As time has gone on, our culture has changed to an adversarial one between employer and employee, where people are either “tools” who exhibit sycophantic self-abuse, or surly, grudging “workers” who secretly conspire against their consumerist capitalist feudal overlords. In my view, the one good thing that came out of the dotcom boom — if [...]
Posts from ‘November, 2009’
Solipsism and inversion
In our modern time, we like to show how enlightened we are and talk about “big concepts” like relativity — as long as they confirm our viewpoints, and let us go back to doing whatever it is we do in our personal sphere. For all our blather about relativity, we don’t understand that we are [...]
Reverence: Renewing a Forgotten Virtue, by Paul Woodruff
Reverence: Renewing a Forgotten Virtue, by Paul Woodruff. $11, Oxford University Press) This little book wins people over because of its simplicity not its rhetorical fireworks or intricate arguments. When you think about it, distilling a simple truth out of a complex situation is either supremely difficult, or strikingly dishonest. In this case, I believe, [...]
Diversity our greatest liability
“My fellow Americans, we must never, ever believe that our diversity is a weakness — it is our greatest strength.” William Jefferson Clinton, State of the Union 1997 Twelve years after this insidious slogan was uttered and accepted by our obliviot voting population, the contrary results continue to reveal themselves. Maybe it is more accurate [...]
Renaissance humanism also fails us today
Once upon a time, populations weren’t diverse, at least not anywhere near to the forced extent they are today. Some of these non-diverse populations started to think of ways to avoid conflict among themselves, which included thinking about ending fratricide. One consequence of the development of humanist philosophy during the Renaissance was the increased emphasis [...]
Economy better off with less people
While there aren’t necessarily less people in the U.S. than in recent years, there are less people working and there is less spending. Under this scenario, the following report came as a surprise for many people: Stocks continued to move higher and the Dow Jones Industrial Average hit a new 2009 intraday high Monday, extending [...]
Remaking modern society
Some metal message board member offers a challenge. Assumption: we often discuss politics and this domain has its own definite views. But we are taught democracy, capitalism and liberal civil/women’s rights together comprise “freedom,” and that anything but freedom is “bad.” So what can we do? We shrug and watch the ongoing travesty, certain we [...]
Bukkake and your daughter
Argument to the extremes is debater’s shorthand for a criticism of any proposed idea by taking it to its most overblown, least-restricted, fully anarchistic conclusion. For example, I say “legalize drugs” and you say “then you’ll have mothers giving their babies crack in order to keep them quiet.” It seems absurd, but it sometimes coincides [...]
The blame game
The internet is amazing because every person on it is a cheerleader. They’re out there shouting their truth so that you think they’re cool even if they’ve kind of failed at life. Many agree humanity’s in trouble; most awakened only when this temporary recession hit, and their consumption and defecation was interrupted. Here are some [...]
Altruism, status and liberalism as a fashion
Roll back preconceptions for a minute, and look at history as a series of 3,000-year cycles. After all, that’s about how long it takes an idea to take hold of a population and be fully acted out, from the highest to the lowest levels. By “idea” here I mean a big idea. The biggest idea [...]
