tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post1208335680698209686..comments2024-03-29T20:21:24.821+11:00Comments on The Social Pathologist: The Failure of Conservatism.The Social Pathologisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12927698533626086780noreply@blogger.comBlogger20125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-88255923793451020492015-11-14T00:30:06.304+11:002015-11-14T00:30:06.304+11:00And you can't argue with success. The countrie...And you can't argue with success. The countries that have been beating the US in every social Metric known are all less conservative than the US. Every single one of them. <br /><br />The counties of Western Europe have crafted the highest standard of living ever experienced. <br /><br />The whole "free lunch" mentality is aimed at the stupid to distract them. It is ideology not reality. Macrhinohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15503632949739109297noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-57919671954132500192013-11-17T16:43:06.113+11:002013-11-17T16:43:06.113+11:00A Conservatism which fails to make some value judg...<i>A Conservatism which fails to make some value judgements is conservatism that cannot govern properly</i><br /><br />How do we get back to a Conservatism that makes value judgements and then actual sticks to them rather than being "manipulated in any direction," as Carnivore noted?sunshinemaryhttp://sunshinemaryandthedragonwordpress.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-1669933126662048952013-11-12T07:53:34.103+11:002013-11-12T07:53:34.103+11:001)that both players have the intellectual capacity...<i>1)that both players have the intellectual capacity to formulate a stable system.</i><br /><br />That groups of human beings throughout history have adopted norms of behavior indicates that it is a basic instinct, not predicated on will or intellect.<br /><br /><i>2) that both players want to engage in reciprocity, either willingly or unwillingly.</i><br /><br />If human morality is based on instinct, not on will or autonomous intellect, then the question isn't "what is right" but "who is in my corner". Morality just *happens*, and we just have to figure out who is on our side and who is not.<br /><br />Note, I am talking about human morality, not God's Law.Ashernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-17946445643040280442013-11-12T07:18:27.336+11:002013-11-12T07:18:27.336+11:00This is a relativistic notion, itself. IF you want...<i>This is a relativistic notion, itself. IF you want sustainable, modern civilization THEN there is a limited set of norms available to achieve that goal. Just saying this sentence makes you a moral relativist.</i><br /><br />In order to analyse morals you've got to get beyond them and look at them from a meta level. Self referential systems can judge their own truth, it's basic Godel.<br /><br /><i>The upside of moral relativism is that morality is based on mutual reciprocity, and you owe no moral considerations to one who does not owe them to you, in kind.</i><br /><br />That assumes;<br /><br />1)that both players have the intellectual capacity to formulate a stable system.<br /><br />2) that both players want to engage in reciprocity, either willingly or unwillingly.<br /><br />Fine in theory, fails in practice.<br /><br />The Social Pathologisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12927698533626086780noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-564387952054549452013-11-12T07:13:35.989+11:002013-11-12T07:13:35.989+11:00oops
Moral non-relativism is that there is only o...oops<br /><br /><i>Moral non-relativism is that there is only one universal and timeless standard that is suitable for human beings in this life.</i><br /><br />Should read<br /><br />Moral non-relativism is the positioon that there is only one universal and timeless standard that is suitable for human beings in this life.Ashernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-62326871984544194772013-11-12T07:06:38.595+11:002013-11-12T07:06:38.595+11:00Sustainable civilisation with sustained technical ...<i>Sustainable civilisation with sustained technical advancement seems only possible with narrow moral limits</i><br /><br />This is a relativistic notion, itself. IF you want sustainable, modern civilization THEN there is a limited set of norms available to achieve that goal. Just saying this sentence makes you a moral relativist.<br /><br />Moral non-relativism is that there is only one universal and timeless standard that is suitable for human beings in this life.<br /><br />The upside of moral relativism is that morality is based on mutual reciprocity, and you owe no moral considerations to one who does not owe them to you, in kind.Ashernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-17143229397280912862013-11-11T23:35:59.026+11:002013-11-11T23:35:59.026+11:00@ Johnny Caustic
Cold Friday.
Brandon
So we'...@ Johnny Caustic<br /><br /><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Cold-Friday-Whittaker-Chambers/dp/0394419693" rel="nofollow">Cold Friday.</a><br /><br />Brandon<br /><br /><i>So we've sold our souls (and our social order) for the privilege of having MRIs? </i><br /><br />And penicillin. <br /><br />Asher<br /><br /><i>Moral relativism isn't the problem.</i><br /><br />Yes it is. Sustainable civilisation with sustained technical advancement seems only possible with narrow moral limits. Ignore those limits and the system collapses, as we are about to see.The Social Pathologisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12927698533626086780noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-65023648590725321612013-11-11T12:19:18.232+11:002013-11-11T12:19:18.232+11:00Which Whittaker Chambers book should I read if I w...Which Whittaker Chambers book should I read if I want to see this deep conservative thinking and only have time to read one book?Johnny Causticnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-44926527315481775402013-11-11T09:31:10.248+11:002013-11-11T09:31:10.248+11:00So we've sold our souls (and our social order)...So we've sold our souls (and our social order) for the privilege of having MRIs? <br /><br />A Faustian bargain, that. Brandonnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-78263150859663827442013-11-10T23:32:51.571+11:002013-11-10T23:32:51.571+11:00Perhaps related to #2, is the very annoying (to me...Perhaps related to #2, is the very annoying (to me, at least) habit of Conservatives adopting changes 'ex cathedra' once Washington has spoken, the law has been passed or the vote taken. Using baby steps of change, Conservatives can be manipulated into any desired direction. <br /><br />The recent discussions of putting women in combat roles is a good example. The Conservatives will fall over each other defending the current role of women in the military. Or they will defend the "equal opportunity" of women in the police, all the while forgetting that 20 years ago Conservatives railed against expanding the role of women in the military (to the current level) and 40 years ago Conservatives railed against women becoming police.Carnivorehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09452340825974303142noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-1843132132482018562013-11-10T18:40:57.485+11:002013-11-10T18:40:57.485+11:00Nazism was just another moral system. Not my mora...Nazism was just another moral system. Not my moral system, but one nonetheless.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09260398531366109345noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-49231794324446133362013-11-10T18:05:40.639+11:002013-11-10T18:05:40.639+11:00Moral relativism isn't the problem. The probl...Moral relativism isn't the problem. The problem is when you have different moral universes crammed into the same body politic. "morality" is a human invention and it is only tangentially related to God's Word. The bible isn't a book that establishes morality.<br /><br />Morality isn't transcendental, but mundane. It's just a system of rules and norms that allow the like-minded to work together without stepping on each other's toes. But when you follow God's Word you adhere to something that transcends morality.Ashernoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-44991721329792390112013-11-10T07:15:35.874+11:002013-11-10T07:15:35.874+11:00@Slumlord
>Not my approach.
All the ammo and ...@Slumlord<br /><br />>Not my approach.<br /><br />All the ammo and destruction wrought onto the Vietnamese by the Americans did not not win the war for them and that strategy has not done so well in Afghanistan. The gooks were able to win in Vietnam because they had won the culture war.<br /><br /><br />You misunderstand me. Vietnam and Afghanistan was a war by the top against the bottom. My scenario is more horizontal than vertical.<br /><br />You also missed my part about training "my followers" (the new generation is probably a better term) to live with hardship, lean times and little food. Another advantage that the Vietnamese and Afghans had over the Americans was that they were used to death and hardship in a way American's weren't.<br /><br />Talk about MRI's all you want but regarding death and illness as normal makes the poor more sober in a way First Worlders never could be.Ingemarhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05695600705603036692noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-69831604304901579962013-11-10T06:50:36.018+11:002013-11-10T06:50:36.018+11:00Ingemar
Then I would coordinate a simultaneous at...Ingemar<br /><br /><i>Then I would coordinate a simultaneous attack on major power plants.</i><br /><br />Not my approach. <br /><br />All the ammo and destruction wrought onto the Vietnamese by the Americans did not not win the war for them and that strategy has not done so well in Afghanistan. The gooks were able to win in Vietnam because they had won the <i>culture</i> war.The Social Pathologisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12927698533626086780noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-86653273150345039032013-11-10T06:47:11.548+11:002013-11-10T06:47:11.548+11:00@Marcus.
I've used the quote before as well. ...@Marcus.<br /><br />I've used the quote before as well. Chesterton was way ahead of the curve. <br /><br />King Richard<br /><br /><i>Your analysis makes the common mistake of conflating 'current Anglosphere pop culture and national politics' with 'the world'</i><br /><br />No, what I said that modern conservatism is heavily "Anglo laced" and this has implications. Particularly the Anglo error of conflating Good and "nice". This tends to be less of a problem, particularly amongst the Germans and Central Europeans,who tend to swing towards the opposite dimension and are frequently accused of boorishness. <br /><br /><i>Perhaps my friend was correct when he stated that 'The heresy once called Americanism may need to be called Anglosphere-ism'.</i><br /><br />No, Americanism is another Heresy.<br /><br /><i>I am surprised to see an Australian making an error I usually associate with Americans</i><br /><br />Because of the peculiarities of my circumstances, I effectively grew up in a pre-60's European refuge. That gave me the unique advantage of growing up in an Anglosphere and Middle European culture. I could see the pro's and con's of both. Don't get me wrong, there's a lot of very good things in Anglo culture, but it does have some weaknesses, and when I critique it, I do it as a friend, not an enemy.<br /><br />Still, it is <b>the dominant culture</b> of the world and even countries like Russia and Poland are yielding to its power. Not through deliberate imposition, but because the liberalism inherent in it makes it easy for the average man to take it up uncritically. Thus the culture advances through movies, songs, dress and so on. <br /><br /><i>Tradition is not meant to 'adapt and react' to the newest manufactured crisis of a corrupt system, it is to preserve truth until corrupt systems collapse.</i><br /><br />The problem is that new realities arise. Industrial life bought new realities which tradition had never had to deal with before, "scaling" up did not work. The other problem is that when tradition conflicts with the truth, who get's priority?<br /><br />See, the problem with the traditionalists is they they view each new discovery as an "innovation" or "novelty" and therefore oppose it instinctively.This was Chesterton's point.<br /><br />A tradition should be valued if it is true and discarded if it is false. The traditionalists are quite prepared to live in error and then wonder why they lose all the time. In Boyd's OODA, accurate situational awareness is the foundation upon which proper decisions can be made.The Social Pathologisthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12927698533626086780noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-125527414006489392013-11-09T04:07:32.396+11:002013-11-09T04:07:32.396+11:00Ingemar,
1) population momentum - it takes a few...Ingemar,<br /> 1) population momentum - it takes a few generations for such shifts to be felt on a large scale but when the momentum shifts it takes many more generations to do anything about it. For example, if every female under 35 in Japan started having 5 kids *right now* Japan would still face population decline for another 2-3 generations. Saying 'it hasn't worked yet' is to admit you don't understand how it works.<br />2) Where are these workers going to come from? North Africa has had below-replacement fertility longer than Europe! The continent of Asia has been below replacement fertility for decades; South America is below replacement. All that is left are parts of Sub-Saharan Africa and that is only parts of it, they tend to be the bad parts where skilled workers aren't coming from, and the death rate is so high it is a wash.<br /> Sorry, but world population has effectively peaked *now*. After a few years of plateau population momentum will swing the other way, and hard. By 210 world human population could well be below 2 billion, maybe (maybe) under 1 billion. This is a reduction in human population unlike anything ever seen before - global and without natural disaster or plague. <br />With that being the case, trust me - populations that maintain above replacement fertility will have a very outsized impact on the next few centuries.<br /> And we haven't even talked about political socialization!Building a Better Countryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01894692867577700734noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-16100298489783680712013-11-09T02:43:23.908+11:002013-11-09T02:43:23.908+11:00King Richard,
>Who are the people having child...King Richard,<br /><br />>Who are the people having children?<br /><br />Look at any list of statistics of countries by total fertility; now consider the Anglosphere's porous immigration policies.<br /><br />Conservatives have been relying on the tired "we'll outbreed them" flavor of wishful thinking for two generations now, maybe three. It hasn't worked. <br /><br />Globalization means that the liberals can outsource whatever labour they can, import human capital for the labour they can't, and technology increasingly means that human input is necessary.<br /><br />Slumlord,<br />>The problem is, so do the material conditions of modern life. You need an industrial society to produce MRI machines.<br /><br />If I were a forward (backward?) thinking revolutionary, I'd train my followers to get used to famine, disease, lean times and the necessity of living by one's hands. Then I would coordinate a simultaneous attack on major power plants.<br /><br />Electricity is the Achilles Heel of modern society. Imagine a fragile body politic that no longer has the social media panem et circenses. Ingemarhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05695600705603036692noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-59389065588310644312013-11-09T02:11:09.740+11:002013-11-09T02:11:09.740+11:00With all respect:
Your analysis makes the common... With all respect:<br /> Your analysis makes the common mistake of conflating 'current Anglosphere pop culture and national politics' with 'the world'. I am surprised to see an Australian making an error I usually associate with Americans. Perhaps my friend was correct when he stated that 'The heresy once called Americanism may need to be called Anglosphere-ism'.<br /> But, to actually continue. Social issues are certainly not dead throughout the world; look at Russia, Poland, and Romania where there is active opposition to homosexuality, feminism, etc. and actual Conservative parties are strong and active in politics.<br /> Also, do not confuse ';a handful of political parties' with actual Conservatives. As you correctly point out, Democracy is a terrible trap and an obviously unsustainable system on the edge of collapse. The moral relativism, cronyism, etc. are not separate issues, they are all part and parcel of Democracy. This includes 'High Anglicanism' which is part and parcel of secularizing Democracy. <br /> This is also why you seem to misunderstand the role and purpose of Tradition. Tradition is not meant to 'adapt and react' to the newest manufactured crisis of a corrupt system, it is to preserve truth until corrupt systems collapse. Tradition has prevented Conservatives from adapting to Modernism, Americanism, Democracy, and Moral Relativism? Huzzah! Tradition has done its job!<br /> This is why fewer and fewer individuals who identify as Conservative are actively participating in the Democratic process - they don't vote, they don't run for office, and they don't engage in other ways because they are realizing the system itself is inherently evil. Not inefficient, not inelegant, but evil. You see more and more young people rejecting the culture, rejecting the politics, and embracing Tradition and Conservatism, but quietly.<br /> Which religious orders are growing fastest? Which parishes are full? <br /> Who are the people having children? Who are the people keeping their children out of the public school system? They are often the same ones attending those Traditional parishes, sending money (and children) to those Traditional orders, and having nothing to do with political parties, elections, or pop culture.<br /> When I look at the shocking advances in politics Liberal concepts made in the West in just two generations i certainly do *not* think that truth can no longer prevail, I conclude that the death of the Boomers may end the madness. Do you really think thousands of years can be annihilated in 100? Oh, America may go away, as may many another polity, but Conservatism? Hardly.<br /> http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1614122024/ref=ox_sc_sfl_title_4?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=ATVPDKIKX0DER<br /><br /> http://www.amazon.com/Shall-Religious-Inherit-Earth-Twenty-First/dp/1846681448/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1383923374&sr=1-1&keywords=shall+the+religious+inherit+the+earth<br /><br /> Maria, mater Dei, ora pro nobisBuilding a Better Countryhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01894692867577700734noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-76171656918707835442013-11-08T18:01:50.191+11:002013-11-08T18:01:50.191+11:00I suppose this quote from Chesterton is appropriat...I suppose this quote from Chesterton is appropriate: <br /><br /><i>"The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of Conservatives is to prevent mistakes from being corrected. Even when the revolutionist might himself repent of his revolution, the traditionalist is already defending it as part of his tradition. Thus we have two great types — the advanced person who rushes us into ruin, and the retrospective person who admires the ruins. He admires them especially by moonlight, not to say moonshine. Each new blunder of the progressive or prig becomes instantly a legend of immemorial antiquity for the snob."</i><br /><br />MarcusDhttp://simulacral-legendarium.blogspot.ca/noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29137904.post-58293888894043992752013-11-08T13:06:31.715+11:002013-11-08T13:06:31.715+11:00You can't compete with a free lunch. That is, ...You can't compete with a free lunch. That is, until someone has to pay the bill.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com