Some concepts build community.
And others are manufactured only to keep only a few in power.
When you are raised relativist, you are taught that there are no truths, or, that there are multiple truths. You have no anchor, no standards, with which to evaluate any given concept.
But you can notice something - is this concept, this idea that is being presented to you, creating happy people? Emma Goldman said, “if you are going to have a revolution, you should have fun doing it.” Fun times make you happy. Cynicism should not be permanent state to be in. You may need to define what “happy “ is, what “happy” means to you.
In liberal Brookline Mass, we were groomed to be cynical. Cynical was the norm. We were not groomed to be good to ourselves, to make something of ourselves, to get along with others, or to give the benefit of the doubt. We were to seek racism and injustice in the very interactions we had in our families, with our peers.
Groomed into activism, our liberal and leftist educators cared nothing about how all this so called “raised awareness” that we had would end up affecting our relationships, or our ability to work in a group with diverse people. It turned out that the “content of our character” was in fact second to the state of agitation we were expected to be in so that we would be ready to spring into action, into a fight, and not even action on behalf of ourselves, but as followers.
Please take a moment to reflect if a given idea you are hearing is organic to the human experience, congruent with the best of most great civilizations, and gives you tools to relate well to people.
The leaders who you admire who cannot define a word are stoking intellectual anarchy. They are stoking just enough anarchy so that you will be dislodged from any intellectual anchor - that is, until you are in their grip, then, no more free thinking is allowed.
The anarchy is just enough to dislodge you, disconnect you from you community and classic truths, and decidedly NOT to keep you in a state of endless flux, but to then follow those who are claiming that simple words “mean lots of things to lots of people” ie - there are no definitions.
This is springboard to then being owned by these new so-called leaders. Then, your freedom will be choked off. You will have cut off your roots, and be at the mercy of an intellectual machine that promised you freedom, but ended up chaining you to their new dictates, and intimidating you should you question them.
Hey, they should be wary of you. If you dislodged yourself from a classic opinion and joined the throngs of intellectual anarchists, then you may just use that freedom of thought that got you there in order to question them someday.
Only a very few can stay in positions of power in a relativist society. Their gold dust will not rub off on you. You pledged loyalty to their anti-establishment stance, but you know that once they sense that you may not walk in lock step with them all the way, they will turn on you, and you will have nothing left.
These so-called leaders in relativist-think do not even mean what they say, they do not live by what they say.
They are testing you. Resist them.
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Here are some examples: it is impossible that anyone can really believe in abortion up to birth. They are testing you and in fact hoping you will put limits on them. So go ahead and put up limits.
It is impossible that gender is suddenly fluid, it is impossible that underage children should be given the chance to choose their gender. Just say "no" to this.
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Another: Leading feminists Gloria Steinham and Marlo Thomas promoted individualism, eschewed marriage and children, and claimed that women should not invest in their appearance. They both eventually married, galling many who had admired them, and were head-turning in their prettiness, photogenic and thin. They had much fulfillment from their positions of influence, a level of fulfillment that cannot be achieved my most because positions of influence are by definition limited.
Fulfillment can be achieved by living in a strong family and community. But following the dictates of leading individualist feminists will turn you into a confronter, and decidedly not someone who gets along well with people.
Another:
Jewish studies professor, small New England College, mid 1980's thrilled that a student like me appeared to be in step with his message of intellectual anarchy, one of them being that there is no definition of the term "Jew" or "Jewish". Just because I was listening fully did not mean that I agreed with him, but he took my attentiveness as a sign of being a future follower. He smirked and scowled and sneered a lot, made fun of the Jewish Sabbath, of the kosher laws, and was in stark contrast to those professors who offered much objective information and left it for the student to continue studying, having been given the tools of "learning how to learn". I confronted him when he said something that was outright antisemitic (oh he was Jewish so he could play with antisemitic imagery, right? Wrong).
And then all that scowling was turned upon me.
Self-imposed so-called leaders who are not connected to classic ideas but to promoting their own agendas will turn on you. Avoid them.
They gain much fulfillment from their positions of influence, a level of
fulfillment that cannot be achieved my most because positions of
influence are by definition limited.
Connect with people who are fine with you if you question, if you do not fall in lock-step, like relativists want you to.
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