Laban suspects that the central insanity of liberaliam is its Rousseauesque belief that man is naturally good. When the inevitable head-on impact with reality occurs, liberal governments find themselves forced to become more and more authoritarian, in order to make a silk purse out of a philosophical sow's ear
It's a tempting thought, but with a couple of problems. There's the obvious flaw that the split is not really a left/right one. I can't see the Great Frank falling for all this garbage. On the other hand, man being prevented from achieving true greatness by the dead hand of society. Hmmmmm.... who does that sound like?
Personally, I think this ideology is best described as 'hipsterism' - a train wreck fusion of the worst aspects of liberalism and libertarianism. Think of them as people who break into your house, shoot your dog then claim the state made them do it.
The other, bigger problem is this: they might think you are a blank slate, but that just proves you need the guiding hand of supa-smart people, like what they is.
For proof of this consider their new baby seals. Large parts of the hipster movement have spent years explaining how Che or Blackbeard were really martyrs to true freedom, but even they can't think of anything positive to say about paedophiles. Nope, it's all about how the anti-paedophile movement is, like, kind of chavvy, and they're all a mobby mob, and most of them don't even own iPhones, and... blah, blah, blah.
There are no actual arguments there, we never find out why they believe what they claim to believe, even in the teeth of all the evidence. We're just supposed to take it on trust that the mark of true genius is to find the nuance in child rape - well, that and if you can't, you're a stoopidy-stoopid prole.
So it goes for huge swathes of modern culture. Crucifix in urine? Are you saying that's not art, Mr Moron T Moron? Trying to recover from an unsustainable credit binge by loosening up credit? Obviously the right thing to do. Then there's...
No, the Rosseau thing is purely tactical. They get to sneer at Dullsville conservatives with their dreary 'morals', objective standards and all the other things our new aristocracy lacks. Instead, we're supposed to take their sneering, eye-rolling contempt for everyone that isn't a member of their incestuous, self-referential cult as somehow proof of superior intelligence.
We're being governed by a high school clique writ large. And things are screwed up? Really? Who'd have thunk it?
It's a tempting thought, but with a couple of problems. There's the obvious flaw that the split is not really a left/right one. I can't see the Great Frank falling for all this garbage. On the other hand, man being prevented from achieving true greatness by the dead hand of society. Hmmmmm.... who does that sound like?
Personally, I think this ideology is best described as 'hipsterism' - a train wreck fusion of the worst aspects of liberalism and libertarianism. Think of them as people who break into your house, shoot your dog then claim the state made them do it.
The other, bigger problem is this: they might think you are a blank slate, but that just proves you need the guiding hand of supa-smart people, like what they is.
For proof of this consider their new baby seals. Large parts of the hipster movement have spent years explaining how Che or Blackbeard were really martyrs to true freedom, but even they can't think of anything positive to say about paedophiles. Nope, it's all about how the anti-paedophile movement is, like, kind of chavvy, and they're all a mobby mob, and most of them don't even own iPhones, and... blah, blah, blah.
There are no actual arguments there, we never find out why they believe what they claim to believe, even in the teeth of all the evidence. We're just supposed to take it on trust that the mark of true genius is to find the nuance in child rape - well, that and if you can't, you're a stoopidy-stoopid prole.
So it goes for huge swathes of modern culture. Crucifix in urine? Are you saying that's not art, Mr Moron T Moron? Trying to recover from an unsustainable credit binge by loosening up credit? Obviously the right thing to do. Then there's...
No, the Rosseau thing is purely tactical. They get to sneer at Dullsville conservatives with their dreary 'morals', objective standards and all the other things our new aristocracy lacks. Instead, we're supposed to take their sneering, eye-rolling contempt for everyone that isn't a member of their incestuous, self-referential cult as somehow proof of superior intelligence.
We're being governed by a high school clique writ large. And things are screwed up? Really? Who'd have thunk it?
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