January 16, 2012

Comment of the Week So Far: "You know how you can tell that 'everyone wants freedom' is baloney?"

"You know how you can tell that "everyone wants freedom" is baloney?....

Look and see how few people do anything to get freedom. Look at the Middle East, how many centuries would you and your family sit in place as your world turned to desert and one marauding horde after another swept through and ordered you around? Even the Europeans were willing to risk it all to come to the New World, and they had agriculture and effective governments. The Middle Easterners and the Africans stay in place and battle over the crumbs. Where is the Arabic Thomas Jefferson and George Washington? Where is the African Edmund Burke? Why is Africa's high-tech export t-shirts and Arab's export what the Europeans pump from the ground?
"Many many cultures on the earth wouldn't cross the street to get their freedom so they don't try for more than buying or stealing something shiny from the successful cultures. Their cultures aren't accidentally backward or centuries behind The West, they simply haven't wanted what we have enough to do what is required. You'll know they are sick and tired of being sick and tired when they stop doing what makes anyone sick and tired. It's not genetic. It is cultural. Any child from any place can be raised with our ways and succeed. Take any kid from here and raise him as the losers live and he will fail. You can't do it for them. They know there are different ways to live and they choose to live their own way and maybe buy some of our stuff." -- Scott M commenting on: Side-Lines: "When I see Republicans or establishment conservatives uttering some vapid and dangerous idiocy...."
Posted by gerardvanderleun at January 16, 2012 1:25 AM
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"It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood." -- Karl Popper N.B.: Comments are moderated and may not appear immediately. Comments that exceed the obscenity or stupidity limits will be either edited or expunged.

Why don't you think it is genetic? Scared to say so?

Posted by: JohnAdams at January 16, 2012 5:03 AM

The Middle East; a lot like Detroit, except with oil wells.

Posted by: Svenster at January 16, 2012 6:03 AM

John Adams, why the heck would it be genetic? Either you need to prove that the cultural explanation is flawed - and nobody has clearly done so to date- or you need to prove that culture is genetically-determined. Good luck with that.

Posted by: Dan D at January 16, 2012 6:52 AM

They are the ones who believe it is genetic. They are the ones who will blame it on the murderous genetics of the European colonials. And the only way the white colonials can enter heaven is by repenting of being white. Black Liberation Theology 101. It is not genetic. It is learned. There are "freedom loving" individuals of all color and creed but they are most likely in a primative tribal culture. Just consider the plight of the Islamic Reformists (yes, they do exist). The Peter King hearings give them a voice and the race-baiters of the Democrat party and the radicals like CAIR demonize him for it. Many muslims want to modernize but it's too easy to scapegoat the European colonials. They enjoy all the freedoms earned by these horrible white colonials - the universities, the religious freedom, the human rights, the security, the entitlements - but they aren't willing to speak out against the radicals of their own kind so long as the "white West" is the main target. I guess they believe it was just luck that America became the greatest idea in human history. It's a time for choosing but we have to have a leader with some grit and backbone. I was more horrified that GW barely got our allies to help with Iraq after 9/11. So we got Obama. Are our allies happy now? Even the young socialists of Europe were vindicating GW during the Egypt uprising and criticizing Obama for doing nothing during the Iranian uprising. It's a brave new world but when the likes of Occupy get mainstreamed while the Tea Party gets demonized, you have to conclude the world is stuck on stupid. They don't get the "it's genetic" pass. It's a choice. And sadly, many of them know it. They choose the anti-Bush, anti-Palin, anti-Tea Party vote. They need to feel cool and worldly. They like the way Obama pronounces Pakistan and believe Palin actually claimed she could see Russia from her house. They are commercially interesting to corperate Levis Strauss and others - isn't that ironic? And that only reinforces their shallow egos. I blame their ungrateful parents.

Posted by: RedCarolina at January 16, 2012 6:58 AM

They are the ones who believe it is genetic. They are the ones who will blame it on the murderous genetics of the European colonials.

And the only way the white colonials can enter heaven is by repenting of being white. Black Liberation Theology 101.

It is not genetic. It is learned. There are "freedom loving" individuals of all color and creed but they are most likely in a primative tribal culture.

Just consider the plight of the Islamic Reformists (yes, they do exist). The Peter King hearings give them a voice and the race-baiters of the Democrat party and the radicals like CAIR demonize him for it. Many muslims want to modernize but it's too easy to scapegoat the European colonials.

They enjoy all the freedoms earned by these horrible white colonials - the universities, the religious freedom, the human rights, the security, the entitlements - but they aren't willing to speak out against the radicals of their own kind so long as the "white West" is the main target.

I guess they believe it was just luck that America became the greatest idea in human history.

It's a time for choosing but we have to have a leader with some grit and backbone. I was more horrified that GW barely got our allies to help with Iraq after 9/11. So we got Obama. Are our allies happy now? Even the young socialists of Europe were vindicating GW during the Egypt uprising and criticizing Obama for doing nothing during the Iranian uprising.

It's a brave new world but when the likes of Occupy get mainstreamed while the Tea Party gets demonized, you have to conclude the world is stuck on stupid.

They don't get the "it's genetic" pass. It's a choice. And sadly, many of them know it.

Posted by: RedCarolina at January 16, 2012 6:59 AM

correction: They don't GET the "it's genetic" pass. It's a choice. And sadly, many of them know it.

They choose the anti-Bush, anti-Palin, anti-Tea Party vote. They need to feel cool and worldly. They like the way Obama pronounces Pakistan and believe Palin actually claimed she could see Russia from her house. They are commercially interesting to cooperate Levis Strauss and others - isn't that ironic? And that only reinforces their shallow egos. I blame their ungrateful parents.

Posted by: RedCarolina at January 16, 2012 7:02 AM

corporate Levi Strauss, that is.

They protest for the sake of protesting.

Even the peace sign has been commercialized.

The myth of the evil white establishment reigns supreme. Just take the tragic story of Katrina. It has virtually become a civil rights issue and blaming the black mayor is considered racist. They need it to be genetic because it gags those who might speak the truth and hold them accountable.

Posted by: RedCarolina at January 16, 2012 8:02 AM

One race is consistently, constantly, perpetually at the bottom of the civilizational ladder. In America, white racism is the "reason". In Africa, European colonialism is the "reason". No matter where they are planted, they find their way very quickly to the bottom of the barrel, and remain there. Of course it cannot possibly be genetic. It cannot possibly be their fault. There is a very very good reason for the fact that all their cultures, communities, and countries are primitive, violent undeveloped shitholes. It's just that modern science has yet to ferret out that reason, and come up with a solution.

JWM

Posted by: jwm at January 16, 2012 8:52 AM

Freedom and liberty are not the same things, and are often at odds. The desire for freedom is natural, liberty is acquired. A successful criminal has perfect freedom.

In liberty, a man's responsibilities are equally prized with his rights. We sneer at the African races for never seeking liberty, but how exactly is beating a path away from a legacy which was left to us superior to never owning it?

Posted by: james wilson at January 16, 2012 11:14 AM

On the nature vs nurture shouting match: it's both, mmkay? There is a genetic component and a cultural component to third world assholery. Not to mention the first world.

Scott M has dared to criticize primitive cultures, risking accusations of racism. Perhaps one day he might summon the courage to acknowledge human biodiversity.

Posted by: Timmy at January 16, 2012 11:45 AM

"Why should we let illegal aliens into the U.S.?" I ask. "Because they are oppressed in their home countries," I'm told. At which point I suggest that they should stay in their home countries and fight oppression. "They could get killed." "Why, yes, they could. In fact, I seem to remember that a number of Americans got killed in the Revolutionary War. If we keep letting them come here then when will things EVER get fixed in their home countries?"

Posted by: RonF at January 16, 2012 1:01 PM

i have little understanding what Red Carolina is talking about - some cliches mixed withleaps of logic, but Dan D, you should know that there is considerable evidence that something genetic gradually started to emerge in NW Europe in the 13th C and increased over time. Coming to America (Canada/Australia/NZ) was a further genetic selection. Lots of books out there on this and related topics - IQ and the Wealth of Nations, Before the Dawn, Farewell To Alms, and lots over at Steve Sailer's site. Disagree if you wish, but don't accuse johnadams of just talking through his hat on this. HBD chick and Information Processing are other fun sites on the topic.

Sure there's culture - would I have gone on missions and adopted children from another country if I didn't think so? And now epigenetics is making its run. But genetic evidence for delaying gratification, controlling impulsive violence, and intelligence all have some evidence behind them.

Posted by: Assistant Village Idiot at January 16, 2012 6:18 PM

Look, everyone wants sex too but we're not running around raping everything that moves. The fact that people do not obey your prescription doesn't mean they don't care about something.

Everyone wants to be free, they just don't always want to do what it takes to get there.

Posted by: Christopher Taylor at January 17, 2012 1:25 PM

I conclude it's not genetic because many thousands of couples with middle-class values adopt children from loser cultures and get non-loser results. I conclude it's not genetic because my background put me in both highly-minority areas and highly-majority areas and the success/failure in both places was doled out to the people that did what successful middle-class people would do. Read Sowell's book on rednecks and liberals. If it was genetic there would be no such thing as poor white trash. There is a world of difference between "it's not genetic" and "all groups are as likely..." There is the same perpetual failure present in Meth Hollow as in Congo and for the same reasons. There is a reason why the bad part of town and the bad parts of the globe share so much. The no-count white-trash losers are nothing better than their counterparts in Detroit or Congo. it's culture and choices, even if all choices are not equally easy for all people. It's not genetic.

Posted by: Scott M at January 19, 2012 6:03 PM

Thanks for the notice Gerard

Posted by: Scott M at January 19, 2012 6:09 PM

I can't help but notice the comments about Detroit, since they remind me a lot of the way certain Europeans speak of the United States: as if it's a metaphor and not a real place. Therefore I suppose it would be impossible to convey the positive impact of people like Mayor Bing and Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy have had in breaking up the cronyism and misuse of funds that was a city trademark going on long before "Hizzoner" Coleman Young. And they NEVER say that they inherited this mess, even though they did.

Posted by: MissJean at January 22, 2012 10:49 AM