The third lady to speak, the one with all-natural, not-at-all-technological adult braces, is Ms Lierre Keith, a former radical vegan and now self-described “gender abolitionist” whose strange mental adventures have previously entertained us. Ms Keith and her associates wish to wage “decisive ecological warfare” against… well, the rest of us, and to “disrupt and dismantle industrial civilisation,” with “complete economic collapse” as the path to salvation. When not signalling their intellectual wattage by calling for the “abolition” of masculinity and “whiteness,” and the “abolition” of the United States, “an illegitimate settler nation,” Deep Green Resistance very much like the idea of “sabotaging infrastructure” and cutting power lines, thereby leaving tens of thousands of people without light and heat. Such measures would, apparently, encourage “class consciousness.” Elderly people in remote locations would no doubt embrace the finer points of revolutionary eco-socialism as they shivered in the dark and the feeling left their limbs.
In the comments, Joan is suitably puzzled by one of Ms Keith’s pronouncements, specifically:
Let’s do what we did before, which worked. We didn’t destroy the planet for those first four million years… we actually participated.
It’s one of the many odd things to fall from our eco-warrior’s mouth. She talks of “we,” by which I assume she means modern Homo sapiens, yet she talks of “those first four million years,” a timescale that massively predates the existence of Homo sapiens. Presumably, Ms Keith and her peers would like us to emulate Australopithecus anamensis, a tree-climbing non-human creature whose “participation” with other species would, I suspect, have been less than serene and angelic.
Behold, a model for us all:
And remember, these people imagine themselves as our teachers.
It's a core assumption amongst the progressives today that pre-industry or perhaps pre-civilisation the world was a Utopia where people lived in harmony with one another, sharing and caring. Never mind that the average life expectancy was 35, that slavery, war, and disease were common, nor even that primitive tribes still live like that today. Hell you're in trouble just for judging them primitive.
She also says, “We haven’t done very well over the past few thousand years.” Which is to say, the period during which all civilisation came about, and with it all of the things on which Ms Keith’s comfortable life depends. But apparently the abandonment of that civilisation, its deliberate destruction, will lead us to a world like the fluffy pre-human utopia of her imagination, and whose tree-climbing creatures we should want to emulate. Does she imagine that proto-humans like Australopithecus anamensis were big on art, reflection and revolutionary politics, and known for championing gender equality? Does she think she would exist in such a world as anything more than meat?
Hell you’re in trouble just for judging them primitive.
As when the Guardian’s “post-colonial theorist” Emer O’Toole chided those who think themselves more sophisticated than 19th century Maori tribes, whose culture was essentially prehistoric and enlivened with cannibalism.
What puzzles me is that if the deep greens want to live like apes or barbarians there are any number of places where they can do so right now. All it takes is an air ticket and a bit of a hike.
How very sincere they all sound. If only they weren't all clothed in, um, the products of the civilisation they want to destroy.
Eh, whatever, I'm sure it's just an accident. I've no doubt such enlightened people would never engage in the kind of the cognitive dissonance necessary to wear modern clothing or live in houses with modern paints (probably oil-derived) coating the walls.
There's definitely something of the old Khmer Rouge in today's green movement... and not just the 'deep green' radicals.
I suspect a society somewhere, at some stage, will succumb to it and it will all end with the usual socialist pile of corpses.
If only they weren’t all clothed in, um, the products of the civilisation they want to destroy.
It’s telling that these self-imagined revolutionaries don’t show us the way by actually living their supposed ideal, which would be easy enough to attempt. So far as I can make out, none of them have chosen to do without the advantages of modernity – living with no medicine to speak of, no dentistry, no Wi-Fi. Instead, they delight in thoughts of sabotage and vandalism – and of hurting other people and violating their will. Of course for some, that’s the sweetest plum. The rest is pretext.
Evidently, the second speaker is making sure her orthodontic treatment is complete before she helps usher in complete social and economic collapse. At least she'll have straight teeth when she enters the Thunderdome.
"If the living world could speak it would say that it's afraid probably, every single day, of being gutted and torn down"
No, the vast majority of it would only express hunger (physical and sexual), fear of those who hunger after it, and pain from any number of untreated afflictions and deprivations.
Interesting conundrum for these people, who are afraid of having their inner selves 'destroyed' by culture: Can non-sentient creatures consent? If not, doesn't that make 'the living world' rather rapey? If they do consent, can you draw a meaningful distinction between non-sentient and sentient-but-pissed/high?
Sorry for three comments in a row, but the DGR Women's Caucus is--of course--fighting to lower the birthrate. Note this tweet.
So, they wish to lower the birthrate by "increasing peoples' standard of living," all while destroying modern industrial civilization. Okaaaaaaaay . . .
It could be argued that life was better before the internet brought such horrible misanthropes to one's notice. We sacrificed quite a lot in securing an unending supply of cat videos.
making sure her orthodontic treatment is complete before she helps usher in complete social and economic collapse.
Amusing as it is to note, the incoherence of their blathering is, for them, most likely beside the point. Despite the pretence, it isn’t a political philosophy or amenable to correction; it’s psychodrama draped in a patchwork of excuses. Like most forms of Marxoid thinking, it’s an attempt to rationalise vanity and a desire to coerce and do harm to other people. Malice with a fig leaf.
@R Sherman - actually, the fewer-kids-when-better-off line is true. More developed societies do have a lower birthrate. Can't do it without the modern industrial civilization, agreed, or at least some evolution thereof. At least an advanced system of medicine, control of any predatory species, and a reliable source of food and drink.
And there might be a bit of population growth occurring before the rate drops, of course...
At least she'll have straight teeth when she enters the Thunderdome.
Hard to forget that highly realistic post apocalyptic trilogy. Oil is in short supply so to get it you follow the standard Hollywood native American battle strategy of endlessly circling the enemy. Personally, I'm pleased to know there will be no shortage of leatherwear and hair gel in the future.
Neils, I mentioned it because it's inconsistent with the organization's goal of societal collapse. I found it amusing. Like eliminating dysentery by destroying sewage treatment plants.
Guys, they are taking the Mickey - remove their welfare and they will scream to the media like nobody's business. What are they using to promote their "cause" - hang on - Social media, something lacking in their nirvana long, long ago. These people are just normal Greens, wanting a religious position to justify not working and living off welfare - to "beat the system". Parasites. mar
From the flowchart depicting "The Evolution Of Socialist Strategies (Or, From Marx To The Neo-Rousseauians)" on p.173 of Stephen Hicks' excellent and very readable "Explaining Postmodernism" (available here), their thought processes (yes, I know) have gone something like this:
Classical Marxist Socialism-> Wait for capitalism to collapse->*failure*->Try intellectual vanguard, agrarian version (e.g. Mao)->*failure*->Change ethical standard->Go from "wealth is good" to "wealth is bad"->Left environmentalism-> This load of horseshit.
War is bad. They make that clear. Also, "one of the ways to stop a war, is destroying an enemy's ability to wage that war." So...war. Mind = blown. The sad piano music almost convinced me.
I'd call them psychotropic warriors. They all have that certain numbness associated with taking too many mind- and mood-altering medications for too long, for whatever demons haunt their thoughts.
This is why they appear so proud of their gibberish. They believe it's "profound insight."
Ah, yes, the magical thinking that reducing us back to survival of the fittest, where the rule of law is but a dim memory, will somehow usher in an era of tranquility and peace. Strangely, history seems to demonstrate that law of the jungle seems to invariably favor those less inclined towards humming mantras and knitting hemp underwear.
These people need to read a bit of post-apocalyptic fiction, or maybe watch an episode or two of Walking Dead.
David - Does she imagine that proto-humans like Australopithecus anamensis were big on art, reflection and revolutionary politics, and known for championing gender equality? Does she think she would exist in such a world as anything more than meat?
It's as if these people haven't seen "Mad Max". The sort of men who rule the wastelands after the fall of civilisation aren't soy-nibbling vegans.
And don't count on Mel Gibson rescuing their hemp-fuelled eco-compounds from rampaging biker gangs, cannibals, and giant, man-eating Triffids. He isn't as spry as he used to be.
I was watching an episode of the reality show Cops recently and it occurred to me that what we need is an offshore penal colony. Say, an island in the middle of a very large ocean, where the sociopathic and habitually criminal can try to eke out a living among their own kind, picking berries, hunting shrews and attempting to build rudimentary shelters.
The same idea might prove useful for Ms Keith and her colleagues. Rather than have them merely scold us for our heathen materialism, let them show us how right they are by living out a small scale version of their ecologically pious post-capitalist utopia. I propose a one-way ticket to a remote and uninhabited island, uncluttered by infrastructure and modern conveniences. After five years or so we could send in a film crew to document their triumph and witness the ungendered, poverty-free fragrance of it all.
The thing I find most fascinating is the innate need of all humans to find a religion and a deity to worship. Yes, with the enviro-mental-ist crowd, the hypocrisy is interesting, the magical thinking is fun to dissect and laugh at, and the complete lack of introspection and self-awareness is awe-inspiring, actually. But, at the core, these people feel a deep and almost instinctual need to engage in a series of ritualistic cognitive and physical activities that they believe will provide order and meaning for their lives. And yet, with all of the options available, they choose to invent a new one that is somehow worse by being more egotistical, more apocalyptic and less rational than all that have come before it. An ancient religion (Christianity) lead us out of the Dark Ages, a new one will lead us back.
Where's a drone with a hellfire missile and a spare flame thrower when you really need one to clean out the forest and return it to its primeval state?
And yet, with all of the options available, they choose to invent a new [religion]
Yes, the dynamic is quasi-religious. And if you’ve seen Ms Keith give her so-called lectures, the comparison is hard to avoid. The devout gather and listen approvingly to a stream of begged questions and bald, often baffling assertions. There’s no actual logical argument, no subtleties of thought, just a series of unsupported statements piled high and teetering. (Masculinity is “emotional numbness,” femininity is “the traumatised psyche,” gender is “a political creation… to separate who counts as human.” And so on and so forth.) And so despite Ms Keith’s alleged dislike of religion – “masculinity’s religion” – her own behaviour, and that of her audience, looks like a kind of ecological Scientology.
Steve B - my wife and I very much enjoy The Walking Dead, though for different reasons.
She is unaccountably keen on the crossbow-fancying hillbilly Yoda, Darryl. But I liked The Governor.
Sure, he was a monocular sociopath, but The Governor was a man who got things done. Whenever he appeared on screen, you always knew he'd be up to violence, or scheming, or violent scheming.
Just because he kept trophies of reanimated severed heads, held zombie gladiatorial contests, and had his undead cannibal daughter locked up in a closet, doesn't mean he was a bad person. He seems to have been a far more capable leader than Rick.
Rick is a goody two shoes and, even when he's executing people in the town square, you can tell his heart's not on it. He looks like the sort of guy who'd cry and have feelings and all that stuff. Blegh!
They should have a spin-off show where The Governor goes from town to town, helping people defeat evil railroad barons / corrupt oil tycoons / scheming property developers trying to buy the old fairground for a song by pretending it's haunted.
SPOILER ALERT: at the end of each episode, he guns everyone down with a Steyr AUG. Then the Sad Hulk theme plays.
After the collapse, I figure these loons to be the first to get their throats cut by food raiders.
The men definitely would because they're physically useless, but I guarantee it would take the women about 30 seconds to decide that what they really wanted all along was a strong man to take care of them.
Talking of zombies, I watched the first episode of Z Nation last night. Looks OK - it has the under-rated DJ Qualls and a satisfying amount of mindless violence.
I was watching an episode of the reality show Cops recently and it occurred to me that what we need is an offshore penal colony. Say, an island in the middle of a very large ocean, where the sociopathic and habitually criminal can try to eke out a living among their own kind, picking berries, hunting shrews and attempting to build rudimentary shelters.
I suggested something similar on this very blog a few years back. It was pointed out to me that for a hunter-gatherer society to survive...well there simply was not an island big enough to handle more than a small group. For some reason this was seen as a problem and not the opportunity for a new reality TV show.
I was watching an episode of the reality show Cops recently and it occurred to me that what we need is an offshore penal colony. Say, an island in the middle of a very large ocean, where the sociopathic and habitually criminal can try to eke out a living among their own kind, picking berries, hunting shrews and attempting to build rudimentary shelters.
To mark who said they are just looking for an excuse to justify receiving welfare : it might be, but the problem with such excuses is that those who make them have a tendency to start believing them.
It was pointed out to me that for a hunter-gatherer society to survive... well there simply was not an island big enough to handle more than a small group. For some reason this was seen as a problem
The protagonist, David MacKinnon, is a romantic idealist up for trial for assault. Since the government fears that he will repeat his action, he is given a choice: either allow trained psychologists to fix him, or leave to an area known as Coventry. MacKinnon chooses to emigrate ... He is sent to the rugged outland beyond the Barrier, where people who refuse to abide by social norms are exiled ... He finds out that the peaceful anarchy he envisioned is a bleak dystopia split into three independent countries ...
So, the mirror image of Cthulhu cultists, essentially. "O blind, amoral cosmic deity, please let us be eaten last..."
People who want to save "nature" should be frequently reminded that nature doesn't - cannot - care about them, or their preferences, or their existence. At all. Maybe they should go on a group outing to the scene of a tsunami, or a volcanic fallout zone. (I mean, sure they could go after all the excitement is over, but during would be so much more edifying.)
I do not follow the thinking of some above that these people are descended from any sort of Marxist thinking. Marx put humans front and centre of his philosophy. He was pro-industrialisation and for the conquering of nature.
Instead these numpties come via a long line starting with Rousseau, and via various anarchist strands. Anarchist terrorism pre-dates the Marxist version by quite some time. But while the Soviet Union stood Marxism (or Maoism for the Ultras) tended to get all the groupies. Largely in practical terms because calling yourself "Marxist" (as groups such as the ANC, IRA, Weather Underground etc did) was a sure fire way to get funding. The Marxism of such groups was totally subsumed by other considerations in practice.
Today calling anyone on the far Left "Marxist" is about as useful as calling anyone right of centre as "Fascist". The complete failure of any sort of orthodox Marxism has led to a crisis in the far left, and they are searching for new ways to promote the destruction of society.
Chester, I fear you're being overly exclusive with your lines of descent - claiming that an anarchist movement can't be steeped in Marxism as well. All of the above references to "abolishing masculinity", et al are the marks of third wave feminism, a pretty explicitly marxist Critical Theory hobbyhorse. It's not classical Marxism, but nothing really is. Did you miss the mention of "class consciousness"? Progressivism in general and Marxism in specific haven't been allied to industrial progress of any sort in a long time.
Then again, anyone repeating the "Fascim is far right" chestnut may have some unexamined received wisdom...
"It occurred to me that what we need is an offshore penal colony."
I'm thinking, "Infested with Komodo Dragons" here. In fact, I'll even settle for Kimono Dragons, I'm willing to accept a little cross-dressing and cultural appropriation.
Chester - it's Frankfurt School, aka cultural Marxism, not Marx-Marx.
Consider Lierre Keith, the "gender abolitionist", "radical feminist", and "environmentalist".
Her schtick isn't new. Erich Fromm, Max Horkheimer, and their fellows at the Institute for Social Research were developing this stuff back in the 1930's.
The nonsense about prehistoric times being some sort of egalitarian (by which they mean matriarchal) golden age date back to Johann Jakob Bachofen's scholarly fantasies, published in 1861 as Das Mutterrecht.
Non Marx-Marx is a pretty weak sort of Marxism. If you can be in direct contradiction to Marx -- anti-industrialisation, pro-"nature" -- and still Marxist, then the term ceases to have meaning.
This blog is pretty severe on non-capitalist "Capitalists", non-artistic "Artists, and non-liberal "Liberals" -- so how come anyone on the left becomes "Marxist"?
If they follow the Frankfurt School, then call them Frankfurters.
Careful thinking requires using labels that fit properly. I find it hard to be persuaded by anyone who labels all their opponents with some random terms like "Marxist" or "Fascist". It suggests that they haven't actually done any thinking, being happy to just slap on a label.
There was a Ray Liotta movie from 1994 called No Escape, where he's shipped off to a penal colony island somewhere off the coast of South America. The inmates have split into two factions, one of which is yer basic Mad Max marauders in the jungle and the other a more peaceful, technological group led by Lance Henriksen as a sort of hippy guru cum dictator. Shenanigans ensue. Amusingly, it's set only seven years in the future.
The problem with these people is not that they're going to bring about the downfall of industrial civilisation—they'd be rapidly extirpated if they really tried—but that they retard the introduction of said civilisation into areas that need it, areas that are a bit closer to their agrarian fantasy than, say, North America and thus fairly unremitting hellholes. They have blood on their hands. I would absolutely love to drop them somewhere in the wild, with a few flints and hammerstones if I were feeling generous.
Again, it’s telling that Ms Keith and her peers chose to be filmed in a woodland setting, suggesting some deep affinity with shrubbery and such, as if they were mystically attuned to Gaia’s throb. Yet so far as I can make out, none of them actually lives among the trees and bugs. Evidently, they prefer shelters with coffee, duvets and broadband. They don’t drink from gently tinkling streams and they don’t feast on whatever small rodent they might conceivably manage to catch without the use of modern means. And Ms Keith is clearly at her most animated when holding court indoors, grandly imparting idiocy to other idiots. People like this chap here, seen passing on The Knowledge: “A world without patriarchy… Can you see the frogs, the squirrels, the otters?”
Chester - Non Marx-Marx is a pretty weak sort of Marxism.
I'd tend to agree, but the Cultural Marxists took over the Left yonks ago. Not many of them are still concerned with who owns the means of production and raising the living standards of the European proletariat. Instead, people like Professor Steve Best dominate the thinking and teaching cadres of the New Left:
Recognizing the limitations of “orthodox” or “classical” Marxism, Frankfurt theorists developed a “neo-Marxist” orientation that retained basic Marxist theoretical and political premises, but supplemented the critique of capitalism with other perspectives, thereby spawning hybrid theories such as Freudo-Marxism, Marxist-feminism, and Marxist-existentialism.
And Dr. Steve puts the "Such-and-such Studies" courses into neo-Marxist perspective:
Within a decade, perhaps, “Animal Studies” programs will be institutionalized globally throughout academia and take their rightful place alongside Women’s Studies, African-American Studies, Chicano/a Studies, Disability Studies, and Queer Studies.
If you can be in direct contradiction to Marx -- anti-industrialisation, pro-"nature" -- and still Marxist, then the term ceases to have meaning.
Yet here we are.
This blog is pretty severe on non-capitalist "Capitalists", non-artistic "Artists, and non-liberal "Liberals" -- so how come anyone on the left becomes "Marxist"?
ComparetheMarxists.com
If they follow the Frankfurt School, then call them Frankfurters.
Reading the comments there, not sure if you're aware, that is one Heath Atom Russell. Was a girl, transitioned to a guy, but is now going back to becoming a girl. Google at your convenience. She/he/she is an assault on her/his/her very own nature.
So, the mirror image of Cthulhu cultists, essentially. "O blind, amoral cosmic deity, please let us be eaten last...
This lot are clearly cultists of Shub-Niggurath, the Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young (a monstrous and infinitely fecund cosmic cancer traditionally worshiped as a nature / fertility deity).
Rather presciently, a 'modern-day' campaign book was published in 1990 for the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game with a wealthy eco-loon as one of the major villains. He wishes to destroy industrial civilisation and create a wilderness in which cosmic horrors prey on humans to reduce the population to a tiny remnant (naturally consisting entirely of demented cultists)...
They do realize they won't have Macs or iPhones any more, right? The frigging morons. I could only make it through 53 seconds of their dumbassedry--the moment Sensitive Carefully-Whiskered Boy showed up, I wanted to punch the monitor. (Well, really, him and the 3 previous ninnyhammers....)
Just to say that Chester Draws is dead right. There is absolutely nothing Marxist about these loons. Which isn't to say that many Marxists aren't loons too; they're just an entirely different category of loon.
You cannot discuss Marxism as if it were one stable set of ideas. In fact, Marx had a bunch of stages he went through, and the stage that produced V.I. of Capital was only one of them.
After Marx died, the Marxists split into a bunch of competing factions.
The mother house of European Marxists parties was the German Social Democratic Party. In 1891, it adopted a platform called the Erfurt program. You can read it here:
It has a revolutionary sounding introduction, but is really meliorative. It calls for the 8 hour work day.
OTOH, there were a number of other theorists. One of them Georges Sorel, who rejected meliorism like the Erfurt program in favor of political violence. His followers included Lenin and Mussolini.
After, the Russian Revolution, Russian theories, which were far from orthodox 19th century Marxism, dominated Comintern. The Russians solved theoretical disagreements with ice axes in the back of the head.
The rise of Fascism in Italy and Germany was something that orthodox Soviet Marxists could not explain. Cultural Marxism was created by Antonio Gramsci in Italy and the Frankfurt school to explain that problem.
Of course, Fascism is itself a heresy of Marxism.
Here is the punchline. There is not, nor has there ever been a single coherent theory that can be held up as true platonic Marxism (BTW Plato was a Communist).
Circling back to the girl above, she and others like here are rooted in the nostalgia that Marx himself cited in the Communist manifesto ("All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned"). Her ideas are just as Marxist as those of the writers cited above.
You're all wrong: the relevant documentary is "Mosquito Coast," wherein Harrison Ford set out to create Utopia with him and his family and a few assorted natives. He even built an ice machine!
You see, that's the proper way to do it: build your utopia in a small corner of the world, and like a pinch of sourdough, you can use it to leaven the whole world.
Which, given the lack of such a colony, I'm beginning to suspect that building utopia might not be the immediate goal, given the emphasis on destroying the entire system first, quite without the consent of 50% +1 of the affected populace.
I’m beginning to suspect that building utopia might not be the immediate goal, given the emphasis on destroying the entire system first, quite without the consent of… the affected populace.
Yes, I’m pretty sure their drama isn’t about what they say it’s about. This would, for instance, explain their remarkable lack of concern for things like logic, and their reluctance to set an example for heathens like thee and me by voluntarily living the way they would have the rest of us forced to live. I very much doubt that their ostentatious extremism is amenable to debate, let alone correction. It strikes me as a kind of role-play favoured by narcissists, the kind of people to whom other human beings are little more than stage props. And the fact that their chosen methods are destructive, and that their chosen goal would obviously entail the coercion and ruin of countless people, suggests urges of an unsavoury and all too familiar kind.
Which, given the lack of such a colony, I'm beginning to suspect that building utopia might not be the immediate goal
To be fair there's been several attempts to build socialist utopias in little self sufficient communities. From New Harmony to Jones Town. cf Kibbutz movement. It's not so much as "will they fail", so much as "when". The longer lasting ones invariably compromised the original ideals.
It is a spoof, isn't it?
Posted by: bilbaoboy | July 15, 2015 at 08:20
"Let's do what we did before, which worked. We didn't destroy the planet for those first four million years… we actually participated."
Er, what?
Posted by: Joan | July 15, 2015 at 08:41
It is a spoof, isn't it?
There is something about sufficiently advanced nuttery being indistinguishable from comedic pretend-nuttery...
-S
Posted by: Simen Thoresen | July 15, 2015 at 09:04
Just "borderline"?
Posted by: jones | July 15, 2015 at 09:56
It's a core assumption amongst the progressives today that pre-industry or perhaps pre-civilisation the world was a Utopia where people lived in harmony with one another, sharing and caring. Never mind that the average life expectancy was 35, that slavery, war, and disease were common, nor even that primitive tribes still live like that today. Hell you're in trouble just for judging them primitive.
Posted by: TDK | July 15, 2015 at 10:08
She also says, “We haven’t done very well over the past few thousand years.” Which is to say, the period during which all civilisation came about, and with it all of the things on which Ms Keith’s comfortable life depends. But apparently the abandonment of that civilisation, its deliberate destruction, will lead us to a world like the fluffy pre-human utopia of her imagination, and whose tree-climbing creatures we should want to emulate. Does she imagine that proto-humans like Australopithecus anamensis were big on art, reflection and revolutionary politics, and known for championing gender equality? Does she think she would exist in such a world as anything more than meat?
Hell you’re in trouble just for judging them primitive.
As when the Guardian’s “post-colonial theorist” Emer O’Toole chided those who think themselves more sophisticated than 19th century Maori tribes, whose culture was essentially prehistoric and enlivened with cannibalism.
Posted by: David | July 15, 2015 at 10:21
Simen: "There is something about sufficiently advanced nuttery being indistinguishable from comedic pretend-nuttery..."
Poe's Law.
Posted by: Patrick Brown | July 15, 2015 at 10:49
David
Don't you know that Cannibalism is a myth propagated by white colonisers
Posted by: TDK | July 15, 2015 at 10:50
What puzzles me is that if the deep greens want to live like apes or barbarians there are any number of places where they can do so right now. All it takes is an air ticket and a bit of a hike.
Posted by: Erwin | July 15, 2015 at 10:50
Jean-Jacques Rousseau has a lot to answer for. But then he was mad. And French.
Posted by: Theophrastus | July 15, 2015 at 11:08
DGR may not need to cut any power lines:
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/jul/15/national-grid-confident-its-power-plans-can-prevent-winter-blackouts
Posted by: Theophrastus | July 15, 2015 at 11:13
I'm afraid I misread that as 'borderline personality disorder'....Oh. wait.
Posted by: Jonathan | July 15, 2015 at 11:14
How very sincere they all sound. If only they weren't all clothed in, um, the products of the civilisation they want to destroy.
Eh, whatever, I'm sure it's just an accident. I've no doubt such enlightened people would never engage in the kind of the cognitive dissonance necessary to wear modern clothing or live in houses with modern paints (probably oil-derived) coating the walls.
Posted by: Mark | July 15, 2015 at 12:34
There's definitely something of the old Khmer Rouge in today's green movement... and not just the 'deep green' radicals.
I suspect a society somewhere, at some stage, will succumb to it and it will all end with the usual socialist pile of corpses.
Posted by: Jon | July 15, 2015 at 12:37
If only they weren’t all clothed in, um, the products of the civilisation they want to destroy.
It’s telling that these self-imagined revolutionaries don’t show us the way by actually living their supposed ideal, which would be easy enough to attempt. So far as I can make out, none of them have chosen to do without the advantages of modernity – living with no medicine to speak of, no dentistry, no Wi-Fi. Instead, they delight in thoughts of sabotage and vandalism – and of hurting other people and violating their will. Of course for some, that’s the sweetest plum. The rest is pretext.
Posted by: David | July 15, 2015 at 12:45
So if we do away with capitalism and smash all the infrastructure there'll be no 'chronic starvation'? There's stupid and there's scary stupid.
Posted by: Anna | July 15, 2015 at 12:50
Evidently, the second speaker is making sure her orthodontic treatment is complete before she helps usher in complete social and economic collapse. At least she'll have straight teeth when she enters the Thunderdome.
Posted by: R. Sherman | July 15, 2015 at 12:53
I note that DGR's "Ladies Auxiliary" is busy, too.
Posted by: R. Sherman | July 15, 2015 at 12:58
"If the living world could speak it would say that it's afraid probably, every single day, of being gutted and torn down"
No, the vast majority of it would only express hunger (physical and sexual), fear of those who hunger after it, and pain from any number of untreated afflictions and deprivations.
Interesting conundrum for these people, who are afraid of having their inner selves 'destroyed' by culture: Can non-sentient creatures consent? If not, doesn't that make 'the living world' rather rapey? If they do consent, can you draw a meaningful distinction between non-sentient and sentient-but-pissed/high?
Posted by: NielsR | July 15, 2015 at 13:03
Sorry for three comments in a row, but the DGR Women's Caucus is--of course--fighting to lower the birthrate. Note this tweet.
So, they wish to lower the birthrate by "increasing peoples' standard of living," all while destroying modern industrial civilization. Okaaaaaaaay . . .
Posted by: R. Sherman | July 15, 2015 at 13:03
It could be argued that life was better before the internet brought such horrible misanthropes to one's notice. We sacrificed quite a lot in securing an unending supply of cat videos.
Posted by: Thomas Fuller | July 15, 2015 at 13:08
making sure her orthodontic treatment is complete before she helps usher in complete social and economic collapse.
Amusing as it is to note, the incoherence of their blathering is, for them, most likely beside the point. Despite the pretence, it isn’t a political philosophy or amenable to correction; it’s psychodrama draped in a patchwork of excuses. Like most forms of Marxoid thinking, it’s an attempt to rationalise vanity and a desire to coerce and do harm to other people. Malice with a fig leaf.
Posted by: David | July 15, 2015 at 13:12
@R Sherman - actually, the fewer-kids-when-better-off line is true. More developed societies do have a lower birthrate. Can't do it without the modern industrial civilization, agreed, or at least some evolution thereof. At least an advanced system of medicine, control of any predatory species, and a reliable source of food and drink.
And there might be a bit of population growth occurring before the rate drops, of course...
Posted by: NielsR | July 15, 2015 at 13:27
At least she'll have straight teeth when she enters the Thunderdome.
Hard to forget that highly realistic post apocalyptic trilogy. Oil is in short supply so to get it you follow the standard Hollywood native American battle strategy of endlessly circling the enemy. Personally, I'm pleased to know there will be no shortage of leatherwear and hair gel in the future.
Posted by: TDK | July 15, 2015 at 13:32
Neils, I mentioned it because it's inconsistent with the organization's goal of societal collapse. I found it amusing. Like eliminating dysentery by destroying sewage treatment plants.
Posted by: R.Sherman | July 15, 2015 at 13:34
Ah, right, wasn't sure at what point of the sentence the sarcasm kicked in, sorry.
Agreed, though I'm struggling to find it funny, myself.
Posted by: NielsR | July 15, 2015 at 13:59
Guys, they are taking the Mickey - remove their welfare and they will scream to the media like nobody's business. What are they using to promote their "cause" - hang on - Social media, something lacking in their nirvana long, long ago. These people are just normal Greens, wanting a religious position to justify not working and living off welfare - to "beat the system". Parasites. mar
Posted by: Mark | July 15, 2015 at 14:02
From the flowchart depicting "The Evolution Of Socialist Strategies (Or, From Marx To The Neo-Rousseauians)" on p.173 of Stephen Hicks' excellent and very readable "Explaining Postmodernism" (available here), their thought processes (yes, I know) have gone something like this:
Classical Marxist Socialism-> Wait for capitalism to collapse->*failure*->Try intellectual vanguard, agrarian version (e.g. Mao)->*failure*->Change ethical standard->Go from "wealth is good" to "wealth is bad"->Left environmentalism-> This load of horseshit.
Posted by: Lancastrian Oik | July 15, 2015 at 14:26
Terrorist misanthropes.
Or misanthropic terrorists.
Posted by: Rob | July 15, 2015 at 14:32
War is bad. They make that clear. Also, "one of the ways to stop a war, is destroying an enemy's ability to wage that war." So...war. Mind = blown. The sad piano music almost convinced me.
Posted by: Jon Powers | July 15, 2015 at 15:02
I'd call them psychotropic warriors. They all have that certain numbness associated with taking too many mind- and mood-altering medications for too long, for whatever demons haunt their thoughts.
This is why they appear so proud of their gibberish. They believe it's "profound insight."
Posted by: Drake D | July 15, 2015 at 15:27
The sad piano music almost convinced me.
Perhaps they should have used the “sad Hulk” tune.
Posted by: David | July 15, 2015 at 15:28
Perhaps they should have used the “sad Hulk” tune.
I learned that when I was 11 and taking piano lessons. I'm here for you, David, if you need me.
Posted by: R. Sherman | July 15, 2015 at 15:36
"one of the ways to stop a war, is destroying an enemy's ability to wage that war."
Heh. George W. Bush, call your office...
Posted by: wtp | July 15, 2015 at 15:59
Ah, yes, the magical thinking that reducing us back to survival of the fittest, where the rule of law is but a dim memory, will somehow usher in an era of tranquility and peace. Strangely, history seems to demonstrate that law of the jungle seems to invariably favor those less inclined towards humming mantras and knitting hemp underwear.
These people need to read a bit of post-apocalyptic fiction, or maybe watch an episode or two of Walking Dead.
Posted by: Steve B | July 15, 2015 at 16:07
David - Does she imagine that proto-humans like Australopithecus anamensis were big on art, reflection and revolutionary politics, and known for championing gender equality? Does she think she would exist in such a world as anything more than meat?
It's as if these people haven't seen "Mad Max". The sort of men who rule the wastelands after the fall of civilisation aren't soy-nibbling vegans.
And don't count on Mel Gibson rescuing their hemp-fuelled eco-compounds from rampaging biker gangs, cannibals, and giant, man-eating Triffids. He isn't as spry as he used to be.
Posted by: Steve 2 - Stevement Day | July 15, 2015 at 16:23
I was watching an episode of the reality show Cops recently and it occurred to me that what we need is an offshore penal colony. Say, an island in the middle of a very large ocean, where the sociopathic and habitually criminal can try to eke out a living among their own kind, picking berries, hunting shrews and attempting to build rudimentary shelters.
The same idea might prove useful for Ms Keith and her colleagues. Rather than have them merely scold us for our heathen materialism, let them show us how right they are by living out a small scale version of their ecologically pious post-capitalist utopia. I propose a one-way ticket to a remote and uninhabited island, uncluttered by infrastructure and modern conveniences. After five years or so we could send in a film crew to document their triumph and witness the ungendered, poverty-free fragrance of it all.
Or to bury what’s left of the bodies.
Posted by: David | July 15, 2015 at 16:29
The thing I find most fascinating is the innate need of all humans to find a religion and a deity to worship. Yes, with the enviro-mental-ist crowd, the hypocrisy is interesting, the magical thinking is fun to dissect and laugh at, and the complete lack of introspection and self-awareness is awe-inspiring, actually. But, at the core, these people feel a deep and almost instinctual need to engage in a series of ritualistic cognitive and physical activities that they believe will provide order and meaning for their lives. And yet, with all of the options available, they choose to invent a new one that is somehow worse by being more egotistical, more apocalyptic and less rational than all that have come before it. An ancient religion (Christianity) lead us out of the Dark Ages, a new one will lead us back.
Posted by: RightofGenghis | July 15, 2015 at 16:29
After five years or so we could send in a film crew to document their triumph and witness the ungendered, poverty-free fragrance of it all.
They'll probably just find a sign reading "CROATOAN".
Posted by: R. Sherman | July 15, 2015 at 16:47
Where's a drone with a hellfire missile and a spare flame thrower when you really need one to clean out the forest and return it to its primeval state?
Posted by: vanderleun | July 15, 2015 at 16:57
And yet, with all of the options available, they choose to invent a new [religion]
Yes, the dynamic is quasi-religious. And if you’ve seen Ms Keith give her so-called lectures, the comparison is hard to avoid. The devout gather and listen approvingly to a stream of begged questions and bald, often baffling assertions. There’s no actual logical argument, no subtleties of thought, just a series of unsupported statements piled high and teetering. (Masculinity is “emotional numbness,” femininity is “the traumatised psyche,” gender is “a political creation… to separate who counts as human.” And so on and so forth.) And so despite Ms Keith’s alleged dislike of religion – “masculinity’s religion” – her own behaviour, and that of her audience, looks like a kind of ecological Scientology.
Posted by: David | July 15, 2015 at 16:57
Steve B - my wife and I very much enjoy The Walking Dead, though for different reasons.
She is unaccountably keen on the crossbow-fancying hillbilly Yoda, Darryl. But I liked The Governor.
Sure, he was a monocular sociopath, but The Governor was a man who got things done. Whenever he appeared on screen, you always knew he'd be up to violence, or scheming, or violent scheming.
Just because he kept trophies of reanimated severed heads, held zombie gladiatorial contests, and had his undead cannibal daughter locked up in a closet, doesn't mean he was a bad person. He seems to have been a far more capable leader than Rick.
Rick is a goody two shoes and, even when he's executing people in the town square, you can tell his heart's not on it. He looks like the sort of guy who'd cry and have feelings and all that stuff. Blegh!
They should have a spin-off show where The Governor goes from town to town, helping people defeat evil railroad barons / corrupt oil tycoons / scheming property developers trying to buy the old fairground for a song by pretending it's haunted.
SPOILER ALERT: at the end of each episode, he guns everyone down with a Steyr AUG. Then the Sad Hulk theme plays.
Posted by: Steve 2 - Stevement Day | July 15, 2015 at 17:19
After the collapse, I figure these loons to be the first to get their throats cut by food raiders.
Posted by: mojo | July 15, 2015 at 17:49
After the collapse, I figure these loons to be the first to get their throats cut by food raiders.
The men definitely would because they're physically useless, but I guarantee it would take the women about 30 seconds to decide that what they really wanted all along was a strong man to take care of them.
Talking of zombies, I watched the first episode of Z Nation last night. Looks OK - it has the under-rated DJ Qualls and a satisfying amount of mindless violence.
Posted by: Jonathan | July 15, 2015 at 18:02
I was watching an episode of the reality show Cops recently and it occurred to me that what we need is an offshore penal colony. Say, an island in the middle of a very large ocean, where the sociopathic and habitually criminal can try to eke out a living among their own kind, picking berries, hunting shrews and attempting to build rudimentary shelters.
I suggested something similar on this very blog a few years back. It was pointed out to me that for a hunter-gatherer society to survive...well there simply was not an island big enough to handle more than a small group. For some reason this was seen as a problem and not the opportunity for a new reality TV show.
Posted by: wtp | July 15, 2015 at 19:20
It shall be done. Well, again.
Posted by: Ten | July 15, 2015 at 19:21
@WTP
Posted by: R. Sherman | July 15, 2015 at 19:24
@WTP
Bugger. HTML fail.
I think you should sue.
Posted by: R. Sherman | July 15, 2015 at 19:25
To mark who said they are just looking for an excuse to justify receiving welfare : it might be, but the problem with such excuses is that those who make them have a tendency to start believing them.
Posted by: Skeptic | July 15, 2015 at 19:40
I was watching an episode of the reality show Cops recently and it occurred to me that what we need is an offshore penal colony
Well, there is John Carpenter's excellent documentary . . .
And then then there is Heinlein . .
Posted by: Hal | July 15, 2015 at 20:04
It was pointed out to me that for a hunter-gatherer society to survive... well there simply was not an island big enough to handle more than a small group. For some reason this was seen as a problem
Shame about Australia, really.
What?
Posted by: David | July 15, 2015 at 20:39
what we need is an offshore penal colony. Say, an island in the middle of a very large ocean
Isn't that called Australia?
Posted by: Curt | July 15, 2015 at 20:47
"what we need is an offshore penal colony. Say, an island in the middle of a very large ocean"
This book has already been written:
Coventry is a science fiction short story by Robert A. Heinlein and part of his Future History series. It was collected into the book Revolt in 2100.--https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coventry_(short_story)
The protagonist, David MacKinnon, is a romantic idealist up for trial for assault. Since the government fears that he will repeat his action, he is given a choice: either allow trained psychologists to fix him, or leave to an area known as Coventry. MacKinnon chooses to emigrate ... He is sent to the rugged outland beyond the Barrier, where people who refuse to abide by social norms are exiled ... He finds out that the peaceful anarchy he envisioned is a bleak dystopia split into three independent countries ...
Download from here:
http://onlinepdfbooks.blogspot.com/2014/01/coventry-by-robert-heinlein.html
Posted by: Walter Sobchak | July 15, 2015 at 21:06
The living world desires peaceful coexistence. Now I have a rash that persists.
And crawly things that are way friendly in the most uncomfortable spots.
Burn everything down, or become a cannibal. Surely not civil society. That would be way too easy.
Posted by: neal | July 15, 2015 at 21:10
So, the mirror image of Cthulhu cultists, essentially. "O blind, amoral cosmic deity, please let us be eaten last..."
People who want to save "nature" should be frequently reminded that nature doesn't - cannot - care about them, or their preferences, or their existence. At all. Maybe they should go on a group outing to the scene of a tsunami, or a volcanic fallout zone. (I mean, sure they could go after all the excitement is over, but during would be so much more edifying.)
Posted by: aplofar | July 15, 2015 at 21:30
I do not follow the thinking of some above that these people are descended from any sort of Marxist thinking. Marx put humans front and centre of his philosophy. He was pro-industrialisation and for the conquering of nature.
Instead these numpties come via a long line starting with Rousseau, and via various anarchist strands. Anarchist terrorism pre-dates the Marxist version by quite some time. But while the Soviet Union stood Marxism (or Maoism for the Ultras) tended to get all the groupies. Largely in practical terms because calling yourself "Marxist" (as groups such as the ANC, IRA, Weather Underground etc did) was a sure fire way to get funding. The Marxism of such groups was totally subsumed by other considerations in practice.
Today calling anyone on the far Left "Marxist" is about as useful as calling anyone right of centre as "Fascist". The complete failure of any sort of orthodox Marxism has led to a crisis in the far left, and they are searching for new ways to promote the destruction of society.
Posted by: Chester Draws | July 15, 2015 at 21:43
Chester, I fear you're being overly exclusive with your lines of descent - claiming that an anarchist movement can't be steeped in Marxism as well. All of the above references to "abolishing masculinity", et al are the marks of third wave feminism, a pretty explicitly marxist Critical Theory hobbyhorse. It's not classical Marxism, but nothing really is. Did you miss the mention of "class consciousness"? Progressivism in general and Marxism in specific haven't been allied to industrial progress of any sort in a long time.
Then again, anyone repeating the "Fascim is far right" chestnut may have some unexamined received wisdom...
Posted by: Spork | July 15, 2015 at 22:04
I'm willing to provide the wire cutters and point out a pylon if they're willing to shin up it and try cutting the power lines.
In fact, I'll even provide the cardboard coffin (as long as the supermarket leaves some boxes out).
Posted by: Paul Nottingham | July 15, 2015 at 22:04
"It occurred to me that what we need is an offshore penal colony."
I'm thinking, "Infested with Komodo Dragons" here. In fact, I'll even settle for Kimono Dragons, I'm willing to accept a little cross-dressing and cultural appropriation.
Posted by: Paul Nottingham | July 15, 2015 at 22:12
there simply was not an island big enough to handle more than a small group. For some reason this was seen as a problem
At which point, this came to mind.
Posted by: David | July 15, 2015 at 22:23
Chester - it's Frankfurt School, aka cultural Marxism, not Marx-Marx.
Consider Lierre Keith, the "gender abolitionist", "radical feminist", and "environmentalist".
Her schtick isn't new. Erich Fromm, Max Horkheimer, and their fellows at the Institute for Social Research were developing this stuff back in the 1930's.
The nonsense about prehistoric times being some sort of egalitarian (by which they mean matriarchal) golden age date back to Johann Jakob Bachofen's scholarly fantasies, published in 1861 as Das Mutterrecht.
Posted by: Steve 2 - Stevement Day | July 15, 2015 at 22:32
Are you sure this isn't a sly piece of guerilla marketing for Eli Roth's next film?
Posted by: lotocoti | July 15, 2015 at 23:04
Hell, P.J. O'Rourke had these people pegged 20 years ago.
Chronological adults with the minds of children. The perfect Socialist Citizens.
Posted by: Spiny Norman | July 15, 2015 at 23:26
Non Marx-Marx is a pretty weak sort of Marxism. If you can be in direct contradiction to Marx -- anti-industrialisation, pro-"nature" -- and still Marxist, then the term ceases to have meaning.
This blog is pretty severe on non-capitalist "Capitalists", non-artistic "Artists, and non-liberal "Liberals" -- so how come anyone on the left becomes "Marxist"?
If they follow the Frankfurt School, then call them Frankfurters.
Careful thinking requires using labels that fit properly. I find it hard to be persuaded by anyone who labels all their opponents with some random terms like "Marxist" or "Fascist". It suggests that they haven't actually done any thinking, being happy to just slap on a label.
Posted by: Chester Draws | July 16, 2015 at 02:18
Flinging feces used to be the metaphorical way they would argue. Is this a new step up or down?
Posted by: LS | July 16, 2015 at 04:09
Is Ms. Keith aware that during "those first four million years, [humans] actually participated" in exterminating the megafauna of the Americas and Australia?
Posted by: Rich Rostrom | July 16, 2015 at 05:11
There was a Ray Liotta movie from 1994 called No Escape, where he's shipped off to a penal colony island somewhere off the coast of South America. The inmates have split into two factions, one of which is yer basic Mad Max marauders in the jungle and the other a more peaceful, technological group led by Lance Henriksen as a sort of hippy guru cum dictator. Shenanigans ensue. Amusingly, it's set only seven years in the future.
The problem with these people is not that they're going to bring about the downfall of industrial civilisation—they'd be rapidly extirpated if they really tried—but that they retard the introduction of said civilisation into areas that need it, areas that are a bit closer to their agrarian fantasy than, say, North America and thus fairly unremitting hellholes. They have blood on their hands. I would absolutely love to drop them somewhere in the wild, with a few flints and hammerstones if I were feeling generous.
Posted by: David Gillies | July 16, 2015 at 05:33
Again, it’s telling that Ms Keith and her peers chose to be filmed in a woodland setting, suggesting some deep affinity with shrubbery and such, as if they were mystically attuned to Gaia’s throb. Yet so far as I can make out, none of them actually lives among the trees and bugs. Evidently, they prefer shelters with coffee, duvets and broadband. They don’t drink from gently tinkling streams and they don’t feast on whatever small rodent they might conceivably manage to catch without the use of modern means. And Ms Keith is clearly at her most animated when holding court indoors, grandly imparting idiocy to other idiots. People like this chap here, seen passing on The Knowledge: “A world without patriarchy… Can you see the frogs, the squirrels, the otters?”
Yes, let’s all follow him.
Posted by: David | July 16, 2015 at 08:07
The irony is, they regard themselves as progressives!
Posted by: Brian | July 16, 2015 at 09:32
Chester - Non Marx-Marx is a pretty weak sort of Marxism.
I'd tend to agree, but the Cultural Marxists took over the Left yonks ago. Not many of them are still concerned with who owns the means of production and raising the living standards of the European proletariat. Instead, people like Professor Steve Best dominate the thinking and teaching cadres of the New Left:
Recognizing the limitations of “orthodox” or “classical” Marxism, Frankfurt theorists developed a “neo-Marxist” orientation that retained basic Marxist theoretical and political premises, but supplemented the critique of capitalism with other perspectives, thereby spawning hybrid theories such as Freudo-Marxism, Marxist-feminism, and Marxist-existentialism.
And Dr. Steve puts the "Such-and-such Studies" courses into neo-Marxist perspective:
Within a decade, perhaps, “Animal Studies” programs will be institutionalized globally throughout academia and take their rightful place alongside Women’s Studies, African-American Studies, Chicano/a Studies, Disability Studies, and Queer Studies.
If you can be in direct contradiction to Marx -- anti-industrialisation, pro-"nature" -- and still Marxist, then the term ceases to have meaning.
Yet here we are.
This blog is pretty severe on non-capitalist "Capitalists", non-artistic "Artists, and non-liberal "Liberals" -- so how come anyone on the left becomes "Marxist"?
ComparetheMarxists.com
If they follow the Frankfurt School, then call them Frankfurters.
No. I hate the Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Posted by: Steve 2 - Stevement Day | July 16, 2015 at 10:43
...other idiots. People like this chap here, ...
Reading the comments there, not sure if you're aware, that is one Heath Atom Russell. Was a girl, transitioned to a guy, but is now going back to becoming a girl. Google at your convenience. She/he/she is an assault on her/his/her very own nature.
Posted by: WTP | July 16, 2015 at 11:15
Was a girl, transitioned to a guy, but is now going back to becoming a girl.
I did hesitate before using the word chap and briefly wondered if I should be using it ironically. But at some point you just stop giving a shit.
Posted by: David | July 16, 2015 at 12:11
So, the mirror image of Cthulhu cultists, essentially. "O blind, amoral cosmic deity, please let us be eaten last...
This lot are clearly cultists of Shub-Niggurath, the Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young (a monstrous and infinitely fecund cosmic cancer traditionally worshiped as a nature / fertility deity).
Rather presciently, a 'modern-day' campaign book was published in 1990 for the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game with a wealthy eco-loon as one of the major villains. He wishes to destroy industrial civilisation and create a wilderness in which cosmic horrors prey on humans to reduce the population to a tiny remnant (naturally consisting entirely of demented cultists)...
Posted by: Andi Lucas | July 16, 2015 at 12:47
Was a girl, transitioned to a guy, but is now going back to becoming a girl.
Are you sure she isn't turning into Tom Watson MP?
Posted by: Steve 2 - Stevement Day | July 16, 2015 at 13:18
They do realize they won't have Macs or iPhones any more, right? The frigging morons. I could only make it through 53 seconds of their dumbassedry--the moment Sensitive Carefully-Whiskered Boy showed up, I wanted to punch the monitor. (Well, really, him and the 3 previous ninnyhammers....)
Posted by: Quint&Jessel, Sea of Azof, Bly, UK | July 16, 2015 at 13:29
Send them here, and let them be one with Nature: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/04/brazil-snake-island-viper-venom_n_5552149.html
Posted by: Quint&Jessel, Sea of Azof, Bly, UK | July 16, 2015 at 13:36
These people need to read a bit of post-apocalyptic fiction, or maybe watch an episode or two of Walking Dead.
Why go with fiction, when reality is easily bad enough?
Posted by: Jeff Guinn | July 16, 2015 at 13:49
Just to say that Chester Draws is dead right. There is absolutely nothing Marxist about these loons. Which isn't to say that many Marxists aren't loons too; they're just an entirely different category of loon.
Posted by: George | July 16, 2015 at 14:44
. . .thereby spawning hybrid theories such as Freudo-Marxism, Marxist-feminism, . .
Frodo-Marxism!! Bringing whole new meanings to petit bourgeois since 29 July 1954.
. . . Marxist-existentialism
Abandon all hope, there is no Marxism.
Within a decade, perhaps, “Animal Studies” programs will be institutionalized globally throughout academia . . .
Ehn? Already been done for ages . . .
Posted by: Hal | July 16, 2015 at 15:56
But at some point you just stop giving a shit.
Hater.
Posted by: Jonathan | July 16, 2015 at 16:01
Well while we're crating F-Marxism categories, I submit Fredo-Marxism.
It ain't the way I wanted it! I can handle things! I'm smart! Not like everybody says... like dumb... I'm smart and I want respect!
Posted by: wtp | July 16, 2015 at 16:17
crating/creating. 220/221, whatever it takes.
Posted by: wtp | July 16, 2015 at 16:18
. . . crating/creating . . .
Cratering, albeit that's already the original form . . .
Posted by: Hal | July 16, 2015 at 16:25
ComparetheMarxists.com
Dammit!
Posted by: PiperPaul | July 16, 2015 at 17:15
ComparetheMarxists.com
Dammit!
Yeah, yeah, it's the easy stock punchline, but here y'go.
Posted by: Hal | July 16, 2015 at 18:00
You cannot discuss Marxism as if it were one stable set of ideas. In fact, Marx had a bunch of stages he went through, and the stage that produced V.I. of Capital was only one of them.
After Marx died, the Marxists split into a bunch of competing factions.
The mother house of European Marxists parties was the German Social Democratic Party. In 1891, it adopted a platform called the Erfurt program. You can read it here:
https://www.marxists.org/history/international/social-democracy/1891/erfurt-program.htm
It has a revolutionary sounding introduction, but is really meliorative. It calls for the 8 hour work day.
OTOH, there were a number of other theorists. One of them Georges Sorel, who rejected meliorism like the Erfurt program in favor of political violence. His followers included Lenin and Mussolini.
After, the Russian Revolution, Russian theories, which were far from orthodox 19th century Marxism, dominated Comintern. The Russians solved theoretical disagreements with ice axes in the back of the head.
The rise of Fascism in Italy and Germany was something that orthodox Soviet Marxists could not explain. Cultural Marxism was created by Antonio Gramsci in Italy and the Frankfurt school to explain that problem.
Of course, Fascism is itself a heresy of Marxism.
Here is the punchline. There is not, nor has there ever been a single coherent theory that can be held up as true platonic Marxism (BTW Plato was a Communist).
Circling back to the girl above, she and others like here are rooted in the nostalgia that Marx himself cited in the Communist manifesto ("All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned"). Her ideas are just as Marxist as those of the writers cited above.
Posted by: Walter Sobchak | July 16, 2015 at 22:51
You're all wrong: the relevant documentary is "Mosquito Coast," wherein Harrison Ford set out to create Utopia with him and his family and a few assorted natives. He even built an ice machine!
You see, that's the proper way to do it: build your utopia in a small corner of the world, and like a pinch of sourdough, you can use it to leaven the whole world.
Which, given the lack of such a colony, I'm beginning to suspect that building utopia might not be the immediate goal, given the emphasis on destroying the entire system first, quite without the consent of 50% +1 of the affected populace.
Posted by: dicentra | July 17, 2015 at 01:13
I have only one thing to say to moonbats like these:
Lead by example; you first.
Posted by: Mark Dietzler | July 17, 2015 at 05:29
I’m beginning to suspect that building utopia might not be the immediate goal, given the emphasis on destroying the entire system first, quite without the consent of… the affected populace.
Yes, I’m pretty sure their drama isn’t about what they say it’s about. This would, for instance, explain their remarkable lack of concern for things like logic, and their reluctance to set an example for heathens like thee and me by voluntarily living the way they would have the rest of us forced to live. I very much doubt that their ostentatious extremism is amenable to debate, let alone correction. It strikes me as a kind of role-play favoured by narcissists, the kind of people to whom other human beings are little more than stage props. And the fact that their chosen methods are destructive, and that their chosen goal would obviously entail the coercion and ruin of countless people, suggests urges of an unsavoury and all too familiar kind.
Posted by: David | July 18, 2015 at 09:47
Which, given the lack of such a colony, I'm beginning to suspect that building utopia might not be the immediate goal
To be fair there's been several attempts to build socialist utopias in little self sufficient communities. From New Harmony to Jones Town. cf Kibbutz movement. It's not so much as "will they fail", so much as "when". The longer lasting ones invariably compromised the original ideals.
Posted by: TDK | July 19, 2015 at 09:22
Another entry in the offshore island stakes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7IZDKk89M0
Posted by: Mr Ecks | July 21, 2015 at 13:52
Why are these scenarios bunkum? Mind control notwithstanding ;)
http://deepgreenresistance.org/en/deep-green-resistance-strategy/decisive-ecological-warfare#collapse-scenarios
Posted by: Stuart | July 21, 2015 at 22:59
Why are these scenarios bunkum? Mind control notwithstanding ;)
Hmmm . . . part of the confusion might be the picture of a dilapidated London Bridge, with the river bank running parallel with the bridge . . .
Posted by: Hal | July 21, 2015 at 23:55
Katniss Everdeen making an appearance in that photo.
Posted by: Stuart | July 22, 2015 at 10:47