Tuesday, January 14, 2020

Quickies: Trends In Collectivism

     Collectivism – broadly speaking, the doctrine that the group is prior and superior to the individual – is the root of all political evil. However, its form can change over time, according to the strategic vision of the collectivists. Ace of Spades notes this in a swift but massively illuminating comment:

     Bernie Sanders is the conventional class-warfare socialist while Elizabeth Warren is the new breed of identity-politics socialist. Elizabeth Warren has run on little except identity politics.

     Hell, she owes her entire career to identity politics, pretending to be a Native American, but only when searching for a job or angling for a promotion.

     So, in response to Sanders' dismissal of her as yet another rich bored leftwing woman with a White Savior complex, Elizabeth Warren did the only thing Elizabeth Warren knows how to do -- she played the Identity Politics Victim card.

     Sanders’s collectivism follows the Marxian model of economic class warfare. Warren’s collectivism is about “oppressed” and “marginalized” groups. In both cases, these...persons seek to get susceptible voters to see their interests as indistinguishable from those of a group – and to have “rights” associated with that group, rather than with any individual member. That way, anyone who is superficially a member of one such group, but who differs with the collectivist’s assertion of its interests, can be denounced as a traitor to his class, his race, his sex, his orientation, his ethnic heritage, or his delusion.

     And there are millions who are seduced by it.

3 comments:

Paul Bonneau said...

I don't like collectivism either; however collectivism per se is not evil. Imposition is. There are examples of people who live collectively who do not impose on their neighbors. Leave them be.

Also I think it is more appealing to the muddled middle for us to fight imposition rather than all forms of collectivism.

Finally, the collectivists mostly cannot learn how bad collectivism is unless they experience it themselves: "There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence for themselves." -- Will Rogers

Therefore, the remedy is not to stop socialists wanting socialism, but to let them have it - without our participation. Secession, Panarchy and subsidiarity are the way to go.

NITZAKHON said...

"And there are millions who are seduced by it. "

Because it's easy. Blame someone else. Avoid responsibility. Succumb to ENVY and LUST and WRATH. Socialism (and Islam) leverage human weaknesses to grow rather than the much harder path of thought, reason, self-control / satisfaction-denial required by Christianity and Judaism.

Francis W. Porretto said...

Where are your reading skills, Paul? Read the first sentence again: "Collectivism...is the root of all political evil. The desire of some fruitcakes to live on a commune is irrelevant!