The regimes we have now all over the West are not what would have been called democracy in Antiquity. They are oligarchic republics with, arguably a lower democratic index than the anti-plutocratic Roman Republic in its heyday. They attract the most wretched race, to lead us all astray.
One of the failings of Rome was sexism. If women are poorly treated, they end up as mental retards. That no doubt sounds fine to ardent misogynists, grossest machos and unreconstructed Islamists. However, women are on the frontline of child rearing until the age of seven or so. So mental retardation, or, at least, cultural retardation, is transmitted from generation to generation, the more sexist the society.
This is why the less sexist a civilization, the more advanced it tends to get.. And why, contrarily to all the flattery from orientalists and various exploiters have tried to make us believe, Islamist countries have mightily stagnated (in depth inspection reveals that most discoveries attributed to “Islam” have nothing to do with it).
The defeat of the Romans at the hands of the Germans may have had to do with sexism. The involvement of German women in war augmented the punch of small German nations considerably.
The Catalan born and raised Manuel Valls, the French Prime Minister, said: « La France est opposée à la légalisation de la GPA. Une pratique intolérable de marchandisation du corps des femmes ». Translation: surrogate motherhood is intolerable merchantization.
A mentally towering lady, who wants to stay anonymous, read my preceding essay and denounced it privately for being too mild. She said: “Most women who engage in surrogacy do not do so out of greed, but out of generosity, altruism. They want other people to enjoy parenthood.”
She pursued relentlessly: ”What does the French Prime Minister say to those who give a kidney? That they are intolerable merchants? And what of those who give blood, and are given a meal in exchange? Are they also engaged in intolerable merchantization?”
Another commenter, Gmax, piped in:”… Valls is a sexist, greed obsessed pig. Yes, pig…”
I stand corrected, and I agree. The problem of Valls is that he is from a system that finds normal to put Macron, an investment banker, the worst sort of bankster, in charge of the French economy. Valls lives, and has always lived, in a world of greed. As a youngster, he wanted already to lead people, tell them what to do, receive money from bankers (what else?), and make that his profession.
This is pretty much representative the sort of persons who make politics into their profession. All they can conceive of, is greed.
It does not help that Mr. Valls is a man. Men, by psychobiological definition, culturally boosted, tend to be more imbued by the Will To Power, grabbing, selling, possessing.
Generosity eludes them.
Generosity, altruism, giving, are more feminine qualities. They escape the French Prime Minster totally. All he knows is merchantization, so that’s what he talks about. He believes that, like himself, all women are for sale.
In general, the very way the present representative oligarchy works, the lowest motivation, greed, is how the representatives such as Mr. Valls are selected. We are selecting for ravenous scums, who cannot imagine any nobler emotions anymore than crocodiles can.
Nietzsche reconstituted it, conflating Sophocles, and a few others, into the wisdom of Silenus, the companion, and, some say, the mentor, of Dionysus, the god of loss of control (thus imaginative wisdom).
Says Nietzsche in the Birth of Tragedy:
”Wretched, ephemeral race, children of chance and tribulation, why do you force me to tell you the very thing which it would be most profitable for you not to hear? The very best thing is utterly beyond your reach: not to have been born, not to be, to be nothing. However, the second best thing for you is: to die soon.”
Did Nietzsche think of out great leaders? What better thing to tell to those who have the arrogance to believe they can lead us, as if we were living in the Chinese dictatorship?
At some point, it’s useless to negotiate with obsolete systems of thought: they should be bulldozed over. Lincoln did not negotiate with slavery, nor Martin Luther King with the racists.
By being unable to imagine a world without greed, as the one and only significant motivation, the French leadership shows that it does not conceive of anything different from what Thatcher or Reagan advocated.
Patrice Ayme’
Tags: Altruism, Generosity, greed, Prime Minister, Professional Politician, Sexist, Surrogate Pregnancy, Valls
Patrice Ayme's Thoughts 
October 5, 2014 at 2:03 am |
I’m blaming the abnormal greed for everything, it’s why climate is changing, it’s why there is no healthy food anymore, it’s why people have epidemic cancer rate, it’s why half of population will die out of obesity, it’s why we are pressurized to use goods that are anything but good. The greed drives this planet, and unfortunately because of it we might not be able to survive for more than additional 30 years: pollution, toxicity, diseases, genetic errors leading to inability to reproduce next generations. Some people will be sitting on piles of money when the end of this planet comes. Good for them, however, who would ever imagine such shortsightedness?
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October 5, 2014 at 4:36 am |
Hello Inese, and welcome! Your comment is much appreciated. Greed has become, indeed, an all consuming religion.
A funny example, in the USA, is putting corn syrup everywhere. That was a consequence of a collusion between government and corn growers (corn requires enormous quantities of water and fertilizers).
I have a highly cynical point of view. Although many people are into shortsightedness, denial, deeper down inside, more sinister instincts are at work. Since ever, too many men has meant ecological disaster, and just as crowded rats become lethally aggressive, so it is with humans now. All this “shortsightedness” is lethal, indeed, and that may be its deepest reason for being.
Now, of course, once we understand all this, people of good will may be able to unite towards nicer outcomes…
PA
PA
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October 5, 2014 at 12:08 pm |
Back to my contrarian ways. Silex stones produce light only if forcibly struck one against the other.
I owe Valls a personal favor, which may make me reluctant to shower him, personally, with the contempt much of his stated positions richly deserve.
However I must state in all fairness that although he is in love with power, he has not been, so far, associated with greed, graft or sleaze.
And I recognize that my contempt for his positions is vented from the safety of my home office, whereas he is on the frontline. There is a war on, and in a war, armchair generals can afford to be bloodthirsty.
Whatever pleasure and self-congratulation can be achieved from bashing individuals such as Valls, Hollande or even Macron, the only proper approach to this whole issue is a dispassionate view of the Hollande team’s performance and strategy.
This is difficult, because we only have appearances and communication (aka spin) to go by. I can only offer speculation and beg for patience as I offer it.
First there is the unsolved mystery of a shrewd, carnivorous, ambitious political animal – Hollande – who suddenly embarked on a course of political self-destruction of which he is most certainly aware. His political career will be over in 2017 at the latest, and contrary to open Pluto-lovers such as Blair or Sarkozy, he has no hope whatsoever of getting into the plush world of finance-backed power movers, because to those guys he’s still a Red and will remain a Red.
His lurch to austerian dogmatism can have two explanations – sincere conviction that it is the right path, or calculation.
I doubt the former – if only because he is highly intelligent. But I do not discard it, of course.
On the other hand, one must observe that his unrelenting advocacy of austerity and liberalism does not really translate to substantial actions or results. “We’re not in austerity” the austerians wail – and they are right. The political ground he loses on the left is not gained on the right.
If this political disaster is underpinned by an ulterior motive, I would submit that, so far, this course has allowed France to escape both the catastrophic impact of austerity, and the wrath of the austerian, German-led CE. The picture that comes to mind is that of a French poodle on a leash, which nevertheless goes where it damn likes, while deftly avoiding his unamused mistress’ kicks in the ribs and occasionally dry-humping her boots in a show of delirious adoration.
In that light, Hollande’s strategy might have been prompted by an early assessment of France’s position of weakness in the international context, leading him to conclude that France was a reed rather than an oak, and acting accordingly.
Hearts of oak may well deride the reeed’s flutters and twists as the gale buffets it, but in the end, guess which survives.
This explanation would account nicely for Hollande’s only identifiable strategy so far – retreating and surrendering with gay abandon whenever he is challenged by the enraged right, and ignoring the left’s stout-hearted jibes. It is more consistent with his behavior so far than the easy characterizations of stupidity and cowardice which do not really fit him. (and I did take my part in the heckling; indeed I will go on; this heckling is central to such a strategy).
In such a context, Valls’ abject surrender to the religious crazies can be seen as yet another shock-absorbing move. Infuriating, but needed. And ultimately without substantial consequence.
I can see you sharpening your gypaete talons to eviscerate me. Reminding me that Lincoln “did not negotiate with slavery”. But he did that, very extensively, canvassing Southern senators with unrelenting patience, and making concessions best hidden from today’s schoolchildren – such as allowing slave owners to recapture escaped slaves on the territory of non-slaving States, or ordering the Federal Navy to leave alons slavers which carried American slaves, while boarding those with African slaves.
And again, guess who won in the end.
Running to my atomic shelter now.
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October 5, 2014 at 8:07 pm |
Well, Dominique, thanks for the long, thoughtful essay. I started a “comment” to answer you, but then, because I am actually more or less organizing a party (!!!!!!!!!!!!! What is this world coming to?), I decided to turn it into a little essay.
The real problem is why there is no left.
That is why I fired countless broadsides at my friend Obama (your reasoning above is sturdy…. As long as it can apply to Obama too!), and then at Krugman. I gave up on Obama after he massacred his presidency irretrievably.
Now he is just a care-taker, and, as such, is doing pretty well. Maybe he finally understood how incredibly much manipulated he has been… Finally. Hollande, methinks, is going through the same process.
So what’s the cause of all this? The likes of Krugman, or, more precisely, and worse, the fact that most people think that Krugman is as left as one can go before laughter sets in.
I know perfectly well the PLUTO CRATIC NYT won’t let Krugman go more left than he does. As witness the incredible amount of censorship I am submitted to there (they know who I am since 2003, in the sense they took me seriously, albeit not lovingly, then).
The real problem is that there is no progressive guidance. A proof is my struggle in philo circles right now to impose the correct view of Aristotle.
OK, more in the essay, I have a party to go to…
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October 6, 2014 at 12:47 pm |
interesting…
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October 6, 2014 at 12:50 pm |
Several feminists fell on me like asteroids, and I had to expand my views in a more severe, anti-male chauvinist sense.
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November 3, 2014 at 5:00 am |
Chris Snuggs I think France should introduce a minimum wage of 100€ an hour. At least then the country would go bankrupt fast instead of suffering this lingering, drawn-out economic and later social collapse thanks to the cretinous policies of the political elite which seems to think that the world owes France a living.
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