Pat Condell discusses what passes for “free speech” on university campuses nowadays:
4 thoughts on “A Valet-Parking of the Mind”
Anyone who isn’t trying to support propagandists needs to stop using this Orwellian term “progressive”. The fact is that every time social and economic Marxism is exposed as a failure, propagandists come up with some new term like “progressive” or “participatory economics” to trick people into believing that the same old failed ideas are something new and necessarily must represent some sort of new improvement.
Marxism and marxist ideas dressed up in new terminology have destroyed entire countries. Because of this, they are regressive the same way sharia law is regressive. Sharia law is specifically regression to 7th century social, legal, moral, and technological standards. Marxism represents a regression to similar medieval conditions in the same areas, as evidenced by the actual effects that it has had on the countries that fully embraced it.
The emphasis needs to be on “what are the actual effects of a belief?” not “how nice does the etiology of a belief sound?” If I promise people a utopia if they just believe X then a bunch of idiots will believe it simply based on the promised reward, without any effort to figure out the effects based on previous evidence. This is the main place where people fail and society regresses.
I tend to avoid the words “progressive” and “regressive” entirely.
Only right and wrong matter, not forward or backward. The timeline is meaningless. We used to get some things right, and lost them; we got some things wrong and took a long time to shake them loose. But nothing is positive or beneficial merely because it is new.
I also believe that civilization should be aiming toward something akin to satisfaction: that there is a goal and a finish line. The idea that “there’s always something that needs fixing” is hypnotic.
That would be true, RKae, if all else were static, in economics, technology etc. For example, note how adept wealthy corporations and individuals have become at paying little or no tax, even when their wealth is generated primarily in territories where poorer citizens and companies pay proportionately more. This is a relatively recent development, at least on such a scale, so “needs fixing”; sadly this would require a degree of intergovernmental cooperation which seems unlikely.
Y-e-ss! What a glorious, booming broadside! It made for a truly feel-good moment. Obviously, the UK and USA academies are in equally wretched state. Let’s figure out how to get this to go viral; we have no time to lose.
Anyone who isn’t trying to support propagandists needs to stop using this Orwellian term “progressive”. The fact is that every time social and economic Marxism is exposed as a failure, propagandists come up with some new term like “progressive” or “participatory economics” to trick people into believing that the same old failed ideas are something new and necessarily must represent some sort of new improvement.
Marxism and marxist ideas dressed up in new terminology have destroyed entire countries. Because of this, they are regressive the same way sharia law is regressive. Sharia law is specifically regression to 7th century social, legal, moral, and technological standards. Marxism represents a regression to similar medieval conditions in the same areas, as evidenced by the actual effects that it has had on the countries that fully embraced it.
The emphasis needs to be on “what are the actual effects of a belief?” not “how nice does the etiology of a belief sound?” If I promise people a utopia if they just believe X then a bunch of idiots will believe it simply based on the promised reward, without any effort to figure out the effects based on previous evidence. This is the main place where people fail and society regresses.
I tend to avoid the words “progressive” and “regressive” entirely.
Only right and wrong matter, not forward or backward. The timeline is meaningless. We used to get some things right, and lost them; we got some things wrong and took a long time to shake them loose. But nothing is positive or beneficial merely because it is new.
I also believe that civilization should be aiming toward something akin to satisfaction: that there is a goal and a finish line. The idea that “there’s always something that needs fixing” is hypnotic.
That would be true, RKae, if all else were static, in economics, technology etc. For example, note how adept wealthy corporations and individuals have become at paying little or no tax, even when their wealth is generated primarily in territories where poorer citizens and companies pay proportionately more. This is a relatively recent development, at least on such a scale, so “needs fixing”; sadly this would require a degree of intergovernmental cooperation which seems unlikely.
Y-e-ss! What a glorious, booming broadside! It made for a truly feel-good moment. Obviously, the UK and USA academies are in equally wretched state. Let’s figure out how to get this to go viral; we have no time to lose.