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Book/DRAFT.md

@@ -341,7 +341,7 @@ There are some interesting discussions re: the cause of adopting the communist p
 
 It is a viable hypothesis as we clearly see a correlation between those who identify as communist and such a personality - the highly neurotic, manipulative type who seeks constant acknowledgment while insisting that all must be in agreement to have any moral standing (cluster B personality).
 
-But it is an incomplete view in that it is proven on the basis of diagnosing communists, but not working out all the possible points of origin for the behaviour of these candidates.
+But it is an incomplete view in that it is proven on the basis of diagnosing communists (and often an armchair diagnosis, though perhaps by those who know something about the matter), but not working out all the possible points of origin for the behaviour of these candidates.
 
 Others might contend that they had particular traits which made them likely to choose to agree with the critiques put forth by communism, and thus it is their weakness of character which makes them communists, and that the main identifier is that communists put up promises attractive to young minds, but I am not convinced these are so distinct. That is to say, though we might observe these psychopathologies and though there may be genetically borne/mediated dispositions which facilitate or make more likely these outcomes, causation is unprovable, and even if we were to assume a fundamental factor present from onset or early life, it itself would be indistinguishable from early childhood influences such as reasoning and early challenges.
 
@@ -2990,27 +2990,101 @@ Let's take as an example, first in the abstract, that to use initiate language w
 
 Though this can occur through the introduction of new terms, and this often is the case, it will also be the supplanting of existing terms or the meanings of terms using dialectical negation. There is now an in-group language which is supported by its own rationalizations predicated on in-group understandings of language and these rationales have become incompatible with general use of language and processes of reasoning through critical thinking using logic in neutral terms.
 
-Or you call it a cult, and they imagine some hollywood movie with cult members carrying daggers and doing blood rituals and extravagant initiation ceremonies for new recruits who have to go through a gauntlet of tests before they can be consideredi
+If people are defensive of some idea or realm of thought, or even just primed to dismiss criticism of something popularly accepted as being the stuff of conspiracy theory, they will respond poorly upon hearing that the thing in question is a form of cult:
 
-So you call it mental illness, and they say "well what's the diagnosis.. why is it that so many intelligent people are interested in these ideas.. they can't all be mentally ill"
+Mostly, they will think of a cult as being something which has been romanticized and exaggerated through a Hollywood production. Everything from high profile international conspiracy involving royalty, to monsters and space aliens. Perhaps something of a skull and bones variety with roots in every institution of the world where members carry daggers, perform blood rituals and must take part in extravagant initiation ceremonies as new recruits who endure gauntlets of tests involving murder and debauchery.
 
-So you call it fascist, and they laugh because they don't see any tiny moustaches on the people whos eem to be associated with whatever it is you're referring to
+As with anything, you need to stick to definitions and be clear that perversion of language isn't necessarily a secret cult, but that formal aspects of it are simply the parasitization of ideas, to borrow from the great Gad Saad, which has established itself in academic disciplines through collectivist praxis, and become well-represented in entertainment and pop culture first and foremost because of the effect of that parasitization. There is no conspiracy required for its instantiation and proliferation, and whether people conspire to achieve objectives for their own benefit is an independent matter which doesn't need to bear any relevance on the subject as we're examining it.
 
-So you call it totalitarian, and they don't even really know how to approach that.. you can't even get to the point of discussing some of the competing understandings of world whichi necessarily lead to ..
+##### Calling it Mental Illness
+
+I've seen many people refer to the ongoing issue as being one related to, or even caused by, mental illness. Whether it's due to the rise in mental illness diagnoses, the focus on mental illness in media and academic institutions, the swelling of mental health and wellness industries, the identification of new mental illnesses for identification as part of professional diagnostic repertoires, mental healthism in education, or the fact that Critical Theory-based analyses, grievance and victimhood as a cultural practice have led to mental health conditions becoming a sort of identity by which people choose to associate themselves, often as a virtue, it's something for which there are many reasons and opportunities to come into thinking about, especially as it presents in politically tumultuous affairs.
+
+Though it's probably not accurate or even helpful to frame the societal challenges of our time as being the product of mental illness, it's perhaps still worth understanding the relationship of mental illness to our shared predicament as it's certainly the case that it has become not just a more visible element in society, but that it's commonly, if not specifically diagnosed, at least referred to among those who associate themselves as being part of a collectivist movement, or who somehow identify themselves using a term which is common in one of these movements.
+
+###### Mental Illness as Critical Consciousness
+
+The fact is that, for those who advocate collectivist solutions, they are seeking evidence that those in their vicinity will agree to their prescriptions. This means agreeing that the conditions themselves are not satisfactory and can only be overcome through such a degree of collective effort that full participation stands as the only proxy indicator by which the conditions are adequately addressed (the alternative being that one wouldn't have an inclination to criticize the environment and, as such, wouldn't have conceived of the possibility of the collectivist undertaking).
+
+For Freire, this would mean "Denounce to proclaim the world". For Marx, it's "Ruthless criticism of all that exists" ("rücksichtslose Kritik alles Bestehenden"). For Horkheimer, he described the whole purpose of the critical method as follows:
+> "Critical Theory ... is suspicious of the very categories of better, useful, appropriate, productive, and valuable, as these are understood in the present order, and refuses to take them as nonscientific presuppositions about which one can do nothing." - Max Horkheimer (Traditional and Critical Theory
+
+It stands to reason that in order to recruit for a worldview which requires the destruction and replacement of the "present order", whether through "ruthless criticism", "denouncing" or the attitude of being suspicious to all that is "valuable", that one would necessarily take on a position which despairs about things such as they are and that, as a collective endeavour, one would seek out, identify, or induce in others a similar sentiment of finding the current world intolerable. A belief that existence is intolerable would cause one difficulty in their everyday functioning. This is quite amenable to definitions of mental illness, which include describing mental illness as being a condition or behavioural pattern which "causes significant distress", "impairment of personal functioning", the "reduced ability for a person to function effectively", and so on. This is, for example, something commonly described of college or university level students of climate science when teachers detail the need to provide their students with additional exam time, or the ability to retake their exams, due to the students being so personally affected by their understanding of the threats they are faced with by virtue of the insight in to the matter that was afforded to them through their study of the course.
+
+Herbert Marcuse bemoaned the failure of the working class to realize the limitations of their circumstance of living in an unliberated environment, due to their having settled for trivial and mind-numbing pacifications which make them "one dimensional". His hope was that the negative experience of college students and ethnic minorities would be so severe such as to constitute a "biological" need for revolution:
+
+> "This new consciousness and the instinctual rebellion isolate such opposition from the masses and from the majority of organized labor, the integrated majority, and make for the concentration of radical politics in active minorities, mainly among the young middle-class intelligentsia, and among the ghetto populations. Here, prior to all political strategy and organization, liberation becomes a vital, “biological” need." - Herbert Marcuse (An Essay on Liberation)
+
+For him, this is the basis by which to form what he referred to as a "New Sensibility":
+
+> "These causes are economic-political, but since they have shaped the very instincts and needs of men, no economic and political changes will bring  this historical continuum to a stop unless they are carried through by men  who are physiologically and psychologically able to experience things, and each other, outside the context of violence and exploitation. 
+The new sensibility has become, by this very token, praxis: it emerges in the struggle against violence and exploitation where this struggle is waged for essentially new ways and forms of life: negation of the entire Establishment, its morality, culture; affirmation of the right to build a society in which the abolition of poverty and toil terminates in a universe where the sensuous, the playful, the calm, and the beautiful become forms of existence and thereby the Form of the society itself." - Herbert Marcuse (An Essay on Liberation)
+
+Across the board, whether represented in the formal offerings of specific collectivist philosophies, or as can be deduced through fleshing out the logical conclusion of collectivist thinking, the participants will participate when they are agitated by the circumstances such as they to such a degree as to become mentally ill. This is the same reason why Critical Pedagogy, which has embedded itself in all of our children's curricula, was formed under the assumption of helping children make realizations that place them in a state of crisis, and then using that mental state to guide them towards transformation, as was stated by Kevin Kumashiro when he said that "Educators have a responsibility to draw students into a possible crisis". Put another way, and has been pronounced in every other area of thought based on Critical Theory (Race, Gender/Sexuality, Marxist Liberation Theology, Cultural Marxism, Intersectionality, and so on), humans must wake up to Critical Consciousness, and it's important to understand the connection between mental illness and Critical Consciousness, be them synonymous or as simply bearing a notable relationship.
+
+###### Struggle Illness
+
+Additionally, as an implemented instance of collectivist activist formation provides the means by which to struggle others and declare what their moods, behaviours, opinions and actions should be, we find an attractive opportunity for persons bearing psychopathological traits to leverage the situation to their advantage. Though this may seem simply as an opportunity for them to exercise the behaviours that they find appealing and gratifying, as programs placed in professional settings by which to enforce adoption of the collectivist ideals and adherence to their corresponding dictates, those who are the most apathetic about leveraging mechanisms of their enforcement in order to distinguish themselves in a corporate or academic environment should be expected to adopt and master the practices most readily. When ethics and morality are not simply evaluated by holding the correct opinion, but are now no longer shown to be lacking in those who don't have them due to the manner by which they can circumvent a dispassionate analysis through maximally focusing on identity and linguistically verified ideological commitment will find a new advantage that may have previously been missing. For these reasons, we should expect a quicker and more sustainable path of ascension in professional settings by those bearing psychopathological traits, such as those referred to as cluster B (especially narcissistic personality disorder of both the grandiose and vulnerable variety).
+
+Lastly, we should speak to the question of nature vs nurture in the context of psychopathology as mental illness. Though it's commonly asserted that there are inherent predispositions and that, at a certain point, it doesn't make much of a difference to ascertain precisely what moment of early life the instantiation of a disorder may have began, so long as it's early enough to be remarked as an inherent trait, there's something to be said for the acting out of identities in a group setting whereby the identity itself is expected to receive praise and glorification on the basis of its oppressed status, insight of consciousness, ethical virtues and so forth. As the identity must be made visible, the practice of constructing the aesthetic is intrinsically superficial. This, in tandem with the expectation of receiving praise and status necessarily leads to the issue of acting out narcissistic behaviour, whether through the manner in which it affects the performer, or through simply having to go through the actions which will validate the assertion of the identity.
+
+We can hypothesize about whether an individual not otherwise predisposed to such a psychopathology might come into reacting to cult initiation through the adoption of a "Critical identity" and having to perform in a manner which puts them through the motions of a narcissistic personality disorder. I cannot say whether such a person would adopt the disorder or simply appear to be affected by it, nor could I furthermore comment as to whether such a person, if having been affected by it, would come to alleviate themselves from such effects after having fallen out of favour with the collectivist cult and, furthermore, renounced the performance of the identity. One should hope for a full recovery, but it is nevertheless a complication to consider.
+
+Children are always going to be more susceptible to these malicious psychological assaults for many obvious reasons. Having less experience always leaves one with more plasticity of character and open to suggestion. Receiving messaging enticing and advising the adoption of certain world-views, particularly from those in a role of authority, but also simply from peers who are lavished with attention from other cult members, and who appear confident and manically enthusiastic about the undertaking, can play a forcefully persuasive role in pressuring one to participate. Facilitating participation even further is that the means of adoption is simply going to be the use of language. This is not just randomly composed language, but the language of cult initiation which has refined itself through many iterations, and which is composed such as to be introduced through topics of interest, popular culture, professional and academic materials, and even simply the messaging which occurs in the environments where affairs of each of these occur.
+
+The identities which correspond to various domains of cult collectivism are hierarchical in terms of their moral standing, access to power, notoriety, and, by extension, and in the view of young persons, the degree to which it corresponds with being fashionable, current, cringey, cool, and so forth. This provides the ingredients for the most powerful form of group struggle to date, which follows in the vein of Maoist ideological indoctrination and thought reform, as was best detailed by Robert Jay Lifton. Rather than struggling children about their commitment to the "People's Party" or their ability to recite the nation's tenets as related to a great endeavour of the nation, the struggle session now pervades all aspects of their learning environment. As mentioned before, when not explicitly in the curriculum, it's found in the messaging of the environment through the choice, title and descriptions of the events taking place, the programs available to students as per their proclaimed and/or designated identities, and the degree to which punishment and accountability must now take into consideration through Culturally Responsive Social Justice in education. That some children are considered more responsible in a conflict and others are punished less severely in order to address "racial equity" in spite of what might have transpired pushes a child to assume an identity which they believe will protect and serve them in asymmetrically mediated conflicts.
+###### Mental Healthism
+
+Preceding all of this, and something which I remember from my own public school experience of the late 80s through 90s (graduated OAC, which was equivalent to a 13th grade, in 2000) was an increased focus on mental health of students and a desire to identify children which might be suffering from a mental disorder. I saw school mates all around me come to believe they had issues with mental health, with some of them being given counseling, and others ending up with a pharmaceutical regimen by which to "address" their issue. I even had a few instances of teachers or counsellors suggesting to me that I may have a disorder because of not appearing to exhibit the normal range of behaviours that they expect from their students.
+
+Of course, it could have been the bullying or the lack of a meaningful social connection with some of my peers, which would very much constitute good reason for someone exhibiting signs of sadness or frustration, but that this is a mental health issue an that I should have it examined. I never forgot one such experience, as it seemed to me that, in an isolated environment with a teacher who had no training as a psychologist, who seemed to be dramatizing the my situation to me in such a manner that seemed inappropriate, even from my own perspective a 12 year old child, and who seemed to want to suggest to me that I was not well.
+
+Looking back on it, I think that all children have their challenges, and my personality and interests may have made me less suited to a typical classroom environment, at least insofar as it is optimal for a child's development, but that the thoughts, feelings, behaviours and so forth that I exhibited were perfectly within the range of normality, and particularly so when considering that my interests and areas of focus were perhaps not the same as those of my classmates.
+
+The tendency to diagnose normal behaviour as a mental illness has been referred to as Mental Healthism by Dr. Bruce Scott and though I don't necessarily agree with his analysis (he blames it, much in the same way as Marcuse, as being a tool by which to force people to conform to capitalism), he's certainly correct in claiming that mental health diagnostics, classifications and the increased disposition to identify opportunities to people, and particularly children, as suffering from a disorder as evidenced by their not having conformed to typical expectations, is a phenomenon which, when coupled with the focus on the need to exhibit a Critical identity associated with having a deeper consciousness about the world in which we live in, and one's special, unique or enhanced cognitive modality, creates pressure and opportunity for a child to adopt a designation of mental illness both to satisfy those interests which seek to place that designation, but also to satisfy the child's belief that they have a remarkably set of characteristics which includes qualities of character, knowledge, and a specific placement in the social hierarchy.
+
+The light form of this is the temptation to claim that one is neuroatypical or neurodivergent. While it might sound perfectly reasonable for some who feel dissimilar from their peers, such as through their interests or the manner in which they approach or absorb information, it's worth taking a moment to think about what it would take for you yourself as a child in a group setting to consider yourself as not being typical, not having a typical mind, not being plain, not being average, and so forth. Being neuroatypical could alleviate the need to be held to the same standard as your peers, such as any expectation that other people are able to verify whether or not you comprehend something. If you assume others aren't able to hold you to a standard, then you can assert anything about your capabilities without evidence, feeding your ego, believing that you may be able to circumvent evaluations that you are otherwise anxious about, and so forth. You might think that you are more evolved than the average, or part of a new evolution of the species. You could even think that it indicates you have special emotional faculties which confer special value.
+
+That isn't to say that none of those things are true, but consider whether these factors might cause you to choose to believe that you are "neuroatypical", and how this might relate to other designations, such as how it plays into "non-conforming" identities, placing you within the spectrum of oppressed peoples bearing an inherent Critical Consciousness. This is particularly important when considering how it contrasts with mere "allyship" if you happen to otherwise be someone who would be stereotyped as having a privileged or oppressor identity.
+
+###### Beyond Allyship
+
+Placing the suggestion of oppressor vs oppressed in the frame of the Master/Slave dialectic isn't just an amusing experiment, but is rather germane in light of the fact that many Critical theorists, their contemporaries, base their view on Marxist implementations of what we might call a Hegelian metaphysic (if we wish to park it there, as we could argue that it goes back further) and, as such, draw from the hypothesized framework of the Master/Slave dialectic:
+
+> "For the master's tools will never dismantle the master's house." - Audre Lorde
+
+!TODO: refresher?
+In fact, the whole notion that different knowledge can be found among those of different identities is based on this very concept. If not, then the Critical Theorist would relinquish their undertaking of praxis and understand that a realist endeavour of providing access to knowledge and development to be pursued universally, without any concept of class consciousness, would be the best path for resolving social conflict. Instead, the bottleneck for progress becomes the execution of transformative praxis predicated on the knowledge which has been hidden in the minds, bodies and experience of the oppressed. Experience which is verified upon their expression of the angst and turmoil to which they have been subjected.
+
+> "the great humanistic and historical task of the oppressed: to liberate themselves and their oppressors as well. The oppressors, who oppress, exploit, and rape by virtue of their power, cannot find in this power the strength to liberate either the oppressed or themselves. Only power that springs from the weakness of the oppressed will be sufficiently strong to free both." - Paulo Freire (Pedagogy of the Oppressed)
+
+This is why it's never enough to be an "ally". An ally can never be the one to liberate anyone at all - the oppressed, themselves, or the oppressor. Those privileged by whiteness can become allies by doing the work of learning about systemic oppression by centering and listening to the stories of minoritized peoples, but doing so is also an act of oppression which imposes demand of emotional labour on the oppressed while benefiting through becoming less ignorant and seeking a status of The Good White.
+
+With this in mind, for a cisheteronormative, able-bodied and light-skinned settler who is seen as the beneficiary of whiteness and colonialism, the most modest step towards an identity which is not limited to the singular, narrow and dead consciousness of the oppressor, is to declare the experience of some form of mental anguish, psychological difficulty or emotional turmoil. It comes through showing that they are "strong" enough to be open about their "mental health" challenge, and the fact of them not merely being a plain and typical oppressor; these characteristics are, in fact, complementary attributes, which is to say that the pain of my experience is my superpower.
 
 #### Getting Into The Substance
 
-Essentially, it is a continuation of the same mentality that would have led to genocide and racism in the past but society and infrastructure are more complex and developed. There is some of the following at play:
+Though we've examined some of the ways in which everyone is susceptible to ideological frameworks which incentivize one's capacity for delusion through the perceived expectation of a collective process which alleviates the perception of limitations to one's organism and experience through their body, and furthermore the insidious nature of idea parasites which become embedded in domains of thought, discussion, research and production, the principal issue here is that these implements of collectivist initiation are set in place and advocated for by those of the higher echelons of society.
+
+There is nothing new under the sun. At least, not fundamentally, though concepts and technologies develop and allow for the same forces to attain somewhat different results. The darker inclinations of human mind, allowing fear, lust for vengeance and retribution for the limitations of the order of being, set us on paths that ultimately lead to conflict where the worst forms include not just racism and othering, but desecration, defilement and genocide. As a continuation of the previous mentality which might be, at its root, something permitted because of the elevated faculties placed atop a beastly construct, we are now witnessing its unfoldment with society and infrastructure that are more complex and developed. This edified buffer permits us ever greater slack as we grow discordant with the blueprint of a resilient species and feed some more injurious possibilities.
+
+Though it's easy to assume that the dehumanizing behaviours emerge from those whose actions exhibit the greatest barbarism, it's with a bit of irony that some aspects of the descriptions brought forth by Critical theorists have some truth to them in the sense that the dehumanizing ideas and behaviours come from some of those who are perceived as the most sensible, elite and refined among us. There is some of the following at play:
 - Seeing as other and unlike
 - Noble beast
 - Controlling the unknown
 - Seeing as lesser
 
-Whether disgust, fear or pity and self-aggrandizement, the true settler is whomsoever wields the wand to reify some notion of critical identity - an ID claiming and promising... ?? // TODO: what?
+Through some combination of disgust, fear, pity and a need for self-aggrandizement, the true settler takes every opportunity to wield the wand which reifies some notion of critical identity. In designating the label of human types, proto-human types, subhuman types, and so forth, they paint a story which reinforces all their claims and places a weight of burden, in the form of promises, upon all of society. Promises which, when fulfilled, make their claims true.
+
+And when I say proto-human, I mean that literally:
+
+> "I know it’s not fair to Neanderthals, but by calling Trump one, we only insult ourselves, since we’re all a little bit Neanderthal – especially those who voted to put him back in office." - Peter Sahlins, Professor of History Emeritus, University of California (Counterpunch: Is Trump a Neanderthal?)
+
+After all, in all collectivist thought, unless one fashions oneself a non-human, the semantics of inclusion/exclusion serve as a proxy for defining who is truly human, or worthy of being a representative or propagator of humanity.
 
 And this is the common theme because as soon as the argument has been made about the existence of an identity and a moral imperative arising from it as reality, you are now committed to that perception about an indefinite quantity of some form or another. The commitment is to a representation of the world which bears some meaning to the subject in question, yet it is also a commitment to swathes of humans; they are now constraints.
 
-This cheap conception of a rich tapestry of different people with infinite variation and locally-tuned awareness is being supplanted with a model which stands for the state and which imposes a life by rule, and rule by law.
+The notion of identity is always a cheap conception, and always suggests a fragmented view of humanity where we are ultimately trapped in silos and liable to engage in conflict. Though humans can have infinite variety of experience and be developed in myriad ways, to suppose that their identities are bound to something which isn't universally available to all humans leads to the questions of what makes someone truly human and what makes someone a better human. We made good progress towards falling into the trap of assuming certain presentations, ethnicities, cultures and classes of humans haven't value to offer and are unworthy of dignity. If we are to play with this idea of separating ourselves such as to make our claim to knowledge implicit through collectivist mythology, then we essentially give up on our own endeavour to better understand the world and overcome its limitations. The casualty is always our rich tapestry of different people with infinite variation and locally-tuned awareness is being supplanted with a model which stands for the state and which imposes a life by rule, and rule by law.
 
 I think that the best term to refer to it is abomination, in that it is obscene, tragic and possibly evil that mankind develops concepts and systems with ever-greater sophistication in the sense of presenting, declaring, elucidating and promising:
 - Presenting: the appearance and opportunity to achieve justice