No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

[Woodsman]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

You can dismiss it as hyperbolic, but to do that you'll also dismiss dozens of other studies supporting the same conclusion. Reed is considered an eminence in his field; the "de Tocqueville of Dixie." Like I said, you don't have to like his conclusions, but you ignore them at your peril.

And if you don't understand why the GOP is strongest in the South and why the map of the old Confederacy overlays nearly 1 to 1 with the electoral map of the 2012/2008/2000 etc election, then nothing in the world I or any academic no matter how esteemed can open your mind to it. I've explained the thesis, I've referenced the study, I've given anecdotes, I've talked about historical precedents. But none of that matters because "we just know" that it's a slander and "a condemnation of an entire region of the country" motivated by academics who "aren't after the truth, but merely to advance their careers and make friends with the secular age."

I'm sure the trustees and faculty never considered that when Reed was named a professor and at that bastion of left wing activism UNC Chapel Hill, no less. His founding of the university's Center for the Study of the American South and his work as editor of the quarterly Southern Cultures was all a big ruse. Yep, Reed is every bit the biased South-hating carpetbagger, just real sneaky about it is all:

Reed served as president of the Southern Sociological Society in 1988-89 and the Southern Association for Public Opinion Research in 1999-2000. He was elected to the Fellowship of Southern Writers in 2000, and was chancellor of that organization, 2009-11. He has lectured at over 300 colleges and universities in the United States and abroad and held visiting positions at over a dozen, including Fulbright lectureships in Israel and India, and the Pitt Professorship of American History and Institutions at Cambridge University. After his retirement from the University of North Carolina, he held visiting positions at a number of institutions; among other things, he was a visiting fellow at All Souls College, Oxford University and a lieutenant colonel in the South Carolina Unorganized Militia, while teaching at The Citadel, in Charleston.

The Citadel. What a bastion of left wing, anti-southern hatred - a fifth column right in the middle of Charleston!

Nice try, but no cigar as they say in the South.

"That's a joke son, dontcha get it?"

I'll stick with Dr. Reed's analysis until someone shows me an equally compelling study by an equally esteemed academic (good luck) refuting it.

Oh, by the way, I've noticed a tendency among some here for accusing others of saying things they never said. If you read the various posts, I was not the one who made broad accusations of national stupidity:

"where do they get these idiots (or maybe in fact they are geniuses leveraging the dumbing down and inability to think of most americans)"

The Left has an endless supply of them to draw upon - from the black population or from California.

[Woodsman]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

vt, I've noticed a tendency among some here for accusing others of saying things they never said. If you read the various posts, I was not the one who made broad accusations of national stupidity:

"where do they get these idiots (or maybe in fact they are geniuses leveraging the dumbing down and inability to think of most americans)"

The Left has an endless supply of them to draw upon - from the black population or from California.

Smart comes in may colors. I don't know what my favorite definition is, but I do recall one definition of stupid as "doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result." Another favorite of mine is by a Southerner. It goes something like "you can't fix stupid."

[vinoveri]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

sorry, don't get your point. Not denigrating Professor Reed, just "scientific conclusion" from sociology in general. Southerners are more likely to be protestant holy rollers, OK I agree, big deal; its like saying Folks in San Francisco are more likely to support gay rights that someone from Alabama, again wow, what an insight. What is the point of all this "knowledge" anyway? So we can identify the right thinkers and those that are ignorant and need "awareness training". How about we agree on teaching everyone how to think instead? Unfortunately neither the left or right will do that. Thinking people are a threat to power centers and ivory towers. The ability to come to conclusions coupled with common sense is very powerful trait of us humans; the modern educational establishment (save for the hard sciences) is designed to undermine thinking and indoctrinate into contemporary norms. First principles again. Who decides right/wrong? I'm going with natural law, ethics and natural rights in the Aristotelian/Lockian/Jeffersonian tradition. Not one in a million of these pontificators could follow a lines a reasoning back to first principles - most is emotive bullshit. Negative liberty is as good as we're going to get, and its good enough, except for those folks who want to dominate others with their view, pushing positive liberty, never admitting that they dismantle the codified percepts of negative liberty that were won with such a long struggle. Hate speech prohibition is a prime example, and if you can't see/admit that, we clearly will have difficulty in finding common ground.

[vt]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

Did the good professor check the population makeup? If crime is high, how is it distributed by race? Crime is correlated to economic levels so that may explain.

Blacks and whites have been at a disadvantage in the south from past segregation and by the lower education spending by the poorer states. Progress has been made, and educational standards are rising.

http://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/Black-Population-Concentrated-in-South-Census-130891268.html

Since there is a higher concentration of blacks in the south can Professor Reed conclude he is a racist because he condemns more crime and guns, plus does not think Southerners smart?

I think his study may be flawed somewhat. Yes, there is some prejudice in the south, but it also exists everywhere. And don't forget the hypocrisy of white liberal politicians and hollywood stars that send their kids to almost completely white private schools.

Finally the hero of the left, Che Guevara, was a racist:

http://www.thecommentator.com/articl...e_was_a_racist

[lektrode]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

must say boys, that this has been a VERY interesting exchange - must be the one dcarrigg was thinking about when he said earlier today that the "...site has taken a fairly sharp ideological turn..." - eh?

and altho methinks he likes strirring the pot/outing us "hard right" types (/sarc), least woody posted it in the right place:
I've Lost My Mind Just Now

and i used the /sarc switch to note that apparently anybody who thinks we're in a 'new age' of .gov overreach - not to mention .gov OVERSPENDING - again, in an EXTREME effort by the political class, esp by the party in power - at pandering to the hard left ?
is now (since 2008 at least) considered 'hard right'

never mind that anybody who should have the temerity to say something unflattering about the emporer's new clothes makes one a racist.

gosh... cant even begin to wonder what some of these same people would think about the 'social norms' in some places (other than the south) after spending a year or so where i've lived the past 24 - horrified comes to mind, but guess thats a diff topic

[vinoveri]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

well 'lek, we "hard right" types seem to be a shrinking minority - I think the only way I escaped the full indoctrination was skipping out on those sociology/poly sci/econ classes and sticking with chemistry and physics, disciplines which drill into to one analytics, skepticism, and an eye for bullshit - unfortunately, wasn't until fairly recently that I recognized those plastic ever changing social science disciplines were mostly bullshit and being used to drive gov policy. Oh well.

[lektrode]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

uh huh - esp by the tenured types in the institutions that focus on teaching _what_ to think vs _how_ to think, eh?
that phenom really seems to be firing on all 8 these daze...

esp for the crowd thats apparently getting most/all their 'news' off twitville/faceboob, mtv and the comedy channel
= same group that put the current occupants in there

[vt]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

In all do respect, I can't find either of these quotes attributable to you.

I understand you don't like the GOP, but many here don't agree with them on every issue. No one here is a racist or wants to take the economy into default.

But why bring up one sided bunk that disdains an entire region? So the GOP gets votes in the South. The Democrats get almost all votes in other sectors. So what?

I like to condemn both parties, because they deserve it. But many here also see the current financial position of this country as dire, and are concerned with damage to the economy from overspending. Let's discuss that issue and leave right or left out.

[vt]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

Polarization has been around a long, long time:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/stone-age-farmers-hunters-kept-their-distance/2013/10/10/59f46f12-31ab-11e3-89ae-16e186e117d8_story.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...-polarization/

[Woodsman]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

I know you don't get the point, vino. Since you dismiss any conclusion derived through social science, I'm not sure how you could ever hope to.

You evidence such a distorted and ideologically motivated view of the social sciences and a tendency towards conflating conservative/libertarian talking points with actual arguments that I don't know exactly how to proceed. But in the spirit of iTulip I will keep trying for a bit longer.

Saying folks from Alabama or San Francisco oppose or support this or the other thing is interesting but by itself doesn't provide us anything of great meaning, yes. However recognizing the facts on the ground is only the first step in understanding how that state of being came to pass and why it is the way it is. This is what Dr. Reed and others like him have done so successfully despite the right's unwillingness to open their eyes. Sociology attempts to answer these questions and has done so quite successfully since August Comte coined our modern understanding of the word in first part of the 19th Century.

Since you ask, the point of such knowledge is to understand human social behavior and its origins, development, organizations, and institutions. Its concern is with society and the relationships among individuals within that society. It attempts to do this using empirical approaches as in the natural sciences, but differs from the strictly positivist toolkit of the physicists or chemists in that it also relies on interpretive tools as a means of testing empirically falsifiable theories. This is primarily because human beings are not atoms or molecules, but fickle creatures of infinite variability and uniqueness and this is particularly evident in their relations, associations and organizations. And I regret that I have to be the one to break the news, but the natural sciences are nowhere as free of ideological or political influence as the right wing imagines them to be.

We agree that teaching people "how to think" is one of the proper functions of the university, but that is far from its only purpose. In my experience, I've seen it do quite a good job of providing students the intellectual tools to do just that sort of work. On the whole, I'd say that the successes far outnumber the failures. But a student must be prepared to recognize and challenge assumptions about how the world works, subject them to testing and reject those that fail. And not every student is prepared to do that or even thinks it is important. Some - often self identifying as conservatives - boast that their professors never "changed their minds" and I've always wondered why such people wasted so much time and money attending university in the first place?

We also agree that thinking people are a threat to the power of the status quo. What some fail to grasp is that by systematically diminishing the value of the social sciences, the right wing is acting in the service of that power. If the people do not have the cognitive tools to understand their society, how it works, why it came to pass, and to compare theirs to others past and present, then how on Earth do you imagine that they will be able to affect any change at all?

But that's the point, isn't it? In the same way the slave master feared slaves who could read, the right wing fears people who can think independently about society and human organizations. This I believe is at the core of the long established tendency of the right wing towards anti-intellectualism and opposition to science, generally. The static society of which the right wing longs for is impossible to achieve without strict enforcement of this anti-intellectualism.

With regard to positive and negative liberty, I'm something of a student of Isaiah Berlin and am looking at the dog-eared copies of "The Age of Enlightenment" and "Three Critics of the Enlightenment" sitting on my bookshelf. They're right next to a similarly worn copy of "Four Essays on Liberty". The man most responsible for our understanding of the terms disagrees with you:

"Positive liberty... is a valid universal goal. I do not know why I should have been held to doubt this, or, for that matter, the further proposition, that democratic self-government is a fundamental human need, something valuable in itself, whether or not it clashes with the claims of negative liberty or of any other goal... What I am mainly concerned to establish is that, whatever may be the common ground between them, and whatever is liable to graver distortion, negative and positive liberty are not the same thing."
-- Isaiah Berlin, Four Essays on Liberty: An Introduction

[vinoveri]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

I know you don't get the point, vino. Since you dismiss any conclusion derived through social science, I'm not sure how you could ever hope to.

...
Since you ask, the point of such knowledge is to understand human social behavior and its origins, development, organizations, and institutions. Its concern is with society and the relationships among individuals within that society. It attempts to do this using empirical approaches as in the natural sciences, but differs from the strictly positivist toolkit of the physicists or chemists in that it also relies on interpretive tools as a means of testing empirically falsifiable theories. This is primarily because human beings are not atoms or molecules, but fickle creatures of infinite variability and uniqueness and this is particularly evident in their relations, associations and organizations. And I regret that I have to be the one to break the news, but the natural sciences are nowhere as free of ideological or political influence as the right wing imagines them to be.


With regard to positive and negative liberty, I'm something of a student of Isaiah Berlin and am looking at the dog-eared copies of "The Age of Enlightenment" and "Three Critics of the Enlightenment" sitting on my bookshelf. They're right next to a similarly worn copy of "Four Essays on Liberty". The man most responsible for our understanding of the terms disagrees with you:

Hey Woods, I never stated that I dismiss ANY conclusion from social science, just those which either don't jive with common sense AND are not falsifiable And it appears that although we agree on many things, we see some things quite differently; the underlined portion of your response is, with respect, completely contrary to my understanding of most of social science - yes, the most rigorous approaches may be statistical, but certainly not falsifiable in general, and like you point out one of the primary reasons is because humans are much much more complex than atoms etc, but this is precisely why the social sciences are tipping at windmills when they try to articulate comprehensive theories. Can they enlighten us with relationship and historical developments, yes; can psychology be used "therapeutically", yes, but none can predict like physics (i.e., they are not falsifiable); hey, even physics doesn't explain everything, but at least if someone puts forth a theory, it will be laughed at (or ignored) unless falsifiable. Economics is the biggest bullshit ss of them all and yet it runs the world. No, my friend, the social sciences have their place, but IMO they are increasingly being used to obfuscate and put forth theories that are nothing but conjecture and poppycock - to serve the interests of their masters and confuse and dupe the public by convincing the uneducated that they are just as rigorous as the hard sciences. Furthermore, SS and other pseudo sciences continue to be the weapon attacking traditional understandings of human nature - e.g., Free Will. Off the topic somewhat , but take Richard Dawkins concept of "selfish gene" published in the 1970's, fair to say it has had a big impact on the non-hard science intellectuals, but it explains nothing, it's not falsifiable, but people run around spouting the concepts and it derivatives and build careers off it in academia based on nothing but a sentiment of "that sort of makes sense" "wow, cool idea", but this not science. In fact, it is the age old heresy of "I'm not responsible for what I do", a very seductive theory for us humans by the way; if we can just get rid of this idea of "free will" and "moral responsibility" we'll all be free - no more guilty conscience, no more "responsibility for (in)actions. A world without moral responsibility would be a dark one indeed.

[Woodsman]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

Vino, I accept your clarification even if I disagree with your conclusions. The aside you make regarding free will and moral responsibility is quite familiar to me and you probably won't be too surprised to learn that I consider it a straw man.

I think I've said all I'm going to say on this for now. Feel free to take the last word.

[lektrode]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

.....this is precisely why the social sciences are tipping at windmills when they try to articulate comprehensive theories. Can they enlighten us with relationship and historical developments, yes; can psychology be used "therapeutically", yes, but none can predict like physics (i.e., they are not falsifiable); hey, even physics doesn't explain everything, but at least if someone puts forth a theory, it will be laughed at (or ignored) unless falsifiable. Economics is the biggest bullshit ss of them all and yet it runs the world. No, my friend, the social sciences have their place, but IMO they are increasingly being used to obfuscate and put forth theories that are nothing but conjecture and poppycock - to serve the interests of their masters and confuse and dupe the public by convincing the uneducated that they are just as rigorous as the hard sciences...... .

in my uneducated 'ignorance', its very easy to agree with this - it also very easy to OBSERVE - given the huge rampup of .gov expenditures in this area - particularly since the 1960's - and how its given rise to politicians such as the current occupant - who, IMHO - is the least experienced, most unqualified in US history - and now that the ACA codifies 'mental health services' as insurable events - just watch how the shrink biz (will quite likely) mushrooms, just like how the social 'sciences' have over the past 40-50years, sucking up HUGE resources in the process, kranking out thousands of (essentially useless) masters degrees, that qualify their holders mainly for .gov jobs and little else - while the HARD SCIENCES get shafted -

which then equals rapid growth in the welfare state = need for more social 'scientists' = more spending on mental health services, that are now insurable events - which will GUARANTEE a rapid runup in their diagnosis and 'treatment'

funny - esp for us uneducated types - how all this 'works' - esp as the political class - on one side of the aisle in particular - coupled with their cheerleaders in the lamestream media - then makes/labels any argument to the contrary, the province of the rightwing 'racist' camp ?

[Woodsman]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

Lek, you have a fresh perspective and I'm grateful for it.

Let's remember that mental health services have always been insurable events. The only difference being the amount one company or the other will compensate the psychiatrist, psychologist or social worker.

And mental illnesses are genuine forms of morbidity that impair normal functioning and are considered a disruption of homeostasis. These people are sick and can be healed or treated. Left untreated they are a cost on society far more expensive than medication and outpatient care. We will pay for the effects of the epidemic of mental illness we've been experiencing for the past two decades. Indirectly or otherwise, we will pay.

That's not to say all is hunky dory. It most definitely is not and some of the effects you've described are quite real. There's a real question on the long term effectiveness and effects of the psychotropic stew available at your local pharmacy. We can fix that, but without longitudinal studies there's no evidence to use to practice effective medicine. I'm no doctor or epidemiologist, but common sense tells me I want my docs to know what's wrong and how to fix it, not guessing like they seem to do now with mental health treatment. Do we have to be so extreme about things? Can we not recognize there is a problem, address immediate needs and devise a long term plan to beating it back?

You seem to think that everyone with a sociology or psychology degree is shaking back in some .gov or .edu living the Life of Reilly. It ain't so, brother. That all but dissertation History major is serving you coffee and stacking groceries or writing C# code somewhere, if lucky. If he's teaching, he an adjunct making less than the dude stacking groceries. There's definitely a problem with how we make intellectuals in this country, but it's not exactly central to resolving the present crisis.

You consider social sciences and humanities "essentially useless." That's the anti-intellectualism the right is famous for, I get it and I understand where it comes from. And I won't try to defend some of the excess because I think they're as stupid as you do. But there's more to life than dollars and cents, man. And the end of existence can't possibly be the accumulation of wealth and power and things, can it? So if it is not and there are non-material virtues that make life better, what's wrong with spending some of our national and private coin to do that? Again, why so extreme a response?

The hard sciences are far from being shafted. I'm too busy now to look, but I expect they get more grant money and more money from private sources than the humanities and social sciences. And so much of the hard science are being funded for non productive purposes that do nothing to improve long term progress and are a sink of resources. That would be war, defense and military spending.

Remember what a right winger called Dwight D. Eisenhower predicted years ago? Read the speech again and see what he says about the role of the scientist and the intellectual, generally.

Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop, has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields. In the same fashion, the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity. For every old blackboard there are now hundreds of new electronic computers.


The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded. Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific technological elite.


It is the task of statesmanship to mold, to balance, and to integrate these and other forces, new and old, within the principles of our democratic system -- ever aiming toward the supreme goals of our free society.

Sound familiar? Everything but the statesmanship part at the end, right?

Lek, its not like there's this huge push for dance and art academies threatening to bankrupt the nation, but STEM academies are popping up like those mushrooms you mentioned. It's just not the issue you believe it to be. Besides, what the hell is wrong with providing children and young adults opportunities for this as a national priority? We're not insects, we're humans. We're potentially the only sentient being in the universe with art, literature, dance, music, science and the wonder and curiosity that inspires all of it. And all those things bring sweetness and joy and progress to existence. Why does this threaten people on the right so much?

Because they feel excluded from it and ridiculed by it. For goodness sake sometimes it seems well deserved as a maddening lumpen neo-Babbitry is the dominant philosophy of the day. But the intellectual is not without fault and deserves the scorn sometimes heaped upon her. She allowed herself to become irrelevant to the larger mass of society precisely because she separated her interests from the larger interests of the mass of men. This is the same reason liberalism and the liberal class as it manifests in late America is so rightfully scorned. They are irrelevant because they turned their backs on the people and left a vacuum for the right to fill. But as we approach November 22, remember that they murdered the real liberals and left us with ashes.

Lek, most of this is really overblown by people with an agenda that want that money for their own purposes and those are not yours or mine, friend. Look for yourself; the country spends jack on higher education compared to war and security. Kids entering college today are nothing more than red meat for wolves in college endowment and bankers clothing.

But do you really believe the problem with this country is that there are too many PhDs in social sciences and humanities, and if we had fewer somehow the economy and society would improve? You pride yourself in common sense, but what's sensible about that?

[lektrode]

Re: No Respect for the Living - Propaganda and the Politics of Right and Left

Lek, you have a fresh perspective and I'm grateful for it....
............
...most of this is really overblown by people with an agenda that want that money for their own purposes and those are not yours or mine, friend. Look for yourself; the country spends jack on higher education compared to war and security. Kids entering college today are nothing more than red meat for wolves in college endowment and bankers clothing.

i cant/wont disagree on either - and appreciate your kranking out such an intensive/verbose reply.

and altho i just tried (for over an hour) to come up with some sort of rebuttal to some of it, had to thrown in the towel woody, since i just dont have the intellectual horsepower to even begin - its not even so much that i disagree with most of what you wrote, as i simply dont know how to answer it.

damned if i know what the solutions are, but i do know that the political class doesnt seem to either - and seem only interested in ONE thing - their own GD re-election - else they, esp the party in power/control of all 3 branches at the time wouldnt have sold The Rest of US out in 2008-09, since main st paid the price/got the shaft, while lower manhattan got the gold mine and some, 100cents on the dollar to boot - while the vast majority of The Rest of US are still bleeding from the haircut.

what eye still havent figured out yet, is precisely what do THEY have over the beltway, that allows them get away with it?