not so clear politics

[poodle-o-morphic-personification]

A brief history of Fake News

Last week, I found a flyer in my mailbox. It bears a logo, that shows the hammer and sickle, yet the content and tone of that flyer might not make you think of Marx. The author spoke in an agitated, partially confused tone. His point was that the presidency of Trump might free the world of the dread of American imperialism, expressing hope that the liberal left’s diabolic ploys to undermine the ethnic integrity of the Bundesrepublik Deutschland might finally be abolished. He managed to design a world, in which free market advocates, the socially liberal left, the military and terrorists posing as refugees attempted to overthrow the world’s natural racial order. He then went on rambling on about a „stinking, lying“ government and its untrustworthy allies. The flyer sparked a humorous response on my part, I immediately knew, that I was dealing with the delusions of a sick man, who was stylizing his personal mental illness into a political argument. I dumped the flyer without giving it a second thought. But if I was born a few centuries earlier, I might have had a different approach to flyers.

In 1648, when the Thirty Years’ War came to an end, a large part of the rural population took notice of that event in the form of flyers. Many refused to believe that the war was actually over. The flyer was perceived as what we would call „fake news“ these days. The people living at the time had been bombarded with flyers throughout decades, reaching from propaganda and accusations of witchcraft towards locals to false declarations of peace. The printing press had then been around for about 200 years, the flyer had followed shorty after. It took the public a long time to learn, how to approach this specific form of political communication and organization with the adequate caution and skepticism. Only after literally centuries were people able to critically judge the truthfulness of this medium.

A similar argument could be made concerning the medium of radio. The story of Orson Welles’ radio-bound interpretation of H. G. Wells’ classic The War of the Worlds in 1938 and the following mass panic are well known, there is no need to repeat the events of that night again. Here once again we find an example of the public, unaccustomed in dealing with the flow of information that this new medium provided, reacting hysterically and inadequately to what could be called, again, „fake news“.

So what is my point exactly? Right now we find ourselves locked in a discussion about inadequate reactions to the seemingly limitless flow of information provided by a new medium, so called „social media“ once again. Just as in the aftermath of the above mentioned radio play, we are now hearing of several proposals that promise the end of „fake news“. For instance in my home country, Germany, there has been a suggestion made by the Interior Minister to create a „defense centre against fake news“. I don’t have to tell you that the idea of a government controlled agency with the competence to judge what is and isn’t real news is more than terrifying. But apart from that, it would also proof to be ineffective. 

Social media has been around since the turn of the millennium, but only in recent years has it really taken off. To acquire the ability to judge the truthfulness of the never-ending tide of opinions, information and entertainment your daily Facebook throws at you requires time. And patience. But with a little bit of both we might get to a point where we can go through all that with ease, just as I can sort the stack of flyers in my mailbox according to their relevance and truthfulness with routine.

tl,dr: Laws and „defense centers“ will not protect us from „fake news“. Only time and training in dealing with the changing media landscape can provide us with the tools we need to separate propaganda from news, and opinions from reports.

[catoinstitute]

“PC” is Just as Much of a Problem on the Right

Conservatives use “patriotic correctness” to regulate speech, behavior, and acceptable opinions…

Political correctness has become a major bugaboo of the right in the past decade, a rallying cry against all that has gone wrong with liberalism and America. Conservative writers fill volumes complaining how political correctness stifles free expression and promotes bunk social theories about “power structures” based on patriarchy, race and mass victimhood.

But conservatives have their own, nationalist version of PC, their own set of rules regulating speech, behavior and acceptable opinions. “Patriotic correctness” is a full-throated, un-nuanced, uncompromising defense of American nationalism, history, and cherry-picked ideals.

Central to its thesis is the belief that nothing in America can’t be fixed by more patriotism enforced by public shaming, boycotts and policies to cut out foreign and non-American influences.

Insufficient displays of patriotism among the patriotically correct can result in exclusion from public life and ruined careers. It also restricts honest criticism of failed public policies, diverting blame for things like the war in Iraq to those Americans who didn’t support the war effort enough.

Learn more…

[poodle-o-morphic-personification]

Patriotisch Korrekt - ein Wort, das wir uns angewöhnen sollten

[poodle-o-morphic-personification]

The world isn’t coming to an end - Western hegemony is

No matter who you talk to, from the far left to the far right, there is one thing that everyone seems to be very certain about: Times are getting worse. It doesn’t matter if they’re scared of Trump, the rise of right-wing exstremism in Europe, “rapefugees“ or terrorism. Everyone can agree on one thing: The world is about to end. First I will argue that this is simply not true, and lacks empiric evidence. In a second step I will try to show that this sentiment stems from the unconscious realization, that it isn’t the world that’s coming to an end, but rather the West’s hegemonic position in it.

I will start with a well-known argument of anti-globalists of the left as well as the right: The exploitation of the poorer half of the globe is picking up pace, the poorest are starving, dying from thirst etc etc. Definitely there is some truth to that. There’s no need to sugarcoat anything, worldwide, about 780 million people are malnourished. That’s aprox. 1 in 9 - or about 11%. Still, in the year 1990 that number was about 990 million. (http://www.hungerexplained.org/Hungerexplained/Facts_and_figures.html) That number decreased by over 200 million - despite a constantly growing world population. If you look at people who gained access to clean water in the past 25 years, you will see that there are reasons to be optimistic: In 1990 about 24% of the world’s population had no access to clean water. That number had dropped to 9% by 2015. (http://www.welthungerhilfe.de/wasser.html) I could find some more examples for the positive development in global standard of living, like the eradication of NTDs in the recent years - but I think you get my point.

“Alright“, you might say, “but what about modern wars and global terrorism?“ Again, there is no need to belittle the tragedy that is the Syrian Civil War. It has lasted over 5 years, claimed about a million casualties and forced millions of people to flee their homes. It probably is the single greatest humanitarian and geopolitical catastrophe of our generation. But let’s take a look at the Korean War: It lasted a bit longer than 3 years (about 38 months), and claimed about a million casualties among the soldiers alone - with an additional 2,5 million civilian casualties. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Korean_War) And terrorism? Well, of course what’s happening is terrible. But we are no strangers to that - or did you forget that Margaret Thatcher narrowly escaped the Brighton hotel bombing in ‘84? No islamist has ever come that close to a leader of a european country.

As you can see, one could argue that the overall development of our world is looking up. So why can’t people, especially in the Western World, get rid of the feeling of overall decline? I would argue that even though they haven’t quite realized it yet, they have a feeling, a feeling that the West’s privileged status among the rest of the world is falling apart.

They feel it, when they see pictures like the one above this piece, they feel it when they read that the Dollar is no longer the go-to currency in times of crisis, and they feel it when they hear about China’s increasing ambitions in the South China Sea. A part of the world that is not only home to >50% of the world’s population, but also the main route for over half of the world’s merchant fleets, as well as about a third of global maritime traffic in general. (http://www.businessinsider.com.au/why-the-south-china-sea-is-so-crucial-2015-2)

No longer must we ignore the fact that this will be the next centre of the world. As I said, I believe that this realization is already creeping up people’s hearts and minds. The mass hysteria in politics, the growing approval for isolationist politics un the US, the omnipresnt apocalyptic mood in Western societies - these must all be viewed as symptoms of the our slow but steady decline.

tl,dr: The Southeast Pacific Area is becoming the new centre of the world. Mass hysteria in politics, an overall feeling of decadence and the proliferation of an apocalyptic mood as the current Western Zeitgeist are all signs that we are beginning to understand this.

[poodle-o-morphic-personification]

“Cuck!” - Die Alt-Right und der Volkskörper

Kaum ein Wort ist so eng mit der “Alt-Right”, der jungen, internetaffinen extremen Rechten Amerikas so eng verbunden, wie ihre liebste Beleidigung, die sie im virtuellen Raum auffällig inflationär gebrauchen - Cuck. Was bedeutet dieses Wort, und wieso wird es (in der Regel weißen, männlichen) Advokaten des Multikulturalismus im Netz ständig um die Ohren gehauen?

Cuck ist die Kurzform des Wortes Cuckold, man bezeichnet damit im Englischen allgemein den ausgestochenen Ehemann, der von seiner Frau Hörner aufgesetzt bekommt. In der Evolutionsbiologie verwendet man den Begriff für männliche Individuen, die Brutpflege für Nachkommen betreiben, welche nicht ihre eigenen sind. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuckold) Überraschenderweise scheint diese Bedeutung einiges damit zu tun zu haben, wie ihn die Alt-Right verwendet. Wenn man dies verstehen will, muss man einen Blick auf das beliebteste Kommunikationsmittel dieser “Bewegung” werfen: Memes. Tonnenweise schlecht gezeichnete, stumpfe Memes. Sehen wir uns eines etwas genauer an, “Carl the Cuck” :

(http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/my-wife-s-son)

Hier haben wir also einen weißen Mann, mit einem Kind das offenbar nicht das seine ist. Das Stereotyp des Schwarzen, der Kinder in die Welt setzt, die er nicht versorgen kann oder will, ist in den USA ein Allgemeinplatz. (http://atlantablackstar.com/2015/01/14/7-worst-stereotypes-black-fathers/) Durch Memes wie dieses wird es jedoch um einen weiteren Aspekt erweitert. Der moderne, liberale und natürlich weiße Mann, der sich dann um die Erziehung der Kinder des Schwarzen kümmert. Ein Cuckold im evolutionsbiologischen Sinne eben. Die Message dahinter ist eindeutig: “Ihr seid so tief in politischer Korrektheit und liberalem Denken gefangen, dass ihr euch von anderen Rassen zum Narren halten lasst und letztendlich eure Männlichkeit einbüßt.”

Soviel also zu der Beleidigung auf persönlicher Ebene: “Weil ihr keine echten Männer, sondern liberale Waschlappen seid, gehen euch eure Frauen mit Schwarzen fremd.” Kommen wir nun zur politischen Ebene. Der Cuck, der fremde Kinder aufzieht, verzichtet damit auch darauf, eigene zu haben. Er ist damit nicht in der Lage sein Erbgut weiterzugeben. In der Logik des Rassismus bedeutet dies, dass er zum Verschwinden seiner Rasse beiträgt. Die Angst, dass die weiße Rasse durch die körperlich überlegene und sexuell aktivere schwarze Rasse verdrängt werden könnte, ist so alt wie der Rassismus selbst.  Hier wird diese alte Furcht mit neuen Ausdrücken wieder einmal geschürt. Es ist also nicht nur die individuelle Frau des individuellen Cucks, über die er die Kontrolle verliert, sondern ins Große gerechnet sein Volk, seine “Rasse”. Selbstredend ist es die weiße Rasse, die in einer rassistischen Weltanschauung den Garant für Fortschritt und Kultur darstellt. Entsprechend ist es legitim, noch einen Schritt weiter zu gehen, und zu behaupten, dass sich der liberale Mann somit zumindest mitverantwortlich für den Verfall der westlichen Zivilisation macht.

Eine derartige Verquickung von Sexualität und Politik ist seit jeher typisch für die extreme Rechte jeglicher Couleur. In der Terminologie des Nationalsozialismus kommt dies in dem Begriff des Volkskörpers zum Ausdruck, der “rein” gehalten werden solle. (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volksk%C3%B6rper#Volksk.C3.B6rper_im_Nationalsozialismus) Bekanntermaßen wurde dies im NS neben dem Mittel des Genozids auch mit dem Mittel der Zwangssterilisierung bzw. mit Steuerung des Reproduktionsverhaltens der Menschen zu erreichen versucht. Die Alt-Right bewegt sich in einer ähnlichen Logik: Durch fehlerhaftes bzw. fehlendes Reproduktionsverhalten schädigt der liberale Mann, der “Cuck", dem Volkskörper im Ganzen.

tl,dr: Hinter der Beleidigung “Cuck” verbirgt sich ein rassistisches Weltbild. Wenn wir uns diese Vokabel genauer ansehen, stellen wir Parallelen zwischen der Ideologie der Alt-Right und der der Nationalsozialisten fest.

[clickholeofficial]

It should be loud, healthy, and good. #JebSex 

[onetruelibertarian]

Follow the OneTrueLibertarian for more libertarian memes!

[anti-state]

Take your places, ladies and gentlemen.

[poodle-o-morphic-personification]

Politik im Jahre 2016

[poodle-o-morphic-personification]

America’s prison system - The case for Gary Johnson

I know, it comes late, and we’re all fed up with the election, but here is yet another piece about it.

I want to talk about something, that seemed to have fallen off off the radar of at least the two major parties’ candidates. As you might have guessed by the graphic and the title, I’m talking about Amercia’s prison system. As we all know, the USA’s prison population is currently the largest in the world. In the last 40 years there has been an increase of over 500%.  (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_incarceration_rate)

Yet neither President elect Trump nor Secretary Clinton seemed to bother making this an issue in their campaigns. Mr. Trump preffered rambling about illegal immigrants, whilst Mrs. Clinton rather talked about her opponent’s “temperament“.

I have to admit, I’ve only followed the election from the other side of the Atlantic. But still I have only come across one candidate who treated the prison system as an important issue. This would be Gary “Aleppo“ Johnson.

When I told my friends that I was rooting for him, they usually asked me “who’s that?“ The second most popular response was “isn’t that the Aleppo-guy?“ “Why yes indeed“, I liked to answer, “the Aleppo-guy. That’s my man! But if you ever bothered visiting his campaign site (johnsonweld.com), you might have noticed that his focus is on something entirely else than the ongoing war in Syria.” 

“How come, that in the United States, the land of the free, there are currently more people in prison than in any other country in the wolrd?“, he asked on his official website. The text went on, and you could read Mr. Johnson’s opinion on that particular matter. I will briefly summarize it: He blames it on a “failed war on drugs”, and proposes that the US should get rid of mandatory minimum sentences asap. (the site’s content has been replaced with a “thank you” text, so you can’t look it up anymore. You’ll have to take my word for it) Now, you might not agree with that perspective, but you do have to give him credit for at least talking about the issue.

As you can propably imagine, I was rather upset when I found out on Nov. 9th that Mr. Johnson did not recieve 5% of the popular vote. This would have granted the Libertarian Party access to the Presidential Election Campaign Fund. (http://ivn.us/2012/11/01/why-5-matters-to-gary-johnson/ and yes, I do realize that this is a libertarian asking for a government handout) With that kind of funding, either Mr. Johnson or a likeminded candidate would be able to raise the issue of the american prison population again in 2020. Of course this wouldn’t guarantee the election of that candidate. (I am well aware that such a scenario is highly unlikely) But with a larger campaign fund, a libertarian candidate might have the chance to at least “raise awareness“ - to use a term Americans seem to love so much - of the issue. And who knows, maybe the libertarian point of view on this topic might have even made it onto another candidate’s plattform, had that kind of funding been available in 2016. Mr. Trump at least seems to be an un-ideological politician, picking up proposals and political stances left and right as he goes.

tl,dr: Mr. Johnson was the only candidate talking about the gigantic issue that is the american prison system. Breaking the 5%-barrier might have given the Libertarian Party the opportunity to raise the issue again in 2020, forcing the two major partie’s candidates to at least talk about it.