Selfishness and Greed

 

Selfishness is correctly defined as "concern for the self". Greed is correctly defined as "the desire and pursuit of values". Thus selfishness and greed are necessary, but not sufficient, for personal moral goodness. Selfish and greedy persons must also be rational, enlightened, and wise to be genuinely morally good.

Selfishness and greed – despite what virtually everybody has believed since about 500 B.C. -- are not necessarily or naturally anti-social or socially destructive. These two related virtues don’t necessarily or naturally involve predation or parasitism. Indeed, just the opposite. Society prospers under them.

Meanwhile, those who are anti-social, socially destructive, predatory, or parasitic in their behavior are not acting with rationality, enlightenment, or wisdom. They are not being truly selfish and greedy. With personal activity of this kind, almost never does the Holy Individual profit or achieve his values.

Those who break their diet and exercise regimen end up fat, weak, and unhealthy. This is not to their self-interest or greedy benefit. Those who fail to show up at their job, or work lazily or poorly, end up fired and broke. Their behavior does not constitute genuine selfishness and greed. Those who abuse or betray their family and friends end up disowned by their relatives and friendless. Such acts aren't seriously selfish or greedy. It’s obvious that those who habitually assault and rob their fellows wind up hated by all and in jail. And certainly those who generally act as monsters and destroyers in their lifestyle are failing to live up to the human ideal of being creative, inventive, and productive. They are damaging or surrendering their reputation, social trust, honor, pride, self-esteem, integrity, ideals, inner peace, and noble soul. The long-term and overall selfish and greedy rewards of such behavior is nil.

Perhaps in some limited and crude way such dreadful and failed people could fairly and truly be described as acting in a "virtuously" selfish and greedy manner. But such fools and scoundrels lack insight and cleverness. The absence of rationality, enlightenment, and wisdom in their behavior means they end up miserable and devastated. Such animals lose their humanity, vitality, vivacity, spirit, sense of satisfaction, feeling of confidence and tranquility, and almost everything that makes life worth living. Callousness, betrayal, brutality, robbery, and murder are not conducive to personal greatness and happiness. A person's real self-interest and best values are forfeited. Ultimately, such lowlifes and losers can accurately be described as self-sacrificing, self-immolating, self-repudiating, and self-destroying.

Not much selfishness and greed in that!

Basic Sense

The universe consists of four elements: objects, categories, creatures, and ideas. Objects are non-living things while creatures are living ones. Categories consist of divisions of things into those which are the same as, and those which are different from, other things. Ideas consist of images of things which are also the same as, or different from, other images. Categories exist in Nature while ideas only exist in the minds of living beings. Categories and ideas correspond.

The universe is both physical and mental, material and intellectual. Creatures and their ideas aren’t remotely unnatural or alien in this universe filled with objects and categories of objects. The minds of the creatures generally comprehend these objects and categories quickly, easily, profoundly, and exactly. Appearance and reality rarely deviate. The universe has no reason or desire to hide from, or mislead, its living components, and virtually no such ability.

The objects, categories, creatures, and ideas of reality are extremely well integrated and exist in fundamental and overflowing harmony. There’s virtually no reason to suppose the universe is different from what it seems and virtually no evidence for it. No aspect or component of existence opposes, contradicts, or clashes with any other. There’s absolutely no conflict between any of the objects, categories, creatures, or ideas inside it.

Creatures are living objects which have free will, and thus direct their own actions, while non-living objects move in purely mechanical ways, based on physics and chemistry, but also very occasionally at random. The ideas inside the minds of the living entities can be mistaken, as in not corresponding to reality, but they rarely are. And yet, creatures sometimes have enough free will to deceive themselves. For the highly sentient, ironically, a rebellion against reason and basic sense is possible. The cosmos generally responds to creatures with an exceptional amount of mistaken ideas by ending their lives and reducing their components back to mere objects.

The universe continually cleanses, purifies, improves, and uplifts itself. Creatures with excessive levels of false and evil ideas inside themselves – living beings which are significantly ignorant, mistaken, retarded, demented, corrupted, or dishonest – are systematically expunged from Nature. Human creatures who have been fooled by the irrational and nonsensical metaphysics and epistemology of Parmenides, Protagoras, Zeno, Gorgias, Pyrrho, Empiricus, Berkeley, Hume, Kant, and Hegel generally don’t do well in the real world. They’re in constant danger of receiving cosmic justice and having their lives terminated.

Woke Bigotry

 

"Diversity, equity, and inclusion" (DEI) are deliberately obscure code words for bigotry. These deceptive, hard-to-understand terms mostly mean racism against whites and sexism against men. But Natural Morality and right reason demand that all people be treated equally, impartially, and objectively, without bias or prejudice. Decency and propriety require that all persons, of whatever identity or type, be judged based upon talent, merit, value, and excellence. This means that all people at all times should be treated based upon justice and morality alone. All judgments by individuals, groups, society, and government based upon biological distinctions, such as race, gender, and sexuality, are inherently dishonest and socially malicious instances of bigotry and depravity which undermine and harm society, and thus should be resisted and terminated. Justice and morality demand that DEI DIE.

Your Job

 

The purpose of life seems to be: 1) Do your best, achieve at a high level, live up to your ideals, be true to yourself, maximize your potential, realize your dreams, and fulfill your destiny. 2) You must also organize and beautify the universe, prevent its natural entropy, disorganization, degradation, and disintegration. 3) You need not serve your fellow man, not even family and friends, except to the extent that they "serve" you, in a mutually profitable exchange of values. 4) You need not thank, serve, obey, or worship the "gods", which will not be grateful or moved, and which almost certainly don't exist. 5) But you do need to impress, and meet the exalted standards, of the demigods or SuSents [super-sentient space aliens], who likely do exist, and who may well be nearby, and hold your current or afterlife fate in their hands.

Tariffs and the Proper Funding of the Government

 

Tariffs are a form of tax. Like compulsory and coercive taxation, they are also a form of theft. Also of tyranny. But a free and moral government is always funded by voluntary and contractual fees – not stolen money or forced labor.

Not only are tariffs an illegitimate form of government fees, they’re odd and unnatural ones. They warp the economy, society, and individual. They force everybody to buy less of -- or perhaps not buy at all -- that which they need and want to survive and thrive. Or they force people to overpay for something, and thus they become unnecessarily and illegitimately impoverished.

Sales and real estate taxes are similarly improper and harmful. They’re an act of unexpected, unneeded, and destructive state theft which distorts and damages the economy, society, and individual. Proper government fees only occur where people sign a formal agreement with the state and freely agree to fund it in exchange for the protection of their individual rights. This could also be described as: for the establishment of liberty and justice for all or, more concretely, for the protection of people and property.

These protection fees should probably always be based upon a basic personal fee, plus an income or net-worth fee. The paycheck or total wealth fees are seemingly proper and just because it’s almost always harder for the state to defend the person and property of a rich person than a poor person. The wealthy should pay more, altho everyone should probably pay the same percentage, such as 5% of wages or 1% of total wealth, whichever is higher. But it may also be proper and just for the exceptionally well-to-do to pay a share which slightly slides down as wealth increases, due to it perhaps being somewhat easier for the state to protect property as overall wealth proportionally rises.

One significant problem with tariffs and sales taxes is they’re usually crude approximations of income. One significant problem with real estate and housing taxes is they’re usually crude approximations of total wealth. Other bad government funding ideas are value-added taxes, gift taxes, inheritance taxes, capital gains taxes, and taxation on individual products and services, such as alcohol, tobacco, gambling, luxuries, hotels, resorts, and the like. People end up altering their behavior to avoid the taxes, and this takes them in the wrong direction in life. Consequently these "bad taxes" render persons less high-achieving and happy than they would have been. Both individuals and groups suffer in many senses due to these particular and peculiar fees.

The political and pro-liberty ideal is to have no strange and warping import restrictions, tariffs, sales taxes, real estate taxes, etc. All government fees for services rendered should be voluntary, contractual, and mostly based upon income and wealth, with no unexpected and illegitimate state fees for overseas purchases, local sales, home ownership, etc. If tariffs are mandatory and coercive they’re acts of thievery and tyranny.

Communist America

 

America is a scumbag, moron, communist country. It was that way from the beginning, and it only got worse over time.

When the English colonists settled in Jamestown, Virginia in 1607, and in Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620, they initially practiced communist farming and housing, which rapidly killed off most of them. When America declared independence in 1776, it started off with mostly communist roads, bridges, tunnels, parks, commons, prairies, forests, schools, money, mail, and more. In 1824 and 1825, when the communist Robert Owens addressed joint sessions of Congress, all the Supreme Court Justices, and all the past, present, and future Presidents, he was shockingly well received. By 1850, communism was halfway extended to steamboats, canals, railroads, banks, libraries, fire departments, and beyond. After the 1930s New Deal and 1960s Great Society, America adopted the gigantic institutions of Social Security, a communist pension program; Medicare, a communist health care program for the old; Medicaid, a communist health care program for the poor; Welfare and Food Stamps, communist charity programs for the poor; and a vast host of other communist privileges, benefits, “entitlements”, and “rights”.

This is a tyrannical and truly evil political system. One way or the other, America needs to figure out the moral nobility and practical greatness of creating a government based upon non-communism.

Western Man for 2600 Years

 

* right vs. left vs. straight (in overall philosophy). Both rightism and leftism are deviant beliefs which have lost their way toward liberalism, and are no longer on the direct, straight path to truth, goodness, greatness, and happiness.

* religious reactionism vs. collectivist regressivism vs. individualist liberalism (in philosophy, culture, lifestyle, approach, and attitude). Both rightism and leftism hate and reject humanity as people currently are, attack them viciously, and see man as fundamentally evil and deserving of destruction.

* surrealism vs. subrealism vs. realism (in metaphysics). Both rightism and leftism see the world as unreal, unknowable, incomprehensible, shadowy, and a type of dream and delusion.

* supernaturalism vs. subnaturalism vs. naturalism (in metaphysics). Both rightism and leftism believe ideas about Nature exist, but Nature itself does not.

* faith and dogma vs. subjectivism and relativism vs. reason and science (in epistemology). Both rightism and leftism are irrational and nonsensical, literally and figuratively, in the formation of their ideas and beliefs.

* ambiguous nebulous uncertainty vs. ambiguous nebulous uncertainty vs. definite absolute certainty (in epistemology). Both rightism and leftism know that they know nothing and that they have no means of acquiring knowledge. They argue that the straightists, who actually claim to know something, are expressing arbitrary, close-minded dogmatism and empty, blind faith.

* self-sacrifice and servitude to god vs. self-sacrifice and servitude to the masses vs. self-preservation and dedication to achievement, greatness, pleasure, and happiness (in ethics). Both rightism and leftism secretly reject and hate man, and seek to make him suffer and die.

* unselfishness and charity vs. unselfishness and charity vs. selfishness and greed (in ethics). Both rightism and leftism oppose caring for the Sacred Self and placing Him first; both regard as evil the desire and pursuit of personal values.

* Welfare statism with lots of fascism forcing you to be “good” and serve mostly god, but also somewhat your family and friends vs. welfare statism with lots of socialism forcing you to be “good” and serve mostly the masses, but also somewhat your coworkers and neighbors vs. personal liberty, social libertarianism, and economic capitalism allowing you to be fully free, serve yourself, follow your dreams, and become as good and great as you can be (in politics). Both rightism and leftism favor a “benevolent dictatorship” which strips away all your rights, stomps on your face, makes you a slave, and kills you dead.

* pseudo-heroic, falsely-dynamic art portraying some “great” man serving and self-sacrificing himself to his religion vs. pseudo-heroic, falsely-dynamic art portraying some “great” man serving and self-sacrificing himself to his collective vs. genuinely-heroic and magnificently-dynamic art portraying some truly great man living for his own sake, fulfilling his destiny, and energetically triumphing over his evil religious and collectivist enemies, as well as over his relatively good rivals, and also the weak and inferior versions of himself (in esthetics). Both rightism and leftism almost completely fail to educate, enlighten, inspire, and uplift their poor, pitiful, miserable followers with their dumb, low, cynical, pessimistic, mediocre, petty, sad, corrupt, loser, defeatist art.

* humble resignation and quiet acceptance of defeat in the service of god vs. humble resignation and quiet acceptance of defeat in the service of the masses vs. defiant, resilient, dynamic, heroic victory and triumph, despite all odds, and against all enemies and obstacles (in spirituality). Both rightism and leftism ultimately kill off all your hopes and dreams as you live out your ridiculous, wretched, pathetic life, and you end up squashed like a bug.

Free Speech

 

Freedom of speech is infinite and absolute. This individual right applies to social communications no matter how false and evil the spoken or written words. It applies no matter how terrible the speaker, malicious the intent, vulnerable the target, or socially destructive the result. In a free society the only proper and allowable defenses against false and evil verbal expression is true and good expression, such as intellectual refutation and moral condemnation of the speech, along with economic boycott and social ostracism of the speaker. Fortunately, these counter-attacks are highly effective in preventing, defeating, and punishing bad speech.

Freedom of expression includes limitless amounts falsehoods, lies, abuse, slander, defamation, bigotry, hated, malevolence, betrayal, blasphemy, cowardice, treason, rebellion, revolution, sleaze, obscenity, stupidity, and depravity. In a good society these are all relatively harmless. But freedom of speech does not include (1) financial fraud, (2) verbal terrorism, or (3) incitement to riot and mayhem. This is because these are really actions and not verbal communications. These dishonest, terrifying, or violent “words” are, in fact, criminal behavior, namely: (1) theft, (2) deliberately, fraudulently panicking others to cause destruction of people and property, and (3) implicitly ordering others to destroy people and property. Despite primitive appearances and surface impressions, such “speech” and behavior constitutes physical aggression and the initiation of force against innocent people or their property.

True Bigotry

 

If you criticize a single black, Hispanic, woman, gay, Moslem, or foreigner today, in this post-1960s era, this is automatically considered an attack upon all of them. If you dare to say something negative about some genuinely-low black, Hispanic, woman, gay, Moslem, or foreigner, somewhere somehow somewhen, then you are instantly labeled a bigot and monster by the best-educated and most virtuous intellectual leaders in our nitwit, dirtbag, Dark Age.

It doesn't matter how relevant, true, and just your criticisms are; nor how tolerant, good, and noble a person you are; nor how virtuous, innocent, and pure the motivations for your criticism. You still get passionately and furiously condemned as a racist, sexist, homophobe, Islamophobe, xenophobe, or whatever.

And our irrational, illiberal, lamebrain, slimeball society – even in the rather hopeful, anti-D.E.I. Trump era – is openly and defiantly proud of the injustice and rottenness of its public pronouncements and judgments here. When it comes to modern reverse-bigotry, our world today is cruel and evil deliberately.

Even worse, most people today still ostentatiously and obnoxiously pat themselves on the back for their supposed willingness and ability to crush the Klan, or Hitler, or whatever, even tho traditional, pre-1960s bigotry against "minorities" (who make up the vast majority) was thoroughly defeated generations ago. Politically correct, multicultural, diverse, sensitive, inclusive, Woke folks are the new bigots, and the only real ones still around. It's no exaggeration to say that today's smug, pompous, assertive, confident, overweening, vicious, malevolent vermin are in many respects even worse than old-style Ku Klux Klansmen and Hitler worshipers.

The modern-world contingent of flamboyant "bigotry" and "hate" fighters isn't so much depraved and loathsome as it is contemptible, disgusting, laughable, and absurd.

Fully Rounded Man

 

Rev. Minot Savage (1841-1918) may be distinctly religious. But he’s also distinctly wise. And he’s still a liberal intellectual. Here’s an excerpt from his first book, Christianity -- The Science of Manhood (1873, p. 9-16):

"Body, mind, heart, spirit, -- we have found that these all are factors of man as he actually exists. Or, to give it such expression as no one can deny, man sustains physical, mental, affectional, and [spiritual] relations. The faculties which make up his fitness for these relations constitute him what he is. But unless rightly combined and proportioned, they cannot make a true manhood, any more than roots and trunk and boughs and leaves make a tree, when the roots are in the air, and one of the boughs is larger than the trunk. Relation and proportion have as much to do with making men, as do the essential elements themselves...

"The true manhood then is not found in the dominion of any one of these to the ignoring or degrading of another. It is in the right development and ranking of them all. Man should be a pyramid, having his body for the base, and his [spiritual] faculty for the apex, with heart and brain between.

"The body must be governed by the reason. The reason also must check and guide the action of heart and spirit, though they both are superior to it in their highest range and uses. A whole body, a clear, strong, quick intellect, a heart that loves the best, and an upward looking of the whole being to the absolute right and true, -- these make a man all that it is possible for him to become."