Political Views from the SCMC Thread

[_Runtu]

Exposure to any set of serious ideas forces one to expand one's own, I think that's a given (if one is truly thinking about them). I do think, based on what I've seen over the last two decades, that French philosophy has indeed helped turn several departments, and especially lit crit, into intellectual ghettos generally speaking. At least, that's the use to which American leftwing academics have put this material. As I understand things, Deconstruction actually begin to wane in France in the early Eighties, at about the same time it begin to be all the rage here. Which brings up another point. Post Modernism is an intellectual fad that will eventually wane and make way for another in the humanities and social sciences. Given the ideological make up of much of the humanities and social science professorate, the traditional Marxism and Cultural Marxism so long at home there will be a set fixture for the foreseeable future, but Post Modernism and its Felix The Cat black bag of pseudo-sophisticated jargon and obtuse verbiage, despite some strong conviviality with traditional leftism, will wither on the vine, eventually.

The only sad part about that is that that which then replaces it may be even worse.

The funny thing about Deconstruction is that it is fundamentally at odds with Marxism.

[_Mister Scratch]

Enough with the political blather from Loran.

Liz---if he cannot maintain the maturity necessary for topicality, please move the thread to the Off-Topic Forum, where, thanks to him, it has begun to go already.

The topic has turned to politics, but the blather is only coming from one participant in the discussion.

You're right about that! Liz, Shades---please move the thread.

[_Coggins7]

The funny thing about Deconstruction is that it is fundamentally at odds with Marxism.

To a point, yes. Deconstruction and Post Modernism is relativist and nihilistic, while Marxism is dogmatic and absolutist (well, philosophically, anything that dabbles in epistemological relativism or nihilism is dogmatic and absolutist too, but covertly), but go to any major state or private university or college website in the nation (especially the upper scale schools) and just look at all the courses, syllabi, and programs that cross Marxist Cultural Marxist, and general leftist themes and concepts with Post Modern. They're quite common. One of the things I encountered in criticizing this stuff, including from Juliann on one occasion, is that Post Modernism is so hard to pin down philosophically (it is claimed), that defining it becomes quite difficult.

It occurred to me, and this is true of Julinann as well, that Post Modernism is a moving target for criticism, and supporters of it can hide behind that moving target and deflect criticism by never really engaging it. When I criticize Post Modernism, its never your Post Modernism, or Juliann's Post Modernism. The bad Post Modernism is always someone else's Post Modernism.

This Chameleon-like nature is, at best, annoying.

[_Yoda]

The thread has been split.

Political comments go in this thread.

[_Coggins7]

But...where does the blather go?

[_Dr. Shades]

Can you give us some examples of "shallow materialist decadence" that somehow relates to libertarian isolationism? And, for that matter, some examples of "historical amnesia" that in any way relates to the same?

Oh, now I see. Your learning from Scratch aren't you. Well done.

What does Mister Scratch have to do with libertarian isolationism having any connection whatsoever to shallow materialist decadence and/or social anmesia?

If you really, honestly don't comprehend what I'm talking about when I mention "shallow materialist decadence" with regard to modern American and western society, with particular emphasis on changes that have occurred since roughly the late Sixties, do you really expect me to believe your going to understand any examples I might be able to give you.

You didn't say "materialist decadence with regard to modern American and Western society." You said ". . . isolationism born of the shallow materialist decadence and historical amnesia that lies at the base of both leftist and libertarian isolationism." I'm still waiting for your explanation of how shallow materialist decadence has any sort of cause/effect relationship to libertarian isolationism.

Historical amnesia? Our entire society is bathed in it. Gen X in particular terrifies me collectively speaking, because of its gross disdain for history and historical context.

That's all fine and dandy, but how or why does it give birth to libertarian isolationism?

OK, I'll give you one little bite to chew on. Pornography. The exponential spread and popularity of pornography since the early Seventies, its second great wave of expansion during the Eighties due to the mass availability of the VCR, and its third wave into the internet, where its available to anyone, at anytime, for free in virtually unlimited quantity. This must be understood in conjunction with the eroticization of much of the mainstream pop entertainment media proper, to the point of cultural saturation.

FAIR enough, but I fail to see how pornography has any sort of cause/effect relationship to libertarian isolationism.

What are the priorities, intellectual and social, or a culture in which this kind of material has such wide and pervasive popularity and influence?

It's not a question of priorities. It's a question of technology finally catching up to hormones.

why should I not term this as indicative of "shallow materialist decadence" in a cultural sense?

You can term pornography to be indicative of shallow materialist decadence all you want. My only request is that you explain to me how libertarian isolationism arises from it.

[_Mister Scratch]

Superb questions, Shades. While I have lauded Loran's homespun erudition in the past, I often feel like he is mincing his words and using his terms too vaguely. I will anxiously await his reply to your queries.

[_Yoda]

But...where does the blather go?

Since there are two politcal threads, the blather can go in either thread you decide to post in.

;)

Sorry, Cog, but you left yourself open for that one.

Love ya!

[_Coggins7]

Can you give us some examples of "shallow materialist decadence" that somehow relates to libertarian isolationism? And, for that matter, some examples of "historical amnesia" that in any way relates to the same?

Oh, now I see. Your learning from Scratch aren't you. Well done.

What does Mister Scratch have to do with libertarian isolationism having any connection whatsoever to shallow materialist decadence and/or social anmesia?

If you really, honestly don't comprehend what I'm talking about when I mention "shallow materialist decadence" with regard to modern American and western society, with particular emphasis on changes that have occurred since roughly the late Sixties, do you really expect me to believe your going to understand any examples I might be able to give you.

You didn't say "materialist decadence with regard to modern American and Western society." You said ". . . isolationism born of the shallow materialist decadence and historical amnesia that lies at the base of both leftist and libertarian isolationism." I'm still waiting for your explanation of how shallow materialist decadence has any sort of cause/effect relationship to libertarian isolationism.

Historical amnesia? Our entire society is bathed in it. Gen X in particular terrifies me collectively speaking, because of its gross disdain for history and historical context.

That's all fine and dandy, but how or why does it give birth to libertarian isolationism?

OK, I'll give you one little bite to chew on. Pornography. The exponential spread and popularity of pornography since the early Seventies, its second great wave of expansion during the Eighties due to the mass availability of the VCR, and its third wave into the internet, where its available to anyone, at anytime, for free in virtually unlimited quantity. This must be understood in conjunction with the eroticization of much of the mainstream pop entertainment media proper, to the point of cultural saturation.

FAIR enough, but I fail to see how pornography has any sort of cause/effect relationship to libertarian isolationism.

What are the priorities, intellectual and social, or a culture in which this kind of material has such wide and pervasive popularity and influence?

It's not a question of priorities. It's a question of technology finally catching up to hormones.

why should I not term this as indicative of "shallow materialist decadence" in a cultural sense?

You can term pornography to be indicative of shallow materialist decadence all you want. My only request is that you explain to me how libertarian isolationism arises from it.

Isolationism of the kind to which I'm referring, regardless of whether its manifested as a political theory from either the Right or the Left, is a manifestation of what the Book of Mormon calls "carnal security" Its a complacency and a kind of intellectual stupor born of generations of unrelenting peace, prosperity, material consumption, and ever greater leisure time and options for fulfilling it. After 9/11, there was brief period of coming together as awareness that we were in the midst of a long, drawn out global war against our very civilization and its foundational principles, which very soon lapsed back into the same opiate-like complacent haze of the assumption of a continuing and endless future of material affluence which nothing will ever alter or impede. We were disoriented-momentarily-by 9/11 and the decade of terrorsist attacks here and around the world during the prior decade, but only momentarily. Unlike the WWII generation and that conflict, life has gone on for us here at home as if nothing had ever happened. 9/11 is a dim memory. The I-Pod, the big screen TV, the new SUV, the Sony Playstation, our collective future filled with the RV and the golf course weren't even fazed by 9/11 except for a relatively few people who can see past that carnal security to an exhausted civilization (American and, to a somewhat more advanced degree, Western Europe) that faces extremely serious consequences unless it cannot rally itself intellectually and morally to the defense of its culture, its values, and its intellectual and political patrimony, among the most important aspects of which are individual freedom and liberty, which are, in my view, the the very principles the most taken for granted by a critical mass of modern westerners and Americans and, even sadder, two principles for which many in this culture and in European societies aren't really even willing to fight for anymore.

The philosophies of the late Sixties and early Seventies have been stunningly successful in eroding and even stripping away (in the public schools, most strikingly) an understanding of and sense of loyalty to the principles of individual liberty and of our political and social freedoms, such that many, if not most of us, are quite literally sleepwalking through WWIII, wrapped securely in our silken cocoons of technology, leisure, carnal comfort, and material convenience. Nehor is, unfortunately, a textbook example of this attitude, and, coming from a Mormon, quite stunning, as most of this kind of stuff comes from International ANSWER types.

You can find a good deal of it, however, at the Von Mises Institute, a think tank loaded with excellent ideas on political liberty, economics, and political economy, but steeped deeply in fantasy in the area of national security and international relations.

Ultimately, both the Left and the Libertarian Right share, in this area, the "opiate of the people", which isn't religion, but the personal and cultural anesthesia generated by generations of unending material progress, prosperity, and ever greater material expectations and assumptions. At the end of the day, this comes back, not to political theory, but to the Gospel. We see in the "pride cycle" plaguing the Nephites generation after generation, precisely these attitudes and their consequences.





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