When enough blue-collar workers get canceled because they are too busy doing their hard and valuable to society jobs to bother with the sensitivities of the latest update from the grievance studies departments of the academic elite, they will get together and build a fucking killdozer and the pushback will be diesel-powered.
J. KB
June 29, 2020
When you’ve lost the Atlantic…
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]
As I’ve said before appeasement doesn’t work:
This afternoon, in broad daylight, this happened in downtown Seattle:
NOW: Antifa Militants and Black Lives Matter rioters are breaking into Amazon Go Downtown Seattle. This protest has turned into a riot. #SeattleProtest #AntifaDomesticTerrorists #seattleriots #BlackLivesMatter pic.twitter.com/RH8u56fCGP
— Katie Daviscourt (@KatieDaviscourt) July 19, 2020
And as Joni Job @jj_talking said this afternoon:
I told @amazon they should leave and no matter how much you pay the MOB, they will turn on you. There’s not enough kneeling you can do pic.twitter.com/eHgOmC1lHj
— Joni Job (@jj_talking) July 19, 2020
“There’s not enough kneeling you can do.” I like that.
Capitalism is all about inequity. Communism is about equity. By its nature, capitalism is racist, sexist, discriminatory vs religion, creed and behavior other than greed. It’s easily observed that race and wealth are linked. Capitalism abuses the minority.
Got Doubt @GotDoubt
Tweeted on July 10, 2020
[If we ran the numbers I wouldn’t be surprised if communism actually does achieve a closer approximation to equality of outcome. Hundreds of millions of people are equally dead because of communism.
It is far better that there exist a few hundred billionaires and 10s of thousands of homeless people than 100 million are murdered by their own government each century.
That should be more than sufficient but that’s not the only issue I have with socialism/communism. There is a more fundamental issue I have.
That equality of outcome is presumed as a desirable goal should be challenged whenever it raises its ugly head. Does anyone seriously believe someone who consistently makes extremely poor life choices and ends up homeless, a drug addict, and gravely ill should have the same standard of living as someone who consistently makes good life choices? If so, then I have serious doubts about having sufficient things in common with such a person to enable meaningful communication. They would literally be living in an alternate reality from me.—Joe]
I’ve been looking at the parallels of the cancel culture, riots, and looting of today in the U.S. to other times and places in history.
Numerous times I’ve mentioned Gulag Archipelago both on this blog and in private conversation with my children and others. The survivors of those times wrote of the truth not being “politically correct” and to speak the truth could result you being “reeducated”, sent to a slave labor camp, or being executed. But, as far as I know, they lacked the riots, thuggish mobs, and looting.
In Nazi Germany the removal of all Jews from government jobs and universities warrants at least a mention. The Brown Shirts, thuggish mobs, and looting ignored by the government certainly are a good match for what we are seeing today in some locations. But the removal of people from their jobs wasn’t because of their political beliefs and/or speech.
After reading Bari Weiss’s letter of resignation from the New York Times (via email from Paul K. and Reason Magazine which has a good article on the topic) another potential parallel was brought to my attention. From Weiss’s letter* (emphasis added):
The paper of record is, more and more, the record of those living in a distant galaxy, one whose concerns are profoundly removed from the lives of most people. This is a galaxy in which, to choose just a few recent examples, the Soviet space program is lauded for its “diversity”; the doxxing of teenagers in the name of justice is condoned; and the worst caste systems in human history includes the United States alongside Nazi Germany.
Even now, I am confident that most people at The Times do not hold these views. Yet they are cowed by those who do. Why? Perhaps because they believe the ultimate goal is righteous. Perhaps because they believe that they will be granted protection if they nod along as the coin of our realm—language—is degraded in service to an ever-shifting laundry list of right causes. Perhaps because there are millions of unemployed people in this country and they feel lucky to have a job in a contracting industry.
Or perhaps it is because they know that, nowadays, standing up for principle at the paper does not win plaudits. It puts a target on your back. Too wise to post on Slack, they write to me privately about the “new McCarthyism” that has taken root at the paper of record.
McCarthyism certainly cost a lot of people their jobs (watch The Front, if for nothing other than the credits at the end which are incredibly sobering). And it was about political correctness of a type. But the thuggish mobs, riots, and looting are missing as well as the political persuasion of the villains being anti-Marxist rather than pro-Marist as we have in the circumstances of today.
The fictional dystopia of 1984 could be considered a match in many ways but it takes place deep in the depths of the fierce suppression of speech, written word, and even many thoughts are forbidden. Something closer to our present circumstance and non-fictional is preferable.
I’m left with less than great matches. Sunday evening I suggested to my children they read Gulag Archipelago. Kim eagerly asked for the spelling but Jaime protested that unless it offered a solution then she didn’t want to get even more depressed and upset by our current situation. That’s a valid point. And furthermore, without great parallels how can I shed light on what to expect next or what to suggest as a remedy? And then there are so many variables such as our technology lending itself to vastly superior suppression of free speech than the previous examples. On the other side of that coin is that same technology also can also be a tool for the enabling of free speech and punishment of the evil doers. And, of course, 100s of millions of guns and billions of rounds of ammunition in the possession of the persecuted also is a variable not present in any of the historical scenarios.
The McCarthyism parallel is by far the least tragic of the outcomes, but it is also the worst match so I’m going to dismiss it.
The conclusion am am left with is that the all the reasonably good historical parallels lead to really bad situations. We must do our best to avoid going in that direction.
I keep thinking that with more and more evidence such as Weiss’s letter, the lessons learned from CHAZ/CHOP, and the continuing destruction in other cities, Portland Oregon in particular, that there is a good chance of a political turn around in the November elections. We should work at making a political solution the most likely outcome while ensuring a 2nd Amendment solution is a last resort and crystal clear that if needed it will be used and will be overwhelming successful.
* I intended to extract a paragraph of the letter for a QOTD but nearly every paragraph would have qualified. I would like to suggest you read the entire letter.
They are not ‘liberals’. They are Leftists. The same people who slaughtered over 100 million of their fellows citizens in the last century once the Leftists gained unchallenged power.
Of course, the reason the Left has been working for decades to disarm you is so they can send the leftist-controlled mob to kill you and loot what you worked so hard for. Which means this is all well premeditated.
The Left are not accidentally incompetent, they are not confused, they are not mistaken. They are evil. You are their enemy and they will lie about their intentions until you are defenseless and then they can reveal what they really want to do to you and your family.
Moa
June 29, 2020
Comment to Leftist Lunatics Dox and Threaten Armed St. Louis Couple Who Protected Their Home From Black Lives Matter Mob During Protest
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]
It is not transcendently stupid for the alleged anti-racism rioters to destroy a Lincoln statue, though, to normal people, it looks like the act of drooling morons. Now, a good number of these cesspeople are drooling morons, but that does not change the fact that trashing POTUS #16’s statuary is brilliant.
They have confused their targets – us – by casting off the constraints of coherence.
Oh wait, you thought that these folks were trying to make a point about racism being bad. And you thought, because that’s how those of us who weren’t raised on Instatwitbook, soy, and critical race theory, that if you point out that something is unreasonable then that will cause the person you were instructing to rethink it. After all, trashing some Honest Abe totem in order to illustrate how racism is double-plus-ungood is about a “12” on the 1-10 scale of unreasonability. And yet, you can point that out all day and they don’t care.
In fact, they laugh at you for doing so.
It’s not about making sense. It never was. It’s about making you kneel.
Kurt Schlichter
July 2, 2020
Stop Making Sense
[Just the other day I posted Not a contradiction which is somewhat related.
Some of his advice is similar to mine about not appeasing the terrorists (see also here and here):
So how do we beat them?
Step one is to understand the nature of the fight. It’s not one of right and wrong, though that’s how they like to disguise it. It is one of power. Give them nothing. Concede nothing. Stop trying to be reasonable with people who think a reasonable compromise is just impoverishing and disenfranchising you instead of stashing you in a gulag or worse.
Read the rest of his advice.—Joe]
If Trump is a Hatemongering, Evil, Racist and a Nazi
Then why aren’t his followers the ones Killing Cops, Destroying Statues, Looting Stores and Assulting Innocent Bystanders?
↤ℝ ™ ᎷᏗᎶᏗᎷᎧᎷ @__Kimberly1
Tweeted on July 8, 2020
[Good question.—Joe]
Via a Toot by Matthew Bracken @Matt_Bracken who also commented:
100% spot-on message.
The cowardly cucks of corporate America are selling out to the Communists, hoping they will be spared.
They won’t.
I’ve been saying essentially the same thing.
It is not the truth of Marxism that explains the willingness of intellectuals to believe it, but the power that it confers on intellectuals, in their attempts to control the world. And since, as Swift says, it is futile to reason someone out of a thing that he was not reasoned into, we can conclude that Marxism owes its remarkable power to survive every criticism to the fact that it is not a truth-directed but a power-directed system of thought.
Sir Roger Scruton
2006
A Political Philosophy: Arguments for Conservatism
Meme tooted by Tamera @tacsgc July 3, 2020
[See also my blog post The Communist Manifesto.—Joe]
BJ Campbell
July 6, 2018
Game Theory on the “Second Civil War”
[Via daughter Jaime.
Yes. This was published two years ago today.
Read the whole thing.
One of the unspoken takeaways I have from it is that the current violence by the political left, despite the warning by Campbell two years ago, is because of the realization they are losing. One should always change what your doing when you are losing. It may make you lose faster. But it offers a chance of breaking out of a situation you know is lost.—Joe]
I like it when Congress wears masks. Most of them should be ashamed to show their faces, and if you plan to rob the public, it helps to dress for the part.
Scott Adams @ScottAdamsSays
Tweeted on May 16, 2020
[I’m reminded of some other quotes:
There is no distinctly native American criminal class except Congress.
-Mark Twain-
The difference between death and taxes is death doesn’t get worse every time
Congress meets.-Will Rogers-
The little boy who goes to the store for his mother and forgets what she sent
him for must grow up to be a Congressman.-Unknown-
The new Congressmen say they’re going to turn the government around. I
hope I don’t get run over again.-Unknown-
And finally:
The Bill of Rights went too far. They should have stopped with “Congress
shall make no law.”-Unknown-
I wouldn’t be so hard on Congress if they would just stay within the bounds of the U.S. Constitution. That they don’t means they are criminals and should be treated as such.
I view the failure to not have consequences for politicians overstepping their authority the single greatest fault of our constitution. I would like to see something like every time one of the laws they voted for was declared unconstitutional meant another five years was added to their prison sentence and a $1000/day fine for every day the law was in effect. It wouldn’t be a perfect solution but it would be better than what we fail to have now.—Joe]
Ask yourself this. If some person was standing in front of you calling you a racist. Would you believe them? Now, between you and the person saying something like that. Who is better trained at arms? You going to let that person hurt you or your family? Especially with no police to restrain you? Americans are only going to play this game so long. Their not buying all those guns and ammo to make a profit on a shortage. They understand full well. I don’t think the AOC’s of the world do.
The only nightmares I have lately is of my gun jamming.
MTHead
June 29, 2020
Comment to Quote of the day—J. KB
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]
The list of terms that the DIE (“Diversity,” “Inclusion,” and “Equity”) industry has manipulated into a specialist meaning that is quite different than the meanings it knows people will assume of them is now quite substantial and familiar: “racism” means “systemic racism,” which doesn’t even require a single racist person or intention, “anti-racism” is some kind of cultish commitment to a lifelong process of activism outlined by these very consultants, “hate speech” is that which disagrees with the consultants’ views of how to “help” people it has defined into perpetual “marginalization” and “oppression,” and “privilege” is whatever quasi-spiritual force that makes a white homeless drug addict whose mental illness is driving him to the brink of suicide richer than Oprah Winfrey, Michael Jordan, and Barack Obama all put together. And even here, in the specialist jargon, is a kind of cruel and abusive manipulation: What are you, stupid? Don’t you even know the definition of “racism”?!
James Lindsay
June 28, 2020
The Diversity Delusion
[Via daughter Jaime.
The infestation of the corporate world by those who would dictate the very thoughts we are allowed to have is increasing. We have passed through the gate into Animal Farm where some animals are more equal than other animals and just around the corner is The Gulag Archipelago.
Respond appropriately.—Joe]
The parallels line up.
Moderate and conservative, well-intentioned white people are the new Jews.
We Jews have leveled up to super-hated status.
And in the halls of academia and Leftist media/activism, it’s 1934.
We know what comes next and it is going to suck.
Via Far Right Of Right@FarRightOfRight:
If you think this is a contradiction you probably made the mistake of thinking they were telling the truth when they said you don’t need guns because you have the police. As we have known for decades they have a culture of lies and deception.
With that established fact in mind we can generate hypothesizes and test them against the facts. If we include the newly established fact that they want to defund and abolish the police as we know it what can it mean?
The hypothesis which seems to best fit the data is our political opponents wish to harm us and/or take our property.
I’ve been collecting examples of “They want you dead” for some time now. The recent looting demonstrates the validity of the “they wish to take our property”. That they wanted us disarmed and dependent upon the police followed by defunding the police demonstrates not a contradiction, but consistency with this hypothesis.
Are there other hypothesizes which match the data? Are there other data points which invalidate my hypothesis?
Discuss. Then take appropriate action. Consider preparing for Boomershoot 2021. Sign up is here.
Via Tamera@tacsgc:
There is more than a little truth in this.
In contrast to the above read:Grace Canceled: How Outrage is Destroying Lives, Ending Debate, and Endangering Democracy by Dana Loesch:
If you have watched any of her NRA videos you might wonder, “What contrast?”
She claims she has been working on taming her inner beast (not her words).
I really liked the subtitle of the book and while I thought her previous books I had read were a little bit simplistic I found them spot on with the facts and having some good points to take away. I should have had a clue with “Grace” in the title that there was a going to be a lot of religion in the book. As an atheist I found the religious basis for her thesis a little annoying. But I found I could agree with most of her conclusions without agreeing with the path she arrived at them.
Extrapolating a bit beyond her stated conclusions I arrived at the take away, “Getting angry and matching the enemies of freedom with tit-for-tat isn’t the best approach.” It’s not good for our psychological wellbeing and it’s not good for our cause. We have the law and the police on our side. It may seem to be a longer path but with all things considered it may not be. Don’t let them make you angry. Any action you take should be with a cool head. Your actions will be judged by others with cool heads.
We are in the middle of a civil war. It’s not really a war for control of territory or resources. It’s a war for the hearts and minds of the people in this country. The pointless destruction and physically assaults on people do not win hearts and minds. The prosecution of the terrorists will win hearts and minds. Encourage and enable those prosecutions.
Heinlein’s Crazy Years got nuthin’ on us. His pastors ate clay sandwiches. We’ve got the crazocracy. His fictional society recovered and achieved space flight. We won’t have the education, technology, or resources to redevelop the automobile because they’re all “racist.”
Our future will look a lot more like Anthem than RAH’s “future history.”
Carl “Bear” Bussjaeger
June 24, 2020
HEINLEIN WAS AN OPTIMIST
[Both Heinlein and Rand references in one great quote. Few will fully understand and they will puzzle at it’s meaning until they spend many hours reading the books. Sorry about that.
I post this anyway, knowing that only 25%, at best, will fully appreciate it with additional effort. But the enthusiasm of those the get it on the first pass will be awesome.—Joe]
Why do I even worry about some silly little statues coming down or some silly little street names changing? Why do I care?
It is because the last time I didn’t care about this, I was a teenager. I have already lived through this thing when I was living in Venezuela. Statues came down — Chavez didn’t want that history displayed. And then he changed the street names. Then came the [school curricula]. Then some movies couldn’t be shown, then certain TV channels, and so on and so forth.
You guys think this can’t happen to you, I’ve heard it so many times. But always be on guard. Never believe something can’t happen to you. You’ve got to defend your country and your society or it will be destroyed.
We didn’t believe it could happen to us. Most Venezuelans — Cubans warned us — and we were like, ‘This is Venezuela, we know about freedom. That’s not going to happen here.’ Yet it happened. And there are literally a lot of people wanting to destroy the U.S.
Elizabeth Rogliani
June 22, 2020
‘Statues coming down’ is a big deal, Venezuelan actress warns
[The high these thugs get from destroying statues and buildings will fade and they will only be able to obtain that same high by escalation. If they are not stopped soon mass murder will be soon be required to sate their desires.
If you think things are happening fast now, don’t ever forget that in Rwandan things went from moderate tension to mass murder in 30 minutes*. The murders occurred at an average rate of about 8,000 per day for about 100 days. This sustained rate exceeded that of Nazi Germany with their gas chambers.
Hutu militiamen boasted they could kill 3,000 people an hour.**
We live in extremely “interesting” times. Prepare yourself.—Joe]
* Rwanda’s Genocide 1994—Supplement to Lethal Laws by Jay Simkin, Aaron Zelman, and Alan M. Rice page 10:
The UN reports that, “less than half an hour after the plane crash occurred, roadblocks manned by Hutu militiamen, often assisted by gendarmerie or military personnel, were set up at which the identiy cards of passers-by were checked and Tutsis were taken aside and killed137.
137. UN Documents, pp. 37-38.
** Ibid, page 1.
Via daughter Kim:
Oregon county issues face mask order that exempts non-white people
Lincoln County, Oregon, has exempted non-white people from a new order requiring that face coverings be worn in public.
That was on June 16th.
Yesterday they revised the order:
Facing a torrent of “racist commentary,” Oregon’s Lincoln County has amended its exemption of non-white people from a new order that requires face coverings to be worn in public, according to a report.
How could they imagine such an order would pass a legal challenge? What if it had been that only women must cover their faces? Or only black people? Haven’t these people heard of equal rights?
Or is it they think of Animal Farm as a guidebook rather than a dystopian novel where some people are more equal than others?
We live in interesting times.
The ballot measure would repeal Proposition 209 (1996), which added the following provision to the California Constitution: “The State shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in the operation of public employment, public education, or public contracting.”
Just to make this completely clear, from the same web page:
A “yes” vote supports this constitutional amendment to repeal Proposition 209 (1996), which prohibited the state from discriminating against or granting preferential treatment to persons on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in public employment, public education, and public contracting.
A “no” vote opposes this constitutional amendment, thereby keeping Proposition 209 (1996), which prohibited the state from discriminating against or granting preferential treatment to persons on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin in public employment, public education, and public contracting.
And from Steve Miller @SteveMillerOC:
The California legislature has now voted to strike these words from our state constitution:
“The state shall not discriminate against, or grant preferential treatment to, any individual or group on the basis of race, sex, color, ethnicity, or national origin.”
I’m speechless.
We live in interesting times.
