I think there are 2 more common causes here of the Social Justice "Libertarians at lunch, authoritarians at dinner" schizo mindset:
First, like their Marxist ancestors, whatever seems good for "the Revolution" at any point in time is ipso facto right and necessary, even if it contradicts what was said the day before. So if turning Cali into an open-air mental asylum gains them more power it's good, and if becoming Covid commissars gains them more power, that's also good. ("In our society whatever serves the interests of communism is moral." Brezhnev)
And secondly, the commonality between being a junkie-enabling libertarian and a Covid-enforcing maximalist is the Social Justice prime emotional impetus: a sort of fundamentalist compassion, where anyone who may cause any harm to any member of a marginalized group becomes not just an enemy or dissident, but a pollutant that needs to be extinguished.
Social Justice is somehow both Marxist and Protestant, and combines the most extreme thinking of both, in that every aspect of life and the world become both intensely politicized and moralized.
Have been reading some Rene Girard lately and he talks about how Christianity died so that its essence/ethos/core truth could live forever.
"The current process of spiritual demagoguery and rhetorical overkill has transformed the concern for victims into a totalitarian command and a permanent inquisition."
I'm of Mark Fisher's 'Capitalist Realism' school of Marxism--the left and right have both become tinged by anti-rational pseudo-religiosity because no one can think of any real alternative to the demonic Mega-Capitalism that is swallowing us all whole. When there is no place in the world that truly escapes the Beast, the conclusion must be drawn that capitalism is apolitical and transhuman, an autonomous AI that follows only its own endless-growth (il) logic. It's not surprising that people are, for lack of a better phrase, going mad. Mark Fisher's book ends inconclusively, and he committed suicide--seems he couldn't think of a solution either. The only one I've found is that contained in the Book of Revelations.
Thank you for this. As much as my friends want to blame Marx for all the wokeness, the phenomenon is as much a product of faith-based campuses like Antioch as somewhere like Berkeley. "Gender" in particular has the character of a travelling preacher and patent medicine show. Something strange happened at the intersection of Michel Foucault Avenue and Ralph Waldo Emerson Street. Marx got twisted up with prosperity gospel and the result seems to fill the hole where liberalism used to have religion.
science is always esoteric knowledge to the masses, but the linking of Puritanism to a top-down technocratic bureaucracy is a stretch. Puritan New England was a flat a social structure as you can get and not be a tribal community. The problem of the State today is not its religious characteristics but the horrendous mis-education of those it serves.
Drug enforcement, tent camp clearances, and abstinence-based recovery: these are all existential threats to the persistence of the flock, and thus to the role and status of the secular pastor. They must be opposed.
Another frame on this (which I'll write about before long) is the dance around the Drama Triangle, described in Transactional Analysis, which those on the cultural left seem to spend their time performing. In it you keep switching between the roles of persecutor, rescuer or victim. In TA it's described as a way of maintaining certain predictable ways of getting attention or affirmation - positive or negative - ('strokes' earned through playing 'games'). Anyway, blah, good piece, as ever.
I agree great piece. I needed a considered explanation of why the Dr. Faucis of our overpriced medical establishment were able to shove every crazy batshit theory down our throats ad infinitum. Unfortunately the time servers inhabiting many of our bureaus in Washington fit right into the crazed puritan mold.
It’s interesting to associate the left with Puritanism until one realizes that ideologies often times come full circle over the course of their evolution .
One opposes woke by eliminating their institutional power (aka Musk firings at twitter) and by eliminating their flock (aka NYC involuntary bringing mentally ill homeless to hospitals for treatment)
Until of course we realize that the very concepts of left and right are merely demonstrative constructs and that movements are merely collections of ideas grouped together through the thousands of conversations of charismatic leaders and the activists who proliferate and enforce their ideas.
When there are clearly better proven solutions to the homelessness & addiction crisis, the only explanation is that the orchestrators want to kill people or at the very least enhance suffering. (I cannot be persuaded by the ‘incompetent’ theory.)
And if some of the people carrying out these harmful policies are legacy “Puritan” types. What of it?
If you’re trying to describe the cause of harmful homelessness & addiction policies (which I think you are) scrutiny must ALWAYS be focused on the orchestrators.
For me (ringleaders closely affiliated with the orchestrators aside) there’s something grotesquely unjust about blaming this or that group that has been manipulated or coerced into following vile policies when we all know that those exact same people could be steered to do amazing works of public good.
But I wonder what about those of us who consistently support liberty. Drugs should be decriminalized and should be free to skip the Covid shot if you want to: it’s your body afterall. It’s sort of lonely here in the anti-authoritarian left. Maybe it always has been.
I think there are 2 more common causes here of the Social Justice "Libertarians at lunch, authoritarians at dinner" schizo mindset:
First, like their Marxist ancestors, whatever seems good for "the Revolution" at any point in time is ipso facto right and necessary, even if it contradicts what was said the day before. So if turning Cali into an open-air mental asylum gains them more power it's good, and if becoming Covid commissars gains them more power, that's also good. ("In our society whatever serves the interests of communism is moral." Brezhnev)
And secondly, the commonality between being a junkie-enabling libertarian and a Covid-enforcing maximalist is the Social Justice prime emotional impetus: a sort of fundamentalist compassion, where anyone who may cause any harm to any member of a marginalized group becomes not just an enemy or dissident, but a pollutant that needs to be extinguished.
Social Justice is somehow both Marxist and Protestant, and combines the most extreme thinking of both, in that every aspect of life and the world become both intensely politicized and moralized.
Have been reading some Rene Girard lately and he talks about how Christianity died so that its essence/ethos/core truth could live forever.
"The current process of spiritual demagoguery and rhetorical overkill has transformed the concern for victims into a totalitarian command and a permanent inquisition."
Great piece!
I'm of Mark Fisher's 'Capitalist Realism' school of Marxism--the left and right have both become tinged by anti-rational pseudo-religiosity because no one can think of any real alternative to the demonic Mega-Capitalism that is swallowing us all whole. When there is no place in the world that truly escapes the Beast, the conclusion must be drawn that capitalism is apolitical and transhuman, an autonomous AI that follows only its own endless-growth (il) logic. It's not surprising that people are, for lack of a better phrase, going mad. Mark Fisher's book ends inconclusively, and he committed suicide--seems he couldn't think of a solution either. The only one I've found is that contained in the Book of Revelations.
Thank you for this. As much as my friends want to blame Marx for all the wokeness, the phenomenon is as much a product of faith-based campuses like Antioch as somewhere like Berkeley. "Gender" in particular has the character of a travelling preacher and patent medicine show. Something strange happened at the intersection of Michel Foucault Avenue and Ralph Waldo Emerson Street. Marx got twisted up with prosperity gospel and the result seems to fill the hole where liberalism used to have religion.
science is always esoteric knowledge to the masses, but the linking of Puritanism to a top-down technocratic bureaucracy is a stretch. Puritan New England was a flat a social structure as you can get and not be a tribal community. The problem of the State today is not its religious characteristics but the horrendous mis-education of those it serves.
Money shot
Drug enforcement, tent camp clearances, and abstinence-based recovery: these are all existential threats to the persistence of the flock, and thus to the role and status of the secular pastor. They must be opposed.
Another frame on this (which I'll write about before long) is the dance around the Drama Triangle, described in Transactional Analysis, which those on the cultural left seem to spend their time performing. In it you keep switching between the roles of persecutor, rescuer or victim. In TA it's described as a way of maintaining certain predictable ways of getting attention or affirmation - positive or negative - ('strokes' earned through playing 'games'). Anyway, blah, good piece, as ever.
I agree great piece. I needed a considered explanation of why the Dr. Faucis of our overpriced medical establishment were able to shove every crazy batshit theory down our throats ad infinitum. Unfortunately the time servers inhabiting many of our bureaus in Washington fit right into the crazed puritan mold.
It’s interesting to associate the left with Puritanism until one realizes that ideologies often times come full circle over the course of their evolution .
Is this a workable two prong strategy?
One opposes woke by eliminating their institutional power (aka Musk firings at twitter) and by eliminating their flock (aka NYC involuntary bringing mentally ill homeless to hospitals for treatment)
Until of course we realize that the very concepts of left and right are merely demonstrative constructs and that movements are merely collections of ideas grouped together through the thousands of conversations of charismatic leaders and the activists who proliferate and enforce their ideas.
Brilliant piece. You certainly are able to wend an argument into a coherent and easy comprehendible whole: very skillful.
When there are clearly better proven solutions to the homelessness & addiction crisis, the only explanation is that the orchestrators want to kill people or at the very least enhance suffering. (I cannot be persuaded by the ‘incompetent’ theory.)
And if some of the people carrying out these harmful policies are legacy “Puritan” types. What of it?
If you’re trying to describe the cause of harmful homelessness & addiction policies (which I think you are) scrutiny must ALWAYS be focused on the orchestrators.
For me (ringleaders closely affiliated with the orchestrators aside) there’s something grotesquely unjust about blaming this or that group that has been manipulated or coerced into following vile policies when we all know that those exact same people could be steered to do amazing works of public good.
I think you nailed it here.
But I wonder what about those of us who consistently support liberty. Drugs should be decriminalized and should be free to skip the Covid shot if you want to: it’s your body afterall. It’s sort of lonely here in the anti-authoritarian left. Maybe it always has been.