Sshh. Art is happening.
A Society Without Money. Or Brains.
Cambodia was to return to ‘Year Zero,’ and recover its former glory, removed from the modern world and the unnecessary corruption of its influences. In order to facilitate the eradication of capitalism, the National Bank was blown apart and all forms of money were banned. Marriages were now arranged by the state, and children were taught to obey the government instead of their parents… By May 1978, the effort to produce a communist system of agriculture had failed utterly and the population was starving… Throughout this period, the emptied city of Phnom Penh stood as a ghost town, a reminder of a lost civilisation of business and commerce.
Matthew Blackwell on the megalomaniacal horrors of the Khmer Rouge. One of these.
Narcissism Versus Reality, Part 4,098
The Obstructing-Traffic-And-Frustrating-Random-People-While-Feeling-Immensely-Self-Satisfied Thing™ first came to my attention during the Occupy fad-cum-gap-year, and it rapidly degenerated into opportunist thuggery and self-indulgent farce. A high point being when a Mao-ling mother placed her four-year-old daughter on active train tracks.
Since then, in the name of “teaching others to care,” we’ve seen self-righteous mobs deliberately blocking the paths of ambulances and giving paramedics the finger, while exulting in their power to alarm, frustrate and coerce. And to endanger lives with collective impunity. And we’ve seen fearless, selfless anti-Trump protestors surrounding and terrorising a lone female driver by trying to smash her car’s windscreen into her face, and videoing her distress for their own amusement and peer-group cred. All done in the name of forcing others to be compassionate.
And at which point, what you’re seeing isn’t politics or protest. It’s sociopathy.
The Thrill Of Woke Retailing
Andy Ngo on the inexplicable demise of an intersectionally feminist bookstore:
The customer wasn’t always right. In fact, he was expected to “abide by” seven “guidelines” including this one: “Cishetero-patriarchy exists, white supremacy exists, ableism exists, racism exists, colonialism never ended, capitalism is bad. This is not a space where we argue about the basics of the situation.” […] Signs denouncing police, the U.S. military and immigration authorities lined the windows. Inside, I looked at some of the merchandise for sale. There were “Riots not diets” buttons and a “Fuck patriarchy” T-shirt. The latter was double-extra-large—too big for me.
The Wrong Kind Of Hispanic
When questioned, some Hispanic students took responsibility for their own shortcomings and successes, citing the importance of hard work, rather than blaming “white privilege.”
Safekeeping
Before the British came [to India], there was no indigenous tradition of exploring or conserving antiquity. The wonderful Buddhist stupas of the Mauryan empire (circa 2nd century BC) were destroyed, abandoned and forgotten during the Hindu revival, and then many Hindu temples met a similar fate during Muslim invasions from the 12th century… The fact is that we have no idea what would have become of the world’s ‘looted’ antiquities if they hadn’t been preserved in Western collections. Would the treasures of Beijing’s Summer palace have survived Mao’s Cultural Revolution? Would the Elgin marbles have survived Turkish tour guides chopping off chunks to sell as souvenirs? Would ISIS have spared those Middle Eastern artefacts that survive in European museums?
Zareer Masani on preserving antiquity. One of these.
Possessions Decolonised
Laurie Penny, a noted advocate of looting and thievery, finds herself being robbed. The irony escapes her.
June 28, 2018: Reader Tips
We kick start this evening’s tips thread with Coldplay — Viva La Vida.
The Rules Have Been Updated
Apparently, black men are the new white men and should be scorned and silenced accordingly.
Coping With Trump, The Feminist Way
You see, when your preferred candidate loses an election, what you really need is some channelling of ancestral spirituality. As opposed to say, a sense of proportion. And so Ms Quintanilla lists some “spiritual practices” in order to enable fellow feminists to cope with the unutterable trauma that is their lives… Suggestions include feeling the breeze, watching trees grow, and, er, pushing up against said trees. No, I don’t know either. But apparently, if your psyche has been exploded and rendered unto dust by the election of someone other than Hillary Clinton, you should immediately find a tree and push up against it. It’s the feminist way.
Why Debate When You Can Harass And Humiliate?
Tomorrow is the one-year anniversary of the day that 50 Evergreen students – students that I had never met – disrupted my class, accusing me of racism and demanding my resignation. I tried to reason with them… Their response surprised me, and it would take months for me to fully understand what had happened. The protestors had no apparent interest in the very dialogue they seemed to invite. I was even more surprised by the protestors’ fervour in shouting down my actual students – some of whom had known me for years. The cruelty and derision reserved for students of colour who spoke in my defence was particularly chilling.
Bret Weinstein on his career-changing encounter with “social justice” Mao-lings. One of these.
What Your Betters Think Of You
So anyway, there’s a large, rather lavish room in which wealthy and statusful people are giving each other prizes. Then, rather incongruously, a particularly wealthy and statusful person steps onto the stage and shouts “Fuck Trump!” At which point, the other wealthy and statusful people rise to their feet, applauding, and whistling, and cheering. As if something terribly brave had just taken place.
Hoping The Crocodile Will Eat You Last
“Dismantling the white supremacist hetero-patriarchy” is apparently something that small eateries should do now, ostentatiously, above all else, and is best achieved by firing female employees for the sin of doing their jobs.
When appeasement encourages more of the same, only louder and more hysterical.
He Teaches Children, You Know
“I just don’t want little Caucasians overrunning my life,” the educator subsequently explained.
She’s A “Leader in Journalism,” You Know
Some thoughts on Laurie Penny, the British left’s foremost unreliable narrator.
Lefties Project, Part 384
Humans Against Hate, a group of anonymous Portland activists, rails against the “oppression” of ideas being discussed – specifically, during a scheduled visit by Jordan Peterson. Naturally, they invoke neighbourliness, while also threatening to shut down other, unrelated events, thereby spoiling the evenings of thousands of random people.
A Place That Doesn’t Exist
Konstantin Kisin on the unhappy realities of ‘progressive’ utopia:
These enemies of the [Soviet] state included my great-grandparents who met in a concentration camp for political prisoners. Every morning at their camp, three people would be picked out at random from the general population of the camp and thrown into the icy waters of the lake to freeze and drown in full view of the other prisoners to ‘keep things under control.’
With this background, I am —perhaps understandably— hypersensitive to the emerging far-left in Western politics. I can’t help noticing similarities in the rhetoric about “eradicating inequality,” “smashing the class system,” and a new age of “radical egalitarianism.” And when I do, I shudder, because… it’s a reminder of the unforgiving reality that those who don’t realise how good they have it, or take their lives of plenty for granted, are vulnerable to demagogic ideologies that promise to tear it all down to build a ‘better tomorrow.’
Shakedown Merchants
“You’re a mean, mad white man.”
Jordan Peterson attempts to discuss “white privilege” with sociology professor Michael Dyson.
But Remembering Facts Is Hard
Heather Mac Donald on standards versus “diversity”:
Yale has created a special undergraduate laboratory course that aims to enhance minority students’ “feelings of identifying as a scientist.” It does so by being “non-prescriptive” in what students research; they develop their own research questions. But “feelings” are only going to get you so far without mastery of the building blocks of scientific knowledge. Mastering those building blocks involves the memorisation of facts, among other skills. Assessing student knowledge of those facts can produce disparate results. The solution is to change the test or, ideally, eliminate it. A medical school supervisor recently advised a professor to write an exam that was less “fact-based” than the one he had proposed, even though knowledge of pathophysiology and the working of drugs, say, entails knowing facts.
Contradictions Are A Feature, Not A Bug
One of many woke dilemmas.