Dak
mentat
Land just wrote a thing saying atomization is another thing which is accelerating, not decreasing (which is how I interpret a comment about the "shift of emphasis"), and that to fight it is pointless if not counterproductive.
Dakryn's Batshit Theory of the Week
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Einherjar86
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Einherjar86
Active Member
I read his Jacobite piece, and I just don't think he's talking about atomization! Or rather, he's discussing only one part of a larger social phenomenon. He even goes into the semantic problems with using the word: "As is well understood, ‘atoms’ are not atoms, and ‘elements’ are not elements. Elementary particles – if they exist at all – are at least two (deep) levels further down. Human individuals are certainly no less decomposable." He's writing here about the normalization of rupture, epitomized by monumental events such as the Protestant Reformation. Such moments have been associated with the rise of individualism as a social/ideological value, but they're also increases in social complexity.
The Protestant Reformation didn't annihilate Catholicism, and it didn't escape completely from interactions with the Catholic Church. It simply added a new mode of religious organization into the mix. Niklas Luhmann refers to the splitting and restructuring of society as "functional differentiation," and I would suggest that the Reformation is an example of this phenomenon--it's a macro-scale process by which social systems evolve (and I use that word cautiously--social evolution isn't biological evolution). There are ideological ramifications that manifest at the individual level, but that's not proof that atomization is outpacing large-scale social complexity.
This seems to be a crucial passage:
The passage I put in bold could come right from Luhmann, except Luhmann would say that there is no withdrawal from modernity--period. No attempt to flee modernity back into community (or any other supposed refuge) can ever result in a clean break, schism, or exit. Every schism drags modernity with it--hell, it was the Protestant Reformation that contributed to the acceleration of what we would call modernity in the first place! And a large part of that had to with tensions between Catholicism and Protestantism. Atomization replenishes its momentum only insofar as it replenishes the momentum of the systems that it gives rise to, and in which it participates. This is the standard definition of functional differentiation in sociological systems theory.
Finally, functional differentiation doesn't preclude independence. In fact, it encourages independence, which is what Land seems to be zeroing in on. Systems and subsystems operate both independently and interdependently. That is, processes of differentiation (what Land sees as atomization) do increase independence--they produce new social systems that designate their own codes and operations--but they also increase interdependence, communications, and observation.
I think Land privileges an ideological admiration of individualism at the expense of the inevitable material situations in which various forms of individualism (or atomization) are produced: i.e. as divisions and subdivisions of a formless mass (that we might tentatively call "society") that is increasing in complexity.
rms
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Dak
mentat
Thanks for sharing that! As a psychologist, I concur with the general gist of Junger's position. The issue of being "alone in a crowd", and more especially, "alone among acquaintances", is incredibly challenging to the human psyche. We are not evolved to live with our current luxury, and even more so are our immigrant populations. There's an intense unease created by the bounty, atomization, and freedom. This is, what I think, the real social solution provided by patchwork. I'm not sure what @Einherjar86 would have to say in response to this, but my experience both in and out of the military, as well as my limited clinical and classwork experience, suggest that we need limited, like minded communities for optimal functioning - particularly ones which face regular challenges.
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CiG
Coming of Age in the Milky Way
rms
Active Member
Restrepo is my pick for best military piece in film. I'd say art, but I haven't read enough books or seen enough paintings 
Dak
mentat
Einherjar86
Active Member
Dak
mentat
Dak
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Einherjar86
Active Member
I didn't watch it, and I probably won't...
I don't mean any offense, but I'm just not interested in how masculinity is being threatened in a modern world.
Yeah, a couple more posts like that and he might get banned
Honestly though, it is more than a little ironic that the tweet accuses social media of contributing to groupthink. The logic here is that the tweeter is participating in groupthink practices, yes? It's forever amazing to me that people like Land see themselves as somehow circumventing these kinds of modern cultural phenomena (like groupthink) when they use the very same platforms that they accuse of producing those phenomena.Wow, this is long. I want to read this, but I don't know when I'll be able to. Thanks for sharing.
CiG
Coming of Age in the Milky Way
Dak
mentat
Pat may not believe masculinity is a thing that can be threatened. But the video isn't purely about masculinity - the psyches of both men and women are facing an unparalleled challenge by not being challenged, except by isolation. This is, imo, part of why we are seeing the massive fracturing of individual psyches into all directions of "identities", anxiety/depressive disorders, extremist politics, etc.
Einherjar86
Active Member
I think the more honest answer is that I just don't care. I don't consider myself a hyper- or even moderately "masculine" person, and I don't think my life is diminished because of that.
Maybe it's because of the community I live in, but I'm not sure I believe that masculinity is something that needs to persist in order for the human species to survive.
Dak
mentat
Well how many of us think we are really missing out on something that isn't socially and/or economically relevant to our positions in life? Of course even I would push back on the sort of "bro" caricatures of masculinity which pervade the strawmen of Jezebel pieces. I would argue there are archetypes of masculinity which certain situations require. A Mad Max world requires a Conan the Barbarian and Rambo if you will allow me to mix 80s references. At a different end of the spectrum we have a Holmes in Victorian England. There are rough and there are polished masculine figures, which correspond to the roughness or the polished nature of the times. The problem encountered today is that things are both and neither rough or/nor polished.
Since rough masculinity has been with the species since the beginning (and with hominids to some degree before that), is a test-tube derived androgynous asexual hominid still the human species? Will such a species have any reason or drive to perpetuate? What's the reason to test tube a baby if there's not even any interest in sexual pleasure? These aren't hyperbolic questions. Even now, the (or nearly the) most emasculated and/or androgynous culture faces a startling demographic cliff.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/the-demographic-cliff/article/690756
I don't think this is simply "hurrdurr, gotta be MOAR MANLY". This is simply, across the entire species, the unwinding of the nihilism Nietzsche warned about yet only faintly in comparison to the true danger. His solution was the Ubermensch, but without Transcendence there is no Why as an engine for the Ubermensch.
It may be the solution is in barbarism, and radical Islam is the specie's vehicle of salvation. How ironically sad.
Einherjar86
Active Member
CiG
Coming of Age in the Milky Way
Einherjar86
Active Member
I don't need to participate in every argument that happens on this board. I responded to this because Dak mentioned my name, and I explained why I'm not interested. You guys can talk about it all you want, but I fail to see how my lack of interest is "fucking terrible."
rms
Active Member
we all know if it was about femininity you'd have an opinion. but you already answered why you don't care so no need to go on any further. don't mind the honesty, it's what i hope to expose in a lot of these discussions
