House of Eratosthenes

I think progressivism holds appeal because it does the opposite of what people say about it: It sorts people into different levels and locks them in place there. This guy here at the top is supposed to decide everything, that guy there has the authority to destroy people because his judgment is completely perfect, all these other people at the bottom should just mill about waiting to be told what to do.

Funny thing is, that’s exactly how the enthused progressives are [naturally] configured. Some of them want to boss strangers around, and others want to line up for their three hots every day and just be told what to do. So the allure i[s] that you’ll be locked into the plateau that is most comfortable to you. It seems there isn’t a progressive anywhere who’s entertained the thought, even momentarily, that maybe ~~the~~ this perfectly-run United Federation of Planets will find the “right” role for him that is different from what he’s envisioned.

We see three tiers, at least. You have the Obama/Hitler/Napoleon/Mao/Stalin guy at the apex of the pyramid…the demigod. The public figure whose face is to be put on posters, and by his very definition cannot make any mistakes since anything he does instantly becomes the definition of moral, just and right. You have the middle manager who carries out the Sun King’s directives. Then you have everybody else.

There are ranks within ranks. Man-God-King has a consort and other immediate family members; they are demigods too. The middle managers are placed on a higher relative level as they are positioned closer to the Man-God-King. As for the proles milling about, sheep-like out at the periphery, it seems they are also ranked within their own caste according to whether they agree ideologically. The “I for one welcome our new overlords” proles are better than the Tea Party proles.

But that is the ziggurat right there, the upside-down funnel. Social structures that accept the left-wing approach, constantly, arrange themselves into this configuration, popularized since ancient Egypt. It’s timeless, I think.

I further perceive that the most enthused progressive aspires toward the middle ring, seeing himself as a middle manager. From arguing with these people, it seems to me they get a perverse thrill out of telling other people what to do…it’s as if, if they were to go out and do their converting and there was no converting to do because everyone already agreed, they’d become exquisitely unhappy. So they’re salivating about the prospect of forcing plans on people, but are not ready to become the person who comes up with the plan because that would involve too much responsibility. They want to receive a plan from someone, and then hammer it into place somewhere else.

I believe their ambitions are formed by absences: They don’t want to come up with the plan, they don’t want to take responsibility for coming up with the plan, and they don’t want to learn to live with something that doesn’t meet with their agreement. They’re simply avoiding challenges, and while they’re at it, avoiding the stigma that would come with avoiding challenges…and so they engage in an illusion, trying to appear to be doing something.

Hence, the appeal of wanting “To Be A Part Of This Thing.”

And yet this ziggurat is also, somehow, “social justice.”

Any ideas on how that’s supposed to work?

This is why I often suspect that our “progressives” are, in their secret hearts, actually obsessed with stasis. They’re so insecure about their own position in life — their intelligence, their career prospects, their life choices, their sex appeal — that the ideal world for them would be one in which everyone wears his bona fides literally on his sleeve. Like a Boy Scout uniform or something, with conspicuous merit badges for stuff like “knowing the title of a Kanye West song” or “reading a Malcolm Gladwell book.” Since they can’t legislate all that yet, though, they have to make due with stuff like skin color and emo glasses and iCrap and bumper stickers and tote bags from the local co-op.
- Severian | 08/02/2011 @ 10:03
[…] Further to my comments here… […]
- The Appeal of Progressivism | academiczoology | 08/02/2011 @ 14:04

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The Appeal Progressivism HoldsTuesday, August 2nd, 2011

The Appeal Progressivism Holds
Tuesday, August 2nd, 2011