Blah, Blah, Blah

 

Long talk is wrong talk. Teachers and intellectuals need to be clear, exact, and concise. They need to come immediately, directly, and powerfully to the point.

Educators and philosophers shouldn’t waste people’s valuable time and effort with their tedious, empty, long-winded blather. And they especially shouldn’t fool, seduce, or brainwash their innocent victims with droning or ranting. Mesmerizing and indoctrinating defenseless masses or naive students with overlong, tiresome, meandering nonsense is wrong.

If a person has something to say, he should say it. Verbosity is evil. Loquaciousness harms us the listener and reader.

People need to learn to make their point – assuming they have one, which is rare – and then shut the hell up. If somebody can’t say what they want to say quickly, strongly, and right on the money, then they’re likely spouting bullshit. 

Almost any lengthy commentary is an attempt to brainwash – whether the speaker or writer fully realizes it or not. He’s tricking the innocent listener or reader while secretly trying to get the mark to join his stupid, evil cult.

Once a person is fooled into slogging thru some large pile of rubbish, he’s trapped. The dreadful material is now part of him – because he’s committed so much of his valuable time, energy, and life to it. To deny the truth and importance of this recent intellectual content is to destroy a part of himself. And this people won’t do.

In today's world, and always, there are many ridiculous, loathsome, ideological groups and semi-cults out there spewing lies and hurting people. Their mind-warping beliefs are interminable vaporizing and not accurate. Their brain-washing thought-systems are ill-conceived and vicious.

And their winding, torturous folderol is rarely or never “the truth” which "takes time to explain”. In point of fact, their lengthy diatribes are almost invariably fatuous and depraved nonsense, as well as acts of destructive indoctrination.

Enlightenment Revolutions

 

The American Revolution of 1776-1783 mostly got it right. The French Revolution of 1789-1799 largely got it wrong. The Americans believed in and fought for “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”, and in deference to “inalienable rights”. The French believed in and fought for “liberty, equality, fraternity”, and in deference to “the general will”.

The Americans, and their Declaration of Independence, were mostly individualist; the French, and their Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen, were largely collectivist. The American revolutionaries essentially thought that sovereignty lay with the individual, and eventually ended up with leaders like Jefferson and Madison. The French revolutionaries essentially thought that sovereignty lay with the nation, and eventually ended up with a leader like Napoleon.

The Americans had a high regard for true reason --  whose leaders were mostly deist. The French established a Cult of Reason -- whose leaders were mostly executed. The Americans overthrew a foreign and tyrannical rule by relatively-virtuous Britain. The French overthrew a local and tyrannical rule by a largely-vicious hereditary monarchy and established church.

But, ultimately, both Enlightenment-based revolutions did believe in, and advance, the cause of individual freedom; and of equal justice and liberty for all.

Communism and Religion

 

Communism and religion are the two great destroyers of Western history and the modern world. Both began in classical Greece. The first serious communists were found in the military dictatorship of Sparta, and the first serious religiosos were found in the mystery cults of Eleusis.

Plato made both false and evil belief-systems much more sophisticated and formidable. He did this with his “demiurge”, which is close to an all-powerful Creator, and with his “republic”, which is close to an all-powerful authoritarianism. Both hateful philosophies demand that the Holy Individual – the cynosure of the universe – sacrifice himself to some nebulous deity or collective which doesn’t truly exist. And other than a handful of oligarchs on top, both ideologies demand massive servitude for all.

Communism and religion are intensely illiberal and anti-modernist. They ruthlessly attack the best of Western Civilization over the past 2600 years. Intellectually, communism and religion essentially deny and reject the epistemology of reason and science. They deny and reject the ethics of individualism and self-interest. They deny and reject the politics of liberty and justice. And they even deny and reject the lofty esthetics and spirituality of heroism and triumph.

Communism and religion are evil incarnate. These fatuous and depraved philosophies need to be annihilated.

The Invention of Religion

 

The Greeks invented reasonism, but they also invented mystery cultism. These two categories of philosophy are based upon rational thought and unreasoning faith, respectively, and they’re diametric opposites. There’s no way to reconcile or combine them. But that didn’t stop the classical Greeks from trying.

The science-oriented Greeks wanted to gain the broad-based knowledge, prosperity, competence, spiritual power, and personal liberty which a life based upon reason generates. They wanted to be fully alive, dominate their environment, become great, feel strong pleasure, and experience true happiness.

But they also understandably sought to live forever. The Greeks wanted the infinite quality and quantity of life which the mystery cults brazenly promised them.

The nearby Hebrew nation was aware of all of this. So they crafted a religion which attempted to integrate the thought of the pre-Socratic philosophers with that of the cultist Orphics, Dionysians, Demeterites, and Pythagoreans. Later on, the Jewish fathers increased their ambition, and tried to combine mystical Platonism with highly rational Aristotelianism.

This bizarre amalgamation sort of worked, at least in some senses. The hybrid and gargoyle of mature Judaism was developed. Soon after came the similar philosophy of Christianity.

Both early religions replaced the Greek logos (i.e. reason and explanation) with the Jewish and Christian “logos”. Jewish and Christian “law” – which was various arbitrary assertions and commands – also replaced Greek natural law, in which the reasoning human mind deduced objective truths about the real world and discovered rational virtues to be used to achieve human greatness and personal happiness.

But Judeo-Christian “virtues” – unlike rational Greek ones – involve self-sacrifice and self-destruction. You have to become a kind of slave to “god” in order to achieve their claimed immortality. To successfully become this holy servant, you need to believe in god with all of your “heart” – which is a sneaky, lying way of saying with all of your drives and passions. You also need to commit to god with all of your “soul” – which is a sneaky, lying way of saying with all of your mind and will.

Many do this, alas.

So the reconciliation and combination of Greek reasonism with Greek mystery cultism – as manifested in the mature philosophies of Judaism and Christianity – has taken place and is still with us. But the philosophy of reasonism has suffered in the mix. So has mankind.

Cooperation and Harmony in Society

 

Even if all one cares about is social cooperation and group harmony – and to hell with individual greatness and happiness – then it needs to be known that the best way to get social cooperation and group harmony is thru non-coercion. Don’t make people interact. Don’t coerce them in that direction. Let them remain free.

If cooperation and harmony between people is society’s primary goal – which is fundamentally absurd – then it needs to be realized that the best approach to this is, as it were, roundabout. Don’t seek this ideal directly. Let it happen. Allow the social cooperation and group harmony to develop naturally, organically, peaceably, and freely. Don’t attempt to force it via government tyranny.

Grant each individual in society his full liberty. Respect the rights of man and allow everyone to interact with each other as they will and choose. Because the fact is: People have more than enough sweetness, goodness, common sense, and rationality within them to cooperate harmoniously with their fellows naturally and easily. This practically happens automatically.

Or at least it does if the social cooperation and harmony is allowed to happen and develop freely. But if some ingenious and saintly social engineer chooses to coerce the social interplay – if he wisely and virtuously elects to force friendship and brotherhood down people’s throats – then that pretty much kills all high-quality cooperation and harmony in society.

Just as people quickly and easily become friends and brothers under individual liberty – as the history of Britain and America in the 1800s proved – so too they naturally become enemies and destroyers under government compulsion. When the rights of the Holy Individual are protected – when all members feel safe and secure from societal attack – then social interactivity flourishes.

Tyranny, in contrast, makes everyone hostile to everyone. People rightly see their fellow man as their slave-master which they must now serve. They accurately view their fellows as their hated lords and masters which they now must cooperate and live in harmony with – or else. People inevitably regard these folks with revulsion, and as their evil enemies.

They even tend to see such hostile forces as bizarre, fascist space aliens – and not human beings at all. People they once would have welcomed, and gladly called friends, they now naturally view as noxious insects which need to be squashed. Freedom-loving individuals properly regard these moral slave-masters as vermin fit only for extermination.

Thus if one is personally and philosophically stupid and slimy enough to favor social cooperation and group harmony above the proper and noble goals of individual greatness and happiness, then one should at least try to realize that far the best way to achieve the ideal of cooperation and harmony is via pure individual liberty with zero coercion of the society and collective.

A Great Beginning

 

The classical Greeks laid the foundation for the magnificent edifice of 2600 years of Western Civilization. Fundamentally, they determined that: 1) man was great; 2) his powerful reason made him so; 3) therefore he should employ it as much as possible. The Greeks essentially concluded that it was man’s job to use his rational mind energetically, systematically, and deeply in order to understand the universe, and thus to live a noble and happy life.

The classical Greeks left the notion of man-as-animal far behind. Rather than a beast, they largely saw man as a type of god. Their thinking and lifestyle created men of lofty minds and noble souls.

The Greeks cast aside most of superstition, magic, and mythology. They generally sought naturalistic and scientific explanations for the nature of the universe, life, society, and individual. With this approach to learning and life, they vanquished age-old ignorance and rapidly acquired a great deal of knowledge and intellectual power.

The Greeks also cast aside much of short-term thinking, narrow self-interest, and immediate pleasure-seeking, in favor of long-term planning, wide self-interest, and deep, long-lasting pleasure. They became personally moral and socially just. Their minds and spirits became healthy and alive.

* * *

It’s true, of course, that the classical Greeks also largely replaced their polytheism with monotheism, their mythology with religion. They invented the mystery cults of Eleusis and Thrace (based just west and north of Athens) putting the worship of Orpheus, Dionysus, and Demeter ahead of the former top gods of Athena, Apollo, and Zeus.

It’s also true that the early Greeks mistakenly combined reason and faith, philosophy and religion, in such loose and tricky belief-systems as that of Pythagoras, Parmenides, and Plato. And soon enough this led to full religions, such as Zarathustraism and then Judaism (based to the east and south of Greece).

But the only Greek thought which was wide-ranging, elaborate, complex, and profound was found in the realm of philosophy, such as Zeno the Stoic, Epicurus, and Aristotle. Full and rich thinking was also found in Plato’s work when he stayed away from the relative shallowness and immorality of theistic speculation.

It’s worth noting that early religious thinking, such as that found in the holy books of the Jewish and Christian bibles, was limited and poor. It was never much rational or philosophical. Religious thought only became decent after true philosophy was smashed, around 100-200 A.D., and all known subsequent ‘philosophers’ became highly religious.

* * *

The pro-reason, pro-science, pro-philosophy Greeks made man great. But the pro-faith, pro-supernaturalism, pro-religion, anti-Greeks drove man low. And it was only a few centuries after this that Western Civilization began a millennium-long Dark Age.

Greco-Roman Liberty

 

Despite what is almost universally believed – including by practically all Objectivists and libertarians – the classical Greeks and Romans loved political freedom and individual liberty. You can see some of this in the confidence, dynamism, and individuality of their statuary. And you can hear it in their frequent contemptuous references to “Oriental despotism”.

And the Greeks and Romans largely understood what the concepts of political freedom and individual liberty meant. They mostly lived under these social ideals and were proud to do so. The classical Greeks and Romans virtually never stopped comparing their civilized, advanced, and free societies with those of the savage, backward, tyrannical Persians, Germans, Illyrians, Etruscans, and other barbarians all around them.

Why did the philosophy- and science-inventing Greeks ferociously resist the overwhelmingly powerful Persians of the early 5^th century B.C.? The poet Simonides (556-468 B.C.) says: “ We fought to crown Greece with freedom.”

The historian Thucydides (460-400 B.C.) once acknowledged “the secret of happiness to be freedom and the secret of freedom to be a brave heart”. So the Greeks courageously resisted tyranny on numerous occasions. The playwright Aeschylus (525-456 B.C.) contrasted “the freeman” with “him enslaved by another’s might”.

One immensely important aspect of political freedom is equal justice for all. And as the great Athenian leader Pericles (495-429 B.C.) noted: "When it is a question of settling private disputes, everyone is equal before the law."

The philosopher Aristotle (284-322 B.C.) generally praised liberty, but then mocked those who argued “because men are equally free [politically], they claim to be absolutely equal [socially]”. Aristotle approvingly stated: “The basis of a democratic state is liberty.” And it should be remembered that the Greeks essentially invented democracy.

The Romans built upon what they learned from the libertarian Greeks and gained a sophisticated understanding of constitutions, rule of law, justice, and certainly political freedom. The historian Sallust (86-34 B.C) noted the irony that often “in the highest [political] position, there is the least freedom of action.” The philosopher Epictetus (55-135 B.C.) added: “Only the educated are [truly] free.”

The poet and intellectual Horace (65-8 B.C.) praised Roman “painters and poets” for their freedom of “bold invention”. He explained: “We claim the liberty for ourselves and in turn we give it to others.” The historian Tacitus (56-120 A.D.) once happily noted: “It is the rare fortune of these days that one may think what one likes and say what one thinks.”

But did the classical Greeks and Romans really understand the relatively difficult concept of freedom of speech? Well, the philosopher Socrates (469-399 B.C.) evidently spent a half-century openly questioning, criticizing, and mocking virtually every powerful person and idea in Athens (frequently during wartime).

The Greeks debated extensively the merits of oligarchy, monarchy, and democracy, while often practicing their marvelous political invention of democracy. But they didn’t praise it uncritically because as the philosopher Plato (428-348 B.C.) observed, often: “Democracy passes into despotism.” Plato condemned even successful dictators by noting: “When the tyrant has disposed of foreign enemies by conquest or treaty, and there is nothing to fear from them, then he is always stirring up some war or other in order that the people may [continue to] require a [dictatorial] leader.”

Regarding political freedom and individual liberty, Aeschylus observed quite early in Greek history that: “Death is better, a milder fate than tyranny.”

Man

 

Man is god. He is goodness and greatness personified. Man is an end in himself. He lives for his own sake.

Man creates his own meaning and purpose. He earns everything he has and deserves everything he is. As Ayn Rand noted: “As man is a being of self-created wealth, so he is a being of self-created soul.” He continually attempts to uplift himself and make his spirit soar.

Man carves out his own existence in nature and reality. He is a dynamic, vivacious, and cutting creature who drives himself forever forward. Man is potentially a hero, saint, and noble soul who forever rises.

Man is as creator. He builds and produces. He invents and achieves. It’s man’s holy duty to always grow and ascend. He is forever traveling onward and upward.

Man is the most wondrous and magnificent thing in the known universe. He is greatness itself. Virtual omniscience and omnipotence are his destiny. Man is god himself.

"Capitalism"

 

When people today speak of “capitalism” they almost always mean: government of vast economic regulation. They mean: fascism or welfare statism.

A “capitalist” these days is a rich person or business owner who uses his wealth to regulate his industry to his advantage. He uses his money to manipulate the political system to enrich and empower himself. By “manipulate” is meant coerce; by “empower” is meant acquire the ability to coerce.

But since in the real world capitalism means individual liberty or economic freedom, this current version of capitalism is the opposite of the real deal. Actual capitalists don’t seek to regulate or coerce anyone, nor do they allow anyone else to regulate or coerce them.

“Capitalists” nowadays secretly bride the legislators, judges, executives, regulators, and other government authorities with cash under the table. Or they openly bribe them via campaign or charity contributions. Or the bribes take the form of extravagantly-paid, no-show “jobs” for the various government officials, their family, friends, and cronies. Or the pseudo-capitalists fool and bribe the people or voters directly.

The general way these “capitalists” – these robber-baron parasites and authoritarians – become enriched and empowered is they get the bribed government officials to alter the tax, regulation, subsidy, import, and export system to benefit themselves – usually thru some version of a monopoly in their industry. This impoverishes and disempowers their customers and victims – as well as the nation and the world.

These “capitalists” slow human progress and damage world society. Their “alterations” of the tax, regulation, subsidy, import, and export system always involves coercion. This warping of economic freedom can also be called criminality or tyranny. And since real capitalism always means liberty, these “acts of capitalism” always involve the contrary of capitalism.

Under true capitalism the good businessmen and companies thrive and grow rich, while the poor ones go broke and out of business. But under vastly regulated fascist or welfare statist “capitalism” it’s the coercive, thieving, bad businessmen and companies which thrive and grow rich, while everyone else suffers considerable elements of impoverishment and enslavement.

No wonder virtually everyone today hates modern capitalism! They should. Current capitalism is the polar opposite, and death, of real capitalism.

The Moral Depravity of EVERYBODY (In the Aftermath of George Floyd)

 

The police are scum – for their generally abusive, thuggish, and brutal behavior as they enforce fascist “vice” laws and semi-fascist, government road rules. These two evils contaminate everything they do.

The police protesters are scum – for their demonstrations and marches against a police and societal “systematic racism” which doesn’t exist, while promoting socialist tyranny, and deliberately providing cover for criminals.

The rioters, vandals, looters, arsonists, and assaulters are scum – for obvious reasons. Time to get out the billy-clubs, if not machine guns, and stop these vermin dead in their tracks.

Black Loves Matter, Antifa, and their allies are scum – for being such racist, communist, cop-killing, savage organizations.

Blacks and Hispanics are scum – for being so criminal, welfarist, Big Brotherist, anti-American, generally immoral, broadly bigoted, and specifically racist.

Whites and Jews are scum – for appeasing evil blacks and Hispanics so much, for supporting the black-and-Hispanic-undermining welfare state so strongly, and for being so self-hating and self-destroying.

The intellectuals are scum – for not being able to figure out practically any of this, despite it being so obvious.

The entire American population is scum – for evading or denying the inferiority of blacks and Hispanics as regards their nature, nurture, and volition, i.e. as regards their manifest weakness of genetics, culture, and morality. This dishonesty and cowardice causes deep paranoia, and massively results in blacks and Hispanics faring badly in their personal, social, and economic lives. This evasion and denial of the obvious causes the majority of their backwardness – not white racism. When it comes to the relative merits of the ethnicities, the general populace needs to stop lying thru their teeth.

This is a scumbag world. Every last one of you is guilty of creating and maintaining it.