Liberals hate leftists. Hate them, hate them, hate them.
They don’t often admit it of course. Admitting you hate those to your left at least as much as you hate those to your right would cause a lot of cognitive dissonance for those who think of themselves as being on the left, and it would weaken their arguments considerably.
But they do. Liberals hate leftists, for a number of reasons.
Liberals hate leftists because there is a night-and-day difference between a capitalist, imperialist establishment and an ideology which wants to tear down that establishment and replace it with peace and socialism. There’s more of a difference between true leftists and establishment liberals than there is between the far right and establishment liberals.
Liberals hate leftists because the psychological discomfort known as cognitive dissonance actually hurts, so those who provoke it can often be perceived as the cause of that pain.
Liberals hate leftists because they’ve spent their whole lives building and reinforcing a worldview which validates war, oligarchy and exploitation while thinking of themselves as defenders of equality and sanity, so when someone comes in promoting an ideology which highlights the discrepancy between those two points the cognitive dissonance which sets in makes them feel like the leftist just slapped them in the face.
Liberals hate leftists because while both purport to support the working class and disempowered groups, only one of them actually does so.
Liberals hate leftists for the same reason someone telling a bogus self-aggrandizing story at a party would hate somebody who caught them in one of their lies in front of everyone.
Liberals hate leftists because leftists are a constant reminder that liberals are not the thing they pretend to be.
Liberals hate leftists for the same reason you’d hate someone who keeps yelling out “This is all fake! Those are actors!” at a theater: they disrupt a pleasant illusion the liberals are trying to enjoy about villains being fought by heroic protagonists.
Liberals hate leftists for the same reason a wife who is informed that her husband is cheating on her will often turn her anger upon the person who told her: they made it hard to hold onto the delusion that their setup is working out fine.
Liberals hate leftists because a worldview that is based on lies will always necessarily be opposed to a worldview that is based on truth.
Liberals hate leftists because your worldview feels like a part of who you are, so people who expose the hypocrisy, ineffectiveness, illegitimacy and untruthfulness of your worldview will often be perceived as if they are attacking you personally.
Liberals hate leftists because they are surrounded by screens telling them all day every day that their ideology is the only correct position, so people who come in pointing out the flaws in their ideology will be perceived not as individuals with whom they disagree, but as liars.
Liberals hate leftists because they’ve been trained by the mass media over the last few years to view any disagreement with the imperialist beltway consensus on foreign policy as Russian and therefore sinister.
Liberals hate leftists because change is scary and status quo bias is a thing.
Liberals hate leftists because if the leftists are right, then everyone who taught them everything they know in life is wrong.
Liberals hate leftists because it’s easier than tearing down your entire worldview and rebuilding it piece by piece from the perspective that everything you’ve been told about the world and the way it works is a lie.
Liberals hate leftists because, despite whatever stories they might believe about themselves, liberals are opposed to everything leftists stand for in every meaningful way.
The more real leftists are with themselves about this, the more effective they will be.
______________________
Thanks for reading! The best way to get around the internet censors and make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for at my website or on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, liking me on Facebook, following my antics on Twitter, throwing some money into my tip jar on Patreon or Paypal, purchasing some of my sweet merchandise, buying my books Rogue Nation: Psychonautical Adventures With Caitlin Johnstone and Woke: A Field Guide for Utopia Preppers. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I’m trying to do with this platform, click here. Everyone, racist platforms excluded, has my permission to republish, use or translate any part of this work (or anything else I’ve written) in any way they like free of charge.
Bitcoin donations:1Ac7PCQXoQoLA9Sh8fhAgiU3PHA2EX5Zm2
120 responses to “Why Liberals Hate Leftists”
One reason I don’t like Caitlin Johnstone is that she never allows my comments to appear under her articles here. For somebody who poses as a human rights activist, this type of out of hand censorship is totally against freedom of speech! 🙁 There is nothing progressive about muzzling a person’s chance to contribute to a discussion thread under an article.
Deschutesmaple’s alleged censored comments never existed.
Caitlin tolerates posts that insult her work and character, as well as lunatics like Michael Kahn and malignant propagandists like Brockland : all a bridge too far in Freedom.
`
When assassinComments come from traitors to mankind like the Liar Deschutesmaple, the death penalty for proven liars is what i recommend.
All leftists (collectivists, statists, socialists) live outside of alignment with natural law or reality as it is. The leftist will only learn that they’re wrong when they’ve had enough pain and suffering in their own lives i.e. that socialism is a political economic farce intended to give power to the political elite while robbing the people of their inherent individual rights. You can’t fix the world, you can only ‘fix’ yourself.
There is never enough evidence for a leftist because the evidence lies in real world experience; which they don’t posses outside of their leftist/collectivist bubble. This requires an intense understanding of the nature of reality, and it requires work (actual life sustaining labor). The leftist is divorced from reality through pseudo-intellectualism and or simple naivety/ignorance – they have been thoroughly brainwashed by the system (mixed economy, tax-payer funded universities and state-leftist mass media propaganda). As with Santa Clause, the leftist lives in a fantasy world that doesn’t exist; a collectively accepted reality created by and for state profit and control.
Hmmm. Well first of all, socialism is a form of capitalism, and the one most resonant with BOTH Adam Smith’s treatises on the natural means of production, Wealth of Nations and Theory of Moral Sentiments. Democracy – liberty – was key to the success of the natural means of production.
The divide between liberalism and socialism appears based on the separation of Smiths’ philosophy into right and left camps based on Wealth of Nations alone, the how of capitalism, and willfully forgetting the social why of capitalism.
Liberals hate the genuine left because, agreed, the genuine left exposes the horse-whispering-at-the-glue-factory hypocrisy of the political left. They hate the right for about the same reasons.
That said, the status quo, was never a static status quo. The problem for the power elites, was the evolving nature of the pre-9/11, pre-COVID status quo which saw a closing of the economic and especially information gap between the power elites and the rest of us. Both as individuals and as nation states, the middle classes and rising Third World were perceived as a threat to the cosseted Western European elites and their corruption of capitalism.
The reset is all about resetting the power gap between the power elites and everyone else to something more favourable to preserving the existing power elites. Not about rebuilding a more just society.
We were evolving to a more just society. Now, we are in danger of not doing so and devolving into postmodern medievalism under surveilance police statism.
Oh my God, blah, blah, blah…
.
It really is simple, so why complicate things?
.
blah, blah, blah, blah, blah………….
Agreed about Conservatives, which is why they are fakes; disguised Communists, like all Socialists.
The real (old) Right despise all the rest, especially Conservatives, because they are too blind/stupid to realise that the ‘people power’ of a democracy or republic is a illusion, of Delphic Oligarch steered mob rule. Peoples wishes are only allowed when the Oligarchs sees personal benefit from it i.e. it’s a Plutocracy!
The Alt-Right was a partial awakening to that reality, but full awakening will realise that ‘people power’ is fake e.g. it took Tyrants conquering Oligarchs territory in Ancient Greece to force/provide debt forgiveness (Jubilee) for the common people, because might is necessary for protection, thus right.
Most r-type / Left people probably can’t comprehend, or hate the fact, that might is right.
It may surprise you to find out that what you just said was already said 150 years ago by Karl Marx.
Karl Marx referred to Democracy as the “Dictatorship of the Bourgeoisie”. Bourgeoisie is a French word referring to the rich, but can also refer to the elite and implies the existence of an oligarchy. Your description of Democracy matches his almost exactly.
The right wing is discovering this as the Liberal Oligarchy uses the same tools against the conservative right that it used to silence the anti-capitalist left.
For the talkative Peter Mann and the sake of my eyesight and this goofy extreme go to the siding posting that is very ODD at this site.
.
“O good must of been someone else’s theory”
.
Is my succinct response to him and his message below in response to mine.
.
Still, I remember some sort of “Mud Man” theory that somebody was espousing and I’m gonna go back and check the record and then I’ll post again if I feel like it.
.
I don’t like labels either, and I’m tired of over-used words that do NOT help with communication, without which, we are all dead.
.
BK
Oh forgive me……
.
It was the “mudShadows” that he’s talked about amongst other things Ad infinitum.
.
Let me tell ya, we all have shadows surrounding us, and myself personally I can feel them real close……I just love the power that emanates from them, but if you let go of humility, then they will swallow you up or burn you to ash in a heart-beat. At least, that has been my experience.
.
Peter Mann, I expect a response to this, but I’d just assume there wasn’t one — at least not one from you. No offense, but maybe your head is surrounded by shadows. Know what I mean?
.
BK
The article was beneath dumb. First, two terms were never defined well enough to make any sense – liberal and leftist. If you don’t define those terms in context, it makes no sense to say one hates the other. In fact, using terms like “hate” is nonsense to begin with. So, three terms, poorly defined, leave the article meaningless.
Its intuitive, certainly, but not dumb.
The genuine progressives are slowly coming to terms with the betrayal of the left by their politicos.
The political left used the civil, inclusive and humanitarian language and street cred of the left as a kind of human horse whispering for power and control, not for real moral humanitarian achievement.
The truly awoken just don’t know how to identify themselves. Globalist identity politics did a number on them as well. All the go-to words have been turned inside out; humanitarian is synonymous with bullying and violent humanitarian interventionism, for example. Liberal, is a kind of arch communist now. Alt-left, denotes violent wingnuts straight out of alt-right fantasy.
Plain old ‘left’ is sort of all that remains. Indoctrinated hostility of the free market keeps them from identifying a libertarians, although, most would be genuine civil libertarians.
Here’s one more: Liberals hate leftists because their self-righteousness is profuse.
The best line in the article is this: “Liberals hate leftists because leftists are a constant reminder that liberals are not the thing they pretend to be.” The only problem with that line is that there are really no such things as liberals any longer. The closest people come today is to be neoliberal corporatists that reside right of center, in the space vacated by moderate Republicans who moved further right in search of increased oligarchic campaign funds.
The only true liberals ARE the leftists!
No, the only true liberals are the libertarians. Liberalism was first and foremost about the primacy of the free market AND having the civil rights to benefit from participation in the free market.
In realpolitik, that translates into the Trumpian coalitions.
Unless and until We, the People, stop using labels to categorize, isolate and enrage each other, we will never be able to change the present arrangement (which is exactly why is use the term “present arrangement” instead of the you-know-what labels that would instantly lead to never-ending, pointless debate).
As the replies and sub-replies on this particular article IMO absolutely prove, we argue incessantly about the specific meanings or definitions of those labels. No assembly of people in an auditorium or in an online commentary/discussion such as this can, or ever will, agree upon just exactly WHAT the words socialism, communism, democracy, capitalism, fascism and terrorism mean, let alone leftist, the left, liberal, fascist, neo-fascist, neo-nazi, right winger, far right, far left, militant, etc.
Like the USD, new, imaginative labels for us to squabble over are printed out of thin air by the Oligarchic Transnational Elite Collective (OTEC) and their employees every day of the week.
Even further, what does the word “mean” mean for those particular words? Here we are not talking about relatively simple words like cat, dog, paper, stone or scissors – where those words can be written on a post-it and stuck to the physical items they “name” or “represent” (something you might temporarily do to household items while learning a new language). All of these other, more complicated words (labels) require “definitions” that refer to specific behavior of the people or the systems so labeled.
One might hope that a label would be a sort of short-cut that would eliminate the need to spell out certain behavior time and time again. But, quite obviously, this is not the case. Instead, confusion reigns in label-world because, once again, everyone saying, speaking or writing the labels would have to agree on their definitions in terms of, again, the behavior these labels represent and, IMO, this will continue to be, as it has in the distant-to-recent past, a never-ending endeavor. There are far more productive ways to expend our energy and there is no time (tome?) like the present to do it.
For example, the 3 young human beings who inherited from their father a factory that had been in our city of 20,000 people for 75 years – one that employed 3,000 of those 20,000 people in well-paying jobs – suddenly decided to close down the factory and moved their capital equipment to a place on the planet where there were desperately poor, starving people who were “willing” to work 18 hours a day, 7 days a week, for food and a place on the factory floor to sleep. Those three owners are making much more profit as a result of that move. The 3 “owners” are ecstatic about their decision.
The employees of the factory who were about to lose their livelihoods were in panic mode because they knew full well that there were no other jobs in their city. The owners of the local businesses that depended upon the employees of the factory continuing to spend their money in their establishments were also in panic mode. They contacted their political representatives at the local, state and federal levels, but they were told that because the factory was “privately” owned, the owners were “free” to do with their “property” whatever they chose, including moving the factory to a location on the planet where they could “maximize profit”.
The factory workers and local business owners decided to do something in an attempt to keep the factory in the city. They decided to protest the factory closure by surrounding the factory to prevent the equipment from being moved. This worked for the few days that it took the 3 owners of the factory’s lawyers to go to a court of law. In short, however many taxpayer-paid government employees carrying firearms it took to arrest and jail however many protesters it took to allow the capital equipment to be removed from the factory was ordered and the equipment was removed from the factory and relocated. Our town and its 19,997 people were economically devastated. The three owners of the factory were elated at their newfound wealth.
Now, will the vast majority of people living in this present arrangement agree that the above outcome was unacceptable and that the arrangement that allowed it must be changed? I think the answer may very well be “yes”. So then the question is: Just exactly WHAT is a better arrangement? Do we want to discuss the details of a better arrangement, or would we all rather spend our lifetimes arguing about the definitions of labels and pointing fingers and name-calling? I know which option OTEC would prefer; they’ll even print some new labels for us to argue about.
“Just exactly WHAT is a better arrangement?” Yes, Ish, that’s where the rubber hits the road. Leftist commentary is filled with explanations and denunciations of the neoliberal status quo, all of them justified, but in and of themselves they take us nowhere but deeper into depression and futility. Here’s the best ‘alternative arrangement” I’ve been able to find in a lifetime of reading. Surely the last word on this crucial subject was not uttered in the late 19th Century, but I think this creative and CONSTRUCTIVE thinker from the first Gilded Age got a hell of a lot right.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/11/19/on-earth-as-in-heaven-the-utopianism-of-edward-bellamy/
Bellamy’s extrapolation of the myth of Jesus is predicated on cherryPicking the sweet bits, while ignoring the oppressive and deceitful elements of biblical dogma. This is why his vision of Utopia never eventuated, not even with the assistance of psychedelics in the hippie rebellion.
`
Bellamy’s imagination may be the best you have found so far, but it is still a bicycle with square wheels.
Confucious says, the proper naming of things is the beginning of understanding.
Getting loosey goosey with the labels leads to identity wars.
From left philosophy to right my take. Please make corrections to getting a better viewpoint.
Anarchist, Nazi, Communist, Progressive, Fascist, Liberal, Libertarian, Conservative, Fascist, Nazi, Anarchist
Notice Anarchists Nazi, Fascist can rise from both right and left. Am I wrong, why? The center is corrupt, the fringes dangerous. Lions and tigers and bears, oh my.
“Liberals hate leftists because your worldview feels like a part of who you are, so people who expose the hypocrisy, ineffectiveness, illegitimacy and untruthfulness of your worldview will often be perceived as if they are attacking you personally.”
.
Each person is born as a one-in-a-lifetime unique miracle. Could never have happened before the moment of birth and could not have happened later. A magical combination of spirit-timing-personality-family-influences, and much more. A special concoction of majesty.
.
So what do we do with that? We immediately start to choose some worn out paths that somebody else laid down before us. Instead of claiming our personal destiny and setting out on new roads and new ideas, we just find the nearest ruts and mindlessly walk without purpose down those ruts for the rest of our lives. OK, not everybody. Just most of everybody.
.
People grab on to a worldview or philosophy that was carved out long before they came on to the scene because it’s quick and easy and you always have lots of people telling you to join up with their side to keep their march of conformity going strong. Or, someone actually started up something new and then people grab on to that instead of finding their own ways with their own unique minds and spirits. Lazy, lazy, lazy.
.
So, people become their “worldview”. In effect, there is no degree of separation between who they THINK they are, and some worldview with an agenda that they’ve literally sold their soul to. And then to make things worse, you begin to defend that worldview AS IF it were really you. What a sad, sick game of Bait and Switch. You bait someone into giving up their personhood, and you swap that out for somebody else’s tired and worn out worldview. And you lose yourself in the bargain.
.
Hello! Your Worldview – as right and righteous and purposeful as you might think it is – IS NOT YOU. Learn the majesty of who you really are. Maybe meet yourself for the first time. You might be surprised how much you like what you see.
Caitlin, you speak of hate, as a white person, such as myself, you must be fully aware that hate is something that white people relishes in. They hate their parents, their children, their siblings, their neighbors, everyone and everything. So much so that I’ve left the white people and now live in a community that is more than 99% black, and except for the almost entirely white police force and emergency workers that still, plague the black community, despite the poverty imposed upon it by all those white haters, there is love and this is spiritually speaking; heaven.
It would be an over exaggeration to say that white people are the root of all evil, but not by much other than to ask; isn’t it interesting that the families that are the Zionist heroes of today are the same families that brought us poverty, Naziism, the Halocaust and WWll? I won’t argue the fact when others are much more qualified than me to do so.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/hyperinflation-fascism-war-new-world-order-may-defeated-once-more/5724353
The libertarian liberals (i.e. Koch’s etc) are the smart puppet masters pulling Trump’s strings. They wrap themselves in the patriotic freedom fakery that is crony capitalism and world domination, while ignoring the true libertarian message of truth, transparency, integrity, non-coercion, civil liberty, peace, etc.
Caitlin, you left out a few, but you canʻt list ʻem all or it would turn into a book. My own liberals-hate-leftists list would include the reality that being leftist in this country endangers your employment. Donʻt be anti-Zionist and try to go up for tenure at a university. A big incentive not to go down that path. Also on my list is loss of friends. I made some comments about Hillary in 2016 related to Honduras and LIbya – in a non-confrontational way – and suddenly found myself downgraded to acquaintance level with a few people. Oops.
During the Presidential primaries in the Democratic Party, a major point of difference between the two major candidates, Joe Biden versus Bernie Sanders, was whether billionaires are bad for the country: Biden said no; Sanders said yes. (This was a major reason why the billionaires made sure that Sanders would lose.) In any country where wealth-inequality is so extreme, there can be no authentic democracy. America’s extreme inequality of wealth makes democracy impossible in this country. America’s other problems follow from that. In reality, it’s a one-party state, and that party is controlled not actually by the counts of voters, but by the counts of dollars. It is an aristocracy; and its decline — to what has been documented here — follows from that fact. Whatever democracy America might once have had is gone now. It has become replaced by a land of mass-deceptions, which are bought and sold.
This fine article can be read here:
Gallup: Americans Tend to Trust Only News That Confirms Their Beliefs; Highly Educated Americans Are by Far the Most Closed-Minded Group by Eric Zuesse!
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/09/27/gallup-americans-tend-trust-only-news-that-confirms-their-beliefs-highly-educated-americans-far-most-closed-minded-group/
Socialism is fine. Capitalism is fine. If you keep sociopaths from stealing everything, socialism and capitalism could co-exist.
I really enjoyed this article from Native American Russel Means.
“…Marxism is committed to even further perpetuation and perfection of the very industrial process which is destroying us all. It offers only to “redistribute” the results–the money, maybe–of this industrialization to a wider section of the population. It offers to take wealth from the capitalists and pass it around; but in order to do so, Marxism must maintain the industrial system.”
https://www.filmsforaction.org/news/revolution-and-american-indians-marxism-is-as-alien-to-my-culture-as-capitalism/
Awesome link. Thanks.
Liberals hate liberals that ignore Moral Hazard.
They don’t actually ignore Moral Hazard, curiously that would be something of a compliment, actually. It would mean that they are able to think outside the herd. They don’t even consider moral hazard as the herd doesn’t think about it. People let their herd do their thinking for them (they really do!).
Here is an article reporting on the lawsuit brought by Bernie Sanders supports against the corrupt DNC, a DNC, Sanders supporters argued, that ignored it’s own charter.
https://observer.com/2017/05/dnc-averts-democracy-lawsuit-bernie-sanders-supporters/
“attorneys representing the DNC repeated the tone-deaf argument that neutrality is a political promise and that the DNC can do whatever it wants without being legally bound to the charter. The resulting message is that the Democratic Party serves the interests of itself and its wealthy donors and that its voters have no choice but to deal with their totalitarian authority and undemocratic processes.”
The DNC is corrupt and totalitarian and cheats it’s supporters. The DNC then dishes out candidates that people swallow regardless. Voters ignore the moral hazard of teaching the DNC that the DNC can continue to shit on it’s voters and feed them candidates like WWIII Hillary and voters will continue to support them.
And what happens? If Bernie Sanders were President right now the new Supreme Court justice would be his choice.
Moral Hazard
I didn’t even get into how liberals hate liberals that try to destroy humanity by electing WWIII Hillary.
WWIII ! That is a real thing! Yet the herd didn’t pick up on Hillary’s declarations (multiple declarations) that she would start a shooting war with Russia, so it didn’t even exist to the individual sheeple. You would get a blank stare – I did – if you had told sheeple not to vote for WWIII. The herd does their thinking for them. It really does! This was an epiphany I gained from Russiagate. How could people, intelligent people, fall for that Russiagate nonsense? Answer: they are mimics that let the herd do their thinking for them.
Best thing you can do for yourself this week, read this about mimics, it will open up your eyes to how people operate:
https://woodybelangia.com/what-is-mimetic-theory/
—-
I vote Green Party.
I get a kick out of both Liberals and Leftists who (war and peace issues aside) are really spoiled brats want to burn the “capitalist” system to the ground and replace it with Marxist hallucinations when it is that very free market which gave them every thing and opportunity they have. They suckle its nipple long into adulthood and hallucinate that they are chic in supposedly despising it all. Ours is the most pampered materialist generation in the whole history of the world! Even the so-called poor here are awash in technological conveniences and gadgets, food unimaginable a hundred years ago, access to education, medicine and total transportation with instant entertainment to boot! Ha! Liars and sulking brats!
Looking around for about 80 years now, I haven’t noticed that the poor or in fact the middle classes are living in any kind of paradise. It is true the better-off individuals can buy a lot of junk, although that’s been true since the early part of the 20th century. The junk doesn’t seem to make them very happy. It’s obvious that people could organize themselves more rationally than as they do under capitalism, but people aren’t rational, so maybe capitalism suits them. The inevitable environmental destruction, social decay, and drive toward war and imperialism are tedious for me, however. It’s hard to believe that’s what people want, but they seem to choose it over and over.
Its not possible to organize billions of people ‘more rationally’ than under genuine capitalism.
Who gets to decide what is rational and enforce that?
A free market of everyone in consensus, compelled by the need to cooperate and get along as peers and near-peers, or just the power elites with compulsory political doctrines favouring power elitism alone?
The power elites hate unrigged capitalism because most wouldn’t survive the free market.
I get a kick out of both Liberals and Leftists who (war and peace issues aside) are really spoiled brats want to burn the “capitalist” system to the ground and replace it with Marxist hallucinations when it is that very free market which gave them every thing and opportunity they have. They suckle its nipple long into adulthood and hallucinate that they are chic in supposedly despising it all. Ours is the most pampered materialist generation in the whole history of the world! Even the so-called poor here are awash in technological conveniences and gadgets, food unimaginable a hundred years ago, access to education, medicine and total transportation with instant entertainment to boot! Ha! Liars and brats!
Could you give us all a little info on “that very free market”, bro? … simple things like where one can find it and how it operates.
I have a strong hunch that capitalism and free markets are antithetical. Then again you maybe an idealist and a believer and your faith disinclines you towards analysis?
The free market is founded on the free choice of individuals to decide for themselves what they need and want and go about peacefully obtaining those things through production and exchange.
No market is truly free, however, that’s due to the fact so many people like to cheat one another.
Capitalism and free markets go hand-in-hand. Crony capitalism presumes to abandon the free market ultimately to pure cronyism, as does communism.
I again point out that while there are liberals and leftists in the Democratic Party, the party, as an institution, its leadership and its national level candidates are not liberal and certainly not leftists. Caitlin’s criticism should thus be directed at that political party rather than at “liberals”. And as modified, her article would be spot on.
‘Liberal’ and its derivatives have a great variety of meanings, so it is difficult to say whether the Democratic Party (or anyone else, really) are liberals without running into some argument or contradiction. I have given up using the term unless I can qualify it. If I had to use a word to characterize the Democratic Party it would be ‘conservative’.
names of a few contemporary liberals and leftists would have helped me to connect faces to words, words, words
How ’bout liberal, Killary and (well beyond) leftist, recently deceased, Andre Vltchek?
How ’bout liberal Backtrack Oldbummer and leftist Scott Creighton?
It’s actually very easy … Bet you can come up with others.
The people you name seem like conservatives: keeping to the old ways if possible. I suppose they may give lip service to old-time liberals like the slavemasters Locke and Jefferson, but they don’t seem very interested in their theories.
How ’bout liberal, Killary C. vs. (well beyond) leftist, recently deceased, Andre Vltchek?
How ’bout liberal Backtrack Oldbummer vs. leftist Scott Creighton?
It’s actually very easy … Bet you can come up with others.
Cognitive dissonance is an alarm call, telling us that we are being lied to … oR that we have deceived ourselves about what is real.
`
Everybody hates cognitive dissonance because (as Caitlin so comprehensively portrays) something inside us hates being exposed as a fake.
`
This perverse dynamic explains why so many of Caitlin’s self-proclaimed admirerers insult her writing, while pretending to be superior thinkers.
`
So, what underlies this virulent self-contradiction.?. Where does this ghastly aberration of reasoning come from ?
`
Seriously, there has to be a practical reason for the duplicity, faint praise, and downright nastiness … which contradict their words of praise for Caitlin’s prophetic insights.
`
Caitlin’s last line is the big clue : “The more real leftists are with themselves about this, the more effective they will be.”️
`
Being real is a benchmark for behaviour that only truthful individuals can live by ; those who care more about their self-importance than being truthful … have preDecided their alliance (in favour of an agenda which they deplore in everybody but themselves.)
`
An agenda which obfuscates meanings, so there is no perceived difference between belief and reality .!.
An agenda with denied bewilderment and resentful irresponsibility as its dismal destination.
`
If anybody has a better explanation than interference by a parasite which denies its own existence, i would appreciate you sharing it in this forum.
Liberals and their ilk are exponents of expediency.
Anyone or anything that gets in their way is EXPENDABLE.
Good one, Caitlin! you are bound to hit a bunch of raw nerves here. By the way, Sweden, where I currently reside is no longer a paradigm of social democracy, but a haven for greedy neoliberal economics, cleverly hidden by myths kept alive by a cowardly and secretive population.ruled by Washington. Here profit always goes before people – old and sick are sacrificed for the good of the system, meaning unless you are fit to work, you are not worthy of living. Over 70’s goes straight to palliative care if they dare enter a hospital. It’s truly frightening to grow old in this country.
Hi Lili-Ann,
Having seen the same degradation happen to Australian and British values, i find your assessment consistent with my own observations.
Something opposes social democracy without being obvious, a toxic hidden dynamic whose endResult cannot be hidden.
`
We are fortunate to have Caitlin reminding us to look at what lies behind the official pretence of democratic freedom.
Hi Peter,
Being a dual citizen with about equal adult time living in both countries, I find Australians more open-minded and less secretive than Swedes, when it comes to their political and social opinions. Swedes obey, they excel at following rules, they are mostly predictable and boring. Aussies meanwhile are mercurial and less restrained, much more alive. Guess where I’d rather be…-
Hi Lilli-Anne,
Thanks for friendly reply.
The germanic culture is not to my liking, either.
For me, part of freedom
is not having to hide anything.
`
To me, Australians are disappointing,
easily frightened by unfamiliar ideas,
and disinterested in increasing knowledge. (i figure that if i can take anything beyond Death, it will be skills and knowledge … and invest my resources to these objectives.)
`
So, I’d rather be in Japan, where the cultural influence of USA is less.
`
I don’t feel at home in Australia, except alone in wilderness, where my connection with Earth is not disrupted by conformist expectations and noise.
But isn’t Japan a very obedient, conformist society as well? I know that Japanese business culture is highly hierarchical. I actually prefer the Danish model, they have the world’s flattest work hierarchy – and are a lot of fun to boot! I don’t know any Swedes, but Danes from my experience are very open minded and convivial.
I had a similar opinion until i spent time in Japan.
`
The graciousness and supportiveness which the common person in Japan shows to travellers cannot be counterfeited.
`
In Australia, USA, Indonesia, Germany, Ireland, the general attitude is that i am worthless (except as a source of money.)
`
The comparison may seem trivial in words, but i was holding back tears when sitting in the aircraft that was to return me to the land of barbarians.
`
In 5 weeks, only one person lied to me, and the only liar had spent 10 years as a buyer of crystals in christianised Brazil.
`
Conformism is something i oppose because it stifles innovation, but what i encountered in Japan was respect and kindness for me as an individual.
Ah, but the rub is suspecting there is a political solution to the problem of politics. Politics is the perfect environment for sociopaths, and so is always eventually saturated with them. Whether they claim to be right, left, center, liberal, conservative, whatever, they are all sociopaths. The only time they are the least bit concerned with the welfare of anyone else is when such may coincide with their own. There has never been, is not now, nor ever shall be such a thing as good government. The assumption of the authority to hold a gun to someones head, and force them to do or not do this or that does not allow for good. However grand their claims may be.
I agree that a major problem in the world is that people with sociopathic tendencies are drawn to seek power. And once in power, they tend to lose any remaining empathy that they might have had. Power corrupts. But it corrupts far more effectively in a capitalist system. The ability to accumulate such huge wealth further drives psychopathic behavior.
And as far as the term “liberal” is concerned, I wish people would stop using it. The definition of liberal is: ““a person who believes that government should be active in supporting social and political change.” This is opposite what so-called liberals in governments around the world want. Please, just call them what they are: ultra-conservative, corporate opportunists. You have two flavors of these in government, one calls itself conservative, and the other liberal, but that is just to appeal to different factions in the voter base. They are all the same, which is why people like Joe Biden love to talk about how he “reaches across the aisle”. That is neoliberal-speak for, “we have the same agenda as the folks on the other side of the aisle.”
““a person who believes that government should be active in supporting social and political change.” By holding a gun to someone’s head? Any time a government is “active” it is threatening someone or some group, or perhaps everyone, with violence, at gunpoint. Power does not corrupt, it attracts the corrupt and the corruptible. All economies are capitalist, the differences being who controls the capital. Those who create it, or those who steal it, which would include any and all governments and those enabled by government to steal it. At gunpoint, always. Without the gun, one could simply choose not to participate in, or finance, any idea government may put forth that one might disagree with.
A little-known fact is that the aboriginal Americans had a form of democracy in which political collaboration was prohibited. This, with enforcing the social hygiene of “Death for the First Proven Lie”, formed a stable society in which ideals of freedom and self-respect could flourish.
`
The Christian agenda of erasing superior societies and knowledge of their development of human potential … is a clue to the true nature of the Bible and its nonHuman origin.
Peter, your impression of the bible is what Christians have been promoting for nearly 2000 years but their erroneous translations and interpretations are horrible corruptions of the earliest Greek, Hebrew and Aramaic texts. Religious and political leaders tortured and murdered Yeshua (Jesus in Greek) because He inspired and led a subversive movement aimed at undermining and ending Roman tyranny. He predicted that eventually His followers would replace military oppression and financial slavery with voluntary cooperation by good citizens in establishing true justice, peace, wisdom, truth, good health and freedom for all, within commonly agreeable limits of basic moral law. After the coming technocratic-military-industrial-pharmaceutical complex traps everyone in universal vaccination and total economic slavery, more people will study, understand and put His revolutionary strategy and tactics into practice.
As usual, you are up Shit Creek in a barbed wire canoe, Tired.
`
The Bible and Koran are books of monstrous ideas, so pretending that Jesus was a RobinHood of spirituality documented in Greek is a blatant denial of Reality.
`
Jesus was a liar like Trump ; he doesn’t love everyone, and downright hates unBlievers.
`
The weight of evidence is that Jesus as you think of him never existed. If he had existed, he would have been mentioned by the local historian, Josephus.
`
The new testament is a fabrication arranged by a committee financed by the Emperor Constantine, who declared himself the Second Coming. of Christ after his strategic “conversion” from polytheism.
`
Most of the New Testament is written by Saul of Tarsus, a zealot priest who persecuted Hebrews for ideological deviance, a man who never met Jesus, (and neither did his bumChum Luke, who is falsely thought to be an apostle.)
`
For you to pretend superior knowledge based on a subversive rumour … is thoroughly irresponsible, the main reason i dislike your daft posts so much.
Hi Peter, I do not care if people dislike what I say and do because I use the invaluable and unquestionable Keys of Knowledge to observe, learn and find the Way, the Truth and the Life. Therefore, I am confident in what I know, believe, say and do.
Not-caring is the essence of ignorance and complacency ; yet Tired boasts of notCaring as if it were enlightenment.
`
My caring about mankind and all the voteLess species explains why i feel obliged to show religious duplicity for what it is, even though it annoys the trolls who congregate here to undermine the meaning of Caitlin’s reportage of the murdering of Life on Earth.
`
Tired’s stated belief that he will be rescued by the same dark force that imposed Christianity and Islam on mankind is a classic example of the Stupidity which characterises those who allow false religion to define their “morality” (as submission and salvation by nonHuman Liars.)
`
Not only does Tired contradict Caitlin, but he considers himself spiritually superior, based entirely on self-aggrandising superstition … propagated by human dupes of the mudShadows.
Peter, Sorry to be blunt but your opinions concerning the world’s greatest liberator are based on misinformation and unproven allegations.
One shouldn’t make vows they can’t keep. I gave written support toTulsi, Yang, and marianne this time around. I suspect some of the minor money I spent to buy four hats went to DNC.
I’ve agreed. Here is how the national poison invades down-ballot: https://www.sentinelsource.com/opinion/letters_to_the_editor/progressives-needed-not-corporate-hacks-by-joseph-mirzoeff/article_74257c4a-e625-577d-8091-1a68fda9ca02.html
One shouldn’t make vows they can’t keep. I gave written support toTulsi, Yang, and marianne this time around. I suspect some of the minor money I spent to buy four hats went to DNC.
One should question why we cannot keep vows of decency.
Says the guy shit-posting rude whines (& yawnzzzz thoughts) below 1/2 of Caitlin’s other posters’ comments. I question if you should even make a vow of decency; seems you may misunderstand the word. Can’t wait for mine.
Hello Agnes
So you think my posts are not worthy.
Please explain why your Arrogance and Presumptuousness is superior.
Don’t you just love bone-simple, logical certainty, especially when it causes cognitive dissonance and high blood pressure in the brainwashed-since-birth? Here’s a good example, so have your nitroglycerine, clot-buster and defibrillator handy, and please don’t shoot the messenger.
Unless millions of voters vote for NON R or D candidates in November, NON R or D candidates will not be elected!
Here’s another. If you are a US voter and you wish for 4 more years of what you’ve been witnessing for your entire life, expecially the cadaver’s-eye-opening last four years (maybe with the added excitement of WWIII), when you enter that voting booth in November, vote for another R or D and your wish will be granted.
No thanks necessary. Just spread the word. Your fellow Americans will be as grateful to you as the readers of this comment are to me.
You deserve no thanks for so disgusting a post, Ishkabibble.
Like your name, it is disorienting nonsense, ending in futility and helplessness.
Fuck Off.
May no attention to Peter Mann. He can’t comment here without insulting someone. My turn is likely next.
I agree with you. I’m sure you are as disgusted as I am with people trying to find a difference between Trump and Biden. American parties are capitalist parties. They have no soup for you.
Yeah, what’s up with that Peter Mann guy? Quite the troll.
Read the posts as if they have a meaning beyond the infantile interpretations of Keith Hayes.
`
Intellectual substance and discerning commentary should not be beyond your ability to decode, John.
`
If you say silly things,
then it invites criticism.
`
And since you are thickSkinned
and not very bright, i use terms
that are memorable,
so you have longer to figure it out. 🙂
Errrrrr, can I please ask you to listen closely to my strong opinion? We all, Ms. Johnstone included, want pretty much the same thing. We want people to be able to become wealthy if they are smart enough or they work hard enough at it, and probably most especially our countrymen. We want a generally fair playing field for this thing called “life.”
The path to doing this does not run through socialism. It doesn’t even run through the ever-corruptible “democratic rule.” It runs through voluntaryism, or essentially, anarcho-capitalism.
Yes, capitalism, your favorite boogey man. You can blame capitalism for anything and everything, but we have yet to experience true capitalism. That example you conjure up immediately upon reading this? Not true capitalism. With true capitalism, there is no government.
Government agencies never look to close themselves down. Once they are formed, they fight like anything to remain relevant, even (obviously) at the expense of actually solving a problem. Instead, they become the problem. And when there is power in government, you can bet your butt that the rich cronies will be bidding highly with their bribes to curry favor and get things run the way they want.
Indeed, capitalism is the true equalizer. The reason it hasn’t equalized anything is because we haven’t seen true capitalism.
And for the record, if I’m wrong, and the rich get richer WITHOUT government’s assistance, then the revolution will just come about even earlier than otherwise.
And that would make everyone reading this happy if I’m not mistaken.
(“We want people to be able to become wealthy if they are smart enough or they work hard enough at it, and probably most especially our countrymen. “) – you
Sorry, but most people I know, myself included, don’t think ANYTHING LIKE THIS. Instead I think everyone should have a roof over their heads. Everyone should have enough to eat. Everyone should have access to education and meaningful work, health & dental care. I have no interest whatsoever in “wealth” and neither have most human beings over the course of the vast majority of human history. Don’t project your Western cultural ideological system on the rest of humanity. It doesn’t fit – which is why the West has been using force for 500+ years trying to impose our “weird” ideological culture on the rest of planet earth.
https://psmag.com/social-justice/joe-henrich-weird-ultimatum-game-shaking-up-psychology-economics-53135
Thank you for your thoughtful response. Capitalism accomplishes your goals most efficiently. And everything we have or can appreciate in our lives comes at a price, whether it is in dollars or not.
capitalism is wrecking the world, despite being bailed out frequently by the big government they pretend to hate. one financial crisis after another; the price is too high for this outmoded system.
As I stated, “That example you conjure up immediately upon reading this? Not true capitalism.”
Please define “true Capitalism”, so we know what you mean by the above remark, Billbowman.
No government regulation (in this case because no government.)
Hardly a definition of trueCapitalism.
Merely one condition, cynically & unrealistically framed with an absence of government.
You asked. True capitalism is when regulation is done by consumers and not governments. You don’t have to like it, but that is what true capitalism is.
This is not a matter of liking : but asking you to make sense of your proposal, a task which is not beneath your dignity. The “regulation of Capitalism by consumers” is a process without mechanism, and something for which there is no evidence. Bullshit like this adds to confusion, rather than clarification … when clarity is what we need to navigate the future.
“You asked the definition of true capitalism. I told you what it is. Again, you don’t have to like it, but when government regulates, that is not true capitalism.Now, let’s please agree to disagree.
I refuse to agree with ideas that do not correspond with observable reality.
`
Your definition of something that evolved from the industrialisation of supply … contradicts the complexity and dynamics of a collective behavioural artefact … by presenting Capitalism as a pure abstract which is deNatured by external constraint.
`
To me, your idea is an act of stupidity, because if taken as true, it obfuscates and renders meaningless a social dynamic which has proven both effective and harmfull.
`
Unless we discern the dynamics and regulate the problematic ones, Capitalism’s obsession with taking control of people and resources will continue to have undesireable effects … such as the extinction of unique varieties of lifeForms.
`
Liking or disLiking is not an appropriate response, yet you treat a refusal to agree as though liking is the only possibility. Which suggests that liking is the criterion upon which you decide everything. So why pretend to be an intellectual ? when your thinking is wholly infantile.
`
Reality is not a matter of opinion ; dealing with the realities of our impact on others must be predicated on discernment and consideration. To disregard dissent as if it is so meaningless that you want to agree to disagree … is a negligence of due diligence.
`
Making everything you dysLike meaningLess makes you unAccountable for spreading Stupidity, pretending expertise when you cannot tell bad from good. I say you are Wrong. Horribly wrong.
`
Your thinking leads to bewilderment & helplessness, which is a crime against humanity and a crime against intelligentLife. And i do not agree to merely disagree.
`
You have drunk a mighty lot of the Kool-Aid there. Do try to sober up.
Capitalism is slavery for all but the capitalists.
For a while there, in post-war America, Fordist capitalism managed to work fairly well for the working class. Jobs were plentiful, well paid, secure, and provided decent benefits. One wage earner could support a family, and life for the vast majority of Americans did not revolve around greed and cutthroat competition. But apart from this bubble that formed at the end of WWII and burst in the 1980s, your comment in on the money.
BillBowman cannot discern the difference between Capitalism and freeEnterprise, yet feels entitled to speak on our behalf (“We all, Ms. Johnstone included, want pretty much the same thing. “)
`
The garbled reasoning which follows this extraOrdinary arrogance … is typical of the problem which must be overcome : Pretenders telling us What we Think.
Your “we all” is an acme of arrogance. Count me out. From where do you get your hokum?
I think I’ve already told you to keep your deluded hands off the Rothbartian appropriation of the term “anarcho” … it’s wrong and cowardly.
Call yourselves “Ayn Rand capitalists” or “Utopian Capitalists”, whatever you want just leave anarchism out of it.
Better yet, why don’t you have a seance and summon the spirits of true anarchists and see what they think about your ideas? Pax
> We want people to be able to become wealthy if they are smart enough or they work hard enough at it, and probably most especially our countrymen.
Speak for yourself. I want no such thing. Wealth is built upon the theft of labor.
Ah, the Buddha Ms Caitlin speaks the truth!
~
Liberals hate leftists for the same reason a wife who is informed that her husband is cheating on her will often turn her anger upon the person who told her: they made it hard to hold onto the delusion that their setup is working out fine.-Ms Caitlin Johnstone
~
Ah, yes Ms Johnstone; the real truth always hurts the deluded very deeply. Living a complete lie is a shock that most people can not deal with. ” Their comfort zone ” evaporates ” and their anger is unleashed on anyone but themselves.
I have liberal friends and things feel strained now. i wonder how does what caitlin is saying apply to friendships?
So where does the squad and their ilk fit into this. Are they leftists or liberals. A more corrupt group cannot be found. I think they fit in nicely with the others in congress. All a bunch of crooks.
Well, if they’re going to do representative politics they are going to have to make a lot of compromises. Is that what you mean by corruption?
I was think more along the lines of bribes, diverting campaign funds for personal use, nepotism, etc. Like how a bartender from NY suddenly lives beyond her means in DC after getting elected.
Very insightful piece.
Every word true.
Leftists hate Liberals RIGHT BACK.
And hopefully, if Trump wins, Liberals will die off,so Progressives can fight the Repubs.
If Liberals win this election, it will be NWO fascism at LIGHT SPEED.
Good article. Very true. And this is the reason I will not be voting for Biden.
Nylene’s trivial solution sustains the problem.
“Liberals hate leftists because, despite whatever stories they might believe about themselves, liberals are opposed to everything leftists stand for in every meaningful way.”
You mean like Human Rights, such as being free to chose someone who might serve, we-the-people better, by speaking the Truth, giving us both sides of the story, someone who actually cares about Truth, morals, and ethics, instead of the two-headed Labor Liberal snake that has been fattening their own bellies, along with their Central Banking swine, and their big tech anal buddies, who are creaming their pants just waiting for the greatest financial collapse in history, that WILL SHIFT ALL WEALTH from the middle-class, to them (Wall Street)?
I hate labels.
So you are one of them huh. A hater.
Kettle calls Pot black.
Sobyou are one of those. A cynic.
So what do you love ?
I actually really enjoy you vitrolic posts.
Interesting dynamic here.
`
I love well intentioned, admittedly imperfect, authentic people who are truly interested in realistic, workable, peaceful solutions to improve our global society, regardless of race, religion, political affiliation . . ..
`
Or labels.
`
I love solutions.
`
I dislike deep state operatives/apologists, paid trolls and the robber baron, global crime syndicate that controls us.
`
I sincerely try not to hate people or any living thing.
Love. Peace.
SHOCKER – in response to you above (92820):
.
I was gonna say something similar, especially the last sentence regarding sincerity, but since you said it, now I don’t need to. Thanks. Still, I appreciate your sentiment and that is worth saying I reckon, so I’m saying it……….
.
ha, ha……
.
Somebody else here said something regarding use of the term “liberal”, and I agreed with that “somebody else”. Who the hell amongst us even knows what that so over-used word means nowadays? Same for the word “neo-liberal”.
.
Without understood definitions by all parties in the conversation nothing is gonna change because folks will talk about the same word but they will have a different meaning in their minds and that leads to a breakdown in communication more often than not. Especially for words like effing “liberal” and stupid “leftist”, and those upon the “right”.
.
BK
I think Shocker goes amiss by putting “peaceful” among the virtues necessary for a revolution against obfuscation and degradation.
`
Depriving us of self-respect and meaning is an act of war, and pacifists are useless as tits on a bull when an enemy must be defeated.
`
Yes, our primary weapon is discerning perceptiveness, but this enemy is unfazed by truth and decency ; they continue regardless, stoppable only by Death.
`
It is for this reason that the aboriginal Americans enforced “Death for the First Proven Lie”.
`
A human can have a full life while being truthful, whereas the puppet of a parasite cannot feed its master without becoming a liar.
Peter M
.
r.u.the.1.who.has. the….
.
Mud Man theory?
.
Seriously – is that you?
.
I don’t think SHOCKER went amiss at all, but of course, everybody has their own opinion. Thank goodness for that cause we aint’ freaking ants now are we?
.
It is just if we don’t commence better communication in a thoughtful yet haste manner, then of course “our days are numbered” and the number is even lower.
.
The clock always ticks, but the clicks of the second hand seem louder to me lately.
.
Peace,
Ken
No. The only mud men i know of live in New Guinea and have nothing to do with current affairs.
Jerry…the UK is a socialist country….see any dictators there or the lack of personal advancement?
So is Canada, all the Scandinavian countries and the EU countries. They all have developed a type of socialism that works for their country , while retaining capitalism ( which is not a political system) as their economic engine.
Don’t you know that?
to Carol:
with all respect, UK a socialist countrey?Come on:with a Queen,”Lords”, Counts,Princess,
Sir’s,etc etc.With a huge disparity(not a bit,but huge)in standard of living between the 1% and the other 99%?That you consider socialism?Please, read some books , or better
listen what Caitlin is saying.Sorry to point this to you.
Oscar,
Britain was first to introduce Worker’s Insurance (by Winston Churchill in 1905). The Labour Party implemented National Health Care after WW2.
`
Your insulting disinformation is a load of toxic shit.
UK is not a socialist country in any sense of the word. UK is extreme right wing. It’s like US basically, but I would argue even more right wing as we have a feudal class system with monarchy, aristocrats, and peasants. In many ways, UK is like a modern version of Saudi Arabia.
I’m Canadian, living in UK for past 23 years. Canada is a bit like Scandinavian countries, sharing Nordic model ideas — capitalism with a human face — but this spirit has been seriously eroded eroded everywhere under neoliberalism. Some socialistic values remain — and it’s very obvious compared to UK — but they’re not really socialist anymore.
At one end of the economic spectrum we have communism. At the other extreme, neoliberalism. If we are to consider neoliberals to be Left — as Liberals insist — we’d have to consider communists to be Right
Ideological nonsense, parrotting the latest conformism.
None of those countries is socialist. Socialism is the workers controlling the means of production, not an active welfare state. Welfare capitalism is capitalism. Modern social democracy is capitalism.
Look no further than the UK press and their hysterical reaction to Jeremy Corbyn to see how even very mild socialists are given no political shrift in capitalist bourgeois democracies.
There is not currently, nor has there ever been, a genuinely socialist country in which the people democratically control the means and distribution of production. The socialist vision remains a human aspiration yet to be realized, a secular version of Jesus’ kingdom of God come on earth.
Not so Newton : the preColumbian civilisations of North America were genuinely supportive of the individual and their quest for meaning and purpose.
`
The natives were not only robbed of their ancestral lands, but had their culture (which thoroughly contradicts the poisonous philosophy attributed to Jesus) denied and misrepresented as godless barbarism by Christians who regarded them as meaningless vermin.
`
Basing your opinions on the beliefs of white society and the bible is a guarantee of horrible outcomes, which itself prevents the empathy upon which socialism depends.
`
The Dakota language has no word for god ; intrinsic proof that they were immune to the parasites that drive men & women crazy. The closest term is wakanTanka, which translates as greatMystery, a terminology which shows proper respect for the abstract unKnown.
Does your socialism accommodate the differences in individual motivation and dreams?
If so, how?
Thanks
“Does your socialism accommodate the differences in individual motivation and dreams?”
I’m going to guess…yes.
“If so, how?”
Maybe do a little homework, read what Caitlin has written. Maybe start here: https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2020/07/15/satori-populism/
“Thanks”
You’re welcome.
Socialism is the economic embodiment of the maxim that your right to swing your arm ends here my nose begins.
You are talking about the real purpose of economics – as described by the greatest thinker – in my very rough version of what he said :How can each individual benefit in such a way that benefits all of us, and how can benefitting us as a whole take care of every individual. Another great thinker spoke about how the purpose of Medicare for All should have in it – my version of what she said – that I should want the health and bodies of every person in this country to be taken care of, and that every person in this country should want my health, my body to be taken care of. The inspiration this makes for in me is very large.
I have come to believe that trying to take care of myself without any regard for anyone else is one root of evil in me, and trying to take care of society as a whole regardless of whether I am better off or not is the other root. A mundane example of how we can have good will and do both at the same time instead is in when a mother takes care of her child she can powerfully have the feeling that that she is taking care of herself.
Who does not like being useful to other people? Who does not dislike, even abhor, being used just for another person’s profit? Shouldn’t jobs be for usefulness not profit?
Alan, I have a feeling Ansel Adams would agree with you.
Your stated beliefs about the root of evil need revision.
Taking care is what avoids evil consequences.
`
Stupidity is a much better candidate for the root of evil : an absence of discernment and consideration for the needs of others, and disregard of the costs of predictable consequences.
`
I agree that jobs should be prioritised for usefulness ;
a much more discerning principle than profit.