Superb writing. The last part on the NPC-ness of the majority really brought home the fact that one needs to constantly remind oneself when listening to such people (often longstanding friends and acquaintances) regurgitate propaganda and programmed attitudes, that it is not their fault. It is a lifetime of such programming. Which is one heck of a spell to break. And there but for the grace of God etc.
"This fits the Kaczynskian take that leftists are “over-socialized". A person could be so thoroughly conditioned with society's values as to compromise their own agency to make choices as independent individuals."
The nature of a society's values and the extent to which each person chooses or is coerced to hold them drive societal outcomes. Most religious value systems — Abrahamic, Hindu, Buddhist — expect each adherent to discern their path to the divine, to integrate it into their lives, to exercise their agency.
The conditioning, whether incidental and/or malicious, divorces people from their agency or perhaps their awareness of agency. Regardless, the outcome, turning ignorantly away from the divine and towards the darkness, the worst in human nature, is the same.
Quite possibly the most under rated substack in existence.
Superb writing. The last part on the NPC-ness of the majority really brought home the fact that one needs to constantly remind oneself when listening to such people (often longstanding friends and acquaintances) regurgitate propaganda and programmed attitudes, that it is not their fault. It is a lifetime of such programming. Which is one heck of a spell to break. And there but for the grace of God etc.
great gathering of information and ideas
These maps are excellent!
"This fits the Kaczynskian take that leftists are “over-socialized". A person could be so thoroughly conditioned with society's values as to compromise their own agency to make choices as independent individuals."
The nature of a society's values and the extent to which each person chooses or is coerced to hold them drive societal outcomes. Most religious value systems — Abrahamic, Hindu, Buddhist — expect each adherent to discern their path to the divine, to integrate it into their lives, to exercise their agency.
The conditioning, whether incidental and/or malicious, divorces people from their agency or perhaps their awareness of agency. Regardless, the outcome, turning ignorantly away from the divine and towards the darkness, the worst in human nature, is the same.
As Ayaan Hirsi Ali points out in here Substack, https://www.restorationbulletin.com, restoration is now required.