That maybe the dumbest most pseudo -intellectual thing I've ever read. As my old philosopher professor said, "most philosophical mistakes are made in the first 3 pages. If you believe Donald Trump no core beliefs? Then tell me what Joe Biden's core beliefs are? Kamala Harris? Hillary Clinton? He has held every position under the sun. As for the belief the conservative American electorate is dangerous, are you kidding me? Who wants to end free speech? Take away your gun? Open the border? End prosecuting crime? End policing? Destroy education? Sexualize and Trans children? Cancel and silence opposition? Should I go on? The left destroys EVERYTHING it touches with or without allusions to Rousseau.
People that belong to the progressive left are roughly one tenth of the democratic voters. So they are in no way representative of "the left" (whatever that term might mean).
And the truth is that even among the progressive left _politicians_ (if you listen to what they really say and write as opposite to what somebody else tells you they said) you'd be really hard pressed to find positions like the one you mention. For example, see this "https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/progressive-left/" for a characterization of what that groups believes. And they are like only 10%, that means one in 10.
So by and large the left has no interest in "ending free speech", "end policing", "end prosecuting crime" (btw funny how you say that when somebody want to defund FBI for doing just that), or even "opening border", much less "destroying education" or "Trans children". I don't know if this is a deliberate misinterpretation on your part or but a misinterpretation anyway. So not the best way to support an argument or even start a conversation.
Look, I myself i am for securing the border, funding (and training) the police better (but also public officials in general), trying to improve conditions of working class people negatively affected by globalization, enlarge education actually, and encourage free speech (especially the well-argued and thoughtful type), and so on. I'd be totally for draining the swamp, for example. And i consider myself very much squarely on the left.
It would seem to me that the divide among left and right is not really about political positions. It's that one side tries, often failing, to come up to solutions to problems, think them through more or less logically, and argue for some actual possible improvement in institutions. Again often failing in all this.
But the other side is instead mainly defined just by an -often visceral- automatic opposition to (their understanding of) whatever the other side says or represents. Or at least that's my, maybe biased, feeling. And by the way the same happens in Italy, for example, so Europe is not that much different.
But i think that part of what Ryan's article argue is that, in some sense, this has always been more or less always the case, at least for a sizable minority. So i guess it's unsurprising that it somehow struck some kind of chord.
With all due respect , I think you are biased, just as the rest of us. I will give you the most recent example: Graham proposed to restrict abortions after 15 weeks allowing later abortions under special circumstances. He was immediately labeled an evil anti-abortion and anti women’s rights evil man by all democratic politicians and mass media. As was DeSantis. They said it was an abortions ban. But was it? Wasn’t it a real chance for a compromise? Many European countries restrict abortions after 11-12 weeks Would you call Switzerland or Austria’s treatment of women inhumane? I do not see left behaving in a pragmatic way.
Are you replying to me? Because I do not belong to any party at the moment and do not hold religious beliefs. Did you even read my post? And it was written almost two years ago. Many things have happened since.
MMMM??? Could there be a Communist Party after Stalin? After Mao? After Tito? What happened after Franco died? What happened after Pinochet died.
I met a Polish economist, who lived under communism. and asked him what sustained the system. He said the terror.
What I see is the persistence of culture. Russia has returned to the Tsar and the Boyars. China has returned to the Emperor and the Mandarinate. History doesn't repeat but it sure as hell rhymes.
An interesting piece with a whiff of the echo-chamber about it, your bias and blinkers given away by your usage of 'terrible' when describing the nations capabilities. You conclude that you don't know but perhaps more appropriately, you may well know but don't understand.
trump has shown the rot in American culture. It used to take terrible privation and suffering to drive people into horrible totalitarian political systems like fascism, in the modern US it seems merely being unhappy about societal changes that usually don't even directly affect an individual can drive about a third of the country into eliminationist fantasies. Mostly because there's an entire grievance/grift industry telling Americans every day that their world is ending and the Other is coming for their kids/home/guns/retirement/etc.
I think it is largely the result of a polity that no longer thinks of politics as a practical way of managing society and finding compromise, to an ego suffused battleground where any compromise is anathema and worthy of violent opposition. And that polity was formed by the creating of various organizations in the non-profit (Heritage foundation, Federalist society) and media spaces (FOX, Twitter, internet cesspools like 4chan) that are in fact dedicated to the destruction of traditional classical liberal policies and the creation of institutions and systems that guarantee eternal rule by an aggrieved minority.
We use fascism as shorthand because of the similarity of authoritarian tendencies, but it really goes beyond that. Most of the cutting edge thinkers (loosely speaking) on the right want to overturn not just democracy but the Enlightenment itself (https://theweek.com/articles/937611/conservatives-who-want-undo-enlightenment). I am at a loss as to what can cause that kind of nihilism and how to combat it.
I don't know if it is a trait that brings some kind of evolutionary advantage, or maybe just a byproduct of evolution (i think the latter) but we humans have a strong innate tendency to form groups that oppose each other. It's not just politics, you can see this in culture, soccer fandom, religion and what not. So the corollary is that the "chance of fascism" will always be there. All we can do is to build institutions that encourage thinking things through before acting. And give other possibilities a chance before joining the ancestral call to defend your group from the other ones.
I have also a comment regarding the fact that "the GOP isn’t becoming a working-class party. It’s still full of rich people, and it still votes for lots of pro-business policies and against lots of pro-worker policies."
Well of course, it's the pro-business money (about 75% of the funding) that run the whole show, in the end. At least money from the existing, well-connected, consolidated business outside big tech.
This is not necessarily always a bad thing, though often it probably is. And I am not saying that anybody has complete control over everything all the time. But still, in my view, it's those business money that run the show. And I don't really see this changing, because, again, a lot of the people voting for the GOP just vote against the other side, it doesn't matter what gets or doesn't get done in the end. Unless, of course, things get real bad at some point.
This was an excellent essay. Thank you. Still digesting this one.
That maybe the dumbest most pseudo -intellectual thing I've ever read. As my old philosopher professor said, "most philosophical mistakes are made in the first 3 pages. If you believe Donald Trump no core beliefs? Then tell me what Joe Biden's core beliefs are? Kamala Harris? Hillary Clinton? He has held every position under the sun. As for the belief the conservative American electorate is dangerous, are you kidding me? Who wants to end free speech? Take away your gun? Open the border? End prosecuting crime? End policing? Destroy education? Sexualize and Trans children? Cancel and silence opposition? Should I go on? The left destroys EVERYTHING it touches with or without allusions to Rousseau.
People that belong to the progressive left are roughly one tenth of the democratic voters. So they are in no way representative of "the left" (whatever that term might mean).
And the truth is that even among the progressive left _politicians_ (if you listen to what they really say and write as opposite to what somebody else tells you they said) you'd be really hard pressed to find positions like the one you mention. For example, see this "https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2021/11/09/progressive-left/" for a characterization of what that groups believes. And they are like only 10%, that means one in 10.
So by and large the left has no interest in "ending free speech", "end policing", "end prosecuting crime" (btw funny how you say that when somebody want to defund FBI for doing just that), or even "opening border", much less "destroying education" or "Trans children". I don't know if this is a deliberate misinterpretation on your part or but a misinterpretation anyway. So not the best way to support an argument or even start a conversation.
Look, I myself i am for securing the border, funding (and training) the police better (but also public officials in general), trying to improve conditions of working class people negatively affected by globalization, enlarge education actually, and encourage free speech (especially the well-argued and thoughtful type), and so on. I'd be totally for draining the swamp, for example. And i consider myself very much squarely on the left.
It would seem to me that the divide among left and right is not really about political positions. It's that one side tries, often failing, to come up to solutions to problems, think them through more or less logically, and argue for some actual possible improvement in institutions. Again often failing in all this.
But the other side is instead mainly defined just by an -often visceral- automatic opposition to (their understanding of) whatever the other side says or represents. Or at least that's my, maybe biased, feeling. And by the way the same happens in Italy, for example, so Europe is not that much different.
But i think that part of what Ryan's article argue is that, in some sense, this has always been more or less always the case, at least for a sizable minority. So i guess it's unsurprising that it somehow struck some kind of chord.
With all due respect , I think you are biased, just as the rest of us. I will give you the most recent example: Graham proposed to restrict abortions after 15 weeks allowing later abortions under special circumstances. He was immediately labeled an evil anti-abortion and anti women’s rights evil man by all democratic politicians and mass media. As was DeSantis. They said it was an abortions ban. But was it? Wasn’t it a real chance for a compromise? Many European countries restrict abortions after 11-12 weeks Would you call Switzerland or Austria’s treatment of women inhumane? I do not see left behaving in a pragmatic way.
Abortion is between a woman and her doctor and you and the rest of society has no place telling either what they can and can;t do. Not to mention the fact that your supposedly pro-freedom party is talking about incredible removal of women's rights including restricting their ability to travel (https://spectrumlocalnews.com/tx/south-texas-el-paso/news/2023/10/24/lubbock-county-becomes-biggest-texas-county-to-enact--abortion-travel-ban-) and subpoenaing women's menstruation records (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/feb/16/virginia-governor-glenn-youngkin-extreme-bill-police-menstrual-histories). Not to mention that the legal jeopardy attached to treating any woman for anything is destroying women's healthcare in backwards states like Idaho ( https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/aug/22/abortion-idaho-women-rights-healthcare) and driving doctors out of state. So take your primitive superstitions and weird religious beliefs and keep them to yourself.
Are you replying to me? Because I do not belong to any party at the moment and do not hold religious beliefs. Did you even read my post? And it was written almost two years ago. Many things have happened since.
MMMM??? Could there be a Communist Party after Stalin? After Mao? After Tito? What happened after Franco died? What happened after Pinochet died.
I met a Polish economist, who lived under communism. and asked him what sustained the system. He said the terror.
What I see is the persistence of culture. Russia has returned to the Tsar and the Boyars. China has returned to the Emperor and the Mandarinate. History doesn't repeat but it sure as hell rhymes.
An interesting piece with a whiff of the echo-chamber about it, your bias and blinkers given away by your usage of 'terrible' when describing the nations capabilities. You conclude that you don't know but perhaps more appropriately, you may well know but don't understand.
trump has shown the rot in American culture. It used to take terrible privation and suffering to drive people into horrible totalitarian political systems like fascism, in the modern US it seems merely being unhappy about societal changes that usually don't even directly affect an individual can drive about a third of the country into eliminationist fantasies. Mostly because there's an entire grievance/grift industry telling Americans every day that their world is ending and the Other is coming for their kids/home/guns/retirement/etc.
I think it is largely the result of a polity that no longer thinks of politics as a practical way of managing society and finding compromise, to an ego suffused battleground where any compromise is anathema and worthy of violent opposition. And that polity was formed by the creating of various organizations in the non-profit (Heritage foundation, Federalist society) and media spaces (FOX, Twitter, internet cesspools like 4chan) that are in fact dedicated to the destruction of traditional classical liberal policies and the creation of institutions and systems that guarantee eternal rule by an aggrieved minority.
We use fascism as shorthand because of the similarity of authoritarian tendencies, but it really goes beyond that. Most of the cutting edge thinkers (loosely speaking) on the right want to overturn not just democracy but the Enlightenment itself (https://theweek.com/articles/937611/conservatives-who-want-undo-enlightenment). I am at a loss as to what can cause that kind of nihilism and how to combat it.
I don't know if it is a trait that brings some kind of evolutionary advantage, or maybe just a byproduct of evolution (i think the latter) but we humans have a strong innate tendency to form groups that oppose each other. It's not just politics, you can see this in culture, soccer fandom, religion and what not. So the corollary is that the "chance of fascism" will always be there. All we can do is to build institutions that encourage thinking things through before acting. And give other possibilities a chance before joining the ancestral call to defend your group from the other ones.
I have also a comment regarding the fact that "the GOP isn’t becoming a working-class party. It’s still full of rich people, and it still votes for lots of pro-business policies and against lots of pro-worker policies."
Well of course, it's the pro-business money (about 75% of the funding) that run the whole show, in the end. At least money from the existing, well-connected, consolidated business outside big tech.
This is not necessarily always a bad thing, though often it probably is. And I am not saying that anybody has complete control over everything all the time. But still, in my view, it's those business money that run the show. And I don't really see this changing, because, again, a lot of the people voting for the GOP just vote against the other side, it doesn't matter what gets or doesn't get done in the end. Unless, of course, things get real bad at some point.