naraburns nihil supernum
1yr ago
(text post)
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Israel-Gaza Megathread #1
This is a megathread for any posts on the conflict between (so far, and so far as I know) Hamas and the Israeli government, as well as related geopolitics. Culture War thread rules apply.
I'd gladly witness your culling by a militarily superior race in its quest for Lebensraum, so long as it's explicitly justified with this inane correlational logic.
Despite the triteness of this platitude, correlation really does not imply causation. There are some tenuous reasons for morality to be weakly correlated with formidability, but overwhelmingly it's just due to the fact that peoples of Western Christian extraction are the strongest, have been for centuries, and have recently developed some queer compunctions. Well, this particular mix of character traits isn't globally optimal, and their exalted status isn't going to last much longer. Technologically advanced Chinese, Turks, Jews, Arabs, Mongols, Africans, whatever, wherever (including in your nations, including in their halls of power) will be as ruthless as they need to, and increasingly prove this as your race decays; first they'll bother with some glib chattering, then they'll stop. You are used to mercy and magnanimity tempering realpolitik. You'll cope about power being self-justifying, inherently beautiful and ultimately more True than any morality when those shackles are cast away.
I'd gladly witness your culling by a militarily superior race in its quest for Lebensraum, so long as it's explicitly justified with this inane correlational logic.
Already happened. And my nazi grandfathers had to witness the full extent of their moral, racial, military and epistemologic inferiority. They fought till destruction because they really believed in the correlation, far more than I do. In a way it vindicated the theory while it destroyed them and their particular beliefs.
When you’re living in your bombed-out capital, your conscience sullied, your army destroyed, your reputation infamous, the universe is trying to tell you something. You can immediately exclude the hypothesis of having done anything right, and of your own superiority.
I don't think realpolitik will triumph if the west falls - people have always resisted the athenians, even when it was hopeless - witness the realists anger at Ukraine. If china dominates, they'll just make their own rules russia and the others will have to obey, and the russians will still be grumbling about 'universalism' .
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Notes -
I'd gladly witness your culling by a militarily superior race in its quest for Lebensraum, so long as it's explicitly justified with this inane correlational logic.
Despite the triteness of this platitude, correlation really does not imply causation. There are some tenuous reasons for morality to be weakly correlated with formidability, but overwhelmingly it's just due to the fact that peoples of Western Christian extraction are the strongest, have been for centuries, and have recently developed some queer compunctions. Well, this particular mix of character traits isn't globally optimal, and their exalted status isn't going to last much longer. Technologically advanced Chinese, Turks, Jews, Arabs, Mongols, Africans, whatever, wherever (including in your nations, including in their halls of power) will be as ruthless as they need to, and increasingly prove this as your race decays; first they'll bother with some glib chattering, then they'll stop. You are used to mercy and magnanimity tempering realpolitik. You'll cope about power being self-justifying, inherently beautiful and ultimately more True than any morality when those shackles are cast away.
Already happened. And my nazi grandfathers had to witness the full extent of their moral, racial, military and epistemologic inferiority. They fought till destruction because they really believed in the correlation, far more than I do. In a way it vindicated the theory while it destroyed them and their particular beliefs.
When you’re living in your bombed-out capital, your conscience sullied, your army destroyed, your reputation infamous, the universe is trying to tell you something. You can immediately exclude the hypothesis of having done anything right, and of your own superiority.
I don't think realpolitik will triumph if the west falls - people have always resisted the athenians, even when it was hopeless - witness the realists anger at Ukraine. If china dominates, they'll just make their own rules russia and the others will have to obey, and the russians will still be grumbling about 'universalism' .
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