Disagreement and polarization are not the same thing. To become polarized means to become entrenched within a political position. It has a veritable raison d'être in some cases, but is often just inherently problematic.


Just a generally agreeable statement.


I've never really seen this as the distinction, as I tend to see the general plight as being because of subjugation, and, therefore, situated within an anti-authoritarian, a school of thought that has a history within the Left, and authoritarian dispute. My assumption was more or less just motivated by the rather fanatical precept that only the libertarian Left was an Ethical choice. To apply the metaphor within the framework of Anarchism, I see that it was sort of like my postulate that anyone decent would've have to have chosen Peter Kropotkin from the original Anarchists, if you will. It seems to make an odd kind of sense, but ultimately doesn't add up to very much and is more misleading than otherwise.


By that same token, though, isn't trying Donald Trump for treason kind of excessive? He's been made enough of an example of already.

Granted, by no means do I think that I should have to entertain tired old arguments, take the teaching of the more fanatical interpretations of Creationism in schools as an example, for instance; I've just found that reading something outside of my general worldview was rather refreshing and wanted to put it out there that open dialogue, despite what I, too, can see in a certain degree of rallying, is just what Politics should actually be like.

The consensus-based decision-making model is not quite what I'm trying to get at here, but, I will say that, within a genuine participatory democracy, it may not fail as it often has in experiments, though am not terribly inclined to advocate in favor of it or against.

In no ways have I made some sort of Orwellian appeal to an ostensive collective will à la We the Living. I think that you have made assumptions about my general ethos because of my stated political philosophy, one, I might add, is relatively free of some of the more oppressive aspects of Marxism-Leninism, as it is counterposed to that as well, where your critiques, if thought a bit more well out, may apply, I suppose.

I'm talking about engaging in political debate as if to discover what potential there is for a better world via open dialogue and have used my own experience to highlight the dangers of becoming entrenched within a specific political ideology to the point of becoming fanatical, which your ostensive polarized clarity does run directly contrary to. It's just about willing to take others' ideas into consideration so as to come to a better understanding of the world.

Well, I'm all for pluralism, but that "polarization clarifies things" runs directly contrary to the general sentiment of this post, which you have claimed to be in agreement with.

In so far that Philosophy is a process of cultivating a way of life, how far beyond the political does it really extend?

I think that, in the text, Marx, somewhat tellingly, posits that the German philosophy of his time would culminate in the abolition of philosophy as such, meaning that, once brought to an ostensive apex, it would cease to be the cultivation of the life of the mind almost exclusively for those of the wealth, status, and class who could afford it and would become a somewhat transcendent project of and for all.

He actually uses the term, "aufheben", which only loosely translates to "abolish".

Above all, one should be a pluralist when it comes to politics because if there was no disagreement there would be no politics at all. Polarization clarifies things. — NOS4A2

I've just posted this thread and another about the text by Karl Marx which includes the statement, "Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.", and, so, am not really one to make such a critique, but I think that there could be an inherent contradiction to your line of reasoning there.

Engaging in the pathology of what recorded version of the play, Hamlet, is "objectively" the best for long enough never to want to think along such lines again is how you can liberate yourself from ever feeling the need to ask such an absurd question.

To be fair, most of her work relates to the Mexican Mafia, as well as that she's on the Church Committee, which I am hoping to be put somehow into effect.

I didn't actually even vote in this election, though, as I was too disappointed by that the Democratic Socialists of America's campaign to elect Bernie Sanders was unsuccessful.

So long!

Apologies for the double-post, but, to explicate further:

Trigger Warning: Brief mention of domestic violence.

Let's say that there is a coalition of anti-authoritarians who effectively wage a nonviolent revolution. It'd probably be more or less comprised of, exclusively, for the sake of brevity, in terms of only political inclinations in regards attitudes towards liberty and economics, as I, of course, wouldn't exclude people concerned with racial justice, LGBTQ+ activists, environmentalists, etc. etc., but don't want for this list to be more than a paragraph long, Libertarian Communists, certain left-wing Communists, some Communization theorists, libertarian socialists, some Autonomists, Anarchists, some democratic socialists, the peace movement, some left-wing Liberals, certain Libertarians, Centrists who are ultimately sympathetic to the libertarian Left, and a set of other theoretical political philosophies that can effectively be inclined towards anti-authoritarianism. As, in order to effectively wage a nonviolent revolution, such a coalition will have needed to have gained mass support, the new political process will, then, have a majority comprised of people who are necessarily inclined towards libertarianism and, in this example, and I would argue that it does follow, egalitarianism. If you are an Individualist Anarchist, which I am not not necessarily, you would probably create a different coalition, but, for the sake of argument, permit me an example. People who were of, for lack of a better term, more authoritative political philosophies, such as less radical Liberalism, Social Democracy, less radical Centrism, or other forms of Libertarianism, would probably want to participate within the political process created by the anti-authoritarian coalition and would form a significant minority, again, for lack of a better term, pragmatic wing. I'm inventing statistics, here, at random, but, let's say that sixty percent of the populace or whatever is aligned with the anti-authoritarian coalition and twenty percent of the populace forms the pragmatic wing. Eighty percent of the populace now agrees with the new political process. That twenty percent of the populace is in opposition to the new political process as such does present a significant threat to it, but does not warrant that they can be excluded from it, as, over time, most of them can be assimilated within the pragmatic wing or may even come around to any of the anti-authoritarian political philosophies that they were in opposition to. The problem is not necessarily that there will be people who disagree with the new political process, but just that, at least, from the outset, there are bound to be people who are either "reactionary", meaning that they are of an intransigent, for lack of better term, recalcitrance wherein they are just simply opposed to the new political process without really taking anything into consideration whatsoever, or "extreme", meaning that they are willing to attempt to overturn the new political process by whatever means that they can. Let's say that only ten percent of the opposition is either reactionary or extreme, with only five percent of it being extreme. It is a test of the validity of the new political process to cope with that there will be a reactionary element. That will have to be countered within the political process. In so far that that is effective, the reactionary element will diminish. Assuming that it does, in our somewhat idealized hypothetical scenario, we have now gotten ninety-five percent of the populace to more or less agree with the new political process. Again, as this is a hypothetical situation wherein something like the network-power of the Central Intelligence Agency has been dissolved through a nonviolent revolution, I am just inventing statistics at random. How does the new political process cope with the remaining five percent? It is likely that, given such a scenario, there will be a set of political factions, exo-Fascists, various Fascists and Neo-Fascists, various Third Positionists, authoritarian Neo-Conservatives, duplicitous Neo-Liberals, various Monarchists and other people who want some sort of return to the aristocracy, certain religious fundamentalists, as well as, though it is unlikely that these two sets of people will ally themselves with one another, certain Marxist-Leninists, Maoists, Marxist-Leninist-Maoists, people who ascribe to Mao Zedong Thought, certain Populists, though, as I did frame this as being a political movement that is more or less of the libertarian Left, it is likely that people of more authoritarian left-wing political philosophies will, at least, attempt to come around to the new political process, which is not to say that they don't pose a predicament in their own right, but, just to suggest that it will differ from that of the either reactionary or extreme Right, as well as, though they are probably likely to find themselves with whatever "strange bedfellows", people who ascribe to a kind of authoritarian Centrism, who, especially after having been removed from power, are likely to attempt to disrupt the new political process by any means necessary. In so far that they are effective in doing so and in violation of whatever substantial rights, so to speak, or whatever there are to ensure that the new political process is genuine, such as the freedom from coercion or something like free association, they may actually need to be removed from the political process. It does seem entirely absurd to let someone read passages from Mein Kampf for hours on end and openly advocate for the systemic elimination of Jews in the name of inclusion, given that there is something like a participatory democratic process. I don't think that a person needs to be dragged out into the street and shot because of that they had, in anger, called someone a "k**e", but there are spheres of discourse to where the freedom of speech just doesn't really extend. Let's say that two percent of the opposition extremists do have to be prevented from participating in the new political process. The remaining three percent could, perhaps, be entertained, so to speak, so long that their abuse of the new political process does not become so consuming that all that anyone any longer does is to attempt to talk them out of their authoritarian ethos. Now that we have, and I do use such language so as not to lie about what this is, though I clearly don't think that such Politics should be carried out as they have historically, banned two percent of the populace from participating within the new political process, what are we to do about how it is that they may retaliate for having been banned? Let's say that one percent of them may engage in some sort of protest or another that, perhaps, should be taken into some sort of consideration, but will probably just more or less be the sort of thing that is just sort of tolerated and can be considered to be akin to certain social phenomenons, such as, though I would not malign such an either spiritual or religious ethos entirely, someone who is a Satanist, but kind of takes the potentially evil aspect of Satanism a little too far. On some level, a young person who insists upon wearing an all-black trench coat to high school every day doesn't really have the right to freely express themselves as such, as they are kind of exploiting the cult aspect of their way of presenting themselves as an implicit threat, but if an Anarchist society is incapable of coping with something that could be akin to that some people just got a little too far into Black Metal, then I don't think that the political philosophy can be meaningfully invoked whatsoever. That there would be such people is, again, another test to the validity of the new political process. Let us, again, assume that it passes. We are now left with the one percent of reactionary opposition extremists who are likely to engage in political terrorism. Even though this set of political factions, left totally unchecked, is only likely to be able to garnish the support of ten percent of the populace, and, therefore, only provide so significant of a threat to the new political process, it does seem evident to me that that they will attempt to engage in political terrorism by way of some sort of counter-revolution should be prevented. There are strategies, à la the First Earth Battalion or the protest that sought to levitate the Pentagon, that could, perhaps, be tried, but, what realistically seems apt is that whatever it is that was veritable of the security apparatus should be repurposed, radically conceptualized, and put into effect. As I support the full decriminalization and legalization of all narcotics, though along with some sort of way to ensure their responsible use, the only criminal plights that I can foresee becoming a problem relate to coercion. As people would no longer be living under a hyper-competitive form of capitalism, I would project that, though, again, there would be some cases, coercion that isn't somehow politically motivated would dramatically decrease, leaving only politically motivated coercion, which, to an extreme degree constitutes political terrorism, as the only primary criminal plight. With that being said, however, I, even in this hypothetical, am only one actor and can not decide for the entire coalition as to how a nonviolent revolution should be carried out or what should be set into motion after the fact, though, given that we have hypothesized a genuinely anti-authoritarian nonviolent revolution, would insist that all narcotics should, at least, be decriminalized. To return to my argument, however, when dealing with reactionary opposition extremist political terrorists, you can either kill or imprison them. I am suggesting that you should imprison them. Rather than imprison within the punitive criminal justice system that exists now, I am suggesting that a rehabilitative justice system should be created. At a random conjecture, I would suggest that such people could get out of a Community in Isolation on good behavior in six months and that, regardless as to what they do while there, there should be a cap on sentences of fifteen years. As there are bound to be a lot of Psychologists who are fascinated by the problem of evil, I don't think that it would be too difficult to staff such a facility with good people who were sincerely devoted to a rehabilitative justice project. As, eventually, society should develop so that what originates such behavior would no longer occur, they would only be temporary. As I do also think that most of the security apparatus, as there is only so much of it that is veritable, should be immediately dismantled, I am not advocating some sort of quasi-totalitarian, but, ostensibly anti-authoritarian, transitional program. I am positing that the problem of what more or less will probably almost exclusively be Fascist terrorism will still exist, even given that there has been an effective nonviolent revolution and some sort of, probably participatory democratic, political process that would not be compulsory, but would be open to all, to have taken the place of the only so veritably Liberal democratic representative democracy that exists now. In order to cope with that, what I am suggesting is that, though largely diminished, some of the security apparatus can be repurposed sort of along the lines of what the United Nations, at least, purports itself to do. Given that there is an effective revolution, people will have to cope with that a counter-revolution will be attempted to be waged. What I am suggesting is that, in order to cope with that, a temporal, radically reconceptualized, and diminished security apparatus should, predicated upon things like deescalation, the minimization of harm, and the minimal requisite repression, be put into effect. It does seem like people will still, for a period of time, need to be protected from, what, again, will probably more or less exclusively be Fascist terrorism, and for human rights to be substantially upheld, even given an effective nonviolent revolution. As that such things are even necessary does indicate that such a strategy is not entirely ideal, I am willing to accept criticism in this regard, but, I do think that it would be somewhat delusional to assume that people who are prone to things like Fascist terrorism will be so taken by a revolutionary political process, though I do hope that some of them will, that they will just simply no longer want to engage in it.

Of Fascists and the like, I will say that you can, with a bit of kindness, sympathy, and willingness to entertain ideas that are totally outside of any form of "civility", get them to unbecome as such entirely so as to fully uphold the ideal of abolition, which I am sympathetic towards, though would also prefer to consider outside of this certain absurdity, but that that takes so much time that, to me, it seems entirely absurd to suggest that people should spend years of their life encountering each and every individual Fascist, or other nefarious person, and that they should, rather, either attempt to carry out an effective nonviolent revolution or to abolish what subjugates people to authoritarianism, which is to say that, though I am of the opinion that a person should just merely level a political debate from their own perspective, in so far that an appeal is made, in a person's case who is similar to mine, it should only ever be made so far out of a person's perspective to their most distant ally, being someone like a Centrist who is ultimately sympathetic towards the libertarian Left. That a person becomes a Fascist is actually rather sad, as, in most cases, they have become subject to what is either usually "Neo-Fascist", though, as I am of the opinion that Fascism just merely survived following the Second World War and did not really experience a revival beginning, perhaps, with the Greek junta in 1967, and, so, don't have too many qualms with just kind blanketly essentializing the entire far-Right with the charge of "Fascism", or what I refer to as "exo-Fascist", basically a form of what I suspect to usually be, though it can be otherwise, Intelligence entrapment, conscription. While there are elements of abolition that are to the benefit of even the far-Right, to attempt to substantiate the ethos as such hazards consuming it within Fascist pathology. Given that to entirely uphold the ideal of abolition requires that people engage in a nebulous project that involves an encounter with the far-Right, as well as that it does not adequately address the immediate concerns of what to do about existent Fascist terrorism, as well as a few other things, such as cases of domestic violence, what I am just simply telling you is that, at this given point in time, that ideal can not practically be upheld as such, which is to say that, in spite of that people should express solidarity with things like the prison abolition movement, there are aspects of the security apparatus that both do need to remain in effect and will, though, again, radically reconceptualized, still, even given the best of all revolutionary scenarios.

The short of which, though I will elaborate further, is that there are four strategies that can be employed in order to deal with either actual or would-be Fascist terrorists, which is just more or less every Fascist. You can engage them in a psychological encounter, which may be effective if you are a genius, extraordinarily well versed in Psychology, and about as good of an actor as John McEnery in Franco Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet, but for everyone else is likely to be, at best, dismissed as "Communist mind control". You can talk to them for an extensive period of time, which is effective, but I wouldn't necessarily recommend as Fascists are likely to lie about you engaging them in conversation as a form of entrapment. You can, otherwise, either kill or imprison them. Aside from that it doesn't seem too ethical to kill them, there is that they have a number of strategic advantages within a civil war, as well as that, unlike everyone else, they are not likely to engage in combat by any ethical code of conduct, and have some of both the official and unofficial sanction of certain parties within the Intelligence community. With all of that in mind, I can only recommend that they be imprisoned. Even though the criminal justice system is kind of terrible, regardless as to how anyone feels about abolition, if you suspect that a person is in danger of carrying out an act of Fascist terrorism, it would probably, at best, be negligent of you not to inform some sort of law enforcement. Given that there is an effective revolution, I would suggest that, rather than place Fascist terrorists within a punitive criminal justice system like what exists now, in so far that they are engaged in terrorism, they should be placed in a rehabilitative justice system. All of this is indicative of that the security apparatus can not be entirely dismantled as of right now or even after an effective nonviolent revolution. You could always just execute them all by firing squad, but what I am suggesting is that it would be better to reconceptualize what is veritable of the security apparatus so as to effect the minimal requisite repression necessary to cope with that such parties will still be active.

TL;DR entirely: Fascist terrorism is how only so much of the security apparatus can be dismantled and rehabilitative justice is what to replace it with.

That is a rather lengthy explication. As I have previously said, it is probably best not to consider utopia along the lines of how it is that people can deal with its more extreme detractors. In so far that such a revolution does not occur, as, though I am not opposed to that happening, it does seem a bit unlikely that such an event will spontaneously happen, I am suggesting that people should merely create and engage in the best communities that they can and to do what they can to abolish what subjugates people to authoritarianism, all of which, I do think, is, in good faith, in keeping with an anti-authoritarian ethos.

Anyways, I am leaving, and, so, I will have to just leave you with that. Thanks for reading all of that if you did. I hope that all is well and goes well and will see or hear from you when or if ever. 'Til then!

I like that Lorde quote, but you're not actually, like, reading what I'm saying.

I'm well aware of the history of the ban. Again, though, that's just what that is. Let's say that there's a nonviolent revolution and a participatory democracy is created. When a person who had a different status of power before and they, then, attempt to disrupt the new political process and you make it so that they can't participate in the new political process for that reason, you do effectively banish them. I would impose a ban as per Roman law or attempt to reduce the status of the person to bare life as per the Third Reich or something, but, it is probably the case that, given an effective revolution, there are people who you will have to make it so that they can't participate within the new political process. Somehow, Giorgio Agemben seems to think that forms-of-life resolve this conundrum, but, as his writing style is so arcane, I still don't understand how that is.

The point that I'm really trying to get at is is that even nonviolent revolution poses kind of a lot of Ethical quandaries that kind of lot of people don't really take into consideration. I don't really have the resolution for them. I'm just kind of tossing ideas out there. I'm not advocating some sort of ostensibly anti-authoritarian dictatorship of the proletariat following a revolution; I'm just trying to minimize the requisite repression given such a scenario. It's difficult to explain as to just what that is as the existent security apparatus is of a punitive framework. For instance, by "soft-policing powers", I don't really mean to imply what that actually refers to, but just of some sort of maximal minimization of escalation and harm. You can immediately establish some sort of ideal society, such as an informal set of asystemic Liberal democratic, proceeding from human rights law or whatever, governing assemblages and an Anarchist communes, the "Commune of communes" or what is veritable of the end goals of Communism, or whatever other kind of societies, communities, groups, w/e, as a kind of plurality of of political or even a-political communities predicated upon something like free association given a participatory democratic what I identify as "Anarchist", though some might claim is a "Libertarian Communist" project wherein participation is not compulsory, but is open to all, that people should like to create those things aside, but it doesn't seem like you can actually entirely do away with any form of repression whatsoever from the immediate outset. I'm not trying to make a crypto-authoritarian justification of heavy handed repression; I'm just trying to figure out as to how it is that the requisite repression can be minimized. Rehabilitative justice and a somewhat radically reconceptualized strategy concerning the security apparatus, wherein, by way of what is kind of a transitional program, though, again, that's another misleading term, such strategies would only be temporal and designed to abolish themselves eventually, which is not suggest that you shouldn't immediately begin to dismantle the security apparatus, but, as I am loathe to admit, there are, perhaps, aspects of it, such as those which the United Nations, with a certain degree of both veracity and pretense, claims to enforce, that may still need to be put into effect. I am an Anarchist, or, at least, was, but, if you want for something like human rights law to be effective, then, you do have to expect that there will be people who will ensure that it is.

All of this is pure conjecture, anyways, as it is probably unlikely that an effective nonviolent revolution will occur.

I meant that the incentives towards authoritarian behavior should be removed and not that authoritarians should be systematically eliminated. The structure of society as such should altered so that it doesn't reward authoritarian behavior.

Once, after the revolution, you banish them from the political sphere, you effectively end up having to imprison them somehow when they attempt to violently overthrow whatever has to come to take their place. Technically speaking, that would be an internment camp. Rather than create a 'soft'-concentration camp for authoritarians, I was suggesting that a rehabilitative facility that people would only ever end up in for so long would be a better option.

All of this is given a hypothetical scenario wherein a nonviolent revolution has been effectively carried out. Once a government or governments are ousted, whatever new way of going about whatever there is will take their place. They can participate within that. In so far that they are disruptive, they may have to not be let to do so. In so far that they, then, decide to violently, as they will be let to protest otherwise, overthrow the new way of going about things, I can't really see another resolution to that crisis other than to place them in something like a Community in Isolation. You could protest them doing that and that may work, but they may just slaughter people en masse. As it is still conditional upon an effective nonviolent revolution for the security forces to decide not to fire upon a civilian populace, the security forces can, then, employ the kind of "soft-policing powers" that that guy from Aufheben received all of that flak for, somewhat justifiably, though I can see that that is useful in this regard, to arrest them without situations escalating to the point where there is an exchange of fire. There's probably bound to be a few cases, but, when you could probably greatly improve the livelihood of everyone on the planet on Earth by dramatically decreasing the number of people who are somehow imprisoned and dramatically increasing the livelihood of those who are, as well as the length of their sentences, with marginal casualties, I don't think that nonviolent revolution should be entirely ruled out because it somehow isn't quite anti-authoritarian enough or can not entirely do away with the State or whatever from the immediate outset. I don't know if you've ever encountered a person such as those who I am referring to, but, though I have qualms with that this is kind the best that I can come up with, as they are vile, debased, and have an excessive and ruthless avarice for power, that I am suggesting that they should be placed in something like a Community of Isolation for two to eight years is really more than kind. Most people just say that you should kill them en masse. As it is part and parcel to the idea that the Communities in Isolation will be nice enough for them to be willing to give each other up, I don't foresee too much danger in that people won't take what is a sincere attempt to, given an effective nonviolent revolution, enforce as minimal of repression as humanly possible seriously enough.

In so far that there is not a nonviolent revolution, what systemically allows for authoritarian behavior, provisions, laws, profit incentives, etc. etc., and what rewards it should be countered so that it can be abolished. As nonviolent revolution is rather grandiose, and does still pose an Ethical quandary, that sort of thing is probably primarily what people should be up to anyways.

Anyways, I am leaving, and, so, I'll just have to leave everyone with that, I guess. As I said before, it's probably best not to think of any ideal society upon such lines and to avoid them if, at all, possible. I'll see you all when or if ever, though. Until then!

Eh, I have some, but not too many qualms with Marx. I think in the Soviet Union, it was pretty clear that the most culpable party was Josef Stalin. Vladimir Lenin and even Leon Trotsky were only so much less culpable, though. The issue with Marxism is, I think, how it has been put into effect, à la more or less Marxism-Leninism and Maoism, and not necessarily Marx himself. I don't blame Friedrich Nietzsche for the Third Reich, and, so, why should I blame Karl Marx for the abuse of the Communist project?

Being said, though, seeing that even my own minimally coercive post-revolutionary strategy somewhat absurdly seems to necessitate "Communities in Isolation", revolution, even nonviolent revolution, is probably not all that its cracked up to be. You could probably just get whomever out of power through peaceful protest however and just set up whatever so that they couldn't be able to overturn the revolution or whatever, but, you'd, then, have to banish them from the political sphere, which is also quite nebulous. When all of Politics needs to be so radically reformed that it ceases to exist as such, though, I'm not entirely sure as to what kind of ideal strategy could be put forth other than nonviolent revolution.

It seems like the best thing to do, politically, is to just create your own communities and try to change things however, though that would tend to rely more upon radical reform than revolution, but, I do think could still be leveled from an Anarchist, specifically Anarcho-Pacifist in my case, though, like I said, I did leave the Anarchist movement in protest of its general proclivities towards crypto-Fascism and political violence and become decidedly a-political, praxis. The community events and protest are really what to do and to engage in adventurist terrorism, believe that you can incite an effective global revolution, or that you are, in point of fact, the contemporary Mahatma Gandhi is not. We do live in a world with over seven billion people and do have effect upon them and it, but, any act that is not somehow of the final project of all of humanity isn't futile on account of not having actually created the best of all possible worlds. I've found that people tend to get swept up into things like "creating history". You should learn to mediate historical events so that you can retain agency with their occurrence, but, there's something that's kind of authoritarian to believing that you should cultivate a cult of personality as some sort of heroic renegade whose acts are somehow supposed to bring about some sort of new way of living. It's kind of like claiming to be a holy person.

I don't know. People should just be open-minded and not take themselves too seriously. The best that almost anyone can do is just simply to live and treat others well, anyways. I'm happy with having left Politics behind me, but do hope for the best for the future for everyone else. It's best to remain as optimistic as you can, I think. Anyways, I am going to leave now, as I have kind of a compulsive habit of using the internet and too many things to do now. I'll see you whenever!

That'd be something, but they don't really want Philosophy majors. Anyways, I'm leaving this forum to prepare for the semester, anyways, so, see you all whenever.

Well, I mean, like, the Anarchist movement isn't really funded by George Soros. There could be such a movement without that kind of funding. I'm only so into nonviolent revolution anyways, though. Like I said, I became more or less a-political.

This is incredible. I can't believe that you created all of this. I don't know that I will read it in its entirety, but I'll probably leaf through it a bit later. I'll be leaving probably tomorrow to begin preparing for the semester and, so, can't say that I'll be much in the way of feedback, but this is pretty cool to find out about.

I voted "no", but, though I do more or less adhere to a kind of strict nonviolence, think that there could be particular cases where violence can be justified, though that is kind of highly qualified. Rioting isn't necessarily violence, though. There are forms of direct action that do constitute violent coercion, but a lot of them don't necessarily. There's a difference between smashing a window, the Earth Liberation Front sort of harassing people from the companies whom they waged nonviolent direct actions upon, the Weather Underground bombings and arsons beginning in 1969, a bank robbery, and a political assassination. On some level, all such acts are coercive, but, an act is only violently coercive in so far that it forces a person to do something because of a threat.

Everything and nothing. I feel like, after years of independent research or whatever, I just don't really agree with anything anymore. I have some vague inclinations towards Deleuze and Sartre, whom seem to be somewhat mutually incompatible, recently developed interests, which I admittedly haven't really investigated, in Nominalism, Neutral Monism, Zen Buddhism, embodied consciousness, and, apparently, The Absolute, though, have never liked Hegel, and am hoping that this concept is in Totality and Infinity. All that I have is a disjointed assemblage of theories that doesn't really seem to add up to anything at all. You'd think that philosophers would have a lot of good life advice, but the only thing that I think that I've gotten from anyone really is the kind of humility exemplified by Socrates. Albert Einstein once said that "The more I learn, the more I realize how much I don't know", but he wasn't even a philosopher.

Well, I appreciate the sympathy, but I haven't even applied for a graduate program as of yet or anything. I have two years of a Liberal Arts degree completed, though I haven't taken too many Philosophy courses as of yet, as I was enrolled at a community college. I don't really have any other interests, though, and every other Liberal Arts career is just kind of the same gambit. It doesn't seem like it makes any sense to do anything other than study Philosophy. Why should I switch my major to something like English when it's just exactly the same way and I haven't already cultivated an interest in something like that?

To plan for the future, though, just getting a Bachelor's degree in Philosophy is kind of pointless. It'll land me slightly better jobs, but I just don't see why I shouldn't just go all of the way through with the higher education when there isn't really anything else for me to do. I feel like I am capable of making it all of the way through, it's really just about motivation.

I've been going through a crisis for ages, but, you are right that studying a Philosophy is supposed to be some sort of way for me to feel like I've done something in life or whatever. I guess that I just feel like that having done something will lead to some sort of having done something and that it is just what to do to make myself feel better.


I actually like you quite a bit as well. I don't necessarily feel like I generate the greatest content, though.

I will probably actually look into it at some point, but I kind of doubt that all that much will change.

Congrats on writing an entire book! I don't think that I've ever been able to finish an essay that was over six or seven pages long. You could always self-publish if you can't find someone to publish it for you. There's a lot of independent publishing companies nowadays, but, I feel like self-publishing will start to become more popular now, especially since not everyone reads books that are actually printed anymore.

The tiers exist and don't exist. It's sort of like Noise music or something. I once saw this teenager play a two-minute long set where he just kind of spazzed out on my ex-bandmate's snare drum in five to fifteen second bursts. In a way, what he had done was not even really art, and, in a way, I had thought that he had reduced the genre to a pure abstract line. I don't mean to draw a comparison to you, of course, but my point is that, while there's an element of that there is a difference between John Cage and any opening act at an Industrial show with a grand total of three audience members, the categorizations of Art as being of any sort of elevated status really is somewhat illusory. Perhaps I'm not being clear, but I think that Philosophy is kind of the same way.

What I mean, I guess, is that you shouldn't let it get to you. I let it get to me as well, but, in so far that you can, you just shouldn't let it get to you. Even the Doctorate is a symbol of status that only really means so much.

Alas, though, like I said, I feel like I've taken too much away from the original poster and, as I probably just can't be talked of my plans as of right now, don't see too much of a point in going on like this. I apologize for kind of bleating about it all and thank everyone for the advice, even if it isn't too likely that I'll take it.

I'll keep that in mind in the future, but I feel like people couldn't really understand what it is that I mean about all of this. I'm not the sort of person who can just settle for a career. It's not within my mental faculties to be capable of doing so. Take it how you will, but, there's not really too much else for me to do.

To be honest, I don't really think that this forum thinks too much of me. Kind of a lot of people don't, and, so, it doesn't surprise me. It's one of the better online forums, but it's also kind of just another place where I feel like kind of outcast. I just sort of toss things out there because of that. If I wanted to be cruel, you'd understand that I am rather intelligent. I know that you're trying to be nice, but it is kind of disheartening to be told to study Computer Science and of the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Occupational Handbook. It's because you don't think that I'll make it as a philosopher, which is what everyone in this field that I've met thinks. I don't mean this about you, but I've known kind of a lot of intellectually domineering men in my life. It results in that I act kind of strangely around intellectuals. The informal class that arises from the whole thing leads me to kind of distrustful of people. I feel like if I got myself to moreso with it, though, I could something or another. Like I said, I don't really have any other interests.

Why not join the military and let them pay all expenses for career education? I got paid to go to school and become a professional meteorologist, and a friend became a lawyer and is now a district attorney, another became a physician. — jgill

I'm openly an Anarcho-Pacifist, which means I can't even actually join the military, even though I have sort of thought about it in the past. What I had really thought was that I could somehow be sent to Kurdistan or do some sort of U.N. type of thing with them, but, quickly realized that that wasn't, at all, tenable.

I don't intend on dropping out. It'll come easy enough when it comes. Anyways, I think that I've diverted this thread for long enough from the original poster, and would like to just move on. Apologies or whatever.

Eh, I see everyone's point, but I'm probably just going to go through with it and suffer the consequences.

The SJWs will Enforce Freedom... — Asif

Like I said, that solution is only given a revolutionary scenario, though contemporary prisons ought to be reformed into being something like, anyways, in so far that they should even exist. If there's a revolution than there's going to be a counter-revolution and what can be done about the counter-revolution is to either kill them or put them in jail. Since killing them is fraught with ethical and strategic quandries, the only solution is to put them in jail. Rather than place them in prison as we have come to understand them today, I have chosen to conceptualize Communities in Isolation, which are technically internment camps, though they wouldn't have to work, and I should hope that such notions don't throw a rose-colored shade upon the history of internment camps, but are intended to isolate the minimal amount of people for the minimal amount of time in the best of possible conditions. Like I said, though, it's probably best not to conceptualize any sort of ideal society along such lines.

Realistically speaking, there's probably some sort of way, with a bit of imagination, to avoid even that, and, so, I may retract such statements at a later date.

I just reread Thus Sparch Zarathustra not too long ago. I'll have to leaf through it to find the quote.

There is still a kind of duplicitous cutthroat aspect to Politics, as well as the reverence for historical "great men", but I hope that those sort of things are on their way out. As contemporary Politics stand, I do consider for myself to be a-political, as I just don't think that they're all that great, but, I don't think that Politics, referring to what Wikipedia defines as "is the set of activities that are associated with making decisions in groups, or other forms of power relations between individuals, such as the distribution of resources or status", is necessarily flawed somehow, and hope that our circumstances will improve. There are all kinds of problems, but the biggest issue, to me, seems to be an avarice as it concerns power.

I've read a good bit of Nietzsche, but don't quite remember that bit. I might have to read that again if you remember where it's from.

My theory about original sin, though I'm an atheist, is that evil is exploit cruelty, usually in the form of coercion, but sometimes otherwise, and to conspire to continue to do so further, or rather that the foundational basis for evil is something like that. I think that it begins as psychological manipulation, progresses into psychological warfare, and then becomes authoritarianism. In a way, it's just psychological, or, rather, as I see, pathological, but there is also that society, as it stands now, rewards such a way of going about things to a certain extent, though, perhaps, and thankfully, only implicitly.


Well, I mean, I do realize that is sounds pretty absurd, but as more or less of even the libertarian Left's revolutionary praxis involves anything from just sort of strategically killing as few of them as possible to just kind of killing whoever however and for whatever reason, I do think that it is a better solution that what most people come up with. It is only given a nonviolent revolution. Otherwise, what leads people to be authoritarian should just be eliminated, which is probably the best way to go about things, anyways.

In so far that there is some sort of revolution or something, I actually have a plan for this. It's kind of nebulous as what I'm suggesting are basically ethical interment camps, but I do feel like it is the most humane solution to this problem. People who have abuse their positions of power and are likely not to wage a counter-revolution against whatever the new system of governance is could be placed in what I call "Communities in Isolation". It'd basically be like a cross between a white-collar mental institution and a retirement community. There'd only be two floors, you'd be able to go outside, there'd be activities such as music and arts and crafts, you'd be able to have visitors, there'd be comfortable beds, clean individual washing areas, good health professionals, good locally sourced organic food, a few televisions, good books in the library, video games, board games, cards, maybe even swimming, trips even, perhaps, basically anything that you could ever want for a mental institution to be like. In a way, it'd sort of be like a utopian planned community, but for people who have abused their positions of power, the purpose of which was to reform them. There'd only be two floors, with the bottom floor being the commons area wouldn't be too much of an issue because you wouldn't need to send that many people to them. The Central Intelligence Agency, for instance, only has 21,575 employees. Even if a fourth of them had to go to a Community of Isolation, the CIA, probably having the highest percentage of people who would need to placed in such a facility, that's only around 5,000 people. Let's say 40,000 people total, and that's kind of an overestimate. As the CIA would be dissolved, their 2.3 billion dollar budget could probably cover that by itself. They'd be so nice that anyone who is of such an ilk or whatever would just want to give whoever up in order to drop out of whatever the society that they're a part of is like. They could also serve as the model for prison reform. People'd probably only ever even be there for two to eight years. I haven't really done any research into how to actually carry this out, but, something like that, I think, could resolve the problem of what to do about the authoritarians. Putting them in ethical interment camps isn't the most ideal solution imaginable, as somehow convincing them to stop being authoritarians would be, but, as that'll take years for just one person, it's kind of the only ethical thing to be done. Even if you're okay with just killing them, which I'm not, you then inevitably have to think about how to get the military to decide not to fire upon its citizens in a revolution, eliminate them, in which case, when they could be placed in something like Communities in Isolation, why?, and, then, also have the military agree not to make you, then, subject to them when they just carried out the revolution for you, which is just far too nebulous to engage in.

With all that being said, though, I'd really prefer not to think about what an ideal society should be like in terms of what kind of ethical interment camp I intend to put people who are just currently incompatible with it or whatever in. Without there being systemic rewards for authoritarian behavior, I do think that, aside from special interest cases or whatever, the authoritarian personality type or whatever will just more or less disappear.


Coercion is impossible to do away with entirely given that there does not yet exist a perfect society, but it should always be being continually minimalized.

I also think this gaps idea is kind of interesting.

Well, looking at my prospect right now, the best job that I could take, but wouldn't, because I suspect for it to be as exploitative and terrible as has been fictionalized, is as a dockworker for sixteen dollars an hour. I don't think that I could work full-time, and, so, with a part-time gig, that's around twenty-five thousand dollars a year, which is still under the average tuition for most grad schools. I'll probably make twleve dollars an hour, work slightly less than that, make slightly over half of that, and will need the entire federal loan to pay for grad school. I live at home. Let's say that I still do. Let's say that I only spend ten-thousand dollars in a year. Let's say that I get into a school where tuition is only twenty-five thousand dollars a year. I'd still need, at least, forty thousand dollars in loans and I'd be working a day shy of full-time on the docks. How well will I, then, do in grad school? I would have a degree, but an entry level data entry job is still just thirty-thousand dollars a year, and, so, kind of the same, just less stressful, as working anywhere else, since I would be working part-time. It seems like, in order to succeed, I just don't have any other options.

You can still get a mortgage for a house with student loan debt, so long that you make the loan payments. If I can find something that I like doing and pay them off within twenty-five years, what's it to me? I'd pay them off sooner if I could, but, though I do intend to give it all my best effort, I'm not really banking on landing a high-paying job.

It's kind of a gamble, but ultimately manageable and, seeing that I do really care about Philosophy, have no other interests, really, and not too many other prospects, I don't see why I shouldn't just take it. Besides, there's also that people will occasionally refer to me as "doctor".

Perhaps. I’m more American than Canadian. I suppose that’s the benefit of a multicultural society—I get to retain my culture at the expense of a new one — NOS4A2

Well, thank you NOS4A2.

Well, don't blame Machiavelli for writing things as they were with power in his time. He made his most famous book for a genuine Prince, not the public. If someone correctly writes about an issue, it then really is about that issue. — ssu

Machiavelli was, I think, bit, but not too much more culpable than Nietzsche, who wasn't terribly, but sort of culpable. "Machiavellianism" was terrible enough, I suspect, for self-respecting libertarian socialists to refer to it as "barbarism". In Plato's case, though I don't really know think that his ideas were cited in the creation of the Roman Empire, his ideas were not in keeping with the times, so to speak, as they did have direct democracy in Ancient Greece. He did have a lot better of attitudes towards women than a lot of other people at the time, though.

Because we both aren't Americans, but do understand how important for Americans is the belief in the US: the belief in their constitution and the freedoms on what their country stands and what it means to themselves. And those ideals in my view do stand for anti-authoritarianism, for freedoms of the individual. — ssu

I think that there's something to the ideals that inspired the American Revolution, but for American patriotism to have become so lost in jingoism, beginning, in this regard, more or less with the Vietnam War that I find myself rather unwilling to be willing to invoke anything other than the First Amendment in arguments over just what the democratic project is and how it is to be carried out. The United States has, since the Cold War, become sort of geo-political bale for most other nations in the world, which is how I can see where the resentment comes from. There's a quote from the film, Z, by a Communist who is affiliated with the Pacifist politician who gets assassinated. He says, "always blame the Americans, even if you're wrong." Because our Intelligence service, to my estimation, is responsible for the survival of the far-Right after the Second World War, there is something to that logic, but I have found that Europeans can become somewhat lost in an odd kind of anti-American European chauvinism even to the point of, proceeding from, perhaps, a veritable critique of Liberal democracy, becoming almost oddly anti-democratic. It's not everyone; that's just a thing that I've noticed.

Do you feel there is or could be any system that is not exploitative not Authoritarian? — Asif

I'm not who this question is addressed to, but, I'll go ahead and answer it. A belief system does imply that a person does a system, and, therefore, an order that does hazard becoming somehow regimated, of, well, beliefs. Even Anarchism, when it becomes an ideology, can become authoritarian. I'm of the opinion that people should be politically a-political and a-politically political, which is to say that they should be against Politics as such, as so much of it is comprised of a contest of ideologies, but not necessarily against Politics, as it does seem like it ought to be vaguely synonymous with something like "conflict resolution". Having found myself in more or less every circle on the Left, I've come the realization that some of what I suspect for most people who become a-political to suspect about Politics is true. Most political groups are only really sort of devoted to their cause and are just trying to use their supporters in some way or another. Politics, regardless as to what it should be, is comprised of kind of a lot of personal feuds, usually concerning political power, but, on more occasions than you might expect, can more or less be chalked up to male chauvinism, which most people have no real reason to engage in whatsoever. It is kind of just a lot of people shouting without having any real idea of what they're saying and everyone really does attempt to push everyone around. There are grains of truth to all of the common platitudes that you hear about Politics and other absurdities that people don't necessarily notice. Jacques Camatte, for all that there is that is veritable of his theories, and I do think that there are aspects of his theories that are veritable, really did kind of write Communism into being him living in his home in the wilderness. Even though I do sort of agree with Simone Weil, the prospect of actually abolishing all political parties does seem to be entirely absurd. What is a person supposed to do? Entry a political party with the sole intent of destroying it? How will the party become destroyed when you could just easily be kicked out of it? When you think about it all with an open mind, you come to a lot of absurd conclusions. They're not entirely true, but there are grains of truth to them that can be helpful to get across at times. Even being a-political is somewhat absurd, as effectively making it so that a person does not have to engage in Politics ends up involving quite a lot of Politics in the practice of doing so.

A governance that actually substantiates freedom, as it follows, equality, predicated upon nonviolence, the praxis in the creation of which should meaningfully invoke free association and solidarity, wouldn't, perhaps, have abolished authority entirely, but would be a step in the right direction in the general anti-authoritarian movement. It could be anything from a more participatory democratic Liberal democracy to the Commune of communes.

I have no interest in hard science or Mathematics, though. I could develop an interest in something like Anthropology or Film Theory, but those are just same kind of gambits. I don't see what the point, when I don't really plan on having a family, and can live with fairly low expenses, of pursuing a career in something that I'm just not interested in. I also have Ethical qualms with just about everything. Were I to become an engineer, for instance, I wouldn't want to work for the military, which seems to be one of the better bets given that career path. You could try to bank on doing something for the Peace Corps or something, but they only really want people who are really dedicated to the profession. Then there's, like, some sort of power plant or something, but then I'd always wonder as to what sort of effect I was having on the environment. I'm thirty. I should've gone back to the unviersity a lot sooner, but, now, it just doesn't seem to make any sense to put any sort of effort into anything that I'm just not really going to care about. I'm most adept at political philosophy, but that path in life isn't really an option for me anymore.

Even having a degree is, even in Philosophy, is, at least, out of the service industry, or, at the very least, with a job as a barista, which I'm frankly quite offended that any person thinks that I am, at all, incapable of performing on account of not having worked at Starbucks at the age of eighteen or being friends with the owner of the establishment. In "Like a Rolling Stone", Bob Dylan says that "when you ain't got nothing, you got nothing to lose". Seeing that I have no future, I don't see why I shouldn't just study Philosophy. I'm just curious about whether or not I can get loans to pay for grad school. Will I score the entire Federal loan of $20,500 per year, because I will probably need for that loan to pay for all of it?

As for grad school being expensive, yes. You can get loans. Grad school is a whole other upgrade to school work rigor. You will be expected to write papers with careful citations. You will be expected to go above and beyond what your writing was as an undergraduate student. An undergrad degree can be fun even if you're not heavily invested in it. A graduate degree is not.

It sounds like right now though, you need to take that time and evaluate those three points. I may be wrong, but it sounds like you're using the idea of grad school as a retreat and a hopeful refuge from not knowing what you want. The reality is, you're past the easy choices in life. Any path you choose from now on will be a sacrifice in something. You just have to figure out what sacrifice fits in with your life goals, and which don't. — Philosophim

You have given some good advice, which I do thank you for. It's difficult for me to come up with an ideal work environment, though, as I've never been in one that there was really anything of that I enjoyed. I guess that I could be less pessimistic, though, and take some time to think about it eventually.

You're not entirely wrong. Since the Film school closed, being the only Film school that I could afford to go to, I'm kind of at a loss for what to do in life. I play music, but I'm not good enough at it to make any sort of career out of it. The only other interest that I have is Philosophy. Going to grad school is just kind of a way to stave off having given up on ever experiencing life in any sort of way that I had wanted to by devoting myself to some sort of career path. I actually kind of like the idea of being challenged to actually write, though. It's difficult for me to write anything on my own, and I do feel like, with a bit of motivation, I could actually create something that, at least, some people would think is somehow valuable. I realize that it's kind of a limited profession, but I feel like there's bound to be some sort of strange occupation that I could discover that'd pay well enough for me to afford living kind of as I should like to. In the future that I imagine, I'd like to live in either an A-frame or eco-house and have an electric car, but I can settle for living in an around one-hundred and twenty thousand dollar house and having a used economy car. As I don't really plan on having a family, I don't expect to have too many other expenses. I feel like there's bound to be something for me to do with a Doctorate in Philosophy that can afford just that.

Often times people in the third category don't know what to do, but think they have to have a degree. It is an expensive waste in time, money, and self-esteem. If you are in this camp, drop out of college, and go do something with your life. Get a job that doesn't require a degree, and try to find a job that you don't hate, and can see doing without dread as you climb up in pay and position. Continue to do philosophy as a hobby. Hobbies are great, and do not need to turn into careers! — Philosophim

I'm not the author of this original post, but, I, too, am in need of advice. I'm going for a Bachelor's in Philosophy because I just don't have any other interests. I figure that I can use the degree to find some sort of entry-level job that has almost nothing to do with the field, like data entry or something. I decided to go back to the university in order to get out of the service industry. I used to think that I could be happy just finding a job as a barista and creating art, but found that I just couldn't seem to land a job as a barista, and, so, thought that I could make do as a dishwasher, which I did exceptionally well, but found that, having perfected the role, a dishwasher's job, by the way, is only sort of to wash the dishes and put them away, to do it well you sort of control the rhythm to the entire establishment as it keeps everyone in the frame of mind which lets them do their jobs well, I was no longer, at all, interested in washing the dishes, as well as that I had come to the realization that washing them too well, which, I found that I almost always had to do, would make it so that it wasn't terribly likely that you be promoted, as restaurant managers can have some difficulty in finding a good dishwasher who will stay in their establishment, which could be easily resolved by paying them a living wage, but, such solutions are not the kind of things that most managers are likely to take into consideration. Anyways, I, then, became a bar-back. In any establishment, it is likely that the bar-back is the smartest person in the entire establishment, as they are the only person to have intentionally chosen the best job within the establishment. You think that you want to become a bar-back to get bartending experience, but, as bartending is likely to consume your entire life, you really do it in order to come to the realization that you just need to go to college. Having found the best job to have without a college degree, I can say with certainty that there are not jobs that a person can find which they will actually enjoy doing. Being a bar-back is just the path of least resistance.

Anyways, what I'm wondering is just how daunting grad school is, really? Can it be afforded? How difficult is it to get in? Do you really have to worry about the loans all that much? Can you get loans to pay for it? Though I am not cheap, I do live with a certain degree of thrift, and don't necessarily mind being in debt. I assume that finding myself in any entry-level Tech job is likely to result in some sort of Office Space like scenario, as, though diligent enough, I have no fidelity whatsoever to any employer, and do believe for common characterizations of the Tech industry to be more or less accurate. Just getting a Bachelor's degree doesn't seem like it is likely to leave me satisfied in life.

I'm somewhat lacking in discipline, though, which is something that I am hoping that my undergrad will alleviate, but do worry that I may lack the academic rigor to make it through grad school. You say that you should just consider Philosophy as a hobby if you aren't really all that devoted to the field, but, as, I do not want to die in the service industry, the Film school that I was going to closed, and I don't really have any other interests, it does seem like I should learn to focus my attention well enough upon philosophical texts that do, admittedly, bore me, to actually go all of the way and get a Doctorate in the hopes that I can land myself a not terribly well paying teaching job at, like, an Art college or something. The two questions that I, then, have are what are the practical concerns in such a venture and how can one motivate oneself to have academic rigor?

Why, though? The coordinated grassroots Democratic Socialists of America campaign in favor of Bernie Sanders was the last political campaign that I believed in. Seeing that I have now become a-political, I would never return upon the other side. What I actually suspect to be likely to happen is for the Anarchist movement to find itself in a fix and to beg me to bail them out of it à la "Gandalf the White", but I am hoping that my having left in protest will prevent that from ever needing to occur.

Well, I did drop out of Politics, and, so, though, perhaps, conceding that there was nothing that I could do, did consider for my departure to be for the well being of myself and everyone else involved.

My assumption is that, in most countries, or even internationally, the legal precepts to prevent a person's legal status from being totally extinguished exist, but are also consistently challenged. Agamben seems to be in a legal debate with the American Neoconservatives who had taken to the writings of Carl Schmitt during the "war on terror". As both they and he, for different reasons, have a tendency to be somewhat arcane, it kind of seems like only they are all that aware of just what the terms of the debate actually are. I, of course, have never actually attempted to inquire as to just what Neoconservative legal theory is, though.

I liked what Tiqqun said about rhythm in The Cybernetic Hypothesis. They advance a kind of counter-rhythm to the circulation of information as it exists now. I'm not familiar with the cube-sat experiment, and, so, I'm not entirely sure what you're suggesting, though.

I can offer plenty of examples of these mistakes, while you offer exactly zero of Trump's "fascistic" thought crimes. — NOS4A2

I actually have a conspiracy about this. Donald J. Trump, star of the show, The Apprentice was led into his position of power by the Central Intelligence Agency. Think about it. They know that almost the entire American populace, including most of the Right, though they tend not know as to just what it is that they have against them, aside from, perhaps, a few Neo-Conservatives, is likely not to agree with anything that they do, and, so, prop up an unlikable businessman to eat all of the flak. The news media swarms upon every controversy, while the CIA has attempted to orchestrate a Neo-Fascist coup d'état in Italy so as to secure control over the Mafia, and incite a global clandestine civil war to be given both the legal and extra-juridical rationalizations, justifications, and attempts at vindicating the establishment of a global crypto-Fascist totalitarian regime that was to bear only the semblance of Liberal democracy, being more or less the implicit goal of the organization since even before its official establishment. Luckily, for all of us, I put a stop to this.

The way I see it, though, Trump himself is not really a Fascist; he's a "useful idiot" to Fascists. They chose him for his sensational attitude towards the associated press and extraordinary capacity to proliferate thought-terminating clichés. To them, he's just there to get people used to what they plan next. There's no real reason to consider what they project into a future where Fascism is capable of securing power again, though.

In Race: the Power of an Illusion, they point out that there is greater genetic variance between two identical fruit flies than there is between two people who are claimed to be of different races. It's crazy what can be done by a common scientific misunderstanding or that such racial essentialist attitudes even still exist, having long been debunked.

Essentialist discourse has been recuperated to some extent, though. The most notable example is probably the Black Power movement.

I only take them seriously enough.

My point was just that if you upset the people who you had wanted to like because you discover that there's still kind of an implicit class within Philosophy, you're just going to find yourself with no future, and, so, it's best to just ignore that whole sort of thing and find yourself something that you like doing, which I don't think is all that bad of advice.

Is this video Nihilist?

Also, it depends upon you define Nihilism. If it refers to the belief that the human experience is ultimately negative, then, Nietzsche probably would've thought that that should be overcome. If it refers to the belief that the revolution is impossible, but should be attempted to be carried out for its own sake, being more or less the contemporary, at least, Anarchist interpretation of Nihilism, then, since he was not a revolutionary, though was likely to say whatever it was that he did, as well as that he was a freethinker and individualist, though he spoke negatively of Anarchism, then, no. If it refers to the more absurd interpretation of Nihilism, referring to the belief that nothing exists, then, no. If it refers to "the rejection of all religious and moral principles, in the belief that life is meaningless", then, sort of, as he did reject all moral principles, but of argues that meaninglessness should be transcended in the creation of new values or whatever. It's difficult to ascribe "Nihilism" to any person's philosophy, as the Nihilists, themselves, tend to believe all sorts of different things. Like Camus, I wouldn't say that Nietzsche was an existential Nihilist, but I would say that he was a nihilistic Existentialist. I would, of course, mean different things by that statement for either philosopher, though.

Liberalism is fine, but I am still confused as to why you believe the way towards liberty is to ally yourself with Conservatives, especially when you don't agree with them. It seems like you'd be better off just trying to find some more like-minded people or more amicable allies.

Eh, it's part paranoia, part because I came to suspect that they had wanted me for something, and part because of that, because of the aforementioned parts, I had decided to engage them in an information war of sorts, after having ended up in a set of run ins with any number of nefarious parties. I even think that I met an actual spook on the train one time. There's also that I was sort of but not really engaged, but for good reason, in a number of activities, the legal status of which can be called into question, but, none of which were explicitly so or actually of any damage to society. I have also stated that I believe that their organization should be dissolved. I had actually kind of wanted to start a movement, the sole purpose of which, was to just that, but came to the realization that they create so many problems for me from the outset that it'd never get off of the ground.

Well, writing a homework assignment isn't evil. The argument isn't just about pain and suffering; it moreso refers to evil. If God exists and she is omnipresent, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent, then how can something like genocide occur? Surely God should've thought people shouldn't've had to have put a stop to it themselves and just have prevented it outright, in so far that she is omnipresent, and therefore aware, omnipotent, and therefore capable, and omnibenevolent, and therefore cares to. I actually think that Epicurus's argument still holds, but only for a omnipresent, omnipotent, and omnibenevolent god.

If one would like to provide a counterargument for "the problem of evil" I'd ask whoever is defending it to prove either of these things exist. One may add evil in that mix as well. — Tzeentch

Why should they have to prove that pain and suffering exist when it seems self-evident that they do. It seems like should have to prove that they don't exist.

Also, evil exists. When you think about something like The Gestapo for an extensive period of time, you have to wonder, why, when they had all of the information that they did about Jews did they actually go through carrying out the Holocaust? They must've known that they did not have the kind of clandestine global dominance that they were made out to, as well as that only some of them were Communists. You can think of any litany of rationalizations or justifications on their end, but, at the end of the day, it was just kind of baseless act of human cruelty. Evil, too, I think isn't too difficult to prove the existence of.

Seeing that the film school that I was going to closed, I decided to go back to the university for my undergrad after taking some classes at community college. I'll be in my third year this fall. To be honest, the prospect of making any sort of career out of it seems to be incredibly daunting, especially since I got into sort of a spat with certain left-wing intellectuals over their assumed ascendency over the libertarian Left and the Anarchist movement, of which, though, as I do suffer from "psychosis", I did kind of flip out, I will say that the people who are actually involved with protests and not the academics who believe themselves to be behind them are who is to direct them, while I do find that the Situationist International's neurotic habit of impersonating the aristocracy to be kind of charming, to actually treat other people with the kind of intellectual and cultural supremacism that the aristocracy was prone to is still offensive, regardless as to just how left-wing a person's purported philosophy is, and that it is the responsibility of the publishers of a text to protect that author's work and not their audience, which are points that left-wing academics can neither plausibly deny nor allow themselves to take into any sort of consideration whatsoever, which tends to result in that they are met with total silence. Being said, though, I am willing to be a good sport and pretend like professional revolutionaries don't really expect for almost invariably precariously employed "pseudo-intellectuals", their words not mine, to do favors for them so that they can maintain their way of life. I have two years left and then I'll go to grad school. After that, I don't really have any idea as to what I'm supposed to do, seeing that my career is already shot, and I have such a marked disdain for the way that prestige makes people behave. I'll probably have to kind of invent something for myself to do. Who knows that'll be?

What I would suggest to you, though, is that, regardless as to how you feel about the cultural hegemony of the field, just ignore it and find something that you enjoy doing. What's the point of only really being able to deliver a somewhat vitrolic, but also somehow righteous, critique on Reddit?

Oh, I understand what you and @Pfhorrest were saying, but, I really think that Camus ascribed a kind of philosophical pessimism that was almost akin to Nihilism. The choice in myth, I do think, is somewhat indicative of that. Anyone can interpret anything however, though. I've only really read The Myth of Sisyphus and Exile and the Kingdom, and, so, I'm no expert on Camus.

A Liberal in what sense, then? Like, Classical Liberalism?

Paleolibertarianism is kind of just a form of Conservatism. I suspect that they claim to be Libertarians for the sole purpose of seeming more liberal-minded. It is a philosophy that advocates for limited government, but, a lot of Conservatives advocate for limited government. Only "cosmolibertarianism" seems to be, at all, though I am kind of a Socialist, in ways, veritable.

I side with conservatives regarding their resistance to current tendencies, such as the aforementioned statism, socialism and the growing intolerance against their views. Libertarians and anarchists lack any political power, I'm afraid. — NOS4A2

But what about the social attitudes that Conservatives have towards individual liberties? I don't understand, when you seem to be of an either Post-Left Anarchist or Rational Egoist, in which case, I could, in part, understand, inclination, as to why it is that you would support people who are in favor of social repression.