Fetishizing Shame

[Mike]

Just caught this great vid. The title of the vid is "Some Thoughts On Wokeness And Shame In Light Of Recent Events". The brilliant Eric Weinstein talks about these things and more in this roughly 10 minute video.

Eric's thoughts were inspired by a tweet by (name eludes me) who tweeted about the guilt he felt for underestimating wokeness and reducing it to an over-reaction by green-haired misfits on college campuses. He went on about how he had to now take responsibility for his misjudgement yada yada yada....

Eric describes briefly how attitudes and ideologies in academics have a delayed effect before affecting society as a whole.

But it's his opinion that the death of George Floyd had very little to do with race relations, police brutality, or the U.S.

The fact is, we are living in a "super saturated" environment, ripe for a "nucleated event". The mistake we are making, he says, is focusing too heavily on the nucleated event and not the super saturated environment.

Next he asks us: Are we in the middle of a worldwide fetish shaming phenomena? We have ****-shaming, for example. Fat shaming. Etc. And now we have this weird kneeling thing.

He explores the nature of kneeling, different kinds of kneeling, and what they represent (he references Colin Kaepernik's kneeling, kneeling before God, kneeling in front of a queen, and so on).

He offers 2 examples of black men either asking or forcing white people to kneel before them, and in one instance kiss their shoes.

"We have all sorts of shaming trading at a premium at the moment," Weinstein says, "with dignity trading at a deep discount."

Weinstein asks: Are some of us feeling so weirdly guilty that we're getting off on humbling ourselves in front of those who feel oppressed and therefore want to oppress others?

He continues: Is the responsibility some white people feel for the current situation being weaponized and parasitized?

He suggests we all be thoughtful and caring when someone asks you to examine a system that has benefited you while causing others to suffer..but if it becomes obvious that those people are seeking power over and not power with, walk away.

He ends with a great quote:
"A modest amount of responsibility taken is worth a great deal more than an oppressive and self extinguishing amount of performative guilt meant to convey that you are willing to destroy your own dignity at the drop of a hat because you do understand that other people have had things in life worse than you."

Lastly he reminds us that we can't pursue equality and grovelling at the same time, from either side of the fence.

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[Constance]

Wow! Thank you so much for sharing that very powerful and thought provoking piece by Eric.:flower:

The question that Eric asked


Is the responsibility some white people feel for the current situation being weaponized and parasitized?



I feel is a very important one and one that I would answer with a resounding 'yes'.

And why I feel this way is because people don't even know, that they don't even know that they are being played.
It is only a very small percentage of the people in our world who are consciously aware that the game is rigged (and always has been) and that nothing in this world is as it appears to be. What is happening is only adding to, and perpetuating the current false realities on an individual and collective basis.

If we really want equality for ourselves and each other, I feel that we need to start by asking some questions.

Questions such as,

What does true equality look like?

What is it going to take to have true equality for humanity?

Imagine if we could instantly snap our fingers and experience true equality for humanity overnight, how exactly would we behave towards each other?

:heart:

[Sarah Rainsong]

He suggests we all be thoughtful and caring when someone asks you to examine a system that has benefited you while causing others to suffer..but if it becomes obvious that those people are seeking power over and not power with, walk away.

I love this. I see many people hurting, and I'm 100% behind recognizing and helping to heal those people, but some don't want healing. They want power.

And THANK YOU for providing such an outstanding summary! I am not often able to watch videos, so this is extremely helpful!:happythumbsup:

[Mike]

qbDhZeafWK4


There are versions of this without the narrator dude, but they're embedded in articles and I didn't wanna deal with that.

[Kryztian]

In my college years I spent one intense week reading and watching documentaries about the holocaust. While I had been aware of this chapter in history before, I never immersed myself in such a way and psychically connected to the real horror. I also did have some feelings of guilt, having a mother born in Germany and having embraced so many things German myself after having many visits there and positive experiences there. During that week I felt truly depressed and was known to say some dark depressing things during otherwise cheerful dinner conversations that led people to say "WFT is his problem?" I did work out the guilt and shame and put things in their perspective, but I am also glad I experienced that dark week of the soul which did lead me to question the violence and social injustice in the world and help me commit to looking at these situations and raising awareness to them.

I was watching the videos of some of the police officers "taking a knee" before the protesters and had a whole mix of reactions: I was touched by their humility and there commitment to creating a peaceful solution, I was offended that good law abiding cops who had worked for creating a more peaceful world were taking responsibility for crimes that weren't theirs, but then I also thought that perhaps some of those cops might have at one time treated people less fairly and justice because of their skin color, or had witnessed others cops doing so and did nothing and said their parts and may have renewed a commit to social justice on their part. Or perhaps to some it was just a meaningless publicity stunt that meant nothing except perhaps getting their pant knees soiled on the street. I imagine it was as different an experience for each cop taking place as it was for the people watching.

Shame is a natural human emotion, something many of us will experience from time to time. And other people will attempt to manipulate it when and where you feel shame to their benefit. And as most of us here in Project Avalon would agree, there are forces working behind the scenes attempting to manipulate us, and they are doing so my determining when and where we feel shame.

If I had the opportunity to at least suggest where my fellow Americans might want to direct their feeling of shame, it would be towards the military and political policies of the U.S.A. We all shout about our candidates we should be supporting and our issues and which "-ism" ("socialism", "capitalism" but never "pacifism") we should be pursuing, but we never question the fact that our country has over 700 military bases around the world and has created regime changes through military force, through economic coercion, thought sanctions and embargos, through assassination, juntas, and coups, though intelligence operations and foreign media manipulation. None of this has anything to do with "spreading American freedom" in the world and everything to do with a small international group of people sucking the wealth and resources out of every nation on earth and turning them into debt slave nations, regardless of the violence and degradation that occurs to make this happen. George W. Bush and his administration pushed fake intelligence and false information to justify the invasion of Iraq which led to 5,000 American and as many as 2 million Iraqis dying senseless brutal deaths. Hillary Clinton was one of the people who spearheaded an invasion of Libya, transforming it from a country where every Libyan had housing, medical care, to a national that now has burnt out cities, Al Qaeda training camps and slave markets. Now George W. Bush rehabilitates the his image by showcasing his paintings of his dog Mrs. Beasley and hanging out with Ellen DeGeneres, while Hillary Clinton goes on book tours promoting her book Gutsy Woman where she basks in the aura of courageous social justice advocates like Harriet Tubman, even though Hillary herself helped slavery markets return to Libya. Should we demand or expect that George W. or Hillary "take a knee" for the millions they have caused immense suffering for? Would that even begin to atone for the immense horror they were instrumental in enacting? What about Ellen DeGeneres and Hillary's book tour promoters who are promoting and rehabilitating the images of war criminals - should they "take a knee" or find some other way to show contrition of deep humility? What about the rest of us Americans, who showed more outrage over a confederate war flag on a state capitol house than we did for the nations we demolished and the millions we murdered? It's clear to me that shame isn't just being fetishized, but misdirected by a very clever and secretive few.

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Yes, George Floyd, Ahmaud Arberry, Breonna Taylor, Eric Garner, Kalief Browder , and Troy Davis and many others African Americans died very wrongful deaths and left many to suffer and grieve about this injustice. There are probably hundreds more in the last two decades. But how does this compare to the two million Iraqis whose names we don’t know, whose stories we don’t know about (partly because CNN and others are completely uninterested)? If we don’t develop some kinbd of awareness or compassion for these outrages, they are going to happen again, and it is much easier, using the power of good government policiy to avoid these cruel and senseless deaths from happening as it would be to stop race motivated killings.

[Gemma13]

Sadly the fact that you just conversed about oppression and crimes against other cultures during the Black Lives Matter protest time, and you used the word "comparison", some people will immediately define you as guilty of systemic racism and having no morals. Your sentencing without trial (i.e. any more conversation) will see you treated with contempt and ignored from here on in.

NO JOKE.  I have some family who are so brainwashed into the radical side of the protests they believe this is the right thing to do.

A coupla memes they've shared to prove the point:

[https://cdn-liker.com/uploads/large_images/5eda9449be44a.png

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And yet in this Black Lives Matter documentary black person clearly states that Black Lives Matter the same as All Lives Matter and we should be uniting.


@1:33:49



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krfcq5pF8u8

[Mike]

Nice post Chris.

Yes, we're much more up in arms about injustice we can actually see. The image of that white cop casually kneeling on that black man's neck was symbolically powerful enough to urge even the most complacent of us into action. You'd have to be completely devoid of a soul to not feel heartbreak and a sense of emotional sickness at the sight of it.

But the action I'm seeing isn't very productive. These gestures ring hollow to me. I'm mostly an agreeable person actually. I enjoy seeing people come together. When arguing with a friend, I'm usually the first to apologize. That type of thing. It would be easy for someone like me to emotionally embrace gestures like these..but within moments of viewing them my stomach goes into knots and I begin to feel something like revulsion.

I agree - if we're going to indulge this collective shame, then we need to get our priorities straight. If the issue was strictly racism, we'd be talking about the native americans 24/7.

We often don't see the horrifying images that war produces. Plus it's often "over there", on some other piece of land we'll never see and never visit. Our war mongering politicians and deep state military operators exploit all that.

There's a very slick propaganda machine that allows for all those things you listed to carry on, from military bases around the world, to embargos to assassinations and so on. An equally slick propaganda machine is causing racial divides between blacks and whites and allows for the conditions we're seeing right now.

Manipulation, all over the place. I view this shame emphasis and all it's outgrowths as another form of that. It's a form of emotional manipulation.

[Kryztian]

qbDhZeafWK4
There are versions of this without the narrator dude, but they're embedded in articles and I didn't wanna deal with that.

What ever offense or disturbing message one might find in the foot washing action, it doesn't in any way compare to the narrator dude at 0:45 "When the civil war comes, and it will comes, ... it's going to get weird. Because the enemy, your enemy, depending which side you are on, you are not going to be able to clearly identify them." Okay, so I am supposed to be worried about some guilty feeling white people showing an excessive amount of contrition, but a white nationalist complaining that it's going to be hard to figure out which white liberal sympathizers need to be murdered along with the those of different skin color, that's just a footnote?

[Mike]

qbDhZeafWK4
There are versions of this without the narrator dude, but they're embedded in articles and I didn't wanna deal with that.

What ever offense or disturbing message one might find in the foot washing action, it doesn't in any way compare to the narrator dude at 0:45 "When the civil war comes, and it will comes, ... it's going to get weird. Because the enemy, your enemy, depending which side you are on, you are not going to be able to clearly identify them." Okay, so I am supposed to be worried about some guilty feeling white people showing an excessive amount of contrition, but a white nationalist complaining that it's going to be hard to figure out which white liberal sympathizers need to be murdered along with the those of different skin color, that's just a footnote?


Yep, I regret that the guy is talking over the video. I'm at work atm, but will try to find the same footage without this dude rambling and replace it with the current one when I get a break

[norman]

I've been looking for a thread to post this video for 2 months but couldn't find one or think of a good enough reason to create a new thread just to post it.

I'm still not sure this thread is right for it but I'm going to risk it because I think Mike will enjoy it, and because this thread could do with a bump anyway.

Douglas Murray on the death of Europe & identity

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Douglas Murray talks immigration, Islam, identity politics and his life. The Sun's Steven Edginton interviews Murray for the series 'Burning Questions'. The pair discuss Murray's books 'The Strange Death of Europe' and 'The Madness of Crowds'. Murray updates his views since the publication of both books and debates issues such as Brexit and the trans rights movement.

[Mike]

Thanks Norman:handshake: Strange synch: I started watching that very video today and am about three quarters of the way thru.:)

[TargeT]

I feel privileged to be in a (technically) oppressed class in the current context.

It is mostly a mental game, there is little physical abuse (though monetarily could be used as an interesting argument to over all energy theft).

It's very interesting to watch "group think" in action; the level of intellectual effort (to validate positions and actions with fact based research etc..) does depress me at times however.


Edit:
The veteran status does outweigh any legal disadvantages that applied to me prior to attaining that status; felt like that's an important note to add (so I might be actually an accurate representation of the "privileged white male" due to my life actions, the privileges are not overly impactful in my mind (probably biased)).

[Agape]

=is shame. It’s of adults who are too fed by everything( super saturated environment) thinking the way toddlers do if they want to be kind.

If they grew up to be kind adults also I think they’d rise some serious questions such as “who else is hungry in this country”, “who else needs medical care”, “who has nowhere to sleep” and go help those people.

I’ve seen lots of this kind of “therapy” and ego fetishizing took off in modern cultures nowadays, breeding whole new generation of happy toddlers of all ages.
Narcissistic egoism that can not accomplish almost anything for real.

Would the same people do it if it was needed ?

Or they just do it to satisfy their egos.


I’ve seen similar picture from the emissaries of white Catholic Church arriving in some poor African country, calling about 32 village kids and washing their feet while posing for camera.
I thought what a shame. If even one of the priests were so dedicated to the humane mission to stay there for life and help those people in their way, be a mother and father to them then it’s for real.

If it’s done for show it’s the very opposite of benevolent.


How long does their “feel so much better” last really. Before they again, beat you with some instrument and clean feet.

😛

[Catsquotl]

Yup again the white man cannot take a step back and let those who suffer have their grief. We have to make it our mission to openly and publicly show our support and some recognition for the fact that we are indeed ashamed.

[TargeT]

Yup again the white man cannot take a step back and let those who suffer have their grief. We have to make it our mission to openly and publicly show our support and some recognition for the fact that we are indeed ashamed.

I'll guess the "we" is those silly people I see on TV.

I am not ashamed of anything I have done, I have made bad decisions at times but I did them; I don't care who knows about it and I actively worked to correct my behavior when it did not line up with my morals (first) and objectives.

Shame and blackmail do not make sense to me... own your **** (or grow from mistakes), those thing's won't exist.