House of Eratosthenes

Charlottesville is the story of two yucky factions mixing it up and getting violent. In the aftermath, there is a lot of truth and fiction being pumped into it, by people who are desperate to prove, above all things, that they’re not with this yucky side or that yucky side. Now it’s true that as a secondary priority there is a lot of other stuff they want to say. Keep those statues! Down with capitalism! Violence is wrong! But if we’re going to be honest about it, those are distant-seconds. The most important thing anyone wants to express, far-and-away, is “I am not a Nazi” and “I am not Antifa.”

That is good, in the sense that people are behaving like they’ve got reputations worth protecting.

But it is not good, in the sense that it must be the most primitive thought expressed in a social gathering. “Hi. My name is [name], I am not a [blank].” Thousands of years of evolution, technical innovation and social advancement; we can’t manage the next rung up the ladder? How about: “I believe in [thing].” Too much?

Ah, well. Here we embark upon more painful truth: We were there already. Past it, in fact. We’ve been sliding. In generations past, we discussed things; for thousands of years, in fact, people would say “thing.” And then the rebuttal would come back: “!thing.” Then the counter-rebuttal: “If not-thing, then why (other thing)? We should expect to see (yet another thing) instead.”

Toppling Statues Somewhere along the line, all this has fallen out of favor. And it’s recent. Somehow, something got discarded, rather like a paddle thrown out of a canoe, and now our chosen form of discourse is a bunch of fluff-n-stuff that doesn’t have much to do with actual exchange of ideas. Seems like lately it’s all demonstrations, all “protests,” all of the time, with everything. Oh sure we have our Sunday morning talk shows, but have you actually taken the time to watch one of those lately?

We do have talk radio, which encourages this. But polite society does not encourage talk radio…you’re looked upon as something of a kook-burger if you listen to it with any regularity. And I’m gathering that the free exchange of ideas is the reason why. To the people who never do it, when they look at someone else participating in it or just listening to it, it seems odd. People would do well to stop and ask themselves why. I know of one family member roughly my age, who regularly disparages another, older family member, for listening to “hate radio.” That is not an isolated sentiment by any means.

And yet…what was Charlottesville, if not hate?

And that was the ultimate end-point of the opposite of talking about ideas, no? Two sides, both with a “my way or the highway” attitude.

And I don’t see anyone noticing this part — each side had an idea that was, at least, sturdy enough to survive an introduction into a real dialogue. Lose the statues! Keep the statues! Speaking just for myself, I would look forward eagerly to an exchange of ideas about this. Not a shouting match, but a considerate, rational, focused inspection of what happens when a nation tears itself in pieces over questions of freedom, federalism, The Rights Of Man, etc….glues itself back together, and then a century and a half later takes steps to obliterate that bloody history. What happens then? Can an advanced civilization such as ours, remain ready for whatever the future brings while it rends asunder its own past? Can it maintain moral anchoring without any anchors? Can it survive the exigencies of both war AND peace, while living out each day in snapshot-mode, deliberately unaware of all that came before?

This would be a good discussion to have.

And this is something I’ve not seen people notice much, even as they busy themselves with noticing many other things. Ah well…now we have fatalities, so I suppose losing perspective on the essentials is to be expected. But what caused those, I might ask? Is there really any good reason for us to be so hyped up on street-protests, all year long and every year? I can think of no good reason. Maybe just a couple of really bad ones…like, someone is funding them because they think they have something to gain politically…and, those who participate in them know of no other way to make their point, and haven’t got anything else to do anyway. Is that it? Because those aren’t good reasons. The property damage is expensive and the deaths & injuries are tragic.

It’s a funny thing. Waterboard one terrorist and you hear all this stuff about “We are better people than that.” Nobody stops to ask, “Better than what, exactly?” Better than…taking active steps, when malevolent people threaten innocent people? The alternative is to not do anything and then say “wasn’t my fault” after the deed’s done, right? Is there any other way to interpret that tired cliché?

But then we go day after day, year after year, watching these “peaceful protests” that are anything but peaceful…the local police are consumed in whatever the event is, wherever it is, must be a great day to go stealing cars or breaking into houses in the middle of the day or whatever other malfeasance you had planned…streets blocked, shops busted and looted, homeowners threatened, all because we don’t know how to discuss anything anymore. And that’s when I don’t hear anybody at all say “We [should be] better than that.” That’s exactly when the full meaning of the statement would be much easier to define, and that’s exactly when it really should be true.

I think we’re past the point of discussion. I think we just need to do what the liberals do. CLAIM we discussed it thoroughly, CLAIM we offered them everything reasonable, CLAIM they wanted something outrageous, then just do whatever the hell we feel like anyway and then act aggrieved when they get angry. Right now there’s no discussion because when liberals are in charge, they do whatever they want. When conservatives are in charge, our leaders constantly kowtow to whatever liberals want.

I pulled for Cruz until Hillary asked Podesta to rig the GOP primary to elect Trump because she “could beat him easily.” I’ve been pulling for Trump because he was going to punish those bastards and set things right. Instead, I hear a lot of bluster and all the RINO’s just bow and scrape and oppose anything that would restore our nation to Constitutional conservatism.
- P_Ang | 08/15/2017 @ 14:26
Quite right. And it took us many steps to get here.

But our BIG turn down the cul de sac, came when…what’s my favorite phrase from sexual harassment class. “The intent of the accused is entirely irrelevant, it is the perception of the aggrieved that determines everything.”

So, if you say “baked potato” and it happens to remind me, for whatever reason, of slavery/rape/oppression/genocide blah blah blah whatever…it’s on you. Shouldn’t have said anything about baked potatoes. Now we’ve got this big long list of things we can’t say…and oops, no one bothered to write down or keep track of what’s on the list. It’s just a bunch of stuff. The intent of the accused is irrelevant…
- mkfreeberg | 08/15/2017 @ 17:10
To fix this, we need to fix the egregious fucking autism of the Millennial generation. They simply CANNOT grok that something can be good, bad, or indifferent, based on the context — because they can’t process context. Stonewall Jackson was a good, God-fearing man… who fought honorably, and very well, for a cause that was partially bad. 50 years ago, nobody would think twice about that statement. The “hero with feet of clay” ….

Nowadays everything has to be either all good or all bad, and since no one and nothing is ever ALL one or the other, we have to keep our panties perpetually twisted until the world changes.
- Severian | 08/16/2017 @ 06:08

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May I Suggest, Going Back to Discussing Things?Tuesday, August 15th, 2017

May I Suggest, Going Back to Discussing Things?
Tuesday, August 15th, 2017