Excellent essay and great job flipping the idea of intersectionality on its head! Instead of each aspect of identity being another way to perceive yourself as a victim and a reason to have a chip on your shoulder towards others, see it as a way to expand the common ground you share with others and to take pride in the responsibilities you have to others and to yourself. Excellent take on this theme!
My apologies in advance for the long comment. This was an article which made me think. Since Daniel D offers the TLDR version of my remarks, I post under his comment.
What interests me is how Critical Theory in part started out as a useful and even necessary corrective to the myth of the human self as an autonomous and ahistorical being. A myth to which we owe as much to Rousseau as Kant or Plato or the Church fathers.
The correction was understanding people as social – and yes, biological – beings who develop and thrive in and through relationships with other people. This true from infancy to adulthood to old age (if one is fortunate enough to live so long).
For a case study, if you want to know why the State should not raise your children or anyone else’s, although this seems increasingly the trend in the USA, consider the (un)natural experiment in history conducted in the Socialist Republic of Romania under Nicolae Ceaușescu.
Our core networks and social networks matter. For our starting core network, the family, parental investment – or the alloparent equivalent or addition – matters greatly. Fathers matter greatly – their presence or absence, their interactions and investment.
What we’ve learned repeatedly from history and yet unfortunately still see in the present, government policies and state institutions can be for, against, or neutral to families: to the biological necessity of developing core networks so that individual human beings may develop and thrive. Not merely survive to die prematurely from violence, substance abuse, or lifestyle diseases and disorders.
This brings us back to the questions of identity and intersectionality. Each connection we have in core networks and expanded social networks can be understood as a role or identity. In the essay above, your mention your status or roles or identities as a husband, father, son, military officer, writer, physical therapist, thought leader, and so on.
These connections or identities – as you eloquently describe – are opportunities for social engagement and human enrichment, for both yourself and others. In the best possible sense, we can recognize that most people will have multiple identities over the course of their lives.
The philosopher Ian Hacking (1986) expressed this well in criticizing the prison-house view of language: “one person can have many voices: there is no such thing as one total language---we bring numerous only loosely connected languages from the loosely connected communities that we inhabit."
The tragedy and betrayal of intersectionality is the denial of our individual multiplicity: that one person can have many connections or roles, identities with different (even if related) voices. Or, as Walt Whitman proclaimed: “Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.)” So indeed do all healthy people. The possibility for contradiction is the possibility for growth.
Intersectionality not only functions to divide, but to segregate and isolate. To deny connections. To prevent personal growth. To curtail and control social interaction and human engagement. Although it started with the recognition that we are social beings, it has become thoroughly and determinately anti-social.
Instead, intersectionality serves neo-feudalism by both justifying and articulating a caste system. This comes at the expense of social mobility, personal responsibility, and the family as a core network or unit. It is thoroughly dehumanizing – or perhaps, transhumanism for the masses -- ignoring repeated lessons from history as well as actively denying biology.
I do like your solution. We’ll see how much traction it gains. We are situated – even as those situations evolve. We are in networks – which are dynamic not stagnant. We as individuals have multiple roles to place – identities of interaction. All this can and must be leveraged against – used to resist – the emergent DIE caste system.
Thank you for the thoughtful comments. I myself used to balk at the idea of identity as being somewhat restrictive, confronted with an attempt to create a caste system based on identity I essentially threw the baby out with the bath water. How we see ourselves on this one way ride matters, and I can't think of a better way to break down how we see ourselves than some function of the identities to which we subscribe. Missing your writing btw, hope you're doing well and can resume posting at some point!
It calls to mind an epic essay by Bill Whittle, in the later days of the Before Times. His was called 'Tribes' and it spoke of some of the conclusions you've made here. I subscribe to it but....there's always a 'but' it seems....Tribalism is the beginning of the death of civilization. Balkanization prevents trust, co-operation, civility.
I like your idea of 'Tonic Masculinity', that's a good formulation. A good goal to work towards.
My only real quibble is that I think we are now firmly in an Oligarchy rather than just being subject to Executive Overreach. EO is just the outward symptom of the true sickness and I expect to see more rot as more hands scrabble for the tainted baton of power.
Not a cheerful note, I know. But thank you again for writing this.
Here's the updated section, I think it is much better. Thanks again!
Unfortunately, our once robust Constitutional American Republic with its previous model of distributed power commensurate with federalism has ultimately concentrated more power in Washington D.C. to a hitherto unrivaled extent in absolute terms. The walls separating our branches of government first warped with executive overreach have collapsed entirely amidst the entrenched legions of un-elected and unaccountable bureaucrats stumbling drunk on a fatuous sense of self-righteous entitlement, insensate to the needs of those who pay their salary. The full divisive force of a toxic contest of oppression elevating vice over virtue has America divided to an extent not seen in our history since the Civil War.
Swarmism might be a useful word in this context, coined (I think) by the bright mind Mary Harrington 👌 It refers to power without a head—hence without accountability—that ‘operates instead via overlapping partnerships and networks.’
I agree the situation is more dire than what is suggested by the attribution mere EO. I'll probably work on that section to express it a little better. Thanks for the kind feedback!
Intersectionality is a political toxin wielded with efficacy by power, it also employs and enriches millions with a talent for grifting and an aversion to work.
Divide and Rule.
It is quite deliberate, moreover given that the managerial class installed Contra Constitution has no internal administrative controls-reflected in all aspects of their governance including now the key Corporation of Finance-they can only increase their support by increasing their numbers by buying more,and increasingly routine intimidation.
What they cannot do Sir is stop or turn round. They show no sign of doing any such thing, indeed you have orders for the Russian Front already whether you know or not. I suspect I do too.
The constant ritual marching and rioting are beginning to smack of the Orangemen marches in Ireland, I notice they tend to start after the Holidays (when the government comes back to work). Its plain intimidation by a government backed paramilitary (BLM, etc) under the banner of Civil Rights instead of say, State’s Rights. Leaders and a managerial class who do such things are beyond moral appeal.
You cannot win on moral appeal to sociopaths who are trapped in their own webs.
I applaud morality, but I must ask if you think moral appeals work, Sir you chose to be a soldier , at some level you know what it really takes.
If these creatures were open to morality and the common good they wouldn’t have done what they have done, nor accelerated all their own worst tendencies.
But you can make this appeal to of course the veterans, and the decent people and perhaps the former shall show the latter as it were The Way.
I agree, those currently in power are committed to a sort of spiritual atrocity in my view. They believe themselves to be better than the common man who is, in their view, incapable of the kind of self-governance outlined in our constitution. This tool is for us. A tool that will allow us to unite so that we may work together to re-institute principles of federalism and separation of powers. Forging bonds based on shared identity is something we do anyway, I'm just trying to outline a model for how to be a little more deliberate about it while also using it to consider how investing your energy towards cultivating virtue along the lines of identity can enrich your life and enhance social cohesion simultaneously. The elite are not interested in this kind of thing, they have all of the answers and believe that people like me should not be aloud to speak at all. They say we shouldn't be allowed to speak because it is dangerous. In a way, they're right, but really open access to information and the free communication of ideas is only dangerous to the corrupt system that provides their sinecures and artificial sense of superiority. Thanks for the support!
Manifesting the identity’s toxic sin-pole kinda nips the bond potential in the bud 😟 Trad social behaviour filters aka good manners used to neutralise this threat to a significant extent. Even from prosaic common sense-ish self-interest—no need to delve into deep stuff—spitting out negative remarks doesn’t seem to do any good for one’s own mood, let alone the definite damage to relational fabric 🤷 What if tomorrow dawns the sunny side up, and you would rather walk back on your angry/gloomy words?
To fight the impulse for cynical discharge, mere self-interest is again enough 😏 Hear the famously reticent 30th potus ↓↓
🗨 I have noticed that nothing I never said ever did me any harm. ~~Calvin Coolidge
That's a good point about traditional social behavior, something I've balked at in the past. I'm just one of those obstinate types that needs a reason for everything. This provides a reason for me to put more effort into manners than mere convention. My mother will be thrilled if I can actually do this...
Just because I need a reason doesn't mean the reason will be something I want to accept. The single word answer to a lot of the dumbest stuff that happens is addressed in my latest article!
Maintaining a strict public conduct code was actually a must for honour-based societies where a single sloppy misstep could easily end your life ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
PS Making your mom happy looks like a sufficiently sound reason to me. [Ref: #3 in your list of illustrations 😝]
Yes, I have heard that. An armed society is a polite society. The issue with my mom hints at the true complexity of intersectionality. There are many things that would make my mom happy that would directly interfere with at least one of my other identities. Fortunately, I am blesses with a mother that is able to take pride in me as her son in spite of the fact that I don't always do what she thinks is best :)
I will add on the subject of atrocity they have committed more than spiritual already but corporeal, and their nihilism cannot be quenched nor their rapacity satisfied.
We are flirting with nuclear war to prolong a regime that has only force without legitimacy remaining, and Bribery of course, to which thankfully we remain largely immune.
We are on inertia now, habit, customs only honored by ourselves, drifting.
Your moral compass you discuss is already within us , as are ties that cross over imaginary borders drawn by baser men, that few have any use for day to day. The people do not think or practice these charades ( even the peddlers of these poisons) but they drift more than we...
The question is how to proceed. As you know, I'm one of the (perhaps naive) ones that believes political solutions are still possible. I like this article in how it culminates with the conclusion that we really ought to be concerned with how at this point. I know I am. https://thedorianinvasion.substack.com/p/beyond-mere-reaction
Not ruling it out, but another reiteration of 2021 should not (and I think will not) be meekly nodded at, moreover you may not be aware but in NY and NJ ARNG were guarding ballot warehouses (not polling places) in 20 and 22 !!! One of my soldiers got a positive 4100 * bullet for “stopping a box of ballots being tossed away.”
Which is just stopping a bad deed. As in “what are you doing? Put them back.”
Low life idiot sheepishly does.
But - Ahem.
He’s an E4 his politics are girls and where’s the party at... but you see in that moment and all the other moments SOLDIERS TOUCHED POWER, a box of votes was changed. Without thought.
You see, the Rail of power touched cannot be let go so easily, so the usual Bromides (not you) will no longer do, let us call it “Situational Awareness” and perhaps even deeper thought required, and a sober taking of stock.
There’s walking into the Dark Room, then there’s being tricked into it (will the trick work again) then there’s stumbling and prat falling into the;
I think the time has come for the defenders to no longer defer our agency to those who have overthrown the Republic in our full view-being sworn in by soldiers dragooned falsely that had been summoned to keep the peace. Creatures who are corrupt beyond measure, faithless, false and Allegiant only to themselves. Our forerunners nobly deferred in the past honorably to men of Honor. Now we are stained with dishonor and indeed those of us unfortunate enough to have been in the Capitol in winter 2021 may be involved in disloyalty (I’m one). We did not cross the river but were tricked and dragged over, deceived. Every day brings new abuses, we are disgraced by association, the world sees us as red handed madmen. The list of corruptions, abuses and making war in every direction and now pointing weapons at our own people, tricked into forswearing or compromising our oath abrogates the agency we surrendered, no one else redeems our nation or ourselves.
Doesn't always striving towards to the convergent pole lead to radical collectivism around certain identities though? The same issues we're witnessing with woke/covidianism? Although us dissidents are probably more towards the divergent poles on our identity spectrums shouldn't a balance between the two be the end goal aspired to instead?
The problem with woke and covidianism isn't that they have a connection with one another based on those identities, it is that those identities define themselves by being disgusted with heterosexual white males and the vaccine and lockdown skeptical respectively. The tonic pole is all about balance, which brings me to my second point. The connection fostered by this approach is organic. Note that similar conception of the identity in question has to be shared in order for it to be used to build connection. This is where the nuance comes into play. You won't necessarily be able to predict which identity you share provides the best common ground, the idea is to just be looking for it. Being open to build connection based on shared identity represents movement towards the convergent pole, while thinking of identity as a means to establish a social hierarchy (such as the victim hierarchy targeted by traditional intersectionality) is divergent.
In any case, collectivism isn't based on true connection, it is based on a lie. It is an imposition of one particular conception of an identity onto a group that doesn't share that conception. The ensuing preference falsification in service of this lie is one of the factors that eventually produces late stage bureaucracy. Us dissidents can very easily build connection based on that identity, but this doesn't mean that we're not also looking for ways to find common ground with covidians should it present itself. If it ever does, it will be on an individual level as their hatred for us is difficult to overcome.
🗨 Qualities or virtues tell us something, but ultimately manhood is a role. It concerns one’s past, present, and future, as well as one’s relation to others. It’s about the situation in which one is placed and which one strives to create for oneself. That is to say, manhood is not about essence but existence.
🗨 “manhood ideals force men to overcome their inherent inertia and fearfulness and to ‘work,’ both in the sense of expending energy and in the sense of being efficient or ‘serviceable’ in doing so.”
I admit I have had serious misgivings about "intersectionality" since I first heard of the concept. It seemed to me another product of post-modern thinking, materialist scientific leveling of what is mysterious and enchanting about being human, a kind of industrial treatment of interpersonal relations. It seemed to encourage people to silo, to retreat into identities separate from the majority, dividing us to infinitude. Call me simple but I prefer, I am a man, I am human, I am an American. I would prefer we all hold to such simple concepts, while celebrating the multiplicity.
I've been thinking a lot lately too about individuality and the needs of community. It seems we divide ourselves further by those who prefer to focus on individuality while others seem to want to subsume themselves in the collective. I would like to think of America as being a place where we are all individuals entirely unique (with our own genius for something) part of some community and communities greater than ourselves.
You're an outdoorsman too. Its just a model, and a map is never fully faithful to the terrain it represents. The way that intersectionality is used popularly is divisive, but it can be used to bring people together. Given the available permutations we are all unique, the focus on identity is just to help key in on ways to build rapport with people and provide a framework for a general way of cultivating virtue.
Navy Divers fingered for Nordstream Bombing, address of school in 1st paragraph. That’s who’s taking the fall, it means we’re about to make a deal with the Russians. See Breaker Morant, Abu Gharib, Haditha et al. They’re taking the fall.
Excellent essay and great job flipping the idea of intersectionality on its head! Instead of each aspect of identity being another way to perceive yourself as a victim and a reason to have a chip on your shoulder towards others, see it as a way to expand the common ground you share with others and to take pride in the responsibilities you have to others and to yourself. Excellent take on this theme!
My apologies in advance for the long comment. This was an article which made me think. Since Daniel D offers the TLDR version of my remarks, I post under his comment.
What interests me is how Critical Theory in part started out as a useful and even necessary corrective to the myth of the human self as an autonomous and ahistorical being. A myth to which we owe as much to Rousseau as Kant or Plato or the Church fathers.
The correction was understanding people as social – and yes, biological – beings who develop and thrive in and through relationships with other people. This true from infancy to adulthood to old age (if one is fortunate enough to live so long).
For a case study, if you want to know why the State should not raise your children or anyone else’s, although this seems increasingly the trend in the USA, consider the (un)natural experiment in history conducted in the Socialist Republic of Romania under Nicolae Ceaușescu.
The science writer Jon Hamilton (24 Feb 2014) notes that much of “what scientists know about parental bonding and the brain comes from studies of children who spent time in Romanian orphanages during the 1980s and 1990s” and runs through some details in the linked article: https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2014/02/20/280237833/orphans-lonely-beginnings-reveal-how-parents-shape-a-childs-brain
Our core networks and social networks matter. For our starting core network, the family, parental investment – or the alloparent equivalent or addition – matters greatly. Fathers matter greatly – their presence or absence, their interactions and investment.
What we’ve learned repeatedly from history and yet unfortunately still see in the present, government policies and state institutions can be for, against, or neutral to families: to the biological necessity of developing core networks so that individual human beings may develop and thrive. Not merely survive to die prematurely from violence, substance abuse, or lifestyle diseases and disorders.
This brings us back to the questions of identity and intersectionality. Each connection we have in core networks and expanded social networks can be understood as a role or identity. In the essay above, your mention your status or roles or identities as a husband, father, son, military officer, writer, physical therapist, thought leader, and so on.
These connections or identities – as you eloquently describe – are opportunities for social engagement and human enrichment, for both yourself and others. In the best possible sense, we can recognize that most people will have multiple identities over the course of their lives.
The philosopher Ian Hacking (1986) expressed this well in criticizing the prison-house view of language: “one person can have many voices: there is no such thing as one total language---we bring numerous only loosely connected languages from the loosely connected communities that we inhabit."
The tragedy and betrayal of intersectionality is the denial of our individual multiplicity: that one person can have many connections or roles, identities with different (even if related) voices. Or, as Walt Whitman proclaimed: “Do I contradict myself? Very well then I contradict myself, (I am large, I contain multitudes.)” So indeed do all healthy people. The possibility for contradiction is the possibility for growth.
Intersectionality not only functions to divide, but to segregate and isolate. To deny connections. To prevent personal growth. To curtail and control social interaction and human engagement. Although it started with the recognition that we are social beings, it has become thoroughly and determinately anti-social.
Instead, intersectionality serves neo-feudalism by both justifying and articulating a caste system. This comes at the expense of social mobility, personal responsibility, and the family as a core network or unit. It is thoroughly dehumanizing – or perhaps, transhumanism for the masses -- ignoring repeated lessons from history as well as actively denying biology.
I do like your solution. We’ll see how much traction it gains. We are situated – even as those situations evolve. We are in networks – which are dynamic not stagnant. We as individuals have multiple roles to place – identities of interaction. All this can and must be leveraged against – used to resist – the emergent DIE caste system.
Thank you for the thoughtful comments. I myself used to balk at the idea of identity as being somewhat restrictive, confronted with an attempt to create a caste system based on identity I essentially threw the baby out with the bath water. How we see ourselves on this one way ride matters, and I can't think of a better way to break down how we see ourselves than some function of the identities to which we subscribe. Missing your writing btw, hope you're doing well and can resume posting at some point!
Your comment is much better than mine!
Grant ,
This might be the most superb judo flip I've ever seen. Thank you.
Thank YOU for your material contributions. I think that freaky article planted a kind of seed that germinated into this.
Well written, coherent, comprehensive, and rational. What more can I say?
Good essay, thank you for writing it.
It calls to mind an epic essay by Bill Whittle, in the later days of the Before Times. His was called 'Tribes' and it spoke of some of the conclusions you've made here. I subscribe to it but....there's always a 'but' it seems....Tribalism is the beginning of the death of civilization. Balkanization prevents trust, co-operation, civility.
I like your idea of 'Tonic Masculinity', that's a good formulation. A good goal to work towards.
My only real quibble is that I think we are now firmly in an Oligarchy rather than just being subject to Executive Overreach. EO is just the outward symptom of the true sickness and I expect to see more rot as more hands scrabble for the tainted baton of power.
Not a cheerful note, I know. But thank you again for writing this.
Here's the updated section, I think it is much better. Thanks again!
Unfortunately, our once robust Constitutional American Republic with its previous model of distributed power commensurate with federalism has ultimately concentrated more power in Washington D.C. to a hitherto unrivaled extent in absolute terms. The walls separating our branches of government first warped with executive overreach have collapsed entirely amidst the entrenched legions of un-elected and unaccountable bureaucrats stumbling drunk on a fatuous sense of self-righteous entitlement, insensate to the needs of those who pay their salary. The full divisive force of a toxic contest of oppression elevating vice over virtue has America divided to an extent not seen in our history since the Civil War.
Swarmism might be a useful word in this context, coined (I think) by the bright mind Mary Harrington 👌 It refers to power without a head—hence without accountability—that ‘operates instead via overlapping partnerships and networks.’
Like it. Well, not the circumstances, but I like how you clearly stated the problem.
I agree the situation is more dire than what is suggested by the attribution mere EO. I'll probably work on that section to express it a little better. Thanks for the kind feedback!
Intersectionality is a political toxin wielded with efficacy by power, it also employs and enriches millions with a talent for grifting and an aversion to work.
Divide and Rule.
It is quite deliberate, moreover given that the managerial class installed Contra Constitution has no internal administrative controls-reflected in all aspects of their governance including now the key Corporation of Finance-they can only increase their support by increasing their numbers by buying more,and increasingly routine intimidation.
What they cannot do Sir is stop or turn round. They show no sign of doing any such thing, indeed you have orders for the Russian Front already whether you know or not. I suspect I do too.
The constant ritual marching and rioting are beginning to smack of the Orangemen marches in Ireland, I notice they tend to start after the Holidays (when the government comes back to work). Its plain intimidation by a government backed paramilitary (BLM, etc) under the banner of Civil Rights instead of say, State’s Rights. Leaders and a managerial class who do such things are beyond moral appeal.
You cannot win on moral appeal to sociopaths who are trapped in their own webs.
I applaud morality, but I must ask if you think moral appeals work, Sir you chose to be a soldier , at some level you know what it really takes.
If these creatures were open to morality and the common good they wouldn’t have done what they have done, nor accelerated all their own worst tendencies.
But you can make this appeal to of course the veterans, and the decent people and perhaps the former shall show the latter as it were The Way.
Good luck
I agree, those currently in power are committed to a sort of spiritual atrocity in my view. They believe themselves to be better than the common man who is, in their view, incapable of the kind of self-governance outlined in our constitution. This tool is for us. A tool that will allow us to unite so that we may work together to re-institute principles of federalism and separation of powers. Forging bonds based on shared identity is something we do anyway, I'm just trying to outline a model for how to be a little more deliberate about it while also using it to consider how investing your energy towards cultivating virtue along the lines of identity can enrich your life and enhance social cohesion simultaneously. The elite are not interested in this kind of thing, they have all of the answers and believe that people like me should not be aloud to speak at all. They say we shouldn't be allowed to speak because it is dangerous. In a way, they're right, but really open access to information and the free communication of ideas is only dangerous to the corrupt system that provides their sinecures and artificial sense of superiority. Thanks for the support!
Manifesting the identity’s toxic sin-pole kinda nips the bond potential in the bud 😟 Trad social behaviour filters aka good manners used to neutralise this threat to a significant extent. Even from prosaic common sense-ish self-interest—no need to delve into deep stuff—spitting out negative remarks doesn’t seem to do any good for one’s own mood, let alone the definite damage to relational fabric 🤷 What if tomorrow dawns the sunny side up, and you would rather walk back on your angry/gloomy words?
To fight the impulse for cynical discharge, mere self-interest is again enough 😏 Hear the famously reticent 30th potus ↓↓
🗨 I have noticed that nothing I never said ever did me any harm. ~~Calvin Coolidge
--
PS 7th footnote cuts like Damascus steel 🔥
That's a good point about traditional social behavior, something I've balked at in the past. I'm just one of those obstinate types that needs a reason for everything. This provides a reason for me to put more effort into manners than mere convention. My mother will be thrilled if I can actually do this...
"I'm just one of those obstinate types that needs a reason for everything."
How the heck did you survive in the army then?
*how DO I survive!
Just because I need a reason doesn't mean the reason will be something I want to accept. The single word answer to a lot of the dumbest stuff that happens is addressed in my latest article!
Maintaining a strict public conduct code was actually a must for honour-based societies where a single sloppy misstep could easily end your life ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
PS Making your mom happy looks like a sufficiently sound reason to me. [Ref: #3 in your list of illustrations 😝]
Yes, I have heard that. An armed society is a polite society. The issue with my mom hints at the true complexity of intersectionality. There are many things that would make my mom happy that would directly interfere with at least one of my other identities. Fortunately, I am blesses with a mother that is able to take pride in me as her son in spite of the fact that I don't always do what she thinks is best :)
I will add on the subject of atrocity they have committed more than spiritual already but corporeal, and their nihilism cannot be quenched nor their rapacity satisfied.
We are flirting with nuclear war to prolong a regime that has only force without legitimacy remaining, and Bribery of course, to which thankfully we remain largely immune.
We are on inertia now, habit, customs only honored by ourselves, drifting.
Your moral compass you discuss is already within us , as are ties that cross over imaginary borders drawn by baser men, that few have any use for day to day. The people do not think or practice these charades ( even the peddlers of these poisons) but they drift more than we...
Perhaps we’ve all had enough.
I know I have.
Cheers
The question is how to proceed. As you know, I'm one of the (perhaps naive) ones that believes political solutions are still possible. I like this article in how it culminates with the conclusion that we really ought to be concerned with how at this point. I know I am. https://thedorianinvasion.substack.com/p/beyond-mere-reaction
Not ruling it out, but another reiteration of 2021 should not (and I think will not) be meekly nodded at, moreover you may not be aware but in NY and NJ ARNG were guarding ballot warehouses (not polling places) in 20 and 22 !!! One of my soldiers got a positive 4100 * bullet for “stopping a box of ballots being tossed away.”
Which is just stopping a bad deed. As in “what are you doing? Put them back.”
Low life idiot sheepishly does.
But - Ahem.
He’s an E4 his politics are girls and where’s the party at... but you see in that moment and all the other moments SOLDIERS TOUCHED POWER, a box of votes was changed. Without thought.
You see, the Rail of power touched cannot be let go so easily, so the usual Bromides (not you) will no longer do, let us call it “Situational Awareness” and perhaps even deeper thought required, and a sober taking of stock.
There’s walking into the Dark Room, then there’s being tricked into it (will the trick work again) then there’s stumbling and prat falling into the;
Darkest of Rooms < we’re Here
I will speak for myself only.
I think the time has come for the defenders to no longer defer our agency to those who have overthrown the Republic in our full view-being sworn in by soldiers dragooned falsely that had been summoned to keep the peace. Creatures who are corrupt beyond measure, faithless, false and Allegiant only to themselves. Our forerunners nobly deferred in the past honorably to men of Honor. Now we are stained with dishonor and indeed those of us unfortunate enough to have been in the Capitol in winter 2021 may be involved in disloyalty (I’m one). We did not cross the river but were tricked and dragged over, deceived. Every day brings new abuses, we are disgraced by association, the world sees us as red handed madmen. The list of corruptions, abuses and making war in every direction and now pointing weapons at our own people, tricked into forswearing or compromising our oath abrogates the agency we surrendered, no one else redeems our nation or ourselves.
I speak only for myself.
Doesn't always striving towards to the convergent pole lead to radical collectivism around certain identities though? The same issues we're witnessing with woke/covidianism? Although us dissidents are probably more towards the divergent poles on our identity spectrums shouldn't a balance between the two be the end goal aspired to instead?
The problem with woke and covidianism isn't that they have a connection with one another based on those identities, it is that those identities define themselves by being disgusted with heterosexual white males and the vaccine and lockdown skeptical respectively. The tonic pole is all about balance, which brings me to my second point. The connection fostered by this approach is organic. Note that similar conception of the identity in question has to be shared in order for it to be used to build connection. This is where the nuance comes into play. You won't necessarily be able to predict which identity you share provides the best common ground, the idea is to just be looking for it. Being open to build connection based on shared identity represents movement towards the convergent pole, while thinking of identity as a means to establish a social hierarchy (such as the victim hierarchy targeted by traditional intersectionality) is divergent.
In any case, collectivism isn't based on true connection, it is based on a lie. It is an imposition of one particular conception of an identity onto a group that doesn't share that conception. The ensuing preference falsification in service of this lie is one of the factors that eventually produces late stage bureaucracy. Us dissidents can very easily build connection based on that identity, but this doesn't mean that we're not also looking for ways to find common ground with covidians should it present itself. If it ever does, it will be on an individual level as their hatred for us is difficult to overcome.
🗨 Qualities or virtues tell us something, but ultimately manhood is a role. It concerns one’s past, present, and future, as well as one’s relation to others. It’s about the situation in which one is placed and which one strives to create for oneself. That is to say, manhood is not about essence but existence.
https://newcriterion.com/issues/2023/2/man-among-men
🗨 “manhood ideals force men to overcome their inherent inertia and fearfulness and to ‘work,’ both in the sense of expending energy and in the sense of being efficient or ‘serviceable’ in doing so.”
Thanks for the shout out!
I admit I have had serious misgivings about "intersectionality" since I first heard of the concept. It seemed to me another product of post-modern thinking, materialist scientific leveling of what is mysterious and enchanting about being human, a kind of industrial treatment of interpersonal relations. It seemed to encourage people to silo, to retreat into identities separate from the majority, dividing us to infinitude. Call me simple but I prefer, I am a man, I am human, I am an American. I would prefer we all hold to such simple concepts, while celebrating the multiplicity.
I've been thinking a lot lately too about individuality and the needs of community. It seems we divide ourselves further by those who prefer to focus on individuality while others seem to want to subsume themselves in the collective. I would like to think of America as being a place where we are all individuals entirely unique (with our own genius for something) part of some community and communities greater than ourselves.
You're an outdoorsman too. Its just a model, and a map is never fully faithful to the terrain it represents. The way that intersectionality is used popularly is divisive, but it can be used to bring people together. Given the available permutations we are all unique, the focus on identity is just to help key in on ways to build rapport with people and provide a framework for a general way of cultivating virtue.
An impressively fertile concept, this tonic whatever keeps on proving to be! 🤸
Here’s real world Intersectionality;
Navy Divers fingered for Nordstream Bombing, address of school in 1st paragraph. That’s who’s taking the fall, it means we’re about to make a deal with the Russians. See Breaker Morant, Abu Gharib, Haditha et al. They’re taking the fall.
https://seymourhersh.substack.com/p/how-america-took-out-the-nord-stream
Under the Rule of Law, the Law is sovereign- and decides who takes the fall.
The Navy Diver is not a Fighting Man, says DeNiro.
He’d better be a lawyering up man, welcome to real war.
GET LAWYERS SAY NOTHING.
They’ll punish you, but it’s far worse if you talk, especially if you say you were following orders.
Months become years or decades. Ask Corey Claggart.
It’s disloyal to name your superiors, it’s not disloyalty to betray subordinates < this is the actual real world code. RHIP.
Congress wasn’t informed, it’s in the article to humiliate Congress, so Congress must demand a victim.
See who and what you serve.
Look at them, so you know.
You don’t want to find out the way The Divers are finding out.