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PaperclipPerfector  6mo ago (text post)   25607 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 20, 2024

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It's the illusion of mastery over human nature when you're really just cultivating the worst parts of it.

I'm reminded of someone in this sphere once describing Francisco Franco versus typical fascist leaders in this (paraphrased) way: "Fascist leaders often saw themselves as the architect of the soul. Franco was just a cop."

I think all authoritarianism and elitism pretty much comes down to this core, that one can, with sufficient will-to-power and unquestionable primacy, have power over what is in a man's heart itself. By contrast, liberalism and progressivism fundamentally surrender that what others do or are is out of one's control, and the differences come down to how to handle that.

with sufficient will-to-power and unquestionable primacy, have power over what is in a man's heart itself.

I like, and agree, with this.

By contrast, liberalism and progressivism fundamentally surrender that what others do or are is out of one's control

Totally agree re: liberalism, but, in the case of progressivism I think the case is that while it does "surrender that what others do or are is out of control," it also makes hard right vs. wrong value judgments. Phrased differently, "I can't control what's in another person's heart, but I can damn sure tell (with authority) if it's good or bad and, therefore, if that person is good or bad."

And that's a massive, massive problem because, followed to its logical extreme, you get to genocide. No, I don't think that's hyperbolic. From some of the speech laws in the UK to BLM in the US, progressive movements move quickly down the path of "disagreement with us is a clear demonstration of evil." If something is truly, deeply "evil" you can easily deduce what the next logical step would be in "dealing" with it.

As an (aspiring) TradCath, I am actually very much okay with hard good vs. bad value judgement - but only in a transcendental sense. I have no problem thinking someone is evil but will wait for The Big Man Upstairs to mete out whatever punishments are warranted in the afterlife. Back on planet earth, I definitely do not want The State to be the high moral arbiter. That's insanely dangerous.

I am not a squishy "live and let level" humanist moral relativist. I believe there is definitely right and wrong, good and evil. I think it's often plain to see which is which. But a political ideology shouldn't be the rubric for that judgement, and certainly not the enforcement executive for perceived transgressions. Progressivism doubles down on all of that by creating a kind of secular quasi-religion. It's a cult, and we're seeing it go through what all cults do; internal strife and self-destruction because of untenable internal contradictions.

By contrast, liberalism and progressivism fundamentally surrender that what others do or are is out of one's control, and the differences come down to how to handle that.

That created the loudest record scratch in my head I've heard in a while.

As far as I can tell this is precisely backwards. The entire point of progressivism is to remake human nature. What else do you call it's unrelenting obsession with equity, insistence that everything is a social construct, galaxy-brained ideas like having social workers fight crime? I've had progressives tell me point-blank that human nature does not exist. Even liberalism isn't free from this, though it's notably toned down.

To be sure there are right-wing equivalents of this. Fascism was a revolutionary ideology, so I can grant you the argument there - though I'd note that this is largely where Hlynka's alt-right progressive meme - but for more traditional forms of authoritarianism / elitism, their entire point is to respond to human nature, rather than acting like you can engineer it.

Thank you, I spent hours trying to come up with a "new soviet man was noble savage all along, is much surprise" joke.

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