1) The Left seems to want to excommunicate everyone - which is causing many of the excommunicated to look for a new political home. That does not, somehow, strike me as a winning political formula, but what do I know?
2) Consensus is good for maintaining political power - it is lousy at solving scientific problems. No major scientific advancement ever came out of the 98 percent of experts who all agree with one another. It's almost always the outlier who solves the tough problems: Einstein, Curie, Salk, Hawking, etc., all propelled major advancements in our understanding of the universe, medicine, etc., precisely because they defied conventional wisdom. This late fixation on not defying "consensus" is a recipe for stagnation.
Thank you! Seriously, 1) if you are going to be trying to win elections -- how stupid do you have to be to keep eating your own? It boggles the mind. They don't want voters. 2) Chilling. Also terrifying to me was politics mixed with a pandemic. Seems like we would have wanted to work together, as we would during war time. But the opposite happened. I wonder if we will ever have people brave enough to tell that story.
My favorite part of the Weinstein thing is when the kid starts yelling at him that "You need to stop demanding that people use logic and reason, and white forms of knowledge". It's wokeness distilled into 1 sentence
I think I can point to the origination of this mentality: 2009 and the expansion of the definition of a "hate crime". That opened the floodgates to a purely subjective, undefined type of crime: a thought crime. I always thought it was quite illogical to say the, for example, murder is actually two crimes: killing someone and hating someone. It always seemed to me that most crimes, almost by nature, have an inherent basis of hate. I knew where that law would take us, and I was more correct than even I feared in my worst projection.
I was so caught up in all of it that I didn't realize where it was headed. My daughter went to a CRT/gender high school and though I recognized it as indoctrination I was so caught up in the woke thing that I figured it was manageable or a necessary thing. I think, personally, that things would have been fine maybe? Had Trump never won. The shock of that threatened everything on the left and that is what birthed the Crazy. My first awareness that something was really wrong was when Al Franken was pushed out of the Senate.
I personally think Trump's election in 2016 caused the left to drop the "slowly boil the frog" approach. This has been going on for a long time. Trump won and "turned the burner off". The left realized that the next time they had power they needed to move quickly and decisively. My $0.02...
One thing I've noticed about the left, because I made this "mistake" myself early on, is that you can't even respond with: "Ok, I understand what you are saying and would like to analyze it to see if it makes sense."
Exactly. I used to attend a house of worship where we prided ourselves (what do they say about pride?) for being truly tolerant and open to what page each person was on. Then came 2003 and the Iraq War. Suddenly, things were slightly less tolerant. Then came Obama and the extreme focus on identity and the birth of "hate crimes" as mentioned above. OK, I could roll with that somewhat, after all, I want to try to live the Golden Rule. But the fury and hate that seethed from the left after Trump won... it is rare indeed now for people to truly listen, accept and love one another - regardless of their politics. I do find that most Conservatives just want to live and let live, unlike the Progressives.
Excellent piece, Sasha! Enjoyed the recording as well.
Brilliant!
Two thoughts:
1) The Left seems to want to excommunicate everyone - which is causing many of the excommunicated to look for a new political home. That does not, somehow, strike me as a winning political formula, but what do I know?
2) Consensus is good for maintaining political power - it is lousy at solving scientific problems. No major scientific advancement ever came out of the 98 percent of experts who all agree with one another. It's almost always the outlier who solves the tough problems: Einstein, Curie, Salk, Hawking, etc., all propelled major advancements in our understanding of the universe, medicine, etc., precisely because they defied conventional wisdom. This late fixation on not defying "consensus" is a recipe for stagnation.
Thank you! Seriously, 1) if you are going to be trying to win elections -- how stupid do you have to be to keep eating your own? It boggles the mind. They don't want voters. 2) Chilling. Also terrifying to me was politics mixed with a pandemic. Seems like we would have wanted to work together, as we would during war time. But the opposite happened. I wonder if we will ever have people brave enough to tell that story.
Politics + Science = The new religion. Science is a tool - "believing" in science is like "believing" in your garden shears or toothbrush ...
My favorite part of the Weinstein thing is when the kid starts yelling at him that "You need to stop demanding that people use logic and reason, and white forms of knowledge". It's wokeness distilled into 1 sentence
I think I can point to the origination of this mentality: 2009 and the expansion of the definition of a "hate crime". That opened the floodgates to a purely subjective, undefined type of crime: a thought crime. I always thought it was quite illogical to say the, for example, murder is actually two crimes: killing someone and hating someone. It always seemed to me that most crimes, almost by nature, have an inherent basis of hate. I knew where that law would take us, and I was more correct than even I feared in my worst projection.
I was so caught up in all of it that I didn't realize where it was headed. My daughter went to a CRT/gender high school and though I recognized it as indoctrination I was so caught up in the woke thing that I figured it was manageable or a necessary thing. I think, personally, that things would have been fine maybe? Had Trump never won. The shock of that threatened everything on the left and that is what birthed the Crazy. My first awareness that something was really wrong was when Al Franken was pushed out of the Senate.
I personally think Trump's election in 2016 caused the left to drop the "slowly boil the frog" approach. This has been going on for a long time. Trump won and "turned the burner off". The left realized that the next time they had power they needed to move quickly and decisively. My $0.02...
One thing I've noticed about the left, because I made this "mistake" myself early on, is that you can't even respond with: "Ok, I understand what you are saying and would like to analyze it to see if it makes sense."
Exactly. I used to attend a house of worship where we prided ourselves (what do they say about pride?) for being truly tolerant and open to what page each person was on. Then came 2003 and the Iraq War. Suddenly, things were slightly less tolerant. Then came Obama and the extreme focus on identity and the birth of "hate crimes" as mentioned above. OK, I could roll with that somewhat, after all, I want to try to live the Golden Rule. But the fury and hate that seethed from the left after Trump won... it is rare indeed now for people to truly listen, accept and love one another - regardless of their politics. I do find that most Conservatives just want to live and let live, unlike the Progressives.
Excellent piece, Sasha! Enjoyed the recording as well.
You make a good point about liberals, who happen to be white and male. They are the collateral damage of the left’s narrative.
Join The Resistance, comrade: https://yuribezmenov.substack.com/p/how-to-join-the-resistance-tm