Take the horse blinders off, take a step back and follow the ole Captain on this one, because I had to step back myself, wipe the crud from my eyes and see what was really going on.
___________________________________________________________________
I was thinking about global warming. Not from a scientific or political perspective, but a psychological one. Namely,
"How dumb are these people not to see it for the scam it is?"
Really? Global warming? Based on computer models that keep failing, constantly get proven wrong, from avowed socialist scientists, and (surprise, surprise) the only solution seems to be higher taxes and more government spending?
But it isn't even the arguments (scientific, political, economic, or logical) that gets me, as much as it is the pure inanity of the topic. It's the fact I have to even debate this in the first place. That there are millions of mindless, conforming humans that actually believe this stuff necessitating my expenditure of calories of energy to address the idiotic and very-religious-like premises of global warming. In other words, the fact we're arguing about something so inane proves there is a larger underlying problem than global warming itself.
Another political issue I can't believe we're arguing - feminism. Not that women should be treated equal and have the same rights as men, etc., but more the current frontier that feminism is pushing. That men and women are INTERCHANGEABLE, and if they're not, THEN THEY BETTER DAMN SHOULD BE!
Ignore the differences in plumbing.
Ignore the differences we enjoy.
Ignore the different aptitudes and weaknesses of both and how they compliment each other and help society advance.
No men and women MUST BE interchangeable to the point we're going to bring them up "genderless." And if you don't agree with that, then you're a (fill in misogynist term here)_______________!
Again, it's an inane argument.
No sane people should have to argue against it. But its outlandishness is only outdone by the fact society is so mindless that this topic has even attained "debatability" in society. The only thing more outlandish is feminism's recent movement into "fact acceptance."
And finally, the never ending arguing I've had to deal with since roughly the age of 18. Where, in a room of thousands of 20 and 30 somethings over scores of parties, I seem to be the sole mind of reason making the "outrageous" claim that you can't have a society where nobody works. That people need to work to support themselves. That we all can't be elementary school teachers and that the equally inane Keynesianism where we "just move money around and economic growth will magially happen" is bunk. 20 years it's been where I painfully have to stoop down to my adversaries' childish level and explain, be it at a college party, a house party, or just in the company of others, the very simple and adult concept that there's no such thing as a free lunch. That if there are too many parasites and not enough producers, society will collapse.
And in return for my insistence on being the only mature adult in the room I get called every type of "ist" or every kind of condescending ideology (Nazi, Fascist, etc.).
But then something dawned on me, prompted by my increasing misanthropy and cynicism triggered by humans -
Do they really believe it?
For example, does the average impoverished black man really believe his poverty is caused by "whitey" and NOT the illegitimacy rate, the crime, lack of fathers and out of wedlock births in his community?
Does that social worker I'm arguing with REALLY believe we can just move money around, take it from those "evil rich" and all the country's socioloigical problems go away?
Does that environmental activist REALLY believe in global warming and care about the planet?
Or is it just one big-ass red-herring for the Right to chase, waste their efforts and energies debating, foolishly believing these people are dumb enough to believe it, when in reality it's just a front to obscure their ulterior motives of theft and parasitism?
And after thinking about it, I've realized it's both.
It is here, we need to break down the left into two general, but very applicable categories - categories I cannot claim to have come up with, but rather a reader - "Dupes" and "Devils." Both of which populate the left, and both of which explain how these inane political arguments are both a ruse and a legitimate ideology members of the left believe.
The "Dupes" are your mindless, zombies who believe anything they're told. They are the foot soldiers of the left. They never think on their own, they have no critical thinking skills (despite what their professors tell them), they don't care to think through the consequences of their actions or ideology and largely can be persuaded with bumper sticker sound bytes or chants that "sound good to them."
Typically the Dupes are you high school or college students or celebrities. Younger idiotic and wiseless children who, by society, the media, the education system, and the government, have been told they are oh-so-smart and "independent minded" as they all wear the same lame ass skinny jeans, thick rimmed glasses, and magically all have the EXACT same political ideology. But don't think it's just youth or a lack of education. You can have professors, fully indoctrinated into the system that their brain is no longer capable of independent thought. A third generation union worker whose forefathers never let alternative ideas into the family. Or even a politician, completely clueless about the mechanics of economics, governance and statesmanship, and just in politics because their grandaddy was. Regardless of the age, economic or other sociological backgrounds, these people have NEVER thought their ideology through and mindlessly follow it like a radical Muslim or a born again Christian. They not only have no intention of "finding the truth," they are fully incapable of it. And thusly, because of the lack of a truly free mind, they make the perfect "dupe" for any politician willing to abuse them.
Those politicians willing to abuse them are the "Devils." People who fully well know what they're advocating is not feasible, unsustainable, and sometimes just outright wrong and evil, but don't care, because it is for their own personal gain.
The liberal arts professors sucking the tuition-blood out of your child, crippling their financial futures until they're 60, as they charge $400 a credit for their worthless humanities class.
Jesse Jackson race-whoring, blaming all of one group's problems on other groups, permitting no critical thinking, self-inflection, let alone desire to actually help the group he hypocritical claims to be helping.
The limosuine liberal, who wants to avoid a real job at all costs and instead enters politics, advocating the unbeatable policy of taxing a rich minority to buy the votes and love of the middle class and poor majorities. Never once would they ever part with their own money to help the poor, it is only through taking other's money do they advocate such a thing.
Whichever of the many variants of Devils, when you're arguing with them, they know full well they are lying, they are living a lie, they are ruining millions of people's lives, and they don't care. They are the epitome of evil.
Now, regardless of whether you are facing a "Devil" or a "Dupe," libertarians, conservatives and other right sided folk face a problem when attempting to engage them in a debate - neither Devils nor Dupes are capable of being convinced.
First, the Dupes are incapable of being convinced because they, frankly, lack the intellectual capacity for intellectual honesty. The lies they've been told are too kind to their egos and thinking of anything else would hurt their fragile little feelings. They will live a lie and suffer the consequences because it's more important their ego be saved than their lives be enjoyed.
And second, the Devils are also incapable of being convinced, not because they need convincing, but because they already agree with you. They agree with everything you say. Now get them to admit that and give up their
racket. They won't because the money is just too good. And so good luck ever convincing a Devil.
So what's a righter-leaning person supposed to do?
Simple - deny their premise right off the bat.
You see, I don't know about you, but I got sick and tired of the 2 hour arguments at college parties where it would go around and around in circles where inevitably they would just say we'd have to agree to disagree. Or where through some spectacularly concocted mental self-rationalizing bullshit, a leftist would say something inane like "well my perception is reality." Or "I don't believe your figures." (both true).
My life is too short for that.
Instead, a much better approach to debating a Dupe (or a Devil) is to immediately call them out on their bullshit.
To a Dupe you say, "you know what, I'm sorry, but I'm not going to debate you. You aren't going to be convinced or persuaded because it's simple - you refuse to. You prefer to believe in your ideology like an unfounded religion and no amount of data or empirical proof I have will convince you. You want to believe a lie which is psychotic and there's nothing I can do to counteract a mental problem."
To a Devil you say, "You're a liar, and you know it. You don't believe the BS you're spewing for one god damned second. And you ain't fooling me."
This will not solve any debates. This will not convince any one to agree with you. But you have to realize one key important thing;
You were never going to solve the debate or convince any one in the first place. It was doomed from the beginning.
But what you DO achieve in calling BS on the premise or calling them out on their intellectual dishonesty is is two things.
In terms of Dupes you DIRECTLY address their real problem - psychological delusion. You say, "No, the real issue is not global warming or whether there are such things as genders, etc., it's that you have such an impaired mind that you actually think this is even debatable. That you have such a psychological problem that I have to stand here and engage you with kid's gloves on actually thinking you believe it's big bad rich people who are holding the world down when in reality you just want an excuse to steal other people's money." This moves the national political debate from arguments that are never going to be solved to arguments as to the sanity of the Dupes.
In terms of the Devils you DIRECTLY address their real problem - they're sociopaths. If there's one thing I love about calling the Devils out on their BS is that you actually do not look like a Dupe yourself. I don't know how many years I've listened to talk radio hosts, WHO SHOULD KNOW BETTER, swallow whole the lies and the premise the Devil's put before them and then argue from such an impossible handicap. The Devil's are LAUGHING their asses off at you. There you go trying to explain, in THEIR TERMS, restricted to their premises, why global warming isn't real, why race relations are better than they claim, how the wage gap is BS, when your only argument should be "you're a liar and a charlatan and you can go to hell. You're abusing the people you portend to be helping and you should be ashamed of yourself."
Of course most talk show hosts, pundits, and conservative media types never grow the balls to accuse leftist Devils of "
crusaderism" or evil, which plays wonderfully into their hands as they make idiots of themselves vainly trying to convince them. But perhaps someday, they might actually want to take the kiddie gloves off, dispense with the "my fine colleague from across the aisle" bullshit and start throwing down.
