Postmodernism and the Anti-Hero
On The Federalist blog is a recent essay identifying Pres. Donald Trump as an anti-postmodernist. (“Donald Trump is the First President to Turn Postmodernism Against Itself” by David Ernst, January 23, 2017.) As interesting as it was, I have a different understanding of the anti-hero. ... It is not that the anti-hero has bad values, but that he has none.
http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/20...
http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/20...
I've never considered him anything but a NY moderate (a moderate-left) politically. I have to admit thus far I'm quite surprised. I still can't help waiting for the other shoe to drop. Even so, watching the leftist bug-out is both amusing and comforting to see...we're in a world of hurt as evidenced from the number of useful idiot suckling off Soros' teat and the multitude of coattail drones too stupid to reason how far from the pier (the Constitution) they've swam.
Nothing can harden my opposition or view of liberal more than it has been.
I voted for Trump because I just couldnt see letting Hildebeast take the country down another notch. I looked at Trump as someone who could at least slow down the advance to socialism. I think he will try, but I am not so sure he can withstand the constant and continual hammering from the left. He will have to just DO what he promised and not listen to the left's demoralizing comments.
As for his financial opportunities, I personally do not care too much - and am somewhat amused - that the US government is renting space in Trump Towers. However, my lack of concern made me stop and ask myself what I would think if it were Pres. Hillary Clinton enriching the Clinton Foundation through her office. (New topic to follow...)
Ego, fame, etc. He wants to be seen and remembered as the great savior. Everything with him is as he says, the greatest, most amazing, most incredible, most everything. It fits with his MO.
I understand the literary device, based on reality, of the Atlas Shrugged good guys naming their companies after themselves, while the bad guys are "Associated" and "Amalgamated." Ford, Buick, Chevrolet, and AC spark plugs for August Champion... So, yes, Trump Towers, and Trump Casino... why not?
How many of the billion Facebook users would jump to meet their friends on "Zuckerberg"? Branding is everything and "trump" is both a verb and a noun, so that works for him. But I would not extend that inward to say that Pres. Donald Trump is an egoist.
He seems to be the opposite of an egoist: a very public man.
Pres. Donald Trump displays the psycho-epistemology of Peter Keating. He is all about what later sociologists called "impression management." Donald Trump may not "care" if other people "like" him, but he does seem to depend on their noticing him. That is why he is on Twitter and reality television, and not just buying and selling buildings, while quietly minding his own business.
What is wrong with those qualities? They lack moral character. Not that I'm a Jesus follower, but, did Jesus die for us in order to be seen as a savior, or did he die to save us?
When you deny your Self, no other virtues are possible.
"the achievement of one's full potential through creativity, independence, spontaneity, and a grasp of the real world."
From Dictionary.com
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Shakespeare said it best: "To thine own self be true; and it must follow as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.
But I meant to imply that the altruist is, in effect, hurting others, (by giving them "things") instead of helping them. So altruism isn't good for the "givee" any more than it is good for the "giver".
Rand also said, "I will sacrifice my life for no man; nor will I allow another to sacrifice his life for me." In other words, no one is responsible for the life of another; HE is the only one responsible for his life.
"A Man Said To The Universe" Stephen Crane:
A man said to the Universe: "Sir, I exist".
"That", replied the Universe, "does not create in me an obligation for your existence."
In other words, to fully self-actuate, a man must take responsibility for himself. No other person can do it for him.
he died for something he sincerely (making allowance for a certain amount of self-deception)
believed in. I'm not saying I believe in it, but I
think it was for his cause. It's very sad.
Even Objectivists commonly accept the word nobility to mean virtue in the vernacular sense. It is all through Ayn Rand's fiction. However, a close analysis of the word reveals its flaws, just as altruism, the common good, the greatest good for the greatest number, sacrifice, compromise, and conflict of interest, are all misused because they are misunderstood.
So you can understand why Wittengenstein, later in the 20th century would say "What do you mean by that". He thought a lot of philosophy was meaningless because the language of it became meaningless.
The other shoe already fell. We just have not heard the thud yet. His Wall will wall us in. His protectionism will reward inefficiency and cost us more. His infrastructure programs will mire us in 20th century roads on the ground -- built by the same old highway contractors -- that prevent transport to the Moon, Mars, and asteroids.
(PS: swim, swam, swum.)
Taking care of what's yours is self interest. You choose to marry, you choose to have kids (most times), you choose to own land, you choose to associate, etc. Why? Because you enjoy it and you favor the idea of MINE (possession, ownership). Taking care of that which you "love" is self-interest, about as as selfish as it gets.
In your world view, is asking for quantifiable ID to receive permission too much? We not talking movement between two or several states we're talking movement between two distinct countries with different laws and different customs.
You seem to also believe that the various states are not distinct with different laws when you enter one. Why do you believe that visitors need to be housed, clothed, and fed when entering the country just as there is would be no requirement for the state of Wisconsin, which has different laws than does Iowa, to house, feed, or cloth those who come into the state from Iowa who may take away jobs from those in Wisconsin or not be able to fix a balance of payments problem spending or buying within Wisconsin. If they cannot make it here and no help is given they will leave soon enough. Of course, there may be a criminal alien wetback crossing the Mississippi and causing trouble, but then the justice system or self defense will take care of that. Just because you cross a border, there need not be a free lunch on the other side.
Time and again the fault resides with Americans.
When does mexico take responsibility for its own economy, its own people and their actions violating a neighboring sovereign nation?
Mexican president comes to phoenix to speak to his people
http://tucsoncitizen.com/morgue2/2003...
Illegal aliens mark in Phoenix demanding rights
http://www.alipac.us/f12/illegal-immi...
Drop House bust in Phoenix (one of many)
http://www.tucsonnewsnow.com/story/72...
National Guard ordered to abandon post on US soil to advancing mexicans
http://www.vdare.com/posts/national-g...
I sick of this shit and all the philosophy surround the carnage caused by these poor and sorry people just looking for a change. Come here properly or or stay out.
Perhaps this is best taken to a new discussion.
I did want to say this in regards to the Eskimo's "sense of property". Driftwood apparently must be either "mine" or "yours", but not both; but wives are to be shared with strangers. Just saying.
Boundaries exist without physical imprisonment. They, however, require rational minds which are capable of conceptual thought and able to create rules and minimal governments to protect persons in their selves and their properties. Quit giving citizens and non-citizens free stuff and making it extremely profitable to be criminals with extreme drug laws, then there would be no reason to want to come here other than better oneself and maybe they would try to civilize their own countries and maybe the USA could become a country of adult humans rather than continue the adolescent stage that it is in at present. Then liberty might just become desirable to most people.
Certainly the wrong side of history derives from the Marxist view that history is already determined. I don't know if Marx---I try to avoid reading Marx, unless I absolutely have to-- used that term (wrong side of history) but I'm sure it refers to anyone who believes that capitalism will not be overturned in time, is on the wrong side of history.
I had to do a dictionary search.
Modern comes from the Latin, modo---meaning "just now". So "post-modern" must mean "after the just-now". And "anti-post-modern" must mean "against after the just-now". So does that mean some think Trump is not for the future?
Help me out here.
Postmodernists reject all of that. They hate the Enlightenment.
If you want to dive deep into postmodernism, you need to read the original works of Paul Feyerabend, Jacques Lacan, Jacques Deleuze, and others.
The best criticism was the famous Sokal Affair. (I wrote it up for my blog, here: http://necessaryfacts.blogspot.com/20... but you can find it in many places online. ) And there is the Objectivist book by Steven Hicks.
Just not interested. To refer to anything as "postmodern" is a degradation of the English language.
"Rationalism" in common language is similar to "realism" in common language. But in technical philosophy, they mean opposites. Rationalism comes from Descartes, Leibniz, and the continental philosophers of the 17th century i.e., the school of thought contrary to the "pure empiricism" of Locke, Berkeley, and Hume. Both are intellectual errors because each is necessarily incomplete.
Small-O objectivism is "rational-empiricism" and capital-O Objectivism advances from that 19th century school of thought: reason and reality validate each other; they are integrated and inextricable.
The Romantic Revolution failed on many fronts because of its erroneous assumptions. It succeeded in aesthetics. The proper form of it, though is called "romantic realism." See, for example the art sold at Quent Cordair Galleries http://cordair.com/ The works of Bryan Larsen have explicitly Randian subjects.
The Romantic Revolution in art expressed the ideas of nationalism in politics. Chopin's polonaises, his "Revolutionary Etude," Tchaikovsky's 1812, and the Prince Igor of Borodin that opened this discussion, all embraced nationalism. That included reaching into folk music - Liszt, Brahms, Grieg, all of them... - and with that, embracing intuition over reason, a theory of epistemology.
At the same time, they sought freedom for the individual (they said), hoping to bring liberal ideas from the UK and US to the continent.
If you have seen Cabaret then you understand how Expressionism was the art of the Weimar Republic - everything twisted, malevolent, dark. The tragic comedy Three Penny Opera reflects the times. Even though Brecht was a communist, the work could not have passed the test of social realism.
I can go on all day...
I think you are saying art is incontrovertibly entwined with the cultural and political happenings of the times. I certainly have no quarrel with that. But art is first and foremost an indicator of man's need to express himself; and of course that would also reflect the particular time in which the artist lives.
We are probably more in agreement, than not.
In fact, when I was going for my degree in math, I was told I needed 6 credits of Humanities. (I had 200 college credits, but nothing in Humanities.)
I could take Art Appreciation, Music Appreciation or Acting as qualifying credits. I took Acting.
You are correct: it is no accident that postmodernism as a label "is a degradation of the English language." As I said above, the word analysis was abandoned for "deconstruction." They take a watch apart completely to its constituent gears and bearings and then point to the absence of a watch as proof that watches do not exist. Rather than watches, though, they do that with reason, reality, and liberty.
http://steve-patterson.com/postmodern...
Or Herman Hesse: "Loneliness is the means by which destiny enables us to understand ourselves."
True extroverts.
My respectful argument may seem like a curve ball but it's all me dino got.
I see this as just giving up, saying since we might be wrong about something let's just make up the facts we want.
I have been wondering if President Trump and his supporters subscribe to some form of this for the past few weeks. I started thinking when I read on this msg board someone say the president's critics are going regret questioning the truth of facts because Trump can just as easily say "fake news" right back. This is based on the premise that truth is a political strategy completely unrelated to objective observation. I don't know whether the people who engage in this intellectually reject the concept of reality or are simply lying.
The seed of that is Thomas Kuhn's Structure of Scientific Revolutions. They go far beyond Kuhn's work, though, and take it show that all science is just a social narrative.
The anti-climate change people are in that mode. I do not mean the ones who point to the scientific errors, the actual data, and better models. Everyone with a brain agrees that the climate changes. Moreover, it is undeniable that cities are warm spots. (Thank goodness for the warmth...) Whether and to what extent human action causes "global warming" is a different question entirely. Most of all, for us here, is the question of what to do about it, if it is real. Just because Texas is turning into a desert is no reason to deny the people of Africa refrigerators and washing machines - or to deny ourselves all of the benefits of cheap energy.
Generally speaking, the anti-climate change voices who support Trump do not know the science. They do not care about the science. They denigrate all "university intellectuals" and "government supported research" without knowing or caring anything about the specific facts. They are "right wing postmodernists."
https://www.galtsgulchonline.com/post...
The above point is valid.
Scientists paid by government do not care about science, they care about money.
Another motivation for the nonsense is the false altruism of 'saving the planet'.
Unlike the harm caused by bribery, there is no end to the damage that this mushy
headed do-goodism can cause.
'Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive.
It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies.
The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated;
but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval
of their own conscience.'
CS Lewis
Those 'anti-climate change voices' of whom you speak know more science than the paid shrills
calling themselves climate scientists who have concocted what they call data, made up phoney
diagrams and analysis, and squelch even their fellow alarmist believers who may question the
gravy chain.
http://www.onpostmodernism.com/art
I get the same feeling from the title of Thomas Friedman's book "The Earth is Flat." Why should I bother to read a book that starts with a misconception?
He isn't even an economist!
Gwop! Gwop! Gwop! Eep! Eep! A-runk! A-runka! RUUUNNNNK!
Wow! Wasn't that so exquisitely sublime for culturally uplifting?
Bet you really dug that cool crescendo at the end.
Do not applaud my awesome art by clapping your hands.
Snap your fingers like satisfactorily entertained beatniks used to do in coffee houses.
Yeah, that cool, baby. That be cool.