The self-defeating nature of using "Privilege (Theory)" (in societal discourse)

[Old Hippy]

Why are right-wingers so obsessed with who gets to punch who?

It's as if they can't imagine a society which isn't fundamentally structured by violence.

maybe they can.... imagine a society where people fight with ideas and words


Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today.....

 

[Aleksey_aka_al]

It's as if they can't imagine a society which isn't fundamentally structured by violence.

Every real-life society is based on violence. The violence is ordered and monopolized by the government. And there’s also the history of violence (which is called just history) which has been building this thing called rights.

It’s just that some societies excel at exporting violence overseas to reduce it at home. It’s somewhat similar to post-industrialism.

Still this very basic human inclination arises in forms such as ultras, or serial killers, or this everyday male repressed by all these new morals, over-tolerance, political correctness and all that, who is waiting for a moment when he could stop sublimating his natural maleness and do some violent stuff safely and in total agreement with the crowd mood and social stereotypes. Like attacking another male on the pretext that he has confronted a woman. Or killing a misbehaving person being a cop.

 

[Narz]

Why are right-wingers so obsessed with who gets to punch who?

I think violence and justice is one of the most compelling concepts humans like to think about. Everyone is obsessed with who should get to do what to whom. That's like 90% of the threads here.

It's as if they can't imagine a society which isn't fundamentally structured by violence.

Can you?

 

[Narz]

maybe they can.... imagine a society where people fight with ideas and words


Imagine there's no heaven
It's easy if you try
No hell below us
Above us only sky
Imagine all the people living for today.....

Haha, yeah, that was the song that popped into my head reading the post.

Ironically I heard Lenin was a wife beater.

 

[Old Hippy]

Haha, yeah, that was the song that popped into my head reading the post.

Ironically I heard Lenin was a wife beater.

I heard that too both Lenin's were lefties so it doesn't surprise me

 

[Traitorfish]

Every real-life society is based on violence. The violence is ordered and monopolized by the government.

Governments aren't really a Thing for 95% of human history, and aren't something which happens to a majority of humans for 99% of human history. It seems unreasonable to draw generalised claims about human nature from what amounts to a large-scale sociological experiment.

 

[Berzerker]

but we can draw a generalization about human nature when push comes to shove

 

[Narz]

Governments aren't really a Thing for 95% of human history, and aren't something which happens to a majority of humans for 99% of human history. It seems unreasonable to draw generalised claims about human nature from what amounts to a large-scale sociological experiment.

It's unlikely government or no-government we will uncover any society that was non-violent (sure some weird sects in India perhaps but they are protected by the local govt)

 

[Traitorfish]

but we can draw a generalization about human nature when push comes to shove

I don't know what this means.

It's unlikely government or no-government we will uncover any society that was non-violent (sure some weird sects in India perhaps but they are protected by the local govt)

Surely you appreciate that there is a difference between "non-violent" and "not fundamentally structured around violence"?

I don't imagine any society has achieved a state of total pacific harmony, but it doesn't follow that all societies will somehow require a certain amount of interpersonal violence to function. As a general rule, violent interactions in simple societies are between groups- "tribes" or polities or whatever you want to call them- not within them. Violence within groups is the result of a failure of both official and customary avenues of conflict resolution, rather than an accepted means of conflict resolution, and is recognised as such. That sort of breakdown is a source of a lot of anxiety for the members of the society, which is why such a huge body of folklore and tradition is devoted towards warning against it. "Do what I say or I'll break your skull" only becomes an accepted means of conflict resolution when the skull-breakers take over, which is, in the grand scheme of human history, a novelty and an aberration.

 

[Akka]

Governments aren't really a Thing for 95% of human history, and aren't something which happens to a majority of humans for 99% of human history. It seems unreasonable to draw generalised claims about human nature from what amounts to a large-scale sociological experiment.

The "no-government" part of human history are simply tribalistic societies, in which the whole discourse from this thread was a non-factor (or even actively negative) because they held together DUE to the tribal spirit that is blamed.

 

[Hygro]

but we can draw a generalization about human nature when push comes to shove

We could but they might as well be wrong. So, do your best, I'll do mine, Traitorfish will do his, and chances are none of it will impress anyone. But I do hope we here can have fun hashing it out.

 

[Berzerker]

I don't know what this means.

You said we cant make a generalization about human nature based on a short term, large scale sociological experiment (ie government). So what happens when push comes to shove? Violence. The state merely reflects human nature. Do this or else, do that or else. Why would we be any different from all the other critters that employ violence?

 

[Traitorfish]

The "no-government" part of human history are simply tribalistic societies, in which the whole discourse from this thread was a non-factor (or even actively negative) because they held together DUE to the tribal spirit that is blamed.

I don't really understand this objection. My claim is that human society is not necessarily structured by violence, the counter-claim was that the prevalence of centralised states is proof that human society is necessarily structured by violence, my response was that centralised states are, in the long-term, a deviation from the human norm.

You could argue that the way humans behave in state-societies tells us something about how people behave under certain kinds of pressure- but you could make the same argument about dropping a group of people into a remote Himalayan valley and watching them eat each other, it doesn't follow that this tells us about how human beings will behave in all or even most situations. Not enough to justify the weird conservative obsession with hitting women.

You said we cant make a generalization about human nature based on a short term, large scale sociological experiment (ie government). So what happens when push comes to shove? Violence. The state merely reflects human nature. Do this or else, do that or else. Why would we be any different from all the other critters that employ violence?

I don't know what "when push comes to shove" means.

 

[brennan]

Where there is government there historically seems to be a lot less violence, or I the only person here aware of Stephen Pinker...?

 

[Narz]

@fish , the not-structured by violence societies have and always will be dominated and eventually annihilated by structured-by-violence societies.

How would contracts be enforced in your utopia?

 

[adcarrymaokai]

Still this very basic human inclination arise in forms such as ultras, or serial killers, or this everyday male repressed by all these new morals, over-tolerance, political correctness and all that, who is waiting for a moment when he could stop sublimating his natural maleness and do some violent stuff safely and in total agreement with the crowd mood and social stereotypes. Like attacking another male on the pretext that he has confronted a woman. Or killing a misbehaving person being a cop.

Uhh, I am a man, and I know plenty of men who don't do any violent stuff and don't have any violent tendencies to "sublimate". Maybe we are not natural, but fake males?

But I also know things are different in third-world countries. For example, life in Russia is tough, so I can see why Russians would be generally angry.

 

[Aleksey_aka_al]

Uhh, I am a man, and I know plenty of men who don't do any violent stuff and don't have any violent tendencies to "sublimate". Maybe we are not natural, but fake males?

You’re already sounding like a guy who specializes on damsels in distress .

So don’t tell me you’ve never defended a girl against a boy based on gender. Life is long enough for such tiny things to happen multiple times. We all experienced them this way or another.

That’s not necessarily hitting the guy confronting a woman, that might be a verbal attack, or halting him from retribution to her, or subverting his social image if you’re not just passerbies.

It’s just that this video shows it naked.

But I also know things are different in third-world countries. For example, life in Russia is tough, so I can see why Russians would be generally angry.

You’ve just done a thing which resembles what I was talking about. You’ve caught a suitable moment to make a racist attack, when it would not be seen like that. Similarly, there are a lot of situations in life when actual violence doesn’t count as one.

The video I posted shows USA. Still I see the very same behavior with easily recognizable nuance patterns as it is in Russia. This is common mentality, obviously.

And we all know this kind of females who are so used to be immune because of their gender, like the following:

Spoiler :

Now. Talking of non-violent “fake males”, as you called it. What would you do, if someone suddenly pours bleach on your groin, while you’re sitting in a train, accusing you of spreading your legs?

1. If it is a female.
2. If it is a male your size or smaller.
3. If it is a girl feminist activist, who is accusing you of aggressively demonstrating your manliness.

That’s what Russian men did:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...ACH-mens-groins-Russia-stop-manspreading.html (videos inside)

Hint:

Spoiler :

Nothing at all, almost all of them. Some of them even excused for spreading legs, as activists report.

 

[Berzerker]

@fish push comes to shove in that context means when a tough decision has to be made it will be backed by the threat of violence

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Uhh, I am a man, and I know plenty of men who don't do any violent stuff and don't have any violent tendencies to "sublimate". Maybe we are not natural, but fake males?

Maybe you are fake humans? A few hundred generations ago your ancestors were eating meat that they killed with their bare hands. If you think a few hundred generations is enough to completely breed out that kind of violence you are going to get a very rude surprise if you are ever in a genuinely high stress physical situation.

 

[Traitorfish]

Where there is government there historically seems to be a lot less violence

Which governments, compared to which alternatives? Doubtless if the government of, say, Sweden, were to just evaporate overnight, we would immediately see an increase in interpersonal violence- but that again tells us about how humans respond to certain kinds of pressures, rather than about how humans function under all conditions.

Maybe you are fake humans? A few hundred generations ago your ancestors were eating meat that they killed with their bare hands. If you think a few hundred generations is enough to completely breed out that kind of violence you are going to get a very rude surprise if you are ever in a genuinely high stress physical situation.

It's not immediately obvious that violence against prey-animals is psychologically equivalent to violence against other human beings. When we talk about people "violent" in modern society, we tend to mean a tendency to interpersonal violence, not to persistence-hunting a gazelle for five hours and then breaking its neck.