The Movement You Need…

This article from Saturday’s London Daily Mail somewhat confirmed something I have been pondering over the past few weeks.

Don’t listen to the liberals - Right-wingers really are nicer people, latest research shows | Mail Online

George Orwell once wrote that politics was closely related to social identity. ‘One sometimes gets the impression,’ he wrote in The Road To Wigan Pier, ‘that the mere words socialism and communism draw towards them with magnetic force every fruit-juice drinker, nudist, sandal-wearer, sex-maniac, Quaker, nature-cure quack, pacifist and feminist in England’.

It all started when I forwarded to a cousin a bit of minutiae regarding statistical differences between behaviors of peoples of various cultures. The data fascinated me because I have done many analyses of precinct-level voting behavior. Past behavior is a great tool for predicting future behavior. Generally, people within a precinct share a greater level of “sameness” than they do with those in neighboring precincts; people self-differentiate themselves from others when they select a place to call home. This information is pretty much confirmed by various sections of the General Social Survey (GSS) to which the Mail’s article pointed as a source.

My cousin, a dyed in the wool egalitarian leftist, apparently was upset that I had the audacity to even read statistics that explore differences between peoples’ cultural traditions and how they might affect behavior. To him, it appears I have committed some some sort of thought-crime in pondering that people from various cultures might be different in any way at all. To him, all people of every culture and every nation are not only “equal,” they’re “identical;” it is an article that underlies his humanist faith. If people actually are different, and that difference is in any way based upon folkways, traditions, or anything handed down through the generations, then his whole set of assumptions about the way the world works might crumble. (Continued)

Tags: Conservatism, general social survey, london daily mail, Political Correctness, progressivism, sameness, traditionalism

I’m a fan of the Gates of Vienna blog, which focuses on all of the various threats to Western Civilization from a rational traditionalist point of view. It’s authors are well-read, conservative, pithy and wickedly politically incorrect in a calculative manner: They’re my kind of people.

A frequent contributor there, a Scandinavian blogger by the name of Fjordman, used to maintain his own blog but gave it up and now makes his presence known as prolific commenter in other blogs and by contributing longer essays to other blogs that hold his interest and share his concerns for the West’s cultural legacy.

I’m particularly fond of his sardonism:

Gates of Vienna: The Rise of Glossocracy

In the 19th century, Britain was threatened with subjugation by Napoleon. The British people rose to the occasion and defeated the threat. In the 20th century, Britain was threatened with subjugation by Adolf Hitler. The British people rose to the occasion and defeated the threat. In the 21st century, Britain was threatened with subjugation by the combined forces of Islamic Jihad and a pan-European superstate. The British people didn’t notice the threat, as they were too busy watching semi-naked people do obscene things on TV. I bet even George Orwell didn’t see that one coming, but maybe Huxley did.

(Continued)

Tags: Conservatism, fjordman, gates of vienna, Political Correctness, western civilization, western traditions

If there is anything I wish I could change about my past, I would have become a serious student of history at a much younger age. Yes, I’ve always had an interest in the past, thanks to the loving intention on the part of many in my family who explained my ancestors’ roles in the establishment of what became the United States. But my interest in things historical was made too narrow, I think, because the left-leaning educators who made up the vast majority of those I came in contact with from elementary school through university were antipathetic toward Western Culture and the philosophies that fed it. My instructors were predominantly disdainful of Christianity, though their views were never directly stated, as the political correctness of the 60′ and 70’s had not yet made it fashionable to knock and mock all things related to Christ. It did not fit their agenda to impress upon me, and my classmates, the importance of truly knowing history because if we knew it and embraced it as prescriptive, we’d likely not be easily sold on whatever pretty packages of radical leftist drivel that might be offered up as “reforms” in the future.

That said, I’m taking notes and drawing inferences about the information being presented at a web site called The Maps of War. Visually, the materials presented there are stunning, and designed to make the viewer ponder that conflict and borders are inseparable. Read below, visit the site an ponder how the “borders of religion” relate to the ongoing conflict between a West born of Christianity and neighbor nation states steeped in Islamic Sharia.

History of Religion

How has the geography of religion evolved over the centuries, and where has it sparked wars? Our map gives us a brief history of the world’s most well-known religions: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Judaism. Selected periods of inter-religious bloodshed are also highlighted. Want to see 5,000 years of religion in 90 seconds?

Those who think that our struggle with expansionist Islam is something “new” either aren’t well-versed in history or lack critical thinking skills. Where will the colors runneth over next?

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Tags: borders, christianity islam, history of the world, Political Correctness

Things I don’t tell my wife

My wife, Shelley, is a kind person - perhaps the kindest soul I’ve ever gotten to know intimately. Frankly, we are very different people and she’s far more consistently pleasant than I am. I’m outgoing, gregarious and less even-tempered; she’s a reserved, consistent and calming influence on me. She’ll never be the one quick to shake the hand of every person in the room, but she’ll always be very observant and perceive a lot of things that I’ll miss. Her counsel is priceless to me, and as I write this I feel a bit guilty for not thanking her for it more often. Knowing her, being with her and growing with her has, I believe, made me a far better person than the one she met seven years ago.

I think it is our contrasting basic natures that feeds a lot of what I put into my writings in this blog and various other written forums in which I participate: She simply would rather not know about or discuss what we call current events in great detail. Too many of the reported artifacts and results of human nature we call “news” are off-putting to her. If the terrorist is in our neighborhood she wants to know about it, but if it involves clashes of civilizations in some distant sand-pit that have been going on since Abraham begat Ishmael and Isaac, I know to spare her the details.

Our commitment to each other, building our lives together and raising our daughter gives us plenty to talk about and work on as a couple and a family. We each bring our unique strengths to bear in rearing our daughter. For instance: Very soon, my wife will be the one most intimately informed about the daily details of our four-year-old’s school days; I’m already trying to make sure that Federal intrusions like the insipid “No Child Left Behind Act” don’t render her part of a generation in which all public school children are molded into equally inept imbeciles.

We’ll both be working toward the same ends by different means while sharing equally in Katie’s successes and disappointments. (Continued)

Tags: communications, current events, human nature, no child left behind act, Political Correctness