Fighting “stupidity”
The always-fascinating Richard Fernandez offers some quotes from anti-Nazi Dietrich Bonhoeffer that I want to call attention to:
“Against stupidity we are defenseless,” [Bonhoeffer] wrote, because imbeciles never feel a qualm. Against the stupid “neither protests nor the use of force accomplish anything … reasons fall on deaf ears; facts that contradict … simply do not need to be believed … and when facts are irrefutable they are just pushed aside as inconsequential, as incidental. In all this, the stupid person, in contrast to the malicious one, is utterly self-satisfied and, being easily irritated, becomes dangerous by going on the attack.”
I must say I find that quote resonates with my experience of trying to have a discussion with certain true believers, whether they be Obama supporters or Trump supporters or 9/11-truthers or any number of other zealots. By “true believers” I am not including everyone who might support either Obama or Trump, of course. But I think anyone who’s been around the blogosphere for the last couple of election cycles knows exactly the sort of thing—and the sort of arguments—I mean, the kind of worship that ignores or negates anything that might contradict or even challenge their faith in their leader, and a sharp and cutting anger at and/or contempt for anyone who would disagree with them.
The thing is, though, these people are not imbeciles. Nor are they even especially stupid, not in the general sense, and not in most other arenas of their lives. There seems to be something special that for want of a better term I’ll call political stupidity, a sort of willed stubborn refusal to look at the flaws in the candidate of choice, to acknowledge when they go wrong, and to accept that other people who oppose them are not evil but have their reasons, sometimes good reasons.
Bonhoeffer’s use of the term “stupid person” is probably meant in the same way as “idiot” in the well-known political phrase “useful idiot.” It doesn’t mean people who actually have IQs in a well-below-average range, it means people who act stupidly or sound stupid in the specific area of politics, people who are somehow blocked from acknowledging certain truths that threaten to invalidate their beliefs. These people are usually reacting to the painful discomfort (cognitive dissonance) that would almost certainly result if they took an objective look. In some people (many people, actually) this results in the wearing of blinders to protect oneself from even having to consider changing their minds and/or admit to having been wrong about something so important.
Bonhoeffer further said:
In conversation with [the stupid man] one virtually feels that one is not dealing not at all with him as a person, but with slogans, catchwords and the like that have taken possession of him. … Having thus become a mindless tool, the stupid person will also become capable of any evil and at the same time incapable of seeing that it is evil. This is where the danger of diabolical misuse lurks, for it is this that can once and for all destroy human beings.
Bonhoeffer was, of course, writing during the Nazi era, and the evil he saw many previously ordinary-seeming people perpetrate, or help to perpetrate, was extreme and blatant. But evil is not always that obvious. And “diabolical misuse” can easily come about by the mechanism of propaganda, an exceptionally powerful tool to which all of us are somewhat vulnerable. The extent of the vulnerability varies greatly from person to person, and the type of propaganda each person is susceptible too varies, as well. Fear? Rage? In-group feeling? Guilt? Self-righteousness? Need to control? Surrender of control? Rebelliousness?
I could go on, but you get the idea.
The 20th Century saw the growth of propaganda by masters of the art, some of them diabolical masters. The 21st has seen new tools—particularly involving the internet and social media—to further the spread of propaganda and the speed with which it can be propagated. One might think that the internet should have made us smarter—all of that access to information—and in some cases and some ways I suppose it has. But in way too many ways and for way too many people it has helped to make us stupider in the sense that Bonhoeffer used the word.
The Diplomad observed that:
“‘Progressives’, of course, are greatly influenced by movies. In fact…the majority of what passes for “Progressive thought” is derived from the Hollywood version of history that they have running in an endless video loop in their heads. Listen to them talk about the economy, race relations, education, “gender equality,” US history, etc., and it all forms part of some giant Hollywood script.”
http://www.thediplomad.com/2016/01/a-quick-note-on-videos-progressives-and.html
Indeed–shortly after 9/11, when the idea of arming airline pilots was first mooted, critics of the idea referred to “gunfights at 35,000 feet” as something “out of a Tom Clancy movie”. Hadn’t they thought that deliberately crashing airplanes into buildings might be something out of a Tom Clancy movie, too? And whether or not something might appear in a movie is obviously irrelevant to its validity from a policy standpoint.
This topic relates closely to my earlier post about metaphors, interfaces, and thought processes, in which I discuss the consequences of the “iconic” versus the “textual” modes of presenting information.
http://chicagoboyz.net/archives/34447.html
“Stupid” is not the right word – the are narcisissists, interested on in what they think.
One objection: you didn’t include any examples of those who agree with your politics.
Ben Rhodes is the flip side of the appetite entity coin.
You cannot reason with them if the are stupid, you cannot reason with them if they are not.
Because they view life itself, at its core (I almost said “essentially”) as unreasonable.
It is only the satisfaction of urges, subjective urges, welling up from who knows, or really cares, where, or why, that have any ‘meaning’; that is to say, subjective significance.
How the f**k then, can anyone sane continue to believe that it is possible to reason with an entity that rejects the idea of truth for the notion of “narrative”? Yeah you can stop warring for a moment if it is in your interest, I suppose; but …
Yet the conservative, like some flabby emotional Glenn Beck-like love craving doofus who never learns, and then cries about the result later, keeps sitting down to a chair that is pulled from under him at the last moment.
No wonder the left has so much contempt for the right.
The reason highly intelligent people can behave stupidly is that they are use to be correct. They begin to assume that any idea they have no matter how ridiculous is correct. Since everyone has highly ridiculous ideas you can’t do that.
DNW:
You don’t like Beck, you don’t like “conservatives.” It appears you didn’t understand Neo or read The Belmont Club (Fernandez). Do you have your “stupid” filter on?
Yes, to argue with a “true believer,” or one who has become a “useful idiot” is a waste of time. Some of them snap out of it eventually. Some don’t.
Are you a “post conservative” or just angry?
I must confess that I have been deep in disturbing thoughts for awhile, and this addresses one of the key elements.
What if (and I credit our peerless Wretchard for this) the hands on the wheel on the ship of state have been turned over to a group that lives entirely through and within the world of pop culture? It used to be said that DC was Hollywood for the unattractive, but that won’t cut it anymore. If you’re going to DC to get in front of the camera, you better be attractive or very charismatic for some reason.
I have come to the conclusion after questioning around the subject for some time with people everywhere in my life, that most folks decide to vote for the person they most want to look at on the TV (or whatever) acting the role. It is no more complex than that. FDR’s executive takeover worked so well because he sounded exactly right for that time, and he knew just what to say. It was true for Reagan, it is true for Obama. It was never so true as it was for Kennedy. Policies and rigorously defined ideologies are just a ruse to keep the few folks who still read distracted. Nobody does “mean girl” better than Donald Trump, and that’s why he will beat Hillary. Scott Adams has it nailed. Nobody wants to look at her for the next four years.
To anyone looking to become President for the next four years, I say “be very careful what you wish for.”
“The hardest thing to explain is the glaringly evident which everybody had decided not to see.”
Ayn Rand
I think the word you might be looking for is–hate.
Hate renders otherwise intelligent people–stupid.
Walter Williams in “The Vision of The Anointed” tells us that this sort of stupid person takes a position based on how it makes him feel about himself: Selfless, compassionate, superior, highly moral, etc.
An argument about the issue threatens the stupid person’s self-worth–which is tied to, tied up in, part of–the label the position possesses.
“I just want there to be no more war.” Fine. But when you hear that from an advocate of universal disarmament, you know they’re stupid. And there is no logical, factual, or historical argument that can touch it…because you’re not arguing logic, fact, or history. You’re attacking a person whose self-worth is entirely about wanting no more war.
In addition, each of these positions puts the person on a higher moral and intellectual plane.
It’s like “racist”. It’s so easy to not be a racist that there’s no distinction in it. But, as I say, it’s easy. So how do you get distinction, at least in your own mind? Accuse the maximum number of your fellow citizens of a vile moral crime, thus meaning you’re in a minority. I’m not speaking of the accusations of racism as a manipulative technique.
I know some highly educated people, well-versed in science, who are fanatical about climate change. The contrary evidence is all around them.
I mentioned recently that James Hansen, a nutcase on the subject, admitting against interest that the previous interglacial was warmer than this one [my acquaintances know about glaciers and so forth] and so we’re actually in the middle of the middle of natural variability and we’re arguing about whose fault it is and why we should turn things upside down about it.
Still, from casual comments to their choice of church, their self-image is that of progressives of higher virtue.
Thus, challenging their beliefs is not addressing the issue at all.
Maybe some of 9/11 Trutherism was a protective mechanism.
They wanted to believe it was Republicans or an inside force that caused that trauma–an entity they had more control over, that they could vote out. Rather than a small group of religious fanatics with no earthly nation state ties.
But in way too many ways and for way too many people it has helped to make us stupider in the sense that Bonhoeffer used the word.
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Or in the sense Plato described.
What’s particularly shocking is how people can switch in and out of stupidity in an instant. I have friends with whom I can have discussions on a variety of subjects, but let one of the pre-programmed trigger phrases come up (“Trump” or “Palin” or “illegal immigration” or whatever) and they go all Manchurian Candidate in a second.
The most shocking was one time during an election year, when a friend and I were talking about the typical Chicago machine voting shenanigans (dead people voting, busing voters from polling place to polling place, etc.). But the moment I said I thought Voter ID would be a good idea, the switch flipped. “No, that’s just a plot to stop black people from voting! Vote fraud NEVER HAPPENS.”
It was a great column and for 6 years I had gone back and forth over the same issue, stupidity or malevolence when it came to the President? I have come down on malevolence. Although I do think Fernandez use of Bonhoeffer makes a great case for stupidity as well.
The one thing I’m not buying is the countless lies Obama has told from Health Care, to Benghazi, and from Immigration to the Iran deal. The stupidity card doesn’t work when you have Obama and his administration going around the country saying one thing and then doing what they claimed they couldn’t do.
However, I do agree the American people have become the non thinking audience Ben Franklin and Bonhoeffer warned would be “stuck on celebrity, stuck on being groupies for Hillary, Bernie, Donald, Obama and Kim Kardashian.”
The Obama administration has primed the pump, so to speak, for a Hillary and Trump run.
So I went over to Fernandez’s link and again he is referring to Rhodes’ “mind-meld” with Obama. And we are talking about that in relation to propaganda.
Well take a look at Joachim Von Ribbentrop (wiki):
Ribbentrop became Hitler’s favourite foreign-policy adviser, partly by dint of his familiarity with the world outside Germany, but also by flattery and sycophancy.[27][28] One German diplomat later recalled that “Ribbentrop didn’t understand anything about foreign policy. His sole wish was to please Hitler”.[28] In particular, Ribbentrop acquired the habit of listening carefully to what Hitler was saying, memorizing his pet ideas, and then later presenting Hitler’s ideas as his own — a practice that much impressed Hitler as proving Ribbentrop was an ideal National Socialist diplomat.[29] Ribbentrop quickly learned that Hitler always favoured the most radical solution to any problem, and accordingly tended his advice in that direction as a Ribbentrop aide recalled:
When Hitler said ‘Grey’, Ribbentrop said ‘Black, black, black’. He always said it three times more, and he was always more radical. I listened to what Hitler said one day when Ribbentrop wasn’t present: ‘With Ribbentrop it is so easy, he is always so radical. Meanwhile, all the other people I have, they come here, they have problems, they are afraid, they think we should take care and then I have to blow them up, to get strong. And Ribbentrop was blowing up the whole day and I had to do nothing. I had to break — much better!’
It is not so unusual to see this “stupidity.” IMO we tend to compartmentalize our knowledge. How many intelligent people does anyone know that have no knowledge of plumbing or electricity, or even general concepts of physics?
Then there’s the Dunning-Kruger effect in which those intelligent people think that because they are intelligent in some disciplines, they are knowledgeable in all disciplines. Again, IMO, this is tied to the fact that the most difficult words in the English language are “I was wrong.” This especially so when one’s identity is directly ties to specific (political, religious) beliefs.
Finally, keep in mind that one can never rationally argue with someone whose opinion is not based upon reason. This is an error the conservative right makes constantly. For example, if called a racist and one responds “I am NOT a racist.” one has implicitly accepted the playing field and the definitions set by the accuser. Just how anyone thinks s/he can win an emotional argument with reason especially when playing in an arena bounded by the emotional rules of the opposition is beyond me.
More media choices does not mean better, even as folks now can be selective / filtering.
The 21st Century has ushered in the manifestation of “echo chambers” and ideological bifurcation of the media (and, to some degree, people geographically).
It proves the falsehood that simply lack of education and few media choices make a population more vulnerable to tyranny’s manipulation.
It comes back to two interconnected themes:
Liberty is a Responsibility, not a Right.
As such, Liberty Requires Care and Feeding to Sustain it.
Commenter DNW said: No wonder the left has so much contempt for the right.
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I said earlier upthread the word (neo) might be looking for is–hate. Contempt–works. It’s a little more sophisticated I suppose in the mind of the user but still means relatively the same thing.
The 21st Century has ushered in the manifestation of “echo chambers” and ideological bifurcation of the media (and, to some degree, people geographically).
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Balkanization.
Re: the term “stupid”. I’ve seen that term used dismissively about everybody and anything.
For instance, back in 2008, many, many were talking about the “stupid, low info” voters, how “stupid” Obama was/is, etc.
Part of the problem is dismissing anyone or any organization that one disagrees with as “stupid” is that it often translates into underestimating their capability and into taking no action to counter (or calling them names and mocking them – not action that moves the ball forward).
Of course Bonhoeffer himself was a True Believer in the same sense that today receives great ridicule.
@Strand – like your word “Balkanization” better, as it is true that there are many camps / tribes. I’ve seen it referred to as “tribalization”, as well.
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On another thought… upon reflection, find myself guilty of doing this, as I’ve essentially shut out several websites (e.g. Drudge, Breitbart) and radio/tv shows (e.g Limbaugh, Hannity, Ingram). They either lost their way, or never cared about the principles they espouse. Either way, I am done with them. This is a process that started around 2007.
Find myself gravitating to blogs like this that itself and its commenters contribute intelligently to the “conversation”, or other sources that provide a little more balanced view, or not afraid to at least present opposing views (e.g. Real Clear Politics).
I don’t know what a “post conservative” is so I cannot respond properly to that.
I suppose that like many here seem to be, I am more or less a small “L” libertarian on principle, with an on-balance somewhat conservative personal attitude.
And yes, I read the Fernandez article, and will read it again before finally posting this reply up.
Am I angry? I would say instead that I am amazed and baffled and intellectually frustrated by what appears to be the constant indignation of conservatives over the assaults they suffer at the hands of people who, the conservatives believe, are violating the basic rules.
But as we all know, or should know by now from our studies [be they formal or just life lessons] in social philosophy and progressive ideology, the progressive denies the validity, and objective grounding of those basic standards in the first place. That is what enables the progressive to do and say what the progressive does and says.
So do I dislike conservatives? No, I dislike anyone’s seeming inability to face reality. In this case it is the plain – and admitted by the opposition – reality that those they are contending with are operating out of a fundamentally antithetical anthropological worldview.
The situation is better than it used to be, and conservatives have become better informed ideologically, but they still go around fuming when they are cheated, by people who use, and are known to use, moral language only for the purpose of rhetoric, or huckstering.
Now as for Glenn Beck. You got me there. He is a emotional wretch, and yes, I dislike him for that.
There are politically stupid people in this sense in all parties and on both sides of the left/right divide. I think it is more prevalent the further left or right you go. I am center right and can have interesting discussions with people on the center left – where we often agree on many things but at least understand each other on those points where we don’t agree – but not with more extreme believers on either side. I have basically given up on the latter; it is a waste of time to try to get through to them.
Eric Hoffer had much to say about the True Believer in his book of that name.
Some excerpts which have a bearing:
“It is of interest to note the means by which a mass movement accentuates and perpetuates the individual incompleteness of its adherents. By elevating dogma above reason, the individual’s intelligence is prevented from becoming self-reliant”
“The true believer’s innermost craving is for a new life – a rebirth – or, failing this, a chance to acquire new elements of pride, confidence, hope, a sense of purpose and worth by identification with a holy cause. An active mass-movement offers them opportunities for both.”
“All active mass movements strive, therefore, to interpose a fact-proof screen between the faithful and the realities of the world. They do this by claiming that the ultimate and absolute truth is already embodied in their doctrine and that there is no truth or certitude outside it. The facts on which the true believer bases his conclusions must not be derived from his experience or observation but from holy writ.” (AGW)
When you can accept ideas that make you feel more moral, it is easy to resist facts that show the opposite. “So tenaciously should we cling to the world revealed by the Gospel, that were I to see all the Angels of Heaven coming down to me to tell me something different, not only would I not be tempted to doubt a single syllable, but I would shut my eyes and stop my ears, for they would not deserve to be either seen nor heard.” Luther, “Table Talk,” 1687 as quoted by Hoffer.
Steven Pinker (“The Blank Slate.”) has also shed some light on the tendency of people to closed-minded. One of the five main personality traits of humans is how open or closed-minded we are. The trait varies among people just like any statistical curve. There seem to be just about as many open-minded as closed-minded. Thus we can always expect there to be people who will cling to ideas or policies no matter the evidence against them. To Bonhoeffer these people seemed to be stupid. To Hoffer they are True Believers. To Pinker they are closed-minded.
Neo is an example of an open-minded person. She does not accept anything without evidence to support it. She also is willing to change her mind when new facts become plain. Don’t know the percentage of the population who are extremely open-minded like neo, but I believe it to be relatively small.
The fact that so many people will seize on ideas that make them feel better, more moral, or superior and will ignore anything that contradicts their beliefs is one of the major issues today. And was probably one of the major factors in the decline and failure of past great nations.
Neo:
“There seems to be something special that for want of a better term I’ll call political stupidity”
It’s just competition.
The Narrative contest for the zeitgeist of the activist game – where narrative is elective truth while the actual truth is just a narrative that must be competed for like any other in the arena – looks like HS debate club based on merit, but it’s actually maneuver contest based on mass.
“Political stupidity” is a good description, but to be more precise, I’ll add that it’s strategic “political stupidity”.
Another, analogous description is opposing counsel.
One-on-one debate with an opposing activist is effective, but you have to understand the operative context of the engagement. You’re not engaging him to convert him, though that would be a welcome effect. You’re engaging him in the context of adversarial, as opposed to inquisitorial, conflict resolution as a quasi-litigator in the quasi-court of public opinion for the sake of a quasi-jury, and he’s opposing counsel.
Defining the problem frames the solution. Like a jury trial, it’s necessary to lay the foundation with elements, definitions, principles, parties, and premises in order to establish the narrative frame to effectively – and convincingly – argue the issue.
For example, the chief instrument for Obama winning the presidency in the 1st place, as well as his most consequential foreign policy choices, is the prevailing yet demonstrably false narrative of OIF. A key pre-condition that enabled that instrument to be effective is that most ostensible supporters of OIF misunderstood the grounds for the Iraq intervention. That provided the opening for propagandists like Ben Rhodes to win the Narrative contest for the zeitgeist. They then re-invested the now-prevailing yet false narrative of OIF as the cornerstone linchpin thematic premise to undertake their discrediting of American leadership of the free world. They earned the social dominance necessary to conduct a paradigm shift in the arena.
The activist game is a team game. The competition for the social dominance necessary to make a difference with paradigm shift often takes the form of class-based narrative frame versus ‘other’ class-based narrative frame. You wouldn’t expect Red Sox players to convince Yankees players to concede the American League East based on the merits of their argument, either. Instead, you expect the opponents to determine the division champion on the field.
In our adversarial legal system, zealous advocacy for the client is a primary professional ethic for attorneys. Similarly, you wouldn’t expect to convince loyal activists to hand over vital social dominance to the opposing team by conceding your elective truth (even if yours is the actual truth) is the right one and confessing the ‘stupidity’ of their team.
In the activist game, which is the only social cultural/political game there is, the contest for the social dominance to reify your team’s preferred social condition is won via competition in the arena, largely with the Narrative contest for the zeitgeist that looks like HS debate club.
That being said, litigious argumentation, while necessary, is not the only component of the Narrative contest for the zeitgeist. Again, it looks like HS debate club based on merit, but it’s actually maneuver contest based on mass.
In that regard, David Foster’s reference to Hollywood gets at the effective method for “fighting “stupidity””. The activist game is social – sociology weaponized or industrialized. Politics are downstream of culture, and culture is a function of activism, particularly with the activist deconstruction and reconstruction of norms and stigmas.
That means, as pre-condition, it’s critical to take control of the social nodes that act as vectors, including campus and academy (which also function as founts and incubators), popular entertainment, media, and now social media, to uphold, redefine, and replace norms and stigmas.
That also means, as pre-condition, building up sufficient social mass, organized with proper activist mindset and skillset, to function as center of gravity to generate and multiply political momentum – such as the Tea Party movement correctly began doing until they deviated off track of their vital social activist movement and limited their focus to electoral politics. That critical error by Tea Party members is a contributing factor to the market inefficiency that alt-Right activists exploited for the Trump phenomenon.
A more successful example of a pre-conditional building up and activist organization of social mass is the Ivy League ROTC campaign. Its success was built upon the pre-conditional establishment on campus of organized, activist student-veterans who thereby altered the civil-military culture on campus and, in turn, altered the civil-military politics on campus regarding ROTC, to the dismay of the elite campus leftists who had taken their supremacy on their supposed home turf for granted.
Activism is the power of the people available to anyone for any cause. Including conservatives, if they ever choose to compete for real.
Fools shall be the ruin of us.
“Experience keeps a dear school, but fools will learn in no other.” Poor Richard’s Almanac
“It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere.” –Voltaire
The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools.” Herbert Spencer English philosopher (1820 – 1903)
“It’s easier to fool people, than to convince them they have been fooled.” –Mark Twain
“For it came to pass that the wise man spoke wisdom to the fool, and the fool did not recognize it.” David Weber
“Abiding in the midst of ignorance, thinking themselves wise and learned, fools go aimlessly hither and thither, like blind led by the blind.” The Katha Upanishad
DNW:
Thanks for the clarification.
The left believes there are no rules only power and how to get and keep it. From there on everything is possible to them.
I agree. As I wrote above, do not accept the left’s definition of the field of play, but establish your own field and force them to play by YOUR rules. Donald Trump excels in doing this (that is, forcing people to play by HIS media rules). Newt Gingrich and Carly Fiorina do this too, albeit with much more style than Trump.
In Ionesco’s play ‘Rhinoceros’, humans are turning into rhinos, and among those who have not yet turned, there is an epidemic of excuse-making for violent rhino behavior.
Something of the sort seems to be happening now: Are We Living at the Intersection of These Two Stories?
http://chicagoboyz.net/archives/50743.html
DNW:
“So do I dislike conservatives? No, I dislike anyone’s seeming inability to face reality. In this case it is the plain — and admitted by the opposition — reality that those they are contending with are operating out of a fundamentally antithetical anthropological worldview.”
That’s the gist of the problem.
The majority of conservatives are fine with diagnosis, as exemplified here, but they’re stuck at complaint rather than following up that diagnosis with pragmatic prescription and necessary activist treatment.
Conservatives’ chronic aversion to activism is essentially un-American. The founding fathers were activist. They evidently understood the reality of the same social nature that Neo describes in this post, exploited by the Democrat-front Left and now the Left-mimicking Trump-front alt-Right. The founders exploited it, too, in order to wrest the American nation from the British empire.
How did Madison et al know to warn about the risks of democracy?
Not (only) from perceptive academic insight. They knew it from practical 1st hand experience as activists who had used the democratic force they, once they were dominant, warned about. They won the social political ‘debate’ over Independence with maneuver contest based on mass, not HS debate club based on merits of the argument.
The American nation was founded with a paradigm shift imposed with social dominance won by exploiting the social nature that modern conservatives complain about. In that sense, modern conservatives are the successors of the founding fathers’ erstwhile neighbors, the American British loyalists (aka Canadians) who passed the buck to King George III in their activist game much like modern conservatives have passed the buck on activism to the GOP.
Conservative ideas and principles are fine and, in my opinion, better than the Left and alt-Right’s alternatives. However, the chronic refusal by conservatives to compete for real in the essential tradition of our activist founding fathers is the problem, no less than an evolutionary flaw.
test
Strand…’flattery and sycophancy’…in Tostoy’s ‘War and Peace’, there is a segment in which 9 different factions within the Russian Army are arguing for adoption of their strategic planning ideas. Listening to all this, Prince Andrei decides that all of them are motivated not by genuine concern for a Russian victory, but rather by the desire for their faction to come out ahead. With one possible exception, a professor type…and *he* is motivated more by a desire to see his theories proven in practice than by anything else.
They are afraid of hurting, or morally manipulating and possibly ruining the life chances of people who they mistakenly believe are fundamentally like them in moral terms and values and … value.
They are afraid, perhaps properly of what God’s justice will do to them if they act upon, rather than in reaction to.
The curious thing in this context is the left’s constant complaint against the right for the crime of morally “othering” them; which is precisely, in all actuality what the right, with its essentialist anthropology and religious convictions, refuses to in fact do.
Of course by “othering”, the left does not apparently mean so much that the typical conservative is actually denying a “one humanity” (moral or otherwise) predicate, so much as that the average conservative persists in and insist on “the illusion” that he is a free moral agent and the locus of individual moral value” rather than a social manifestation and expression of some monistic field to which we may apply our creative energies howsoever we will — to power.
Clever, DNW pull the Nietzsche card. Oh boy, that guy has served humanity well. Not.
Excellent comment thread here. Everything I thought of saying was taken up and put nicely by others.
It is true that we are all like this to some extent, not wanting to hear what is inconventient. Jonathan Haidt’s research is remarkable on this, and the summary that Pinker has been putting out this last decade is valuable. Both were once quite liberal in their politics but hedge quite a bit at this point and find that conservative audiences are more likely to listen to them and understand what they are saying. Both still tend left, but they can at least hear.
@Strand @ David Foster – yes, contempt and riducule work on all of us, but they work far more on liberals. Social acceptability as related to David’s pop culture/movie/iconic theory in the first comment is much more important to them. I sometimes think that this is most of how liberalism spreads, as it was in high school fashion.
On another thought… upon reflection, find myself guilty of doing this, as I’ve essentially shut out several websites (e.g. Drudge, Breitbart) and radio/tv shows (e.g Limbaugh, Hannity, Ingram). They either lost their way, or never cared about the principles they espouse. Either way, I am done with them. This is a process that started around 2007.
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Have done exactly the same thing. Never could listen to radio.
Radio–well–Goebbels has a great quote or two about that. I kind of hate how everything smells like Springtime in The Weimar lately. Heh.
It’s very unnatural how Hillary squashed the Democratic field, and how all or most of Conservative radio went in for Trump. It seems like they learned a thing or two from Journolist.
I think the right ended up with celebrity radio pundits. It was weird online you could question or criticize any Republican official but critique Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin–or Rush Limbaugh and there would be hell to pay. Cults of Personality. Rush Limbaugh the “comedian” with his Ditto head followers–that –I think–was a model for Trump. That enviroment laid the ground for Trump. Add a very divided field of Republican contenders that started in primaries of states with very low density–and the infotainment wing had an outsized influence. The result–as they say–is history.
J:J:,
The point about not having true believer’s facts to be derived from his own experience is one explanation for what we are seeing today. More and more people never leave their bubbles to have life experiences that might contradict the message. desegregation of schools was supposed to help this, but it didn’t take long before blacks and white were eating at separate tables and living in separate dorms. Gated communities are another example, as are work places where the right credentials are necessary. How many people have really gotten out of their comfort zone to actually have experiences that might inform them?
David Foster Says:
May 9th, 2016 at 2:37 pm
Strand…’flattery and sycophancy’…in Tostoy’s ‘War and Peace’, there is a segment in which 9 different factions within the Russian Army are arguing for adoption of their strategic planning ideas. Listening to all this, Prince Andrei decides that all of them are motivated not by genuine concern for a Russian victory, but rather by the desire for their faction to come out ahead. With one possible exception, a professor type…and *he* is motivated more by a desire to see his theories proven in practice than by anything else.
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Shoot –I knew –I would someday –wish that I had read that book.
I sometimes think that this is most of how liberalism spreads, as it was in high school fashion.
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Like high school cliques? I agree very much with that idea.
political stupidity = ideological idiocy
Nick:
You write that I didn’t give examples of those who agree with my politics.
Well, it depends what you mean by “agree with your politics.” I would imagine that a great many Trump supporters are in basic agreement with my politics with the exception of their support for Trump. I certainly include them.
But in general, if I agree with someone on an issue, and they give a “stupid” reason for supporting it, I may dislike their reasoning but usually not enough to write a post about it. And I usually don’t bother to have a discussion with them about it, either. One picks one’s battles. I’m sure such people exist, however.
Neo, this is almost a phobia of mine. With this season’s seeming fracture of alliances, I don’t think there are many people who agree with my politics who I’d characterize as doing so foolishly. It feels like the foolish people parted company with me. But – I would never take anyone seriously who said what I just said. I can’t imagine being persuaded by someone who wasn’t willing to concede the sloppy thinking and even bad motivation among some of his compatriots.
As for talk radio, I got the impression that the damage they did was by not going all-in on a candidate. By considering the merits of a dozen of the 16 candidates, they failed to nudge the crowd in any direction.
There is no limit to the treachery true believers are willing to accede to. Witness the Iran nuke deal – possibly the most heinous betrayal in human history.
If Obama was an enemy of the United States, only concerned with not badly blowing his cover, what would he do differently?
See also Daniel Greenfield’s commentary,
The Betrayal of the USS Cole
…Mashur Abdallah Ahmed al Sabri, one of the members of the USS Cole cell, has already been released by Barack Obama from Guantanamo Bay.
Sabri was rated as a high risk terrorist who is ”is likely to pose a threat to the US, its interests, and allies”, but that was no obstacle for Obama who had already fired one Secretary of Defense for being slow to free dangerous Al Qaeda terrorists and was browbeating his latest appointee over the same issue.
http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/2016/05/the-betrayal-of-uss-cole.html?utm
The problem of “stupidity” isn’t per se, stupidity. The problem is that politically correct stupidity is protected from consequence. And because it is protected from consequence, ever greater stupidity flourishes, until reality arrives. Consequential realities are nature’s corrective feedback mechanism.
The West’s politically correct stupidity, a ‘cancer’ arguably initiated by Rene Descartes with his “mechanical philosophy”, has been growing in the West for centuries and, having finally attained majority status, is approaching its tipping point, where consequential reality can no longer be avoided.
Nick:
Perhaps because I was on the other side for so long, and during that time I was noticing all the foibles and “stupidity” of the right, I am more than willing to concede there’s plenty of stupidity all around.
For an example that doesn’t have much to do with left or right (opinions differ on both sides), I think Oswald killed JFK and he did it alone, and that every single conspiracy theory I’ve ever heard or read is “stupid” in a number of ways (I’ve written about the JFK assassination conspiracy theories on this blog before). But I recall that a number of trusted and intelligent commenters here ascribe to one conspiracy theory or other, and these are people with whom I agree on other matters. What’s more, I continue to argue that Bill Clinton did not commit perjury in the Lewinsky matter, and if you don’t think that’s an unpopular POV here, you should think again. Some of my attempts at convincing others of the idea that Clinton did not commit perjury can be found here, here, and here (much back-and-forth on that comment thread; keep scrolling down).
I doubt I convinced anyone. And yet I think I’m being very persuasive in the sense of logic, and the people who don’t believe me are not stupid people in general. While I have to admit maybe I’m not as right as I think I am, I do believe I am right, and that my reasons for saying what I say are not emotional but are logical and evidence-based. I think that anyone who holds a position that is not merely emotionally based must believe that they are right, and that those who agree with them are also right. If someone were to argue, however, that Oswald was the lone assassin of JFK because their astrologer told them so, or that Bill Clinton didn’t commit perjury because he cannot tell a lie, I would have no trouble saying those reasons are stupid (without the scare quotes) even though the positions are in agreement with mine.
Some people say that exposure to information makes us more prone to propaganda, not less. Every datum is another chance to be lied to.
Eric,
William McGurn at WSJ has a new piece up saying that Bush was right about Iraq. It’s not about going in, but about sticking with it and the success of the surge. Maybe a reinterpretation of Bush is gaining some momentum.
I’m currently reading Thomas Sowell’s The Vision of the Annointed.
I’m not far into it, but Sowell begins by discussing the entire act of finding facts to fit the narrative of the anointed. It’s a perfect complement to what we are here calling political stupidity.
It’s an important work. Most people on the right are already aware of most of his discussion, but he puts this information in a categorical form which makes it all make sense and provides facts and figures to support his conclusions.
Highly recommended!!
T:
Yes, it’s an excellent book.
As is The Quest for Cosmic Justice.
Paste any label upon cultists, they remain cultists. Stupid, smart or whatever; its just chatter. IIMO, the subject is a fervent desire to line up and salute the dear leader. That in a nut shell is what is under discussion. We have all been here before. Cut to the chase. Keep it simple. Follow your first principles. obamians or trumpians have no first principles. I have no milliseconds of patience for people without principles grounded in reality, And reality is not up for negotiation.
Evan Sayet explains How Modern Liberals Think (47 minute YouTube video with 723,276 views):
Hows this for stupid?
Lindsey Graham: Army is smallest since 1940, Navy smallest since 1915
and
Russia to test unstoppable ‘Satan 2’ stealth nuke capable of wiping out an ENTIRE NATION
and
China Successfully Tests Hypersonic Missile
Seventh test of new DF-ZF glider tracked over northern China (april 2016)
and
Nuclear Smugglers Tried Selling Radioactive Materials To ISIS
and
[the islands do not belong to china]
Marine times
Top Marine: U.S. watching as China militarizes disputed islands
Exclusive: China sends surface-to-air missiles to contested island in provocative move
EXCLUSIVE: China sends fighter jets to contested island in South China Sea
and
Russian jets keep buzzing U.S. ships and planes. What can the U.S. do?
Navy Times
This is why the Navy didn’t shoot down Russian jets
What it looks like when Russian attack jets fly ‘dangerously close’ to a Navy ship
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2016/04/13/russian-air-force-buzzed-u-s-navy-destroyer-repeatedly-in-baltic-sea/
and
Russia’s nuclear doctrine takes an alarming step backwards
the idea of a ‘de-escalation’ strike, which has now been incorporated into Russian nuclear doctrine:
oh, by the way, neo, you did the leftist thing and ignored the differences in word meaning treating things of different meanings as the same, when they are not.
you also left out what used to be called “moral imbiciles” who would do this for reasons other than stupid, but for the actual advantage.
see John Cleese, how to really really really annoy people. (which i have put up before), where he explains that you can demolish others without blame or attack if you just do so under the auspice of helping them…
the kind of thing moral imbeciles would like
you used the term imbicile, stupid person, and others while trying to equate a period in which words were used correctly with now when they are haphazard and considered equivalent when not
Bonhoeffer’s use of the term “stupid person” is probably meant in the same way as “idiot” in the well-known political phrase “useful idiot.”
no… he meant what he said… if you have read a lof of him, as i have, you find that he is a pretty precise speaker. and remember he had insight among others who would have argued that his points were irrelevant, which is why so many jews stayed and died… they were not smart in this, they did not want to see it, they did not want change, and they stayed and died (and to those that clearly see things, staying to die horribly is kind of stupid)
[edited for length by n-n]
We have used an online tool called Nuke Map to sketch out the potential death toll of each weapon if it was dropped on St Paul’s Cathedral in London – and the results are truly horrifying.
http://nuclearsecrecy.com/nukemap/
how stupid can one be to make a new weapons more powerful than russia stalin era bomba which caused the planet to ring like a bell 7-8 times when tested..
i dont know if they have the SATAN II on this application
.
Artfldgr:
Two points (I’m in a hurry).
I did not use the term imbecile. It’s a quote from another source. I actually was careful not to use the term myself.
Too many Jews did not stay. I wrote a long post about this (don’t have time to find it now). Most of the Jews who COULD leave, did. The ones that stayed were mostly very old, taking care of the old, too poor to leave, or had their way blocked for other reasons. Huge numbers left, the ones who could. Some of them got trapped in the countries to which they fled, later on. But the vast majority did not stay of their own free will.
They were not stupid, they were trapped.
“It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.”
― Jonathan Swift
Expat: “More and more people never leave their bubbles to have life experiences that might contradict the message. desegregation of schools was supposed to help this, but it didn’t take long before blacks and white were eating at separate tables and living in separate dorms. Gated communities are another example, as are work places where the right credentials are necessary. How many people have really gotten out of their comfort zone to actually have experiences that might inform them?”
This is an instinct that goers back to our days as tribal hunter gatherers. My grandmother had a saying that applies.
“Birds of a feather flock together, and so do pigs and swine.
Ducks and geese will have their choice, and so will I have mine.”
I first recognized this tribalism when, as a young geologist, I was doing mapping in the Uinta Basin in Utah. There was a Ute Indian reservation in the basin and we would occasionally come across a Ute settlement. They would be groups of crude houses with a nice pick up truck parked in front of each one. I talked with many of the men who came out to see what we were up to. This was 1954. In those days all Indians were sent to boarding schools for an education and many were even sent on to colleges. These Utes were well educated, but they preferred to live in their villages on the reservation. They had big herds of sheep, which provided them with some income, as well as the money that came in from the Federal government every month. They didn’t want to live like white men (though they liked the white man’s trucks), and because they had an income that made them independent, they had a choice.
I live in a community for “active adults” (over 55) and my neighbors are mostly people who were successful in their careers. Yet they are mostly incurious about the world and politics. One fellow I have breakfast with occasionally, will not discuss politics or world affairs. If I mention something in those areas, he becomes agitated and even red-faced as he says, “I don’t want to talk about it. It’s all BS!” I consider him to be and example of someone who is closed minded.
Yes, people don’t like to leave their comfort zones, if they have a choice. Tribalism, closed mindedness, need to identify with some moral cause. etc. We humans have a hard time dealing with instincts that are hard to overcome.
J.J.
Another geologist! Geology is interesting work but hard to make a living at it (at least for me). Diversity (career changes) became a necessity. Coal, geothermal, coal, hydrology/nuclear waste, directional drilling/oil ….. You keep em flying!
OM, my career in geology didn’t last long. A total of 18 months. I was about to be drafted and joined the Navy to avoid being a PFC on KP. The Navy sent me to OCS, where I was, due to the “needs of the service,” sent to Pensacola. It turned out that flying was a good fit for me. I spent the rest of my working life as a pilot – first Navy, then airline.
I have a nephew that is a petroleum engineer. His career has been up and down so much it looks like a stock market chart. In the last few years he has gotten a piece of some production in the Denver – Julesburg Basin. He’s not on easy street yet, but it gives him some stability. Oil will rise again. It was $2 a barrel in 1954 and no one ever thought the price would break $3. 🙂
Neo – FWIW, you convinced me that Bill Clinton didn’t commit perjury. He’s good at skating close to the edge.
Juli:
I’m gratified.
It really IS hard to change anyone’s mind. The perjury thing is a pet peeve of mine, for some reason.
One might think that the internet should have made us smarter–all of that access to information–and in some cases and some ways I suppose it has. But in way too many ways and for way too many people it has helped to make us stupider in the sense that Bonhoeffer used the word.
It made me more wise.
But self educated individuals are probably in the 10-3% bracket of overall statistics for humanity. Right up there with those disobedient to authority on pain of death or the US revolutionaries.
The majority of humans, 68%, are too weak to rule themselves. Thus when you give them the tools of power and knowledge, they don’t know how to use it.