Way back in the olden thymes, I was going back and forth with a liberal acquaintance about a topic related to his cult’s recent fixation on diversity. I no longer recall the details of the conversation, but at some point, he said, “The reason we moved to Arlington was so our child could experience diversity.” He was speaking of Arlington Massachusetts, one of the whitest places on earth. He had moved to honkeyville, but he had somehow convinced himself that it was a rainbow community of racial and ethnic diversity.
Being a polite person, I laughed in his face. There are limits to civility. I doubt he has ever forgiven me for not only laughing at the ridiculous claim, but then proceeding to point out the demographic reality of his new home. Arlington is roughly 85% white and 10% Asian, and those Asians will be college professors and professionals. The tiny black and Hispanic population is clustered in one area of town. You can drive around the place all day and never see a brown face that is not riding a lawnmower or leaf blower.
Now, I have no doubt that my former acquaintance and his Progressive hive-mates glorified one another on a regular basis for their embrace of diversity. You can bet they swapped stories about how their kid had a black friend at school or about their supposed friendship with the Muslim coworkers. He actually tried that one on me once. Because it was nothing but virtue signaling, they never faced any push-back. In fact, they got nothing but confirmation from their hive mates, so their delusions were always reinforced.
When people outside the hive wonder how people in the hive can believe the nonsense about diversity and the blank slate, it is important to keep in mind the power of magical thinking. They want this stuff to be true, so they tend to gravitate toward others who have the same fantasies. It is exactly how cults work. The doubt or concern of one member becomes a reason for the rest to double up on their belief. Progressives are people in search of purpose and identity, so they tend to clump together for support.
Whether you call it self-delusion, magical thinking, wishful thinking or whatever, this is powerful juju. My old Progressive acquaintance was not fazed by my mockery or the facts I later sent him. In fact, he has only grown more deluded over the years. He is now one of those old guys who still wears an “I’m With Her” t-shirt and tells people he is a moderate libertarian. It is not that he is a liar or crazy, it is that he so desperately wants this image he has of himself to be true, that he has convinced himself it is fact.
It is not just lefty cult members who are prone to self-delusion. Magical thinking is just the grease that makes the gears of life turn smoothly for people. All of us engage in some degree of it. In fact, it may be a requirement of leadership. Read the biographies of great leaders and you almost always find that they had an extreme over-confidence in their abilities. Often, they believed it was their destiny to achieve greatness. It was what pushed them to conquer the world or accomplish some great contribution to humanity.
At the same time, over-the-top belief in some cause is the driving force behind the great evils of history. Stalin was not mindlessly evil. He believed he was on the side of the righteous, just as the Nazis, Chinese communists and other murderous movements of the last century believed they were on the side of good. The Allies in World War II incinerated cities full of women and children, in order to break the will of the other side, because they thought they were fighting a just cause. The self-righteous make the best killers.
The power of self-delusion is not just the belief in some cause, but belief in the face of available evidence. It is the conflict between the delusion and reality that is the chemical reaction, releasing energy the believers harness. The American Left refers to themselves as the “resistance” even though they are in complete control. It seems that the greater the gap between observable reality and delusion, the more fanatical the believer. That conflict between reality and delusion releases energy in relation to its contrast.
This is a useful thing to keep in mind when dealing with lefty relations. Your well-intended efforts to break the spell only serve to make it stronger. It is counter intuitive, but the best thing you can do for a deluded friend or relative is to act disinterested. If you argue with them, they see that as proof they are speaking truth to power. If you agree with them, even on a small point, they see that as confirmation. Indifference throws water on that chemical reaction and robs them of the energy to continue in the face of reality.
This is why the Left forces everyone to pick a side. For example, you cannot be indifferent to the various crotch fads. You are either enlightened or a homophobe, open minded or a gender-normative bigot. There can be no middle ground, because the delusion that fuels these causes depends upon the conflict. The indifferent are the black swans of the delusional. It is not simply hive-mindedness. It is a need for the conflict between their beliefs about themselves and the reality of the world in which those beliefs conflict.
‘Fazed’.
Seems you missed Arlington guy’s point. White guy of some means moves in and hires brown guy to mow the lawn etc. See- brown guys are around all day so it MUST be a diverse neighborhood. Now don’t go thinking brown guy of some means is welcome there because in my experience we are not. Interestingly enough the lack of welcome is in an ‘affluent’ area of Connecticut – no exactly deplorable country.. or maybe it really is.
It’s nice when affluent people of color make their own affluent areas. It’s the natural order and everyone is happier.
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One of your best! Thanks – it’s all crystal clear now. These people are sick (in the head), and the only restorative will be that old-fashioned Dutch cleanser of reality! The cult cannot cure itself, it just doubles down until “game over.” Thanks!
If you are talking to a middle aged liberal woman, don’t argue with her. Just talk about the opportunities available to her children. They are very focused on that, and what immigration and the diversity does their prospects after college is what gets their attention. To say nothing of what the current emphasis on railroading college aged men does to their thoughts about their own sons.
Yeah, Tim, that may well work for that demographic, but I propose something that can make dents in other demographics, relating to the subtle SOCIAL aspects of these interactions with Lefties, esp. insofar as they place ANY value on their relationship with you. (If SJWism is THE point of their lives, then don’t waste your time.)
Most of these Lefty pitches involve bulldozing/ virtue signaling, touting the status or interests of “the poor people of color”, but with a preference that the Lefty’s contempt for normal rules of civility, and for the legit interests of people of “non-color”, be hidden. We need to implicitly jack them up, about their (increasingly obvious) contempt for normal rules of civility, and for the legit interests of people of “non-color”. (M. Waters’ recent tantrums, and Antifa’s antics, are probably well known enough, to give us a real edge here.)
Zman says “the best thing you can do for a deluded friend or relative is to act disinterested. If you argue with them, they see that as proof they are speaking truth to power.”
I propose, not arguing with them (about their beloved views), but politely DEMANDING that they concede to you YOUR right to differ with them, esp. on the EQUAL right of people of “non-color” to defend their legit group interests.
Of course, the utterly committed SJW could care less about being seen as a bratty fanatic, but many of your deluded friends or relatives will prefer not to be pigeonholed (by friends or relatives) as being that boorish. In effect, you can thereby politely test the real score, about your relationship with them.
So, you might say to them: “Well, let’s see now! Will this be a fair discussion, or an Establishment/ Maxine Waters style talking points lecture?”
If their response is in the ballpark of civility, you might add:
“there are other considerations, such as the legit group interests of people of ‘NON-color’. If you can clearly commit, here and now, to the idea that ‘people of non-color’ have EQUALLY- legit group interests, I may give you a chance to live up to this commitment. But if you’re one of those lefties who actually are driven, by actual contempt for the legit interests of people of ‘non-color’, or who are determined to dominate this “debate” with trite talking points, there’s no point in pursuing things with YOU.”
Of course, taking such a hard line is wise, only when talking with a Lefty with whom you have no VERY valuable relationship.
With real loved ones, real friends, etc., your approach might be:
“I’ll consider talking to you about this, bearing in mind that our relationship is of value to each of us. But I won’t be rolled, as happens so very often, in discussions with people who tend to toe, or at least COVER for, the Maxine Waters line. If this exchange can’t be based on mutual respect, we’re better off talking about other things.”
What the powerful Elites won’t tell you, is that for every job an illegal, or “diversity candidate” gets; it’s another white person who is unemployed. As a kid, I questioned my parents on how giving a black (my father’s term: negro) over a white person, simply because of the skin color, equitable? Of course, they answered the truth, it wasn’t. I can’t begin to tell you the number of white women, who married ethnic, getting promotions and special privileges at AT&T. I saw far too many highly qualified individuals shoved aside for the rainbow effect. The whole Affirmative Action idiocy is nothing but a race to the bottom. And This Society is paying for This Insanity in full measure.
Scott Adams became a cartoonist (Dilbert) because he hit the “diversity ceiling” twice, meaning, “there was no hope for a white male like me to get promoted.”
http://blog.dilbert.com/2014/10/31/loser-choices/
When they live in Segre-Gated-Communities, they can talk about how great the diversity they won’t experience is.
“He’s now one of those old guys who still wears an “I’m With Her” t-shirt and tells people he is a moderate libertarian. It’s not that he is a liar or crazy, it’s that he so desperately wants this image he has of himself to be true, that he has convinced himself it is fact.”
I had no idea Z knew my brother.
LOL.
He wanted to move to Arlington to experience diversity?. Wow.
Arlington is not totally white bread , but it’s damn close. I guess this shows how seriously delusional these people are.
You’re not going to see much “diversity” on the streets of Arlington MA. I’m sure there is low income housing in town – which is likely more “diverse” now that the Obama administration’s effort to diffuse cancer all over the body seems to having an effect. I know the town I live in – which has (had?) something like a 1% African population – seems to have black faces popping up pretty frequently.
According to the stats – Arlington is 85Z% white. Black or African American is 2% of the population. Although I suppose their perceived effect might “punch above their weight” if they’re all unemployed and spend all their free time walking the streets during the day.
Z-man: Just an observation …. I think “sef-delusion” is a reduntant construction. Not an intellectual here, but in the recent past I looked up this as well as “illusion” in order to better understand what I thought was going on. By definition, delusion involves the self — a construct one personally creates, then buys into. Whereas, “illusion” is some construct, idea or action created by one that fools another ….
Another thought …. delusion lies at the core of that ancient, hairy and irrational beast at mankind’s core — that beast we have (rather incompletely) come to call the LEFT in its political & cultural incarnation. A thought —
We are weak, tranistory little meat sacks with one tremendously powerful ability — the ability to conceive of things “other-than-they-are”.
This ability has been provided to us, or it developed serendipitously (take your pick) as a survival tool, without which, we all would have ended up as raw material for higher predator coproplites.
This ability provided us a tremendous advantage, narrow as it’s survival advantage might initially have appeared in earlier eras. And yes, my dog can do the same, to some degree, but not to the degree humans are capable.
Also, we have (had) a tremendous mental over-capacity — our brains had the ability to morph and expand, so we were somehow always just a bit ahead of the environment and threat. I think we have that over-capacity still, thus the great variety in human behaviors, cultures and …… affinity for alternate, unsubstantiated realities.
I think this ability to see things Other-Than-They-Are is the font of creativity, and it leads us straight away to the arts, fantasy, delusion, and, ultimately, madness. All of a string …
This beast touches all of us to one degree or another. Those who have a more “artistic” template, or who are less firmly attuned to verifable reality, are more likely to believe in and see unicorns; those not so much so, or whose lives are bounded by hard reality (or the Wolf), not so much so.
It’s no wonder that in our reality-optional culture, and with our elites, intellectuals and political class holding firmly to un-reality, we are suffering cultural, political, intellectual and artistic madness.
You are correct, but it is an idiomatic expression that is so common, that fighting against it is pointless. When people use it or hear it, they assume it to mean the source of delusion is internal, rather than external, like propaganda. Logically, of course, one cannot lie to themselves, but many people manage to do it 😉
In strict clinical terms, a delusion is a fixed, false belief, such as people are reading my mind or this woman is into me, whereas an illusion is something real that is misinterpreted, such as that tree is a witch or that bird was a spy plane.
Stalin did not believe he was on the side of righteousness
Zman, your writing style and content have always been good. Lately they seem to gotten even better. Might think about pulling some of your essays together in a book and self-publishing with some place like CreateSpace. If your goal is to get your ideas out to the public, this would advance it.
When your book becomes available, I can think of a few people from the middle of the political spectrum I’d buy copies for.
Yes, please!
Agree with all of it, but My experience differs by a bit. Faking indifference did not shut them up. If you didn’t validate their virtue signalling they’d redouble their efforts and they’d get pretty snippy about it too. Me thing I’ve noticed about leftists is that they will run their mouths, play head games and destroy their families … but it’s never their fault. When they win these dog fights they start, it’s because they have the moral high ground. When they lose, they are the noble, stoic victims of fascism and tyranny. The women are the worst.
There should be a caveat that when you are closely related to them, the rules of indifference may not apply.
The problem with expressing disinterest is that they smugly assume they just enlightened you with their brilliance and left you speechless. That is hard to let stand. The approach I use is to agree with them on some level, and then throw in a twist to hit them over the head with. For example:
-George Bush was an awful president. Too bad Obama adopted most of his policies.
-I agree global warming could be a problem. How do you like your new SUV?
-The problem with abortion and immigration is that they are diluting the African-American population.
-If we are going to live solely by evolution theory, shouldn’t we stop subsidizing people who can’t survive on their own?
-There is no God, so shouldn’t we just have fun and destroy the planet, since it really makes no difference?
-I agree CEOs are evil bastards. Guys like Zuckerberg, Bezos, Buffett, Gates, and Cook are a bunch of greedy douchebags.
You can’t change a liberal mind, but you can at least have some Alinsky like fun with them. If you do it lightheartedly, you can bypass their “speaking truth to power” delusion, and since you somewhat agreed with them, they don’t even get mad at you.
I’m stealing these.
It’s so easy to poke holes in the arguments of others, holes big enough to drive a truck through. But do any of us have a good handle on reality? Our own experiences are such a small part of the world, and every last thing that you receive second hand, to view or to read, has passed through a prism of sorts.
If you aren’t asking lots of tough questions, every day, you easily fall into the trap of accepting what you see and “know” as real. Test your conclusions, all the time, with the most difficult contrary evidence and arguments that you can find. Go where the evidence takes you, then test it all over again.
That’s the only way you can build a robust set of ideas that are coherent and defensible. One thing I particularly enjoy about Z’s interview sessions, as opposed to the monologues, is that you can more easily see how his ideas are a well thought out whole, composed of elements tested and working together. They are tested in the crucible of argument. I am envious, and aspire to develop such a well integrated and robust perception of the world for myself. I fear that I am only accumulating pieces of the puzzle, that can take me off in tangential directions and down a wrong path.
The other element of Z’s interview conversations, is that you get to witness how a well reasoned and thought out set of ideas, properly presented, can demolish an alternative proposition that is not so tested and thought through. Ecce gut butthurt in yesterday’s interview, but you could see that one coming down the tracks a mile off.
I don’t know all the names, but I quit listening when that one guy started going off the rails about Texas. It’s a good thing to be aware of trends, but trends are not always ultimately determinative. Malthus is the most famous example of seeing a trend, thinking it was determinative, creating a whole world view out of it, and never having one prediction come true.
Everyone knows his name, though, and that’s something.
Two best weapons are indifference and, when appropriate, ridicule. When you can combine the two it’s deadly. I tend to be careful anymore about “casual” conversations around here since they always seem to turn to the outrage du jour, since they know I’m a Republican. Sometimes the opening for something like this will occur: “Come again, now what is it the trannies have their panties in a twist about? Bathrooms again? Oh sorry, I meant “boxers”, or should it be “panties”? What kind of trannies are we talking about? I just don’t have the time to keep up on this stuff. Anyway, good to see you, it’s been too long, have a nice day!!”
Diversity is the bitch goddess liberals worship.
Once taught with a new teacher who said she went through a special process so her child could go to that district, to be around “diversity” (inner city black) . She stayed one year. I assume she put her offspring back in her home district when she left.
The parasite views the world through the prism of dependence as the sole mode of survival. Their social fanaticism exists because it “works” in the sense that it enables them to obtain and sustain control over the host. In times of plenty, the producers (host) feel a moral obligation to prop up the less fortunate and will yield to the incessant whining. This is in our DNA, e.g. the parental reaction to a crying baby.
“This is in our DNA, e.g. the parental reaction to a crying baby.”
I would refine that to say it’s the Mother’s reaction to a crying baby. Just one of the negative consequences of giving women more political power in our society.
I saw this all the time in academia. They thought they were “diverse,” even though they all knew one Black guy… and it was the same guy… and, except for the fact that he wore a dashiki and wrote “academic” “papers” about rap music, he was as white as lifetime tenure at $300K per year could make him. Ditto “the resistance” – the Left runs everything in a college town, including the police department, but they all think they’re standing up to The Man 24/7. It’s actually kinda enjoyable, being a secret shitlord in a college town – it’s like you’re constantly stoned from all the bizarre reality-avoidance that’s everywhere around you. I’ve often said that if alumni ever went back to campus for anything but football games, there’d be no Liberals in America.
The Man against the Man who doesn’t know he’s the Man! Could do a sci-fi Kafkaesque movie/novel: going to find the Man and finding…himself!
I’ve thought many times about writing a comic novel about my time in academia. The problem is Poe’s Law — I could quote real academic papers, with impeccable citations, and nobody would believe me. Even Swift couldn’t make fun of this stuff.
Check out Lucky Jim by Kingsley Amis.
One twist on that. The daughter of one of my colleagues (who is black) actually chose to go to a historically black college. Not for the reason you’d think. Wants to be a doctor and every “white majority” school she visited the students expected her to be “extra woke” and in the vanguard of social justice or some such shit. She actually found the black schools were more focused on academics and less on protesting every perceived outrage 24/7. She just wanted to get a chemistry degree and be a doctor…
The very tail end of Z’s two hour conversation touched on this. To be a black American is a negative sense of being, in that every element of black American culture is defined by its relationship to whites. There is no stand-alone element to being a black American, unlike being black in most of the rest of the world. To the extent that this is a true thing, your colleague’s daughter is attempting to escape that negative trap. It makes all the sense in the world.
She’s a smart kid. And you are bang on about not wanting to be defined by the latest protest outrage. Have always thought Z’s messaging on this made a hell of a lot of sense. And bolstered from what I’ve observed from the non-American brand–they refuse to be defined by their relationship with white people.
It may be that “metaphysics” would be a better word than “magical thinking”. Comte tried to kill off the word, but it is not used enough and remains a good word. Two books I’ve mentioned here before are good for understanding how metaphysics affects thoughts and outcomes of the beliefs that metaphysical thinking brings about (we ALL do it, anyone who thinks that he simply looks at facts and is driven by them is either self-deluded or a liar), they are The Metaphysical Basis of Modern Science, by E.A. Burtt, and The Great Chain Of Being, by Arthur Lovejoy.
My readings about the French Revolution also brought me to a letter published in a book I don’t have with me right now, covering the revolutionary age in compiled primary source material. In it Diderot, the encyclopedist, explains to his contributors that one important thing that they will need to work on after doing the encyclopedia will be to work on a new metaphysics to replace those in use at the current time and how a metaphysics is not only essential to have, but essential to get right. I think Kant’s writings on the future of metaphysics may have been a response to this.
Furthermore, I think that what many people today refer to as philosophy is really an attempt to consciously but unknowingly create a metaphysics. They aren’t in the process of trying to describe the world and how it works, but how they want it to work.
This is good. Ts Eliot said of Henry James “he had a mind so fine no idea could penetrate it.” People sort of laugh at this, as if he was saying James was an idiot, but I think he meant what you are saying, that James was a rare individual who could see reality for itself and not through the lens of a metaphysics or an ideology. Thanks for posting the book titles. Not being gods, we humans require idea systems and metaphysics to approximate reality and guide us.
“we moved to Arlington (MA) was so our child could experience diversity”
Having grown up in MA, that’s hilarious. If he actually believed it, he would have moved Roxbury or Dorchester (probably both gentrified since I left). Maybe Bentley and Tufts are using affirmative action in their admissions?
My old town has become much more “diverse” as professional Indians have moved in to area to work in medical and high tech companies.
Roxbury and Dorchester have I believe gentrified a *little bit*, probably due just to the obscene real estate prices around Boston and people’s need to just find an affordable place to live.
None of that however has changed the fact that “shooting in Dorchester” , or : “shooting in Roxbury” is a regularly run news item if you watch the local news or read the newspaper.
Speaking of diversity, with the Supreme Court trending conservative, I’m hoping we can finally end Affirmative Action. The idea that you can end racial discrimination by discriminating on the basis of race was crazy from the start. You end up with people in power who don’t deserve it, and a whole lot of white resentment.
“The idea that you can end racial discrimination by discriminating on the basis of race was crazy from the start.”
Yes, and the idea that a race with an average IQ of 85 should be doing just as well as whites with and average of 100 or Asians with 106 did not make sense either. There was no real discrimination holding them back. There was only delusion about abilities.
Yes and what makes affirmative action increasingly a destructive idea is that it applies to immigrants and bit just blacks.
“I moved here for the Diversity.” Just capitalize it, and you’re good to go. “Diversity” is just one of the names of their cult. Don’t need any black people for that.
I find redpilling these guys to be damn near impossible. As soon as I start ever so gently, they *sense* where I’m going and put up furious resistance. Of course this suggests that they *already know* the facts, and at the same time *refuse to know.* If they KNOW AND STILL REFUSE TO KNOW, well, that’s a tough nut to crack.
Notice how closely this fits with Orwell, who was a practical psychologist of no little genius, way more than just a “political writer.” Defining doublethink:
Block quote 1:
To know and not to know, to be conscious of complete truthfulness while telling carefully constructed lies, to hold simultaneously two opinions which cancelled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them, to use logic against logic, to repudiate morality while laying claim to it, to believe that democracy was impossible and that the Party was the guardian of democracy, to forget whatever it was necessary to forget, then to draw it back into memory again at the moment when it was needed, and then promptly to forget it again, and above all, to apply the same process to the process itself—that was the ultimate subtlety: consciously to induce unconsciousness, and then, once again, to become unconscious of the act of hypnosis you had just performed. Even to understand the word—doublethink—involved the use of doublethink.
Block quote 2:
The power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one’s mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them… To tell deliberate lies while genuinely believing in them, to forget any fact that has become inconvenient, and then, when it becomes necessary again, to draw it back from oblivion for just as long as it is needed, to deny the existence of objective reality and all the while to take account of the reality which one denies—all this is indispensably necessary. Even in using the word doublethink it is necessary to exercise doublethink. For by using the word one admits that one is tampering with reality; by a fresh act of doublethink one erases this knowledge; and so on indefinitely, with the lie always one leap ahead of the truth.
If you watch the eyes, you can see the lies kick in, when a leftie is presented with the truth. They drop into the “approved” and “mandatory” language and arguments, bypassing all logic and reasoning, to go to the rote response. The same statement, word for word, turns up again and again from different people. There is no thinking involved, it is more akin to hypnosis.
>hypnosis
Perhaps. I tend however to view it more as repeating a catechism, albeit a Progressive one rather than a Catholic one. (Though these days sometimes you can’t tell the difference….)
Two instances spring to mind immediately. One was while talking about immigration and the effect on jobs: I was stunned then bemused when an otherwise intelligent friend said, all in one breath and with an intonation and cadence that sounded as if someone was talking THROUGH her (think “meat puppet”) rather than she herself speaking, “We just have to accept that manufacturing jobs are gone from the US, will never return, and move on from there.” Come to think of it, it sounded remarkably like a tall, effeminate, prissy, self-satisfied, supposed half-Kenyan, supposed man rather than a short, Pakistan-born woman.
The other instance was when the resident “typical European liberal” (soi disant, always said with a smirk), with whom I unfortunately shared an office spent nearly a week trying to get me into an argument on Trayvon Martin, and through that, guns. Finally I could not stand it any longer (hard to work with the incessant yapping) and decided to settle the would-be discussion. Even though this guy was a high-IQ type, and with a classical education yet, it was obvious his arguments were based on feels rather than facts. Within a half hour he started blathering on about “Emmett Till” and “the problem with the US is the one-drop rule” and similar such tired race fodder. His misinformation about defensive firearms usage, violent crime rates by race, etc was even worse. At this point MY blood was up, and for a change I would not let HIM disengage from the discussion. After three hours of my life (that I will never get back) the “typical European liberal” had completely conceded every point about St Trayvon (anyone looking forward to the upcoming movie?) and was unable to refute published FBI and CDC statistics. Finally he blurted out “Well, *I* don’t like guns. They scare me and I don’t think anyone should have one.” This denouement was comical because he reddened and made a move to cover his mouth when he realized he had admitted that all his high-minded (as he saw them) arguments boiled down to his own fears, insecurities, and projection thereof onto others. I admit it, I was not gracious when I saw the abortive arm twitch. “I saw that. I think that means we’re done here.”
That guy’s hated me, presumably for helping him humiliate himself, ever since. Which is no loss to either of us, I’m pretty sure. And not that I’m so clever. I owe it to Andrew Branca’s excellent coverage of the whole Martin/Zimmerman cluster on the Legal Insurrection site (and to give credit where it is due, also a then-helpful frequent commentor there who subsequently apparently became deranged over hatred of Trump).
Anyway, all that long digression (so much for “how not to be boring”) was to say that the first case was repetition of a catechism, and the second struck me as repetition of magical/talismanic phrases, or invocation of secular saints and martyrs. It all seemed very religious/cultic.
“Whether you call it self-delusion, magical thinking, wishful thinking or whatever…”
I call it tribal enemy propaganda.
White people did not generate these silly beliefs in their own minds. These ideas were presented to them by the people who controlled the information that they received.
That happened in an intellectual way throughout their time in Jew-influenced educational system where they learned which beliefs demonstrate high status & which beliefs demonstrate low status.
It was even more powerfully reinforced with imagery & emotion every time they consumed Jew-influenced media.
After a lifetime of this propaganda, most white people cannot perceive or think clearly about most issues.
1) They’ve been emotionally conditioned to shrink from badthink as low-status & evil.
2) Their minds are filled with evocative imagery supplied by the media to generate desired emotions. Try it yourself. Think of the word “diversity”. Even though you know the reality of that word, somewhere in your mind you probably also saw a multi-hued happy image supplied by ad agencies & TV producers.
3) The vocabulary they have been supplied with makes it difficult to express ideas that the tribal propagandists do not like. For instance, there are countless words to condemn straight white men for disparaging other groups —- racism, homophobia, misogyny, antisemitism —- but what are the simple words for other groups disparaging straight white men?
In summary, though white liberals are especially infuriating & disgusting, it’s worth remembering that they didn’t get that way on their own.
The word “status” is key. From Paul Johnson’s “A History of the American People” (especially the second paragraph):
***
The 1932 election saw the emergence of the ‘Democratic coalition of minorities,’ based on the industrial Northeast (plus the South), which was to last for half a century and turn Congress almost into a one-party legislature.
But it was only in 1932 that the Republicans finally lost the progressive image they had enjoyed since Lincoln’s day and saw it triumphantly seized by their Democratic enemies, with all that such a transfer implies in the support of the media, the approval of academia, the patronage of the intelligentsia, and, not least, the fabrication of historical orthodoxy.
***
The story behind the losing of that “image” would be an interesting one, indeed. More pressing, perhaps, is how to get it back.
You want Republicans to get back their progressive image?
In this context I don’t take “progressive” to mean specifically left-wing, I take it to mean “leading,” i.e., ascendant, believed by the influential and powerful–the regnant thought system.
Could be wrong, though. Remembered the quote from way back, and pulled it without much context.
Nothing is more awful than a left-wing Republican, no doubt. “Conservatives” who conserve nothing–ghastly, despicable. (Cf. the recent actions of the British “conservative” prime minister.)
You could say “status”, “progressivism” or just “moral high ground”.
My point is that the way people judge it is culturally transmitted from one generation to the next. And that while white people directly transferred it between themselves, we passed on sane, healthy, white-benefitting criteria to judge it.
But at some point, another group inserted itself into the cultural transmission mechanism. So instead of passing on white-benefitting criteria, they passed on criteria that benefitted their group.
For a picture of how that process would work, imagine the values that a WASP Ivy League professors would have taught a young Jewish student in the 1930s. Now, imagine the different values that Jewish professor would teach HIS students in the 1960s.
Now multiply that process by every Jew working in academia, education, newspapers, law, music, advertising, TV & film.
The left generally labels Trump as a homophobe. All I see from him is indifference to the subject. True believers cannot stand indifference, as it trivializes their passions. We all will be made to celebrate such things, comrade.
That’s an odd one to push.1.Nobody really sees “gay rights are threatened” as an issue, except for college girls, and 2. With the NY and global elite crowd T has been with in Hollywood, London, Paris, etc….they think he has not done business with and formed friendships with any gays? They really think that’s going to sell with the average people? C’mon! P.S. Why does my text box say “CIA”??
Ric Grenell, Trump’s appointment as Ambassador to Germany, is gay. He has no problems with gays, blacks, hispanics, asians. He loves women and jews. He seems to worry most about radical Islamic Muslims, but that’s perfectly reasonable. But I’m sure he’s got plenty of middle-eastern friends from all his international dealings, maybe even some Iranians…
That is homophobia by their standards. Russia is a ‘deeply homophobic society’ simply because it doesn’t have an array of ‘civil rights’ specific to gays. There are no anti-gay laws in Russia, but the absence of pro-gay laws is, in the “lets worship the abnormal and the substandard” west of today, ‘homophobic’
Queers in Russia have to make do with merely the same rights as the rest of us peasants. Terrible, eh?
If a queer in Russia is assaulted, he is treated just like anyone else who is assaulted, rather than have the whole community go into some hysteria about ‘violence towards gays’
So the question is how to be actively, or even effectively indifferent.
Corey Lewandowski’s “womp womp” seemed quite effective…
My above mentioned sister-in-law was in a big tizzy over the Mexicans locked up without their kids.
My reply: (shrugs) “I don’t really care about illegal immigrant kids as long as they aren’t set free here.”
*insert feelings-based rant*
My reply: “Okay, throw them in jail with their parents or just deport them immediately. Hey, what do you guys want to do for dinner?”
Yes. The alt-right meme “zero f**ks given” is a great example of this. It’s an effective rhetorical device. Drives leftists crazy.
The ability to overcome cognitive dissonance is always the primary trait of the fanatic. Whether in religion or politics, fanatics always display the power of invincible ignorance.
Hypnosis will do that to a person.
I have had this exact experience with a co-worker. He will spout some silly lefty bubble line. I will present facts that are so obvious he has to acknowledge their truth. Then I will later overhear him spouting the same delusions to someone else, completely ignoring the truths he acknowledged days before.
Yes. A trait Hofer described in the true believers
I have to visit a rabidly leftist sister-in-law next week. Nothing disappoints her like an indifferent shrug. I think it’s because there’s no response to it.
My rule of thumb for political/current events discussions is to have a good idea of the person’s true feelings/opinions. before you get all worked up arguing about something. This goes for family members, too. You NEVER want to motivate the wrong person to VOTE!!
This story is completely made up
I IMPLORE you to read to watch Adam Conover.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e68CoE70Mk8
whites made the problems we have to clean it up
White people don’t like to live around Black people very much. Why can’t the Black people make their own neighborhoods nice?
I couldn’t get through the video because it was so sophomoric. The video cited the statistic that, due to redlining, 98% of the Federally guaranteed home loans in the 1930s were issued to whites. This sounds terribly unfair by 2018 demographic standards, but the US was approximately 90% white in 1930, so the racial balance of loan approval was not that far out of whack.
(I’ve seen a couple other videos by this guy and he relies upon the inability of his audience to think critically, which probably explains his success among the left).
There were no data processing systems available in the 1930s and to the best of my knowledge there were no credit scores in the 1930s. All things considered, map-based redlining of neighborhoods was probably a pretty good proxy for creditworthiness at the time.
The redlining was determined by mortgage failure rates compared to property values, not race. If a mortgage failed and a bank had to take it over, the property had to be resold.If the property the mortgage was taken out on was not worth much, there would be trouble turning it over and banks don’t like to hold property. Part of the reason blacks back then tried so desperately to move into white neighborhoods was because, taking into consideration the redlining, it was easier to get a mortgage in a white neighborhood, and if the morgage went bad the bank had an easier time turning over the property.
What Brett Stevens calls the “Age of Ideology” has been the age in which if there was a conflict between a theory that made us feel good and observable reality, people went with the theory. They could do this because figuring out ways to produce excess resources put enough distance between us and starvation that we had the margin to indulge in delusions. This is why great philosophical and religious systems from the Stoics to the Christians to the Buddhists warn us against the effects of too much wealth on our mental and spiritual wellbeing. In the Middle Ages, Christian thinkers agreed that “Christian poverty” was the best thing for the soul, but merely disagreed on what that meant – whether it was living in rags and being hungry or merely having a sufficiency to meet one’s needs and no more. This now seems appalling and barbaric to us, but I think history has vindicated them. Once we had some extra to spare, the first thing we bought with it was delusion. The results are leading us to destruction.
I always love your posts—are you in social sciences or something related?
The “Wolf at the Door….,” Yes. Without the threat to our survival, we become wholly self-absorbed and self-referential, and all the worst in the human animal begins to boil out of the pores. I’m of mixed opinions about the Trumpian econimic boom — make things too good, in this dangerously ideological age, and people will likely go fully off the rails.
Who are the worst believers in the delusion though?
Is it people who are “wealthy” but had to work for it – or is it people who have “wealth” – but did absolutely nothing to attain it?
I believe that unwarranted “wealth” is the true devil. Since absolutely no work has in the past equaled absolutely no reward , what we have going on right now with the welfare states is a condition where millions upon millions of people are wealthy far over and above their actual work input would warrant.
If you’ve ever been exposed to “inner city” dwellers – there is a definite tendency towards buying big screen TV sets, expensive clothes – and luxury line cars (even if those cars are 10-15 years old). This all gives the illusion of wealth – at least in their minds. Which is exactly where the problem starts.
As for leaders, Trump certainly employs Positive Thinking, as per my books Trump:The Art of the Meme (Kindle, 2017) and Magick for Housewives (Manticore, 2018). Of course, although you are right that all leaders use it, Lefites are offended when someone they don’t approve uses it; see Gary Lachman’s Dark Star Rising for supposed details on how Bannon and Dugin used black magic to create the golem Trump.
Lived in Laguna Beach for six months in early 90s for the surf… rented an apartment from a far Leftist couple with children. Engaged in rare and meaningless chit-chat but remember the father saying, “We wish it was more diverse here.” I didn’t utter a word – but as if from out of the clouds I heard myself silently say, “Well aren’t you the goddamndist biggest liar. What you really wish for is that your little blond Jewish daughter isn’t molested by a heaving aboriginal and THAT’S WHY you live in lily white Laguna”.
I asked a woman in a pub in Bridport, Dorset, how she liked living there. She told me it needed more diversity! I proceeded to ask her if she was missing Muslim Rape gangs and black muggers in her life. She got hysterical and told me I was making it all up. How we laughed at her reaction. They have no clue what it is like to live in a big city and think they need culturally enriching.
I prefer laughter to indifference. It has to be spontaneous though. Indifference must be a cultivation that is best left for the truly evolved man.
I do believe in fairies, I do!!!!
I live in a college town. They’re everywhere.
Engaging them is almost always a losing proposition.
Well put, but it’s the majority who hold these delusional views, at least from my experience. We are not talking of some fringe conspiracy theorists—it’s the mainstream!
I have a serious hypothesis that I’m the only sane person in my state!
Here’s how it works in academia (particularly social sciences):
1) Paper A makes an unverified (and often unverifiable) claim. This is either made in a book that is subject to no real academic rigor or is given a pass by the astonishingly corrupt peer review system because it tells the liberal hive what they want to hear.
2) Papers B, C, D, and E make the same claim, citing Paper A as their source.
3) Papers F-Z cite papers A-E as sources.
4) The unverified and unverifiable claim is now “extensively documented in multiple peer-reviewed papers”, and thus must be accepted as scientific fact on the level of Newton’s Laws. If you disagree, you are “ignorant”.
You’re a denier, anti-science.
This also how a lot of internet attacks work. Some really dodgy left-wing website says that Lefty X has received “death threats” from unspeakable “white supremacists,” and the “mainstream” outlets immediately pounce on it, and then each other, as a “source.” And then it becomes a manufactured “reality” in our Gaslight World.
Can confirm. Don’t take my word for it — google up “Michael Bellesisles” and “Arming America.” He flat made his sources up, and his thesis is laughable to anyone who knows anything about American history, but he told them what they wanted to hear, so nobody bothered to check. He won the Bancroft Prize, which is like the American History version of the Nobel Prize… then he got debunked by a software engineer.
It is hard to avoid flaunting yourself when you can.
A lot of men in college, surrounded by pretty girls with bright, attentive eyes, and young Forces of Nature BMOC’s, feel inspired by the Human Factor to be More Than They Can Be — and Get An Edge On Life . . . in the library..
Sorcery goddess. what are you doing here?
You answered your own question. The sorcery is strong and mysterious he moves between the worlds man!
Evidence: the Steele Dossier, a fantasy made up, leaked to the press, and then sited as a “source” of “evidence.”
Legal precedent works pretty much the same way.
“The foregoing cases suggest that specific guarantees in the Bill of Rights have penumbras, formed by emanations from those guarantees that help give them life and substance. Various guarantees create zones of privacy.”
From Grissold vs Connecticut.
News, supposedly “factual” news, is made the same way.
The mainstream narratives we’re flooded with are created that same way as well.
Funny. The ‘factual’ evidence of ‘Russian collusion’ gathered by Obamanauts in the DOJ were created similarly. Seems to be a pattern.
I’ve been on the faculty of three universities in two countries; some academics really are admirably intelligent and creative, but 95% are at or near the general level of “hack”, and do essentially nothing to advance human well-being.
To borrow from Bill Buckley, we’d be better off governed by the first 1000 people listed in the local phone book, than by any set of academics.
AntiDem get back to writing your blog