William Wildblood

(Original en inglés aquí)

Es difícil ver cómo la civilización a la que perteneces se destruye a sí misma. Especialmente cuando esa civilización ha creado muchas cosas grandes y nobles y ha alcanzado alturas que civilizaciones anteriores no habían alcanzado,  tanto a escala humana (en arte y ciencia) como a escala espiritual (en religión). Y es desconcertante que tanta gente no vea esto, aunque sospecho que más personas comienzan a hacerlo a medida que la naturaleza suicida de nuestra civilización se vuelve cada vez más evidente y su comportamiento cada vez más absurdo. 

También es extraño que tantos miembros de esa civilización parezcan empeñados en arrastrarla al fango. Podríamos hablar de envidia y resentimiento. Estos son obviamente los principales impulsores de esta conducta destructiva, pero ¿son realmente suficientes para explicar la completa locura de gran parte del comportamiento actual? No creo que lo sean. Un gran número de personas en la era moderna sufre de un profundo desorden espiritual y sólo se puede especular qué lo ha causado. ¿Es el odio a sí mismo de los decadentes? ¿O es la rebelión contra Dios de los soberbios?

Y, sin embargo, aunque es difícil permanecer impasible viendo cómo las cosas empeoran día a día, disfrazadas de nuestra relativa prosperidad (pues la gente puede soportar muchas cosas si tiene el estómago lleno), es importante que no sucumbamos a la desesperación,. La mejor manera de evitar esto es darse cuenta de dos cosas. Uno, nada dura en este mundo. Todo pasa por un ciclo de primavera, verano, otoño e invierno. Así son las cosas en un mundo en el que la decadencia o la entropía es el telón de fondo de todo, como debe ser en un mundo material (ya que sólo el espíritu perdura).

Ahora estamos en pleno invierno. Entonces debemos darnos cuenta de que Occidente tenía los defectos dentro de sus cualidades. Durante un tiempo estas últimas dominaron, pero ahora han surgido los primeros y están derribando todo el asunto. Nuestra civilización contenía las semillas de su propia destrucción y ahora han brotado y las malas hierbas están ahogando las flores. La principal cualidad de Occidente era el fuerte sentido de un yo individual y la idea relacionada de libertad. En esto se ha basado nuestra civilización. Pero la desventaja de esta cualidad es el egoísmo y, más especialmente, la tendencia del yo a sacar a Dios de su trono e instalarse allí. Esto es lo que hemos hecho tanto colectiva como individualmente. La idea de que podemos rehacer la creación a nuestra propia imagen es una consecuencia de ello.

Occidente también dio origen a «la máquina» gracias a su exploración de las ciencias naturales. Esto tuvo los beneficios que conocemos, pero también fue un monstruo tipo Frankenstein que ciertamente se volvió contra nosotros. Materialmente milagroso pero espiritualmente mortal. ¿Habríamos estado mejor sin ella? Ésa es la forma equivocada de plantearlo. La llegada de la máquina tuvo que ser así, ya que todas las posibilidades deben resolverse por sí solas al final de una era como la que nos encontramos actualmente. Podríamos haber reaccionado mejor ante ello, pero que la conciencia se centrara cada vez más en lo material produjo, de alguna forma, que fuera inevitable.

El segundo baluarte contra cualquier desesperación que pueda surgir a medida que nuestro mundo se desmorona es darnos cuenta de que nuestro verdadero hogar no está aquí sino en el Cielo. Esta vida es una experiencia de aprendizaje. Sólo somos visitantes y el mundo es un puente, no un hogar.

Si estamos vivos ahora es porque estamos destinados a estar vivos ahora. Hay lecciones que podemos aprender y servicios que podemos prestar y quizás la más importante sea la que acabo de mencionar. Deberíamos valorar el pasado pero no podemos preservarlo porque nada en él puede durar para siempre.

Por otra parte, nada bueno, nada verdadero, puede perderse jamás. Todo lo bueno aquí no es más que un vago reflejo de una realidad en otros lugares. La perfección existe pero no está aquí. Este mundo es sólo para hacernos dignos de él. La civilización material de Occidente está pasando, pero todo lo bueno que hay en ella será recogido y absorbido en el Cielo.

Summary of previous posts

In previous posts, we have seen that the natural selfishness of humans (this roaring lion that wants to have everything and to the hell with everybody else) is contained by two kind of restrictions: practical restrictions and cultural restrictions. These are the bars of the cage that restrict the movements of the lion (that is the expression of the selfishness of every citizen), which are contained so they don’t harm other people.

In our society, practical restrictions have been drastically relaxed because of the incredible wealth that has produced the Industrial Revolution. Cultural restrictions have been drastically relaxed because of the ideology/religion of liberalism (which is a form of relativism). As we have seen in previous posts, this is the official ideology used as an ultimate justification of behavior and public policy in Western civilization and it is an ideology that can be used to justify anything. So it is as if it did not exist.

Its void is filled by another official ideology: leftism, which is the base of the law and culture in Western civilization. Leftism is an absolutist ideology with absolute goods and absolute evils. In this sense, it is not different from any other official religion. But there are two properties that make leftism an unprecedented phenomenon when it comes to official religion of a society.

1. Its restlessness. Leftism is always evolving and incorporating new absolute goods and evils in a process that has been accelerating. Its latest absolute evil (transphobia) won’t be the last. Some things that were common sense only five or ten years ago, now they are the evilest of evil things and they cannot be disputed.

2. Its opposition to obvious reality and natural law, which is constantly increasing. What is true and good for all societies is false and evil for leftism and vice versa. Leftism is a reality inversion and moral inversion, which constantly increases. So, for example, protecting your tribe is bad (if you are a white person) while promiscuity is good. A man being a man is false while a man being a woman is true. Men and women being different is false while men and women being equal is true. And so on and so forth.

The first property can be explained by the fact that leftism uses liberalism (a relativistic ideology) as its ultimate justification so it can justify anything, no matter what outrageous. So there is no mechanism for get leftism to be still. It is free to wander where he wants.

Fair enough. But why does leftism always evolve in the same direction: getting farther and farther away from obvious reality and the natural law? If leftism is free to wander, we should expect that it wanders in random ways. There must be some mechanism for it to always go left. Explaining this mechanism is the objetive of this post.

Might makes right

Once you have removed the practical and cultural restrictions to the selfishness, it is logical and natural that everybody wants to express his own selfishness to the highest extent. Since the selfishness of one person limits the selfishness of another person, this would lead to a world when everybody is fighting with everybody to express its selfishness as much as he cans. This is the «state of nature» that Enlightenment «philosophers» claimed it was

In fact, the state of nature is not real and has never been because  power is and has always been unequally distributed. Without practical and cultural restrictions, when two selfishness conflict, the selfishness of the most powerful person wins.

So, without an official ideology that restricts the selfishness of the powerful, might makes right. Whatever the powerful want, it gets justified by liberalism and it gets incorporated to leftism. Might makes right.

We see in ancient societies that religion was a real restriction to the power of rulers. So the king had to do penance before the grave of Beckett because he had violated the sacredness of bishops, according to the official religion of Christianity. No amount of power could go against the rule that killing a priest was bad.

Those were the times. Now when the powers that be want something, he incorporates it into the official religion (leftism), so it is indisputable. To incorporate it, it justifies based on liberalism, which can justify anything. So yes, might makes right.

The structure of power in our society

So the evolution of leftism is explained based on the structure of power in Western society. This structure of power is currently composed by the following groups:

• The economic powers. These include the globalist financial powers: the Rotschild, the Rockefellers, the Wallenbergs, etc. The ones in power. They hide behind a myriad of organizations: Blackrock, the Open Society, the WEF, etc. They also include multinational corporations and national and regional banks.
• The clergy (these are the ones that create and enforce the religion). That is, the managerial class. Including the intellectuals that create the ideas in universities. The journalists and entertainers that transmit these ideas to the people. And the politicians, civil servants and white collars employees that enforce these in ideas in the public space and private companies.
• The true believers. The ones that belief the religion created and enforced by the clergy.

These groups of power are not exclusive. The vast majority of the clergy are true believers and many of the people belonging to the financial powers are too. However, there are true believers (progressives, LGBTI, feminists, immigrants who believe in uncontrolled immigration, etc.) that are not part of the financial powers or the clergy.

These groups of power can be conceptualized according to their  :

The nobility. (or «the optimates» in the Roman sense) The financial powers and the upper classes of the clergy (international civil servants, well-paid civil servants, university professors, most important journalists and politicians, well-paid corporate managers).

The good serfs (or «the clients» in a Roman sense). The true believers that are not part of the clergy and the lower part of the managerial class (school teachers, your average civil servant, a white collar clerk in a private company, etc.)

The nobility gives money and psychological rewards (status, self-perceived morality and intelligence, meaning, etc.) to the good serfs while the good serfs give votes and enforcement of the ideology to the nobility. This is the

What do I mean by enforcement? The good serfs ensure that the ideology is enforced in real life, even in the smallest spaces, by attacking the ones that don’t comply with a series of tools: defense of the ideology in private and public life, shaming (you’re an homophobe! in private life and social networks), withdrawing of means of life (dismissal of a job, demands of resignations, removal of customers, etc.), reporting violations of the ideology to the administration, etc.

In reality, the good serfs also give money to the nobility but this is done in a not obvious way so the good serfs don’t notice too much (taxes, debt, printing of money, prices of goods and services, etc.) and, when they notice, they blame the enemies of the ideology (foreign actors, bad serfs or some mythological entities: «the rich and capitalists that don’t belong to the nobility»).

The citizens that are not part of the groups of power are called:

The bad serfs. People who create its own wealth and don’t (totally) believe in the leftist religion.

The main characteristic of the groups of power is its parasitism. With the exception of true believers that are not part of the clergy, all other people belonging to the structure of power live out of the money not created by them. The financial powers make their money by using other people’s wealth . The clergy lives «of»** the taxes of other people.

Leftism as a power grab

What does this have to do with leftism as an official religion? Leftism is a rationalization (an ideological justification) of the increasing parasitism of the groups of power.

Power has always had a tendency to concentrate but they faced practical and cultural restrictions. Technology has decreased practical restrictions and liberalism has decreased cultural restrictions. So we are in an era of concentration of power like the world has never seen.

More specifically, the nobility rules how money, power, status and morality are to be created, used and distributed. They are judge and jury.  This is why they have an incentive to expand by taking more and more of these good things from other people.

All innovations in Western civilizations are ways to take more wealth from the serfs to give to the nobility. And Leftism is the ideological justification to do that:

More specifically, all innovations can be categorized in three classes:

• In favor of the structure of power. Taking material wealth, power and psychological rewards (status, virtue signaling, self-perceived morality and meaning) from the bad serfs and giving them to the nobility and good serfs.
• In favor fo the nobility. Taking material wealth and power from the serfs (good and bad) and giving them to the nobility.
• Expanding the number of good serfs and decreasing the number of bad serfs.

(As you see, the second way implies that good serfs work for their own destruction, although they are so ideologically blinded that they don’t notice.)

The end game is the expansion of the number of good serfs until they are no bad serfs. So good serfs are parasitized by the nobility while being satisfied about the order of things. People will have the barest minimum to live but they will be happy because they think they are fighting for the common good or the planet or some other vague concept. You will own nothing and be happy.

Leftism is the rationalization of these actions. Their alibi. It has evolved to justify the transfer of wealth power and psychological rewards that has been explained. So it has a very definite direction.

The political cause

How do Leftism justifies this transfer of good things and expansions of the groups of power? The concept this justification is based on is «the political cause».

A «political cause» is an initiative to change society in some aspect. This change is considered to be good and justified based on liberalism (it is said that this change will produce more freedom, more equality and more rights). The «political cause» is perceived by its supporters as a «moral crusade»: a fight of good against evil. That is, a fight of the good people to remove some aspect of society that is considered evil.

The goal is to remove this aspect of society so the society works the same way but without this evil. There is no understanding of Chesterton’s fence. There is no concept that some things perceived as evils can be preventing greater evils. Almost always, if the cause succeeds and that aspect of the society is removed, greater evils are produced, which can be addressed by new political causes in a cycle of destruction of the society.

The most important causes have been: the abolition of slavery, the social gospel, the feminine suffrage, the illegalization on alcohol, second-wave feminism, civil rights movement, LGBTI causes, the cause for the uncontrolled immigration and its legalization and  the environmental cause. The movement to restrict movement and rights under Covid can be seen as a short-lived cause: it was expressed in moral terms and as a fight of good against evil, altruism against egoism.

Some of these causes are composed of other smallest causes. So feminism has a cause about equality in the workplace, removing of social stigma of female promiscuity, divorce, abortion, etc. And some other movements can be political cause in the future: incest, pedophilia, polyamory or reparations for black people.

How political causes work

Leftism evolves to justify this transfer of wealth and psychological rewards listed above.

Yes, but why does this direction coincide to getting farther and farther away from obvious reality?

EXPANSION OF THE GOOD SERFS.

The rest of the population

The high echelons of the managerial classe. The leaders of the international civil servants

The rest of the managerial classe

Why is this against the natural law?

La crisis de la Iglesia Católica se aproxima a un clímax.

El pasado 13 de marzo se cumplieron diez años de la elección del Cardenal argentino Jorge Mario Bergoglio como Sumo Pontífice de la Iglesia Católica. Ese aniversario fue recordado por muchos artículos elogiosos en los principales medios de la prensa mundial. Ross Douthat fue una de las pocas excepciones al coro de alabanzas, al sostener en su columna del New York Times que el Papa Francisco trajo a la Iglesia Católica una década de división. Douthat considera que las reformas de Francisco tienden hacia una autodestrucción del catolicismo.

¿Qué decir de esa crítica? Lo cierto es que Francisco ha proporcionado sobrados motivos de preocupación a los católicos que muchos llaman “conservadores”, y que en realidad son “ortodoxos”, o sea fieles a la doctrina católica bíblica y tradicional. Presentaré algunos de esos motivos sintéticamente, clasificándolos en tres áreas: la doctrina cristiana, la relación de la Iglesia con el mundo y el gobierno de la Iglesia. Cada una de estas áreas daría para escribir un libro.

En el frente doctrinal, el pontificado de Francisco presenta características que lo vuelven único en la historia de la Iglesia, dado que las declaraciones y actuaciones cuestionables o dudosas de Francisco en materia doctrinal son numerosísimas. El libro de varios autores Denzinger-Bergoglio: Los sorprendentes aportes de Francisco al bimilenario Magisterio de la Iglesia recopila y analiza en 1.769 páginas cientos de esas declaraciones, con base en los primeros tres años de su pontificado. [Nota del transcriptor: los tres primeros años son los que Francisco menos se dedicó a la herejía. Después fue mucho más audaz]

Se puede entender fácilmente que un Papa locuaz sea impreciso en un discurso improvisado; pero cuando una idea se repite con insistencia, esa explicación ya no vale. Por ejemplo, Francisco ha dicho muchas veces que Jesús no multiplicó los panes y ha llegado a hablar de “la parábola (sic) de la multiplicación de los panes”.

Otra de las ideas extrañas que Francisco repite sin cesar es su condena del proselitismo. En el lenguaje cristiano tradicional, “proselitismo” es sinónimo de “misión”; por lo tanto, es algo no sólo legítimo, sino incluso necesario y esencial. Recientemente se comenzó a distinguir entre un “proselitismo bueno”, guiado por el amor a Dios y al prójimo, y un “proselitismo malo”, impulsado por motivaciones egoístas o mundanas. Francisco ha condenado muchas veces el proselitismo sin hacer ninguna distinción. Da la impresión, a veces reforzada por el contexto, de condenar cualquier intento de convencer a no cristianos de que el cristianismo es la religión verdadera. Esta última convicción, tan central en toda la historia de la Iglesia (y tan enfatizada por Benedicto XVI), no parece jugar un rol importante en el magisterio de Francisco.

Por si acaso aclaro que, según la fe católica, el Papa es infalible sólo cuando habla ex cathedra y Francisco nunca lo ha hecho.

Pasemos a la gran cuestión de la relación de la Iglesia con el mundo. En esta área Francisco se ha caracterizado por imponer a toda la Iglesia sus opiniones personales sobre temas que parecen obsesionarlo. Indicaré dos ejemplos que son novedades absolutas:

1. Su prédica sobre la obligación incondicional de acoger a todos los inmigrantes que vengan. Es verdad que sus declaraciones sobre este tema han sido un poco oscilantes, pero en general ha transmitido esa idea. Según la doctrina moral cristiana tradicional, si bien obviamente se debe respetar los derechos de los migrantes, los gobiernos tienen derecho a regular la inmigración de una manera justa. Se trata de una cuestión compleja y prudencial que no admite recetas únicas.

2. Su apoyo entusiasta a la teoría científica del calentamiento global antropogénico catastrófico, convirtiéndola en la premisa básica de una especie de nueva moral ecológica. Dado que la cuestión de la verdad o falsedad de esa teoría es un tema estrictamente científico, en la práctica se está desconociendo la legítima autonomía de la ciencia con respecto a la Iglesia. Esto trae consigo el riesgo de causar una suerte de nuevo “caso Galileo”.

En este punto conviene mencionar un hecho sintomático. Hace pocos años, un miembro de la Curia Romana dijo, con alegría, que por primera vez la agenda del Papa y la de las Naciones Unidas están en sintonía. Opino que cualquiera que recuerde con admiración la cruzada épica de San Juan Pablo II contra el imperialismo demográfico neomalthusiano no podrá menos que estremecerse ante semejante novedad.

En cuanto al gobierno de la Iglesia, destacaré un solo aspecto del pontificado de Francisco: su toma de partido a favor del “progresismo” eclesial.   

El término “progresismo” no tiene aquí un sentido político, sino teológico. El progresismo es una desviación del cristianismo que se caracteriza por su relativismo teológico y moral: los progresistas tienden a pensar que no hay verdades objetivas en materia religiosa o moral; o que, si las hay, no podemos conocerlas. Por ende, hasta los dogmas de fe pueden cambiar según el espíritu de la época.

Francisco ha rehabilitado, premiado o apoyado a muchos progresistas. Daré sólo dos ejemplos entre muchos posibles: 1) Leonardo Boff, teólogo de la liberación condenado en 1985 por su tendencia filomarxista, dice haber sido uno de los principales asesores de Francisco para la redacción de su “encíclica ecológica” Laudato Si’; 2) James Martin SJ, principal adversario (dentro de la Iglesia) de la doctrina cristiana sobre la homosexualidad, ha recibido varias cartas de apoyo y varios nombramientos importantes de parte de Francisco. 

La citada toma de partido se profundizó después de la muerte de Benedicto XVI. Francisco está intensificando su lucha contra la Misa latina tradicional y está multiplicando sus intervenciones sobre (¿o contra?) las porciones más “conservadoras” (o sea, como ya expliqué, más ortodoxas) de la Iglesia.

[Nota del transcriptor: El autor deja de lado muchas fechorías de Francisco, como:

• el apoyo a la China comunista que persigue a la Iglesia (sus alabanzas a China mientras se niega a reunir con el obispo Zen de la Iglesia perseguida),
• la adoración en el Vaticano de la diosa pagana Pachamama (contradiciendo el primer mandamiento) y la emisión de una moneda glorificando a esa diosa
• la persecución y disolución de órdenes religiosas que celebraban la misa latina,
• la declaración de Abu Dhabi, en la que dice que las diferentes religiones son igualmente válidas, contradiciendo la doctrina católica, lo que conecta con su rechazo del proselitismo.
• la creación de nuevos pecados, como el pecado ecológico y la pena de muerte, como si un Pontífice tuviera la autoridad para crear nuevos pecados.
• la contradicción de la prohibición del adulterio, contradiciendo las palabras del mismo Jesús, en la encíclica Amoris Laetitia
• su negativa a contestar las Dubia que le preguntaban por esa encíclica, mientras que, de manera extraoficial, declaraba que la interpretación correcta era la anticristiana.
• de sus declaraciones heréticas e incluso blasfemas no hay que hablar porque son demasiadas para poderlas comentar]

El 01/07/2023 ocurrió algo insólito. Francisco nombró como nuevo Prefecto del Dicasterio para la Doctrina de la Fe a Mons. Víctor Manuel Fernández, Arzobispo de La Plata (Argentina), un teólogo ultraprogresista amigo suyo. [Nota del transcriptor: Este teólogo había publicado un libro de poesía erótica homosexual. Otros nombramientos también producen escándalo, como el nombramiento del obispo que se pintó en una catedral teniendo relaciones homosexuales para la Academia Pontificia de la Vida]

Además, en el próximo “Sínodo de la Sinodalidad”, que tendrá lugar en octubre en Roma, varios Obispos alemanes procurarán que toda la Iglesia acepte las conclusiones del “Camino Sinodal” alemán, que, entre otras cosas, aprobó por amplia mayoría la bendición de las uniones homosexuales. El Papa no ha contrarrestado enérgicamente esta grave deriva progresista.

Oremos por la Iglesia, para que supere lo más pronto posible su crisis actual, y por el Papa, para que cumpla fielmente su misión de confirmar a sus hermanos en la fe cristiana y católica.

Daniel Iglesias Grèzes

EL SEGUNDO ACUERDO

No te tomes nada personalmente

Los tres acuerdos siguientes nacen, en realidad, del primero. El Segundo Acuerdo consiste en no tomarte nada personalmente.

Suceda lo que suceda a tu alrededor, no te lo tomes personalmente. Utilizando un ejemplo anterior, si te encuentro en la calle y te digo: «¡Eh, eres un estúpido!», sin conocerte, no me refiero a ti, sino a mí.

Si te lo tomas personalmente, tal vez te creas que eres un estúpido. Quizá te digas a ti mismo: «¿Cómo lo sabe? ¿Acaso es clarividente o es que todos pueden ver lo estúpido que soy?».

Te lo tomas personalmente porque estás de acuerdo con cualquier cosa que se diga. Y tan pronto como estás de acuerdo, el veneno te recorre y te encuentras atrapado en el sueño  del infierno. El motivo de que estés atrapado es lo que llamamos «la importancia personal». La importancia personal, o el tomarse las cosas personalmente, es la expresión máxima del egoísmo, porque consideramos que todo gira a nuestro alrededor.  Durante  el período de nuestra educación (o de nuestra domesticación), aprendimos a tomarnos todas las cosas  de  forma  personal. Creemos que somos responsables de todo. ¡Yo, yo, yo y siempre yo!

Nada de lo que los demás hacen es por ti. Lo hacen por ellos mismos. Todos vivimos en nuestro propio sueño, en nuestra propia mente; los demás están en un mundo completamente distinto de aquel en que vive cada uno de nosotros. Cuando nos tomamos personalmente lo que alguien nos dice, suponemos que sabe lo que hay en nuestro mundo e intentamos imponérselo por encima del suyo.

Incluso cuando una situación parece muy personal, por ejemplo cuando alguien te insulta directamente, eso no tiene nada que ver contigo. Lo que esa persona dice, lo que hace y las opiniones que expresa responden a los acuerdos que ha establecido en su propia mente. Su punto de vista surge de toda la programación que recibió durante su domesticación.

Si alguien te da su opinión y te dice: «¡Oye, estás muy gordo!», no te lo tomes personalmente, porque la verdad es que se refiere a sus propios sentimientos, creencias y opiniones. Esa persona intentó enviarte su veneno, y si te lo tomas personalmente, lo recoges y se convierte en tuyo. Tomarse las cosas personalmente te convierte en una presa fácil para esos depredadores, los magos negros. Les resulta fácil atraparte con una simple opinión, después te alimentan con el veneno que quieren, y como te lo tomas personalmente, te lo tragas sin rechistar.

Te comes toda su basura emocional y la conviertes en tu propia basura. Pero si no te lo tomas personalmente, serás inmune a todo veneno aunque te encuentres en medio  del  infierno.  Esa inmunidad es un don de este acuerdo.

Cuando te tomas las cosas personalmente, te sientes ofendido y reaccionas defendiendo tus creencias y creando conflictos. Haces una montaña de un grano de arena porque sientes la necesidad de tener razón y de que los demás estén equivocados. También te esfuerzas en demostrarles que tienes razón dando tus propias opiniones. Del mismo modo, cualquier cosa que sientas o hagas no es más que una proyección de tu propio sueño personal, un reflejo de tus propios acuerdos. Lo que dices, lo que haces y las opiniones que tienes se basan en los acuerdos que tú has establecido, y no tienen nada que ver conmigo.

Lo que pienses de mí no es importante para mí y no me lo tomo personalmente. Cuando la gente me dice: «Miguel, eres el mejor», no me lo tomo personalmente, y tampoco lo hago cuando me dice:

«Miguel, eres el peor». Sé que cuando estés contento, me dirás: «¡Miguel, eres un ángel!». Pero cuando estés enfadado conmigo, me dirás: «¡Oh, Miguel, eres un demonio! Eres repugnante. ¿Cómo puedes decir esas cosas?». Ninguno de los dos comentarios me afecta porque yo sé lo que soy. No necesito que me acepten. No necesito que nadie me diga: «¡Miguel, qué bien lo haces!», o: «¿Cómo eres capaz de hacer eso?».

No, no me lo tomo personalmente. Pienses lo que pienses, sientas lo que sientas, sé que se trata de tu problema y no del mío. Es tu manera de ver el mundo. No me lo tomo de un modo personal porque te refieres a ti mismo y no a mí. Los demás tienen sus propias opiniones según su sistema de creencias, de modo que nada de lo que piensen de mí estará realmente relacionado conmigo, sino con ellos.

Es posible que incluso me digas: «Miguel, lo que dices me duele». Pero lo que te duele no es lo que yo digo, sino las heridas que tienes y que yo he rozado con lo que he dicho. Eres tú mismo quien se hace daño. No me lo puedo tomar personalmente en modo alguno, y no porque no crea ni confíe en ti, sino porque sé que ves el mundo con distintos ojos, con los tuyos. Creas una película entera en tu mente, y en ella tú eres el director, el productor y el protagonista. Todos los demás tenemos papeles secundarios. Es tu película.

La manera en que ves esa película se basa en los acuerdos que has establecido con la vida. Tu punto de vista es algo personal tuyo. No es la verdad de nadie más que de ti. Por consiguiente, si te enfadas conmigo, sé que eso está relacionado contigo. Yo soy la excusa para que tú te enfades. Y te enfadas porque tienes miedo, porque te enfrentas a tu miedo. Si no tuvieras miedo, no te enfadarías conmigo en modo alguno. Si no tuvieras miedo, no me odiarías en modo alguno. Si no tuvieras miedo, no estarías triste ni celoso en modo alguno.

Si vives sin miedo, si amas, no hay lugar para ninguna de esas emociones. Si no tienes ninguna de esas emociones, lógicamente te sientes bien. Cuando te sientes bien, todo lo que te rodea está bien. Cuando todo lo que te rodea es magnífico, todo te hace feliz. Amas todo lo que te rodea porque te amas a ti mismo, porque te gusta como eres, porque estás contento contigo mismo, porque te sientes feliz con tu vida. Estás satisfecho con la película que tú mismo produces y con los acuerdos que has establecido con la vida. Estás en paz y eres feliz. Vives en ese estado de dicha en el que todo es verdaderamente maravilloso y bello. En ese estado de dicha, estableces una relación de amor con todo lo que percibes en todo momento.

Sea lo que sea lo que la gente haga, piense o diga, no te lo tomes personalmente. Si te dice que eres maravilloso, no lo dice por ti. Tú sabes que eres maravilloso. No es necesario que otras personas te lo digan para creerlo. No te tomes nada personalmente. Aun cuando alguien agarrase una pistola y te disparase en la cabeza, no sería nada personal. Incluso hasta ese extremo.

Ni siquiera las opiniones que tienes sobre ti mismo son necesariamente verdad; por consiguiente, no tienes la menor necesidad de tomarte cualquier cosa que oigas en tu propia mente personalmente. La mente tiene la capacidad de hablarse a sí misma, pero también tiene la capacidad de escuchar la información que está disponible de otras esferas. Quizás a veces, cuando oyes una voz en tu mente, te preguntes de dónde proviene. Es posible que esta voz provenga de otra realidad en la que existan seres vivos con una mente muy similar a la humana. Los toltecas denominaron a estos seres «aliados». En Europa, África y la India los llamaron «dioses».

Nuestra mente también existe en el nivel  de  los  dioses, también vive en esa realidad y es capaz de percibirla. La mente ve con los ojos y percibe la realidad de cuando estamos despiertos. Pero también ve y percibe sin los ojos, aunque la razón apenas es consciente de esta percepción. La mente vive en más de una dimensión. Es posible que en ocasiones tengas ideas que no se originan en tu mente, pero las percibes con ella. Tienes derecho a creer o no lo que esas voces te dicen y a no tomártelo personalmente. Tenemos la opción de creer o no las voces que oímos en nuestra propia mente, del mismo modo en que decidimos qué creer y qué acuerdos tomar en  el  sueño  del planeta.

La mente también es capaz de hablarse y escucharse a sí misma. Tu mente está dividida, igual que lo está tu cuerpo. Del mismo modo en que puedes estrechar con una mano tu otra mano y sentirla, la mente puede hablar consigo misma. Una parte de tu mente habla y otra escucha. Cuando muchas partes de tu mente hablan todas al mismo tiempo, se origina un gran problema. A esto lo llamamos mitote, ¿recuerdas?

Podemos comparar el mitote con un enorme mercado en el que miles de personas hablan y hacen trueques a la vez. Cada una tiene pensamientos y sentimientos diferentes; cada una tiene un punto de vista distinto. Todos los acuerdos que hemos establecido – la programación de la mente – no son necesariamente compatibles entre sí. Cada acuerdo es como un ser vivo independiente; tiene su propia personalidad y su propia voz. Hay acuerdos incompatibles, que se contradicen los unos a los otros, y el conflicto se va extendiendo hasta que estalla una gran guerra en la mente.

El mitote es la razón por la que los seres humanos apenas saben lo que quieren, cómo lo quieren o cuándo lo quieren. No están de acuerdo con ellos mismos porque unas partes de la mente quieren una cosa y otras quieren exactamente lo contrario.

Una parte de la mente pone objeciones a determinados pensamientos y actos y otra los apoya. Todos estos pequeños seres vivientes crean conflictos internos porque están vivos y cada uno tiene su propia voz. Únicamente si hacemos un inventario de nuestros acuerdos destaparemos todos los conflictos de la mente, y con el tiempo llegaremos a extraer orden del caos del mitote.

No te tomes nada personalmente porque, si lo haces, te expones a sufrir por nada. Los seres humanos somos adictos al sufrimiento en diferentes niveles y distintos grados; nos apoyamos los unos a los otros para mantener esta adicción. Hemos acordado ayudarnos mutuamente a sufrir. Si tienes la necesidad de que te maltraten, será fácil que los demás lo hagan. Del mismo modo, si estás con personas que necesitan Sufrir, algo en ti hará que las maltrates. Es como si llevasen un cartel en la espalda que dijera: «Patéame, por favor». Piden una justificación para su sufrimiento. Su adicción al sufrimiento no es más que un acuerdo que refuerzan a diario.

Vayas donde vayas, encontrarás a gente que te mentirá, pero a medida que tu conciencia se expanda, descubrirás que tú también te mientes a ti mismo. No esperes que los demás te digan la verdad, porque ellos también se mienten a sí mismos. Tienes que confiar en ti y decidir si crees o no lo que alguien te dice.

Cuando realmente vemos a los demás tal como son sin tomárnoslo personalmente, lo que hagan o digan no nos dañará. Aunque los demás te mientan, no importa. Te mienten porque tienen miedo. Tienen miedo de que descubras que no  son perfectos. Quitarse la máscara social resulta  doloroso.  Si  los demás dicen una cosa, pero hacen otra y tú no prestas atención a sus actos, te mientes a ti mismo. Pero si eres veraz contigo mismo, te ahorrarás mucho dolor emocional. Decirte la verdad  quizá resulte doloroso, pero no necesitas aferrarte al dolor. La curación está en camino; que las cosas te vayan mejor es sólo cuestión de tiempo.

Si alguien no te trata con amor ni respeto, que se aleje de ti es un regalo. Si esa persona no se va, lo más  probable  es  que soportes muchos años de sufrimiento con ella. Que  se  marche quizá resulte doloroso durante un tiempo, pero finalmente tu corazón sanará. Entonces, elegirás lo que de verdad quieres. Descubrirás que, para elegir correctamente, más que confiar en los demás, es necesario que confíes en ti mismo.

Cuando no tomarte nada personalmente se convierta en un hábito firme y sólido, te evitarás muchos disgustos en la vida. Tu rabia, tus celos y tu envidia desaparecerán, y si no te tomas nada personalmente, incluso tu tristeza desaparecerá.

Si conviertes el Segundo Acuerdo en un hábito, descubrirás que nada podrá devolverte al infierno. Una gran cantidad de libertad surge cuando no nos  tomamos  nada personalmente.  Serás inmune a los magos  negros y ningún hechizo te afectará, por muy fuerte que sea. El mundo entero puede contar chismes sobre ti, pero si no te los tomas personalmente, serás inmune a  ellos.  Alguien puede enviarte veneno emocional de forma intencionada, pero si no te lo tomas personalmente, no te lo tragarás. Cuando no tomas el veneno emocional, se vuelve más nocivo para el que lo envía, pero no para ti.

Ya puedes ver cuán importante es este acuerdo. No tomar nada personalmente te ayuda a romper muchos hábitos y costumbres que te mantienen atrapado en el sueño del infierno y te causan un sufrimiento innecesario. Bastará con practicar el Segundo Acuerdo para que empieces a romper docenas de pequeños acuerdos que te hacen sufrir. Y si practicas además el Primer Acuerdo, romperás el 75 por ciento de estos pequeños acuerdos que te mantienen atrapado en el infierno.

Escribe este acuerdo en un papel y engánchalo en  la  nevera para recordarlo en todo momento: No te tomes nada personalmente.

Cuando te acostumbres a no tomarte nada personalmente, no necesitarás depositar tu confianza en lo que hagan o digan los demás. Bastará con que confíes en ti mismo para elegir con responsabilidad. Nunca eres responsable de los  actos  de  los demás; sólo eres responsable de ti mismo. Cuando comprendas esto, de verdad, y te niegues a tomarte las cosas personalmente, será muy difícil que los comentarios insensibles o los actos negligentes de los demás te hieran.

Si mantienes este acuerdo, viajarás por todo el mundo con el corazón abierto por completo y nadie te herirá. Dirás: «Te amo», sin miedo a que te rechacen o te ridiculicen. Pedirás lo que necesites. Dirás sí o dirás no – lo que tú decidas – sin culparte ni juzgarte. Siempre puedes seguir a tu corazón. Si lo haces, aunque estés en medio del infierno, experimentarás felicidad y paz interior. Permanecerás en tu estado de dicha y el infierno no te afectará en absoluto.

We’ll see the relativism go together with individualism

Christianity too repressive and high IQ. Reformation.

Atomization in the Middle Ages. Guilt culture.

Make it too vulnerable to fake relativism. A people of priests. No falling back to tribalism, like the Jews.

Saint Augustine.

—-

3: Nominalism

Why did the West go to Hell (Ia): A general overview (a)

by Virapala

[Why did the West go to Hell attempts to be a logical and historical explanation of the genesis of today’s Absurdistan: a world where you are evil if you say that pigs cannot fly. You can contact the author on virapala.merdeta.com]

Introduction

After some decades of thinking, reading and observing about the decadence of the Western civilization, I have decided to write my ideas about this topic. I started writing about the concept of rights, which went completely out of control producing four different long posts. I quickly realized that the topic of Western decline is so complex that there is the danger of the forest not being able to be seen for the trees.

So I have decided to write a general overview of the causes of decadence in Western civilization, trying to hide or summarize as many details as possible. The outcome has been this text, which is divided into two different posts. The text is  a bit long, a bit heavy in information and includes some claims that are not justified. My idea is to start from this general overview and write other texts to tie the loose ends and explain better the ideas presented here.

Why civilizations decline and fall

As another text will explain, all civilizations decline and fall because of the same reasons. These reasons are caused by a basic human contradiction: humans evolve individually but they live in society.  As a result, natural selection has shaped human nature to maximize individual fitness (defined as the ability to have as most descendants as possible) and this goes against a harmonious society because of the tragedy of the commons.

For example, males have evolved to maximize their individual reproduction. This means that their biological instincts make them to desire to have sex with every attractive woman they find. But this does not produce a good society because, if all men are competing for sex, they cooperate less, they focus less on work, and all series of conflicts are produced when men want to accumulate women or have sex with other men’s wives.

In short, the set of biological instincts wired in us by evolution is an insatiable beast. I imagine it as a roaring lion that wants to have all the resources (sex, money, status)  he can and to the hell with everybody else. I will call it «selfishness» or «selfish human instincts». In Christianity, it is called «original sin»: the innate tendency to engage in sin (in antisocial behavior). This will be explained more accurately in another text.

Of course, the complete actualization of these selfish human instincts is not possible because  everybody has these instincts inside him but not everybody can have all the resources in the world. So the complete actualization of the instincts of a person conflicts with the complete actualization of the instincts of another person, because they want the same resources.

As a result, the selfish instincts of people must be repressed to make living in society possible. They are repressed through two kinds of restrictions:

• Practical restrictions. Selfish instincts are restricted because of practical aspects that make them impossible to completely actualize. For example, I can’t have sex with all women in the world because I don’t have the energy,  the money, the access to all women («that girl living on the mountains of Kazakhstan seems pretty cute!»), not all  women want to have sex with me and other practical aspects.
• Cultural restrictions. Human culture has three mechanisms to restrict selfish  human instincts and encourage pro-social behaviors. These mechanisms are called «guilt», «shame» and «fear» in anthropology and will be analyzed in other texts. Even if I could, I wouldn’t have sex with my neighbor’s wife  because a) I would feel guilty of being such a scoundrel b) I would not want other people in the community to ostracize me and/or c) I would not want to be beaten by my neighbor or to be punished by the State.

So the lion (the set of selfish human instincts) is inside a cage with two kinds of bars that restrict his movements: practical restrictions and cultural restrictions, so he cannot harm others. Every person and every society lives in a continuous conflict between his selfish instincts and the restrictions to these instincts (called «repression» in psychology). This repression is necessary for a society to exist. As Sigmund Freud said: «The history of civilization is the history of the renunciation of instinct.»

However, the lion is always trying to escape his cage in all the manners possible and, to do so, he invents all kinds of strategies to take advantage of some defect in the bars of the cage. If some bars are weakened or removed, the lion takes advantage of this fact immediately.

Decadence starts when society reaches a high level of success and practical restrictions decrease (due to a  bigger power, prosperity or technology) so selfish human instincts can have a better actualization. For example, maybe I can now have sex with more women because better contraceptives and cheaper travel give me better access to women with less hassle («Yes, this is my first visit to Kazakhstan, mister officer. The travel is affordable now.»).

In this situation, the culture of a society changes so cultural restrictions are also relaxed (for example, adultery is decriminalized, divorce and free sex are encouraged, etc.) in order to allow this better actualization of human instincts. The cage has fewer practical and cultural bars so the lion (the set of selfish instincts) is allowed more freedom .

This creates a higher level of conflict and societal dysfunction because everybody is trying to actualize his selfish instincts more than before and this enters into conflict with the instincts of everybody else. As a result, the society ends up being conquered by other societies that repress better the individual instincts of their citizens so they function better as a society.

The success of these other societies will lead them to eventually removing some restrictions to the selfish instincts of their citizens so they start the cycle again. This is a cycle that repeats once and again in history. You see it in the Late Bronze Age collapse (it is obvious in the ancient conquest of Canaan by the Israelites, as narrated in the Bible), ancient Greece, ancient Rome, the Abbasid Empire and our modern Western civilization.

The insanity of the modern West

However, when we compare the decadence of the Western civilization to the decadence of other civilizations (say, the Roman Empire), we cannot help marveling about the insanity of our own decadence. For example, in a period of some few years,  Western civilization has «discovered» that some men are women in reality. This has been elevated as a self-evident truth and the ones who deny such an absurd proposition are labelled as immoral, fired or persecuted with the force of the law.  The late Romans, the late Greeks or the late Abbasids  had their dose of degeneracy, thank you very much, but they never reached such levels of insanity.

There are two reasons why the decadence of the Western civilization is much bigger and weirder than other decadences. In the modern West, the two bars that repress selfish human instincts (practical and cultural restrictions to selfishness) have been removed in a specially drastic way.

Starting with the practical restrictions,  the wealthier and more technologically advanced a civilization is, the more pronounced its decadence is, because it can remove practical restrictions to selfish human instincts better (this will be better explained in other texts). The West is incredibly wealthy and technologically advanced, due to the successive waves of the Industrial Revolution (whose last wave is the digital revolution). This removes many practical restrictions and allows the selfishness to express in unprecedented ways, not seen before in human history.

A relativistic civilization

However, in this series of texts, I want to focus on the second cause of the magnitude of the decadence of the Western civilization. This second cause is that the cultural restrictions of the modern West have also been relaxed in an unprecedented way to allow the expression of  selfishness in ways unseen in human history.

More specifically, in 5000 years of history, the Western civilization is the only one that has a relativistic ideology  as its official ideology (as its official religion, because we will see that ideology and religion are synonyms). This allows the biological selfishness to express in unprecedented ways.

This is a new event in the history of mankind, because something so absurd has never occurred to any other civilization before. How we ended up in such a dead end is only explained because of a strange chain of historical events, which will be explained along the line. For Christians like me, it is difficult to avoid the feeling that demonic forces were behind this chain of events, but this is going to be a historical and logical analysis, not a spiritual one.

We say that a concept is absolute if it is the same for everybody. A concept is relative if it is different for different people. A society or culture is absolutist if it is founded on absolute concepts. This is the only sane way to found a society and all enduring societies have been absolutist, with exception of the modern West and the societies that the modern West has managed to infect and pervert.

A culture is relativistic in theory if it claims to be founded on relative concepts. A culture is relativistic in practice if if claims to be founded on absolute concepts but these concepts are, in reality, relative. The modern West is a mixture of these two kinds of relativism.

The modern Western civilization is relativistic in theory with respect to the truth and morality. It is founded on the idea that different people have different opinions on truth and morality and these opinions are equally valid (we will see that this foundation is not true in reality, but this is the official argument). So there is no absolute truth or morality (which are independent from each person, and true for all people) or,  even if it existed, it would be impossible to discover. So the only way to take collective decisions is to count the different opinions and see which opinion is majority. As Argentinian writer Jorge Luis Borges said: «Democracy is an abuse of statistics». This, in reality, is not true (the important collective decisions are taken outside the democratic game, as we will see), but it is the official argument.

Western civilization is also relativistic in practice because it is founded on concepts like freedom, equality and rights, which are presented as absolute. But these concepts are relative, because the freedom/equality/right of a person is, in reality, the lack of freedom/equality/right of another person, as we will see. So these concepts are relative to the person being considered.

Three problems of relativism

The problems of relativism are well known. First, relativism in truth is self-refuting. The statement «Each truth is relative (different for each person)» claims to be a universal truth that applies to all people, that is, it is  an absolute statement that contradicts the very idea it is claiming.

In reality, this is the lesser of problems of relativism in Western civilization, because most people have lost the ability of thinking logically and they only emote and react to conditioning like Pavlov’s dogs. They don’t have any problem in having a contradictory worldview and, even if they could understand the contradiction, they would not give a dam.

The second problem of relativism is that it encourages selfishness and antisocial behavior, producing anarchotyranny. If freedom/equality/rights are paramount (which is always interpreted as «my freedom/equality/rights are paramount» because of the innate selfish bias of humans), I don’t have to think so much about other people. In addition, if I define my own truth and morality, I can define my morality to fit my selfishness. I am judge and jury.

«Yes, I abandoned my husband because the new man was more exciting, but I define my morality and I decide that I have the right to be happy. My kids? They are happy if I am happy. So this action was perfectly moral and, in fact, morally obligatory. About not committing adultery? These are tales of old church ladies. I don’t believe in any external moral authority: I believe in myself and being true to myself. Staying in an unhappy marriage would have meant not being true to myself. And my husband is sad now but it will be better for him to be with a woman who loves him. In fact, I am making him a favor.»

Men is not a rational animal: it is a rationalizing animal. He does what he wants and then finds reasons to justify his actions. With no external rule of conduct, he is judge and jury so he always finds a way to justify himself, to absolve his own selfish actions, whether by redefining morality or by using freedom/equality/rights as an alibi.

So the relativistic society gets more and more immoral and chaotic, with more conflict, a fight of everybody against everybody to express his selfish human instincts as much as he can. For example, England and Wales had 66% more population in 2001 than in 1898. But they had 4024% more rapes and 2630% more indecent assaults on women than in 1898.

In short, the relativism of Western civilization relaxes the cultural restrictions to selfish human instincts seen above. I can say to myself that I am not behaving badly because I define my truth and my morality and I define them in a way that they justify my behavior. I also define my bad behavior as a part of my freedom/equality/rights. So «guilt» and «shame» are removed, creating anarchy. Only «fear» (the fear of the State punishing me for my bad behavior) is left producing totalitarianism. As we will see, this is one of the roots of Western anarchotyranny.

The third problem of relativism is that it produces atomized societies. If different people have different concepts of the truth, they have three options: they enter into conflict with each other (anarchy, as we have just seen), they leave the State to solve the conflicts by force (tyranny, as we have just seen) or they separate from each other to decrease the level of conflict.  This separation can be physical or psychological (for example, lack of meaningful relationships). So, under the banner of the relativistic concept of freedom, the Western societies unravel. First, the societies turn into a set of communities  (see ethnic neighborhoods, posh woke real state) and then the communities unravel themselves. Families are more and more broken. People are more and more lonely.  Western societies resemble more and more a formless groups of atomized individuals with are safe and lonely in their relativistic existence and are only bound through transactional relationships or through the State. This was Rousseau’s dream and it is illustrated in the Youtube documentary «The Swedish theory of love», which I highly recommend.

There is a fourth problem of relativism and it is the most important to understand the evolution of Western society but this post is long enough, so it will be explained in the next post.

We saw in the previous post that the modern Western civilization is

• relativistic in theory with respect to the truth and morality, which are claimed to be relative (different for each person).
• relativistic in practice because it uses concepts like freedom, equality and rights. These concepts are relative, because the freedom/equality/right of a person is, in reality, the lack of freedom/equality/right of another person.

We have seen that the relativism of Western civilization causes societal problems like anarchy, tyranny and atomized societies.  But the main problem of the relativism in Western civilization is the one will be explained in next.

Political systems cannot be based on relativism

The main problem of relativism is that it is impossible to scale. Every man can adopt relativism in an individual manner (and, as we saw, this produces conflict, which causes anarchy, tyranny and atomized societies). But it is impossible to apply relativism in a collective manner.

To be more specific, it is impossible for a political system  to be based on relativism, as we are going to see.

This is because each political system is based on laws. The law should allow some things and forbid other things. Which things should the law allow or forbid? It should allow good things and forbid evil things so it needs a concept of good and evil that is publicly shared by the elite and authorities and, even better, by the entire population (even if they don’t feel this way in private, see Timur Kuran’s Private Truths, Public Lies).

This concept of the good and the evil upon which the law is based is the official ideology of the society, that is, its official religion, because a religion is a moral system that distinguishes good from evil (some of you will object to my use of the R word but, please, bear with me, this will be explained in another text and let’s not quarrel about names). In this sense, every country is a theocracy.

This official religion cannot be relativistic in theory (if there is no absolute truth and no absolute good, there is no reason to have laws that allow and forbid behaviors).

This official religion cannot be relativistic in practice either. For example the law cannot be founded on «freedom». It is common for politicians to say: «Our political system is founded on freedom», as if the relative concept of freedom was an absolute concept (the same for everybody). But there is no such thing as a political system founded on freedom because the freedom of somebody is the lack of freedom of somebody else.

My freedom to have private property is the lack of freedom of everybody else to use my property without my consent. Capitalist countries will allow the first freedom and will forbid the second one. Communist countries will do the opposite (in theory). But you cannot allow both freedoms at once. So there is not a political system based on freedom, the same way you cannot have a coin with one side.

In short, a political system  cannot be founded on relativist concepts, because the law is absolutist and not relativistic.

But we have said that the Western civilization is based on a relativistic ideology. So how is this possible? Are we contradicting ourselves?

The paradox of Western civilization

It is possible because relativism is the theoretical official religion of the Western civilization  but it is never put into practice in the political systems of this civilization. It is only used by the powers that be in a rhetorical, official and theoretical way  (in speeches, official documents  and,  more importantly, as a way of justifying policies and laws). But, as explained above, it cannot be applied in practice so it is not applied.

For example, in theory, all people in Western countries are free, equal and have the same rights. This statement is completely relativistic and completely theoretical.

But, in practice, some people are freer than others, some people are more equal than others and some people have more rights than others. So, for example, in a divorce, the person who wants out of the marriage has freedom and rights to divorce, but, the person who wants to remain in the marriage and his kids have no freedom or rights at all.  In an abortion, the woman is free to kill her child (it is her right) while the man and the fetus have no freedom or rights and nothing to say. And so on and so forth.

As we have seen, it would be impossible for a society to be based on freedom, because the freedom of a person is the lack of freedom of another person (the freedom to divorce of a woman is the lack of freedom of a man to see how their kids grow). So in the Western civilization, like in any other countries, some freedoms are guaranteed while other freedoms are restricted.  In a Muslim country, the woman has no freedom to divorce but the man has the freedom to see his kids grow. The late blogger Zippy Catholic used to hammer this point home once and again (we miss you, Mark).

Muslim countries don’t have less freedoms than Western countries. They have different freedoms. However, Muslim countries are coherent because they don’t claim to be based on freedom while Western countries do.

Therefore, in fact, Western civilization has two official religions:

1. A relativistic religion in theory, for rhetorical uses. I will call this «liberalism». Its concepts (liberty, equality and rights) are presented as if they were absolute concepts and they are claimed to be the foundation of the society. Of course, this is only a rhetorical ploy (for speeches and, more importantly, to justify policies and laws). Relativism cannot be put into practice so liberalism is only a rhetorical ploy. Liberalism is a very simple ideology (it only consists of some few words: liberty, equality, progress, rights, etc.) and has not substantially changed for the last 200 years.

2. There is a real official religion, which is codified in the laws and it is the base of public discourse and policies. I will call it «leftism». This is an absolute religion with absolute goods and evils. For example, absolute evils are racism, sexism, homophobia, white nationalism. Absolute goods are the legalization of divorce and abortion, secularization, uncontrolled immigration, etc. These are absolute concepts and must be enforced as absolute by the law, the government and society in general. Leftism is constantly changing and incorporating new absolute goods and evils (transphobia is the latest evil so far, but it won’t be the last).

Go to a workplace and say that you don’t think the new LGBTI program is a good idea, because everybody should have their opinion and freedom of thought, and you will see how long liberalism (relativism) goes (I did this and I was fired). You will see what the ideology being enforced in society is leftism, not liberalism.

Liberalism is only a rhetorical ploy to justify leftism.  It took me a lot to see this distinction and this article by Bonald was useful so I decided to use his terminology.

That article explains how both religions are used to justify leftism, for example, in a debate of  gay marriage. You attack the ideas of ideologies other than leftism by using liberalism («Christian marriage is a cultural construct that does not allow freedom and equality to gay couples. Live and let live») and you defend your own ideas by using leftism («You should bake the cake for a gay wedding, you bigot, you homophobe»). There is no freedom or live and let live for this last case.

In short, your ideas are relative (liberalism), my ideas are absolute (leftism). It is «relativism for thee but not for me». This phenomenon of «relativism for thee but not for me» will be constantly seen in the history of relativism in Western civilization.

In short, Western civilization is based on what I call «a fake relativism». Relativism (liberalism) is used in a rhetorical way as if it was the foundation of the society but the society is based on leftism, on an absolutist religion (like any other society is because it is impossible to do it another way).

How other societies work with ultimate justification

If Western society is really based on an absolutist ideology like other societies, why is so harmful that it uses relativism in a rhetorical function?

The problem is that relativism is used as an ultimate justification of changes in the culture and in the law. And relativism can justify anything, no matter how insane it is.

If we start asking: «Why is A true/false?», this will have an answer along the lines of «A is true/false because it is derived from B, which is true/false». Then we can repeat the question with B: «Why is B true/false». This will produce a C being true/false. We cannot go on infinitely with this chain of justification. This chain stops with Z being true/false, full stop. Z is an ultimate justification and we can call it «a reality dogma».

Morality works the same way. If we start asking: «Why is A good/evil?», this will have an answer along the lines of «A is good/evil because it produces B, which is good/evil». Then we can repeat the question with B: «Why is B good/evil». This will produce a C being good/evil. We cannot go on infinitely with this chain of justification. This chain stops with Z being good/evil, full stop. Z is an ultimate justification and we can call it «a morality dogma».

All civilizations have dogmas, which are the foundation of the civilization. In ancient societies, dogmas were collected in holy traditions or holy texts such as the Bible, the Qur’an or the Talmud, which were used as the ultimate justification in these other societies. Each chain of justification ended with «the Bible/Qur’an/Talmud says it so».

However, these holy texts are extensions of obvious reality («men are women are different») and of the natural law («don’t steal»), that is, the universal moral law that all sane societies follow, because it is biologically wired in humans and it is the only way to organize a society.  The natural law has dogmas like «don’t lie, don’t steal, don’t murder, respect your neighbor’s wife, etc.».

All traditional holy texts include the dogmas of obvious reality («men are women are different») and the natural law («don’t steal») with some exceptions). They also include some other dogmas in addition («the Trinity», «the obligation to pray»). So the traditional holy texts can be seen as extensions of obvious reality and the natural law. See the appendix of The Abolition of Men by C.S.Lewis to see how all civilizations agree on the dogmas of the natural law (called «the Tao» by C.S.Lewis).

(The mechanism that makes all the holy texts to agree on obvious reality and the natural law is that societies that are not based on the natural law don’t survive long term , because the natural law is the minimum set of rules needed for a society to function, so the holy traditions of these societies die with them. This will be explored in another text)

Having the dogmas of a society derived from holy texts has as a benefit that its culture is not completely free. The culture is constantly changing but it does not get very far away from the dogmas of the holy texts, so it does not get very far away from the dogmas of the natural law. I imagine these cultures as a dog tied to a stick with a chain. The stick is the natural law. The dog (the culture) can move somewhat but he is not completely free, he must be somewhat close to the stick, even if the chain is long.

This seems outrageous to modern Western people, raised in a diet of fake rationalism. How can you limit your freedom of thought? You should be able to question anything! Follow your reason when it leads you!.

In fact, human reason (aided by convincing fallacies and social pressure) can justify absolutely anything, The modern West is a society that prides itself in its rationalism and it has rationally justified that a man is a woman (see «the social construction of gender» and other sophistries).

The dogmas of the holy texts mean that ancient cultures are protected from insanity. They cannot say that there are 26 genders because «God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. (Genesis 1:27). Or, if you are a Muslim, «O mankind, fear your Lord, who created you from one soul and created from it its mate and dispersed from both of them many men and women.» (Qur’an 4:1)

How the modern West works with ultimate justification

As we have said, the modern West has leftism as his real religion, but liberalism is his ultimate justification. Unlike ancient societies, whose dogmas were written in long texts, the dogmas of the modern West are surprisingly short: they are limited to a series of relativistic liberal concepts: freedom, equality, rights, and progress (with an additional implicit concept: tabula rasa).  In the modern West, these concepts of liberalism play the same role than the Bible, the Qur’an or the Talmud in other societies, which are used as the ultimate justification in these societies.

Every ultimate justification of the leftist religion in Western society is done starting from liberalism (which is the rhetorical religion) and not from leftism (which is the real religion). So why is homophobia evil? Because it goes against the freedom, equality and rights of homosexual people. Why is secularization good? Because it goes in favor of the freedom and equality of people of non-Christian religions, and so on and so forth.

So why is having liberalism as justification so bad? And how it is possible than an absolutist ideology (leftism) is justified starting from a relativistic ideology (liberalism), when this is logically impossible?

It is bad because the dogmas of Western civilization (freedom, equality, rights) are completely relativistic. When applied to the collective, they are fake dogmas that don’t mean anything. They are words to conceal the fact that the Western civilization has no dogmas at all. This means that this civilization is a free dog, with no chain. The civilization can move in any direction and there is no limit to the insanity it can accept.

Any direction the Western civilization moves can be justified as a new right, freedom or equality. Do we want to legalize divorce? We can say we are protecting the rights and freedoms of people unhappy in their marriage. Do we want to forbid divorce? We can say we are protecting the rights and freedoms of kids to have a stable family.

Do we want to enforce the identification of trannies as women? We can say we are protecting the rights of people trapped in the wrong body or are wanting the equality of these «women» with other women. Do we want to forbid identification of trannies as a women? We want to protect the rights of women to have private spaces (like restrooms) or the equality of women to have the same reward as men with the same effort in sports.

The sacred relativistic concepts (freedom, equality, rights) of our civilization are able to justify ANYTHING, no matter what. They are no concepts when applied to collective but a series of empty words than don’t mean anything. They can justify anything and its opposite.

More specifically, there is no insanity big enough that cannot be justified by using relativistic concepts. And this is why our society has reached these levels of insanity: liberalism (relativism) as an ultimate justification allows it, while other societies are restricted by their holy texts, their absolute religions based on the natural law.

Liberalism for me but not for thee

But this produces another question. If liberalism can justify anything, why is it only used to justify leftism? Why isn’t liberalism used to justify the freedom of everybody to use the pronouns he wants to interact to other people? Or the rights of kids to have a stable family?

That is to say, the fact that the relativistic liberalism allows insanity does not mean that it forces insanity. If liberalism concepts mean nothing, if liberal concepts give freedom to the society (to the dog) to go in any direction (because they are relativistic), we would expect for the Western society to go in random directions, but the direction is always the same: towards insanity and towards the opposite direction of obvious reality and the natural law.

In fact, if we speak accurately, liberalism is not properly an ultimate justification of leftism. It is an ultimate rationalization.

Leftism has its own dynamics and evolves in an completely independent way from liberalism. It has mechanisms in place that make leftism evolve in one direction. As Mencius Moldbug said “Cthulhu may swim slowly. But he only swims left. Isn’t that interesting?”

Once leftism has produced a cultural change because its own internal dynamics, liberalism is called to justify it, to rationalize it. A liberal justification is created which justifies the novelty as derived from the freedom/equality/right of someone (let’s say the freedom and right to be called by your favorite pronouns). The fact that the freedom/equality/rights of other people is restricted is completely omitted (the freedom/right of everybody to free expression). So leftism is rationalized starting from liberalism using a fallacy of omission («stack the deck» fallacy). This is the only way to derive an absolute ideology (leftism) from a relativistic ideology (liberalism).

So, in other words, it is liberalism for me but not for thee. Relativism is never applied in a complete manner. It is applied in a partial way that justifies leftism and, when it contradicts leftism, it is not applied. Liberalism justifies leftist rights but other rights are never discussed. We will constantly see this in the history of the modern West.

But, what are the mechanisms that make leftism always evolve in the same direction? This will be seen in the last post of this text.

This is the end of this text. But it is only a summary. There is a lot more to explain such as the historical birth of relativism, the factors than increase its influence and lots of loose ends included in this text.

Moralistic worldview – IS OUGHT

The Myth of Religious Violence.

Para la siguiente: la religión es relativista y se presenta como absolutista.

IS y OUGHT no encajan

As the previous installment explained, the language of rights and the language of responsibilities are logically equivalent. Rights are moral claims expressed with an active voice and obligations are moral claims expressed with a passive voice.

In fact, a right is someone else’s obligation and an obligation is someone else’s right. But this does not imply that both languages are equally good, because there is more in language that logical representation. A language expression can be logically adequate while being:

a) Not clear. The expression does not make easy to understand its meaning.

b) Not useful: The expression does not produce useful emotions and actions in humans.

The last installment explained why the language of rights is not clear: it is a convoluted, obscure and manipulative way to speak about obligations.

This final installment will explain why the language of rights is not useful: it produces all kinds of social and personal dysfunctions.

RIGHT MUDDLES RESPONSIBILITY

The passive voice muddles responsibility 

As we saw in the first installment of this series of rights, the language of rights is a form of the passive voice of the moral claims (the passive voice of the OUGHT part). Like any passive voice, the language of rights makes easy to muddle responsibility.

If we start with a passive voice of the IS variety (the one that explains how things are, not how they should be), we can see this in the following statement of Cardinal Edward Egan regarding the handling of sex abuse allegations against priests:

«It is clear that today we have a much better understanding of this problem. If, in hindsight, we also discover that mistakes may have been made as regards prompt removal of priests and assistance to victims, I am deeply sorry,»

For the sake of brevity, I have removed from this text the explanation of all the dishonest linguistic and semantic tricks that muddle responsibility in this despicable statement.

I will only focus in «mistakes may have been made». Who committed these mistakes? We don’t know. The passive voice allows to express an action while omitting  a vital piece of information: who did the action described. It is a dishonest grammar structure that hides responsibility without the listener noticing that the responsibility has been omitted.

In fact, as we saw in a previous installment, passive voice follows the structure PATIENT be ACTION [by AGENT], where «by AGENT» can be and is often omitted. Cardinal Egan could have said: «Mistakes we made by us» but he preferred to omit this information. This kind of manipulation is impossible with an active voice: «We made mistakes», «[Whoever] made mistakes». It is impossible to hide responsibility.

In short, the passive voice allows people to hide the agent, the responsible of the action, as if these crimes were accidents of nature, which only just «happen». As Theodore Dalrymple observed in English prisons:

I am fascinated by prisoners’ use of the passive mood and other modes of speech that are supposed to indicate their helplessness. They describe themselves as the marionettes of happenstance.

In the previous statement by Cardinal Egan, it seems that the bishops enabling sexual abuses were only unlucky. They happened to work in a place where some mistakes simply «happened». This is the dishonesty of the passive voice.

The language of rights produces anarchotyranny

As we saw in a previous installment, the language of rights is only a passive form of the OUGHT statement: a passive voice to express moral claims. So it shares the dishonest muddling of responsibility with other forms of the passive voice.

The language of rights has the following structure: PATIENT has a right of ACTION [by AGENT] where «by AGENT» can be and is often omitted.

Let’s see an example with the language of obligations (modal active voice):

«You should not litter»

This is as clear as water. Whose responsibility is it? Yours. The one reading the sentence is the one who should not behave like a pig when walking on the street.

Let’s put it in the language of rights (modal passive voice):

«You have the right to a clean public space»

Whose responsibility is it to keep the public space clean? It is not clear at all. It is not clear that you have to refrain to behave like a pig in the public space. Maybe  the local or national administration is the one responsible to keep the public space tidy and, as Theodore Dalrymple observes:

Thus, to take a trifling instance, it is the duty of the city council to keep the streets clean; therefore my own conduct in this regard is morally irrelevant—which no doubt explains why so many young Britons now leave a trail of litter behind them wherever they go. If the streets are filthy, it is the council’s fault. Indeed, if anything is wrong—for example, my unhealthy diet—it is someone else’s fault, and the job of the public power to correct. 

That is, the language of rights produces anarchotyranny. It produces:

• Inmoral behavior (anarchy): everybody thinks that other people is the responsible to make the right (clean public space) come true so he feels free to behave as he wants. I can leave a trail of litter behind while protesting bitterly that «I have a right to a clean space».
• Overreliance on the State (tyranny): Since nobody is responsible, it is the role of the State to step up and clean the streets full of garbage. Even if it does not do it (because of unwillingness, incompetence or lack of means), everybody recognizes that it is the State the one who should guarantee this right. Even if the State does not clean the streets, it should be the one that is responsible to keep the streets clean, whether by outsourcing the work or creating new laws. Individual behavior is not important.

That is, the historical movement from the language of obligations to the language of rights in Western civilizations produces a change from individual moral behavior to the expansion of the State.

People behave more and more in a anti-social way (this is often called «freedom») while the State meddles in all aspects of individual life. Since the State is not able to control each individual, this produces both more anti-social behavior and more control of the State. This is part of the movement from a society of guilt and shame to a society of fear, which is ongoing in the Western civilization and will be discussed somewhere else.

The language of rights is a tool for parasitism

As we have seen, the language of rights seems like a great deal in our societies with infantilized populations. I get to behave as I want and Daddy-State will pick up the bad consequences of my actions. What’s not to like?

In fact, besides the fact that the State cannot cover the bad behavior of each individual (see above), there is the fact that the State is composed by people.  The ones cleaning the streets are the street sweepers, which are paid by the State, that is, by taxes.

So the role of the language of rights is to shift responsibility from the people behaving badly to everyone. Now, if I want to behave like a pig in the public space, everybody has to pay for this through taxes. I may not pay for this (for example, because I am poor or a minor) but somebody is paying for my bad behavior. Somebody who does not behave like a pig is paying for me behaving like a pig. And the State is growing as the middleman for these taxes and responsible for this cleaning.

That is, the language of rights is a tool for parasitism. The parasites manage to shift the costs of their behavior to something else. This is one of the causes why both anti-social behavior and the size of the State are constantly growing in Western civilization. Taxes and State control increase and increase while people find new ways of being a parasite, which are expressed as a new right that is being created.

For example, in my country, even bad students have a right to higher education. This means that everyone (including working class people who does not go to the University) has to pay the costs of bad students who don’t want to study and want to party all the time. As I have said, the right is only a manipulation tool to justify parasitism. The right of bad students to have a fun college life is the obligation of everybody else to pay their irresponsible behavior.

This parasitism is often paid by the entire population through taxes  but this is not always the case. Sometimes specific individuals bear the cost instead of the general population. The squat («okupa») movement in my country justifies its actions saying that the Spanish Constitution includes a right to housing so they are entitled to live in an empty house or apartment that belongs to somebody else, because they have this right. In this case, the costs are borne by the owner of the house. The right of a woman to have alimony in America is the obligation of his ex-husband to pay. In this case, the costs are borne by the ex-husband.

But, in general, the language of rights is mostly used with «rights» of some specific people, where the obligations (or costs) are omitted but they are diffused throughout the entire population. The right of a trans to be considered a woman and be called «the right pronouns» is an obligation for everybody else to lie to him and to engage in ridiculous linguistic expressions.

In fact, most new rights benefit specific interest groups while creating new obligations to the population in general. This is what makes palatable new rights to the general population. It is not only that the responsibility is muddled but that they are diffused throughout the population so they are divided by a big number of people and seem a small cost. Every new right is a small monetary or non-monetary cost that  «taxes»  the population so it seems a minor hassle. So this way the temperature of the water where the frog swims increases little by little.

——

RIGHT HIDE RESPONSIBILITY COMPLETELY

Rights as a power grab

But, in reality, it is worse than that. In examples like «I have a right to clean public space», it is obvious that someone has a responsibility to keep the streets clean although it is not clear whose responsibility it is.

But most statements of rights do not muddle responsibility but they hide responsibility completely.  In fact, the language of rights makes easy to forget that there is somebody responsible to make this right true, that there is some obligation. It seems that there are only advantages.

This is why everybody is talking about his rights. It tries to impose obligations on the rest of society while disguising the fact that these obligations are being imposed. It is a manipulative action by normal people and politicians.

With normal people, it  is difficult to argue with a person who says «This is my right». The language implies that there is no cost to respect this right. So people claim rights as a rhetorical way to impose obligations to other people, without other people noticing that obligations are being imposed. The language of rights is a tool of manipulation to grab power for myself while imposing the costs to someone else.

This is why the left-wing parties and politicians in general are always wanting to increase rights («we need to advance in rights», «we need to create new rights»)  because it seems something that only has a positive side and no downsides. They create new rights to impose obligations that benefit the State or the interest groups that support the politicians while it seems that no obligation is imposed and it is a change that only has a positive side: it is «progress». In short, it is the perfect racket: it is a power grab that seems to give you power instead of taking power from you.

The scope creep of rights

With special groups and politicians having this interest in using «rights» as a rhetorical tool to get advantages for themselves, it is not strange that new rights are constantly being discovered and enforced. In Western civilization, the set of rights have scope creep: human rights, women’s rights, gay rights, trans rights, migrant rights, animal rights, etc. You start by saying «I have right to live» and you end up by saying «I have a right to be called with xir as my pronoun». Rights are constantly increasing, because they are presented as a positive thing with no cost.

This way, a vast part of the Western population is more and more slave since it has to obey to all the obligations that these rights impose. But, since these obligations are hidden under the concept of rights, Western population applauds any new right and, hence, it applauds its own enslavement.

Rights as a geopolitical tool

In addition, this is used as a power tool in geopolitics. When the American Empire wants to invade a country, it can justify the invasion as «we are doing to enforce rights». Since the obligations implied by these rights are hidden, this sounds like «we are doing it because we want to do good». So each invasion is sold as a moral crusade.

In the invasion of Afghanistan, the alibi was «we are fighting for women’s rights» (no matter that the vast majority of women in Afghanistan supported sharia). This made blogger Jim quip: «We went to war in Afghanistan to make the local schoolgirls put a condom on a banana».

Recently, the Department of State declared that it has as a duty to impose LGBTI rights around the world. This provides the perfect alibi for invasion, since LGBTI rights is a modern Western invention that has not been exported to many countries in the world. In fact, all countries that are not Western, have no LGBTI rights or the LGBTI rights do not measure to the standard of LGBTI rights in the Western world.

Since Western civilization is constantly creating new rights, it is easy to find a new right that is not enforced in some country that USA wants to invade so there is always an alibi for invasion. We can invade for money, for power or other geopolitical goals, but we always says we invade for rights. We are not invaders but liberators.

————-

RIGHTS ARE RELATIVISTIC.

A culture based on rights?

We have seen that my right is someone else’s obligation. But there is something more. Rights are incompatible with other rights, a topic that was explored when talking about freedoms. In fact, since obligations is the lack of freedom, what is explained here is only the same problem than the one explained when talking about freedoms, only expressed in the language of rights.

When Muslim terrorists attack Western countries, there is a chorus of politicians that say: «they attack us because they hate our freedoms, they hate our rights». The rationale is that Western societies have more rights and freedoms that Muslim societies have, so Muslim terrorist, somehow, hate us for this. (The fact that we are meddling and killing people in the Middle East since forever has nothing to do, of course).

But is there a society that can have more rights than another one? In fact, this is impossible.

The infamous Masterpiece Cakeshop case before the Supreme Court illustrates this case. Masterpiece Cakeshop, a bakery in Lakewood (Colorado), refused to design a custom «wedding» cake for a gay couple based on the owner’s Christian religious beliefs. The Colorado Civil Rights Commission found that the bakery had discriminated against the couple and the Supreme Court reverted this decision.

Here we have two supposed «rights»: the right of the gay couple not to be discriminated against and the right of the baker not to do something against his religious beliefs. Both rights are in conflict. Allowing the gay couple’s right is forbidding the baker’s right and vice verse. Whose right is going to prevail? The Colorado Civil Rights Commission thinks that it is the former that should prevail but the Supreme Court thinks that it is the latter. In fact, as we have seen, this depends on the values of the society.

So you can’t have a society that has more rights than another one, since somebody’s right is somebody’s lack of right (or to be honest, somebody’s obligation is the lack of obligation of somebody else). The right of the gay couple is the lack of the right of the Christian baker. Every time the law recognizes a right is denying another right.

So Western societies have the right of women to divorce their husbands while Muslim societies have the right of men to have their families intact and see their children grow. Muslim societies don’t have fewer rights than Western societies. They have other rights (or, being honest, other obligation).

The same way there is not some thing such as «advancing in rights». Every time you advance in a right, you «regress» in another right.

Rights as a relativistic concept used in an absolutist manner

What we ultimately have is that «rights» (like «freedom» or «equality») is a relativistic concept: the right of somebody is the lack of right of somebody else.

But rights are presented in the public discourse like an absolutist concept: as if there were rights out there that are independent from societies and individuals and that they have to be accepted because it is morally right. So public authorities speak about «advancing in rights», «expanding human rights to the entire world» and so on and so forth.

As we have seen, this is one of the features of the Western culture: use relativistic concepts in an absolutist manner. This has obvious advantages for manipulation:

• Since rights are relativistic, anything that powers want to enforce on the population can be expressed as a right. See above for more details.
• Since rights are treated as an absolutist concept, they are presented as something indisputable, something that people have to accept and comply with.

So rights (like freedom and equality) are the ultimate weapon: you can legally and morally force everybody to abide with anything you want.

Rights as a tool of political manipulation

Since rights are obligations disguised as freedoms, since they seem all advantages and no downsides, Western authorities can use them as a tool of political manipulation. The method is as follows.

1. Western authorities (politicians, international organism, the elite behind) want to impose some new political measure. Let’s say «making divorce legal», which happened in my country in 1981.

2. This political measure will benefit somebody and will harm somebody. For example, it will benefit the person who wants to divorce and it will harm the person who wants to keep the marriage intact.

3. The authorities focus only on the people that benefit from the new measure and invent a new «right», which didn’t exist five minutes before but it is created from thin air. There is a right for unhappy people in marriage to «rebuilt their life». This people have a right to divorce, because they are entitled to be happy. The» right» to be happy of the abandoned spouse is completely omitted.

4. The benefits of the new political measure are publicized in media, movies, songs until the population see the «new right» as something that is so obvious and so fair that denying it puts you in the same category as Hitler.

5. The new «right» is recognized in a law and now there is an obligation for some spouses and kids to see their families broken. We are advancing in rights! Yippee!

6. Lather, rinse, repeat.

This method has been used with all kinds of new «rights». The last example is the right of «gender identity», the right of «gender-affirming medical care» (that is, the obligation of parents to see his deluded kid to be castrated).

An example: using rights to introduce pedophilia

Pedophilia is a right nut to crack, for obvious reasons. Decades of trying to make it legal have produced modest advances. The problem is inventing a right out of pedophilia to apply the method described above is not obvious. For decades, the course of action was to try to invent a right for pedophiles to have a good sexual life. This was so outrageous that it had to be introduced piecemeal. So we got all these «ethical pedophiles» that claimed not to touch children (some of them were caught touching children afterwards) but they wanted to be understood because they were born this way.  So we had things like this TEDx talk claiming that pedophilia should be accepted as an unchangeable sexual orientation https://www.metroweekly.com/2018/07/tedx-speaker-argues-that-pedophilia-should-be-accepted-as-an-unchangeable-sexual-orientation/

Obviously, this went nowhere so a more effective strategy had to be devised.  Now the course of action is to invent a right of sexual expression for children. If children want to have sex with an adult, who are you to limit the right of the kid, you monster? This will be the new «right» that is going to be imposed to us.

On September 21, 2022, Irene Montero, the Spanish minister of equality declared in the Spanish House of Representatives:

“All children in this country have the right to know their own body, to know that no adult can touch their body if they don’t want to, and that this is a form of violence. They have the right to know that they can love or have sexual relations with whoever they want, based, yes, on consent. And those are rights that are recognized, and that you do not like.»

See the language of rights used to justify that kids can have sexual relationship with adults, even if it is in an indirect way. The minister refused to rectify these words when asked to.

The Spanish Minister for Equality has reiterated that «children have the right to know that they can love whoever they want and have sex with whoever they want, that they have the right to abortion.» She stated that sex education is «a pillar of access to sexual and reproductive rights,» which in the minister’s opinion is «a matter of human rights, not an ideological option.»

This is the end game of the concept of rights in Western thought: to justify the most outrageous abuses that cry out to heaven based on creating «new rights». Western people have been trained to agree when they hear words like «rights», «freedom» or «equality», like Pavlov’s dogs. Their brains turn to mush and they justify the most criminal abuses. They repeat «freedom», «equality», «rights» while they drool like idiots.

Conclusion

This started as one page of notes I had based on the reflections on rights I have had for years and wanted to flesh out. Then, when I tried to write it, it blew out of proportion. If you have reached the end of this writing, thank you for your patience.

I only wanted to show that the concept of rights is one of the most evil concepts that has produced Western thought and that is used to enslave us and take us to hell. There is no way out of our current predicament without rejecting the language of rights and go back to the language of obligations, which was used by the wisdom of all cultures except the modern West.

—-

Muddles responsibility: produces anarcotyranny

HIdes cost: Scope creep.

Right as barrotes.

Since it hides costs, it is used as a power grab by people and politicians

Relativistic. Parasitism – Privatizes benefits

The right to pedophilia: use as a weapon.

It is relativistic used as an absolutist rhetoric

sibility

—————–

The right to pedophilia. These are the new rights. Only five years ago and it seems Moses. So you are a meanie denying a right.

In Western society, the concept of rights has scope creep. The rights of children, women, LGBTI, migrants… This is the way the power and the groups of pressure favored by the power imposes obligations to the majority of the population without noticing that an obligation has been imposed.

Fight people with each other.

As a result, the rights is a tool of parasitism. The right to education of bad students. Western civilization is invaded by a set of parasites that are incompatible with each other.

Without the tommyrot.

But what is a right, anyway. An obligation is easy to grasp:

Not a symmetry. It is a convoluted and manipulative way to talk about obligations.

Right after right, we are being put in chains.

—————–

Language of obligations is straightforward. Has the following structure:  AGENT OBLIGATION BENEFICIARY. The object is often implicit but it is obvious to find out.

Language of obligations is SUBJECT has the right of RIGHT [by the AGENT] where «by the AGENT» is often dropped and not obvious to find out.

Who is the responsible to produce this right or obligation? Shall not litter. Muddles responsibility.

In fact, the language of rights makes easy to forget that there is somebody responsible, that there is some obligation. It seems that there are only disavantages.

This is why the left-wing parties and politicians in general speak of rights in the campaigns, because it seems something positive while an obligation is imposed on layers of the populations.

This is the fact why everybody is talking about his rights. It tries to impose obligations on the rest of society while disguising the fact that these obligations are being imposed. It is a manipulative action by normal people and politicians.

The right to pedophilia. These are the new rights. Only five years ago and it seems Moses. So you are a meanie denying a right.

In Western society, the concept of rights has scope creep. The rights of children, women, LGBTI, migrants… This is the way the power and the groups of pressure favored by the power imposes obligations to the majority of the population without noticing that an obligation has been imposed.

Fight people with each other.

As a result, the rights is a tool of parasitism. The right to education of bad students. Western civilization is invaded by a set of parasites that are incompatible with each other.

Without the tommyrot.

But what is a right, anyway. An obligation is easy to grasp:

Not a symmetry. It is a convoluted and manipulative way to talk about obligations.

Right after right, we are being put in chains.

The language of rights, as any other

• «We did not have a good understanding back then» (as if priests abusing minors is rocket science),
• «in hindsight» (as if this has not been a sin for 2000 years),
• «if mistakes were made» and «mistakes may be made» (he does not admit that something wrong has happened, it is only a possibility that it may have happened),
• «I am deeply sorry» (instead of admitting responsibility or apologizing, he only «feels sorry»).

In addition, labelling the enabling of sex crimes and despicable sins as «mistakes» is completely dishonest.  This can almost be read as if this was an accounting error when we are talking about priests abusing minors and bishops enabling this behavior.

But look at the passive voice: «mistakes may have been made». Remove the dishonest «may» and we get to «mistakes were made». Who has made these mistakes? It is never said. You cannot retrieve this information from the words uttered. There is not a «by» clause, such as «mistakes were made by all of us» or an honest active voice «We made mistakes».

It has often been  noticed that the passive voice is a manipulation device to hide responsibility, by hiding the agent of the action. The book «Mistakes were made (by not by me)» explains this and provides the following statement of Cardinal Edward Egan regarding the handling of sex abuse allegations against priests:

«It is clear that today we have a much better understanding of this problem. If, in hindsight, we also discover that mistakes may have been made as regards prompt removal of priests and assistance to victims, I am deeply sorry,»

The good Cardinal had no responsibility and nothing to feel guilty about. He happened to be present in an unenlightened era where sexual abuse was not well understood and working in a place where «mistakes were made». He «feels sorry» about the victims, the same way you can feel sorry about the victims of World War II without having responsibility in these deaths.

In short, passive voice can be used as a dishonest way to shirk responsibility because the responsible of the evil deeds can be easily omitted.

The language of rights also muddles responsibility

As we have seen, the language of rights is only a modal version of the passive voice and shares its manipulative character. The language of rights, like any other passive voice, makes easy to omit the AGENT of the action, that is, the person responsible for the moral claim.

In the previous installment, we saw that rights and obligations are two sides of the same coin. A moral claim can be expressed in the language of rights (the beneficiary has a right to something: «You have the right to life») or in the language of obligations (the agent has an obligation towards other people: «Thou shalt not kill»). This is the same moral claim expressed in two different ways. Ancient cultures preferred the latter while the modern West prefers the former.

But, as the previous installment claimed, the language we use is important. It shapes our thoughts, our feelings, our worldview. It makes easy to think some ideas and makes difficult to think some other ideas.

So it is the time to analyze the linguistic implications of the language of rights and the language of difficulties.

Is the concept of rights adequate?

For years, I saw rights and obligations as a two ways of expressing a moral claim: two language expressions for the same moral fact. I thought that, since they were logically equivalent, using one or another was a matter of cultural and personal preference. Ancient cultures favored the language of obligations while modern Western culture preferred the language of rights.

So I was surprised when I read the beginning of Simone Weil’s book: «The notion of obligations comes before that of rights, which is subordinate and relative to the former.»

I wondered: «Is she right?» Are obligations preferable to rights?

It turns out that there is more in language that logical representation. A language expression can be logically adequate while being:

a) Not clear. The expression does not make easy to understand its meaning.

b) Not useful: The expression does not produce useful emotions and actions in humans.

Going to the dictionary

Focusing on the clarity, is it the notion of rights clear enough? This is a weird question for Westerners. We take «right» as something self-evident, so clear that it is difficult to explain or give a definition. As I said, it is similar to words like «red» or expressions like «2+2=4», which are clear and obvious, although difficult to explain.

Some years ago, when I started thinking this topic, I thought that a first approximation is to consider rights as a version of freedoms. I have the right to private property because I am free to have private property. But there was something that eluded me. «Rights» had a sense of urgency and normativity that is not present in «freedoms». It is like rights were more important than freedoms, in some way. I am free to eat vanilla ice cream but I don’t have a right to eat vanilla ice cream (all the companies producing it may have broken).

So I decided to go to the dictionary. Merriam-Webster defines «right» as «the power or privilege to which one is justly entitled» and «entitled» as «having a right to certain benefits or privileges». If we remove the circular definition we have the right is «a just power or privilege». «Privilege» is defined as «a right or immunity granted as a peculiar benefit, advantage, or favor». So, removing the circular definition, we have that right is «a just power» but this does not capture the notion. I have a just power of treating my wife in a good way but this is not a «right». In addition, if you investigate «just» in the Merrian-Webster, it follows a set of circular definitions.

Let’s change of dictionary. The Oxford English Dictionary is not available and the Collins dictionary is circular in its definition of right. The Cambridge English dictionary says that a right is «the fact that a person or animal can expect to be treated in a fair, morally acceptable, or legal way, or to have the things that are necessary for life». But this is the definition of justice, which is much broader than the notion of right.

So I recurred to the authoritative dictionaries in my two native tongues:  in Spanish and Catalan. Both dictionaries spill the beans but the IEC Dictionary of the Catalan Language is clearer. According to it, a right is the:

Faculty to demand what is due to us, to do what the law does not defend, to have, demand, use, etc., what the law or the authority establishes in our favor or is allowed to us by whoever can.

Defining the concept of rights

And the IEC Dictionary of the Catalan Language show us the truth: a right is the faculty to demand what is due to us, that is, the obligations other people have to us. My current definition is:

A right is somebody else’s obligation [that benefits me].

It also could be said that «an obligation is somebody else’s right [that benefits him]», since both are logically equivalent. But there is a difference that breaks the symmetry. If you want to define a right in a non-circular form, it is impossible to do it without using the concept of obligation, although you can hide the concept of obligation under the rug with similar language («what is due to you, what other people are bound or tied to do for you», «what should be done to you»).

Since dictionaries did not help with that, I tried to define the concept of rights without recurring to obligations. Every attempt ended up throwing the concept of obligations under the rug. My best shot was:

A right is a freedom one should have.

And the trap is in the word «should». What happens if I don’t have one of my rights?  If my right to private property is not guaranteed, it should be guaranteed and every person should not use my property without my permission. That is, every person has the obligation of not using my property without permission. So we are ultimately talking about obligations.

You can’t define rights without the concept of obligations, but you can define obligations without the concept of rights. In fact defining obligations without recurring to rights is the natural thing to do and all the mentioned dictionaries do it this way.

Rights as a dishonest concept

So Simone Weil was right: the concept of obligations is primary and the concept of rights is only a convoluted and dishonest way to speak about obligations. She says:

A right is not effectual by itself, but only in relation to the obligation to which it corresponds, the effective exercise of a right springing not from the individual who possesses it, but from other men who consider themselves as being under a certain obligation towards him.

I would go further: rights (in the modern sense) do not exist, they are only a dishonest way to speak about obligations. It is not strange that almost all civilizations have defined the moral landscape using the language of obligations: it is the clear, honest and right way to do it.

A comparison may be adequate. There have always been a tiny minority of people with gender disphoria: men who considered themselves women and vice versa. The right and honest language to refer to this phenomenon  is «gender disphoria» or something similar.

But we can label people with gender disphoria as «trans» and people without gender disphoria as «cis». This, without the rest of the transgender ideology, is not false. It is logically equivalent to using «gender disphoria».

But this is a dishonest way to express the phenomenon: it muddles things, it is a convoluted way to express the situation, which implies that this is an identity issue instead of a medical issue and implies that «cis» and «trans» are two equivalent modalities of being human. You end up with things like «cis-normativity» to refer to the normal and natural functioning of all societies in all ages.

The same way, «rights» is logically equivalent to «obligations» but it is a dishonest way to express the situations which allows all kinds of manipulations, which will be explored in the final installment of these series.

Ancient cultures had «duties» or «obligations» and anything that was not a duty was a freedom. So they had freedoms and obligations (lack of freedom). Day and night. White and black. Left side and right side.

Modern western culture has «freedoms» and «rights» (that is, obligations). So, even if the logical meaning is the same, the rhetorical content is completely different, because right seem like freedom so it seems that there are not obligations for the pampered modern man. Day and day. White and more white. Right side without left side. It is a brilliant maneuver of manipulation.

An example

One of this manipulations is that rights are presented as something that only gives freedom and the obligations they describe are quietly omitted.

So everybody is in favor of rights, because they see it as a form of gaining freedoms without downsides. They don’t see the obligations involved.

The elections in my country ended up in surprise. Although everyone was convinced that the right-wingt parties were going to win, the left-wing parties managed to retain the power.  After the elections the same message was repeated once and again by the president to many left-wing politicians.

Here is how Patxi López, an important left-wing politician put it: «We have to form a government that allows us to continue advancing in rights». Pedro Sánchez, the president said this:

The message from the polls has made it clear that those who propose […] going backwards are not the majority and that, therefore, Spain can continue […] advancing in social rights.

Who can oppose «advancing in social rights» if everything looks positive and with no downsides? Rights, as presented by modern Western, are magical: they have no downsides and can be created out of the blue, with no cost involved.  The fact that each right brings with it a set of obligations is ignored by everybody. After each new right, the modern Western man is more and more slave: bound to more obligations, but the language of rights conceals this in a brilliant maneuver of manipulation.

But we will explore that in the final installment about rights.