This is in many ways an expansion of one idea from my essay on challenging power, and it's a thought I really want to emphasize for your consideration.
To anyone advocating for the cause of getting CRT and gender ideology out of schools, I have a brief thought experiment for you. On the front end, it should be stated that I share your end goal of children not being taught this insanity. It's the means of getting there I'm a bit fuzzy on.
My understanding of the actions surrounding this movement is they seem to limited to directives that can be summed up more or less as "knock it off" with the intention of collecting data at a later point to judge how well the initiative/legislative has been implemented. Even these are limited to CRT; I'm yet to see anything pertaining to getting groomers out of K-12. A ddg search will give a bevy of articles about both "successful" and failed attempts at banning CRT and related ideas from K-12 curriculum. An example that seemed to be emblematic of the way these things are worded is Glenn Youngkin's EO in Virginia. Here's a link:
After reading this, what do you notice? Do you see anything whatsoever addressing the underlying cause of CRT being taught in schools? Has anyone even asked why- and how- this stuff is being taught in schools to begin with? Put differently, why is there no parallel legislation prohibiting instruction on Flat Earth in science classrooms? Could it be because we do not observe a big push by science teachers to teach Flat Earth Theory in any serious way?
Here's my thought experiment:
The second World War has ended. Germany is fully under the control of allied forces, and you are one of those individuals. Your task is to assist in the de-Nazification of Germany, with a specific focus on the Nazi intelligence and secret police agency, the Stasi. Would you begin by issuing an order that the Stasi will no longer be Nazi, but instead be ran as the new Germany's version of the CIA? How would that even work? I mean, it's not like the Naziism within the Stasi just magically manifested itself, did it? Isn't what makes the Stasi a Nazi institution the fact that it's staffed by an unknown (but likely very high) quantity of Nazis?
The allies decided to tackle the problem of de-Nazifying the Stasi by not tackling the problem of de-Nazifying the Stasi, but rather dissolving it and starting from scratch. The Stasi was Nazi because it was filled with Nazis. K-12 education is filled with activist ideology because it is filled to the brim with activists who want to teach your kids their insane ideology. Declaring they can no longer teach your kids their insane ideology is actually a greater task than declaring the Stasi can no longer be Nazi, because at least the allies were there to theoretically enforce such a decree. But even they knew it was easier to just start from scratch.
Any push to "get X thing" out of schools that does not address the fact that most teachers will need to (and should be) fired in order to accomplish such a thing is just a giant fail from almost every conceivable angle.
In almost every instance, the answer is to build new schools that will not be staffed with activists, with provisions in their contracts tying their employment to this zero-tolerance rule.
If you disagree with this thought experiment or framing, I'm all ears.
Also, the mic fix did not work, and I'm probably going to need to order a new one. I'm still writing up a storm though, which is actually where this post came from. Talk to you soon 🤙
While driving yesterday, I had an idea to help facilitate more regular content creation, especially during this time when it is all but impossible to make videos outside of livestreams from my phone. The idea is that of a biweekly post that roughly takes the form of a newsletter, of which this is shall be the first volume. As an aside, evidently a synonym for biweekly is 'fortnightly,' which I'd totally use if it weren't for the association with a game of stupid dances.
My current plan for the format is as follows, though obviously this is likely to change.
-Introduction, brief life updates, and maybe a thought or two I've had lately that I wanted to share with you.
-What books I have been going through, and any excerpts or takeaways I feel are worth sharing.
-Any other noteworthy podcasts or media I've consumed lately.
-What stories I'm paying attention to (if any) and why
-Any questions I might have for you guys
-?
Alright, it's called TL;DR for a reason. Let's jump in.
As I mentioned earlier, we have Covid again. I'm not going to ...
I know it's been quiet here lately. I'll eventually explain what's been going on with my personal life (most of it has been a mixture of our new baby being really, really difficult, and perpetual sickness. For example, last week three our of the four of us had to go to the hospital) but this is what has consumed virtually all free time outside of work and family time.
Please consider helping us bring justice to these bastards. Their indifference and complicity in the harm done to these kids has to stop. Please help us make that happen.
For those who missed it, here's an open letter I wrote to my community last fall after the suicide of a former student, himself a victim of this school district:
https://returntoreason.medium.com/an-open-letter-to-the-citizens-of-albany-county-ca507fa24cd8
Thank you for everything you do. You guys are awesome, and I look forward to filling you in on what's been going on in the near future. See you soon.
ps- I will be...
Salutations! I hope you all had a fantastic Christmas. Here is my list of top ten the things I learned/conclusions I reached from this past year. Some are directly related to events, others are not. Either way, I tried my best to create a list of useful ideas for you to incorporate into your view of the present moment. I hope you find this list useful, as many of the items on it are lenses I find incredibly important for understanding the world around me. As always, I welcome any feedback you might have!
In Part 2, I use Conquest's Three Laws of Politics to expand on my specific critiques of Peterson's Manifesto, and flush out some of my own axioms that I failed to explain in Part 1. This is where I get into the nuts and bolts of how institutions deviate from their original purpose and begin to generate and pursue their own interests.
What began as a singular episode critiquing one of my intellectual heroes has turned into a multi-part series going after some foundational axioms of mainstream Conservatism.
In this introductions, I discuss Permanent Washington and the concept of accountability, and sew the seeds for what's to come in either trusting or rejecting many mainstream Western institutions.
It's worth mentioning that this recording, along with every other part in this series, has taken almost (in some cases more than) a day to upload. I have no idea why my internet is failing me as hard as it is, but here we are. Hopefully you find these recordings in time to assist you in your vote tomorrow 🤙
I've been wanting to do this for a while. It might have taken me two days to figure out how to get this from my phone to my computer, but I finally got it to work.
On Saturday, I used the voice recorder app on my phone to record a podcast covering Karl Schmitt, his discussions of power, and how we can map this onto our contemporary situation with The Regime that runs our country, and the Bureaucratic State which does its ideological bidding.
After listening to it, I realize there is some more context I need to add to the ending, so I might record another one tomorrow or Wednesday. Either way, it feels good to be recording stuff again. As always, I welcome your thoughts and feedback!
"We don't know where this thing isn't."
-Bret Weinstein
@JamesDerian suggested I pin and regularly update a thread of sources I'm compiling to illustrate the total societal takeover of Far-Left Orthodoxy, including their explicit targeting of our kids for indoctrination. Here is that thread.
Compromised entities:
Nickelodeon
Cartoon Network
Kellogg's Cereal
Mattel Toys
Lego
Sesame Street (SESAME STREET 🤦♂️)
PBS
CNN
The New York Times
The Washington Post
NPR
NBC News
Gender/Sexuality
Cartoon Network celebrating transgender children:
https://twitter.com/stage13network/status/1377332951659151360?s=20
More Cartoon Network trans stuff:
https://twitter.com/cartoonnetwork/status/1377259794294259717?s=20
Cartoon Network on "normalizing gender pronouns"
https://twitter.com/cartoonnetwork/status/1338539346530537475?s=20
Lego released "rainbow set" for Pride Month:
https://www.lego.com/en-us/aboutus/news/2021/may/everyone-is-awesome/
"Queer up your morning routine" with Kellogg's new cereal featuring edible glitter, ...
