Gods Are Crazy But Is Science Going Mad?

Advanced Physics and the Irrationality of Religion.
Religion has come in many shapes and sizes. Even within a single religion, there are many schools of interpretation. For instance, in the Old Testament God is intemperate and unpredictable; He willfully and erratically interferes in our affairs or plays dice with the cosmos. But, others have argued that God created the universe according to set of rules, and so, the universe is governed by those rules–such as gravity and so on. In some religions, the divine forces are, if not always gentle or friendly, systematic and well-patterned. Consider the ancient Egyptian religion which believed that the change of seasons and the flow of the Nile reflected the stability of the universe as governed by gods. On the other hand, the gods worshiped and feared by civilizations along the Euphrates and Tigris were believed to be unpredictable, violent, and fearsome. Historians think these differences reflected the physical environments of Egyptians and Mesopotamia. The ebb and flow of the Nile followed the similar patterns year after year, encouraging the notion gods prefer order over chaos, and that the universe is governed by stable laws. As the rivers of Mesopotamia violently alternated year after year, civilizations along them were inclined to believe in violent gods and a chaotic universe(or perhaps gods were themselves not powerless against the unwieldy universe).

Anyway, as the Jewish narrative progressed, an idea arose that God created the universe according to certain principles. And, God gradually removed Himself from the affairs of man. God existed, of course but didn’t interfere with the clockwork functioning of the universe. Since He already told us what we must do, it was up to us–with our free will–to choose good over evil.
This view of the universe complemented certain scientific assumptions. Though we credit the pagan polytheistic ancient Greeks with the invention of science, science-as-search-for-the-universal-laws-of-the-cosmos was deemed perfectly acceptable in the Christian world. Science wasn’t seen as challenging or refuting God but a way to appreciate and admire the genius of God’s design. Indeed, many scientists thought the order in the universe could not have been possible without a Maker.
But, as science progressed, it took on a life of its own. It became its own master. If reason based on evidence was the source of all knowledge and truth, shouldn’t God’s existence also be questioned and put to the test? What was the evidence for the existence of God or that God created the universe? How can the notion of some deity without shape or form with supreme power coexist with Reason? Isn’t God a matter of traditional belief or Faith? Or worse, a delusion?

Science sought to find the laws of the universe and order in all things. According to science, even chaos had or hid its own logic or order. Nothing can exist or operate outside the laws of the cosmos. For instance, primitive peoples look upon lightning and thunder as crazy or crazed manifestations of nature or godly rage. Science tells us that even the most cataclysmic phenomena–floods, earthquakes, forest fires, etc–happen for a reason. Lightning is electricity. Earthquakes happen because of pressures built along geologic fault-lines. Asteroids hit the Earth because our gravity attracts flying pieces of space objects. And, we now know that there are simple reasons for infections–germs. So, if we use our reason, we can find the order or the hidden laws behind any phenomenon, no matter how ‘crazy’ it may seem to ordinary senses. A primitive man who’s never seen a TV or heard a radio would surely be startled and confuse what he sees or hears as magic. But, we know that a TV or radio is a machine made by man along certain scientific principles.

Christians were not averse to science as it was a form of respecting God. Christians had a similar concept about art. Art would be an appreciation of God’s beautiful creations and the nobility of nature and man. Artistic genius was seen as a gift bestowed unto man by God. God has the grand artistic talent to create the wonders of the world. Man’s art would appreciate and replicate this beauty in a humble way. In pre-modern times, even the most ambitious artists served the vision and power of God.

To be sure, the very notion of art and science didn’t sit well with some religious folks. In the Old Testament, it’s forbidden to make idols of man or animals for such would blaspheme God’s lone creative powers. Life can only multiply through sex, a mechanism equipped in all living forms by God. Man may procreate but not create. Creation was the lone power of God. According to this view, a sculpture or painting of a living being was a sign of hubris on part of man, as if he had the same powers as God. In the area of science, many religious folks feared that any exploration of the workings of the universe was disrespectful to God; God made the world the way He saw fit, and it was our duty only to live in His world with gratitude and humility, not nosily look around to see how everything works.

But, especially with the Renaissance, Christian Europe came to appreciate the role and significance of art and science. Even so, most Renaissance painters focused on religious subjects and themes; they also dwelt on pagan themes but were careful in that regard lest they incur the wrath of religious authorities. Kings, noblemen, and rising business class were more ambivalent. Narcissistic and vain in their love of beautiful things, many could not resist the beauty and charms of sensual paganist art. Even the religious authorities–the privileged ones anyway–found roundabout ways to collect and appreciate sensual art–as long as such were said to be within good taste and a tribute to God’s eye for natural and human beauty. But, strong-willed artists wanted more freedom, and at times ran up against the orthodoxy of religious powers.
Same was true of the scientific community. As long as scientists offered up discoveries that confirmed the view of the church, they were honored and sponsored. But, when Galileo argued that the Earth revolved around the Sun and not the other way around, he got himself into trouble. Christians wanted to believe God had placed Earth at the center of the universe–just as the Chinese across the millenia had believed that China was the Middle Kingdom, the center of both mankind and the universe.
Anyway, mounting evidence proved that the Earth was not the center of the universe. Eventually, the Church accepted Galileo’s discoveries, believing that such did not, in any real sense, call into question the authority of God. Just because Earth wasn’t at the center of the universe didn’t mean that God wasn’t at its center. Besides, Galileo’s impeccable models showed that there is a perfect mechanism governing the stars and planets. So, there was a Maker after all who designed the universe to function like clockwork; we just didn’t happen to be at the center of it anymore. Besides, what did it matter? Why do WE have to be at the center of anything as long as God is at the center(and everywhere)in the universe?

But, there was no guarantee that science would continue to serve God or only reveal the glory of God. Science, based on curiosity, endless questions, and reason, was also bound to call into question the very existence and authority of God. Could God be proven or discovered through science–based on facts and use of reason? For science to be truly independent and free, this question had to be asked. The more it was asked, the more science became a thing unto itself. If Galileo was said to have only ‘discovered’ few of God’s truth, Einstein was said to have ‘conquered the universe’ when awarded with the Nobel Prize. Of course, conquering the universe isn’t quite the same as creating the universe, but IF there is no god and the universe just happen to have ‘created’ itself, couldn’t it be argued that the man who figures out its laws is the greatest being that could ever exist?
The two scientific areas where religion was most profoundly challenged were in physics and biology. Physics asked the most profound questions about time and space, about the infinitely large and infinitely small. It searched far and wide, it looked into very nook/cranny of the universe. It didn’t find God anywhere. It found bigger and bigger stars and smaller and smaller particles. It found funny things happening to time and space in other dimensions. But, where was God?
As for biology, it questioned one of the most sacred ideas in the Bible, namely that God created life and that life is sacred. Also, Judeo-Christian-Islamic religions believed that man was a separate creation all unto himself. If Darwin had proven that evolution applied to only non-human life, his theory might have been more acceptable to Christians. But, Darwin went whole hog and said man too evolved from lower forms of life. Not all religions found these notions anathema, but Christianity naturally did due to its creation myth where God created man to rule over nature. Was man just a product of nature?

As the Western World advanced through modernity, the ‘progress’ of Art followed much the same pattern as that of science. It became more a thing unto itself than a craft devoted to glorifying God and his creations. Of course, all great artists had always partly been into art-for-art’s-sake, but their great talent still dutifully and reverently served some ‘higher’ authority or theme.
But, already by Beethoven, this was no longer the case. Beethoven believed in God but also believed that his creative powers were equal to that of God. So, Beethoven wasn’t so much serving God–as Bach had done–as competing with Him. This outlook eventually led to the secular sanctification of the artist. Art became the religion for many people in the late 19th and 20th centuries. Unmoored from old certitudes and sacred subjects, artists became their own subjects. Their grand, brilliant, dark, violent, and/or sensual expressions and visions became the new heavens and hell for late modern man.
A genius was not just a smart talented person who learned how the universe worked or who replicated, in art, the beauty created by God. He was a discoverer of new universes of knowledge, the creator of new ways of seeing the world. He would do for science or art what Napoleon did for politics. Such greatness was also said to have the moral or amoral authority to change the world. The vision of the Great Man embodying the new spirit in knowledge, creativity, and politics was Nietzsche’s superman. This great Superior Man had the will and power to create Gods, not just meekly serve some already pre-packaged God.

Of course, this is also where the Age of Reason breaks apart. Freedom in art and creativity didn’t necessarily co-exist peacefully with freedom in science. Science is about finding out what really is; creativity is about what one feels, what one imagines. Civilization is the product of both fantasy and technology.
Reason promised truth and justice based on what the mind teaches us. Reason demanded more freedom. But, more freedom also meant greater freedom to feel, to emote, to imagine, to fantasize. The rise of Romanticism struck a blow on the citadel of Reason. Romantics argued that man is not mind alone but feelings, creativity, sensuality, imagination, and even madness. Indeed, madness and even diseases–such as tuberculosis–became fashionable and romanticized in artistic circles.
Of course, the tragi-comic aspect of all great 20th century radical revolutions was they expounded on reason but won power and support through political romantics. Leninism, Stalinism, Hitlerism, Maoism, Che-ism, and etc all played on the emotions and imagination of the masses. Much of it was kitschy and ridiculous but also grand, awesome, and magnificent. To add to the irony, there were both the themes of desecration and consecration. As rebel ideologies, they challenged the notion of the sacred(as defined by conservative or traditional powers) but also erected new gods and engraved new orthodoxies.

Anyway, it seems we’ve backtracked a great deal from the original point, which was that science and reason would show us the orderly way of the universe as opposed to religion, which posited that the laws of the universe were created by an all-powerful God--implying that God himself could bend those rules at his will. Initially, science was content to figure out and understand–rather humbly–the laws as devised by God. As Reason grew in power and gained in confidence, it sought to prove that there is and can be nothing outside the laws of the universe. God, whether He existed or not, could not violate or circumvent universal or cosmic laws. Einstein said, "God does not play dice", which was another way of saying that He canNOT play dice. Even God is subject to a power greater than He–the laws of nature.

Science sought to show that every corner of the universe was subject to these universal laws. The power of Reason would bring man closer and closer to the ultimate truth. Perhaps one day, we would know all the laws governing matter, energy, life, and humanity. Or, even if we could never know all the answers, we would know increasingly more and make advances that would improve civilization by leaps and bounds. Reason would reveal the mechanism of stars, life forms, society, history, etc. Karl Marx, for example, thought he figured out the secret dynamics of history. Having gained such ‘scientific’ knowledge, he thought his kind should have the power(even total power) to change society. If expert doctors are the ones to perform surgeries, if expert auto mechanics should repair cars, why shouldn’t expert philosophers of history handle political and macro-economic affairs?

Though fascism is considered an irrational ideology, there is a rationalist twist to its theories. Fascism is essentially a rational understanding and use of the core irrational nature of man. If Marx focused on the economic forces in history/society, Mussolini and Hitler focused on psychological forces in history/society.
In a way, both the radical left and the radical right thought they had rationally figured out the irrational nature of economic and psycho-political behavior. Marx thought he unearthed the irrationality of elite economic behavior. He observed how the rich and powerful advance economic processes wherein they themselves are ground to dust. The rich and powerful seek greater power and wealth, but their means eventually favors the people they ‘exploit’. The kings and noblemen sought to only use the bourgeoisie, but the bourgeoisie came to supplant the kings and noblemen. The bourgeoisie ‘exploit’ the working class(and the peasant class uprooted from the soil and forced to work in factories), but this very process would only lead to the expansion and revolt of the working class against the capitalist class. Though the rich and powerful ‘rationally’ sought to maintain their power and privilege, the very system they’ve created and operate will lead to their demise. Marx thought he rationally understood this irrational behavior on the part of the rich/powerful, who in their desire for more wealth and power, only end up digging their own graves. Lenin, in a similar vein, said the bourgeoisie would supply the revolutionaries with the ropes to hang them with.

If Marx focused on economics, Mussolini and Hitler focused on psychology. (To be sure, Mussolini started out as a socialist, so he was the product of both the radical left and right, much more so than Hitler whose socialism was basically practical than ideological). Mussolini and Hitler saw politics as art and theater, as communal mythmaking. Both were skeptical of the power or ability of The People to ‘think’ rationally. Individuals could think rationally perhaps, but then everyone disagrees anyway on what is good for society.
So, Mussolini and Hitler thought political unity and national strength should fundamentally be founded on holistic, emotion-bound, and sacred concepts of the nation, state, destiny, tradition, and/or race. Both leaders thought the essentially mythical and religious nature of man was a given, a fixed constant. (Liberals plagiarized a big page out of this book in their grooming and marketing of Obama. Though a secular leftist, Obama played the spiritualist game, and the media coverage of him has been very sacramental and messianic. Also, the cult of Martin Luther King makes a mockery of all rational and skeptical principles presumably held by liberals. King is not remembered or understood as a political or historical figure but as a divine figure, a kind of modern prophet. And, of course, the cult of personality surrounding Che Guevara has nothing to do with rationalism. But, this is a reality that goes back to Marx and Lenin. Before the charisma cult of Mussolini and Hitler, there was already the deification of communist thinkers and leaders. And, recall that the French Revolution, that supposedly great struggle for the triumph of Reason, gave us the first great modern god-man Napoleon. And, certain artists, especially Wagner, gained almost a god-like cult in the 19th century. Cult of personality seems almost universal. We can see it in the worship of Jesus and the iconography of emperors.

The cult of Jesus was a rather great and troubling development because it deified humility and elevated equality. Jesus was said to be a man who didn’t care for wealth or power. He ate simple food and cared for the poor. Yet, the Jesus cult made him out to be not only a prophet or son-of-god but the equal of God Himself. In a way, Jesus cult has served as the template for the tyrants of the 20th century. It being the age of the masses, the tyrants had to be a man-of-the-people, both humble and god-like, both ‘one of us’ and ‘the one and only’.
It had always been understood that Kings were better than the people. The modern ideology said the People are the bosses, and so the leader must reflect the will of the people, must be one of the people. If so, why must the leader be elevated above the people far beyond any king or duke in the past? Perhaps, this is the most troubling thing about the rise of Obama. America had been cautious in its choice and perceptions of its presidents. Even Teddy Roosevelt the tough guy knew his limits, and he had to deal with the opposition like anyone else.
In the US, the media and academia are owned and run mostly by liberal Jews. Blacks, the victors in sports and pop music, are held in awe and reverence by ‘faggoty ass white boys and jungle-feverish white girls’. So, Obama has become the god-man of America. Even Republicans say they are much more optimistic since Obama became President. This isn’t rational or sensible. Cult of Personality has taken over America, and there is nothing to oppose it but some scattered opposition in the media. Most people don’t read conservative journals. Most people get their news from TV. Most kids get their views of the world from schools taught by liberal teachers who themselves have been weaned on the cult of Martin Luther King, the religion of white guilt, and the worship of the Superior Badass Negro.

Anyway, I digress again. So, we return to science and religion once more. Science was going to reveal the order of the universe and human society. More discoveries would dispel all notions that anything could happen by chance or that there could be divine intervention(or even the existence of God) as such would violate the fixed laws of the universe.
But, 20th century led to some funny discoveries. The theory of relativity went far beyond Newtonian physics. This theory was (mis)applied to culture, society, and philosophy(mainly by those who didn’t even understand its math). In some ways, cultural relativism was an outgrowth of this theory. On the other hand, I would argue cultural relativism would have come along anyway, Einstein or no Einstein. It was the inevitable product of Western anthropologists’ exploration and study of other cultures--the realization that ‘reality’ always exists within a certain paradigm. Cultural relativism doesn’t necessarily say all perceptions/conceptions of reality are equally valid; it merely says reality is as it is to those ‘trapped’ in their particular paradigms.

Even so, even the theory of relativity didn’t violate the concept of order in the universe; it merely showed that cosmic laws were far stranger than we thought. And, though Einstein’s idea of matter and energy being interchangeable was alarming to some, it could be demonstrated by a neat mathematical formula. It could be proven and measured.
But, the theory of quantum mechanics was altogether stranger. It posited that in the realm of subatomic matter, randomness and chaos prevailed. And, there seemed to be no way of bridging the laws of nature between Big reality and Little reality. Though this was purely a scientific matter, it was bound to have metaphysical and spiritual implications. Didn’t Reason promise us a vision of perfect order through science? This seemed to be the case with science up to the early theories of Einstein. But, the theory of quantum mechanics threw a monkey wrench into the whole notion of a unified universe governed by the same rules. The rules of the ‘normal’ universe didn’t seem to jibe with the random ‘rules’ of the subatomic universe. So, is our seemingly ordered universe merely a thin layer of a much crazier universe beyond the penetration of reason?
A sort of parallel developed in the arts as well. Art, of course, was never rational, but it had its rules and conventions passed down as tradition. Also, it had its favored subjects, generally sacred and spiritual. The Age of Reason embraced political and social revolution but didn’t dispense with the notion of art having conventions and serving a ‘higher’ purpose. There had been many great individual artists throughout Western history whose personal genius cannot be denied, but they were serving ideals and subjects bigger than themselves.
With the rise of Romanticism, the artist’s own genius and personal vision became the central theme of Art. He didn’t have to imagine God or the Noble Ideals or Beauty. Rather, his main obsession was to reach within his soul and unleash all the creative powers within. Romanticism embraced the opening of the creative pandora’s box. Even so, 19th century Romantics could only build upon what had come before them, and therefore, their great passions and obsessions did serve themes of beauty, passion, nobility, purity, etc despite some of the mad quality. Romanticism was new and different, but also a continuum. It was still very much part of the grand tradition. Wagner’s music was ultimately the sublime twilight of Old Music than the dawn of New Music.
What we call ‘modern art’ that arose in the 20th century was a clean break from the past. It was to Art what quantum mechanics was to science. If the theory of relativity was still related to Newtonian physics through a loopy mathematical formula, quantum mechanics was a break from both and existed in a world of its own.
In the arts, avant-garde art of the 20th century was a clear break from the creative past. The concept of Art serving themes or primarily replicating reality was gone. Rather, Art explored its own subatomics. It fragmented and divided into smaller and more abstract parts. In some ways, it turned more into an intellectual exercise than an artistic enterprise. At its most far-reaching, it wasn’t even intellectual nor recognizably sensual. It was like watching the elements of creativity spun around and around in a nuclear accelerator and then blasted onto a canvas. The results were often particular(as in ‘like particles’). Indeed, even the concept of Art was shattered and lost. Today, much of Art is really a deconstruction of not only art but of all the forces–social, economic, political, academic, etc–that play a role in determining what is ‘art’ and what its value is. It’s about "a-r-t" with many more quotations and parantheses around it.
Anyway, what does the most advanced science say about reality? All the Newtonian scientific laws still govern and apply to what we consider 99.99% of reality. Theory of relativity makes us understand stars and galaxies. But, is there any set of laws governing the realm of the infinitely small? Yes or no, aren’t all big things made of small things? If there are no rules in the small world, and if big things are made up of small things, is the basic core of reality beyond order, beyond laws we can fathom?
This is not what Reason promised us. Scientists mocked religious people as believing that any part of the universe could be beyond the laws of nature.
Of course, quantum mechanics doesn’t say there are no laws of nature, but it does tell us that the laws of nature in the subatomic world are nothing like what we might define as ‘laws’. Can laws be anarchic and random? In quantum mechanics, we have an observation of reality but no understandings of its laws if there are, indeed, any.
Of course, I’m not in anyway suggesting this proves the existence of God. It’s merely to point out that science finally ended up with a discovery which is even more ‘nonsensical’ than what religious people believe. The very people who mock religious people for believing in a God willfully violates cosmic laws now believe that chaotic randomness reigns in the realm of subatomic matter beyond the reach of rational measurement.

Of course, the String Theory and others like it have tried to finally unify theories governing the big and small. And, if its formulations are correct, we finally seem to have the answer. But, its implications are even more ‘nonsensical’. String Theory says there is more than one plane of reality; there are parallel universes, maybe 5, 9, 12, 24, infinitum. What you don’t do in one universe, you do in another, and so on and so on. String Theory may make mathematical sense, but its theories are crazier than any religion.
This is where scientific truth becomes insane; indeed, far more ludicrous than anything taught by religion. I do not oppose or blame science or scientists in anyway. All I’m pointing out is that the strongest argument used against religion by science goes out the window with String Theory–and more such theories down the pipeline. For all I know, String Theory may well be true, but if it is true, the cosmos is a madhouse.
The notion of religious folks believing in crazy stuff as opposed to scientists discovering & believing in orderly stuff is no longer tenable. The methods of science and mathematics may be as valid, sound, and legitimate as ever but what if they tell us, at the end of the day, that ultimate reality defies and mocks at all notions we’ve built up around science? And, if there can be a million parallel universes, who’s to say one might not actually have God?
Richard Dawkins and others like him deserve great respect as scientists as they carefully and impeccably–and arrogantly and haughtily–make their rational argument to persuade us that laws of nature govern everything, and these laws can be understood with anyone with an open mind and open to reason. In biology, this is true enough. But, it’s physics that explores the ultimate reality, and what it’s telling us is beyond reason though it’s reason that is taking us to that conclusion. ‘Mad scientist’ may be an unfair stereotype but physics is turning into mad science–not because it’s bad science but because the more we know through legitimate scientific and mathematical methods tells us that ultimate reality defies all our concepts about laws of nature and cosmic order.

Were Stalin and Hitler’s mass killings rational? What is the essence of Rationalism?

The following piece asks the question, ‘was what Hitler or Stalin did rational?’.
The question sounds perverse, and in a way it is. How can the mass killings of people–especially those who are ‘innocent’–be rational? Also, even if we allow that no one is innocent in either the spiritual or ideological sense, who has the right to kill so many?

Still, rational isn’t the same as moral. The opposite of rational is mad or irrational. Neither rationalism nor madness is moral or immoral; both are amoral. We generally prefer rationality, but rationality isn’t the same as rationalism. Rationalism says that we should think, believe, and act according to the rational dictates arising from premises founded upon scientific principles. It could be argued that Hitler and the Nazis would have been less dangerous had they been mad than rationalist. As madmen, they might have killed Jews one day, spared them on the next, and so on. Mad people lack consistency and don’t follow logical courses of action.

This cannot be said of Stalin or Hitler. They had a set of beliefs or principles supposedly founded on scientific facts, and acted accordingly and consistently. To be sure, there are people who can be mad or delusional in some fundamental way and then be logically consistent in the pursuit of that delusion. Think of UFO nuts whose basic belief in alien beings are founded on nonsense or lunacy but logically pursue ‘data’ based on their assumptions. And, there’s another kind of madness where some people see patterns and conspiracies through overly active, imaginative, and paranoid mind.

All of this makes us wonder to what extent people like Marx, Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, and others were merely scientifically wrong or fundamentally imbalanced psychologically. Were they scrupulously rational and sane men who unfortunately or tragically came upon a set of wrong ideas, or were they fundamentally imbalanced mentalities fated to mis-connect historical and ‘scientific’ dots–those that would not have been connected by people more attuned to reality. (But, what is macro-reality except what we read about in books and magazines, and what author or researcher has full grasp of larger social reality? All views of social reality are half-truths and half-guesses founded on personal agendas and prejudices.)
Anyway, no one can know everything about the world of men. It’s difficult enough to understand the nature of elemental particles or the behavior of ‘simple’ organisms. When it comes to mankind–all the people together--, it’s impossible to know the utlimate truth about human nature, human potential, human diversity, and human good/evil. So, anyone who claims to know about humanity and then comes up with a set of theories which justifies policies for creating utopia is deeply suspect.
In this sense, rationalism is dangerous when applied to the human world because there is only so much we know about ourselves, much less others. To look upon mankind as particles of (historical)matter can lead to dehumanization–no matter how utopian the goals–, as was demonstrated many times in the 20th century.
The problem is never rationality, something we always need more of but of excessive rational-ISM. Excessive or radical rationalism assumes that a handful of very intelligent men can understand the true nature and potentialities of man, and such, they should have the power to socially engineer us like guinea pigs. This is not necessarily an anti-government position. Indeed, one could argue libertarianism is just another radical ideology though less dangerous than leftism. The libertarian philosophy of let-chips-fall-where-they-may also looks upon human beings as particles of (socio-economic)matter; supposedly, individual freedom and free markets will sort everything out for the good of all. Rather fanciful notion considering the nature of man.

Anyway, one could argue both Stalin and Hitler were rationalistic men–even ultra-rationalistic. They believed in a set of principles and then pushed them to their logical conclusions. When it came to ideology, Stalin was a communist and Hitler was a National Socialist. When it came to strategy, both were opportunists. As a result, their tactics were sometimes at odds with their stated ideologies–especially during the Nazi-Soviet pact–, but everything they did made rational(ist) sense within what they believed about the world and statecraft.

One may ask, how rational was it for Stalin to kill so many? What possible harm to the state could entire families of peasants or various powerless ethnic groups possibly do? What was the necessity of pushing millions of Ukrainians and others toward starvation? Why did entire ethnic groups have to be deported across the vast Soviet continent and worked and/or starved to death?
While some of it made brute economic sense, the scale on which it took place makes us wonder if there could be any rational justification.
And yet, if we take Stalin’s ideology seriously, it made sense enough. After all, Stalin wasn’t only trying to build an economy but create the New Man, a New Culture, a New World. In this equation, all the little nationalisms were an hindrance. All nationalisms had to be smashed or made Soviet-friendly. And, the logic of the revolution dictated that the most ruthless, dramatic, and sudden attacks on the Old Order was most effective. The Russian Civil War taught the Bolsheviks that it’s us-or-them. There could be no compromise. So, the communists waged a total blitzkrieg against the old order–churches, nationalities, property owning peasants, etc. That most of the victims were powerless–and even poor–was irrelevant. Cumulatively, they were seen as a deadweight dragging the revolution. The only way to turn the lethargic masses into a revolutionary force was through a war mentality. Everything had to be us-against-them. So, even people who didn’t oppose the revolution could be deemed as the enemy if they weren’t part of the revolutionary army or militants. The enemies were not only the anti-revolutionary saboteurs and agents, but the people themselves clinging to old ways of thought. In a way, the latter type was a bigger challenge for the revolution. The ruthless Soviet secret police could amply ferret out and destroy anti-communist agents in a totalitarian police state. But, what do you do about the population who only wanted to be left alone, keep their property, and mind their own business? Such people weren’t out to overthrow the system, but they were standing in the way of the revolutionary locomotive. Either they worked to lay down new tracks or they had to be run over.
In this sense, Stalin’s mass killings did make sense. That they unfairly killed millions of innocents is very true, but what is an ‘innocent’ in historical terms? Whether one is innocent or not depends on the historical context. A well-off German family in the early 1940s is doing no direct harm to anyone and is indeed innocent. But, as a witting or unwitting cog in the Nazi-dominated German machine–much of it devoted to war–, is he truly innocent? Similarly, within the context of Soviet ideology, anyone who owned private land and didn’t want to relinquish it to the communists could not have been regarded as innocent. By the very nature of his outlook and habits, he could only be regarded as a reactionary or even anti-revolutionary.

Much the same could be said of Hitler’s mass killings. It may seem perverse to say Hitler’s killings–especially of the Jews and gypsies–were rational(ist), but it would be more perverse to say they were mad. It was not like Hitler was hallucinating day in and day out, rolling the dice and killing Jews and gypsies the one day and then embracing them the next. No, there was a terrible logic to what Hitler did, and it was certainly rationalist.
One may ask, what is so rational about killing Jewish conservatives(Jews who embraced German nationalism) and Jewish children? How could children be guilty of anything? This is a valid question within the field of criminal justice, but Nazi ideology had another way of judging people-racially. It was the contention of Hitler and other Nazi ideologues that Jewish problem was essentially biological. Therefore, the outer manifestations of Jewish sickness was rooted in Jewish genes. As such, the genes themselves had to be eradicated. Within the beliefs of this ideology, Hitler’s holocaust makes rational sense.
After all, how do we deal with cockroaches and rats? Do we just kill the adults of the species since they are the ones doing the harm? No, we find ways to eradicate their babies too. Why? Because the babies will inevitably grow up into harmful bugs and pests. We don’t hope that maybe the young rats and roaches will grow up to be different from their pesty parents. We believe that rats and roaches are genetically programmed to engage in behavior that is harmful to us.
This was the logic of Nazism when it came to the Jewish and gypsy question. Nazis believed that the social, economic, and political problems related to Jews or gypsies were essentially rooted in biology. In other words, Jew can’t help but be a Jew. A gypsy can’t help but be a gypsy.
Of course, not even Hitler believed all Jews were bad or corrupt, but he believed that even good or decent Jews possess recessive or latent genes that could produce an evil or wicked Jew down the line.
The nature of Nazi ideology being what it was, one could argue that the Jewish holocaust was rational even if horrific. Rationalism always operates within the context of what is assumed to be true. As such, it is amoral.

To be sure, one may question the rationalism of the premise itself; one can argue, for instance, that Nazi ideology wasn’t rational at its roots, and so the Jewish holocaust was the rational outcome of something irrational. There is some truth to this. If Hitler and the Nazis had looked carefully at the facts, they would have realized that the nordic race wasn’t purely ‘Aryan’, a misapplied term to begin with. Also, they would have admitted that the so-called Aryans were not superior to Jews in intellect nor superior to blacks in physical prowess. So, Nazi ideology was fundamentally false, and the rationalist actions perpetrated in its name served a set of lies or delusions. So, would proper rationalism have prevented something like Nazism? If Nazism had been founded on truth than falsehoods about race and human biology, could the Jewish and gypsy holocaust have been prevented? Perhaps, perhaps not.

After all, the truth–Jewish intellectual superiority, for instance–could just as well have served an ideology committed to the mass killing of Jews–man, woman, and child. A people may feel contempt for those deemed inferior but may fear those deemed superior. We humans wouldn’t want to be visited by beings much smarter than us from other planets. (Suppose a 1000 alien being arrive from another planet, and their average IQ is a 1000; and suppose we accept them as fellow beings. Suppose their numbers multiply quickly, and they gain control of our economy, politics, etc. Suppose they grow more arrogant and contemptuous of us dumb humans as they gain power and wealth. Wouldn’t many people prefer to wipe them out before we eventually become their guinea pigs–like Christian Slavs, for a time, became the chattel of Bolshevik revolutionaries disproportionately made up of significantly smarter Jews?) There’s a chance that the Alien Beings may be nice, but what if they are not? And, even if they are nice, it would mean we are now at the mercy of their kindness; if they choose to destroy us, we are finished.

So, the Jewish holocaust could have happened even if Nazism had been an ideology of inferiority than of superiority. Indeed, there’s enough evidence to suggest that Nazism was as much founded on inferiorist impulses and resentments as on supremacist ideas. No race, nationality, or people want to regard themselves as inferior or less worthy, so they mask their feelings of inferiority with superiorist rhetoric. But, look behind the facade, and the real passions may well be driven by fear and resentment of the people perceived to be smarter, richer, more talented, and/or hostile to the established order of the native majority. In Germany, especially during the great depression of the 20s and early 30s–and the humiliation of defeat in WWII and fear of Soviet communism(dominated in the early stages by radical Jews), many Germans came to regard Jews with envy, fear, and dread. Many Germans were too proud to admit their sense of inferiority vis-a-vis the Jews, so the Nazis came up with a theory of why Jews were more successful and accomplished than Germans. It was said Jews were devious, cunning, or conspiratorial. Or, that Jews concocted false ideas like Marxism, Freudian psychology, and Einstein’s theory of relativity to confused good solid Germans. Even in the world of the bourgeoisie, it was said Jews got ahead through fancifully devious finance capitalism than good honest economics. (A crucial contradiction that Nazism fed upon was the perception that ‘Aryans’ looked nobler and more handsome but were less intelligent than Jews. Nazis believed that aesthetics should be synonymous with intellect, and natural nobility with talent, but that wasn’t the case in actual reality. A rather funny looking and acting Einstein was the greatest scientist of his age. ‘Nibelungenish’ Jews were better businessmen than Germans who were themselves among the best in the world. This divergence of intellect and aesthetics has been something Jews have been well-aware of as well. So, Jews always found ways to find and use idealized‘decent’ good looking goyim who would serve to cosmeticize the superior intellectual ideas of Jews. And, so Freud placed his hopes on the Aryan Carl Jung to be serve as the conduit for Freudian psychology. Ayn Rand was radical Jewess who propped up Aryan-like heroes of commerce and art, when in fact many giants of business and arts of the 20th century were funny looking Jews–or funny looking gentiles for that matter. Reagan was the tall handsome goy face to Milton Friedman-ism, and the ‘noble’ and ‘soulful’ Obama is the idealized mask behind which Jews like Larry Summers and the New Republic gang hope to operate. In Hollywood, many writers have been funny-looking Jews, but the actors have often been Aryan-like whites or Idealized blacks. The superior aesthetic image of the goyim has been made to serve the ideas and values of Jews. Since the audience come to see ‘Aryan’ or ‘Soulful’ types espousing values pushed by liberal Jews, people are led to think that Jewish values are their own values.)
Anyway, for the Nazis, this wasn’t just a political, cultural, or historical problem but one rooted in Jewish genetics. Hitler and his ideological comrades were convinced that the Jewish gene had directed Jewish survival, behavior, deviousness, and repulsiveness toward non-Jews from the beginning of history. Jews were like a unpleasant breed of dogs–one with weasel-like features and different from the normal breeds. This was an extreme form of anti-semitism, but philo-semitism could also be based on genetic uniqueness of the Jews. Charles Murray, a neo-conservative gentile, wrote an article last year in Commentary magazine arguing that Jews–at least the Ashkenazi kind--are intellectually and creatively more gifted than other peoples(which implies that Jews are more precious than other peoples). Murray makes a genetic case for why we should admire Jews whereas Nazis made a genetic case for why we should hate them.

Given the premise of Hitler’s beliefs about race and history, it made rational(ist) sense to remove Jews from gentile society and even execute something as radical as racial extermination. Indeed, given the principles and beliefs of Nazis, it would have been irrational not to do otherwise. Again, rational(ist) isn’t the same as moral or what we would consider sane. It is what logically follows from what is accepted as the factual premise. If the premise states that Jews are a cancerous tumor, only radical surgery can save your people from the Jews.

It’s often said that Nazi biological science ranged from crude to downright false, but that was true of all biological sciences back then. (Of course, much ‘scientific’ knowledge about humanity even today is pretty fanciful or tainted by ideological prejudices, mostly leftist and egalitarian.) The problem wasn’t so much the theory of racial differences but the radical conviction that one’s beliefs were totally correct. In this light, one may ask whether Nazi prejudices were the results of biological sciences or biological sciences merely justified their prejudices. We may also ask if rationalism and radicalism are compatible, inseparable, or opposites.

First, the relationship between rationalism and radicalism is a tricky one. Rationalism says one’s view of reality and worldly actions must comply with what reason has revealed about the nature of reality. Perhaps, the problem isn’t so much rationalism as the need to live and to act–to apply rationalism to the real world. If we existed as mere consciousness without physical form, we may indefinitely ponder the nature of truth through open-ended rationalism. But, we must act IN THIS WORLD, and our knowledge–whatever the methods used to attain it–is always faulty and incomplete. So, rationalism can only amount to applying one’s imperfect understanding of reality to reality. For most of history, the great scientific minds thought the sun and stars revolved around Earth.
Even the best minds could only be rational with known data, and not everything is ever known; also, even if everything has been discovered and revealed, no single man or group of men can learn and synthesize ALL knowledge and come up with a totally unified theory of reality or what it means to be human. Also, what we may know about subatomic particles or cells or simple organisms may not tell us much if anything about morality and human needs.

Anyway, the problem of man is he must live, and in order to live he must act. To act, he must make decisions. He cannot put off decisions forever in search for the ultimate truth. Like a commander in battle, he must make decisions with limited, faulty, and ever shifting intelligence. So, man is always condemned to act with imperfect understanding of reality despite his effort to be factual and rational.
(We must also keep in mind that factual and rational are not the same thing. The problem is different ideas and decisions can be rationalized from the same set of facts. Suppose you hit a dog with a car. Should the dog be put to sleep or treated for recovery at great cost? Both are rational.)
Besides, most people are not particularly brilliant or intelligent, and so their rationalism amounts to accepting what the experts say. If textbooks told kids that there are only two lifeforms–animals and plants–, that’s what most kids would unquestioningly believed. If a new textbook said there are 3 lifeforms–animals, plants, and protists–, that would the new orthodoxy. And, so on. So, even for most secular people, rationalism is little more than going along with the experts. Since we can’t understand the complexity of their ideas and methods, we readwatered down magazine articles or books that explain in layman terms. Or, we watch a PBS or cable documentary on scientific matters which are really no more than fancy graphics and generic narration. Even so, we believe that most people in science are serious and worthy men committed to the truth and have the character and caution to admit and correct mistakes. And, who can deny that this system has indeed done wonders for the modern world? Of course, we are talking of hard sciences such as physics, chemistry, and elemental biology.
But, when it comes to human or social sciences, the picture is different. Assumptions and beliefs about mankind are never free of prejudices, agendas, ideologies, and so on. Worse, though social or human sciences are the least truthful and objective of all the sciences, they are expected to offer the greatest number of answers to our social and psychological problems. And, this is where radicalism creeps into rationalism. Social scientists don’t merely want to understand the world but to change it–as Marx put it(though Marx was wrong to assume he was the first to try; philosophers had ALWAYS wanted to change the world; one only needs to read Plato, Han Fei Tzu, or Machiavelli). On the one hand, as scientists they must be filled with caution and humility. But, given the nature and scale of human problems, they feel a need to do something. Just being ‘objective’ may be belittled as ‘bourgeois’, ‘privileged’ and detached from the needs of fellow man. Social scientists and intellectuals of the Left argue that scientists who insist on ever more experiments and discussions are living in a bubble; when the world is crying out for help from poverty, oppression, ignorance, and so on, how can scientists in their ivory towers just search for better truth and look upon every proposed program for social change with skepticism? And, indeed, it may well be true that some people calling for caution and more experimentation/discussion rather than radical action aren’t necessarily devoted to pure science but trying to maintain the status quo. The Left may call for a radical program on scientific grounds, but the Right may call for caution and stasis on the same grounds. The Left may argue that science tells us so and so, and we must act on the so and so. The Right may argue that the so and so are not so certain, and we shouldn’t do anything until we know more. But, how long do we have to wait?

Rationalism isn’t the same as radicalism, but it’s often compatible with radicalism–at least in the human sciences–because many ‘scientists’ in the field believe that their discoveries must serve to advance mankind. There is a built-in impatience within human sciences, which aren’t so much about knowing simply to know but about knowing to DO more. Even so, rationalism isn’t necessarily serviceable only to the Left. Though the Right, due to its religious grounding, has often been at odds with rationalism, rationalism has served the agendas of the Right. Consider the leftist principle of the equality of man. More scientific data are showing that not only are individuals markedly different from one another but there are also considerable differences between men and women and among races. The scientific left has tried to do away with the concept of race altogether, but more data is showing that such is a scientific stupidity, borne more of ideological fixations than real science. While race is not the same as species, that different groups within the same species have different genetic makeup cannot be denied.
Today, there are many rationalist scientists whose findings may be equally disturbing to the religious right and to the ideological left. Consider the case of Edwin O. Wilson whose theories are at odds with the religious right who cling to God and the ideological left which blindly embraces the notion of human equality as fact than as mere ideal.

And indeed, this has been the problem of the Left from the very beginning. On the one hand, it claims to be rationalist, i.e. based on scientific inquiry, experimentation, and data, but on the other hand, it claimed to be for the equality of man. This is the fundamental contradiction within the so-called Enlightenment Principles. Consider this statement on the Soviet revolution from this site which we’ve heard over and over from the Left: http://www.history.ucla.edu/people/faculty?lid=651

"His research seeks to understand how the greatest experiment of the 20th century, led by a movement that grew out of rational, enlightened, egalitarian, and democratic traditions resulted in dictatorship and the deaths of millions of its own people."
The above statement assumes that ‘rational’ and ‘enlightened’ are synonymous with ‘egalitarian’ and ‘democratic’. Taking note of the contradiction within Enlightenment principles, it’s not hard to understand why Leftist experiments failed miserably.
To be sure, there was something enlightened and undoubtedly true about the notion that all men are basically the same and that the traditional forms of social hierarchy were based on false assumptions. In other words, the King and noblemen didn’t have any special kind of blood running through their veins; they were not biologically superior to their subjects. So, an idea of a society where all people would have equal chance and a greater stake made sense. But, just because traditional forms of hierarchy were based on false assumptions, it doesn’t naturally follow that there are no natural hierarchies among men.
Given the fact that most people aren’t very intelligent, we can’t expect them to be expert rationalists. Also, to be truly enlightened was and will always be an elitist ideal and possibility. One may argue that all people should equally have access to higher wisdom, but the fact is only a relatively few are bound to achieve it. Also, being educated doesn’t necessarily mean learning how to think freely or think rationally. For many people, it simply means being indoctrinated, just swallowing what one reads in books or gets from lectures. Why else are so many social scientists clones of one another, spouting the same cliches and certitudes? They’ve learned how to read books, take notes, and make good grades, but the great majority of them never learned how to think freely on their own.
So much for rationalism and enlightenment being cousins of egalitarianism and democracy. The enlightened order is bound to be just as elitist and hierarchical as the old order though on firmer biological and, perhaps, moral grounds(depending on how one conceives of right and wrong). In the old order of the king and aristocracy, power and wealth were passed down by blood/heredity. In the enlightened order, many on top happen to be people with the best minds, talent, ambition, etc. The successful in the enlightened new order tend to have earned their right to wealth and power. Even so, we don’t have an egalitarian order.

There were bourgeois revolutionaries–especially Americans–who were perfectly happy with this new order; there was a greater emphasis on equality and fraternity–whatever that means in practice–in the French Revolution. Many French revolutionaries wanted simply to get rid of king and the noblemen and make for a freer society. But, the more radical ones–and such folks tend to be more ruthless, committed, and conspiratorial–insisted that the ‘rational’ and ‘enlightened’ must be synonymous with ‘equality’ and ‘democracy’. They were Procrustean rationalists. It was this irrational insistence that led to socialism and communism and the horrors of Marxism-Leninism-Stalinism-Maoism.
Worse, radical leftism also raised major doubts about the value of intelligence and intellect. People like Marx, Lenin, Bela Kun, Trotsky, Stalin, Ho, Mao, Che Guevara, etc were no dummies. They were highly intelligent men. Marx and Trotsky were probably even geniuses. Yet, each of them was monstrous in his own distinct way. While some people with superior intelligence/ intellect may despair of the stupidity of most people, other men of intelligence actively seek to ‘save’ mankind–and make things worse.
To be sure, most communist leaders embraced the ideal rather than the factuality of equality as it was a useful justification for holding onto all the power. Even a communist society isn’t equal, and that becomes the excuse for leaders to hold onto power–as the goal hasn’t been accomplished yet. Indeed, this is still the ideological justification of the Chinese Communist Party--that everything it does(even pushing capitalist market reforms)is all part of building a truly equal society.

This may well explain why so many elitists–cultural, intellectual, and political–have tended to be of the Left. Egalitarianism has been more about creating than living in an equal world. For such to be realized, ‘enlightened rationalists’ must have more and more power over the people(nominally, to serve the people). So, it is in the name of equality that a permanent mandarin class seeks power. And, people are too dumb to realize this, which is why the masses of people keep voting for politicians who promise more equality and ‘social justice’. The end result is we end up with politicians who are more powerful than ever before. We elect would-be-tyrants in search for equality. We need only to look at the example of Venezuela with Hugo Chavez. The funny thing is, for all the rhetoric about the nobility and self-respect of The People, The People often don’t trust themselves or their. Poor people want tougher government to take from the rich to give to the poor. The rich people may want tougher government to protect the property of the rich from the poor. The more ‘enlightened’ rich may want bigger government to buy off the poor–by providing diversionary bread and circuses–before the people turn into angry mobs and rebel.
There is also the problem of temperament and personal nature. Whatever intelligence may achieve in math or hard sciences, it is a slave to one’s temperament or emotional nature shaped by cultural upbringing and factors in human affairs. Men like Marx, Lenin, and Hitler may have been genetically fated to be radical and dangerous. What’s true with cats and dogs is true with humans. Some people are naturally more tolerant and live-and-let-live than others. Generally, people of strong emotional dispositions tend to seek dogmatic or radical belief system. It’s hard to imagine someone like Marx or Hitler as an easy going liberal even if they had been raised by Maude(of the 70s TV show). On the other hand, take a man like Gorbachev who grew up in a radical communist system; he had a generally congenial and easygoing nature and liberalized an iron-clad totalitarian system. Intelligence may be crucial in attaining power, but decisions are often driven by emotion and temperament.

In some cases, totalitarian systems do come under the rule of men of superior intelligence and intellect. This can be said of Lenin, Trotsky, Stalin, Mussolini, Hitler, Mao, and to a lesser extent, Castro and Che. But, in some cases, second-raters come to power with the help of sponsors–like the communist bosses of Warsaw Pact nations installed by the Soviet Union–or over a mostly ignorant, stupid, and pathetic populace(in which case, it only takes cunning and opportunism–as with Mobutu in Zaire or Chavez in Venezuela). This fact further complicates the problem of ‘social justice’ and egalitarianism. What chance does a nation have for making progress if its rulers who think themselves so smart, wise, courageous, and visionary are really just demagogic political hacks? But then... did nations ruled by men of genuine intelligence and talent–Russia under Lenin, Trotsky, or Stalin–, or Italy under Mussolini, or Germany under Hitler, or China under Mao do any better? Intelligent and talented, yes, but intelligence and talent in the service of what? In the service of impossible dreams and warped by the megalomaniacal personalties who thought they knew everything.

Neither the rationalist–as opposed to rational–premise for communism nor Nazism was truly scientific in light of what we know today–indeed even of what they knew back then. The Enlightenment ideal of equality was rooted in Judeo-Christian principles despite the anti-religious position of French revolutionaries. The concept of fairness or justice has little or nothing to do with scientific facts. Also, the facts were bound to show that humans were more equal than some ‘scientists’ claimed while less equal than others claimed. There was always bound to be scientific data that could be used to emphasize similarities or differences. Study of DNA can show that every person on Earth belongs to the same human species and originated from a tribe in Africa. But, studies of people around the world make it plain as day that intellectual, emotional, and physical differences do exist among races. So, there is a scientific and rational basis for both leftism and rightism. Humans and society, being ever so complex, what is The Truth that favors one -ism over the other.
A leftist could argue that his side is preferable because it’s in our interest to live together as equal world citizens with mutual respect for one another. A rightist could argue that the nature of blacks being what it is, a higher number of blacks in any society is bound to lead to social decay and the sort of thing you have in Haiti, Detroit, and Africa; it can be argued that no amount of goodwill or idealism is worth a dime if it goes against the reality of how things actually work out.

And indeed, this is a major problem we face today. The number one problem in both US and Europe today is race. In the US, Jews, the smartest and most talented people on Earth, have gained near-monopoly in many areas. Jews tend to look upon white gentiles as their main rivals and have used blacks to guilt-bait white gentiles. Blacks, the strongest and most aggressive and the wildest race on Earth, have often been a criminal, social, sexual, and cultural threat to white America. Of course, most Jews don’t live with dangerous blacks; most Jews range from affluent to super-rich. Jews have also milked the Jewish holocaust for all its worth to pre-empt any criticism of Jewish power. Though many Jews are leftists and champion the need to speak truth to power, don’t ever think it applies to Jewish power. We must all pretend that even billionaire Jews just got off a refugee boat. We have idiot white trash Evangelicals praying for Israel and cheering Jerry Springer who exploits them with derision.
As long as Jews control the media and schools and fill our eyes, ears, and brains with the Jewish holocaust all night and day, we’ll think that our primary moral duty in life is to suck up to Jews. Thomas Frank wrote a book called ‘What’s the Matter with Kansas?’ where he asked why poor whites support rich Wall Street Republicans. Someone should write a book called ‘What’s Wrong with White Goyim?’. Why are so many white gentile Americans supportive and slavish to Jews and Jewish interests when the vast majority of Jews support policies–economic, political, cultural, demographic, foreign policy, etc–which go against interests of white goyim? If rich secular Wall Street republicans have exploited cultural issues to make poor whites vote for free trade policies, Jews have exploited moral and historical issues to make white folks support the Jews when in fact most Jews are doing everything in their power to undermine white power. The vast majority of Jews–through their all-powerful control of media, culture, entertainment, and academia–has given us the contemptible and disgusting Obama as president. When will white America wake up and understand that Oprah and Obama are both hoaxes manipulated by liberal and leftwing Jews to undermine white power. And, why shouldn’t white people think in terms of white power when blacks think in terms of black power and Jews think in terms of Jewish power?

When it came to Jews, the Nazis came to find a connection between their physical repulsiveness with their moral repulsiveness. Of course, repulsiveness is subjective. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and what may be deemed morally repulsive to some may seem morally justified and liberating to others. But, we have a tendency to match one kind of hideousness with another. Most movies still follow this formula, which is why good guys are generally handsome and bad guys tend to be either ugly or hideous in some way. The central prejudice that says beauty is good and ugliness is evil still stands.
And, in some ways, we use this against the Nazis. How useful it has been for anti-Nazis that Hitler and his henchmen were mostly an unpleasant looking bunch. To be sure, there was a certain intensity and striking quality about Hitler; there is genuine power in his photos. But, Hitler and many Nazis come across, in many newsreels, as dark and disturbed rabble-rousers. They were into the ‘bad boy’ image. Given the nature of our debased and mindless rebel culture, it may explain why there continues to be a fascination among some youths for Hitler and his cohorts; they could almost be seen as the proto-Rolling Stones who played rock n roll with history itself.

Anyway, the way we remember and condemn Nazism is often contradictory. On the one hand, we give them the same treatment they gave the Jews. We look upon them as ugly, hideous, monstrous, subhuman, degenerate, and irredeemable sickos. It’s as though there was only one way to get rid of them--eradicate them. Germany had to be thoroughly de-nazified, and even–or especially–Germans took up on this theme. In a way, the process is far from over. Today, German kindergarten students are drilled to tears about the Holocaust and made to feel national-spiritual guilt over what happened during WWII. It’s as though the German soul and psyche are naturally infected with this evil which must be rooted out at an early age; in other words, Germans are BORN guilty and wicked.

In contrast, there is the oft-seen image of the noble Jew, the wonderful Jew, the Jew you wanna hug, Jew you wanna invite to dinner, the Jew worthy of your daughter, the delightful Jew, the warm Jew, and etc. In many cases, good looking non-Jews play Jewish characters in movies to physically ennoble Jews–to sanctify them as more christian than christian. So, Lena Olin is a Jewess in "The Reader", Montgomery Clift was a Jew in "Young Lions" and "Freud", and Aidan Quinn played a Jew in "Avalon" and so on. Or, Jews are placed in what should really be handsome roles. Because we’ve been brainwashed that Jewishness is wonderful, we don’t say ‘Ewwwwwwwwww’ but force ourselves to believe that Barbra Streisand is really the romantic heroine or that Sarah Jessica Parker is sexy and on par with the hot women around the world. So, there is the ugly-fication of Nazis and ‘white supremacist’ types who are portrayed in most movies as subhuman neanderthals, human apes, degenerate retards, or sick fuc*s, whereas there is the pretty-fication of Jews as the new and proper ideal of physical nobility or beauty. (This reversal of standards is also being carried out with homosexuals. The Jews who run the media would have us believe that there’s nothing as dysfunctional, desperate, and degenerate as the traditional nuclear family and nothing as healthy, normal, and clean as a gay couple. Ozzie and Harriet are closet psychotics while Ozzie and Harry know best.)

But, there is a more sophisticated twist to countering the Nazi myth that equated (Aryan)beauty with goodness. This way is to subvert and undermine the notion of beauty altogether, or at least the notion of Aryan or gentile white(especially Northern European) beauty. The remarkable documentary ‘Architecture of Doom’ does exactly this. http://www.amazon.com/Architecture-Doom-Rolf-Arsenius/dp/B00003XALS

The central theme of Peter Cohen’s documentary is that beauty as a political ideal is anti-humanist as it imposes godly standards on us. Susan Sontag argued along similar lines in ‘Fascinating Fascism’, an attacks on the aesthetic sensibility of Leni Riefenstahl. Beauty itself is the enemy since it is elitist and exclusive. Most people are not beautiful, not even pretty. Indeed, one wonders if Nazism would have waged war on the ugliness among the Aryans after the Jews had been dealt with. Had Hitler triumphed, what would have been the next stage? To favor the beautiful and healthy Germans over the ugly and less healthy Germans? We may be attracted to beauty, but people are generally not beautiful.
Also, beauty is not the same as morality or intelligence. And, since Jews are generally less beautiful than white gentiles, Jews have seen beauty as a false idol to smash and desecrate. So, the Jewish character in ‘Broadcast News’ says that William Hurt’s character(who gets promoted based on looks) is ‘the devil’. And, white goyim have bought into this as well. So, Robert Redford made ‘Quiz Show’ which apologizes for the special treatment good looking white goyim got over more deserving and intelligent Jews. So, Tom Brokaw broke down in tears and confessed that he got ahead in his profession because he was a good looking white gentile male on the night of Obama’s win. (So, do Obama’s undeserved win and the promotion of other undeserving blacks in various professions at the expense of better qualified non-blacks serve justice?). So, Betty Friedan waged her feminist campaign which essentially was an ugly Jewish attack on the pretty goyess order. Since Friedan felt ugly and worthless as a woman, she felt a need to undermine and discredit the entire edifice of femininity. Her main enemy for many years was Phyllis Schlafly, but Schlafly could never be effective with her marmish and moralistic demeanor. The ugly gang of Jewesses finally met their match in the pagan Camille Paglia who celebrated beauty.

Though the Jewish attack on (white)beauty was radical, hateful, demented, and ugly, there was an important issue to consider–namely, that beauty in and of itself is not morality, intelligence, dignity, or nobility; heck, we need only to consider the moral and intellectual makeup of most Playboy bunnies. The Nazi cult of beauty was indeed not just dangerous but insane. It was inhumane in its impossibility, contempt, arrogance, and delusion. (Hitler was also blind to the beauty of the Slavic peoples.)

The absurdity of the cult of beauty can be seen in Japan today. Most Japanese are, by world standards, short. By world standards, Japanese are not generally a good-looking people though there are wonderful exceptions. Now, consider the manga and anime, the cultural obsessions of Japan. From a young age, Japanese kids gobble up this stuff, and what do they learn? That nothing is more important, essential, and cool than being tall, muscular, western-looking, and etc. Most Western people cannot match the ideals set forth in manga and anime, so just imagine how many Japanese fit the bill? This culture has spread all over Asia and may explain why so many Japanese are unwilling to get married. With short Japanese guys dreaming of the ultimate dreambabe goddesses of anime and with short Japanese girls dreaming of the ultimate studs of manga, most Japanese are bound to be very disappointed with actual fellow Japanese. This is a massive self-delusion on a national scale. At the very least, the Nazi ideal was based on some measure of reality as good number of Germanic peoples were tall, sturdy, and solid looking. When wimpy Japanese guys pretend that they are anime-like studs or when Japanese girls pretend they are like manga-like goddesses, it’s pathetic and ridiculous. They may dye their hair blonde or wear shoes with foot-high midsoles, but they aren’t fooling anybody but themselves. Of course, Japanese haven’t killed anyone as a result, but it is still a flight from reality that is pitiful and laughable.

Anyway, another way Jews have tried to destroy white beauty is by promoting miscegenation. This way, white beauty becomes absorbed by blacks, Jews, and others. Since our multiculturalist society ideologically favors non-whites over whites, half-breeds generally tend to identify with the non-white side–especially if black. So, when a white mixes with a black, white beauty is serving blackness. When we see a good looking person of white/black ancestry, we don’t say, ‘doesn’t white features make the black person look good?’ but instead, we say, ‘isn’t he or she good looking because he or she IS black?’
Jews see a sexual parallel between Nazi hatred of Jews and white American fear of blacks. In the American South, white men feared the much stronger black men on two levels: one fear was that the black man would rape the white woman whereby the weaker white man would be unable to protect his wife or daughter(the Willie Horton scenario where the negro raped a white woman while her man was beaten up and helpless to save her); the more humiliating was perhaps the scenario where the white woman would willingly choose the black man over the white man because she found the negro so much more masterful and stud-like(the Jack Johnson scenario where white women swarmed all over the studly and powerful negro and laughed at the flabby white men who’d been pummeled into hamburger meat by Johnson). Black men were a physical sexual threat to white men. As such, white men propped up the mythic ideal of the pure and dignified white woman who remained loyal to her chivalrous white knight warrior.

In Europe, gentile men often resented the ‘ugly Jew’ using his superior intellect and talent to gain more money and power to charm and buy quality ‘white pussy’. There is some of this today. There’s no way any good looking woman would fall for Woody Allen if not for his fame, fortune, and celebrity attaiend through superior smarts and talent. The idea of ugly and hideous Jews using their smarts and cunning to ‘buy’ quality Aryan women was anathema to many proud European men. (A variation of this resentment and even fear applied to Asiatic men as well–the Fu Man Chu or Ming the Merciless, who sought to sexually conquer and enslave white women with their ruthlessness and wantonness. This, like the fear of blacks and resentment of Jews, was rooted partly in history as huge areas of Europe had once been conquered and raped by Mongol barbarians; also, the Ottoman Turks who conquered Greece and some of the Balkans and long posed a threat to Europe were partly of Asiatic origin.)

Anyway, for these reasons, Jews have a felt a need to destroy the ideal of the pure white woman and the noble chivalrous white knight warrior. Jews have tried to turn white women into lowlife skanks aping and lusting after negroes or hopping into bed with a rich Jew. As for white males, they’ve been castrated into faggotyass dweebs who look upon this prospect of racial suicide with happy acceptance befitting a retard.

Is an ideology based on beauty irrational? If so, one could argue that the Nazis rationally served an irrational idea. But, could a rational case be made for beauty? After all, we all love beauty. Suppose there are two kinds of butterflies facing extinction and only one could be saved. One is very beautiful while the other one is plain. Wouldn’t we choose the beautiful one? Would such choice be rational or irrational? Isn’t it rational or at least sensible to choose beauty over ugliness or plainness? On the other hand, beauty isn’t necessarily the truth. What if we had to choose between a beautiful painting that presents a false vision of humanity and an ugly painting that presents something truthful. Would the ugly truth have greater value than the beautiful lie? I’m sure many on the Left would agree with this, but this preference of truth over beauty also undermines the philosophical assumptions of the Left. The idea of human equality is, after all, just a beautiful lie. We know that people and peoples are not equally beautiful, intelligent, or noble in disposition. Is the ugly truth held by misanthropes then preferable to the beautiful lie of progressives who’d have us believe that if we overcome our ‘racism’ and ‘sexism’, the world will be a shining utopia? What if we swallow their lie onl to find our civilization invaded and under attack by savages and barbarians who cannot elevate themselves? What if a healthy modern white nation takes in a million black immigrants from Africa in the leftist belief that blacks are merely white-people-with-black-skin and find out otherwise: that blacks are, by nature, stronger, less intelligent, more aggressive and out-of-control?
A beautiful idea is worthless unless it is grounded in truth. Otherwise, it’s the false dream of the privileged elite that doesn’t have to deal with reality on the streets but only learns about reality through the media owned and operated by themselves. It becomes a self-perpetrating lie until all of civilization crumbles and even the elite finally fall under the sword. The problem is that the privileged elite is always the LAST to fall under the sword. Even as the elite has the most power over social policy, it suffers the least until it’s too late. They can afford to be safe and protected in their gated communities and ivory towers. So, the civilized masses fall first before the barbarians or savages–or the civilized people themselves become savage or barbaric(as is happening in the UK). And then, the elite no longer finds itself protected by a buffer of stable civilized folks(the very people the elite has been admonishing all these years)from the savages and barbarians(those whom the elite had been apologizing for and corrupting with their destructive and decadent policies).

The rise of Fascism and National Socialism can be understood in these terms. The elite lost its soul, and the civilized masses in the middle felt civilization giving way to madness and supported men like Mussolini and Hitler who promised a iron-clad defense of all that is proud, strong, stable, healthy, and noble. Of course, Mussolini and Hitler ended up bringing about the fall of European civilization as dictatorial systems have a way of allowing ‘great leaders’ to act according to their personal whims. But, the mass support and solidarity behind both Fascism and National Socialism weren’t so much to worship the godlike leader as to save civilization from looming chaos and/or radical-bloodbath-of-the-Bolshevik-kind.

If an ideology founded upon beauty isn’t fully rational, can the same be said of one founded upon the notion of human equality? How is egalitarianism rational when there’s plenty of scientific evidence to show that humans are, as individuals and as racial groups or as sexes, not equal? There’s an idea about all men having been created equal by God, but this is not a rational idea. Perhaps a nice idea, but nothing more. One could argue that people are, more or less, the same, but this is only true in the most basic sense. There is a world of difference between Albert Einstein and Mike Tyson, just as there is between a Chihuahua and a Pitbull. And, there’s a world of difference between someone with an IQ of 80 and someone with an IQ of 180. An person with IQ of 80 will probably never master Calculus in a 1000 yrs whereas a person with an IQ of 180 can build the atomic bomb in a few yrs. Indeed, though Jews are publicly the most vocally opposed to the notion of racial differences, no group better demonstrates the awesome power of racial differences. The power of the Jews cannot be explained nor understood without taking genetics into account. For some reason, Ashkenazi Jews ended up with the highest IQ of any group.

It is for this reason that one of the profoundest contradictions in the West, especially America, is that the people who are vocally and ideologically most egalitarian are themselves the richest and the most powerful. In a way, the Jews are trying to have it both ways. They practice Ayn-Rand-ism to become the richest and most powerful amongst us and then they support big government socialism to fool us that they care about all of us. Of course, capitalist Jews and socialist Jews collude to help one another.
In a way, socialism empowers the elite more than the masses. Socialism is about government power, and as such, it makes those in government more powerful over the people. Sure, the people get more freebies, but this means people become less self-reliant and more dependent on government programs and dictates(the bureaucracy and the professional political class; also for the rich, nothing is as satisfying, sexy, and fulfilling than Political POWER!!!).
Jews gain riches through capitalism and then expand government so that they will have political power over us as well. And of course, Jews pretty much took over all of the media and have the dominant role in the top universities across America. Much of this is worthy of great admiration and respect as Jews achieved so much through intelligence and diligence. But, there are other reasons as well. Though Jews have long attacked the old-boys-network(generally meaning wasp or wasp-ized power), they practice the Jew-Boys-Network. We need only look at the workings of Hollywood and the Bernie Madoff scandal to see Jewish tribalism in business.
Also, Jews have cleverly exploited the Jewish holocaust to prevent anyone from speaking truth to Jewish power which is the most powerful power in the world.
Anyway, whether it’s Milton Friedman-ism or Naomi Klein-ism, it means more power–economic or political–power to Jews. Just look at the top businessmen in the US, and great many are Jews. Just look at the top appointments in governments, and they are Jews. To some extent, this is inevitable since Jews are more intelligent and talented. On the other hand, it means more power to liberals and leftists since the great majority of Jews are liberals and leftists. And, considering that Jews generally look upon white Americans with feelings ranging from condescension to distrust to hatred, it’s something we need to be worried about.

Anyway, the notion of rationalism is generally flawed in our political discourse. At best, all we can hope for is a crazy quilt coordination of mini-rationalisms based on mutual respect and trust. In this sense, rationalism is like law and business. It cannot work properly unless all sides play by the rules and don’t overstep their boundaries. Laws are worthless unless people obey them. Not everyone may interpret or adhere to laws equally, but they must do so, more or less. Same is true of business. Commerce cannot long function if only a handful of people follow the rules while most people cheat–at least woefully. Since no one has the powers of God and can know everything, the most he can do is try to gain the best knowledge in his own specialized field and then try to coordinate his findings with data gathered and theories developed in other fields. So, people in each field should ideally follow the methods of science and offer up their fragment of truth. Some people may then be adept enough to knit all these pieces together to form a better sense of the larger reality.
In hard sciences, great things have been achieved through this process, but the same cannot be said for human sciences. There is too much ideology, too much prejudice, too many agendas, too many sacred dogmas–religious, cultural, or secular–for us to arrive at any agreed upon unified understanding of human reality. In sociology, for instance, those who favor the nurture argument will not even bother to consider the findings of those who favor the nature argument, and vice versa.

Also, what may be valid for one group of humanity may not be applicable to others; there may far less universal truths for humanity than we assume. For instance, many of us believe that the free market system works best, but perhaps its success depends on a people with adequate intelligence, discipline, and certain emotional qualities. After all, what applies to some breeds of dogs may not apply to other breeds of dogs. All dogs are intelligent, but some breeds are more intelligent than others. Also, temperamental differences among breeds make some breeds better at other tasks than other breeds are. So, in a very general sense, we can speak of universality of man but this breaks down when we get down to the nitty gritty. What would have been the chance of creating an atomic bomb had the Manhattan Project been dominated by African Pygmy scientists? How many gold medals in the 100 m sprint would US win if it only sent Mexican- or Asian-Americans? Humans are flexible and intelligent enough all around the world to appreciate and imitate the achievements of others–and even the most intelligent peoples required ideas borrowed from other peoples and cultures–, but it cannot be said that what comes naturally or more easily to one group of people will be true with all groups of people.

In the human sciences, we have three main problems as pertaining to the ideal of rationalism. First, scientists come with ideological baggage first and then seek only that data which justifies or validates their ideology or prejudices. So, a leftist who enters the field will seek only the data proving that races don’t exist at all whereas a rightist will try to emphasize biological differences as much as possible. Secondly, there is the willful falsification, distortion, or repression of data to disprove the other side; the left will also use social, moral, and intellectual ostracism to discourage any research that might undermine its ideological dogma. Third, because there’s so much bogus or exaggerated ‘science’ from all sides, it’s nearly impossible to coordinate them into even a rough rationalist picture of reality. There are simply too many divergences among the ‘discoveries’ and theories. It must also be said that humans are the most difficult subject to study–even if they could be used as guinea pigs.

In hard science, there is much less of this problem. In many cases, scientists will first look at the vast available data before venturing upon their own hypotheses. In other words, a new hypothesis is likely to be the product of great knowledge gained through long years of study than merely something to prove out of ideological fervor. Also, though hard scientists are often passionate, it’s hard to get ‘personal’ about neutrons and electrons. And, since the data are likely to be produced from genuine scientific methods, they are much more likely to complement other data to form a larger picture of reality.

I don’t see human sciences being truly rational no matter how much it may be rational-IST. But, just as realism isn’t reality, rationalism isn’t rationality; rather, it is the conceit that one is being rational or the cult of rationality. In a way, rationalism may blind us to rationality just as much as religion, because a fool who’s deluded that he’s being rational is less likely to heed warnings and advice. Why should he when he’s being SO ‘rational’? This was both the problem of Nazism and communism. They had no need for critics or nay sayers since they had Reason on their side.
Still, no one argued that Nazism was the legacy of the Enlightenment and the Age of Reason. Despite its scientism, it hasn’t fooled most of the scientific and humanities community. But, communism did fool a lot of people–in hard sciences, human sciences, and the humanities–that it is indeed a product of the Enlightenment. But, this is both a curse and a blessing. There was much that was profoundly good and necessary about the Enlightenment but much that was twisted and contradictory. The Age of Reason wasn’t so much about reason as what intellectuals assumed reason would reveal. It was more about the prophecy than the practice of reason. The French philosophs argued that reason would show This to be true,Tthat to be false and would lead to such and such society. Much of this was fantasizing and delusional. And, communism was built upon the hallucination of reason. Funny that those who were most passionate about reason were so unreasonable, but then passion and reason are dangerous partners.

The Pre-emptive Socialism of Obamanomics.

Look at Obama's top donors and the people--other than blacks--that supported him most: the white educated class. This is especially true of the Jewish population, the most successful in America which voted 80% for Obama. Jews are not only overwhelmingly liberal but have great influence in media, and they used their power to make Obama president. So, Obama-ism didn't happen because the unwashed masses smashed down the gates of the rich. Rather, Obama-ism is socialism perpetrated by some of the most successful and most educated people in America. Sure, Obama got the bulk of the black vote, Hispanic vote, and some blue collar white vote--as Democratic candidates tend to do. What's striking is he pulled ahead because he got much of the upper-middle class white vote--and Asian vote(another successful group in America).
So, why would rich and successful people support Obama? (1) Fear. The rich and successful are anxioius about the rising tide of envy and resentment among Middle Americans. So, what is to be done? Buy off a radical like Obama and make it seem as though America is now controlled by someone who 'cares for the people'. If a black man is president, there really must be Change upon the land. Rich people have tried to buy off radicals before. Neither Mussolini nor Hitler could have succeeded without the support of the rich; the Italian and German bourgeoisie sensed that people were growing more restless, and therefore, it would be a safer bet to have a 'man of the people' take power--at least nominally--and dole out handouts to calm the unwashed massesive. Hitler, you recall, calmed the people down with public works and jobs. Of course, Hitler also outmanuevered the rich people and brought destruction to Europe. But, Obama is firmly in the hands of the rich who've bought and marketed him. (2) Intellectual arrogance. The educated class sat through many lectures in colleges and read many books written by leftists. Education is a good thing, but intellectuals have a tendency to mistake book learning with actual reality. At any rate, they hold ideals at odds with reality and believe that they must have more power through government to push their ideals or ideology onto all the people. (3) Sheer powerlust. There are many kinds of power but political power is most addictive and potent. Rich people aren't satisfied with economic well-being or power; they want political power,and bigger government means more power in their hands; sure, they have to pay higher taxes, but as they--or their children--will be running government(Kennedies, Bushies, etc), they don't mind. (4) Conscience. Rich white people have swallowed the religion of political correctness and multiculturalism. But, almost all of them know nothing of poor people. They live in highrise condos or in gated communities away from the 'disenfranchised'. By making Obama president and expanding government--which will be run by people of their social status--in the name of helping 'the people', white liberals can feel 'progressive' and 'inclusive'.
We have to start accepting the reality that GOP is no longer the party of the rich and successful. GOP is the party of Joe the Plumbers. Democratic Party, for all its pandering to labor and minorities, is also the party of urban, privileged, highly educated, and very wealthy upper- and upper-middle class. It will become more so since rich people send their kids to elite colleges, and guess who runs those institutions? Also, kids raised in privilege want 'clean' jobs or to follow 'noble' callings in life, and nothing is said to be nobler in our democratic society than 'serving the people'. To serve the people, you need political power. See how clever it is. Liberals serve themselves by claiming to serve the people. Of course, one could argue that a successful businessman creates jobs and opportunities and so on, but he's said to work for 'profit' whereas politicians and bureaucrats are said to work for the 'good of the people'--with taxes taken from successful businesses of course. Anyway, the point is socialism is a worse habit among the rich and successful than among the poor. The poor didn't come up with the ideology of socialism; rich educated people did. It's rich people who've been using socialism to gain power for themselves in the name of the people. And, many people fall for it because it sounds nice and very Christian--help the poor, take care of needy, 'greed' is evil, etc.


Obama-ism is not about the masses tearing down the rich. It's about the rich buying off a radical to push their own agenda. Though Obama acts like a proud black man, he's really just a puppet-boy of the white liberal upper-class. You might call this pre-emptive socialism. Old-style class warfare would be where the masses rise up and tear down the system. In pre-emptive socialism, the rich people buy off mass envy and resentment by propping up a symbolic radical like Obama who will then do as the rich white liberals tell and guide him. Obama knows nothing about economics, so he will fetch when Larry Summers and Tim Geithner tell him to. And, bigger government isn't necessarily anti-capitalist as far as the liberal rich are concerned. More government spending means more contracts for favored private companies. Just as Halliburton found the Iraq War to be quite lucrative, many liberal leaning private companies are bound to make 'obscene profits' from the Obama order.

Sean Penn's "INTO THE WILD" and what it tells us about culture and the Left.

"Into the Wild" is one of the better films of recent years, but it’s not without considerable problems. Sean Penn is an able director and has an eye for nice details but lacks a sure-footed personal vision or style characteristic of the great ‘auteurs’. To be sure, personal style can get in the way or overwhelm a particular subject or theme–impose the director’s narcissistic will–, and it is true that some films have more to gain by less directorialism. Still, Penn was shooting for personal filmmaking with "Into the Wild". It’s not your average flat-footed and earnest road movie/story of self-discovery. Penn has employed the vast array of cinematic language to tell a story of this guy who ventured into the wilderness to find his true inner soul. The problem is these techniques generally don’t amount to much beyond art-film eye candy; as such, it may be higher quality eye-candy than most but eye-candy nevertheless. There are breathtaking moments in "Into the Wild", but they are momentary. We don’t sense a sustained directorial vision that pulls it altogether. In some ways, "Into the Wild" is comparable to "Dances with Wolves" and "Passion of the Christ", also films made by actors-turned-directors. Perhaps, actors have a different approach to directing. Most directors approach cinema as something watched and choreographed whereas an actor-turned-director may bring his acting mindset to filmmaking. An actor is always the center of attention, he is watched than doing the watching. This may explain why the eye-candy emphasis in the films made by all these men.
Nevertheless, "Into the Wild" is a pretty good film and some of the images and the story left an impression on me. The story is compelling enough, there are harrowing moments, and the road movie aspect is enjoyable. Most of all, Penn should be lauded for having approached this story from a psycho-biographical than from a socio-political angle. The temptation would have been great in many a liberal or leftist director to turn this story into an inspirational tale of an idealistic young man searching for justice, truth, beauty, and purity in a world corrupted and compromised by greed, deceit, compromise, and whatnot. Though Penn’s sympathies are with the rebellious–and left-leaning–hero, "Into the Wild" is–wittingly or unwittingly–a penetrating analysis and exposure of the left-libertarian rebel mentality(or any radical departure from the norm). We see the desperation alongside the heroism. We see the self-deception within the search for ‘truth’.
It’s often been said that the personal is political, but it’s also true that political is personal. The emotions that fuel the youthful hero’s quest or escape in the movie are largely familial and personal. By temperament, he’s a contrarian who wants to do everything differently. And, his family life, though economically stable, has been lacking in the kind of warmth and trust essential to happiness. Like most young people, he’s full of energy and not quite capable of understanding his own soul. Intelligent and aggressive, he looks and searches outward. Since he’s lived in the world of men all his life, he figures all moral and social discontents are associated with civilization. The only way to find truth is to take leave and reconnect with nature. Or, at the very least, one must always be on the move, not attached anchored to anything or anyone. In this sense, this is a much more truthful film than "Motorcycle Diaries" which would have us believe that Che Guevara’s enraged passions were all about social injustice and American imperialism than his own ugly hangups and megalomania.

In "Into the Wild"–again, whether Penn meant it or not–we can’t help but see the megalomania at the core of Bill McCandless–the hero. He obviously wants attention, recognition, and adulation as a special kid, a wonderful kid, a brilliant kid, a courageous kid, etc, etc. Problem is he’s not really That Special. Sure, he’s smarter than most kids but no Einstein(in an Ivy League setting, his smarts would be dime-a-dozen). He likes to do the odd or wild thing, like running to the stage to receive his diploma. Been there, done that. Maybe in the 50s or early 60s, that might have attracted attention, but in the age of "Girls Gone Wild", that’s Mr. Rogers crap. He’s read a good deal of books and romanticizes about some ideal life apart from civilization, but the 60s generation has done that already. Indeed, he meets a hippie couple who ride around in a trailer and grow old on the road. Again, been there, done that. Also, in this age of the internet where every kid–smart, dumb, pretty, ugly, American, foreign, etc–is a celebrity with his own blog and myspace site, Bill’s egomania is dime-a-dozen. There is no escape, not even in escape, because it’s all been done and told about and read about before in a million books and magazine articles. Bill, at least from what I’ve been able to gather from the film, has a personality much like Mao Zedong, Adolf Hitler, and Che Guevara. He’s a poet-rebel-tyrant, the sort who’s not even satisfied with power but must keep pushing the envelope.

Some tyrants are satisfied with power and control. Stalin, though murderous, wasn’t much of a gambler. But, Hitler wasn’t satisfied with being Fuhrer of Germany. He wasn’t even satisfied with having won control over much of Western and Central Europe. He dreamt of building a mega-city called Germania and had to gamble everything to defeat the Soviet Union and turn all the eastern territories into parts of the German empire. Mao wasn’t satisfied with power either. As a poet-intellectual, he tended to see everything in a kind of mythical and mystical way. So, he embarked on the Great Leap Forward, as though men could achieve godly deeds if imbued with the proper zeal. After that failed, Mao called on the most cataclysmic revolutionary excess in history, the Cultural Revolution, which was suppose to cleanse the revolution of impurities and re-energize it for a future generations. And, Che wasn’t satisfied with the victory in Cuba. He felt restless and hit the road, traveling to Africa to foment revolution there; the utter failure of that venture only whetted his appetite for more, and he went into the jungles of Bolivia to ignite communist revolution that he hoped would spread all the way to Canada. All these men spoke of history, the people, justice, and so on, but they were driven by their own megalomania, self-importance, passion for power, etc. They tended to have a romantic, mythic, and artistic view of history and humanity than the ‘compromised’, ‘normal’, ‘square’, or ‘bourgeois’ kind. Such people are found in all areas of life, perhaps most in the artistic community where it’s no sin–indeed a necessity–to be wildly imaginative, different, contrarian, rebellious, etc. As art is fiction and fantasy, who cares if the rules and ideas are crazy? Wagner’s madness was no problem as long as it was restricted to the operatic stage. Of course, Wagnerianism was a problem on the historical stage, and this is where art can be dangerous. Art or the system of idol-making does inform the way we see and feel reality, and it has a way of becoming entangled or interwoven with ideas and politics. In time, ideology may become inseparable from Idology. Indeed, a great many people gain their ideology through idology. The songs, the rituals, paintings, and architecture of the Catholic Church have been as important–if not more so–as the Biblical Text in converting non-believers or in making good Catholics out of children. Most communists never read much of Marx. They were won over by catchy slogans, songs like the International, the pageantry and shameless kitsch, leftist artistry, the cult/image of rebellion. And, this is also true of democracies. Many–perhaps the majority–people vote based on the appeals of symbolism, imagery, presentations, and performances. It was not political or intellectual sobriety that led to victories of George W. Bush or Barack Obama. If democracies are generally preferable to autocracies, it’s because no single person or group can grab all the power–though it must be said that US has pretty come under control of the liberal/leftist Jewish elite which gained almost total domination of the media, arts, and academia, the institutions that shape our imagination, ideas, and sense of reality.
Anyway, I got the impression that Penn wasn’t stupid enough to swallow whole the idealistic aspects of the story. Perhaps, he was attracted to this story because it made him face his own demons. As we all know, Penn is a moral narcissist, radical maverick, and a self-centered prick(not necessarily bad for art). Penn must have seen himself in the story of Bill–the good and bad sides. Perhaps, Penn made it partly as a celebration of the wandering free spirit and as a cautionary tale of being wrapped up tightly within oneself. Indeed, that is the irony of Bill’s story. He travels and sees more than most people, but he is trapped in the same place–within himself. On the one hand, he feels morally and intellectually superior and wants to match it with physical superiority; but, his need to prove himself to himself and to people around him betrays a sneaking self-loathing and self-doubt. He roams about freely, but in some ways, he’s a one-man totalitarian state, a kind of hermit kingdom of the soul that seeks utter isolation and independence. Of course, he never is–as his needs are always met by contact with humanity, and indeed when he’s finally alone and isolated in Alaska, he pitifully meets his doom. Also, personal memories keep creeping through the cracks of his iron-walled psyche. The fact that he keeps moving or running is proof that he is running FROM something; as long as he keeps running, he will never be free from that something.
Penn can’t help being a narcissistic-leftist-bullying-clown. People like him are actually as contrarian as they’re radical. They always wanna stick out in the crowd. So, Penn is pro-gay-agenda in the US but will also hang out with the Castros and Hugo Chavez–very anti-gay latin machomen. How is this possible? Because of Penn’s contrarianism. The way he sees it, US is run by evil heterosexual white males, and so Marxism and gay-agenda are both suitably anti-American. There is no real rational system to Penn’s thought process; it’s really a knee-jerk emotional response.
Penn may also have been drawn to this story because of his compromised position as a Hollywood star. Penn sees himself as a true artist, a great actor, and even a greater potential director. Yet, he’s made a good number of box-office hits and have enjoyed Star treatment. He knows he’s talked the talk but hasn’t always walked the walk. Also, even genuine artists are fakers in the sense that they are dealing with artifice. They are pretenders, not doers. Marlon Brando figured this out and disdained acting in his later years. He could play the best this or that, but he was only acting; he was a performer before the camera, not an actor on the world stage. He felt phony, and I suspect Penn shares some of this doubt. As such, Penn celebrated a guy who didn’t just talk the talk but walked the walk of totally ‘free’ behavior. Bill really did what he set out to do–stupid or wise.
Warren Beatty may have felt the same way when he made "Reds". John Reed, whether you like him or not, threw himself into the Bolshevik Revolution. He helped Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin become the leaders of Russia. He wasn’t just a writer or just a journalist but a crusader who devoted his life to a cause. Foolish or not, he wasn’t just an observer or imitator of history but a doer, an actor on the world stage.

Wanting to actively practice one’s ideals or throw oneself into historymaking has long been the theme of many creative and intellectual people on both the right and left. Mishima staged the ridiculous coup and slit his own belly because he felt insufficient as a mere intellectual and writer. Pasolini and Godard both grew increasingly radical and political, feeling compromised as mere ‘bourgeois’ artists; they came to use their cameras like AK-47s or Khmer Rouge-ish machetes. Writers like Garry Wills have condemned John Wayne for having been all talk but no walk, all bark but no bite–Wayne, the hero of many war films, did not ever serve in WWII.

Some artists want to live up to their popularized ideals while others shy away and work to counter the public image of themselves. In American cinema, perhaps Clint Eastwood has gone furthest in the latter regard. Having become world famous for his roles in the nihilistic Spaghetti Westerns and bloody Dirty Harry films, Eastwood-as-director has tried to play down the image of the invincible killer or enforcer with the infallible gun. Some artists need to be more-than-human; Eastwood has been stressing the need to be more-human. Eastwood as director has been telling us that he’s not a star but a rock–albeit a special rock–on the ground. While many directors go for Greatness, Eastwood’s style is unassuming and without Pantheonic gestures. Orson Welles wanted to be the god of cinema–and he had the talent to prove himself. Eastwood wants to be an honest filmmaker.

"Into the Wild" lies somewhere in between Wellesianisms and Eastwoodisms. Stylistically, it’s quite ambitious. Penn is pretty adept–if not brilliant–at composition, editing, and. But, the movie is also down-to-earth and realism-istic at other times. The story shoots for the stars, reality hits the ground over and over.
Perhaps, Penn made this film partly to tell his critics that he knows all about the dangers and foolishness of unfettered radical or maverick mentality. Many people see Penn as a self-absorbed nut, and Penn could be saying, ‘look, if I made a substantially critical film about someone I admire and identify with, doesn’t it tell you that I’m aware of the pitfalls of megalomania?’ Nice try, Penny, but we know you’re a nutter just the same. No one can escape oneself. Not Bill, not Penn, not you nor me. We is what we is.

There is a number of films that came to mind while watching "Into the Wild": "Vagabond" by Agnes Varda, "Jeremiah Johnson" with Robert Redford, "Easy Rider", "Picnic", and most of all, "Here’s Your Life" by the great Jan Troell. There were also aspects of the films of Terrence Malick, especially in the voice-over narration, but that may be the weakest part of the film. For Malick, it worked for "Badlands" and to a lesser extent with "Days of Heaven", mainly because the simple musings against the backdrop of the big world suggested a troubled irony. But, it was disastrous in "Thin Red Line" where we were supposed to regard the voice-over narration as profound philosophical ruminations. In "Badlands" and "Days of Heaven", the narration emphasize the mystery of the world beyond human understanding. In "Thin Red Line", the pompous narration cheapens and reduces what we see; we think... ‘oh, so THAT’s what all of this is about’.
In "Into the Wild", the narration consists of ernest thoughts and observations by Bill’s sister, and they are painful to the ear. They are inane, precious, mushy, gooey, and etc. And, we are supposed to take them straight. "Into the Wild" is not without irony, but irony flies out the window whenever we hear the trite poetic waxing of Bill’s sister. (Maybe, he was trying to get away from her). Her observations don’t really tell us something we couldn’t glean from the story as it unfolds. Also, her words have a way of, at once, sanctifying, spiritualizing, and Dr. Philosophizing Bill to death. Oh, if he’d just ended up on Oprah instead of Alaska, it would have ended up oh so nicely for everyone!
It must be tough sometimes to be both a tough guy and a progressive. Penn sees himself as both and shares the insecurities of fellow leftwing Jewish artists like Oliver Stone and the late Paul Newman. Penn wants to be seen as a tough and rough guy but also a caring sensitive guy. The story of Bill captures both aspects of leftism. On the one hand, there is Bill who is upset with the hypocrisy of mankind and wants to be a ‘good guy’. On the other hand, there’s Bill the rugged man of the wild; and he’s no vegetarian and hunts for food. He’s like Che Guevara of self-reliant survival; indeed, his Alaskan venture ends rather like Che’s Bolivian venture. Both Che and Bill are restless types who must always seek new excitement and new challenges. They want to push the envelope. Thankfully, Bill only wanted to push himself whereas Che wanted to push all of humanity toward his vision of justice. Another figure Bill has similarities with is Ted Kaczynski the Unabomber. Kaczynski was somewhere between Bill and Che. On the one hand, he did want to radically change society; on the other hand, he was hermetic and wanted to be on his own. To his credit, Bill never means no violence to anyone. Also, he hunts only for food. But, I wonder if he realized to what extent he relied on the people and society he held in such low regard. After all, books, guns, clothes, and even most of the food he’s eats were all man-made and mass-produced by modern society. Indeed, people like him could putz around through great distances because there are man-made roads stretching all across this vast continent and because surplus of goods allows a good many people to be generous.
Bill is strange in having both greater empathy and contempt for most people. Unlike most people who stick to family and friends, Bill wanders and gets to know all sorts of people. But, he will not commit to anyone because his personal religion is himself and his own sense of freedom and destiny. He feels that everyone is like a turtle without the balls or guts to do what he’s chosen to do.
Finally, he comes to a bad end, and this is where the movie turns into great art. Bill’s final days are presented with power and poetry. It has the ring of truth without dramatic overload or stylistic excess. It’s painful to watch, and even skeptics must feel obliged to respect a part of Bill’s being which accepted his fate with whatever grace and inner-peace he could muster up. In one way, he dies as the petulant kid wishing to lay a guilt-trip on his parents and feeling superior to rest of compromised mankind. But, in another way, such things no longer matter; weakened, weary, dying of starvation, poisoning(from eating mis-identified plants), and the cold, he comes to sense something bigger than his ego, convictions, and conceits. Up until then, he’d traveled all around United States; finally, it’s as though some higher spirit is traveling through him, carrying his soul to a peaceful place.
"Into the Wild" also keys us as to why leftists make better artists than conservatives–at least in the modern world. However crazy leftists may be, there is a sense of adventure, empathy with others, curiosity, and open range spiritualism. It’s true enough that good many talented leftists are egomaniacs, but they feel a need to understand and connect with the larger world or with the deeper areas of their souls. There’s also a Promethean sense of going where and doing what no one has done before. Much of this may simply be a self-delusional conceit, but delusions may lead to creativity and new ideas.
Oliver Stone and Sean Penn both have this spirit.
In contrast, take conservative entertainers like the Frasier guy and Drew Carey, and you got little more than comfortable notions about good vs bad and social niceties. To be sure, Mel Gibson of "Apocalypto" and John Milius of "Apocalypse Now" have been powerful–if not necessarily great–artists, but notice both have essentially wandering pagan souls(despite Gibson’s Catholicism). Radical leftism may be stupid, but many leftists haven’t been afraid to go to the ends of the world–or at least pretend to--to see and do something different. Of course, leftism is ultimately foolish because its stated goal is a totalitarian society run by radical intellectuals where individuals no longer have any freedom. Of course, anarcho- and libertarian-leftists will claim they are for a progressive and pluralistic order of free individuals, but anarchism and libertarianism are social impossibilities.
Still, leftists–as long as they don’t have total power–have a certain spirit that fuels their creativity. It’s also crucial to creativity that leftists tend to be irreligious or anti-religious. As such, they see themselves as gods. Though this may be immoral and sacrilegious to conservative or religious folks, it’s good for art. All great artists see themselves as gods of sorts. Beethoven couldn’t have composed what he did if he had the personality of your average conservative. Okay, what about Bach and Handel? I would argue that in their art, they didn’t just accept God but searched for God, explored the richness and depth of the spiritual realm. For them, God was as playful and humorous as great and awesome. Today, most conservatives worship God-as-dogma, the Gun-as-baby-bottle, or Greed-as-religion-unto-itself. There’s nothing wrong with God and Guns as long as they are spiritual or political crutches. As for Greed, that’s what money becomes if one sees and judges everything in terms of dollars and cents. This is all the funnier when liberals and leftists generally beat out conservatives in the Game of Greed. Your average Naomi-Klein-reading leftist yuppie is likely to be richer and more materialistic than some Ayn-Rand-reading conservative clod.

"Into the Wild" is not a perfect movie, and Penn is not one of the greatest directors ‘of all time’, but Penn and his movie show us in spades that leftists have the adventurous spirit necessary for personal art. "Reds" by Beatty may be a stupid movie politically, but we can admire the romanticism of Beatty–and that of John Reed. They believed in the drama of history, the epic poetry of the adventurous ego. Bad for politics but good for art. Show me a creative conservative spirit who feels a mad passion to make a great film about Teddy Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan. None. Instead, most conservatives are Dilbertarian pundits who politically talk the talk but don’t culturally walk the walk. Art and creativity requires a degree of madness. There is plenty of madness on the right but the energy is directed toward religious moralism than toward paganesque creativity. The Right needs to go into-the-wild to discover its own fire of creativity.