What Leftism Does to People

[Luissa]

Last Monday, Andrew Klaven offered a mini essay that is particularly pertinent at this time of history given the social upheavals witnessed across the country.

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil, I think there are some people who will actually consider whether he is right. Or whether his thesis is flawed and why.

The emphasis is mine and I took some liberties with the paragraphing hoping to make the text more readable.

Why the heck do you "expect" to engage in civil discourse when you put up hyperbolic and insulting tripe like this?

This is really just spoiling for a fight. In other words..trolling.

Trolling? If it is trolling, wouldn't you think at least one leftist would have come up with an argument to challenge Klaven's thesis? At least one leftist would have had a thought about why the thesis is incorrect rather than accuse me of trolling or slinging insults at whomever? But after repeated requests, alas, not even a nibble re the topic.

And civility is impossible if those on opposite sides of the issue disagree?

I really find that sad.

But the further the thread goes, yes some on the right are engaging in the inevitable food fight too, but the more the leftists are demonstrating Klaven's thesis.

The fact that the straw poll is running 5 to 1 in agreement with Klaven's thesis should illustrate pretty clearly that there is something to say for the thesis.

To be fair, I don't think you were trolling.
I do think the article was a little biased, and based how he feels about leftism. And like I said he has a point in a limited way.
I think the man should look at history and see how most societies react when they feel oppressed. When the poor feel like they are being oppressed more often than not they will tend to go towards a left way of thinking. In reality most of the OWS is probably not ultra left, but they are the ones people are choosing to listen to. My biggest problem with them, is the normal people who just want corporate america to no longer go unchecked, but do not want to get rid of capitalism do not raise their voice. The movement is what we need, but they need a better message.

 

[Foxfyre]

Why the heck do you "expect" to engage in civil discourse when you put up hyperbolic and insulting tripe like this?

This is really just spoiling for a fight. In other words..trolling.

Trolling? If it is trolling, wouldn't you think at least one leftist would have come up with an argument to challenge Klaven's thesis? At least one leftist would have had a thought about why the thesis is incorrect rather than accuse me of trolling or slinging insults at whomever? But after repeated requests, alas, not even a nibble re the topic.

And civility is impossible if those on opposite sides of the issue disagree?

I really find that sad.

But the further the thread goes, yes some on the right are engaging in the inevitable food fight too, but the more the leftists are demonstrating Klaven's thesis.

The fact that the straw poll is running 5 to 1 in agreement with Klaven's thesis should illustrate pretty clearly that there is something to say for the thesis.

To be fair, I don't think you were trolling.
I do think the article was a little biased, and based how he feels about leftism. And like I said he has a point in a limited way.
I think the man should look at history and see how most societies react when they feel oppressed. When the poor feel like they are being oppressed more often than not they will tend to go towards a left way of thinking. In reality most of the OWS is probably not ultra left, but they are the ones people are choosing to listen to. My biggest problem with them, is the normal people who just want corporate america to no longer go unchecked, but do not want to get rid of capitalism do not raise their voice. The movement is what we need, but they need a better message.

Thank you, but again Klaven is very well schooled in history. If you did read the whole essay there was also a link to his bio which is quite impressive. How societies in the past have behaved is irrelevent to the fact that it is those on the left who behave as the Occupy groups do while those on the right are well mannered, well behaved, and do not violate the rights and property of others.

Those in the Tea Party are absolutely angry, frustrated, many are out of work due to no fault of their own, and are making a statement that they are mad as hell and they aren't going to take it any more. So why aren't they as violent, disruptive, and disrespectful of others as is the Occupy groups?

If that is bias it is informed bias and it is a valid social phenomenon to explore.

(And according to his bio in Wikipedia, he identifies himself as a liberal. )

If the Occupy groups want corporate America to not be allowed to go unchecked, they should be picketing Congress and the White House don't you think? What good does it do to picket in the places where they are doing all the damage? However, I have not seen a single interview in which anybody in the Occupy group knew why he or she was protesting, who he or she was protesting, or what they wanted done.

 

[Luissa]

Trolling? If it is trolling, wouldn't you think at least one leftist would have come up with an argument to challenge Klaven's thesis? At least one leftist would have had a thought about why the thesis is incorrect rather than accuse me of trolling or slinging insults at whomever? But after repeated requests, alas, not even a nibble re the topic.

And civility is impossible if those on opposite sides of the issue disagree?

I really find that sad.

But the further the thread goes, yes some on the right are engaging in the inevitable food fight too, but the more the leftists are demonstrating Klaven's thesis.

The fact that the straw poll is running 5 to 1 in agreement with Klaven's thesis should illustrate pretty clearly that there is something to say for the thesis.

To be fair, I don't think you were trolling.
I do think the article was a little biased, and based how he feels about leftism. And like I said he has a point in a limited way.
I think the man should look at history and see how most societies react when they feel oppressed. When the poor feel like they are being oppressed more often than not they will tend to go towards a left way of thinking. In reality most of the OWS is probably not ultra left, but they are the ones people are choosing to listen to. My biggest problem with them, is the normal people who just want corporate america to no longer go unchecked, but do not want to get rid of capitalism do not raise their voice. The movement is what we need, but they need a better message.

Thank you, but again Klaven is very well schooled in history. If you did read the whole essay there was also a link to his bio which is quite impressive. How societies in the past is irrelevent to the fact that it is those on the left who behave as the Occupy groups do while those on the right are well mannered, well behaved, and do not violate the rights and property of others.

Those in the Tea Party are absolutely angry, frustrated, many are out of work due to no fault of their own, and are making a statement that they are mad as hell and they aren't going to take it any more. So why aren't they as violent, disruptive, and disrespectful of others as the Occupy group?

If that is bias it is informed bias and it is a valid social phenomenon to explore.

I understand he is well schooled in history, I am just saying he should look into it, and maybe compare this movement to other movements. People tend to not want certain policies that favor corporations ie conservative ideas when they feel oppressed by them, and when they feel the ultra rich are going unchecked.
Sun Yat Sen and the chinese movement before it was taken over by communist is a prime example of the point I am trying to make if you take out wanting to over throw the government. Which the majority of OWS do not want to do.
And to be fair most in OWS do not want violence which they state often, but in order to get things done you have to be disruptive. Electing officials who just continue down the same road is not being disruptive. Making life hard for corporate america and the establishment has a chance of changing something. If MLK Jr and others had been non disruptive like the Tea party group we would have never experienced change.

 

[Foxfyre]

Klavan starts his essay with this paragraph:

The true test of a philosophy is not what it promises to make of the world but what it makes, in fact, of its adherents. Human nature is remarkably recalcitrant, but ideas do affect people over time, for good or ill, and the societies people make will ultimately bear the image of those effects and thus of the ideas. When historian Paul Johnson, in his book Intellectuals, detailed the often vicious and demented lives of such thinkers as Rousseau, Shelley, and Marx, he was not engaging in casual ad hominem attacks, or playing gotcha with our universal tendencies toward weakness, perversion, and moral failure. He was attempting to trace both the origins and the consequences of his subjects’ philosophical errors. Our beliefs arise from who we are and we become what we believe, a process which, according to our choices, can either resemble a spiral staircase heavenward or a flushing toilet. To him who has, more will be given, and from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

I'm pretty sure he is well aware of the phenomenon as it has played out in history.

And do people have to be disruptive to get things done? The Tea Partiers were not disruptive, not doing anything illegal, and they were careful to be good citizens and good neighbors. And they were not only able to swing the House back to GOP control but did it by mostly electing people who shared their rightwing conservative values--and yes, that would be Classical Liberal values.

So maybe most of the people in the Occupy groups do not seek violence or illegal behavior, but that seems to be happening just the same.

How does a responsible citizen condone people damaging people's businesses, terrorizing neighborhoods, damaging and defacing property, defecating in the street, and generally being rude and insensitive and irresponsible? If most say they didn't want violence, they should have left the premises when the violence started. They didn't.

 

[Bfgrn]

Last Monday, Andrew Klaven offered a mini essay that is particularly pertinent at this time of history given the social upheavals witnessed across the country.

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil, I think there are some people who will actually consider whether he is right. Or whether his thesis is flawed and why.

The emphasis is mine and I took some liberties with the paragraphing hoping to make the text more readable.

Leftism is bad for people. It makes them awful.

The unwashed, ill-mannered, anti-Semitic, entitled, and now violent mobs littering various parts of the nation under the banner “Occupy” believe their ideas will lead to a better society — but they actually are the society their ideas lead to. Their behavior when compared to the polite, law-abiding, non-racist demonstrations of so-called tea partiers tells you everything you need to know about the end results of statism on the one hand and constitutional liberty on the other.

This is not, of course, to say that every left-winger is a miscreant but rather that the natural, indeed inevitable, result of statism is to produce nations of miscreants. When the state is permitted to make the individual’s moral choices, the individual is forced to become either a slave or a criminal; when the state is permitted to redistribute wealth, it chains the citizen into a rigid, two-tiered hierarchy of power rather than freedom’s fluid, multi-layered rankings of merit and chance; when the people are taught to be dependent on entitlements, they are reduced to violence when, inevitably, the entitlement well runs dry; when belief in the state usurps every higher creed, the people become apathetic, hedonistic, and uncreative and their culture slouches into oblivion.

I need hardly expend the energy required to lift my finger and point to Europe where cities burn because the unemployable are unemployed or because the hard-working won’t fund the debts of the indolent; where violent and despicable Islamism eats away portions of municipalities like a cancer while the authorities do nothing; where nations that once produced history’s greatest achievements in science and the arts can now no longer produce even enough human beings to sustain themselves.
Klavan On The Culture » What Leftism Does to People

Andrew Klavan...the guy who compared George W. Bush to Batman?

You know Foxfyre, I've heard similar arguments before, I'm just trying to remember where and when...

Oh, wait...

What Mao Zedong said about liberalism

"Liberalism is extremely harmful in a revolutionary collective. It is a corrosive which eats away unity, undermines cohesion, causes apathy and creates dissension.

It robs the revolutionary ranks of compact organization and strict discipline, prevents policies from being carried through and alienates the Party organizations from the masses which the Party leads. It is an extremely bad tendency."
Combat Liberalism

"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality.

Today Christians stand at the head of our country. I pledge that I will never tie myself to parties who want to destroy Christianity... We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit.... We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press - in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of liberal excess during the past few years."

Adolf Hitler
The Speeches of Adolph Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1 (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pg. 871-872.

 

[Foxfyre]

Last Monday, Andrew Klaven offered a mini essay that is particularly pertinent at this time of history given the social upheavals witnessed across the country.

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil, I think there are some people who will actually consider whether he is right. Or whether his thesis is flawed and why.

The emphasis is mine and I took some liberties with the paragraphing hoping to make the text more readable.

Leftism is bad for people. It makes them awful.

The unwashed, ill-mannered, anti-Semitic, entitled, and now violent mobs littering various parts of the nation under the banner “Occupy” believe their ideas will lead to a better society — but they actually are the society their ideas lead to. Their behavior when compared to the polite, law-abiding, non-racist demonstrations of so-called tea partiers tells you everything you need to know about the end results of statism on the one hand and constitutional liberty on the other.

This is not, of course, to say that every left-winger is a miscreant but rather that the natural, indeed inevitable, result of statism is to produce nations of miscreants. When the state is permitted to make the individual’s moral choices, the individual is forced to become either a slave or a criminal; when the state is permitted to redistribute wealth, it chains the citizen into a rigid, two-tiered hierarchy of power rather than freedom’s fluid, multi-layered rankings of merit and chance; when the people are taught to be dependent on entitlements, they are reduced to violence when, inevitably, the entitlement well runs dry; when belief in the state usurps every higher creed, the people become apathetic, hedonistic, and uncreative and their culture slouches into oblivion.

I need hardly expend the energy required to lift my finger and point to Europe where cities burn because the unemployable are unemployed or because the hard-working won’t fund the debts of the indolent; where violent and despicable Islamism eats away portions of municipalities like a cancer while the authorities do nothing; where nations that once produced history’s greatest achievements in science and the arts can now no longer produce even enough human beings to sustain themselves.
Klavan On The Culture » What Leftism Does to People

Andrew Klavan...the guy who compared George W. Bush to Batman?

You know Foxfyre, I've heard similar arguments before, I'm just trying to remember where and when...

Oh, wait...

What Mao Zedong said about liberalism

"Liberalism is extremely harmful in a revolutionary collective. It is a corrosive which eats away unity, undermines cohesion, causes apathy and creates dissension.

It robs the revolutionary ranks of compact organization and strict discipline, prevents policies from being carried through and alienates the Party organizations from the masses which the Party leads. It is an extremely bad tendency."
Combat Liberalism

"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality.

Today Christians stand at the head of our country. I pledge that I will never tie myself to parties who want to destroy Christianity... We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit.... We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press - in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of liberal excess during the past few years."

Adolf Hitler
The Speeches of Adolph Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1 (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pg. 871-872.

Yes, and Chairman Mao said this in that same essay:

We must use Marxism, which is positive in spirit, to overcome liberalism, which is negative. A Communist should have largeness of mind and he should be staunch and active, looking upon the interests of the revolution as his very life and subordinating his personal interests to those of the revolution; always and everywhere he should adhere to principle and wage a tireless struggle against all incorrect ideas and actions, so as to consolidate the collective life of the Party and strengthen the ties between the Party and the masses; he should be more concerned about the Party and the masses than about any private person, and more concerned about others than about himself. Only thus can he be considered a Communist.

You should know that liberalism almost everywhere else is defined much differently from modern American Liberalism.

And anyway, Klavan was not speaking of liberals as much as leftism. Would you care to make a case that Marxism and Communism is not leftist?

 

[Cowman]

Last Monday, Andrew Klaven offered a mini essay that is particularly pertinent at this time of history given the social upheavals witnessed across the country.

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil, I think there are some people who will actually consider whether he is right. Or whether his thesis is flawed and why.

The emphasis is mine and I took some liberties with the paragraphing hoping to make the text more readable.

Andrew Klavan...the guy who compared George W. Bush to Batman?

You know Foxfyre, I've heard similar arguments before, I'm just trying to remember where and when...

Oh, wait...

What Mao Zedong said about liberalism

"Liberalism is extremely harmful in a revolutionary collective. It is a corrosive which eats away unity, undermines cohesion, causes apathy and creates dissension.

It robs the revolutionary ranks of compact organization and strict discipline, prevents policies from being carried through and alienates the Party organizations from the masses which the Party leads. It is an extremely bad tendency."
Combat Liberalism

"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality.

Today Christians stand at the head of our country. I pledge that I will never tie myself to parties who want to destroy Christianity... We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit.... We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press - in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of liberal excess during the past few years."

Adolf Hitler
The Speeches of Adolph Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1 (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pg. 871-872.

Yes, and Chairman Mao said this in that same essay:

We must use Marxism, which is positive in spirit, to overcome liberalism, which is negative. A Communist should have largeness of mind and he should be staunch and active, looking upon the interests of the revolution as his very life and subordinating his personal interests to those of the revolution; always and everywhere he should adhere to principle and wage a tireless struggle against all incorrect ideas and actions, so as to consolidate the collective life of the Party and strengthen the ties between the Party and the masses; he should be more concerned about the Party and the masses than about any private person, and more concerned about others than about himself. Only thus can he be considered a Communist.

You should know that liberalism almost everywhere else is defined much differently from modern American Liberalism.

And anyway, Klavan was not speaking of liberals as much as leftism. Would you care to make a case that Marxism and Communism is not leftist?

No, Liberal elsewhere is not defined differently from American Liberalism. The only thing different about American Liberalism compared to European Liberalism for example, is that American Liberals tend to be more watered down.

Do you know any Liberal people who live in countries within Europe? If you did, you'd know what I say is exactly true. Whenever they talk about Liberalism in the context of us Americans, it's always about how we're far to the right of them.

You're thinking of things like Democratic Party and Republican Party of other countries. Those are not what they seem like here, and it's differently depending entirely on the country you're talking about.

You are right in saying that Marxism and Communism are leftist however, just like somebody saying Nazism and Imperialism is rightist would also be correct.

However, just because somebody is leftist or rightist, doesn't mean they fall into those corners of the political spectrum.

 

[Bfgrn]

Last Monday, Andrew Klaven offered a mini essay that is particularly pertinent at this time of history given the social upheavals witnessed across the country.

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil, I think there are some people who will actually consider whether he is right. Or whether his thesis is flawed and why.

The emphasis is mine and I took some liberties with the paragraphing hoping to make the text more readable.

Andrew Klavan...the guy who compared George W. Bush to Batman?

You know Foxfyre, I've heard similar arguments before, I'm just trying to remember where and when...

Oh, wait...

What Mao Zedong said about liberalism

"Liberalism is extremely harmful in a revolutionary collective. It is a corrosive which eats away unity, undermines cohesion, causes apathy and creates dissension.

It robs the revolutionary ranks of compact organization and strict discipline, prevents policies from being carried through and alienates the Party organizations from the masses which the Party leads. It is an extremely bad tendency."
Combat Liberalism

"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality.

Today Christians stand at the head of our country. I pledge that I will never tie myself to parties who want to destroy Christianity... We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit.... We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press - in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of liberal excess during the past few years."

Adolf Hitler
The Speeches of Adolph Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1 (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pg. 871-872.

Yes, and Chairman Mao said this in that same essay:

We must use Marxism, which is positive in spirit, to overcome liberalism, which is negative. A Communist should have largeness of mind and he should be staunch and active, looking upon the interests of the revolution as his very life and subordinating his personal interests to those of the revolution; always and everywhere he should adhere to principle and wage a tireless struggle against all incorrect ideas and actions, so as to consolidate the collective life of the Party and strengthen the ties between the Party and the masses; he should be more concerned about the Party and the masses than about any private person, and more concerned about others than about himself. Only thus can he be considered a Communist.

You should know that liberalism almost everywhere else is defined much differently from modern American Liberalism.

And anyway, Klavan was not speaking of liberals as much as leftism. Would you care to make a case that Marxism and Communism is not leftist?

The rest of the world doesn't conform to your parochial indoctrination.

Socialism is liberal. More people (preferably everyone) have some say in how the economy works. Democracy is liberal. More people (preferably everyone) have some say in how the government works. "Democracy," said Marx, "is the road to socialism." He was wrong about how economics and politics interact, but he did see their similar underpinnings.

Communism is conservative. Fewer and fewer people (preferably just the Party Secretary) have any say in how the economy works. Republicans are conservative. Fewer and fewer people (preferably just people controlling the Party figurehead) have any say in how the government works. The conservatives in the US are in the same position as the communists in the 30s, and for the same reason: Their revolutions failed spectacularly but they refuse to admit what went wrong.

Your author spews the stench of judging people with phrases like: "The unwashed, ill-mannered, anti-Semitic, entitled, and now violent mobs littering various parts of the nation. Their behavior when compared to the polite, law-abiding, non-racist demonstrations of so-called tea partiers tells you everything you need to know about the end results of statism on the one hand and constitutional liberty on the other."

Let's look at history ...which group was unwashed, ill-mannered anti-Semitic, and violent mobs littering various parts of the nation.

And which group was polite, law-abiding?

 

[Foxfyre]

So Bfgm, you consider conservatism to be 'selfish' and define Communism, the most unselfish (in theory) form of society ever devised, to be conservative?

Well I'll leave other folks to try to make sense out of that. I'm going to bed.

 

[Bfgrn]

So Bfgm, you consider conservatism to be 'selfish' and define Communism, the most unselfish (in theory) form of society ever devised, to be conservative?

Well I'll leave other folks to try to make sense out of that. I'm going to bed.

You parochial indoctrination won't permit you to see it.

Communism as it was practiced, not in theory, in ultra conservative states like Russia was very selfish. The people did not control the state, the Politburo did.

 

[Luissa]

Klavan starts his essay with this paragraph:

The true test of a philosophy is not what it promises to make of the world but what it makes, in fact, of its adherents. Human nature is remarkably recalcitrant, but ideas do affect people over time, for good or ill, and the societies people make will ultimately bear the image of those effects and thus of the ideas. When historian Paul Johnson, in his book Intellectuals, detailed the often vicious and demented lives of such thinkers as Rousseau, Shelley, and Marx, he was not engaging in casual ad hominem attacks, or playing gotcha with our universal tendencies toward weakness, perversion, and moral failure. He was attempting to trace both the origins and the consequences of his subjects’ philosophical errors. Our beliefs arise from who we are and we become what we believe, a process which, according to our choices, can either resemble a spiral staircase heavenward or a flushing toilet. To him who has, more will be given, and from him who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

I'm pretty sure he is well aware of the phenomenon as it has played out in history.

And do people have to be disruptive to get things done? The Tea Partiers were not disruptive, not doing anything illegal, and they were careful to be good citizens and good neighbors. And they were not only able to swing the House back to GOP control but did it by mostly electing people who shared their rightwing conservative values--and yes, that would be Classical Liberal values.

So maybe most of the people in the Occupy groups do not seek violence or illegal behavior, but that seems to be happening just the same.

How does a responsible citizen condone people damaging people's businesses, terrorizing neighborhoods, damaging and defacing property, defecating in the street, and generally being rude and insensitive and irresponsible? If most say they didn't want violence, they should have left the premises when the violence started. They didn't.

And what have they accomplished?
I have heard the answer they have blocked bills put forth by the left, but what else?
And have they gone against the norm, and really changed anything? Didn't they just start getting paid by corporate America just like everyone else?
Marco Rubio: Campaign Finance/Money - Summary - Senator 2012 | OpenSecrets
Mark Rubio has taken money from Goldman Sachs and the Club for Growth

Rand Paul: Campaign Finance/Money - Summary - Senator 2012 | OpenSecrets
Rand Paul got a direct donation from Koch Industries along with donations from a hedge fund, and quite a bit of money from the coal industry.

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) voiced concern that the new regulations may not be worth the cost to coal companies -- even though pockets of his state have been designated black lung “hot spots” by the federal government.

In a hearing of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pension Committee, Paul also asserted that the number of black lung cases has been on the decline. But according to the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH), in recent years such incidences have in fact been on the rise in certain areas of coal country.

Incidences of black lung disease have generally been on the decline since a 1969 law set the maximum exposure at two milligrams. But in certain areas, particularly in western Virginia and eastern Kentucky, the number of cases has been rising since the late 1990s, according to figures from NIOSH

Rand Paul: Regulating Black Lung Could Be Too Pricey For Big Coal


Like I said, being polite and passive doesn't always get you anywhere. The OWS doesn't want people like Rand Paul for their change, people who just step in line. Change doesn't happen by electing Rubio and Paul. I can continues with more examples if you have a problem with the two I presented.

 

[chanel]

Last Monday, Andrew Klaven offered a mini essay that is particularly pertinent at this time of history given the social upheavals witnessed across the country.

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil, I think there are some people who will actually consider whether he is right. Or whether his thesis is flawed and why.

The emphasis is mine and I took some liberties with the paragraphing hoping to make the text more readable.

Why the heck do you "expect" to engage in civil discourse when you put up hyperbolic and insulting tripe like this?

This is really just spoiling for a fight. In other words..trolling.

Trolling? If it is trolling, wouldn't you think at least one leftist would have come up with an argument to challenge Klaven's thesis? At least one leftist would have had a thought about why the thesis is incorrect rather than accuse me of trolling or slinging insults at whomever? But after repeated requests, alas, not even a nibble re the topic.

And civility is impossible if those on opposite sides of the issue disagree?

I really find that sad.

But the further the thread goes, yes some on the right are engaging in the inevitable food fight too, but the more the leftists are demonstrating Klaven's thesis.

The fact that the straw poll is running 5 to 1 in agreement with Klaven's thesis should illustrate pretty clearly that there is something to say for the thesis.

I agree with the thesis. Many righties on this board have made essentially the same argument. However... It should be noted that the age difference between OWS protesters and the tea party is significant.

From a psychological perspective, it makes sense that young people would be drawn to leftist ideals, because they are more self-centered and fearful about leaving the nest. Big daddy government can take care of them when mommy and daddy have said "enough".

Older Americans are more experienced, worldly, and seek satisfaction through productivity. Integrity replaces selfishness.

Developmental psychologists are debating the concept of "emerging adulthood". "It primarily applies to young adults in developed countries who do not have children, do not live in their own home, or have a substantial income to become fully independent in their early to late 20's. 30 is when you are considered fully grown. That emerging adulthood is a new demographic is contentious, as some[2] believe that twenty-somethings have always struggled with "identity exploration, instability, self-focus, and feeling in-between."[3]

Emerging adulthood - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The "group think" phenomenon that is surfacing at these protests, certainly suggests that the 20 somethings are lost souls longing for purpose and belonging. And the radicals there will offer them the world. Literally.

 

[jillian]

Trolling? If it is trolling, wouldn't you think at least one leftist would have come up with an argument to challenge Klaven's thesis? At least one leftist would have had a thought about why the thesis is incorrect rather than accuse me of trolling or slinging insults at whomever? But after repeated requests, alas, not even a nibble re the topic.

And civility is impossible if those on opposite sides of the issue disagree?

I really find that sad.

But the further the thread goes, yes some on the right are engaging in the inevitable food fight too, but the more the leftists are demonstrating Klaven's thesis.

The fact that the straw poll is running 5 to 1 in agreement with Klaven's thesis should illustrate pretty clearly that there is something to say for the thesis.

why would anyone take you seriously when you're calling people who disagree with you "leftists" and making up silly premises? many of the people on the left are quite intelligent... far moreso than the high five slap on the back "rightists" who flood this board with nonsense.

maybe *that* is why no one is taking you seriously. i have nothing personally against you. i think your heart is in the right place.

but not understanding how silly and offensive nonsense like this is doesn't speak well of you.

 

[Ravi]

Last Monday, Andrew Klaven offered a mini essay that is particularly pertinent at this time of history given the social upheavals witnessed across the country.

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil, I think there are some people who will actually consider whether he is right. Or whether his thesis is flawed and why.

The emphasis is mine and I took some liberties with the paragraphing hoping to make the text more readable.

Leftism is bad for people. It makes them awful.

The unwashed, ill-mannered, anti-Semitic, entitled, and now violent mobs littering various parts of the nation under the banner “Occupy” believe their ideas will lead to a better society — but they actually are the society their ideas lead to. Their behavior when compared to the polite, law-abiding, non-racist demonstrations of so-called tea partiers tells you everything you need to know about the end results of statism on the one hand and constitutional liberty on the other.

This is not, of course, to say that every left-winger is a miscreant but rather that the natural, indeed inevitable, result of statism is to produce nations of miscreants. When the state is permitted to make the individual’s moral choices, the individual is forced to become either a slave or a criminal; when the state is permitted to redistribute wealth, it chains the citizen into a rigid, two-tiered hierarchy of power rather than freedom’s fluid, multi-layered rankings of merit and chance; when the people are taught to be dependent on entitlements, they are reduced to violence when, inevitably, the entitlement well runs dry; when belief in the state usurps every higher creed, the people become apathetic, hedonistic, and uncreative and their culture slouches into oblivion.

I need hardly expend the energy required to lift my finger and point to Europe where cities burn because the unemployable are unemployed or because the hard-working won’t fund the debts of the indolent; where violent and despicable Islamism eats away portions of municipalities like a cancer while the authorities do nothing; where nations that once produced history’s greatest achievements in science and the arts can now no longer produce even enough human beings to sustain themselves.
Klavan On The Culture » What Leftism Does to People

I read this twice because it seemed familiar. Not plagiarized, but the general drift of the message.

Then I got the brilliant idea to substitute Jew for Left in your C&Ped little rant and I realized that it sounded like something straight out of Nazi Germany.

Some things never change, and demonizing people is one of those things.

Good work on declaring yourself the victim in your opening paragraphs.

 

[editec]

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil....

Nice job keeping things reasonable civil, there FF.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Really cool.....

My favorite part

.When the state is permitted to make the individual’s moral choices, the individual is forced to become either a slave or a criminal;

No wonder everyone fears Libruls

The irony is, that sort of statement is being cheered by a bunch of people who loudly proclaim their moral allegiances and subservience by thumping an ancient book that decided their morality for them.

 

[Harry Dresden]

You're not very familiar with California, are you?

no im not.....i have just been living here since 1967.....and work in a Liberal Democrat Unionized place.....where the majority have voiced their opinion on gay marriage many a time......and the AMERICAN Latino Males i live among have also voiced their opinions enough with me .....now how long have you lived here?....

Longer than you.
Southern California, especially Orange County, is very right wing.

yea oh its so right wing that all these Democrats here in OC just adhere to Republican policies.....Orange County is no longer very Right Wing Junky......your still back in the 70's.....come forward to the Present......and im sure the "Right Wing Loons" in OC were the ones who swayed the vote.....this State is highly on the Democratic side of the coin and much more Liberal than Conservative.....the Gay marriage thing should have passed the first time it was voted on and it most Defiantly should have passed the second time around by a good margin.....it did not.......your problem just like your boyfriend Dean is,you cant except that MANY Democrats can not get behind the idea of two people of the same sex marrying......they might tell you they do to your face,like they told the Gays here.....but when they get to the voting booth their true feelings came out......deal with it Junky....when it comes to Gay Marriage Rights,your side is not much different than the other side.....apparently....

 

[Harry Dresden]

I'd feel better about conservatives if their facts weren't all misinformed Rush/Fox/Pubcrappe and they weren't brainwashed Rush/Foxbots/haters...

Translated: I would feel better about conservatives if they would all just start thinking like me.

No, read my signature. FACTS dittoheads DON"T know, and BS they do think they know as true. All documented. Very bad citizens- love being brainwashed haters...change the channel.

your just as brainwashed Frankie.....people who throw blankets over everyone for the acts of a few sure as hell are not logical thinkers....maybe you should try another channel.....

 

[Sallow]

Last Monday, Andrew Klaven offered a mini essay that is particularly pertinent at this time of history given the social upheavals witnessed across the country.

I fully expect the numbnuts, wingnuts, and dingbats to immediately condemn his thesis and probably some right wingnuts will immediately applaud it without thinking.

But if we could keep this reasonably civil, I think there are some people who will actually consider whether he is right. Or whether his thesis is flawed and why.

The emphasis is mine and I took some liberties with the paragraphing hoping to make the text more readable.

Why the heck do you "expect" to engage in civil discourse when you put up hyperbolic and insulting tripe like this?

This is really just spoiling for a fight. In other words..trolling.

Trolling? If it is trolling, wouldn't you think at least one leftist would have come up with an argument to challenge Klaven's thesis? At least one leftist would have had a thought about why the thesis is incorrect rather than accuse me of trolling or slinging insults at whomever? But after repeated requests, alas, not even a nibble re the topic.

And civility is impossible if those on opposite sides of the issue disagree?

I really find that sad.

But the further the thread goes, yes some on the right are engaging in the inevitable food fight too, but the more the leftists are demonstrating Klaven's thesis.

The fact that the straw poll is running 5 to 1 in agreement with Klaven's thesis should illustrate pretty clearly that there is something to say for the thesis.

What thesis? This is an indictment.

The "left" in this country was responsible for the revolution, the constitution, religious freedom, freeing slaves, women's rights, civil rights, a strong military, the middle class, innovation, infrastructure, labor rights, clean air, clean water, and heck..just about anything that makes this nation a super power.

Left to the right, we'd be an English colony and a backwater.

There's nothing to refute here.

 

[NYcarbineer]

And do people have to be disruptive to get things done?

You managed to get through school without learning the history of the United States of America? Amazing.

I can imagine your statement above appearing in a Boston newspaper editorial, sometime shortly after the Boston Tea Party.