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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   26432 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 15, 2024

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On the other hand, violent schizophrenics attacking people on the subways is obviously not the default.

Respectfully, I assure you that it is. At the very least i contest that it's "obviously not".

I don’t understand what you mean.

In a state of nature, the unproductive, unpleasant crazy person would have long since starved, frozen, been driven into the wilderness, or perhaps been killed by others. I meant the enabling behavior of everyone else other than the crazy homeless person (enabled by surrounding civilizational resources) and the man confronting him (possibly representative of a state of nature).

In a state of nature, the unproductive, unpleasant crazy person would have long since starved, frozen, been driven into the wilderness, or perhaps been killed by others.

You're absolutely correct and as I observed below this is one of those odd paradoxes of living in a prosperous liberal society. The failure in this case is ultimately one of imagination. That you don't typically see the underlying mechanisms of society does not mean that they are not real or present.

As I argue in my response to @guesswho, the fact that many people can go their entire lives without ever having to get blood on their hands represents the strength and prosperity of our society, but that doesn't mean the dirty work isn't getting done. Or that failure to do it will not have negative consequences.

Edit: "Represents" not "Respects"

the fact that many people can go their entire lives without ever having to get blood on their hands represents the strength and prosperity of our society, but that doesn't mean the dirty work isn't getting done. Or that failure to do it will not have negative consequences.

Yes, that makes sense.

I would expect many liberals to know this. My democrat relative who lives on the Chicago South Side and served in Vietnam certainly knows this, but maybe you're using "liberal" as something more like progressive or woke? I suppose there are some regular liberals who really believe the propaganda.

I’m pretty sure that in a state of nature, some kind of primitive clan based society, Neely would not have lived long enough to threaten random people on the subway.

There is an interesting paradox one observes in "less civilized" societies like East Africa where life is simultaneously much more dangerous and yet in some ways cleaner and safer.

While on one hand you need to be on constant guard against armed bandits, wild animal attacks, and random freak accidents resulting from a complete lack of anything resembling OSHA standards, or even basic traffic laws. On the other hand, you don't see a lot of the sort of low level "random" crime you see in parts of the US because the true degenerates generally don't live long enough to become a problem.

What subway?

Correct. Neely survived as long as he did because he had the full backing of the sovereign. Why Hlynka thinks this is a point in favor of Hobbes, I do not understand.

I think you're arguing at cross-purposes. His claim is that the "on the subways" part of that is not the default, because in the state of nature subways don't exist. You can presumably claim that the current paradigm if continued is going to lead to the subways not existing anymore - the Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return! - but you do want to actually spell that out, not just say "no ur rong".

What I took @HlynkaCG to mean was that, even though subways aren't the state of nature, the underlying mentality of the schizophrenic who attacks people on the subway is the state of nature. The subway isn't the relevant part, but rather the crazy guy lashing out.

The subway isn't the relevant part, but rather the crazy guy lashing out.

Precisely

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