Dakryn's Batshit Theory of the Week

[Einherjar86]

Disagree entirely on Trayvon Martin. It's racial through and through, down to our very perception of the case.

 

[zabu of nΩd]

If i may ignore a number of arguments for a moment and focus on the Trayvon case: the right-wing misuse of relativism is a problem, sure, but there is no shortage of hypocrisy in the black community. Hip hop is a multibillion dollar industry fueled by materialism, homophobia, domestic violence, and all manner of nonsense. Blacks are by no means alone among America's oppressed populations, yet they still manage to cultivate a Death Star sized sphere of egomania that drags our country down every bit as much as the poverty does. Why doesn't their overly vocal majority simply shut up for a while and do the same kind of soul-searching that the Christian right, the bankers, the Boy Scouts, etc. have been going through?

 

[Einherjar86]

Corporate America has been fueled by materialism, homophobia, and a variety of forms of domestic abuse. Hip hop merely vocalizes these issues and profits off of them.

That said, it absolutely glamorizes them and perpetuates the problems, but "white" Hollywood isn't innocent either. Simply look at all the glamorized representations from Wall Street to Too Big to Fail. The film industry may appear to churn out films that demonize corporate capitalism, but they are fundamentally crucial to its development. After all, if no one made the brokers look cool in the films, how would anyone ever know how awesome it is to be one of them?

I'm not sure exactly what you mean by recent soul-searching, especially among bankers...

 

[zabu of nΩd]

Well the Christian right clearly has to find a way to modernize if the Republican Party is to survive. As far as bankers, the recession did much to show the true colors of many banks and investment cadres, and there are those in the industry who have been more successful than others in avoiding the continuing onslaught of lawsuits and Federal investigations. Boy Scouts is self-explanatory, and has parallels to the expansion of tolerance in the military.

I'm not trying to single out blacks as more to blame than anyone else for the cultural cesspool that is mainstream America; I'm just saying lots of different groups have a part in that drama, and very few of these groups are willing to come clean.

 

[Dak]

I see no evidence of soul searching in any area of the West. Where change is occurring it's a begrudged shift to maintain relevancy, not out of any renewed spirit.

 

[zabu of nΩd]

Whatever, i've been up all night and i'm still a bit under the influence. Surely you gents can look past a few odd word choices.

 

[SentinelSlain]

There's no doubt that the advent of capitalism emancipated certain flows of production from the tyranny of the feudal state, but its global and technological development also re-territorialized new flows, and led to its own form of politico-economic state.

I don't think that relativism allowed for the success of Western capitalists. Rather, it allowed the system in which they operated to develop and prosper by effectively withdrawing from the ideological battlefield. That is, instead of continuing to pursue dogmatic ideals of Western supremacy and exceptionalism, it allowed them to claim "All cultures are equally valid and relevant, and we hold nothing against them." The implicit rider to this tale being that those same cultures couldn't hold anything against the West; but meanwhile, history has just emerged from centuries of Western imperial dominance and slavery. So we have hundreds of cultures/ethnicities around the globe thinking: "Fuck you, I'll hold it against you!" And why shouldn't they? Asking why they shouldn't be allowed to hold it against us is often misinterpreted as relativist, but no one is trying to justify or condone flying planes into buildings. But viewed in this light, I think it's rather easy to see how relativism played little role in effectively bettering the lives/opportunities of non-Western cultures, but did far more in providing an argument for the West to try and sneak off scot-free.

How about because inherited guilt is a very dumb and bigoted concept? Also, a lot of the time "they" wont even acknowledge what they did and they haven't stopped doing "it". Cases in point, the Assyrian, Armenian and Greek Genocides, all of the post colonial massacres, which were numerous and include, for example, Zanzibar and Rwanda and also the present threat of an attempt at genocide along tribal lines in South Sudan.

Why should the guilt and responsibility of the tragedies that occurred in the Western dominated world only be allocated according to the vague notions and simplistic bigotries held by some groups. Why not really go there and look into it? So accept that white slavery, both to America and to the Arab world was massive at the time of slave triangle. Why not accept that the Ottoman Empire didn't really treat its religious minorities very well at all, especially when they petered towards having some independence. Why not accept that slavery only really became anywhere near universally outlawed because of the decisive action taken by the British?

Also, why not look at previous civilizations for comparison. Some say the greatest slaughter of all was that done to the Hindus by the Mughal Empire. The Romans colonized Britain, stole the gold and raped Boudica's daughters. Who hates the Italians over that?

 

[Einherjar86]

Whatever, i've been up all night and i'm still a bit under the influence. Surely you gents can look past a few odd word choices.

Haha, surely.

I see what you mean, at least with the Boy Scouts perhaps; but I don't see much incentive to mend our ways as far as Wall Street and corporate finance goes. If anything, the big fish learned they can cheat the system and get away with it with money to spare; in some cases, enough to last them for the rest of their lives.

EDIT:

How about because inherited guilt is a very dumb and bigoted concept? Also, a lot of the time "they" wont even acknowledge what they did and they haven't stopped doing "it". Cases in point, the Assyrian, Armenian and Greek Genocides, all of the post colonial massacres, which were numerous and include, for example, Zanzibar and Rwanda and also the present threat of an attempt at genocide along tribal lines in South Sudan.

Why should the guilt and responsibility of the tragedies that occurred in the Western dominated world only be allocated according to the vague notions and simplistic bigotries held by some groups. Why not really go there and look into it? So accept that white slavery, both to America and to the Arab world was massive at the time of slave triangle. Why not accept that the Ottoman Empire didn't really treat its religious minorities very well at all, especially when they petered towards having some independence. Why not accept that slavery only really became anywhere near universally outlawed because of the decisive action taken by the British?

Plenty of people do accept it, or at least admit to; but they don't want to accept the consequences.

Inherited guilt isn't intended to put blame on any specific individuals or actors. It's intended to communicate the fact that a communal, social debt exists in the world today. It's no one's responsibility to pay it. It can only be a community's responsibility; accusing and blaming specific individuals will only ever result in the same defensive backlash: "It's not my fault! I wasn't there! Why don't you pay it?" And everyone who says this has the right to say it. No one is blaming anyone specifically, and no one should ask any one person, or group of specific individuals, to pay it back. It has to be assume as a cultural responsibility because trying to trace this debt back to specific individuals is not only fruitless, it's impossible.

It's likely that this won't ever happen, or it will happen hundreds of years down the road.

 

[zabu of nΩd]

I'd venture that America's already begun paying a big social debt with the Affordable Care Act...

...but that would expose me as the establishment pansy i've turned into, so never mind

 

[Dak]

The ACA is more corporate/government raping of America.

 

[zabu of nΩd]

As opposed to the general public raping America with expensive preventable diseases, emergency room visits, and a general lack of responsibility for their future. Pick your poison.

 

[Dak]

The public raping itself is less sustainable. Neofeudalism on the other hand is quite sustainable, relatively speaking.

 

[zabu of nΩd]

As far as i'm concerned, no crusty old idea from any half-witted segment of our accountability-phobic population is sustainable as long as there are smart, forward-thinking people around with the economic freedom to profit off of new ideas.

 

[Dak]

Bad economics are never sustainable. However, they can be bankrupted/bailed out and repackaged over and over.

It's hard to put a finger on the worst affliction of modern society, but accountability phobia is high on the list of potentials.

 

[Dak]

http://www.policymic.com/articles/44725/this-is-what-budget-cuts-have-done-to-detroit-and-it-s-freaking-awesome

We can only hope this trend rises with the fall of incompetent bureaucracy.

 

[matt schrauben]

http://www.policymic.com/articles/44725/this-is-what-budget-cuts-have-done-to-detroit-and-it-s-freaking-awesome

We can only hope this trend rises with the fall of incompetent bureaucracy.

The writer of the article is obviously quite biased. Nonetheless this is quite cool.

 

[Dak]

I'd rather our individual and collective bias be out in the open than hiding behind sterile language and posturing.

 

[matt schrauben]

I wouldn't argue that either. It's just that when someone is that biased they often convienently leave out or ignore information that conflicts with their beliefs. So it's good to take articles like that with a grain of salt.

Edit: Then again, you could say that about just about all news/information sources.

 

[Einherjar86]

Yes, you can.

I'll take that article with a grain of salt as well, but I followed a few of the links he included and some of that stuff sounds very cool indeed.

Speaking of news sources, the accuracy of the media, and government tyranny, here's Žižek's criticism of Chomsky:

 

[Dak]

As Ein said, yes you can.

We all have a bias, and it's going to come out, even if it's only in the nature of what we give the most attention to.

Edit: Interesting video from what I could decipher. I agree that this conflicting dichotomy is out there that [x] group is of no consequence, yet is also terribly dangerous.