MMX2010

RJ, you live in America, right? I do, too. And, boy oh boy, do we believe in the glory of monogamous relationships. However, around 60% of marriages end in divorce. And I would guess, (but cannot prove), that around 65% of still-married individuals are unhappy. If you grant my numbers for the sake of argument, this means only 14.5% of monogamous relationships are functional or healthy. My argument doesn't support my case, but it does reveal the enormous flaws in yours. Because if monogamous relationships are so wonderful and functional, and because America is so devoted to monogamous relationships, then a 14.5% success rate is not impressive. So, despite the force with which you say, "Monogamous relationships are healthy!", the majority of cases disprove your argument. RJ, I first asked you very specific questions to determine what definition of "functional relationship" you're using. I then suggested Rollo's blog as an excellent introductory source about the nature of women and relationships. But now you're presuming that I don't know the answers to your questions. Your contempt is palpable, but you don't realize that Rollo's blog asks, and answers, these questions repeatedly. Nor do you realize that his blog has supplied me with those answers long before you asked them. ------------------------------- (1) Our relationship is functional for her, because she combines my best qualities with his best qualities to acquire a better man than she could independently. We live in the most female-permissive society that has ever existed, and this permissiveness has revealed woman's nature to us all. In times past, society prevented women from expressing their bad and ugly sides, but those restrictions no longer exist. (2) You're assuming that we are "keeping secrets" from him. This assumption makes him the passive victim of our choices. But did you ever consider that the evidence is right in front of him, and yet he doesn't want to look? Of course not, but most importantly, Why not? (3) As for her "cheating on me", my answer is, "Nothing at all, and I wouldn't have it any other way." Feminism asks, "Which woman do you prefer? A woman who is with you because she wants to be. A woman who is with you because she needs you. Or a woman who is with you because she has no other choice but to be with you." I not only prefer the first, but I also accept that women's freedom makes it highly unlikely that any woman will be deeply satisfied with any one man. Christina and Stefan will be fine for years because Stefan is Stefan. He is wealthy, famous, attractive, physically fit, excellent with children, and emotionally accessible. He is Alpha Male, and Beta Male, combined: a veritable one-in-100-million. I am "merely" me. I work hard to improve myself, while accepting that no amount of self-improvement will "entitle" me to a woman's life-long loyalty. My favorite Rollo saying is, "You cannot negotiate desire." And its truth applies to both personal improvement and the societal shaming of woman's poor choices. The statement, "She needs to take responsibility for her mating choices!", is correct 100% of the time. But shouting it to yourself so that you can hold women's misbehavior in contempt, or assert that "bad men" "enable women's misbehavior" - (a falsehood in a society where women are free) - is an attempt to negotiate a woman's desire. But the more women obey your statement, the more likely you'll either end up with a woman who needs you, or (worse!) a woman who is with you because she has no other choice. If you think a woman is going to be sweet, pleasant, nice, and virtuous just because she needs you, what happens when she no longer needs you? And if you honestly think a woman is going to be sweet, pleasant, nice, and virtuous when she has no choice but to be with you. *shudder*. A toast to you RJ: May you get the woman you deserve according to your romantic definitions, your knowledge of women, your degree of self-improvement, and your confidence in all of these.

This thread. Before I clicked on it, I noticed the title "Does Everyone Have Sociopathic Tendencies?" The title alone suggests someone read an article or book stating that literally everyone has sociopathic tendencies, and wants to discuss it. But reading the post revealed two important things: (1) It came from a Post Count = 1 individual who wants to determine whether he, himself, is a sociopath. (2) It gave a hyper-small glimpse into his childhood. My response was the complete opposite of RTR. I didn't take his post at face value. I didn't ask him what he felt. I didn't say, "When I read your post, I felt 9x squared minus 12x plus c, where c is a constant." Instead, I both directed him to tell us about his childhood, and also assumed that there was a specific incident that drove him to post. The result of my non-RTR approach is that neeeeeel both expanded upon his childhood and detailed the specific incident. -------------------------------------------- My second example is rather complicated. There's a blogger by the name of The Last Psychiatrist who specializes in two areas: (1) Dissecting the nature and purpose of advertisements and movies, while lamenting their negative effects on viewers. (2) Dissecting the nature and purpose of therapy, while exposing its misuse and ineffectiveness. His best anti-therapy article is also an anti-RTR article. It is extremely long, so you'll need thirty minutes to read it if you already agree with his arguments. You'll need longer, (an hour or more), if you don't. The central example from the article reads: Because I believe in that article and example, I have a Hierarchy Of Suspicion, types-of-questions/arguments that I either will or won't RTR. (1) Extremely Suspicious - Abstract, detached questions over the nature / personality of the questioner. (Example: Am I A Sociopath?) (2) Very Suspicious - Abstract, detached questions over the motivations behind abusive parents. (Example: Why Did My Father Always Verbally Abuse My Mother?). (3) Sometimes Suspicious, Sometimes Not - Abstract, detached questions of whether a person should do a specific thing. (Example: Should I Kick My Father In The Balls?) This question is highly suspicious if either the questioner already has a long history of kicking his father in the balls, or if he's not seriously considering it. But if it's extremely out-of-character for him to do so, and if he's very serious about it, then he's contemplating major changes to his character. (4) Never Suspicious - Emotional questions coming after the questioner has done something completely out-of-character and needs help dealing with the fallout. (Example: I Never Yell At My Wife, But Today I Yelled At Her And Called Her An Idiot! HELP!) Doing something out-of-character means that you've broken out of the "Feeling Bad About Yourself is better than Doing The Mental Work Of Change" hierarchy. And I will RTR those conversations repeatedly. Granted, the argument that therapy is sometimes a way NOT to heal and grow is controversial to the FDR community. But the argument isn't absolutely against therapy; it just warns that some people, sometimes, aren't going into therapy for honest reasons. And when you use RTR to give honesty / validity to a dishonest, invalid approach, you don't help. You make yourself and everyone involved miserable. Massive disclaimer: Just because I'm suspicious doesn't mean I'm right. And I'm not-at-all advocating that neeeeel should kick his father in the balls.

What happens if we apply your belief on a national scale? The overwhelming majority of children are spanked and/or verbally abused, and therefore have no concept of playful banter between emotionally healthy adults. Thus, if you encounter four different children from four different families, it's extraordinarily likely that at least one of them can't respond happily to playful banter. But we can't determine which one is the abused one, so no playful banter....ever. Thus, rather than modeling perfect emotional scaling, we encourage children to mull over every emotion, to ultra-precision. Accomplishing...what? (Besides the elimination of playful banter and positive masculine energy from the nation.) -------------------------- Meanwhile, in this thread, when I posted my laughter to neeeeeeeel, he said, "I did have an emotional response to your post, and when you said you would have laughed at me too, I suppose I was angry, I felt a rush of blood to the head. I also felt a sinking feeling in my stomach "I am right, I am useless, he would have laughed too, there must be something wrong with me" Reading the rest of your post, I like your examples, and that would be two nicer ways of dealing with things ( although I wouldnt call them also "laughing")" So, good result, right? You disagree with what I did, but neeeeeel liked it. ------------------------------- Yes, I know. Because it's obvious. In your first post to me, you took my one example (three times), and inferred that I would behave similarly in all, (or most), situations. ---------------------------------- He wasn't angry at the board game. He was angry at his parents, because they were abusive assholes. They raged over the pointless, yelled about the unimportant, and beat him for mild mistakes. Their reactions were disproportionate to every situation, and they suppressed neeeeeel's natural emotional responses - especially ones regarding anger at injustice. So neeeeeel could only get angry at That Which Is Not His Parents. A board game. The parents, recognizing that it's stupid to get angry at a board game, laughed and laughed and laughed and laughed, because the logical parts of their brains recognized that their own emotional mismanagement caused neeeeel's rage issues. But the emotional parts of their brains, particularly the ones centered around self-esteem, couldn't handle the truth. And intense laughter transformed their pain and humiliation into elation. Right now, you're missing two things: (1) neeeeel wasn't angry at the board game, he was angry at his parents. (2) neeeeel isn't angry now! He's supposed to be angry, but he isn't. Some quotes from neeeel. (1) "I cant determine whether I am a sociopath or not, or cant get rid of the feeling that I could be a bad person , and that it could be all my own fault. What should I do about it, if anything? I guess I came here for confirmation that my childhood wasnt great, and now that Ive got it, I still dont believe it.... (2) "The event that made me post here that I remembered recently, was actually something that happened when I was an adult. A couple of years ago, I was visiting my parents. I was on my ,laptop, and my mum commented that I was typing really fast, and that I didnt seem to be looking at the keys . I said "yeah, I dont need to look at the keys", I guess I was proud of my typing ability. My dad immediately chimes in with "pretentious, moi? " in what seemed to me to be a quite nasty and snide tone, directed at me. I found this really hurtful, all the more because I cant see it any other way than being said with an intent to hurt. I was pretty depressed for hours after this, and when my mum asked me what was wrong, I spoke to her about the comment, and she said I was just being silly, it was just dad being dad, that he was just joking around, that I take things on board to much, etc. He had actually said a similar comment to her earlier, when she was admiring some dishes in a window, he made some disparaging comment, and when I asked her if she felt hurt about that, she just said the same, that he was just joking, he didnt mean it, etc. I can see that as far as my hurt, that IS down to me being very sensitive[/b], that other people could laugh it off." (3) In his first response I quoted, he guesses that he felt anger. So, while you're defending the importance and validity of Anger In The Abstract, you're missing that neeeeel isn't Angry Right Now. He's supposed to be angry right now, but he's instead dissociated, confused, and muted-in-emotion. If you support the validity and importance of anger, what have you done to make neeeel angry? What anger have you expressed? This thread, kind of. I feel bad that neeeel is witnessing our discussion, because I'm not sure that it helps him. Also, if the woman in the phone-call example resists his message to "Cheer up. It's not that big of a deal.", then she'll flood the relationship with, "I wanna talk about this....." RTR-discussions, where "this" is just another "not that big of a deal" thing she's upset about. Then it'll turn into the classic, "He never listens to me when I talk about my feelings." discussion, which blames him for her lack of emotional control. It's great when a highly emotional chick does so many important things that she can't help but be emotionally intense. But it's annoying when a highly emotional chick does little, if any, important things - but still remains emotionally intense. Both chicks can read about RTR, and both can defend their emotionality with RTR - but only one of them is a wonderful girlfriend.

Your argument is right approximately 98% of the time. It's wrong when someone has an opinion that doesn't reflect reality, but he or she isn't either aggressively imposing that belief on others, nor trying to get someone else to pay the cost of his/her mistakes. It's hard to imagine a Christian who never-at-all wants other people to be a Christian, nor wants anyone else to pay any money for the mistakes of his/her Christian beliefs. But if such a Christian existed, I'd respect their Christianity.

Because you asked, "I just wonder; how do you feel about partaking in affair like this? Wouldn't you want form a more functional relationship with someone who is single?" But whose definition of "more functional relationship" are we using? Yours? (If yours, is it because you have exceptional relationships and I don't? If yours, is it because your definitions are based on scientific consensus of what functional relationships are? If yours, is it because you feel strongly that your definition is better?) Or Mine? (If mine, is it because you asked me the question, and I'm free to choose my own definition? If mine, is it because I have superior relationships than you? If mine, is it because my definitions are based on scientific consensus of what functional relationships are? If mine, is it because I have strong feelings that my definition is better?) Those questions, RJ, were designed to examine what your definitions of "more functional relationship" are, and where you derive your definitions from. Without answering those questions, you just complain that I "didn't answer your question directly" - which looks like you don't want to discuss your definitions of "more functional relationship". Instead, you want the entire world to assume that your definitions are right, so you can justify your impression that my affair with tattoo'ed chick isn't functional. Meanwhile, my relationship with her is functional, is healthy, and is wonderful.

Alright. As long as you didn't expect your post to change anyone's behavior, you did the right thing. Parents are almost never going to change their behavior because a total stranger objects to it. So if you got frustrated or experienced self-doubt because they didn't change their behavior, your expectation of behavioral change was wrong.

Kaki, I wondered whether my reply to you was unclear, but then this post came along. There are only two types of people who express their every emotion. The first type is comprised of people like Stef, while the second type is Blackfish's post above. The difference is that Stefan's emotional expressions are perfectly scaled, meaning that if something is 40-points-happy-out-of-100, he neither expresses 20 points worth of happy, nor 100 points worth of happy. He always matches a 40 with a 40. It's why he can vociferously yell "FUCK EVIL!", while merely sternly-but-forcefully remind people that it's bad to laugh at abuse. Meanwhile, the emotional intensity behind Blackfish's post is obvious. But what is he responding to? Is he being tortured? Did someone kidnap his wife? Is an FDR board member holding his money at ransom, demanding that he praise the entire FDR community? If neither of these, then the mismatch between "the negativity he's reacting to" and "the emotional intensity with which he's expressing his negativity" is what makes his emotions inappropriate. The ability to match emotional intensity with emotional expression is both what makes Stefan so awesome and makes civility possible. So when a five year old gets extremely angry at losing a board game, the child mismatches emotional expression and emotional intensity. And it's a parent's job to either model that matching skill, or to reveal the extraordinary mismatch that the child is expressing, preferably through parody. (And our mutual contempt for neeeeeel's parents is because that they're both guilty of the emotional mismanagement that they mocked neeeeeeeel for possessing.) I didn't advocate laughing at neeeeeel so that he'd turn his anger into either happiness or no emotion whatsoever. I advocated laughing at neeeeeel so that he'd turn his extraordinarily high levels of anger into an appropriately small level of anger. So he still gets to be angry, just not THAT ANGRY. Emotional regulation is NEVER censorship nor oppression. In fact, the inability to emotionally regulate is censorship or oppression. Witness how, if no one knows how to handle Blackfish's emotional outburst appropriately, Blackfish has turned the entire focus of this thread from neeeeeeeel's current situation to Blackfish. That's oppressive and neeeeeeel doesn't deserve that.

The State is not the same thing as the Market.

No, I don't have trouble being direct. I'm undergoing a large change in my personality and values through reading the works of Rollo Tomassi. Because his language is somewhat specialized, and because I strongly sense you're not familiar with it, it's difficult for me to communicate to you unless I'm assured that you speak the language. (You'll notice, however, that you began with your feeling of discomfort - (which was accurate) - and turned it into my personal problem, "MMX has a problem with being direct.") Also, you didn't directly ask whether I take accountability for my interactions with those people. But you definitely Implied that I do not. My answer is not only, "Yes, I take full responsibility for my interactions with them.", but also, "You are not appointed by any higher authority to monitor my level of responsibility-taking, nor did I explicitly ask you to help me with that." (You'll notice, again, that you began with your feeling of discomfort - (which was accurate) - and turned it into my personal problem, "MMX has a problem with taking responsibility.") There are two reasons for this, one already stated, one not. (1) Before he moved in with her, he was devoted to his music and was regularly working out. But after he lived with her, he stopped writing music and has grown overweight. He has also become bankrupt. If you take the long-view and ask, "Is their relationship a healthy one?", the answer is almost certainly, "No." But he is so devoted to turning her into a healthy, independent, strong woman that he only takes the short view. "Today is a good day if her behavior looks like progress. But today is a bad day if her behavior looks like non-progress." So he experiences "good days and bad days" without recognizing the downward slide of their relationship, especially in terms of the two things which ought to matter most to him: his music and his health. (2) Long before I moved in with them, I paid them monthly rent for an apartment that I wasn't even living in. He seemed devoted to his work and music, so I figured financing him would be helpful. But when I moved in, and discovered they were bankrupt, I decided to move out. I made this decision with both of them in the room, but decided to only tell him, since he would take it most difficultly. I told them, "I've already made up my mind with regard to my living situation, so Wife, please excuse me." Wife replied, "No. I get to be involved in any decision you make. I live here." I replied, "No, don't worry about it. Let me just tell Husband what I've decided." Wife replied, "Look, motherfucker. When you agreed to pay us rent, you didn't sign a lease or anything. So if I wanted to call the cops on you right now, I could." I replied, laughingly, "Well, if you're going to do that, make sure to do so when Husband is home." Wife turns stares directly at Husband, who's white as a sheet and completely frozen. He had the presence of mind to say, "Don't look at me....", in a very weak voice. But it took him three minutes to say, "Just go. Let us talk." When I told him I was moving, he was extremely disappointed. But I asked him directly, "Do you realize how ironic and frightening it was that she threatened to call the cops on me to remove me from a house that I was already committed to leaving?" He weakly said, "I don't like it when she acts entitled." But it never dawned on him to stand up to her. So if you think my contempt is misplaced, please say so. But I find it sad that you'd criticize my contempt before knowing all the facts of the situation. ---------------------------- Lastly, I asked you three important questions before: (1) Women are biologically programmed both to constantly test a man's philosophical strength and moral boundaries and to possess completely contradictory motives-for-having-sex, (which translates as being attracted to contradictory types-of-men). These contradictions are specially tuned to her menstrual cycle. (2) These contradictions, combined with the pussy pass that Stefan describes, means that the overwhelming majority of women have less-than-zero self-knowledge about men, themselves, and sexuality. (Zero knowledge would mean they're ignorant, but less-than-zero knowledge means that they think they know important things....but their knowledge is wrong.) (3) Items 1 and 2 mean that, in the vast majority of cases, the best part of a relationship is during the beginning stages when a woman is behaving better solely for the purpose of keeping you around. When she begins to feel disappointment towards who you are, she begins to behave less better - which sours the relationship. To what extent do you believe these three things to be absolutely true for all women, (with rare exceptions)?

There are two different ways of laughing at a child, though. And, like most people who listen to FDR, you're probably only familiar with the first way, which neeeeeel so eloquently described. First Way - A large family, headed by two emotionally retarded and abusive adults, routinely and unjustly mocks their youngest child. The youngest child never expresses his anger / frustration to his parents because they're abusive assholes, which means the child bottles all of his emotions inside. One day, the child explodes in anger at something NOT his abusive parents, like a board game. And the parents laugh and laugh and laugh, because they're convincing themselves that they've no idea where the child learned to get so angry over a board game. Second Way - A large family, headed by two emotionally mature adults refuses to abuse any of their children. Their emotional integrity works beautifully, but, because no children are emotionally perfect, one of them gets angry at a board game. The father, who routinely models Amused Mastery (Footnote 1) with his wife, laughs at his child. The child laughs in response, and his anger at the board game is instantly dissipated. You asked me before, "How do I know that the child's anger is inappropriate?" The answer is, "Because the amount of emotional intensity he's expressing doesn't match the activity he's participating in, which is losing a game. If that game were the Super Bowl, then his emotions would be appropriate." I don't know if you realize it, but you're beginning with one factual observation, (which is, "MMX2010 chooses to laugh at his child's emotional outburst, in this particular case."), and then inferring, "Because MMX2010 would laugh at his child's emotional outburst in this particular case, the child will have a generalized feeling of never being able to express his emotions." That makes no sense, because you can't magically inflate one example into a series of repeated examples. These two questions do the same thing of "beginning with one example, and then generalizing it to an oppressively large number of negative examples. Factually, (and this is very important), I didn't tell "someone" not to be angry. I told neeeeeeeel not to be angry. Secondly, this means that your question, "Has the ever worked for anyone?", should be changed to "Did that actually work for neeeeeel?" I didn't ask him directly, but I did PM him to see if he downvoted my post. He said, "No. And that he had no problem with it." So, "Yes, the action of telling neeeeeeel not to get angry helped him not to get angry." I was raised Christian, but have been an atheist for twenty years. And the only Bible verse I still find both useful and hilarious says something like, "If your right eye offends you and causes you to sin, cut it out of your skull and smash it on the ground. For it is better for a one-eyed man to enter Heaven than for a two-eyed man to enter Hell. And if your left hand offends you and causes you to sin, saw it off and throw it in a wood-chipper. For it is better for a one-handed man to enter Heaven than for a two-handed man to enter Hell." My answer to your question is, "If honesty, curiosity, and RTR in this particular instance offends the relationship and causes everyone to be miserable, cut it out. For it's better for a behavioristically-induced-minishock to produce a happy relationship than for unfettered emotional expression to sour it ." (For a third time, you're beginning with a single observation and inferring a mountainously-large number of repeated incidents.) Both. Women are much more prone to inappropriate anger than their children. And Amused Mastery works best on women and children. Masculine men like it a lot, but non-masculine men hate it. --------------------------- Footnote 1: Amused Mastery is Rollo Tomassi's term for the culmination of masculine self-improvement. You can read more about it here. http://therationalmale.com/2012/09/14/amused-mastery/

I understand what you're saying, and I think I didn't communicate my argument very well. Off-screen guy believes in government, because he was trained from birth to believe in government, and his belief caused him to incorrectly infer that everyone believes in government. After inferring this, he inferred that Stefan wants to outbreed the state. But Stefan wants to raise a child to never believe in government at all. And this non-belief in government will cause her to both resist government intervention and preach libertarianism to all of her friends. Hope that helps. Let me know if it doesn't.

That's not what happened. The State enacted arbitrary rules, translated as "Only people who obey the rules get to sell cigarettes for these higher prices." So when Garner sold loosies, he was using the power of the State to turn a profit. (Chris Cantwell's argument is annoying because it assumes that Garner did something capitalistic, like invent a teleporter to save on fuel costs for transporting cigarettes, to sell at lower prices. But there was nothing capitalistic about what Garner did, and Stefan would've supported Garner if there were.)

Think of it this way: if atheists were irrelevant, the sitcom would've never been made. So its existence is a good thing, regardless of what it depicts.

What measures did you take?

In your story, when you describe yourself as being "lazy", were you really being lazy or were you choosing not to work? In your story, when you describe yourself as being "busy", were you really being busy or were you choosing to work? neeeeeeeel uses the word "sociopath" to describe himself, but that word is equally inaccurate your self-descriptions of either "lazy" and "busy". This is because words like "sociopath", "lazy", and "busy" attempt to describe your Inner Essences, Personalities, or Immortal Souls, and none of these objects actually exist. The resolution, in your case, is to say, "I chose not to work." instead of saying, "I was lazy." And to say, "And then I chose to work hard." But the resolution in neeeeeel's case is to either call Stef, (who will probably call him out on his self-description), or to stop searching for, and reflecting upon, the words he uses to describe his essence. By stopping this "word-searching" project, he could then define himself by his actions. And by taking the right actions, he'll eliminate his self-labeling problem.

I've three suggestions. (1) Set up a call-in with Stef, since he's much better at this than I am. (2) Ask yourself, "If I know my parents are immoral idiots, then why am I respecting their assessments of me?" (3) Stop wondering whether you're a sociopath, (because even if you are, is it really that big of a deal?), and become ultra-successful. If you no longer wonder whether you're a sociopath after you've become successful, then the problem is solved. And if you're still wondering, then you have more money and success with which to solve the problem.

Great article. All of the bold-print is contained in the original article. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- http://www.henrydampier.com/2015/01/anti-cop-pose-libertarian-strategic-error/ The Anti-Cop Pose is a Libertarian Strategic Error Libertarians have found themselves in an impossible position thanks to years of regular anti-police activism, bombastic statements against police, and sloganeering around the Drug War. I would argue that the leading voice in this strain is Radley Balko, who ran a widely-read blog on police abuses that he eventually turned into a book contract and columnist gigs at the Huffington and Washington Posts. The main reason why this strain of activism has turned into a dead-end for the libertarians comes down to a several reasons: The problems of maintaining a stable legal order. Misunderstanding what the Drug War is, due to taking political propaganda at face value. Being unable to speak honestly about race, knowing the fates of Murray Rothbard and H.H. Hoppe for doing so. An emotional and financial desire to reach the mainstream population through the prestige press and television. A misunderstanding of the demographics that are likely to respond to libertarian appeals. To support the first bullet, let’s get ourselves to Moldbug, who writes: The problem with Mises as guru is that Misesian classical liberalism (or Rothbardian libertarianism) is like Newtonian physics. It is basically correct within its operating envelope. Under unusual conditions it breaks down, and a more general model is needed. The equation has another term, the ordinary value of which is zero. Without this term, the equation is wrong. Normally this is no problem; but if the term is not zero, the error becomes visible. The entire idea of a stable libertarian order is predicated on the ‘order’ part of things. When the country is populated by numerous people who have no respect for notions of property and peace, then it’s impossible to maintain the law… and even then, only possible to maintain the law at high expense, with some measure of brutality. On the second point, contemporary libertarians, for fear of the outer darkness to which anyone who writes about racial differences will be relegated, tend to neglect to discuss the different tendencies of different groups of people and cultures. Ron Paul’s first race in the Republican primaries was damaged badly by the publication of what were really quite mild newsletters in which his ghostwriters discussed race and crime. Contemporary libertarians tend to over-compensate for this with ostentatious expressions of pro-Civil-Rights rhetoric, contradicting many of their other positions concerning freedom of association. The libertarian ideology, at least in its most vulgar expressions, tends to float atop a world of pure theory, without reference to its cultural roots or origins. Finally, it’s the worst possible pose to strike for an ideology supposedly dedicated to the defense of absolute private property rights to support violent rioters who are destroying the property of small merchants. The libertarian is supposed to be fighting for the rights of the people like the petty merchants whose businesses the rioters are destroying. The rioter who destroys his shop and threatens his life is a more direct threat than the policeman who collects tax and intimidates the more dangerous men away from his territory. Similarly, it’s nonsensical to simultaneously support an ideology that supposedly fights for the rights of ordinary people to maintain the integrity of their persons and property against all challengers to express sympathy for assassins of police officers. Regardless of whatever theoretical reasons there might be for grinning ghoulishly at the deaths of cops, to place oneself on the same side as the communist revolutionaries advocating these disruptions of public order is to be on the wrong side, to ally with the left and the associated forces for the forceful dissolution of society. In this way, libertarians behave like someone else who called herself a ‘libertarian’ on occasion: Emma Goldman, who allied with Lenin, until the Party purged her and exiled her to America. Contemporary libertarians who support rioters above police adhere to their own theories, which are obscure and alien to the common people, above the facts of actual events happening outside of their windows. Arguments about the ‘NAP’ and the ‘absolute right to property’ spoken on one day, in private, become irrelevant to the minds of the common people when they see a libertarian spokesperson go on television and say that the police are at fault, and that the mob (invariably a socialist-democratic mob) is correct to be incensed. I understand the appeal of striking this pose, because I have stricken something like this pose before for the same reasons, and regret my mistakes. People like Christopher Cantwell, who are evidently invited to speak at libertarian conferences, speak as if they are either on the FBI’s payroll or on the payroll of whatever succeeded the Comintern: Even these liberal fuckin idiots who want the government to control every aspect of their lives, are starting to realize that police are violent fuckin monsters who cannot be trusted, and while I don’t like the race pimping or the destruction of private property, if these Marxist fuckin animals can produce just a few more Ismaaiyl Brinsley’s, guys who will whack a couple of the king’s men then take themselves out, well, they just might make up for some of the damage they’ve done to society. Such statements have little appeal to anyone predisposed to civilized life. It wouldn’t go over well with an insurance salesman with three children in Peoria. The intellectuals are far more dangerous than the police ever have been and ever will be. Libertarians have created a commons under their intellectual brand, and have subsequently debased it, as Rothbard lamented late in his life.

That's not what's happening, in my opinion. What's happening is that your parents' behaviors have left you rather unskilled at very important things. Imagine a survey that asks "On a one-to-ten scale, how satisfied are you right now with these five aspects of your life? (A) Sexual relationships. (B) Financial. © Diet. (D) Body Weight / Sense of Health. (E) Hopefulness for the future." I predict your answers are rather low, with no area being higher than a 4. So you sense that your life is not successful, which drives you to ask, "Am I a sociopath, or not?" But I think the correct question is, "If I was raised with love and empathy, or if I were wildly successful despite my childhood, would I still be wondering whether I'm a sociopath?"

How often do you meet any of the parents face to face? Not just the parents who posted the picture, but the other parents who commented about the picture?

Do you live on a mountain top, devoid of any human contact, raising your food via seeds that were never taxed? If not, you played a part. You either supported the law's existence, which got Eric Garner killed. Or you didn't think the law's existence could be that dangerous, which got Eric Garner killed. Or you knew that the law's existence could be that dangerous, but you didn't do anything....which got Eric Garner killed. We are all guilty here. All of us are less guilty than the police. But being less guilty isn't the same as being absolutely not guilty.

The most important thing I'll say is that Stefan is awesome at these conversations, so you should probably arrange a call-in show. ------------------------- In my opinion, all of your examples lead me to the same conclusion. So rather than illustrate all of them, I'm going to comment on just the one I quoted. I'll begin by saying something extremely shocking and seemingly non-empathetic. It isn't, though, because it leads to a larger point. I want you to read what I say, then remember what happened when you were playing Monopoly, and then read the rest of my post with emotional detachment. (Reading with emotional detachment may be difficult. So if you need to read my post tomorrow, or the next day, that's fine.) Are you ready? Are you sure? Here it comes. I would've laughed at you, too. If you're really angry at what I said, (even though I told you not to be), then you probably heard, "I would've laughed at you in the same way, and for the same reasons, as your family did." But I didn't say that. I only said that I would've laughed at you, too. There's a way to laugh at a child, or a woman, in a way that signals empathy and compassion while also signaling that the child's or woman's anger isn't appropriate. Something like, "Hey, neeeeeel. Maybe if you throw the game board against the wall, you'll win the game." (And if you don't get it, then I will throw the game board against the wall in the most ridiculously silly way, then I'll make myself clean it up in a silly way. And, by then, you'll be laughing along with me.) ---------------------- Or if you still don't get it, a blog post I read from a man talking about his girlfriend. "My girlfriend called me to complain about something, and so I hung up on her twenty seconds into what I felt would be a two-minute long rant. Thirty seconds later, she calls me back to resume her rant as if we had never been disconnected, so I hung up on her immediately. Thirty seconds later, she calls me back - but this time she isn't saying anything. And I calmly tell her, 'If you start talking about what you were talking about earlier, I think I'm going to pass through another dead zone.' She laughs, and starts talking about something much more pleasant." --------------------- So there are multiple ways to laugh at women and children such that they know you're feeling empathy/sympathy while also knowing that their emotional reaction isn't appropriate. And a man who wields such laughter raises emotionally balanced children, and adds to the emotional well-being of his wife. You were never mad at your family because they laughed at you. You were mad at them because their own inability to calm themselves down whenever they were sad / enraged meant that they didn't know how to calm you down when you were sad/enraged. No one in your family is skilled at emotional management, so, of course, they had no ability to manage your emotions. But they also lack the moral authority to make any judgments on your emotions. So why do you believe that you're "basically a bad person", when your only evidence is the opinions of those unskilled at understanding your emotions?

First of all, hi. Secondly, I don't think you really want to discuss whether everyone has sociopathic tendencies. I think you really want to discuss your childhood. So why not give us more details about your childhood, especially the event you recently remembered that caused you to post?

Kind of. You are arguing that your verbal disagreement with the creation of the law that killed Eric Garner makes you "less guilty" that those who supported the creation of that law. I'm asserting that arguing you are "less guilty" means that you've admitted that you're "guilty", and that Eric Garner's ghost, (which doesn't exist, but makes a useful prop), doesn't distinguish between the Less Guilty and the More Guilty. It just hates everyone who is Guilty, to the exact same degree. I raucously make fun of Video Guy for trying to turn Eric Garner into a heroic symbol of State-Smashing Courage, especially because: (1) He does have the courage to smash the state, and (2) He doesn't realize that trying to turn other people's actions into the ultimate symbols of Who You Are, What You Want, and What You Value is the devil's bargain that creates government in the first place. It is hilarious that Video Guy's first action was to advertise that he has no balls, and that his second action was to imply that Eric Garner's "balls" - as incorrectly implied by Video Guy - are really Video Guy's balls! (It's not, in Video Guy's opinion, that he has no balls; it's that Eric Garner's balls were a perfect symbol of his own balls. So the tragedy is not even that the State cut of Video Guy's balls when they murdered Eric Garner; it's that Stefan doesn't get that Eric Garner's balls are his balls, and so Stefan's arguments prevent Video Guy from basking in Eric Garner's courage.) Discerning listeners realize that the very act of saying, "That guy's balls are my balls!", is advertising that you don't have any balls. ------------------------------ In your case, the argument seems to be, "Well, at least I don't support the existence of the laws that killed Eric Garner!" But if your position doesn't force you into any form of meaningful action, then you're implying that your views don't make you belong to a specific category of people. This, however, turns yours (and everyone else's) political position into advertising brands - the same way that telling everyone whether you prefer Coke or Pepsi turns your soda-purchasing habits into advertising brands. And if you don't realize that pretty much everyone is doing the same thing, (speaking about their views as if they were advertising brands, rather than using those views to Do Something Concrete And Meaningful), then you don't realize that the Government sees you in essentially the same way that it sees your political opponents: Non-Threatening. Please note that I, too, haven't turned my political views into anything Concrete And Meaningful. But I'm saying that I know that I haven't and I don't wish to wrongly assert that I'm better than anyone else who also hasn't.

I don't think he does. I've been devouring a lot of posts from The Last Psychiatrist, and his/her most interesting ones concern advertising. Before you read the blog, you strongly think you make your decisions independently of commercials. Afterwards, you cry and get mad. But you mostly wonder what your life would've been like if you really hadn't been so influenced by commercials. ------------------------------- Advertising creates consumerism just as parenting creates government. Advertising also creates the false sense that "Everyone else is affected by these commercials; not me!" Hell, the false sense that you're beyond influence by advertising is necessary for you to further engage in consumerism. And in seemingly unrelated news, Chris Cantwell is strongly implying that Eric Garner's actions were heroic because they challenged the state and its tax laws. And he's implying that Stefan wants us to use peaceful parenting to outbreed statists. But he doesn't realize that cheering on Eric Garner for defying the system, (while Cantwell himself does nothing similarly heroic or daring), is allowing Garner to represent Cantwell's best interest and values. Nor does Cantwell realize that he took Stefan's jokes about breeding, (which were only said to individual callers to encourage them to have families), as if they were clarion demands that all listeners create a voting-bloc. So I don't think Cantwell realizes that he sees Garner as a quasi-heroic representation of himself, (the same way we're all supposed to see the police and legislators as non-heroic representatives of ourselves). Nor does he see that his own desire to fill the government with "people like him" is the only reason that he interpreted Stefan's joke that way.

The most important part of that video comes at about 15:30. Off-screen guy says, "To make a statement like, 'Evil is a matriarchal thing.' is ridiculous." On-screen guy corrects him, "The title of the video is called 'The Matriarchal Lineage Of Evil'." And he further explains, "Our mothers abuse us as children, and we grow up to think that violence is okay." Off-screen guy interrupts and asks, "Well, what about that fathers?" On-screen guy says, "Believe me. Do you think that fathers abusing their children doesn't get enough attention? In my book it does." Off-screen guy says, "Yeah, but to make a claim that evil comes from the.....that evil comes from women is pretty ridiculous." (They go on for about two minutes.) Off-screen guy concludes, "Honestly, I didn't hear very much of it (meaning the videos from which On-Screen Guy is making his arguments) , but I did hear him say make that statement, and it was an unprovoked kind of thing. It was in a larger conversation, but it wasn't like he qualified it and said, 'Some women are violent.' He didn't qualify any of it. He just said that 'Evil is of the matriarchy.'" --------------------------------- Now which of these two people do you believe spent the most time listening to Stefan's arguments, so that he could fully understand it before he commented on it? And which do you think became so overly emotional in response to small sentences within the conversation that he could no longer accurately process what Stefan was saying? Granted, that's not a difficult question to answer. But realize that this entire video takes one-or-two-sentences-at-a-time, pauses, and allows the commentators to criticize. Their defense is that none of the soundbytes they're playing are edited - meaning, (I think), that no one chopped them into pieces and then re-assembled them to quote Stefan out-of-context. Unfortunately, it never dawns on them that clipping one-or-two-sentences from a 90 minute long conversation isn't a reliable means of understanding the point of that conversation. Nor do they consider that they're unwittingly revealing some very unflattering data about their ability to think deeply, withhold judgment before all of the requisite information is presented, and not let one's emotional reactions to small words and small sentences cloud their processing ability. As such, I don't recommend that you watch the video.