Universalism

Mencius Moldbug has updated his cryptoCalvinism thesis and renamed it “Universalism”:

As UR readers have been reminded ad nauseam,
one of my many eccentric opinions is that the tradition to which most
sophisticated Westerners of 2007 conform is best seen as a sect of
Christianity. Since this tradition sees itself as a pure product of
science and reason, neither sectarian nor Christian nor even
traditional, my perspective is heretical in the strict sense of the
word. We can’t both be right.My argument is that though the
tradition is theologically atrophied, its moral and political
positions, and its personal and institutional patterns of transmission,
identify it as the legitimate modern successor of mainline progressive Protestantism.
Since this is only the most powerful branch of Christianity in the most
powerful nation on the planet, swallowing its claims of dewy-eyed
innocence is a little difficult for me.

Why the name change?

It’s simply unrealistic to expect to be able to make this revision, or
even evaluate it fairly, without adjusting the language we use to
“frame” the problem. To this end I’ve field-tested some neologisms,
such as ultracalvinism and cryptocalvinism, and also satisfied myself that existing names, such as liberalism, are just as useless and confusing as they seem.

What is it?

In a probably-vain attempt to boil down all this cant, I’ve defined the four principal Ideals of the creed as Social Justice, Peace, Equality and Community. As we’ve already seen, Social Justice means political violence, and Peace means victory. We’ll get to Equality and Community shortly.

Read on for the rest of idea at his blog.

Congress Had A Chance to Apply an Anti-Lawfare Measure…

…but chose not to regarding the Flying Inmans.

There are several possible whys individuals voted against the Counter-Lawfare protection:

• Their Cryptocalvinism Universalism ideology maneuvers them into stupid position
• There are afraid of Islam (and appeasement is their instinctual – their fingertip feeling – reaction)
• Some may be on the other side

Anyways, read more here (Gates of Vienna) and here (Political Warfare).

The Outed Left Make My Skin Crawl

Here are the pictures from Zombietime (with Commentary by Belmont Club):

Fifty years from today Zombietime’s archives are going to be a trove for the archaeology of the Left — even for those members of the Left (if they still call themselves that) who want to understand what their side really thought. The record will protect against the airbrushing that retrospectively softens the hard edges of ideological activism that presents the Rosenbergs for example, as simply patriotic Americas reacting against the excesses of the McCarthy era. One of the most admirable things about Kim Philby was his pride in treachery. Asked why he joined the KGB, Philby answered, “one does not look twice at an offer of enrolment in an elite force.” This is in refreshing contrast to the numberless Western Leftists who thinly pretend to patriotic, or liberal churchmen or champions of human rights when deep down inside is a treacherous, atheistic authoritarian just waiting to bust loose.

What’s funny, when I read this now, I think: “Look cyptocalvinists!”

Blame This Guy for My Lite Blogging: Mencius Moldbug of Unqualified Reservations – Darn You To Heck, Moldbug, Darn You to Heck!

I can’t really blog much when I have some 200 pages from his archive printed-out and stacked on my couch.

Worse, I found that the few days while I drive around and listen to public radio talk shows, I would laugh and yell out to voices of the guests…”Ha your a cryptocalvinist…so are you ! Hahahahahah!”.

What is cryptocalvinism? Unqualified Reservations says it four ideals are:

• Equality (the universal brotherhood of man)
• Peace (the futility of violence)
• Social Justice (the fair distribution of goods)
• Community (the leadership of benevolent public servants).

He also says that:

The “cryptocalvinist ultracalvinist hypothesis” is the proposition that the present-day belief system commonly called “progressive,” “multiculturalist,” “universalist,” “liberal,” “politically correct,” etc, is actually best considered as a sect of Christianity.

Note: I changed the above quote from ultracalvinist to cryptocalvinist to reflect that author’s later change in terminology.

I think you can think of cryptocalvinism as a set of memes (or memeplex) that has found out how to use 5GW techniques (e.g. secrecy, manipulation) to survive and flourish. How cool is that!

Anyways, go check out the site and enjoy it. There are also related discussions at TDAXP, Econlog and Dreaming 5GW.