacted — very strongly, and with tremendous force — against the assault on their ‘rights’ that was being carried out by the North. It had so very much to do with ‘rights’ (and please, because I am speaking about this, I do not want anyone to think that I ‘believe in’ a slave republic).
Therefor, that the North imposed itself against the Rights of the South, enshrined in the Constitution, and the Progressive Left’s apparent assault against rights, I think a case of correspondence can be made.
Oddly enough, it must be remembered, Marxian theory was not unknown and his influence not unfelt even around the time of the Civil War. There is a great deal of writing by Marx on the American Civil War that can be Googled.
I don’t think that it is fair to characterize Harriet Beecher Stowe as a religious zealot. John Brown certainly was but Stowe although lively involved in religious debates with other Christian sects, her primary focus seemed to be in ending slavery and after the Civil War she set up an integrated school in Florida. Here’s a recent book on her spirituality for your reference: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2014/february-web-only/harriet-beecher-stowe-spiritual-adventurer.html
Yes, Leninist and Stalinist characteristics. I agree. Furthermore, more and more, I see socialists thinking becoming normalized in the U.S. like never before. Bernie Sanders and his legions of young people who openly praise socialism. Also, the blurred lines between the $15 dollar an hour minimum wage and “Living Wage” movement – pure socialism. And the various “class warfare” movements… all having characteristics in common with Bolshevism.
Having said this, I need to clarify that there are certainly benefits of the socialistic economic system. And certainly, here in the U.S. we already have certain programs and institutions that have socialistic traits that are widely seen as good and beneficial. However, in the more virulent strains, socialism/Bolshevism/Communism inevitably curtail personal liberties, personal self reliance and freedom. In the end, the Bolsheviks won out in Russia in the 1920’s because they were the minority group that was most comfortable with extreme behavior and the spilling of blood… lots and lots of blood.
“How’s that for a conspiracy theory?”
J.H.: I’m not addressing every point in your post, just the Russian connection generally. The CIA report on Russian involvement in the 2016 election begins by saying, “Russian efforts to influence the 2016 US presidential election represent the most recent expression of Moscow’s longstanding desire to undermine the US-led liberal democratic order.” In describing Russia’s specific goals, it begins, “Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the US democratic process…,” before mentioning the Clinton campaign. So it’s not at all outside the mainstream to say that Russia’s activities were not ad hoc to influence the outcome of this election.
Full report is at the bottom of this linked page:
https://www.wired.com/2017/01/feds-damning-report-russian-election-hack-wont-convince-skeptics/
Thanks. Good to know.
[Reply to J. Houghton Feb 8 at 9:22 am]
“[T]here are people who live here who may not hold America’s interests in the highest of regard and who would love to throw a few hand-fulls of sand into the gears if they have the opportunity.”
There are already significant and impactful numbers of such people in positions of career “service” within the federal Executive Branch. They are in addition to the “assets” who have infiltrated the influence-spheres of entertainment, media, and academia who you mentioned. It’s a not-so-vast left-wing conspiracy, still. But, it IS a conspiracy, a pretty big one, a Team Left. Unfortunately for us all, it is also a team primed for, if not also actively engaged in the promotion and advent of, totalitarianism.
Yesterday I wrote, “I’ll have more to say about this sometime tomorrow.”. I wasn’t kidding, here it is…
I’m going to set aside some of the hyperbole and focus on a few points made by Kurt.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”Leftists don’t merely disagree with you. They don’t merely feel you are misguided. They don’t think you are merely wrong.”
I agree with this part.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”Once you get that, everything that is happening now will make sense.”
Make sense; that’s just ridiculous! Only if you choose to think like they are thinking can it “make sense”.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”They hate you.”
I agree that hate is taking over. This is a real problem for the left because the left has taken their attack the messenger to new levels and true hate is directed at the people they oppose NOT the ideological differences. The path of true hate usually has one end, violence.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”You are normal, and therefore a heretic.”
From their point of view that’s completely false; you are a heretic because you disagree with them, therefore you are abnormal.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”Understand that when they call Donald Trump “illegitimate,” what they are really saying is that our desire to govern ourselves is illegitimate.”
False. Illegitimate to the left is anything they disagree with. Liberal Purity Test it has nothing to do with the desire to govern ourselves.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”Their beef isn’t with him – it’s with us, the normal people who dared rise up and demand their right to participate in the rule of this country and this culture.“
Please allow me to fix that sentence; Their beef is with the abnormal people who dared rise up in opposition to their ideology. Remember how Liberal Critical Thinking works.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”They hate you, because by defying them you have prevented them from living up to the dictates of their false religion.”
A simpler version of that is; They hate you, because you openly defy them and will not let them have their way. Period. They are suffering from Traumatic Political Stress Disorder.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”The first step is to end the denial. Open your eyes. See what is happening.”
I agree, accept that there is a problem. Think about raising children for a moment; when a child has a temper tantrum what do you do? Do you feed the tantrum beast and exponentially increase the probability of additional tantrums by “rewarding” the tantrum and give the child what they want just to shut them up because you are publicly embarrassed or tired of the noise; if that’s what you do then you are part of the problem. The political left has been and is currently playing a psychological game and their expectations are that you will fold under the pressure like the embarrassed or tired parent above; they think that’s what you will do because that’s what’s been done for the last 25 years and especially over the last 8 years. They have seen the pattern, they have expectations based on those patterns, and they will not change their tactic until they learn that the tactic is no longer productive to achieve their goals.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”Their religion tells them we are greedy, racist, sexist, homophobe morons who hate science and love Hitler.”
Then we need to change their perception and be reasonably prepared in case they choose a different path.
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”So the only outcome is that one side wins and the other loses.”
That’s thinking just like them, it’s false narrow-minded bull shit!
Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”How to we respond?”
That is the trillion dollar question and if there was one clear answer to that question then the next step might not be easy but at least you would know exactly where you have to place your foot, but it doesn’t end there.
Again; Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”The first step is to end the denial. Open your eyes. See what is happening.”
Accepting that there is a problem of a Liberal Hive Minded temper tantrum, is the first step for some. How do you respond to that temper tantrum is the second step, not so easy.
What’s the answer?
A wise man once said, If we want change in our lives the change must begin in us.
1. In my opinion; societal containment is the answer, not physically, but figuratively. You do not feed the tantrums, reaction gives them more reason to increase their tantrums and gives them a perception of “power”, you contain the tantrum. All actions have consequences.
2. You protect the public from the criminal element within the left choosing anarchy as their means of tantrum and you prosecute each and every one of them to the full extent of the law, and punish them accordingly, no politically correct pandering! Make public examples of each one of them.
3. Right now a huge portion of the political left feels powerless much like a cornered animal and they are lashing out at all those that confront them. Give the ones that are not being uncivil some room to breathe. Find ways of making them feel less powerless and less cornered but be firm on ethics and morals. Encourage civil discourse while encouraging them take 100% responsibility for the uncivil hate and the actions associated with that hate that are being used to support the political left with ends justify the means behavior. Changing in the behavior of the left must be encouraged but for change to be effective and long term it must be their choice, change from within.
4. Ignore the “civil” tantrums and drive on with policy and we must shut down any hateful nonsense from both sides. The hate must be shut down with actual facts, logical arguments, and ethical behavior; let morals be a source of strength. Be seen as the “moderate” adult in the room but do not under any circumstances tolerate hateful behavior, threats, or violence of any kind from anyone regardless if they are on your side. Impose that the ends DOES NOT justify the on everyone in your path that believes otherwise.
Thanks for reading to the bottom; I guess I had a lot to say. 🙂
It’s worth a Comment of the Day.
Thanks Jack.
“Kurt Schlicter wrote, ”Once you get that, everything that is happening now will make sense.”
“Make sense; that’s just ridiculous! Only if you choose to think like they are thinking can it “make sense”.
I think that in the original article “will make sense” is intended to mean “can be understood,” not “is reasonable.”
LoSonnambulo wrote, “I think that in the original article “will make sense” is intended to mean “can be understood,” not “is reasonable.” “
I disagree.
It took a long time to get there, but this was by far the most worthy point you made, in my view. All were worthy, to be sure, but this one should be the raison d’être of this comment.
Well done.
Thanks Glen.
This is as much a general counterpoint to Zoltar’s 12:20 pm comment as it is a general comment about your post. The Left-Right war that is ongoing in the was-U.S. is due to irreconcilable differences between closed minds.
Jack, I’ll say it again and again, without tiring: It’s too late. This country is headed to dark places. We’re on our way now, already. There is nothing that anyone can do to stop it. It’s only going to get worse for all of us. It will not get better. Soon these will be the good old days.
Hate breeds hate. Hate trumps love, but love does not necessarily trump hate. Eventually, given enough hate, the hated will hate back against their haters. (That has begun.) If certain hated were hated before they hated their haters, and became haters-just-like-their-haters as a result of being hated by those haters, then the “original haters” must own culpability for bringing hate upon themselves – and, must suffer the consequences. The preceding four sentences might seem like Authentic Frontier Gibberish, but I assure the whole fucking world, it is not, and I don’t care who doesn’t trust me – I do not heal blindness, and I do not suffer self-blinding gladly.
Now, the “original haters” will not own culpability. They WILL NOT change their perceptions, their “ethics” (or unethical rationalizations), or their behavior. (Civility is DEAD.) They will not tolerate anything but total victory, and total defeat for their enemies. It’s just like in World War II. There is no alternative. There must be total losers, and total victors. It’s “us” versus “them.” To the fucking end-of-the-world end.
Jack spoke of a “nation of assholes.” It’s here. That shit won’t go back into its bowels.
Interesting video…
That’s at the hewillnotdivide.us exhibit… There’s been some inadvertently hilarious things come out of there.
I read Kurt Schlichter’s “People’s Republic.” It’s an entertaining yarn, complete with cardboard characters and a large amount of gun porn, and it reads like the work of a promising adolescent. For me, the “promising adolescent” filter should be applied to everything Schlichter writes and says. A promising adolescent makes incrementally more sense than a toddler pitching a tantrum, but a rational and ethical adult would not view either one as a model for thought or behavior, or regard either one as shining a light into the darkness.
Jack,
In this thread alone, I have seen comments that border on calls to violence from slickwilly, luckyes, and Steve-O. They are all conservatives, and regular commenters. The tone of their comments can’t be read as anything other than excitement for this “civil war” to begin.
This is not new from any of them.
I have not seen anything similar from any liberal commenter on this site.
That, of course, does not indicate that violence on the right is a bigger problem than violence on the left.
It does indicate–to me–that if you’re going to complain about violence on the left, you might want to first notice the calls to violence coming from the conservatives who frequent your blog.
Sorry, can’t help myself. I keep seeing the scene from Godspell playing out before me:
How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when you yourself fail to see the plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.
(Luke 6:42)
Also a hysterical transformation of a legitimate parable into a convenient rationalization. The Left is threatening violence, undermining Democratic institutions, dividing the nation, sowing hate, engaging in violence, and the good, rational, peaceful liberals are lecturing the victims and targets of the Violent and Totalitarian Left. Explain. How about showing some leadership and integrity and addressing the actual problem? Hint: it requires making your pals angry at you, and risking the same hate they are spraying around at others.
I could easily turn that around on you, Jack:
“Conservatives on this blog are advocating violence, and you are lecturing this blog’s liberals. Explain.”
You have no idea whether we are “making our pals angry at us.” There are no liberal commenters here advocating violence, so there is no one here for us to make angry.
Other than the conservatives here advocating violence.
Once again, Chris, you veer into the indefensible. Nobody’s advocating violence. Many are fed up with the violence of the Left, and pointing out that they are ready to mount a defense by the same means, if necessary.
Please note that unless you wish to ally yourselves with the violent Left, you have nothing to fear from these comments. Otherwise, you’re claiming the general garment they’re presenting is cut to your fit, and that would be instructive.
I understand you and Patrice feel put-upon by being included by inference, but keep in mind that’s a two-way street — in order for you to be included in their broad strokes, you must reckon yourself included in the group that they are upset with.
In either case, your outrage is really just whining. Poor you.
Seen any ACTUAL violence from the right after this election? Bluster is one thing, actually going out and smashing windows, tearing up newspaper boxes, or hitting people is quite another.
Yes, and my response to that–and the response to that I’ve seen from other liberals here–is that it’s wrong, and it should stop. You’re saying that righties should get more violent in response. Every liberal here is advocating more peace, while you and two other conservatives here are advocating more violence.
Again, I am talking about just this blog, not generally.
That’s pretty hilarious Chris. The Left is rioting, calling for Trump’s assassination, fearmongering and creating hysteria, and the “good liberals” approach is…to lecture conservatives?
I lecture both conservatives and liberals who advocate violence.
You wouldn’t know that, since on this blog–which is the only context in which the two of us interact–only conservatives advocate violence.
“I have seen comments that border on calls to violence from slickwilly, luckyes, and Steve-O.”
Funny – I interpret what they are saying as: “If you bring violence to my doorstep, you will be met by far more violence than you had anticipated.”
Which really makes sense if you have read these guys over time. My read on them is that they want to be left alone by the government and other busybodies so that they can lead their own life in peace.
Bingo.
Many on the right are beginning to say ‘enough, already!’ to the constant drone of how bad we are (due to skin color, or lifestyle, or religion, or whatever) when we just want to be left alone.
Failing that, do not be surprised to discover resistance when you bring violence into my neighborhood.
Too funny. Yes, Chris, the danger of permanently dividing the nation, wounding its institutions, paralyzing the government and crippling democracy isn’t coming from the boycotts, then bullying, the hate and fear-mongering, the non-stop denigration of the President in print and broadcast journalism, from riots, from ignorant celebrities, from Democratic Party leaders making frontal attacks on the elected President involving accusations of insanity, greed, racism, incest, treason and fascism, but from a few over the top posts by conservatives on Ethics Alarms.
Yet another list conflating rational criticism and peaceful protest with violence, Jack, and you wonder why such complaints are hard to take seriously?
No, there is no “danger” from calling the president greedy and racist, as he is both. There is no danger from boycotts, as they are a time-honored tool of peaceful protests. There is danger from riots, of course, but if you put peaceful protests on the same level of badness as those, then you’re shooting yourself in the foot.
Isn’t that what conservatives here keep telling us? That if we freak out over everything Trump does, “no one” (other than the 60-70% of Americans who already view Trump unfavorably) is going to listen to us?
Why isn’t the converse of that true? Why don’t people ever tell you that if you freak out over everything the left does–say, a bad review of a Trump restaurant, or Kaepernick taking a knee–no one will listen to you when you complain about an actual riot?
The answer may have something to do with bias.