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PeakOil is You

PeakOil is You

Your political leaning

What's on your mind?
General interest discussions, not necessarily related to depletion.
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What political view do you support?

Fascist (no democracy, limited indiv. rights)
4
No votes
Conservative (democracy, free market, trad. values)
11
No votes
Libertarian (democracy, free market, liberal values)
21
No votes
Centrist (democracy, limited free market, trad. or liberal values)
18
No votes
Liberal (democracy, very limited market, liberal values)
13
No votes
Socialist (democracy (?), total gov. control over economy)
4
No votes
Anarchist (indiv. or tribal autonomy)
22
No votes
Other
7
No votes
 
Total votes : 100

Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby JPL » Sun 18 May 2008, 21:14:24

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('btu2012', 'N')o, you've just trained yourself into thinking that the problem is due to some specific group, rather than to all of us.


That's because it is due to a specific group. 'I' am not a problem & I am not in that group that is destroying the planet.

But one thing I have noticed, when the Yanks are in a big doo-doos, they sling it around with a great big shovel.

Anyhow, please continue...

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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby MrBean » Sun 18 May 2008, 21:34:14

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('btu2012', 'T')hen kill all Whites, Caucasians or subscribers to Western Culture and get done with it. :)

We need a scapegoat, no ? That's the point.


No, the point is the fact that in its suicidal mania Western Culture is not only killing itself but the whole planet as fast as it can. And Western superiority complex makes Westerners unable to see and accept that it is they who are in more need of help than the peoples and ecosystems they want to civilize.

Interesting, BTW, how somebody who believes that scapegoat called Jesus was sacrificed for his sins wants to preach others about need for a scapegoat... when not bashing this or that group of personal enemies... :roll:

PS: and it's you that is speaking about nuking and killing all, so what's that about? Civilized though patterns, projected to imaginary enemy?
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby btu2012 » Sun 18 May 2008, 21:53:37

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JPL', 'T')hat's because it is due to a specific group. 'I' am not a problem & I am not in that group that is destroying the planet.


Of course you are, each of your many kids consumes more resources than 20 inhabitants of Bangladesh, simply because you live in a rich country (France).

I bet that those dirty Yanks who form Ludi's family (she and her husband) have a much lower environmental impact than your family has.

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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby btu2012 » Sun 18 May 2008, 21:59:08

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBean', 'N')o, the point is the fact that in its suicidal mania Western Culture is not only killing itself but the whole planet as fast as it can. And Western superiority complex makes Westerners unable to see and accept that it is they who are in more need of help than the peoples and ecosystems they want to civilize.


So kill all those who disagree with you and the problem will be solved. :)

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')nteresting, BTW, how somebody who believes that scapegoat called Jesus was sacrificed for his sins wants to preach others about need for a scapegoat... when not bashing this or that group of personal enemies... :roll:


First, how do you know what I believe about Jesus ?

Second, I am not preaching. Just helping you to clarify your own thoughts.

You want to blame modern Western civilization (of which you are a part) for our predicament, while absolving others.
So go ahead and destroy that civilization. That's the point, no ?

And third, you might have noticed that I react to people who try to impose ideological beliefs on others. Including post-modernist beliefs :)
Last edited by btu2012 on Sun 18 May 2008, 22:34:36, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby Ludi » Sun 18 May 2008, 22:16:48

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('btu2012', '
')I bet that those dirty Yanks who form Ludi's family (she and her husband) have a much lower environmental impact than your family has.



Oh nonsense!

(but thanks for your faith in us, however misplaced :) )

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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby MrBean » Sun 18 May 2008, 22:41:02

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('btu2012', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBean', 'N')o, the point is the fact that in its suicidal mania Western Culture is not only killing itself but the whole planet as fast as it can. And Western superiority complex makes Westerners unable to see and accept that it is they who are in more need of help than the peoples and ecosystems they want to civilize.


So kill all those who disagree with you and the problem will be solved. :)

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')nteresting, BTW, how somebody who believes that scapegoat called Jesus was sacrificed for his sins wants to preach others about need for a scapegoat... when not bashing this or that group of personal enemies... :roll:


First, how do you know what I believe about Jesus ?

Second, I am not preaching. Just helping you to clarify your own thoughts.

You want to blame modern Western civilization (of which you are a part) for our predicament, while absolving others.
So go ahead and destroy that civilization. That's the point, no ?


Sigh. You have read enough of my posts to know I don't side with this or that civilization, through much struggle I've come to realize that all civilizations are inherently self-destructive. Just saw a document about Khmer civilization that lasted only about few centuries before it self-destructed because of ecological imbalance it caused. Western civilization just happens to be the worst of the lot, the one represented on this forum and the one that is colonizing and destroying also the land I was born to.

Before trying to help my clarify anybody's thoughts you should try to overcome your own superiority complex, which is not separate from your cultural conditioning and emotional attachment to its insanity - which makes you foam about your projections about nuking this, killing all that, destroying this or that civilization. It is conditioning by insane culture that makes you think and speak like that. It's not your fault and it is possible to liberate oneself from that culture as proven by many here, were it not there would be no hope.

And let's be honest, you are lying: you are not really trying to clarify my thoughts but presenting your own thoughts as what I'm supposed to think in a hostile manner. Really to attempt to clarify someones thoughts would require genuine compassion and openness and all you have to offer is prejudiced hostility.

And if you don't believe that Jesus was the scapegoat for your sins, then just say so and I'll take your word for that. Until that I cannot but presume that you believe in the most basic tenet of Christianity.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby eastbay » Sun 18 May 2008, 23:05:05

btu, you certainly have a way of getting under peoples skin. Try some niceness for a change. You will be happily surprised at the result. :)
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby btu2012 » Sun 18 May 2008, 23:12:32

Mr Bean,

Primitivism is an "ism" like any other. I don't think that the solution to the ills of our current civilization is the wholesale rejection of this civilization and a return to something which is so far removed from our current life that we could hardly imagine how to get there.

In general I think that any "ism" is a caricature of reality, which is why I reject all of them. For example post-modernism believes in a sort of caricature of reason, and because of that discards too much of reason to actually be useful. Similarly rationalism discards too much of intuition etc. The Enlightenment, Romanticism etc are also ideologies, and problematic for the same reason. Communism, Capitalism, individualism, collectivism, fascism, imperialism, colonialism, racism, libertarianism, socialism -- each are simplifications of reality to the point of childishness.

Regarding Jesus, I don't think that he was a scapegoat for anyone but an example of virtue.

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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby threadbear » Sun 18 May 2008, 23:16:37

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('medicvet', 'I')'m in a quandry.

I can't figure out if I am a democratic socialist with strong libretarian leanings, or a libretarian with strong democratic socialist leanings...

eeny, meeny, miney....


Same.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby btu2012 » Sun 18 May 2008, 23:17:34

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('eastbay', 'b')tu, you certainly have a way of getting under peoples skin. Try some niceness for a change. You will be happily surprised at the result. :)


Sure Eastbay. But remember that every time you talk about communism you have 100 million victims to account for. That has an impact on those who have some direct experience of what it means, and there is a huge number of the latter in this world since those victims had families.

Not that I'm excusing the crimes of capitalism, don't get me wrong. But it's up to Marxists of all stripes to prove their case in face of the overwhelming evidence that communism is a socio-economic disaster. Hopefully they can make that case while showing some respect for those victims' memory.

By the way, since we talk about niceness. The overwhelming majority of those victims where not "capitalist stooges" , "counter-revolutionaries", "enemies of the people" or whatever other dehumanizing label Marxists have used and use to excuse those crimes. Most of them where people like you and me, who were often killed simply due to their social origins. It never ceases to amaze me how people can talk in cold blood about killing countless millions or how supposedly "nice" and "civilized" individuals can make excuses for such murder.

Furthermore, a major reason why those murders continued is that so many left-wing intellectuals in this world kept making excuses for what was happening, while justifying the unjustifiable. That some of them continue to do that is an extraordinary expression of niceness and goodness from these people who supposedly care so much to save others from themselves.

It is instructive to remember that the Spring of Prague in 1967 was followed by the Paris student revolts in 1968, where a bunch of students engaging in "free love and revolution" against the French democracy used "Marx, Mao and Marcuse" to justify their self-centered orgy while dismissing the suffering of the Czech people.

Btu
Last edited by btu2012 on Mon 19 May 2008, 03:45:14, edited 6 times in total.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby DomusAlbion » Sun 18 May 2008, 23:20:54

I wonder how many millions or 100s of millions of victims the next ism will create.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby btu2012 » Sun 18 May 2008, 23:26:42

Let's hope that it won't be environmentalism. :)
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby DomusAlbion » Sun 18 May 2008, 23:30:18

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('btu2012', 'L')et's hope that it won't be environmentalism. :)


Funny, that is the one that popped into my head. I was imagining Al Gore when he's in one of his enviro-rages, telling his minions "We must eliminate the useless eaters and save blessed Gaia."
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby btu2012 » Sun 18 May 2008, 23:33:41

Precisely. There were many heated debates on this board regarding the idea that we have to discard "full belly ethics" and proceed with a massive program of euthanasia in order to save the world.

Let's hope that we will find a better way.

I know, I know.... Hope springs eternal.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby MrBean » Mon 19 May 2008, 07:03:07

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('btu2012', 'M')r Bean,

Primitivism is an "ism" like any other. I don't think that the solution to the ills of our current civilization is the wholesale rejection of this civilization and a return to something which is so far removed from our current life that we could hardly imagine how to get there.


I agree, there is no "return" per se (entropy takes care of that). Nor is the answer attempt to enforce and control a certain future, that is the dysfunctional way of civilization (ideology of growth and superiority), what we can and should do IMHO is letting new possibilities open up by doing less, not more. Relearning how to live in balance and share with nature is a healing process that will take multiple generations. The criticism of civilization or rather attempt to understand the roots of the problem of our illness that goes today also by the name (anarcho)primitivism and there is nothing new in the "primitivist" philosophy. Greed is neither individual or collective problem, it is both. There can be no real healing (of civilization or anything) without understanding the root of the problem, everything else is just medicating the symptoms. One main aspect of the root of the problem is limiting our world view only to one form of order, one form of time and being: linear time and with that the yearn to control future.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby btu2012 » Mon 19 May 2008, 07:25:12

We do seem to agree on this. Yeah, capitalism is greed. No doubt about that.

You seem to be saying that the root of the problem is ethics, if so then we agree even more :)
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby MrBean » Mon 19 May 2008, 08:02:54

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('btu2012', 'W')e do seem to agree on this. :)


I'd like to modify my statement a bit, if there is something new with "primitivistic" criticism, it is better scientific (empirical, historical, etc.) understanding of the enviromental dynamics of how civilizations get born and then collapse. These findings lead to most simple and basic truths that can (and should?) be used as usefull starting point for more complex and contextual thought and action, such as:

Any socio-cultural metabolism that depletes top-soil (= good and historically & enviromentally accurate definition of civilization) instead of maintaining it or adding to it is fundamentally suicidal.

As for capitalism and marxism, capitalism (as dogma of unrestrained greed) seems inherently incapable of accepting this maxim and acting accordingly, marxist/socialist thought has been historically euro- and technocentric and ridden with problems and evils of civilization, but it does have at least theoretical possibility to evolve towards this direction - not denying that it would be a long way and lot of package to loose.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby buzzard » Mon 19 May 2008, 09:04:43

It seems that there may be a few others here who believe like I do that Politics as it is presently structured has outlived its usefulness on this planet. Unless, of course you believe that homo-erectus had political factions.
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby Fredrik » Mon 19 May 2008, 09:47:34

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('threadbear', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('medicvet', 'I')'m in a quandry.

I can't figure out if I am a democratic socialist with strong libretarian leanings, or a libretarian with strong democratic socialist leanings...

eeny, meeny, miney....


Same.


If your definition of libertarian is compatible with socialism, it's obviously at odds with my (and most Americans') understanding of the term.

From Wikipedia:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')t [ie. Libertarianism] rejects the compulsions of socialism and communism so far as to uphold, at one end of the spectrum, private property, whether held on an individual or group basis. It promotes personal responsibility and self-organized charity, as opposed to welfare statism.


But on the other hand:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'I')n Europe, where the term libertarian was first coined, it is more usually a euphemism for anarchism or libertarian socialism.


If you support democratic control over the economy, but esteem maximum individual freedom in other matters of life (sexuality, abortion, self-expression), shouldn't you call yourself a liberal? But then there's individual gun ownership opposed by liberals...
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Re: Your political leaning

Unread postby btu2012 » Mon 19 May 2008, 10:42:55

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MrBean', 'A')ny socio-cultural metabolism that depletes top-soil (= good and historically & enviromentally accurate definition of civilization) instead of maintaining it or adding to it is fundamentally suicidal.


I agree with this and would extend it. Any dynamics which destroys its own preconditions for existence is self-destructive.

It's common sense really. Furthermore supporting such dynamics in our societies is unethical, unless one views our societies as worthy of destruction.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'n')ot denying that it would be a long way and lot of package to loose.


Most likely the result of losing that package would be something not recognizable as Marxism. In fact much modern "Marxist" thought is Marxist just in name. I.e. people want to classify all criticism of capitalism as "Marxist" as if all human thinking could be divided into capitalist or Marxist.

Btu
Last edited by btu2012 on Mon 19 May 2008, 10:45:39, edited 2 times in total.
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