Archives For conservatism

Around the same time, a New York University psychologist, Jonathan Haidt, was formulating a theory about why liberals and conservatives have such a hard time productively conversing.

After mucking around in a lot of survey data, he came up with this basic idea: Liberals and people of the left underpin their politics with moral concerns about harm and fairness; they are driven by the imperative to help the vulnerable and see justice done. Conservatives and people of the right value these things as well but have several additional moral touchstones — loyalty, respect and sanctity. They value in-group solidarity, deference to authority, and the protection of purity in mind and body. To liberals, those sincerely held values can look a lot like, in Dr. Haidt’s words, “xenophobia, authoritarianism and Puritanism.” This asymmetry is the fountainhead of mutual incomprehension and disdain.

A pretty fair and balanced take on affirmative action.

We should insist on procedural justice — which is to say, we should insist on the rule of law and on the equality of all people before it. But we ought not allow that insistence to be a bunker into which we retreat when we do not wish to think too hard about the real social and economic distance between black Americans and white Americans. The fact that we passed a new set of rules in 1964 is not in itself an accounting for what came before or an answer to what has happened since.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/450124/campus-affirmative-action-rule-law-must-trump-social-justice

You can make of the recent transformation of the United State’s morality what you may, however I can only deduce that it doesn’t bode well for the future. I did find the low approval of extramarital affairs to be interesting as I thought it would be higher. The fact that these acts are rapidly becoming morally permissible in the minds of the people  is pretty incredible and even more incredible are that these changes are occurring in less than two decades. Perhaps at the very least people can now visibly recognize that there is not a clear consensus on several contentious moral issues.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/210542/americans-hold-record-liberal-views-moral-issues.aspx?g_source=Social+Issues&g_medium=newsfeed&g_campaign=tiles

This research paper empirically espouses what I believed to be basic common knowledge which is the tendency for both conservative and liberals to be equally biased. From the study we can deduce that the myth of conservatives being more stooped in bias is largely perpetuated by liberals stranglehold on media and education institutions. Because these institutions are selective in hiring and require peer reviews to submit work they have become the perfect echo chambers for homogeneous ideological beliefs to thrive in this case liberal beliefs. The best solutions in combating scientific bias are to remove the safety blinders by seeking dissimilar fact sources, scrutinizing information from multiple sources, and to refrain from simply accepting fact on the basis that it confirms your bias.

 

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2952510

I recently had the pleasure of listening to a Roaming Millennial stream in which she and another libertarian conversed with two white ethno nationalists concerning the concepts of white nationalism and their desires for a white ethno state in the United States. This brought about several different feelings upon hearing these views articulated from confusion to laughter as I attempted to grasp this strange and intellectually bereft world view. I have since been doing some digging in this strange microcosm of the Alt-Right and feel compelled to set the record straight when it comes to these ideas by drawing the lines between nuance and blind ideological ignorance. I have decided to compile a short list of some talking points along with my own personal analysis as to why this particular world view ignores historical precedent and is delusional in its attempt to grasp a utopian image of certain cultures.

I feel it is pertinent to state that my genetic ancestry and upbringing don’t lead me to agree with the world views being espoused by white nationalists. Despite my DNA consisting of 52% white DNA, I am under no delusions that I am acceptable to such people particularly those who grew up in the United States. In fact on multiple occasions I have seen ethno nationalists declare that it is mixed people such as myself that are the bane of white existence as I am contributing to some mythical “genocide.” Furthermore I have done constant traveling both abroad and domestically which in turn sways my views from a broad more global perspective on origin and nationality. By no means am I a preacher of multiculturalism and diversity. However that being said I tend to weigh both the pros and cons of the different multicultural ideologies and policies. By doing so I believe I am able to view things in a more objective way that is not contingent upon it agreeing with my chosen world view or ideology.

Immigration

Firstly I disagree with the constant reference to all white people in monolithic terms in an effort to play the identity politics game. I do not understand the constant need to collectively group people who would otherwise be opposed historically in the efforts of gaining political power today. Mind you political power and political gains are the crux of the whole white ethno national movement. The ultimate core of the ideology is the hopes that by implementing political action that time can be suddenly reversed along with the present day sociological make up of our present nation states. Now of course to the average learned individual this would appear to be a foolish aim: it is. Not only is reversing such times not feasible but it is not desired by the majority of the populations in question. I often hear white ethno nationalists cite the 1960s as this utopian goal which needs to be achieved. They often lament the immigration of non-white persons that supposedly occurred after this period despite the historical facts showing  overwhelming restrictions upon not only immigrants from Asian and Africa but also Eastern and Southern Europeans. They often characterize the immigration policy as changing to prefer non-white immigrants but that is simply not the case. Immigration in the United States simply evolved from an origin based system for selecting immigrants to a merit based one. A merit based system of immigration is infinitely more American in the constitutional sense than one based on national origin. So why is the influx of immigration from places besides Northern and Western Europe viewed in such a negative light and are there any compelling arguments for why this immigration needs to cease? From my listening to the arguments and further reading I have yet to find a convincing argument for doing away with current immigration practices. Immigrants especially today must be subjected to vetting and meritocratic formulations to be chosen for legal immigration into the United States. I have yet to see any compelling evidence that this population of non-white immigrants to the US are a net negative for American society.

Now lets hypothetically toy around with this ridiculous notion that ethno nationalists have in regards to immigration. Their proposal is for immigration especially for non-whites to simply cease to exist. Not only would this not be in line with American constitutional values but its simply not how America has done things even before the 1960s. Next step on their agenda is for non-white peoples to emigrate to their national countries of origin. For starters this would be a logistical nightmare in which authorities would need to DNA test every individual to determine their origin and level of whiteness. Additionally many immigrants and non-white persons in the United States no longer possess a country of origin to return to and would have no compelling reasons to leave their possessions and adopted homeland. This predicament is never addressed by white nationalists and ethno nationalists. So besides the logistical nightmare that is emigration what are they going to do about the historical implications? Are they going to go as far back as recorded history will allow or are they going to simply pick a time and essentially rewind human history until that time? Who are the deciders of said time and will it only be whites deciding which time period? These questions are not addressed.

Racial Hatred

I found it utterly ridiculous when I heard some white ethno nationalists attempt to classify the emotion of hate as not only a naturally occurring emotion, which granted it is, but rather its also a justifiable one. It is incredibly mind numbing to believe such brain twisting takes place where people take a negative emotion like hatred that is proven to be psychologically degenerative and destructive and attempt to paint it as justifiable manifestations of pride. I suppose their line of reasoning is that because our modern cosmopolitan societies involve different ethnicities living in close proximity to one another then this hatred to other ethnicities is not only inevitable but righteous hatred. Naturally this line of thinking is not only absurd but ignores the personal responsibility of the individual to choose to partake in our civilized society by observing the constitution. While I can understand being upset at certain policies and ideologies that can be viewed as threatening particularly left/progressive ideologies, I can not understand the intellectual leap that needs to take place from simply combating poor policy directives to moving on to such extreme and indefensible far right positions.

Often I see white ethno nationalists quoting DOJ crime statistics but naturally they only employ the use of statistics that support their narratives which are 1. that blacks are violent and 2. that violence would decrease if the ethnicities would not mix together. This of course is not only categorically false but dishonest in its analysis of statistical data. Yes the black community deals with a violence and crime issue but that is in large part due to the cultural implications in particular areas of the black community. This might blow a lot of ethno nationalists minds but not all blacks are the same culturally despite constantly being group into a monolith for political purposes. The blacks particularly in the south are the ones who are more violent than say ones from the northeast and in large part that is due to blacks adopting the predominant Scot-Irish culture post-civil war which is tribalistic and views violence as a solution to quarrels. This view can also be found in the Mongol and Arab cultures as well as the Scot-Irish and therefore is not unique to American blacks. But naturally I wouldn’t expect a ethno nationalist to grasp the nuance that needs to take place when distinguishing peoples cultures and of course they won’t acknowledge the negative aspects of the adopted Scot-Irish culture, a white culture.

Mixed Races

The ideas in regards to race mixing were rather archaic and arbitrary. They basically believe that all miscegenation laws would need to be put back into effect and that all mixed individuals would need to essentially pick a side. As a mixed individual I can say with complete confidence that these ethno nationalists and white nationalists are incapable of grasping the complexity that makes up an individual’s personal identity, especially if that individual is of mixed ethnic ancestry. They appear incapable of understanding how an individual would not feel torn internally simply because a certain ethnic group is unwilling to accept a mixed individual into their ethnic enclave. Whether a person is accepted or not is largely not up to that individual and therefore a mixed individual is largely at peace with their identity because how they are received is mainly not something that is controllable from the outside. I can’t control whether a person views me as white, asian, or black so why bother fretting over such trivialities?

 

Anyway these are my initial thoughts from delving into this bizarre subculture of nationalists. I imagine I will be writing more on the subject as I see fit and if I find points that need refuting. I can empathize with the feelings of ethno nationalists but the methods and desires which go in the face of reality are not something I can take seriously.

Milo’s comments about pedophilia made me feel sorry for him