House of Eratosthenes

Yes, once again it is time to dig into the obsessive-compulsive-list-making “what’s been ripening in the innards of the smartphone” file. And nobody disagrees with me about any of it.

At least, when talking-out-loud most people don’t disagree with much of it. Being a liberal, lately, seems to involve saying something to the effect of “Oh in a perfect world I wish (insert some of what follows here)…BUT…we have all these problems, so therefore we must ‘invest’ in my program.” And being a “moderate” liberal versus an “extreme” liberal, seems more than anything else to have to do with how quickly the liberal gets to that “but.”

Regarding what makes a society free, strong and healthy, there does not appear to be a lot of disagreement. Except for craven disagreement, the disagreement that must cower out of sight, hiding behind red herrings.

Some of these things can be measured, in service of producing an actual number. Where that is possible, and the number is found to be in a decline, that place is coming off the rails. So you can probably form a guess about my thoughts regarding the direction our country has been heading for the last year.

1. Taboo versus Law. There is a vast, yawning gap between laws that are written down, and unenforced cultural taboos that are universally observed as a sign of respect the individual pays to the sensibilities of the community. There is an abundance of little things that are frowned-upon, and because they are frowned-upon they are very seldom done. They carry absolutely no penalty whatsoever. In fact, making any kind of “hard” law against some of these things, is one of the taboos.
2. Stigma is firm but soft. Rule #1 notwithstanding, nobody ever has to profess a false belief, or keep their silence about a genuine belief, to keep from losing their property, their business, their kids, their spouse, their house, their job, their stature in the community, or anything else. Hey let’s face it: If thinking a certain thing is evidence that you’re a wonderful person, and then you get penalized for thinking something else, then thinking that thing is no longer evidence of your wonderfulness, now is it?
3. Men do things. Able-bodied men, of all ages, are knights. They defend women, children, old and handicapped people, from trifling inconvenience as well as danger and bodily harm. They never, ever remain sitting when a lady approaches.
4. Failure. Universally available, and free. No person, enterprise or industry is “Too Big To Fail” — ever. Failure is regarded as something that is always possible, to be avoided at all costs, but never to be ignored or sidestepped once it is earned. Depriving a man of the failure he has justly earned, is rightfully seen as just as deplorable as depriving him of wages he has justly earned.
5. The high wall. Coarse humor and other material are kept away from children, as well as adults who might not prefer it. The girly mags kept behind the clerk, rather than at knee height out front; the blogger who takes the effort to write “not safe work work language in this video”; the curtain in front of that special room in the back, at your video store; South Park scheduled on the cable teevee for 10pm or later. These are fundamental building blocks of any civilized society. The spicy stuff is freely available, but walled off.
6. Promote strength and not weakness. If an individual falls short of a physical or mental challenge, he is encouraged to try again, and discouraged from developing the one-time failure into a lasting disability.
7. Keeping and bearing arms. There really isn’t any telling who does & doesn’t have a gun, but it’s probably not too far from the truth to suppose everyone is carrying something.
8. Egalitarianism. A penalty for a crime is constant, regardless of the class, economic status or birthright of the convict.
9. Take your place. Children wait for grown-ups; grown-ups make sure the women go first; the women see to it that, among them, the elderly and infirm go first.
Nucular 10. Say it. At work, rest or play, nobody ever mumbles; misspellings are exceedingly rare; if an idea is worth expressing, it’s worth expressing properly.
11. Earn your pay. The employee sees his employer as a partner in the business — nobody ever does half-ass work, or less work, to avoid making his co-workers look bad. He does what the boss says, not what the union boss says.
12. Non-Discrimination is a taboo and not a law. Opportunities are not awarded to, or withheld from, people because of their religion, race or gender (unless applicable).
13. Getting rich by watching the rich. People don’t pay greater attention to indigents and ask “Who is at fault?” They pay attention to those who are better off, and ask “What wise things did he do that put him in this position?”
14. Independent thinking. It starts early on. Teachers teach and grade children to produce a good outcome, not to follow a certain sequence of steps.
15. Children wait. Children are afraid to interrupt adults. When they play or are otherwise too distracted to move out of the way of someone else, they do their playing in low-traffic areas, where they aren’t likely to obstruct.
16. Faceless kingmakers. There are no anonymous panels of experts artificially creating other experts. When men carry great respect and authority, the people who show them this respect are ready to list the wonderful things those men have done, not the titles, awards and other gimmicks bestowed on them by anonymous commissions or third-parties.
17. Faceless kingmakers, continued. With regard to #16, nobody can earn respect, authority, titles, awards or other gimmicks by talking a certain way; they have to accomplish something, and it has to be something measurable.
18. Rehabilitation and Recidivism. If a man continues to prove himself unable to live safely among others, he is ultimately put to death.
19. Ownership. People ask “Is it my place to pass judgment?” before asking “Would I have done it the way he did it?”
20. Individuality vs. Groupthink. Groups just aren’t very important. The individual is the de facto master of any given task, challenge or situation. Very few things in life are decided by a vote anywhere, or for that matter by passages out of some kind of rulebook. Committees, where they exist, exist only for brief periods of time and decide practically nothing at all.
21. Mind-altering substances. No one ever uses hallucinogenic drugs. They see their fortunes in life as being linked to their ability to think things out capably, so they just don’t want to mess with that.
22. Nobility of labor. People spend time doing their own manual chores; many of them possess an abundance of tools that they have designed and constructed themselves. It is impossible to do any of this when you engage in the sloppy ramshackle thinking I see of late; and, I suppose, it is perhaps not possible to avoid the sloppy ramshackle thinking I see of late, if you haven’t done something like this in awhile.
23. Keeping up with the Joneses. Nobody ever wants to buy something just because someone else they know bought the same thing.
24. Headwear. Men and boys never wear hats indoors. Ever. Headgear above…or a roof…never, ever both. Simply not done.
25. Strong and silent. The more powerful the leader is, the shorter his speeches are, the greater the passage of time before he gives one, and the less likely it is that he’s ever heard to blame his predecessor for anything.
26. Family first. Nobody who lives in a household ever tolerates disparaging comments about anybody else who lives in that household.
27. As the ladies go, so goes civilization. Girls give their attention to boys who are serious about what they’re trying to do, and show some drive when they’re trying to do it; not to whoever “makes me laugh.”
28. School. In school, when one child picks on another child and the other child tolerates it, the officials see to it the weaker child “mans up” and that the stronger child is punished — BOTH of those, not one or the other. The lazy school official who turns a blind eye, or enforces discipline only upon children who’ve shown the intelligence and civility to respond positively to it, and in so doing allows this adolescent boy-coming-of-age juice to pickle, like improperly-fermented homemade beer — he is universally regarded as the lowest and most detestable form of bureaucrat, something toxic to natural human development, inimical toward manhood. And that goes double for erring in the opposite direction…handing down some ill-thought-out “hard rule” (see #1) trying to make bullying into a relic from the past. Not gonna happen. Bullying is not something to be expurgated, it is something to be handled.
29. School, continued. With regard to #28, children who can communicate with other children but not do the work, are seen as needing improvement; children who can do the work but who lack “communication skills,” are seen as successful and worthy of emulation.
30. Husbands. Women and men mate for life; all of her children are biologically his.
31. Charity. When any member of the community is enduring urgent need, nobody is condemned with such disdain as the other member who could help and refuses to — except for whoever else wants to force him to. Nobody seeks to make himself, or anybody else, “better” by passing some obligatory law requiring charity. (Again, refer back to #1.)
32. Charity, continued. With regard to #31, to receive such charity and then gripe about it in quality or quantity, is regarded as one of the lowest possible transgressions.
33. World travel. The most respected community members are the ones who have traveled to other countries. But before they traveled they personally worked to earn the solvency needed for their traveling. Traveling is not used as a bully pulpit to promote some sick vision of hyper-internationalism, or to promote materialism and extravagance as if luxuries should be prioritized as staples of life.
34. Central, unifying language. There is one and only one dominant spoken and written language, and whoever isn’t functional in it, does the best they can to learn that one before any other.
35. Immigrants speak the language of the community. With regard to #34, whoever immigrates to this place, speaks that one dominant language before their mother tongue — even at home.
36. Children speak the language of the community. With regard to #34 and #35, children of immigrants are taught to speak the language of the community before their mother tongue — at home.
37. Parents don’t raise boys and girls, they raise men and women. Parenting is seen as a process of making kids capable first, and “safe” second. A parent who delivers a child to adulthood, happy healthy and whole but not capable, is seen as a failure at parenting (see #4).
38. Taxes pay for things, where they are unavoidable. Taxes are never levied, increased or exempted to reward or punish classes of people. Social experimentation by tax code is an unknown thing. Taxes are collected for the purpose of funding vital government activities, and for no other reason.
39. There is a(n unwritten) Hays Code. The fiction that people enjoy, has heroic characters who do good things, villainous characters who do bad things, and nobody ends up prosperous at the end by avoiding honest work or by breaking the law.
40. People acknowledge each other. The everyday greeting is not only desirable, not only obligatory, but sacred. Men who once fought over a woman, take the time to do it with each other, friendly or not. Very few tasks justify withholding a handshake, eye contact and a decent Hello. And for this reason, people don’t spend much time at all with their “personal tunes.”
41. Weaknesses are not coveted. Nobody ever brags about, or connects an identity to, an inability to do something other people can do. People do not greet new acquaintances with that most odious of self-introductions, “I don’t know anything about computers.” People don’t form relationships around weakness. People don’t say “That’s my friend Carol, she doesn’t know how to cook.” They say “That’s my friend Carol, she’s the best interior designer around.”
42. Armageddon is not breathlessly anticipated. Very rarely does anyone talk about the entire world ending, for any reason.

Cross-posted at Right Wing News.

In regards to 34, 35: I had a fellow NCO for a few years in the Army who was Mexican. So was his RTO (radio guy). The NCO would not tolerate being spoken to in Spanish by his RTO unless it was a purely off-duty situation.

In contrast, the chow hall was a mess of stratification. All black guys at that table, all Puerto ricans at that one, all Mexicans at that other one, all white guys over there. And whatever language was their first, they spoke. Pissed me off a bit. But still not nearly as much as walking into an orderly room and listening to 2 or 3 senior NCOs laughing and joking away, in uniform, in front of their troops, in some other language. I can’t think of a place that ease of communication and singularity of message is more important than the military, but an awful lot of people didn’t see it that way.
- Andy | 01/30/2010 @ 12:49
[…] Justice Department Drops Plan for 9/11 Manhattan Trial Bush Justice Officials Cleared My 42 Definitions of a Strong Society Statement of James O’Keefe Unhappy Hipsters The Obamarang “One Scotch Away From Being […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 01/30/2010 @ 13:00
Cheers to that first NCO you were talking about.

Communication is the one place where individuality is not helpful; and that’s only because of the nature of it. There has to be a connection taking place or else the stated task is not being fulfilled.
- mkfreeberg | 01/30/2010 @ 13:13
I like it. As long as I get to keep my booze. 🙂
- philmon | 01/30/2010 @ 21:38
Oh yeah. And on Jimmah Cahtah. I was in grade school when he was elected and he was the first person I ever heard mispronounce the word, and in just that way… “NU-CYU-LAR”. It grated on me. It drove me nuts. As a kid.

And whenever Bush said it I wanted to slap him upside the head, too. But you know what?

Let’s just blame it on Carter. Blaming previous administrations is all the rage, you know.

(Did Eisenhower really pronounce it that way? Geez!)
- philmon | 01/30/2010 @ 21:43
43, A Sense of Occasion: Try to remember that different places and situations require different behaviors. Don’t wear sweats and a t-shirt to church. Stand and take your hat off when the National Anthem is played at an event. If you have to talk on a cell phone in public, speak softly, briefly and don’t discuss your hemorrhoids or your horrible boyfriend.
- Greg Hlatky | 01/30/2010 @ 23:01
Morgan, can you insert this post into your “Items of Interest” list at the left side of this page?
- cylarz | 02/01/2010 @ 12:41
I mean your “42 definitions” list, of course. It ranks up there with “things I know.”
- cylarz | 02/01/2010 @ 12:41
I think I can figger out how to do that. If I can’t, I better not go whining about it.
- mkfreeberg | 02/01/2010 @ 19:05
[…] epochs, each mutually exclusive. (Morgan Freeberg posted an excellent itemization of the Strong Society.) I can’t help but notice that the smart ass kids we know today — the ones who fancy […]
- Salt Water Prairie | Bruce Hanify | 09/06/2010 @ 11:26
[…] historical epochs, each mutually exclusive. (Morgan Freeberg posted an excellent itemization of the Strong Society.) I can’t help but notice that the smart ass kids we know today — the ones who fancy […]
- What to Do? « The Daily Bayonet | 09/08/2010 @ 05:53
[…] mutually exclusive. (In this regard, Morgan Freeberg has posted a brilliant itemization of the Strong Society.) I can’t help but notice that the smart ass kids we know today — the ones who fancy […]
- Saltwater Prairie | The Grail Quest | 08/09/2011 @ 19:21
[…] FAQ Glossary Things I Know Things I Doubt Conservative Platform I Totally Hate These Words Things I Don't Get Movies You Ought Not Spoil Rules For Living With Me When I Start Running This Place Bathosploration What Is A Liberal? Yin and Yang If We Really Cared The Oath Seven Steps to Insanity Morgan's Personality Test What the Blogroll Icons Mean Things That Make Me Smile I Don't Want to See These Things in Movies Ever Again Feminism in Ten Acts My 42 Definitions of a Strong Society […]
- House of Eratosthenes | 01/05/2015 @ 17:37
[…] Freeburg’s Definitions of a Strong Society […]
- FROM CHARACTER TO CARICATURE | BRUCE HANIFY | 09/15/2015 @ 16:13

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My 42 Definitions of a Strong SocietySaturday, January 30th, 2010

My 42 Definitions of a Strong Society
Saturday, January 30th, 2010