Tuesday, May 01, 2012

Freedom and Truth, Intelligence and Reality

No time for a new post, but just slackenough for a peerback on what was happening in the Cosmos five years ago this month.

One of the consolations of secular humanism is that since a human life has no intrinsic -- which is to say, transcendent -- purpose, it isn't possible to waste one's life.

Nor, if absolute truth doesn't exist, is it possible to be intrinsically wrong and therefore cosmically stupid.

And of course, if virtue is reduced to an arbitrary cultural agreement -- say, about whether or not it is a good idea to leave a woman attached to her clitoris -- then a culture cannot be bad, much less evil, only "different" and probably oppressed and victimized to boot.

If human beings are not free to know truth, then neither freedom nor truth can be said to exist. In other words -- no, the identical words, only italicized for added oomphasis: if human beings are not free to know truth, then neither freedom nor truth can be said to exist.

These two categories -- freedom and truth -- are so fundamentally intertwined, that any diminution of one leads to a negation of the other. Therefore, it should be no surprise that a philosophy such as leftism, which does not value liberty, should be permeated with so many lies.

And it is not just that these lies represent bad or faulty information, subject to correction. Rather, these are vital lies which one is compelled to believe, often in spite of common sense and hundreds and even thousands of years of collective experience. In other words, one is not free to believe otherwise.

Perhaps you remember the seemingly mundane but illustrative example of the high school cheerleaders who were compelled by law to root equally for both boys' and girls' teams. As Dennis Prager wrote at the time, "almost no one directly involved wants this -- not the cheerleaders, not the fans, not the boys' teams, and not even the girls' teams. But it doesn't matter: The law coerces cheerleaders to cheer at girls' games."

And it all begins with a vital lie of the left, that men and women are identical. Since no normal person believes this, it must be mandated and pressured into us by force.

Put another way, the state -- and this is just one of dozens of examples -- makes it against the law to be normal. (Other examples that come readily to mind: in California it is against the law to "discriminate" against a cross-dressing employee, and in our public school textbooks it is forbidden to depict any culture in a negative light.)

Once a vital lie such as this is accepted, freedom must be constrained in a thousand ways -- not just for men, but obviously for woman as well, since a normal girl has no spontaneous interest in being a cheerleader at a girls' softball game.

For that matter, at least back when I was in high school, no boy with his chromosomes in order wanted to be associated with the words Yell. King. Might as well say shrieking pussy. Or just William Yelverton.

I mean, what an intrinsically undignified designation for a young man. Real men don't yell (except when necessary), any more than they whine, quibble, needlessly complain, pose as victims, or contact the authorities when a troll hurts their feelings.

If you would be a king among men, you must not only refrain from all pettiness -- which is only the absence of a negative -- but possess a genuine center of power. This power may be in the realm of knowing, or doing, or being, but a man, in order to be one, must conquer something in one of these realms.

Furthermore, with respect to knowledge, one can't just know "anything." Rather, you must know truth; and, most importantly, you must defend it, just as you would defend your family. Nor can you do just anything. Rather, you must courageously do what is virtuous in a fallen world.

And you certainly cannot be just anything. Rather, your being must radiate the calm presence of Being itself, which undoubtedly supersedes, or at least infuses, the other two powers. This center of Being is also the center of Power, since it is a terrestrial prolongation of the celestial center of Truth, Virtue, and Freedom.

Prager notes what should be a truism, that "Of all the myths that surround Left-Right differences, one of the greatest is that the Left values liberty more than the Right. Regarding a small handful of behaviors -- abortion is the best example -- this is true.

"But overwhelmingly, the further left one goes on the political spectrum, the greater the advocacy of more state control of people's lives.... It is astonishing that this obvious fact is not universally acknowledged and that the Left has somehow successfully portrayed itself as preoccupied with personal liberty with regard to anything except sexual behavior and abortion."

Again, since the left does not value real liberty, their version of "truth" must be coerced, never arrived at freely. As Prager notes, "Most activists on the Left believe that they, not only their values, are morally superior to their adversaries. Therefore, coercing people to adhere to 'progressive' values is morally acceptable, even demanded. It is thus quite understandable that laws would compel high school cheerleaders to cheer at girls' athletic events as much as at boys'. And true to leftist totalitarian models, not only is behavior is coerced, but emotions as well."

In other words, in compelling one to have certain emotions, the left even tries to shape you "from within," or "beneath" cognition. This is one of the purposes of political correctness, as it compels people to identify with, and express, false emotion -- for example, hysteria over Arizona merely enforcing Federal immigration laws.

Again, consider the pettiness of the left, which leads to an insect-eye-view of the world. Regarding the cheerleaders, leftist activists insist that they should "attend girls' and boys' games 'in the same number, and with equal enthusiasm' as part of its five-year goals.'"

Is it not Orwellian to require "equal enthusiasm" of anyone over anything? Ironic, since "enthusiasm" comes from en theos, or to be in-spired by God. How could enthusiasm be compelled, and still go by the name? Isn't that like "forced spontaneity?"

Besides, for a true leftist, shouldn't genuine en-thusiasm of any kind be against the law on the grounds that it violates the so-called separation of church and state? So too inspiration (spir = spirit) and charisma ("divine gift"). My own field of clinical psychology has many similarly illiberal demands mandating, for example, that I "respect" diversity. Why? Why not the Absolute, or One? Why the pluribus but not the Unum?

Because so-called progressives cannot compete in the marketplace of ideas, it is critical that they hijack the judiciary, so that their policies can be imposed on an unwilling populace, whether it is the redefinition of marriage, or government enforced racial discrimination, or acceptance of illegal Democrats, or compelling citizens to purchase health insurance.

It is simply axiomatic that "The more secular the society, the more laws are needed to keep people in check. When more people feel accountable to God and moral religion, fewer laws need to be passed. But as religion fades, something must step into the moral vacuum it leaves, and laws compelling good behavior result" (Prager).

Natural law is eclipsed by unnatural law, which ends up producing unnatural men -- which is to say, either feminized males or developmentally arrested boys. Or, you could say that the denial of natural law creates merely natural men; which is to say, animals. And for the left, this is "mission accomplished."

The truth is not at your service. Rather, vice versa. Only by virtue of this constraint -- the yoke which is paradoxically easy -- are you free. Not to mention, intelligent. Which is to say, real.

Man is so made that his intelligence has no effective value unless it be combined with a virtuous character. Besides, no virtuous man is altogether deprived of intelligence; while the intellectual capacity of an intelligent man has no value except through truth. Intelligence and virtue are in conformity with their reason for being only through their supernatural contents or archetypes; in a word, man is not fully human unless he transcends himself, hence, in the first place, unless he masters himself. --F. Schuon

22 comments:

William said...

I did not contact the authorities because Condon "hurt my feelings." I did so because the culture of leftism encourages victims to be bullies, and vice versa. Big difference.

Gagdad Bob said...

Dude, it's the internet, not the faculty lounge. Man up!

mushroom said...

If William did not exist, we would feel compelled to invent him. But if we did, he'd be much wittier.

Van Harvey said...

" if human beings are not free to know truth, then neither freedom nor truth can be said to exist."

There's a whole lot of Truthiness packed into those few words. Good thing it's not matter, that'd be close to maximum density and producing a black hole, but as It IS, I'm feeling free as a bird from having read it.

mushroom said...

OK, I'm going to quibble about "yell", though not about "yell king". Should that really just be one word, "yellking"? That way it sounds like something one would do with eggs and a yell king.

Anyway, a rebel yell is quite consistent with masculinity. A war whoop is masculine. A whoop and a holler is certainly acceptable as male behavior. Still, your basic point is correct. There is no way either of my granddaughters would be interested in dating the squad yellking.

mushroom said...

... these are vital lies which one is compelled to believe, often in spite of common sense and hundreds and even thousands of years of collective experience ...

It often takes years of post-grad studies to reach this level of abject stupidity. It is not a path to be taken lightly.

mushroom said...

The disconnect between the left and freedom is the thing that troubles me the most. I could live with a leftist government if they left me alone.

It is the insistence upon conformity that I will resist until the end.

I'm tempted to put leftist in quotes because there are worshipers of the idol State on both sides, and they should be disdained equally.

julie said...

To be fair to the boys on the cheerleading squad, my stepdad's nephew took that route and thus had access to cheerleaders who otherwise would never have given him a second glance (kid was hopelessly nerdy); it also forced him to get in shape when he might otherwise have become a real butterball. And I'm sure there must have been something in standing at the bottom of those pyramids...

That said, the whole idea of the yell king is more than a little silly.

And it all begins with a vital lie of the left, that men and women are identical.

Yes, this touches on something I was thinking yesterday in re. the lack of "deep or serious discussion of religion in school or in the MSM." There isn't just a lack of religious discussion, there is a lack of discussion of what it really means to be male and female. In fact, such consideration is forbidden, because you can't have kids thinking that there's some kind of masculine and feminine ideal when the agenda is that everyone is the same, but also that women are eternal victims and men eternal oppressors. True ideals would simply make too many people aware of how far they fall short, and gaia forbid their self-esteem might become damaged as a result. However, the false ones - for instance, that women can have it all and live "just like men" with no consequences - are enforced with little to no limit.

Might as well say shrieking pussy. Or just William Yelverton.

Ha - yep, I've been thinking exactly that ever since he went crying to the authorities. What a petty, puny, pusillanimous and pitiful excuse of a man. It occurred to me last night that regardless of whether he ever becomes open to truth, the worst possible punishment I can think of for him is to simply be him.

julie said...

Mushroom - I could live with a leftist government if they left me alone.

That's just it, though - a leftist government by definition cannot leave you, nor anyone, alone.

julie said...

Of all the myths that surround Left-Right differences, one of the greatest is that the Left values liberty more than the Right. Regarding a small handful of behaviors -- abortion is the best example -- this is true.

Today's example provided by Zombie. Just don't forget the brain bleach...

Van Harvey said...

Julie said "There isn't just a lack of religious discussion, there is a lack of discussion of what it really means to be male and female. In fact, such consideration is forbidden, because you can't have kids thinking..."

Yep. And really, no need to delimit it with 'male and female', it applies to equally to everything else discussed in school today. In my daughter's (13 years old today!) 'Ancient Civilization' class, all the kids are making posters of different topics, Rachel lucked out with 'The Five Pillars of Islam', the idea being the need to 'examine and compare' different cultures and beliefs.

Their idea of how to go about this, is to have her make this poster on the 'pillars', pointedly absent any mention or consideration of whether or not those are followed in practice, or even consistently supported in its ideology, and then at the end of this big 'ol poster (and yeah, poster, an essay being out of the question (too easy to slip into actual thinking. Danger!)), and it's bullet point summaries, there is to be one question: "How do the Five Pillars of Islam compare to other religions?", and of course they allow for at least two sentences to consider that question in depth.

What is the point of that? The point is not to engage the kids in discussion (on something they're entirely unprepared to discuss), but to reduce all cultures and beliefs to one, undifferentiated mass of 'Oh, yeah, they think we should be good', while giving the pretense of having considered 'the issues', which have in no way been considered.

Goes the same for anything related to anything remotely multi-culti or greenish, be it Islam or green energy or Western and other cultures, and so on.

Anna said...

" if human beings are not free to know truth, then neither freedom nor truth can be said to exist."

This is why when people start demoting truth to something "optional" or to opinion, it is reasonable to be concerned for the effectual disappearance of certain things and to stand in the way to protect them, even in conversation. It is right to be concerned enough to feel it even on a physical level (ie to tensen up or have an adrenaline alert) when people do violence to the truth (especially to truth itself). The battle lines start way back from when many people are willing to consider them to be an issue.

mushroom said...

Regarding the protesters pictured on Julie's link, I think the word "war" needs to be relegated to describing armed conflicts between nations or at least very large groups where someone actually might die.

Disagreeing about who is going to pay for someone's birth control is not a war. It is not even a skirmish, not a dust-up, not a fist-fight, not even a cat fight. It is, or should be, a discussion. They should explain to me why the hell I should pay for them to get laid, and I will explain why I shouldn't because -- trust me on this, if any of those chicks pictured get pregnant, I had nothing to do with it. I quit drinking almost thirty years ago.

And I am all for private uteri. In fact, I think maybe they aren't private enough which might be part of their problem.

USS Ben USN (Ret) said...

After William contacted the authorities they offered to put him in the Witless Protection Program.

Christina M said...

"Natural law is eclipsed by unnatural law, which ends up producing unnatural men -- which is to say, either feminized males or developmentally arrested boys."

And produces debased women who shut down or kill off "the most powerful thing in the world, the life force in women."** [For example, Julie's link to Zombie's photos.]

**http://www.imaginativeconservative.org/2012/04/books.html

Christina M said...

Regarding Van's story about the poster on the "Five Pillars of Islam."

Two months ago, I discovered that my 15 year old son could not write a five paragraph essay. I was able to teach him how pretty quickly. In talking to the English teachers about a week later during parent-teacher conferences, I quickly realized that the literature teachers do not teach writing. They only teach literature. Why? Because it takes time to read those essays and because it is painful to read the essays that are written. I know, because I have read some of them.

Around the same time I read an "essay" written by a "professor emeritus" in my writers' group. He couldn't write a five paragraph essay either. I was shocked.

I'm beginning to suspect that teachers aren't teaching writing because they can't write either.

My boys are learning lots of trivia that make them whizzes at scholastic bowls and at taking exams, but they have no way of putting that trivia together into a coherent thought.

Van Harvey said...

Chris_M said "My boys are learning lots of trivia that make them whizzes at scholastic bowls and at taking exams, but they have no way of putting that trivia together into a coherent thought."

My daughters "Communication Arts" class, when it really gears up to engage students in the 'fun of learning!', includes gems of analysis, such as

"Write what your favorite word was in this story, and how it made you feel"

Seriously. That's from one of their worksheets.

I use school as nothing more than a steady stream of teachable moments. 'Remember kids, if you don't think things through better than this, you too could wind up like that.' Talk about scared straight.

William said...

Step right up puppies, get your daily strokes from your master pseudo intellectual bullshit artist, Bob. Get a piece of Wiliam while you're here.

Pardon the captain, but what kind of a person needs to build himself up by publically denegrating another individual and shows exceptional cowardice by deleting his comments? That's Bob's cozy little personality cult here. Right Racoons?

Gagdad Bob said...

Oops. Touched a nerve.

julie said...

Aw, poor baby. Wonder if he wants some cheese with that whine?

William said...

What kind of a person needs to build himself up by publically denegrating another individual? Me, that's who. Projection, baby. Deal with it!

Christina M said...

Van said, "I use school as nothing more than a steady stream of teachable moments. 'Remember kids, if you don't think things through better than this, you too could wind up like that.' Talk about scared straight."

We say the same thing here. I feel bad our kids have to sit there and put up with a lot of this nonsense. It seems worse than when I was in school, and that was bad enough, with The Magic Circle" "get in touch with your feelings" Fridays.

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