This week a lot of conservatives are worrying about the culture war, as in, what do we do now? Is "revolution," whatever that means, inevitable?
For David Solway, it is "Desperate Times Call For Desperate Measures." If lefties are hounding conservatives out of the public square then we should defund the universities, put the ACLU, SPLC, and Planned Parenthood out of business, teach the corporations which side their bread is buttered, and crack down on Antifa.
For the alt-right it is a resumption of nationalism, cultural and economic, and understanding that "immigration is invasion."
For Jonah Goldberg this week, it is a pox on both your houses. I tell you, the conservative old guard is in a world of hurt.
Sorry, but I don't believe that the Clunking Fist is the answer. So what do we do?
First, let us realize our big mistake. We thought after the Reagan Revolution and its staggering economic boom, and the End of Communism with the collapse of the Soviet Union, that the battle was won. Obviously, any rational person would agree that the free market and free peoples were the answer. So let's just be nice, as "in victory, magnanimity." Wrong!
The point is that there is no such thing as "any rational person" and Reason has nothing to do with the case. We are talking about religion here, which I like to back-hand as the search for the meaning of life, the universe, and everything. Everyone has a religion, even people that don't admit it.
My belief is that we humans cannot actually know the meaning of life, the universe, and everything. If we did, there would be no need for life, or anything. We would just be self-driving cars on the way to Nirvana, courtesy of Google Maps; just sit back and enjoy the ride: in 100 feet, turn right.
In fact, we do not know the meaning of life, the universe and everything, so we make it up. No, wait. Some charismatic individual has a vision; he makes it up into what we call a "religion," and the rest of us go along for the ride.
Here is a brief history of religion.
In the old days humans knew that the whole world was driven by spirits: in the trees, in animals, in charismatic shamans. The way to get on was to propitiate the spirits with bloody sacrifice: corn maidens, first-born sons, and the like, as advised by the shaman.
But then, starting in the Axial Age, religion began to change. The spirits started coalescing into a monotheistic God, he who had created the world for humans to wive and thrive. The good thing for men was that God had sacrificed his Son, so that earthly fathers didn't have to sacrifice their sons; the good thing for women was that God provided the perfect relationship: love God and he would love you right back. But watch it! God ran a divine justice system, so all your bad behavior would have to be paid for in Hell or Purgatory after you died. However, all along, there were plenty of people that believed in the old spirits, but they didn't write books.
But then, starting about 200 years ago, leading lights determined that God Was Dead. They didn't believe that God created the world; they believed that creative people created the world, with science, philosophy, logic, reason, and activism. We humans made the world, and we can make it better. Artists can paint creative visions, writers can create literary visions, activists can implement political visions, and engineers and scientists can create technological visions. But all along there were still plenty of people that believed in the God of divine justice and love, but nobody who was anybody read them or paid any attention to them. And there were still plenty of people that believed in spirits, but they still weren't writing books.
Now I believe that it is utterly ludicrous to imagine that the religious revolution that began about 200 years ago would be resolved by now. That is just not how things work in the human world. What really happens is a chaos of competing visions of the meaning of life, the universe, and everything offered by charismatic neo-shamans to deal with the existential problem that the world has changed. And how.
This means that every one of us needs to be out there pushing our vision of the world and proselytizing all the world over for all we are worth.
One of these movements is characterized by Skip Marley's "Lions."
Do you notice a little problem with this magnificent vision? There seems to be something missing. What about all the people in the middle, people who are neither chosen lions or helpless victims, people who are just trying to live their lives in the market economy wiving and thriving without being victims or being protest organizers. What about these folks, that we might call "deplorables?"
You can see this problem in the Manifesto of the First Activists, Marx and Engels. In their narrative myth the binary opposition of feudal lords and feudal peasants will be replaced by neo-feudal capitalists and neo-feudal proletarians. Even though the bourgeoisie has created "massive" and "colossal productive forces" it will all end in "immiseration." Back to lords and peasants.
Notice that wherever the adepts of Marx have gained political power they have in fact reduced society to a binary world of nomenklatura and victims, lords and peasants, through their fascist war on the autonomy of the middle class that realizes Mussolini's vision: "All within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state." Imagine!
So what do we do about it?
Thank you senator, I'm glad you asked that.
First of all, we have to understand society not as a binary entity of lords and peasants, or Nietzsche's masters and slaves, but of Three Peoples: the People of the Subordinate Self, workers and peasants; the People of the Responsible Self, middle-class deplorables; and the People of the Creative Self, artists, writers, businessmen and activists. It is kinda reductive, but not as reductive as the left's Activists and Victims.
In my Three Peoples theory, there are, necessarily three religions, one for each of the Three Peoples. I discuss this in "What Gods Do the Three Peoples Believe In." But there is a problem. The religion of the People of the Creative Self believes that the People of the Responsible Self should be ground into the dust because otherwise they will grind the victims into the dust: "Religion and the Three Peoples: The Big Problem." This, I argue, is worse than a crime, it is a blunder.
What is the solution? Perfectly simple. Just as the religion of the People of the Responsible Self requires its believers to relieve the poor, the People of the Subordinate Self, it is high time that the religion of the People of the Creative Self require its believers to be compassionate to the People of the Responsible Self and build their religion of creativity on the shoulders of the religion of responsibility. So, you Activists of the World:
You know: I think this could be great fun.
For David Solway, it is "Desperate Times Call For Desperate Measures." If lefties are hounding conservatives out of the public square then we should defund the universities, put the ACLU, SPLC, and Planned Parenthood out of business, teach the corporations which side their bread is buttered, and crack down on Antifa.
For the alt-right it is a resumption of nationalism, cultural and economic, and understanding that "immigration is invasion."
For Jonah Goldberg this week, it is a pox on both your houses. I tell you, the conservative old guard is in a world of hurt.
Sorry, but I don't believe that the Clunking Fist is the answer. So what do we do?
First, let us realize our big mistake. We thought after the Reagan Revolution and its staggering economic boom, and the End of Communism with the collapse of the Soviet Union, that the battle was won. Obviously, any rational person would agree that the free market and free peoples were the answer. So let's just be nice, as "in victory, magnanimity." Wrong!
The point is that there is no such thing as "any rational person" and Reason has nothing to do with the case. We are talking about religion here, which I like to back-hand as the search for the meaning of life, the universe, and everything. Everyone has a religion, even people that don't admit it.
My belief is that we humans cannot actually know the meaning of life, the universe, and everything. If we did, there would be no need for life, or anything. We would just be self-driving cars on the way to Nirvana, courtesy of Google Maps; just sit back and enjoy the ride: in 100 feet, turn right.
In fact, we do not know the meaning of life, the universe and everything, so we make it up. No, wait. Some charismatic individual has a vision; he makes it up into what we call a "religion," and the rest of us go along for the ride.
Here is a brief history of religion.
In the old days humans knew that the whole world was driven by spirits: in the trees, in animals, in charismatic shamans. The way to get on was to propitiate the spirits with bloody sacrifice: corn maidens, first-born sons, and the like, as advised by the shaman.
But then, starting in the Axial Age, religion began to change. The spirits started coalescing into a monotheistic God, he who had created the world for humans to wive and thrive. The good thing for men was that God had sacrificed his Son, so that earthly fathers didn't have to sacrifice their sons; the good thing for women was that God provided the perfect relationship: love God and he would love you right back. But watch it! God ran a divine justice system, so all your bad behavior would have to be paid for in Hell or Purgatory after you died. However, all along, there were plenty of people that believed in the old spirits, but they didn't write books.
But then, starting about 200 years ago, leading lights determined that God Was Dead. They didn't believe that God created the world; they believed that creative people created the world, with science, philosophy, logic, reason, and activism. We humans made the world, and we can make it better. Artists can paint creative visions, writers can create literary visions, activists can implement political visions, and engineers and scientists can create technological visions. But all along there were still plenty of people that believed in the God of divine justice and love, but nobody who was anybody read them or paid any attention to them. And there were still plenty of people that believed in spirits, but they still weren't writing books.
Now I believe that it is utterly ludicrous to imagine that the religious revolution that began about 200 years ago would be resolved by now. That is just not how things work in the human world. What really happens is a chaos of competing visions of the meaning of life, the universe, and everything offered by charismatic neo-shamans to deal with the existential problem that the world has changed. And how.
This means that every one of us needs to be out there pushing our vision of the world and proselytizing all the world over for all we are worth.
One of these movements is characterized by Skip Marley's "Lions."
We are the lionsThe idea is that there are the chosen -- call them activists -- and then there are the victims. It is the holy calling of the chosen, the activists, to peacefully protest for the victims and liberate and emancipate them and bend the arc of history towards justice. Sometimes peaceful protest is not quite sufficient to get the job done.
We are the chosen
We are the movement
This generation
You better know who we are
Who we are
Do you notice a little problem with this magnificent vision? There seems to be something missing. What about all the people in the middle, people who are neither chosen lions or helpless victims, people who are just trying to live their lives in the market economy wiving and thriving without being victims or being protest organizers. What about these folks, that we might call "deplorables?"
You can see this problem in the Manifesto of the First Activists, Marx and Engels. In their narrative myth the binary opposition of feudal lords and feudal peasants will be replaced by neo-feudal capitalists and neo-feudal proletarians. Even though the bourgeoisie has created "massive" and "colossal productive forces" it will all end in "immiseration." Back to lords and peasants.
Notice that wherever the adepts of Marx have gained political power they have in fact reduced society to a binary world of nomenklatura and victims, lords and peasants, through their fascist war on the autonomy of the middle class that realizes Mussolini's vision: "All within the state, nothing outside the state, nothing against the state." Imagine!
So what do we do about it?
Thank you senator, I'm glad you asked that.
First of all, we have to understand society not as a binary entity of lords and peasants, or Nietzsche's masters and slaves, but of Three Peoples: the People of the Subordinate Self, workers and peasants; the People of the Responsible Self, middle-class deplorables; and the People of the Creative Self, artists, writers, businessmen and activists. It is kinda reductive, but not as reductive as the left's Activists and Victims.
In my Three Peoples theory, there are, necessarily three religions, one for each of the Three Peoples. I discuss this in "What Gods Do the Three Peoples Believe In." But there is a problem. The religion of the People of the Creative Self believes that the People of the Responsible Self should be ground into the dust because otherwise they will grind the victims into the dust: "Religion and the Three Peoples: The Big Problem." This, I argue, is worse than a crime, it is a blunder.
What is the solution? Perfectly simple. Just as the religion of the People of the Responsible Self requires its believers to relieve the poor, the People of the Subordinate Self, it is high time that the religion of the People of the Creative Self require its believers to be compassionate to the People of the Responsible Self and build their religion of creativity on the shoulders of the religion of responsibility. So, you Activists of the World:
Stop beating up on the People of the Responsible Self! Reform your creative religion so that it is compassionate to the People of the Responsible Self.Or, to paraphrase Marx:
It is high time that the People of the Responsible Self should openly, in the face of the whole world, publish their views, their aims, their tendencies, and shame the Lions and the Activists, the People of the Creative Self, into a tolerance for the Other.What is needed are thinkers who can inspire millions and bring the mindless adepts of the Activists to a dead stop in real time. What is needed are politicians to get right into the faces of the lefty hypocrites on Twitter. What is needed is for all of us to think as deeply as we know how, and act as courageously as we dare on the perilous border between Order and Chaos, advertising the astonishing order of our free-economy and its free-association culture, and battling the chaos of the Great Reaction, the belief that you can understand the world best as divided into masters and slaves, as in olden times.
You know: I think this could be great fun.
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