Troops Piss on Dead Taliban:
“I have seen the footage, and I find the behavior depicted in it utterly deplorable. I condemn it in the strongest possible terms,” Panetta said. “This conduct is entirely inappropriate for members of the United States military and does not reflect the standards or values our armed forces are sworn to uphold.”Let's treat those that resolve to destroy America with the utmost dignity and respect. Next, us "enlightened" folk will shake the hands of our daughter's killers and give mass murderers a respectful burial consistent with his religious wishes...oh wait.
Girl Scouts rejects Boy Dressed as Girl:
The whole debacle began in October, when Bobby Montoya, a 7-year-old who was born with male genitalia but has identified as female since age 2, asked to join the local Girl Scouts. In a panic, they rejected Bobby, which brought national attention. The Girl Scouts of Colorado responded by changing their minds and giving GLAAD a press release that stated, “If a child identifies as a girl and the child's family presents her as a girl, Girl Scouts of Colorado welcomes her as a Girl Scout.”So gender is not only a construct, but it is so malleable as to change merely on one's own statement. In other words, you can change your sex just by saying out loud, "I am a woman."
Men and Woman are Different, Study Claims:
Men and women are "basically different species," says a new study published Wednesday on the Public Library of Science website that seems determined to validate every Men Are From Mars, Women Cry At AT&T Commercials book ever written.And the Sun is hot.
GOP's Latino Problem Gets Worse:
Democrats dominate among non-white groups, winning among African-Americans and Asian Americans as well as Latinos. In 2008 Obama carried 67 percent of the Latino vote, and even won the Cuban-American subset previously loyal to Republicans. For GOP presidential candidates, the party’s struggle to attract Latino voters is particularly troubling for two reasons.Latinos like the Democrat plantation too. And getting uncle Jose over the border more easily.
Is Romney too liberal for being the face of conservatism?
Looking at Mitt Romney's political ideology, one in ten Americans (8%) say he is too liberal, compared to 15% of Republicans and one in five Conservatives (20%).Doesn't matter - they'll call him racist anyway.
What if Tim Tebow were Muslim?
So I ask, what if Tim Tebow were Muslim? How would our society react if during every interview, Tebow said “Insha’Allah” or “Allāhu Akbar” rather than thank his Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ? Or instead of falling to one knee and praying, Tebow pulled out a prayer rug and faced Mecca?What if he had one leg?
The posthumous fawning over Christopher Hitchens:
Slate today has 26 articles on the late Christopher Hitchens. For an "iconoclast," he seems awfully popular with everybody who is anybody.Bashing religion, when the elite think of it as a marker of the bucolic underclass, does not make one an "iconoclast."
(Extremely good-looking) Actress and singer Ariana Grande - "Even Performers Like Me Get Bullied":
Sometimes, people can be extraordinarily judgmental and closed-minded to anyone different or special, which is why it's so hard for young people in this day and age to be comfortable enough in their own skin to not listen to the people picking on them. But we shouldn't let them make us unhappy. If anything, we should feel sorry for the people who want us to feel bad about ourselves, because they are the ones struggling for approval...Be happy with being you. Love your flaws. Own your quirks. And know that you are just as perfect as anyone else, exactly as you are...And it's true. :] We're all fabulous.Sorry kids, if another kid in school is making fun of you, it's almost definitely not because you're "special", at least not "special" in a good way.
----------------------------------------------------------
In real life, I've put forth the idea that America is OVER-employed rather than under-employed. For the most part, people do nothing besides creating problems which they themselves fix. The news media, along with non-producing jobs like sociology professors, history teachers, and interior designers, champion the importance of something merely so that they have something to do. Then the idea gets entrenched and the talking heads or the party planners can justify their jobs. I mean how did someone actually get funding to study the social differences between men and women? I could get the same insight from asking a first grader about who has cooties. And yet we imbue this class, the technocratic, insulted, self-perpetuating elite, with such undue authority merely because we can't escape listening to their pontifications. After all, if they're always saying something it must be right, right?!
108 comments:
Gee, you're an angry fellow.
Why don't you sit back and take a look at yourself. Think about how bad the modern elite is. Then compare it to any other elite in history. And then see how "bad" you have it.
Second of all, ask yourself does a happy person get as angry as you are? No, he doesn't. You're not miserable because of society's elite. You're miserable because of your own feelings of inferiority, which make the world look that much worse.
It is the result of an overly pampered generation, the boomers, gaining power quite quickly. The younger generations might have more technological comforts but what have we lost? Marriage? Dead. Jobs? Overseas or priced out. Safety? Paul Jersey can answer tha
*Paul kersey
Breeda is right. U get upset about the elites' actions. But what do u do to make life better?
U should focus on yourself. Maybe sarge some girls.
"Think about how bad the modern elite is. Then compare it to any other elite in history."
The modern elite hates its own people and acts on it. Previous elites usually just left their people alone or even championed them.
I have a unit that I teach my high schoolers called "Was This Study Necessary?" I've collected frivolous studies over the years (just go to Yahoo news, they love publishing them). I print the news article on the study, then if it's free, I get the original study itself. The theme "Useful or not? You decide." The kids can judge on not only the silliness or pseudoscientificness of the topic, but look for methodology weaknesses.
The modern elite hates its own people and acts on it. Previous elites usually just left their people alone or even championed them.
Yeah, like the American elite that lied the country into World War I and then locked anybody who criticized the war up. Or the one that provoked Pearl Harbor so the United States could save international communism. Or the elite that killed an entire generation of white men to free blacks and "preserve the union." Or those who killed 50,000 young men in Vietnam.
I'd much rather have an elite that hates me instead of one that engages in that kind of "championing."
On modern elite's watch America went from 90% white and 98% Christian to 49% white at the under-2 age group, and demoralized.
If 1950 Americans would see what this country has turned into, they would all commit suicide.
Pissing on the corpses of enemy fighters is really unprofessional and serves no purpose. Just put a few rounds into their chest and move on. It shouldn't become a national crisis, but it's also not something that should be completely disregarded.
Question for hillary:
What's worse, pissing on dead enemies or ejaculating onto an intern's dress?
Republicans insist on continuing to paint themselves into the older, whiter, maler corner, just as they've been doing for years, so what do you expect? Latinos can be white, or any race, but you get the idea. Yes, one of two things will happen: the Republican Party that we know - nativist, xenophobic - will change, or it will cease to exist as a force in national politics. It is indisputable, because the GOP is on the wrong side of demographics. Republicans could very well win a few more elections before that happens, of course.
i've never understood why folks get their panties in a wad over stuff like grunts pissing on dead bad guys. You want the bad guys dead, we make them dead, then you get indignant when were callous to the remains. Gee, just maybe being callous goes with the job. Being an infantryman is not the freaking boy scouts with cooler toys.
I do see it as a rookie move. they'll settle down and be more business like about it once they gain some more experience
Since when is the Republican Party "nativist"? When do they push nativist policies? They can barely be counted on to enforce laws against illegal immigration. They have lent support to efforts to enact amnesties. A lot of conservative Christians sponsor refugee immigration. The notion that more than a small percentage of Republicans are "nativist" is drastically out of touch with reality.
This taliban-pissing thing is going to be huge. It's just the kind of non-story needed to distract us brain dead sheep from everything else happening in the world.
"i've never understood why folks get their panties in a wad over stuff like grunts pissing on dead bad guys. You want the bad guys dead, we make them dead, then you get indignant when were callous to the remains. Gee, just maybe being callous goes with the job. Being an infantryman is not the freaking boy scouts with cooler toys."
I've never understood why soldiers should be knuckle-dragging retards instead of cool-headed professionals.
P.S.: Enforcing laws against illegal immigration is only the bare minimum of what a truly "nativist" government would be doing. If the government were "nativist", it would shut the doors to all non-white immigration, phase out most government services in languages other than English, shut down (or at least limit the power of) the EEOC, discourage and possibly ban interracial relationships, and encourage higher white birth rates. The GOP is not pursuing any of these policies. They are not "nativist."
Government money in academia is WELFARE for high IQ and well behaved people, especially whites, who refuse to work.
These people piggy backed off of the hard sciences' place in academia. They mimic what the sciences do, but it amounts to nothing. Why do the hard science people let them get away with it? At my school the Engineering Department threatened to leave the school over something at one point and they got their way. All that money could go to something else but instead it employs legions of high IQ people mentally masturbating.
Government employment does much the same thing, but the high IQ requirement is not there. You just have to be moderately well behaved.
I play a game on my drive home to my whitopia where I count the german sedans that I see. I am really curious what these people are doing that they can afford these cars. I always like to look at the driver to see if they have the look of an engineer or the look of a well dressed Walmart shopper.
From the Salon Tebow article:
"But professional Muslim athletes are hard to find. Ahmad Rashād. Rashaan Salaam. Kareem Abdul-Jabaar. Hakeem Olajuwon. Rasheed Wallace. But most of these athletes are retired and went about their religious lives quietly."
You see those athletes had class. Its a personal thing that they kept personal CLASS. Something Tebow has none of.
I take great solace in a previous Salon article about Tebow when a teammate told him to go fuck himself when Tebow asked for them to pray. I'd like to tell him the same thing
An unusual number of trolls here today.
Good stuff! It's linked HERE by Ex-army.
First, a general example of "class":
"You see those athletes had class. Its a personal thing that they kept personal CLASS. Something Tebow has none of."
Then, a personal example of said "class":
I take great solace in a previous Salon article about Tebow when a teammate told him to go fuck himself when Tebow asked for them to pray. I'd like to tell him the same thing."
Curious juxtaposition of comments.
Actually, Latinos don't care that much about immigration, certainly no more than any other group. Immigration just isn't a big issue at the ground level. Of course, the ward heelers in La Raza have no other issue, and as they are far more visible than your average latino who might not even speak English, they get to be the spokespersons.
On Romney, the reason we will have Romney is because electing a Republican is more important to conservatives than electing a conservative. Obama is hated so much, that everything will be sacrificed on the altar of electablility in the hopes of beating him. The comical thing is that Obama will probably win a second term.
I agree there is too much media. Especially on the internet, there are articles and articles and blogs and blogs written about everything imaginable. Who in the world reads all this stuff? Who pays for its creation?
"Yeah, like the American elite that lied the country into World War I and then locked anybody who criticized the war up. Or the one that provoked Pearl Harbor so the United States could save international communism. Or the elite that killed an entire generation of white men to free blacks and "preserve the union." Or those who killed 50,000 young men in Vietnam."
Great point (though I do think Hitler would have come over here eventually). It's not as if corrupt elites are a new thing. WWI always struck me as the Anglo-American elite making a bunch of Midwestern Germans fight against their relatives.
"Gee, you're an angry fellow.
Why don't you sit back and take a look at yourself. Think about how bad the modern elite is. Then compare it to any other elite in history. And then see how "bad" you have it."
At least the elite of the past understood that people had a spiritual dimension that they valued. It wasn't just mass crass consumption that runs over everything else. There's a reason so many feel like life is empty and meaningless. Feelings have become more important than standards in every walk of life (up to now even the Girl Scouts). Just because you're happy being a fatty at the trough doesn't mean the rest of us have to be.
"Second of all, ask yourself does a happy person get as angry as you are? No, he doesn't."
This says more about the trivial nature of valuing happiness over higher, more noble instincts than it does about One being some sort of Grumpy Gus whose rants are baseless.
"You're not miserable because of society's elite. You're miserable because of your own feelings of inferiority, which make the world look that much worse."
Trust me. The people on the Alt Right don't feel inferior by any stretch. You're the one who's taking One's general observations about culture and making the arguments personal here. If anything, that's the mark of someone who's arguing from the vantage point of resentment and inferiority.
Just because some of us choose to take a more critical view of life than cheerleaders for the status quo like yourself doesn't mean we have feelings of inferiority. We not counter One's views with substance instead of ad hominem?
"Great point (though I do think Hitler would have come over here eventually). It's not as if corrupt elites are a new thing. WWI always struck me as the Anglo-American elite making a bunch of Midwestern Germans fight against their relatives."
That's utter nonsense. What is that even based on? Even pro-American people like Pat Buchanan know that that charge against Germany is poppycock. The Germans didn't even want war with the Brits or the French. Who declared war on whom? Who let troops go after Dunkirk? Hitler tried to make peace with Britain twice and the offer was rejected. Germany didn't even have CLOSE to the military might to even DREAM about what they are accused of wanting to do.
I disagree with your first interpretation: peeing upon thy enemy is bad P.R. ------ particularly while simulataneously attempting to hold yourself up as the premier moral scold to the rest of the wrold. It also endangers Americans on the front lines.
That's why we shouldn't moralize war, nikcrit. War is always nasty and brutal and should be done to further a certain people's interest. It needs to be understood as such as well if we are not continue having meaningless wars.
One of the things that strikes me as I read Thucydides is how matter of fact-like war is viewed. It's not a holy crusade.
The West's moralizing of war in the manner it does is a modern construct. And it's unhealthy.
The non-productive jobs that dominate so much of our economy now are not only a drain on our collective resources, but they're also unfulfilling for the people who occupy them (aside from those who are either good at fooling themselves or too dumb to notice that they're not doing anything).
Unfulfilling work... you could add that to the 100 reasons NOT to go to grad school:
http://100rsns.blogspot.com/
"Great point (though I do think Hitler would have come over here eventually). It's not as if corrupt elites are a new thing. WWI always struck me as the Anglo-American elite making a bunch of Midwestern Germans fight against their relatives."
Huh? This is one of the weirder assertions I've seen on here. The majority of the troops during WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, etc were of Scots-Irish and/or English descent...
You're exaggerating the German-ness of this country. WWI was corrupt and unnecessary for other reasons.
Also, peeing on the enemy is unfortunately news-worthy, unlike all your other examples. It demonstrates a lack of self control. The military is supposed to be disciplined. You wouldn't have seen men our grandparents' age peeing on the enemy or any other unnecessary nonsense like that. It's a signifier of the decline of our culture.
"...who was born with male genitalia but has identified as female since age 2..."
Wait, WTF?! Age 2?! How does a two year old come to identify as the opposite sex, when he hardly knows the difference anyway?
All I can imagine is that his mother wanted a girl/hated men and so treated him like a little girl for the first two years of his life. If I remember correctly, the dad was nowhere to be found in the news coverage of that story. Just one more reason why single motherhood is bad for society.
As for the soldiers pissing on the bodies of dead enemies; I can understand the impulse, but it's unprofessional and their officers ought to put a stop to it. Should it be a national news story though? No.
"That's why we shouldn't moralize war, nikcrit. War is always nasty and brutal and should be done to further a certain people's interest. It needs to be understood as such as well if we are not continue having meaningless wars ... The West's moralizing of war in the manner it does is a modern construct. And it's unhealthy."
That observation has merit IMHO, but still doesn't negate my opinion that pissing upon a vanquished enemy is wrong; and it doesn't address the 'endangering one's own' element I mentioned.
"It's not a moral crusade"
It is to our Jihadist enemies, which may further empathize the self-interest in not unnecessarily degrading an already vanquished enemy, etc.
I don't know; I see your point about tearing down some the moral pretense covering the aims of battle. Still, that being considered, I just don't see too much uncomplicated good from indulging such acts and having them publicized and thrown back in our face.
At the very least, it's unnecessary and a potential can of worms.
if only the elite showed as much outrage over the high rate of suicide (another form of aggression that is often a byproduct of living in a war zone and experiencing the types of things that happen there) as they did over 4 marines pissing on dead corpses.
we're operating on two planes here, and as usually happens, we have the things that are not quite so heinous on the ground level are being demonized from the 50,000 foot level. us outside observers watch all of this happen much as people during the civil war would watch from a bluff as Union and Confederate troops had at each other. we see that those marines are doing something that has probably always happened during wartime, and we see that the PTB are doing their face-saving thing. but we look at the PTB and scoff because they're the ones that made the decision to send those troops in in the first place to do what troops inevitably do in war zones.
At least the elite of the past understood that people had a spiritual dimension that they valued. It wasn't just mass crass consumption that runs over everything else. There's a reason so many feel like life is empty and meaningless. Feelings have become more important than standards in every walk of life (up to now even the Girl Scouts). Just because you're happy being a fatty at the trough doesn't mean the rest of us have to be.
"Mass consumption" is what every people in the world wants when given the choice. The only governments who suppress it at all are lunatics like the Taliban or socialist governments that keep their people so poor they don't have a choice, but even in those cases the governments eventually fall and mass consumerism takes over. I'll trust the choices people have made in every society they've had a choice over some cranky bloggers telling us that people are more miserable than ever without any evidence.
This says more about the trivial nature of valuing happiness over higher, more noble instincts than it does about One being some sort of Grumpy Gus whose rants are baseless.
I'm a utilitarian. I value human happiness. On what basis do you value something more "noble"? How do you decide what is or isn't noble?
Just because some of us choose to take a more critical view of life than cheerleaders for the status quo like yourself doesn't mean we have feelings of inferiority. We not counter One's views with substance instead of ad hominem?
I'm happy to argue facts with people who base their opinions on facts. OneSTDV, however, argues from nothing but anecdotes and gut feelings. This post for example, is the equivalent to "I don't like Muslims, I don't like liberals, I don't like the elites." Not much of substance there.
Just to add to my previous comment, people want their Facebook, IPad, MTV and all that other crap. It doesn't mean that they elite doesn't push a lot of evil nonsense with that, but complaining about "mass consumerism" is like complaining that time saving devices allow more women to go into the work place. When people are constrained they act in one way, and when they get choices they act in another. There's no way to stop that.
I would also ask what the alternative to "mass consumerism" is. Praying five times a day to Mecca and blowing yourself up when people laugh at your prophet? Burning witches at the stake? Invading Russia for lebensraum? Building a new Soviet Man? Gimme nihilism over any of that.
We should ban BReeda from the comments. I thought OneSTDV had learned a thing or two about commenting in his days.
in other words: curb the impulse, not its mode of transportation....... Next argument please!
You wouldn't have seen men our grandparents' age peeing on the enemy or any other unnecessary nonsense like that.
I think you might be surprised at what our grandfathers did in wartime. There weren't many video cameras around at the time.
We should ban BReeda from the comments. I thought OneSTDV had learned a thing or two about commenting in his days.
Lol, it's funny how completely unself-aware you nerds are. Half of what you post is complaints about how much liberals don't like free speech, but as someone who has argued on liberal blogs before, I can tell you that I see more calls to ban commenters in one post here than I see in a month on liberal blogs.
Those you criticize are better than you even in the areas where you consider yourselves superior. Of course this doesn't apply to all the nerds who call themselves part of the "alt right," but it does apply to a good percentage of you.
You wouldn't have seen men our grandparents' age peeing on the enemy or any other unnecessary nonsense like that. It's a signifier of the decline of our culture.
Yes, you would. It was quite common in the Pacific Theater during WWII for GIs to pee on the corpses of Japanese soldiers, pry out any gold fillings, boil the flesh off the head to make a skull souvenir. Read memoirs of marines who fought at Okinawa, Peleliu, Guadalcanal, etc. This is nothing new and wasn't even viewed as all that freakish in less politically correct times. (Life Magazine had a full page photo of some well-dressed young woman smiling at a Japanese skull her fiance had sent her...with a love letter written on it.)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
American_mutilation_of
_Japanese_war_dead
I've known a few Vietnam vets who told me they did similar things in that war. Although I personally consider such body-part trophy-taking kind of gruesome and tacky, it's nothing new and not limited to "evil" or "decadent" Americans. Let's face it: We humans are all descended from mean monkeys.
"Gimme nihilism over any of that."
Your wish will be granted.
Why do people like BReeda come to sites and try to lecture others? I don't mind if you post a thoughtful response to my arguments, but coming to a comment section and giving condescending lectures is a reflection of you being pathetic and also quite annoying to the people who have to quickly scroll past your comments without reading them (hint, hint).
In sum, go away.
[I'm not responding to your personal attacks because they're so trite.]
"Lol, it's funny how completely unself-aware you nerds are"
breeda,here's a lil tip, you aren't fucking or feeding any of he men here so they don't have to pretend to value your opinion or care about your content free shaming language tropes
I picture this BReeda chracter looking like a cross between an elderly Ayn Rand and Andrea Dworkin. But I wonder if it might actually be some basement-dwelling omega-male virgin nerd projecting his own problems on random alt-righters.
I don't mind if you post a thoughtful response to my arguments,
Oh yes, you do. Let's put it this way: has there ever been any poster who came here and disagreed with the majority of the commenters and was not dismissed as a "troll"? I remember this one guy named Yan Shen, who went out of his way never to respond to insults, and it was either here or at Mangan's (it's the same people at both blogs, I'm guessing), that you responded to every one of his posts with "FUCK YOU GO AWAY PLEASE BAN THIS GOOK!!!" It would be quite hilarious if the "alt right" didn't see liberals as oppressive.
And if you want to argue that Yan Shen was actually a "troll", tell me what commenter came here, disagreed with the majority and was not constantly insulted? No, no groupthink here. This is where the free thinkers hang out. ha ha.
Oh, I'd love to have reasonable discussions. I find it fascinating how you all get the IQ thing, but can be so terribly wrong on everything else. But the posters here have not been able to have reasonable discussions with anyone else who has come around here so, you probably won't be able to start doing so now.
"Germany didn't even have CLOSE to the military might to even DREAM about what they are accused of wanting to do."
If I remember right, Smedley Butler wrote something like that in War Is A Racket, which came out between the wars. It would have been near impossible for them to take over America.
And if you want to argue that Yan Shen was actually a "troll", tell me what commenter came here, disagreed with the majority and was not constantly insulted? No, no groupthink here. This is where the free thinkers hang out. ha ha.
(That was at Mangan's and that guy was baiting everyone.)
Has there even be a dissenter who came here who wasn't incredibly annoying and condescending (hint, hint)?
But your point is short-sighted in that we live in PC America, so we're constantly exposed to leftist inanity. That's what makes us freethinkers.
And sometimes we just want to get away from people who will criticize us for being unhappy nerds with small penises who live in our mothers' basements - only because we want what was axiomatically normal 60 years ago.
But your point is short-sighted in that we live in PC America, so we're constantly exposed to leftist inanity. That's what makes us freethinkers.
And sometimes we just want to get away from people who will criticize us for being unhappy nerds with small penises who live in our mothers' basements - only because we want what was axiomatically normal 60 years ago.
I'm actually sympathetic to much of this, and I agree with many of your criticisms of modern America. In getting away from groupthink, though, it's always good to be self-critical and make sure not to fall into a reactionary equivalent.
I think those Marines deserve a medal for the amount of restraint they displayed. I mean, they waited until the Talis were dead before they pissed on them.
Then there is the fact that Marines in WW 2 fighting against the Japanese routinely made flower pots (and were allowed to do so) out of the emptied out top-halves of the skulls of their enemies.
"Yeah, like the American elite that lied the country into World War I and then locked anybody who criticized the war up. Or the one that provoked Pearl Harbor so the United States could save international communism. Or the elite that killed an entire generation of white men to free blacks and "preserve the union." Or those who killed 50,000 young men in Vietnam."
All but one of those (and arguably, that one too) were the same "modern elite".
BReeda said...
"I'm actually sympathetic to much of this, and I agree with many of your criticisms of modern America."
You're growing weak, BReeda. Don't be a pussy. A good troll never gives in.
Breeda = chick. "Angry" = Beta Male. Fixed that for ya.
What you are looking at One is the SWPL empire of moral lectures built on the mountain of female consumerism. Why did we not have this in earlier media times (heyday of newspapers 1850-1920, heyday of radio/movies 1920-1950, early TV empire 1950-1970?) Simple -- the female consumerism to sell ads against the nonstop moral lectures about who is Alpha and who is not (really the only objection about the Marines) to fund the whole thing.
No one cares about the Taliban doing horrible things. Because the female consumer/audience for infotainment considers them "Alpha" in the sense that, they are powerful and dominating therefore anything they do is OK (it is not always about desire).
"only because we want what was axiomatically normal 60 years ago."
I have a feeling you read my long comment about MRAs at Chuck's a few days ago.
"You're not miserable because of society's elite. You're miserable because of your own feelings of inferiority, which make the world look that much worse."
I think there is a grain of truth to this (BReeda can now officially be called -not- a troll, although I think he/she is a poor thinker and its kind of snark does not seem to serve any useful purpose). This generation of white men is confronting a lot of feelings of inferiority. We've been raised on Wall Street and Ayn Rand, and we have to watch high paying jobs get handed to low iq NAMs.
Supercop -- if want understanding, read "With the Old Breed" or "Steel Helmet," both written by WWII Pacific Marines. Both were middle class nice guys, and they write openly about their transformation into killers in the brutal meat-grinder that is infantry combat.
They had to lie in their own, and others, feces and urine for days. Drink contaminated water. Suffer from horrendous heat and humidity. Be afflicted with flies non-stop. Suffer non-stop infiltration, mortar, sniper, and machine gun attacks from entrenched, emplaced enemies they often could not see. Eat meager and miserable rations. See their buddies blown apart, in horrible ways. So it was no wonder some collected Japanese ears, or gold teeth, or other ugly things. Because war brutalized them in ways even reading it cannot really convey. But if you want to know why, two guys who were transformed by it, wrote why. They weren't that way when they went home. But it haunted them.
No one in WWII expected perfect behavior. Because they were on the GI and Marines side. Now? Its like a beta male who slips up something minor while an Alpha skates on cheating.
Apologies and correction.
Steel Helmet is a Korean War film by Sam Fuller. Helmet for My Pillow is the book I meant. With the Old Breed is more widely known:
"In Sledge's words, "this was a brutish, primitive hatred, as characteristic of the horror of war in the Pacific as the palm trees and the islands."
Sledge describes one instance in which he and a comrade came across the mutilated bodies of three Marines, including one Marine whose genitals had been cut off and stuffed into the corpse's mouth. He also describes the behavior of some Marines towards dead Japanese, including the removal of gold teeth from Japanese corpses (and, in one case, a severely wounded but still living Japanese soldier), as well as other disturbing trophy-taking.
Sledge describes in detail the sheer physical struggle of living in a combat zone and the debilitating effects of constant fear, fatigue, and filth. "Fear and filth went hand in hand," he wrote. "It has always puzzled me that this important factor in our daily lives has received so little attention from historians and is often omitted from otherwise excellent personal memoirs by infantrymen." Marines had trouble staying dry, finding time to eat their rations, practicing basic field sanitation (it was impossible to dig latrines or catholes in the coral rock on Peleliu), and simply moving around on the pulverized coral of Peleliu and in the mud of Okinawa."
If you want to contrast how Marines were treated then, and now, just look at how the men who formed them, then, and now, are treated before (and after) they are serving Marines.
No one cares about the Taliban doing horrible things. Because the female consumer/audience for infotainment considers them "Alpha"
ha ha, yeah and I'm the troll.
"We've been raised on Wall Street and Ayn Rand, and we have to watch high paying jobs get handed to low iq NAMs."
What example can you provide in which this is typical and routine in a 'we-have-to-watch' way?
@Whiskey: minor quip: I'd say newspapers peaked in the early-to-mid '70s; it's Watergate hey-day; also the period of highest circulations ------ though that's of course due in part to reasons beyond newspaper industry itself.
BReeda said...
"ha ha, yeah and I'm the troll."
It's not either/or. You can be a troll, too...and you ARE! Now stop slacking and start trolling like you mean it.
" we have to watch high paying jobs get handed to low iq NAMs."
Is that really the worst of it?
I mean if you had a hot devoted wife, would it suck as much? Maybe the destruction of the family and male/female relations is really worse. I think of how poor my forebears were out on the frontier, but at least my 25 year old Danish farmer great great grandpa with damned little to call his own was able to marry my Norwegian great great grandma when she was a hot 16 year old. She loved him and was damned good looking for at least about 20 more years.
It sucks to be cheated out of good jobs for sure. But if you have a happy home, it is not like you are totally missing out.
I mean, would you want to be President of the United States if you had to hump Michele Obama? AND didn't have anything on the side? Yuck. It makes that out house and a log cabin with the hot 16 year old look mighty damned good.
I mean, would you want to be President of the United States if you had to hump Michele Obama? AND didn't have anything on the side? Yuck. It makes that out house and a log cabin with the hot 16 year old look mighty damned good.
I don't remember who said this (I'm thinking Dave Chappelle or Chris Rock), but it goes something like:
"Men would live in a cardboard box if they could still get laid."
There's also this statement I've seen often in the Roissysphere:
"Men created civilization just to impress women."
And to answer your question - But Michelle Obama was one of the hottest women in the world a few years back according to Maxim (a publication only out-betad by the New York beta Times):
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/14/michelle-obama-named-maxi_n_203448.html
Here is another comment, paraphrased, from commenter gig @ Chateau a few years ago:
There was once an outlier budding young brilliant inventor/innovator at an [African, Andean, forget which one] village centuries ago. He realized that he can invent civilization, arts, culture... then he looked at the women around him, and said "aw, fuck it."
"It is to our Jihadist enemies, which may further empathize the self-interest in not unnecessarily degrading an already vanquished enemy, etc."
The "enemy" there is far from vanquished. And we don't have the will to "finish" it because this war was never in our interest. I won't argue that this PR is good for us, but had we stuck to the principle of fighting for OURSELVES instead of "good" and "Axis of Evil" nonsense, this war wouldn't have happened.
Don't confuse this as me in any way thinking that the Muslims are our friends. But the choice isn't between occupying the Middle East or watching our buildings come down.
"I don't know; I see your point about tearing down some the moral pretense covering the aims of battle. Still, that being considered, I just don't see too much uncomplicated good from indulging such acts and having them publicized and thrown back in our face."
I think we largely agree. I'm not trying to excuse these men's behavior. But if we never said we're "the good guys," we wouldn't have to justify the war from that angle in the first place and we'd know more clearly "why we fight" and what's really at stake.
"At the very least, it's unnecessary and a potential can of worms."
Absolutely.
""Mass consumption" is what every people in the world wants when given the choice."
Oh, so now you speak for everyone? Then why do the Muslims reject our attempts to give them "mass consumption"? Why to they reject the threat of having McWorld brought to them?
Furthermore, even if most of the people in the world did want mass consumption, that wouldn't make it right or justifiable. Appeals to popularity are a child's fallacy. C'mon. Do I have to really repeat that tired cliche?
"What is popular is not always right; what is right is not always popular."
"The only governments who suppress it at all are lunatics like the Taliban"
So you think they are "lunatics" simply by virtue of them wanting to keep American influence out? What about the Serbs or the North Koreans? Now, I know the North Korean government is corrupt, but you don't think they have legitimate reasons at all for not wanting their country to become one big shopping mall with junk like ours at the expense of its historical identity?
"or socialist governments that keep their people so poor they don't have a choice,"
Again, I'm no fan of North Korea, but it's rather hard to stay rich when you don't control the big stick. North Korea COULD become like China and South Korea and embrace Westernization, but they choose not to. As a result, trade sanctions are in place against them to "punish" them. The governments do choose to oppress them, sure. But they don't necessarily want to preside over a pile of dirt. We help make that happen.
"but even in those cases the governments eventually fall and mass consumerism takes over."
Why is mass consumerism so good aside from the fact that people want it? Have you ever considered you're arguing with people who aren't guided by utilitarian pretenses?
"I'll trust the choices people have made in every society"
People in this society voted for Clinton. And Bush. And now this joker. And before them, a bunch of jokers and corrupt politicians. Explain that.
"they've had a choice over some cranky bloggers telling us that people are more miserable than ever without any evidence."
The odds of one person being right on something are far higher than on several million or a high plurality of people being right. It's simple arithmetic logic.
As George Carlin once quipped:
"Think about how stupid the average person is and then realize that half of the people walking around are even dumber than THAT!"
Not to mention going that going by your logic, we shouldn't listen to any individuals at all (whether it's One or a utilitarian like yourself) but should defer perpetually to the consuming masses.
"I'm a utilitarian. I value human happiness."
What if a boy wants to have sex with an old man? It makes them both happy. What do you say? What if a man is happy having sex with animals? Or what if there are people who'd like to have sex with corpses? Say some good-for-nothing bastard dies with no family who cares what happens to him, why not let some necrophiliac have at him? It's increasing human happiness, after all.
If you qualify your notion of good in terms of human happiness (which no great culture has ever done), you can't rightfully object to those scenarios I mentioned because order of rank is immaterial to that worldview and that's just the starting point.
You see, utilitarianism doesn't protect society from poor taste if poor taste becomes popular as it unquestionably has with increasing obviousness. The fact of the matter is that the Jeremy Benthams and John Stuart Mills are far from the top of the philosophical pantheon for reasons that are obvious to anyone who's bothered to read anyone else. Even Peter Singer is having second thoughts about his utilitarian thinking.
"On what basis do you value something more "noble"? How do you decide what is or isn't noble?"
I'm a Nietzschean. The heroic archetype epitomizes the noble man. Heroic courage is the highest virtue. And it's what creates the highest value in human experience. You don't get high culture and its subsequent amenities without the noble heroic instincts that move us beyond animal status. We can all be a bunch of apes sitting around jacking each other off having a merry old time and you wouldn't have a thing to say about it given the system you go by. Your system doesn't care how much it debases man while my system of thinking ONLY concerns itself with bringing about the highest out of human possibility.
"As long as anyone desires life as a pleasure he has not raised his eyes above the horizon of the animal, for he only desires more consciously what the animal seeks through blind impulse. But that is what we all do for the greater part of our lives...But there are moments when we realise this:..we see that, in common with all nature, we are pushing towards man as towards something that stands above us."
--Friedrich Nietzsche
"The common man wants nothing of life but health, longevity, amusement, comfort -- "happiness." He who does not despise this should turn his eyes from world history, for it contains nothing of the sort. The best that history has created is great suffering."
-- Oswald Spengler
"I'm happy to argue facts with people who base their opinions on facts. OneSTDV, however, argues from nothing but anecdotes and gut feelings."
No, that's not what you're doing when you speak for what every single person (or "peoples") on this Earth wants out of life without so much as a shred of evidence for such a large claim. If history is our repository, the evidence suggests that morality is not a universal, but cultural. Now all of a sudden you expect me to believe that strip malls are going to change that?
"This post for example, is the equivalent to "I don't like Muslims, I don't like liberals, I don't like the elites." Not much of substance there."
What?
I think expressing your opinion and explaining why your opinion is what it is is far more substantive than basing your opinion on the idea that everyone wants to shop and because everyone wants to shop it is therefore good that we model our society in such a manner.
most likely you don't understand because you've never been involved in ground combat
it's ill mannered to speak so poorly of your betters supercop
BReeda, if you stuck around and paid attention, you would realize that many of us consider Whiskey a joke. I learned to ignore anything he says a long time ago. He has a huge track record of getting things horribly wrong - and even when he happens to be right, it's usually not an original insight.
BReeda, if you stuck around and paid attention, you would realize that many of us consider Whiskey a joke.
He/she/it knows this. He/she/it doesn't care. It was convenient to make that remark at that time, so he/she/it made it. This is Trolling 101, my dear Lucille. You've been on the internet how long? And you haven't grasped this yet?
"People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."
-- George Orwell
pissing on dead hajjis is part of being one of those rough men. Not he best part, but if you valued the other guys humanity you wouldn't pull the trigger
Lucille said...
If the government were "nativist", it would...discourage and possibly ban interracial relationships
Wouldn't that violate the people's civil liberties?
Do you really want a centralized governmental power telling you (as a consenting adult) who you can and cannot date?
It's true what Whiskey says, whether they're on the Right or Left, women love authoritative government telling people what to do. That's why female libertarians are so scarce (with exceptions like BReeda).
The government tells people who they can and can't marry as it is. You can't marry close relatives; in most parts of the country, you can't marry someone of the same sex, you cannot marry more than one person.
A civil marriage is a government construct. You cannot have a state-sanctioned marriage operating under libertarian principles; it is a government institution and it makes sense for the government to set parameters regarding what constitutes legal "marriage."
(A marriage recognized by a religious institution is a different but related matter, and is not what I'm referring to.)
In any case, I don't especially want a return to a ban on interracial marriage. I don't really care about the issue as much as other things - especially immigration.
Probably true, but in many cases, I choose to err on the side of assuming someone is discussing in good faith.
I'm a Nietzschean. The heroic archetype epitomizes the noble man. Heroic courage is the highest virtue. And it's what creates the highest value in human experience. You don't get high culture and its subsequent amenities without the noble heroic instincts that move us beyond animal status. We can all be a bunch of apes sitting around jacking each other off having a merry old time and you wouldn't have a thing to say about it given the system you go by. Your system doesn't care how much it debases man while my system of thinking ONLY concerns itself with bringing about the highest out of human possibility.
"This is one of the ancient braves; he is angry at civilization because he believes that it aims at making all good things--honours, treasures, fair women,--accessible to even cowards."
---
Aren't you the guy who said he doesn't chat up girls because it's animalistic? How are things going Nietzsche town? All quiet on the female front? ;-)
PS: the point of my comment was not that I want all of those policies to become law, but pointing out that it is ridiculous to claim that the GOP is "nationalist."
"It's true what Whiskey says, whether they're on the Right or Left, women love authoritative government telling people what to do."
Whiskey isn't always wrong. Once in a great while, he calls it correctly.
Not sure if you're interested in this One, but saw this interesting thread on Reddit tonight.
http://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/ogg5t/another_horrific_attack_involving_a_pit_bull_lets/
It's amusing to see the discussion here on dog breeds, because on the one hand you have people acknowledging that Pit Bulls are genetically predisposed to aggressive behavior, and on the other hand you have people arguing that it's only poor owners and socialization that results in them being much more dangerous than other dog breeds.
At some points, someone comes in and says, "This would be racist if it were talking about humans."
-Sliko
Oh, so now you speak for everyone?
No, I simply observe the choices they make everywhere and always.
Then why do the Muslims reject our attempts to give them "mass consumption"? Why to they reject the threat of having McWorld brought to them?
The reason that Muslim groups have to fight modernism is because their people want it. What would be the need for Al Qaida and the Muslim Brotherhood if Muslims rejected consumerism on their own: spent all their time praying instead of shopping? Watch Arabic TV, and it's got the same stupid pop songs, girls shaking their asses, and ads for dishwasher you see on American TV.
Now, it's true that a lot of people vote for groups like the Muslim Brotherhood. However, I consider the results of markets, and not elections, to be indicators of what people want. The reason is that when a person votes, there is exactly zero chance of him ever changing the result. Therefore, one does not have to live with the results of his decision. Voting is an expressive activity, like spouting off in a bar. In a market, however, a person makes a choice about how to spend scarce resources and deals with the consequences.
To take an example the people here would be familiar with: just think of liberals who vote for politicians that want integration but run away from blacks in their daily lives.
So when I see Muslims vote for the Muslim Brotherhood but spend their spare time listening to American pop music, I see the latter as more indicative of their preferences. Conservatives in all societies have to resort to politics (i.e., telling people what to do) because they can't get what they want through people's choices freely made.
That's not to say that there isn't a bunch of crap that the mass media pushes because of liberal ideology. Arab and Japanese pop culture isn't hostile to the majority culture the way Western pop culture is. But you see the same desire for modern goods and a pleasant life everywhere.
What if a boy wants to have sex with an old man? It makes them both happy. What do you say? What if a man is happy having sex with animals? Or what if there are people who'd like to have sex with corpses? Say some good-for-nothing bastard dies with no family who cares what happens to him, why not let some necrophiliac have at him? It's increasing human happiness, after all.
Utilitarianism would take into account the shock of the community. So if a few people like to have sex with corpses, the fact that the vast majority would find this completely disgusting means that allowing sex with corpses would probably be a net loss for human happiness.
I'm a Nietzschean. The heroic archetype epitomizes the noble man. Heroic courage is the highest virtue. And it's what creates the highest value in human experience.
The ideas of "noble man" and heroism are subjective and vary by time and place. A couple hundred years ago, when dueling was dying out, some conservatives complained that it represented a loss in masculine virtue. To the Palestinian, having eight babies and sacrificing them all to destroy Israel is heroic and noble. Some times and places emphasize being courageous in defense of the nation, while in others people only care about the family or tribe. Which concept of nobility would you like society to adopt? And how do you pick?
"Conservatives in all societies have to resort to politics (i.e., telling people what to do) because they can't get what they want through people's choices freely made."
What a fucking joke... No. Just, no.
Whiskey: "Supercop -- if want understanding, read "With the Old Breed" or "Steel Helmet," both written by WWII Pacific Marines. Both were middle class nice guys, and they write openly about their transformation into killers in the brutal meat-grinder that is infantry combat."
My point is that boorish and immoral behavior isn't something that should be expected of soldiers. Ok, so obviously soldiers in the Pacific theater couldn't always maintain a stiff upper lip due to the circumstances, but that doesn't mean we should pat them on the back for it and make that kind of behavior the norm.
Anonymous: "most likely you don't understand because you've never been involved in ground combat
it's ill mannered to speak so poorly of your betters supercop"
This reasoning would only be valid if every single person involved in ground combat behaved the same way. But they don't.
And since when have soldiers been above criticism and judgment? If soldiers of a foreign country pissed on dead Marines, I doubt you'd be spouting these platitudes.
"Aren't you the guy who said he doesn't chat up girls because it's animalistic? How are things going Nietzsche town? All quiet on the female front? ;-)"
No, I'm not. Kind of ruins your post, doesn't it?
Of course if the Taliban (who are, you know, actually fighting in their own country) pissed on the corpses of US soldiers, we'd never hear the end of it.
This is a bid deal because it kind of makes a mockery of the reasons we're there in the first place.
I don't see how BReeda's any worse than Whiskey or TUJ. I think people need to go easy on the troll accusations.
"No, I simply observe the choices they make everywhere and always."
Well, then look a little harder. Because they don't make the same choices. They don't all decide to become secular, Westernized countries. That is obvious to any second grader who's taken a geography class. Even among peoples who've accepted a degree of classical liberalism for economic purposes, values vary. You have to yet to even explain that. All you do is just ASSUME that that's what most people want (which is flagrantly wrong) and that that makes Western secular shop culture right (which is also not justified too well on your part).
"The reason that Muslim groups have to fight modernism is because their people want it."
That makes no real sense. If their people ALL wanted modernism, the religious classes in that society wouldn't have the power they have. Your logic is self-evidently wrong.
"What would be the need for Al Qaida and the Muslim Brotherhood if Muslims rejected consumerism on their own: spent all their time praying instead of shopping?"
Like a typical liberal, you're confusing cause and effect. What's the glue holding al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood together if they all wanted consumerism? Some form of evil that's indefinable like the neo-cons want Middle America to think? The people of those cultures are complicit with those groups. Now, that doesn't mean EVERY one of them are complicit. But a substantial portion are and you can't explain this in any type of convincing manner with your current worldview.
"Watch Arabic TV, and it's got the same stupid pop songs, girls shaking their asses, and ads for dishwasher you see on American TV."
Yeah, there was also conservative Islamic based revolution against that type of secularity in Iran. Granted, the Shah was a ruthless guy. But the revolution against him didn't have to be fundamentalist Islam in character.
"Now, it's true that a lot of people vote for groups like the Muslim Brotherhood."
You've just refuted your own logic here. Talk about cognitive dissonance.
"However, I consider the results of markets, and not elections, to be indicators of what people want."
Oh, so you just pick and choose what should be factored in so that your a priori worldview seems less inconsistent? How convenient. Maybe I should ignore that war is a fact of life and is ineradicable and go on the notion that it's some accident that it keeps happening.
It's true that people are terrible at deciding what's best for them. But c'mon. If a bunch of Palestinians vote for an uber conservative group like Hamas, they know they aren't getting markets ahead of their religion. Which is another interesting feature of your belief system-- the shear arrogance contained within it that wants to play down the sincere convictions that people have about their faith which they profess to be above the types of values you think are top dog in everyone's minds.
"The reason is that when a person votes, there is exactly zero chance of him ever changing the result."
Another unsubstantiated claim here. For being someone who accuses One of making claims he doesn't support, you sure don't do a good job of enforcing this standard upon your own words.
"Therefore, one does not have to live with the results of his decision. Voting is an expressive activity, like spouting off in a bar."
It is. But as dumb as people are, they do know that if the choice is between supporting a revolutionary like the Ayatollah Khomeini and one like Lenin, the texture of the culture is going to be vastly different.
"In a market, however, a person makes a choice about how to spend scarce resources and deals with the consequences."
I understand how the market works. But elevating the market to the level of importance that you do (which you give it the superlative importance), is itself a value judgment and one that prior to the capitalist worldview ascension during the so-called "Enlightenment," would be considered quite low.
"To take an example the people here would be familiar with: just think of liberals who vote for politicians that want integration but run away from blacks in their daily lives.
So when I see Muslims vote for the Muslim Brotherhood but spend their spare time listening to American pop music,"
So you just assume that EVERY last person that voted for a conservative Islamic party is that big of a hypocrite? The fact that your point of view MUST lie on the large pre-supposition that everyone is a huge hypocrite makes your assertion very dubious.
No, I'm not. Kind of ruins your post, doesn't it?
Whoops, my mistake then.
Carry on, you noble, ancient brave. ;-)
"I see the latter as more indicative of their preferences. Conservatives in all societies have to resort to politics (i.e., telling people what to do) because they can't get what they want through people's choices freely made."
Except when people vote for conservative candidates on the basis of conservative principles. And what's wrong with telling people what to do? Again, suppose the conservative leader is correct and the MAJORITY (as opposed to all people, like you're fond of claiming) of people are incorrect?
"That's not to say that there isn't a bunch of crap that the mass media pushes because of liberal ideology. Arab and Japanese pop culture isn't hostile to the majority culture the way Western pop culture is. But you see the same desire for modern goods and a pleasant life everywhere."
You're confusing the argument here. Yes, most people will choose to make their lives comfortable if they can but there are several caveats to this that many people employ which you just ignore. So desire for relative comfort doesn't mean that every person is willing to give up EVERYTHING in the interest of cheap consumer goods in the manner of some shallow American consumer who's long since embraced his lack of identity and lack of spiritual dimension. The desire for some comfort in terms of modern appliances doesn't mean that those cheap consumer goods are at the top of people's wish lists irrespective of EVERYTHING else. The Japanese kamikazes and the 9/11 hijackers are specific examples of this. Serbia during the 1990s is a perfect modern example of this just as the Middle East today is. Yes, the Serbs were bombed into accepting Americanism but it's unfair to ignore the fact that they had to be bombed. Yes, Japan accepts some level of modernization now and they would have anyways under the rule of the Imperial government. But in the 1940s, they wanted that modernization to happen on their OWN terms and they fought hard for that during the Second World War.
How do you explain the Amish? While their standard of living is extreme by modern standards, do you think they are the ONLY people who put their particular identity and way of life over selling out?
Most people are morons who like to shop. But there are exceptions. And following the exceptions (as in the exceptional men) as models tends to elevate man. You want us to all sink to the lowest common denominator in the name of comfort it seems. You want us all to be pigs feeding at the trough who know or care little about any type of higher value.
There are also constructs within cultures that portend to a type of asceticism. Monks in both the East and West are easily identifiable examples of people who do not share your values. And simply because most people are not as extreme as they are, doesn't mean that everyone fights for everyone's right to consume when they go into a war despite the rhetoric from the tv.
"Utilitarianism would take into account the shock of the community. So if a few people like to have sex with corpses, the fact that the vast majority would find this completely disgusting means that allowing sex with corpses would probably be a net loss for human happiness."
All you're doing here is trying to dodge the moral question I previously posed to you with this "community" buffer. Forget about "the community," whatever that is. Say this happens somewhere where the only person who knows about it is the man doing it. It still feels wrong to me and MOST people with any sense of self-respect. And your worldview can't explain why. But I know why it feels wrong; because you're reducing people's value to sensory stimuli.
"The ideas of "noble man" and heroism are subjective and vary by time and place."
Well, what you're talking about changing is morality within cultures and epochs. And if you accept that morality changes, you're contradicting your previous universal claim that everyone wants to shop above all else if given the chance.
The heroic archetype from the ancient world is pretty bedded within Western tradition which is why I alluded to it. Simply because morality does change depending on the culture doesn't follow that such heroic instincts can no longer be looked to as a model.
"A couple hundred years ago, when dueling was dying out, some conservatives complained that it represented a loss in masculine virtue."
There's probably a point to be made there. Men sure don't seem honorable or masculine today. Perhaps if there was the real threat of a duel, men would shape up a bit.
"Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing."
-- Robert E. Howard
But Nietzscheans believe that that honorable dueling instinct should be sublimated into other areas of culture. If two men agree to settle things via a duel on the street, I see nothing that should stop such an agreement from a moral perspective.
"To the Palestinian, having eight babies and sacrificing them all to destroy Israel is heroic and noble."
In a certain sense, it is. But it has never been seen as heroic to kill women and children in a Western context. Islam, because it is an Abrahamic faith with some deficiencies, has certain rules that ignore such considerations if their faith is interpreted a certain way. In other words, they are a bit consequentialist. At any rate, while the killing of such innocents may be seen as ignoble, their is no doubt there are courageous instincts that are being utilized by the Muslims even if those instincts are being employed in ways we find contemptible. Even the degenerate talk show host Bill Maher recognized this when he objected to the hijackers being called "cowards"; he was summarily fired from ABC for speaking this obvious truth, of course.
"Some times and places emphasize being courageous in defense of the nation, while in others people only care about the family or tribe."
It's the same instinct. The nation (as opposed to a proposition country like what exists today) is an extension of one's tribe. Look up the original definition of "nation." But even people who defend ridiculous proposition nations like the U.S. today are fueled by the same idea of "a people" even the interpretation of people is stretched to its breaking point.
"Which concept of nobility would you like society to adopt? And how do you pick?"
I've already answered this question. The instincts that support a higher type of man. A man of heroic courage and strength.
In regards to "how do I pick," I really don't. the exceptional man chooses himself. People like Napoleon and Alexander asserted themselves and had the characteristics to back up their assertions. They weren't elected in some plebiscite free for all.
"Whoops, my mistake then.
Carry on, you noble, ancient brave. ;-)"
Wait, that might have been me, now that I think about it.
But you're mischaracterizing what I said in that other thread.
I said that chatting up girls and misleading them and "playing" them where the end objective is to get into their pants and then dump them is animalistic.
I'm all for guys trying to get with women, though. My evaluation of them as "animalistic" as to do with their designs rather than them strictly having sex. I'm not some sexual prude like many of the religious types you run into.
Another unsubstantiated claim here.
You really need a source for the statement that one vote never changes an election? Look up the "voting paradox."
How do you explain the Amish
I'm talking general trends in history, not something that can explain every behavior of every individual or group on the planet.
Look at it this way. In every modern, wealthy country we see birthrates between 1 and 2 per woman. We see a mass consumer culture and the popularity of American pop culture. We've seen secularism and loss of national identities and traditions. We see a mixed capitalist system and democracy. This applies to America, Europe, Canada, and the Far East, all to varying degrees. Is this all a coincidence?
You see the same factors at work in the Muslim countries, but simply at an earlier stage: the lower birth rate, the increasing secularization, etc. For every Arab who joins Al Qaida, there's thousands who worship Kobe Bryant and 50 Cent. The conservatives in the Middle East will put up more of a fight than their counterparts in the West, but they are fighting a losing battle.
There's a reason why modernization brings the same secularism and loss of identity everywhere. These developments are based on rising IQ through the Flynn Effect and higher education levels. As people become smarter and more educated, it's harder to believe in religion. As people have more time to read books, watch TV, and learn about other cultures and epochs, people become less and less likely to believe that they come from a chosen race or their God is the real one. They start to rely more on reason, and less on instinct in ordering their lives.
It's the same instinct. The nation (as opposed to a proposition country like what exists today) is an extension of one's tribe. Look up the original definition of "nation." But even people who defend ridiculous proposition nations like the U.S. today are fueled by the same idea of "a people" even the interpretation of people is stretched to its breaking point.
People fight and die for their tribe because they have religious or ethnic myths about why their people is special and better than others. That's how the Jews survived for thousands of years as the "Chosen People" and why Muslims blow themselves up today. Being smarter and better educates makes people realize that such silly myths have no rational basis.
We've reached the point where people know that whatever traditional concept of heroism they may hold is cultural-specific. Who is going to get passionate about something that they know they only believe in because of an accident of birth? Once the logic and truth of nihilism is out there, it cannot be put back into the bottle.
This is why I always laugh at the white nationalists who try to believe in Thor because they see it as being true to their ancestors or better for the white race in the long run. The original believers in Thor did not say "We should believe in this because it leads to the higher instinct in man, and it would be better for society." They believed in their Gods because they actually thought they existed. Modern white nationalists, better educated and with higher IQs than their ancestors, will never be able to convince themselves of what they wished they actually believed.
If you disagree, you need an explanation of why there has been such a convergence in the lifestyles, economic systems, and governments of all the wealthy countries in the last 50 years. You also need to explain the huge decline in violence in the last few decades, documented in Pinker's last book. The simplest answer is that people are outgrowing the myths that they held on to when they were significantly poorer and less intelligent. Thus, they are no longer able to find meaning in religion, politics, or ethnic pride.
In regards to "how do I pick," I really don't. the exceptional man chooses himself. People like Napoleon and Alexander asserted themselves and had the characteristics to back up their assertions. They weren't elected in some plebiscite free for all.
Well then, what are we arguing about? You, or whoever the superior man is, will soon show himself and all this debating will be for naught.
"You really need a source for the statement that one vote never changes an election? Look up the "voting paradox.""
I can tell now that you're arguing just for the sake of arguing.
This is what you said:
"The reason is that when a person votes, there is exactly zero chance of him ever changing the result."
That sounds like you're talking about voting in PRINCIPLE, not making a claim that no election has ever been decided by a single vote. C'mon, already. Don't move the goalposts and act like I'm being a moron.
So yeah, no election has ever been decided by a SINGLE vote, but that's not the same thing as voting itself not making a difference which was a totally reasonable manner to interpret your comment given what you responding to and what you actually wrote.
"I'm talking general trends in history, not something that can explain every behavior of every individual or group on the planet."
Let me quote your own words back to you.
""Mass consumption" is what every people in the world wants when given the choice."
You said EVERY PEOPLE. That is clearly not true. Can you just admit you've lost this argument gracefully? I bet you can't.
"No, I simply observe the choices they make everywhere and always."
Again, they don't always make the same choices. It's highly arrogant of you to think you can grasp every peoples' value judgments.
"Look at it this way. In every modern, wealthy country we see birthrates between 1 and 2 per woman. We see a mass consumer culture and the popularity of American pop culture. We've seen secularism and loss of national identities and traditions."
I've lived abroad. In Korea, which is arguably a nicer place than the U.S., they are most CERTAINLY not losing their national identities nor are they in Japan or emerging countries like Vietnam. You keep trying to make across the board value judgments for different peoples on the basis of modernization trends. Yet, I've shown you how that thinking is fallacious. Again, simply because a country is willing to modernize, it does not follow that they have the same values as people who like to shop here in this country. The fact that people have washers and driers doesn't mean that they aren't willing to put other cultural matters ahead of those appliances. I've already explained to you this fallacy of yours.
"We see a mixed capitalist system and democracy. This applies to America, Europe, Canada, and the Far East, all to varying degrees. Is this all a coincidence?"
Not all of Europe had a choice. Hitler had popular support but his regime was blown to smithereen and today there are still military bases set up in Europe. There are a sizable number of Russians who loathe capitalism which is where Putin's support comes from. Do you think it's a coincidence that the U.S. elite (which has a plutocratic elite) favors countries that are "open"? I will again refer to you to North Korea and the Vietnam War (as well as the Palestinians) as consequences of countries who choose to oppose this "openness."
Don't forget that Hamas and the communists in Vietnam had the popular support. They didn't/don't want our modernization if it means modernizing on U.S. terms. Translation: They value other things ahead of technology EVEN if they value technology as well. Why you can't get this through your head is beyond me.
But it's not a surprise to me that the Western states would mostly have similar values given that their historical trajectories have been intertwined and quite similar. So naturally their values would resemble each others more than the values from other cultures. That doesn't prove what you think it does, though.
"You see the same factors at work in the Muslim countries, but simply at an earlier stage: the lower birth rate, the increasing secularization, etc."
No, it's birthrate lowers as society becomes more secularized. Our culture was quite advanced technologically and the birth rate didn't slow until feminism and depressed wages became a reality. Lower births don't have to be some inevitability with modernization, though. And you keep acting as though secularization is a good thing a priori without qualifying why in any credible terms.
"For every Arab who joins Al Qaida, there's thousands who worship Kobe Bryant and 50 Cent."
I'd like to see some numbers for that large claim. If that were true, we wouldn't have to stay there and keep peace. As we pull out of Iraq, the place will descend into chaos (there are already signs) and the chaos will come from religious energy. Shopping malls will be much further down the list of concerns.
"The conservatives in the Middle East will put up more of a fight than their counterparts in the West, but they are fighting a losing battle."
You've already proven my point here. Are these conservatives not "people"? You speak about them as if they are some nebulous force of nature or something from a vacuum. It's amazing that you don't see it. So now it's obvious to even you that not everyone or even ALL peoples want the same thing.
Again, you ignore my example of the popular Islamic revolution in Iran (among other examples I provided). But that's because you can't answer that and you just like to argue.
"There's a reason why modernization brings the same secularism and loss of identity everywhere."
Yeah, and there's also a reason that societies have to be fought tooth and nail in some cases for that secularized world to ever come about. And it's not because of small religious cabals alone like you keep implying.
And again, please stop arguing as though an appeal to popularity were a legitimate argument to make in terms of deciding what is right and what is wrong especially if you can't even establish your philosophy of utilitarianism in a halfway decent manner.
"These developments are based on rising IQ through the Flynn Effect and higher education levels."
The Flynn Effect has been called into question. While I won't say it's baseless, if you're going to buttress part of your argument ON THAT, then you're really grasping at straws. Furthermore, there is nothing about embracing secularity that makes a person more intelligent. Yes, you're more apt to use gizmos and gadgets in a puerile way, but you're not necessarily more intelligent.
"As people become smarter and more educated,"
Again, your argument assumes so much. You're making the positive claims here. The burden of proof rests on you and I see little to nothing in terms of support for your claims.
"it's harder to believe in religion."
People have a superficial understanding of religion if I'm to take the new atheists vanguards for the type of trend you're referring to. Even atheistic/or nonreligious philosophers like Nietzsche and Schopenhauer understood there was a great deal more to religion than the people today who think they've simply outgrown it.
"As people have more time to read books,"
People read trash books. They're not reading Critique of Pure Reason or War & Peace, for the most part. Look at the New York Times bestsellers. It's all ghost writer biographies and cult of personality nonsense. And that's the proportion of people who actually read. The bookish people, unlike in the past, are not the ones controlling culture. It's the stupid masses via supply and demand. And most of the stupid masses have not read a book.
"watch TV,"
lol
"and learn about other cultures and epochs,"
In a very superficial way. In the past, the educated in Europe could speak Latin as a given and they could quote from Homer and Cicero and Shakespeare. Today, being educated means passing some "critical theory" class and perhaps having the amount of knowledge about another culture that comes from glossing a NatGeo presentation.
"people become less and less likely to believe that they come from a chosen race"
Tell that to the Jews.
"or their God is the real one. They start to rely more on reason,"
You do know that Catholic doctrine is based on Socrates and Plato and Aristotle's metaphysical ideas, don't you? Islam is likewise based on Aristotilean metaphysical deductions.
There is nothing unreasonable about the basis of some religious faith. I certainly respect G.K. Chesterton over Jon Stuart Mill.
Look, I'm not even religious. But I can respect that there's more to it than what you're making it out to be.
"and less on instinct in ordering their lives."
Now you're positing that humans rely less on instinct? Is this due to technology? Either way, it's absolutely absurd.
"People fight and die for their tribe because they have religious or ethnic myths about why their people is special and better than others."
Whoa! Slow down. It's not necessarily based on superiority. It can also be based on the fact that they wish to retain that identity and way of life. I want my children and grandchildren to look like me. Not some amalgamation. I want the folk ways and literature I cherish to live on (which it is more likely to do if people like me survive). That's not weird. It's natural. Reproduction is the closest thing to eternal self-preservation we have and like a typical liberal, you're saying all that amounts to bigotry and superstition.
Again, I lived in Korea. They weren't "racist" toward me. Most of the kids and adults I knew were atheist. At the same time, they don't want their way of life or identity destroyed. They're very protective and despite modernizing, foreigners are only around 2% of the population and they don't want to change that. The same applies to Japan.
"That's how the Jews survived for thousands of years as the "Chosen People" and why Muslims blow themselves up today. Being smarter and better educates makes people realize that such silly myths have no rational basis."
Yeah, well, the Jews have pretty good schools over in Israel and the country is pretty modern, but they still think they're "chosen."
"We've reached the point where people know that whatever traditional concept of heroism they may hold is cultural-specific. Who is going to get passionate about something that they know they only believe in because of an accident of birth?"
The fact that I have the background that I have is anything but an accident. It's like saying a squirrel is a squirrel by accident or that a tiger is a tiger by accident. People may downplay ethnic heritage because polite "globalistic" society today frowns upon it, but that doesn't mean people are born the way they are by accident. Quite the opposite if you're as high on science as you seem to want to pass yourself off as being.
"Once the logic and truth of nihilism is out there, it cannot be put back into the bottle."
The culture will destroy itself if it doesn't. We're not going to go on this way forever. The same way the Romans or the Greeks didn't go on forever. Something healthier that addresses the verities of life will rise up. That's why Christianity replaced a nihilistic pagan society like Rome.
"This is why I always laugh at the white nationalists who try to believe in Thor because they see it as being true to their ancestors"
Belief in Thor is a metaphysical concept. The Aryans believed that man creates the gods as much as the gods create man. This outlook is not reducible to scientific concepts.
"or better for the white race in the long run."
A strong God is always better than a weak one in the long run.
"The original believers in Thor did not say "We should believe in this because it leads to the higher instinct in man, and it would be better for society." They believed in their Gods because they actually thought they existed."
That depends on who you asked (since you were there and everything). The people at the bottom probably had a metaphysically objectivist view; I'm not sure this applies to everyone. And even if everyone did have a metaphysically objectivist view THEN, that doesn't invalidate metaphysical paganistic beliefs TODAY.
"Modern white nationalists, better educated and with higher IQs than their ancestors,"
Another nonsense claim without evidence.
"will never be able to convince themselves of what they wished they actually believed."
Again, it's a metaphysical question. Some God or religion will come back even if its not Thor. All the historical evidence we have points to the idea that religious instinct in man (in one form or another) is ineradicable. Even secularity has a certitude of dogma and faith-based beliefs as you yourself have shown.
"If you disagree, you need an explanation of why there has been such a convergence in the lifestyles, economic systems, and governments of all the wealthy countries in the last 50 years."
I never argued that most people don't want to be comfortable. And the plutocratic elite is happy to provide comfort to the masses to enhance their own standing which some people realize comes at perhaps an even greater expense in the long run.
My argument has only ever rested on the idea that there are sizable numbers of the human species who are discontent with the current emerging global order. You're the one who speaks with such certitude that it's what people want and that because it's what people want that it's right.
"You also need to explain the huge decline in violence in the last few decades, documented in Pinker's last book."
Abortions, perhaps? I'd like to see Pinker's claim. You act as if the onus is on me to just read Pinker's book or that I should somehow figure out his claim. Not a very fair way to argue. Cite his claim and I'll try to answer it.
"The simplest answer is that people are outgrowing the myths that they held on to when they were significantly poorer and less intelligent. Thus, they are no longer able to find meaning in religion, politics, or ethnic pride."
They aren't outgrowing anything. The current order is based on abundance which is something people of the past didn't have. Do we all stay "educated" and Enlightened when the trough runs dry? You believe in illusions of progress.
Notice how I answer everything you throw at me. I don't ignore half your argument like you do mine.
You still keep arguing from the assumption that utilitarianism is the best ideology even though I've raised objections you seem incapable of answering.
"Well then, what are we arguing about? You, or whoever the superior man is, will soon show himself and all this debating will be for naught."
I don't see how this renders any argument about the matter moot.
Notice how I answer everything you throw at me. I don't ignore half your argument like you do mine.
Women do that a lot, especially feminist trolls.
You said EVERY PEOPLE. That is clearly not true. Can you just admit you've lost this argument gracefully? I bet you can't.
You know, I was going to point out that anybody with an adequate IQ could tell that "every people" does not literally mean "every single person and group, without exception," but I thought I'd remain nice. If you are trying to have a debate, rather than chalk up a Win, you give the other person the chance to qualify a statement. This is like when someone says "white are smarter than blacks" and another person responds "NOT ALL WHITES ARE SMARTER THAN ALL BLACKS."
And even when read literally, it applies to every nation of substantial size, which is what I was thinking of.
"As people become smarter and more educated,"
Again, your argument assumes so much. You're making the positive claims here. The burden of proof rests on you and I see little to nothing in terms of support for your claims.
Sorry, I am not here to fill in the gaps in your education. I am not going to provide footnotes for all my claims, especially ones that all educated people should know are true. The rise in literacy rates alone shows people are more educated. If you don't know about the rise in literacy rates, there's Google.
So yeah, no election has ever been decided by a SINGLE vote, but that's not the same thing as voting itself not making a difference which was a totally reasonable manner to interpret your comment given what you responding to and what you actually wrote.
Sweetie, let's look at that statement again. "The reason is that when a person votes, there is exactly zero chance of him ever changing the result." I'm obviously talking about the individual, and then the context of the discussion only adds to the obvious interpretation.
Notice how I answer everything you throw at me. I don't ignore half your argument like you do mine.
Well, I'm simply enjoying this conversation less and less as I realize the extent of the gap between us.
Anyway, if your idea of a meaningful society is Korea, then I also would like the West to move towards it on many things, and of course doing so is realistic. I consider Korea and Japan as nihilistic societies, but simply without the multi-cultural self-hatred.
"Well, I'm simply enjoying this conversation less and less as I realize the extent of the gap between us."
Y u no understand me?!!! [sob]
And I thought campus utilitarians were hilarious.
Yeah, it's obvious this woman is a troll. She only responds to parts of arguments that she can pick at and create confusion. The parts where it's obvious she's wrong, she just ignores and pretends that her whole point of view still rests on solid ground.
"You know, I was going to point out that anybody with an adequate IQ could tell that "every people" does not literally mean "every single person and group,"
So "every people" doesn't mean every group of people? Really? It sure sounds like it. Either words mean something or they don't.
"without exception," but I thought I'd remain nice. If you are trying to have a debate, rather than chalk up a Win, you give the other person the chance to qualify a statement. This is like when someone says "white are smarter than blacks" and another person responds "NOT ALL WHITES ARE SMARTER THAN ALL BLACKS.""
You're not comparing like with like at all. You're attesting to people's value judgments across the board, not indicating general trends in intelligence. When you're trying to say something about the value judgments of people as a whole, you're making a claim about human nature that is far larger than Dr. Rushton is when he observes a trend in IQ scores by race.
"And even when read literally, it applies to every nation of substantial size, which is what I was thinking of."
Oh, so now it's "every nation of SUBSTANTIAL size,"; And I should just know what qualifies as "substantial." Even though your claim is about human nature.
At any rate, the examples I included consist of nations that any reasonable person would consider "substantial."
"Sorry, I am not here to fill in the gaps in your education."
I don't want you to educate me. I want you to support your claims. How credulous do you think I am? If a person is going to make a positive claim, the onus is on them to show how that claim is true. All I've asked you to do is support your claim without just name-dropping Stephen Pinker or vaguely alluding to some study that is highly contested. Hardly an unreasonable request.
"I am not going to provide footnotes for all my claims, especially ones that all educated people should know are true."
No, you're spouting liberal talking points that are echoed on universities and when I ask those people to support their claims in the same way I just asked you to, they play the same sorts of games.
"The rise in literacy rates alone shows people are more educated."
No, it doesn't. Again, you assume to much. First of all, you have to qualify what "educated" is. Because being "educated" is a relative term. Furthermore, being "educated" is not the same as having a high IQ.
"If you don't know about the rise in literacy rates, there's Google."
I do know about the rise in literacy rates; but the fact is that doesn't indicate what you think it indicates. I've explained why already. But you had no good response to the part where I explained this so you just ignored it.
"Sweetie, let's look at that statement again. "The reason is that when a person votes, there is exactly zero chance of him ever changing the result." I'm obviously talking about the individual,"
No, it's not obvious. It can be taken two ways. It can either be taken as a statement about ONE individual in which case: DUH! I hardly needed you to tell me that.
But I gave you the benefit of the doubt and interpreted it in a manner that actually gave that otherwise pointless statement of yours some substance. So I chalked it up to your attitude about voting in general. Now you're in the awkward situation of trying to convince me that you waste your time writing self-evident sentences that are akin to "the sky is blue" or "the grass is green" because you like to argue any way you can to distract from the fact that your worldview is largely unsubstantiated and just wrong.
"Well, I'm simply enjoying this conversation less and less as I realize the extent of the gap between us."
No, you can't condescend when you've lost an argument. It doesn't work that way.
"Anyway, if your idea of a meaningful society is Korea,"
Korea is meaningful to Koreans. That was my only point. Don't try to twist it. Your feelings and my feelings are irrelevant. The discussion was about human nature and order of rank in terms of what humans the world over value. Not whether you and I thought Korea was nice or not.
"then I also would like the West to move towards it on many things, and of course doing so is realistic."
What?
"I consider Korea and Japan as nihilistic societies, but simply without the multi-cultural self-hatred."
Well, that's a step above what we have. At any rate, Koreans and Japanese have a consistent culture, not a hodgepodge. They have a high standard of living as well. They've modernized but not completely lost sight of who they are. You don't have to like those places, but my point about them still stands.
You also, again, can't just assign those countries some adjective like "nihilistic" in some desperate effort to dismiss my point and not qualify in any way shape or form what you mean. But that's consistent with your general sloppiness.
LOL. BReeda's idea of heaven is an endless shopping spree in a glittering golden mall. That's even sadder & cheesier than the Muslim's paradise of perpetually sexing 72 virgin maidens.
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