Remember when Sixties hippies on the left wanted to “Question Authority”?
If you’re of a certain age, like I am, you probably remember those bumper stickers that exhorted us all to Question Authority. It was the mark of a thinking person not to take everything at face value, in particular the words of the government or government agencies.
I remember once going to an SDS meeting when I was in college. I was never a leftist but I suppose I was toying with it a bit at the time (this was during the Vietnam War). But what I saw and heard at that meeting repelled me on a gut level and I never went back. That one meeting cured me of any interest in taking the left as an authority on anything, except their angry, ranting, incoherent, narcissistic selves.
I wish I could remember what was said, but I don’t. I only remember the sense I had of dangerous people who were also stupid, and yet very very arrogant. That just about summed it up.
And now we have those same people, grown old, but they’re not running social media. It’s a younger crowd, and they have decided not only that they’re not going to Question Authority when the Democrats are in charge, but they’re not going to let anyone else Question Authority either.
And so we have this sort of thing:
…[I]n April Facebook blackballed a mother for daring to criticize the radical Marxist and racist policies of her school board.
Since then, Facebook has shut down a pro-Israel Christian site with 77 million followers and blocked the viewing of reviews of a climate book by former Obama science advisor Steve Koonin that raised doubts about the theory of human-caused climate change.
Facebook has made this announcement:
During these initial tests we’ll explore a variety of ways to rank political content in people’s feeds using different signals, and then decide on the approaches we’ll use going forward. COVID-19 information from authoritative health organizations like the CDC and WHO, as well as national and regional health agencies and services from affected countries, will be exempt from these tests. Content from official government agencies and services will also be exempt.
This isn’t just Facebook; it’s everywhere. The left wants freedom of speech when the left is not in control. But once it does take control, the left wants to shut up anyone who disagrees or questions the authority of the left.
“Questioning authority”, “fighting the establishment”, “opposing the system”, and “speaking truth to power” , amongst other hackneyed leftist cliches, no longer have anything to with the “progressive” weltanschauung now that the “long march” has succeeded far beyond what radicals might have imagined in the days of SDS and the New Left. In fact, it has been amusingly noted, by today’s conservative dissidents and by clever contrarians on the right, that what leftists now engage in most of all is speaking power to truth.
I too in the late 60s went to some SDS meetings at MSU and later at WMU. After the first one what I and my friends went there to do was ask questions of the “leaders” and get kicked out, but we were always stoned then and thought it fun.
Over the decade from ’66 to ’76 my views changed to what is now called conservative. Of the Left, to repeat myself from the George Floyd thread.
It, for any and every it, is never about what the Left says it’s about. It is only and always about power and the money that power brings. Period.
Eventually they may just get the totalitarian state they are working so hard for and discover that they are the new Soviet SR’s or the German SA as they too get rounded up for a camp.
People, get the to alternatives to Facebook.
GeoffB sums it up well: with leftists, everything, absolutely everything, is about power and control. That is the final and only end; everything else is merely a means. Authority should be questioned…when it is not the authority of the left. Dissent is patriotic, when dissenting from a non-leftist position or authority. Diversity is our strength…as long as there is uniformity that the leftist paradigm is unquestionably true in every detail. And so on…
I am younger (43) than most people who regularly post here. My first encounters with ‘the left’ (as opposed to ordinary liberal Democrats) were in the 90s, both in college and when I worked as a union organizer in the summer of 1997. They were distinctly unpleasant experiences. I was a mainstream Democrat at the time, center-left for certain, but not socialist or even ‘social democrat’. That was unacceptable to them. I was repeatedly shouted down and/or condescended to, for asking too many questions and voicing too much dissent, no matter how civil I framed it. It was a learning experience for me, and definitely one of the first seeds of doubt which would ultimately lead to my moving right a decade later.
Now the left controls most of the Democrat party, much of the MSM and social media, is making serious inroads in the military, all organized religion (including fundamentalists like the SBC), etc. We are seeing the results
College kids today absolutely accept authority. The Creighton women’s rowing team had to wear masks while rowing. I came across a bunch of female undergrads next to the lake. They wanted me to take their pictures. I asked them to remove their masks. They said they couldn’t because, “Creighton makes us.”
Back in the 70’s, no way would we have accepted that.
Cornhead:
If their photos, maskless, somehow got onto the Interweb be sure that some Karenwaffen would not rest until they were kicked out of Creighton (and off the rowing team?). Because “justice” or “safety” or “white privilege.”
Om: I am SO adopting “karenwaffen”!
Godessoftheclassroom:
It’s a “ubernamen” (?) but someone else on the web Ace(?) or streiff (?) came up with it.
https://redstate.com/streiff/2021/04/27/cdc-changes-guidance-on-facemasks-karenwaffen-hardest-hit-n369904
The Soviet Union spent a whole lot of money jamming US radio broadcasts, in an attempt to ensure that their citizens did not hear unapproved thoughts. But they had no way of absolutely banning unapproved thoughts in private conversations between friends (although they could and did make the expression of such thoughts risks)
But in America today, a large % of what would previously have been in-person or telephone conversations between friends is now mediated by social media and subject to suppression.
Yep, now that they run most things they’ve changed their tune to suppress any free speech they disagree with. And I once thought FB was mostly harmless.
The unmasking happens here in Mass this weekend. People here (Nantucket) are fairly paranoid and closely track the number of cases. I’ve had the Karenwaffen (I love this moniker!) point out I’m maskless as I’m taking out a mask just prior to entering a store.
Seriously, I thought at the very beginning based on their behavior, that antifa stood for anti-first amendment.
Go Broncos!
H G Wells’ 1933 novel The Shape of Things to Come posits the emergence of the Air Dictatorship: global rule established by a technocratic group that begins with the imposition of a monopoly over global trade networks and especially control over the air. Benevolent, rule, of course, as Wells saw it.
We now seem to be falling into de facto rule by a Communications Dictatorship, or at least a Communications Oligarchy. See my post Comm Check:
https://chicagoboyz.net/archives/64898.html
Old hippie Deadhead friend of mine came out in favor of vaccine passports the other day, expressing outrage that bad people are circulating blank forms to evade the authorities. I considered razzing him about questioning authority etc, but have pretty much given up arguing with people now.
This is why I also have a MeWe account, and am ready to switch when needed.
}}} People, get the to alternatives to Facebook.
The problem, Art, is that 95% of people I want to talk to and 95% of the things I want to interact with are still locked onto FB.
They haven’t begun to really purge people, yet, for having independent thoughts.
Truman was particularly irked by the “professional liberal,” whom he distinguished from “real liberals” like himself. Professional liberals lived by slogans and saw American politics as an ideological war, which Truman considered alien to the genius of the Democratic party. In his lifetime the party was a sort of political melting pot in which conservative Southerners and moderate border-state men like Truman found common ground with Eastern liberals. “Professional liberals are too arrogant to compromise,” Truman said. “In my experience they were also very unpleasant people on a personal level. Behind their slogans about saving the world and sharing the wealth with the common man lurked a nasty hunger for power. They’d double-cross their own mothers to get it or keep it.”
Eight Days With Harry Truman
https://www.americanheritage.com/eight-days-harry-truman
I believe it’s “Classical Liberals” vs. “PostModern Liberals”.
The PMLs have slowly replaced the CLs, to the point where 95% or more of self-ID’d liberals are PMLs, when you dig deep.
And PMLs are the “Professional Liberals” that Truman speaks of.
Some online wag once commented that when Red Diaper Barry took power, the Left began covering their “Question Authority” bumper stickers with the ones that said, “OBEY!”
when Red Diaper Barry took power
His mother and father separated in September 1961 and in the succeeding 21 years he only spent five weeks in sum in the same city with the man.
There is no indication his mother was ever a member of the Communist Party or any adjacent organization. She was an NGO functionary obsessed with Indonesian village handicrafts.
His mother also relied on her 2d husband and her parents to clean up after her until she was nearly 40, and that included leaving him in the care of his grandparents while she pursued her own objects. She also blew up her 2d marriage when her husband said he’d like to have more than one kid. He and his mother never lived in the same city after 1975 and while she was in a hospital in Honolulu expiring from cancer, he was at some witless political demonstration in Washington. Here’s a suggestion: the attention and affection she received from him was pro-forma and she had little influence on his thinking.
As for his grandparents, who actually put some sweat equity into him, there isn’t much indication they had any investment in public affairs at all. (His grandmother’s response to press inquiries in 2007-08 was to tell them she was ill, go away).
… when Red Diaper Barry took power, the Left began covering their “Question Authority” bumper stickers with the ones that said, “OBEY!” — Bilwick
John Carpenter alert, with the great cult classic “They Live.”
From IMDB:
From Wikipedia:
Obey Clothing (stylized as OBEY) is a clothing company founded in 2001 by street artist and illustrator Shepard Fairey as an extension to his work in activism. The company appropriates themes and images used in its clothing from the John Carpenter film They Live.
Shepard Fairey is also the guy that created the Obama HOPE poster.
If you haven’t fallen asleep yet, there is this absurdity,
https://www.elephantjournal.com/2013/06/how-did-obey-go-from-an-anti-corporate-anti-man-street-un-brand-to-made-in-china-fratboy-wear/
Or does it all make perfect sense?
Art + Deco,
Neither Obama’s mother, father or grandparents were the formative political and cultural influence upon Barack Obama. Search “Frank Marshall Davis” who was Obama’s mentor and a life long, avowed communist. Reportedly, Obama spent many years under Marshall’s tutelage. Here’s a starting point: https://america-wake-up.com/2012/07/28/obamas-communist-mentors-advisors-connecting-the-dots/
Add to that, “Mr. Obama recalled the opening lines of the Arabic call to prayer, reciting them with a first-rate accent. Mr. Obama described the call to prayer as “one of the prettiest sounds on Earth at sunset.”
One might wonder how Obama reconciles two diametrically opposed totalitarian ideologies. But then, raving narcissists never let contradictions trouble them.
I was born in 1970 and am just old enough to remember hearing or seeing the phrase “ Never trust anyone over 30.” Even then I thought the people saying that were stupid, as I respected the older crowd and realized the people saying it would be over 30 soon enough, if they lived long enough.
I have not had any respect for the “ left” since I was aware of their existence.
Is it Die, Der, or Das?
“Der”, sounds right for a waffen.
Or, “die” fur Karen.
Perhaps a German speaker can provide the proper article.
It’s destined to see a lot of Internet repetition, so might as well get it right from the git-go.
DNW:
Looks like its up to you. Wouldn’t want incorrect information on the Interwebs:
“All your base are belong to us.”
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/all-your-base-are-belong-to-us
Ahh…don’t worry. The little numb-headed cretins at Facebook just allowed discussion of the origin of the Wuhan virus being from…well…from Wuhan. More specifically, the virology lab in Wuhan.
I wonder if they asked Xi if this was OK?
It must be so hard to keep track of all of the fictions they protect over at Facebook.
Search “Frank Marshall Davis” who was Obama’s mentor and a life long, avowed communist.
Davis was a personal friend of Stanley Dunham. They played checkers and smoked dope together.
Davis was sent out to Hawaii to take a position on the staff of the west coast Longshoremen, which actually was run by a crypto-Communist, one Harry Bridges. By the time the Dunhams arrived on Oahu 15 years later, he was running his own business. His lines were advertising and distributing paper. The Communist Party’s membership rolls declined by 85% over the period running from 1947 to 1972. What do you think happened to those people? And, yes, people who move out to Hawaii have a tendency to go native. The climate does not sustain social militancy.
My political mentor, btw, was once an aide to Vito Marcantonio. People’s trajectories can surprise you.
“Die Waffen” ist korrekt.
Art + Deco,
Since I was a liberal in 1992, I’m certainly aware that people’s trajectory can change.
Davis running a business that paid the bills bears what relevance to his politics?
All that matters is whether Frank Marshall Davis remained a dedicated communist. Are you aware of any change in Davis’ perspective?
Given Obama’s political preferences, he certainly embraced Davis’ mentorship.
The right is libertarian.
The center is moderate (“conservative”) in America: Pro-Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness, without diversity and other class-based bigotry.
The left side of the governing spectrum is totalitarian. The totalitarian-anarchist, left-right nexus is leftist.
Frank Marshall Davis was a Pederast. Political deviancy just icing on the cake.
Regarding Pederasty, last night’s bedtime was serendipitously Sir Richard Burton’s notes on said topic in his commentary on his translation of the Thousand and One Nights. The entire document makes for interesting reading, not just the Pederasty section. Much very good incisive and decidedly un-PC social commentary on a huge range of topics. What was interesting was that he talks about deviancy in elite circles in Europe cf. the Orient — and there always was plenty to go around. Can’t blame everything on the Usual Suspects, after all! 🙂 Bummer.
My SDS story came from sitting in on a conversation on the quad where a SDS leader was saying how Lenin should be a big part of the college curriculum. From the gushing tone with which she said Lenin, it was apparent that she didn’t mean study Lenin so that one could better know one’s enemy. On the contrary, she considered Lenin one of the great minds of the Western World, on a par with Shakespeare, Plato, or even Marx.
When I heard that, I decided that was the last time I’d associate with SDS. I had 2 reasons for dislike of Lenin. First, I knew a number of Iron Curtain refugees and their children in my hometown. Two of my classmates, in a class of 25, had Iron Curtain refugee parents- and I knew a lot more. Second, I took a Politics course in 9th grade. From having read A Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovitch, I concluded that the Communism was evil. From having written a term paper on Soviet agriculture, I concluded that Communism was a disaster as an economic system.
The SDS leader did have some sense in her, as she never went the Weatherman/Weatherperson route. She has been a state legislator for 2 decades,where it appears she is a typical tax-and-spend Democrat who likes to have her photo taken with political bigwigs.
Neo had an interesting discussion on Franklin Marshall Davis. (April 2009) Obama and the disturbing influence of Frank Marshall Davis
Gringo,
My take on Lenin was that he was a sociopath. A cold blooded murderer whose murderous actions were justified by his ideological fanaticism. Ideological fanaticism and sociopathy are a natural fit for each other. Indeed it can be argued that often, they are two sides of the same coin. Sociopaths are fundamentally disconnected from a conscience and ideological fanatics reject moral restrictions.
@GB:
Yes.
Our (yes, I know) Side won’t win without its own sociopaths. Human history really distills down to what Sociopath A pulled on Sociopath B. The rest is just details and supporting casts.
Addendum: This even more so as soon as age of mass education, mass media and universal suffrage arrived.
Zaphod blowing even more smoke than usual; when you gaze fixidly into the abyss it gazes back.
@om:
Go easy on the Nietzsche; it’s kinky stuff:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lou_Andreas-Salom%C3%A9#/media/File:Nietzsche_paul-ree_lou-von-salome188.jpg
😀
Zaphod links; often analogous to what’s found looking under the rocks.
…bumper stickers…
One of the 60s’ greatest hits: AMERICA–LOVE IT OR LEAVE IT.
Another chestnut: GOD, GUTS & GUNS MADE THIS COUNTRY GREAT.
My all-time favorite:
JESUS LOVES YOU. EVERYONE ELSE THINKS YOU’RE AN A$$HOLE.
(All caps for authenticity)
I was politically undecided in college – voted for McGovern as an undergrad because we all knew Nixon was a crook. In graduate school, I went to one meeting of the “revolutionaries” who wanted to plan a sit-in over some kerfluffle I no longer remember.
As with many others commenting here, that was my last fling with the left; in time, I recognized most of my beliefs accorded better with what American politics labels conservative.
Our lone real anarcho-communist among the Political Science TA’s was such a jerk even the other progressive-leftists wanted nothing to do with him.
DNW:
Die Waffe – the weapon
Die Waffen – the weapons
Nouns ending in -e are feminine in about 90% of the time.
As a non-native student of German I have long struggled with the correct use of German genders.
I found a very good guide: Der, Die, Das The Secrets of German Gender by Constantin Vayenas to be extremely helpful.
Truman was particularly irked by the “professional liberal,” whom he distinguished from “real liberals” like himself. — “In my experience they were also very unpleasant people on a personal level. Behind their slogans about saving the world and sharing the wealth with the common man lurked a nasty hunger for power. They’d double-cross their own mothers to get it or keep it.” – Truman via OBHell
I hold to the very similar Dew Decision Rule on distinguishing “real” ideologists (aka true believers) from “professional” ideologues. You can talk to, and debate with, the ideologists, who are sincere and well-intentioned even if wrong; when you cross the ideologues, they get mean.
The Internet knows Everything – although this doesn’t quite capture the nuance I’m attempting to invoke.
https://wikidiff.com/ideologist/ideologue
“We now seem to be falling into de facto rule by a Communications Dictatorship, or at least a Communications Oligarchy. See my post Comm Check:” – David Foster
I had already read that some other time you posted the link, which I encourage you to continue doing whenever relevant, but it can always bear re-visiting. The comments are worth perusing as well.
“you probably remember those bumper stickers that exhorted us all to Question Authority”
Someone, I forget who, asked “If Authority answers, will you listen?”
Zaphod,
“Our (yes, I know) Side won’t win without its own sociopaths. Human history really distills down to what Sociopath A pulled on Sociopath B.”
There’s a big difference between an ideology driven fanatic/sociopath and a sane individual who recognizes the need for strategic and tactical ruthlessness. The sociopath has no moral issue with the unneccessary killing of innocents. The sane individual, who recognizes the need for ruthlessness, goal is the complete elimination of the sociopath’s ability to resist and the reduction of harm to innocents to the degree that is commensurate with his goal.
As for history, America’s actions in fighting the Nazi’s and the even more brutal Japanese military demonstrates the falsity that it takes one sociopath to defeat another. What it takes is the will to win, the logistical resources needed and the moral recognition between killing and murder.
Davis running a business that paid the bills bears what relevance to his politics?
Have a gander at George McGovern’s remarks about his time in the hotel and conference center business. Or Irving Kristol’s about his time in the military. One was an old man getting an education, the other a young man.
All that matters is whether Frank Marshall Davis remained a dedicated communist. Are you aware of any change in Davis’ perspective?
His revealed preferences, and some understanding (from family members who’ve lived there) about what life in Hawaii is like, suggest to me that he went native. What one relation told me in 1975 would tend to apply: malcontents head back to the Mainland after a few years; it’s too disorienting for them here.
Given Obama’s political preferences, he certainly embraced Davis’ mentorship.
Oh, for crying out loud. Obama is spiteful and secretive, and has a menu of shticks characteristic of a politician of a particular vintage (the green energy boondoggles in particular). His mentality is otherwise perfectly banal in the Democratic Party. Stanley Kurtz big revelation was that he once belonged to Michael Harrington’s outfit. Michael Harrington wasn’t some red commissar; ultimately, he and Irving Howe were promoting Sweden as a model.
Oh yuck. I was born toward the end of the Baby Boom and had older brothers who were quite awful to me. Of course they were and remain radical liberals. I think that generation of male leftists are horribly sexist. And I have never understood why the leftist women who consort with them regard themselves as feminists.
“Obama is spiteful and secretive, and has a menu of shticks characteristic of a politician of a particular vintage (the green energy boondoggles in particular). His mentality is otherwise perfectly banal in the Democratic Party.” Art + Deco
For an intelligent, presumably informed man, that is a remarkably obtuse analysis of Barack Obama. He is far more radical than you imagine. Like Bill Clinton, he recognizes the value in playing his cards close to his vest and presenting himself as a moderate. Nor does the mentality of “perfectly banal democrats” have many years long associations with depraved individuals like Rev. Wright and Bill Ayers. Much less pose for smiling portraits with the likes of a Louis Farrakan.
For an intelligent, presumably informed man, that is a remarkably obtuse analysis of Barack Obama. He is far more radical than you imagine.
No, I’m seeing what is; you’re doing the imagining.
have many years long associations with depraved individuals like Rev. Wright and Bill Ayers. Much less pose for smiling portraits with the likes of a Louis Farrakan.
Farrakhan was in Jesse Jackson’s campaign entourage at one point; Obama’s never had an association with the man of that level of intensity. The political culture of the black population in this country stinks, and one manifestation of that ca. 1985 was that Louis Farrakhan could fill Madison Square Garden and the Felt Forum.
As for Rev. Wright, see Steve Sailer. What was notable about Rev. Wright was that his discourse was heavy on Africanisant political babble and light on actual religious themes. Sailer notes that Oprah Winfrey was briefly associated with that congregation, then went elsewhere; Sailer surmises that (1) Winfrey is secure in her understanding of herself as black and (2) doesn’t go to church to hear political speeches. Sailer offers that Obama’s attraction to Wright was a function of a (1) an insecure self-understanding and (2) a fundamentally secular outlook. Obama got his religious education from Stanley Dunham, who attended a Unitarian congregation because “you get five religions for the price of one”. Into that vacuum marched Jeremiah Wright. (It is odd that Mooch, who had an ample grounding in vernacular black culture, put up with Wright).
As for Ayers and Dohrn, one of them landed a post on the teacher-training faculty of the University of Illinois at Chicago and another landed an associate’s position at Sidley, Austin 18 years after she’d last cracked a law book. Once their legal problems were sorted out, they were treated indulgently by the Chicago establishment. Sad, but that’s life in our times.
As for Ayers and Dohrn what’s a little domestic terrorism (bombs with high explosives not just some Molotov cocktails) in the days of their youthful exuberance? Nothing to see or say about those two and BHO. What is it that Bill Ayers said? “Guilty as hell, free as a bird.” And of course there is the Bill Ayers photo on 9/11 walking on an American flag. Nothing to see or say about BHOs fellow travelers. Funny that. “Legal problems,” how droll.
Graduated high school in northeast Ohio in 1970. Every year there was a lot of FB posting from classmates about Kent State.
This year, zilch.