Page 10 of 14 FirstFirst 1234567891011121314 LastLast
Results 181 to 200 of 265

Thread: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

  1. #181

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Muizer View Post
    You can't be serious! That's not the proof, that's the THEORY.
    Use this forum to discuss political theory and science in the abstract, as opposed to particular events.
    You don't say!
    I'm honestly struggling to understand what exactly are you disagreeing with.

  2. #182
    pacifism's Avatar see the day
    Citizen

    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    purple mountains majesty
    Posts
    1,958
    Tournaments Joined
    1
    Tournaments Won
    0

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Exarch View Post
    i answered your post sensibly, please respond properly.
    What's there to say? When Legio_Italica provided evidence that you're mistaken, you said that that evidence must be wrong. That "divide by 4" retort of yours has no basis in actual statistic analysis, it was a bunch of hot air. So when you're throwing out evidence because it doesn't fit your conclusions, then I have to consider the possibility that your opinion is more important to you than whether it's actually true. I could maybe understand doing that in some situations where it's a principle you deeply believe in, but being so disparaging to women should not be one of those times. I'm sorry. I don't hate you or anything, but I cannot try to find common ground with the views that you're expressing. I just can't. It's not decent. The implications of what you are arguing for is too deeply hurtful for me to even pretend to respect it.

    You should be relieved that you might be wrong.

    Quote Originally Posted by Exarch View Post
    Naturally, but the issue is that there are now so damn many of them in America and the west today.
    There's a completely normal reason why white supremacists can also be sexists too. If someone thinks that men are better than women, and a white is better than a non-white, then a white man can be superior to most people just by existing. Those people want to believe that they're better or more worthy as individuals than most other people, and that's how they choose to do it. It's just a lack of compassion and demographic bullying, so to speak.

    Quote Originally Posted by Heathen Hammer View Post
    Stop deflecting. You are the one who started talking about racism and chauvinism, which are typical traits of modern Western left, especially in US.
    Read your own thread. Can you not see Exarch's posts? I didn't bring it up first, he did. I was responding to him. Or did you not recognize that those people that he brought up were in fact white nationalists being sexist?

    Quote Originally Posted by Heathen Hammer View Post
    If you are ready to throw a tantrum over "its okay to be <insert race>", or "all lives matter", then you are racist and chauvinistic.
    "Black Lives Matter" wasn't meant to mean that no other lives matter, it's supposed to mean that the issues unique to the black community should not be written off or accepted as mundane, because people are dying from them. "All Lives Matter" is not a very relevant response, and can arguably be interpreted as a dismissal of whatever issues Black Lives Matter is trying to raise. It's basically like saying that everyone has problems when someone tries to talk about their own. Not very helpful, in the view of BLM.

    "It's okay to be white" has some issues with being co-opted by some fairly racist characters. Can't say I blame someone "throwing a tantrum" over actual white supremacist recruitment campaigns. Innocuous phrases being repurposed as by hate groups is a classic tactic: in this case, a symbiotic relationship between a few actual racists saying "it's okay to be white" on the internet (who can easily disappear into the crowd of non-white supremacists), while the larger population of people saying "it's okay to be white" can complain that they are being unfairly associated with horrid people and they merely want to start a conversation about ethics or whatever.
    Read the latest TWC Content and check out the Wiki!
    ---
    Graham's Hierarchy of Disagreement

  3. #183
    Muizer's Avatar member 3519
    Patrician Artifex Magistrate

    Join Date
    Apr 2005
    Location
    Netherlands
    Posts
    11,088

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Heathen Hammer View Post
    You don't say!
    I'm honestly struggling to understand what exactly are you disagreeing with.
    Yes, I can imagine it is hard if you don't know the difference between a theory and supporting evidence, of which, as far as your cited article is concerned, none has so far materialized.

    If this theory has any descriptive value (the bare minimum for any theory) and not just for Britain, but for the Romans, Greeks, French and Americans too, then it should be possible to identify every stage of its cycle in their respective histories.

    I am asking you to provide this supporting evidence so we can assess whether it holds up to scrutiny.

    If you can't or won't, then any argument built upon it is built on quick-sand.

    What you've been doing is expecting us to take it on faith that this theory is a valid starting point for discussion.

    I'm not taking it on faith. I don't think anybody here is.
    "Lay these words to heart, Lucilius, that you may scorn the pleasure which comes from the applause of the majority. Many men praise you; but have you any reason for being pleased with yourself, if you are a person whom the many can understand?" - Lucius Annaeus Seneca -

  4. #184

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by pacifism View Post

    There's a completely normal reason why white supremacists can also be sexists too. If someone thinks that men are better than women, and a white is better than a non-white, then a white man can be superior to most people just by existing. Those people want to believe that they're better or more worthy as individuals than most other people, and that's how they choose to do it. It's just a lack of compassion and demographic bullying, so to speak.
    Funny enough, this also explains Exarch's frantic spamming of "China=Übermensch" threads and replies here everyday.

    Racial supremacists and ultra-nationalists are all the same. They desperately want to be seen as special and important, but suffer from a lack of accomplishments to point too. So they try to build up their nation/race/whatever in everyone else's eyes, or tear down another, in the misguided belief that it will make everyone believe that they are just inherently superiorfor belonging to said nation/race/whatever.

    The thing is, it doesn't work. Because even if their nation/race/whatever were as wonderful as they claim it to be, they had nothing to do with it. They didn't win the war, invent the new technology, build the company, or do anything like that. They spent their lives sitting around trying to convince strangers on the internet that they're important. Their nation/race/whatever would be in exactly the same state, for good or ill, if they hadn't been born at all.

  5. #185
    conon394's Avatar hoi polloi
    Join Date
    Sep 2004
    Location
    Colfax WA, neat I have a barn and 49 acres - I have 2 horses, 15 chickens - but no more pigs
    Posts
    16,794

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    How is it nonsensical? Without expanding on that it just sounds like generic gainsaying. Let's try to go beyond "author bad!".
    No it its simply pointing out your OP link presents a grand hypothesis but no actual evidence or definitions. Or rather it puts none of its examples in the context of its nominal hypothesis.

    "So oikophobia is a natural outgrowth of the way cultures, and certainly Western cultures, develop. It occurred in ancient Greece, in Rome, in the French and British empires, and now in the United States"

    So first this list is odd and messy. Are talking about cultures or states?

    "To give a very brief overview of this development, we may say that in the beginning, a people relatively uncivilized and uncultured, but possessed of great mobility and untested strength, awakens and, as it were, goes to war in service of its deities. Initial successes against surrounding peoples lead to greater wealth and prestige, and a national identity is forged, accompanied by literary epics and other accoutrements of culture."

    Nice bit of either Imperialism or Fascist BS. Goes to how manly. How does this able to ancient Greece again? In the service of it deities? Very much not applicable to Greece and Rome and Only cynically so for France and Great Britain much of the time. "and a national identity is forged" and typically reforged over and over again except for those who prefer golden age-ism.

    "Eventually, the people reaches its pinnacle of success, with so much wealth that a broad and permanent leisure class can be established, and this era of greatest political power will generally coincide, more or less, with the pinnacle of the nation’s cultural and scientific achievements"

    You see notice again unfounded assertions. But this whole frame work on an actual example out of the list offered.

    "There is finally enough wealth and power for the leisure class, and in many cases for people lower on the social ladder as well, to become more occupied with achieving higher states of wealth and prestige vis-ŕ-vis their countrymen than they are with the health of the community itself."

    That right the lower class should know its place - cannon fodder in the struggle thingy.

    "This is where oikophobia sets in. Diverse interests are created that view each other as greater enemies than they do foreign threats."

    RE Gracchi its pretty clear they (and supports) were not killed by Gauls so I think they argue yes internal threats were worse than external ones. I guess for asking for some of that upward mobility and maybe a reward for the struggle thing. But thay must have been self haters huh?

    "the urge to compete against others even through minor distinctions like a virtuous action or the newest gadget—becomes one motivation through which a particular interest expresses its superiority over others"

    Sad why can't a person simply perform a virtuous action because it is virtuous. Sad view. "Newest Gadget" true I think we should stopped with Sargon the Great who needs any of the latest gadgets after him and the height of Sumerian/Mesopotamian empire?
    Last edited by conon394; October 20, 2020 at 07:15 AM.
    IN PATROCINIVM SVB Dromikaites

    'One day when I fly with my hands - up down the sky, like a bird'

    But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place; some swearing, some crying for surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left.

    Hyperides of Athens: We know, replied he, that Antipater is good, but we (the Demos of Athens) have no need of a master at present, even a good one.

  6. #186

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    @conon
    No it its simply pointing out your OP link presents a grand hypothesis but no actual evidence or definitions.
    Definition of what? Evidence for what? Again, this is just vague gainsaying without addressing the OP.
    Are talking about cultures or states?
    I'm not sure what this sentence even means. Was that a question?
    Nice bit of either Imperialism or Fascist BS.
    I guess nature is Imperialist and Fascist. Or maybe you should stop using buzzwords on everything that contradicts the archaic egalitarian utopian beliefs.
    You see notice again unfounded assertions. But this whole frame work on an actual example out of the list offered.
    That's not unfounded, that's literally history of every advanced civilization.
    That right the lower class should know its place - cannon fodder in the struggle thingy.
    You saw the word "class" and started spouting neomarxist buzzwords without even addressing the quote.
    I guess for asking for some of that upward mobility and maybe a reward for the struggle thing. But thay must have been self haters huh?
    All societies in history rely on hierarchy, so your assertion, again, is in realm of some atavistic marxist belief from 1850s that has no pragmatic application and has intellectual value of college student's thought experiment.
    Sad why can't a person simply perform a virtuous action because it is virtuous. Sad view. "Newest Gadget" true I think we should stopped with Sargon the Great who needs any of the latest gadgets after him and the height of Sumerian/Mesopotamian empire?
    Aqueducts didn't save Rome, now will Iphone save the Western civilization. I do find it funny how modern Western neomarxists combine their atavistic view on society with blind belief in saving power of consumerism.


    Quote Originally Posted by pacifism View Post
    "Black Lives Matter" wasn't meant to mean that no other lives matter, it's supposed to mean that the issues unique to the black community should not be written off or accepted as mundane, because people are dying from them. "All Lives Matter" is not a very relevant response, and can arguably be interpreted as a dismissal of whatever issues Black Lives Matter is trying to raise. It's basically like saying that everyone has problems when someone tries to talk about their own. Not very helpful, in the view of BLM.

    "It's okay to be white" has some issues with being co-opted by some fairly racist characters. Can't say I blame someone "throwing a tantrum" over actual white supremacist recruitment campaigns. Innocuous phrases being repurposed as by hate groups is a classic tactic: in this case, a symbiotic relationship between a few actual racists saying "it's okay to be white" on the internet (who can easily disappear into the crowd of non-white supremacists), while the larger population of people saying "it's okay to be white" can complain that they are being unfairly associated with horrid people and they merely want to start a conversation about ethics or whatever.
    "Black good, white bad" Okay there, way to show how "anti-racist" you are.
    BLM is being used by racists and black nationalist groups to a much further extent, so by your own thought it is racist and chauvinistic then. You just happen to have two standards for white nationalism and black nationalism, which is pretty much my point, which ironically also serves to be additional proof for point of the OP.

    Quote Originally Posted by Muizer View Post
    Yes, I can imagine it is hard if you don't know the difference between a theory and supporting evidence, of which, as far as your cited article is concerned, none has so far materialized.

    If this theory has any descriptive value (the bare minimum for any theory) and not just for Britain, but for the Romans, Greeks, French and Americans too, then it should be possible to identify every stage of its cycle in their respective histories.

    I am asking you to provide this supporting evidence so we can assess whether it holds up to scrutiny.

    If you can't or won't, then any argument built upon it is built on quick-sand.

    What you've been doing is expecting us to take it on faith that this theory is a valid starting point for discussion.

    I'm not taking it on faith. I don't think anybody here is.
    And? Historical events that you are demanding evidence for are part of high-school history curriculum of any developed country. I'm still not sure which part of the OP you need evidence for. That Roman Empire collapsed?
    Last edited by Heathen Hammer; October 20, 2020 at 02:30 PM.

  7. #187
    Muizer's Avatar member 3519
    Patrician Artifex Magistrate

    Join Date
    Apr 2005
    Location
    Netherlands
    Posts
    11,088

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Heathen Hammer View Post
    And? Historical events that you are demanding evidence for are part of high-school history curriculum of any developed country. I'm still not sure which part of the OP you need evidence for. That Roman Empire collapsed?

    The theory you cite places oikophobia in the final stages of a civilizational cycle. I've summarized the stages of the cycle as laid out in the article before:


    Quote Originally Posted by Muizer View Post
    1) An uncivilized and uncultured people awakens.
    2) Its national identity is forged through war against surrounding peoples
    3) success leads to greater wealth and prestige, such that eventually a permanent leisure class can be established
    4) great wealth and lack of foreign enemies results in strife turning inwards, hence self-hatred, leading to decline/fall

    I'm getting the impression you think you can cherry pick only the 'decline' phase and still place it in the wider context of this model. That is not correct. If this is a valid model for e.g. Roman history you ought to assign rough time periods to each of its phases.

    For instance, the back bone of the early Roman Republic where land-owning, free citizens who had the votes and made up the military. It carried the Republic through the Punic and Italian wars. It was destroyed by a greedy leasure class that was more intent on carving up wealth (i.e. land) between them than sustaining the system that made it possible in the first place. We can demarcate the end of this phase of the republic with the failure of the Gracchi to reverse the trend in the late 2nd century BC or shortly after, when under Marius the republic was compelled to resort to a professional army. From the perspective of a non-elite Roman citizen living through these times, this phase has all the hallmarks of your 'oikophobic' phase. Yet Rome persisted and it is generally agreed upon its pinnacle was reached under the '5 good emperors', 2-3 centuries later.

    I'm sure you can come up with a different periodization that does conclude with decline, but that's with the benefit of hindsight. I've just demonstrated how your theory would have 'predicted' the decline and collapse of Rome to Romans living in the 2nd century BC when in fact it was far from reaching its peak.
    Last edited by Muizer; October 21, 2020 at 10:02 AM.
    "Lay these words to heart, Lucilius, that you may scorn the pleasure which comes from the applause of the majority. Many men praise you; but have you any reason for being pleased with yourself, if you are a person whom the many can understand?" - Lucius Annaeus Seneca -

  8. #188
    Ludicus's Avatar Comes Limitis
    Citizen

    Join Date
    Sep 2006
    Posts
    13,065

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Ludicus View Post
    ... the western expansion was based on three things: search for gold/slavery, scientific curiosity, and religion conversion.
    The scientific curiosity and the discovery of the "other",

    "...Now, the Portuguese know more in one day than the Romans knew in 100 years"
    "
    Garcia de Horta. (Colloquies dos Simples and Drugs: Fifteenth Colloquy – Canela, Cassia lignea and Cinammon;I Vol: Page: 210).
    -----
    A fascinating reading for History lovers. To read on a rainy day... 294 pages.

    Writing New Worlds - Cambridge Scholars Writing New Worlds:The Cultural Dynamics of Curiosity in Early Modern Europe
    I. Collecting News (seven chapters)
    II. Voyages, the Visual and the Arts (seven chapters)
    III. Travel, Experience and Knowledge (six chapters)

    Read with attention the chapter 20: On How the "Savage" Became Ever More Savage: Perspectives on Africa in Early Modern Europe"
    Il y a quelque chose de pire que d'avoir une âme perverse. C’est d'avoir une âme habituée
    Charles Péguy

    Every human society must justify its inequalities: reasons must be found because, without them, the whole political and social edifice is in danger of collapsing”.
    Thomas Piketty

  9. #189
    pacifism's Avatar see the day
    Citizen

    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    purple mountains majesty
    Posts
    1,958
    Tournaments Joined
    1
    Tournaments Won
    0

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Heathen Hammer View Post
    "Black good, white bad" Okay there, way to show how "anti-racist" you are.
    Don't be silly. I never said that. I actually said the opposite. Don’t deliberately misinterpret me. I don’t deliberately misinterpret your views.

    Quote Originally Posted by Heathen Hammer View Post
    BLM is being used by racists and black nationalist groups to a much further extent, so by your own thought it is racist and chauvinistic then. You just happen to have two standards for white nationalism and black nationalism, which is pretty much my point, which ironically also serves to be additional proof for point of the OP.
    What I’m getting at is that when a community believes that its problems are being marginalized and tries to call for attention (e.g. Black Lives Matter), responding that every community has problems (e.g. All Lives Matter) doesn’t actually help solve anyone’s problems. In extreme cases, it can even be a tool used against solving that community’s problems by bad actors trying to silence that call for awareness.

    And if you really want to know, I think that the motivations behind black nationalism in the U.S. and white nationalism in the U.S. are different. Black nationalism in the U.S. is led by people who have given up on a racially just America because it has such an oppressive history (their heyday was the 1960s and 70s, after all). White nationalism in the U.S. is perpetuated by people who haven’t given up on preserving a racially unjust America. They’re both wrong in methods and goals, how they view other races, and they both have hate problems, but they clearly exist for different reasons. If you want to pretend like you suddenly care about systemic racism now so you can sanctimoniously say how racist it is of me to have a reason behind my double standard, then I guess I can take that heat. But let it be known that I saw it coming a mile away and such a cheap Gotchya! isn’t really fooling anyone.

    Quote Originally Posted by Coughdrop addict View Post
    Funny enough, this also explains Exarch's frantic spamming of "China=Übermensch" threads and replies here everyday.

    Racial supremacists and ultra-nationalists are all the same. They desperately want to be seen as special and important, but suffer from a lack of accomplishments to point too. So they try to build up their nation/race/whatever in everyone else's eyes, or tear down another, in the misguided belief that it will make everyone believe that they are just inherently superiorfor belonging to said nation/race/whatever.

    The thing is, it doesn't work. Because even if their nation/race/whatever were as wonderful as they claim it to be, they had nothing to do with it. They didn't win the war, invent the new technology, build the company, or do anything like that. They spent their lives sitting around trying to convince strangers on the internet that they're important. Their nation/race/whatever would be in exactly the same state, for good or ill, if they hadn't been born at all.
    I’ve been on a bit of a spree watching and reading ContraPoints recently, so I’ll just say that what you said reminds me of the last third of this transcript. The basic premise is that alt-right white nationalism is not an act born from hatred, but fear. I think people on the left and the right often act like culture is some kind of monolithic, static thing must be looked at but not touched and kept frozen in time forever. I don't get why. Cultures have endured so much worse than immigration and occasionally overzealous civil rights movements, and so I really don't see why my "Western culture" - whatever that means, exactly - will taste death instead of metamorphosis.
    Read the latest TWC Content and check out the Wiki!
    ---
    Graham's Hierarchy of Disagreement

  10. #190
    conon394's Avatar hoi polloi
    Join Date
    Sep 2004
    Location
    Colfax WA, neat I have a barn and 49 acres - I have 2 horses, 15 chickens - but no more pigs
    Posts
    16,794

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Definition of what? Evidence for what? Again, this is just vague gainsaying without addressing the OP.
    Well Muizer very elegantly just made the point I was looking for you come up with for Rome. Basically you need to show how you hypothesis is either predictive or actually descriptive at minimum. Also Muizer left out the the political power and military apex period of Rome (the Unified republic that survived the Social war) was not its technological apex which would be somewhere in the Imperial period.

    But now you have example please hang ancient greece on the proposed model. Or failing to define ancient greece, at least fit any notable classical Greek state on that model (I don't care Sparta, Athens Rhodes Syracuse, Macedonia).

    I'm not sure what this sentence even means. Was that a question?
    What I meant is I have no ideal what unit the link would use in its argument. States like United states. Empires The French empire or Rome or something as vague as and non unified as Ancient Greece (which is sort of like saying the west)
    IN PATROCINIVM SVB Dromikaites

    'One day when I fly with my hands - up down the sky, like a bird'

    But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join together at the latter day and cry all 'We died at such a place; some swearing, some crying for surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their children rawly left.

    Hyperides of Athens: We know, replied he, that Antipater is good, but we (the Demos of Athens) have no need of a master at present, even a good one.

  11. #191

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by pacifism View Post
    What I’m getting at is that when a community believes that its problems are being marginalized and tries to call for attention (e.g. Black Lives Matter), responding that every community has problems (e.g. All Lives Matter) doesn’t actually help solve anyone’s problems. In extreme cases, it can even be a tool used against solving that community’s problems by bad actors trying to silence that call for awareness.
    The opposite is closer to the truth. Groups which attempt to monopolize victimhood (particularly along identity fault lines) damage a society's ability to solve common problems and/or address structural injustices. The Black Lives Matter movement is a political brand of the liberal ruling class which is being bankrolled by corporate America and wealthy individual patrons. Its purpose (beyond simple marketing) is to expand and further entrench racial voting constituencies at the expense of class unity.

    The received wisdom, echoing the official mythology around Black Lives Matter Global Network Inc.—co-founded by Garza along with fellow activists Opal Tometi and Patrisse Cullors—is that BLM is a grassroots movement that rose up organically out of the widespread rage sparked by viral videos of Black American men killed by police officers. According to this account, the political priorities of activists in Brooklyn screaming at cops and calling to defund the police have been fused with those of suburban moms in Peloton T-shirts, hand-painting signs with their kids using the BLM hashtags of large multinational conglomerates—an unusual union of protesters and the corporate boardroom spurred on by nothing more than everyone’s shared outrage over racism.

    There is, however, another version of events, in which the heartfelt dedication to racial justice is only the forward-facing side of a more complicated movement. Behind the street level activism and emotional outpouring is a calculated machinery built by establishment money and power that has seized on racial politics, in which some of the biggest capitalists in the world are financially backing a group of self-described “trained Marxists”—a label that Cullors enthusiastically applies to herself and the group’s other co-founders.

    Is Warren Buffet the Wallet Behind Black Lives Matter? Tablet Mag, Oct 6th.
    And if you really want to know, I think that the motivations behind black nationalism in the U.S. and white nationalism in the U.S. are different. Black nationalism in the U.S. is led by people who have given up on a racially just America because it has such an oppressive history (their heyday was the 1960s and 70s, after all). White nationalism in the U.S. is perpetuated by people who haven’t given up on preserving a racially unjust America. They’re both wrong in methods and goals, how they view other races, and they both have hate problems, but they clearly exist for different reasons.
    Black nationalists and white nationalists do not exist for different reasons; their sole purpose is to prioritize, or to encourage the prioritization of, the interests of their respective racial "nations".

    If you want to pretend like you suddenly care about systemic racism now so you can sanctimoniously say how racist it is of me to have a reason behind my double standard, then I guess I can take that heat. But let it be known that I saw it coming a mile away and such a cheap Gotchya! isn’t really fooling anyone.
    Systemic racism (as it is understood here) is a myth upon which America's overwhelmingly dominant "anti-racist" philosophies rely; it is the ultimate bogeyman of the liberal ecosystem.
    Last edited by Cope; October 22, 2020 at 01:14 AM.



  12. #192
    Muizer's Avatar member 3519
    Patrician Artifex Magistrate

    Join Date
    Apr 2005
    Location
    Netherlands
    Posts
    11,088

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Cope View Post
    Black nationalists and white nationalists do not exist for different reasons; their sole purpose is to prioritize, or to encourage the prioritization of, the interests of their respective racial "nations".
    To be honest, I much prefer the ideal that each individual is to be judged on their merits, without regard for race, religion, gender etc.. The sad fact is that politically speaking it's a spent ideal. A hollow promise. For centuries, rich white/european christian male leaders have preached it, yet for the poor, for women and especially for people of colour every practical step towards it becoming reality has been an (often bloody) uphill battle. So even while I find the ideological underpinnings of a movement like BLM dodgy , I can't really blame them for looking for alternatives. I think anyone who sincerely believes in the old principles of equality and equal opportunity would realise that to harp on about those ideals to criticize those who rightly feel let down by them will be seen as an affront, as obstinacy, as complicity with those who failed them in the past. All the more so, because at the practical level there's plenty of common ground to be found.
    Last edited by Muizer; October 22, 2020 at 04:56 AM.
    "Lay these words to heart, Lucilius, that you may scorn the pleasure which comes from the applause of the majority. Many men praise you; but have you any reason for being pleased with yourself, if you are a person whom the many can understand?" - Lucius Annaeus Seneca -

  13. #193
    pacifism's Avatar see the day
    Citizen

    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    purple mountains majesty
    Posts
    1,958
    Tournaments Joined
    1
    Tournaments Won
    0

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Cope View Post
    The opposite is closer to the truth. Groups which attempt to monopolize victimhood (particularly along identity fault lines) damage a society's ability to solve common problems and/or address structural injustices. The Black Lives Matter movement is a political brand of the liberal ruling class which is being bankrolled by corporate America and wealthy individual patrons. Its purpose (beyond simple marketing) is to expand and further entrench racial voting constituencies at the expense of class unity.
    I'm not talking about corporate wokeness. I'm explaining why people criticize the phrases "All Lives Matter" and "it's okay to be white".

    Quote Originally Posted by Cope View Post
    Black nationalists and white nationalists do not exist for different reasons; their sole purpose is to prioritize, or to encourage the prioritization of, the interests of their respective racial "nations".
    You mean to say that different kinds of nationalists all want to advance the interests of their respective nations? Stop the presses!

    Why they exist are for different reasons.

    Quote Originally Posted by Cope View Post
    Systemic racism (as it is understood here) is a myth upon which America's overwhelmingly dominant "anti-racist" philosophies rely; it is the ultimate bogeyman of the liberal ecosystem.
    Yeah, that's the point. If you or him racks up a triple-digit post count in the George Floyd protests thread defining racism to only mean an individual's belief in racial superiority, but then suddenly turns around to say:

    "But pax, criticizing people who say 'it's okay to be white' is racist!"

    Is plain disingenuous. It's one thing if it is spoken out of ignorance, but that phrase is a code word that was used in an actual white nationalist recruitment campaign.
    Last edited by pacifism; October 22, 2020 at 10:28 AM.
    Read the latest TWC Content and check out the Wiki!
    ---
    Graham's Hierarchy of Disagreement

  14. #194

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by pacifism View Post
    I'm not talking about corporate wokeness. I'm explaining why people criticize the phrases "All Lives Matter" and "it's okay to be white".
    As mentioned above, such criticisms are typically intended to facilitate the monopolization (and monetization) of victimhood by certain groups. This has the effect of damaging efforts to confront injustices common to people of all identities.

    You mean to say that different kinds of nationalists all want to advance the interests of their respective nations? Stop the presses!

    Why they exist are for different reasons.
    Your second sentence contradicts your first; why nationalist movements exist (in the most generic sense) is not the same as what their histories are.

    Yeah, that's the point. If you or him racks up a triple-digit post count in the George Floyd protests thread defining racism to only mean an individual's belief in racial superiority, but then suddenly turns around to say:

    "But pax, criticizing people who say 'it's okay to be white' is racist!"

    Is plain disingenuous. It's one thing if it is spoken out of ignorance, but that phrase is a code word that was used in an actual white nationalist recruitment campaign.
    I made no argument that racism could not, or has never been, systematized; nor did I comment upon the abovementioned phrase. I simply argued that the myth of systemic racism in contemporary America is designed to prop up the country's dominant liberal ecosystem.



  15. #195
    pacifism's Avatar see the day
    Citizen

    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    purple mountains majesty
    Posts
    1,958
    Tournaments Joined
    1
    Tournaments Won
    0

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Cope View Post
    As mentioned above, such criticisms are typically intended to facilitate the monopolization (and monetization) of victimhood by certain groups. This has the effect of damaging efforts to confront injustices common to people of all identities.
    That's a bit cynical of you. It can also have a damaging effect on white nationalist recruitment campaigns. Surely you can offer your criticisms of the BLM movement without using such slogans.

    Quote Originally Posted by Cope View Post
    Your second sentence contradicts your first; why nationalist movements exist (in the most generic sense) is not the same as what their histories are.
    I don't see the contradiction. Your "point" was that by definition all forms of nationalism are at least similar. Well, duh. That's adjectives for you. That doesn't address the different motivations between the black and white nationalism in the U.S..

    Quote Originally Posted by Cope View Post
    I made no argument that racism could not, or has never been, systematized; nor did I comment upon the abovementioned phrase. I simply argued that the myth of systemic racism in contemporary America is designed to prop up the country's dominant liberal ecosystem.
    Well, that just comes across as prevaricating. If you don't think it exists in America, I don't know where you would think it is.
    Read the latest TWC Content and check out the Wiki!
    ---
    Graham's Hierarchy of Disagreement

  16. #196

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Cope
    Black nationalists and white nationalists do not exist for different reasons; their sole purpose is to prioritize, or to encourage the prioritization of, the interests of their respective racial "nations".
    Precisely. The problem is that some racial movements in the US are rightfully treated as terrorism or at a minimum criminal, while others are lauded as civil rights heroes, and are entitled to full access to the political establishment, mass media, and corporate power structures, as you mentioned. Sympathies in the political mainstream may tend toward a total moratorium on immigration and deportations on the basis of race or religion among certain cleavages that coincide with white nationalists on those issues. On the other hand, BLM lobbyists advocate for the total elimination of the federal prison system, mandatory racial propaganda in schools, and targeted subsidies for people with a specific skin color/racial background. Some of these racial subsidies are already being advanced at the state level, SCOTUS precedent, the Civil Rights Act, and the Constitution be damned.

    One brand of extremism is treated with derision and condemnation; the other with increasingly mandatory ritual praise and celebration on penalty of political, social and economic repercussions. It doesn’t matter that immigration doesn’t correlate with local crime rates in the US, or that empirical analysis doesn’t indicate conclusive evidence of racial differences in fatal police shootings in the US when controlling for contextual factors (1 2 3). Political power is seldom predicated on factual consistency. There will always be those sympathizers on either end of the spectrum who shrug and say “well I don’t agree with that movement/ideology but society left these people with no other choice” as though reciting a profession of faith.

    As it relates to allusions to civilizational decline, the problems caused by these racial divisions tearing at the fabric of society are self evident. However, that doesn’t mean the political and corporate interests riding on the exploitation of these divisions seem to mind the medium to long term costs. Even in the immediate sense, the most expensive riots in US insurance history don’t appear to have fazed the political or corporate establishment in the slightest. The ability of “western civilization” to weather the elements of rot underlying the storm really comes down to whether or not it can survive the shameless rent-seeking corruption and apathy of its various leaders and those they enable for an indefinite period of time in the midst of numerous external threats. It’s not like the phenomenon is unique to the US. We’re seeing the same in Europe with regard to Islamic extremism and nativism. I wouldn’t call it oikophobia or weave it into some theory of history, but it’s obviously not a positive development, and it’s not going to “go away” until and unless those in power stop perpetuating it for political and monetary gain.
    Of these facts there cannot be any shadow of doubt: for instance, that civil society was renovated in every part by Christian institutions; that in the strength of that renewal the human race was lifted up to better things-nay, that it was brought back from death to life, and to so excellent a life that nothing more perfect had been known before, or will come to be known in the ages that have yet to be. - Pope Leo XIII

  17. #197

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    Quote Originally Posted by Muizer View Post
    The theory you cite places oikophobia in the final stages of a civilizational cycle. I've summarized the stages of the cycle as laid out in the article before:





    I'm getting the impression you think you can cherry pick only the 'decline' phase and still place it in the wider context of this model. That is not correct. If this is a valid model for e.g. Roman history you ought to assign rough time periods to each of its phases.

    For instance, the back bone of the early Roman Republic where land-owning, free citizens who had the votes and made up the military. It carried the Republic through the Punic and Italian wars. It was destroyed by a greedy leasure class that was more intent on carving up wealth (i.e. land) between them than sustaining the system that made it possible in the first place. We can demarcate the end of this phase of the republic with the failure of the Gracchi to reverse the trend in the late 2nd century BC or shortly after, when under Marius the republic was compelled to resort to a professional army. From the perspective of a non-elite Roman citizen living through these times, this phase has all the hallmarks of your 'oikophobic' phase. Yet Rome persisted and it is generally agreed upon its pinnacle was reached under the '5 good emperors', 2-3 centuries later.

    I'm sure you can come up with a different periodization that does conclude with decline, but that's with the benefit of hindsight. I've just demonstrated how your theory would have 'predicted' the decline and collapse of Rome to Romans living in the 2nd century BC when in fact it was far from reaching its peak.
    So, you are kinda proving me correct. Had the Cesar not start and Octavian not finish the job, that leisure class would have caused the eventual demise of the Republic. Instead Octavian prevented decline and ensured centuries of Pax Romana.
    However, nature took her course and due to centuries of prosperity permanent leisure class established itself again - that time it gestated and was also empowered by oikophobic Christianity that became spiritual poison of Roman people in 300s AD. Julian could have been another Ceasar, but unfortunately his early death prevented another miracle

    Quote Originally Posted by pacifism View Post
    Don't be silly. I never said that. I actually said the opposite. Don’t deliberately misinterpret me. I don’t deliberately misinterpret your views.



    What I’m getting at is that when a community believes that its problems are being marginalized and tries to call for attention (e.g. Black Lives Matter), responding that every community has problems (e.g. All Lives Matter) doesn’t actually help solve anyone’s problems. In extreme cases, it can even be a tool used against solving that community’s problems by bad actors trying to silence that call for awareness.

    And if you really want to know, I think that the motivations behind black nationalism in the U.S. and white nationalism in the U.S. are different. Black nationalism in the U.S. is led by people who have given up on a racially just America because it has such an oppressive history (their heyday was the 1960s and 70s, after all). White nationalism in the U.S. is perpetuated by people who haven’t given up on preserving a racially unjust America. They’re both wrong in methods and goals, how they view other races, and they both have hate problems, but they clearly exist for different reasons. If you want to pretend like you suddenly care about systemic racism now so you can sanctimoniously say how racist it is of me to have a reason behind my double standard, then I guess I can take that heat. But let it be known that I saw it coming a mile away and such a cheap Gotchya! isn’t really fooling anyone.
    You were the one who said "its okay to be white" is bad because "racists" use it. If that's the logic, then you should make same conclusion in regards to BLM, but instead you go on a rationalization diatribe. Again, this hypocrisy is a perfect example of oikophobic sentiment.

  18. #198

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    In addition, here is an interesting excerpt from Sir Keith Joseph's famous speech, where he describes the leftist oikophobia:
    It was the radical Socialist writer and patriot, the late George Orwell, who described the left-wing intellectuals as men motivated primarily by hatred of their own country. Socialists who spoke most about brotherhood of man [sic] could not bear their fellow-Englishmen, he complained. Their well-orchestrated sneers from their strongpoint in the educational system and media have weakened the national will to transmit to future generations those values, standards and aspirations which made England admired the world over.


    It is just because their message is that self-discipline is out of date and that the poor cannot be expected to help themselves, that they want the state to do more. That is why they believe in state ownership and control of economic life, education, health. Their wish to end parental choice in where and how their children shall be educated, in spending their money on better education and health for their children instead of on a new car, leisure, pleasure, is all part of the attempt to diminish self and self-discipline and real freedoms in favour of the state, ruled by socialists, the new class, as one disillusioned communist leader called them.


    Of course, I shall be misrepresented, but let me ward off what misunderstanding I can. I am not saying that we should not help the poor, far from it. But the only really lasting help we can give to the poor is helping them to help themselves; to do the opposite, to create more dependence is to destroy them morally while throwing an unfair burden on society. The populist rulers of Rome thought they had hit on a foolproof method of achieving a permanent curb on their patrician rivals when they created a dependent proletariat relying on them for bread and circuses; but in the end it destroyed the political stability of Rome, and so Rome itself fell, destroyed from inside.
    https://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/101830

  19. #199

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    So, can some of you experts answer me, is this "oikophobia" thingy White Genocide?
    Optio, Legio I Latina

  20. #200
    pacifism's Avatar see the day
    Citizen

    Join Date
    Mar 2013
    Location
    purple mountains majesty
    Posts
    1,958
    Tournaments Joined
    1
    Tournaments Won
    0

    Default Re: ‘Oikophobia’: Our Western Self-Hatred as a sign of Western civilizational decline

    As far as I can tell, no, but it's not not white genocide either.

    Quote Originally Posted by Heathen Hammer View Post
    So, you are kinda proving me correct. Had the Cesar not start and Octavian not finish the job, that leisure class would have caused the eventual demise of the Republic. Instead Octavian prevented decline and ensured centuries of Pax Romana.
    However, nature took her course and due to centuries of prosperity permanent leisure class established itself again - that time it gestated and was also empowered by oikophobic Christianity that became spiritual poison of Roman people in 300s AD. Julian could have been another Ceasar, but unfortunately his early death prevented another miracle
    Take it easy, Edward Gibbon. Most historians don't ascribe Christianity as the primary cause for the fall of the Western Roman Empire anymore.

    So this supposed cycle of the collapse of white Western civilizations due to self-hatred happened to Rome, except when it didn't happen to the Republic, but that actually still proves it right because it would've happened if it didn't not happen? Huh? It seems like your theory just simply can't be wrong.

    Quote Originally Posted by Heathen Hammer View Post
    You were the one who said "its okay to be white" is bad because "racists" use it. If that's the logic, then you should make same conclusion in regards to BLM, but instead you go on a rationalization diatribe. Again, this hypocrisy is a perfect example of oikophobic sentiment.
    Well, shoot, that phrase made it to the Anti-Defamation League’s database of hate symbols for a reason, so racists probably do use it. Is it too much for you to admit that you didn’t know that? The fact that they can trick non-racists to also use it and muddy the waters of who believes what doesn’t really change that it’s also a code phrase used by racists. White nationalists use dog whistles like it all the time in order to find each other and sound less extreme normal people.

    I don’t see how Black Lives Matter fits into this. I’m aware of some of the excesses of people involved, but the idea that activists for reducing poverty or violence against blacks in the U.S. is functionally equivalent to white supremacists is just absurd. For one thing, American blacks are more vulnerable as a group than whites.

    Quote Originally Posted by Legio_Italica View Post
    One brand of extremism is treated with derision and condemnation; the other with increasingly mandatory ritual praise and celebration on penalty of political, social and economic repercussions. It doesn’t matter that immigration doesn’t correlate with local crime rates in the US, or that empirical analysis doesn’t indicate conclusive evidence of racial differences in fatal police shootings in the US when controlling for contextual factors (1 2 3). Political power is seldom predicated on factual consistency. There will always be those sympathizers on either end of the spectrum who shrug and say “well I don’t agree with that movement/ideology but society left these people with no other choice” as though reciting a profession of faith.

    As it relates to allusions to civilizational decline, the problems caused by these racial divisions tearing at the fabric of society are self evident. However, that doesn’t mean the political and corporate interests riding on the exploitation of these divisions seem to mind the medium to long term costs. Even in the immediate sense, the most expensive riots in US insurance history don’t appear to have fazed the political or corporate establishment in the slightest. The ability of “western civilization” to weather the elements of rot underlying the storm really comes down to whether or not it can survive the shameless rent-seeking corruption and apathy of its various leaders and those they enable for an indefinite period of time in the midst of numerous external threats. It’s not like the phenomenon is unique to the US. We’re seeing the same in Europe with regard to Islamic extremism and nativism. I wouldn’t call it oikophobia or weave it into some theory of history, but it’s obviously not a positive development, and it’s not going to “go away” until and unless those in power stop perpetuating it for political and monetary gain.
    Okay, but white liberal paternalist racism is a lot less harmful than white supremacist racism is. The latter is rooted in targeted hatred of blacks in a way that the former simply isn’t, and that makes the claim that both forms are equally bad a much harder pill to swallow. It also makes it kind of easy to question the sincerity of anti-racist people who talk on and on about how widespread and bad the first one is and never really say anything about the second kind on their own initiative.

    What I think is interesting is that your second and third source say that minorities are more likely to be on the receiving end of non-lethal force and that minorities are disproportionately killed by police, (1 and 2), respectively. Your first and third sources even seem to be at odds: the first one accounts all disparity in police shootings to crime and there is no real disproportion, while the third one says that minorities are disproportionately killed by black and white officers equally. Just reading the abstracts of those papers alone show it’s not nearly as clear-cut “there is no real racism here” as you make it seem. In fact, there has been concerns about the white supremacist presence in local law enforcement for some years now, something that is just intolerable to me.
    https://theintercept.com/2017/01/31/...w-enforcement/
    https://theappeal.org/the-epidemic-o...-4992cb7ad97a/

    Even if the number of racial supremacists working in police departments is low enough that it is not a concern for some people, it still means that we might need to shift where one finds racial bias in police forces. If only a few officers are quite racist, could it be that many more officers are a little racist? Sen. Tim Scott has famously talked about being pulled over seven times in a single year, and I think that profiling and escalation are the real marks of police misconduct nowadays. Black men are perceived as being more threatening, so they are pulled over more often (during daytime) and searched more even if many police departments have had a hard time finding any contraband (1, 2, 3). People who taste the police use of force are disproportionately black, there is a significant racial disparity in misdemeanor arrests or marijuana drug charges and receive longer sentences for similar drug law violations.

    This is not an exhaustive explanation, but put together, racial disparities in law enforcement do not even need to be caused by white supremacists if widespread tendencies of profiling and escalation alone do the trick.

    And by the way, it is the insurance costs of riots in this past year have been higher than average. But put it in perspective. The amount of damage over the course of weeks all across America is about as much as a large wildfire, and much less than a hurricane. The last riot of a similar insurance loss was L.A. in 1992, where much of it was localized, targeting small businesses, and arguably much more damaging than this year’s. Wildfires and hurricanes are at more damaging and a lot more regular than these riots, but they don’t appear to have fazed the political or corporate establishment very much either. There are even political fiascos surrounding those events too, but we’re hardly being unraveled by them, now are we?
    Last edited by pacifism; November 21, 2020 at 07:33 PM. Reason: fixed broken links
    Read the latest TWC Content and check out the Wiki!
    ---
    Graham's Hierarchy of Disagreement

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •