Everyone is giving up. Me, I intend to persist in my folly. I’ve heard good things about that.
K. West, five years or hours, and spiders
I was listening to some David Bowie last night and was struck by the album art for Ziggy Stardust . Right above Bowie is a sign that says ...
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Following up on the idea that the pecked are no longer alone in their bodies , reader Ben Pratt has brought to my attention these remarks by... -
Disclaimer: My terms are borrowed (by way of Terry Boardman and Bruce Charlton) from Rudolf Steiner, but I cannot claim to be using them in ... -
I’ve been sailing all my life now Never harbor or port have I known The wide universe is the ocean I travel And the earth is my blue boat ho...
3 comments:
It is certainly time to give up on *some* things, like democracy, and regarding majority votes as providing legitimacy (which, of course, they never did anyway).
People talking about organizing a new nationalist/ populist political party... What? Haven't they noticed that those who voted; actually did more harm than good, because of vote-switching software in the machines. For many people it was literally better for Trump Not to vote at all (in the states where voting actually mattered).
Christians must adjust to having lost. That has been the situation for many/ most Christians (and many Christian denominations) throughout history.
The challenge is to be a Christian in an anti-Christian world. That isn't a novelty - what is a novelty is doing so in the face of opposition from the 'Christian churches', and therefore in the absence of a lot of things that have been considered essential to 'being a Christian' (or at least a Christian of a certain type).
But if it really is true that God the creator is our loving Father, then it will always be possible to be a sufficiently good Christian, no matter the circumstances. That's what people need to discover - and discover each for himself, because there is no a priori valid source that can tell them.
I gave up on democracy a long time ago and have abstained from voting for more than 20 years.
As for "legitimacy," I think it can only be defined within an established system of government. In a hereditary monarchy, the accepted order of succession confers legitimacy. In a democracy, voting does. Donald Trump is the legitimate President of the United States in the same way that Charles II was the legitimate King of England. Whether either democracy or hereditary succession is "a good thing" is a separate question.
@Wm - OK, but that just kicks the can. A legitimate King or elected official depends on the legitimacy of heredity or voting.
I saw through voting fully and finally pretty suddenly, due to participating in university democracy. Obviously the same experience did not lead to the same result in others - but it can happen to a group mind.
More deeply, all systems of government are wrong, but a spirit behind them can make them suffice - lacking that spirit they become evil. For all my hatred of democracy Now, I can see that when it was operating in an RW Emerson or a Walt Whitman-esque society, it will suffice.
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