Mes: junio 2024

THIS IS WHY AFRICA GETS THE LEADERS IT DESERVES !!!!!!!!!
Author: Matthew Parris

17 August 2002

There was a woman who had whipped her hair into a sea of caramel spikes, which is hard to do with tight black African curls. There was a woman who had achieved a chemical blonde. There was a man in zips and a black leather coat – black on black – a batik skirt and new trainers, [ = sneakers (US)] top of the range. There were men who had decorated their heads by mowing lines around the cranium, one in a crinkly, multicoloured crepe-cotton shirt and rainbow plastic winkle-picker shoes, impossibly tight, cap worn backwards. He was trying to get upgraded into business class, inventing ludicrous stories.

The Englishwoman doing the check-in for Air Gabon at Gatwick was having none of it, and stood her ground. She had 36 passengers to check in for the flight from London to Libreville, via Brussels. It took her little more than three hours.

This was not her fault. Her passengers were waBenzi , the term used across West Africa to describe the successful: the people with money, power or influence; the people who drive Mercedes-Benzes. There being few roads surfaced or properly maintained outside the squalid towns and cities, they do not drive far, but they drive big.

My fellow passengers at Gatwick struck me as worth describing less as an excuse in travel writing (we all have our airport stories) than as an object lesson in the politics of development. For this was the elite, the commercial and administrative class through whom (short of the re-impositon of colonial rule) both aid and advice from countries such as ours must be channeled. These were the rich. They must have been. They were able to fly to and from Europe. Some were from Gabon, many from Congo, and all had been shopping.

The word “shopping” hardly does justice to the industrial scale of this little crowd’s acquisitions. I have seldom in one place seen a collection of luggage at the same time so ostentatious, so expensive and so gross. They were leather or fabric-covered suitcases as high as a child, and more cube-shaped than case-shaped.

And everyone kept pushing in. We started in a queue – three whites scattered among the Africans – but by the time the whites got anywhere near the check-in desk we were the last three in the line. The man in skirt and trainers and his enormous wife simply barged. Others sidled. Some struck up loud conversations with those at the front of the queue, then pretended to be positioned there.

A man in dark glasses (indoors at night) and two noisy female companions held up the whole check-in for about half an hour with an argument about how much excess baggage his party had (a mountain) then, failing to fool the check-in agent, affected to saunter off with his women and talk to someone else – to show he didn’t care – leaving his documents half-processed on the counter. This delayed the agent’s work until she coolly shoved his documents aside and received the next passenger – whereupon Dark Glasses, alarmed, pushed in front of a middle-aged man of scholarly demeanor and his unpushy wife – infuriating the couple to the point of pushing back in again. Meanwhile Crinkly Shirt, having succeeded in pushing in so brutally that Decorated Head protested, came over all loud-laughs-and-hand-shakes and “what a card-I-am, eh!” – which, such was its swagger and sudden bonhomie, worked. Suddenly, everyone was wreathed in smiles. Another cheater got away with it.

At last they were all ready for passport control. And of course after that they all got lost again in the duty-free shops. The flight was delayed while missing passengers were paged, latecomers sauntering up to the departure gate with yet more purchases in big bags, leading to more arguments about hand luggage and more attempts to cheat.

Found out, the capacity of these people to affect innocent shock and apparent ignorance of every rule was astonishing. The airline attempted a staggered boarding procedure but nobody took any notice, stampeding at the gate and onto the plane, whereupon a handful more passengers tried to pretend that they were business class and had to be moved from these seats, each professing the same total surprise at their eviction as they had shown at the news that flying involves weight restrictions.

The Dutch crew handled this with bemusement. Though our airline was called Air Gabon, the plane and its captain and crew seemed to have been hired from a Netherlands charter company. All the stewards looked like Tintin and showed as amused a command of Third World chaos as Herve’s young Belgian journalist.

One sensed among this European crew an unvoiced – professionally unvoiceable – scorn for these passengers. The crew was resigned to such behaviour and they were paid to handle it. One sensed, too, the calm confidence we have when observing the vanity of fools, that they will not have the last laugh.

We took off, landing in Brussels 38 minutes later. Decorated Head complained loudly, to the admiration of his women, that there had been no refreshments: “Ce ne’est pas gentil,” he said to a stewardess. Dark Glasses was prevented from disembarking with the departing passengers to get some beer. On his behalf, Crinkly Shirt began a huge row, storming up and down the aisle, shouting and swearing that Belgium was a racist country and lunging at the stewardess as if to hit her. At one point, he yelled that he would get a gun “and blow this plane up”, and soon had a faction among the passengers muttering and interjecting in his support; but the Tintins were unmoved, everybody calmed down, and we were soon airborne.

Truculence turned back to docility as suddenly as it had flared up, supper was served, Crinkly Shirt banged his tray and demanded more beer, and soon everybody was asleep. When we landed six hours later, all the passengers clapped. We escaped into Libreville, a gentle mess of a place. Anger, jollity, meekness, swagger, obedience, had passed across these waBenzi like sun and rain racing along an island, with such speed: momentarily warm, momentarily cruel, suddenly kind, suddenly innocent, suddenly corrupt…. I tried hard not to quote to myself that famous line of Kipling’s and I won’t here. These were only the regular waBenzi, perhaps trying too hard. The super-waBenzi would have been flying on Air France, business class, from their boltholes in Paris and Nice. They are less conspicuous. Those are the waBenzi with whom governments deal. These – economy clas on Air Gabon with me – were the ones whom businessmen, aid workers, doctors and travel agents must face.

From the picture, the object lesson, I have tried here to paint. I would like to draw your attention to a detail I think important. With the broad view – of the volatile, sometimes brutal and sometimes rapacious people who have an unfortunate habit of getting to the top in Africa – I think we are pretty familiar. With the warmth and talent – the fortitude, the ingenuity and the huge likeability of the little people, the common people, of Africa – no-body who travels there can fail to be familiar. So we tell ourselves that by some tremendous mischance this most worthwhile of human races is persistently badly led.

But is it mischance? I had watched Crinkly Shirt barging the queue with growing fury. When he succeeded I hardened my heart against him. Any European would. It would be hard thereafter ever to like or trust this man again. This was a white man’s reaction. His cheating and bullying had also annoyed and disadvantaged his fellow Africans.

But when, having won, he turned to his black victims, all smiles, joshed with them and held out an arm to shake hands, their frostiness melted. This fellow was a winner. He was behaving in a kingly manner. They were on his side again – what a bloke! Resentment fled, to be replaced by a wish to be part of the top dog’s gang. That is how the common people of Africa let themselves down; by letting their own leaders let them down. I’m afraid an instinct for justice requires a certain meanness of spirit, an ungenerosity, an unwillingness to forgive. It may also involve a resentment or begrudging of power. Such qualities are not entirely likeable.

The passengers on Air Gabon forgave their friend. He will therefore do it again. I am not confident about the New Partnership for Africa’s Development in which the Prime Minister is putting so much trust. I wish he and Clare Short had been with me in that queue.

(Original en inglés aquí)

Me gusta mucho «El código cultural» de Clotaire Rapaille. Este es un libro divertido y revelador sobre las culturas del mundo y, principalmente, sobre la cultura estadounidense. Nunca he olvidado su observación de que la cultura estadounidense es una cultura adolescente. Lo explica de una manera que es demasiado larga para escribirla aquí pero es muy convincente. Si quieres una buena lectura, te la recomiendo totalmente.

He pensado mucho en eso porque la cultura americana ha exportado esta adolescencia a toda la cultura occidental y lo veo en mi país. Mientras que los niños no tienen libertad ni responsabilidad, los adultos tienen toda la libertad y toda la responsabilidad. Los adolescentes quieren toda la libertad sin ninguna responsabilidad. Por eso se rebelan contra sus padres mientras asumen que sus padres los ayudarán si las consecuencias de su libertad salen mal.

Esta es la etapa de nuestra cultura occidental y proviene de la Ilustración. La Ilustración habla de libertad y derechos pero no de deberes y responsabilidades. ¿Cuántos políticos o gente normal conoces que hablen de derechos? ¿Cuantos conoces que hablen de deberes? La proporción es de aproximadamente un millón a cero. Así que la Ilustración es una ideología/religión adolescente. Fueron necesarios dos siglos para que se afianzara, porque el pueblo estadounidense siguió el cristianismo, que es una religión con deberes. Estos deberes cristianos impregnaban la sociedad, del mismo modo que el énfasis confuciano en los deberes impregna la sociedad china. El cristianismo y el confucianismo son religiones/ideologías para adultos.

Pero, desde los años 60, las élites lograron lo que habían deseado durante siglos: desarraigar el cristianismo de la población estadounidense y sustituirlo por la ideología de la Ilustración (en su última versión: el progresismo). Desde entonces, la población occidental ha revertido a un estado de perpetua adolescencia.

La gente habla de infantilización pero no es así. Los niños están felices de hacer lo que les dicen. Los occidentales quieren derechos sin deberes. La sociedad occidental está estructurada para favorecer esta adolescencia, desempeñando el Estado el papel de los padres. Por ejemplo, «¡Sé libre! ¡Fornica! ¡Es tu derecho! ¿Estás embarazada? ¡No tienes responsabilidad! Aborta»

En la mayoría de las sociedades la adolescencia no existe. Se pasa de ser un niño a ser un adulto con todos los derechos y responsabilidades, a través de un rito de iniciación (por ejemplo, perseguir un león). En el caso de las mujeres, el rito de iniciación es el matrimonio. En nuestra sociedad occidental la adolescencia va desde los 10 años hasta los 40 años como mínimo, pero yo he visto a gente con 80 años ser mentalmente adolescentes. Estos son los frutos de la Ilustración.

I really like «The Culture Code» by Clotaire Rapaille. This is a fun and insightful book about world cultures, and, mostly, about American culture. I have never forgotten its observation that American culture is an adolescent culture. He explains it in a way that is too long to write here but it is very convincing. If you want a good reading, I fully recommend it.

I have thought a lot about that because American culture has exported this adolescence to the entire Western culture and I see it in my country. While kids have no freedom and no responsibility, adults have all the freedom and all responsibility. Teens or adolescents want all the freedom without any responsibility. So they rebel against their parents while assuming their parents will help them if the consequences of their freedom go wrong.

This is the stage of our Western culture and comes from the Enlightenment. The Enlightenment talks about freedom and rights but not about duties and responsibilities. How many politicians or normal people do you know that speak about rights? How many do you know that speak about duties? The score is about one million to zero. So the Enlightenment is an adolescent ideology/religion. It took two centuries for it to take hold, because American people followed Christianity, which is a religion with duties. These Christian duties permeated society, like the Confucian emphasis on duties permeates Chinese society. Christianity and Confucianism are adult religions/ideologies.

But, since the 60s, the elites achieved what they had wanted for centuries: uproot Christianity from the American population and replace it with the Enlightenment ideology (in its last version: liberalism). For then on, Western population has returned to a state of perpetual adolescence.

People talk about infantilization but it is not so. Children are happy to do what they are told. Western people want rights without duties. Western society is structured to encourage this adolescence, with the State taking the role of parents. For example, «Be free! Fornicate! It is your right! You are pregnant? No responsibility! Abort»

In most societies, adolescence does not exist. You go from being a kid to being an adult with all rights and responsibilities, through a rite of passage (for example, chasing a lion). In the case of women, the rite of passage is marriage. In our Western society, adolescence goes from the age of 10 to the age of 40 at least, but I have seen 80 years old to be mentally adolescent. These are the fruits of the Enlightenment.

What should be explained

Restlessness

Opposition to natural law

Script

Not talking about spiritual things

Leftism works for the powerful. In other societies, powerful were restricted because of a rigid justification.

It is sold as an expansion of rights. But it is an slavement.

The cause as a moral crusade.

Overton window

Benefits that a cause brings

Why causes go in a unique direction

The new religion is a cemetery of causes

Summary of the previous installments

We have seen in previous installments that the official religion of the Western civilization is leftism: a religion with absolute goods (feminism, multiculturalism, diversity, etc.) and absolute evils (patriarchy, white supremacism, sexism, racism, homophobia).

Although liberalism (the religion of freedom, equality and rights) is often mentioned as the official ideology of the Western society, this is only a rhetorical ploy. Liberalism, as a relativistic religion, can  justify anything but it is only used to justify leftism.

Western society is composed by the financial rulers, the managers (or clerks) and the serfs. The managers and the serfs who adhere to leftism are called «the clients» (in a Roman sense). Leftism is only the rationalization of the parasitical behavior of the rulers and the clients. It exists to justify taking good things from the general population and giving good things to the rulers and the clients.

These «good things» are money, power and psychological well-being. We will call them «benefits». So this change means the impoverishment, enslavement and mental health decline of the general population. We will call this «the disempowerment of the population».

But some things have been left unexplained: why this direction towards parasitism coincides with the direction towards the opposite direction of obvious reality and natural law.

Of course, some explanation given by some bloggers is that the rulers are, in reality, controlled by evil spiritual entities, and I agree with this. But Satan often uses other people and material processes to do evil (the same way God uses secondary causes to do good). Here we are interested in these processes: how demons use the weakness of people and society to take society farther and farther away from obvious reality and the natural law.

The political cause

How do Leftism justifies this taking of good things from the general population and giving good things to the rulers and the client. This justification is based on the concept of «the political cause».

A «political cause» is an initiative to introduce a new dogma into the leftist religion. Since the leftist religion is a religion about society, a political cause is  an initiative to change society in some aspect. This change takes benefits from the general population and gives benefits to the rulers and the clients of leftism.

As we have seen, most of the population gets along with this because this change is sold as something good and justified based on liberalism (it is said that this change will produce more freedom, more equality and more rights). The «political cause» is perceived by its supporters as a «moral crusade»: a fight of good against evil. That is, a fight of the good people to remove some aspect of society that is considered evil.

The goal is to remove this aspect of society so the society works the same way but without this alleged evil. There is no understanding of Chesterton’s fence. There is no concept that some things perceived as evils can be preventing greater evils. Almost always, if the cause succeeds and that aspect of the society is removed, greater evils are produced, which can be addressed by new political causes in a cycle of destruction of the society.

The most important causes have been: the abolition of slavery, the social gospel, the feminine suffrage, the illegalization of alcohol, the second-wave feminism, civil rights movement, LGBTI causes, the cause for the uncontrolled immigration and its legalization and  the environmental cause. The movement to restrict movement and rights under Covid can be seen as a short-lived cause: it was expressed in moral terms and as a fight of good against evil, altruism against egoism.

Some of these causes span other smallest causes. So feminism has a cause about equality in the workplace, removing of social stigma of female promiscuity, divorce, abortion, etc. And some other movements can be political cause in the future: incest, pedophilia, polyamory or reparations for black people.

The process of introduction of a political cause

Political causes involve finding a behavior that is marginalized by the society (normally, for good reason) and mainstreaming it and eventually making it desirable.

In a society, there are always marginalized behaviors and the definition of a political causes begins when intellectuals (working in universities, think tanks, writers, humanitarian funds, etc.) create a theory that justifies the people doing these behaviors as «oppressed» groups. The organizations and projects where the  intellectuals work are paid by the financial rulers, who have the veto power through the simple method of not funding ideas that go against them .

Then, the ones working or studying in these organizations (especially, the graduates of the universities) get hired by the government, NGOs, schools, corporations and media and propagate this political cause to the rest of society. This is a simplified description but you can find a real example of this propagation mechanism here

Phases of implementation of a political cause

Since political causes involve the mainstreaming of a marginalized behavior, this behavior goes through all the phases of the Overton Window:

Inexistent or marginal. The cause does not exist for citizens (LGBTQ in the Middle Ages) or it only exists among marginal groups (LGBTQ in the 60s)

Growing. The cause is adopted by the powers that be and starts conquering society. It goes through all the phases of the Overton window. Starts being a minority cause but increases until ending up as a cause publicly adopted by the majority of the population.

Indisputable. The cause is publicly adopted by the entire society. It does not mean that everybody supports it. In fact, the majority of society may privately reject it: this is the phenomenon of the “law of silence” or “preference falsification”. However, the ones that don’t support it have to be silent, since publicly going against the cause implies being marginalized, persecuted and labelled as an evil person.

There are two kinds of indisputable causes:

Finished. The cause has obtained all its objectives. For example, the legalization of divorce. Being indisputable and having reached all its objectives, the cause stops being a cause and its effects are integrated in the normal functioning of society.

Chronic. The cause is indisputable but it has not obtained all its objectives, because these objectives are not possible. For example, equality between men and women, because science shows that there are biologically different. Of course, societies try to convince themselves that chronic causes are achievable, even if it is a matter of centuries.

We won’t enter here about the techniques to manipulate this Overton window because they are well know. Use of education, government, corporations and media are paramount. Elevating the political cause as an obvious reality and moral good (that is, the opposite from the truth) is necessary.  As a result, the ones that oppose to the political cause are labelled as ignorant and/or evil.

Why the political cause succeeds

The political cause succeeds because it produces many benefits (money, power and psychological benefits) to the ones that support it (the rulers and the clients). The rulers have the power to define the political cause but the managers have to implement it in the public realm. The clients in general (managers and leftist serfs) are going to ensure that the political cause is present in the private realm.

Los beneficios que proporciona una causa se dividen entre beneficios tangibles (materiales y legales) y beneficios intangibles (psicológicos).

Los beneficios tangibles (materiales y legales) que se derivan son obvios:

1. [Partidarios] [No indiscutible] En la clase alta, está el deseo de poder y dinero. Esto incluye a políticos que defienden la causa, empresarios que se benefician de ella, élites que la usan para aumentar su poder. Para esto, estas personas deben presentarse como los que luchan por que una causa triunfe, por lo que esta no puede ser indiscutible.

2. [Partidarios] [No finalizada] En las clases media y baja, está el deseo de subvenciones, ayudas económicas y puestos de trabajo justificados por la causa (por ejemplo, como Director General de la Mujer o trabajadora social para mujeres inmigrantes). También se incluyen aquí los beneficios de audiencia obtenidos por los medios de comunicación, aunque estos últimamente son más aparatos ideológicos que empresariales. Esta causa no puede estar finalizada para que esto sea posible, pues si se han conseguido los objetivos ya no hay motivo para invertir más dinero en intentar implementar la causa.

3. [Beneficiarios] [No finalizada] Obviamente, los beneficiarios directos reciben beneficios materiales y legales de una causa, como beneficiarios. Así, las mujeres pueden recibir ayudas de una causa feminista u obtener leyes que las benefician. Obviamente, sólo puede darse si la causa no está finalizada. Una causa finalizada (por ejemplo, la legalización del divorcio) no puede obtener estos beneficios, pues no se ve la necesidad de impulsarla. De hecho, ya no se ve como una causa sino como un hecho de la vida.

Pero tan importantes como los beneficios materiales son los beneficios psicológicos, que se detallan a continuación. 

4. [Beneficiarios] [No indiscutible] Lo más obvio: los beneficiarios reciben lo que estaban buscando: una relajación de las convenciones sociales que permita que la sociedad acepte su estilo de vida. Estas convenciones sociales suelen estar basadas en la ley natural, por lo que suele pasar que lo que se acepta es una violación de la ley natural (caso de la promiscuidad sexual) o, incluso de la realidad fáctica (caso de los trans).

Se trata de usar la aprobación social para luchar contra el sentimiento de vergüenza o deshonor (que es social) así como intentar apagar el sentimiento de culpa o de reconocimiento de la realidad (que son individuales).

(El hecho de que la conciencia (la culpa) y el reconocimiento de la realidad no se puedan apagar definitivamente, hará que los beneficiarios busquen la aprobación social y eviten la desaprobación más y más, como formas de apagarlas temporalmente. Si tienen acceso al poder, los beneficiarios acabarán implantado un estado de cosas totalitario, en el que la aprobación de su conducta contraria a la ley natural o la realidad fáctica es obligatoria y la desaprobación está prohibida, como se explica en otro escrito.)

Los beneficios de los puntos 3 y 4  los llamaremos «beneficios oficiales» pues son los que se usan para impulsar una causa. Los otros beneficios (del punto 1 al 2 y del 5 al 12) se llamarán «beneficios ocultos», pues no suelen considerarse al defender o atacar una causa.

5. [Beneficiarios] [No indiscutible] Validar la trayectoria vital. Muchos de los que apoyan las causas son gente que no le ha ido bien en la vida, a veces por las circunstancias, pero, la mayoría de las veces, por sus propias decisiones. La izquierda fomenta esas malas decisiones y las justifica una vez se han tomado. La responsabilidad de los errores personales se transfiere a la sociedad y la persona queda libre de culpa (esto viene directamente de Rousseau).

Así, esta gente no se siente culpable por sus errores ni toma la responsabilidad de enmendarlos o intentar no volverlos a cometer. Es la responsabilidad por los propios errores lo que define la adultez, por lo que las masas de la izquierda se encuentran infantilizadas, en un estado de desarrollo detenido. Se trata de luchar contra el sentimiento de responsabilidad: reconocer los propios errores y luchar para no volverlos a cometer.

Es decir, las causas son los medios por los que la izquierda transmite a la sociedad  la culpa de los fracasos personales. Veamos, por ejemplo, la causa de «fat acceptance». Si uno no tiene una enfermedad rara, para ser un obeso mórbido (en comparación a un gordo normal), uno se lo ha tenido que trabajar durante años con una falta de autocontrol que lleva a unos patrones de alimentación insanos. La causa de «fat acceptance» hace que la persona piense que la culpable es la sociedad por no acceptar los cuerpos obesos mórbidos como atractivos, en vez de aceptar su responsabilidad e intentar adelgazar para tener una buena salud.

De nuevo, es una forma de escapar de la culpa, del sentimiento doloroso de que uno lo ha hecho mal. De nuevo, la causa es útil mientras no es universalmente aceptada. En un caso de una persona que se sienta mal por un divorcio, la causa no es útil, pues todo el mundo acepta el divorcio, así que uno no puede decir que el problema del divorcio es que hay gente divorciofóbica.

También esto permite conllevar una baja autoestima que tienen estas personas que han fracasado en algún aspecto de la vida (en este caso, el control de peso).

6. [Partidarios] [No indiscutible] La causa permite sentirse buena persona ante uno mismo. El objetivo es eliminar la culpa (parte de la conciencia) de comportarse mal en la vida privada (en otras áreas), justificándose ante uno mismo que uno es bueno, porque apoya una causa supuestamente noble (uno es bueno porque es antirracista, antifascista, etc.).

7. [Partidarios] [No indiscutible] La causa permite sentirse a uno mejor que los demás. En este caso, no se trata de evitar el sentimiento de culpa (como en el punto 6), sino que es un sentimiento de orgullo. El orgullo es una de las drogas más adictivas para el hombre y, aunque se puede conseguir de diversas formas, el orgullo porque uno apoya una causa es una de las formas más fáciles de conseguirlo. Este orgullo se debe a dos motivos. Primero, apoyando la causa uno se siente «especial», diferente a los demás (autoexpresión, como ponerse un tatuaje). Segundo, apoyando la causa uno experimenta ese sentimiento de ser mejor que los otros que se da en la parábola del fariseo y el publicano.

8. [Partidarios] [No indiscutible] La causa permite presumir de buena persona ante los demás. Esto se llama «señalar virtud», «postureo moral» y es lo que los fariseos hacían en el Nuevo Testamento (por ejemplo, dando limosna en público). Esto aumenta el estatus social ante la comunidad (siendo la búsqueda del estatus) y también elimina la «vergüenza», el estigma social, en el caso de la conducta privada. Mientras los puntos 6 y 7 son interiores y privados, el punto 8 se refiere a la imagen público del individuo.

(A los puntos 6, 7 y 8 podemos darle el nombre común de «fariseísmo». Estos beneficios psicológicos están prohibidos en el Nuevo Testamento. Sin embargo, Lutero progresó hacia la desactivación de esta prohibición, diciendo que la gente se justificaba por la fe y no por las obras. Lo importante no es lo que hagas, sino que tengas las opiniones correctas, lo que hizo el costo del fariseísmo prácticamente nulo y muy difícil de combatir. La opinión calvinista de distinguir entre gente que ya sabe que está salvada y gente que está condenada potencia el fariseísmo. La modernidad deriva de esta postura calvinista a través de los movimientos puritanos de Estados Unidos).

9. [Partidarios] [No indiscutible] La causa permite descargar las frustraciones de la vida dirigiendo el odio y la indignación contra los no partidarios, que se conceptualizan como los enemigos. El hombre moderno tiene pocas ocasiones socialmente aprobadas de descargar sus frustraciones con ira de forma catártica, lo que se ha demostrado de forma científica que es bueno para su bienestar psicológico. La causa proporciona un motivo aceptable para comportarse con odio e indignación, descargando toda esa ira acumulada por las frustraciones de la vida contra un enemigo que se conceptualiza como el mal. Las manifestaciones que acaban en vandalismo público son un ejemplo de esto, así como gente gritando violentamente en nombre de la tolerancia y la paz.

10. [Partidarios] [No indiscutible] La causa permite alimentar la necesidad de trascendencia. El hombre tiene un deseo de trascendencia, de buscar algo superior a uno mismo. Esto tiene un aspecto religioso (buscar el bien) y comunitario (buscar ser parte de una comunidad donde todos se ayudan). Estos dos aspectos se dan frecuentemente unidos y están cubiertos con las religiones tradicionales.

Con la decadencia de la religión tradicional, el liberalismo o progresismo se ha convertido en la nueva religión. Sin embargo, el liberalismo es todo lo contrario al sentido de trascendencia: es radicalmente individualista y tiende a arrastrar al hombre al egoísmo más feroz. En realidad, la máquina que hace moverse al liberalismo es el egoísmo humano.

El hombre moderno está inundado de liberalismo: no puede concebir otra cosa, ni puede concebir renunciar a su egoísmo, pero necesita la trascendencia. Las causas son, en realidad, partes del liberalismo y, por lo tanto, avanzan el egoísmo. Sin embargo, el hecho de que se expresan con lenguaje noble y que se conciben como una lucha por el bien y contra el mal permite usarlas como sustituto de la verdadera trascendencia.

Así, las causas permiten dedicarse al egoísmo mientras uno siente que está luchando por algo justo. No estamos hablando aquí de un sustituto de sentirse bueno (puntos 6 y 7) o de una forma de presumir de bueno sin serlo (el punto 8) sino de un sustituto de buscar el bien y buscar al prójimo.

De nuevo, este beneficio sólo se produce si la causa no es indiscutible. Si la causa es aceptada por todos, no hay manera de imaginar una comunidad en torno a ella y no se puede conceptualizar como la lucha del bien contra el mal.

Obviamente, los beneficios del 5 al 10 sólo se producen si la causa no es indiscutible. Uno no puede sentirse más bueno que los demás o presumir de bueno ante los demás con una causa indiscutible (como la igualdad de hombres y mujeres), porque todos la comparten y uno no sería mejor que los demás. Sería alguien normal.

11. [Beneficiarios] [Partidarios] [No indiscutible] Finalmente, las causas permiten servir de vía para el resentimiento (entendido de la forma que lo definió Nietzsche y lo analizó Scheler en su libro «Ressentiment»). El resentimiento forma muy enquistada de envidia, con características propias.

El resentido siente que le podía haber ido mejor en la vida o en un área de la vida, pero no es su culpa. Se siente injustamente tratado por la sociedad. A veces, tiene una buena posición pero envidia a aquellos que están todavía mejor.

En suma, siente que él debería estar mejor en el juego social. Si no lo está, es porque la sociedad lo oprime.

La sociedad moderna fomenta el resentimiento, pues nos dice que todos somos iguales. Con este dogma de la igualdad, las desigualdades en la vida son injusticias, fruto de la opresión. Es una injusticia que los negros tengan más dinero que los blancos, que los hombres tengan más dinero que las mujeres, que los nativos tengan más dinero que los inmigrantes, que los heterosexuales tengan una vida más fácil que los homosexuales, que los hombres prefieran a las guapas que a las feas…. La sociedad moderna es una máquina de crear resentimiento.

El resentimiento produce dos tipos de acciones:

a. [Beneficiarios] [No finalizada] El resentido aboga por cambiar los valores sociales. Para ello apoya una causa que intenta invertir los valores, de forma que los ganadores sean los perdedores y al revés. Si la causa triunfa completamente, el resentido mejoraría su posición en el juego social. Por ello, el resentido sería uno de los beneficiarios de esta causa. Así una mujer que se le conoce como promiscua, intenta cambiar los valores sociales para que la promiscuidad se vea bien y, por lo tanto, ella ascienda en la escala social.

b. [Partidarios] El resentido descarga su frustración con la sociedad apoyando otras causas de las que él no es beneficiario, como forma de rebeldía. Esta causa no debe ser indiscutible.

En cuanto a la primera acción, que es la que requiere más explicación, el ejemplo tradicional del resentido es el del intelectual que se dedica a la política de izquierdas clásica porque está resentido de no ser rico. El piensa que es superior a los ricos, porque es más inteligente y debería ganar más que los ricos, pero gana mucho menos. (El chiste del 10 por ciento). Apoya la causa de redistribución de la riqueza con el fin de obtener más dinero para él. Es el típico que siempre está clamando con que se aumenten los impuestos a los ricos. La causa de redistribución de la riqueza es una inversión de valores: no deben obtener dinero los miembros más productivos de la sociedad sino los menos productivos.

Otro ejemplo es la mujer obesa mórbida que está clamando porque las revistas de moda acepten modelos obesas, dentro de la causa de «fat acceptance». Se siente resentida porque la mujer delgada obtiene todo tipo de atención y beneficios. Ella piensa que es injusto y que la sociedad debería darle ese reconocimiento. Piensa que los cuerpos bellos y sanos son los obesos mórbidos y que los cuerpos delgados son  insanos, feos y que la gente sólo le considera bello porque ese modelo de cuerpo es impuesto de forma opresiva por los poderosos a través de los medios de comunicación. Lucha para que los cuerpos obesos estén cada vez más presentes en la vida pública.

Vemos aquí también la inversión de valores: lo obeso es bello y sano mientras lo bello y sano es feo e insano.

Es decir, el beneficiario resentido es un (relativo) perdedor que quisiera ser el ganador en el juego social y aboga por invertir los valores sociales, de forma que él sea el ganador.

Los puntos 10 al 22 de este escrito de Ted Kaczynski analizan con más detalle los aspectos psicológicos del resentimiento.

El resentimiento es un estado psicológico que lo impregna todo. No sólo requiere lo que acabamos de ver en este punto, sino que requiere varios puntos que ya se han visto. Por ejemplo, la necesidad de validar la trayectoria vital puede ser un efecto del resentimiento, así como la necesidad de expresar ira de forma catártica. El resentido siente ira por la sociedad por tratarlo injustamente.

12. [Beneficiarios][Partidarios][No indiscutible] Identidad. Cada ser humano debe preguntarse «¿Quién soy?» y debe responder a esa pregunta ante sí y ante los demás.

Definir la identidad de uno es siempre definirse como parte de una comunidad.  En el pasado, esta respuesta se basaba en las comunidades de la familia, el pueblo, la nación y la religión. Soy un católico español, de Artana, un Rodríguez, el hijo del maestro, el padre de Juanito.

Sin embargo, conforme el individualismo avanza, este tipo de respuestas dejan de ser factibles para todo el mundo. Con la destrucción de la familia, mucha gente ya no tiene familia o está distanciada de ella. Mucha gente considera la nación como una rémora y se proclama «ciudadano del mundo». Mucha gente se proclama sin religión y esto es algo común.

Una causa da un sentido de identidad: soy una lesbiana antifascista trekkie que está interesada en los gatos y en el vino.

Fíjense como la identidad ya no está basada en las comunidades de religión, nación y familia sino que está basada en falsas comunidades de orientación sexual (forma parte de las comunidades de lesbianas), falsa comunidades de las causas (comunidades de antifascistas) y falsas comunidades de los hobbies (amantes del vino, gato y Star Trek).

(Se dice que estas son falsas comunidades porque no son como las comunidades tradicionales, en qué la gente se conocía entre ellos y creaba estructuras de relación. Son simplemente grupos de personas atomizadas que tienen los mismos gustos. La comunidad de Artana es una comunidad: es más grande que los individuos porque tiene relaciones sólidas entre ellos. La comunidad LGBTI o de trekkies son gente que ni se conoce entre ellos. Es una falsa comunidad).

La parte de esta autodefinición que nos interesa aquí es la de las causas, que se aplica tanto a los partidarios de la causa. Los partidarios pueden sentirse que su identidad es luchar por el bien, contra el fascismo, a favor de la inmigración, etc.

En los partidarios que también son beneficiarios, esto puede llegar al extremo. Por ejemplo, hay homosexuales que han hecho de la lucha a favor de la causa gay todo el centro de su vida y se definen antes que todo como gays.

Pero prácticas homosexuales las ha habido toda la vida y nunca alguien se ha definido por sus prácticas sexuales. Si hubieras preguntado al Emperador Adriano quién era, no hubiera dicho que era un homosexual, aunque tuvo un amante homosexual durante años. Si le hubieras dicho «Tú eres un homosexual», no lo hubiera entendido, de la misma forma que una persona que está sola y se masturba continuamente no se define como «Yo soy un masturbador».

 

The political cause succeeds because it produces

Why political cause is towards more entropy

The result of the political cause

After the political succeeds, the end result is a society which is farther away from obvious reality and the natural law. A society with less order and more entropy. More chaotic and less free (anarchotyranny). A society with

 

 

 

 

 

Summary of previous installments

In previous installments, we have seen that the the ideology/religion of liberalism (the religion of freedom, equality and rights, which is a form of relativism) is the ultimate justification of behavior and public policy in Western civilization and it is an ideology that can be used to justify anything. So it is as if it did not exist. It is a rhetorical ploy.

Its void is filled by another official ideology: leftism, which is the base of the law and culture in Western civilization. Leftism is an absolutist ideology with absolute goods (feminism, multiculturalism, diversity, etc.) and absolute evils (patriarchy, white supremacism, sexism, racism, homophobia) and it is justified because of liberalism, because liberalism can justify anything..

In this absolutist sense, leftism is not different from any other official religion. But there are several properties that make Leftism unique between the official religions of societies:

Property A. Its restlessness. Leftism is always evolving and incorporating new absolute goods and evils in a process that has been accelerating. Some things that were common sense only five or ten years ago, now they are the evilest of evil things and they cannot be disputed.

Property B. Its direction. Leftism does not evolve in random directions but getting farther and farther away from obvious reality and natural law.  Leftism is a reality inversion and a moral inversion, which constantly increases.

Property C. Its popularity. As we will see, Leftism is a religion whose goals are enslavement, impoverishment and mental health decline of the vast majority of the population. However, it is  very popular among the majority of the population.

This text will try to explain property A and C while the next installment will try to explain property B and deepen the understanding of property A.

Evolution of modern society

The evolution of leftism is clear if we see it from a non-ideological perspective. Modern society always evolves in a direction where more and more good things are taken from the general population and good things are transferred to the powerful and to the people that support leftism.

These «good things» are money, power and psychological well-being. We will call them «benefits». So this change means the impoverishment, enslavement and mental health decline of the general population. We will call this «the disempowerment of the population».

It is tempting to see this change as a transfer of benefits but this would be inaccurate. The good things taken from the population are bigger and different than the good things given to the powerful and the people that support leftism.

For example, let’s suppose a bank reduces the number of their offices by forcing people to do most transactions online (true story). The good things taken from the population are: people without computer skills find their lives a bit harder, many employees lose their jobs, their families are destroyed or have a difficult life because of economic hardships, the communities where these families live are impoverished, etc.

The good things given to the powerful is that the owner of the bank has more amount of money that he doesn’t need and he can’t spend in a thousand lives. But now, he is the number 51 in the Forbes list of wealthy people (instead of number 47). In addition, this excess of money can help this guy to play God and try to implement a «better world» according to his half-baked ideas that create more chaos, but nobody tells him they are asinine because he has so much money.

So you have destruction of many lives compared to the vanity of a guy with too much money. Both are good things but not equivalent. This change is only possible because the rulers have the power and the people being dispossessed have no power to protect from this predation.

The class structure of modern society

More specifically, Western society is composed by three social classes:

• The rulers. Financial powers like the Rothschild, the Rockefellers, and others. They rule in the shadow and are often hidden behind all kinds of non-profit and profit organizations (Bank of International Settlements, Blackrock, etc). The rulers decide the direction towards society should go.
• The managers. This includes the intellectuals that create the ideas in universities. The journalists, teachers, professors and entertainers that transmit these ideas to the people. And the politicians, civil servants and white collars employees that enforce these in ideas in the public space and private companies.

Since «the Managerial Revolution» by James Burnham, it has been often claimed that the managers have replaced the wealthy people as a ruling class. I will believe it when I see the managers take decisions or define policies that go against the rulers. This was done in Communist countries, which were really managerial, but in our Capitalist system, financial powers rule and managers are only their assistants. The same way the clergy was assistant of the power during the Middle Ages.

This does not mean that managers are without powers. In fact, the upper layer of managers (say, the high officers in international institutions) have some power about how to implement the direction set by the rulers in society. The lower layer of managers have power how to transmit and enforce the directives of the managers in their companies, school, etc. Since the rulers are hidden, the population thinks that the managers (politicians, international organization) are the ones that rule societies.

The rulers and the managers are «the structure of power» in Western society.

• The serfs. The ones that have no power about the direction of the society. An immigrant, a trucker driver, the owner of a small business, etc. They can be divided into good serfs (if they support leftism) and bad serfs (if they don’t support leftism)

We will call the managers and the good serfs as «the clients» (in a Roman sense). They are the ones that support the enslavement, impoverishment and mental health decline of the population through its support of leftism.

Leftism evolves to take more and more benefits (money, power and psychological benefits) from the population and to give more benefits to the rulers and (sometimes) to the clients.

In this exchange, the rulers are the main beneficiaries but the upper layer of the clients can also be benefitted if the benefits they receive is bigger than the benefits they give. For example, a high level officer of the European Commission receives more benefits (salary, status, power) that he gives (say, through taxes).

A feminist school teacher (the lower layer of the managers) receives less benefits (virtue signaling, moral justification) that she gives (taxes, loneliness because of feminism), but she doesn’t realize that leftism is the cause of her disempowerment (she attributes loneliness to patriarchy) so she supports leftism because of the benefits she perceives (virtue signaling, moral justification).

Leftism as a justification of the power grab

So each novelty in modern society can be explained as  taking benefits from the population to give benefits to the rulers and (sometimes) the clients. Leftism is only the ideology to justify this process.

For example, both massive immigration and the incorporation of woman to the workplace disempowered the population by reducing wages, increasing taxes, making people more unhappy and more dependent from the State, while increasing wealth, power and meaning for the rulers and the upper layer of the managers.

This disempowerment had to be justified so «feminism» and «multiculturalism» were created as a new «gods» or dogmas of the religion of leftism. From a logical point of view, importing masses of people from very patriarchal societies contradicts feminism, but the hidden logic is that both movements benefit the rulers and the upper layer of the managers. Leftism is an ideology to rationalize parasitism of these classes with respect to the general population.

The rulers of traditional societies could not do that so easily because the religion was established. Henry II could not define «the murdering of bishops such as Beckett» as a good thing, because he could not change the religion. But leftism has liberalism as a ultimate justification and, as we saw, liberalism can be used to justify anything (in this case, the alibi is «to increase the rights of women and poor foreigners»)  . So the powerful define the religion as they see fit and have no restriction in their behavior. The powerful control the religion instead of being restricted by it.

This explains the restlessness of leftism. Liberalism allows leftism to be always changing, because it can justify anything (unlike the dogmas of traditional societies). However, it does not force leftism to be always changing. If leftism is always changing is because the rulers benefit from each novelty and the rulers have the power to implement it. Each leftist novelty such as feminism, LGBTI or multiculturalism has ended up increasing the benefit of the rulers, of the powerful. The fact that it disempowers the population is a byproduct.

How people accept their own disempowerment

How do normal people accept and even promote leftism, which justifies their own disempowerment? There are multiple mechanisms.

The first mechanism is that the disempowerment is sold as an expansion of rights. Since each right is someone else’s obligations (again, the relativism of liberalism), new obligations are introduced into the population while claiming they are rights and concealing the obligations attached.

For example, rights of illegal immigrants to be given healthcare imply the obligation of everybody else to pay for this healthcare through taxes. By claiming «rights» are introduced, the impoverishment and enslavement of the population are concealed. Only the bright side is presented in a constant propaganda campaign. It is again a fallacy of omission («stacking the deck» fallacy).

The second mechanism consists in the rationalization of the disempowerment. When divorce and abortion were introduced in Spain, there were told that these were going to be very special cases for dramatic situations and there wouldn’t be masses of people divorcing or aborting ( “safe, legal, and rare”, as Bill Clinton would said). After this happened, divorce and abortion were redefined from «necessary evils» to «highest goods and rights».  So now families broken and children killed are rationalized saying that these are good things because, for example, women have the right not to be trapped in an unhappy marriage and own their body.

The third mechanism is that leftism blames all its failures to other people and to insufficient leftism. So, when people get impoverished because leftism, «the right» is to blame and the solution is more leftism. For example, when feminism fails, the answer is that feminism has not been sufficiently implemented (because of the evil «patriarchy») and the solution is more feminism.

A special case of this third mechanism is that leftism takes its victims and makes them soldiers. An example is the liberated woman who followed very well all the rules of feminism and, hence, ended up lonely and childless at her forties. This woman is hurting and admitting that she has committed mistakes that cannot be undone only adds to her misery. So her mind tries to rationalize these situations and leftism provides the perfect alibi: she has not married because men are sexist and only want a submissive slave instead of a strong independent woman like her. So she has to fight against the patriarchy by promoting feminism. This gives her meaning and something to live for. And it is a perfect excuse to try to convince young women to follow the same path she followed: «Misery wants company».

So each victim of leftism is converted into a fighter for leftism. Leftism feeds of its own failures: destroys lives of people and uses them to destroy more lives of people in a vicious circle that destroys society, like a cancer growing in a body.

Something to be explained

We have said that leftism evolves in direction towards more benefits for the rulers and (sometimes) for the clients. But why does this direction coincide with the direction consisting in getting farther and farther away from obvious reality and the natural law?

This requires a more detailed examination of the mechanism of leftism, which will be done in the next installment.

—–

If leftism is free to wander, we should expect that it wanders in random ways. There must be some mechanism for it to always go left. Explaining this mechanism is the objetive of this post.

Spiritual reality. Satan works with secondary causes so it does not reveal its existence.

We are interested in these secondary causes.

Why did the West go to Hell by Virapala

[Why did the West go to Hell attempts to be a logical and historical explanation of the genesis of today’s Absurdistan: a world where you are evil if you say that pigs cannot fly. You can contact the author on virapala.merdeta.com]

Part I.b.: The two religions

Introduction

We saw in the previous installment that the modern Western civilization is founded on a relativistic religion. This ideology is:

• relativistic in theory with respect to the truth and morality, which are claimed to be relative (different for each person).
• relativistic in practice because it uses concepts like freedom, equality and rights. These concepts are claimed to be absolute (the same for each person) but they are relative, because the freedom/equality/right of a person is, in reality, the lack of freedom/equality/right of another person.

We have seen that the relativism of Western civilization causes societal problems like anarchy, tyranny and atomized societies. For a better explanation, please read the previous installment.

However, the main problem of the relativism in Western civilization is the one will be explained in next.

Political systems cannot be based on relativism

The main problem of relativism is that it is impossible to implement in a society.

It is well known that the different relativistic concepts contradict each other.  As Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn said: «Human beings are born with different capacities. If they are free, they are not equal. And if they are equal, they are not free».

But there is something deeper than that. Each relativistic concept contradicts itself. Relativism is impossible to scale.

Every man can adopt relativism in an individual manner (and, as we saw, this produces conflict, which causes anarchy, tyranny and atomized societies). But it is impossible to apply relativism in a collective manner.

To be more specific, it is impossible for a political system to be based on relativism.

This is because each political system is based on laws. The law should allow some things and forbid other things. Which things should the law allow or forbid? It should allow things that are considered good and forbid things that are considered evil. Therefore, it needs a concept of good and evil that is publicly shared by the elite and authorities and, even better, by the entire population (even if they don’t feel this way in private, see Timur Kuran’s Private Truths, Public Lies).

This concept of the good and the evil upon which the law is based is the official ideology of the society, that is, its official religion, because we define religion as a moral system that distinguishes good from evil. In this sense, every country is a theocracy.

(Some of you will object to my use of the R word but, please, bear with me. This will be explained in another text and let’s not quarrel about names. If you have problems with this word, please replace it with moralistic ideology).

This official religion cannot be relativistic in theory (if there is no absolute truth and no absolute good, there is no reason to have laws that allow and forbid behaviors).

This official religion cannot be relativistic in practice either. For example the law cannot be founded on «freedom». It is common for politicians to say: «Our political system is founded on freedom», as if the relative concept of freedom was an absolute concept (the same for everybody). But there is no such thing as a political system founded on freedom because the freedom of somebody is the lack of freedom of somebody else.

My freedom to have private property is the lack of freedom of everybody else to use my property without my consent. Capitalist countries will allow the first freedom and will forbid the second one. Communist countries will do the opposite (in theory). But you cannot allow both freedoms at once. So there is not a political system based on freedom, the same way you cannot have a coin with one side.

In short, a political system  cannot be founded on relativist concepts, because the law is absolutist and not relativistic.

But we have said that the Western civilization is based on a relativistic ideology. So how is this possible? Are we contradicting ourselves?

The paradox of Western civilization

It is possible because relativism is the theoretical official religion of the Western civilization  but it is never put into practice in the political systems of this civilization. It is only used by the powers that be in a rhetorical, official and theoretical way  (in speeches, official documents  and,  more importantly, as a way of justifying policies and laws). But, as explained above, it cannot be applied in practice so it is not applied.

For example, in theory, all people in Western countries are free, equal and have the same rights. This statement is completely relativistic and completely theoretical.

But, in practice, some people are freer than others, some people are more equal than others and some people have more rights than others. So, for example, in a divorce, the person who wants out of the marriage has freedom and rights to divorce, but, the person who wants to remain in the marriage and his kids have no freedom or rights at all.  In an abortion, the woman is free to kill her child (it is her right) while the man and the fetus have no freedom or rights and nothing to say. And so on and so forth.

As we have seen, it would be impossible for a society to be based on freedom, because the freedom of a person is the lack of freedom of another person (the freedom to divorce of a woman is the lack of freedom of a man to see how their kids grow). So in the Western civilization, like in any other countries, some freedoms are guaranteed while other freedoms are restricted.  In a Muslim country, the woman has no freedom to divorce but the man has the freedom to see his kids grow. The late blogger Zippy Catholic used to hammer this point home once and again (we miss you, Mark).

Muslim countries don’t have less freedoms than Western countries. They have different freedoms. However, Muslim countries are coherent because they don’t claim to be based on freedom while Western countries do.

In short. relativisim is not workable and is completely absurd. It cannot be put into practice in a society.

Therefore, in fact, Western civilization has two official religions:

1. A relativistic religion in theory, for rhetorical uses. I will call this «liberalism». Its relative concepts (liberty, equality and rights) are presented as if they were absolute concepts and they are claimed to be the foundation of the society.

Of course, this is only a rhetorical trick (for speeches and, more importantly, to justify policies and laws). Relativism cannot be put into practice so liberalism is only a rhetorical ploy.

Liberalism is a very simple ideology (it only consists of some few words: liberty, equality, progress, rights, etc.) and has not substantially changed for the last 200 years.

2. There is a real official religion, which is codified in the laws and it is the base of public discourse and policies. I will call it «leftism».

This is an absolute religion with absolute goods and evils. For example, absolute evils are racism, sexism, homophobia, white nationalism. Absolute goods are the legalization of divorce and abortion, secularization, uncontrolled immigration, etc. These are absolute concepts and must be enforced as absolute by the law, the government and society in general.

Leftism is constantly changing and incorporating new absolute goods and evils (transphobia is the latest evil so far, but it won’t be the last).

Go to a workplace and say that you don’t think the new LGBTI program is a good idea, because everybody should have their opinion and freedom of thought, and you will see how long liberalism (relativism) goes (I did this and I was fired). You will see what the ideology being enforced in society is leftism, not liberalism.

Liberalism is only a rhetorical ploy to justify leftism.  It took me a lot to see this distinction and this article by Bonald was useful so I decided to use his terminology.

That article explains how both religions are used to justify leftism, for example, in a debate of  gay marriage. You attack the ideas of ideologies other than leftism by using liberalism («Christian marriage is a cultural construct that does not allow freedom and equality to gay couples. Live and let live») and you defend your own ideas by using leftism («You should bake the cake for a gay wedding, you bigot, you homophobe»). There is no freedom or live and let live for this last case.

In short, your ideas are relative (liberalism), my ideas are absolute (leftism). It is «relativism for thee but not for me»., which is a phenomenon constantly seen in the history of relativism, since its introduction in the Western civilization in the 16th century.

In short, Western civilization is based on what I call «a false relativism». Relativism (liberalism) is used in a rhetorical way as if it were the foundation of  society but  society is based on leftism, on an absolutist religion (like any other society is because it is impossible to do it another way).

How other societies work with ultimate justification

If Western society is really based on an absolutist ideology like other societies, why is so harmful that it uses relativism in a rhetorical function?

The problem is that relativism is used as an ultimate justification of changes in the culture and in the law. And relativism can justify anything, no matter how insane it is.

If we start asking: «Why is A true/false?», this will have an answer along the lines of «A is true/false because it is derived from B, which is true/false». Then we can repeat the question with B: «Why is B true/false». This will produce a C being true/false. We cannot go on infinitely with this chain of justification. This chain stops with Z being true/false, full stop. Z is an ultimate justification and we can call it «a reality dogma».

This is regarding the IS part of Hume’s IS-OUGHT  distinction. But it is the same about the OUGHT part. That is, morality works the same way. If we start asking: «Why is A good/evil?», this will have an answer along the lines of «A is good/evil because it produces B, which is good/evil». Then we can repeat the question with B: «Why is B good/evil». This will produce a C being good/evil. We cannot go on infinitely with this chain of justification. This chain stops with Z being good/evil, full stop. Z is an ultimate justification and we can call it «a morality dogma».

All civilizations have dogmas, which are the foundation of the civilization. In ancient societies, dogmas were collected in holy traditions or holy texts such as the Bible, the Qur’an or the Talmud, which were used as the ultimate justification in these other societies. Each chain of justification ended with «the Bible/Qur’an/Talmud says it so».

However, these holy texts are extensions of obvious reality («men are women are different») and of the natural law («don’t steal»), that is, the universal moral law that all sane societies follow, because it is biologically wired in humans and it is the only way to organize a society.  The natural law has dogmas like «don’t lie, don’t steal, don’t murder, respect your neighbor’s wife, etc.».

All traditional holy texts include the dogmas of obvious reality («men are women are different») and the natural law («don’t steal») with some exceptions. They also include some other dogmas in addition («the Trinity», «the obligation to pray», «Mohammed being the last prophet»). So the traditional holy texts can be seen as extensions of obvious reality and the natural law. See the appendix of The Abolition of Men by C.S.Lewis to see how all civilizations agree on the dogmas of the natural law (called «the Tao» by C.S.Lewis).

(The mechanism that makes all the holy texts to agree on obvious reality and the natural law is that societies that are not based on the natural law don’t survive long term , because the natural law is the minimum set of rules needed for a society to function, so the holy traditions of these societies die with them. This will be explored in another text)

Having the dogmas of a society derived from holy texts has as a benefit that its culture is not completely free. The culture is constantly changing but it does not get very far away from the dogmas of the holy texts, so it does not get very far away from obvious reality and the natural law. I imagine these cultures as a dog tied to a stick with a chain. The stick is obvious reality and the natural law. The dog (the culture) can move somewhat but he is not completely free, he must be somewhat close to the stick, even if the chain is long.

This seems outrageous to modern Western people, raised in a diet of false rationalism. How can you limit your freedom of thought? You should be able to question anything! Follow your reason when it leads you!.

In fact, human reason (aided by convincing fallacies and social pressure) can justify absolutely anything, The modern West is a society that prides itself in its rationalism and it has rationally justified that a man is a woman (see «the social construction of gender» and other sophistries).

The dogmas of the holy texts mean that ancient cultures are protected from insanity. They cannot say that there are 26 genders because «God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. (Genesis 1:27). Or, if you are a Muslim, «O mankind, fear your Lord, who created you from one soul and created from it its mate and dispersed from both of them many men and women.» (Qur’an 4:1)

How the modern West works with ultimate justification

As we have said, the modern West has leftism as his real religion, but liberalism is his ultimate justification. Unlike ancient societies, whose dogmas were written in long texts, the dogmas of the modern West are surprisingly short: they are limited to a series of relativistic liberal concepts: freedom, equality, rights, and progress (with an additional implicit concept: tabula rasa or blank slate).  In the modern West, these concepts of liberalism play the same role than the Bible, the Qur’an or the Talmud in other societies, which are used as the ultimate justification in these societies.

Every ultimate justification of the leftist religion in Western society is done starting from liberalism (which is the rhetorical religion) and not from leftism (which is the real religion). So why is homophobia evil? Because it goes against the freedom, equality and rights of homosexual people. Why is secularization good? Because it goes in favor of the freedom and equality of people of non-Christian religions, and so on and so forth.

So why is having liberalism as justification so bad? And how it is possible than an absolutist ideology (leftism) is justified starting from a relativistic ideology (liberalism), when this is logically impossible?

It is bad because the dogmas of Western civilization (freedom, equality, rights) are completely relativistic. When applied to the collective, they are false dogmas that don’t mean anything. They are words to conceal the fact that the Western civilization has no dogmas at all. This means that this civilization is a free dog, with no chain. The civilization can move in any direction and there is no limit to the insanity it can accept.

Any direction the Western civilization moves can be justified as a new right, freedom or equality. Do we want to legalize divorce? We can say we are protecting the rights and freedoms of people unhappy in their marriage. Do we want to forbid divorce? We can say we are protecting the rights and freedoms of kids to have a stable family.

Do we want to enforce the identification of trannies as women? We can say we are protecting the rights of people trapped in the wrong body or are wanting the equality of these «women» with other women. Do we want to forbid identification of trannies as a women? We want to protect the rights of women to have private spaces (like restrooms) or the equality of women to have the same reward as men with the same effort in sports.

The sacred relativistic concepts (freedom, equality, rights) of our civilization are able to justify ANYTHING, no matter what. These are no dogmas when applied to collective but a series of empty words than don’t mean anything. They can justify anything and its opposite.

That is, there is no insanity big enough that cannot be justified by using relativistic concepts. And this is why our society has reached these levels of insanity: liberalism (relativism) as an ultimate justification allows it, while other societies are restricted by their holy texts, their absolute religions based on the natural law.

Liberalism for me but not for thee

But this produces another question. If liberalism can justify anything, why is it only used to justify leftism? Why isn’t liberalism used to justify the freedom of people not to bake a cake for a so-called «gay marriage»? Or the rights of kids to have a stable family?

More specifically, the fact that the relativistic liberalism allows insanity does not mean that it forces insanity. If liberalism concepts mean nothing, if liberal concepts give freedom to the society (to the dog) to go in any direction (because they are relativistic), we would expect for the Western society to go in random directions, but the direction is always the same: towards insanity and towards the opposite direction of obvious reality and the natural law.

In fact, if we speak accurately, liberalism is not properly an ultimate justification of leftism. It is an ultimate rationalization.

Leftism has its own dynamics and evolves in an completely independent way from liberalism. It has mechanisms in place that make leftism evolve in one direction. As Mencius Moldbug said “Cthulhu may swim slowly. But he only swims left. Isn’t that interesting?”

Once leftism has produced a cultural change because its own internal dynamics, liberalism is called to justify it, to rationalize it. A liberal justification is created which justifies the novelty as derived from the freedom/equality/right of someone (let’s say the freedom and right to be called by your favorite pronouns). The fact that the freedom/equality/rights of other people is restricted is completely omitted (the freedom/right of everybody to free expression).

That is, leftism is rationalized starting from liberalism using a fallacy of omission («stack the deck» fallacy). This is the only way to derive an absolute ideology (leftism) from a relativistic ideology (liberalism).

In other words, it is liberalism for me but not for thee. Relativism is never applied in a complete manner. It is applied in a partial way that justifies leftism and, when it contradicts leftism, it is not applied. Liberalism justifies leftist rights but other rights are never discussed. We constantly see this in the history of the modern West.

And this is all I wanted to say about the relativistic ideology of liberalism. However, the absolutist religion of leftism merits an additional explanation. More specifically, what are the mechanisms that make leftism always evolve in the same direction (the opposite direction from obvious reality and natural law)? This will be seen in the next installment of this text.