The Maelstrom of Violence

[Classic-Xer]

(08-30-2017, 11:48 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(08-30-2017, 11:19 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: Antifa's tactics are not just violent though; they actually prefer non-violence from what I'm reading; it's just that sometimes they get violent, usually when provoked.

I think your reading is exceptionally charitable.  Yes, if they can shut down free speech representing views they oppose without resorting to violence, they will, but that's nearly as bad as doing it through violence - possibly worse, since the violence at least discredits them to some extent.

You know what your dealing with when violence is openly used as a means to eliminate opposition. You don't know what's happening when shit happens and no one seems to care or views it as an action which directly relates to them/potentially impacts them in the future. My college educated pals didn't view college as a long term gig like their professors and administrators or life long college students may have viewed it at the time. They simply viewed college as a means to get better (higher paying) jobs. What went on in college, what people believed in college, what activists (professors and students) did during college didn't much matter to them because they'd be leaving and moving on with their lives in a few years. I have to admit that I don't much care what students do on college grounds. However, if one of them where to take it off campus and try to apply it off campus, I would meet them head on and destroy them.

[Kinser79]

(08-30-2017, 11:46 AM)Warren Dew Wrote: I don't think 1. would have to be by an established Marxist-Leninist party.  Some charismatic person who is either part of the movement or who had influence and wants to take advantage of the movement would be sufficient.  Even some factions of the Democratic party might work.

I agree that 2. is also a possibility, especially if the press keeps pushing the alt Right toward white nationalism.

As of yet no successful leftist revolution has occured in the absence of leadership by an ML party. I suspect the discipline of democratic centeralism is required to pull it off. Should the left gain ground, an unlikely event, at most we'll see a Spanish Civil War scenario being set up.

As for 2 it isn't just the Alt-Right, which I identify as right wing racial identitarians. According to Antifa anyone to the right of Mao is a fascist. Considering that includes just about everyone except open communists (and a few of them too, actually) a charismatic leader on the right is likely to appear.

Indeed the main reason why Hitler became Chancellor, and the NSDAP won major electoral victories in the early 1930s was because the population grew tired of the reds and the browns fighting in the street. One side had to be eliminated, and given the choice folks picked brown because they were more likely to be able to keep their private property.

As I've said before, fascism only really rises when there is a credible threat to capitalism by communism. That threat isn't arising. Neo-conservatism (IE Trotskyism masquerading as something right-wing) has been discredited. Neo-Liberalism is also discredited. Civic Nationalism is an out growth of bourgeois liberalism itself, so isn't a threat to capitalism.

[Bob Butler 54]

(08-30-2017, 07:51 PM)Kinser79 Wrote: As I've said before, fascism only really rises when there is a credible threat to capitalism by communism.  That threat isn't arising.  Neo-conservatism (IE Trotskyism masquerading as something right-wing) has been discredited.  Neo-Liberalism is also discredited.  Civic Nationalism is an out growth of bourgeois liberalism itself, so isn't a threat to capitalism.

I see both Marx and Hitler being discredited.  I too don't see their heirs as credible threats.  This doesn't mean all autocratic rule has gone away.  The European forms have crashed but the Middle East hasn't found its way out of the old patterns yet.  Too many are focused on what they think they learned of the European variants of autocratic rule.  The world overall has been doing autocratic tyranny for far longer than Stalin's and Hitler's time.

This doesn't mean there aren't young testosterone filled youngsters wearing Nazi clothes and waving slaver battle flags.  It riles up folk.  It's not a true attempt to revive gas chambers and public lynchings, but it satisfies the need for attention.

We do have an urban / rural cultural divide and a strong division of wealth.  For decades the wealthy and rural have worked enough together to keep the unraveling memes on the see saw.  Bush 43 saw it at a peak.  He had neo conservatives, big oil, and televangelists.  These groups had different memes and values, but at least early on they managed to work together.  Too many may have been discredited since.  The old memes, the old ideas, have often enough crashed and burned. 

Trump pulled away much of the rural, while the Establishment elites ought to be at least a bit nervous.  Brietbart has an oar in the fight, but are sometimes portraying the Republican establishment as joining the left.  This doesn't feel true yet.  How well will Trump, Palin and others of the rural faction do in a collision with an establishment wealthy enough to provide money, but having trouble gathering the votes?  I don't know yet.  The time isn't quite now.  I don't feel it quite my fight other than hoping both factions end up discredited.  To get there, the left needs to feed Trump more rope.  The rural anti establishment folk haven't found a stable champion with gravitas, but the Trump - Palin personas are both eccentric and intuitive.  I don't know that they are looking for stable champions with gravitas.

[pbrower2a]

(08-30-2017, 07:51 PM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(08-30-2017, 11:46 AM)Warren Dew Wrote: I don't think 1. would have to be by an established Marxist-Leninist party.  Some charismatic person who is either part of the movement or who had influence and wants to take advantage of the movement would be sufficient.  Even some factions of the Democratic party might work.

I agree that 2. is also a possibility, especially if the press keeps pushing the alt Right toward white nationalism.

As of yet no successful leftist revolution has occured in the absence of leadership by an ML party.  I suspect the discipline of democratic centeralism is required to pull it off.  Should the left gain ground, an unlikely event, at most we'll see a Spanish Civil War scenario being set up.

As for 2 it isn't just the Alt-Right, which I identify as right wing racial identitarians.  According to Antifa anyone to the right of Mao is a fascist.  Considering that includes just about everyone except open communists (and a few of them too, actually) a charismatic leader on the right is likely to appear.

Indeed the main reason why Hitler became Chancellor, and the NSDAP won major electoral victories in the early 1930s was because the population grew tired of the reds and the browns fighting in the street.  One side had to be eliminated, and given the choice folks picked brown because they were more likely to be able to keep their private property.

As I've said before, fascism only really rises when there is a credible threat to capitalism by communism.  That threat isn't arising.  Neo-conservatism (IE Trotskyism masquerading as something right-wing) has been discredited.  Neo-Liberalism is also discredited.  Civic Nationalism is an out growth of bourgeois liberalism itself, so isn't a threat to capitalism.

The 1915 Klan had many fascistic traits -- before Mussolini defined fascism in the mid-1920s. It arose before the Russian Revolution.

[Eric the Green]

(08-30-2017, 11:48 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(08-30-2017, 11:19 AM)Eric the Green Wrote: Antifa's tactics are not just violent though; they actually prefer non-violence from what I'm reading; it's just that sometimes they get violent, usually when provoked.

I think your reading is exceptionally charitable.  Yes, if they can shut down free speech representing views they oppose without resorting to violence, they will, but that's nearly as bad as doing it through violence - possibly worse, since the violence at least discredits them to some extent.

I don't think antifa can close down free speech without resorting to violence. They show up to express their speech too. If they use violence, then yes, that discredits them to some extent, although they can justify it. But it's not good tactics overall because of how the right-wing uses it to their advantage. And they are entitled to defend themselves if attacked.

They shut down Milo's speech at Cal Berkeley, by smashing windows and setting fires. Not good methods on their part. But Milo should never have been allowed to speak at Cal. A university has discretion in whom it invites to speak on campus. It should choose qualified speakers who do not stir up hate and violence. Hateful prejudice of the kind Milo represents has no place on a university campus. Nor does speech which incites violence, as Milo's does. The University is quite capable of inviting conservative speakers who are qualified.

[Eric the Green]

(08-30-2017, 11:46 AM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(08-30-2017, 12:28 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(08-29-2017, 08:45 PM)Warren Dew Wrote:

(08-29-2017, 10:36 AM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(08-29-2017, 10:16 AM)Warren Dew Wrote: Actually we have a very good idea, since their goal is to 'destroy capitalism' and they fly anarchocommunist flags.  Stalinism is at the end of that road.  They might not be exactly equal - Stalin killed several times more people than Hitler - but they're on the same level.

They aren't even close.  Marxist-Leninists look at the Antifa crowd and laugh.  They are at most useful idiots for the Stalinists who follow in their wake, and they are always the first to the Gulags after the revolution.

Sure.  That's why I say "Stalinism is at the end of that road", rather than it being their goal.  They don't think they're Stalinists, but they pave the road for the Stalinists.

I was more objecting to calling them on par with "Stalinists".  They aren't even close.  Antifa's tactics are to smash stuff and hit people.  Their ideology is to label anyone they don't like a fascist, whether they are or not.  Which I find amusing about people who claim Trump is a fascist.  In a calmer, saner time, within the living memory of both Boomers and Xers he would at most be a pro-business Democrat.

In any event only two outcomes are going to arise from Antifa's antics. 
1.  There is a communist revolution headed by a Marxist-Leninist party
2.  The emergence of an actual fascist group to combat antifa by taking control of the state.

At present in the US situation 1 is unlikely.  Most of the ML parties in the US are poorly lead and terribly small.  And the CPUSA has been suffering from Browderism since the 1940s and is thus  spent force.  Situation 2 is more likely.  If the mild reforms Trump wants to push are frustrated too much someone who is less mild than him will be found, and Gen X has plenty of people like that running around.

Antifa rioting every weekend is the best thing that ever happened to the neo-nazi types.

I don't think 1. would have to be by an established Marxist-Leninist party.  Some charismatic person who is either part of the movement or who had influence and wants to take advantage of the movement would be sufficient.  Even some factions of the Democratic party might work.

I agree that 2. is also a possibility, especially if the press keeps pushing the alt Right toward white nationalism.

1. Democrats are nowhere near Stalinists. It's true that libertarian right-wing economics claims that regulating and taxing business is "totalitarian," but it is not; it is vitally necessary. You can see where absence of government regulation leads in Houston today. The Oil business is allowed to get away with anything by Texas libertarian government, and the result is that people are being unfairly poisoned by the flood, as they frequently are.

A charismatic Marxist-Leninist is highly unlikely to get anywhere in America. But show me one with a great horoscope score, and I might take a look. On the other hand, even the Green candidate Jill Stein has an outstanding score, and is going nowhere. I looked up an independent candidate named Laurence Kotlikoff whom my friend suggested, and his score is 13-2, but appears to be going nowhere. You have to be in a position to be recognized as a prominent candidate in order to get elected or nominated. Even Bernie's score was better than Hillary's, probably, but couldn't win because he's a "socialist" whom the Democratic Establishment was lined up against.

The "movement" called antifa is too loose for it to be taken by anyone toward any particular political goal other than to oppose fascism.

2. good.

[David Horn]

(08-31-2017, 11:50 AM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: There is a solution to all of this shit. Most people would not like it. We have a fine military. They are generally aligned with the grand American Tribe. Identitarianism is not allowed in the military. Maybe they need to lead.

Sorry, but rule enforced by a neo-Praetorian Guard is about as bad an outcome as I can imagine.  Restoring the draft and making it inescapable would do more to temper things than any other single act I can imagine.  Skin in the game for all.

[Kinser79]

(08-31-2017, 11:50 AM)X_4AD_84 Wrote: There is a solution to all of this shit. Most people would not like it. We have a fine military. They are generally aligned with the grand American Tribe. Identitarianism is not allowed in the military. Maybe they need to lead.

I have a Better idea.  Only Veterans should be allowed to be citizens.  All other are civilians.  Civilians would be able to own property, have free speech and all that good stuff.  The two things they wouldn't be allowed to do would be vote and hold political office.

Some have read Starship Troopers by Heinlien and see a dystopia.  Actually I read it and thought to myself it was the closest possible to utopia.  Politics quite simply is too important to be left to the politicians.

[Bob Butler 54]

I see the identity of the ruling elites evolving.  The agricultural age had a nobility that attempted to monopolize weapons and thus political power.  As first the longbow and then muskets become dominant, we had citizen armies and the old nobility became land owning aristocrats.  The land owning aristocrats eventually contested with the robber barons as the means of gathering wealth changed.

I’m not thrilled by any group of elites being in control, and would emphasize feedback mechanism that allowed the People as a whole to keep the elites in check.  This has tended not to happen with representative democracy, in great part as the representatives tend to become corrupt.  Thus, I’d like to see direct vote networked democracy tried.

Yes, the current military has its virtues, but power corrupts.  The key is allowing a clear enough vision to spot the corruption, and a clear enough tool to pull the corrupt.

[Kinser79]

(08-31-2017, 09:42 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I see the identity of the ruling elites evolving.  The agricultural age had a nobility that attempted to monopolize weapon and thus political power.  As first the longbow and then muskets become dominant, we had citizen armies and the old nobility became land owning aristocrats.  The land owning aristocrats eventually contested with the robber barons as the means of gathering wealth changed.

I’m not thrilled by any group of elites being in control, and would emphasize feedback mechanism that allowed the People as a whole to keep the elites in check.  This has tended not to happen with representative democracy, in great part as the representatives tend to become corrupt.  Thus, I’d like to see direct vote networked democracy tried.

Yes, the current military has its virtues, but power corrupts.  The key is allowing a clear enough vision to spot the corruption, and a clear enough tool to pull the corrupt.

In Starship Troopers there is such a system though it isn't gone into much detail in the novel.  I've seen the movie (it is one of my favorite movies actually but I understand that movie was basically written by a cheese eating surrender monkey so his tinkering with the plot makes it suspect) but do not consider it canon. 

Heinlien said that veterans had the right to vote, though it is considered to be a lesser right.  As such this means that there is a lesser democracy.  Rather, the video clip I posted was far more relevant.  Exercising political power is exercising force.  As such it seems prudent to leave the exercising of that force to those who have demonstrated through military service that they are willing to make the safety and security of the body politic their personal responsibility.

This of course necessitates that any such state has an all volunteer military.  Fortunately the US already has such a military and instituting a draft would be an anathema except under the most dire of circumstances, if then.

[Bob Butler 54]

I've read the book but not seen the movie.  I've read a lot of Heinlein.  You just have to remember a few things.  He and his wife were never able to have children, which resulted in somewhat odd virile heroines.  He and Schmitz did strong ladies before strong ladies became a thing.  He pushed libertarian politics and perspective fairly hard.  He also came at a time not far beyond the barnstormer, where a lot of people could build a near state of the art aircraft in their garage.  This resulted in a common science fiction shtick that anyone could build a space ship in their garage.  This meshed well with a notion that if you could see the smoke from your neighbor's chimney, it was time to move on.  Inhabitable Earth like planets were a dime a dozen.  The frontier was often endless.

In a way, NASA's space with hoards building craft in huge corporate clean rooms, and people constantly looking over the astronaut's shoulder is far less romantic.  Collin's Carrying the Fire gives a much better notion of space flight as often practiced.  How do you carry fire?  Very carefully.  There are so many things that can go wrong catastrophically.  This could change as technology makes space more familiar, but still now it is a structured environment.

Heinlein lived in a strange place, but he made for fun reading.  The movie, from what I heard, just came from a different strange place.

Can't resist a particular pair of airborne perspectives.

Annotated High Flight

      Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds1 of earth,
      And danced the skies2 on laughter-silvered wings;
      Sunward I've climbed,3 and joined the tumbling mirth4
      Of sun-split clouds5 -- and done a hundred things6
      You have not dreamed of -- Wheeled and soared and swung7
      High in the sunlit silence.8 Hov'ring there,9
      I've chased the shouting wind10 along, and flung
      My eager craft11 through footless halls of air.

      Up, up the long, delirious burning blue12
      I've topped the windswept heights13 with easy grace
      Where never lark, or even eagle14 flew.
      And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
      The high untrespassed sanctity of space,15
      Put out my hand,16 and touched the face of God.

1. Flight crews must insure that all surly bonds have been slipped entirely before aircraft taxi or flight is attempted.
   
2. During periods of severe sky dancing, the FASTEN SEATBELT sign must remain illuminated.
   
3. Sunward climbs must not exceed the maximum permitted aircraft ceiling.
   
4. Passenger aircraft are prohibited from joining the tumbling mirth.
   
5. Pilots flying through sun-split clouds must comply with all applicable visual and instrument flight rules.
   
6. These hundred things must be listed on a Federal Aviation Administration flight plan and approved prior to execution.
   
7. Wheeling, soaring, and swinging will not be accomplished simultaneously except by pilots in the flight simulator or in their own aircraft on their own time.
   
8. Be advised that sunlit silence will occur only when a major engine malfunction has occurred.
   
9. "Hov'ring there" will constitute a highly reliable signal that a flight emergency is imminent.
   
10. Forecasts of shouting winds are available from the local Flight Service Station. Encounters with unexpected shouting winds should be reported by pilots.
    
11. Be forewarned that pilot craft-flinging is a leading cause of passenger airsickness.
    
12. Should any crew member or passenger experience delirium while in the burning blue, submit an irregularity report upon flight termination.
    
13. Windswept heights will be topped by a minimum of 1,000 feet to prevent massive airsickness-bag use.
    
14. Aircraft engine ingestion of, or impact with, larks or eagles should be reported to the FAA and the appropriate aircraft maintenance facility.
    
15. Air Traffic Control (ATC) must issue all special clearances for treading the high untrespassed sanctity of space.
    
16. FAA regulations state that no one may sacrifice aircraft cabin pressure to open aircraft windows or doors while in flight
    

[pbrower2a]

(08-31-2017, 09:42 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I see the identity of the ruling elites evolving.  The agricultural age had a nobility that attempted to monopolize weapons and thus political power.  As first the longbow and then muskets become dominant, we had citizen armies and the old nobility became land owning aristocrats.  The land owning aristocrats eventually contested with the robber barons as the means of gathering wealth changed.

I’m not thrilled by any group of elites being in control, and would emphasize feedback mechanism that allowed the People as a whole to keep the elites in check.  This has tended not to happen with representative democracy, in great part as the representatives tend to become corrupt.  Thus, I’d like to see direct vote networked democracy tried.

Yes, the current military has its virtues, but power corrupts.  The key is allowing a clear enough vision to spot the corruption, and a clear enough tool to pull the corrupt.

We have several possible ruling elites. Among them:

1. Traditional landowners -- the people who own the land and literally lord it over agricultural laborers and sharecroppers who have no alternatives. Those are the exploiters of the agrarian era who may have even had literal ownership of their workers as chattel slaves. In more recent times, urban landlords can be the worst exploiters of the time. See the desirable parts of California, new York, and New England.

2. Financiers and industrialists -- the capitalists, whether bankers or factory owners. Maximal profits came from sweating the industrial workers. These people are the evil bourgeoisie of Marxist caricature.

3. Bureaucratic elites -- people who do not need to own property but exploit political or administrative power over workers. In Commie countries they were the infamous nomenklatura, people with connections and began to act like aristocrats, even pushing their children into such roles while doing everything possible to keep people with no connections from joining them (What loving parent who has a great way of life wants his beloved son or daughter to become a prole or peasant?)

4. Intellectuals -- people who create ideas and images and expand knowledge. These people create the cultural legacy and expand the scientific lore. (In America they are mostly under the thumb of the previous three elites).

5. Organized crime.

Democracy is in grave danger when four of the five have unrestrained power and the fourth is inder the thumb of others.

[Kinser79]

(08-31-2017, 10:45 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I've read the book but not seen the movie.

The movie is quite good but you have to have an attraction to sci-fi type movies to really like it. My son and boyfriend weren't impressed but I thought it was pretty awesome even if the director essentially pushed the mockery of fascism pretty hard. Honestly it is the type of film that really could only have been made in the 1990s.

 

Quote:He and Schmitz did strong ladies before strong ladies became a thing.

Strong ladies are often good if they are done correctly. When they are done poorly they essentially act like men who just happen to have tits and a vagina. An other one of my hobbies is reading Harry Potter fanfiction, we have a trope called "Herman Granger" where the character of Hermione is done so poorly and unfeminine as to really be essentially a man. In that can the character was clearly female, though have to admit that JKR didn't really pull off the heterosexual friendship well. Not that a woman really could be expected to. Male friendships and female friendships are inherently of a different nature.

As my brother in law put it once "Men are mean to each other but don't mean it; women on the other hand, are nice to each other but don't mean it."

Quote: He pushed libertarian politics and perspective fairly hard.

He definitely did that.
 

Quote:He also came at a time not far beyond the barnstormer, where a lot of people could build a near state of the art aircraft in their garage.  This resulted in a common science fiction shtick that anyone could build a space ship in their garage.

True perhaps, but building a space ship is most akin to living in a submarine. I guess you could say I was an aquanaut. That being said due to the environment of deep space being more like that of deep water it is more difficult to build to build a completely sealed pressurized structure that won't leak the precious oxygen into space or the ocean. That being said there have been garage built submersibles but they in general act more like diesel-electric dive boats than a modern nuclear submarine.

Quote:  This meshed well with a notion that if you could see the smoke from your neighbor's chimney, it was time to move on.  Inhabitable Earth like planets were a dime a dozen.  The frontier was often endless.

Given recent advances in the detection of exoplanets that is moving into the realm of science rather than science fiction.

Quote:In a way, NASA's space with hoards building craft in huge corporate clean rooms, and people constantly looking over the astronaut's shoulder is far less romantic.

I don't know about romantic, but it lacks a certain pizzazz that good science-fiction requires. It is like the notion of being on a submarine is far more romantic than the reality. The reality is more closely akin to living in a tin can for months on end without the ability to wear deodorant (because it interferes with the oxygen scrubbers). Needless to say you get used to the smells of your shipmates or you attempt to burn out your sense of smell.

Quote:  Collin's Carrying the Fire gives a much better notion of space flight as often practiced.  How do you carry fire?  Very carefully.  There are so many things that can go wrong catastrophically.  This could change as technology makes space more familiar, but still now it is a structured environment.

Possibly, but I'm of the opinion that humanity must develop space flight and eventually colonize other celestial bodies if we ever plan to survive as a species. First target of course is going to be Luna of course.

[David Horn]

(08-31-2017, 09:55 PM)Kinser79 Wrote: In Starship Troopers there is such a system though it isn't gone into much detail in the novel.  I've seen the movie (it is one of my favorite movies actually but I understand that movie was basically written by a cheese eating surrender monkey so his tinkering with the plot makes it suspect) but do not consider it canon. 

Heinlien said that veterans had the right to vote, though it is considered to be a lesser right.  As such this means that there is a lesser democracy.  Rather, the video clip I posted was far more relevant.  Exercising political power is exercising force.  As such it seems prudent to leave the exercising of that force to those who have demonstrated through military service that they are willing to make the safety and security of the body politic their personal responsibility.

This of course necessitates that any such state has an all volunteer military.  Fortunately the US already has such a military and instituting a draft would be an anathema except under the most dire of circumstances, if then.

First, the movie was one of the worst pieces of tripe I've ever tried to watch ... tried being the active verb here.  I tend to like Heinlein's books as sci-fi literature, though he is by far too libertarian for my taste politically.  There is at most a 0.00001% chance that a libertarian society can emerge and even less that it can work, so it's not a matter of pressing concern to me.  It's a philosophical paradigm suitable only for automatons. 

And fwiw, killing the draft was the first act in the play in which we're embedded.  It was a cynical ploy by Nixon, and the most likely takers on that offer werel on the right.  Why are the warmongers so unwilling to practice what they preach?

[Kinser79]

(09-01-2017, 01:42 PM)David Horn Wrote:

(08-31-2017, 09:55 PM)Kinser79 Wrote: In Starship Troopers there is such a system though it isn't gone into much detail in the novel.  I've seen the movie (it is one of my favorite movies actually but I understand that movie was basically written by a cheese eating surrender monkey so his tinkering with the plot makes it suspect) but do not consider it canon. 

Heinlien said that veterans had the right to vote, though it is considered to be a lesser right.  As such this means that there is a lesser democracy.  Rather, the video clip I posted was far more relevant.  Exercising political power is exercising force.  As such it seems prudent to leave the exercising of that force to those who have demonstrated through military service that they are willing to make the safety and security of the body politic their personal responsibility.

This of course necessitates that any such state has an all volunteer military.  Fortunately the US already has such a military and instituting a draft would be an anathema except under the most dire of circumstances, if then.

First, the movie was one of the worst pieces of tripe I've ever tried to watch ... tried being the active verb here.  I tend to like Heinlein's books as sci-fi literature, though he is by far too libertarian for my taste politically.  There is at most a 0.00001% chance that a libertarian society can emerge and even less that it can work, so it's not a matter of pressing concern to me.  It's a philosophical paradigm suitable only for automatons. 

And fwiw, killing the draft was the first act in the play in which we're embedded.  It was a cynical ploy by Nixon, and the most likely takers on that offer werel on the right.  Why are the warmongers so unwilling to practice what they preach?

As regards the movie, well that's a matter of taste.  Believe me even if it was as bad as you say it is, there is far worse tripe to watch.  Essentially every Xmas movie on Hallmark channel to which I'm exposed between October and January.

For the record I oppose the whole Xmas in October thing.  I rather like Thanksgiving.

Anyway, I agree that a libertarian society is unlikely which is why I support a minarchist style Classical Liberal society.  We've already had a society like that, in this country.  It was just over thrown in 1932.

As to the Draft, I'm not convinced having one is a good idea. Also the biggest warmongers I've seen have been the Democrats. Remember the difference between a Trotskyite and a Neocon is that they changed their tie.

[Bob Butler 54]

I can sympathize with blacks and homosexuals who have been stereotyped and the victim of prejudice.  You can say that it isn't my fight.  I don’t have a duty to go out and correct these things.  However, quite arguably, I have a duty not to be part of the problem.  (See Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience for the logic.)  If I have stereotypes and prejudices I feel an urge to stifle them, not to act on them to the best of my ability.  It is akin to tribal thinking.  One route to self improvement is to avoid vile stereotypes and the accompanying prejudice.

This is not a universal urge.  There are neo confederates and neo nazis among others who will play with prejudice and embrace tribal thinking with glee.

I’m a boomer, however.  Boomer hatred is common.  There are many people here who have boomer stereotypes and exercise boomer prejudices quite openly.  This is often not though as important as racial, cultural or gender stereotypes,  but it is comparable.  Some people build stereotypes and exercise prejudices.

I’m not totally innocent of this.  Thing is, part of being a blue boomer suggests trying to fight such things as prejudice and stereotypes.  Still, there are thing I do think of the younger generations.  Much of them fall under the category of “they do know know, they were not there.”  They have not felt the lynchings, bled over the coat hanger abortions, or carried a live draft card.  That takes some of the edge off the stereotypical thinking of the young, but it doesn’t help at a detailed level if someone is locked in, unwilling to listen, if someone lacks the imagination to figure it out.

I should be known for saying there are reasons for major cultures, subcultures.  They didn’t appear from nowhere.  The world views and values behind the cultures once were accurate, once produced favorable results.  There are places still where the old cultural memes still produce favorable results and are very well thought of.  Just watching the ‘debates’ here can show you that if you’d care to listen.

And generational gaps are quite akin to cultural gaps, political gaps, racial gaps, or gender gaps.  Humans are quite good at stereotypes, hatred, tribal thinking and hating the other guy.  I’d suggest that getting involved in any of them involves you in identity politics.  It is very human to divide between Us and Them, seeking to oppress Them in one way or another.  Simply, if you think you are joining an identity conflict without joining an identity conflict, think again. Examine the mirror closely.

I see Kinser as quite legitimately fighting racial and sexual problems.  That’s not directly my fight.  Doesn’t mean I won’t pull the verbal equivalent of a trigger if someone wanders into my sights.  Even then, if Kinser wants me to not fight his fights, I won’t.  That doesn’t mean I don’t have opinions and won’t voice my opinions on the matter generally.  Kinser is hardly the only one with such problems, his isn’t the only approach, he hasn’t the authority to enforce that his approach is to be the only one.

And I’ll be muttering about his not having been there, he didn’t know what was necessary, he didn’t see the problems of the time.  That’s the real essence of generational prejudices.  Every generation is apt to pick up different lessons learned.  It is better to try to learn the other generation’s lessons than to practice stereotyping, prejudice and hate.

[Kinser79]

(09-01-2017, 03:20 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I can sympathize with blacks and homosexuals who have been stereotyped and the victim of prejudice.

More importantly can you sympathize with both groups being overtly told they are victims for the purpose of control, exploitation and victimization?  That is precisely what the left does since the worst racism I've ever experienced was from other blacks and the worst homophobia I've ever experienced was at the hands of other queers.

Quote: You can say that it isn't my fight.

It's not.  A white female student once asked Malcolm X what she could do to help blacks in their struggle.  He told her "nothing".  To be frank, if there was a race problem in this country there is nothing that white people could do or give to black people that would have any value, any merit or any appreciation.  Why?  Because, something given has no value.

Quote: I don’t have a duty to go out and correct these things.

You don't.  Mostly the problems the black man faces in the US today are problems of their own making.  The problems faced today are not because we have a big government institution intentionally and deliberately oppressing anyone on the basis of their race (excluding Affirmative Action which is actually oppressive to Whites and Asians far more than it is to Blacks or Latinos).

Rather these problems are the result of poor choices individually and a culture that promotes as good the most ignorant, criminal and vile aspects of our society.

Quote: However, quite arguably, I have a duty not to be part of the problem.  (See Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience for the logic.)  If I have stereotypes and prejudices I feel an urge to stifle them, not to act on them to the best of my ability.  It is akin to tribal thinking.  One route to self improvement is to avoid vile stereotypes and the accompanying prejudice.

Political correctness is not a matter of self-improvement, rather it is a matter of policing the speech of others.  This policing is done in the name of not hurting people's feelings.  You know what though?  Some people need to have their feelings hurt.  They need to be offended because that is the only thing that will get through to them.

Al Sharpton said this clip offended him.  You know what offends me?  Al Sharpton because I think that if MLK were alive today he'd see what has happened to the group he fought for and what they have become.  I think Malcolm X would be much the same.  And for the record I'm far closer to Malcolm than MLK.

Quote:This is not a universal urge.  There are neo confederates and neo nazis among others who will play with prejudice and embrace tribal thinking with glee.

There are.  There are also racist black groups too. BLM is the largest.  Largely speaking in 2013 according to the SPLC there were some 5000-8000 Klan in the US divided into 130 different groups.  There are around the same number of Neo-Nazi groups.  The rest of the so-called Alt-Right consists of Libertarians, Civic Nationalists (which can be all colors) and Kekistanis (I consider myself both of the latter groups).  

Given the choice between dealing with at most 16K neo-nazis and Klan vs every third black person wanting to riot and loot, I'll pick the one which isn't around 4% of the population thanks.  Neo-nazis and the Klan together only make up 0.00005333...% of the population.

Quote:I’m a boomer, however.  Boomer hatred is common.  There are many people here who have boomer stereotypes and exercise boomer prejudices quite openly.  This is often not though as important as racial, cultural or gender stereotypes,  but it is comparable.  Some people build stereotypes and exercise prejudices.

Many boomer sterotypes found on this board are quite accurate.  Cynic Hero not withstanding.  I think his deal is he is mentally ill or something.  He wouldn't be the only person on this board with a mental illness either so I don't want anyone getting on a high horse because of that--and I mean real mental illnesses not MFers running around pretending they have autism cause they're really just a feckless shiftless loser.

Quote:I’m not totally innocent of this.  Thing is, part of being a blue boomer suggests trying to fight such things as prejudice and stereotypes.  Still, there are thing I do think of the younger generations.  Much of them fall under the category of “they do know know, they were not there.”  They have not felt the lynchings, bled over the coat hanger abortions, or carried a live draft card.  That takes some of the edge off the stereotypical thinking of the young, but it doesn’t help at a detailed level if someone is locked in, unwilling to listen, if someone lacks the imagination to figure it out.

I do not have to have been enslaved to have felt in my skin the injustice of such a system.  I do not have to have a vagina in order to understand that not having access to a medical procedure rarely if ever taken up lightly is vitally important.  And I don't need to be hanged by a mob to know that all forms of vigilante justice is unacceptable in a country that aims to be civilized.  As for the draft card, well I volunteered to serve in the military so I don't see the point.  As far as I'm concerned pacifists need to have their heads caved in with a bat, because they are the first to surrender to any fascist, communist or foreign threat.  I take my line of thinking from Patrick Henry, a white man:

Patrick Henry Wrote:Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!

Quote:And generational gaps are quite akin to cultural gaps, political gaps, racial gaps, or gender gaps.  Humans are quite good at stereotypes, hatred, tribal thinking and hating the other guy.  I’d suggest that getting involved in any of them involves you in identity politics.  It is very human to divide between Us and Them, seeking to oppress Them in one way or another.  Simply, if you think you are joining an identity conflict without joining an identity conflict, think again.  Examine the mirror closely.

I would argue that politics is the result of culture, which is partially derived from identity.  Some of these identities are innate to an individual, some of them are matters of choice.  In America politics derived from innate idenities are stupid, each American has an overriding identity stronger and more powerful than being black or white or something else, or being a man or a woman (there is no something else there no matter what the snowflakes try to tell you), of being a Christian or a Jew or Muslim or an atheist or something else.  That identity is American.

That identity informs me that Thomas Jefferson and even Robert E. Lee are as important to my make up as my 3X great-grandfather who was a slave.

Quote:I see Kinser as quite legitimately fighting racial and sexual problems.  That’s not directly my fight.  Doesn’t mean I won’t pull the verbal equivalent of a trigger if someone wanders into my sights.  Even then, if Kinser wants me to not fight his fights, I won’t.  That doesn’t mean I don’t have opinions and won’t voice my opinions on the matter generally.  Kinser is hardly the only one with such problems, his isn’t the only approach, he hasn’t the authority to enforce that his approach is to be the only one.

1.  I am.  I've had to deal with a great deal of hatred directed at the two most important people in my life.  Both because they are white, and one because he is a man.
2.  It isn't your fight to fight.  I don't want you involved in it.  Mostly this issue is directly between myself and the male human who donated his genetic material to my creation.
3.  I'm not interested in telling you to not say whatever you want.  If you're not inciting others to violence, crime or panic as far as I'm concerned your right to freedom of speech is absolute.  That applies to the most detestable person imaginable as the most lovable person imaginable.
4.  The methods by which I engage in this struggle is built upon experience.  I've tried many things, some of them dreadfully stupid, others more useful.  What I do know is that if the goal is to limit prejudice and discrimination then the solution cannot be found in "reverse" prejudice and discrimination.

I put reverse into quotes because from my perspective there isn't a reverse.  Discriminating against someone for being white is as bad as doing so because they are black.  Unless we're talking about my bedroom.  Apart from myself, and my cat (Espresso--he's a rescue cat and his fur is black, he also likes to kill things and put them into my shoes) Apartheid is in full effect.

Quote:And I’ll be muttering about his not having been there, he didn’t know what was necessary, he didn’t see the problems of the time.  That’s the real essence of generational prejudices.  Every generation is apt to pick up different lessons learned.  It is better to try to learn the other generation’s lessons than to practice stereotyping, prejudice and hate.

And I'll be muttering at you that you've not experienced the things I have either.  That you don't know what is necessary.  That you weren't there.  So everything you're going to do you'll be getting right back.

[Warren Dew]

(08-31-2017, 09:55 PM)Kinser79 Wrote:

(08-31-2017, 09:42 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I see the identity of the ruling elites evolving.  The agricultural age had a nobility that attempted to monopolize weapon and thus political power.  As first the longbow and then muskets become dominant, we had citizen armies and the old nobility became land owning aristocrats.  The land owning aristocrats eventually contested with the robber barons as the means of gathering wealth changed.

I’m not thrilled by any group of elites being in control, and would emphasize feedback mechanism that allowed the People as a whole to keep the elites in check.  This has tended not to happen with representative democracy, in great part as the representatives tend to become corrupt.  Thus, I’d like to see direct vote networked democracy tried.

Yes, the current military has its virtues, but power corrupts.  The key is allowing a clear enough vision to spot the corruption, and a clear enough tool to pull the corrupt.

In Starship Troopers there is such a system though it isn't gone into much detail in the novel.  I've seen the movie (it is one of my favorite movies actually but I understand that movie was basically written by a cheese eating surrender monkey so his tinkering with the plot makes it suspect) but do not consider it canon. 

Heinlien said that veterans had the right to vote, though it is considered to be a lesser right.  As such this means that there is a lesser democracy.  Rather, the video clip I posted was far more relevant.  Exercising political power is exercising force.  As such it seems prudent to leave the exercising of that force to those who have demonstrated through military service that they are willing to make the safety and security of the body politic their personal responsibility.

This of course necessitates that any such state has an all volunteer military.  Fortunately the US already has such a military and instituting a draft would be an anathema except under the most dire of circumstances, if then.

I think the era of the draft is over.  With nuclear weapons and modern military technology, wars are no longer just a matter of how many warm bodies you can put in the field with rifles.  You don't lose a war because one disgruntled draftee frags his sergeant, but when you're regularly using nuclear weapons, that picture changes.

The other thing mentioned in Heinlein's Starship Troopers is that the system is stable, because in the event of insurrection, the veterans are the ones that determine whether it succeeds.  I wonder how accurate that would be.  I don't think it would have been true in the warm bodies with rifles era, but again, we're due for a change with nuclear weapons.

[Bob Butler 54]

Kinser

Not surprised.

There was an entertainment shtick not many decades ago where the name ’Bruce’ became associated with homosexuality. All an actress had to do to get a laugh was to pronounce ‘Bruce’ with the right inflection. Maybe you’d get an actor to portray the stereotypes of the time to milk the laughs. In time, this provoked a letter to a network executive. The author’s name was Bruce. The ‘comedy’ didn’t much bother him. He was an adult with considerable self confidence. However, his son was an elementary school student also called Bruce.

Stop.

It stopped.

When you say that violence is important, that words never hurt, I don’t doubt it is true of yourself. You sound much more like the father Bruce than the son. I don’t think you speak universal Truth. You speak one guy’s opinion. You have one life experience. The question is whether that opinion is worth anything.

I can admire your honesty regarding tribal thinking. The core of it is essentially true. Folk will care more about tribe members than folk outside the tribe. That seems just human and natural. I’d question the notion that tribal identity is fixed in size or in content. These things are culturally learned. To me, it is clear that this has become part of the US’s red / blue divide. Some have welcomed a greater number of people into their tribe. The idea of a maximum tribal size is just a poor excuse.

What I’m hearing is that tribal thinking has you not practicing identity politics within your tribe, but you will blatantly openly practice it outside the tribe. All I can say is that I have a larger tribe. As I don’t anticipate enlarging your thinking, I don’t expect you to shrink mine.

I can’t speak for all blue boomers, but I wouldn’t be surprised by a good number who would agree.

Refraining from tribal thinking, refraining from identity politics, refraining from stereotypes, prejudice and hate, all seem worthy goals to me. They are perhaps not the center of my life. I don’t feel compelled to stand on soap boxes on street corners, let alone make fists while standing in the shadow of a confederate general’s statue. However, on the rare occasion when the situations arise, the moral compass is there.

At your request, you can fight your own battles. Just don’t expect others not to fight theirs.

I did watch the Boondocks video. I sympathize with many of the ideas. I wouldn’t use the language, or get away with it. But, mostly, it seemed an exercise in one person from a different time with different values putting words in the mouth of another. The person who wrote the video’s words just didn’t earn MLK’s place, so he stole it.

Me, I’m glad MLK achieved what he did. At the same time, I suspect he wouldn’t have gotten so far without Malcom X in the wings. They are more a team, a complementary pair of representatives of their time, than many people appreciate.

[pbrower2a]

(09-01-2017, 03:20 PM)Bob Butler 54 Wrote: I can sympathize with blacks and homosexuals who have been stereotyped and the victim of prejudice.  You can say that it isn't my fight.  I don’t have a duty to go out and correct these things.  However, quite arguably, I have a duty not to be part of the problem.  (See Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience for the logic.)  If I have stereotypes and prejudices I feel an urge to stifle them, not to act on them to the best of my ability.  It is akin to tribal thinking.  One route to self improvement is to avoid vile stereotypes and the accompanying prejudice.

It's "There but for the grace of God go I". If a difference is involuntary and harmless, then I am in no ethical position in which to disparage the difference. One does not choose one's ancestors and thus the genetic traits that suggest that (in America) that one's ancestors included chattel slaves. Religion usually reflects the culture in which one was brought up. One can reject the Catholic Church, but one cannot fully reject all of the subtle patterns of thought that are part of a Catholic childhood. One is not evil fr being a dwarf. Being caught in a house fire? The scars could remain with you for the rest of your life.  Until there is some discovery of a cure for spinal cord injury, we can assume paraplegia and quadriplegia permanent.

People can make destructive, harmful choices, and we can judge those. Criminality, drug addiction, and alcoholism are obvious enough. But nobody chose African origin in South Africa under Apartheid, and nobody chose to be classified as "Jewish" and thus damned to extermination under Hitler. Racism and religious bigotry might be just under the cautious cover of a personality, but when they are released in fullest virulence they can make life pointlessly miserable -- or damned. Nobody would ever see me as black, but on the Web I fit at least three stereotypes of "Jewishness".

I have experienced gay-bashing... and after that experience I decided to stand for homosexual rights so that people would have less of an excuse for doing evil to real or imagined homosexuals. The problem wasn't that I did not have the means with which to convince the angry bigot that I am straight. (It's really simple -- male homosexual porn does not excite me, and I am not going beyond that). I do not exude crude masculinity, so the bigot must have thought that because I am a sissy in contrast to him that I must be gay. I quit making gay jokes.

Quote:This is not a universal urge.  There are neo confederates and neo nazis among others who will play with prejudice and embrace tribal thinking with glee.

I certainly do not want in that tribe. But I do not want to belong to the tribe of pedophiles, either. Or car thieves. Or alcoholics.

If it is ethnicity, I am about half people of British and Irish origin and about half of German-speaking peoples (Germany and Switzerland). That's not much of a unifying identity except as "white". So what? Female beauty needs not look like me to be attractive.  There might be some comfort in my cultural identity, but that also imposes boredom.

Quote:I’m a boomer, however.  Boomer hatred is common.  There are many people here who have boomer stereotypes and exercise boomer prejudices quite openly.  This is often not though as important as racial, cultural or gender stereotypes,  but it is comparable. Some people build stereotypes and exercise prejudices.

As a Boomer I see some of the patterns. Of course I like to see myself as cultured and principled and with a capacity for vision. But if I have had ruthlessness, arrogance, or selfishness the elites (especially among my generation) have extirpated those. Boomer elites in politics, ownership, and management have treated even their generational peers harshly. There are people who believe resolutely that the rest of humanity are proles and peons to be treated badly for the gain and indulgence of elites as if such were the Will of God... and the harsher the view of the Will of God, the harsher is the person holding that view.

People like me did not prevail, and those who did prevail in my generation would be perfectly happy if I were to disappear.

Quote:I’m not totally innocent of this.  Thing is, part of being a blue boomer suggests trying to fight such things as prejudice and stereotypes.  Still, there are thing I do think of the younger generations.  Much of them fall under the category of “they do know know, they were not there.”  They have not felt the lynchings, bled over the coat hanger abortions, or carried a live draft card.

That takes some of the edge off the stereotypical thinking of the young, but it doesn’t help at a detailed level if someone is locked in, unwilling to listen, if someone lacks the imagination to figure it out.

I am as young as one could be to remember news reports of the dead-end resistance to desegregation. I remember seeing a nearly-new Ford Galaxie being pulled out of a Mississippi swamp and figuring that something really bad had happened to three missing young men. Soon afterward the bodies were found.





We still have video that can create genuine memories for people who were not there. So it was with newsreels of the exposure of Nazi concentration camps. If I find law and order essential to life. liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, I find brutality and exploitation inexcusable.

Quote:I should be known for saying there are reasons for major cultures, subcultures.  They didn’t appear from nowhere.  The world views and values behind the cultures once were accurate, once produced favorable results.  There are places still where the old cultural memes still produce favorable results and are very well thought of.  Just watching the ‘debates’ here can show you that if you’d care to listen.

The fault with tribal thinking is not that it recognizes people as tribes different in their own rights and for benign causes, but instead that there is one's own tribe and everybody else as a sort of tribe of lesser value. 

Quote:And generational gaps are quite akin to cultural gaps, political gaps, racial gaps, or gender gaps.  Humans are quite good at stereotypes, hatred, tribal thinking and hating the other guy.  I’d suggest that getting involved in any of them involves you in identity politics.  It is very human to divide between Us and Them, seeking to oppress Them in one way or another.  Simply, if you think you are joining an identity conflict without joining an identity conflict, think again.  Examine the mirror closely.

Time is as much environment as anything else. Time establishes what technologies are available and what institutions are in operation. Something so obvious as "black" means something very different in Virginia in 1947 and in Virginia in 2017. Being gay in America once long meant being confused with pedophiles -- but a same-sex male couple that has a child might ferociously defend that child from any pedophile.

I may be wise enough to recognize that oppression does great, unconscionable harm. Add to this -- I can be jaded of my own 'group' as defined by ethnic origin. Someone else's culture might have something attractive to offer.

Need I be Japanese to appreciate this?

Quote:I see Kinser as quite legitimately fighting racial and sexual problems.  That’s not directly my fight.  Doesn’t mean I won’t pull the verbal equivalent of a trigger if someone wanders into my sights.  Even then, if Kinser wants me to not fight his fights, I won’t.  That doesn’t mean I don’t have opinions and won’t voice my opinions on the matter generally.  Kinser is hardly the only one with such problems, his isn’t the only approach, he hasn’t the authority to enforce that his approach is to be the only one.

I do not have Asperger's syndrome. It has me.  I would rather be black or gay than live under a circumstance that has messed my life up about as badly as addiction or having an IQ on the borderline of mental retardation. I would not choose addiction or a low IQ, the former because of its consequences to others or the latter because, as little identity as I have outside of Asperger's, my intellect largely defines what I am and can enjoy.

Asperger's has messed up my ability to attract a wife. Yes, I would have likely married out of the ethnic background I was brought up in just to get some esthetic and intellectual enrichment.

Kinser has problems that make his homosexuality and blackness trivialities. He is an extremist, and you probably remember him in his Stalinist incarnation. I see a fanatic, and it is the fanaticism and not the shallow veneer of beliefs that make him so upsetting.

Quote:And I’ll be muttering about his not having been there, he didn’t know what was necessary, he didn’t see the problems of the time.  That’s the real essence of generational prejudices.  Every generation is apt to pick up different lessons learned.  It is better to try to learn the other generation’s lessons than to practice stereotyping, prejudice and hate.

There usually is something behind any stereotype, and when one understands the cause one can excuse the difference.