He catches himself using the word “nice,” which is a painful word to use, and then he smoothly corrects himself by retrying to articulate his thoughts in words more descriptive and inspiring.
It’s like our culture, in the USA, glorifies speech that is informal or slang, and it feels like the ideal is to be so extremely cool that we actually use the bare minimum of concentration and conviction when we speak.
I once heard an English person say that there is no point in doing something if you don’t do it with 100% effort.
It turns out that it is much more attractive to speak with full conviction like Christopher Lee.
I find it hard to do, personally, due to the fact that it inadvertently activates anger pathways in my brain.
This leads to the question of whether anger is the real reason that people are always “too cool for school” in the USA to use 100% focus, eye contact, conviction, etc. like Christopher Lee.
Zenny, you are an aristocratic type. That’s what the far right is ultimately: a cluster of civilizational tendencies. They are sensitive men.
I find that sensitive people are really the only ones worth talking to. Think about it: they can see patterns, see through narratives, think for themselves, and use empathy. The most sensitive white nationalists tend to have the most interesting takes.
I can’t stand when people use potty language or grossout humor.
I’m also naturally drawn towards perfectionism and craftsmanship, which are older, civilized values. Democracy mixes the classes, so you get peasants deciding our language, our culture, and our sense of masculinity.
This comment actually triggered some epiphanies in my mind.
It also made sense of some things you have said in the past about the society being run by incompetents and/or the elites not running things.
I think you are right - I am a proud believer in aristocracy and the idea of a benevolent upper class running society. And, what we have now is not quite that.
What we have is a situation where elites do run things, and they are fairly elite often times by fair metrics, but they are often not benevolent aristocratic/noble types, and in the parts of society that aren’t major hubs, the institutions genuinely ARE run by incompetents.
Basically, our elite class is happy validating a spirit that is diametrically opposed to what people used to call magnanimity. There are, in my opinion, largely ethnic reasons for this. These things motivate the upper class to not care about the society. Instead, the upper class only cares about their own heroic feats of careerism and “changing the world” and by that they have specific kinds of political or technological changes in mind; as such, they do not find value in bearing the burden of leading nations of men. Their lack of societal mentorship also relates to the spirit of leftism and liberalism, and as always, white guilt. The details need a separate post.
As for Dick Spencer, I was upset that he would make claims that Batman is a portrayal of “paternalism,” and I was upset at his claims to aristocracy. Both are false. Most Batman renditions don’t display nobility or paternalism - Batman just looks Anglo/WASP/English or something and Dick interpolates the paternalism because that’s what he feels about Anglo culture. There’s good reason to see this in Anglo culture, but there isn’t such a thing in Batman.
As for Dick being an aristocrat himself…oh please. I’ve not heard anyone confirm if he has ever “worked a single day in his life” so to speak.
Zipf is pretty relevant here, especially his notion of tools and jobs.
A healthy society is structured like this:
You have many grunts (“tools”) who can perform a small number of jobs. (Chopping firewood, fishing, or planting turnips for 40 years).
At the top, you have one leader (a “tool”) who can perform a very large number of jobs. (Sense war, write treaties, play the social game, fix the economy, know theory).
Intelligence is the jobs-to-tools ratio. Few tools performing many actions. Whereas strength is the opposite: many tools performing few jobs.
Sensitive people can sense many things using one brain.
So the top of the hierarchy is like an eyeball controlling the body of a dragon.
This leads to the question of whether anger is the real reason that people are always “too cool for school” in the USA to use 100% focus, eye contact, conviction, etc. like Christopher Lee.
I know I tend to choose a few phrases that will get me through most of my basic functional interactions. This prevents Freudian slips and more elaborate equivalents. This would be a lot less useful if I didn’t have anger and other unwholesomeness that I have to keep hidden, but I would still do it.
