2013-09-28

Five Words That Will Make Me Cease to Take You Seriously.

Ok.  They're not all words, but "parts of speech" doesn't work it a title.  Nevertheless some terms are so devoid of meaning, deliberately obfuscatory, overused and misapplied, or have such negative implications about the person using them that once I hear them used, I'm finished listening.  This list is comprised of terms that Lefties like to use.  I'm sure the the Right has a similar set, but I don't even listen to them any more, and consequently, haven't heard them.  So, here it goes.

The ism suffix:  Far too many people think that simply calling someone a (parameter)ist suddenly makes the parameter under question an invalid one to use when forming expectations about someone.

The one most often egregiously used is "classism".  Class matters.  When one looks at the social mobility of the children of immigrants versus that of the native populations in first world countries, it becomes apparent that after a couple of generations in a mostly free society, most families have reached their natural level.  A lot of immigrants are poor, or working in well paid but low status businesses.  Their children rarely are.  This is because most immigrants are intelligent ambitious people form countries where that wasn't rewarded.  Once they're in a country where those traits are rewarded, they reap those rewards.

When you meet someone whose family has been in the slums or trailer parks for generations you can make reasonable assumptions about their ability, work ethic and ambitions.

Yes that is classism and it is valid.

I've also heard ridiculous terms such as "speciesism", "heightism", "sizeism", and the most ridiculous of them all "ableism".  Somehow not hiring someone because they aren't able to do the job is bad.

Of course this is all a rhetorical trick to get people to think of those judgments as equivalent to racism.  See, they are all "isms", therefore all bad.

Denialism/Denialist:  This term was first applied to those who question the fact or the degree of the holocaust.  And at the time I didn't object to this because it was clearly being applied only to nut-bars.  But then I saw the term being applied to Norman Finkelstein.  My cursory examination of his position leads me to believe that his arguments regarding people hijacking the holocaust for current personal or political gain are worth considering.  But he doesn't deny it happened.  I don't know if he is correct or not, but he doesn't belong in the same class as those who denied it happened.

Then it was applied to those who question the degree of, and the degree of human contribution to global warming.  It is used to imply that they are corrupt, just working to make the case for "big oil", because that who funds their grants.  Funny how those who support the alarmist position are never considered to be corrupt, just making the case for "big regulatory bureaucracy".  Nevertheless, it is used to impugn the men rather than refute their augments.

Now it has been used against anyone who waits for evidence in support of a rape accusation.  They are now "rape denialists".

Social Justice:  An action or situation, where the concept of justice even applies is either just or it isn't.  "Social Justice" is just a term of art used to evade the fact that someone is being denied proper justice, to further some purported greater justice.  If frequently comes in the form of "It's OK to deny you this position in favor of this less qualified candidate because someone who looks like you did something bad to someone who looks like him in the distant past.".  

When the wronged party and the party perpetrating the wrong or both are dead before the situation can be remedied, the sad fact is that justice will be eternally denied.  Further injustice is just that.  It's not remedial.  It just adds to the amount of injustice in the world.

Progressive:  This may just be applicable to American political discourse.  It is usually applied to small 's' socialists, those who tolerate a free economy to the degree that it provides the wealth for them to redistribute and the actors in the productive portions of that economy do as they are told.  Some time between the wars those with these beliefs hijacked the term "liberal" form those who support liberty.  To see how liberal they really are, ask them how many laws and regulations they want repealed.  If they name anything beyond the narrowly personal, I'll eat a vegetable. 

As an aside, I think we should take the term back, instead of using clumsy terms like "libertarian".  Maybe the Australians can help with this since their Liberal party is actually a liberal party.


Once the hijacked form of the term became recognized as referring to those who support the banning of sodas beyond a certain size and the exhalation of water vapor they needed a new term and the settled on "progressive".

It's clever rhetoric.  Who could be against progress in a world that has benefited greatly from progress in manufacturing, transportation, agriculture, medicine, communications, hell, damn near every field of human endeavor, including politics.  Of course they gloss over the fact that those advances came about because of proper liberalism.

They use the term "progressive" to imply that their policies will bring forth more of what has happened in the past.  Of course progress is really just change, it doesn't specify the nature of change.  If you're in a car speeding towards a cliff, progress is the last thing you want.  If your country is progressing towards the states of Britain or the U.S. in the seventies, you want a Thatcher or a Reagan to hit the brakes and throw it in reverse.

The Masses:  Has this term ever come from someone who is not a smug douche?  When it comes to manga, sports, video games, kangaroo racing and a lot of other things, I'm the masses.  I don't give these thing s much attention.  That doesn't mean I can't recognize a bad story, a dropped ball, a boring game,  or a poor jump, if kangaroo racing is even a real thing.

Referring to people as "the masses" is probably the most dismissive piece of rhetoric ever invented.  When you hear it, you won't have to look far to find someone in a fedora with a beard or a curly mustache, who studied comm or literature.

2013-09-12

Can Authortarians Even Attempt an Honest Argument against Liberty

So, if you think Salon is a neutral journalistic blog, think again. They're reprinting Alternet articles. I wonder how many they've reprinted from Reason or The Freeman. This article is the usual attack on straw libertarians, so I'm not going to address the whole thing here. Fortunately the author, someone called R.J. Eskow, probably a lit or comm major, offered eleven questions and I'm going to answer them.

Are unions, political parties, elections, and social movements like Occupy examples of "spontaneous order"—and if not, why not?

The answer to most of these is "sometimes", so I'll address them one by one.
Unions
Sometimes, When there is no state regulation forcing employers to negotiate with them, when workers are free to decide themselves whether or not to join, when they aren't bribing politicians for their benefit, when they aren't using force against people, when they aren't vandalizing property, when they aren't using mob action to physically impede people who are just going about their business, then they are an example of spontaneous order.

It's not that hard.
Political Parties
They are when the state recognizes them and singles them out for special benefits/regulations
social movements like Occupy
The name itself gives it a way. They are physically placing themselves in spaces that belong to others against the owners wishes.

It's the force thing again. Are you beginning to understand?
Is a libertarian willing to admit that production is the result of many forces, each of which should be recognized and rewarded?

Of course. In a free economy production is recognized by allowing the producers to keep or sell what they produce and by allowing them to pay for the assistance they may need in producing. Everyone places different values on all the goods produced and consequently the value of the work used to produce them. The way to aggregate this is through prices in a free market.

Is our libertarian willing to acknowledge that workers who bargain for their services, individually and collectively, are also employing market forces?

Duh, as long as they aren't using force, themselves or through agents.

Is our libertarian willing to admit that a “free market” needs regulation?

Too nebulous to answer. Laws against mislabeling products, sure. Laws preventing someone from offering a shuttle service because the taxi companies and bus driver unions own the politicians, fuck no.

Does our libertarian believe in democracy? If yes, explain what’s wrong with governments that regulate.

Yes, it is the best way to protect liberty. Clearly, it's not perfect. The problem with regulation is that it is preventing otherwise free individuals form making mutually beneficial exchanges. It also drives the misapplication of resources by distorting the information contained in prices.

Does our libertarian use wealth that wouldn’t exist without government in order to preach against the role of government?

Of course. When the government sets itself up as a monopoly, or takes your money to provide its option, leaving you to use it or pay double, you have little choice.

Does our libertarian reject any and all government protection for his intellectual property?

This is a huge point of contention among Libertarians, and I haven't resolved my position yet.

Does our libertarian recognize that democracy is a form of marketplace?

That is just an empty assertion. Camping stores opperate in a market place, competing for customers, inventory and facilities. I don't camp. What happens in that market is a null factor in my life and I am a null factor in their business. That is a market. Whether or not I vote, the state is still negating a large portion of my working life by taking a portion of my wages/profits against my will.

Does our libertarian recognize that large corporations are a threat to our freedoms?

Not nearly to the same degree as big government. Avoiding large corperations is difficult. Avoiding the government is impossible. Then, when the corporations buy the government, we are really fucked.

Does he think that Rand was off the mark on this one, or does he agree that historical figures like King and Gandhi were “parasites”?

You realize the King and Gandhi were fighting government coercion, don't you? Although not perfectly. I'm sure that if they lived to achieve power themselves they would have introduced a different batch of state control into peoples lives.

If you believe in the free market, why weren’t you willing to accept as final the judgment against libertarianism rendered decades ago in the free and unfettered marketplace of ideas?

Hey dumbfuck, "free marketplace of ideas" is a metaphor. Whose final judgment? You and your yuppy friends, who spend more time polishing your rhetorical skills than actually learning anything.

I'm livid.  I'm not even going to edit this one beyond eliminating the squiggly red lines.

2013-09-10

FTB: Dawkins Bad, Blah Blah Blah.

So FreeThoughtBlogs has launched another attack at Richard Dawkins.  There is also a bullshit petition up as well.  This time it is for failing to conflate different types of molestation.  Unfortunately the whole interview is behind a paywall but the offending statement seems to be this:

Just as we don’t look back at the 18th and 19th centuries and condemn people for racism in the same way as we would condemn a modern person for racism, I look back a few decades to my childhood and see things like caning, like mild paedophilia, and can’t find it in me to condemn it by the same standards as I or anyone would today.

Is this so horrible?  All he is doing is recognizing that social moral development is something that happens over generations.  Each generation figures sees one to a few things wrong and corrects them.  Is it fair to disdain those earlier beliefs?  Yes.  Is it fair to condemn those who held and lived their lives according to those beliefs, rarely or never hearing any different.  No.  It is no more fair to blame some 15th century guy for thinking that semen contained little people, or a 19th century guy for believing that time was constant.

PZ Meyers then tries to compare Dawkins to William Lane Craig, "As for that excuse about not judging behavior of an earlier era by our modern standards…I've heard that before. From William Lane Craig, to justify biblical murders." Apparently, Meyers doesn't seem to recognize justifying the actions of a putative omnipotent, omniscient being with fallible real people, another example of their usual conflation.

In and excerpt form later in the interview (I don't know how close it is to the above quote.), Dawkins says:

I think we should acknowledge it ... But the other point is that because the most notorious cases of paedophilia involve rape and even murder, and because we attach the label 'paedophilia' to the same things when they’re just mild touching up, we must beware of lumping all paedophiles into the same bracket.

It's clear that Dawkins is saying that it is also important recognize degrees of molestation.  We don't treat the guy who pockets a bag of Skittles in the 7-Eleven the same way we treat someone who holds it up with a gun.  Of course these are the people who equate an invitation to coffee to an attempted rape.

Greta Christina and Alex Gabrien have echoed Meyers' position.

They're just going after another target on their enemies list.  If one of their allies made the same statements they would be making the same arguments I just did.