Why Dunk on Your Critics When Self-Criticism is Such an Easy Layup?

A Good Quip is Emotionally Satisfying

I cannot be the only person who, when in moments of mental turmoil, fantasizes about leveling some ideological opponent with a brilliant quip which shuts them up. I believe this experience is somewhat common among humans.

But lately this unhealthy exercise has become less satisfying, and I think it might be worthwhile to deconstruct why; mostly for my own sake, but perhaps, dear reader, you might glean some understanding (whether of me, yourself, or some potential universal humanity).

The more righteous I feel, the more devastating such quips, which never seem to come at the time they are needed, tend to be. But as I continue to grow as a thinker, the more I am certain that certainty isn’t all that laudable a goal. And in recent months, I have noticed that I catch myself, while formulating some quip, retorting back at myself in the process. It softens my emotional satisfaction, and robs me of the catharsis of which such ruminations are capable.

That is, I have begun to value my ability to see myself from the point of view of my interlocutor and see how the devastating verbal barrage of truth was blunter (double entendre intended) than I anticipated. The next thing I know I’ve discovered nuances and depths of uncertainty I wasn’t able to see in the blinding light of certainty.

It’s not completely unlike the experience of realizing, mid-argument, that your significant other is actually right. In the moment, you are too taken-aback and still too emotional to admit it, and perhaps you dig in because of this, but it changes the experience nonetheless. Anyone who frequents Twitter might have some understanding of this phenomenon, as well.

Idealism and certainty

Back in the halcyon days of 2012 or so, back when I was idealistic and more certain, I found myself in the lap of the burgeoning movement we now think of as the woke mentality. I saw it as progress, and even recognized it as a form of the same PC culture I saw in the 1990s. I saw it as the world finally waking up to certain realities and I saw it as a good thing. I became woke (even if a lot of it wasn’t really new to me) before the term fully took hold.

I was endlessly amused by memes which excoriated the people who couldn’t or wouldn’t see The Truth^TM, and enjoyed those in my orbit lambasting those who tried to resist with their own biting criticisms. When blogs I read wouldn’t follow along, I often left them behind and enjoyed seeing other blogs mocking them. Nothing like a good dunk, to use a current phrase.

An example of this would be Jerry Coyne’s Why Evolution is True, which I used to read regularly until he started to chafe at some of what was called, at the time, 3rd Wave Feminism, Feminatzis, etc. While I agreed with Coyne’s view of science in the face of anti-science rhetoric from evolution-skeptics and so forth, I found his anti-feminism sometimes to be off-putting, and sided, at the time, with PZ Myers in those blog wars. There was even a time when I had drinks with PZ, Amanda Marcotte, and other like-minded people (in PZ’s hotel room, no less) at a convention during these times. I was part of a movement, it felt like, and it felt good. For someone with seriously debilitating insecurity, it was tremendously validating.

This was after the days of Elevatorgate, where the rift within the atheist/skeptic community foreshadowed the coming larger cultural, political, and ideological divides which came to dominate much of everything. I saw my side, the side of the coming liberal utopia of awakened skeptics, as being attacked by dim-witted, privileged, and clueless gobshites who were simply too dense or self-interested to hop on the truth train. I saw the red pill movement, which took shape not long after all of this, as angry, resentful, and hateful people who were very obviously wrong. It felt good to be on the right side of justice, and to have a set of smart, clever, and devastatingly witty compatriots ready and willing to throw a quip towards our enemies.

And we felt superior.

An Inception of Awakenings

In the next few years, I went through (metaphorical, of course) Hell. Much of it was my own doing, but what wasn’t mine was a trauma which came from realizing that what I thought were wise friends and allies were, in many cases, toxic, abusive, and dishonest fanatics for a cause which I no longer could support.¹

But, as I have said previously, I wasn’t red-pilled. I reject their movement as well and I’m not going to be joining the likes of David Silverman² anytime soon. And if, after reading this, you think that he and I are of a similar ilk, then you will have failed to understand my larger point here, and have mistook me leaving one set of toxic ideas for joining another. This cultural war doesn’t have merely two sides, and I don’t think any major faction is always wrong (no, not even David Silverman and those who side with him are always wrong, even when they are making asses of themselves).

But it does feel like, in some sense, that I woke up more than once, as if I’m rising through layers of bad dreams, never sure if this, right now, is finally reality. I’m not sure if the top is still spinning.

And in a sense I do realize that this reality, this set of perceptions, beliefs, etc to which I ascribe some level of objective truth, is still a Kantian dream from which I may never wake. Because if our view of the world, viewing ourselves as entities which see ourselves as entities because we have an entity category built into our minds, then it is the case that we are all trapped within an inescapable box completely separated from actual reality, and then there is no waking up. There is no being right or having the truth, there is just an endless process of wittling away nonsense with better questions and methodologies for separating nonsense from tentative objective reality.

Which would mean that thinking of yourself as woke is just, indeed, a kind of spiritualism or religion; just another idea of another world beyond ours. Just another form of being asleep, as it were, but believing, just like every other ideology, that you have the truth. It’s undeserved righteousness, just like everyone else.

In the vein of seeing this in religious terms, I’m looking forward to John McWhorter’s upcoming book, where he promises to explore the idea of wokeism as a new cult, religion, or something of the like (it hasn’t been published yet, but his thoughts on the subject to date seem consistent with such ideas). As a student of religion, culture, and someone who has shifted ideological frameworks myself, it seems clear to me that most ideologies behave in similar ways to religions, insofar as they create pious followers who see their enlightenment in relation to others’ obfuscated perspectives. In other words, all true believers see themselves as woke relative to those uninitiated. Par for the course, in terms of people.

The New Meta-Narrative

To clarify what all that jargon above was about; I’m skeptical that any of us have the truth, but I think there is a truth; it’s just that we may never know what all of it is. So, if anyone is claiming to have the truth they are delusional, wrong, or lying to some degree. And what bothers me about the woke isn’t their worldview. In fact, I largely agree with their goals, some of their beliefs, and don’t think most of them are acting in bad faith. What worries me is their tendency towards an un-willingness to hear criticism without responding with some version of a “Kafka Trap,” which is to say that any criticism is treated as evidence of that which the criticism is aimed.

The most notorious example of this is the idea, and the book of the same name, of White Fragility. This is an idea which essentially states that any push-back against the claim that I (for example), as a white person, am racist (or at least contribute to the support of systemic racism) is evidence of some fragility within myself. It is a claim which the true believers believe has no valid counter. In other words, it’s an assertion, and it is believed with a kind of faith, and to reject it is to deny The Truth.^TM In other words, heresy.

It is akin to being told that there is an original sin (racism, in this case) of which we are all subject in one way or another, and we need to repent. But there is no ridding oneself of this sin, but only to keep “doing the work”, perpetually. We light-skinned humans exist in sin, or as a racist and we must confess our sin and seek forgiveness (which will never come). It’s right out of the playbook of religion, so perhaps it takes an atheist contrarian to see it clearly.

This is not to say that the existence of systemic racism has no merit; I, in fact, do think that there are systemically racist policies, cultural norms, etc which are a significant problem which must be addressed. However, the claim that such racism is ubiquitous and inescapable is a claim with a different level of scope than the fact that it exists at all. Further, conflating the criticism of the ubiquity of systemic racism with it’s nonexistence³ is a very common ploy used in the back-and-forth between interlocutors of the cultural conversation going on these days.

And considering my history with insecurity and depression, feeling guilty is sort of my go-to feeling. It took some amount of therapy and perhaps even wisdom to learn that this is a manipulation, and one that is all too easily inculcated onto Left-leaning white people who are currently willing to accept this as the truth about racism in our culture, whether out of fear, guilt, or cynical playing along to not get on the wrong side of the woke police. And I also understand that the recognition that one is being manipulated is one which causes reactionary and defensive behavior. Many people’s reactions against this idea are overkill, such as James Lindsay’s decision to vote for Trump because he fears the woke takeover of the Democratic party, which he sees worst than the threat of a second term for Trump. I find this an unreasonable conclusion, but one that at least makes sense to me because I have a similar reaction to being manipulated. I, however, am not ready to jettison the entire Left, including the current Democratic party, for the sake of a fear of it being led by authoritarian Woke Leftists with some bad ideas.

That is, many people who react to the woke with an overcompensation (support for Trump, intentionally trying to trigger woke people, etc) believe they are seeing wokeism as a new meta-narrative to replace the meta-narratives of the patriarchal, hierarchical, sexist, racist, etc world in which the woke say that we live. The irony of this is (as Cynical Theories points out) that wokeism grew out of a set of Postmodernist philosophical ideas which sought to deconstruct, transcend, or expose meta-narratives, only to later be used to create a new one out of a goal to achieve social justice.

But if the current SocJus movement it’s based on some bad ideas, then if it succeeds in its goals then all it will do is replace it with a new form of injustice, ultimately. At least that’s what many who are critical of the woke mentality believe, and why they oppose people like Robin D’Angelo, Ibram X. Kendi, and their allies in the attempt to create new policies based on woke ideas. Such critics of SocJus wokeism believe that their methods and ideas won’t succeed in creating social justice at all. I think they have a point; it will solve some things, perhaps, but it creates new problems. And the unwillingness of the woke to hear criticism, while understandable as a human response, will be the factor that will make it a new orthodoxy to be opposed once it actually has real power. If the woke would allow skepticism into their ranks, this could be avoided. But they treat criticism as evidence of people being racist, sexist, etc and worthy of being ostracized, ignored, and considered problematic. Therefore, many people are legitimately worried about this phenomenon.

Thus there are so many people quipping at each other, and the most vociferous quippers are the ones least likely to consider that their side is in error. And it reminds me of what it felt like to be surrounded by such a righteous, witty, and insular tribe. I felt like I was part of something, but what I didn’t realize until later was that I was surrounded by many toxic people. The point is that being part of a toxic culture doesn’t feel toxic because even abusive, toxic, and hateful people are capable of great affection, kindness, and loyalty to those inside their tribe.

And this is why I’m now suspicious of any tribe which does not actively seek skepticism, criticism, and ideological challenge from inside or outside that community, which is to say the overwhelmingly vast majority of human groups.

Seeking ideological purity creates an insular bubble where ideas are never challenged, which then creates the very meta-narrarive which the Theories which are the basis of their woke ideologies were originally supposed to correct for. They are, essentially, shooting themselves in the foot because they remove anyone who doesn’t bend the knee. So it’s understandable that even those on the Left who don’t fully agree stay quiet out of fear of losing friends, social connections, or even their jobs. I’m lucky to be in a position where I will, at most, lose a few acquaintances (already have) but my livelihood is not in jeopardy.

So, what I mean to say is that the metaphor of “woke” is especially bad and problematic (I’m taking the word back), because it is self-righteous and entitled especially because it considers criticism to be evidence for their worldview. And this was the basis for how and why I no longer considered myself one of the woke.

The key for them to understand is that I didn’t then join the opposition, because they are also largely toxic. I merely found myself in the no-man’s land between trenches, and have discovered that neither trench looks inviting as a safe space.

A Book Recommendation

Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay deal with these concepts, related to wokeness, Critical Theory, and the history of these ideas, in their recent book, and corresponding website, Cynical Theories. I’m recommending these resources not because I agree with all of their conclusions, but because they expose many of the problems with the philosophical underpinnings of “Theory,” upon which much of the current woke mentality is based. Also, I do so despite the fact that I find much of Lindsay’s tone and conclusions (outside of the book, primarily) off-putting and often incorrect themselves. Pluckrose I tend to agree with much more often, in terms of her public pronouncements, but regardless of their differing political opinions, their criticism of Critical Theory is important to be aware of.

The gist of the problem is that the philosophical ancestors of woke ideologies are largely anti-science, anti-rational, and are most-definitely anti-liberal (in the philosophical sense not necessarily the political one, though it can be that too). Things such as evidence, logic, skepticism, and other important tools of criticism are denounced and replaced with power dynamics which seem to be cynically utilized for the sake of control and political expediency, which is the very problem I think we should be concerned with, not emulating.

And with the recent rise of woke ideas taking over much of academia, the corporate world, and other parts of society and culture, there is a sense that you are either on-board with justice or you are deplorable; you are with them or against them. It’s too simplistic a dichotomy and it ignores those who are for social justice but not in the way that many of the Woke Left are trying to achieve it. The problem is that most people don’t know that there is such a distinction, and so they conflate people like me, who are critical of much of their methods, with the red-pilled/Alt-Right/Trump-supporting/NAZI-sympathizing/socialist-hating and actually racist and sexist part of our culture which opposes the woke for equally bad reasons as those who support it. I am not Ben Shapiro.

I, and many others out there, don’t have a political or cultural home among the two major sides of this conflict, and we see ourselves pilloried from both ends as being on the other. People who I listen to, read, or both (whether it be the Fifth Column podcast, Andrew Sullivan, Blocked and Reported (Jesse Singal and the “transphobe” Katie Herzog), Coleman Hughes, or the aforementioned John McWhorter) are hated by both sides of this tribal cultural war because they don’t bend the knee to any orthodoxy. I don’t always agree with these people (I don’t always agree with myself), but I appreciate people who are willing to say what they think and challenge orthodoxies on all fronts. And somehow that’s bad, because one is either racist or anti-racist (says Kendi), with no possibility of being neither. That’s ridiculous.

Dreaming of Being Awake, but Still Snoring

The woke ideology is not enlightened, even where it makes good points and is right. They take good ideas and goals and wrap them in emotion to sell them to well-meaning people who want the world to be better than it is. And if you criticize them, you are considered a heretic and labeled as problematic. The whole cancel culture thing is really about how people are afraid to speak up when they disagree, because they know the potential interpersonal, social, and professional costs. The wars going on in many media outlets, between the woke and those who disagree, is going to be an ongoing conflict for years to come.

The point is that I believe that much of the woke world uses ideas such as standpoint theory (which is an interesting, and I think valid, set of ideas worthy of study in general) incorrectly; that is to say too broadly. All ideas have to be subject to scrutiny by any person who is able to parse the logical, rational, or empirical factors related to it. And no (again), this isn’t a form of supporting white, western, supremacy itself.

Postmodern/poststructural/woke ideas are not automatically and universally bad, but they are, I think, used too broadly or liberally (lol) than I think they have epistemologically earned. I frankly don’t think that most of the people policing ideas out there in the Left are sufficiently trained or (frankly) interested in logic, skepticism, and science to wield such a weapon correctly, and so we end up with a loud minority of people seeking justice but creating different forms of, probably unintentionally, injustice. Good intentions, bad execution.

And they do it for a quite human reason; they are caught up in the emotion of the movement. They feel empowered and important, being a part of a set of ideas which could make the world better. That is, their goals are laudable. They aren’t bad people, they are just people with ideas which don’t always survive scrutiny, and like many ideological movements before them, they are overzealous and undeservedly self-righteous.

I understand it because I experience this same set of feelings, thoughts, and a sense of belonging as they do when I come up with those zingers in the shower, on a walk, or unable to sleep. This is a fairly universal human experience, but the difference is that the ideas we want to defend, criticize, or even to expand upon are ideas that are stuck in a whirlwind of historical, cultural, and ideological chaos which is really difficult, if not impossible, to pin down. At different times ideas, even within small pockets of culture, have relative power. Right now, there is a set of ideas about social justice, those that we refer to as wokeness, which are on the rise in terms of influence and power in our culture. And the irony is that the ideology of anti-oppression is now in a role where, at least on small scales, is acting much like an oppressive force upon groups and individuals.

Sure, on a large scale, they are still punching up, but in small ways, in small interactions, it occasionally punches down. Ibram X. Kendi describes this, in his book How to be and Anti-Racist, as the future discrimination that we need:

The only remedy to racist discrimination is antiracist discrimination. The only remedy to past discrimination is present discrimination. The only remedy to present discrimination is future discrimination
Ibram X. Kendi, How to be an Antiracist

Kendi views this as righting an historical wrong; a continuous punching-up until the scales are even. But, that’s the thing about policy, cultural mores, and ideologies; they take on a life of their own and become the new mores. A goal of equity is one thing, but if the method one utilizes to attain it becomes the new normal, it won’t stop once the goal is attained, but it will still operate, as if through mere momentum, to punch in the same direction once equity is attained.

The problem with discrimination, oppression, and injustice in general is not who it’s being done to, but that it’s being done. And I don’t trust any potential amendment, policy, or moral idea to right a wrong by use of the very same tools which created the problem in the first place; stopping an attacker with a bat isn’t made better by taking the bat and handing it to the original victim. That’s mere revenge porn. Again, an understandable and very human reaction, but not a just one.

Here’s the point. People in control now believe they are right. People fighting them think they are right. People think they are right. But they can’t all be right, and in fact it’s quite likely that none of them are fully right. So, shouldn’t our highest values as carriers of ideologies, rather than to defensively parry criticism, be to actively self-criticize? Not that we have to accept criticism from any idiot on Twitter or Facebook comment section, but to already be doing it yourself? To do so, you need to take your serious critics seriously.

Shouldn’t we be questioning our most sacred beliefs and values, and find the weaknesses of our arguments, before some clueless bro points it out to you? It’s our instinct to defend our tribes, of course. But we need to, if we’re going to survive this infancy as a species, find a way to stop grouping ourselves based upon ideology/orthodoxy if we want to find truth, justice, or any solutions which will actually work in the long run. It’s too easy to get caught up in interpersonal fights where we defend our friends and attack our enemies regardless of the strength of our arguments. We need to do better, collectively.

I yearn for a day where open criticism will not result in ostracism from communities and then be thought of as merely removing problematic people. The freedom to criticize exists, and of course nobody has to pay attention, but dismissing criticism which points to your ideological foundations as invalid or a source of the problem merely makes your beliefs sacrosanct, which no idea should be. The good ideas keep surviving criticism for a reason, and don’t need your defense by removing critics from your club.

Because actual skepticism, rationality, logic, and critical thinking has never been the dominant meta-narrative of any system which has power, despite what some have said; the colonial, Western, white world is not one based in rationality and logic any more than any other group (yes, this is a claim which derives from Theory). Those things are available to all groups but rarely applied universally. Such tools are usually used as a means to reinforce our biases and destroy our foes (say, with witty quips), but rarely to question the strength of our own ideological foundations.

It’s sort of like how the strongest criticisms of any religion comes from other religions, but it takes an atheist to point at them all and say, “hey, you are all incorrect here.” So, while it might take a deplorable Trumpster to point out issues with wokeism, it takes those of us yeeted out of the Left to point to both said Trumpster and Woke Cultist and say “y’all are all wrong, so let’s actually start listening to each other and then maybe we can figure this shit out, finally,” while being quite aware that both of them will dunk on us with a witty quip, and continue to dismiss us and each other.

Question even your most sacred values and beliefs, and not just those of your ideological enemies.

Notes:

[1] I will clarify, here, that the hurt I also caused them, and our subsequent enmity, was not the reason I ended up on another side of ideological rifts, but being separate from them did finally allow me to reflect more clearly on ideas I previously cleaved to from an emotional distance; a process which took some years.

[2] If you haven’t been following the ravings of David since his various ousters, exposure of his awful behavior, and subsequent leaving of the Left, suffice it to say he’s become anti-woke in a way I will not endorse. That is to say that it’s possible to be critical of wokeness without becoming a snarling, angry, resentful idiot.

[3] And yes, there are woke critics who go this far in their critique. I disagree with such critics.

Fuck all the things, especially ourselves

You know what? fuck the Republican party. You know what they did, what they are doing, and what they are likely to keep doing. Fuck them.

Going forward, we need to find a Democrat who can defeat Trump. That’s what matters.

Right?

I mean, sort of. But that’s too simple, and it misses the point of something important. let’s build the argument.

The Democrats are the home team, right now.

Aside from the few months I was a Democrat in order to vote for Bernie Sanders in the primary back in 2016, I’ve always been an Independent. I have no political party. I doubt I ever will have one for more time than it might take to vote in a primary.

Right now, I like the Democratic party much more than I like the Republican party. It’s an easy choice to make. That is, if I had to back one of them I would not hesitate to support the DNC in this moment in history.* The attempts of the House of Representatives to find some justice and the truth in their investigations into the doings of people around Donald Trump related to obstruction of justice, corruption, bribery, hush money, and potential cooperation with Russian attempts to alter the public opinions and actions around the 2016 elections is something we should stand behind.

But, did you notice the heading of this section? Yeah, see I’m clever like that and I intentionally wanted to invoke that process in your brain that cheers for the home team and boos when the other team scores. I wanted to get the circuits of tribalism flowing in your head, because some of you read that paragraph above and you were like “fuck yes!” and some of you, maybe, were more like “fake news!” Maybe a few of you were like ‘dude, I totally saw what you were doing and am not impressed with your bashing the point over my head with that over-sized cartoon sledgehammer.’

And you’re right, keen observer of my overtly obvious point.

And yet, still, I’m compelled. I do believe that Donald Trump is, in objective fact, corrupt and criminally guilty. In addition to his ample personality flaws, he’s also done illegal things and should not be in a position of power. He surrounds himself with cons, liars, and ethically dubious people who do his bidding to enrich themselves. That narrative is, to some extent, just the truth. If you disagree, well I think you are just factually wrong.

So, the democrats are the good team, then, right?

No. That’s a false dichotomy. Yes, I also know that this point was obvious from the start.

Your friends are great. Fuck your friends.

It’s nice to have friends. They have your back when things get tough. They give you advice that you need from time to time, and are good fun on occasion, as well. We need friends. We need people we trust in our lives.

And aren’t you glad you cut some people out of your life? You know, the people who were assholes that time? The people who you used to like, but now they are evil?

It’s sort of bizarre how easy it is for a person to be your friend, having your back and giving you advice or feedback, to being not a friend and suddenly they are not available for either. There is a strange cognitive switch that sort of goes off in some of these situations, and over time you may even wonder how you could have been, at one time, friends with this person.

In recent years, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about this cognitive phenomenon, and I’m fascinated by it. It has made me reconsider many things about the nature of friendship and the alienation of being mad at/hurt by someone. And this has had a major effect on how I view the concepts of trauma and desires for “justice” or whatever.

I don’t want to dwell on that and that’s not the point of this post, directly. I also don’t have any solid conclusions, but I do have a lot of skepticism about the various narratives about such things which I know will rub many people the wrong way. And the implications of this skepticism is already alienating me from people who are, in some sense, allies.

But, to go back to the point of this post, which is about politics overtly with the minor tangentially relevant analogy of all things related to people, groups, and cultures, I’m of the opinion that I don’t care to support the democratic party. I’m of the opinion that supporting individual candidates, who may or may not be members of that party, is more important than supporting the party itself.

So…

Fuck the Democratic party

This is the nuance that I am seeing which some people I know don’t seem to see. Yes, the Democrats in congress are playing an important political and historical role, right now, by initiating certain investigations and by (hopefully) shifting the party to the left and being more inclusive of people who have, traditionally and historically, had less of a political voice.

But fuck the party

You know why? Because every time a group of people comes together to work on something as a group, shit gets done. But, also, when people start to identify with that group, the almost necessary product of such an association is to out-group the people who don’t. That is where tribalism starts.

There is a story going around about Bernie Sanders running as a Democrat, for president, and as an Independent, for his senate seat. And democrats are losing their shit over this. I don’t see the problem.

No, Bernie Sanders isn’t a loyal member of your team. He doesn’t identify as a Democrat. He sees running as a Democrat to be useful for him, in terms of running, and you’re mad because he’s not supporting the party at large. Well, why the hell should he? Why should anybody have to demonstrate loyalty to a party? Why is loyalty to a party a good thing? Notice the nuance between working with a party to get shit done and loyalty and identity with such a group.

If you cared about having a good candidate, with good ideas, who can possibly do good things for the country as a whole, then why would that person have to be a member of one of your parties? Why the fuck is that a good thing?

Fuck your stupid party.

Fuck Bernie Sanders

Actually, I like Bernie Sanders. He was the first (and, so far only) political candidate whose campaign I gave money to. If he were nominated, I’d be happy. I don’t necessarily think he’s the best candidate for the upcoming election, and I might prefer someone else, but I’m Ok with him and would support him.

But fuck Bernie Sanders. And fuck his loyal followers, especially.

Are you confused yet?

Ok, let me see if I can clarify

If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him

Everyone who knows me is aware that I’m not a big fan of religion in general. Christianity is a plague upon the world. Islam is a silly yet dangerous thing. Judaism is problematic for so many reasons. Hinduism and its various sub-religions are silly, especially as it’s sold in the West as a bunch of platitudes and stretching. And Buddhists are threatening to (and sometimes actually are) killing Muslims. Pretty much all religion is problematic, either overwhelmingly so or merely in part.

But we need to keep in mind that religion overlaps with philosophy, in many respects. The Bible has some wonderful literature (I like Ecclesiastes and some of the Psalms and Proverbs, for example). The Vedas, Upanishads, and Bhagavad Gita are all largely lovely. There are even parts of the Koran which are poetic and lovely. And Buddhism has many pearls of wisdom worth paying attention to. Not to mention the Dao de Jing, which is overwhelmingly impressive and absolutely worth reading.

But one thing that keeps coming back to mind, for me, is the heading for this section. Another formulation is this Buddhist koan:

“If you meet the Buddha, kill him.”– Linji

This koan is a mind-puzzle for you to ponder, as I believe it has many interpretations and many uses. In this case I think what it might point to is the problem of deifying or idolizing certain people, groups, or ideas. I think that it has relevance to how we look at our heroes as well as our enemies.

If you are not a Trumpster, you might see Donald Trump as the idol of all that is wrong with people and the world in general. Let’s be real for a second though, ok? He’s just a spoiled, immensely privileged, and largely clueless man who probably didn’t really want his position anyway, and has no idea what to do and has been doing illegal and immoral things for decades, hidden behind his celebrity, which he would have probably gotten away with if he weren’t president.

He’s not the devil, the antichrist, or even a criminal master villain. He’s a very flawed human being surrounded by leeches and fixers who have been pulled out of the swamp and into the light, and they are now drying up in the hot exposure of the sun. Instead of draining the swamp, he’s dragged many of his hangers-on out of the swamp and put them on the dry land above for us all to see.

Sure, politics has always been corrupt and slimy, but perhaps not until now (at least in the U.S.) had the lower swamp scum been in this position, and the nakedness of the sliminess is both a relief and a shock to us because we are used to it being better attired.

But it makes me wonder whether part of the phenomena which is this moment is history is that we do not kill our Buddhas when we meet them. In other words, we aren’t willing to tell our heroes, revered institutions, and even our culture to go fuck itself, often enough.

We are too attached to the things we identify with.

Self criticism is the beginning of destroying tribalism

What do you love? What do you value? What do you hate? What is your identity?

When we identify with a person, group, culture, nation, etc, we start to project ourselves onto those things. And as those things are challenged, questioned, or not taken seriously, it’s as if we are being attacked ourselves. This is about as universal as a human experience as anything I can think of.

It’s well past time to enthusiastically consent to being challenged, questioned, and not taken seriously. It’s time to tell ourselves and our identities to fuck off and die already. Not literally, of course. But it is time to take ourselves, our values, and especially the groups we identify with way less seriously.

Every friend group, every facebook group, every subculture experiences drama and in-fighting. Rifts occur, people are ostracized, and enmities form and eventually calcify to become the structure of the group itself. It becomes the identity of the group and its members.

Activists within the DNC really don’t tend to like Bernie Sanders right now. And Bernie supporters are really mad at the DNC. Both sets of people have reasons to be mad. They aren’t incorrect. That isn’t the issue. The issue is that they are taking it personally and therefore unable to transcend the fray and see it as if they were an outsider. What we need is a political and cultural version of the Outsider Test for Faith.

Not enough of us have killed our Buddha, upon meeting them. We have not told ourselves to fuck off.

And until we are all willing to tell ourselves to fuck off, we’re fucking ourselves, collectively.

*Also, fuck the Green party, the Libertarian party, and all the other parties. Fuck all the things.

Ramadan at work

So, I work for Muslims.

Some people I know would wonder how I could do so (especially since I wrote this), if they were all Islamophobic and such, but it does not bother me. I really don’t mind working for this Muslim family any more than working for Christians, Jews, or Hindus would bother me. They are just people, who are from Syria, and who practice Islam. From my perspective, it’s not much different than working for people, from Italy, who practice Christianity. They are both silly religions with checkered pasts.

In the several months I have worked there, only once or twice has the issue of religion come up, and never in a proselytizing way. They are fairly non-political (they have not expressed any strong opinions about what is going on in Syria right now, except to say that America should not be involved, and rarely talk about it at all as far as I know), they seem to support the concept of the separation of religion and government (their comments about groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood seems to indicate that religion should be separate from political and business decisions), and their two sons seem just as American-acculturated as any kids in the neighborhood. They are not unlike most America citizens; they came here, love it here, and they have a cultural background they brought with them. It just happens that theirs is a minority culture and religious perspective in America.

Hell, so is mine.

They are relatively observant Muslims. They pray at least a couple time a day, that I see, in the back office (Muslims are supposed to pray five times a day, according to one of the five pillars of Islam). They can be heard singing Arabic songs when in a good mood, they sometimes sit and read from the Koran when business is slower, and, well, recently it has become more obvious.

You see, recently Ramadan started and this has given me a peek into the reality that there is some cultural distance between us which was not as obvious before, but that distance has given me some perspective. Watching them get more irritable as the day goes on (due to being hungry, thirsty, etc as they fast during daylight hours, which is longer during the summer) and watching the ritual of the sundown feast shows me, up close, how much these people are like everyone else I know from my mostly Christian family background. Because while there is distance, culturally, between us, this distance is no so far as to make them alien. In fact, they are so much like the Catholics on my father’s side of my family (many of whom dislike Islam greatly, for political reasons) in that the way they approach ritual and holy times is automatic and interwoven into their routine.

Have you even talked to a (moderately) practicing Catholic about why they do their daily or periodic rituals? Most of the Catholics I know don’t believe all the doctrines. Hell, they likely don’t even know what most of the doctrine is, as I have had to explain concepts such as the Nicene Creed and other concepts to them, especially in historical context. Ask a Catholic about the Council of Nicaea some time, and observe the blank stare you will probably get in return. But when it comes to ritual, they’ve got it down. There is a sort of sacred time and space and a set of behavior which provides order, meaning, and ‘right’ feelings at certain times. When there is a baby, there is a baptism. When they enter a church, they become serious and reverent where before they seem to not care about such reverence. There is a seeming difference between everyday life and Catholic life, as observed from the outside.

What I have been observing recently is much the same at work. Ramadan seems to be a sacred time, perhaps somewhat like how Lent is for Catholics, and it seemingly pulls them into a different space of awareness, because they have to fast during daylight which is a constant reminder. I have not asked them much about it, mostly because they have been a little irritable (being hungry and all) but I suspect that following Ramadan for them is as natural as celebrating Christmas, baptizing one’s child, etc is for Christians. I suspect that they don’t really think about why they do it, just like many Christians. It’s just what you do, if you’re Muslim.

There are other employees there who are Muslims as well. When sundown comes, they eat with the family for the evening meal. I have not been invited to join them. Granted, I am not really hungry because I ate already, not being a practicing Muslim and all, but I find it interesting that it does not even seem relevant to them. They don’t even seem aware that this is happening. As one of the few non-Muslims who works there, I am different. I am an outsider. I am kafir. I don’t feel ostracized or discriminated against (that is, I don’t really care) but it highlights the role of cultural tradition and ritual to simultaneously pull together the in-group and to otherize the out-group.

Religion is not all bad. However, one of its strengths, creating cultural bonds, has a complimentary function of clarifying cultural lines of division. Religion fosters tribalism. Thus, it’s only a strength to bring communities together for those in the community.

This is generally true, for all sorts of cultural traditions, rituals, or ideas. Monogamy creates bonds within a coupling that others cannot be a part of, by definition. There are levels of intimacy in all relationships, even in polyamory, which divide those inside and those outside the tribe, family, etc. Pride of one’s national heritage, as in “I’m proud to be an American” serve the same function. They pull together a group, but alienates at the same time.

Kirk: “Spock, you want to know something? Everybody’s Human.” Spock: “I find that remark… insulting.” — Kirk: “Spock, you want to know something? Everybody’s Human.”
Spock: “I find that remark… insulting.”

It’s quite unavoidable. You can try to universalize the message, but this is only a temporary fix. Define the in-group as humanity and if/when we make contact with alien sentient life, the other is them (I’ve been watching Babylon 5 again…). It’s a tough knot to untie, and I am not sure there is a solution. Because having groups of people who vary in importance to us, hierarchical or not, is a logistical and practical solution to only having so much time and energy to spend. It’s nice to have people close to you, intimate with you, and who you can call family. But the other side of this is the necessary alienation of others, especially those with whom we share few values. Liberals, conservative; Democrats, Republicans; Capitalists, Socialists, Communists, Anarchists, etc. There are people who are, in some way, ‘other’ to you. Religion, tradition, ritual, and nationalism all use this aspect of human behavior to its simultaneous advantage and disadvantage.

And yes, it will be an improvement if and when humanity outgrows religion, nationalism, etc. But I doubt that will solve the fundamental problem. Personally, I’m not sure there is a solution. I’m not writing this to say we should try to give up the concept of culture, and to transcend culture, because that would just create a new culture. I’m writing this because we should all be aware of this phenomenon. And those others who will not understand it are just stupid and evil, or something. But we, the enlightened, will understand it. Or something.

As for my employers and this Ramadan thing, I will say that the evening feast usually looks quite delicious. Perhaps they are trying to convert me with the promise of delicious food. It’s not working, alas. Well, if the promise of 72 virgins (or raisins, whatever) won’t do it, food won’t do it, then I guess they are just going to have to verify their claims rationally and empirically. Yeah, somehow philosophy wins over food and sex for me. Sorry, religion.

Atheist Communities and ‘religious’ behavior

Over the weekend I had a conversation with some friends about what the atheist community might need to do in order to create an environment that would replace that of the world of religion. The community, social activities, and even the rituals were mentioned, and it is clear that this is no easy question. But what I hope is commonly accepted by the atheist community is that we are not replacing religion; we don’t want to emulate the cultural institution in all ways. We are, I hope, trying to create activities and institutions to improve upon our culture, society, and ultimately the world. We are not going to build atheist churches, but we are going to build a better world based upon skeptical and rational thinking, evidence, and science.

But how?

First, I would like to make a distinction about what makes up religion. It is often said that if we are to get rid of religion (which is not the goal of most atheists, I don’t think), we would have to replace what religion does for people socially and so forth. But what I think is missed here is that the social gathering, community, common purpose that happens when religious communities are done well (As opposed to in-group feeling churches of intolerance, judgmental propensities, and in-fighting, which also is relatively common) are not unique nor original to religion. Just like how religion usurps the idea of morality as their own, religions often usurp the idea of community as their own idea. We are not trying to take away people’s communities, we are trying to install reality into them. There is no need to take away their group upon educating people, we just need to give them new visions of what their communities can be like. Reality is a good start.

Humans naturally group into communities. And while I want to see people of different views and opinions talking to each other more, it is clear that we seek out like-minds for most of our socializing. And so obviously when people come up with strange opinions about the nature of reality, they will seek out others who will accept those views and create churches, temples, and so forth. But the social grouping came first. What I take from this is that the atheist community does not have to worry that much about creating alternative communities for people who leave their faith, as that will happen naturally.

However, I think that we, as the atheist community, will need to think about how we organize those communities when we do create them. We do have to remember that there will be people who are scared, timid, and intimidated upon entering our community for the first time by those who are here and boisterous. We will have to keep in mind that there are people with very strong opinions and loud voices who will annoy other people. We have to keep in mind that there are genuine conflicts about definitions, tactics, and goals of the atheist community. And if we are to try to create umbrella groups (such as UnitedCOR), we have to keep those things in mind. But since I am not in a position of leadership of such an organization, I will not dwell on the details of how to do so. Mostly because I really don’t know.

All I want to emphasize is that what we call “religion” has aspects of it that are good. Most of these things are natural behaviors of humans whether those humans believe in silly theological positions or not. But much of what is natural in human groups are things we can leave behind, ideally. If we are going to, in the long-term, replace the institutions of “religion” with activities that don’t include gods, we will have to be prepared for the reality that things such as tribalism (like what happens between liberals and conservatives) will exist. In fact, with the arguments such as the one between gnu atheism and accommodationism, it is clear that this already exists. Because while atheism per se cannot be a religion, the communities that atheists can create will start to emulate, in many ways, the activities of religious groups. But the mistake that so many commentators make, in trying to argue that this implies that atheism is a religion, is that they forget that the group behaviors that they think of as “religious” are actually as secular as anything gets; they exist independent of religion. So the question is not whether atheism is a religion, but rather whether atheists will create groups like religious people, or whether they will improve upon the idea.

We need to be prepared, as atheists creating communities, that we are potentially subject to the same mistakes that we see in religious communities. And while we are unlikely to create a system which allows continual abuse (of children or anyone else) by our leaders, we are certainly capable of sectarian thinking and avoiding continual communication with people of differing opinions. We must deal with this now, not later. It’s not as important that we all agree on the definitions, tactics and goals of others (although it might be nice, ideally, to do so) so long as we are trying to comprehend those alternative definitions, tactics, and goals in order to work together when we need to, and set aside those debates for more appropriate times and places.

But we need to keep the lines of communication open, the enemization (rather than demonization) of those we disagree with to a realistic and appropriate minimum, and keep re-building our own views when they are presented with reasonable challenges. It’s not about being correct, it’s about staying correct.