sliders1234
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User ID: 685
Personally, I consider myself alt-right. I consider TheMotte overall alt-right. Everything and anything can be the alt-right. The one group missing for the alt-right would be Neil Strauss - TheGame - and all the pick-up artists. The psychological insights merged with some writers and ended up on the manosphere which eventually lands you in the Proud Boy ideology.
I would consider the alt-right to be primarily the intellectual counter-arguments against the new elites ideology. So anything against modern feminism, blank-slate race views, woke, sjw, modern Marxism (ideology I would attach to blm).
I would consider the arguments Bill Ackman is making to attack Harvard and Dean Gay as fairly core alt-right arguments.
I also would agree that the left successfully labeled the alt-right as literally the KKK so it’s a dead label. But how I understood the term in 2014-2020 would have been the intellectuals of the right against modern leftists assumptions while dropping the religious arguments of the rest of the right.
The alt-right often uses evolutionary biology arguments to replicate the views of the traditional conservatives on a broad swath of ideas/policies.
I never would have associated the old school kkk types as alt-right because they were in fact old-school and old-arguments.
It’s definitely not almost zero chance. There is a ton of antisemitism going around. You can’t just forgive everyone for being a dumb kid who did antisemitism by accident. Someone is pulling the strings.
And Greta is fairly high up decision maker in this food chain. Now perhaps she’s all manipulated by her parents but at some point the people calling for let’s kill the Jews need to be believed and are actually advocating for what they are saying.
I fail to understand how you just accidentally use a Jewish dog whistle while also fairly directly calling for Jewish genocide.
Either that or Americas left is just the global useful idiot. Hamas does literally mean drive them into the sea till they drown and the Gretas are always supporting those types.
She’s almost 21 now. At some point your not dumb kid and you just don’t accidentally do genocide promotion.
Interesting case. Now I disagree with unions (in most cases) and I believe you should be allowed to fire someone because they are a Christian and vice versa or because they have a skin color you don’t like.
But since there is a union involved I definitely think special protections should be involved. The flight attendant can’t bargain for herself and work in her chosen profession. It’s not a free market. It’s already at its core a coercive relationship where she’s forced to join the union.
Stones her union rep by government force. So she certainly should have to deal with the complaints of her constituency. Without knowing all the legalese here it feels like this was decided correctly.
But a core part of this to me comes from unions only existing because of government violence. Otherwise they wouldn’t exists.
There are a small amount of unions that would freely appear without government. Construction is one potential area as project may be short-lived and both sides of the transaction would prefer to work with an organization verifying worker quality.
The solution in a free market (works best when it’s a constant costs business like airlines and not firms with moats who can discriminate) would be for the wrong thinkers or wrong skin pigment bidding their labor cheaper than the right thinkers and the firm hiring the wrong thinkers makes more money.
sliders1234
2mo ago
Genetic modification seems so obviously to be progress but I am starting to expect it to face a great deal of political backlash.
Let’s say we are in a Cold War with with China. In order to defeat the US they begin with their ideal Chinese man but then change the genetic code so that they create Shaquille O’Neill physical traits plus 250 IQ. These guys crush the US. But then the super humans end ruling China too. And they are so modified they are more different from Han Chinese than European Americans.
You don’t really need War for this timeline as simply doing it in peace time would end up creating humanoids completely different to current humans and basically a mass extinction even or at a minimum making human existence void of any meaning a second tier species watched over by their better.
Same thing of course applies to AI.
Historically this is invasion. The Romans never would have let millions of migrants enter their territory and use their resources. They would have slaughtered them.
If I open a dictionary this fits many of the definitions you will find. I’m sure in about a week all those definitions will be modified to make sure invasion only means with guns.
We also frequently use the word “invasive species”. Those aren’t species using force to enter a new environments. Often their species that lack predators and therefore grow uncontrollably.
So often a debate does come down to the definition of a word.
I would note you I believe think Trump committed insurrection on Jan 6. In many ways this is very similar but I do believe the gap between: Trump gives speech causing riot is the meaning used by 14th amendment rioters as an insurrection is much larger than the gap between the definition of invasion constitutional writers used and what is occurring at our southern border.
This just comes down to how stretchy are the words invasions and insurrection.
sliders1234
9mo ago
Ok so I am at a Notre Dame wedding where I went. I’ve fallen away from the news of the place the last few years. A few people did the student to administrator route so I got some news on how the place is doing. The school no longer has priest in the dorms. From what I can guess it’s because people aren’t entering religious life so they lack the numbers. Notre Dame isn’t the church but I do think it had a special place in American Catholicism.
I feel like this has a culture war point. The right is no longer reproducing itself. The right perhaps is a larp from people who remember the old days but aren’t living that life. Which would explain how someone like Trump could be the chosen leader.
When I went there we would all do our things during the week and live together then our rector a Priest would give mass. And if you wanted to you could go to daily mass and walk down the hall.
I feel like this is anecdotal but there is something here when an institution is failing to reproduce itself.
sliders1234
7mo ago
I’ve been relatively happy with McCarthy. But I support Ukraine funding.
We do need to cut federal spending. The current levels are harming the economy. If we cut federal spending it would cause demand to fall. But that fall is easy for the fed to compensate for by cutting rates. We could go back to the 2010’s economy of big but workable deficits and low rates. Bidenomics has been a disaster.
Also I wish they were doing a better job impeach Biden. (Let’s not relitigate that but personally I believe it’s correct and just).
sliders1234
1mo ago
I am in Argentina now for a bit. And being here makes me more racists. Salaries are down like 20% in a few months in real terms and farther away from where I am at I am fairly certain there is real poverty. Yet things feel chill and feel safe. I see far fewer cops than I would in any major city in the states. In the states I have had lunch with literal army vehicles and national guard on the street corners. It keeps making me think is this what society would be like in a 100% European ancestry country.
From a HBD perspective it seems safe to say Italians have proven themselves to be incapable of managing a central bank.
sliders1234
8mo ago
I am convinced Biden is guilty of corruption so I like the impeachment. I do not believe it’s primarily about pumping up the base. The Dems are running on Trump being a criminal. Impeaching Biden helps with the moderates so they have him impeached as a criminal too. The average median voter who thinks about the election a week or two before the election will be bombarded with all the bad stuff Trump has done. Which ya some of it was bad and stupid and the files at Mar-Lago feels like a valid case to me. The point of impeaching Biden is to have it one the record the evidence he was taking bribes all over the world and at a decent probability forced Ukraine to fire a prosecutor to make his family money. He want get convicted in the Senate but for that median voter there will be a stack of bad things Trump did and a stack of bad things Biden did and the median voter will either have to choose a candidate on a different issue or stay home instead of voting for Biden.
I don’t make the rules and the GOP doesn’t either. The election the country wants is the guy who loses goes to jail. Perhaps, we have more important things but I’m not a member of the party that ran two impeachments.
Inflation would be easy to deal with. Last decade government spending averaged 21.5%. Since COVID it’s been around 24%. If we just returned to last decades spending my guess is inflation would fall back to last decades inflation and interest rates would fall back to last decades interest rates.
But I do disagree with those saying it’s all an optics show. The election will come down to in all likelihood getting 50k votes in the right places. Impeach we must.
sliders1234
9mo ago
The funny thing about Hunter Biden is the Hunter Biden Brand is very culture warry but Hunter Biden himself is just a fairly stereotypical fucked up elite guy who did a bunch of grifting on his name.
Deep down I don’t even think Joe is culture warry left. He was probably disgusted by a bunch of trannies showing their boobs on the White House. But he grew up a Democrat politician and his chief skill is being that so he says what he needs to say for his coalition. He likes being the front man.
The only reason these people matter is because the left could never agree on a politician that wasn’t just a blank state so they propped him up. And now all there scandals became culture war.
sliders1234
1mo ago
Doesn’t Ron Desantis disprove your rule that non-elites can’t achieve high office or even Joe Biden?
Desantis has like 400k networth now. Yes he has has the elite degrees. This just says the filter for entering the elites may be earlier. He no doubt got great SAT scores early then got into elite schools. Paid for it looks like from ROTC money.
The thing with the filter being earlier it could mean one of two things.
- It’s just earlier and you need to be taking the steps for that path early.
- The filter isn’t high school academic achievements, but the people with ambition to be an elite already have that ambition young so they get themselves on that track early.
Joe Biden doesn’t seem to have money or elite academics early.
sliders1234
8mo ago
He’s got too much money. This seems more like a gift to society. Right-wing boycotts have taken off since twitter became neutral.
He has indicated before that his goals for humanity were being limited by cultural changes.
He’s already made more than enough money to fund however many heirs he wants to have. Musks personal gains from spreading his genetics has long been maxed out. Unless he takes on 20k girlfriends.
Marginal Revolution linked to this on Britain today. Honestly felt like creating a post on it since I thought it added good points since UK failing is the current thing.
https://www.sambowman.co/p/britain-is-a-developing-country
Honestly a cheaper currency shouldn’t be causing their electricity and home building prices to blow out. Each would seem to have some influences from imports but they probably get a lot of their building products internally or from Europe which also has had its currency cheapen.
His thesis is England is no longer on the technology frontier. Looking at this data does make me thing England is sort of the poors now to be a little hot. They need a lot of reform.
The relative wages shown between England and low end US labor seems appalling. If I was English and rich and wanted to wake up my country I’d start running fake ads advertising cleaning labor jobs in America at relatively high wages. Could be a good political ad. “Come to America and be a janitor so you can send remittance home”.
sliders1234
7mo ago
You left out (4). The west gives you proper weapons and you win the war. 30 years later your children are richer than England.
This has happened before. Poland is on path to be wealthier than England in 10 years. The average dude might already be there.
Your preferred option sounds like I’ll accept be a drunkard and survive my life. (4) provides the option to have a large successful family. The EV is much much higher.
sliders1234
9mo ago
For a long time though we just mostly ignored the differences in differences. The things you mentioned didn’t become a problem until the BLM and CRT people showed up. Things just functioned for a long time.
sliders1234
11mo ago
Desantis actually does live up to it a great extent. I would guess 30-70% of motte posters have a higher net worth than him (I think it’s around 300k). Probably 90-95% at his age.
I only see 2 areas where he is failing. He expanded the death penalty. True pro-lifers are against that. And it’s a harder argument to make but I think he’s not following his beliefs on Ukraine.
sliders1234
6mo ago
I don’t understand politics? I see people flying in on hangliders then machine gunning down civilians. Then Greta shows support for them along with many others.
I then see opinion polls that Hamas is mostly supported by the residents of Palestine. Greta and her ilk then show support for the people backing hanglide and machine civilians. Sometimes the obvious answer is the correct answer.
I mean I knew Jews having their hands in everything behind the scenes was a belief. In fact I’ve even posted here that I believe it is fundamentally true. (I just don’t believe in murdering Jews). But I’m of the belief they contribute a lot to society.
Maybe a fairer representation would be she isn’t an anti-Semite directly she’s just fine with genociding high IQ successful people which a lot of Jews fall under.
Being autistic isn’t an excuse. Autistic people get symbolism. I’ve been accused of being on the same spectrum as her. She just happened to pick anti-Semitic symbolism at the same time she was backing a group with a goal of genociding jews.
sliders1234
2mo ago
I can’t see the thread so I am guessing it is now deleted/blocked but would be interesting to hear the story.
sliders1234
8mo ago
Target bud light
Why do Aircraft Carriers vote?
The Case against Democracy.
A common retort on the left is Why does Land Vote? I don’t think they can explain that view when I will assume they believe Aircraft Carriers should vote.
Balaji had an interesting tweet which led me to coin this term.
https://twitter.com/balajis/status/1663429591757885440?s=46&t=aQ6ajj220jubjU7-o3SuWQ
Synopsis the global system is controlled by America with some partners. If it was a Democracy a bunch of other countries would control the system. America consistently interferes with other countries policy thru sanctions etc. Those countries in a Democracy would do that to America when they don’t like what we are doing.
Benjamin Franklin famously said “A Republic if you can keep it”
I think it’s beyond clear that Republic/Democracy isn’t clearly the best form of government but it depends on something else. At the global level I don’t think the world would be a better place if India, China, and a few other populous countries were in charge.
South Africa is struggling a lot now. Electricity is spotty and other public goods. I think that country is probably best if the Elon Musks white people had more power but perhaps in a less racists and nicer way.
Historically I’m not sure I can think of a Republic/Democracy that didn’t limit who could become citizens. Rome made some tribes into citizens but not everyone.
It makes me think the key thing is a shared civic religion and beliefs that are good and makes a successful country. In that situation a Republic probably works better than other forms of government. And yes I’m probably arguing that a Republic needs a certain level of average IQ (Which I believe is Garrett Jones argument he avoided saying directly).
Can anyone make an argument a Republic is best for all people - land and aircraft carriers shouldn’t vote? Or that land and aircraft carriers are not the same thing - the UN should be how it is but countries should all be Democracies?
The only counter I can come up with is at the global level the rest of the world hasn’t developed enough. A blank slatist type argument that America has reasonably good public schools creating a sufficient amount of citizens. But the rest of the world isn’t there yet so the world should be governed by the strong now. But fundamentally I think most people just use the arguments that increase their own power and power of their tribe when they can.
I’m not sure how you can describe the recent Palestinian attack on Israel other than it’s a hate crime and genocide. She then posted support for them with no qualifiers. That is being extremely charitable.
The right never gets that. Even say the Proud Boys who leader is Afro-Caribbean was accused in a debate of being a white supremacists organization. If I’m even not using that standard but an easier standard of you just backed an organization that did genocide with no qualifications then it seems to be fair that they back Jewish genocide. There are lines for being charitable, this is not it.
Even the most charitable take is she something like anti-growth so she’s fine with murdering people for that goal. Maybe that’s not anti-semitism but there is no functional difference in the results between antisemitism and her position. It’s almost like a Nazi saying I don’t hate Jews we just needed their land for ethnic Germans to breathe.
sliders1234
8mo ago
Unions aren’t market forced and are protected by the government. Market forces would be the company paying the marginal wage to get to equilibrium for the workers they need which is often fairly high.
It would be better if hbd didn’t need to be taught. It was just vaguely understood enough. But with the left saying every outcome difference it makes talking about hbd more important to prevent policy mistakes. S Africa would be better if for the most part they just let whites rule. Now you have the globalist saying everything is racism which makes their lower class believe the reason they are not getting ahead is oppression which then leads to ethnic conflict.
The thing is once you start thinking about hbd you start seeing it everywhere.
If I went to some Harvard economists policy symposium on Africa they would have all these fancy theories on what should be done. But non of them would incorporate hbd into it.
I don’t care if he’s guilty as charged. Everyone who’s done anything guilty of something.
I do think he broke some norms with regards to these documents. But are they breaking bigger norms by charging him? I’m reminded that Hillary probably broke some laws with document security and Biden held on to some classified documents.
Even if you assume he’s 100% guilty we all break laws all the time and prosecutorial discretion etc don’t get charged. How do I know this isn’t something ignored for ex-potus and not something that matters because “Trump is a really bad man”. Lawfare etc especially when Trump loves breaking norms himself and probably should have just returned the docs.
I’m still reminded of other prosecutorial norms not being followed like Flynn being attacked on a Logan Act violation which every new administration breaks and had never been prosecuted before. And his NYC cases all seem to be “novel legal theories” or things no one prosecutes but Trump.
So this is weird because Trump breaks norms so I don’t know if they are breaking norms prosecuting him on a lawfare way.
I think it would also be fair to say that the US has moved to the right. Part of this was because of failures on the left but I also say Musks buying twitter was a big boost and COVID had a great deal of just be nice to the crazies thru the pandemic. It’s not just Motte going right. Maybe I’m in a bubble but I’m basically expecting as close to a landslide for Trump as possible for tribal America.
A second point for violent crime isn’t a real risks is it negates all of the costs society bares to mitigate violence in the US. We spend a lot of money on prisons. And a lot of money trying to boost black schools. Chicago’s economics would be a lot different without these costs. You also would not have had the ghettoization of the southside of Chicago. More urbanization does increase agglomeration effects. If America never had slavery I am fairly certain we would have universal health care. I don’t know if on net this would be a good thing because I think we would be less FU capitalist which probably hurts growth in other ways. Without black people American politics would be a lot more like Canada, but a super power.
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