Quote of the Day: Tribalism

Bravest Man in America's picture
Submitted by Bravest Man in ... on Mon, 2008-02-04 22:52.

What are the nature and the causes of modern tribalism? Philosophically, tribalism is the product of irrationalism and collectivism. It is a logical consequence of modern philosophy. If men accept the notion that reason is not valid, what is to guide them and how are they to live?

Obviously, they will seek to join some group—any group—which claims the ability to lead them and to provide some sort of knowledge acquired by some sort of unspecified means. If men accept the notion that the individual is helpless, intellectually and morally, that he has no mind and no rights, that he is nothing, but the group is all, and his only moral significance lies in selfless service to the group—they will be pulled obediently to join a group. But which group? Well, if you believe that you have no mind and no moral value, you cannot have the confidence to make choices—so the only thing for you to do is to join an unchosen group, the group into which you were born, the group to which you were predestined to belong by the sovereign, omnipotent, omniscient power of your body chemistry.
This, of course, is racism. But if your group is small enough, it will not be called "racism": it will be called "ethnicity."

Ayn Rand


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National Australian Sorry Day

HWH's picture
Submitted by HWH on Tue, 2008-02-05 22:54.

I know it's just Rudd taking care of the cheapest election promises, but I thought this little e-mail doing the rounds falls squarely into this new topic.

Reminds me of the oft-seen spectacle in South Africa where they would televise the claiming of some ancestral property by a savage dressed in feathers, skins and bones stepping out of a limo whilst chatting on his mobile phone..and then the appeasers claim we shouldn't be judging cultures...Ha!

______________________________________________________

AUSTRALIAN APOLOGY TO THE ABORIGINAL POPULATION

We apologise for giving you doctors and free medical care, which allows you to survive and multiply so that you can demand apologies.

We apologise for helping you to read and teaching you the English language and thus we opened up to you the entire European civilisation, thought and enterprise.

We feel that we must apologise for building hundreds of homes for you, which you have vandalised and destroyed.

We apologise for giving you law and order which has helped prevent you from slaughtering one another and using the unfortunate for food purposes.

We apologise for developing large farms and properties, which today feed you people, where before, you had the benefits of living off the land and starving during droughts.

We apologise for providing you with warm clothing made of fabric to replace that animal skins you used before.

We apologise for building roads and railway tracks between cities and building cars so that you no longer have to walk over harsh terrain.

We apologise for paying off your vehicle when you fail to pay the instalments.

We apologise for giving you free travel anywhere, whenever.

We apologise for giving each and every member of your family $100.00 and free travel to attend an aboriginal funeral.

We apologise for not charging you rent on any lands when white people have to pay.

We apologise for giving you interest free loans.

We apologise for developing oil wells and minerals, including gold and diamonds which you never used and had no idea of their value.

We apologise for developing Ayers rock and Kakadu, and handing them over to you so that you get all the money.

We apologise for allowing taxpayers money paid towards daughters' wedding ($8,000.00 each daughter)

We apologise for giving you $1.7 billion per year for your 250,000 people, which is $48,000.00 per aboriginal man, woman and child.

We apologise for working hard to pay taxes that finance your welfare, medical care, education, etc. to the tune of $1.2 billion each year.

We apologise for you having to approach the aboriginal affairs department to verify the above figures. For the trouble you will have identifying the "uncle toms" in your own community who are getting richer and leaving some of you living in squalor and poverty.

We do apologise. We really do.

We humbly beg your forgiveness for all the above sins.

We are only too happy to take back all the above and return you to the paradise of the "outback", whenever you are ready.

___________________________________________________

I admit that reason is a small and feeble flame, a flickering torch by stumblers carried in the starless night, -- blown and flared by passion's storm, -- and yet, it is the only light. Extinguish that, and nought remains.- - Robert Green Ingersoll


Rand Hits the Nail on the Head. . .

jriggenbach's picture
Submitted by jriggenbach on Tue, 2008-02-05 16:42.

. . . with an excellent description of the type of mentality that says "we" and "us" when referring to the U.S. government.

JR


In Tribal Retardation

F L Light's picture
Submitted by F L Light on Tue, 2008-02-05 04:41.

1
Tribes in resentful communes are not tried
By reason, taking ritual as a guide.
2
Their ethnic, envious wretchedness much worse
Becomes as socialists commend this curse.
3
In tribal retardation truculent
Reluctance to the trials of reason is ill-meant.
4
Where ethnic slowness is impoverishing,
See tribes in fixed resentments sickening.
5
In tribal retardation men resent
That reason would impugn their management.
6
Too primitive for human promptitude,
All tribal businesses have been subdued.
7
The hebetude of tribal habitats
Abides enthusiastic theocrats.
8
Too primitive for thoughtful promptitude,
They let untenable taboos obtrude.
9
In tribal prolongation of constraint,
Punctilious superstitions are not faint.
10
Truly resentful tribal wretches try
To wrench ambition down and see it die.
11
In tribal prolongation, stupefied
Continuance of resentment will abide.
12
Truly resentful tribal wretches let
No village inmate new ideas beget.

http://photon.blog.co.uk
http://theeleutherian.blogspot.com


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