Anarchism Has Never Taken Ableism Seriously March 22, 2019
Posted by Summerspeaker in Anarchism, Despair, Transhumanism.Tags: ableism, anarchism, anarchy, disability, eugenics
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Woman no longer wants to be a party to the production of a race of sickly, feeble, decrepit, wretched human beings, who have neither the strength nor moral courage to throw off the yoke of poverty and slavery. (Emma Goldman, “Marriage and Love”)
A Bit of Hatemail from Jaimie Hayden October 2, 2018
Posted by Summerspeaker in Despair, Queer politics.Tags: bigotry, hatemail, transphobia
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This is what it’s like being trans on the internet in 2018! Jaimie sure taught those straw men ey built a lesson! Ah, bigots!
I don’t buy you. You aren’t just repellent to others because you’re in a minority group. You’re self-hating, comically negative, and basically made of being resentful. You hate everyone else for being happy when you’re not. That’s a choice. That’s your responsibility. That’s the content of your bad character, AKA the thing it’s right to discriminate about. Plenty of people don’t respond to bad luck by being toxic. People hate you not just because your body is ugly but because your soul is ugly.
But let’s say you’re right, that it really is out of your control that other people just find you repellent and there’s nothing you can do about it. What you’re saying is you want human connection with people knowing full well it causes them pain.
Well, pedophilia is genetic. Some people are born with sexual desires they can’t fulfill without damaging other people’s lives. It’s not their fault. It’s bad luck. Well, I’m sorry. Either that pedophile has a moral obligation to accept a life of sexual frustration, or everyone else has a right to remove the danger to their children and community. There’s no way out of that.
If you’re right about yourself then you’re in the same boat. When you act like society is unfair because it’s organized so that people who feel miserable around you aren’t pushed to be around you, you’re fantasizing about people having less options about not giving you affection. And that’s pretty much like rape. Sorry, people being able to choose to be around people they like just means unlikeable people end up alone. That’s the system working. Anything else is you feeling entitled to ruin other people’s lives.
You’re basically an incel, and you need to be told something blunt. If you somehow at the same time lack every possible good thing from beauty to talent to charm to money to status to style to pride to fun to wit to kindness, then you should be rejected. That’s what not having merit means. But then I honestly have trouble believing that anyone in real life could really be as bad at everything at once as you paint yourself.
Imagine someone really existed whose body literally excreted shit from pores in the surface of their skin. Everything you touch turns to shit. Other people around them feel nauseated and ill just standing in the room with you. Well, obviously that person wouldn’t ever experience love or touch or affection. Of course they don’t. They’re a utility black hole. It’s absolutely senseless for anyone to put resources into someone incapable of being happy no matter what you do and who makes everyone else less happy just by existing.
But, like I said, I don’t buy you. I think it’s just easier for you to wallow in misery than admit you’re born less good at being deserving of anyone else’s love or respect, and your only choice is a long hard road of self-improvement to become adequate at it. It’s not fair, but the only way you’ll get anywhere is stop caring about unfairness and do the work of catch-up at being loveworthy. Knowing you might not succeed but realizing it’s your problem to succeed anyway.
If someone’s legs are broken, the person who trains themselves to walk on prosthetics and accepts working four times harder for imperfect functionality might succeed, while the person who just shouts hatred at people with functioning legs will fail. Making yourself feel better by over and over telling a moral story about how evil luckier people are is just doubling down on failure and the absolute most certain way to remain a failure for the rest of your life. Every unit of energy you throw at hating the world for being unfavourable to you is squandering resources you more than anyone else can’t afford to waste. While making you more and more unlovable and a worse and worse person.
And if you really just can’t. If the game of reality just spat out a map where there’s no way you can win this nightmare level, then you should accept that this is reality. Every human being faces that situation eventually. It’s called death. And some people go out with dignity, while other people go out whining and hating and shaming the human species with their disgraceful spectacle.
Grow some dignity. Change your life. Stop dragging everyone else down.
Jaimie does kinda have a point about how abject and impossible being genetically unlovable is. $10 says the vast majority of people (including radicals!) agree with Jaimie at the end of the day, because everyone loves eugenics. If you’re going to be a eugenicist, at least be kind enough to advocate exterminating the genetically unfit as soon as possible, so as to minimize their/our pain.
Against Resignation September 5, 2016
Posted by Summerspeaker in Anarchism, Despair, Occupy Wall Street.add a comment
When I met newly radicalized folks with the Occupy Wall Street movement back in 2011, they were so committed and optimistic. It didn’t last, of course. Tensions grew. Folks got evicted. Folks went to jail. Etc. But oh was it beautiful for a moment there! Remembering the passion makes me wish my heart hadn’t turned to stone. Anarchism needs more fiery idealists and fewer jaded veterans.
Public Service Announcement November 15, 2015
Posted by Summerspeaker in Anarchism, Anti-imperialism, Despair, Transhumanism.add a comment
Though a staple of geek culture, using the verb “nuke” to express opposition to something isn’t half as cute as you think it is. “Nuke organic farms.” “Nuke New Zealand.” Etc. Nuclear weapons have a specific history, one that to date has no revolutionary associations whatsoever. Massacres and dynamites have better records. On the whole I’m skeptical of violent and militaristic language, though I remain fond of wishing death to nonliving things: “Death to empire! Death to oppression! Death to domination! Death to hierarchy!” Etc. The verb “nuke” has nothing worthwhile to recommend it. This usage impresses those who appreciate hyperbole and geek culture but otherwise alienates and horrifies.
Update July 26, 2015
Posted by Summerspeaker in Despair, Epistemology, Transhumanism.Tags: epistemology, rationality, relativism, science, skepticism, transhumanism, William Gillis
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I’ve been reclusive lately, focused on academics, an interpersonal relationship or two, and distracting myself. My career in the Imperial Academy goes well enough, I guess, while the human connections have been a disaster. I’ve enjoyed drowning my sorrows in cardstock (MTG, specifically EDH) and will continue to do so, but over the last couple weeks my health has taken a downturn that makes indulging in distraction more difficult. At the moment I can hardly breath because of allergies, so I’m not good for much – even when taking the allergy meds they use to cook meth.
My main engagement with transhumanism this year has been via William Gillis’s thought. Between Gillis and Meera Nanda, I’m reassessing the value of criticizing versus supporting science and rationality. I plan to continue doing both, of course, and in many cases criticizing examples of actually existing science as a social practice supports science as a set of principles and methods. With that said, in retrospect I feel I’ve at times given excessive weight to critiques of science and rationality coming from humanities scholarship, both because I found them more convincing than I should have and because I considered these critiques important for an audience I assumed had an unshakably positive view of science. I still regard critiques of science useful, but Gillis and Nanda make a powerful case for the dangers of any move away from science and rationality.
At base I remain fond of old-school skepticism and of relativism; the former amounts to an intellectual game while the later has more meaningful implications. Regarding skepticism, I see no absolutely stable grounds for knowledge, as our senses could be deceiving us and/or our reasoning may be misguided. The edifice of science rests on foundations that haven’t been and probably can’t be definitely proven. However, these foundations are overwhelmingly plausible. The scientific worldview based on empirical evidence, logic, and modeling strikes me as far more likely and practical than any alternative. Regarding relativism, we have zero evidence by the scientific worldview that the universe gives a shit about anything. Values comes from humans and other sentient beings. As such, no universal guide for what should be exists. Our senses and reasoning presumably give us access, albeit mediated access, to objective reality. but what we make of this access only matters to the minds involved. Apart from us, nobody cares. The scientific worldview by all indications provides a closer model of objective reality and this becomes valuable insofar as sentient beings decide it is. I consider this exceedingly valuable as do many other people, but I shouldn’t beguile myself into believing there’s some higher purpose beyond my interests and those of other humans. By universe’s lights, a mind wrapped up in its own subjective reality is every bit as good as one striving toward objective reality: both simply are.
As such, I support science and rationality because I believe they align with my interests and, at least in the long term, with the interests of the vast majority of other currently existing minds (especially human minds). Objective material reality has quite a hold on most of us. Humans tend to suffer when we can’t manage basics like food, water, shelter, and healthcare. Improving the quantity and quality of these basics benefits lots of folks regardless of their position on science and rationality, regardless of whatever subjective realities they’re pursuing. Excessive criticism of science can prove dangerous if it obscures the profound importance of improving shared material conditions and/or if it presents alternatives to science as credible. Playing with subjective realities comes much recommended, but objective material reality stands out as the primary basis for political struggle.
Quotation for the Day May 7, 2014
Posted by Summerspeaker in Despair.add a comment
Reinaldo Arenas, Before Night Falls, 194:
Sexual pleasure often exacts a high price; sooner or later we pay with years of sorrow for every moment of pleasure. It’s not God’s vengeance but that of the Devil, the enemy of everything beautiful. Beauty has always been dangerous. MartĂ said that everyone who is the bearer of light remains alone; I would say that anyone who takes part in certain acts of beauty is eventually destroyed.
This matches my experience – which differs markedly from Arenas’s – but I’d extend the dynamic to pleasure in general. Whether from a marathon gaming session, sexual encounter, riot, or big meal, enjoyment too commonly entails future suffering.
Welcome to the Future January 2, 2014
Posted by Summerspeaker in Despair.4 comments
Happy 2014 to those of y’all who believe in such things! Expect flying cars and jetpacks. I hope to devote more time to this blog and related endeavors in the coming months – but my hopes often go unrealized. Lately I’ve been focusing on school, personal matters, and distraction, not necessarily in that order. I desperately need to find some more income, but I’m no good with this economic system.
Anissimov and Company Declare Themselves Reactionary December 1, 2013
Posted by Summerspeaker in Despair, Evo psych, Technology, The Singularity, Transhumanism.1 comment so far
See Klint Finley’s take on this new movement:
So what exactly is the Cathedral stopping neoreactionaries from talking about? Well, the merits of monarchy for starters. But mostly, as far as I can tell, they want to be able to say stuff like “Asians, Jews and whites are smarter than blacks and Hispanics because genetics” without being called racist. Or at least be able to express such views without the negative consequences of being labeled racist.
Speaking of which, neoreactionaries are obsessed with a concept called “human biodiversity” (HBD) – what used to be called “scientific racism.” Specifically, they believe that IQ is one of – if not the – most important personal traits, and that it’s predominately genetic. Neoreactionaries would replace, or supplement, the “divine right” of kings and the aristocracy with the “genetic right” of elites.
To call these claims “controversial” would be putting it lightly, but they underpin much of anti-egalitarian and pro-traditionalist claims neoreactionaries make. Delving into the scientific debate over race, genetics and IQ is beyond the scope of this article, but I’ve included some links on the topic in the reading list.
It’s not hard to see why this ideology would catch-on with white male geeks. It tells them that they are the natural rulers of the world, but that they are simultaneously being oppressed by a secret religious order. And the more media attention is paid to workplace inequality, gentrification and the wealth gap, the more their bias is confirmed. And the more the neoreactionaries and techbros act out, the more the media heat they bring.
I don’t have time to address this in any detail, but it’s worth being aware of. These folks literally want closed hierarchical societies in the mold of nineteenth-century Europe but with super tech. It almost seems like self-parody or trolling.
P.S. Check out Michael Anissimov’s Twitter feed if you really want to be horrified.
P.P.S. Also see Rick Searle’s take.
Mission Accomplished November 6, 2012
Posted by Summerspeaker in Anarchism, Despair.9 comments
Y’all’s celebrations disgust me. The United States government is a nightmare. Death to all domination. Smash the prisons, free the prisoners, tear apart the war machine, delete the border, expropriate the expropriators, castrate the patriarchs, and have the queerest dance parties in the street.
Anarchy Is for Losers: On Failure and Its Charms October 4, 2012
Posted by Summerspeaker in Anarchism, Despair.1 comment so far
marxism/ anarchism appeals to the angry loser and the jilted among us
Receiving two evaluations today has turned my thoughts to the subject of success and failure. The first evaluation, from those who have power over me, was negative — another rejected article submission. The second, from those who I had power over — students — was positive. This dynamic aligns with my politics and and place in the world. While some anarchists may contest the ideology’s association with criminals, losers, outcasts, queers, and rejects of all kinds, I passionately embrace this designation. I’ve no compunctions about declaring that my lack of status within the existing system goes light-years toward explaining my opposition to it. Envy and resentment indeed animate my spirit. Anarchism serves as a way for me to maintain a fierce sense of self-worth amidst the chorus of voices telling me I’m not good enough and offering that simple choice: conform or die. Were I successful under the status quo, I suspect I’d think and feel much differently. It’s difficult to imagine. I hate hierarchy when it’s on my side too, but with attenuated intensity.
So yes, anarchy is for losers as well as lovers. The prospect of social and material leveling holds obvious appeal to those of us who’ve lost again and again and again. Being judged would be bad enough in an egalitarian world; it’s nightmare when your access to even basic comforts and necessities depends on assessment from above. I’ve limited reason to believe I could ever assimilate enough to win a position of security within the logic of authority and meritocracy. I’ll never be disciplined, pretty, rigorous, or smart enough by their standards. In my case, critics are right: I seek revolution because I can’t (as well as don’t want to) succeed under the established framework. They consider this damning; I consider it structural grounds for transformation. Building a society of adamant autonomy and promiscuous generosity suits my rational self-interest. How else am I supposed to get nice things? Even if I wanted to sell out, nobody’s buying.
To be completely clear, I ain’t exalting powerless or preaching altruism. Empathy sits at the center of my worldview, but that’s distinct from self-sacrifice or what Friedrich Nietzsche called “slave morality.” I’m not looking for pity or condolences by my identification with failure, as nice as those can be. Rather, I’m making a proposal for radical change. We losers should gang up and fulfill our desires via a combination of destruction, expropriation, and production. Let’s take the physical wealth we’re denied and indiscriminately distribute love, affirmation, and recognition amongst ourselves. Anarchism isn’t — or doesn’t have to be — about asceticism, mediocrity, and victimhood. You can understand it instead as wildly ambitious gambit for status. I view my detractors with the same contempt as they view me, but critically without any interest in stifling their dreams. I’m a failure by their standards, not my own, and I’m going to keep it that way.
Expect us.
Queering the Singularity 