The Virginia Society for the Preservation and Appreciation of High-Quality Posts

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

https://bariweiss.substack.com/p/everybody-hates-the-jews

In this ideology, science is at the mercy of politics, identity trumps ideas, and obvious truths are dangerous to say out loud. Silence is violence, they say, but violence, when directed at the right people, is justified. Racism is the gravest of sins, but racism, when directed at the right targets, is the price of justice. Bullying in theory is wrong, the bullying of the right people is not just okay, it is a virtue. In the name of anti-racism it imposes racist policies. In the name of culture, it erases art. In the name of progress, it rewrites — even deletes — our history.

Perhaps most significantly, in the name of equality and justice this ideology insists that it is better to have everyone worse off than to be unequal in any way. If some people lose the race, the race must be dismantled.

There is endless whining about the various grievances of "indigenous peoples" of all sorts, which is ironic because the Jews have the most valid claim to be the true "indigenous" people of not just the 1948 boundaries of Israel, but the whole of Judea and Samaria as well.  The Jews are a people that have not only been dispersed around the World, they have been subjected to systematic and planned genocide in countries they were relocated to.  In the last 200 years, Russia and Germany are examples.

What the Jews wanted was a piece of the World's Turf.  The 1948 boundaries were boundaries that the Jewish people had a real claim to.  The Arab nations waged war against the Jews on day one.  The Palestinians, who had collaborated with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and Hitler during WWII (yes, THAT Grand Mufti) blocked European Jews from escaping to safety in Israel.  They tried again in 1967.  This time, the Jewish People decided to maintain enough land in order to defend themselves,  A number of Arab nations have made peace with Israel today, but the Palestinians have never, ever, acknowledged Israel's right to exist, not even within its present borders.

There are legitimate issues here.  In 1977 a professor of mine (an observant Jew teaching Israeli Politics) pointed out to us that Israel, within its 1977 borders, would have an Arab majority someday, based on birthrates, and this would be true even if every Jew from America and the USSR emigrated to Israel and Israel could absorb such immigration.  This begged the question of what becomes of a Jewish State with an Arab Majority.  

Second class citizenship for Arabs is not something that neither the world  nor I would find acceptable (even while some of it overlooked other sins of this sort in other places).  But what, then, would be a safe place for World Jewry?  Hitler happened; the Holocaust was a mere 32 years in the past at that time, and it happened in a first world Western Civilized nation (Germany) that, up until Hitler, was one of the more liberal and tolerant places for Jews in Europe.  The Jews have a unique case to claim a piece of the World's Turf, and they have an indigenous people's type of claim to the one they have now.  Should there be no lasting consequences for the folks that collaborated with Hitler and the Grand Mufti?  Should there be lasting consequences for firing rockets down on civilians (as the Palestinians have repeatedly done?  Should there be lasting consequences for initiating wars of aggression against Israel and then losing them?  And can we count the number of Arab states that could easily provide sanctuary for "Palestinian Refugees"?

You'll forgive me, but the Palestinians don't have the moral high ground here.  They never have, and they don't as of now.  That does not justify their mistreatment, but much mistreatment has come at their hands.  To consider the Palestinians blameless in all of this is nothing short of delusional.  I would ask, however, what is needed for Jews to actually BE safe in the World, absent a land that they can consider to be their piece of the World's Turf?  There are any number of folks here that I would like to hear from on THAT specific issue.  

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Just feel like reminding everyone that Joe Manchin killed the Child Tax Credit, directly condemning tens of millions of American children to poverty, with West Virginians being among the hardest hit places proportionally because he thought a staffer was rude to him and a few people kayaked with signs outside his yatch.

Just because everyone seems to have forgotten that. No it had jack all to do with inflation. Go back and check the articles, it’s about him wanting work requirements on literally everything (including, hilariously, paid leave from work) because he’s a rich person scared of welfare queens, and no it’s not about West Virginians. He explicitly worked to kill the stuff that benefited West Virginia (CTC, the Black Lung fund) and he wants to compromise on Green Energy that West Virginians hate.
He represents no one but himself.  And himself is an incredibly vile and completely incoherent constituency.

The point being that any ‘revived bill’ is just going to be ‘funnel money to Joe Manchin and call that a win’

It doesn’t make a difference politically and is sh**tty, non-consequential policy.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

I've tried to stay away from this site over the past few days, and the toxicity in this thread is a good reason why. I'll make my point here, then go back to my sabbatical from this forum and the absolute dumpster fire that is American politics.

The legality of Roe vs. Wade, or a repeal, for that matter, is beside the point, since this decision is so obviously judicial activism. And it's also perfectly emblematic of why America is not a democracy, and is, if anything, trending away from being one. At least half of the justices who are in favor of this were nominated by a president who got fewer votes than his opponent. They were confirmed by a Senate that does not come close to representing the actual make-up of the American population, and by a party that won a majority despite receiving significantly fewer votes. And they will serve for life, continue making decisions which, like this one, do not at all represent what the majority of Americans think or want.

It's almost funny how complacent or even happy people are with an increasingly small minority of the population calling all the shots. While humanity has always had its hierarchies, which tend toward a pyramid shape, this country is losing any pretense of even caring about its citizens. Make no mistake, this is not the endgame, and we're going to see many more decisions based purely out of activism and "owning" the other side, which is pretty much all politics amounts to these days. I can't even get myself to be mad at conservatives who seem to cheer anything that means that liberals will be unhappy, since I don't have the energy for anger anymore. Instead, I'm just disheartened, and it makes me that much more convinced that this country is going to continue to backslide and fall further behind other countries. And many people here aren't even going to care, so long as they believe that their side is "winning" (or, more importantly, people they're taught are the bad guys are unhappy.)

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Alben's actual views on trans people aren't out of the mainstream at all. His issue is with framing and style, not the substance itself.

However, he has gotten it into his head that all the fake provocateurs and bots he sees on Twitter are what Democrats actually believe, egged on by Republicans who have invented this whole trans culture war out of thin air. Who in real life is this "radical TRA" strawman he keeps arguing against?

He says that he recognizes that gender and sex are different and that he treats people with respect and uses the preferred pronouns. That's the Democratic position. What's the problem? How have the Democrats let fringe Republicans redefine the "default" positions of the parties to the point where Democrats are believing it? Every time he's ranting about these "radical TRAs" I'm like "man, I'm one of the most pro-trans cis people here and this caricature he's presenting doesn't resemble me at all."

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Steven Spielberg

https://www.instagram.com/reel/C3gVAnuJUFV/

The guy is looking to make a documentary on the October 7 rapes, murders and kidnappings.

Yep. A particularly odious Corbynist was trying to gin up a boycott against him when news of this first broke.

I don't think it can be understated just how much this hardened the spines of liberal Jews worldwide. We get it that they not only expect us not to fight back, but to stand and salute at our own people's murder, or it's back to being unpersons. And no, that's not acceptable and we'd rather go down fighting.

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

Internationally: he is going overboard in a campaign to ostensibly rid Gaza of Hamas, but to the point of becoming the perpetrator himself and removing Israel’s sympathetic look in the immediate aftermath of October 7.

This didn't exist. Even putting aside the universal celebration of the attacks in the Muslim world, in the west the discourse was primarily 'the attack is bad BUT' followed by an explanation in which Israel was ultimately to blame for it. Protests against Israel began before they had even begun their military response. The decades long demonization of Israel by NGOs and international civil society, which caused the ambivalent reaction in the west to October 7, is self defeating and works against Palestinians in the long run. The 'criticism' is so over the top and in most cases false that Israelis naturally tune it out, even on the occasions its true. It's the boy who cried wolf on a global scale

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

I blame media and especially social media.

Firstly I think social media has spread false narratives that things are crappier than they are by only showing the extremes; extremes wealth and privilege and extreme poverty and violence, making it seem like there’s MASSIVE inequality. Furthermore because extreme wealth is just spammed everywhere people sort of expect it to be the norm when it never was. I really dislike this believe the 60s were some golden era for the mainstream American public than that was far from true.

There’s genuinely a cohort of people on my generation who think they’re struggling economically and getting screwed over until they can afford to party all day in the Penthouse of 432 Park Avenue.

I also think social media has just lowered many people’s social trust and caused them to act weirder and more hateful towards eachother. Social media also comes with the byproduct of less real person interaction where people tend to have more mutual respect for eachother and actually feel more connected to the community around them. Also what allows folks to fall down conspiracies

That’s not to say there aren’t real problems like housing cost, but even that is a bit inflated; it’s only a few cities that have it really bad, and while average home price has generally gone up, so have things like home size.

I think there needs to be a serious mass movement to try and get people off social media, and I think social trust and country optimism would increase.

This can also be accomplished by encouraging certain patterns of social media usage that promote real-life interactions and facilitate greater civic engagement. Which really needs to be done by civil society and not by government or big business.

Maybe in theory, but that’s expecting social media to behave in a way fundamentally antithetical to its design.  Such a movement would need to come about organically through real-world/in-person interaction and word of mouth.  That said, I do think the TikTok ban - whether or not one agrees with the reasoning - will help as TikTok has become a uniquely malicious influence on this stuff even compared to the likes of Twitter, Instagram, and FaceBook (which is really saying something).

[Chancellor Tanterterg]

I blame media and especially social media.

Firstly I think social media has spread false narratives that things are crappier than they are by only showing the extremes; extremes wealth and privilege and extreme poverty and violence, making it seem like there’s MASSIVE inequality. Furthermore because extreme wealth is just spammed everywhere people sort of expect it to be the norm when it never was. I really dislike this believe the 60s were some golden era for the mainstream American public than that was far from true.

There’s genuinely a cohort of people on my generation who think they’re struggling economically and getting screwed over until they can afford to party all day in the Penthouse of 432 Park Avenue.

I also think social media has just lowered many people’s social trust and caused them to act weirder and more hateful towards eachother. Social media also comes with the byproduct of less real person interaction where people tend to have more mutual respect for eachother and actually feel more connected to the community around them. Also what allows folks to fall down conspiracies

That’s not to say there aren’t real problems like housing cost, but even that is a bit inflated; it’s only a few cities that have it really bad, and while average home price has generally gone up, so have things like home size.

I think there needs to be a serious mass movement to try and get people off social media, and I think social trust and country optimism would increase.

This can also be accomplished by encouraging certain patterns of social media usage that promote real-life interactions and facilitate greater civic engagement. Which really needs to be done by civil society and not by government or big business.

Maybe in theory, but that’s expecting social media to behave in a way fundamentally antithetical to its design.  Such a movement would need to come about organically through real-world/in-person interaction and word of mouth.  That said, I do think the TikTok ban - whether or not one agrees with the reasoning - will help as TikTok has become a uniquely malicious influence on this stuff even compared to the likes of Twitter, Instagram, and FaceBook (which is really saying something).

I'm not necessarily referring to the Metaverse platforms (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp) here. There are other apps that have more specific purposes.

Good point