Thursday, January 28, 2021

Light Privilege in the Ultimate Patriarchy

I don't usually read comments, but when I do, I typically respond with a shrug, although occasionally with a sense of wonder at man's preternatural ability to miss the point. This morning I will make an exception and respond to a few. 

One commenter asks why I "feel a need" to write about the left, and "always with the same utter lack of insight." Well, if I had insight, I'd understand the need, wouldn't I?

For that matter, if the left is so banal, Bob, why the fascination? That one is easy. I'm not actually interested in the left except to the extent that they're interested in us

For example, they want to censor us, raise our taxes, indoctrinate our children, discriminate on the basis of race, destroy women's sports, force us to pretend that psychological deviancy is normality, and destroy the energy industry because of some goofy religious belief about the weather. 

"As a psychologist, surely you've given some thought to this?" Yes, but psychology only explains so much. I've since graduated to post-postgraduate work in applied pneumatology and divine pslackology (which are two sides of the same nonlocal coin). 

"I have a similar problem – I find the right pretty boring, yet I'm also somewhat obsessed with them, can't leave them alone [you don't say!]. There must at least be a name for this type of compulsive interest in that which disgusts."

Apples and oranges. In your case, it is called projection. For while it is true that the left is obsessed with conservatives and can't leave us alone, the desire is not reciprocal. We want a limited government with enumerated powers, while the left wants a vast government with unlimited powers. We would be more than happy to leave you alone. Your entire platform is devoted to never leaving us alone. I live in California. Nuff said. 

"And most Democrats believe in God, which Bob has expressed as impossible." Not only have I never suggested this, I have written extensively on the impossibility of literal a-theism (whether speculative or practical), and of how the left is quintessentially a political religion.  But the principles of leftism and Christianity are antithetical, period.  

For what is the first principle of the left? 

Trick question! You will have noticed that the left always plays philosophical Calvinball, hence the chaotic and contradictory policies -- defund the racist police one day, heroic police the next day for saving our capitol from white supremacists! Black riots are righteous insurrections, pro-Trump clowns are treasonous insurrectionists! Global warming is an existential crisis, but let's not solve the problem with nuclear power! I can't think of a prominent leftist policy that isn't riddled with contradictions.  

Bob calls Democrats "leftists, a meaningless term if ever there was one." Which demonstrates the principle that leftism itself always involves an attack on the plain meaning of words. 

"He indicates Democrats are partially demonic but has never admitted a Republican could be partially demonic." 

Never said that. First, Democrat and leftist are not synonymous, although rapidly becoming so. At any rate, I never attribute to evil what is adequately explained by ignorance, stupidity, indoctrination, mental illness, and sociopathy, in that order. For the great majority of decent Democrats, the first three are sufficient. If we're analyzing, say, an Adam Schiff, then deeper factors and lower motives come into play.  If he isn't diabolic, then I have no sense of smell.

Never call Republicans demonic? If so, it is because they are more adequately explained by stupidity, cowardice, and petty self-interest. 

But "'demonic' itself is a nebulous concept which arguably has no reality in the One Cosmos comprised in total of God's good Self and nothing else." No, it's not at all nebulous. Quite specific, rather, and a "necessary" component of the total psychic economy -- necessary in the sense that this is not heaven and man is free to reject the good and true, even though culpable for doing so.

"As far as I know Bob does not believe centrist political views are possible, or admit the existence of people who fall between the Democrat and Republican continuum of opinions." 

This is mostly correct. For example, what is the centrist view between the principle that the Constitution means what it says and the principle that it means what the left wants it to mean? What is the compromise between the principle that men cannot be women, and the principle of "oh yes they can, fascist!" What is between the principle that discriminating on the basis of race is evil, vs. racial discrimination should be the animating principle of every last federal agency?

What is the centrist compromise between the 1776 and 1619 projects? There isn't one, because the second is crazy, stupid, false, and evil.

Etc.

That was a total waste of time, because no amount of logic, evidence, or elucidation of first principles can have any impact on the committed leftist. Now, on to this morning's post. This chapter is called History and Transcendence, and based upon the amount of highlighting, it must be a good one. 

Much of it revolves around a gnomic statement by Voegelin to the effect that history is a web of meaning with a plurality of nodal points. What could this mean? 

Among other things it means that history can never be reduced to a single explanation, as in, for example, Marxism. Rather, it is -- obviously -- not only multifactorial and overdetermined, but multidimensional. It is also teleological, only not in a deterministic manner. 

History is oriented to a transcendent attractor which history itself can never reach. But this is precisely where gnostic political religions go off the rails: on the one hand they pretend to deny transcendence even while forcing it to occur on the terrestrial plane. This always involves countless broken eggs, but they say it is worth it because the omelet will be delicious.  And free!

Let's not even waste time on that one, for the yolks write themselves.

Back to this multidimensional web of meaning. You have heard it said that Truth is just your opinion, man, but I say unto you that truth is symphonic. Not only that, it is a jazz symphony, meaning that it is simultaneously deeply structured and yet improvisational, which is why there is no liberty in the absence of order, and vice versa.

At every level and in every endeavor, we must conform ourselves to this order. For example, there are orders of physics, biology, morality, politics, metaphysics, and theology. 

And let's not forget the importance of time in this ambiguous space inhabited by man: "the intelligible order of history is made up not merely of a line of development though time." Rather, there are numerous lines of "meaningful advance," which is how the most privileged people on earth -- e.g., Barack Obama, Susan Rice, John Kerry, George Soros -- can be such moral retards.    

And this is a Big Problem: that "lines of meaning" can sometimes run "backward." One of the reasons I left the left is its deeply regressive ideas about race and gender. 

More generally, the tribal identity politics that so defines the left is as atavistic and barbaric as a principle can be -- at antipodes to the principle that the Constitution is colorblind and that all people are created equal. But Dems never really change, so Antifa and BLM are just their new KKK, as Jason Whitlock points out.

Yes, man always lives in the vortex of the now, but what a show!  Consciousness -- mine, anyway -- is situated in this vertical space between" human and divine modes of being," which is the "site" where "divine presence meets human response."  Truly, it is what it is -- or AM what it AM, rather, and we have the unique privilege of participating in this luminous center, or what we call light privilege

Groan. The end

27 comments:

ted said...

Looks like we are going to need some evil equity to counter that light privilege.

Gagdad Bob said...

Equity is just forcing us to give stuff to high status, already privileged minorities.

Gagdad Bob said...

"to achieve ‘equity,’ you first have to take away equality for individuals who were born in the wrong identity group. Equity means treating individuals unequally so that groups are equal.

"This is exactly contrary to the central thrust of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. It could easily be judged, in particular cases, to violate the 14th Amendment. Individuals discriminated against might have standing to go to court."

Anonymous said...

I'm not actually interested in the left except to the extent that they're interested in us.

Speaking for the left, I'm only interested in you to the extent you have an effect on politics. One particularly stupid aspect of your schtick is the pretense that only one side (the left) is engaged in politics while the right is just sitting here minding its own business.

The right just attempted a violent overthrow of the democratic process, which you'd think would give its supporters pause, but no, it's the same old stuff.

Cousin Dupree said...

That's a new one: BLM and Antifa are right wing, as is the FBI and its Russia hoax.

Cousin Dupree said...

And I am not aware of a single prominent conservative in politics or the media who condoned the unauthorized tour of the capitol building, nor am I aware of any prominent Democrat who condemned Antifa and BLM for their role in the most expensive riots in American history.

Anonymous said...

Sometimes, centrism is not a compromise. It wants small government types to check and balance big government excesses. Or the reverse if that needs to be the case.

Sometimes, like when fighting the German Nazis (back when they were the bad guys), big government solutions were the only way. Other times, big government stalls out economies and promotes psychopaths into power positions and innocent people die.

Sweden is a reasonable example. Sometimes democratic socialist but with a very high standard of living regardless, recently the system was retuned to allow more freedoms and the economic conditions didn't change much. But then covid struck and now Sweden has more covid incidence and deaths than all of its neighboring Scandinavian neighbors combined. It's always something. Is it time for another retuning? We shall see.

In America, the problem is that plutocrats have moved the Overton window (economic, not cultural) so far to the libertarian right that most of "left" and "right" are in the pocket of the plutocrats. So "the left" politicians wants pillow fights and the right goes for the head wound, as Steve Bannon once proclaimed. But he recently got caught stealing donation money, before sucking up to Trump again to be pardoned, so who cares what he thinks anymore. Forget what I said about the one formerly known as "Sloppy Steve".

With a plutocracy in control, "We the People" become "You the Losers who We The Rich People have manipulated into squabbling over the scraps, So You the Losers need to Listen to We the Rich People".

And then China wins and everybody else suddenly wants a Capitalist/Communist economy with atheist/Buddhist metaphysical leanings. Sometimes problem solving is hard.

Anonymous said...

Hello Dr. Godwin, I enjoyed today's well-crafted post and especially your tactful and reasonable explanations offered to critical commenters of yesterday.

I'll have to hoist myself back on the soapbox to bleat further about centrism. As soon as I think of some examples that show how centrism works. It is taking a while to think of them.

And then there is this you wrote:

"History is oriented to a transcendent attractor which history itself can never reach. But this is precisely where gnostic political religions go off the rails: on the one hand they pretend to deny transcendence even while forcing it to occur on the terrestrial plane."

I would point out that the end-game of some of the major religions is transcendence on the terrestrial plane so in that way it mirrors gnostic political religions. There is sharing of goals.

-Christianity awaits the return of Christ to create a Kingdom of Heaven on Earth.
-The Hindu posits that after some Yugas Earth will be so infused with spirit so as to resemble the Heaven wherein dwells Krishna.
-Buddhists gain individual transcendence on the terrestrial plane.

We all know what we want, it is just a matter of how we get there. And how fast. It is probably best not to rush things.


Anonymous said...

Anonymous 1:45 wrote: "With a plutocracy in control, "We the People" become "You the Losers who We The Rich People have manipulated into squabbling over the scraps, So You the Losers need to Listen to We the Rich People".

Now this makes a good point. Humanity has a yearly colossal surplus of wealth which it achieves largely through technology.

How do we know this? Because vast swaths of the population (possible up to 80%) labor at tasks deemed non-essential. That is interesting. Some people work in advertising. Others make gew-gaws and trinkets. Sports players are an example.

Folks get paid for these things. You need a magic pillow and someone to shill it on TV? Boom. It is virtually the same as a hand-out. These are the "scraps" alluded to by anonymous. Most people get money for nothing but are furnished with various make-work tasks to help make them feel "useful." And the stress for all of those diving for the scraps is very punishing. And needless.

Yes, the rich are lording it, but we enable them because we believe in scarcity, and there actually isn't any. That is the secret.

Stop believing in scarcity. Insist the fat-cats stop hoarding the surplus and pay out, and let people quit their ridiculous make work assignments and just give them what they need to live without making them leap gesture like trained seals.

We are soon to enter an era when surplus wealth becomes so obvious and so grotesquely oppressive that people will be exhorted to spend and actually prohibited from working.

It is a'coming and you can say you read it here first.

julie said...

Ugh; the Gamma wall of text never ends.

To the post:
hence the chaotic and contradictory policies -- defund the racist police one day, heroic police the next day for saving our capitol from white supremacists!

One thing Joe did accomplish on his first day was speed up the timing of this process: pass a mandate about wearing masks, then the same day proceed to very publicly not wear a mask while going about various ceremonies. This was excused because it was a "celebration."

Gagdad Bob said...

I'll believe in global warming when Kerry, Obama, and Gore limit themselves to carbon footprints as modest as mine.

julie said...

To paraphrase Instapundit, "I'll believe there's a crisis when the people who keep telling me there's a crisis act like there's a crisis."

What do they do, and what are the fruits?

Gagdad Bob said...

Sure, Obama purchased a $15 million mansion in the Hamptons, but only after he stopped the rise of the oceans.

Anonymous said...

The primary reason the left is so interested in the right, is because Bob doesn't believe in science, because it's Satanic or something.

Texas leads the nation in renewables (shhh...). The reasons? Functional capitalism and science. And as prices for solar, wind and battery continue to drop even more states are sure to be be driving "the right" nuts.

Daisy said...

Wow, such brilliant insight! I am blinded by the sheer genius.

Cousin Dupree said...

"Functional capitalism and science."

Anonymous said...

Thanks guys. Some handy info for you all. I can always tell another’s flavor of conservatism by their attitude towards climate change.

If the science is real to them but they’re concerned about the economic costs and governmental inefficiencies, then they’re educated Lincoln Project types. (RINOs)

If they have endless and always disjointed reasons why it’s physically impossible for the science to be real, then they’re libertarians. (interestingly, none of their hundreds of reasons against ever addresses that one climate science reason for, AGW CO2)

If they launch into spiels about people who hate us for our freedoms then they’re neocons. (still a few around)

If they suddenly start yelling about the scourge of transexuals and Never-Trump Traitors and sarcasm about scientists being hoaxers, they’re evangelicals. (you can make them go away by giving them a $20 bill)

Daisy said...

You say this as though anyone here cares how you classify conservatives.

You must be a delight at parties.

Cousin Dupree said...

More climate science.

"The Obama State Department found five separate times that the pipeline would have no material impact on greenhouse gas emissions since crude would still be extracted. Shipping bitumen by rail or tanker would result in 28% to 42% higher CO2 emissions and more leaks. No matter. President Obama in 2015 rejected the permit as an oblation to the Paris Climate accords."

It's a religion. And not the good kind.

Gagdad Bob said...

When the left says "follow the science" they mean "obey the scientism."

Gagdad Bob said...

John Kerry Says We Only Have Nine Years Left To Save The World.

File under "The worse your logic, the more interesting the consequences to which it gives rise."

Anonymous said...

Clean renewable energy is cost-effective and more labor-efficient than extracting and burning fossil fuels and will generate a higher profit margin.

There's staggering money to be made in renewable and the go-getters are going to get rich.

The energy industry has been over-run by technology and will have to abandon the fossil fuel bonanza much like Kodak had to drop the camera film. Oil had a long run but has recently become obsolete.

The climate change religion will pivot as true believers start to go after other things beside the energy sector.

julie said...

The Morning Rant at Ace's has some great zingers today:

"There are three things that feminists hate, yea, even four things they despise: a contented wife, a strong husband, happy children, and a household full of love."

Anonymous said...

You say this as though anyone here cares how you classify conservatives.

You must be a delight at parties.


Actually, I'm wise enough at parties to stay away from discussing religion and politics and I make sure to never attend parties over-represented by nutjob tribalists. Still, I'm fascinated by how cognitive bias and brainwashing works, but more specifically, how obvious sociopathy is so able to spot take advantage, then get away with it.

My point once again: Climate science is settled, but the impacts of mandates are not. This seems a reasonable "conservative" position. In fact, it once was, 20 years ago.

Anonymous said...

"There are three things that feminists hate, yea, even four things they despise: a contented wife, a strong husband, happy children, and a household full of love."

I know a conservative Christian family where the strong-willed wife pretty much owns her teddy-bearish husband. They do occasionally fight, but they seem generally happy.

And I know a couple, soulmates who met at bible camp, where the husband's career was sent overseas and he struggled afterwards trying to find decent work, while the wife's career took off. It drove her nuts and she divorced him because he "was holding her back". She subsequently went through two "strong husbands" who wound up cheating on her with one being severely abusive. Her ex eventually found a successful career and re-married well and has kids, while his ex-soulmate is now well past the age of bearing the children she very much wanted. She's miserable and pines for her old soulmate all the time. I suspect that her innate female drives had gotten the best of her.

Maybe "feminism" needs to be better defined?

Van Harvey said...

"You will have noticed that the left always plays philosophical Calvinball, hence the chaotic and contradictory policies -- defund the racist police one day, heroic police the next day for saving our capitol from white supremacists!"

Yep. As Truth is not their aim or concern, contradictions pose no problems. Words are but incantations they perform upon us, to 'win' the power to do what they desire to do to us.

Anonymous said...

I do believe that the desired concept is to keep "Rule of Law" managed by We The People, and not They Big Government.

Both “sides” are guilty of allowing the PTB ample opportunities to try and come up with plausible excuses for expanding the latter for themselves.

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