Thursday, June 22, 2017

On Destroying Intellectual Inferiors

Tom Woods has left a comment at the post, TWITTER BATTLE Woods vs. Raimondo on Using Leftist Disruptive Tactics.

This has caused JaimeInTexas to respond:
Wake up Tom. When the other side are people like antifa, politeness is already gone.
I really don't get this. Are we really supposed to act like those whose behavior we disapprove of?

I really don't like smelly SF homeless who rage in my face. Am I not supposed to shower for a month and rage in their face?

The easiest thing for me to do is to just avoid these characters.

As for the crazed left, this does not mean we should not act to protect our property, If there is a speech that is expected to go on, or some other gathering, that the crazed left might attempt to stop, well then, it should be held where there is plenty of security. Or where the crazed left is not likely to show up.

This is just common sense.

Although I have a "right" to eat a steak and have a glass of wine at night on a park bench in the Tenderloin, I sure as hell am not going to do it.

Again, common sense.

Engaging in battle by disturbing activity on private property to support freedom on private property seems quite absurd. That is not going to do anything but bring the battle to the gutter.

This is very low-level stuff. Everyone from Keynes to Ayn Rand to Hayek recognized that all societal battles are won by a few at a high intellectual level.

I can assure you that the street genius professor who was arrested after swinging a bike lock at the heads of righties in Berkeley is not a key foundational theorist of the Cultural Marxist school and Critical Theory views that he hugs so close to his chest. He is a low-level thug looking for support from the arguments of the Frankfurt School intellectuals that developed the theories.

The street thugs are as significant to the real intellectual battle as homeless are to the entrepreneurial battles going on in Silicon Valley.

Shimshon also responded to Tom:
Tom, "screaming like a leftist" not the edge of leftist extremism and you know it. Now that the left has openly drawn guns (along with bike locks and various improvised weapons), are you going to use the same logic? How long are you going to preen about how the left should simply moderate their bad behavior and bare fangs against people on the right actually making an effort to stop the insanity. Aristotle put it best:

"[B]efore some audiences not even the possession of the exactest knowledge will make it easy for what we say to produce conviction. For argument based on knowledge implies instruction, and there are people one cannot instruct."

They are ineducable. They are literally incapable of learning. They are insane. And you keep trying to be civil and logical with them. Trying to educate the ineducable. That makes you insane too. You're shooting right, like them, instead of left, as you should be.

My language often waxes rhetorical, because I have observed that most of the Austrian School libertarians I am familiar with are as ineducable as the left. Prove me wrong. Please do tell, what does your imagination suggest instead?

There were better and more effective things to scream, to be sure, but they were screaming like slightly inept rightists rather than leftists. Imagine if they had said "Long live the God-Emperor!" (one of Vox Day's suggestions). If they had done it dressed like Based Stickman, or some other real-life character, even better. I hear they're making a Based Stickman comic.

Tom, your Rally for the Republic speech was heroic and inspiring. But it's not 2008 anymore. It's time for a new speech.
I am really trying to digest this comment.  Shimshon writes:
They are ineducable. They are literally incapable of learning. They are insane.
If they are ineducable, incapable of learning and insane, why are is Shimshon paying attention to them?

Sure we have to protect ourselves and our property but if you are going to engage with the
" ineducable, incapable of learning and insane." how are you going to do this other than on an "ineducable, incapable of learning and insane" level?

Is this what Silicon Valley entrepreneurs do, spend their time trying to convince batshit crazy San Francisco homeless to become software engineers?

I happen to think that a good portion of the left could get their crazed views punctured under the right circumstances, That's far from easy. And few on the right come anywhere near to having the skills to do this but the answer is not doing the same batshit crazy things that the leftist are doing.

This is a long game, a very long game, that is not going to be won in the next election cycle or the one after that. If you don't like the intellectual battle for the battle itself and think you are going to move the world toward freedom by acting like a lefty thug, you are greatly mistaken and you are probably much better off surfing the sports channels because the battle isn't going to be won anytime soon and it is certainly not going to be won imitating the lunatic left that hates private property and debate.

On the other hand, if you love the intellectual battle then you should study and study to make your intellectual firepower superior so that you are able to intellectually destroy anyone your inferior.

That said, it is certainly possible on a given important issue of the day to use short term tactics and form alliances to attempt to destroy a particularly dangerous interventionist intrusion. However, this must be a well thought out strategy with precise goals. Not a random reactionary action based on nothing more than "Well, they are doing this to us, so we are going to do it to them." What is that going to accomplish other than result in pitched battles with no logic nor direction?

How does disrupting a private event promote private property? What is the goal of the disruption beyond getting animal spirits charged up on both sides?

This is not how the intellectually superior will win.

 RW

31 comments:

  1. "I can assure you that the street genius professor who was arrested after swinging a bike lock at the heads of righties in Berkeley is not a key foundational theorist of the Cultural Marxist school and Critical Theory views that he hugs so close to his chest. He is a low-level thug looking for support from the arguments of the Frankfurt School intellectuals that developed the theories."

    Robert, the only reason the bike lock street thug was caught was because of the kind of people you bemoan. The "weaponized autism" as we call it. You would've tsk-tsk'ed that we should avoid all such confrontations altogether while the perp got away with his violence.

    You don't get it and you are clueless. Perhaps you don't really view America as your home? Do you need to go back? Italy, is it? Those people on the front lines with what you think are immature antics finally realized that fighting back is not pointless. They have nowhere else to go.

    I can see you in Poland after the Nazi invasion, bemoaning any sort of attempt to fight back. Resistance is just stooping to the Nazis' level, correct?

    "The easiest thing for me to do is to just avoid these characters."

    That is less and less possible. You can't even listen to a right wing speaker today without violence. If (when, really) LvMI events are subject to the same violence, will you still bemoan any reaction?

    What happens when it's not just the Tenderloin, but your own neighborhood? Is resistance then sensible and prudent?

    Now that I think of it, I am certain that Rothbard himself would have applauded the common man reaction to these totalitarian nutjobs.

    "On the other hand, if you love the intellectual battle then you should study and study to make your intellectual firepower superior so that you are able to intellectually destroy anyone your inferior."

    Because "low-level thugs" respond so readily to dialectic, amiright? I can't believe you still believe that reasoned debate is possible with them! Tom Woods, Robert Wenzel, please meet George Will to get your bow tie, stat!

    Let me refresh your memory:

    "[B]efore some audiences not even the possession of the exactest knowledge will make it easy for what we say to produce conviction. For argument based on knowledge implies instruction, and there are people one cannot instruct."
    -- Aristotle, Rhetoric

    They are ineducable. They are literally incapable of learning. They are insane. And you keep trying to be civil and logical with them. Trying to educate the ineducable. That makes you insane too.

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    1. Shimshon, I think few intellectuals (Robert included) that think themselves above the fray have had that "come to jesus" process where they define clearly what their line in the sand is what they are committed to doing should that line be crossed.

      When you are clear on that situation you become equally clear on how little debate is warranted at all. The insane will not be swayed in the short term or long term and life is too precious to waist time on unfruitful ventures

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  2. "If they are ineducable, incapable of learning and insane, why are is Shimshon paying attention to them?"

    Bob, I am paying attention to YOU, as well as Tom, NOT THEM. Notice how I say it's a waste of time to talk on an intellectual with them (I am starting to feel the same about you and Tom too, but I enjoy it). I applaud any and all efforts to take down the thought police. Would that you were paying attention to THEM, instead of those on the right attacking them!

    But it is not my fight. I went back. I am in Israel, not America.

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    1. If I may, the goal of interacting with the lunatic left could be to terrify them, not win them over. They are like petulent children, they need boundaries for their own sake (not that I care about their wellbeing, but if it's a side effect of us taking care of our own interests, then why not.)

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  3. "This is a long game, a very long game, that is not going to be won in the next election cycle or the one after that."

    Correct. The Reconquista took 700 years.

    They have to go back.

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  4. I've heard that "you always become what you hate".

    Yet, in politics, everyone seems so disingenuous, it's very difficult to know what they were to begin with. Both the left and right claim to be driven by a loose set of morals, but their actions appear, to me, less ethical with each passing election cycle.

    “Rummaging in our souls, we often dig up something that ought to have lain there unnoticed.” ― Leo Tolstoy

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  5. I agree with you. And in fact, there is a contradiction in the arguments that the alt-Right uses.

    First, they cite the behavior of the left as the reason that Trump won. it's common around twitter and the internet to see someone say 'And this is why Trump won.' In other words acknowledging that the bad behavior of the left has influenced people to not like them, and to vote for Trump

    But second, they claim now their good behavior in the past has had no effect and the tactics of the left must be utilized and thus we they must interrupt leftists.

    So which is it? Did staying relatively good compared to the left influence people enough to win elections or does it not?

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  6. "Everyone from Keynes to Ayn Rand to Hayek recognized that all societal battles are won by a few at a high intellectual level."

    Rand and Keynes and Hayek didn't have the Internet. The Hayek/Buddy Harper/Leonard Reed concept of infiltrating the intelligentsia and disseminating information to the second hand dealers so they can trickle down to the public is antiquated.

    The second hand dealers are the new power structure under Trumpism. We know public policy studies say whatever the public policy masters want them to say. It's a rigged game. Why play it? We made a new game.

    No one is going to follow some spineless pussy like Jeb Bush while 18 year olds white girls are radicalized to hate their own fathers and brothers. Show Americans backbone and they'll lend an ear. Say what you will about Trump but that guy has never backed down going back to Birtherism. He's Clint Eastwood. It's sad that libertarians can't find someone better than John McAfee to play the same role. There must be some badass maverick wealthy libertarians who don't pull any punches out there. Bueller? Bueller?

    Ignore the crazy Leftists and they multiply undisturbed. Stand up to them loudly and visibly and they are weakened. Nip this in the bud. They Right needs the conflict to provide a bigger platform to the Leftists so they can be exposed. The Left is already shocking to middle America. The coastal elite still don't get it, but they will in time.

    For the nu second hand dealers (those in the meme war, the weaponized autists, the Alex Jones types) this is a war for the future soul of America. Why allow the Left to radicalize and recruit unobstructed? Ideas are lost on these people. Shit, many so called libertarians jumped ship from Ron Paul to Bernie Sanders. They feed on rationalizations, victimization and righteous indignation.

    They are bullies and cowards and need to be stood up to and made an example of. They have no principles, no moral code. The initiation of force is wrong, retaliation is not. Even when it's vile and reprehensible, it shall not be condemned.

    Bob, you sound like a man without children. Tom sounds like a guy living for the ever-after. Fuck that. The rules men live by on Earth are written by to those who fight for it - for better or worse.

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  7. Yes, the left uses those tactics, which is how Nixon and Trump got elected.

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  8. I hink that politeness is something to be desired and to live by. I like Wenzel. That is why I read his blogs. There are areas we disagree but it is an intellectual pursuit. If I were to meet Wenzel and visit, there is no doubt that it will be a respectful and polite encounter.
    We give others the benefit of the doubt behavior teaches otherwise.
    There is a level of encounter that politeness goes only so far. But the personal is different when dealing with mass information/persuasion.

    BTW, I have met Tom Woods. Several years ago at his visit to Saint Thomas Univ., when he talked about his book "How the Catholic Church Built Western Civilization." I read the book and went to see his lecture, along with my wife and kids. And we are not Catholics. With Tom Woods I can also have polite conversation. Tom is very jocular and no doubt would have me laughing at many things.

    Bob's and Tom's audience, though, are very different. The audience being targeted by methods bemoaned by Woods cannot be reached except by actions which reflect their emotional way of life.

    Politeness is a good thing, until punches, bottles, bullets start flying. Ceding ground and constantly retreating is not a strategy and, eventually, you run out of space.

    I just rather push back while I still have room to maneuver.

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  9. I forgot to add:

    Because I am willing to use violence, if it ever gets to there, to defend myself and my family, it does not mean that I seek violence as a way of life.

    Many hardened military generals looked forward going home and farm, others to build and others to teach.

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  10. As the years pass, more and more, I run into the willfully "ineducable" from both the left and the right. As such, I think some of the arguments for "action" are persuasive but only in cases where they are undertaken to promote or defend liberty. I have no interest in the supremacy of one statist faction over another. The idea of Trump as some staunch champion of the right who never backs down is delusional.

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    1. "I have no interest in the supremacy of one statist faction over another."

      I sympathize and agree but what do you do when the choices are, for example, between Fulgencio Batista and Fidel Castro; imprisonment and torture on the one hand versus imprisonment, torture or summary execution by Ernesto Guvara?

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    2. When considering the current depressing state of the political landscape, I often think of Ron Paul and his many, many years almost alone in the political wilderness. I bet he was tempted at times with "golden apples" to join one faction or another. But he didn't. After all those years, his polite, educational style caught fire for a time and he's still at it. I want to be that "with it" at 80 something years old. The content he delivered in that style changed my mind and the minds of others close to me in a profound way. Had he been yelling or smashing things, I probably would have been put off. A lot of years have passed since I discovered Ron Paul. I'm still on board the liberty train but I now accept that true liberty is not currently a mass movement and is a pursuit currently followed only by a remnant.

      Locally, I inject my attempt at principled libertarianism into debates with statists on the right and left. My gut tells me that many people have questions about issues of perpetual war, police state, taxation, etc. but oftentimes don't have the time to think them through or are just heavily indoctrinated or inundated with propaganda. Sometimes I see people have an a-ha moment. Other times I run into the ineducable. It may get snarky or sarcastic but I have never been subject to or seen any "leftist" or other political violence first hand. I just don't see some epic struggle between the status quo and some organized insurgent political faction like in Cuba in 1958-9. The Trump "phenomenon" has turned out to be as synthetic and superficial as he is.

      I have been fortunate enough to be able to structure my life and business in a way I find most conducive to learning about and practicing what I preach and avoiding a deep matrix lifestyle. Of course, I have to deal with the inescapable elements of the faceless "secondary socialism" present in today's society. None of that currently rises to the level of the extreme scenario you suggest.

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  11. I'm more or less resigned to the reality that the Alt Right is motivated by a tiny fraction of leftists, most of whom you'll never encounter in your daily life, happily. They're the hype machine of the right, and the more you see of them, the more you think "I'm supposed to prefer this...why?".

    I don't see what they see, I think they exaggerate all the leftist threats out there, and I don't see anything fundamentally different or more violent with this period as compared with many others. There are, however, many who benefit financially from pushing this crisis mindset. I see that this particular protest was organized by a nonprofit, correct?

    If you shut off facebook and your TV, and talked your neighbors, you'd see that the country is doing a lot better off than you're lead to believe.

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    1. How old are you? Do you think that governments, at any level, have shrunk? The growth has mostly been by the liberal side of things. Do you think that the same tactic/methods apply at all levels of the conflict?
      As to shutting off, there is merit to that. There is a sort of peace that comes from being ignorant. As to "the country is doing a lot better off than you're lead to believe," if you compare to WW1 and WW2 time period, sure. If you mean technological advances, sure. If you mean government intrusion into our lives and pockets, you are wrong.

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    2. I think you've turned the tables here. You're equating violent, extreme leftists that I mentioned with governments in general. As much as I hate the government, I see a big difference between HRC and the smellsters at Berkley.

      If you're claim is that you personally are motivated by the expanse and intrusion of government, that's hardly anything new.

      The Alt Right is advancing a position that describes the current situation in this country at a crisis level, near civil war, and civilization ending. I think this is hysterical.

      My position is that we're nowhere near that level, and have been worse off historically, and yes including measuring by total freedom in the country. Let's not forget that there was literal, government supported slavery in this country, followed by a massive civil war.
      While the Union didn't have the technological advancements of the NSA, I'd say that the occupation of the south during reconstruction also qualifies, then of course Jim Crow for nearly 80 years after that.

      So no, I don't think I'm wrong about the fact that we're historically more free than those periods, on whole. If you think you're less free than ten years ago, that's probably true, and less free than twenty years before that, also probably true.

      With regard to shutting off because ignorance is bliss, you miss the point entirely. The point is that the divisiveness you see on Facebook, Twitter, and CNN doesn't reflect reality. Shutting yourself off from something that doesn't reflect reality decreases ignorance, it doesn't increase it.

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  12. I think Scott Adams nailed this issue:

    Hypocridiot: A person who thinks a reasonable excuse for bad behavior is "The other side did something bad too."

    https://twitter.com/ScottAdamsSays/status/876819955722764288

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    1. I read Adams. Guess what? He missed by a mile.
      Did you read the comments?

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  13. Can't advance NAP by violating NAP.

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    1. No, things are different now. We must abandon our principles in order to save them.

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    2. NAP has been violated many times over. It's now a Hobbsian state of nature. What should concern us is how to get to a baseline of populace that is capable of and is likely to adopt the NAP once the civil war is over.

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  14. Not understanding why people think I'm saying the left deserves politeness or can be reasoned with. No one who reads or listens to me regularly could think such a thing. I am saying that acting like a damn fool in public is counterproductive.

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    1. It depends. What do you think was/were the goals of the "fools?"

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    2. Stupid is as stupid does.

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  15. The alt-right is not about antics. It is about three things:

    Nationalism.
    Western civilization.
    Winning.

    I'm not sure where you stand on the first. On the second, we probably largely agree. But on the third? I've yet to meet an Austrian who wants to win anything more than debate points.

    My problem is with people shooting right. Tom and Bob (and others), why are you directing criticism at various individuals of the right doing things you don't like or won't ever engage in? I'm not an antic-seeker. But I don't have a problem with them, and think they do good work, because they undermine the left, and are only getting better at doing what they do.

    STOP SHOOTING RIGHT. You think it's counterproductive. You're wrong. Just because it's not for you doesn't mean it's not effective. All these antics are just forms rhetorical argument that are beating the unreasonable left (ie the SJWs) back for the first time in decades. No doubt, GamerGate and Sad/Rabid Puppies were too low-brow for your Harvard background also. I agree it's odd that gaming and SF/F freaks were at the very leading edge of the war against the leftist thought police, but there you go. In years to come, they will probably be remembered at least as much as, if not more than, you and Bob and all the Austrians for their contribution to beating back the enemy and laying the foundations for a return to a freer society (however long it takes).

    Tom, if you're not talking to the SJW left, because you realize correctly it is not possible to reason with them, let it go.

    TL;DR Stop criticizing the right. Shut up and SHOOT LEFT.

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    1. Shoot left, the guy says. What does he think I do 24 hours a day? The Harvard line was just stupid. He thinks screaming is a good approach, and I think it makes us look like idiots. He thinks my opinion that screaming makes us look like idiots should not be expressed, because I should never criticize the right, even when it does counterproductive things. That is lunacy.

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  16. "Everyone from Keynes to Ayn Rand to Hayek recognized that all societal battles are won by a few at a high intellectual level."

    Quite obviously not because the winners in regard to thinkers are those who give the ruling class an excuse to do what they want. Keynes won because his ideas further empowered those in power. Meanwhile the battle for the hearts and minds of the masses is won with feelings, not rationality or logic. If a high intellectual level was appealing to voters then Ron Paul would have at least won a republican primary. Donald Trump won on appealing to emotion, one liners, etc. He showed no intellectual understanding of many things. In fact worse than that with some.

    If high level intellectual arguments won the day we would be living in a libertarian utopia.

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  17. Follow the NAP and adhere to Private Property Rights.

    It is frustrating being subjected to these Alinsky/Ayers tactics and violence. Especially because the powers that should not be do little to protect those subjected to the lefts tactics, such as the cops being told to essentially let these thugs get away with crimes.

    There is no easy solution. Heading down the same path as the likes of Antifa goes against the NAP and Private Property Rights, so is unacceptable. This does not mean we should not be present at events and that we cannot protect ourselves. We so need to be aware that we have a huge disadvantage because the thugs are allowed to block entrances and throw urine and blow air horns in your face.

    At present we are not going to be able to do much about events/gatherings at controlled by lefties, colleges and public property for example. If we are going to be present where the lefties have control we need to be aware that we are at a disadvantage and may be assaulted.

    The example of a Mises event being disrupted by these thugs is a different situation. First conferences put on by the likes of the LvMI or FFF do not even register with the thuggery; these events are way over their heads. Second these events do not attract enough attention.

    Let’s say these jerks do come to disrupt our events and the cops will not intervene in a meaningful way. Then we need to be smart and creative like the entrepreneurs we like to exalt. Private security is the first thing to come to mind. Choosing venues that will supply security or protest when the coppers do not do their jobs is another. Intelligent creative people will figure it out.

    There is another aspect to this situation.

    Studies have shown that facts do not change minds. If this is true what we come to believe at an early age is not likely to change. Considering the current education system this puts libertarian views at a huge disadvantage. Changing this may be the best tactic.

    Other studies indicate political views are genetic. If this is true libertarians will have to wait much longer for our views to become mainstream. At this point we are the mutants. It may be a few million years before the majority has evolved.

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    1. IMO you are correct about the early learning. Getting people to simply accept they were duped in grade school is practically impossible. Furthermore I've noticed how the schools are run a couple decades prior is how adults expect the society to be run. So long as the government has the schools liberty will continue to decline.

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    2. Common. Government run education just needs more funding and everything will be fine.

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