Today I'm angry at liberal misogynists. (Such a rare thing for me, wow.)

@taylan liberal misogyny, or as some call it: "liberalism"

@dagda I dunno I think one can be a liberal without being a misogynist. I'd still consider myself a liberal at the end of the day if I had to label myself liberal or conservative. All it *should* mean is that one values personal liberties, like freedom of speech, freedom from the government or others in society trying to mandate a certain way of dressing or a certain sexuality, and so on.

@taylan liberalism and conservatism are both liberalism. Conservatives of today aren't about defending the divine order of the church and king, they usually defend (their interpretation of) the constitution of their country (revolutionary republican concept from the french liberal radicals).
In the end both liberals and "conservatives" (conservative liberals) advocate to continue the dictatorship of capital (to which concepts like free speech and limited government interference are optional).
Capital could *theoretically* agree to no exploit women as a class (free reproductive care for working class families, wombs for surrogacy, sex industy, etc.) and only exploit hands and brains sex-antagonistic, but it will likely not happen because of power

@taylan oh you mean the heraldscotland article not historical dialectical materialism lol well went off on a tangent i guess

@dagda I was actually thinking of the guy I slagged off a few days ago who was posting hatred against JKR, who I'm sure would consider himself a liberal / would be considered a liberal in the broad modern sense. Anti trump and such.

@taylan
That's progressivism, not liberalism. People who believe in banning hate speech/misgendering/etc are illiberal progressives
@dagda

@taylan
Trump/MAGA/modern Republicans are, as far as I can see from the other side of the Atlantic, illiberal conservatives
@dagda

@light @taylan liberalism has a fairly well-established track record of persecuting dissent on the mode of economic production tho, even mass murdering peoples across the globe to preserve theirs, largely party-agnostic. "Progressive" also has basically no coherent meaning, a far right techno-accellerationist would also call themself a driver of historical progress. Historical progress is defined by the classes that come out on top in struggle only

@admitsWrongIfProven
Maybe "reactionary" would have been a better term?
@taylan @dagda

@admitsWrongIfProven @light @taylan
That's the part where I would give the "woke progressives" the point tho, in that Trump/MAGA no longer is a conservative (as in protecting the constitution, tradition and mode of economics) but rather a proto-fascist.
Even the personal history fits right in with f. ex. Mussolini (butthurt former "leftist").
There is no immediate rationale in his national chauvinism (astroturfing everything with CIA is much more utilitarian for his cause than announcing future conquests on Fox News) and random persecution and attacks on stuff he doesn't like. It's struggle with no tangible goal or objective, for the sake of itself and the "thrill"

@admitsWrongIfProven
Especially if this memo is correct: https://america2.news/content/files/2025/02/Musk-NRx-Memo-Feb-5-2025.pdf (haven't read yet)
@taylan @dagda

@admitsWrongIfProven @taylan @light
I know that these words get used by others in other fashion but I choose to be vulgar in my analysis, which is based on material and historic observations. A lot of political science in the West is terminally corrupted and ideological word salad, this used to be different with the first generation of radical liberal thinkers. Adam Smith for example was very explicit in that capitalism means parasitism and exploitation, even though he supported it (as he couldn't see an alternative in his historical and subjective context).
Nowadays the objective of academia is manufactoring consent, they believe in their own falsehoods, it's a sign of intellectual degeneration but consequential as their intellectual means are representative of an order of things that has overstayed it's welcome and is in rapid decline

@light
"the deep state"? Who is this from?
"america2.news" is not a domain i recognize, so just some randos or some respectable news org?

@taylan @dagda

@admitsWrongIfProven
I don't know, sorry
@taylan @dagda

@dagda
>liberalism has a fairly well-established track record of persecuting dissent on the mode of economic production tho, even mass murdering peoples across the globe to preserve theirs, largely party-agnostic.
Source?
@taylan

@light @taylan

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-communist_mass_killings

@dagda
>Even the personal history fits right in with f. ex. Mussolini (butthurt former "leftist").
Because Trump used to identify with the Democrat party at times?
@taylan @admitsWrongIfProven

@light @taylan @admitsWrongIfProven Yeah, Democrats are not really what is perceived "left wing" in the global context but to US-context I would consider it the equivalent as the (viable, represented) political scope is somewhat limited by the de-facto 2 party system

@dagda @taylan In all the two-party countries, the parties do not represent competing moral principles. They represent competing collections of interests. Once you understand that it all falls into place.

Anyone who holds onto moral principles is excluded from political power. A gang of thieves will welcome a crooked cop, even if he demands a bribe, but will rigorously exclude an honest cop. And these are just rival gangs of thieves.

@mike805 @taylan
The american two-party system does represent competing moral principles tho.
Law-based rule ("The exact words in the constitution are the only principle of how things should be") vs. Popular rule ("The will of the people is how things should be"). If you wanna go meta-philosophical it's Order vs Chaos.
Truth is that moral principles don't hold power by themselves, you need leverage to enforce them (by being elite, having popular will, the law, tradition by your side). The right wing ("Order moralists") have been replaced by fascism, the left wing ("Chaos moralists") were captivated by pseudo-jacobinism, social technocracy and bureaucracy, etc.
BOTH parties profoundly nepotistic, oligarchic, militaristic etc. but that's just the US in general. I don't see how "new" moralists wouldn't just get overrun by the totality of this machine, that's the exact mistake the "New Left" (1968) went through

@dagda @taylan So in theory there are moral principles involved. In practice there are not and it's all interests. My point exactly.

IMHO this country had a fatal flaw in its code from the beginning. It crashed in the 1860s, has never recovered, and since then has just been a contest of interests.

After all, IF slavery is such a great evil that it invalidates your right to exist as a nation (which is quite a reasonable position) THEN the American Revolution should have been put down... 1/3

@dagda @taylan immediately and the slaves would have been freed two generations earlier.

IF slavery does not invalidate a nation's right to exist, THEN the Confederacy had the same right to secede as the (slave-owning) United States had in 1776.

There is no logic that justifies both of those outcomes, other than "the winner gets what he wants."

Which means the USA is and always has been just a contest of interests, with no moral or philosophical foundation whatsoever. 2/3

@dagda @taylan There was an effort by Leftists in the second half of the 20th century to retrofit the Bill of Rights as a logical basis for the existence of the United States.

None of those rights had existed in their modern forms until ACLU type lawyers won court cases in that era.

The Left did that assuming it would guarantee them victory. But when the Right started using that weapon to beat them (2015+) the Left suddenly turned against absolute free speech.

Again, it's all interests. 3/3

@mike805 @taylan I mean yeah, of course, the great melting pot, the great experiment. Still interesting to look at from the outside, but I increasingly get the impression that it'll end in barbarism sadly

@dagda @taylan All the evidence of history is that civilization contains the seeds of its own destruction. If we ever figure out how to stabilize one long term, that will be a new discovery.

It was understood in ancient Greece that one person one vote democracy was the degenerate state of a republic right before it crashed into a dictatorship.

Sure looks like we are approaching that point.

@dagda @taylan Yes I know people will point out China as a civilization that survived long term. But it really didn't. There were long periods where it was divided into warring feudal domains. And when it was united that was because someone conquered it. Every time one of those dynasties fell, a double digit percentage of the population died off, mostly from hunger due to the chaos. Not an example to emulate.