How do you get a good person to do horrible things? You make him think he is doing good things. You cheer him for doing these “good” things. Then he becomes capable of the worst things. Here is what Soviet dissident Aleksandr Solzynitsyn said – which has been largely forgotten:
“To do evil a human being must first of all believe what what he is doing is good. Ideology – that is what gives devildoing its long-sought justification and gives the evildoer the necessary steadfastness and determination. That is the social theory which helps to make his acts seem good instead of bad in his own and others’ eyes so that he won’t hear reproaches but will receive praise and honors.”
Note who is being reproached – and praised – right now.
Wait and see who will be arrested tomorrow.
It is a virtue to “social distance” – and a heroic act to call armed thugs down upon those who choose not to.
What is happening has happened before. In Solzynitsyn’s Soviet Union, people eagerly arrested – and murdered – their neighbors and friends and even family members when it was asserted that those unfortunates were insufficiently virtuous. An entire country was turned into the apotheosis of evil on the basis of doing good – defined as furthering the cause of “socialism.”<
/p>
In the United States, saaaaaaaaaaafety serves the same purpose. This has been a work in progress for decades, just as it took decades for the evil virtues of Karl Marx to become the “good” of Soviet Russia. The individual is irrelevant. The collective is everything. The individual exists through the state and the state is therefore the highest good. To question the state is the greatest evil.
History does not repeat – it echoes.
In America, one cannot be too safe, ever – and everyone else had better be saaaaaaaaaaaafe, too. The slightest risk justifies the most extreme measures. Everyone must accept this – or else.
This isn’t reason. It is the rabidity of a deranged Jesuit. Without Jesus – but armed to the teeth. Kill them all; god will know his own.
Murderous virtue signaling. The cultivated hate in the name of doing good roiling in the guts of the Prius driver and helmet-wearer that urges him to shoot the SUV driver and helmet-not-wearer. They are endangering the planet! It isn’t saaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaafe!
Before, he merely thought about shooting them. Now he has what he has always craved – in the form of a bug that gives him a cause.
This will give the government unlimited power – not just accepted but cheered, on the basis of doing good.
People are itching to signal their virtue because virtue – defined by government, which is just the people who control the apparatus of government – gives them the moral agency most people crave, because most people instinctively want to be good and be seen as good.
Define that good and you control them.
Pervert that and you have everything necessary to turn the United Stated into something extremely bad, like Stalin’s Soviet Union.
Note that people aren’t merely staying home and shuttering their businesses. They are demanding everyone stay home and shutter their businesses. To not agree that this is virtuous – we have to d this! – is to be portrayed as a very bad person indeed. And we all know what happens to bad people.
And now, it is happening. With much worse to come, probably.
Stand behind that line! Stay home! Cash must be gotten rid of as it is dirty and might spread the virus!
How dare you!
This isn’t new, either.
In the old Soviet Union, a 13-year-old boy named Pavlik Morozov was hailed as a hero for turning in his own parents to be shot by the government. His parents were resisting “de-kulakization”- Stalin’s “plan” to force Russian farmers off their privately owned plots and into collective farms, confiscating everything they owned along the way. Little Pavlik denounced his parents for “hoarding” grain (so they might not starve) rather than turning it over to the Soviet authorities (who exported it to generate cash for the Soviet regime).
Millions of Russian “kulaks” starved; millions were force-marched into the camps Solzynitsyn wrote about. Millions never returned from those camps.
Because doin’ good ain’t got no end – as the rabid Captain “Red Legs” said in The Outlaw Josey Wales.
Morozov, who was justifiably torn to pieces by enraged townsfolk, was turned into a martyr and object of worship by the Soviet government for his act of virtue signaling. Statues were erected to him.
People were expected to take off their caps when they passed by.
The kid wasn’t evil, though. He served evil – because he was convinced he was doing good, as good was defined in a society gone psychotic. Doing that kind of good turned an entire country into an abattoir.
How long will it be before statues are erected to such “heroes” here?
Americans already worship them. Not the brave individuals who risked their lives by standing up to tyranny. Armed government workers – who enforce it. And there is nothing more virtuous in the land of the unfree and formerly brave than to submit and obey.
And – soon – to Pavel Morozov anyone who doesn’t.
. . .
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Hmmmmmmm….. Watched a video of a guy getting a Corona test in NY. They swabbed his nose and mouth. I wonder if they are also collecting DNA samples??? I mean, the guy had to show ID and everything, and go through a gauntlet of National Guard mercenaries- so they have all of his info….. Maybe that’s what this is about- or just a handy opportunity to do so without question or detection…….
Surprised I haven’t heard anyone else voice this concern (Voice it, Eric!)- but then again, I’m not exactly a voracious consumer of information (I pretty much avoid even the alternate media these days) so I guess I wouldn’t know if others were already pondering this; but think about it: What a convenient way to add those who have not been arrested to the database, eh?
There really is nothing stopping them from collecting them. Especially right now.
Social proof is wood alcohol to drunks. Last lily liver standing, wins.
Maybe that Russian kid used the Id•eology to bump off the folks for motives of his own, & then the Id•eology bumped him off in turn the better to serve “*it’s*” motives, which is to say the motives of those wielding it.
All the best religions got martyrs *&* fodders biologically imperatively pumping out the child sacrifices.
Can’t help wonder about all those crazy people pushing the idea that cash spreads the Coronavirus all the while they carry around those filthy phones, rub them all over their body and wipe their hands all over them. Same with those plastic credit/debit cards.
***”How long will it be before statues are erected to such “heroes” here?”***
Even worse- in NYC (and I’m sure, countless other collectives) they rename/co-name streets after every “fallen” badged/uniformed mercenary, local politician, or commie “community leader or activist. [“Fallen”? As in “fallen angel”- i.e. a demon?]
Imagine having to live on a street so named! (They so rename parks and such too!]
I know a sure-fit method for social distancing.
It definitely would Not be approved for use in Virginia, much less any large metro area.
However it may come into play very soon.
Jon Rappaport’s WordPress blog has been closed for violations of TOS.
According to an article recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine by Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, Dr. H. Clifford Lane, and Dr. Robert R. Redfield, the case fatality rate may be less than one percent, and the clinical consequences of Covid-19 may be more similar to that of a severe seasonal influenza.
On the basis of a case definition requiring a diagnosis of pneumonia, the currently reported case fatality rate is approximately 2%. In another article in the Journal, Guan et al. report mortality of 1.4% among 1099 patients with laboratory-confirmed Covid-19; these patients had a wide spectrum of disease severity. If one assumes that the number of asymptomatic or minimally symptomatic cases is several times as high as the number of reported cases, the case fatality rate may be considerably less than 1%. This suggests that the overall clinical consequences of Covid-19 may ultimately be more akin to those of a severe seasonal influenza (which has a case fatality rate of approximately 0.1%) or a pandemic influenza (similar to those in 1957 and 1968) rather than a disease similar to SARS or MERS, which have had case fatality rates of 9 to 10% and 36%, respectively.
At least he still has his other blog up and running. Wonder why they suspended it? Ugh. https://blog.nomorefakenews.com/
Thanks for the article. It is especially disheartening these days when I see libertarians who are falling for all of the hype and even giving up their libertarian principles in order to fight the virus. It is encouraging to see the comments from this article from people who are questioning the government narrative.
You bet, Geoff – and I will not bend knee. Ever. I’m just too damned stubborn and – I suppose luckily – have no kids to worry about so I can tell the bastards more weight when the times comes.
The coming wave of new government mandated laws, rules and restrictions will make our heads spin, provided any of us are lovers of a tyranny free existence. Heaven help us if a tyrant like Bernie or Hillary gains power. This is the last gasp of socialism as all the promises made by government over the last 50 years cannot ever be paid for. The virus panic of 2020 is nothing more than a smokescreen as the Marxists attempt to gain full control of Europe and the US. We must resist at all costs.
Very true, though I am more afraid of Hillary and what she will do. She and Bill had those so disagreed with killed or disappeared.
There’s a localized website for neighborhoods, called NextDoor. It is perfect for these latter-day Morozov snitches.
Here’s an exchange from this weekend.
“Connie Cahill, Ashburn
Social Distancing
Dear Neighbors – just a comment about the lack of social distancing in my neighborhood. I regularly walk around Summerwood and the streets branching off of it. The past few days I have noted that the adults all adhere to the guidelines, but the young teens and older ones ignore it. Several times today a group would be coming my way and would just keep walking and expect me to go out into the street. I did and said something to them and got a questioning look as if I was crazy. Parents, please talk to your children – for their sake also.
“Jackie Barnes, Ashburn Village
It’s pretty simple. If people are not adhering to social distancing guidelines or are gathering at parks, playgrounds, tennis/basketball courts, etc., call the non-emergency Sheriffs number and they will handle it. Loudoun County and LCSO have stated they want us to do that.”
Yes! Turn ’em in! You’re a gooooooood person!
Hi Tarheel,
Sickening, but not surprising. I used to live in Loudoun, by the way. And this is why I no longer do!
Yep, not surprising. This is the same area that, in the 1970s, John Riggins lived in a camper by Goose Creek, pretty much in the wilderness, while he played for the Redskins. A lot has changed.
These busy-bodies, mostly Yankees and Alexandria-dwellers, who moved into the ex-urbs are in heaven since they have “official blessing” to meddle and control other people’s lives and actions.
Add to that the crushing property tax burden–$900 per month for a good-sized house–and the $1+ BILLION county school budget, and I’m headed your way.
Ready for a low(er) tax Virginia county–with a 2nd Amendment sanctuary as a bonus.
Our nextdoor posts for our area ARE FILLED TO THE BRIM with posts like these.
“Parents, come get your children OFF the playground!”
“I saw 10 kids playing basketball! Don’t they know they are spreading the virus?”
“Why aren’t you wearing a mask!?”
“I saw a neighbor having a house party with way more people than is safe. What if I get sick?”
“Respect my safety …”
NextDoor is just like Facebook: wanting to suck up all your personal information. They want it to look like it’s something that’s local, but it’s run by former Google and Yahoo executives. Just another way to track people’s every move and utterance.
One of your best Eric.
Thanks, JWK – the kind words are much appreciated!
I’m now convinced that the majority in this decaying wreck of a once-great nation DESERVES the lethal tyranny that it is imposing upon itself. Like a case of tertiary syphilis that a philandering man earns by having unprotected sex with any filthy thing calling itself a female human, the Amoricon sheeple have earned the slow slaughter coming their way by refusing to live as responsible, autonomous adults and insisting on being fed and diapered by any and every megalomaniacal scumbag with a golden tongue who has delivered them empty promises in return for unrestrained power, gulling them with the most ridiculous rhetorical vomit imaginable, verbal tripe that shouldn’t even convince a five-year-old who has been instilled with any form of common sense.
To be brutally blunt, I HOPE most of these morons are marched off to FEMA camps once the One Percent decide that they’re no longer USEFUL idiots. The challenge for the rest of us, the remnant, lies in being able to sustain a remnant of freedom while having to lives in a world of slavery while fighting against assimilation by the Damned.
Herein lies the problem. How would one expect the general population to act after a lifetime of constant propaganda saturating the perception of any and all who are unlucky enough to never experience the epiphany the few have had. My epiphany occurred about 35 years ago, as I listened to Irwin Schiff on a radio broadcast describing how personal income tax had no legal foundation whatsoever. Following which I eagerly sought out other examples of the illegitimacy of the State, which are abundant. I was a card carrying member of the Libertarian Party for about 5 years, until I came to the same conclusion Einstein did, that a system that creates a problem is not capable of solving it. There is no political solution to the problem of politics. I graduated to Murray Rothbard, Lew Rockwell, Tom Woods, etc. and never looked back. But where would I be if I had never listened to that radio broadcast 35 years ago?
I went from card carrying rethuglican in 2010 to anarchism in 8 years of watching the system. Libertarianism is great and I used that word in public to not scare people but it is also worth reading people who are virtually anarchist/voluntaryist. Libertarianism is knowing the state is evil in any form, anarchism is ignoring its legitimacy altogether.
Maybe, but what about us who aren’t sheep, who despise tyranny. Though they may deserve FEMA camps, we don’t. Please be careful what you wish for, it may come back to bite all of us. Me, those who wish to be sheep, let them, we who don’t will become sheep dogs, though I fear some maybe come wolves. Take care and stay happy, healthy and safe.
“But after all it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or fascist dictorship, or a parliament or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peace makers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in any country.” – Hermann Goering.
Seems about right. Now, everyone sing God Bless the USA…c’mon, you know the song…
I thank my lucky stars
To be living here today
‘Cause the flag still stands for freedom
And they can’t take that away
And I’m proud to be an American
Where at least I know I’m free
And I won’t forget the men who died
Who gave that right to me
And I’d gladly stand up next to you
And defend Her still today
‘Cause there ain’t no doubt
I love this land
God Bless the U.S.A.
You are now allowed to vomit.
PS: “America’s chickens are comin’ home to roost.” – Malcolm X
This seems apropos:
“The government gives them the drugs, builds bigger prisons, passes a three strike law and then wants us to sing God Bless America. No, no, no. Not God Bless America. God Damn America! That’s in the Bible. For killing innocent people. God Damn America for treating us citizens as less than human. God Damn America as long as she tries to act like she is God and she is Supreme.”
-Rev. Wright
Amen and Hallelujah! (the autoeditor said just saying “Amen” wast too short…I’ve been accused of that all my life…)
Great article Eric, the USSA has become East Germany with the self appointed Stasi just dying to get their social credit score upgraded with a pat on the head from Uncle. See something say something on steroids. Another feature of the Soviet Union about to be imported here are internal passports – permission slips to travel. The idiot governor of Rhode Island is already harassing anyone with NY plates having the audacity to drive through her pissant state, national guard and other assorted AGW’s to enforce it. Can’t wait to encounter the AGW who stops and asks for my “papers” on my daily walk, I will not submit and obey.
area around NYC is ground zero for the virus. jews from new Rochelle went to aipac by the hundreds infecting 1000’s. 68% of congress was there then they all flew home spreading it around the country. that is why trump said a couple of days ago to stop people from leaving NYC then retracted. they gotta keep the NYC people out of their states
Eric,
Outstanding article today, one of your best!
And it won’t take long for “If you see something, say something” to lead to hauling off the neighbor so that the tattler can get their apartment. Happened in East Germany, could easily happen here.
I can tell you one encouraging thing I’m seeing in my local rural community in southern Arizona: my neighbors, if our NextDoor forums are any accurate indication, will mete out to any wannabe Morozovs exactly what little Pavlik got from his neighbors. There’s plenty o’ firepower hereabouts, and plenty o’ desert (and carnivorous desert wildlife) in which to dispose of remains.
The hell do you live? Cops are already being called on kids playing basketball (5 on 5) in suburb Houston! It’s okay though, they should have asked 1 kid to leave then they would be safe with 9.
Rural southern Arizona ain’t Houston.
Too bad,Sam would be turning somersaults down under those Bluebonnets.
A person that I read (used to) articles and contributed on his website as he was always advocating common sense economics and the Constitution. This morning he was fawning over the governor of Rhode Island. She is forcing anyone from NY to 14 days quarantine,,, if they sneak in it’s a big fine and 90 days jail. Police are searching homes that New Yorkers may be suspected of “hiding out” This was his last line.
“Leadership is where? Is Rhode Island it? Perhaps Gina Raimondo should be put in charge. A person who can make a reasonable decision and act on it seems to be rare among American public officials.”
This pundit is in his 80’s. Ever since a hurricane hit his area he became a believer in MMGW. On the MMGW issue I didn’t care much as it’s everybody’s right to their opinion even if baseless. This economic shutdown is different,,, he is advocating a police state thinking it will save his rear and could care less what it does to others and the nation.
Because of my age and a couple of medical conditions I have a good chance to die if this virus does exist and infects me BUT I do not want my grandchildren to live in a police state. This crap will never end just like the nine/eleven crap they legislated (unpatriot act, etc) that never ends.
Nobody wants to die but some things are way more important.
The person sounds like someone with what I call ‘flexible’ principles. They’re liars and pussies in conservative clothing. Very dangerous.
What Gov. Raimondo is doing is explicitly prohibited by the Constitution: “The Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens of the Several States.”
Of course, nobody cares about the Constitution any more… it appears it is being used in lieu of toilet paper these days…
“Nobody wants to die but some things are way more important.”
That seems to be the issue around which the whole charade turns, doesn’t it? For decades, centuries, the “enlightened” have railed against those who stubbornly refuse to be good sheep because it’s “risky”, goes against “studies” and “experts’ opinions”. All for saaaaaaaaafety, as Eric puts it.
We’ll see where the good shepherds are leading the sheep now, but I’m guessing it’s nowhere good. Maybe the current insanity will lead a few of them to realize that having a stubbornly independent mind is a protective mechanism against psychopaths and fools. Most will obey right up until it’s their turn to be slaughtered.
Er, I left the point out. One requirement of an independent mind is to not be ruled by fear. In our brave new world of weak-minded oldsters who just want to coast through retirement, empowered women who act like everyone’s angry wives, and emasculated men, fear of bodily harm is almost universal.
Easy on us oldsters dude,,, Yes, A few are feminized some are weak minded, but boomers are the last of the reasonably free in America. That’s why they’re hated so much.
We grew up when the American dream was opportunity, not a mortgage, When you could rest your rifle in the corner, not in a 2 ton safe locked and relocked. When you could tell a cop to get a warrant without fear of him unloading 15 rounds into you. When they didn’t dare lock you down because they knew thousands would protest. When government schools were scared shitless of mothers that didn’t like what they were doing.
It’s mostly the younger generations but it really isn’t their fault. They’ve been propagandized, feminized, while being ostracized for having any backbone 24 & 7 all their lives. They have been lied to, conned, drugged and ridiculed. Any values, morals, worth having have been extracted and replaced with the worship of government authority.
The government schools and media have done more to destroy this nation than any foreign enemy could ever dream of doing. They have destroyed all culture, any sense of national unity and replaced with racial hatred and open borders.
I don’t see how we can survive.
boomers were the worst thing unleashed onto the US. greedy self entitled scumbags who burden the medical business with their endless operations replacements etc. fat diseased diabetic pricks. BOOMERS DESTROYED EVERYTHING THIS COUNTRY WAS FOUNDED ON
Stop by anytime and we can talk soy boy
Easy OB, he was probably raised by Baby Boomers…with the emphasis on “BABY”. Strapped in, hovered over, always protected and never jacked up against the wall when they acted like little turds. When I look at what Boomers are considered successful I see Bubba & Hilary and a lot of my former classmates that think just like them. Is it any wonder they act that way after 12+ years of Marxist indoctrination?
And I’ll be 67 in July.
Biker, it’s just more foot-in-mouth disease from one of the usual suspects that pops in here from time to time. Rest assured that everything SPQUEER70AD “knows” is wrong. Good for the occasional laugh.
Congrats on carrying on the marxist class warfare you were taught to.
-Fellow millennial
The most important thing is to always have someone to blame when things go to shit. It’s also very important to paint your wide and diverse group of scapegoats with a very broad brush. Jews are in control of the world, blacks are lawless thugs, boomers destroyed America.
The boomers I know all worked very hard their entire lives. If you can blame them for anything it has to be raising a generation of helpless, whiny, pampered, lazy, self indulgent, know-it-all crybabies.
SPQ is largely right! We, the Boomers, grew up in a time when the first-world was at it’s pinnacle- or just starting to decline. We lived in a care-free world with for the most part very little to worry about in day-to-day life. We could do whatever we wanted to, and as a result, became very hedonistic.
Life was all about seeking-out whatever titillated, “floated our boat” and provided the lifestyle we desired, that most of our peers lost all concern for the liberties, responsibilities and morals which occasioned that golden era.
Most of my relatives in the Boomer age-range are a prime example of this. They didn’t have a care in the world, other than the pursuit of their desired lifestyle. Many of them do realize how much better the world we knew was, but they lack any understanding of why it was that way; They did not perpetuate the ways of our fathers- who realized the value of freedom (Having come here to seek that freedom) nor the moral values which guaranteed independence, sound economics, strong families and strong communities, which perpetuated those ideals. They endured the Depression, and their strong values got them through it- but their desire to give their kids the material things which they often lacked, resulted in a large number of entitled brats who grew up in a genteel world of abundance and leisure which they did not have to earn- and that resulted in the subsequent generation knowing only of the benefits of the forefather’s actions, but not the responsibilities or struggles. (Even the poorest of us had it very well in such a wonderful time!).
Yeah, the Boomers and Xers and Millenials may “work hard”- as in putting in the time- but that is often just a means to an end- to feed the materialism and hedonism- hence they had/have no fear of crippling debt; no fear of trading liberty for what they perceive as safety and economic advantage (even though it really isn’t)…..
They may work hard- but it is often to their detriment. They work too hard in many cases; letting strangers raise their kids, as father and mother are consumed with work to pay for the house that they can’t afford, and two new cars, and expensive toys.
Thjere’s a book, I think it’s The Millionaire Next-Door, which chronicles the lives of the average “millionaire” (which these days these days, pretty much means just a middle-class business-owner in a typical city or suburb) and one of the things it notes, is how many of the kids of the middle and upper-middle-class people more often than not do not fare very well- financially or at life in general, because while their fathers were all self-made men who rose from the bottom, their kids tended to have everything provided for them (Edumacation, cars, etc.) and thus never learned the lessons of their fathers- such as the consequences of their own actions; the value of a dollar; responsibility, etc.
The “better life” that their fathers desired to give them, so that they woulkdn’t have to endure the struggles which they did, robbed them of what made their fathers successful and responsible.
Like the old saying goes: “Be careful what you wish for; you may get it!”.
Big difference between the guy who worked to put himself through college or start a business, and the guy who has it handed to him by daddy, or who can amass a huge debt by signing on the dotted line, and thus sign his future away, without realizaing the future implications because it just seems like free money at the time.
Which is not to say that some don’t realize that…or that they are at least starting to. But now it’s too late, because the mechanism is in place so that their peers- the competition- can all avail themselves of the “easy path” (or so it seems at the time) and thus the value of what the responsible do, is diminished (Why kill yourself working hard to pay for that degree or start that business, when all those around you are doing the same on borrowed money and getting the same thing, thus devaluing the worth of your degree and it’s earning power; or starting ten other businesses around you that will undercut you until boith they and you go bankrupt?)
Nunzio, Speak for yourself.
You’ve apparently only watched on the sidelines while others did things that you couldn’t.
Don’t tell us about your own shortcomings and project them onto those of the Boomer generation. You are sadly lacking in understanding of what happened when you weren’t looking. Now you have to catch up with those who left you behind.
LOL@ Doug Kelly.
I had this stuff figured out when I was but a kid. I’ve always lived life under my own terms, and at my own cost…and had a great time doing so. Been self-employed since I was 17; never bought into the debt or the 9-5. Always did the right thing no matter what, and I have not one regret; wouldn’t change one single thing if I could go back and do it all again; and such a life has paid great dividents, as I am (and have always been) debt-free, and more free in general than just about anyone I’ve ever heard of. I live where i want, and have the time to enjoy the things I care about (and always have).
Maybe you misread/misunderstood my previous post.
As for most of my peers? THEY are the ones [not all of course] who dropped the ball; they allowed or even called for the tyranny; they let the “experts” and politicians rule them; they failed to discipline their kids and teach them right. Don’t that on me…..they largely made this mess that we now have…and they are reaping the consequences of it.
I never sold-out. I’ve stood for principle since I was a kid, and have always lived it- same as I do now.
I really don’t know what you’re thinking, or what gives you the ideas that you opined……
@ken, “weak minded oldsters” was a generalization evidently, but I don’t think it’s unfair. Most of the sheeple, oldsters or not, are that way because it’s much, MUCH easier to just “go along to get along” at any given place and time. Independence is not just difficult but risky (Nietzsche had something interesting to say on that).
And old people who have learned to rely on their steady gov’t checks are among the least able to take that risk. How many are in such a situation? I can’t tell, but the conspicuous silence from that quarter on the economic and moral unsustainability of entitlements, entirely apart from the illegal immigration issue, is very telling.
I think nunzio has the right picture. Freedom was doomed when America embraced hedonism, and that happened in earnest when the Boomers were growing up – the watershed moment being the counterculture movement of the 1960s, which should have been resisted by those who should have known better – the boomers’ parents – but wasn’t.
They were probably too busy hyping up the Commie Threat and destroying the dollar for fun & profit to worry about such silly things as knocking some sense into the kids.
Again, I’m generalizing. But I think it’s safe to say that the Boomers were the first generation to grow up with cheap credit, gov’t largesse, and indoctrinated by mass media. The roots of those things come from earlier still, but there you are.
Well-said on all points, Lane!
Bad times breed strong people, strong people create good times, good times breed people who think the good times will never end because they live in a continuous present with no understanding of cause and effect. This may be why it so often seems that the worst catastrophies are preceded by a seemingly-magical time of wealth and prosperity – the Roaring Twenties before the 1929 crash, the 1950s and 1960s before the “malaise” and planet fever of the 1970s, or the glitz and glamor of the 1990s and 2000s before the Bush crash. In each case there was behind-the-scenes meddling contributing to the crisis, but there were also people, especially in the younger generations, who didn’t know what a good thing they had or how they’d got it, and who, once the crisis hit, glommed on to any politician or movement promising a quick cure for their pain – regardless of the (permanent) cost in real prosperity and liberty. It reminds me of what John Adams said:
“I must study politics and war, that my sons may have the liberty to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history, and naval architecture, navigation, commerce, and agriculture, in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain.”
For whatever reason, it seems as if the painting/poetry/music/architecture/statuary/tapestry/porcelain generation always forgets how it got to where it was and devolves into mediocrity, until things get bad enough to produce another politics/war generation which then starts the cycle over again. But depending on the height a culture falls from, it may require a long and painful descent to reach that point, and meanwhile the forces of entropy are making permanent gains.
This seems to have worked in a remarkably cyclical way ever since people first started trying to pigeonhole generations. The “Lost Generation” (born 1883-1900), despite many of them serving in WWI, actually went on to become the “frivolities generation” of the cycle via the Roaring Twenties, and looking at the dates some earlier members of the Greatest Generation (born 1901-1927) were probably a part of the problem as well. Then the 1929 crash hits. The middle members of the Greatest Generation come of age in the depression, others during WWII; they were the “politics/war” reset generation, who witnessed and/or participated in the recovery first-hand but still, depending on precise DOB, may not have known much before FDR’s welfare state, which became a permanent gain. The “silent generation” (born 1928-1945) came of right after the war and went on to participate in America’s postwar ascendancy as the STEM generation in the middle of the cycle; older members witnessed the depression and war firsthand as children but absolutely know nothing other than early welfare state. Then along come the baby boomers (born 1946-1964) to fill the place of the “frivolities generation”, and their oldest members finish off the cycle with the counterculture movement, environmental movement, safety advocacy, welfare-state expansions, and so on.
Now, this is where the cycle seems to go out of sync with the generation labels. Generation X (1965-1980) would be the “politics/war” generation in this cycle, but the last Gen X’ers were born at the very end of the malaise era and even missed the Gulf War, so late Boomers and early Gen X’ers would be the politics/war generation, trying to pull out of the doldrums of the 1970s. But still, they wouldn’t know much about the world before the not-so-Great Society and the entry of safety and the environment into the legislative realm. More permanent gains.
The Millennials came next, with birth dates of 1981-1996, making me (1995) a very late millennial. So the mid-late Gen X’ers and very early Millennials would have to be the mid-cycle STEM generation that helps the world get some of its “magic” back, but not all of it because they still grew up immersed in the “permanent gains” from the last frivolity-generation crash. That would then make the middle Millennials the “frivolity” generation, then you have the crash of 2008 which would make later Millennials and early Gen Z the “politics/war” generation again – but now they know nothing of the world before helicopter moms and trillion-dollar deficits. Gen Z, however, is scary for another reason; membership therein is roughly defined as being “too young to remember 9/11” or as being younger than a millennial but still… old enough to be in grade school as of right now, I guess? “Too young to remember 9/11 is the scary part”; plenty of these kids are already old enough to vote and they won’t even realize that there was a world before the institutionalized (and deadly serious) security theater of the 2000s and onward – or, for mid-late Z’s, before safety & environmental hysteria came roaring back in the mid-to-late 2000s. Late Gen Z and early Gen Alpha (because they’re already naming another generation) is shaping up to be the STEM generation again, but I fear that their talents will be misapplied by order of the commandant.
Now, there’s probably a whole bunch of reaching and lazy logic in there, and the timing gets very funky when you try to make it match up to the official names (it’s almost as if bunching people into generations based on arbitrary dates rather than the events that shape people results in labels that mean nothing!), but the point is, life seems to run in cycles of 40-60 years that play out rather predictably: people struggle through a hardscrabble upbringing and want the next generation to have better (“struggle” generation), then people build on the previous struggle to make major scientific advances and standards of living improve at an accelerated pace (“science” generation), then they get fat, dumb, and happy off the effort of the previous two phases and wreck everything (“frivolity” generation), resetting everything back to a “struggle” generation and starting the cycle over again.
Frankly, I think the hardest place to come from, psychologically, is right on the borderline between a “frivolity” generation and a “struggle” generation, such as a late millennial. You have just enough time to see a “frivolity” generation in action and start thinking you’re growing up to join it, without knowing what it is or what’s about to happen to it. And then you get to watch it all shatter just as you come of age, and suddenly you’re the one who has to do the hard work of rebuilding so that someone else decades from now can enjoy (and, inevitably, squander) what you thought you were going to enjoy in your prime.
It’s probably why I hate modernity so much. I had just enough time to sample the glitz and glamor of the mid-2000s via car magazines and also via video games like Need for Speed. I started thinking that maybe, when I grew up, I too would have a rice racer with neon chassis lighting, and would prove its worth by driving it at highly illegal speeds on a regular basis. And then 2008 happened, and I got to watch the economy crash, car design go down the toilet in the name of Gaia, gas prices go up a space elevator, and an outright anti-American evilmonger be elected President, all in the space of a year or two, just as I started my slow transformation from a boy into a man. And the situation didn’t improve much for many years after that.
It’s probably also why I hate bicycles so much. If I’d been born in 2000 or 2005, I’d know nothing but a shared road; if I’d been born in 1985 or 1990, I might have already had my fun on the street and gone on to join the boring keep-it-on-the-track types. Instead I started driving at just the right moment to enjoy a couple years of, I guess, beginner’s luck, and then have my beautiful, precious gutter drops ripped out from under me by people who teeeeeeechnically have a right to do so. You will never understand how much that, in particular, stings.
Hi Chuck,
This is very well-said. I’m Gen X and so experienced, as a child, teenager and young man, an America that was practically a Libertarian oasis compared with today’s Authoritarian Fear State. Kids were able to assert their own authority with very little fear of repercussions beyond a lecture. There was no such thing as a “school resource officer” – that is, an armed government worker – in school. Which was a boring place but not a prison. We came and went without incident. The 16-year-olds who had cars would go to McDonald’s for lunch. Yes, really. The younger kids were dropped off at the bottom of their street and walked the rest of the way. No “mom” waiting in a minivan. That would have been mocked as faggy. Because it was.
Adults were generally free to do pretty much anything that wasn’t actually criminal – and could (and did) argue with cops (as opposed to AGWs) over things like traffic violations because it was understood that traffic offenses did not rise to the level of felonies. It was inconceivable, almost, to have a gun pointed at you by a cop unless you pointed one at him first.
Most people weren’t pussies, either. Or at least, pussies – obeyers – weren’t worshipped.
Today, they are – and it’s why we’re here today.
Thanks, Eric and Chuck!
It’s so reassuring to see such sober observations. Spot-on! We need more of this; more people who can so accurately assess reality and understand. Seems these days, that it is only here on this site where such sanity is still iun evidence!
Chuck, I see you have seen much the same pattern as in the 4th turning theory. Fascinating book.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strauss%E2%80%93Howe_generational_theory
I’m not certain I agree with some of their conclusions, but over all it has merit for building upon. The old meme was well stated, but it has dire implications for personal liberty. Strong men produce good times. Good times produce weak men. Weak mean produce bad times. Bad times produce strong men. Cycle endlessly. We are heading into VERY bad times. We can expect a Strong Man to take the stage soon. It could be MUCH worse. Imagine if She who would be Queen was in power… Lets hope for the best.
Nice poetry.
But time, whatever its qualities, doesn’t breed.
And the genetic bits people bring to breeding were already there, at their own conceptions, whatever the times were like when they were conceived, whatever the times were like as they matured, whatever the times were like when they conceived the next generation.
You’re talking like an actuary, or epidemiologist – or a radical egalitarianist-insist we’s all one same thing — albeit less dry, more poetically – which is superior to the tech manual writin’ style alternative.
But Cohort-speak, Longitudinal lapidary’ing, Law o’ large numbers…doesn’t say a thing about this one, or that one, or any other one.
Instead it curve-fits – the force of fraud – each this one & each that one to a conformance with the whole, & insists upon a conflation that does not exist.
Of course, lots of this that these & those are all for the force-fitting, & always have been.
Tribes give\take bribes, those spoons full o’ sugar that helps the medicinewo\man take a dive, go down, & stay down…so the front-runnin’ bookies get “paid” fait accompli.
Even honestly, sans front-running fix is in dives, can make a lot of bank with this approach – if you have a large enough bank to start with (or lucky hit a small bank into a big bank).
But you will never know the details, who is who, why, wherefore, when, where, wtf really just happened, is happening?
And if this becomes the only tool in the box – as it is for groupthankin’ hallelujah’ists hanging onto corkscrew coil #4* – you’ll never see the trees for the forest, & that’s just as fundamental attribution erroneous as the verse stuck in sung backwards is.
*but it is just a ride, so what moniker’s slapped on is just bumper sticker preference. I think “kondratieff” – the bumpersticker, not the content — makes for interesting soundwaves. Grand mal(investment) seizure’s another fun one…the orbit’s epilepsycal.☻
The distribution tolls that bell across the curve of time.
And the distribution hasn’t changed but for the fluctuation inherent a thrumming string (just plucked or picked & thrumming – not even bent) from the get-go.
People want to chop the distribution up, make discrete chunks of time out of it, this time it’s different, that time was different, next time will be different – but it just isn’t so.
Never has been so.
And I’ll sell ya’ all the answering calls you want to the cracked-bell proposition it is, or will ever be, so.
Until “the singularity,” at least.
Each generation, cohort, has got the same distribution – of rhyming individuals\types, incl the fondue goo types who were conceived to meltpot•ribe bribe imbibe – as every other generation\cohort.
If these trees seem different those trees, seem to contradict what I’m saying, you’ve missed the forest.
If this forest seems different from that forest, seemingly contradicting what I’m saying, you’ve missed the trees.
Vonu put Fitzgerald’s bit about holding seemingly opposing ideas in here…& that’s the dickens for many, too many: it was the best of times it was the worst of times…even tho both ends the continuum & all between were & are happening simultaneously.
I’d say that a whole lot of the mess derives from the zero-sum game constant that is cohort-melt contagion…
Or, ain’t much more antisocial than social “proof” – just look to the poof after poof after poof those “proofs” engender.
If you got gangs in your genes, I got no sympathy, despite you got no culpability – cuz that is the buggy-feature sores code that landed you; you didn’t select it.
Gang•genes is gangrenes is gyrenes is jarheads is living (sorta) proof tabula rasa’s nada – all them jars was pre-poured…
…same as mine was…
… & there will never be a melding of those minds, the I-minds (my own biz) & the we-minds (“our” – which means all, including as many I’s as us weebles can dot — own biz).
Every wo\man is an island – even if s\he goes wire to wire as just a plodding-in-place clod of the con•tinent.
Yeah, the plates move. But tectonics is mostly glacial. Quake zones is mostly known.
And if you live in QZs it’s up to you – which is to say the Trojan horse that rode you in — to do it right. Or not.
Oyz, when dealing (double/triple dealing) with a skewed conformal map, the slip in length always has an angle/agenda at or nearly at the endo. This cycles the curve/recurve though risky neighborhoods (stop and fisk is optional, but not optimal)
Banal is as banal does, but even a stopped clock is handy twice per rotation. That rotation breeds revolution, which is always coming around and around. Meet the new clock, same as the old clock, lets rope a dope not to get fooled again. I really hate that song, its far too scatter/shatter for my taste.
Chlorine is bad for jeans (out damn spot!) but pools are scenes with evolving seams neither deep nor shallow but culled between. Action/reaction ebb and flow, away on another adventure we go. When all is one, the task is done, and keys become Gates and taxes rebates.
Beege…Thx for reiterating (even if it is just a rounding-the-corner error): Neighborhood agendas & dilemma’d prisoners are risky biz.
I saw guys endo, triple forks under & behind tea kettle. Never happened to me, but I was prolly just lucky.
Or maybe it’s just luckier, sometimes, not to conform to skewed maps that ain’t ever the territory anyway.
Never highsided, either, did lowside, tho: my angles were always thrown over low, & the agenda was always the curves & corners, ♪♫ cuz momma, that’s where the fun is ♫♪.
Even before the tracks (recurve bows, other parabolas, in that convex span…).
Even more after the tracks.
Some things don’t change too much.
Bodies of motion, in motion.
But stopped clocks? Those don’t change, nor move, at all – at least not at the scale that’s supposedly weighing the time.
But bangbang doubletap 12’oclock high watch yer 6 – da plane! da plane! — a few days interpretation or argument from numerized authority in a row & suddenly, keepers of the ol’ licked timex is false positive that the sun, or at least the neighborhood, revolves around it.
Or him.
Or her.
But only when s/he’s in soylent green fondued form: Weus!
(Like Zeus, only more powerful.)
Until the big surprise comes, at least – but not necessarily even then. Stupid is as stupid does, Gump’s momma put it (‘cept stupidity ain’t chosen anymore than baldness is).
Black swan dive, 12’oclock high, & the fondue comes unglued, like liquid metal Terminator did – “social” spreads out, shelters even more in place than it did before.
Or Big Jim (fisk) finds out where it’s at – & it’s not hustlin’ people strange to you.
Familiarity breeds contempt of courtin’ disasters “known” unknowns. “Bang, yer dead” (Charlie Bronson, from the ether in Jan Michael-Vincent’s very soon to be vaporized head).
It’s a set-up to payday for being fundamental attribution wrong twice a day (or any other schedule) – if it, as it often does, makes you believe you musta’ been right – maybe even that you’re a genius.
Brains & bull markets & fix is in rigged fights with matadors wavin’ red means pitch black dark as it gets neath the green, green grass o’ home.
Right (answer, but do show your work: broke clock “right answers” are wrong – cuz less\worse than worthless answers): the revolutions are a treadmill.
Ain’t a chance Atlas’ll shrug, step off, until he ditches the hopium treadmillin’ in his head that ropes him to bein’ the designated dope.
Same for boulder roller Sisyphus (he might do well to fire his Camu-flaging enabler-apologist shrinkwrapper, too).
But neither of them can do any of that.
Those aren’t choices, subject to will, any more than Cool Hand Luke’s inability to comprehend – according to Strother the Martinet bookkeeper – was.
Chlorinate as much as ya’ like.
(Jeans in pool water might go bleached bone white, then dissolve.)
If tds is high enough (& it is…well beyond high enough, what with all those dissolved bones) the gene pool still goes, & stays, gangrenous…& so the limb-lopping is, continues to be, continuous…
…And the cartel sawbones wouldn’t have it any other way; volume numbers is good “business.”
Chlorine, pools, spots o’ Bard, bits of perhaps conspicuous consumption breadcrumbing, math with a minor in, & low opinion of, poetry…eyes & nose are burning a bit.
Seeking reality by “the numbers” (of the numbers, for the numbers) “leads” to created inexplicableness.
& “never let a good inexplicableness go to waste.”
The heads we win, tails ya’ll lose, probability distribution. Let ‘em eat cake.
But the numeratti have been too big to fail despite too failed to support since long before I got here, & so have had “success” after success in bailing themselves out.
The Ox Bow Incident scales…ouroboros is covered in those scales…& that old snake is incapable of learning from its circularity trick…incapable of refusing all that bribery incentive…so the rolling along to get along just keeps goin’ along…& shedding its stopped clock “ghost-skin” twice a day.
Those marauding python “invaders” constricting the life out of the everglades ain’t just a metaphor.
And I ain’t April foolin’.
^^^Ladies & Gentlemen, I give you: The progeny of the union of Lewis Carroll and Dr. Seuss!
Marvelous compliment, Nunzio. Thx.
I’m a boomer, care to try and spout that crap in my face? BTY Pork Boy. Bet my medical records are a lot thinner than your. Bet my physical ability can out match your any day of the week and twice on Sunday.
Bill, you have medical records?! Whus! I haven’t been to a doctor (excepting an eye doc and dentist), since I was 16 -nearly 42 years ago. Never been to an ER.
Guess that time is taking it’s toll though….I do weigh 10 lbs. more than I did in high-school…..
So what’s your problem with what I said, above? You think that our fellow Boomers making life too easy for their sprogs, and foisting their responsibilities off onto others is somehow a good thing?! You like the world that their progeny has created, and how the wonderful world in which we grew-up has vanished?
lane splitter…good post
Age factions, generational cohort fictions, religions, races, creeds, Apollo’s, Rocky’s, Mr. T’s, Dolph Lundgren…all diversion distraction. But get a load of that Stallone, eh?
Lots of “clinical” ploys – if the clinic at large isn’t proofy enough — that reminding most people of their mortality turns ’em buttercup daffodil yellow, er “conservative.”
Fight-flight-freeze, where the wo\men are wo\men & the sheep are nervous.
Can’t wait for the rat-out-a-neighbor phone app. You get social standing credits and get to watch the “offender” be Hut-hut-hutted. How Stasi-esque! Soon you be considered suspicious for not ratting out others enough.
You know, I’m just waiting for the ugly encounter I know is coming on one of my daily exercise routines where I’ll be confronted by some noodle-brain idiot who’ll scream at me from his car about how I should be off the streets. Because after all, doesn’t everybody know this “super-bug” can live in the air for 2 months & how I’m in imminent danger for not only myself, but also everyone within a 5 block radius of me because of my presence – For Shame!
And now you know why I carry pepper spray.
Btw Eric, today’s piece borders on brilliancy. Simply Outstanding!
Amen, Bagwan – and, ditto.
They can – and will have to – forcibly Hut! Hut! Hut! me as I will not comply. Because I do not fear.
Especially, them.
They’re bullies and low-order cretins and unworthy of the respect one gives a healthy rattlesnake.
Great article. On a topic of serious interest, are you aware of ID2020 and its implications? Its being tied into various operational plans as we speak.
More here if you are interested.
https://biohackinfo.com/news-bill-gates-id2020-vaccine-implant-covid-19-digital-certificates/
I see some ugly encounter in my future as well. Keep in mind I’m generally by myself and everything I foresee causing one is me keeping to myself but being outside the normal of most everyone else. Because the real war is against independence and individuality.
Hi Brent,
My ugly encounter may be today – or soon. The Coonman has ordered mass house arrest for the entire state – excepting himself, of course. I will not comply. I am going to go out just because. Probably my coffee shop is now totally shut down – and I won;t even be able to sit in the parking lot and drink my coffee and work on my laptop. But I am going there anyway and god damn them all.
Wait a moment, let me put my bell on… clang clang… ^^ Eric, no doubt you already know this, and have taken it into consideration, but the typical AGW is really spun up these days, and is just looking for an excuse to ruin some else’s day (at the least…). Its been my experience that waving a red flag in front of a gigantic mad bull is a Bad Thing™. YMMV of course. I believe a wise mad man once said; “And it harm none, do as you will”
These days we first have to stand up to trannies, then we can stand up to tyrannies
Simply perfect. LMAO
NO one says it better than you Eric. Thanks