Egregious Agreement

By: Jonathan Seidel

Visions perspectives and worldviews: the birth of echo chambers (Sowell, 14)

Our worldviews shape who we are. While we aren’t always consistent, we tend to lean in the same direction. That direction being whatever the tribal group we are a part of. This tribalism invites the individual into the religious worldview but also binds them into an echo chamber that reviles any disagreement. 

Whether religious, secular, conservative or liberal the opposing view is not only incorrect but misguided. It hurts the heart hearing someone else’s view. How could they believe in that? How heartless could hey be? Views are embedded in the psyche attached at the hip. The viewpoint is corralled with emotional stress. How dare it be challenged? How dare someone disagree with a perfectly pure position? Outrageous. Outlandish. Utterly disgraceful. Such is the predicament of disagreement. A believer hearing a secularist deny God or a secularist hearing a believer deny evolution. The degree of latitude varies based on the magnitude of the denial. For some denying God is bad for others it isn’t so bad. Ridiculing homosexuality may bother some liberals while burdening others more. The more connected to the view the more emotion exerted the harder to disagree. It is a matter of scope and allegiance. 

Worldviews are consistent with tendencies. The progressive impulse follows several issues across the board. Beyond the intersectional crowd and the party titles, liberalism tends to promote innovation and conservatism static. This doesn’t mean that a conservative would be anti-technology but the tendency is to pushback on alterations that threaten one’s way of life. Liberalism is not a one size fits all. It corresponds to various individuals and various degrees. Liberalism can be synchronic and diachronic. How liberal one is to their peers versus how liberal they are to other societies. Liberal has come to mean a lot of things but in the strict definition of its progressive character those who wish to make alterations are liberal and those who oppose these alterations are conservative. It may vary in age but there is a consistency across socio-political and socio-economic lines.  The quadrant axis of horizontal-economic and vertical-political find equivalency had the vertical axis been turned ninety degrees to parallel the economic spectrum. There are those neo-liberals who are socially liberal but fiscally conservative. Such individuals may a time desire more governmental intervention to cover the market’s limitations. 

This does not mean that libertarians are socially conservative. Socially conservative in the normative conservative definition. This is the problem with definitions. Libertarians are socially conservative not in progressiveness but in governmental intervention. The progressive agenda is anti-religious values thus those fiscally conservatives have been hounded by religious dogma in their ideals. Fiscally conservative is concerning interventionism. No governmental interventionism in social or economic issues. Yet the religious formula has conflated conservative and anti-LGBT. Religious conservatism is reactionary to progressive secular ideas, this is not the same as anti-interventionism. Many libertarians believe that individuals can make their own choice. Non-interventionism does not mean that one cannot marry a man nor have a sex change, only that the government shouldn’t demand or even recommend. Each individual is to make their own choice. To some extent the authoritarian axis demonstrates a regulation of the social filter but absent religiosity, the issue has nothing to do with progressive or regressive but solely the governmental infiltration. 

All this is to say, that looking at the position misses the mark. Both lefties and libertarians support legalising cannabis and abortion. Yet concerning gun rights they divert. Their philosophies differ. The lefty wishes to maximise progressivism with governmental intervention but the libertarian solely wishes to maximise autonomy and minimise governmental intervention. While their results may align in many cases, they permit all these progressive ideas at the hilt of governmental silence. Guns is a highly contentious discussion. While the debate turns into second amendment hacks and Texas gun lovers this fails to account for the genuine debate with libertarians. Libertarians reckon with the tragic deaths. Yet they believe that governmental intervention will do more harm than good. The government’s control is a hindrance to this as well as it controls the population. They cannot defend themselves against intruders or a potential tyrannical government. Anti-control doesn’t mean that it is the Wild West but individuals need to make their choices and be free to mark them. Control is a dangerous choice. Gun deaths by murder were higher in liberal populations and suicides in conservative areas. The more control the potential horror from black markets as well as inadequate policies. 

Differences on principle and on policy demonstrate a clear bias in consistent perspectives. It boils down to values. Should people be left to their own devices. Should fate be the guide of the distressed life. Libertarians aren’t necessarily anti-community or anti-charity. If locals wish to fund an event or raise money for a sick patient they would welcome it. The core is governmental intervention. Volunteering is the core of the ethical foundation. Responsibility to others and aiding out of volition. Not waiting for the government to do its job but acting for the sake of the self and others. Should people take initiative or allow others to do the job for them. This is not to break down to libertarians are against hiring maids or buying dishwashers and it is those dependent lefties that pawn off their work (that would be super interesting and would turn leftism into a childish complaint yet it is most probably if genuine amongst the immature youth). Yet concerning policy they believe that it is only the government who can provide these abilities. Their governmental input may solely rest on the conservative rejection of the progressive ideals thus attempting to usurp their state legislation with federal legislation. The bedrock is not of the policy but how the policy relates to the execution of other variables. 

Thus to some extent conservative individuals are fakes. They do not want federal invasion but they do wish state government to intervene. In this vein, they wish to live by certain values and for those to be enforced. Banning abortions and gun polices are state enforced. Yet further is the homosexual alienation and dismissing secularism. While this may not be legislation, it a collectivist ban and even more so a dogmatic disdain. It isn’t that individuals can do whatever they like. They can only do what the the community likes. Both have constructed communitarian exclusivity. Conservatives are no more anti-interventionist than liberals. In some regard, they wish the market to run its course but provide fares to minors and farmers. When technology can rid these groups, they wish to halt progress and perish in the archaic doctrine (though to some extent the green energy institutional push is carrying a lot of weight). Fighting fire with fire. One interventionist scheme attempting to overpower the other. Conservatives banned state abortion so liberals permitted it on the federal level. The particularist prose of the conservatives is still a collectivist restriction. This is not the libertarian motto, far from it. 

Much of contemporary politics and the culture war concerns the power of government. How much power states should use and how much should the federal list use. Each trying to outdo the other. Whomever is in charge uses their political power to exert more power of the public. Yet the media continues to expel the conflict in a horizontal spin. It is left versus right when it reality it is elites versus the citizens, it is the self-proclaimed aristocrats and the commoners. Collectivism fights on both sides. Neither wishes to yield. To some degree, the identification model of the progressive wing is an individualist motif that conservatives cannot reckon with. Libertarians seemingly could care less. Do your part as a citizen, do not compel me to do anything leave me in peace and you can whatever you like and call yourself whatever you like. The libertarian does not concern himself with the socialisation of society. What people wish to do is their own thing. A modern phenomena that many traditionalists cannot fathom. They wish to live in a democracy. A country of freedom and yet cannot handle when people desire more of it. The libertarian acknowledges the right to individuality insofar as that individuality does not press on his freedom. Do what you want but do not enforce anything on me that I do not consent to. 

Conservatives attempt to live in the modern world with the market as the core but ultimately cannot forgo their traditional values. They use these values as the essence of a just society. Like their institutional dogmas of yesteryear who massacred on the basis of collective ideals. At least lefties permit people to do as they wish. Their problem is that they desire the government to ensure that this is the case. That the parent intercede and punish those who refuse to accept. Accept or else hellfire will rain down on you. Mother will punish you for your insolence. A bratty little brother who wishes for you to accept him for doing nothing. Yet there is no real problem with except the coercive aspect. Their collectivist scheme is irritating and deflating. All for personal autonomy and experimentation but not with the governmental overhaul. Not with the compelled collectables. When such critiques are levelled, they cry scream and yell. They respond with fanatical polemics. The fail to comprehend the position, falsely group their dissenters and respond negatively. Even if they take the time to listen they may still object out of fear that someone will try to take their rights away. If the government compels then everyone must conform. The wrongheaded logic fails to consider that the next government can overturn their favourable policies. It then becomes a battle of electing specific officials that agree with a certain issue or electing officials on a single issue. 

Whoever started the firefight began a battle for the ages. From the onset, states have chosen their own rule book and then the federal government attempted to overhaul it. Fighting endlessly for institutional power. This has nothing to do with social or economic aspects but simply who decides the law. Whomever is in charge does so. It may not reflect the state or even the country’s position. This axis is very different than the lefty-libertarian discussion. Yet it gets convoluted into a left-right debate. Not everyone who is economically left is socially left nor vice versa. Yet those who are economically left desire governmental intervention for equity purposes which then generally includes the impoverished and immigrants who could use some aid. Whether it goes so far as accepting transgenderism or other LGBT rights is questionable. Yet they would be considered a minority group that falls on the lower half from discrimination and would potentially need assistance. Those who are socially left see the social disaster and require interventionist economics to assist them. 

The two axis divide the perspectives. Social and economic have their overlap but they are varied agendas. They may run hand in hand for certain issues such as student loans. Not only does the government freely give the loans, it then ought to forgive them as well (the government on behalf of taxpayers covers the payment). The government intervenes due to expensive school prices. Other times, the push for government run health care may be based on a humane right or to assist destitute areas of the country. It may be for both. Both may support reparations yet one does so on racial justice while the other does so on wealth imbalance. The socialist may not consider the various groups but instead categorises them into the oppressed. Though this is similar to the social intersectional victimisation, it doesn’t differentiate but unites into one class. The social lefty and the economic lefty may agree on the solutions but their philosophies are divergent despite how similar they are. The social lefty reckons with the discrimination of minorities and thus seeks redemption through interventionism while the economic lefty reckons with the tyranny of the employer thus seeking redemption through interventionism.    

A socialist isn’t always as progressive as many today seem to be. Some socialists are nationalists others are racist. Yugoslavia was a socialist country. The Balkans has always been a traditional place with its personalised language and culture. In spite of this, they were indeed quite ethnocentric: racist and anti-semitic. The nationalistic ethos opposed diversity even when they did depart to support the decolonised areas in Africa. A socialist may open to others as long as they are off the mainland. A socialist need not be a fan of homosexuality but such characterisation means little. In the face of the economic imbalance, what matters is congruency. That doesn’t mean everyone can do as they please but instead they must conform to the national ethos of the nation. This is an idea that has transferred through various political institutions. American democracy rid the king but held onto the social limitations as well as did Soviet Russia from the Russian Empire. There were innovations but also many limitations. Many innovations were skewed or focused. For the socialist, some social progression may be required or a consequence of the economic standardisation but that is not the main goal. The socialist cares little for Bezos’ big tech defence of diversity hiring or pro-LGBT rights does not obviate the employee oppression. 

Today, social implies the economic but not vice versa. A self-proclaimed socialist is a progressive fan and an anti-nationalist. In their anti-nationalism they desire the nationalism to control. The nationalism of China, Yugoslavia and the USSR all operated on ethnocentric philosophies. They merely continued the institutional traditionalism. The same can be said of the shift from monarchy to democracy with the same institutional order. Lefties bashing America still desire the government to take charge albeit in a different way. Conservatives wish for the same. Taking the case of war, it is only libertarians who are anti-war. Liberals and conservatives wish to spread democracy to the world. Sending troops or military aid is consistent though the destination or the rationale may be divergent. Libertarians on the other hand are anti-war. It doesn’t make them more or less nationalistic, it is a policy of staying isolated rather than involving on the world stage. For the current political climate whether it’s spreading democracy or assisting oppressed minorities the goal is the same. The irony is the symmetry between the two ideologies. They have different opinions, many times they overlap but they utilise the same framework. Political power to impress ideas onto others. It is no wonder they support war. The results must be authoritatively supplied from the dynamic governmental apparatus.

Contemporary tribalism falls into socio-economic politicalisation. The privatisation of social compels the economic to accompany. The social is the left and the economic is the right. Yet such a dichotomy cultivates binaries. If one is pro-LGBT they are a socialist and if they are pro-market they are a republican. Such dubious characterisations fail to meet the standard quest of interpreting one’s position. There is rare nuance. Stepping out of line is a crime. To be part of the tribe is to agree to both sides. Be both socially and economically on one side of the aisle. Yet this forces everyone into a frame game. The only way to to be on the left or the right on both issues. Yet this duality is divorced from the major issues plaguing others. How dare Jill Stein steal votes from Hilary. Though the idea preventing another candidate from running (had she stolen votes from Trump they wouldn’t be complaining) is itself an attack on liberty and authoritarian. At the best it is a separate issue that blinds people. Nobody inquires why people voted for her. People voted for her because she was anti a lot of things that people were upset about. The authoritarian binary was invaded by a foreign export. She must be a Russian ruse. No she represents a significant part of the nation that disagrees with the conventional political landscape. 

On the outskirts of the political plane are other positions. While Stein isn’t a libertarian she does bring something new to the field. She asks questions and provided critical innovative ideas. She seems to have an authoritarian pull. Gary Johnson was a right libertarian. Relying on private companies to handle much of the public access. The question of left libertarianism isn’t so common but it most probably resembles communitarianism. Small government in its smallest collective force. Property is shared by the people not held by the government. The ideals of individual freedom and liberty are manifest with more collectivist consideration. To some extent a town would share its resources with one another and work together instead of each townsman doing his own thing. It is like working at a factory just for a town and equally shared amongst the workers. While starting from scratch, this may be possible, it must begin on a small scale. All recent socialist states and cities are government heavy. A town could pull this off but it is far from ready. Though placing these ideas in light of the current market, left leaners would protest corporations and right leaners would wait for the market to force corporations to compromise. Anti-interventionism is solely government based. Though many libertarians may draw the line at health care or police. Anti-interventionism is not anarchism. There isn’t a one size fits all but the message is the same. Government is imperfect so how much of is involved is calculated but limited.

The political compass encircles much of the perspectives on reality. Most candidates and voters seek governmental intervention to decide the lay of the land. Biases of various dogma prevent the vertical axis from challenge. It is a horizontal battle of left versus right. Only authoritarians are allowed in the ring. Libertarians have to drink from the dirty water down the hall. Libertarians are just trying to screw with the electoral system and vote in Trump. At the core of it all is not always the inherent socio-economic biases but the execution heuristic that falls short of the true liberty. On both ends forcing LGBT and banning LGBT are authoritarian. The bedrock is coercion for the sake of an idea. While my bias may be quite obvious, it is evident that while the horizontal axis differs the vertical axis is identical. Visions of reality only matter if one’s logos is consistent. Liberals and conservatives are progressively fighting for their side to emerge victorious. Instead the foundations of liberty are muddled by authoritarian force. At the root of these ideas is institutional pressure over individual volition.

Boys Playing Cops and Robbers

By: Jonathan Seidel

Neo-feudalism consumerism and ultra-capitalism/corporatism: bending the knee to organisations over the state (Fromm, Being, 27)

The rise of globalisation and international corporations has challenged the authority of the state. While in the past government’s could meddle with monopolies, with companies moving overseas local governments have lost that power. Instead corporations have become more powerful. Some even believing that the most notorious run the world. 

The term neo-feudalism has been used throughout the recent decades. A demonstrating of corporations exceeding the might of the governments they reside in. A corporation seeking profit will expand its eligibility. If governments protest they will ship their resources away. If workers strike, fire them and hire new ones abroad for cheaper. Globalisation did not only mean more conversation between countries but also the malleability of travel. Corporations could move their bases and find a new home quickly. Their success was beloved and beholden. No nation was safe if the corporation decided to just up and leave. Luckily many of these American-based corporations feel more at home as well as recognising the economic supremacy of the US. Then again, sometimes the workers are highly trained such as Apple. The tax benefits are super worthwhile as well as training thousands of novices over again would be a tremendous loss. There is a rationale to stay even with the overwhelming critiques. 

Yet, the tax benefits themselves are offered by the government. The US court cases making corporations people only solidified their power. Rising corporate power is the fault of the nation itself. Given the capitalist freedom of America it was only natural that privatised groups would rise in every sector. Yet here lies the problem. The issue is when the government intervenes at the behest of the corporation. For example, big pharma is the only one who is allowed to deal medicine. If you wanted to start an ambulance company you would have to be licensed by big pharma’s standards. Since they do not want the competition they will obviously refuse your request which they’ve done multiple times. Governmental members have also provided favours for corporations instead of assisting the people. A congressmen gave a chunk of land to a crony businessman to build a factory when a good samaritan offered to build a park instead. Weapons contractors have their own lucid consequences. 

With governments afraid of corporations there is much pleading and kissing up for their own needs. To some degree it may keep them in state and hiring working but at the same time much of their nefarious operations intentionally go unnoticed. Even more so the consumer turns a blind eye. The consumer power of the US prevents many from moving overseas. Whether that be continuous taxes or lost revenue. In other counties like Singapore and Hong Kong the cost is even higher. Taxes are even greater. The potential benefits are outweighed. While the government may have them grounded it doesn’t mean they have control over them. In many ways, nesting in Silicon Valley is perfect for them. If the government is going to provide them a sweet deal to stay they why move. The government hasn’t prohibited them from moving abroad just their headquarters must stay put. Apple is global so is Starbucks yet their main base is in the US where privacy is much more provided. 

Given, the state-backed assistance to corporations in cultivating monopolies and awarding privileges arbitrarily to those they wish deserve. The issue isn’t so much the market economy but the governmental intervention in the economy. University tuition didn’t rise from corporate greed but governmental welfare. Governments began giving out loans more frequently so the universities assumed they were paying for tuition. As the loans increased so did tuition. The irony is that if loans are given to everyone then universities will just raise their tuition. There is no ceiling. The government has opened the floodgates and cares little to solve their mistake. While there is debate about unequal competition. In the early 1900s, established companies just ate the smaller ones, shoving them out of business. Still, the biggest issue is the government batting for the other team. They aren’t on the side of citizens but corporations. A majority of congress had increased stock in weapons contractors with each passing year of the Afghan War consistently campaigning for the war’s continuation. While they were making millions, citizens were losing their children for green paper. 

In many situations, intervention which is intended to assist the citizen is actually to assist the wealthy. Beating down the citizen more. It is worse than the mid nineteenth century. At least then, the government wasn’t helping anyone. Companies were killing citizens with government turning a blind eye. Laissez-faire dominance kept governments a bay while employers destroyed the spirits and body parts of employees. What changed ironically against libertarian advocates was governmental intervention to an extent. This isn’t all true. What really caused the shift was unions. Workers unions shot back at the employers. Without any aid from the government ceasing their protesting, they kept marching on. Laissez-faire applied to both sides. No aid for anyone. Unions grouped together. The early attempts failed but the AFL succeeded in achieving better conditions. There is a degree to where unions brought the government involved leading to many reforms in the early twentieth century up to WWI. It was the interventionism that leads to the considerably better conditions workers live under than before.

Factory work, as deadly as it was, faired better than other domestic jobs of its time. More flexibility and freedom. Given the advances, it was a healthier life than medieval peasantry. Though to be fare the question is unfair given the advances in medicine since the Middle Ages. Side by side farming technically may have been healthier but there was still freedom to be fired or quit though the choice was more forced to make money to pay for homeostasis. To some extent the issue is looking at the picture with short lenses and assuming causation. Indeed, intervention eventually provided better conditions but it didn’t necessarily need to. People struggled but so have many throughout history. The first generation was bound to suffer but unlike the gruelling static linearity, the industrial revolution provided the access to better quality life. Many would suffer but that is life. Take the case of D-Day. In order for the siege of Normandy to be successful the first line would have to punch through the enemy defences. Most of the first wave perished. A necessary evil in order for the later units to overwhelm the enemy. Conditions presumably would’ve improved inevitably with better technology and more worker hounding. 

Even Libertarians may accept the positive contributions of the governmental apparatus to make workers lives better. People were demoralised and the government came in and saved them. Yet what government ever does anything without an agenda? What government actually helps out of the purest intentions? The answer is nearly zero. The government was eager to help as much as they were eager to provide the welfare state. While the first interventionists may have been well-intentioned, their successors used the ideology to broker deals and snuggle close with other elites. The government was the one who kept slavery alive, it was the revolution that overpowered its will giving moralists the much needed passion and safety net to eradicate it. Moreover, the issue isn’t so much with federal officials but with state officials. The greatest lie of conservatives is governmental interventionism. Conservatives do not want less government, they want less federal oversight but plenty of state immersion. The creation of Jim Crowe during the industrial revolution just shows the manner of governmental intrusion to alter the lives of people. 

Governmental intervention did aid workers but only those who were white. Woman and African-Americans were not aided in the quest. Minorities were shaken with grief. Only a few years later, Jim Crowe made its debut. The era of reform was selective to a certain privileged group. While growth is gradual, it seems interventionism had its own intentions that only fuelled discrimination instead of solving it. The same thing happened with the welfare state. Blacks were gradually growing and then reliance on governmental aid as well as a few other nuances deconstructed the entire push forward. Interventionism studied their rise and pushed them off the cliff. They were so close to Everest and given a participatory trophy for playing before being cut off. Much that hides behind the curtain is the congressional imprint on the suppression of liberty. Just recall the Dred Scott case which legally determined his forced return to slavery. The government upheld a discrimination of ontology and discernible biology. While without abolitionism, slavery would’ve continued, the industrial revolution presumably would have ended it at some point. Despite that, it cannot be under-appreciated how much the government’s policies created the inferiority of blacks. 

The great reforms came with a catch. Not only did governments gain attention and Jesus-like salvation tropes, it also placed the government more deeply in bed with the wealthy. Technology boomed which made life easier not regulations. Regulations were helpful but also did what they always did kept people at bay. Recall in the Middle Ages it was canon that workers status was inferior and competed to work for a master. The argument isn’t even if governments should ever intervene but that there are negative consequences to their intervention. The good that comes may be outweighed by the evil it leads to. Reforms can be quite positive: outlawing slavery, better conditions, women’s suffrage, same sex marriage and so many more. The question is does this result end up causing more issues than it intended to solve. Take a controversial claim like same-sex marriage. The government is protecting those that are disallowed to do so but who is disallowing them. Many times federal approval is from dissenting state opinion. The state bans it and then the federal government overpowers it. None of this is economics. The poor reality is the insertion of cultural nonsense. Stupid emotions clouding the market.

Overall the government’s job is to protect its people. While inquiries of the extent intervention or the need of its presence is justifiable, it is always taken to the extreme. The War on Drugs or on Terror has only hurt more than it has helped. Running on some neo-christianised salvation, the public’s coercion into the state’s affairs has muddled their trust and destroyed their reputation. How many blacks were incarcerated for ounces of weed, how many poor teenagers were killed in Iraq. Black markets spring up, communities impoverished and society tarnished. The era of reform sought giant leaps in corporate interests while citizen interests were struck down. There are a few giant leaps periodically but over two hundred were struck down following the creation of corporate personhood. The fourteenth amendment progressed civil dignity yet also was used to capitalise on the corporate greed. Then at the height of the sexual revolution, corporate power was extended. Just as citizens were gaining their freedom so were big businesses. One could not go without the other, apparently. Even when intervention can be helpful, politicalising corporations has enabled legislative victories debasing attempts to make workers' lives better and destroying the market fashion.

The gradual intrusion of corporate might from money to persuasion has only furthered their rise. This is the height of corporate greed. The height of feudalistic themes. The government is beholden to the corporations word. The king needs the nobles’ aid. The government acts as the corporations demand. The vast money and lobbying executed to bribe officials to their side is monstrous yet so deep. The citizens live in a republic run by aristocratic greed. An illusion prevailed. It looks like a republican system. People are elected. Congress is diverse. We had a black president. Democracy must be working. The machine is operating. Deceiving the public into submission. Well-intentioned youngsters fall in line with their older contemporaries. Aspiring ideas fall flat on their face after their first term. They became the evil they attempted to overcome. Following the elitist mantra they turn into the new nobles. Just look at January 6th for a great example. While they didn’t care for the destruction of cities. No protection nor salvation for the assault. Democracy was still in full force because elections still were in effect. Yet when they get attacked for their appalling hypocrisy and elitist life styles. Boarding people up in their houses destroying their businesses while not following their own rules. While making millions in the process. That is when democracy ends. When corrupt officials are shaken to the floor decrying the rebellious anger. 

Despite the rise in corporatism, their hold is not necessarily a bad thing. While moderns string assaults on feudalistic nobles and cinema characterises them as evildoers, it isn’t necessarily the case. There is a lot more embellishment than is genuine. There were obviously bad nobles and bad monarchs. Noble taxation caused many merchants to seek out the monarchy to take control and protect them. This may have assisted merchants in ridding noble power but led to absolutism. Absolutism famously was the catalyst to democracies given the disaster that was that era. A pious king meant a good life and psychopathic king meant a bad life. It was all dependent on chance. This was the same for nobles. Unlike absolutism, nobles had rules and principles. Their own pride was on the line and any publicised wrongdoing would doom their household so even they had to be careful. There were sketchy corrupt ones. They had power and they exercised it. Laws were bent in their favour yet it would be untrue to claim that this made them evil. They had a duty to manage their household like a modern CEO though less complexity but potentially more pressure. 

As awful as feudalism was, it had certain benefits. Social determinism meant obligations and connections between one another. This social interactiveness further enhanced the communal aspect whereby people worked for another. Products were passed along as all was in the service of the communal cause. The static society ensured that the communal payoff was much quicker than the profit achieved in the following century. Not too pretty but it had some perks that are lost today. In that regard, to some extent it follows that corporations may occupy a similar hub. Whereby the noble is stronger than the king and the corporation is stronger than the government. Whether or not this was applicable over a century ago is irrelevant. Change may be more possible by corporations than governments. The ability of governmental reform was startled by the citizenry in response to the mechanical shifts in society. The transformations unfolding forced the government’s hand. Without the technological progress in the private sector, the static interventionism may never have reached the civil liberties applied all over. It was businesses that put extended civil liberties on the map. 

There are terrible issues with corporatism. Yet interventionism may not be the solution. Just because the media discusses it endlessly does not mean it is genuine. It is pandering slogans to viewers more than legitimate news. What is the better option. Faith in the angelic government that promises to intervene all the while screwing over the citizenry. Corporations may be contributing to climate change or tough factory conditions. Yet this is something that people can protest without governmental intrusion. Once the government intercedes, it attempts to control the situation. Like a parent taking over the fight between two brothers. Corporations have done less damage than the CIA. American led democratisation has contributed more evil than Amazon exploiting its workers. At least people can push back against corporations, they cannot do so readily against the government. When was the last time a government official was sent to prison. They cover up their own faults and blame the citizenry. The government has never been responsible, corporations have never been given that chance. The government has given them privileges but then publicly calling them out. It a straw man to make it seem they are on the citizenry’s side, they are not. They are unfaithful liars. 

Laissez-faire may be a tad too much. Yet the governmental attachment to corporate greed is truly remarkable. There are insertions that companies such as Blackrock and Vanguard are behind governmental orders. This synthesis of political and economic centrality is heavily dangerous. Yet be aware of the political corruption involved in submitting the citizenry. More than trusting politicians alone is that they are already in bed with these businesses. May as well take your chances with corporations without political might than those immersed with political butt-kissing. For many it is their intervention in the public sector that created the recession. While recessions may be an inevitable part of the economic cycle, their magnitude is directly related to the policies legislated that drown citizens in poverty. When Blackrock is siting with congress members on the future of economic policy during a pandemic, there is something devilish brewing. Many of those politicians who were ousted for their insider trading with respective companies. The government always blames poor people and immigrants for the disaster. They never take responsibility. The reversal of governmental intrusion would leave wealth more democratised instead of centralised. Homes wouldn’t inflate as clearly but they would have homes. 

This age is similarly feudalistic though lacking the social arsenal. Exchanging the social obligation for individualistic immunity. There are clear reservations for corporate power. Just as bad nobles were extremely dangerous so are unchecked corporations. Unlike the past, people can stand up for themselves in many degrees. Just because, it isn’t obvious or it is difficult does not mean it isn’t possible or shouldn’t be done. Recovering the social obligation would be a novel start. To this degree the humanistic prioritisation in place of religious affection must be empowered. The ethic of responsibility must revive itself in light of ethic of rights. Rights are significant but they are foundational. The citizenry as a whole including the wealthy ought to see themselves as part of the whole. All working for a singular clause of prosperity and salvation. Philanthropy goes along way, Carnegie and Rockefeller despite their faults donated millions. It must go beyond donations and behavioural assimilation. Profit is the most important thing and with lackadaisical aid from the state, it is the people who must rebel, protesting for care. 

Corporatism is more than just the workers themselves. It is the influence and their users especially social media. While the general purview is the employees working at these factories and the conditions they suffer under, the massive impact of media imagination is strong. They are indeed platforms but they also harvest information. Regular media projects information to the public. Conveying and manipulating the audience. It is a play honing on the prey. Social media platforms invited audience members onto the stage to play characters. By indulging in their website you are feeding into their system. Users facilitate the crony levels of demonstration. Advocates fight for higher wages for workers because they don’t want to lose the service. People wish to aid the struggling worker but they also do not want to lose the quick transferral of their goods. There is no recommendation for another Amazon to rise but for Amazon to just give in so consumers can continue to benefit for the company. There is also a level of influencers especially on YouTube who utilise the platform to make themselves big. Users participate in the algorithmic sensationalism while other users export their ideas in video format. Influencers in their entrepreneurial spirit hope to capitalise and make more money than the salary contracted workers. Corporatism is bought into by users whether to enjoy entertainment or to enrich off popularisation.   

Much of the literature on semi-corporatocracy is filled with supreme technological advancements. The cyberpunk genre fills the void of corporate power by the leash of supreme technology with extensive poverty. Sci-fi alongside the cyberpunk nexus involves incredible inequality. The dystopian nature of cyberpunk demonstrates the incredible progress of technology met with greed. Nueromancer wows the reader with futuristic amazement yet backstabs with an oppressive oligarchy. A nihilistic hell hole with all the technology present. It is not paranoia or megalomania but cruel corruption. It isn’t too far off in regards to the possibility but is concerning the tech availability and corporate thug namesake. The genre fits the nightmares of liberals and denounce the laissez-faire advocates. One thing that must be acknowledged is that without choice there is little possibility for change. Without sidelining the state there is little hope for moral aspirations. Corporations will never change if they are tattled on at every turn. There are mishaps and those to be pointed out but relying on the state to mend every issue will only stir more division. The humanist hope will be a foregone conclusion. Corporations will persist, hierarchies still in place. Yet the communal enterprise seeks to veil such differences. Yes they exist but are merely a cog in the machine. A face of reality with no less dignity nor ontology.  

Child Pawns

By: Jonathan Seidel

Child services and Sartrean existentialism: the state’s accursed role

Child services exist to protect children from unruly parents but are they a neutral actor?

Parents generally have say about their children’s lives. The government cannot intervene into the household. Private property isolates the citizen from the government’s clutches. This privacy protects liberty but those in the household may not be protected. If the state protects its citizens then citizens who are harming their children must be removed. The government is a protector. Its job is not to invest in people’s privacy. The entire purpose of the state is to allow people to live in their own harmonious orchards. Taxes for protection. One’s home is their own is their safe space. The government has no right to intervene in their lives. The way a parent wishes to raise their children is their right. The way a husband wishes to treat his wife is his duty. The state can only recommend methods or at most demand public appearances. The privacy of home is dedicated to the privacy of the individual. The state can control the norms of the street but cannot of the private sector. 

On ethical grounds, the state’s intervention is an abuse of power. The state acts as a defender against foreign threats not familial drama. Attempting to exert its control is tyrannical. There are rights to that family to do as they wish. Their model is their own. The state cannot go any further than the public street. Legislating that certain models must be upheld publicly is acceptable but up until the lawn. No further can the government trek. While government is known for its misuse of authority does not abrogate the line dividing man and the state. The state acts independently of the people. The people are entitled to their own way of life inside the home. A haven away from the public sphere. The state still had reservations. There were always persecuting offences. Jews could not practice their Judaism and persecuted for belief yet at home it was dangerous but possible. Hiding away in one’s house fends off the governmental oversight. Avoiding governmental surveillance. 

The onset of human rights guaranteed freedom from institutional harassment. Less state interventionism and more freedom for people to live as they pleased. The democratic hope promised an end to tyranny. No longer would the state involve itself in other people’s lives. That was the curse of medieval religiosity. Forcing people to convert or die. Forcing families to live by a certain doctrine. With a new model, freedom was provided in the privacy of homes. The state is in charge but only so far. It has its role and that ends at the curb. The hierarchical family failed to change. Men ruled the house and women were and children were his dependents. What happened in the confines of the home were in the vested interest of the husband. Not much else could be done. Yet it was a husband’s duty and prerogative. The government had no say into how a husband wished to run his household. It was his right and he did as he desired. Only with female empowerment did laws begin to change.

Laws began to change for women but not so for children. While progress has reduced the punishments of sacrifice to murder to slavery to whipping, the parental control of a child is still attached at the hip. Children are dependent on their parents and thus are deserving of punishment if they act out of line. Children owe their lives to their parents’ intimacy. Governmental intervention praised for female aid. Not perfect but a big swing in the past centuries (though heavily biased against males over female perpetrators). Children unlike their mothers do not possess the same intelligence to do anything about it. They are young and ignorant. Powerless and fearful. Unable to transcend the threshold to get authorities involved. Uncertain of the consequences that may follow. Intervention is at times unavailable or unwilling. It was only in the late nineteenth century that child abuse was even brought up as a possibility. Parents have authority insofar as they do it correctly. Maltreatment is grounds for dismissal if courted and guilty. 

While there are legal and social avenues out there, it does not mean that they are tenable nor effective. It comes down to children speaking up. Children need to speak up about the issue or no one knows about it. Bruises can be hidden and stories concocted to sway away from abuse. Privatised groups obviously entered the fray first. Capitalising on the lack of federal assistance. The government didn’t want to intervene and public outrage would’ve been inevitable. In time organisations popped up and attempted to overturn the long standing norm. One evolving from persecuting death to persecuting wounds. Technology and advanced medicine have been able to deduce whether a wound was accidental or deliberate. Doctors in good conscience could analyse and bring it to the appropriate authorities. Yet if the child never went to the doctor then little assistance can be done. If the problem never reaches the street the child cannot be helped. Many cases are from onlookers either guessing or suggesting a potential problem. A big offence but one with tragic consequences. Without intervention, the children are doomed to suffer.

These organisations emerging have benefited children greatly. Protecting them from abuse and giving them a home away from the cruelty. While imperfect as any other institutional program there is a betterment to the child’s life. Non-profits have jumped on the bandwagon to do what they can to help children in dire situations. There is a lot of legal handiwork but the goal is that they deserve to be treated correctly. The government stepping in is writing a wrong. Parental authority only goes so far. There is a limit to one’s ability to educate a child. Buckling up on permissibility heightens the child’s personification. They are not solely someone’s daughter but a citizen of the state. The state must protect them. Parental consent is a closer eye but protection must be domestic all the same. Abuse is overpowering the weak. The government seeks to protect the weak. Thus using a battering ram to dislodge a child from a dangerous parent. Hellbent on ensuring the child’s safety as a citizen of the state, a deserving member of society. 

A child belongs to the state as much as they belong to the parent. Yet potentially even more so. Un-ironically reverting to an age old custom of the state’s enforcement of the family. Though with better intentions here. The state’s goal is to overtake the parental’s neglect for concern. The state has the power and the obligation to preserve the liberty of that child. If the child’s liberty is at stake due to parental nuisance then it must be removed from the house. A unilateral investment in a child’s future. Clawing the child away from the gnawing parental shark teeth. The state’s interest to protect its citizens. Thus even in the case of an illegal child, born on American soil is privy to the privileges of the citizen life. Every child deserves to be protected and no parental extremism will halt such progress. The state has a moral obligator but also a possibility to derail parental authority for state salvation. The state is the ultimate protector not the parental enclosed cubits. The medieval harassment is a prayer of hope for the child’s future. 

The first step is gracious. Yet what about communist children taken from their homes. Don't worry. They are parents spilling fascism into their children’s ears. They are corrupting them and need to be removed. What is considered dangerous may evolve from physical assault to ideological damage. The state’s power rests in a physical stimulation. Yet this solely is the first step. The individuality of the child is to be preserved. A strong Sartrean idea. Yet in society there is no being. Being is always linked to something. Whether that be a family or the state. No one is truly ever free. The man of the forest or living on an island is technically absolutely free though he belongs to those locations. It’s a tautology in this instance. For the child of a democratic society just as in the medieval institutionalism, the child is a product of the state. While family law separates there is a line. If the family opposes federal intent then the authority may grasp at ideological diversity. Only those with the same ideology can stay. Only Christian children and only capitalist children. 

Is teaching religion or creationism abusive? To what degree does the government intervene. It’s only an ideology. It isn’t hurting the children but it is creating a monolithic culture. What about racist and sexist ideas. The lack of physical torture seems to undermine the protective services capability. That is for now. Though public school curriculums are endowed with certain models. The next step is outlawing certain parenting educational forums. Whether they be nasty or beneficial. It doesn’t matter. The state is not a natural exerciser but an agenda-seeking phoney. To what extent will legislation seek to separate children from their parents. They belong to the state and the state wishes them to be this way. The Sartrean ethos may be shouted but it is a lie. Their being is directly linked to their belonging to the state. The state does not wish to liberate them so they are free to roam around as they please. Instead they are freed to follow the state’s advice. Quite nefarious in this mark. Capitalising in the institutional power lost in the past few centuries. A frightening but plausible near future with quasi-police state rhetoric to ensure model citizens under the auspices of federal desires. 

The state is no one’s friend. Services at the start are always well-intentioned. Children must be protected but always be weary of how this may open pandora’s box. It may seem great at the beginning but it may evolve into a dangerous foe. Unable to do anything other than secretly teach children their heritage in the basement. Away from the police chattering. The inquisition may emerge once again just this time against the former perpetrators. It is too soon to tell but there are periodic cases popping up everywhere. Just be aware of the possibility. The honourable state is a lot more selfish than it lets on. Liberty is curbed to their wishes. Stay alert.