Zealot
A faithful soldier engaged in a righteous war.
Zealots do not doubt, they do not waver, and they do not negotiate.
They serve a higher power, they are perpetually on the right side of history, and they will twist any gospel to suit their own ends.
They are embodied anti-wisdom.
Posted: 13 Mar 2023
Suffering
One of the truly profound definitions of existence.
People love to romanticize about the uniqueness of their own suffering, and we readily turn it into a competition.
Claiming that others do not understand our troubles or traumas places us upon a pedestal of pathos, unreachable by those who would support us, just so we may feel uniquely burdened by an exquisite turmoil. When we suffer, we want to be the one who suffers most – others could not possibly understand.
While our lives are sufficiently complex and varied, there is bound to be enough commonality among our experiences that others may indeed understand us. This has the potential to topple our pedestal, and some will refuse to accept an empathetic ear, especially if their suffering is the only interesting thing about them. ‘You don’t understand!’ they will bellow, as though there is value or wisdom to be found in repelling assistance.
When people claim to understand our suffering, it is generally a matter of measure. If a parent loses their child, and a friend who has previously lost their sibling is offering support, they may say ‘I know how you feel’ or ‘I understand.’ They are not inferring that losing a child is the same as losing a sibling, it is an admission that they have suffered, like all of us have, due to losing a loved one. If they felt depressed, lost, hopeless, and resentful due to their loss, then they can imagine how the parent feels – enduring the suffering of loss with some additional misery on top. Claiming that we understand is far more often meant to mean we can imagine, and this is because human suffering is not unique, and romanticizing about its uniqueness does no one any good. It is someone telling us that they support us, and support is often hard to come by.
Perhaps we turn it away because we feel like we deserve to suffer?
Like many things, suffering has become POLITICAL in the modern era. Previously, the traumatized and pathological would seek solace in therapy or support groups, the purpose of which is to confront our vulnerabilities honestly that we may grapple with them and ultimately recover. Currently, people are incentivized to pool their grievances and mobilize their ranks in the pursuit of capturing power and privilege. This is justified in their minds because they believe that their abstract or arbitrary group has been uniquely aggrieved, and this uniqueness will be leveraged against others who will be told that they ‘do not understand.’
We all understand suffering, it is just a matter of degrees. It was considered laudable to manage our suffering and overcome our challenges, because we are not so special that our failure to do so was acceptable in the broader context. Now, we have weaponized suffering to the point that it is being invented because a market exists that can be exploited.
Essentially, if we can make our suffering unique, then we can justify failing to overcome it. If we admit that our suffering is not so different than the millions of others in history who have successfully managed to recover and do great things, then we cannot leverage it.
The uniqueness is necessary for both our inaction and the illegitimate capture of power.
The vengeful among us have even found ways of justifying increasing the amount of suffering in the world, allegedly as recompense for their internal turmoil. They intend on making others suffer as they have, whether theirs is real or imagined. This is emotional predation.
Recognizing that our suffering is common brings truth back into the picture and hinders the prospects of the aggrieved with political aspirations.
Our suffering is ubiquitous, and those who prescribe theirs as unique so they may benefit when others equally as worthy of relief do not, are either vengeful or opportunistic.
See: TRUTH, VICTIMHOOD
Posted: 12 Mar 2023
Kneel
A position of subservience welcomed by those who demand obedience over a handshake or a head nod.
Beyond prayer or a proposal, an embarrassing posture occupied by the weak seeking mercy.
The desire to have people kneel before us has become increasingly popular in a landscape of equity and cry-bullying - it offers a sense of relief to those with unresolved resentment. For these people, the best way to feel better is to make others suffer or submit.
On the other hand, it has also become fashionable for the pathetic to kneel voluntarily before others, like they are idols.
It is difficult not to speculate about the fetishistic nature of these dynamics, as though some people cannot manage to keep their sexual proclivities sequestered to the bedroom.
Being great does not involve making others small.
‘Great people are those who make others feel that they, too, can become great.’ - Mark Twain
Posted: 11 Mar 2023
Documentary
An editorial pretending to be a book that we watch to feel informed without having to read.
Posted: 11 Mar 2023
Comedian
Modern jokers; incarnations uniquely tasked with safeguarding humanity – the most important person in the kingdom.
The last bastion of truth in a world where everyone else has been purchased.
An anchor for authority, never a tool. Those suckled by the establishment are political prostitutes, not comedians.
The most difficult people to control, which makes them among the most dangerous to those with illegitimate power. Bearers of legitimate power do not fear comedians; the truth does not threaten them. Comedians are master tacticians that weaponize humility and honesty to unite ordinary citizens, a feature that is desirable in leadership but is often sorely lacking.
Professional purveyors of humour, they are positioned to combine insight with levity to maintain a clear sense of equality that is accessible to everyone. Their disarming nature is exactly what makes them so powerful.
Comedians are widely celebrated for a litany of reasons. They assist us with alleviating stress, they instill courage by taking chances with their jokes, and they build empathy by exposing the audience to novel perspectives. They embed impolite truths into their routines so we can experience the relief of common sanity. They make room for the human condition to breathe.
By their nature, comedians are likely to produce controversy. While busybodies who are perpetually incapable of controlling themselves are likely to take exception, others simply do not enjoy their turn under the knife. This is to be expected, but it is irrelevant. There are more important things at stake than the public execution of our egos, and many would argue that if our ego is capable of being taken out by a comedian, then we likely had it coming.
The triumph of our ego precedes the fall of our humanity, and comedians are the bulwark.
For the modest, comedians may entertain, but the risks of pathological hubris are low. It is the affluent, the elite, the wealthy and powerful, celebrities, and the hubristic that comedians target, and it is done for the sake of the fodder and the audience alike.
Historically, a joker was a person tasked with the responsibility of entertaining a monarch, frequently with humour. After all, a monarch with no humour is a dangerous person indeed; without humour, there is no laughter, and in the absence of laughter, even the most benevolent soul loses itself. In literature, the joker is frequently a symbol of common sense and honesty, his position being one where truths, especially uncomfortable ones, can be embedded in humour due to his licence to mock and speak freely in the presence of the monarch. Often when a remark is directed at the monarch, if it makes the subjects laugh, then the monarch will typically follow suit. Reminding ordinary citizens that the monarch is mortal is extremely important for keeping the peace. The monarch who believes themselves beyond ridicule will not remain in good graces for long - he or she is not a transcendent being, they are subject to human standards.
A monarch is a proxy for anyone who, due to their status, enjoys more privileges and fewer consequences than ordinary citizens, if any at all. Their lives are insulated from the realities that most of us face, their entourage supplies them with virtually anything they want, and ordinary citizens revere them. Currently, monarchs are absent from most countries, but they have been sufficiently replaced with an affluent ruling class comprised of the targets that the comedian favours. It is a class who enjoys fewer vulnerabilities, and for those who suffer greater vulnerabilities on average, opportunities at capturing leverage are always worthy of consideration. Nothing soothes the human soul quite like the revenge that staves our existential resentment.
Wise monarchs employ jokers specifically for this purpose. They recognize that their status will alter their perceptions over time to the point that they may start to consider positions that are entirely detached from reality, and they may lose themselves as they victimize the citizenry in tandem. The joker does not pose a threat due to his status - he cannot challenge the crown in any legitimate manner, he is just a joker after all. The joker is therefore uniquely positioned to remind the monarch that they are only human through mockery while they remain unworthy of punishment as an untouchable.
The joker pulls all the angels and gods down from heaven, and lifts all of the demons and devils up from hell, to a plane where all of humanity can be mocked as equals.
The comedian is the arbiter of fairness in a world where it is difficult to find. They are a symbol of aspirational humanity. A feature of the fair application of mutual respect is that everyone can be equally disrespected. If some people shall be respected and others not, this is not fair; if some can be disrespected and others not, this is not fair either. Comedians establish a landscape where everyone is equally capable of accessing respect, and this is most easily done by including everyone in a game of ridicule. Whenever you imply that someone is beyond ridicule, you elevate them beyond the scope of humanity, and you eliminate them as a player in this game.
What will happen to someone if they have been placed on a pedestal beyond the reach of mockery? They are receiving a reinforcement that the rules we are subject to do not apply to them, and if they start to believe it, they may start acting like it. A human unbound by the restraints of social cohesion, even if it is from the freedom to be ridiculed, will not maintain their MODESTY for long. The joker is the failsafe.
The comedian is the ground to the lightning that defines the monarch, and acts as a guardian of their humanity should they become susceptible to the influence of being adored without exception. After all, the monarch remains a susceptible human, and as such, their mind can become warped by the power, adoration, sex, and drink that accompanies their post. There is no greater sin that a monarch can commit against their humanity than to punish the joker for excelling at their function, because without the joker, who dares to take on the risk of grounding the monarch? No one else occupies the position that is considered so foolish that they may speak freely in the face of real power.
A monarch untethered from the constraints of humanity loses sight of the most important thing that accompanies the acceptance of vulnerability: ethics. A monarch without a recognition that they are vulnerable not only as a mortal, but as being susceptible to the influence of their status, is a creature capable of the most horrific atrocities, and one day they may feel it worthwhile to engage in some resentful behaviour. But what exactly would someone with everything have to be resentful about?
Living a life filled with luxuries, influence, power, protection, status, and typically a readily available source of food and sexual partners would be enough to satisfy someone, would it not? Depending on the person, perhaps. For other less introspective, less reflective, and less grateful monarchs, escaping the undertow of the human condition is far more difficult. Noticing that discomfort, unease, dissatisfaction, and hopelessness continues to plague us even when we seem to have everything is burdensome. This is especially concerning because the subject is someone who enjoys more influence and less vulnerabilities on average, someone who people follow and adore, and who have received constant reinforcements that they are more than a mere mortal. These are the sorts of people who provide themselves warrant to tinker in the lives of others - they may even view it as their duty to guide ‘lesser’ beings. This is a mind that confuses their good fortune, success, or status with one that is fit for leadership or rule.
The desire to control aspects of our lives, and potentially others, does not diminish with status. In fact, we are very likely to view our growing status as a validation of our ethos, and we may use it to rationalize our desire to engineer the world. This is not an indictment of tyrants; it is a description of humanity. Such contortions persist as temptations on our journey through life. Not everyone is tempted, but if we are, we expect that jokers rise to the occasion, to rescue us from the pit of the inhumane.
The artistry of a joker is unparalleled. They do not wage wars, they do not assassinate, they do not raise a fist, nor do they encourage mobs to carry out edicts against potential threats. They use only words, and they use them while occupying the lowest status position in society: someone who is never to be taken seriously under any circumstances. Ironically, this is precisely what provides them with protections afforded to no one else when truths must be spoken in the face of authority. This is exactly the point.
Comedians counterbalance the human susceptibility to status. Part of the reason why politicians and celebrities become so insufferable over time is because they have a steady and reliable line of interactions with people that reinforce their self-perception of possessing status and affluence. Being perpetually empowered and fawned over has a disinhibiting effect, and these reinforcements produce an inaccurate depiction of reality and our place in it. Our capacity to make coherent judgments is likely to become significantly impaired as our sense of self-importance and duty increase steadily over time. This combination of factors is what introduces the risk of having our humanity slip away, this is the necessity of comedians.
Each of us is deserving of this ridicule for the ridiculous, and each of us will have our turn against the wall. But for clarity’s sake, I will provide some examples of when we may be particularly susceptible to different sorts of reinforcements, those where we can become twisted in the absence of honesty, common sense, and ridicule.
Here is a short list:
-Parents
-Teachers/Principals
-Media personalities
-Politicians
-Club organizers
-Business owners
-Authors
-Experts in any field
-Athletes
-Strong personality in a group
-Dominant one in a relationship
-Members of a protected class
-People with disabilities
-People with mental health problems
-Diplomats
-Religious fundamentalists
-Narrow-minded atheists
-Children
-People under 30 years of age
-Ideologues
-Figureheads
-Managers
-Law enforcement officers
-Representatives
-Special interest groups
-Mental health professionals
-Doctors
-Everyone.
This is not a condonation of cruelty. Ridicule is not the same as cruelty, which is virtually impossible to justify, even by the most creative philosophers. A joke is not an act of cruelty, because the truth cannot be cruel. Do not conflate these two.
Comedy is the great equalizer because if everyone can be made a mockery, then we are at least equal at that. If anyone starts to get the crazy idea that they are beyond ridicule, comedians are here to pull us back in, and laughter typically follows. Someone who cannot laugh at themselves and all their shortcomings cannot be trusted, because they afford themselves courtesies that they would not share with others. Comedians keep us honest about our humanity by reminding us that we cannot escape it.
Silence a comedian and we will all pay the price, all because someone thinks that they are too good to be human.
Posted: 6 Mar 2023
Online Dating
A rigged lottery designed to increase the efficiency of sexual transactions by reducing humans to commodities.
A smorgasbord of pictures and words that do not convey anything real.
A boon for the career-driven who enjoy the familiarity of viewing every exchange as a transaction.
One of the most predatory services ever conceived, exploiting our desperation, hope and loneliness by riddling it with bots designed to rob us of our enthusiasm and empty our wallets.
Its popularity is one of the many indicators that we are quickly approaching a normalized state of psychopathy.
Posted: 6 Mar 2023
Alcohol
The most abused substance on the planet.
A product used to ease anxiety and obliterate our capacity to experience reality, which tells us a great deal about ourselves.
The subject of the most boring stories that we share in hopes that others will perceive us as interesting, when we are just admitting that we are fragile and lost.
This is not a secret and everyone knows it.
Now where is my whiskey?
Posted: 6 Mar 2023
Fact Checker
Everyone and no one.
Not a real thing, because it is impossible to build a coherent methodology for such things because there are no verifiable hypotheses. Even if they were, facts do not necessarily convey truth or understanding, and so their purpose remains unclear.
The only potential use for something called a fact checker would be to dissuade ordinary citizens from engaging with sources themselves and prevent discussions designed to verify claims.
No honest broker would attempt to be a fact checker in any official capacity. They exist to support a narrative or a political agenda.
Posted: 6 Mar 2023
Perception
Not reality, despite what is claimed.
The notion that ‘perception is reality’ is meant to convey that we can reliably predict that humans will behave as though their perceptions are coherent interpretations of reality. This is a valuable insight indeed. However, it has been taken to the extremes of literal interpretation by some so that they may become shapers of reality. Using this model, whatever we perceive – which we will unavoidably embed with our own bias and interests – literally describes reality, and we expect that others will accept it in turn.
This is also known as a psychotic episode.
The difference is that while psychotic disorders are particularly onerous and difficult to manage pathologies, believing that our perceptions are reality is a form of pathological narcissism experienced by people who find reality too difficult to manage. These people need help, not an audience of embarrassing complicity.
The confusion between perceptions and reality are responsible for giving rise to the idea that people can have their own TRUTH, which they cannot. Professing this is an admission that we do not possess the mental and emotional fortitude to accept reality for what it is, which is certainly sad, but then we add the view that we are able to then substitute objectivity with subjectivity and nothing will be lost in the exchange, which depicts us prideful yet aloof. This is a terrible deal that may benefit us in the short term by leveraging the compassion of others, but the suffering it will cause us and our loved ones in the long run makes it decidedly worth avoiding.
Beyond concerns regarding the validity and characterization of our perceptions, there is also the matter of how our preoccupations shape them.
One of the most overlooked aspects of our perception is their susceptibility to our bias informed by our preoccupations. We are biased creatures through and through, this cannot be changed despite what is claimed by progressive zealots, but it can be understood well enough to inspire a redirect. Two of the most pronounced are our pattern recognition and confirmation biases. Not only do we find connections between our experiences and observations, regardless of whether they are coherent, but we actively seek out confirming that our perceptions of these patterns are reinforced rather than tested.
Recognizing this about ourselves fundamentally alters how we understand ourselves and the world, and it is part of why so many find stoicism and mindfulness useful as tools for introspection. Ignoring it places us squarely on the path towards HUBRIS, because we become blind to the distinguishing aspects of context.
If I am a baseball fanatic, then I will see it where others do not, even when it is illogical, and I will believe it to be apparent that it belongs. I will interpret average and benign objects and interactions as meaningfully connected to baseball with far more frequency than is appropriate – it is always on my mind after all. I will use baseball analogies disproportionately, discuss the minutiae of games and plays, and I may even collect or wear memorabilia.
There is absolutely nothing wrong with this. In fact, it is probably good to have something around which we organize our lives that provides us with a sense of community and orientation. And these descriptions probably do not apply to every fan. The concern is whether we will begin to believe that these interpretations and perceptions are transferable into reality in a literal sense without consequence. Witnessing symbolic representations and proxies that are concordant with our preoccupations are valuable and useful in human sense-making, but they are not effective substitutions for reality. This is because these things inform us about ourselves and our values, they do not convey reality in a literal sense. Simply put, they are mirrors, not microscopes.
Let us move into more contentious realms. If my preoccupation is race, then I will see its importance in every human interaction. Disparities will be viewed through this lens, dynamics will be explained by race, and outcomes will be measured according to race. Not only would this be one of the most confounding endeavours seeing as race is not a category with clear lines, but it seeks to capture the complexity of humanity in a box of melanin. With respect to my predilections about race, I will seek out ways to confirm them in every examination. I see race everywhere because my mind put it there.
The same rules apply to sex, gender, religion, politics, and any other savoury topic that capitalizes on our meandering attention. If we are preoccupied with any of these, we will inevitably prime our perception to locate it, whether it is there or not. Our bias will fill in the gaps of uncertainty and conclusions will form as perfect images appearing out of thin air.
The human brain will always find a way to relate phenomena to something we value while limiting what we can perceive due to our narrowing field of vision. Preoccupations put important things, real things, in our blind spots. Taken to its logical conclusion, we will specialize in mirages and view critics of our subjective kingdom as enemies at the gate. If we are currently functioning on an instinctual level, trapped within our preoccupations, our response will be directionless and swift, yet justified by our conscience as an act of self-defence. We will be wrong, but we will believe we are right and righteous.
To reiterate, behaving as though our perceptions are real is not the same as them being real. Some remain confused about this, and others understand it intuitively. Regardless, perceiving them as transferable interpretations of reality that reliably produce results will destine us for failure.
We are all susceptible to these pitfalls, but understanding them is necessary for effective recourse. Failing to liberate ourselves from the preoccupations that shape our perceptions is a reliable way to sabotage our fulfillment and succumb to ideology. The best course of action is to diversify our interests, the information we consume, the people we speak with, and the areas we explore. Focus on minor projects or improvements based on real people and their situations, and minimize our obsessions.
Attempt to construct a mind like a mosaic, with numerous perspectives and views adhered with understanding and empathy. The pieces should be of varying shapes, sizes, and colours.
Being addicted to a perspective makes us a one-note joke, a parody of a human being, yet we will wonder why we are so anxious when we strike the same chord repeatedly, hoping for a different sound.
See: MENTAL ILLNESS
Posted: 7 Mar 2023
Socialism
The spoiled brat of liberalism that seeks to control much of our lives, especially our money. Socialists will just end up spending it on candy for themselves and their friends.
A top-down model obsessed with the redistribution of wealth that promises it will work next time.
The main driver and benefactor of the dilution and redefinition of words, which is why it always predictably results in fascism.
At odds with the rule of law because the powers of central planning are arbitrary.
Austrian-British economist, legal theorist and philosopher Friedrich A. Hayek, had a great deal to say regarding the evident and unavoidable connections between liberalism, socialism, communism and fascism. He catalogued his observations in the Road to Serfdom.
He pointed out that few recognize that the rise of fascism and Marxism was not a reaction against the socialist trends of the preceding period but a necessary outcome of those tendencies. Yet it is significant that many of the leaders of these movements, from Mussolini down (and including Laval and Quisling) began as socialists and ended as fascists or Nazis. And that long before the Nazis, too, the German and Italian socialists were using techniques of which the Nazis and fascists later made effective use. The idea of a political party which embraces all activities of the individual from the cradle to the grave, which claims to guide his views on everything, was first put into practice by socialists. To many who have watched the transition from socialism to fascism at close quarters the connection between the two systems has become increasingly obvious, but in democracies, the majority of people still believe that socialism and freedom can be combined. (1)
It is not a novel take, but he drives his concerns home with the often-maligned sentiment:
“They do not realize that democratic socialism, the great utopia of the last few generations, is not only unachievable, but that to strive for it produces something entirely different - the very destruction of freedom itself. As has been aptly said: ‘What has always made the state of hell on earth has been precisely that man has tried to make it his heaven.”
The book is a tour of socialism’s operating system, where Hayek combines humanist philosophy with historical record to deliver a compelling argument seeking to shatter the illusions and manipulations put forward by any system set on centralized planning. He was attempting to assist us in identifying and interpreting their tactics, lest we fall victim to the same deceptions as our forebears.
Any system trending towards central planning should rightfully generate concerns in the minds of citizens. Humans do not tend to manage power well, despite the glee with which many seek to accumulate it.
One of the most popular deceptions is the preying on the earnest interests of citizens through the deliberate ambiguation and redefinition of words. The craving for ‘freedom’ felt by citizens will take on a new meaning. Classically, it meant freedom from the arbitrary power of others, but socialists now use it to describe a sort of freedom from necessity and limitations. Ironically, this would only be achievable through the use of arbitrary powers that governments grant themselves, which is the opposite of freedom. Socialists used this change in meaning to carry out a redistribution of wealth, from the pockets of ordinary citizens to the coffers of the government. Socialism was to bring ‘economic freedom’ which they would argue is more important than all other freedoms.
People often quibble over the fact that since the communists and Nazis clashed with one another more than with others, that this someone places them in opposition to one another. Hayek points out that this only occurred ‘because they competed for the same type of mind and reserved for each other the hatred of the heretic. Their practice showed how closely they are related’. They never reached a compromise because this would interfere with their prospects of robbing one another’s garden for choice daisies. It is relatively easy to turn a Nazi into a communist and vice versa, and both sought to funnel incensed and idealistic young socialists into their ranks. A socialist seed grows into a fascist flower if you give it the right light.
The promises of a road to freedom are just the opposite, because the control necessary to produce such a thing is complete. A totalitarian regime will be forced to take control in ways that even they did not intend at the outset. Individualist ethics will be replaced with collectivist ethics, and one will always be sacrificed for the other. This is when invocations of the GREATER GOOD will occur, acting as cover for an impossible venture that they believed was clear and accessible. ‘Once you admit the individual is merely a means to serve the ends of the higher entity called society or the nation, most of those features of totalitarianism which horrify us follow of necessity’. All collectivist conduct will be regarded as imperative, and intolerance for dissidents will become public policy.
The MAID – medical assistance in dying policies in Canada glaringly exemplify the killing of the old, the sick and the downtrodden. Policies such as these are treated as ‘mere matters of expediency; the compulsory uprooting and transportation of hundreds of thousands becomes an instrument of policy approved by almost everybody except the victims’. Ordinary compliant and obedient citizens will ignore acts that would tend to cause a revolt because they are not subject themselves to these inequities.
Collectivists are neither compassionate nor kind, despite the rhetoric they espouse. A distinguished American economist, Professor Frank H. Knight, correctly notes that the authorities of a collectivist state ‘would have to do these things whether they wanted to or not: and the probability of the people in power being individuals who would dislike the possession and exercise power is on a level with the probability that an extremely tender-hearted person would get the job of a whipping master in a slave plantation’.
Hayek then brings it home with a sobering set of passages outlining the normalization protocols found in collectivist states:
“A further point should be made here: collectivism means the end of truth. To make a totalitarian system function efficiently it is not enough that everybody should be forced to work for the ends selected by those in control; it is essential that the people should come to regard these ends as their own.
The most effective way of making people accept the validity of the values they are to serve is to persuade them that they are really the same as those they have always held, but which were not properly understood or recognized before. And the most efficient technique to this end is to use the old words but change their meaning.
Even among us we have planners who promise us a ‘collective freedom’, which is as misleading as anything said by totalitarian politicians. ‘Collective freedom’ is not the freedom of the members of society, but the unlimited freedom of the planner to do with society what he pleases. This is the confusion of freedom with power carried to the extreme.”
Any system that necessarily eschews truth as part of its operating is inhumane by definition. The requirement for citizens to substitute their own will for that of the state could only be supported by the pathologically naïve or the remorseless psychopath. Public funds will be used to whittle our humanity through the use of coercive propaganda campaigns until we become destabilized to the point of malleability. The end of the road to serfdom arrives soon thereafter.
There are aspects of socialist policies that may benefit the broader context, but even then, there are many arguments that different approaches would prove more fruitful. Regardless of what you believe, the progression of collectivist ideologies that result in a totalitarian state with a dominant centralized planning structure will engineer a world that none one of us want to live in. Only the tyrant and the coward are at home in such dismal waters.
Liberalism needs to be reinvigorated regularly with freedom as its epicenter, lest it give way to socialism, the foreplay of totalitarianism.
Curiously, most socialists seem to forget that they are merely useful idiots in the cause to capture power, and they will be the first ones shot when they have outlived their usefulness.
Their ignorance of history is consistent with their ignorance of humanity.
(1) All excerpts from Hayek, F.A., The Road to Serfdom with The Intellectuals and Socialism, 2005, Reprinted 2010, The Institute of Economic Affairs, London.
Posted: 26 Feb 2023
Hate
A state of humourlessness that fails to appreciate our shortcomings.
A description of a negative human emotion that has been adopted as a political pejorative designed to destroy someone’s reputation.
An adjective used almost exclusively in public discourse by activists and bureaucrats who have appointed themselves guardians of society to share their disapproval of one or more people with whom they disagree.
Where the incompetent prefer the buck to stop. If we are good at something, then we are regularly given leeway in a variety of ways because our value persists irrespective of how much hatred we display. Those who believe themselves to have the right views, the right politics, and having attended the right colleges - but are otherwise mediocre or useless, need to stay competitive in a market that where they have no value. This is strategically achieved by undercutting their superiors through fallacious ad hominems.
It is not a matter of whether or not hate exists. The issue is that humans cannot be trusted to distinguish between parody, disagreement, legitimate dissidence, irony, and real hatred when we occupy positions that would claim such things. Additionally, we should remain suspicious of those who would want such a position. Finding a deferential and moderate host to take on such a role is not likely considering it would provide us with arbitrary power over others, something that only political egotists would revere.
The political nature of the term is further clarified by examining how it is discussed by hate hustlers. While there was a time when we understood hatred as the offspring of fear and ignorance, this is no longer the case. We have disabused ourselves of this empathy and those who hate are now not only dangerous, they are a sort of intolerable evil that we must fight at every opportunity. Not with education or love, mind you, but with disrepute and dismissal from society. It turns out that this new brand of religious intolerance towards the hateful is lacking the wisdom of the past that urged us to treat them with compassion and understanding.
We have traded our patience for pitchforks, because peace does not benefit the politics of the vicious.
The correct way to address hate is to humanize others and find a common ground. We need to recognize and appreciate that the prejudice we may possess does not invalidate our worth as a contributing member of society. We are comprised, after all, of far more than one perspective or view, and we should examine them together while we work on understanding the genesis of such things.
It may be impossible to overcome them entirely, but this is how progress is made. We do not need third parties to arbitrate our differences for us, we are perfectly capable of doing it ourselves, although it seems that many of us have forgotten how. The solution is to learn again, accepting that if we leave it to a politically-minded egotist, our neighbours will start to disappear before our eyes.
Compassion should be reserved and allocated for those who deserve it, it should never be used as a justification to crucify another on our behalf.
When in doubt, laugh with whom you hate.
Posted: 26 Jan 2023
Narrative
A substitution for reality that emerges out of ignorance or a belief that it does not conform to our expectations.
A story about truth that we believe is stable enough to build upon, although we often settle on those we prefer over those that make sense.
The foundation of ideology.
All narratives are stories, but not all stories are narratives. Most of what we conceive is predominantly informed by stories - constructions about meaning that vary in complexity, utility, depth, scope, particularity, and resonance. Each concept contains numerous stories, they are not constrained to a single composition. Even the concepts themselves qualify as stories, but this is a convoluted metaphysical claim that, while meaningful in its own right, will struggle to find its place in this setting.
Some examples are language, money, and love.
Language contains a story about the connection between conveyance and reality, but it also contains stories about philosophy, history, geography, culture, power, biology, art and humanity. Money contains a story about value and potential, but it also contains stories about transference, status, ownership, markets, commodities, leverage and human interest. Love contains a story about emotion and commitment, but it also contains stories about tradition, violence, property, control, compulsion, evolution and procreation. There are many more beyond these to be sure, and appreciating the significance of each and how they are interrelated is a determining factor in whether we actually understand something. If we cannot grasp these strands and their interconnectivity, then we have no basis for professing conceptual proficiency.
Stories also iterate over time, and they are subject to selective pressures just like any phenotypical characteristic, improving their resolution if they are valuable for adaptation. Those that do not offer sufficient value, or if they promote maladaptive tendencies, will have to undergo significant changes or they will be forgotten to time, and rightfully so. Stories have always been part of human sense-making, and our necessity for narrative formation driven by our biology is likely to keep them around for as long as we remain human. Narratives, while typified as stories, possess some unique characteristics that distinguish them from others.
Most stories seek to interpret reality in a manner that improves human understanding, narratives seek to prescribe reality in a manner that the bard believes is or ought to be the case. Stories are constructed around phenomenon that emerges around us - they are bottom-up models of perceived reality. Narratives are constructed around an ideal that presumes its relevance irrespective of reality – they are top-down models of prospective desirability.
Narratives are often esoteric, requiring that an anointed class remain at the forefront of its cause, whereas stories possess a quality of universal accessibility. One demands that a select group govern an obedient majority, the other democratizes meaning and encourages reciprocity. Stories wane over time if they suffer practical repudiation, but narratives remain consistent over time due to their rigidity, and their waxing is encouraged, not due to any adaptive strategy that benefits humanity, but because it benefits the narrative and its adherents. Complexity is found in both, but the richness in compelling stories occurs as a result of natural processes. The complexity in narratives occurs as a result of normative processes designed to conflate its validity with redundant and often inconsistent navel-gazing – it is shallow and empty.
Both are useful in their own right, but while stories spread memetically built upon evolutionary principles, narratives feign profundity built upon an artificial substrate of idealism. The former leads to understanding, the latter leads to control. This can be seen in how often exchanges are welcome that challenge our understanding of each.
Stories are like poetry, they follow a recognizable structure, they vary in potency, and we are all encouraged to share our understanding of the material. High quality stories possess the capacity to produce exponentially-growing degrees of freedom that become intertwined as we unite around their potency. Narratives are stale and lifeless, they exist in whichever form the anointed dictate, and they may be engaged with only in the prescribed manners that are dictated. They do not exist to generate unity nor do they invite universal access on our own terms, they attempt to capture generalized power through complicity, and the tactics employed are predatory and disingenuous.
Rather than examine stories closely to determine their nature, we can perform a relatively straight-forward assessment to assist us in clarifying this pretty quickly.
If it is persuasive on its own merits, encourages deference by all parties, contains clear and accessible wisdom, and leaves us feeling more connected, then it is a high-quality story that will likely contribute to human understanding. Collect as many of these as possible, and share them so we may discover where we stand relative to one another.
If it is fails to persuade in the absence of unspoken threats or emotional weaponry, encourages egocentric reference points, contains opaque wisdom or none at all, and leaves us feeling less connected or even divided, then it is a narrative, and it is not likely that it will contribute to human understanding. Even if it did, would it be worth all of the destruction it invites?
With this in mind, examining our views is extremely important if we are looking to prioritize common sense, unity, pluralism, and individual human worth.
Posted: 26 Feb 2023
Heresy
A religious description of offense used to capture power and influence through fear; a contrivance.
A conceptual factory fueled by prideful fear designed to mass-produce and endless supply of witches to burn.
An extremely effective way to manufacture mistrust and conflict among citizens, and to justify committing atrocities against innocent people under the auspices of the GREATER GOOD.
A natural byproduct of ideology and faith, which is why we ought to be especially careful in how we construct our ideas and what we put into them.
A feature of some narratives that depicts the world as comprised of good and bad people, which immediately disqualifies such narratives as worthy of human attention.
While heretics are considered lost or unclean, they pose as a threat regardless to both the integrity and capacity for an idea to spread, and so they must be converted or destroyed. It is in this way that we can see that prideful fear is the main driver of rigid belief.
If we ascribe things to a higher order belief, then it is just a matter of time before our neighbours decide that they are in a position to carry it out on behalf of God, or worse, an ideological framework. They are the anointed, after all, and we are the heretic. It is incredible how quickly we give ourselves the permission to attack others informed by a belief or our own creation or choosing. Once someone is labeled a heretic, the onus is always placed on the victim to demonstrate or convey their innocence or provide recompense. They are just a heretic; we are the devout. They answer to us.
When heresy becomes a palpable description of our conduct, neighbours will inevitably attack one another to demonstrate their commitment to the cause. Rigid perspectives are fundamentally dehumanizing; they turn us into mindless implements of faith. Sideliners are encouraged to participate in the demonization of those who think differently for fear that if they do not, their doubt with respect to the faith may be interpreted as heresy in turn. The chosen will include them among the unclean.
At some point, merely questioning an article of faith will constitute heresy, and the true face of the devout can be glimpsed. Heresy is a crutch for the malevolent whose death is best experienced vicariously through others courageous enough to live free from the influence of dictatorial apparitions.
Whoever has been ordained as a representative of a rigid belief structure will do whatever they please while always finding a way to justify it as an anointed party who is solely capable and responsible for interpreting the will of the order. And they could always use another scapegoat to distract their adherents from their shortcomings, as if to imply that no one is of sufficient competence, moral character or wisdom lead anyone in such a manner.
Discussions introducing this sort of doubt is avoided at all costs, you filthy heretic.
See: WITCHES
Posted: 25 Feb 2023
Witches
Proxy scapegoats; living effigies that we burn to justify our neuroticism and absolve ourselves of responsibility.
While they are described as an obstacle to stability and progress, these heretics do not actually represent an external threat. They are icons of our shortcomings that we displace onto others in lieu of accepting that our misfortunes are a product of our own sins.
In the film Monty Python and the Holy Grail, there is a scene where a group of peasants, poor and downtrodden, enthusiastically usher a helpless woman through town claiming that she is a witch. Along the way, men, women and children of all ages cease their activities and join in the rabble driving towards the town square, seeking permission to burn the witch from a knight tasked as consul for the region.
When questioned by the knight as to why they believe that she is a witch, the rabble claims that it is because she looks like one. The would-be witch complains that the rabble dressed her as a witch against her will, and they even fabricated a crude false nose out of a carrot and string. The knight heeds her protest and when he is about to dismiss them, the rabble begin to invent stories about things that she has done, not only to justify their forced costuming, but to further compel the knight to permit them to burn her.
The knight is not persuaded by their claims, but instead guides them through a series of leading questions that he believes are designed to identify a witch. After numerous painstaking exchanges, he determines that if the witch weighs the same as a duck, this must mean she floats in water, which means she is made of wood, and the reason that we burn witches is because they are made of wood. They place her on a nearby scale that the knight recently built for just such a purpose, and when a duck is placed on the other plate, the scales balance perfectly. She is officially labeled a witch and they carry her off to burn her. Absolutely brilliant.
While this scene is humourous in its own right, the genius of its commentary is rarely discussed in explicit terms. You see, the knight is just as foolish and fearful as the rabble, but he has concealed this beneath a moderate temperament and sophistry. The humour of the scene is the irony on display. King Arthur witnesses the entire affair and even chimes in to contribute, which is readily applauded by the knight. Everyone in the scene is the same; the peasants, the knight, the king and his accompaniment, they are all corrupt idiots, and they all wanted to see a witch burn.
Her identity was fabricated, and yet it was entertained. The claims of her witchcraft were ridiculous, and yet the trial continued. The knight’s methodology was ludicrous, yet it carried the day. How convenient it is that the knight happened to have a nearby scale he designed himself! He demonstrated its accuracy to the townsfolk…by having it balance the weight of a full-grown woman with that of a duck. King Arthur celebrates the wisdom of the knight and invites him to join his quest for the holy grail.
Everyone wanted a witch to burn, and they each found their own way of justifying it. Some used crude means, others more sophisticated, but everyone got what they wanted in the end, and they felt righteous doing it. The knight even found a way to legitimize his broken scale as an effective tool for identifying witches; it is doubtful it would be useful for anything else.
A question of great importance about the entire endeavour, everyone and their part in it, is why?
Why indeed.
The crux is that we value the potential good fortune, the elimination of misfortune, and the absolution that we believe accompanies the cleansing of a categorical threat – a heretic.
If we perceive ourselves as cursed, suffering ill will, or experiencing misfortune, we generally seek to discover its genesis and remediate it. Rather than accepting that it may be our own shortcomings or a fact of an uncontrollable existence that we find ourselves where we are, we opt to displace the blame onto someone else. We ascribe our problems to them and then, if we can find a way to attach a NARRATIVE of malevolence to them, we will sprinkle on a little moralistic justification for their termination, and we have ourselves a worthwhile witch.
An extremely important feature of this framing is that any moral embedding is entirely arbitrary. The morality is a necessary ingredient in justifying the immolation, it is never a coherent articulation of morality. It merely grants us the permission and the clear conscience to destroy others. It constitutes either a collectivist morality or the Machiavellian mechanism favoured by psychopaths, as seen in DARK TRIAD personalities.
If we were to reverse engineer the situation, we are confronted with some philosophical quandaries that provide some pertinent insights. Let us remove witches from the equation; witches no longer exist. In the absence of a nemesis, who are those inclined to burn witches supposed to target as a meaningful substitution? There appears to be three options: one or more deities, themselves, or nothing in particular. Keeping in mind that introspection and self-criticism are sufficiently absent from those who hunt witches, none of these are particularly good options.
Blaming a transcendental entity beyond ourselves can go one of two ways – acceptance that it is their will, or a refusal of their will. The former does not a witch hunter make, so we are not talking about the same sort of person. The latter has to deduce that they are either worthy of such misfortune, which is the sort of introspection absent from witch hunters, or that perhaps there is nothing worthwhile to hear our prayers. Absolution cannot be sought in such circumstances, which undermines our prospects of righteousness. We may as well be a witch at that point, a hell spawn that we are deservedly sending to a fiery afterlife. This absolutely will not do.
Accepting the burden of responsibility defeats the purpose of witch burnings. If we are to consider that it is our own conduct, or lack thereof, that has produced our misfortune, then we are rightfully deserving of our suffering. Resentment for reality itself may be present, but it is born out of an acknowledgment that we are ultimately responsible, and so most will merely manage the pain, like we all do. Very few will lavish in reducing others to combustibles based on resentment of reality alone, and when they do, we are not gathering in the streets to follow them.
After we have dismissed our gods from consideration, and we find that taking responsibility is unappealing, we may conclude that there is no explanation in particular for our misfortune. We are now in a position to ascribe blame to anyone or anything, the others options having been eliminated. For the nihilistic, the hunt is never holy, it is a act of desperate hope. Nothing specific can be recognized as the source of our misfortune, but we figure that maybe, if we cleanse the world in a more general sense, then lady fortune may show her face. We integrate whichever narrative we find the most appealing with our perceived trauma and for a moment, we are instilled with a sense of hope that we scramble to realize.
To the point: there appears to be a human predisposition, perhaps even a necessity, for the traumatized and downtrodden to imagine that witches exist among us, especially if they are inclined to displace personal agency. Their identification and destruction appeal to us, irrespective of circumstance, and we will find a way to absolve ourselves and establish hope through their sacrifice. It is us or them, and they would do the same if given the chance, right? Our ability to lie to ourselves in lieu of accepting responsibility is one of the most abundant sources of avoidable human suffering.
When a human has been reduced to a witch, we may do with them as we please, they have become a pariah, unworthy of care and good for a single purpose. We would rather destroy others than take responsibility or accept the uncontrollable aspects of reality.
See: HERESY, VICTIMHOOD
Posted: 23 Feb 2023
Intellectuals
Insulated visionaries responsible for virtually every bad idea without any verifiability or accountability metrics.
An anointed class that values abstraction, idealism, and inhumane narratives in their models in lieu of reality, consequences, and wisdom.
Intellectuals are largely defined by baseless a priori notions that prescribe their positions on any given matter. Their visions serve as a substitute for both questions and answers.
It is common for intellectuals to view themselves as anointed figures. This is predominantly due to two forms of insulation; the rest is explained by an air of esteem that they afford themselves as a by-product of these barriers. First, intellectuals gravitate towards abstractions which, by their nature, fail to adhere to most of the reality beyond the metaphysical. Such examinations can be valuable, but the focus of most intellectuals are the ideas themselves, and this protects bad ideas from the grounding features of reality. It is often considered that the more untethered the idea, the more profound it is, and the more worthy of celebration the intellectual.
There are intellectuals who seek to create models tethered to the real world informed by hard evidence and coherence. These thinkers do not tend to view themselves as anointed because they are readily reminded of the intrinsic limitations of abstractions when stretched across reality – the holes become apparent. For the rest, their failure to think coherently renders them difficult or impossible to grapple with, and their untenable positions are somehow interpreted by them as an indication of their fortitude and rigour.
Second, they are insulated by their locale – academic settings and unidirectional or highly constrained mediums. A group of captive students incapable of competing intellectually or rhetorically is the favoured setting for such thinkers. Cocktail parties, the internet, and the unemployment line are also popular. When intellectuals share their ideas in a public setting, it is often done through published articles or books. While these mediums can be contended with, they are infrequently read by ordinary citizens, and when they are, their critiques generally do not reach the intellectual. Even if they did, an anointed intellectual is likely to disregard the input of a lesser being. Most intellectuals avoid public debates at all costs because they run the risk of embarrassment, whether it is due to their ramblings reaching a larger audience or because they fear a formidable adversary. They may post material online, but is rarely an exchange with a competent opponent – they prefer masturbation to intercourse.
American author, economist, political commentator and senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Thomas Sowell, assessed intellectuals at great lengths in his book Intellectuals and Society. Among many other gems:
The anointed enjoy ample opportunity to have their attitudes guide their work, not principles, especially when these attitudes are prevalent among their peers and insulated from consequential feedback from the outside world. This works out well for them because they are generally obsessed with change and not the transmission of wisdom or practical knowledge.
They prefer to analyze and conceptualize people as abstractions or as members of categories, but then convey their concerns as individualistic because it suits their agenda. They deliberately avoid recognizing the transience of individuals through such categories so they can frame social issues as problems for which they alone possess the cure. They believe that institutions are the cause of problems, and that it is their job, as anointed intelligentsia, to solve them for us. Additionally, they seek to prevent them from happening at all.
Predominantly preoccupied with gaining and maintaining the moral hegemony of the anointed above all else, including the desires or interests they claim benefit from their initiatives - the poor, minorities, or disenfranchised. That being said, they are willing to sacrifice the well-being of those they profess to be primarily concerned with when it conflicts with the symbolic issue they feel defines their vision.
If pressed, they will generally acknowledge human limitations, but they do not build them into their vision, which disqualifies them as worthy contributors to solving complex problems.(1)
It would be difficult to state it more poignantly than Sowell, and his descriptions are both clear and cutting.
In many ways, these are predictable features of intellectuals. The abstract realm is a wonderland of infinite possibilities, and it will attract certain personalities. Due to the inherent shapelessness of the landscape, our attitudes will tend to guide us. Introducing a principle into this realm creates boundaries, which many intellectuals consider inhibiting. In lieu of establishing a concrete principle and having it guide us through the terrain, we permit some approximation of roaming to orient us until we reach a destination concordant with our attitudes. Throughout this pursuit, we are pretending that our minds are blank in a sense, unbiased and merely floating through a space of fair examination. This is false of course, but we are experts at fooling ourselves, and the fact that our immediate circle reinforces these misguided notions (likely because they benefit from them as well), solidifies this cognitive malpractice.
It is perhaps the most characteristic of the intellectual that he judges new ideas not by their specific merits but by the readiness with which they fit into his general conceptions, into the picture of the world which he regards as modern or advanced. Intellectuals are masters of the technique of conveying ideas but are usually amateurs so far as the substance of what they convey is concerned.(2)
The gravitation towards and immersion into this realm that immediately warps itself around bias invites the architect to cut seams and smooth edges as he see fit. The comfort and deceitful idealism that emerges soon thereafter serves as the foundation for the remaining transgressions. The push towards changes and revolution over practical knowledge or wisdom, the depiction of humans as abstract over individual examinations, and the recognition of categorical transience all contribute to this chimeric egocentricism. Because the intellectual realm is a constructed bias abstraction, we will inevitably witness ourselves on every signpost towards our settlement.
The erosion of individual agency is expected – people are both too benign and too complicated for the intellectual. Institutions possess formalized traits and they are responsible for guiding people, as such, intellectuals love their domineering image, especially when it has a ready-made purpose that may be assessed relative to our ideals. Hence, institutions will be viewed as the source of all social ills, and the intellectual the antidote. The novelty of this realization compels us to believe we serve a special role in correcting them. We will find a way to convert this novelty into a sense of moral duty, justifying our bias as noble, and with our newly anointed status, we have become the guardian of the disenfranchised. That is, unless they conflict with our posturing, then we will remove them from the equation – reality is far too inconvenient for the intellectual.
When pressed on the impossibilities of our ideals and the inconsistencies of our approach, we will speak out both sides of our mouth. We will defend our intellectual awareness by acknowledging that human limitations exist when addressed formally, but due to the realistic tethering of such a position, we cannot have it built into our model. Idealism has no time for reality, or for people. This has been the case since intellectual models have become endemic to academic settings, and the increased standards of living that have accompanied the increase in wealth in some countries have made these fruitless capitulations all the more common. A decrease of existential concerns appears to produce an increase in aimless intellectual formulation and subsequent pandering. Most intellectuals currently oscillate between bored and unimaginative.
Intellectuals consistently occupy the top spot on the podium for mental gymnastics. They love to deconstruct everything except their own positions.
(1) Sowell, T., Intellectuals and Society, 2011, Revised and enlarged edition 2022, Basic Books, New York.
(2) Hayek, F. A., The Intellectuals and Socialism, 1949, Kessinger Publishing LLC, Montana.
See: STUPID, IDEALISM, SOCIALISM
Posted: 19 Feb 2023
Pornography
Sexual education for children that perpetuates a form of sexual autism.
A product that contains almost no real information that has exploded in popularity due to our system of limbic capitalism.
Louise Perry, writer, New Statesman columnist and campaigner against male sexual violence, says the following:
“Porn is to sex as McDonald’s is to food. These two capitalist enterprises take our natural appetites, pluck out the most compulsive and addictive elements, strip away anything truly nutritious, and then encourage us to consume more and more. Both products are…exaggerated versions of naturally occurring stimuli, that tap into an evolved longing for nourishment, excitement and pleasure but do so in a maladaptive way, fooling the consumer into gorging on a product that initially feels good but in the long term does them harm.
…On the one hand, [women] have a sexual script that has become increasingly aggressive and loveless. But, on the other, we have a group of men who are so stupefied by porn that they are (sometimes permanently) impaired in their ability to have sexual relationships with real people. Put simply, the porn generation are having less sex, and the sex they are having is also worse: less intimate, less satisfying and less meaningful.
…The porn industry…destroy its workers and consumers alike.”(1)
Porn may have a place in some contexts, but it is damaging the capacity of our children to develop healthy sexual relationships.
Our sons and daughters will look at one another, completely confident about how this dance is done while equipped with all of the wrong moves. They will harm one another in the process while receiving constant reinforcements from the porn they consume due to how engaging and exciting it is.
There is an incredible amount of denial regarding the availability of deviant and illegal pornography. Some parents dismiss any concerns, while others try and manage their expectations imagining that the porn their children are watching is relatively tame. Young adults, men in particular, are among the most curious about deviant sex whilst being the least risk averse. The menu of violence, bestiality, child pornography, and degradation is available for them if they know where to look. All of this culminates into shaping their perceptions of what sex can, does, or should include. We probably do not know what our children are watching or how it may be influencing them, and they are not likely to share it with us. This is a worthwhile concern.
While objectification may be arousing in some settings, your partner is not an object - they are a person - and the escalating passions that emerge between two people are to be met with a mind bent on discovery and reciprocity.
Like fast food, we should reduce how much porn we consume, and when we do consume it, remember that it is a magic trick: an illusion designed to engage and then disappear without a trace.
(1) Perry, L., The Case Against the Sexual Revolution: A New Guide to Sex in the 21st Century, 2022, Polity Press, Cambridge, UK.
Posted: 18 Feb 2023
Education
Jean Piaget, one of the greatest minds to study child development and learning, stated that ‘[t]he goal of education is to create men and women who are capable of doing new things.’(1)
While education may have many goals, this serves as a good foundation. Despite this clear and honest directive, modern institutions are fundamentally confused about what this is supposed to look like. Or worse, they may not be confused at all.
Conformity and guidelines for learning may be actively discouraged in some settings, but even when these are present, they are not entirely unconstrained. This is important because nothing in reality is boundless, but it can be misconstrued and abused like all good intentions. High quality learning should be active and exploratory, but what is included and excluded within these bounds? What are the rules of engagement? Who is participating? These are all ripe for abuse - it all depends on the TEACHER.
We often do not choose the schools our children attend, and we do not choose their teachers or the curriculum either. And while these are not unique in any respect to most public institutions we are generally compelled to utilize, none have the capacity to completely screw up our children as much as poor schooling. Teachers and schools can compromise and damage our children for good.
Most teachers do not pose a threat to our children. But it has increasingly become the occupation of choice for ACTIVISTS, intent on transforming both education and our children into tools for an agenda. It is in this way, when the individual or special interests of teachers or institutions are used to serve a perverse incentive, that our children, and by extension society, suffers. It appears as though using children as a captive audience for proselytization is trending beyond religion these days.
The foundation of Piagetian education and its desire to make learning active and exploratory is no longer being used in any traditional sense. Currently, young children are actively being exposed to mature themes such as sex and sexual ideologies, politics, racism, social justice, and a host of other concepts they do not understand. Often, the teachers themselves do not understand the subject either.
This often occurs because they have a childless activist teacher who does not understand, nor cares to understand, that children generally prefer to just play innocent games and eat snacks. You would think that this knowledge would be a mandatory part of becoming a teacher.
What is interesting is that while Piagetian exploratory learning is present in some corrupt sense, it is swiftly curtailed when teachers and institutions conclude that our children have been sufficiently schooled to hold their prescribed views and beliefs. So, the model is used to justify introducing mature themes, but it is then dismissed once the prescribed boundaries have been set. This is the opposite of education; it is SCHOOLING.
As our children grow and progress through the institutions, it does not appear anything changes. Most high school and post-secondary students, who are now adults, view the institutional narratives as sacrosanct. How could a system dedicated to exploratory learning produce prideful students that are completely possessed with ideological views if it were not compromised? The proof is in the pudding.
It is impossible to become a man or woman capable of doing new things if we have been taught to believe that we know it all, that we are owed everything, and that complaining about things is how we improve them.
(1) Benson, N., Collin, C., Ginsburg, J., Grand, V., Lazyan, M., Weeks, M. (2012) The Psychology Book, London: Dorling Kindersley Ltd.
Posted: 15 Feb 2023
Study
Scientific currency that has been ascribed social merit.
Increasingly popular as a tool used by governments to exercise authority over others.
Numerous aspects of studies are ignored when they are invoked to argue a particular position. These include who performed the study, who funded it, the methodologies used, the sample size, the recognized bias and limitations, the protocols, the implications, the risk inferences, if it was voluntary, if it was self-report, and how the study was structured. Essentially, everything important to consider when assessing the validity or quality of its findings.
Instead, the data produced by the study is packaged by stakeholders in a manner that is consistent with their priorities. Sound bites and headlines are then constructed and propped up across every form of media in order to generate consistency or controversy, whichever is being sought at the time. Sources are frequently omitted in said reporting, and when they are present, they often have broken links or they are secreted behind a paywall.
We consume these stories, decide if the result in consistent with our preconceptions about the world or a particular issue, and then regurgitate the major talking points as though we performed the study ourselves.
We hope that this will make us look intelligent and knowledgeable to others.
See: SCIENCE, STATISTICS
Posted: 13 Feb 2023