Brainpolice : Philosophy, Collectivism

Mikhail Bakunin and Collectivist Anarchism

Brainpolice — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 21:35:00 GMT

Mikhail Bakunin was the Russian father of the strain of anarchism known as collectivist anarchism. He was initially loosely associated with both Karl Marx and Pierre Joseph Proudhon, and eventually he developed anarcho-collectivism using both of them as influences while deviating from them both at the same time. Bakunin's anarcho-collectivism, which wasn't completely developed until towards the end of Bakunin's life, differs from mutualism and individualist anarchism in certain significant ways, but it also differs from Marxist communism in certain ways as well. While it does call for collective worker ownership of the means of production, Bakunin's anarcho-collectivism is more along the lines of a half-way point towards communism since it still allows the renumeration of labor.

However, there are certainly some similarities between communism and Bakunin's ideas. Like the communists, Bakunin emphasized anti-theism. He reversed Voltaire's quote that "if god did not exist, it would be necessary to invent" him to "if god really existed, it would be necessary to abolish him". And like the communists, Bakunin had a materialist basis for his philosophy, which makes his economic analysis similar to that of Marx. The Russian, Polish and generally pan-slavic cultural context that Bakunin was working with was primarily a reaction to the royal or noble classes which were much more prevailent in such a context than in America and certain parts of Europe at the time. This helps explain the cultural trends towards collectivism that took place around Bakunin.

But beyond this, Bakunin was actually a critic of Marx. He rejected the notion of a "dictatorship of the proletariet" and supported the notion of decentralization or federalism, and hence there is supposed to be free association between the communes in an anarcho-collectivist society. While the goals between anarcho-collectivism and Marxism were quite similar, Bakunin fundamentally clashed with the Marxist communists over questions of strategy, rejecting formal political strategy in favor of a more social form of revolution and what he called "the propaganda of the deed". However, some controversy exists over the degree to which Bakunin's notion of "the propaganda of the deed" is dangerous and has been used to justify violence, and individualist anarchists tended to shy away from the revolutionary methods of many collectivist anarchists.

Bakunin is known to have been a strong supporter of the Paris Commune of 1871, which was surpressed by the French government. Bakunin persisted in favoring social revolution over political strategies, which eventually lead him to be purged by Marx from The First International. The difference between Marx and Bakunin over how to go about reaching their mutually held goals became irreconcilable. Bakunin thought that Marx's strategies would just lead to another despotism, which turned out to be a wise foresight. He strongly opposed the idea of seizing the power of the state as a method of revolution. In this regaurd, Bakunin must be credited as the first thinker to effectively try to depoliticize communism.

Bakunin's historical significance in anarchism more or less represents the planting of the seeds for all forthcoming collectivistic variants of anarchism such as anarcho-communism and anarcho-syndicalism. At the same time, it must be said that he also represents the initial cause of a fragmenting of communism between Marxist and anarchistic strains. In either case, Bakunin was most definitely a key figure in the history of anarchism.

False Realism and Utopianism

Brainpolice — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 02:26:00 GMT

Conservatism is a defense of the existing order or past existing orders as "natural". Any potential alternative to the existing order or to the romantisized past order is immediately brushed aside as "unnatural" and "utopian" or "idealistic". In the conservative view, all existing inequalities are "natural" in a sort of deterministic sense. The conservative strongly emphasizes nature over nurture to explain and defend currently existing or past existing conditions. On the other hand, utopian left-wing ideologies such as Marxism strongly emphasize nurture over nature and hence attribute the vast majority if not all currently existing conditions and inequalities to political, economic and cultural influences in a deterministic sense. Nothing short of a significant transformation in human nature can possibly obtain the ultimate end sought of a purely egalitarian society, and the desirability and implications of such a purely egalitarian society is alarmingly questionable upon reasonable reflection.

The conservative errs in considering the existing order or past orders to be inevitable into the future or that they can possibly sustain themselves perpetually. They tend to ignore the extent to which inequalities are the effect of influences such as state intervention and bureaucracy. The conservative tends to defend the unequitable effects of state intervention as if they came about naturally on the free market, and therefore concludes that currently existing disparaties between various groups of people are both inevitable and justified. When anyone proposes or attempts to change such conditions or the existing order in general in a significant way, the status quo is defended by the conservative. The conservative has little to no concept of the dynamic nature of society over time and fails to see the potential changes that can be made and the advantages that can be reaped. Conservatism can be seen as a very pessemistic view in a sense, particularly pessemistic towards the future.

The marxist engages in the opposite error. They blame all existing inequalities and negative conditions on the non-existant free market and then arbitrarily proclaim that it's just a phase of history that will inevitably be surpassed by a collectivistic utopia, if only all the workers magically take over the state and somehow voluntarily dissolve it. The marxist does not recognize the degree to which state intervention is the primary cause or enabler of the inequities that they have so much distain for. They put themselves foreward as being proponents of change in the right direction, but what they ultimately have to offer is more of the same: state intervention and centralization. The actual cause of the problems which they aim to solve is precisely what they propose as a solution, and therefore their "change" isn't a meaningful or beneficial one. They propose what in some ways amounts to an authoritarian heirarchy as the solution to authoritarian heirarchy or dictatorship as a solution to dictatorship.

The distinction between and reliance upon nature and nurture is often a false dichotomy. That which involves human influence is often characterized as "nurture", yet human beings are a part and product of "nature". The real question is a matter of which particular parts or aspects of "nature" are influencing other particular parts or aspects of "nature". There are some issues with the use of the term "natural" to begin with. In a certain sense, everything and whatever the current state of affairs happens to be is "natural". The only alternative to something being "natural" would be for it to not exist, unless of course one is proposing that there is some kind of supernatural realm which would still ultimately reduce to non-existance. That being said, it is definitely nonsensical to consider all present conditions and all present forms of organization to be inevitable and a permanent state of affairs. Stasis is not "natural". Organizations and organizational forms are never permanent in the grand scheme of things, so it would be more genuinely "realistic" to propose that the eventual dissolution of the existing order is "natural" and inevitable at some point.

While the conservative puts themselves foreward as a realist, they are truly nothing but a proponent of either stasis or "turning back the clock" to "the good old days", which becomes their own romantic utopia. The extent to which they see current affairs as moving in an "unnatural" direction causes them to become reactionaries, desparately trying to cling on to old traditions. On the other hand, the marxist sees the present as "unnatural" and proclaims an inevitable utopian future to be a "natural" progression. They've drawn erroneous conclusions from the basis of the hegelian dialectic, philosophy of history and social evolutionary theory. Both involve the bastardization and politicization of science as a handy rhetorical authority and a misguided appeal to either nature or nurture.

Politics Is The Opiate Of The Masses

Brainpolice — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 10:38:00 GMT

Theism is not the only kind of mysticism. Collectivist and political ideologies are also forms of mysticism. The nature of politics involves blind faith in a "highest essence". The abstractions of these "highest essences" function as arbitrary authorities to appeal to. The most common of these arbitrary and rhetorical authorities are "society", "nation", "state", "humanity", "race", "class" and "gender". In political ideology, these concepts function precisely in the same way as a deity. As a consequence of faith in these abstractions, individual human beings and/or certain collections of human beings are given the status of a deity. These concepts also all have one thing in common: they obscure the individual and turn the individual into a sacrificial peon to collective abstractions. In all cases, belief in something that doesn't exist (at least in the way concieved) functions as a mechanism to provide a plastic sense of meaning or identity.

While theism assigns a non-existant entity with rights not possessed by human beings, statism assigns certain human beings with rights not possessed by everyone else. While religious ideologies conflict over who rules the universe and how they do it, political ideologies conflict over who rules over other human beings and how they do it. In electoral politics, certain human beings are deified and people conflict over which deifed human being should rule over everyone else. For many people, the election rallies and political holidays are just as much of a "spiritual experience" as any religious ceremony at a fundamentalist christian church. People literally have faith in politicians, bureaucrats, nations, and states and they use that which is attributed to them as a way to legitimize their personal biases and their actions. The health of political power relies in large part on the exploitation of the religious impulse in the broadest sense through the use of rituals, symbolism, illusions, grandios promises, bread and circuses.

Many political assumptions are essentially forcibly inherented from parents and cultural norms, just like in theism. While religions tend to promise a utopia after death, political ideologies tend to promise a utopia during life. Both make use of fear and guilt and exploit the pessemism within people to elicit obedience. The morality of politics is based on arbitrary authority rather than reason. "The law" has the same functionality as a deity's alleged words or religious texts. The individual must submit in spite of their rational evaluation. Furthermore, politics provides a mechanism by which people can enforce their personal preferances and their incorrect conceptions of morality onto innocent bystanders. Politics is more dangerous than religion is by itself, since it is only through the mechanisms of politics that religion can be tyrannical on a large scale. Politics is the opiate of the masses.

The Nail in the Coffin of "The Right"

Brainpolice — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 20:54:00 GMT

It is common for many libertarians, especially those in America, to assume that they have a natural alliance with "the right". This is based on certain assumptions, such as the notion that contemporary libertarianism grew out of the old American conservative movement and that "the right" is generally supportive of less government and more free markets in comparison to "the left". In short, the libertarian who makes such assumptions is at least partially buying into the way in which the political spectrum is typically framed in contemporary public discourse, with "the right" standing for less and less government control and "the left" standing for more and more government control, with "the left" standing for collectivism and communism and "the right" standing for individualism and capitalism. One would think that the libertarian should know better than to buy into this false dichotomy. It eradicates all nuances.

I find such assumptions to be mistaken for a number of reasons. In historical terms, libertarianism predates the existance of contemporary American conservatism altogether and the term "libertarian" itself actually derives from certain socialists from the 19th century. And, the term libertarian itself aside, the bulk of those who are considered to be the forefathers of libertarian ideas were originally considered to be on "the left", including free market proponents. Furthermore, it seems to me to be the case that the bulk of self-identified "rightists" do not actually support a free market or any consistant philosophy of individualism. I see no serious compelling reason to assume that "the right" necessarily supports state power any less than "the left". Conservative devotion to individualism and free markets is largely rhetorical, not substantive. These are campaign slogans, not seriously or consistantly held philosophical positions.

If viewed in terms of the original meaning of the left-right political spectrum, the meaning that it had centuries ago, libertarians are actually on the "far left" while the conservatives are on "the far right". For the left originally was supposed to represent anti-authoritarianism, anti-statism and revolution, while the right was supposed to represent the status quo, the oligarchy and reactionaries. Taken in its original context, conservatism has always been the polar opposite of libertarianism or liberalism. Libertarians are often mislead by the modern assumption that "the left" is necessarily in favor of statism and opposed to free economic interaction. Since this is assumed about "the left", the libertarian may make the mistake of then concluding that "the right" is therefore their natural home on the political spectrum.

But what does "the right" of today really stand for? Not to make too hasty of a generalization, as a "rightist" may not necessarily support all of these things, but here's what immediately comes to mind: corporatism, protectionism, monarchy, theocracy, traditionalism, militarism, nationalism and racism. It is important to note that all of these things were strongly opposed by historical libertarians and classical liberals to varying degrees. Classical liberals tended to be cosmopolitans in their worldview, and therefore nationalism does not jibe very well with such a philosophy. They also respresented a radical divergence from past political traditions, which implies an opposition to monarchy and theocracy. And there was always a strong opposition to war and imperialism within the old libertarian "left". Furthermore, obviously any sensible understanding of free market economics would lead one to oppose protectionism and corporatism.

Why do I identify "the right" with these traits? Because as far as I can tell such traits are implicit in their own rhetoric and in the substantive content of their policy positions. Obviously I do not mean to lump all "rightists" together into one arbitrary camp, as there are different factions within the contemporary conservative movement. But each faction represents some selection among the listed traits. Neoconservatives tend to support corporatism and militarism. Paleoconservatives tend to support protectionism, nationalism and traditionalism. The Christian right tends to support theocracy. Furthermore, despite quibbles among different factions of conservatives, they all are united by an irrationalist opposition to anything that is considered to be part of "the left". When it comes down to it, many conservatives are willing to set aside their differences to function as reactionaries to what they commonly oppose. Therefore anti-communism, anti-Islam, anti-multiculturalism and anti-secular sentiments prevail.

The problem is that in the name of opposing such things, the conservative tends to enter into a desperate state in which they will support just about any means in the name of defeating their common enemies. Thus, whatever disposition they may have had towards restraint in political affairs is at least temporarily set aside. The communists, radical Islam, the secularists and multiculturalists must be defeated at all costs first - then, only when the enemies have been defeated, we can worry about restraining the government, freeing up the economy and adhering to a non-interventionist foreign policy. But even when one boogeyman is defeated, it usually is replaced with another one. Thus, when the Soviet Union fell and left a void of rationales for foreign policy interventions, radical Islam was then used as the new rationale.

Even if the conservative is somewhat or even entirely correct in opposing something, such as a communism, they may tend to make the mistake of going on to form or join equally dangerous reactionary movements and end up supporting other things that should merit opposition as well. In short, they fall into the trap of thinking that "the enemy of my enemy is my friend". But it does not logically follow that since one opposes communism, one must join forces with the fascists. It does not logically follow that since one opposes social democracy, one must join forces with the monarchists. It does not logically follow that since one opposes the state's discrimination laws, one must join forces with white nationalists. It does not logically follow that since one opposes government ownership of the means of production, one must indiscriminately support corporations.

The economic views of contemporary conservatism are also very warped. For the modern conservative does not support laissez-faire, but some form of a mixed economy or corporate state. Sure, the conservative's rhetoric is often devoted to laissez-faire, but their support for "capitalism" is more often than not merely a knee-jerk apologia for current economic conditions, corporations and the rich, irrespective of wether or not it has anything to do with laissez-faire. In short, the contemporary conservative often ends up using the term "free market" to describe and legitimize what we currently have. But we do not currently have a free market. The average conservative has not read Ludwig Von Mises or Frederic Bastiat. Their support for "capitalism" is more or less merely cultural, not an informed and substantive position. All they know is that they oppose "socialism" and "communism", and "capitalism" is the opposite of those things, therefore they must support whatever "capitalism" is. But their "capitalism" happens to be either the status quo (or elements of it at least) or some romantisized past utopia.

Since the conservative tends to conflate laissez-faire with corporatism or the effects of a mixed corporatist economy with "the free market", actual consistant proponents of laissez-faire may actually be demonized and brushed aside as being "socialists", since a consistant adherance to laissez-faire would naturally lead one to oppose corporatism. The conservative loves to see red where it does not really exist, therefore going on red-baiting witch hunts. The conservative may see red in positions that don't necessarily have anything to do with being a communist, such as opposition to political borders and support for multiculturalism. They accept an absurd false dichotomy: either you support the conservative agenda or you are a "far leftist". A "far leftist" is defined quite simply as anyone who disagrees with the conservative to any significant extent.

While there certainly are conservative intellectuals, the average conservative does not derive their position from any serious study of philosophy, economics or history. They derive their position from the media, their parents and cultural cliches. They are brought up to believe that whatever the conservative establishment happens to be supporting equates to small government, free markets and individualism - and that everyone and everything else is more or less a representation of big bad communism and "big government". In contemporary politics, conservatism has more to do with one's cultural preferances than any half-seriously thought out political philosophy. Dimwitted talkings heads such as Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter determines the conservative's views rather than anything remotely resembling a rational thought process.

What does the libertarian truly have in common with the contemporary right? In my estimation, very little. What they have in common is a matter of rhetoric and to some limited degree over what they are opposed to. But the libertarian ultimately has no compelling reason to support what the contemporary right does. For the contemporary right is largely a reactionary statist movement. Figures such as Ronald Reagen and Pat Buchannan are not particularly libertarian, despite any correct positions they may hold to on certain individual issues. Contemporary conservatism is just another brand of statism.

Definitions

Brainpolice — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 05:08:00 GMT

So I put together some relatively witty definitions of my terms. If you're not offended by at least one of these, then you are awesome!

Constitutionalism - The belief that a piece of paper drafted and signed by a tiny aristocracy of men is a legitimate perpetual contract that makes the government voluntary on the part of those within a society that did not sign the document and limits the powers of governmental agents for all of eternity.

Minarchism - The belief that there can be a government limited to the protection of rights without violating rights in and of itself; the belief that all goods and services should be provided by the free market yet somehow the principle magically doesn't apply to the defense and arbitration industry.

Democracy - The belief that the government is controled by the people simply because every few years they get to punch a hole in a piece of paper with the names of a few rich and powerful men on it.

Nationalism - The belief that imaginary lines on a map constitute real and meaningful property boundaries; the belief that territories have human traits or personalities of their own; the belief that immigration is the spawn of satan.

Objectivism - The belief that the initation of force is wrong yet somehow it is permissible to arbitrarily invade Iran and Venezuela because "we" have oil interests there; the belief that only romanticism is real art; the belief that you can eliminate taxation and still have a "government".

Political Libertarianism - The belief that the state is inefficient and immoral yet for some strange reason the state is the only viable means by which we can bring about liberty; the belief that democracy is tyrannical yet we must use it to our advantage.

Paleoconservatism - The belief that conservatism was hijacked by leftists and communists and that the "true conservatives" are those who support protectionism and white nationalism; the belief that you're more conservative than those creepy neocons yet somehow you support just about as powerful of a government as they do.

Christianity - The belief that the path to salvation lies with devotion of one's life to a Jewish zombie hippie who is his own father.

Satanism (Laveyan) - The belief in the writtings of a former carnie con artist who haphazardly threw together the ideas of Ayn Rand and Aleister Crowley, incoherant ramblings on the Enochian key and rhetoric to drawn in rebelious teenagers.

Zionism - The belief that because your people were nearly liquidated once, you have an inherent right to liquidate others and forcibly remove them from their own territory.

Religion - The belief that fairy tales from centuries or millenia ago passed down through shaky oral tradition and written down by fallable men are actually absolutely true and codes to live one's life by.

Collectivism - The strange belief that groups have a mind of their own yet their component parts don't.

Altruism - The belief that self-destructive servitude for the sake of others is the greatest virtue; the belief that everyone should mutually be slaves to eachother.

Epistemological Subjectivism - The belief that all truth claims can be reduced to mere personal opinion or preferance, yet somehow this view isn't a mere opinion in and of itself.

Epistemological Nihilism - The belief that there is no such thing as truth, yet somehow it is true that there is no such thing as truth.

Statism - The belief that it is not only moral but necessary for a particular group of individuals to do that which is openly aknowledged as being immoral and not necessary for everyone else to do; moral hypocrisy at the institutional level.

Primitivism - The strange belief that living in a cave or mud-brick hut or as a hermit in the woods is preferable to modern industrial society; the romantisization of long gone tribal and hunter-gatherer societies (in which life was nasty, brutish and short) as peaceful and prosperous utopias.

Welfarism - The belief that the poor can be helped by giving them back a tiny chunk of what was originally stolen from them and keeping them in a state of dependancy on the government; the bribery of the lower classes.

Inflationism - The belief that all problems can be solved by simply printing up more money, despite overwhelming evidence that the arbitrary creation of new money creates problems in and of itself.

Monetarism - The belief held by a bunch of Chicago School economists who think that they are free market proponents but really are quasi-Keynsians.

Anarcho-Syndicalism - The belief that corporations are evil yet somehow corporate dominated, government chartered and cartelized unions are the path towards a free and stateless society.

Hobbesianism - The belief that a highly pessemistic view of human nature that entails war of all against all justifies absolute control by the state, despite the fact that the state is made up of *gasp* human beings.

Radical Environmentalism - The belief that the planet itself has intrinsic value and that human beings are inherently evil parasites on the face of the planet; the modern religion of nature-worshop.

Globalism - The strange belief that large-scale conflict and war would end if only we put all political power in the hands of a singular oligarchal institution with control over everyone in the entire world.

Animal Rights - The belief that non-human entities deserve human rights; the belief that chickens and bumble bees should be equal before the law; the attempt to liberate the unliberatable.

Marxism - The belief that some crazy rich German guy has predicted an inevitable egalitarian future and has mapped out the path towards the liberation of all poor and working people through the work of a benevolent dictatorship.

Racism - The strange belief that a particular roll of the genetic dice entitles and requires one to completely separate themselves from others with another particular roll of the genetic dice; the collectivism of bubble-headed bigots.

Secular Deities and the Problem of Humanism

Brainpolice — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 04:17:00 GMT

An atheist criticism of contemporary secularism

Most atheists and agnostics still have a religious mindset, only they have replaced the formal concept of a god with other concepts. In the absence of faith in an all-knowing and all-loving god outside of the universe, they have substituted faith in other artificial constructs that are considered to be inside of the universe. They rely on faith in an abstraction to be confident in the existance of order and morality. They act as if the non-existance of such abstractions, or at least the lack of them as a rationale, would lead to chaos and immorality. The abstraction worshiped may be the state, the nation, humanity, the planet or environment. These things are treated as if they were spirits or geists and are used as an appeal to authority.

To be sure, abstractions can be sensible and useful insofar as they are derived from reality by reason. But most secular people either do not derive their abstractions from reality or treat certain things that exist in reality as if they were deities. Collective concepts such as nations are treated holistically as if they were sentient entities in and of themselves and are used as an authority for justification of goals and actions. But strictly speaking a nation does not exist, at least in the manner it is being viewed by the nationalist, as an individual entity or actor. And for an example of the adoption of things in reality as deities, radical environmentalists tend to treat the planet itself as if it were a diety with intrinsic value. The planet most certainly does exist in reality, but it does not have intrinsic value and is not a sensible source of morality.

The vast majority of contemporary secularists still believe in things that do not exist, particularly collective constructs. They refer to specific groups of people, such as races and economic classes, as if they existed as singular concious actors. But realistically speaking, there is no race or economic class as a whole that one can point to as being responsible for anything. Nor can an individual reasonably claim to be acting on the behalf of such collective abstractions. "The white race" or "the proletariet class" cannot rationally be used as a reason justifying one’s actions. Racists merely use the abstraction of a race as a diety. Classists merely use the abstraction of a class as a diety. Statists merely use the abstraction of a state as a diety. In all cases, the functionality is the same as a diety. All deities in formal religions, of course, originated from the anthropromorphisization of elements that people interpreted from around them in the world. The contemporary atheist, while they may have abandoned the formal concept of a god, is merely repeating this process in reverse.

It is unfortunate but most atheists are statists, and usually of the "left" variety. I think this is partially due to the cliche way in which contemporary cultural politics is framed in public discourse. Since it is assumed that the "right" is for religious people, the secularist has more of a tendency to flock to the "left". Of course, I reject the notion that the "right" is necessarily any less statist then the "right", but that’s beside the point. The overall point is that while many atheists don’t worshop a god external to the universe, they nonetheless still worshop human beings or leaders or rulers. They treat certain human beings in positions of power as if they were a god anyways. But in my view atheists should reject the state and other such worldly "geists" for some of the exact same reasons that they reject the concept of a god. If you reject the concept of a god, you should have no more reason to treat humans as a god. Human beings should not be treated as gods. Noone deserves to be worshoped. Noone deserves to be a ruler. You have no more reason to consider rulers worthy of your respect then any non-existant deity. While the rulers might actually exist in reality, they nonetheless don’t necessarily deserve your respect any more then a deity.

While I’m not the biggest fan of Max Stirner and I think that he uses very odd language to get his point across, in his writting "The Ego and His Own" he pointed out the problem of secular people deifying either humanity as a whole as an abstraction or certain other human beings in general. Allow me to leave you off with a quote from "The Ego and His Own" that touches on this:

Atheists keep up their scoffing at the higher being, which was also honored under the name of the " highest " or être suprême, and trample in the dust one " proof of his existence " after another, without noticing that they themselves, out of need for a higher being, only annihilate the old to make room for a new. Is " Man " perchance not a higher essence than an individual man, and must not the truths, rights, and ideas which result from the concept of him be honored and—counted sacred, as revelations of this very concept ? For, even though we should abrogate again many a truth that seemed to be made manifest by this concept, yet this would only evince a misunderstanding on our part, without in the least degree harming the sacred concept itself or taking their sacredness from those truths that must " rightly " be looked upon as its revelations. Man reaches beyond every individual man, and yet—though he be " his essence "—is not in fact his essence (which rather would be as single* as he the individual himself), but a general and "higher," yes, for atheists "the highest essence."† And, as the divine revelations were not written down by God with his own hand, but made public through " the Lord’s instruments," so also the new highest essence does not write out its revelations itself, but lets them come to our knowledge through " true men." Only the new essence betrays, in fact, a more spiritual style of conception than the old God, because the latter was still represented in a sort of embodiedness or form, while the undimmed spirituality of the new is retained, and no special material body is fancied for it. And withal it does not lack corporeity, which even takes on a yet more seductive appearance because it looks more natural and mundane and consists in nothing less than in every bodily man,—yes, or outright in " humanity " or " all men." Thereby the spectralness of the spirit in a seemingbody has once again become really solid and popular.

Sacred, then, is the highest essence and everything in which this highest essence reveals or will reveal itself; but hallowed are they who recognize this highest essence together with its own, i. e. together with its revelations. The sacred hallows in turn its reverer, who by his worship becomes himself a saint, as likewise what he does is saintly, a saintly walk, saintly thoughts and actions, imaginations and aspirations, etc.

It is easily understood that the conflict over what is revered as the highest essence can be significant only so long as even the most embittered opponents concede to each other the main point,—that there is a highest essence to which worship or service is due. If one should smile compassionately at the whole struggle over a highest essence, as a Christian might at the war of words between a Shiite and a Sunnite or between a Brahman and a Buddhist, then the hypothesis of a highest essence would be null in his eyes, and the conflict on this basis an idle play. Whether then the one God or the three in one, whether the Lutheran God or the être suprême or not God at all, but "Man," may represent the highest essence, that makes no difference at all for him who denies the highest essence itself, for in his eyes those servants of a highest essence are one and all—pious people, the most raging atheist not less than the most faith-filled Christian.

In the foremost place of the sacred,* then, stands the highest essence and the faith in this essence, our "holy† faith."

-- Max Stirner, The Ego and His Own, Pages 48-50

The Rational and Individualist Case Against Racism

Brainpolice — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 10:50:00 GMT

I'd like to state upfront that I am not an egalitarian, which is to say that I am fully aware of the fact that people are inherently unequal with respect to their mental and physical capabilities as individuals, and I despise the politically correct way in which racial questions are often treated in public discourse. I do not support affirmative action or any attempts to force people of different racial groups to associate with eachother. However, I intend to make a decent criticism and refutation of the ideology of racism itself as well as its goals.

Like all forms of collectivism, racism treats entire groups of people as if they were individual entities in themselves. But only individuals exist, think and act. Responsibility cannot reasonably be assigned uniformly to entire races or abstract concepts. In the same way that the entire caucasian race cannot be blamed for any particular blunders done by certain white people in the past, the entire negroid race cannot be blamed for any particular blunders that certain black people may engage in presently. The notion of ancestral guilt is morally bankrupt, for it assigns moral responsibility to certain individuals who took no part in the thing in question for merely being descended from those who may have engaged in the thing in question. The notion of collective guilt is morally bankrupt, for it assigns moral responsibility to everyone within a given group for the actions of particular individuals within that group.

Racial polylogism is the view that treats different racial groups as having different logical structures of the mind, while simultaneously ignoring the diversity within a given racial group. But in reality, perhaps barring the severely mentally handicapped, there is only one fundamental logical structure of the human mind. Individuals may indeed vary widely in their mental capabilities and how they apply their mental capabilities, but this in no way validates the premise that entire races have different logical structures of the mind than eachother, it only applies to individuals. In other words, even if one could scientifically prove that one race on average has better or worse intellectual capabilities, this essentially has no bearing on the individual members of such groups, who vary among themselves in the first place. And it would do nothing to change the fact that all human beings share the same fundamental characteristics that make them human.

All human beings have a rational self-interest or incentive towards certain basic things, the most fundamental of these being maintaining their own existance and the quality thereof. Each individual is self-aware and possesses the capacity to be rational. The defining feature that sets human beings apart from other animals is our rationality and the expanded capacity for moral choice and knowledge accumulation that it gives us. All people, no matter what their skin color is or any other such unique physical characteristics they may possess, have this capacity to one degree or another. When it comes to this basic capacity, noone, no matter what group identity is attached to them, can be reasonably characterized as sub-human. The biological differences between the races can essentially be reduced to little more than miniscule and superficial physical differences in appearance, and do nothing to counteract the fact that all such people share the same fundamental defining features of being a human.

Racial identity is in many ways an illogical collectivist mindset, for one is identifying themselves with an abstraction rather than as an individual. One is actually sacrificing their genuine identity and unique qualities in order to conform to an ideal and become more uniform with respect to others. Racial identity can lead to the idea that one must act a certain way and that one is entitled to certain privileges merely for being part of a particular group. Treating people differently in terms of rights merely on the basis of what racial identity group they belong to sets up a precedent in which different groups are granted a different set of rights. Thus, racist conceptions of rights may suffer from the fallacy of group's rights just as much as an egalitarian conception does. In practise, the only significant difference between the two is that they place different emphasis on which group gets more rights then the other.

Racists tend to rely on an extreme form of either biological or cultural determinism in order to defend their premises. They assume that one's race uniformly dictates one's ideas and behavior. While cultural marxists may tend to overemphasize nurture in explaining the behavior of people from certain racial or cultural groups, racists may tend to overemphasize nature in their attempts to explain such things. The cultural determinists are somewhat correct in pointing out that people are a product of their environment, although they unfortunately take this view to illogical extremes. But it cannot be denied that there are some biological and cultural differences among the tendencies of individuals belonging to different races. However, racists tend to make the mistake of assuming that correlation equals causation when dealing with statistical data about racial tendencies, and all of their attempts to prove the inherent inferiority of certain races have been debunked scientifically.

Many racists may have an agenda of separatism between races. Some may go so far as to envision a completely ethnocentric culture in which each racial group remains completely hermetically sealed from the other. Unfortunately for the racists, however, this would be counterproductive for them. Even if it were the case that one group is indeed superior to the other, it would still be more advantageous to trade and associate with them than to completely isolate from them. In economic terms, the theory of comparative advantage proves this beyond the shadow of a doubt. Discrimination generally does not benefit the discriminator in the long run, it hurts all parties involved. In economic terms, discrimination is suicidal, because either you're lowing the amount of customers or you're hiring a less qualified worker over a more qualified one, and therefore are accepting lower productivity. Racial discrimination is a suicidal buisiness practise in a modern society.

To add more insult to injury to the cause of the racists, it is physically impossible to have complete social isolation between the races. The history of mankind is in many ways a perpetual history of migrations between territories, and as time passes society naturally, albiet slowly, becomes more integrated. While white pride groups may tend to think of themselves as ethnically pure, in actual fact the history of Europe is full of the intermingling between different tribes, including ones that were originally from places far from Europe. In a profound sense, everyone is a "mut" on some level. The consequences of inbreeding have been shown to be negative, so it may very well be the case that evolution favors racial mixing. In either case, ultimately, racial separatists are trying to accomplish something that is impossible. It is impossible to manage to stop migration of foreign peoples in its track, and it is impossible to economically benefit while persueing a large-scale discriminatory buisiness practise. The movement of people of different ethnicities across land masses and the interbreeding of people of different ethnicities is to some extent inevitable, and will only intensify over time.

In conclusion, racism is not an ideology that has reason or evidence on its side and is ultimately self-defeating.