Beautiful. I was in DC yesterday and the sense of desolation was palpable. The earnest strivers were noticeably absent and, when encountered, had a defeated air.
How did so many young and presumably intelligent people fall into such meanness and madness? Can it just be hating woke? But you and I hate woke, and we're not chortling with glee as the barbarians raze civil society.
You don't quite understand what it was to be young and feel completely smothered under what really did look to be a total woke gleichschaltung. Jonah Goldberg likes to tell the anecdote about how the Nazis forced their ideology into everything - even the cat fancier magazines had to be about "the superior Aryan Cat" - and especially in schools that sort of attitude was everywhere. You couldn't be in a knitting group without "centering the experience of POC [that horrid neologism]-knitters and the oppression inherent in the excessive whiteness of hobby stores." The ever-changing speech policing. The complete vanishing of traditionally-boyish stories from the YA shelves. And worst of all, the Stasi-esque progressive thought policing and witch-hunts on pre-Elon social media. All delivered with a maximum of smarmy "eat-your-vegetables" condescension designed to infantilize, isolate, and humiliate. I'm an elder-millennial so I only got the beginnings of it in the late 2000's and early 2010s, but it was bad then and from talking to friends' younger siblings it has gotten significantly worse (though things appear to be swinging back a bit in recent months). That kind of smothering sows quite a lot of resentment, which is now having it's own Langston Hughes "raisin in the sun" moment. These kids have lots of memories of punchable lib faces sneering at them, and now their revenge is exploding indiscriminately all over the place. The libs should have read their own literature and realized that it could happen to them too.
An important capture of the craven, bloodthirsty anarchic mood/tone/energy... I have one question what did you mean when you said you are not apart from this in some way? Not sure I understand.
Last night’s unpresidential State of the Union Address was a masterclasss in anger, belligerence and manipulation. It might be more correctly named Division of The State Address, or State of Disarray. Barbarians indeed.
Trump’s abandonment of Ukraine and betrayal of our allies is reprehensible. His behavior in the Oval Office is alien to anything I have ever seen or believed to represent my beliefs. This alien New Coach is a disaster. He has recruited the worst players he can find. He persuaded the alumni, small donors and large, to contribute their hard-earned cash to the team and he pocketed the money. Now he is placing bets against the team. The team will lose and he will make even more money. He has thrown the game. Is this the coach for your team? Or is he
Thanks for this raw and honest essay Damir. I think any analogy to the past is somewhat slightly missing the mark. Take your example of the Freikorps, for instance; in Weimar, the traditional conservative authoritarian hierarchy still largely remained. Yes, Weimar was a constitutional democracy, but even in the final few years, many decisions were made via executive fiat.
The demise of Weimar could be pinned down to a few institutional failures, Germany's lack of liberal tradition and its fair share of simple bad luck. Although the Freikorps were used as tools to defeat the spartacist uprising they lacked much shared ideology apart from some general agreements around militarism, conspiracy theories about ww1, and nationalist sentiment. Hitlerism embodied some of these things but was much more uniform and extreme in its ideology.
But I guess my point is that the traditional notions of authority in Germany generally remained pre-Hitlerism. Conservative, militaristic, and nationalist values were found in a conservative majority which without Hitler would, in my opinion, have created the space for a European War in the 20th century, even if it would have been much less destructive than the one we eventually had.
I'm just not sure the same is true of America's politics today. It feels that as Shadi alluded to in the previous episode that the traditional notions of authority and legitimacy in America have melted away. This strikes me as a different kind of crisis and certainly more chaotic in its foundations and a more revolutionary possibility emerging.
I guess that If I was to go with a historical analogy, I'd go to Caesar. The Republic has lost legitimacy amongst the mob and is struggling to assert its hegemony which it once possessed. A fat and idealess hierarchy is being brought to heel by someone willing to take risks and 'represent' the mob with what they really want. Now, we all know what happened to Caesar, but he did essentially re-shape rome. Maybe that is what will happen here....
I quit watching Fox News during the Obama years because all they did was bash Obama night and day. It was not news but propaganda. It is statistically impossible for one side to be wrong about everything. Now I do not watch the left media for the same reason. I will agree on the tangible arrogance of the right but it is just as annoying watching the self righteous left refusing to at least acknowledge that American voted for many of the things he is doing. Why do they not come along side and help with the cutting of waste and fraud? This should be a non-partisan issue. But TDS keeps you guys stuck from evolving. You will pay with lost elections.
I’m not left wing. I view myself as center right-ish. Anti-woke. Pro capitalism. Pro free markets. Pro free speech. I’m also pro experts (however fallible they may be) and pro civil service.
I don’t care that most people voted for this moronic nonsense. People voted Hitler into power too. So what? The Elon/Trump administration is deranged. But I suspect the morons who voted for this will need to touch the stove before they learn.
Beautiful. I was in DC yesterday and the sense of desolation was palpable. The earnest strivers were noticeably absent and, when encountered, had a defeated air.
Nicely rendered, Damir. Extra points for mentioning Luxemburg and Liebknecht.
How did so many young and presumably intelligent people fall into such meanness and madness? Can it just be hating woke? But you and I hate woke, and we're not chortling with glee as the barbarians raze civil society.
You don't quite understand what it was to be young and feel completely smothered under what really did look to be a total woke gleichschaltung. Jonah Goldberg likes to tell the anecdote about how the Nazis forced their ideology into everything - even the cat fancier magazines had to be about "the superior Aryan Cat" - and especially in schools that sort of attitude was everywhere. You couldn't be in a knitting group without "centering the experience of POC [that horrid neologism]-knitters and the oppression inherent in the excessive whiteness of hobby stores." The ever-changing speech policing. The complete vanishing of traditionally-boyish stories from the YA shelves. And worst of all, the Stasi-esque progressive thought policing and witch-hunts on pre-Elon social media. All delivered with a maximum of smarmy "eat-your-vegetables" condescension designed to infantilize, isolate, and humiliate. I'm an elder-millennial so I only got the beginnings of it in the late 2000's and early 2010s, but it was bad then and from talking to friends' younger siblings it has gotten significantly worse (though things appear to be swinging back a bit in recent months). That kind of smothering sows quite a lot of resentment, which is now having it's own Langston Hughes "raisin in the sun" moment. These kids have lots of memories of punchable lib faces sneering at them, and now their revenge is exploding indiscriminately all over the place. The libs should have read their own literature and realized that it could happen to them too.
I think he’s half-chortling
An important capture of the craven, bloodthirsty anarchic mood/tone/energy... I have one question what did you mean when you said you are not apart from this in some way? Not sure I understand.
I don’t want to pretend that I don’t get the thrill. I’m not so virtuous.
oh you understand thrill is an appeal- but you are not into this particular thrill- got it
Nah he’s fully engrossed by the thrill
Yes, that’s how it sounds, here and in previous posts
Last night’s unpresidential State of the Union Address was a masterclasss in anger, belligerence and manipulation. It might be more correctly named Division of The State Address, or State of Disarray. Barbarians indeed.
Trump’s abandonment of Ukraine and betrayal of our allies is reprehensible. His behavior in the Oval Office is alien to anything I have ever seen or believed to represent my beliefs. This alien New Coach is a disaster. He has recruited the worst players he can find. He persuaded the alumni, small donors and large, to contribute their hard-earned cash to the team and he pocketed the money. Now he is placing bets against the team. The team will lose and he will make even more money. He has thrown the game. Is this the coach for your team? Or is he
The Enemy Within . . .
49.8% are not a majority.
And 22% of adults do not represent the popular will.
Don’t worry I don’t believe in the popular will.
guard goons? stopped reading pretty much after that
Ok…?
Thanks for this raw and honest essay Damir. I think any analogy to the past is somewhat slightly missing the mark. Take your example of the Freikorps, for instance; in Weimar, the traditional conservative authoritarian hierarchy still largely remained. Yes, Weimar was a constitutional democracy, but even in the final few years, many decisions were made via executive fiat.
The demise of Weimar could be pinned down to a few institutional failures, Germany's lack of liberal tradition and its fair share of simple bad luck. Although the Freikorps were used as tools to defeat the spartacist uprising they lacked much shared ideology apart from some general agreements around militarism, conspiracy theories about ww1, and nationalist sentiment. Hitlerism embodied some of these things but was much more uniform and extreme in its ideology.
But I guess my point is that the traditional notions of authority in Germany generally remained pre-Hitlerism. Conservative, militaristic, and nationalist values were found in a conservative majority which without Hitler would, in my opinion, have created the space for a European War in the 20th century, even if it would have been much less destructive than the one we eventually had.
I'm just not sure the same is true of America's politics today. It feels that as Shadi alluded to in the previous episode that the traditional notions of authority and legitimacy in America have melted away. This strikes me as a different kind of crisis and certainly more chaotic in its foundations and a more revolutionary possibility emerging.
I guess that If I was to go with a historical analogy, I'd go to Caesar. The Republic has lost legitimacy amongst the mob and is struggling to assert its hegemony which it once possessed. A fat and idealess hierarchy is being brought to heel by someone willing to take risks and 'represent' the mob with what they really want. Now, we all know what happened to Caesar, but he did essentially re-shape rome. Maybe that is what will happen here....
Usual Trump Derangement Syndrome.
What’s deranged about it Janet?
I quit watching Fox News during the Obama years because all they did was bash Obama night and day. It was not news but propaganda. It is statistically impossible for one side to be wrong about everything. Now I do not watch the left media for the same reason. I will agree on the tangible arrogance of the right but it is just as annoying watching the self righteous left refusing to at least acknowledge that American voted for many of the things he is doing. Why do they not come along side and help with the cutting of waste and fraud? This should be a non-partisan issue. But TDS keeps you guys stuck from evolving. You will pay with lost elections.
I’m not left wing. I view myself as center right-ish. Anti-woke. Pro capitalism. Pro free markets. Pro free speech. I’m also pro experts (however fallible they may be) and pro civil service.
I don’t care that most people voted for this moronic nonsense. People voted Hitler into power too. So what? The Elon/Trump administration is deranged. But I suspect the morons who voted for this will need to touch the stove before they learn.
On the civil service, do you think there's any issue with it being dominated by members of a single political party?