Our Future

👀 @theophite.bsky.social

I had some self-avowed communist the other day try to come at me with “the paradox of tolerance” from the Open Society and its Enemies by Karl Popper. Poor guy had no clue what that book was even written about.

Karl Popper, well-known communist.

election.princeton.edu/wp-content/u...

I do, actually. Do you? I can recommend some good reads. The Five Stages of Fascism by Columbia University emeritus Robert O. Paxton is a prescient piece at this moment. But maybe you can regale me about the connection to Michels in Italy. I’m sure I’d like your take on it.

Right, the only fascist here is you. You want centralized power. Illiberal politics. You are someone who follows in the footsteps of Carl Schmitt. That is, you are a fascist. Not an uncommon thing for a supposed socialist either.

Your hypothetical state could be of an authoritarian flavor. I don’t want that. I like the liberal vs. illiberal. I just want my economic system to also fit with that vision. It’s a market economy but focused on a worker-to-owner and renter-to-owner model, which I think fits with 🇺🇸 sensibilities.

Having people actually own what they create is a great solution. Right now that doesn’t happen. Rents are everywhere. That’s perverse. Communism doesn’t have the goal of “teaching people to fish” either. Centralization is the goal not decentralization.

It sounds like you don’t know much about it.

What about distributism? Got any literature on that?

U2?

Different time. Another time.

They’re going to try to pressure Maduro to cop to it. You know it. I know it.

Maybe I see it more because I’ve lived on both sides of the train tracks. I was homeless at one point and now I work at a “good” university. Anecdotal, but to this day I have self-preservation impulses others don’t because I had to. That doesn’t make me wrong, I just had other life lessons.

Right, I have little patience for that either. But I do bristle at the approach taken. There are points he has but the framing of it wasn’t one that would bring more people on board. You don’t convince people through oppositional frames. That’s for rallying the base. And maybe that’s what this was.

You know, it just seems like there are a lot of people who are in positions of relative privilege who are very much invested in believing the world will be fine simply because they want that to be the case. Their priors inform them to be. Many people out there have had different lives.

I hope so, but there is still a ton of damage that has been done and for me on the flip side it’s been frustrating to see people seem to suggest it’s winning the midterms and then walking into a golden dawn. That doesn’t seem realistic. I worry about holding on to something that may not exist.

Often I don’t see people bemoaning “doomerism” having any plan about what to do if they do try to meddle in the next election, for example. Personally, I’d use the opportunity now to start organizing for how we can mobilize people, just as they are, to be more involved in the elections process.

That’s not an environment conducive to making sound judgements. There are things to be pessimistic about. Being pessimistic about them can be vital to planning out how we’re going to put our efforts to avoiding that apparent route. But it can also lapse into a dangerous despair.

But here it is mostly leftish people so the partisan, owning, dunking dynamic is focused more between liberals and leftists and is creating a wedge. Just like these social media mechanisms work anywhere else. I don’t think anyone is immune. I see a ton of toxicity from all of the above.

The problem as I see it is that nobody here actually engages with other people where they’re at. So many people just talk past one another and create caricatures that aren’t fair. It’s the platform. It’s the concision. It’s the distance it creates.

Are all of those points wrong on their face? Have they not violated laws and ignored them? Maybe look at some of the quotes going on his post. Many are from people in Minnesota. Some reference family members or loved ones taken. Might your need to silence all “doomerism” also be misplaced?

Let me explain it like this, there are many reasons to be legitimately worried about what’s happening right now. Someone condescendingly telling you to “look on the bright side” ain’t it either. Have some humility yourself and realize people are going through things you might not fully understand.

The only strategic approach is to game out the worst case scenarios based on the available evidence. Anything less isn’t planning for a better outcome, it’s simply wish casting for a better outcome. Bellwethers are useful. Canaries indicate trouble. As with many things, there has to be some balance.

That’s fine and all, but that doesn’t make blind optimism the default correct view either.

The value of the Shoe+ estate? $499k.