Statists want you to believe you're stupid

dullhawk (66)in #liberty • 5 years ago

Statists want you to believe you aren't smart enough to know how to solve problems. They say you have to trust the president or congress or the city council to do what's necessary because you can't possibly understand the issues. You don't see "The Big Picture"* and don't understand "how these things work".

How convenient for them.

Erich Fromm had something to say about this vulgar lie:

"One kind of smokescreen is that the problems are too complicated for the average individual to grasp. On the contrary it would seem that many of the basic issues of individual and social life are very simple, so simple. in fact, that everyone should be expected to understand them. To let them appear to be so enormously complicated that only a "specialist" can understand them, and he only in his limited field, actually-- and often intentionally-- tends to discourage people from trusting their own capacity to think about those problems that really matter. The individual feels hopelessly caught in a chaotic mass of data and with pathetic patience waits until the specialists have found out what to do and where to go." -- Escape from Freedom

I see statists use this tactic all the time.

You can't understand why it's not a good idea to get rid of all anti-gun "laws" because you don't have the wisdom and experience of the police unions, the BATFEces, the FBI, or federal judges. It's simplistic to believe you can be responsible for yourself and that an armed populace would deter archation.
You can't understand the nuances of "border security" because you aren't an expert. You can't just respect all property rights (including ending all welfare) and respect the right of defense-- it would be chaos.
You're not a scientist so you can't understand the data pointing to Climate Change. Trust the experts to tell you what you'll have to do to avoid this disaster they say is coming.

Statists need to make you believe the world is too complicated for individuals to understand. Otherwise, you might realize you don't need their god to save you. So they constantly order you to "leave it to the professionals who know best". They constantly insult you and your intelligence. They get paternalistic and condescending as they assure you "government knows best".

Don't be so uppity as to notice that their "professionals" and "experts" are always on the side of violating YOUR natural human rights and imposing more control over YOUR life.

Yeah, the world is complex. But if the average human can't understand it, clumping sub-average humans together in a gang you call "government" isn't going to magically give them superhuman abilities. Quite the opposite. I'll trust the spontaneous order arising from the self-interested actions of free individuals before I trust the "wisdom" of monopolistic government being imposed on everyone.

*I once worked for a business that I saw doing really dumb, self-destructive things on orders from the manager. Being a good employee who wanted to see the business thrive, I told this manager what I thought and his standard response was that I didn't see "The Big Picture" that only he could see.

I swear I didn't say "I told you so" every time the things I warned him of came to pass.

But I sure did think it a lot.

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#statism #intelligence #complicated #simplicity

5 years ago in #liberty by dullhawk (66)

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steampunkkaja (52) 5 years ago

Your third bullet point is the most poignant - and also the most infuriating. Arguments from authority are worthless in science, and the fact that politicians use science to prop up their positions when it suits them irritates me to no end. They know that the public generally respects what science has to say, and if they can't find a legitimate scientific study to back up their claims, they'll either make something up, or bribe someone to fudge the data. However, science for hire is no science at all, because the scientific method is to draw a conclusion from available evidence, not find evidence to support a pre-established conclusion; that would be the ideological method. The sad part is that, regardless of whether "science" claims that the world is getting warmer or cooler, most of the data cited by both climate chaos fearmongers and climate change deniers is fake. The public isn't even exposed to what science actually says about the climate, because it's such a hot-button political issue these days. "Keep burning oil to heat your homes, keep making that hideous commute into the city so we don't have to pay you enough to live in the city," they say on one side, "get rid of your car, cover your roof in solar panels, stop eating meat," they screech on the other. Both positions are equally ridiculous.