Comment by ralusek | Hacker News Reader

Comment by ralusek | Hacker News Reader

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I think the current primary strategy is to destabilize Western liberalism. Every tenet of liberalism is actively under attack, and successfully so.

Individualism? Long gone, the name of the game is collectivism and your identity groups are everything.

Color blindness? It's officially considered to be an outdated, laughable mode of thinking. If your identity collective is paramount, how can you be blind to the parameter by which we should first be characterizing you by?

Freedom of speech? Muh freeze peach. This is now a dog whistle value for hate speech. Freedom of speech just means freedom for the identity groups in oppressive positions.

Rule of law? The application of the law should, of course, not be universal. It should be applied with context, with the context being...you guessed it...your identity group.

Objectivity? Facts? Reason? Tools of the colonialists in order to snuff out alternative modes of thinking. Any claim at truth is simply done within the context of the identity group.

If you don't think the left has succeeded in this objective, I don't know what planet you're living on. As a liberal, I can hardly communicate with any of my peers within the framework that has been foundational to Western civilization.

"Individualism" was never really implemented as "western" value; it was only ever a catch-phrase to defend the status quo by insisting those at the top "earned the right" to be there.

"Color blindness" likewise has mostly been used to argue that those on the bottom of society deserve to be there; (again) preserving the status quo. I.E. shutting down discussion by labeling racism a "solved problem".

"Freedom of speech" complaints most often come from those claiming to be "censored" because they are no longer being given a megaphone.

"Rule of law" is used to prevent analysis of those laws by, among other things, demonizing any discussion of those laws' motivations, or the cultural context in which they are enforced.

"Objectivity, Facts, and Reason" are used as buzzwords, often by those who know they aren't actually on their side, because

1) everyone knows they are good, and so claiming to already possess them is convincing rhetoric,

2) painting your opponents as "rejecting" them is also persuasive rhetoric, especially to your uninformed audience.

Claiming that people are actually demonizing them is a mischaracterization.

None of these were actually faithfully followed, and they were indeed used as excuses. But they used to be viewed as ideals to work toward. Now there are circles where they are _only_ seen as excuses, and they really have been demonized.

You could make that case, but I do think that they ceased to be "ideals to work toward" before people started recognizing them as such. I.E. it was only after "colorblindness" advocates started using the term to shut down discussions of issues facing minorities that people started calling out "colorblind" rhetoric as disingenuous.

One more observation. The choice of words in "diversity equity inclusion" is telling. DEI is god in Latin. In good old times, the ruling class had the Church with its inquisition and heresy to control the crowd, when the neutral laws didn't work. Today you can shout "I'm a heretic and I don't believe in god" and nobody would budge, so the ruling class had to invent something else. Not long ago it was the abstract communism and terrorism, but even these two words don't instill fear in masses today. So the ruling class has come up with this DEI - the new awkward god for the masses, and racism being the new heresy. But given how convoluted and laughable this ideology is, I bet it won't stick for even ten years. I'm really curious what will be next.

Someone here has posted a link to the Herman-Chomsky propaganda model. A quote from it: "So I think when we talked about the "fifth filter" we should have brought in all this stuff -- the way artificial fears are created with a dual purpose... partly to get rid of people you don't like but partly to frighten the rest. Because if people are frightened, they will accept authority."

Western liberal democracy is collapsing because the right wing reactionaries were right about diversity destroying society, but their mistake was attempting to focus on things like racial and religious diversity. Diversity of ideas is not sustainable.

Now we can see multiple “factions” each with different ideas about the direction to take society with many of these ideas being excluding of or outright hostile to a different faction. So the solution? You have to kill them before they kill you (not in a literal sense, or at least not yet). Some of these factions will band with others (see right-libertarians typically siding with reactionaries and the progressive adoption of various leftist ideas) though it will be interesting to see what happens there when whichever group comes out on top.

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