Posted on 04/22/2011 7:29:09 AM PDT by yetidog
I so sincerely hope you are right. I suspect you are speaking in the long term, though. There are plenty of examples of the authoritarian collectivists maintaining control over vast areas (Russia, the Former Soviet States, Eastern Europe) for more than a couple of generations. Go back in history and the large totalitarian empires lasted for even longer. Yes, humans crave liberty, but even competitive humanity has a short attention span and tends to relax too soon and too easily when and if they reassert themselves.
It even got very bad and hard relatively recently in Western Europe and the UK under Labor for more than a generation. They still vacillate between lighter forms of central control and have difficulty maintaining the drive to freedom even with pluralities favoring individualism. People love their *rights* and tend to avoid their responsibilities. Give them superficial freedom (abortion, sexuality, drugs, consumer goods, entertainment)and *enough* food and they will be willing to abrogate responsibility to an elite.
I agree about money. It is puzzling that this government is willing to forgo the revenues produced by energy production in order to clamp down on capitalism and comfort for the populace. Especially, as you point out, in a time when they are suffering lack of revenue brought on by their own anti-productive policies. All this in a period when many of us doubt they have the hard asset reserves, such as gold, to weather the collapse of the fiat currency. But, the Soviets did the same thing, as did the Maoists. So, they don’t seem to care about logic and will deprive themselves as well as the populace in the name of their ideology. I suppose, being a relatively small cadre, they figure on being able to skim off enough vital resources and luxuries for themselves while using the “persuasion of power” to keep control. This generates resentment, but they do not seem to care. My only conclusion is that they intend to kill off enough useless eaters to make sure there is enough available for themselves and their minions.
I do know that it gets quite tiresome here on the ground trying to maintain self-sufficiency and some independence in the face of this smothering oppression. My husband and I often question why we are so stubborn and so unpersuaded by the totalitarians. It would be easier to give in, especially as we get older. If it is hard-wired, that explains it, just as it explains the unrelenting drive to subject and control by any means necessary by the oppressors. If they are Darwinianly (is that a word?) unfit, they make up for it with persistence and sheer stamina.
I still think it is just a never-ending cycle. Sometimes, the will to freedom predominates. At other times, the will to power does. If it is genetically and anatomically determined, then it would seem to be that we are roughly evenly divided as to type. So, while those who favor liberty are stubborn and will not submit, so those who favor control are, as well. Meaning, IMO, no one ever wins for more than a given span of time and the battle will go on forever.
I love this. It is the epitome of the legalistic, logical argument I remember from many a Shabbot discussion.
I was raised in Conservative Judaism. After years of various epiphanies, I became a Christian, although of the individualistic, unchurched variety. Still, likely because it was my childhood experience, I delight in the exercise of defending a position with articulate, well-crafted argument, based on definable terms.
I pity the poor rabbi. He was hoist on his own petard and had to revert to argument by authority. In my birth family, he would have been laughed away from the table.
I, too was raised in Conservative Judaism, and, although I’m treasurer of our Reform Temple, mostly because the Conservative congregation isn’t much anymore, I have no real attachment to Reform Judaism.
Borrowing from your description, I suppose I’m an individualistic, untempled variety of Jew.
Very interesting.
Any usual occurances happen around the time of your conversion? Any illness, change in environment or social circle, new hobby, new experience, etc? Even anything unrelated to politics?
Yes there was. I immersed myself in art and fell in love with things that are beautiful. I found that certain human beings had the greatest potential for beauty in the universe. Beauty is of course the total opposite of ‘liberalism’ and the banal lifestyle of a leftist. I didn’t realize this until I discovered that left wing tolerance and the allies of ‘liberalism’ were directly responsible for tormenting and destroying my objects of beauty. It’s adherents couldn’t even tell the difference between genuine compassion and hatred of the same object.
‘liberalism’ (it is not true liberalism) is banal, hedonistic, selfish, nasty, and revolves entirely around hatred, envy, and rebellion. This is of course the total opposite of beauty. It disguises itself as love, compassion, affection, etc but has nothing to do with any of those.
Thank you for the detailed reply.
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