I made the mistake o’ checking in on Social Democracy for the 21st Century, which I mocked mo’ than half a year earlier, & the ridiculousness o’ its content has gone from depressing to just laughable.
Immigration
“Lord Keynes,” who is so lazy a devotee o’ John Maynard Keynes that he just up & stole his name to the confusion o’ everyone, truly has a hard on for opposition to vaguely-defined “mass immigration,” despite having no rational basis. For instance, if one looks @ the papers he links here, one consistently sees minor positive influences o’ immigration on employment (with 1 paper stating that there was minor negative in the short run, but positive in the long run). Considering the basis o’ his argument was that immigration was just a conspiracy by the rich as “class war” gainst the working class, his argument obviously falls apart–¡& with evidence he provides! All he has left are a bunch o’ people who, ’bout a century ago, opposed immigration. Yeah, it’s also true that 19th-century socialists like Proudhon, Marx, & Bakunin were outright antisemites & racists. Shocking that people centuries ago may not have been as enlightened as we are now.
‘Course, anyone who understands how “class war” works can easily see how stupid this “plan” o’ the rich’s would be. Yes, under mindless mainstream economics–which Lord Keynes pretends to be mo’ sophisticated for, ‘less it serves his preconceived ulterior aims (so much for the labor market not being the same as other markets, “Post Keyensians”–god, I hate that dumb ass term)–a greater supply o’ workers may decrease the price; but what mindless mainstream economics ignores is that a greater supply o’ workers also increases their political power. That’s why Republicans are so ardent in fighting immigration: they’re seeing before their eyes how immigrants are turning their precious southern red states purple.
‘Stead, Lord Keynes trumpets voter-fraud scares based on weak anecdotal evidence. When a commenter asks LK to provide actual data, LK insults that person & simply reiterates his points. This is a common tactic o’ his, right out o’ the Bill O’Reilly school o’ pundit hackery: ignore critics’ valid points & ‘stead force their own irrelevant points, & then threaten to silence them by blocking their comments if they don’t answer exactly as he wants.
& some o’ his arguments are pure nonsense. Look @ this:
Now we have a second question for you: you asserted that given that low percentage of migrants, they were “hardly enough to sway any election.”
You now have direct evidence of an election stolen by ethnic voting fraud.
Actually, there wasn’t any. If LK actually looked up the issues, he’d know that, for the only real controversy, the Tower Hamlets 1, the allegedly “ineligible” votes weren’t ‘nough to sway the election:
A report for Labour’s NEC found that 16 of the roughly 900 people who took part in the candidate selection ballot might have been ineligible, but couldn’t say if they had voted for Rahman. Even if they had, it would not have affected the outcome. Rahman had won by 182.
& LK shouldn’t have the balls to throw round talk o’ “intellectual honesty” when he uses such bullshit weasel words as “there was very recently a strong suspicion that the Oldham West and Royton by-election was tainted by postal vote fraud [emphasis mine].” ¿By whom? A bunch o’ whiny UK Independent Party sore losers without an ounce o’ evidence, that’s who.
Also loved this line o’ LK’s
So please just f*ck off if all you can do is insult me like this, because I am not going to be slandered [emphasis mine] by anybody.
It seems that it’s not just American bigots who are too dumb to understand English…
Still, a’least he was courteous ‘nough to censor “fuck” in the most obvious way possible. There could be kiddies reading this.
Also, his defense o’ such luminary sources as fucking Breitbart.com on the basis that criticism is mere “ad-hominem” is bullshit. Breitbart isn’t so controversial ’cause it’s right-wing (nobody criticized him sourcing The Daily Mail); Breitbart is so controversial ’cause it’s been caught many times lying & manipulating facts, including doctoring documentaries (just look up Shirley Sherrod video or their “expose” on ACORN–the fact that the latter involved alleged voter fraud should especially make rational readers wary). Once you engage in that shit, you lose all credibility as a source, case-closed. & if Keynes’s claim that “Breitbart in that article is mostly just reporting the facts as you can read them in left-wing UK news sources like the Independent or Guardian,” ¿then why didn’t he quote those much mo’ trustworthy sources? ‘Cause they aren’t spewing these same “facts”–as I pointed out earlier, The Guardian disputes his claim o’ the effectiveness o’ the alleged Towers voter fraud on the election outcome–’cause he’s full o’ horseshit.
Then we get this genius work from habitual commenter Ken B:
The answer is, it doesn’t fricking matter is [sic] the information they cite is accurate. It’s dishonest to pretend you can ignore facts because people you don’t like cite them.
If the information they cite isn’t accurate, then by definition it isn’t fucking facts you fucking moron.
But it gets wackier. He quotes some dumbfuck @ Jacobin conflating neoliberalism & not being a bigot. “Most neoliberals aren’t bigots, so people who aren’t bigots are neoliberals. Duh, ¿What’s a Venn diagram?”
Then we get this nonsense:
Michaels even argues that the core of the Tea Party Movement was an element of profound middle class – even upper middle class – hostility to neoliberalism on the issue of mass immigration:
That’s right, Lord Keynes & Michaels are trying to argue that the Tea Party was a good, anti-laissez-faire political movement. You know, that movement whose core was laissez-faire economics, that couldn’t shut up ‘nough ’bout nonsense like “smaller government” & “low taxes” & “low spending” & whatever. That’s why it’s called the “tea party” movement, based on a (simplistic) interpretation o’ the Boston Tea Party as an anti-tax protest. We’re talking ’bout a movement started by Ron Paul fans–’cause we all know how much Ron Paul hates laissez-faire. If you think the Tea Party Movement is anti neoliberal, then, congrats, you are officially lobotomized.
If you read the clusterfuck mess o’ words that Michael pukes out–clearly he didn’t bother with such bourgeoise nonsense as proper fucking editing–you’ll read a lot o’ paragraphs o’ hand-wringing that basically says, neoliberalism is basically nothing mo’ than an equivalent o’ supporting illegal immigration, ’cause Milton Friedman said that you can’t have a welfare state with illegal immigration without any evidence. Yes, & Friedman also thought that Monetarism was a useful tool for preventing depressions. It’s quite clear that Milton Friedman’s a fucking idiot & that his wise words aren’t worth shit. I reiterate my point: ¿how the hell does increasing the population o’ working class people, & thereby their influence on the electorate, hurt their ability to compel the electorate to pass welfare? & you can’t fall on supply & demand, ’cause welfare is, by definition, outside o’ the fucking market. It’s not like there’s some imaginary rule that says that if there’s too many people, well, fuck, I guess the government can’t have welfare anymo’, for reasons. I guess they’d just run out o’ money, since any Keynesian knows that the government can’t spend mo’ than they take in from taxes, & the government can’t raise taxes, ’cause leading Keynesian social democrats Dick Armey & David Koch wouldn’t support that.
As for his defenses o’ anti-immigration on “cultural” & “democratic” grounds, these both fall apart:
Democratic
This is a corrupt, self-perpetuating argument: apparently “democracy” is conspiring to keep people from a different class from having access to said democracy through citizenship. Shocking that said “democracies” may be biased gainst them.
You could flip Lord Keynes’s voter-fraud scares: while greater protection may minimize Muslims getting mo’ votes than they merit, it’s just as possible that it would lead to Muslims who deserve the right to vote, & who have done nothing wrong, to be cut out, too, given the imprecision o’ the issue. ¿Why is Lord Keynes mo’ comfortable with unfairly costing Muslims votes o’er unfairly gaining Muslims votes, ‘specially when they are, either way, still relatively less powerful than whites?
In fact, an American couldn’t help noticing that LK’s defense o’ “Europe for Europeans” is suspiciously similar to southern US states’ “States Rights,” which is historically used as a ‘scuse to deprive black people o’ rights & portray southern states that do so as victims who have their “culture” wrongfully infringed by the evil federales. Both are equally hypocritical: if it’s OK for them to suppress other cultures, it’s just OK to suppress those cultures.
Culture
As for the “culture” part: the assumption that “Swedes” or “Tibetians” are the “rightful” owners o’ “Sweden” & “Tibet”–merely due to arbitrary history–is the same mindless logic market thumpers use to argue gainst any income redistribution. Rational people acknowledge that the past is full o’ so many disruptions that the current distribution o’ property–including land. Just as capitalists haven’t actually proven that they are the “rightful” owners o’ their property, Europeans haven’t proven that they are the “rightful” owners o’ theirs.
& if LK wants to talk ’bout culture & nations being disrupted by foreign influences, maybe he should read a fucking history book & learn ’bout the UK & its long history o’ dominating Middle Eastern countries through violent force–including chopping up the Middle East into the national boundaries that persist to this day. But while it’s fine to leave them with the consequences o’ that, ¡but don’t you dare let too many Muslims come into the UK &… not truly lower wages or hurt welfare @ all! After all, we have to see who the true victims are.
As a few commenters have pointed out, on basic logic, discriminating gainst someone due to their birthplace is no different, logically, from discriminating gainst someone due to race, gender, or any other aspect they didn’t chose. If anything, Muslims who actually work to get to Great Britain have proven themselves mo’ meritorious than lazy Britains who were just born there & otherwise did jack shit to deserve the privileges with which they were born. To support this double standard is neither consistent with socialist equality or purported laissez-faire meritocracy, or any rational ethical basis. It’s just hypocritical corruption–a mindless obedience to arbitrary tradition. That’s why both socialist Millennials & neoliberal elites support immigration–the same reason both socialists & capitalist supporters believe the earth revolves round the sun. That’s why Lord Keynes’s “Old Left” is dying out, as he bemoans so much. He can’t back it up with empirical evidence, he can’t back it up with logic. All he can back it up with are reams o’ ad hominem guilty-by-association arguments & paeans to the superstitious tradition o’ “culture.” The “Old Left” is dying ’cause it’s mental garbage & deserves to die, ‘long with creationism or flat-earth theory.
Also, LK is so historically ignorant or deceitful that he expects people to believe that the early 20th century–the era o’ the original Keynes–was the era o’ the “Old Left,” when the left goes far back to the 19th century, before Keynes e’er existed. & feminism & antiracism have been a part o’ the left longer than Keynes e’er was. To argue that they were inventions o’ those vile 60s hippies is the stupidest thing LK could say–& considering what we’ve seen him say, that says a lot. Same goes for open borders. ‘Gain, before Keynes was e’en born, classical socialists like Marx were famously saying, “The working men have no country.”
Identity Politics
Lord Keynes’s criticism o’ “identity politics”–from what I can understand, since he ne’er formally defines that term, is simply giving a shit ’bout anyone who isn’t white or male–is vague & incoherent in a suspicious way. LK loves to reiterate repeatedly that he isn’t racist or sexist–as if racists & sexists have ne’er said that–but repeatedly bashes feminism in general. ‘Cause nothing’s worse than women daring to get jobs for themselves ‘stead o’ being baby-making machines when it threatens men’s feelings o’ “running the home”–¡a vital necessity for men!
The deep irony is that despite Lord Keynes’s criticism o’ Marxism, this attitude o’ his toward “identity politics” is taken straight out o’ the book o’ chauvinistic Marxists: that racial or gender issues are mere “distractions” from the “important” issues o’ poverty ‘mong white men.
¿But how are these issues not important to these other people? After all, ¿what use is welfare or work if women are still forced to be miserably dominated by men & black people & Muslims are still being murdered in the street? ‘Specially if LK’s promised true panacea isn’t e’en that great. A’least Marx promised true political equality; LK promises continued economic subservience o’ the working class, but with slightly better living conditions. Whooie. Considering one’s identity is central to their entire existence, it’s absurd to call caring ’bout one’s identity frivolous. Before one worries ’bout keeping oneself ‘live, one needs to worry ’bout having a reason to live @ all. Personally, if I were forced to spend the bulk o’ my life taking care o’ some snot-nosed brats or obeying some dumb brute o’ a man, I wouldn’t be so keen on guaranteed meager subsistence.
This myth truly bugs me: that such higher-level goals as self-actualization are only for the privileged; the poor need only care ’bout keeping themselves ‘live so they can continue to be mindless tools to be used by rich people so they can find self-actualization. This is whence comes the right-wing insistence on stereotyping working class people–or a’least the “good” working class–as folksy, “simple” (uncreative) people, while bemoaning weird, different, cosmopolitan things as “elitist”–as if only rich people can enjoy creativity.
This assumption is not surprising from Keynesians, since their own deity claimed that the working class were merely “boorish” & that only the rich were “the quality of life and surely carry the seeds of all human achievement.”
Also, in more o’ LK’s ad hominem nonsense, he’s trying to spin some conspiracy that caring ’bout nonwhites, women, & gays–as well as all o’ the other cultural developments o’ the 60s & 70s–was all manufactured by the evil corporations to get cheap labor–proven by the primary sources that are YouTube clips o’ Vodka ads. ‘Cept they’re not truly saying that, since it’s obvious bullshit; they’re just hinting is all.
Look @ this brilliant exchange ‘tween Ken B & Lord Keynes’s main partner in crime, “The Illusionist,”–or as he’s called when he’s not in his D&D club, Phillip Pilkington–where Ken B somehow looks like the rational 1:
Ken B:
Idiots. I am not denying business bows down to SJW shit. But you have the sequence backwards. The culture is not full of SJWs because the Fortune 500 instituted diversity training bullshit. Companies go along to get along, to avoid potests, and suits, and OHSA complaints, and bad press and …
The Illusionist:
And we didn’t say it was, Kenny boy.
Ken B:
You certainly did say it. You said they were part of the program. That’s what part of the program means. If you meant they were useful idiots you’d have said useful idiots instead.
The Illusionist:
I meant they were active pushers. It is well-known that the 60s countercultural ‘revolution’ was driven by marketers:
They pushed this crap in the 60s. Now the crap has become more extreme and they’re pushing bathroom police and other nonsense.
This is very much so corporate driven. And if you’re familiar with corporate culture you’ll know why.
1 The Illusionist comment: “We didn’t say businesses inspired diversity.” Next comment: “But businesses totally inspired diversity.” That certainly is some magic illusion you pulled off there, Prospero.
But don’t worry, “Illusionist”: you can simply whine @ Ken B for excluding him from the “club” & for considering you “not 1 o’ us” & ignore all o’ his points, like you did when you tried arguing with Marxists on some other guy’s blog (ne’er live it down).
In general, LK’s tactic is the most mindless o’ ad hominem fallacies: he simply points out that elite capitalists support a thing, & therefore to oppose it must be the “true” left, ignoring that there are many things that both socialists & capitalists support simply ’cause it’s obvious. Based on that logic, since the elite neoliberal capitalists all oppose monarchy, true leftists should support monarchy–since we all know democracy is just a ploy by the rich to better control the government through the public using their control o’ the means o’ communication to control them. ¿See? I can make up bullshit conspiracies, too. It’s not hard. It shouldn’t be shocking that both neoliberals & socialists support feminism, racial equality, & equality o’ national origins: anyone halfway civilized is, just as is anyone who opposed monarchy, feudalism, or any other backward idea from medieval times. With ‘nough conflicts in terms o’ economics ‘tween neoliberals & socialists, it seems counterintuitive to try & bring back long-dead conflicts, like whether or not someone should be locked out o’ opportunities simply ’cause they were born in ‘nother country or born with a vagina, outside o’ their control.
The Problem with Keynesianism
This all brings us to a bigger problem: not only is it futile for Lord Keynes to talk ’bout what women or racial minorities should care ’bout; he’s clearly not e’en working class, ¿so what right does he have to talk ’bout e’en the interests o’ working-class white men like me?
I’m going to let Lord Keynes in on a li’l secret to working-class living: welfare isn’t as useful as he thinks it is. Honestly, the worst part isn’t so much just poverty as it is being forced to spend the majority o’ one’s time doing the most soul-crushingly tedious, inane, insulting, subservient work there is. No ‘mount o’ welfare or higher wages changes that, ‘less it’s so high that I can save ‘nough to retire much earlier than when I’m just ’bout to die.
That’s what the ol’ socialists understood, which was why they’re goal wasn’t petty welfare or wage increases, but changing the fundamental political relationship ‘tween workers & capitalists. Indeed, Keynes–both Lord Keynes & the original Keynes–were so dim that they didn’t e’en understand what made “capitalists” capitalists; it wasn’t that they were simply “rich,” but that they were so rich that they were free from working for someone else & could spend their time doing what they wanted to do, & still make money. That social relation was the most useful contribution o’ classical socialist economics, & Keynesians routinely miss it in favor o’ focusing on insignificant shit like the labor theory & their own petty abstract bullshit ’cause they’re just as ignorant, just as sheltered from the actual living conditions o’ most people as the neoclassicals they hypocritically criticize.
So, Lord Keynes’s practical solution is to keep the majority o’ the public in miserable subservient conditions for most o’ their lives,–in fact, to embed them mo’ into it, since the goal o’ Keynesianism is to increase employment1–just that they’re less likely to starve & mo’ likely to live such miserable existences longer; & in return, women must go back to the kitchen, make babies, & be subservient to their husbands, & Muslims & other immigrants can stay in their own countries to starve. Forget “You have nothing to lose but your chains”; Keynesians will make it all better by prettying up your chains with slick paint & shiny bows. ¡Viva la mediocridad!
So, let’s summarize LK’s “Old Left”: they’re sexist, racist, nationalist, anti-foreigner, & not only support capitalism, but support the philosophy that, by the words o’ its own creator, Keynes, despises working-class people–& yet they claim they support working class (white male) people simply ’cause they’re opposed to the vaguely-defined “too much immigration,” regardless o’ most other issues… ¿So it’s 1 consistency is its opposition to weaker classes? Sounds rather right-wing to me; but in these Orwellian times, ¿who knows? ¿& who cares? Whatever he wants to call it, it has no basis in science (e’en the empirical evidence he found showed that immigration had a positive effect for the working class) or logic, & thus I’d rather just define it as “mental garbage.”
Also, I should point out that he defines those evil SJW (i.e. people who support such silly things as justice–AKA, consistent logic–as opposed to hypocritical, narrow interests) leftists the “regressive left,” “regressive” being no mo’ descriptive than a mere empty insult. It’s the intellectual equivalent o’ calling them the “poopie-head left” & demonstrates the level o’ rationality ‘hind LK’s arguments: don’t definitively defend a point, just assert it in the most simple-minded way & call anyone who doesn’t agree fools who will pay or useful idiots to the neoclassical Illuminati. Meanwhile, the “regressive left” laugh & shrug on, minds unchanged.
Footnotes:
[1] This reminds me o’ the ol’ Chumbawamba song, “The Candidates Find Common Ground”:
Full employment, slave labor & schemes,
an unemployed workforce, a capitalist dream;
But let’s keep Britain working–
¡Either way, we must keep Britain working!
Digression: “How I Left Common Sense”
& don’t get me started on some bullshit link some Anonymous commenter linked to, “How I Left the Left”, which is full o’ biotruth bullshit:
In actual fact, most women are instinctually driven to have children and this occupies a good deal of their consciousness. This manifests negatively in female feminists in their obsession with abortion. Abortion is how they politicise the denial of this core component of their femininity. Women also have a tendency to be more self-denying, devoted and, of course, motherly. This is again tied up with child-rearing but in the modern world it is exploited by employers who use this to extract more labour from compliant women. Feminists glorify this exploitation because it allows them to justify the suppression of the self-denying, devoted, motherly aspects of women which men do not possess in nearly the same degree. It was immediately obvious to me that this ideology leads many women into lives of extreme unhappiness.
Don’t be bothered by his utter lack o’ scientific evidence; he assures us that he has “a fairly strong grasp of the psychiatric literature,” without any evidence to back it up. Quite contrary, a simple look online will show that, for instance, his idea o’ what the “psychiatric literature” says on transgenders differs quite strongly from what actual, official psychological organizations say. Since he provides ample evidence (none), this is shocking.
I also love some earlier logic he uses: he knows that “actual” women are completely different from men in that they’re feminine (the concept o’ a feminine man, or that men can be different @ all, is ‘course not e’en considered @ all). ¿How does he know that? ‘Cause these “actual” women are simply women who aren’t feminists–which is to say, people who believe it’s OK for women to not fall into standards o’ femininity. Great circular logic, bud.
E’en if this were true, ¿who cares? Humans also instinctually become irrational when in stressful situations. Part o’ this thing called “modernity” is that humans develop this semblance o’ independent thought & fight gainst mindless animalistic “instincts” & do what they want to do ’cause they’re not mindless fucking animals.
¿Have I entered a time warp? ¿When has the basic ability o’ individuals to choose their own personality & behavior–to a reasonable extent that does not infringe on others ‘bove the usual–become radical ‘gain? I mean, we’re not talking ’bout women running round chopping off people’s dicks here; we’re talking ’bout women being evil ‘nough to get jobs or not be ruled by men or to have some semblance o’ independence from social norms.
