Friday, November 7, 2008

Melanie Phillips: Preventing National Suicide

Melanie Phillips compares the challenges the UK Tories and US Republicans have in restoring the core values of Western Civilization, in Preventing National Suicide. She gets to something that has been very obvious of late:

As a result, freedom has shrunk to what ideology permits. Equality legislation has cemented a “victim culture” under which the interests of all groups deemed to be powerless (black people, women, gays ) trump those deemed to be powerful (white people, men, Christians). Since this doctrine holds that the “powerless” can do no wrong while the “powerful” can do no right, injustice is thus institutionalized, and anyone who queries the preferential treatment afforded such groups is vilified as a racist or bigot.
This evokes Jerry Pournelle's famous quotation of Jim Burnham: "Liberalism is a philosophy of consolation for Western Civilization as it commits suicide." It also ties well into Evan Sayet's theory of leftist thinking, which I recomend heartily.

19 comments:

  1. This theocratic freak-show you seem to think of as such a great thinker has been roundly debunked in the UK as a "McCarthyist," an extremist, and even chastized by conservatives in Britain as mentally unstable zealot. She says AND I QUOTE: the Palestinians are an "artificial" people who can be collectively punished for acts of terrorism by Islamist terrorists because they are "a terrorist population." If this isn't the ideology of a militant ethnocentric supremicist, I don't know what is. She believes in creationism crap over science, she thinks that Global Warming doesn't exist, and this one is great- she thinks that the MMR vaccine is linked to autism. As a physician-to-be,this last one is particularly disturbing as the MMR agent has literally saved tens of thousands of children- i've read hundreds of journals on the matter and administered this vaccine myself to children.
    My God
    My God, how crazy do people have to be before the the readers (if not thinkers) in this blogosphere will question the motives and actions of right-wing gurus?

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  2. Ad hominem attacks convince us that you're in the right, every time. You lefty zelots don't every seem to realize just how rabid and distasteful you appear to ordinary people. Debate and civil discussion aren't in your emotional playbook, it seems. We regular folk view you in much the same way we view wolverines, as somewhat dangerous examples of unthinking hatred of anything that isn't you. Try to actually reason, we'll listen. Hurl invective, we'll point and laugh. As I'm doing now, clown.

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  3. "Zionist Ideology", your entire rant is ad hominem, as it speaks not to the arguments Phillips makes in this article, but to other things she's said in other contexts.

    But let's take these things one at a time:

    "McCarthyism" basically means "anti-communist".
    "Extremist" is devoid of content: If I am to undergo surgery, I would like an extremely good surgeon to perform the procedure. It is also a relative, if not subjective, epithet.

    The "Palestinians" are indeed an artificial people. When the Ottoman Empire was dismantled, the British Mandate of Palestine was arbitrarily constructed alongside other artificial nations. Later, 3/4 of "Palestine" was renamed "Transjordan", now known as "The Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan". The Arab residents of the quarter of the Palestine Mandate west of the Jordan are ethnically and linguistically indistinguishable from those living on the east side. The people now called "Palestinian" should be called "Jordanian". Either that, or Jordan should be renamed "Palestine", solving the problem of the "Palestinian homeland" without wiping out the Jewish one.

    Global Warming certainly happens from time to time, but the hypothesis that it is largely caused by human activities is far from proven.

    MMR can both save lives and be linked to autism.

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  4. Is it an Ad Hominem attack to describe Adolf Hitler as a crazy genocidal maniac? Or is it just describing the character of the man/monster? To defer to LOGIC and the tools of metaphysics would be to imply there was a serious argument taking place here gentlemen. Then we might enter into a long discussion about the history of liberalism (of which this very blog is an example of ironically)

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism

    However, there is no serious, scientific, political, rational, defendable, or otherwise coherent argument that comes from a discredited racist like the dishonorable Ms. Phillips.

    http://www.hurryupharry.org/2008/09/26/melanie-phillips-takes-leave-of-her-senses/

    Just tribalistic rantings against another religious group.
    Like Thomas Jefferson (the father of "liberalism" in America), I too have "sworn eternal hostility against all forms of tyranny over the minds of men." To believe in the supremacy of the "western-world," or to think of one religious tradition as superior than any of the other thousands that have come and gone over the epochs simply shows the ignorance and lack of perspective within the "grain-of-sand-on-the-beach" conservative epistemology.

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  5. However, there is no serious, scientific, political, rational, defendable, or otherwise coherent argument that comes from a discredited racist like the dishonorable Ms. Phillips.

    That is a textbook example of ad hominem.

    Suppose we had proof that Adolf Hitler had once stated that 2+2=4. (Maybe a researcher dug up some primary mathematics test.) Does the fact that he was a murderous racist then make the statement any less true?

    If such attacks are the best you have, then in reality you have nothing.

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  6. These aren't attacks mr monster. Follow the links. They are reality. Ms. Phillips is a racist. It is provable. It is real. It is verifiable. She calls herself an "ethnocentrist." Her claims are that "white-western" culture is superior to all others. She is a tribalist- pure fact. I'm not making a claim she wouldn't make herself. At least Mr. Monster she can admit what she is. I guess your handle in here subliminally tells me what your heart is made of too. You have my pity.

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  7. You don't seem able to understand the difference between evidence and personal attacks. You don't have my pity for this terrible disability. You have my scorn. Go away and learn a bit about logic, rhetoric, and civility, and come back when you've grown into an adult. Not that I expect it to happen.

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  8. From "Oh for the love Of..." November 7, 2008, 5:21 AM. --
    "Just tribalistic rantings against another religious group.
    Like Thomas Jefferson (the father of "liberalism" in America), I too have "sworn eternal hostility against all forms of tyranny over the minds of men." To believe in the supremacy of the "western-world," or to think of one religious tradition as superior than any of the other thousands that have come and gone over the epochs simply shows the ignorance and lack of perspective within the "grain-of-sand-on-the-beach" conservative epistemology."


    So, if I make the claim that it is the philosophical tradition, including the "scientific method," which developed under Western Civilization that has raised the standard of living world-wide to the highest ever, I must be a "tribalist," unjustifiably "ranting against another religious group." And I am displaying my "ignorance and lack of perspective within the "grain-of-sand-on-the-beach" conservative epistemology."

    Why, thank you for explaining that. I understand much better, now.

    Jej.

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  9. Anonymous 6:19

    My handle was hung on me by a former co-worker, and it stuck, because I was 6'6", and over 250#. In this environment, my physical attributes are less relevant. Here, the name is appropriate, based on its original Latin roots.

    SVM, ERGO MONSTRO

    Ms. Phillips is only a "racist" under the modern meaning of the term: "Someone who disagrees with a leftist." Under that definition, I am a "racist" as well. My opposition to socialism gets processed through some mythical lexicon that says "socialist" is "code for 'black'".

    The Card has been played with such frequency of late that it is played out. Leftists have gone to that well and pumped it dry. If we are "racist" for opposing governing philosophies that apparently garner wide support from ethnic minorities, then what word remains to describe the Hitlers, Klan lynch mobs, etc.?

    To reiterate, if ad hominem attacks are all you have, you have nothing.

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  10. I'm sorry Mr Monster, but your Latin is a little off. I'm afraid that your handle is actually translated more correctly as:

    bovis feces

    How sad to actually call oneself a racist and then try and "redefine" the term as "leftist". Remarkable feat of "logic" there Mr. psuedo-intellectual. How sad to think of a metaphysical universe containing an infinite number of stars and an incomprehensible number of galaxies reduced to the mere labels of a proud tribalistic apologist. In a world of mere "CONservative" or "liberal" Mr. Monster- I imagine your dreams are rather humanoid and your personal life rather like the movie Pleasantville.
    Let me FREE you brother from those psychological chains of black and white, good versus evil, light versus dark.... follow the link to head down the rabbit hole, or simply stick around the 3G world of cognitive jesters like Melanie Phillips.

    I'll be waiting ;-)

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_is_dead

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  11. "A call", you display the reading comprehension skills of a second-grader. I did not call myself a racist; I said that the term is used so liberally (heh) that it now is applied to anyone who opposes leftism. I said that leftists would call me a "racist", just as the prior mouse called Ms. Phillips one.

    Now go back and write an update to your dKos diary about how you stuck it to a RethugliKKKan.

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  12. I read call's screed, Monster, and it's well nigh incomprehensible. Perhaps he believs he was actually saying something, but it isn't evident from what's posted here. I wouldn't worry about him too much--I doubt he can find his way out of Mommy's basement.

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  13. You didn't follow the link did you Mr. Monster? Are we afraid of going to a place that can't be handled by a "3G" cosmology? O Brother Where Art Thou?

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_is_dead

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  14. Of course you know folks, this is all the same provocateur, using different names each time. Child, if you have a point to make, make it. Otherwise, go away and let the adults talk, there's a nice boy...

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  15. wager, I assume you're the same mouse as the other one, since you're flogging the same "link". Free TechTip for you: a "link" is done by enclosing the URL within HTML Anchor tags like this:

    <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_is_dead">Click this, Mr. Monster</a>

    which becomes:
    Click this, Mr. Monster

    Now that we understand what a "link" is, we may proceed. You seem to want me to comment about Nietsche, as if his philosophy were somehow relevant to the unsubstantiated charge that Ms. Phillips or I are "racist". Sure, I can do that.

    Whenever "Nietsche" and "racist" are mentioned in close proximity to one another, my memory finds the shortest distance between them through the "Übermensch", from which it's pedal to the metal to National Socialist ideas like Untermenschen, Judenhaß, Krystallnacht, Lebens unwertes Leben, which, uh, finally led to Die Endlösung

    So it would seem that following Nietsche's advice, and "killing God" philosophically, and replacing Him with that Übermensch didn't work out so well.

    That's not to say that one can't construct a theory of natural rights without the God of Nature as their Author. I respect those who don't share my religious faith, but do share the commitment to those rights that we believe are inherent in the nature of our species. In fact, in some upcoming essays, I hope to explore that exact topic.

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  16. My little condescending monsterito, your understanding of western history is at best elementary if you are equating the rise of Nazism with Nietzsche. But I must give credit where credit is due my little monster, you have taken the first brave and bold step away from the idiocy of theological thinking. The psychological reductionism of the conservative world view seems rather small when one returns from a critique like the afor mentioned right? I mean, you DID read the article right my little monster? You would not enter into the Ad Hominem attacks (so chastized from before) against an idea-- would you? Instead of just glossing over the literature and setting up a "straw-man" to comfort your little ego, try returning to the article and ask yourself if you can provide a detailed response to the this critique on your particular religion... without the nonsense of equating Nietzsche with Nazism. Afterall, "Monster" starts with the same letter as the word Moron. Does that mean those two words are linked? Biblically based Conservative dogma cannot respond (and never could) to this attack. I'm looking to see if My little monster is versed enough in the philosophical traditions of post-modernism to logically and coherently respond.

    Note: I noticed that there seemed to be a tinge of negativity with regard to the Übermensch- Remember that "Nietzsche diagnosed the Christian value system as a reaction against life and hence destructive in a sense, the new values which the Übermensch will be responsible for will be life-affirming and creative." Does that concept sound like the ideals of Nazism? I think not good sir.

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  17. The Monster isn't condescending, troll, he's just trying to explain to you why you do not convince anyone. Tossing about large words as you do doesn't disguise your ad hominem attacks against him or the rest of us, or provide any evidence or even philosophical grounds to believe anything you say. Your argument can be boiled down to "this article is correct because I agree with it."

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  18. Nietsche and Nazi don't just share initial letters. It is undeniable that Nietsche's philosophy influenced Hitler's thinking, or was used to justify that thinking if it evolved independently. If you can't see that, there's no point discussing anything with you.

    versed enough in the philosophical traditions of post-modernism to logically and coherently respond.

    Post-modernism is illogical and incoherent. Go over to Protein Wisdom and try to argue that crap with Goldstein. He'll give you a well-deserved pimp-slapping.

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  19. Gee, I missed this latest episode of troll dropping. If Anymouse is trying to make specific point, I'll be damned if I can find it behind all the drool. He/she/it paid a visit to the Lounge as well and left a deposit. Since it consisted of nothing but calling Chase a douchbag (literally) I deleted it.

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