SUBSTANCE: It is here on steemit. It is often lacking in day to day conversations...
I was just watching a video with Douglas Murray in it and he has perhaps coined the term Islamophilia. I am not going to go into that word in any kind of depth as really it was not the meaning of that word that caught my attention. It was the behavior that went along with it, and that behavior goes far beyond Muslim/Islam in scope. He was mentioning how enamored people often are (even Hollywood celebrities) with Islam when they themselves are not Islamic. Then he made a quick statement that went to the heart of why I am writing this post. He said they are often enamored with something they know little to nothing about. They are praising and endorsing things of which they themselves have no knowledge.
At that point I had to stop watching. Not because I disagreed, and I hadn't even really gotten to what that particular video was about. I had to stop as I decided I needed to write this post. I immediately pictured what he was talking about as a current day problem that is far larger than Islamophilia.
I realized the praising and endorsing of things by people that know almost nothing about those things is very common. I'd even argue that a good portion of anything that requires much background research is endorsed purely as some kind of herd popularity movement. The herd has decided it likes topic X so I'm going to talk about how great topic X is. Anyone that talks against topic X I am going to attack, belittle, shame, and do whatever I can. How dare they challenge X?
What do you know about X?
It's good. That's all I need to know.
What is good about it?
Everything!
Do you know how it does Y?
Oh, you're one of those. You're an anti-Xist. This is a waste of time. I am going to leave now.
How many crowd endorsements these days are being carried out by crowds that predominantly know very little about what they are endorsing? By observation I am thinking it may be a higher number than we would like to consider. Reason, rationality, and knowing something about what you are talking about and endorsing is becoming increasingly viewed as not only unnecessary, but as a bad thing.
Is it easy, and does it feel right?
Those are today's ultimate measures for determining truth.
Facts? You're a hater if you try to talk about facts. We don't need them. We can just FEEL what the universe is telling us. If it feels good it must be true. If it feels bad it must be false.
The world is a beautiful place that is easy if you just let it be.
NOTE: Large portions of this should be taken as satire, sarcasm, or both. I don't personally believe this EASY, FEEL GOOD approach to reality. In fact I see that as a fairy tale. Yet looking around me that seems to be the predominant way people seem to be trying to view reality. Is this the partially the result of too much exposure to so-called "reality" TV that has tons of cameras, is very scripted, repeated for camera angle, etc.
You can watch survival shows of someone supposedly trying to survive lost in the desert... How many people pay attention to all of the interesting camera angles that occur? How many people think "I wonder who is filming that shot?" which then leads to "How many people are actually there?" Then you might think... "Pretty easy to talk about how awesome you are at surviving when you have an entire film crew stomping around with you, and likely some vehicles not far away..." "Do you have any more of that bottle water handy?" as the star stands up from the fold out chair with the word STAR written on it and walks a few feet into the desert.
Source: STRATIS: The Sunday School Drop-out
I guess it prepares them for being a CNN reporter. :)
Spot on analysis! There actually is a psychological phenomenon that ties into this: the Dunning-Kruger Effect. Basically it states that the less we know about something, the less we realize how little we actually know - and therefore feel more certain on the subject. You see this everywhere, from politics to professional environments to people claiming their favorite hobby is the best thing just happened to mankind.
Interestingly, the opposite is also true: the more we know, the more we realize how little we know. This is why often (not always) the most brilliant minds seem so humble about their knowledge.
I think that serves as a wise lesson to anyone who feels certain they are an expert on any subject. As long as you feel the need to boast about it, you might just want to check yourself for how much you really know.
You've inspired me to write a little piece about this, hopefully I'll get it out here in steemit
Send me a link here when you're done writing it.
Will do!
Thanks
Totally awesome point for discussion on this Monday morning!
As I read through this a second time-- trying to crystallize some of my own thoughts and observations that have been germinating in my mind for some months-- I kept coming back to that meme near the bottom:
FAKE IS THE NEW REAL
Clever and flip on the surface... but also a reflection of a world in which more and more people are trapped in a paradigm within which they feel compelled that they need to "be MORE ____"
More... WHAT?
Cool. Smart. Open minded. Worldly. Popular. Hip. Successful. Outspoken. Alternative. Free. Liberal. Conservative. Intellectual. Redneck.
It used to be that people mostly "overconsumed" in the physical realm... we acquired "things" and "assets." But we're slowly moving towards a postcosumer society where our tendencies to overconsume is being transferred to "attention." And how do you get attention?
You have to become a mass consumer of attention getting personal attributes. Fake or real, we don't care. Especially in Hollyweird. In fact, fake is better... and so, far more people relate to "Survivor" than to "Survivorman."
As a life-long liberal, I'm scared to death of America's modern Left. It's almost like they view critical thinking as "selling out" or as being"part of the establishment". Simply interviewing an "alt-right" personality is enough to get you labeled as a Nazi these days. Mentioning facts that don't feel good is enough to get you labeled a klan member.
Which puts you squarely in the classical liberal camp...
What they call liberal today is nothing of the sort.
The Walking Dead is a lot safer... zombies in that are slower, and easy to manipulate and deal with. :)
There always seems to be a fascination with the unknown... not a very good reason to endorse it, it's contrary even opposite of common sense. One should investigate thoroughly before endorsing anything.
There was always something fascinating about the Middle East to me years ago... Tales of the Arabian Nights... Cairo in the 1920's under a full moon- Western men in white tuxes, women in evening gowns. Egyptian men in fez's there was something so exotic about it. Not, however, a good reason for endorsement. It's easy to jump to conclusions... if something is exotic, it must be deserving of endorsement. I can see the attraction for shallow Hollyweird types, the ones that jump on any bandwagon deemed haute mode. Herbert Spencer once wrote that condemnation prior to investigation leads to perpetual ignorance... so too does endorsement.
Leaving totally aside the optics on religions and dogmas of cultural beliefs. I will concentrate my comment on what's mentioned in the last paragraph of your article. "Reality TV Substance"
While the Current Educational System insist on not teaching our children to think for themselves and if they simply persist on refuse on provide to them the right tools to actually learn to LEARN properly. I'm afraid that the new generations will be stunned beyond doom. Because unless that truly conscious parents strongly intervene early in their proper education at home. It will be each day harder to open their young and inexperienced eyes & minds to the appropriate levels of digest reality. And prolly will never occur to them to pause for a moment to question what is in front of their noses as to consider raise at least one of the italic logical questions you've described in that last paragraph. :/
I'll watch "Finding Bigfoot" sometimes and I chuckle as I watch all the camera angles and imagine these big packs of camera men smashing through the woods while these guys whoop and yell. Then the supposed solo investigations can have interesting camera moments too which clearly show it is not solo. IF there is truly something like that out there I doubt this type of thing would ever find it. Yet, that really isn't the goal I think. It's just to have a serial spectacle.
Dang, I was getting all my pro -Islam comments ready in my head. I do not white knight often for them but Moslems are actually another group of people that could be on our side in the peaceful fight against the centralistic NWO.
Are you religious btw? Me Atheism with sprinkling of agnosticism .
Oh and from an outside perspective the american media seems to be like the worst propaganda machine there is.
It was funny that our media at least had the dignity to report on how all this we invest in private investors for Africa is a hoax before they did (not) show the G20 meeting.
Switzerland media is pretty awesome. They are the ones that interviewed Assad.
In a way the American people are the most informed but also the most misinformed people, due to your media being such a huge power, your media dictates what our media is saying about you btw. My father is still suspicious about the Trump Putin relationship....
I usually chuckle and say I am an Atheist/Deist (not Theist) and I expect to be challenged on the contradiction. It doesn't happen very often.
I've written a post about it once. For a long time it was one of my favorite posts... but it is one of those that didn't do too well when I wrote it. :)
The little religion that history has forgotten... Deism (not to be confused with Theism)
Well, since god was never mentioned once in your texts, I was pretty sure you are a heretic as well ;). Christians tend to hide their religion quite a bit, which is actually something I really don't like. In Islam it is one of the guidelines that you should preach your believes and let me ask you if you don't think your ideas/religion are not worth spreading is there any point in them after all?
But there are I actually think there is a big flaw in saying "all religions are evil", I mean monotheism is kind of authoritarian by default, but what about Polytheism where you can choose which god you think is the coolest of them? :D
Yep, basically I don't believe in organized religion, or revealed (by visions, prophecy, dreams, etc) religions.
Many had enough trouble explaining strange phenomena. They always can only do it within the confines of the knowledge they currently have and the words they have.
The universe is vast. There is a lot of very naive stuff in most religions, especially with what we now know. Yet people (often even scientists) will gladly suspend reason when it comes to religion.
That doesn't mean there is no creator, or that there is a creator. I am not agnostic as I do care and the post I linked you describes in the latter half my thoughts on the topic fairly well.
I consider it very arrogant of people to act like they know the secrets of the universe when so many of the things we know today were not even concepts we could have explained 100 years ago. That continues as you go back in history.
Could there be a creator? Sure. Yet I'm certain it's not in any of the human books we have written.
I don't attack people's religion as it is the core of their reality and it does bring some people comfort. I do see a lot of "evil" done in the name of religions and the people doing it typically justify it somehow and think they are doing "good".
As long as it is not forced on me, and laws are not passed that impact me based upon them then I don't much care what religion people believe and practice.
what do you think about the "saying" that science has become the new religion? There is nothing you can say against the opinion of a scientist, you are not qualified. And remember every field of live can be studied and thus produce scientists.
I like to argue with people about their religion, and I tend to be very negative towards christian people. One of my main claims would be that they are actually deists because the "I see god in nature"/"It is not impossible that higher powers exist"-stuff is also something many christians told me. I always said "that is nice and dandy, but why call yourself a christian instead of just individualist theist or something?"
Mhh I can't really recall you touching on agnosticism. I always thought it meant that you believe there is some higher power within nature/life that we can not describe/see yet. I have to admit I saw an Agnostic only talk once on yt and it made me think that I dont want to get lumped up too hard with those people.
I say those people are not scientists. :)
Being a scientist does not require a degree. If you know the scientific method and you use it and follow it then you are a scientist.
You may not be a skilled scientist or be even particularly good in the areas you are exploring with science, but if you know the scientific method and use it then you are technically a scientist.
The scientific method does not have a state where it is no longer allowed to question, challenge, hypothesize, etc.
Thus those that are against that, are not practicing science. They are in fact practicing a religion as they are treating it as dogma.
Yet science itself did not change, they did.
They are not scientists. They are priests.
This is why when I hear someone talk about consensus which is an Appeal to Popularity or Band wagon fallacy I shake my head as that is not science.
That is trying to shut people down. Calling names "conspiracy theorist", "truther", "anti-vaxxer", etc to me is no different from other religions saying "heretic", "blasphemer", "apostate", or "infidel".
So science is not becoming a religion. Those people are simply no longer practicing science.
but dont you think that in the mind of the people science has replaced religion but the science in their head still has a very religious character. Especially if you go into social science and especially education.
Oh and I hate most established science communities because even if they say that there can't be only one truth they often say stuff like there are different opinions, but there is definitely a preferable one... They also butchered statistics in education class so hard that I could not watch it for much longer:
classes with 22 children show now significant learning difference to class with 27 children, ergo the idea that smalller classes are better is a hoax. I got really mad at this way of interpreting numbers.
Some of them definitely. I blame a lot of that on the education system.
I actually don't consider a good deal of people that get the label scientist these days as actually scientists.
Do they think they are scientists? Sure. The problem is if they are not following the scientific method then technically they are not. :)
Except, they don't just walk away, or tune out. If you are deemed an anti-X, and they don't even have to watch the video, they just know it from the title (which actually may be about an 18th century dessert - which actually happened) they go on a rampage against you. Not just verbally (or in the written version), they seriously try to do damage, whether with the down-vote button (which I think is why FaceBook doesn't have one), or doxing, or any way they can annihilate you. It's called indoctrination. Don't question anything, everything is good, and above all else, attack anyone who suggests otherwise. Good post.
I agree with you in general @dwinblood except I would add that I find most speaking hatred also know very little of what they are talking about!
How many are aware that Islam is very similar to Christianity? When speaking of religion there is always good and bad in all. And in all religions people are still individuals whom pick and choose what to follow.
If interested you can learn a lot about Islam in a 45 minute video called "Mohammed's last speech" (it may surprise some)
Oh I agree. Other than in my intro image where I tried to emphasize feminists praising Islam when it is not very EQUAL or FREE for women.
Yet, in my post I didn't bash Islam once. I only opened with how it was a video I was watching talking about it that inspired my post.
After that I didn't have anything to say about Islam. I referred to everything as X. Why? Because, as I stated I realized peoples endorsement of things they know nothing about extends way beyond Islam.
I am not a Christian. I do not believe in any REVEALED or organized religions. I am fine with other people believing what they want as long as they don't force it upon me, or pass laws based upon their religious beliefs that force me or others not of their faith to do things.
I also collect bibles and religious texts and have most of my life. I know quite a lot about religion and if I wanted to spend all day bashing them all I need do is open up the books and start reading. That is not my goal. I do not plan on doing that.
Yet, the intro image was the closest to Islam bashing that the post had. The text did not. As stated the purpose of my image was to show Feminist endorsing Islam which if you read it and study it is not at all equal for females. How many virgins do females get when they die?
I'm sorry if I gave the impression that you were bashing Islam @dwinblood, that was not my intention nor did it cross my mind. I was referring to a wave of online ignorance (as you touched on)
To answer your last question, this might surprise you but women are treated and receive the same as men in Muslim heaven. As for the virgins/servants both sexes receive the same amount but they are heavenly creations (meaning they were never people) and it's important to note that most do not believe in that as they claim it's equivalent to how many Christian believe in Genesis today.
I'm not a person of Faith either but I have spent time studying Judaism, Christianity and Islam. I actually enjoy studying others beliefs but especially if it something I wish to speak about (like you touched on)
Cheers brother
The closest I've come to defining what I am is defined in PART of this old post of mine.
I often would say I am an atheist/deist and wait for some reaction. Most of the time no one took the bait. :)
Yup you nailed it, if it is filmed for reality there is none there!
Its ironic you didn't finish seeing the movie, and started writing :) its even more ironic, that I didn't finish reading your post, and started commenting. What a junkfood world, ah? ;)
Oh I went back to listening to the video after I posted this. What inspired me was a more macroscopic view of a thing he was describing as people doing.
You are good