The same basic power dynamics exist in religion. Though he presents it in a joke, Žižek makes a direct comparison to a Rabbi and wokesters. Do you think the religious need therapy also?

The emotionally vulnerable are just being exploited and led in destructive circles, because the grift depends on them not finding a proper cure. — Tzeentch

What is the proper cure?

When one reduces one's own historical and/or cultural identity to "subservience to patriarchy", "slavery", etc. the 'other side of the mirror' is that one is indirectly admitting to one's own inferiority. Hence, observing the woke is like watching a dog chase its own tail. — Tzeentch

This doesn't address how "one's wrongdoing paradoxically grants a kind of moral authority."

Žižek underscores the point that morality is power in disguise. The scenario is what Nietzsche calls the “ascetic ideal” — a way of dominating life by turning life-denying values like humility into a source of authority, powerful not in spite of humility but because of it.

LOL, you're getting much better. — AmadeusD

I trained with the best.

How would you explain this phenomenon in a way that differs from Žižek’s interpretation? — Number2018

Nietzsche's master/slave morality.

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Speaking of socio-aesthetic milieus, there was a recent dustup in the culture war over the logo redesign for a restaurant chain. Trump Jr. led the anti-woke charge against Cracker Barrel and Trump Sr. finished it, damaging the brand and forcing them to abandon their rebranding efforts.

It might be noted that rebranding of this kind is a common practice in the evolution of a brand. It's sometimes called logo simplification or brand minimalism, and the basic logic of it simply that brand equity allows simplicity — the more familiar the brand, the less it needs to say visually. A good literally iconic example of this is the Apple logo. When the brand was new the logo was a highly detailed illustration of Isaac Newton under a tree.

What's remarkable about this is that the anti-woke mob was led by the heads of MAGA, and that the rebrand apparently had nothing to do with wokeness.

Textbook refusal to admit it’s a fallacy fallacy.

If some people can do this, all people can do this. — AmadeusD

Classic hasty generalization fallacy.

To be honest, I imagine this the easiest litmus test for whether or not one is doctrinaire, woke or anti-woke. Have you read any books on the subject?

Has anyone tried to read woke? It's intolerable garbage. Judith Butler? Robin DiAngelo? Candy-ass X? — Jeremy Murray

I've only read anti-woke books like Cynical Theories by Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay, Material Girls by Kathleen Stock, and really awful ones like Woke, Inc. (on a par with DiAngelo awfulness I imagine). Though I've read some woke-adjacent books like The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander.

Words physically move through the air to ear drums. Intentions do not. — AmadeusD

I think you mean to say that sounds move through the air to ear drums. Words do not. Right?

Your stoicism compelled you to spend time, search my name and Biden’s. I love living rent free. — NOS4A2

That took seconds, the hard part was deciding on an EO graph. And stoicism has been out for ages. I’m a Nietzschean now. Will to power, baby! :strong:

They will pick one misplaced word in my post, attack that, and pat themselves on the back while lauding their personal 'courage'. — Jeremy Murray

You misspelled progpagandist.

Your underhanded attempts to insult are keenly noted, Athena. Ironic to the nth. Particularly when you do not have the gall to actually tag me or address me directly - addressing a third party with your thoughts about one is a sure-fire sign you are not emotionally intelligent. — AmadeusD

The @ symbol in front of your name shows the intention to tag you. Must be a technical glitch that the link isn’t working.

And btw, didn’t you say before that words can be given or are you walking that back also?

I guess it’s an inside joke.

I think that is an example of poor emotional intelligence. — Athena

At core it seems to imply that an individual is an independent being. Nothing could be further from the truth.

@NOS4A2

The first post listed in the search for your mentioning "Biden" (743 instances) is your protesting his excessive use of executive orders...

Biden has been signing EO’s like a madman. He has almost signed as many EO’s in his first two weeks as FDR did in his first month. According to Biden’s own words this is dictator shit.

https://www.npr.org/2021/02/03/963380189/with-28-executive-orders-signed-president-biden-is-off-to-a-record-start

But who cares? At least he doesn’t make mean tweets. — NOS4A2

Yet you think "all forms of protest are stupid."

Oh, and:


It would be smart of you to protest Trump's excessive use of executive orders also.

I just did a search and there are 743 instances of you mentioning Biden on this public forum. I didn't read any of the posts listed but I assume they express some disapproval or objection.

Thou doth protest too much, methinks.

I just thought it would be funny in a dumb sort of way if you were to defend flag burning as a form of protest like Trump's opponents. Don't mind me.

You’re against the right to safely burn a flag that you own as a form of protest? What other liberties are you against?

They might find it stifling, but it does not seem to follow from this alone that it is necessarily better for those who do find it stifling to act contrary to systems of "external values" in virtue of this fact. It seems that, in at least some cases, it is better to for those who feel stifled to learn to appreciate and enjoy what at first seems stifling. For example, the music student or person learning the art of painting might find their instruction initially stifling, and yet it may help to make them more excellent, and they may learn to love what they have initialy learned under some duress. — Count Timothy von Icarus

There is no escaping the weight of external values, and every student at first confronts the limits of their own abilities. Yet instruction, when it accords with a person’s nature, can serve as a catalyst for self-realization rather than a constraint. What becomes stifling—perhaps in the sense that DE intends—is when a spirit is bent against its grain: when, for instance, one who is inwardly a musician is compelled to devote themselves to science, sculpture, or some discipline for which they feel no inner drive.

It perhaps makes "putting power on a pedestal" less obviously bad (if one judges more conventional, liberal notions of power bad, or at least not desirable in themselves).

To be clear, I was sort of asking if placing high value on wtp or creativity, self-overcoming, and life-affirmation has a downside or will reliably result in meaning.

I haven't determined how meaningful it is to me yet. I'm defiantly interested.

How so?

My feeling about it is inaccurate?

Can you point out an inaccuracy?

Meaning you don't use limits as resistance to grow stronger and simply quit when you've hit your limit?

attempting to struggle through it is ignoring your higher drives. — DifferentiatingEgg

So rather than struggle you always quit when faced with a challenge that interests you?

How so?

Very Nietzschean of you to encourage quitting. :lol:

I didn’t say anything about creating yourself.

I was talking about this:

I guess I'm just hella confused about this:

I would feel better about it if lead to greater meaning (creativity, self-overcoming, and life affirmation) than the conventional definition of power. I can’t say how I feel more plainly than that.
— praxis

Because that's essentially what will to power is... — DifferentiatingEgg

You seem to be saying that wtp is essentially my feeling better about it if it lead to greater meaning (creativity, self-overcoming, and life affirmation) than the conventional definition of power.

Again I’m no expert but I don’t think will to power is defined by my feeling better about it than the conventional definition of power.

The will to power isn't about Coveting power. — DifferentiatingEgg

I didn’t suggest that it was.

I would feel better about it if lead to greater meaning (creativity, self-overcoming, and life affirmation) than the conventional definition of power. I can’t say how I feel more plainly than that.

Will to power may be a metaphysical claim about the structure of existence, but for me it only carries weight if it is also experientially meaningful—can be embodied as a lifestyle.

Would you feel better about the Nietzschean notion of power if you saw it as radically distinct from its conventional definitions? — Joshs

Does anyone feel better about the Nietzschean notion of power—embodying it as a lifestyle?

Meaning you’re fully onboard with conservative branding?



That’s Viktor Orbán, btw. He was a rockstar at CPAC.

That’s brand infringement, dude.

Ya feel? — DifferentiatingEgg

No, but I’m only on chapter 7 of Zarath so I’m not fluent in uber-speak.

It seems that Nietzschean values place power (self-overcoming) on a pedestal, perhaps slavishly.

Gotta take the “uber” out of it - too inequitable. “Trans-uber” isn’t woke.
“Trans-ber-mensch”, is better. Maybe go “she-ber-mensch” for the female/male hybrid version. — Fire Ologist

I don’t get DifferentiatingEgg‘s woke as lived experience thing, but the culture war is fully last man standing in a puddle of piss. That I get.

“I say unto you: one must still have chaos in oneself to be able to give birth to a dancing star. I say unto you: you still have chaos in yourselves. Where is the lightning to lick you with its tongue? Where is the frenzy with which you should be inoculated? Behold, I give you the Trans-Übermensch. They are this lightning. They are this frenzy.”

My view hasn’t changed, though it might have if you didn’t ignore the following the first time I posted it.

"…the woke see advertising beer as a perfectly reasonable place to teach their ideological lessons." This phrasing, which conflates ‘the woke,’ corporate advertising, and the political left more generally, collapses distinct ideas into a single caricature and reflects partisan rhetoric more than independent analysis.

It’s a simple point that I think is true about wokeness, and is at the heart of why the anti-woke dislike wokeness. — Fire Ologist

I agree that anti-woke rhetoric has been very influential.