JEWS AND YOU AND JEWS

[Mark]

If you point out that the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith is a Jewish organization, and if you point out that this Jewish organization supports "hate-crime" legislation, and if you point out that such legislation is anti-American, what are you?

Apparently you’re an anti-Semite, a bigot, etc.

If people consistently use such words in that way, like Humpty Dumpty, then indeed you are an anti-Semite, bigot, etc. Get used to it.

A recent AIPAC, WINEP, etc lie America into debilitating wars, then you’re an anti-Semite, get used to it. (Yes, I know, WINEP is not ostensibly a Jewish group or even AIPAC, but they are nonetheless and if you point it out you’re an anti-Semite.)

Some Gentiles want government censorship, unrestricted immigration, perpetual war for Israel, etc. Why single out the poor Jews?

Set aside that when some fool insinuates that Jews are the salt of the earth ("No one could imagine some luminary as anything but Jewish." etc.) it’s worth pointing out that there are a few bad apples and that their existence is nothing new – e.g. the Bolsheviks, most fellow travelers of the thirties, and most neocons today. The Jewish groups mentioned above are extraordinarily effective. They are making a big difference to America and the difference is bad news.

Note the pretense of not understanding. Another fool went to a Jewish school where from two to four hours of mathematics of homework were required every weeknight, yet he pretends not to know the difference between "some" and "all" or between "All X is Y" and "All Y is X." When I criticize a Jewish group, he insinuates that my real meaning, despite any protest to the contrary, is "All Jews are bad." Only an anti-Semite would notice that the ADL is a Jewish group.

Ellen,

Your eagle-eye caught the contradiction between SB’s flippant remark and his earlier serious statement. (SB: That’ll learn you not to make flippant remarks.)

Speaking of eugenics, especially the Nazi version, and Third World immigration, I’d like to paraphrase (not an exact quote, but close) something originally by Peter Brimelow, about the Immigration Reform Act of 1965, officially the Hart-Cellar bill, the culmination of a 40 year effort by B’nai B’rith and other Jewish organizations:

There is a sense in which current immigration policy is Adolf Hitler’s posthumous revenge on America. The U.S. political elite emerged from the war passionately concerned to cleanse itself from all taints of racism and xenophobia. Eventually it enacted the epochal Immigration Reform Act of 1965. This triggered a mass immigration so huge and so different from anything that had gone before as to transform—and ultimately to destroy—the one unquestioned victor of World War II.

(In fact one might question whether the U.S. was victorious, but that's another story.)

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

If you point out that the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith is a Jewish organization, and if you point out that this Jewish organization supports "hate-crime" legislation, and if you point out that such legislation is anti-American, what are you?

Apparently you’re an anti-Semite, a bigot, etc.

Mark,

Bullshit.

If you act like a bigot, walk like a bigot and quack like a bigot, you're a bigot.

Like saying all the problems in the USA government are from Jews. Good God!

Get off my site with that garbage.

I don't want to have to moderate you, but I will.

In fact, I changed my mind. I'm doing that right now.

I've had it.

Bravo. You're now a martyr striking a blow against the big bad Jews.

Michael

EDIT: For good measure, I'm throwing in the SB dude, too. Enough of the crap.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

That may hold true for dishonest exaggeration, except that I'm not engaging in that behavior, Michael.

Greg,

Sigh...

I don't work that way.

But let's play it your way for a minute. What is an HONEST exaggeration?

All exaggerations are lies if you want to do semantics.

See the silliness?

Anyway, what does the story of a wonderful person in your life have to do with the UN?

On second thought, I prefer to let it go.

I wish you well. You seem like a good person.

Michael

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

If anyone wants to look into the laws, history and so forth Mark and/or SB dude the brought up, I have no problem with that.

OL members are good people and I don't want to stifle any discussion.

But I will not discuss this through the frame of promoting antisemitism, which is the game those clowns were playing.

Facts are not my beef.

Bigotry is.

Michael

[ginny]

Did you just moderate them? That must be what the happy yells around the country is all about. Brant can post again.

[moralist]

That may hold true for dishonest exaggeration, except that I'm not engaging in that behavior, Michael.

Greg,

Sigh...

I don't work that way.

But let's play it your way for a minute. What is an HONEST exaggeration?

All exaggerations are lies if you want to do semantics.

You're right, Michael. It wasn't meant to imply a semantic loophole. There is no such thing as an honest exaggeration. Everything I posted is true. Real world business experience accounts for my regard for Jews I know personally.

[Ellen Stuttle]

Mark,

Bullshit.

If you act like a bigot, walk like a bigot and quack like a bigot, you're a bigot.

Like saying all the problems in the USA government are from Jews. Good God!

Mark doesn't come across to me as a bigot, or as saying that "all the problems in the USA government are from Jews."

Serapis Bey doesn't come across to me as a bigot either, though he does as someone who enjoys ruffling feathers.

Ellen

[Robert Baratheon]

Note the pretense of not understanding. Another fool went to a Jewish school where from two to four hours of mathematics of homework were required every weeknight, yet he pretends not to know the difference between "some" and "all" or between "All X is Y" and "All Y is X." When I criticize a Jewish group, he insinuates that my real meaning, despite any protest to the contrary, is "All Jews are bad." Only an anti-Semite would notice that the ADL is a Jewish group.

You are misrepresenting my statements. How I in fact characterized your argument was: "All Jews Are Bad (except for those who aren't)." The point was not that you are using a false argument (i.e., a rational argument that happens to be untrue); it was that you are using an irrational argument not based in falsifiable logic.

So now I'm a "fool" who is feigning ignorance on the point, presumably to divert attention from us bad Jews who are doing concerted sabotage to your country, right? Here the entire mode of irrational thinking is on full display: all evidence is either confirmation or an exception to the conspiracy; every seemingly legitimate counterpoint a clever Jew defense to prevent the awful truth from coming to light. Since I'm now "one of them," go ahead and add me to your "bad Jews" laundry list, which we can only assume is growing like Topsy with so many millions of ripe cherries from which to pick.

Except I see you've abandoned your "bad Jews" list for the moment in favor of "bad Jew groups." Seems you never stay in one place for long, lest your assertions come under any serious scrutiny. Are we now to begin assembling a "good Jew groups" list to counter your own, then debate whether one outweighs the other, or whether the "good Jew groups" are really just exceptions or irrelevant to your case, or how the 10,000 other pro-immigration groups in the United States - most of which have no Jews working in them at all - can't compare with the "Jew" immigration groups who are the true ultimate threat, pulling strings from behind the curtains?

I'm sorry, but you've exhausted me already. I'd much rather not play a stacked deck with one who is constantly changing the house rules to suit his hand as well. I'm genuinely interested in any reason-based arguments you have to offer - including the anti-Jew variety - but what you've presented here is faith masquerading as reason. I'm not offended by it - it bores me, which is a much more serious violation in my book.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Mark doesn't come across to me as a bigot, or as saying that "all the problems in the USA government are from Jews."

Serapis Bey doesn't come across to me as a bigot either, though he does as someone who enjoys ruffling feathers.

Ellen,

Well you, qua Joo, don't come across to me as someone who is undermining the USA government, either.

Yet since you are a Joo, according them you never know, right?...

(I love that spelling of WSS for contexts like this.)

They want to play that game, they finally got it.

So they don't appear as bigots to you.

Fine.

Your opinion.

They do to me.

In fact, now that I think about it, they are much worse kinds of bigot than an in-your-face nasty kind. They dress their bigotry up as reason and sell that snake-oil by drip-feed as honest inquiry. And in their framing, it's always the evil Joos doing the bad stuff...

That's bigotry in my book.

Oh, they don't like being characterized like that?

Then why the hell do they characterize and condemn Joos they don't know by the same method?

I used to think like you do about them, but I just got sick and tired of the repetition. And that was the tell for me. Repetition. How come it never got better? That was a good question, so I looked deeper using the persuasion filters I have learned and bigotry is what I saw coming out loud and clear from in between their lines.

Bigotry is nasty business and it always leads to bad places. I don't want it near me.

But I'm not prohibiting them from being bigots. I'm just saying they can't preach their bigotry on OL. And it's my right to do that.

If you want to discuss their "unbigoted" notions of the evil Joos with them, there are plenty of places other than here to do that. And I wish you well in your endeavor.

Michael

[Robert Baratheon]

I used to think like you do about them, but I just got sick and tired of the repetition. And that was the tell for me. Repetition. How come it never got better? That was a good question, so I looked deeper using the persuasion filters I have learned and bigotry is what I saw coming out loud and clear from in between their lines.

The basis of my rejection is different and doesn't even make it to the point of disgust. I rapidly become bored with things that don't fully engage my mind, which is why I can't sit still in an office meeting for more than an hour or so. Arguments from faith and repetition knock my high-functioning ADHD into mental torture, and I need some better stimulation, stat. I crave novel ideas like progressives crave additional sources of state revenue, and this discussion is as stale as they come. The "All Jews Are Bad (except those who aren't)" tautology is just an exercise in faith-based storytelling - we might as well be listening to a sermon from a Young-Earth churchgoer or a Scientologist speaking on how Thetans are the source of all emotional disorders. They aren't interested in what you have to say, so once you have the gist of their message, there is little point in listening any further. The time would be better invested listening to an economics podcast or finishing my latest video game. Doing anything, really.

Fellow OLers: if Serapis is an anti-semite I'd know, we'd certainly have talked about it at some point. Fact is sometimes he goes down some crackpot rabbit-hole, Peak Oil (for instance) being among of his obsessions a few years ago, now he never mentions it. Anyway, I got him to agree to read The Prague Cemetery, we'll see how that goes.

Whereas The Other Who Shall Not Be Named is stubborn to a fault, SB operates from an unstable peak at the other extreme of the spectrum. The majority of the time, I enjoy his antics and proddings because they expose me to new ideas that I wouldn't encounter otherwise. I'm anti-fragile by nature - I like change, risk, disorder - and he offers that to me in droves. But nothing in life is free, and the price I pay is the occasional derangement from the discard pile. I don't mind his little "Jew boy" jabs at me - I take it as a term of endearment, actually. But I do hope the anti-semitic weed growing in his brain doesn't crowd out the valuable crops in his harvest.

[Brant Gaede]

"Anti-American" complaints come out of a sense of American nationalism and naturally Jews tend to oppose that. My father was an American Nationalist anti-Semite American (anti-war) Firster in the late 1930s and 1940-41, something of a crypto-Nazi even. All the garbage logically hung together and it was just that, mostly garbage. He was "pro-American," I guess. My New-Dealer maternal grandfather testified before Congress in support of Roosevelt's attempt to pack the Supreme Court. Since he wasn't a Jew--I have no Jewish relatives--I guess that had to be "pro-American" too? Whatever: pro or anti-American requires arguing off a collectivist premise with a voluntary or involuntary bigotry default.

--Brant

[moralist]

Whereas The Other Who Shall Not Be Named is complacent/stubborn to a fault...

I can name him...

And I'm a distinct minority at the other side of the spectrum because over the years I've found that secret manipulative cabals and international banking conspiracies have almost no effect on my daily life when compared to the personal moral choices I make. Those macro issues can become emotional distractions which can divert attention away from the personal failure to properly address the micro moral issues in life.

A man I know said: "It's more important what you do in your house, than what they do in the White House."

So while global events are great for their entertainment value and I enjoy them immensely... only the small stuff really matters.

[Robert Baratheon]

I can name him...

And I'm a distinct minority at the other side of the spectrum because over the years I've found that secret manipulative cabals and international banking conspiracies have almost no effect on my daily life when compared to the personal moral choices I make. Those macro issues can become emotional distractions which can divert attention away from the personal failure to properly address the micro moral issues in life.

A man I know said: "It's more important what you do in your house, than what they do in the White House."

So while global events are great for their entertainment value and I enjoy them immensely... only the small stuff really matters.

I agree to the extent that one should not be a willing martyr for liberty. Where I think your agorist philosophy runs aground is with the assumption that you can outrun statist incrementalism indefinitely if only you are clever enough. The reality is if you ignore the problem long enough and allow government to grow, it will come after you and your business eventually. Or if it isn't done overtly, it will wreck your local economy and neighborhood so there is nowhere left to hide or do business, as happened in my home state of Rhode Island. Try doing business with no customers.

[Brant Gaede]

Whereas The Other Who Shall Not Be Named is complacent/stubborn to a fault...

I can name him...

And I'm a distinct minority at the other side of the spectrum because over the years I've found that secret manipulative cabals and international banking conspiracies have almost no effect on my daily life when compared to the personal moral choices I make. Those macro issues can become emotional distractions which can divert attention away from the personal failure to properly address the micro moral issues in life.

A man I know said: "It's more important what you do in your house, than what they do in the White House."

So while global events are great for their entertainment value and I enjoy them immensely... only the small stuff really matters.

Does this make you a small man?

--Brant

[moralist]

I can name him...

And I'm a distinct minority at the other side of the spectrum because over the years I've found that secret manipulative cabals and international banking conspiracies have almost no effect on my daily life when compared to the personal moral choices I make. Those macro issues can become emotional distractions which can divert attention away from the personal failure to properly address the micro moral issues in life.

A man I know said: "It's more important what you do in your house, than what they do in the White House."

So while global events are great for their entertainment value and I enjoy them immensely... only the small stuff really matters.

I agree to the extent that one should not be a willing martyr for liberty. Where I think your agorist philosophy runs aground is with the assumption that you can outrun statist incrementalism indefinitely if only you are clever enough. The reality is if you ignore the problem long enough and allow government to grow, it will come after you and your business eventually. Or if it isn't done overtly, it will wreck your local economy and neighborhood so there is nowhere left to hide or do business, as happened in my home state of Rhode Island. Try doing business with no customers.

I found this old piece of wisdom to hold true: "For every temptation, there is a way of escape."

Catastrophes are never uniformly distributed, and neither is statist incrementalism. In fact, the more bloated and convoluted the bureaucracy, the more cracks there are through which to fall. There are always boundless opportunities to creatively adapt to the changing world around us, but that creative adaption demands that our attention be placed upon the micro moral choices which impact our lives far more than any government ever could, because only those small nuances have the power to set into motion the beneficial circumstances which form the foundation for the next choice.

In business, catastrophes are also never uniform. There are always Capitalists who know how to immunize themselves against economic and political plagues, and these are the people with whom I do business. Among the finest vaccines known are decency, responsibility, productivity, solvency and frugality. These moral principles work together to create a healthy immune system which is strong enough to protect us from a "dirty" world.

The government is not the enemy. It is only the creation of millions of fools who expect someone else to pay their bills. If there is any real enemy, it is to be found in how I live, so that is where I place my attention. Every large event is always preceded by a string of small omens. If our attention is diverted away from our own lives, we miss those omens and expose ourselves to becoming collateral damage.

[Robert Baratheon]

I found this old piece of wisdom to hold true: "For every temptation, there is a way of escape."

 

Catastrophes are never uniformly distributed, and neither is statist incrementalism. In fact, the more bloated and convoluted the bureaucracy, the more cracks there are through which to fall. There are always boundless opportunities to creatively adapt to the changing world around us, but that creative adaption demands that our attention be placed upon the micro moral choices which impact our lives far more than any government ever could, because only those small nuances have the power to set into motion the beneficial circumstances which form the foundation for the next choice.

 

In business, catastrophes are also never uniform. There are always Capitalists who know how to immunize themselves against economic and political plagues, and these are the people with whom I do business. Among the finest vaccines known are decency, responsibility, productivity, solvency and frugality. These moral principles work together to create a healthy immune system which is strong enough to protect us from a "dirty" world.

 

The government is not the enemy. It is only the creation of millions of fools who expect someone else to pay their bills. If there is any real enemy, it is to be found in how I live, so that is where I place my attention. Every large event is always preceded by a string of small omens. If our attention is diverted away from our own lives, we miss those omens and expose ourselves to becoming collateral damage. 

 

I suspect we're on the substantially the same page about what to *do* from an individual perspective, but there's something that deeply bothers me about your "I'm so clever, catch me if you can" philosophy, and I can't quite put my finger on it. It has something to do with the implicit contempt you're displaying toward those who have been caught in the government machine and chewed up within its gears. It's like an objectivist version of the noxious union mentality - "I got mine and everyone else can eff off." The implication is that those rotting in a North Korean or Iranian prison deserve their fate for being caught in the net, or something along those lines. You're just so much smarter than they were.  

 

I submit that what you believe to be outrunning the lion may in fact be only outrunning the herd members who aren't as fast as you are. Eventually though, the herd thins, you'll be a little weaker and older - or maybe you'll happen to stumble - and you may find yourself in the crosshairs, bringing up the rear. At that point, the herd will not save you. If it helps you sleep at night, push the predator right of your thoughts - deny its potential - and keep on truckin' with your me-centric philosophy. But make no mistake, the predator will be back year after year, bigger, stronger, meaner, hungrier, and in greater numbers. There may come a time when you will wish you had gone back to aid your herd and confront the danger together before it grew out of everyone's control.

 

[Brant Gaede]

I can name him...

And I'm a distinct minority at the other side of the spectrum because over the years I've found that secret manipulative cabals and international banking conspiracies have almost no effect on my daily life when compared to the personal moral choices I make. Those macro issues can become emotional distractions which can divert attention away from the personal failure to properly address the micro moral issues in life.

A man I know said: "It's more important what you do in your house, than what they do in the White House."

So while global events are great for their entertainment value and I enjoy them immensely... only the small stuff really matters.

I agree to the extent that one should not be a willing martyr for liberty. Where I think your agorist philosophy runs aground is with the assumption that you can outrun statist incrementalism indefinitely if only you are clever enough. The reality is if you ignore the problem long enough and allow government to grow, it will come after you and your business eventually. Or if it isn't done overtly, it will wreck your local economy and neighborhood so there is nowhere left to hide or do business, as happened in my home state of Rhode Island. Try doing business with no customers.

I found this old piece of wisdom to hold true: "For every temptation, there is a way of escape."

Catastrophes are never uniformly distributed, and neither is statist incrementalism. In fact, the more bloated and convoluted the bureaucracy, the more cracks there are through which to fall. There are always boundless opportunities to creatively adapt to the changing world around us, but that creative adaption demands that our attention be placed upon the micro moral choices which impact our lives far more than any government ever could, because only those small nuances have the power to set into motion the beneficial circumstances which form the foundation for the next choice.

In business, catastrophes are also never uniform. There are always Capitalists who know how to immunize themselves against economic and political plagues, and these are the people with whom I do business. Among the finest vaccines known are decency, responsibility, productivity, solvency and frugality. These moral principles work together to create a healthy immune system which is strong enough to protect us from a "dirty" world.

The government is not the enemy. It is only the creation of millions of fools who expect someone else to pay their bills. If there is any real enemy, it is to be found in how I live, so that is where I place my attention. Every large event is always preceded by a string of small omens. If our attention is diverted away from our own lives, we miss those omens and expose ourselves to becoming collateral damage.

You'd actually get a lot more mileage with this in Argentina than in the US. The Argentines consider their government to be a work-around joke plus there is no NSA.

--Brant

[Robert Baratheon]

Brant - I modified my post a bit to clarify the point. You're just too quick for me! Maybe you'll prove a faster wildebeest than I am and live out a long life grazing beside Moralist.

Actually, truth be told... I decided to cast my lot in with the lions some time ago...

Edit: Nevermind, didn't realize you were quoting an earlier post.

[caroljane]

Brant - I modified my post a bit to clarify the point. You're just too quick for me! Maybe you'll prove a faster wildebeest than I am and live out a long life grazing beside Moralist.

Actually, truth be told... I decided to cast my lot in with the lions some time ago...A

Edit: Nevermind, didn't realize you were quoting an earlier post.a lion would have been quicker to discern the difference between and

Surely a lion would have been less quick to mistake an English-South African for a Boer.

[caroljane]

We will herd him into the kennel yet, Brant. You take the right wing and I will take the left.

[moralist]

I suspect we're on the substantially the same page about what to *do* from an individual perspective, but there's something that deeply bothers me about your "I'm so clever, catch me if you can" philosophy, and I can't quite put my finger on it. It has something to do with the implicit contempt you're displaying toward those who have been caught in the government machine and chewed up within its gears.

You're right.

I have absolutely no sympathy for people who gave the government their sanction to become its victims. They stick their head in the noose and then whine about rope burns. So many people have literally pissed away their freedom in their need for the government to make someone else pay their bills. The government is only what people have demanded it to be. And each individual's own personal experience of getting the government they deserve is the direct consequence of how they are living their life.

So if you feel that you are not getting the government you deserve, change how you are living, and you will.

It's like an objectivist version of the noxious union mentality - "I got mine and everyone else can eff off." The implication is that those rotting in a North Korean or Iranian prison deserve their fate for being caught in the net, or something along those lines. You're just so much smarter than they were.

I don't know yet why you're trying to ascribe a view to me that I don't hold, especially when I've said nothing about foreign countries.. I'm sure there is a reason, but I don't see it yet.

I submit that what you believe to be outrunning the lion may in fact be only outrunning the herd members who aren't as fast as you are. Eventually though, the herd thins, you'll be a little weaker and older - or maybe you'll happen to stumble - and you may find yourself in the crosshairs, bringing up the rear. At that point, the herd will not save you. If it helps you sleep at night, push the predator right of your thoughts - deny its potential - and keep on truckin' with your me-centric philosophy. But make no mistake, the predator will be back year after year, bigger, stronger, meaner, hungrier, and in greater numbers. There may come a time when you will wish you had gone back to aid your herd and confront the danger together before it grew out of everyone's control.

Gee... thanks for your good wishes, Robert.

I don't think you understand the ramifications of that attitude, because if you did, you'd have dropped it yesterday and wouldn't still be holding onto it today.

Greg

[Robert Baratheon]

You're right.

I have absolutely no sympathy for people who gave the government their sanction to become its victims. They stick their head in the noose and then whine about rope burns. So many people have literally pissed away their freedom in their need for the government to make someone else pay their bills. The government is only what people have demanded it to be. And each individual's own personal experience of getting the government they deserve is the direct consequence of how they are living their life.

So if you feel that you are not getting the government you deserve, change how you are living, and you will.

I now know what bothers me about your philosophy - thank you for bringing it into focus with these latest comments. It's black-and-white absolutism married to a dogmatic faith in just deserts. In your simplistic worldview, everything happens for a reason directly tied to a person's own faults or virtues: if someone is successful, it's because they're a good, smart, proactive person and deserve the good fortune; if unsuccessful, it's because they're a bad, dumb, reactive person and got what was coming. There's no allowance for natural variation in outcomes, no acceptance that, in the real world, bad things can happen to good people or the opposite. It's moral utopianism adopted for your own emotional and intellectual convenience. Hey, you've done alright, so it's obviously because of your overwhelming virtues and cleverness. Others struggle, but they have only themselves to blame for it, so pay them little heed. It's self-indulgent theistic hogwash based on a willful ignorance of the inherent arbitrariness of life.

[moralist]

You're right.

I have absolutely no sympathy for people who gave the government their sanction to become its victims. They stick their head in the noose and then whine about rope burns. So many people have literally pissed away their freedom in their need for the government to make someone else pay their bills. The government is only what people have demanded it to be. And each individual's own personal experience of getting the government they deserve is the direct consequence of how they are living their life.

So if you feel that you are not getting the government you deserve, change how you are living, and you will.

I now know what bothers me about your philosophy - thank you for bringing it into focus with these latest comments. It's black-and-white absolutism married to a dogmatic faith in just deserts. In your simplistic worldview, everything happens for a reason directly tied to a person's own faults or virtues: if someone is successful, it's because they're a good, smart, proactive person and deserve the good fortune; if unsuccessful, it's because they're a bad, dumb, reactive person and got what was coming. There's no allowance for natural variation in outcomes, no acceptance that, in the real world, bad things can happen to good people or the opposite. It's moral utopianism adopted for your own emotional and intellectual convenience. Hey, you've done alright, so it's obviously because of your overwhelming virtues and cleverness. Others struggle, but they have only themselves to blame for it, so pay them little heed. It's self-indulgent theistic hogwash based on a willful ignorance of the inherent arbitrariness of life.

The nature and tenor of your response defines another difference between us. Other people's philosophies don't bother me, because that's their own free choice. They made their choice just as I did. And they're the ones who get the consequences they deserve by their own free choice just as I do. I'm not exempt from the moral law of gravity. No one is. The playing field is perfectly level.

Everything that happens does serve a reason and a purpose, and that reason and purpose is to teach us how to become better people. And just as you are free to deny the causality of the consequences of your own actions, I'm just as free to affirm it. So we each already have our personal choice and everything that unfolds from it already within our own lives. It's not so much what happens to us, but what we do about it that makes all the difference. For the consequences of our choices today determine the basis from what we will chose tomorrow.

(edited to expand on a few ideas).

[Brant Gaede]

You're right.

I have absolutely no sympathy for people who gave the government their sanction to become its victims. They stick their head in the noose and then whine about rope burns. So many people have literally pissed away their freedom in their need for the government to make someone else pay their bills. The government is only what people have demanded it to be. And each individual's own personal experience of getting the government they deserve is the direct consequence of how they are living their life.

So if you feel that you are not getting the government you deserve, change how you are living, and you will.

I now know what bothers me about your philosophy - thank you for bringing it into focus with these latest comments. It's black-and-white absolutism married to a dogmatic faith in just deserts. In your simplistic worldview, everything happens for a reason directly tied to a person's own faults or virtues: if someone is successful, it's because they're a good, smart, proactive person and deserve the good fortune; if unsuccessful, it's because they're a bad, dumb, reactive person and got what was coming. There's no allowance for natural variation in outcomes, no acceptance that, in the real world, bad things can happen to good people or the opposite. It's moral utopianism adopted for your own emotional and intellectual convenience. Hey, you've done alright, so it's obviously because of your overwhelming virtues and cleverness. Others struggle, but they have only themselves to blame for it, so pay them little heed. It's self-indulgent theistic hogwash based on a willful ignorance of the inherent arbitrariness of life.

The nature and tenor of your response defines another difference between us. Other people's philosophies don't bother me, because that's their own free choice. They made their choice just as I did. And they're the ones who get the consequences they deserve by their own free choice just as I do. I'm not exempt from the moral law of gravity. No one is. The playing field is perfectly level.

Everything that happens does serve a reason and a purpose, and that reason and purpose is to teach us how to become better people. And just as you are free to deny the causality of the consequences of your own actions, I'm just as free to affirm it. So we each already have our personal choice and everything that unfolds from it already within our own lives. It's not so much what happens to us, but what we do about it that makes all the difference. For the consequences of our choices today determine the basis from what we will chose tomorrow.

(edited to expand on a few ideas).

A mouse in a maze may exult in its choices but that's ignorance. I have a more expansive view of human being and activity, moral suasion and gravitas than you seem to. I don't object to your general approach--for you--just don't find it very interesting, but it takes all kinds and many kinds are still possible even in the United States of Obama. Ayn Rand may have made a mistake if she conflated individualism with a theorectical person's lack of need for other people. We are all social animals, but the amount and type of need for that is all over the human interactive map. I remember once hiking in the Grand Canyon coming on an old mining camp's remnants. That people had been there decades before digging mine shafts was much more interesting to me than the canyon itself. I love old railroad beds and no longer used rr tracks. Such things are a handshake with the human productive past and represent social gratification of one of many types to me. I once stopped at a rr crossing in New Mexico. I got out and sat on the hood of my car and waved at the train engineer who waved back as the diesel locomotive and a long train of boxcars went slowly past. Freedom destroys the exoskeleton of slavery and would be enslavers enabling human expansiveness and benevolence even for those who don't appreciate it, but freedom has to be fought for, protected and won by someone/somebodies somehow or the maze simply gets smaller and smaller thanks to indifferent and bad people.

--Brant

[Robert Baratheon]

Everything that happens does serve a reason and a purpose, and that reason and purpose is to teach us how to become better people.

This is religion in its ugliest form: narcissistic self-exaltation. You're the person who survives a mall shooting, walks up to the nearest camera and declares, "God has a plan for me!" as the preschooler and Sunday school teacher who were standing next to you at Dippin' Dots are wheeled past their grieving family members in body bags. The only difference is government is the gunman who has (so far) spared you from its rampage. It's rank egocentrism gussied up with a Tony Robbins endorsement and knock-off Objectivist dust jacket for marketing to secular audiences. It's doctrinaire self-help rubbish, and it doesn't bother me emotionally; it's an affront to the intelligence of your audience who are capable of recognizing shades of gray.