One of the main stereotypes about people on the right is that they are "mean". This is one of the reasons I often use the word liberal to describe myself, although I am not immune from the label of "mean" under the right circumstances, which tend to occur around 24 times a second. You could say "but liberals are mean, they destroy peoples cars based on who the CEO is" But liberals' intentional meanness comes from an exasperation of all the nice things they have been trying to do. If I see the world inherently as flawed, and I see myself as the adult, then I could reasonably assume that I could go over and above the law and wrangle the situation like an adult lifting scissors out of the hands of a running child. Then the rights reaction opposing a well meaning policy or philosophy is easily framed as meanness.
The word "conservative" is perhaps past-dated, but it’s easy for people who are “for law and order” to also have very bad optics. You can almost get tricked into it following the line of reasoning that “liberals only want the overweight to be models", or "liberals only want to allow you 1 square of toilet paper at a time”. It’s easy to latch onto this negative-market value that liberals are seemingly putting forward as the “new normal” and roll your eyes about yet another bleeding heart “good deed” attempt at warping spacetime into an unnatural mold.
It’s easy for the right to look like “mean guys” when they follow the line of critique into staunch ridicule, for example, making fun of the statue of a black woman in NYC. It’s just a statue of a lady, there are people all over the place who are different races and genders and weights, having a statue of one I thought was kind of nice, and I want more nice ladies around; if they feel loved, they will be nicer. But one might get dragged into this talking point and say “why don't we have heroic statues and heroic values?", and the thinking goes: the woman is not an ideal weight but may be seen as ideal and emulated therefore promoting obesity. I don’t think this. I think it’s natural and timeless for the ideal to be the shape that pronounces all the subtle curves and muscular patterns like a lean jaguar- but that's not to say I don’t think overweight women are beautiful, heroic, and deserving of their own statues. The argument cements the lefts “opposition to hostility” and gives a strong foothold in logic: Why can’t a slightly overweight black woman be celebrated as heroic? Liberal activism has roots a lot deeper than the war side of our outlook: Conservative activism is often rooted in a defense of tradition and "by the book" methodology. The lefts activist spirit has been honed and refined almost as a religion- while the right never talks about making cool statues until they see an overweight black lady statue.
Even if the philosophy is supposed to benefit all, rightward activism can tend to look more selfish. For example, who would be the primary beneficiary of an increase in the supply of thin women?
"Surface meanness" is the immediate aesthetic generalization, and is not necessarily "real" meanness, but it suffices for those looking for a fight, and probably constitutes the lions share of causes for drunken scuffles outside barrooms. If you love Guy Fawkes masks enough, you'll find a way to flash Guy Fawkes looks at people, even if that includes learning an orthodoxy of "good" that you can use to sift through the river bed to find unwilling flakes of "evil" (like fat shamers) to justify cryptic youtube videos, virulent gossip, and behind the scenes blacklisting.
I often get the feeling that negative reactions to peoples personalities is less about the actual offense caused which is negligible, but the fact that breaking the supposed "rules" and being "weird" suddenly gave the green light for attack- This philosophy is cynical, because it accuses people of wanting to attack in the first place, rather than wanting peace and seeing a disruption in the peace. "Beat up the drunk guy syndrome" is a term i coined that shows this when drunk guys are acting extroverted around sober people, the sober tend to react against them in many situations, yet when drunk people are partying together, they happily throw out the stifling social customs for the sake of fun. Although I don't drink at art galleries, I'm sure happy that some people are drinking because they loosen up the atmosphere and I can in a way profit from their drunkenness' rather than react against it.
The worst of the worst arguments are the ones traded as currency among the opposing faction, and the right makes very bad optics flaws: like that one where the kid is at the republican convention wearing an ice shirt and is openly mocking immigrants. It's an oof moment for all involved in my opinion.
It’s almost like the liberals are the gorillas in the jungle constantly planning and breaking tree branches off to make tree forts and the right are the ones blocking the passageways while bopping them on the dead with an acorn and calling them kooks before scampering back into the cave.
The worst of the worst arguments are the ones traded as currency among the opposing faction, and the right makes very bad optics flaws: like that one where the kid is at the republican convention wearing an ice shirt and is openly mocking immigrants. It's an oof moment for all involved in my opinion.
It’s almost like the liberals are the gorillas in the jungle constantly planning and breaking tree branches off to make tree forts and the right are the ones blocking the passageways while bopping them on the dead with an acorn and calling them kooks before scampering back into the cave.
Kook is a very powerful word in that you are in effect accusing a person of breaking the social laws that establish our stiflingly freedomless reality that you only “love” when you are an expert at it’s execution and a benefactor of it’s tyranny, and it’s a central premise of my personal philosophy that small acts of tyranny are ubiquitous (ever present) in society. I also call people kooks so go ahead and run with scissors if you must.
But to my point about ubiquitous tyranny I remember a caller in to a radio talk show who was an aid worker in Africa and she said that it was an established and pesky part of the culture that when someone in the restaurant was going to be promoted, all hell would break loose to damage the person before the promotion took place. This is not just Africa, that was just where the anecdote was from: and its natural to resent not rising.
Part of me thinks that the success of early Christianity was due to this this liberal zeal for activism against the perceived immorality of Roman imperialism and religion being forced on them. Promptly after Christianity took over it drove ideological wedges into the empire and caused it's collapse.
With the counsel if Nicea (argument over trifling nonsense in Christian doctrine) shortly after CONSTANTINE normalized Christianity with the Edict of Milan in 313, it already began to rigidize but this also happened to “wokism” which started as a free thinking free-for-all of respect and now has regulation and strictures you have to follow or else face the guillotine. It’s like the liberal mind wants to create the best society computer but once that computer is implemented it controls the movement of all the energy and locks themselves into a gridlock they never really wanted in the first place. The right is not immune from this.
Liberals then left the church with the "enlightenment" when Galileo was running with scissors snipping at Geocentric philosophy of the Catholics. The Church no longer fit the mold of a new and interesting tree fort and was just another maze guarded by sober silverbacks. I say this while remembering the priceless charity work and spiritualism of Christians, and with full knowledge that I'm proving my own point about coming off as mean.
But I'll also add that Organized religion is hogging all the spiritual people that would make the best free thinkers. The pagan religions were more about fun and people would dress up as Gods for celebrations, and this created an open heroic loop that meshed fantasy, creativity, and solemn mysticism. Nobody dresses up like Jesus for fun, that would be a psychological offense - he is covered in blood with stakes through his extremities- and who wants to dress up as the prophets? They are not often portrayed as the genius michelangelo portrayed them. Role playing into the superego is basically illegal outside of Holloween.
But to my point about ubiquitous tyranny I remember a caller in to a radio talk show who was an aid worker in Africa and she said that it was an established and pesky part of the culture that when someone in the restaurant was going to be promoted, all hell would break loose to damage the person before the promotion took place. This is not just Africa, that was just where the anecdote was from: and its natural to resent not rising.
Part of me thinks that the success of early Christianity was due to this this liberal zeal for activism against the perceived immorality of Roman imperialism and religion being forced on them. Promptly after Christianity took over it drove ideological wedges into the empire and caused it's collapse.
With the counsel if Nicea (argument over trifling nonsense in Christian doctrine) shortly after CONSTANTINE normalized Christianity with the Edict of Milan in 313, it already began to rigidize but this also happened to “wokism” which started as a free thinking free-for-all of respect and now has regulation and strictures you have to follow or else face the guillotine. It’s like the liberal mind wants to create the best society computer but once that computer is implemented it controls the movement of all the energy and locks themselves into a gridlock they never really wanted in the first place. The right is not immune from this.
Liberals then left the church with the "enlightenment" when Galileo was running with scissors snipping at Geocentric philosophy of the Catholics. The Church no longer fit the mold of a new and interesting tree fort and was just another maze guarded by sober silverbacks. I say this while remembering the priceless charity work and spiritualism of Christians, and with full knowledge that I'm proving my own point about coming off as mean.
But I'll also add that Organized religion is hogging all the spiritual people that would make the best free thinkers. The pagan religions were more about fun and people would dress up as Gods for celebrations, and this created an open heroic loop that meshed fantasy, creativity, and solemn mysticism. Nobody dresses up like Jesus for fun, that would be a psychological offense - he is covered in blood with stakes through his extremities- and who wants to dress up as the prophets? They are not often portrayed as the genius michelangelo portrayed them. Role playing into the superego is basically illegal outside of Holloween.
Dealing with the homeless is a point of activism on both sides, with the right also assuming the role of the parents to the kids- “we will take you off the streets and cheaply house you with no drugs or alcohol” and the left being the bringer of duty to the older kids, “we will take your toys and give them to the younger kids. I fall on the right side of this debate (and many debates), and it’s easy to look like Patrick Bateman from American Psycho during the homeless murder scene when “helping” the homeless man AI. I have a homeless friend , a 66 year old guy who is sober, well educated in history, and lives out of his 3 run down cars on the street. He’s obviously a hoarder, and I point this out- I’m taking him to shampoo his car and wash his clothes on Thursday. But even my “do gooder” attitude opens opportunities for my blithe criticism. It feels like i’m ridiculing google or facebook from my perch at the armchair general command headquarters.
Patrick Bateman:
"Do you know how bad you smell?" I whisper this soothingly, stroking his face. "The stench, my god…"
"I can't…" He chokes, then swallows. "I can't find a shelter."
"You reek," I tell him. "You reek of… shit."
Movie Scene:
It’s the soft bigotry of low expectations and low esteem that allows for me to recognize his dimmunitive condition, and it puts him at my mercy to accept help- this puts me in the drivers seat again! I do think the homeless should start shining shoes again, on the one hand because even the poorest Americans are wild about their $200 shoes, but also because people subconsciously love for a perceived social inferior to be kneeling in front of them in supplication, and im not saying this because I want supplicants, I’m saying it because it may be an avenue for increased spending on the poor, and a gateway to employment. But I'm also not pretending that we live in a pretend world of black and white- the market is the market I can't shame you into causing it's basic reality to shift. The quick brown cold math of calculus jumps over the dough eyed tears of pity.
I can’t blame people for thinking I’m mean, but American Psycho also has a scene about this do-gooder politically correct mantra being more about appearances than actually helping people.
Movie Scene
