House of Eratosthenes

As Rush Limbaugh says, it’s not often a caller comes up with a point he entirely missed. “Open Line Friday” worked out well that way for him, when “Robin” called in about an hour ago and brought up something about the millennial kids. They’re being sold a bill of goods, and sold down the river; what they’re being sold, is a sense of futility and despair. The medication of this entire generation is a part of that.

I recall when I was in public school, we had these kids who were very bright and consistently brought home the grades to prove it, along with very high scores on the exams, but I was completely baffled when I asked one of them something about the subject matter and what he knew was next to nothing. These kids know how to “study” but their studying only works for 24 to 48 hours. More troubling than that, they possess all sorts of intellect and gifts for noodling out ambiguities in the exams, even though their command of the concepts is lacking. I recall one example, in my own son’s homework, that he had to bring to me because it required a correct interpretation of “one hundred and one over fifty-eight”; does that mean 100+1/58, or 101/58? The ambiguity was not the point of the exercise — it seems the test-maker simply hadn’t considered it. Nor was there any guidance for resolving this against the notations, in the material covered so far in the class, to the best I could determine. Unfortunately, I’m no sharper in this area than my kid. In fact, I’m very sure his class was filled, as mine would’ve been back in the day, with these “bright” kids who would have reliably sorted out the equation in the correct way without even comprehending how there could have been a question or misunderstanding. There’s a process of soft empathy here, between test maker and test taker, and I’m not tuning in on the right frequency.

Anyway, my observation over the last several years, is that if you’re a millennial and you’re male — it seems you are in this class of empathizing, super-bright super-charismatic but not-forming-command-of-the-concepts kids…the high score on the exam, but only within 24 hours kids…either that, or you’re medicated.

What this “Robin” caller managed to link together, was this epidemic of medication of manly boys who think in a manly way, and liberalism. The thread that connects these two bodies of thought together, meanders through what I was noticing half a year ago during my bike ride through Silicon Valley: Everywhere you look, systems. Systems with kiosks in them. Systems, with kiosks, that do the things individuals are usually expected to do. The individual, therefore, is this empty shell who approaches the system, self-assimilates, and then relies on the system and all of the systemic resources, as an alternative to “packing” supplies, tools and knowledge. The “user” then tumbles on through, waiting for the next kiosk to dispense drinking water, sunscreen, doggy poop bags, lip balm, hand sanitizer or whatever. And of course if trouble comes along, he dials 911 and hopes for the best.

Liberalism is despair. It is a message that you can’t do anything for yourself. You need to take the medication you’re told to take, so you can do your homework.

I’m glad to see my “reference manual” about the difference between liberals and conservatives, inspiring additional comments. Like Nightfly’s:

It would probably be more precise to say that conservatives love individuals and liberals love groups. This is a problem, because only one of those loves works in both directions: a conservative can love a group made up of individuals, but a liberal can’t love an individual in the same fashion. To be individual is to be distinct in some way, and inasmuch as you are distinct, you differ from the beloved group. That’s why all such movements keep growing more and more monomaniacal, purging members to keep themselves ever pure.

It also explains the phenomenon noted before at Morgan’s place, that movements of the left inevitably flow only one way, more leftward into extremism. You start by losing diversity of opinion about the topic at hand, continue by losing diversity of topic, and by the time you start to shed diversity of personality, hobbies, and outside interests, the brakes have snapped and you’re barreling down the mountainside in a runaway rail cart.

Right. Helpless people want everyone else to be helpless. And it could be said that conservatives aspire to be what people tend to think an iPhone is — a cool, smart gadget loaded up with software applications and all kinds of wonderful capabilities — whereas liberals aspire to be what the gadget really is, which is merely a token engaging the network, which is the real product being sold. The network has the capabilities, and all that money paid for the fancy phone is actually a subscription to the services that maintain the network. The smartphone actually does very little. In fact maybe, for that analogy to work, I should say the conservatives aspire to be the Leatherman. Liberals are more like a GPS receiver.

The trouble with minimizing the expectations made against the individual is, by its very nature, it minimizes the individual’s responsibilities; and when you minimize the individual’s responsibilities, you minimize the individual’s sense of responsibility. This encourages the “Occupy” mindset. It works like this: The system is supposed to sell me a light rail ticket, or the system is supposed to give me lip balm, or the system is supposed to give me a doggy poop bag. What if, one day, it doesn’t? When that happens, you have the situation most guaranteed in all of the human condition, to create discord and strife: A need, unmet, with no immediately-recognizable vision for getting it fulfilled, along with a consciousness that lacks the experience required for forming and realizing challenging visions.

That consciousness, then, is boxed into a corner. There is no next-step for it to take, other than throwing some sort of temper-tantrum. It must strike, it must protest, it must vandalize, it must obstruct someone else, because the resources for achieving the goal are all externalized. It has to seek out someone more capable who might be able to solve the problem, and torment that other person, who will then be frustrated into making the delivery. Whether that works or whether it does not — chaos ensues. Individual capability is conducive to order, individual weakness is conducive to chaos. So when you climb in your car and turn the ignition key and nothing happens, you do something constructive to solve the problem. But a ticket dispensing machine at the light rail station that doesn’t dispense tickets, is soon vandalized. Because boy oh boy, that’ll really show “them.”

This medication fad…like liberalism itself, the link to which Robin managed to point out…is a fucking time bomb. They should both be treated as such. It is unconscionable what we are doing to the next generation. And inexcusable.

“…Helpless people want everyone else to be helpless.”

Once upon a time there was a bucket full of crabs….
Once upon a time there was a dog in a manger….
Once upon a time there was a sleeping beauty…
Once upon a time there was a craftsman, educated by apprenticeship, who owned the home he built, along with his alien spouse, who cooked over a wood fire, and shit in an outhouse. He hunted with weapons, for meat, fur, and leather for practical footwear. His spouse used hemp for durable clothing, thread, and rope. Their children joined in every day labor by tending the field that provided their food. He joined the hard working bretheren of his community in the onus of negative reinforcement of irresponsable, fraudulent, and larcenous behavior.

Et cetera, et alia, ad nauseam.
- CaptDMO | 08/17/2013 @ 07:27
Yes, socialism is despair. It is also a form of of Sophistry because it is believed based upon ideology rather than any form either philosophic realism or idealism. That is the true problem with it to me. You cannot argue with a Sophist because they believe that words are more important than facts but they change the definition of their words when challenged because it the intention, the imagined goal that is important and that the policies of the left always, ALWAYS devolve into totalitarianism. Socialism can only be maintained by force because there is logical, scientific or experiential proof that it works, in fact quite the opposite is true. They are defending a system that they know will not work. When you point out to them that their idea of equality, of freedom and progress is actually nothing of the sort they simply shout you down.

It is also covetousness. If you have a Netflixs account look up the fakeumentary “We’re not Broke”
- Fai.Mao | 08/18/2013 @ 15:14

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Friday, August 16th, 2013