There is a lot of argument about whether progressives really believe what they say, or whether it's just social pieties they regurgitate to signal being high class. From my experience talking with progs, these don't seem to be conflicting paradigms as much as basically the same thing for most. While there are some people who can separate the two, the average prog sees elite consensus as true by the very nature that it's elite consensus.
The rhetoric of saying, "why does it matter?" makes sense, since it's simultaneously a real belief and just a linguistic piety. In other words, solipsism all the way down.
I may be off but I am reminded of the recent J Burden piece tyranny of just https://jburden.substack.com/p/the-tyranny-of-just, you're both touching on this progressive tactic/reflex of trivializing things to avoid having to confront them
This is the best distillation of what's wrong with Obama era liberalism that I've read. In short, we can do what we want because surely there are "adults in the room" somewhere
Man, I really had a f'ing blast reading this article.
It is just very very perceptive. For me it actually describes how this beast "works", i.e. what is the actual mechanism around good intentions, downplaying problems and evading responsibility, metastasing of the problems, etc; in the same way as Atlas Shrugged for me explains the aspects of the competency crisis which are more general than the D.I.E. link, that is, it explains its essence. The psychology behind the good progressive's viewpoint, the assumption that there surely is some adult correcting things, is completely true. I literally had this conversation only yesterday, things can't get out of hand because the judicial system is very slow and therefore crazyness just doesn't seep into it that easily.
The trans issue, at its face value, is really a non-issue though. Like communism, it's self-evidently nonsensical. It's only an issue when big money is being pumped into it, and people respond to big money. So the actors defending it don't need to be entertained seriously, especially not fringe actors like journalists. What really matters is what is the logic behind this sickness, who is pumping the money and for what gain? For communism, we have a lead in the Fabian Society, and many of the Fabians wrote extensively about the logic behind this social technology. You just have translate from the British and remember you're listening to the guys who set up the first concentration camps, sold fleets full of opium to Chinese and used to sell Irish as slaves. But you can open up Bertrand Russell and in the 1920s he plainly writes what will happen to Russia and China later in the 20th century. I'll allow myself to remind you that Britain was the world's hegemon at the time and was (still is) a feudal society with an extensive tradition of secret societies. Imagine that if instead of studying up on the Fabians and four Internationals, the history of socialism in Prussia and Austria, you were to sit down and debunk the complete works of Marx, Lenin and whatever came out of Stalin's desk any given week. You'd be wasting your time, reputation and energy on nonsense. It would be like putting Earth at the center of the Solar system, not technically wrong but completely unusable.
These problems are small, but so am I. It is my job to care about the small things.
Due to the over-use of profanity in this article, I am not sending it out via e-mail.
There is a lot of argument about whether progressives really believe what they say, or whether it's just social pieties they regurgitate to signal being high class. From my experience talking with progs, these don't seem to be conflicting paradigms as much as basically the same thing for most. While there are some people who can separate the two, the average prog sees elite consensus as true by the very nature that it's elite consensus.
The rhetoric of saying, "why does it matter?" makes sense, since it's simultaneously a real belief and just a linguistic piety. In other words, solipsism all the way down.
I may be off but I am reminded of the recent J Burden piece tyranny of just https://jburden.substack.com/p/the-tyranny-of-just, you're both touching on this progressive tactic/reflex of trivializing things to avoid having to confront them
The eunuchs are ever the ruin of the state.
This is the best distillation of what's wrong with Obama era liberalism that I've read. In short, we can do what we want because surely there are "adults in the room" somewhere
Civilization ends not with a scream, but with a snide "How does this effect you personally?"
Man, I really had a f'ing blast reading this article.
It is just very very perceptive. For me it actually describes how this beast "works", i.e. what is the actual mechanism around good intentions, downplaying problems and evading responsibility, metastasing of the problems, etc; in the same way as Atlas Shrugged for me explains the aspects of the competency crisis which are more general than the D.I.E. link, that is, it explains its essence. The psychology behind the good progressive's viewpoint, the assumption that there surely is some adult correcting things, is completely true. I literally had this conversation only yesterday, things can't get out of hand because the judicial system is very slow and therefore crazyness just doesn't seep into it that easily.
Great work.
The trans issue, at its face value, is really a non-issue though. Like communism, it's self-evidently nonsensical. It's only an issue when big money is being pumped into it, and people respond to big money. So the actors defending it don't need to be entertained seriously, especially not fringe actors like journalists. What really matters is what is the logic behind this sickness, who is pumping the money and for what gain? For communism, we have a lead in the Fabian Society, and many of the Fabians wrote extensively about the logic behind this social technology. You just have translate from the British and remember you're listening to the guys who set up the first concentration camps, sold fleets full of opium to Chinese and used to sell Irish as slaves. But you can open up Bertrand Russell and in the 1920s he plainly writes what will happen to Russia and China later in the 20th century. I'll allow myself to remind you that Britain was the world's hegemon at the time and was (still is) a feudal society with an extensive tradition of secret societies. Imagine that if instead of studying up on the Fabians and four Internationals, the history of socialism in Prussia and Austria, you were to sit down and debunk the complete works of Marx, Lenin and whatever came out of Stalin's desk any given week. You'd be wasting your time, reputation and energy on nonsense. It would be like putting Earth at the center of the Solar system, not technically wrong but completely unusable.