Lord save us from journalists and patriots.
You realize Trump could have seized DC with his rioters? He decided not to, because he is/was a patriot. Seizing power through the sine qua non of democratic processes, literally to a T the way the Founding Fathers seized power, would have been to betray America's democratic principles. If we stop equivocating it turns out ignorant red voters wanted less Fascism, but Trump is a loyal Fascist and it was his duty to stop them from betraying themselves like that. His protest was white and it would have been racist, see. Friends don't let friends do the r.
Incidentally this is why the Cathedral is freaking out about said riot. Trump has exposed a fatal weakness to the world. All that remains now is for some enterprising mid-level aristocrat to whip up a mob and exploit it. (High-level aristos already knew about the weakness.)
We get used to seeing mobs as somewhat impotent, largely confined to looting undefended stores. Sure they cause hundreds of billions in damage, but only because the police have been explicitly ordered not to stop them. When it's a red-state mob, this is not the case. Imagine the mob where Rittens is an average member.
Anyway, let's talk context.
Jack is a Lord. Highly ranked, maybe even a duke, though I doubt it. You can tell because he built a company.
Twitter has around 5000 employees. You need at least 50 lords to manage 5000 peasants. Jack has maybe three lords including himself.
To run 5000 peasants properly as a single unit, at minimum Jack would need 50 squires or knights, plus two barons managing 25 knights each, plus a count or margrave or something to keep the barons yoked together and reporting properly to Jack. If any layer is not properly hierarchical in such a way, the high-status subordinate will merely end up topping from the bottom, essentially isolating their department from the CEO.
Jack, however, is a Fascist. He has no idea that leaders are born, not made. He thinks if he hires smart enough cows they can learn not to be herd animals, and that's exactly what he tried. Not that he had a real choice, given that there aren't 50 available lords. He would have had to choke his company down to the available lords; simply not allowing it to expand.
Result: some of the psycho lords inside USG noticed all these loose peasants and casually mind-controlled some key figures. The peasants couldn't possibly do what Jack wanted them to do because there aren't enough hours in the day for Jack to tell them all what to do. In particular, the censors were seized, in accordance with Roman tradition. Or rather, the psycho lords had agents mind-control the peasants on their behalf. It wouldn't do for mere employees to get ideas above their station due to regularly speaking to those with real power. Secrecy is also an issue. Have to have at least one sacrificial cutout in case Assange or someone exposes the racket.
Aside: it's plainly obvious Jack wants out, and if you can explain to me why he doesn't just quit, I would greatly appreciate it.
I shouldn't (but probably do) have to point out that this model is specific and easily falsified. You can cast my description as functions with certain unknown variables, and go looking for the missing variables. Track down the censors at Twitter. (Or Facebook.) Track down who they consider to be 'thought leaders'. Track down who gives marching orders to the thought leaders. If any of the dynamics aren't as I described, it will become immediately obvious.
In short it's not a shamanistic model. This is [stage direction], not thaumaturgy. As such, I learned something today. Moldbug is a little shamanistic, but not consistently enough to do it properly. He's super chuffed about the anima called the Official Press, and quite happy to let it summon historical poltergeists to throw things around without any noticeable agent interaction.
Apparently, the Press has power, which it uses according to hunger.
Somehow, China and Russia's press aren't subject to any of the nonsense that Moldbug ascribes to the Press. Apparently Russian journalists don't suffer from thymos? What privilege!
The Press attacked Trump's riot. Because it wasn't secured. Sure. I can agree.
The Press didn't attack BLM riots. Because they were secured. Problem: they were primarily secured by journalist air cover.
Moldbug's thesis: the Press attacks things the Press doesn't secure. Haha, oops.
Back when there were some Americans fluent in English, this formal fallacy was known as begging the question.
Of course in reality, it's the Twitter thing again. Sulzberger can't control all his peasants. More on this in a bit.
This aposiopesis has several roots. First is mixing shamanistic analysis with regular analysis. The Press is certainly an anima. Absolutely. Power (kratia) is not an anima. Power is joules per second. Joules are force times distance. If you can't write the detailed position function x(t) then you don't understand Power.
Moldbug vs. Junk DNA. Alleged scientist: "I can't find a function for this, therefore it has no function."
MAGA rioters get arrested, while Fascist rioters don't. "I can't see why therefore I don't need to explain it."
Moldbug has gone full climatologist. If you think the Earth is doing funky climate things and you're a real scientist, the first thing you check is what Jupiter is doing. Nature is generously providing you with a control, and it's rude not to take advantage of it. If you're a climatologist, you become a lady and protest way too much in the pages of Wikipedia. Jupiter might be tracking Earth's temperature kink for kink but that's Definitely Not Important due to Reasons.
Likewise Moldbug is a Fascist who loves Fascists but is quite done with Fascism. Thus there must be some very clever reason Fascists keep doing the Fascism. Sure, it's fun to play with toy theories and likewise it's an interesting intellectual exercise to work out why exactly Zuckbook censors so close to the party line, but...well, more on this in a bit.
What would really happen should Zuckerberg or Dorsey start countermanding the traitors in their organization? I figure Zuck would be fired by the board he allegedly controls. Alternatively they have or can invent blackmail material on Zuck. Accuse him of Russian collusion. Zuck doesn't exactly have tens of millions of loyal potential-rioters who might get pissed about this.
If this wouldn't work it's clear that he would be blocked by Visa and Paypal, the same way Gab is. Lose all his advertisers and so on. Remember all business in America is in violation of the law, as per anarcho-tyranny. If you pay your dues to the Party, then you don't get prosecuted. Rebel, and suddenly the investigators start noticing your irregularities. If Zuck can't be prosecuted for anything, certainly his advertisers can be found to have hostile work environments or whatever it takes. Often they don't even need to be this ham-handed. American businesses suffer lawsuits constantly. All they have to do is stop ruling in favour of favoured corporations.
The Press is likewise controlled. It is normal for the Press to commit treason or break various secret acts. Should any paper dare to cross the Party, all they have to do is start prosecuting them for these crimes.
If we're being proper shaman, the ultimate conclusion is Fascists gonna Fasc. America is a
theocracy. It has a Pope. (A psycho Pope, natch.) The Pope is Fascist. Anyone who isn't Fascist
gets excommunicated, because the Army is Fascist and backs the Pope. Who is the Pope? In this sense, Moldbug's intuition can sort of be rescued. It doesn't matter who the Pope is. Sure you could find him, attack him, and take him down, but the Army would remain Fascist (it's full of peasants, after all) and would only accept a new Fascist as Pope. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
However, there very certainly is a Pope, and he determines how far the party line goes. In particular he ensures nobody goes so far the Army is alienated and starts to doubt Fascism. Otherwise the alleged-holiness spirals would have given us tranny tyranny in the 50s. Further, the Pope finesses that line real hard. At least as tight as the joins in the Pyramids. He is exceptionally skilled. The Army is always on the verge of feeling betrayed enough to desert en masse, but never quite crosses that line.
Russia and China may or may not be theocracies. Probably not? They have Popes anyway. Their Popes are not Fascist. Thus Pussy Riot gets beaten, arrested, and forgotten. Inexplicably this doesn't make the Russian Press act the slightest bit hungry. At worst, China's Pope is subordinate to a nu-Stalin.
Similarly we can see that places like the Philippines, Rwanda, Uruguay, Poland, and Hungary reject the Party the moment they think they can get away with it. The very instant America's force projection falters, they start rolling rightward. Cthulu always swims left as long as there's a literal gun to its head.
What happens if you attack America's Pope? It doesn't work, because Fascism. The only way to make the Pope's defeat Official is to change public opinion. More precisely, to wrench the Army's loyalty away from the Pope. However, the Army can't understand that their Pope is the Pope. The Pope told them they think for themselves, and they obediently believe this is the case. To get them to sit down and listen long enough to teach them they're in fact ignorant, stupid peasants, you have to already be the Pope.
Thus you only succeed in letting the psycho lords know you're a genuine threat. "He knows what's going on, shiiiiiiiiit~" Then they tell Hillary that you have evidence that might lead to her arrest, and then... They rely heavily on security by obscurity and piercing this will bring you right to the top of their to-do list. Sure you'll inconvenience the Papacy, but little else. If you can figure out who the Pope is, so can his enemies, and thus they coordinate a nice coup and usurp the office. Usurpers are more American than apple pie. You're already dead at this point, though.
Why is America biologically fucked? Because this hack is undoubtedly the best American writer. I've looked for decades for someone better than Moldbug, and found none. Is this good enough? This is not even remotely good enough.
You may think YouTube comments and Twitter replies are made primarily by idiot 13 year olds. Haha, nope. Average Americans aren't even fluent in English, let alone current events, let alone history.
"You would think no grownup could take this shit seriously. You would reckon poorly with history!"
On the contrary, it is exactly true that no grownup could take it seriously. Most Americans take it seriously, and the conclusion is left as an exercise for the reader.
Prusisan school is specifically and consciously designed to have this result. No grownup would be surprised that it in fact does.
BTW when Moldbug says he won't leave America, he's lying. If it becomes sensible he'll be out in a heartbeat. Pure signalling.
I have to do this quickly so I won't have to read it again:
ReplyDeleteWhat distinguishes a well-written poast, like this one, from an equally well-written Times op-ed? Nothing at all but prestige.
I'm really noticing people saying a lot of things as if they were facts without knowing that, which may be the test of whether one is a peasant or something above peasant. You do it too, but it eventually gets back around to that you're trying and he's got some things you might not have thought of, but is, as usual, bombastic and condescending and his bow to verisimilitude is that he doesn't have prestige. But he thinks he knows what HE would be *Poasting* if he did have prestige. He does not know.Despite the spontaneous headache and the sense of *waste of time*, there are nuggets here and there. But would I have really 'missed out'? No, the most profound thing I read I can bolster something I had already outlined to do personally, so no.
This does not necessarily prove that they enforce their opinions, presumably super Jewy opinions, on their own news desks. In fact, anyone who knows anything about journalism knows they don’t and can’t. And the propensity of Jews to own things is easily explained by our notorious cleverness.
Of course. It's the same with the early and not-so-early Hollywood moguls. Imagine mixing Stuffed Derma or Gefilte Fish with Marilyn Monroe or Gary Cooper.
So he bonds finally with the tribe because of 'our notorious cleverness'. Yes, and more often than not, they own a lot of tacky things, due to their notoriously poor visual sense.
(Dear anti-Semites: I do appreciate the undeniable sincerity of your anti-Semitism—while there were a lot of fake anti-Semites in the Third Reich, today there is no view more self-evidently sincere—but you are simply barking up the wrong tree. Sorry.)
That's just too Jewish for me. You know, it's much like your 14 years of torture at boarding school: I thought Leviticus sheerest torture, and it made me stop in 3rd grade with my project to read the whole Bible. I did do this later, and was so glad I could skip that particular novel, but I may also have skipped Numbers and Deuteronomy, but it wasn't getting me much press even when I lied about reading 'all of it'. I hate the Torah, except for the parts that are like in Cecil B. DeMille's The Ten Commandments (both versions, but I mean the talkie, although I saw his silent later, and it was much better. Here he writes again as if he had power to force this mere opinion on someone else. We don't have to dislike Judaica just because we know that NYT can't afford, despite its notorious cleverness, to ignore White Gentiles.
Sulzberger XVII in his ornate den of barbaric splendor
ReplyDeleteSome of these whose families are old wouldn't have to add also 'garish', though most would need to. I only know because I couldn't find anything tellingly Jewish in Mrs. Edgar Leventritt's Park Avenue apartment. The subway violinist I told you about was with me there, and he said he thought my apartment 'had more character', but I could have lived with hers over mine with no trouble at all. I thought it hilarious she gave to 21yo's pate sandwiches. Old scold.
The smugness is literally everywhere. I know why you depend on him, but while a certain amount of smugness can be attractive, it needs to be tempered. This is smothered in smugness. Well, the one who said "Style is character" was right, but maybe that doesn't cover everything; it may have in her case, or rather definitely did. You find him a necessity despite all the ugly sounds. Amazing he uses 'heck' when he uses 'fuck' and 'shitlord' so promiscuously. I never like people who use 'heck' when they don't have to. Well, give yourself a big "Fuck You" kind of Congratulations. Nobody has ever gotten me to read Moldbug before (except Spandrell once), but I can't quite thank you for this estimable blessing. You wouldn't be able to get me to read Lovecraft, though. The time has passed for that. Moldbug exemplifies 'style is character' insofar as he and his style are devoid of charm, but I think among you 'shitlords', that's not supposed to matter (obviously, or you're membership would be even more marginal.) Nick has charm sometimes, little as he or you may value it, but his doesn't last long. What an American patriot he's turned out to be. It's mind-boggling.
Last night, Nick wrote that Moldbug covers most points well, or something to that effect (I don't feel like simultaneous headaches or spontaneous combustion migraines, which I never had till reading Moldbug), and that he could be the "Foucault of the Anglosphere", which would be a "really good niche". Peculiar that Foucault was the one singled out by Paglia and Peterson as a superficial derivative of many thinkers past and wrongly ignored by him. I read a good bit of him 20 years ago. Some of it didn't appear to be that, but I am no expert. I just know that his alter ego Deleuze had major personal influence on me, and Foucault didn't. He was very masochistic. Some like it that way, or think they do.
Love your thing about Jupiter. I think about Jupiter and Saturn all the time. They don't have dystopia, and even Uranus, poor turned-over planet, doesn't. Yet they seem quite alive with their light, and can teach every earthling all the secrets if they'd just listen.
I don't see how the 'wokeful' feel good about their wondrous state, either, though. Also do agree that Twitter is not only for those without decent English, it makes even theirs worse. Do you know any Tweeter who say "couple of beers" instead of "a couple beers"? And they've never known when to say "different from".
Bien. à tout à l'heure.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theseus#/media/File:Kadmos_dragon_Louvre_E707.jpg
ReplyDeleteI don't know if this went through. Terrible things have been happening on this machine today. Anyway, was surprised that something so serpentine was called 'dragon', I always thought they were like a combination of crocodile and dinosaur. I don't know what the one in Der Ring is supposed to be, but not something the same height as his murderer. I've been mostly studying Minoan 1500 B.C., but this has to be a thousand years later, because Athens was sending Greek people to be eaten by Cretans, and Theseus was Athenian. Ditched Ariadne for Phaedra. I can't figure out if that's the same Phaedra who married her stepson, which never seemed a big deal like Jocasta and Oedipus.
[Please erase one of these last ones if the other came through too. I think it was deleted, but that I can't check.]
I agree that America is fucked. I see it every day, since I'm American. Based on what I see of other white countries, they're fucked as well; IMO Moldbug is a better writer than anyone contemporary Russia produces. In particular, I know someone personally who studied under Dugin, and said disciple (a Russian slav by ethnicity) strikes me as unintelligent in conversation.
ReplyDeleteI'm a young man, and I'd like to work in math research, or at least to learn enough math so I'm on the frontiers of the discipline. Next year I'll be applying to math Ph.D. programs. Right now the most valuable doctorates are from schools in the USA, but there's a huge part of my mind that tells me to leave the USA, maybe for Singapore or HK, possibly for Uruguay, Malaysia or one of a few other choices. I could move sooner rather than later, and try to get my degree abroad; I could abandon my degree goals, and move at any time; I could move later, after getting my degree, and try to get a job abroad; I could abandon my expatriation goals and try to get a job in the USA. I've lived in SG and HK before but not elsewhere.
As far as I know, a reasoned decision between these options amount to a comparative analysis of the fuckedness and un-fuckedness of various countries and institutions.
What would you guess is my best bet?
I'd lost la grande ligne. I just spent several hours looking back through and now it makes sense and isn't embarassing. Even found that conversation we had in late Spring 2018 when I was under unbelievable pressure. I had thought I'd looked for it before and found that you had deleted it, but it was there, and though awful, not quite as bad as I'd remembered it. I am not sure why I thought the anonymous about the 'drunk Consul' was you, although it may well have been. Then you closed it with a polite epilogue, and I never looked back far enough. I should have remembered the title. I can't believe I asked you out for a drink at the Pierre if you were ever here. I didn't know about the austerity of your techno-Amish life.
ReplyDeleteRead a lot of the other posts I'd already read too. Yes, yes, work until things are finished, polished, perfect, indisputable. Recently I got caught up in a lot of posts during this vicious period that I couldn't understand, but have relaxed now.
I see that you definitely want things to be in good shape, better, but that it makes no sense to ask you *how* you want them to be better or *what* would (in particular, political) make them better. I saw your remark about having read about "20 minutes of Aristotle" and tons more of Nick and Moldbug. So you say in this post that he is the best writer in America. But I couldn't google what 'your country' is. Nevermind, I needn't be a pest, and you hardly torture me.
It's interesting though, because it's obviously Moldbug's content that you think is so important and true (or often true), and it doesn't bother you that he has no elegance. I shouldn't have been so heavy-handed back then, but I also can't believe what I've lived through since then. Of course 'less is more and smooth is better', so I guess I get a pampered translation of Moldbug through you, than whom you write so much better but think he's more visionary and knows all these things. I don't know. I thought you thought you were very visionary, and you do too, but sometimes Moldbug says something, as I mentioned above, which I'll pay attention to. But, at this point, I cannot see that I couldn't have done very well without it.
I saw your talk about 'an Athenian writing as if to a Spartan', or 'an Athenian writing as if above everyone else', but I can't say for sure I feel entirely guilty--after all, just because you didn't like the 'particularly Iannis Xennakis world' doesn't automatically mean I should be paid back in videos of ghetto youth, now does it? LOL. It's not to figure you out, but it's definitely a pleasure--some of the things I reread seemed even more remarkable this time. Even if I disagree, I feel comfortable enough. I suppose I was a bit scared of you before, yet I'm stuck with being very selective and often intolerant (I already hate UR hayseeds.) You're not going to tell me that just because you live like a Spartan that you don't write like an Athenian, are you? You want to know what Ur was like, what it felt like. I didn't read that tonight, but I remember it. I'm sure I'll get to it, but I'm in love with Minoan columns and palaces and bodies right now--even their plumbing system. It seems a similar desire, to feel the sensation of an ancient place. But the old Mesopotamian civilizations going back to 21st c. B.C. have always been easier to remember than the Minoan and Mycaenean--I used to wander around the huge Near East collection of the Met in summer 2000 all the time, and saw an ancient Babylonian object right on the wall from 20000 B.C. I like to be star-struck, although the forms change through the years--and it only works if they're sometimes inside, sometimes outside me.
There could be better American writers than Moldbug, but why would they write to an audience of idiots?
ReplyDeleteIf you want to work in research, as in, get grants, then you might as well finish your PhD. Doing so in America should be fine. Though if you can get a math PhD at the place you intend to settle in - why not? Make your contacts locally. If you're moving a great distance, make sure to visit the place recreationally first. Learn enough that you're not surprised about how it feels to live there.
ReplyDeleteIf you've lived in Singapore already, that would be my best guess. America is going down, and they'll try to take you with them. Singapore won't allow it. Further, their crime rate is negligible compared to anywhere in the Anglosphere, which caps the possible downsides. Etc. For contrast, even if middle Europe evades America's snatching hands they'll try to become the new Holy Roman Empire and thus jam a dagger in their own eye.
Places in South America shouldn't be taken down by America's decline, but they're kind of shit-heaps at the best of times. Unless you have many corrupt friends in the right places and/or your own army, I wouldn't recommend it.
If you just want to know the most math there's no reason to go to university at all. If anything isn't free or cheap online, you can work it out yourself. Scihub has math papers, doesn't it? The Wokies stay away from math pages so even Wikipedia has quite a few useful bits, clearly written by a professional. At worst you can buy your own textbooks for a fraction of the price of a tuition, which is how I'd suggest someone learn physics. (For comparison, philosophy is such a young field you can and should figure it out 100% for free, and there are no grants worth the money.)
Likely all of European alleged-civilization is fucked. Anything that has allowed America to become its anchor.
If Russia accepts stagnation there's no reason they need particularly adept writers. It's only bad if they try to go all progressive.
"There could be better American writers than Moldbug, but why would they write to an audience of idiots?"
ReplyDeleteBit of a catch-22, no? If you're smart enough not to write for the internet, then the internet audience remains 100% idiotic.
I have seen a selection effect. Smart-er writers appear from time to time but notice the public sphere is an intellectual wasteland, and disappear again. Hurlock, Polymath Archives, etc. They don't even last long enough to evaluate whether they're good enough or not. Likewise the prettiest women don't let themselves get photographed for the internet, especially not naked. You can tell because occasionally they screw it up, like the smart writers do. Lesson in there (not that I could tell you what lesson).
If they can't meet they can't work together. If they can't work together then no non-fake work gets done. Logical fork strategy, if you see what I'm saying.
Yeah, it does hurt. I thought of you as The Boy Wonder, and told people you were the smartest person I'd ever run into. You were special, of course it was supposed to be 'exciting', not just reliable. Though unsurprising, it's still a very mean thing to do to me. It was something you didn't have to do. Wow, yes, I really did like you, didn't I? And without even knowing or caring what you looked like or whether you were rich or poor. Sad.
ReplyDeleteSo now I get to see what Cancel Culture feels like. Fortunately, I have others to talk to, but there wasn't anybody like you. So you turn out to be mostly like Nick Land, I already said that. But this is cowardly of you.
ReplyDelete