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ZorbaTHut  2yr ago (text post)   31616 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 17, 2022

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Cowen has a lot of good points, but he ultimately turns a blind eye to the race problem which is the fatal flaw of classical liberalism (a flaw which was not shared by their 18th century counterparts- who failed in their own way, but they did not deny the problem like classical liberals of today). Cowen even acknowledges "the Brazilianification of the United States... Brazil being a paradigmatic example of a low trust society and government."

But he invokes Brazilianification as purely a political failure of trust rather than an outcome of a race problem. This is what Brazilianification looks like Mr. Cowen, and it's not caused by pessimism from would-be classical liberal idealists. It's caused by the type of power dynamics that the "New Right" appreciates and accepts as being a premise that any aspiring ideology must operate within.

There does seem to be a growing influence of Alt-right/dissident-right/New Right/Deep Right/Whatever right on the more mainstream right discourse which is very interesting to see. Cowen does seem to grasp the big picture, he just leaves out a few pieces of the puzzle.

Cowen's best point is that "the stupider version" of the New Right could threaten to be worse than the status quo:

Very recently we have seen low trust lead to easily induced skepticism about the 2020 election results, and also easily induced skepticism about vaccines. The best New Right thinkers will avoid those mistakes, but still every political philosophy has to be willing to live with “the stupider version” of its core tenets. I fear that the stupider version of some of the New Right views are very hard to make compatible with political stability or for that matter with public health.

But I think this argument could have been made 15 years ago, where anxiety over Obamacare or something was the most polarizing issue of the day. But political polarization has gone so far that these values have lost credibility. If more intelligent people like Cowen accept the core tenets of the New Right then that would reduce the risk of "the stupider version" having a monopoly on crucially important premises in the political discourse.

Ultimately though it's encouraging to see classical liberals acknowledge the criticisms that have created this demand for an "alternative" Right.

Brazil's problem is not. Race is only a problem in so far as one subscribes to Marxist (or more accurately post-Marxist) models of class interest. Sadly Brazil, much like academia is rife with current and former Marxists.

This is not anything new, this is just the Trad-Right's old warnings about rootless cosmopolitans and dangers of identity politics coming to pass.

But I think this argument could have been made 15 years ago, where anxiety over Obamacare or something was the most polarizing issue of the day. But political polarization has gone so far that these values have lost credibility.

Tell me you're under the age of 25 without using those words. Look kid, I'm old enough to remember the OKC Bombing and there being serious discussion in about whether McVeigh had actually done anything wrong.

Ah yes, who could forget the mid-90s. Truly the peak of political polarization and Brazilianification. I'm glad the country is so much more unified in comparison to those dark times.

Ah yes, who could forget the mid-90s. Truly the peak of political polarization and Brazilianification. I'm glad the country is so much more unified in comparison to those dark times.

You might think you're dunking on me right now but I'm dead fucking serious. As bad as the the current state of polarization is, the early-mid 90s were arguably a lot worse. At the very least sectarian violence was producing a lot more bodies than it is today. Ruby Ridge, Waco, the Rodney King Riots, OKC, Abortion Clinic Bombings, Church Bombings, University Bombings, the DC Sniper Attacks, need I go on?

I think you are right. Back then , the unrest was the real thing, not like the AstroTurf stuff we see now. They were playing for keeps, not just making noise. There has been an uptick in mass shootings though. But people seemed as divided during the Clinton era, such as Hillarycare, which was a huge deal at the time, as they are now. Same for the Lewinsky scandal, which was polarizing. Or the 1995-1996 government shutdowns. The difference now is social media has an amplifying effect on discourse.

The past decade has its own list of similar tragedies and shocking, violent acts. But if we're talking about political polarization, we have ways we can measure that and the notion that the country is more politically united today than it was in the mid-90s is clearly not true.

The past decade has its own list of similar tragedies and shocking, violent acts.

Sure, but scale matters. The Blue tribe media basically lost their minds over Kenosha Kyle, imagine their response if there had been multiple running gunfights between "right wing neighborhood militias" and "anti-racism activists" in the way that used to be the norm.

Likewise I don't think that anyone is going to deny that academia and the media have become hopelessly polarized but at the same time academia and the media have been becoming less and less representative of the nation at large so what is actually being measured?

Not DC Sniper, that's off by a decade (2002). The bombings might be a wash; in the wake of Dobbs, there were a number of arson attacks on churches and crisis pregnancy centers by pro-abortion radicals. Did the 90s bombings have higher body count? Unabomber killed two people in the early-mid 90s.

Eh my bad, you hit middle age and everything that happened before you were 30 just starts to blend together. It came to mind because the political angle of that one (a pair of hardcore Anti-fa types trying to start a race war) always seems to get conveniently memory holed if/when the incident is mentioned at all. My recollection is that abortion activists and anti-abortion activists killed about a dozen between them.

Edit to Add: For such a smart guy Kazinsky was really bad at actually building bombs and as someone who actually kind of sympathizes with his manifesto, I feel dirty for occasionally wishing he'd had more "success".

done in by ego, really . for someone so smart and principled, he was was not immune to these sins.

But he invokes Brazilianification as purely a political failure of trust rather than an outcome of a race problem. This is what Brazilianification looks like Mr. Cowen, and it's not caused by pessimism from would-be classical liberal idealists. It's caused by the type of power dynamics that the "New Right" appreciates and accepts as being a premise that any aspiring ideology must operate within.

Many countries that are more ethnically homogenous than the US have had unrest/crisis over the past decade, worse than the US. Moreover, most unrest, such as protests, tend to be homogenous. I think more diversity may lower social trust but it paradoxically engenders societal stability.

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