Posted By RichC on March 12, 2024
Political ideology has always interesting me. I was aware of different philosophies early on since an intellectual best friend from high school was way to the left and interested in Socialism and Marxism.
Charlie Matthews (Kamikaze) seemed like a leftover from the 1960s and even back in the 1970s and 80s supported the Marxist philosophy (I’m not sure about today 
as we’ve not talked “politics” for years).
To be fair, he was openminded, enjoyed debating and he never rejected my views or conservative political leanings with anger. We often talked/debated as we listened to music, canoed, sailed (he live/work on Brenich one spring) and we enjoyed traveling together during our first year of college (different schools – ONU for me and Knox for him). Ideological differences aside, we remained friends well after college and tried to say in touch by writing even when he lived in China (until 1989) and then Portugal.
To the point of this posts, a recent mention by Elon Musk regarding today’s “woke” mindset and lack of tolerance for opposing points of view, had Devon Eriksen commenting 
as to why he believes “Marxism isn’t an ideology, but a tactic” being used by today’s more “militant political left.” Anyway, I found it interesting.
The truth is that Marxists consist, by definition, of the weak and envious, and of those who wish to weaponize that envy.
There is no coherent ideology, no consistent set of beliefs, because Marxism isn’t an ideology at all… it’s a tactic.
It is the simply the weaponized narrative of unilateral oppressor and oppressed, applied to whatever problem the storyteller has.
This is why Marxism has no consistent character over time, why Che Guevara executed homosexuals in the name of the same Marxism that celebrates homosexuals over normal people today.
There was no change in what Marxism is. It’s simply that the tactics of Marx are being employed by different people. “Woke” is just a name for the current tactical application of Marxism by whoever is currently doing so.
This is also why there is an “oppression stack” among employers of Marxism. It’s because Marxists not only use the tactic against normal, successful, healthy people, making them out to be oppressors… they also employ it against each other, struggling to have the greatest appearance of victimhood, so they can wield the most power and cash it in for the greatest rewards.
The reason we are experiencing this surge of Marxism right now is that western classical liberalism is uniquely hackable by this tactic.
In fact, Marxism is a just the exploitation of a bug in classical liberal philosophy.
Classical liberalism holds that rights belong to everyone, and they must be most urgently defended in those who are most oppressed, without reference to any in-group preference, including an in-group preference for other classical liberals.
That last sentence is the bug. It makes classical liberalism into a suicide pact, a death morality where classical liberal societies will embrace their own destruction the moment an outgroup can convince them that its failure to thrive is due to oppression.
Western civilization can only survive if we stop letting people convince us to be too broadminded to take our own side.
Category: Education, Friends, Human Interest, Politics |
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Tags: charlie matthews, commentary, devon eriksen, elon musk, ideology, marxism, philosophy, political, socialism
Going to college after high school has always seemed expensive, but by working, borrowing and getting help from parents … it was do-able, and by today’s standards, seemed affordable. I can’t help but smile noticing that when I finally paid off my student loan that I could start saving to put my kids through college. Sadly, today the debt many college graduates carry is overwhelming and they aren’t even thinking about having children.
changed her air filter without a problem (I knew 
but I’m not sure it did? ☹️ 
