Greetings!: A disjointed hemmorhage of enthusiasm.

[Steinhauser]

Hello, Stef-Fans and philosophiles!

 

In the interest of keeping this brief, I'm going to keep this brief.

(Sorry. I love saying that. It's a tautology that's also completely
self-defeating. And you can probably already tell, I will absolutely not be keeping
this brief.)

 

---- ABOOT ME ----

I'm a twenty-something guy from Canada. I'm employed at a factory temp job that's not quite dead-end, but still a narrow and gravelly back road. (I am looking for a change in my life - a topic for another, uh, topic.)

Like (I'm guessing) most of you, I'm an anarchist (in some circles "voluntarist," in others simply "pacifist"), formerly libertarian, before that an Orwell-reading, Zeitgeist-watching directionless teenaged malcontent, before that I suppose a left-leaning ambivalent.

I'm also (like I'm guessing most of you) an atheist, formerly moral/spiritual relativist (though deep down I knew that was bullshit, but it was a convenient stepping stone away from Catholicism), before that Catholic (though deep down I knew that was bullshit too).

My upbringing was actually quite good, all things considered. Although I know everyone says that. (I've tried to be objective, and compiled a laundry list of authoritarian transgressions, like abovementioned churchgoing. I still think my parents did a damn good job. Above all else, they were - and are - nonviolent and conducted themselves day-to-day with an integrity and honesty I can only hope to emulate.)

Interesting facts about me? I like nature, with a preference for dinosaur- and insect-related topics. I'm a nudist (not the kind that goes to colonies, the kind that sits in a basement apartment running up the gas bill all winter). I occasionally (formerly: obsessively) play Magic: The Gathering and various video games.

 

---- MY FDR EXPERIENCE, or: how I learned to stop worrying and love philosophy ----

I started following FDR about a month ago, after seeing

of the Men's Rights movement. (I'd been interested in the Men's Rights movement for a while, but have recently become disillusioned with it - a tale for another time perhaps.) Stef's whip-sharp reasoning and oration (and, okay, that delightful chrome dome and fun-to-imitate accent) immediately stood out to me: "Is this guy for real? Is he...always like that?" A few short minutes of Youtube surfing confirmed that yes, he is and yes, he is. Awesome!

After gobbling 50-odd hours of FDR, it was clear Stefan and I shared a lot of positions. But what really intrigued me were the topics I'd formerly disagreed with, or had never given very much thought at all: Philosophy, virtue and honesty, uncompromising self-inventory and laser-guided elimination of hipocrasy, universal morality, an emphasis on nonviolent parenting -

(!!! Now here's a thing. Tangent time. From a very young age I yearned for opportunities to prove I didn't need to be corralled like an animal, and dreamed of a time children would be treated as equals. Why should parenthood, or teacherhood, automatically confer complete authority over children, I thought? Shouldn't respect be merit-based? But then, I observed the other children, and began to doubt myself: "My ideas might work for me, but most of these hellions would take complete advantage of the situation!" I filed those thoughts away, to see if they changed as I grew, or if I'd ever encounter people who had entertained those same ideas, and/or could reconcile my concerns about them. And I finally have, in peaceful parenting and unschooling. But I digress.)

- and more specifically, how they all managed to tie everything together. They were the missing pieces to the puzzle, coalescing to form a Grand Unifying Theory of Everything, or an attempt at one so complete I've yet to see a rival argument to match it. UPB pulled morality out of the namby-pamby ether of abstract "rules to live by," and into the realm of objectivism and the scientific method. A principled approach no longer felt like a faith-based handicap that shunted real world solutions, as it had before, but rather became necessary to the process. Similarly, empathy was no longer at odds with "cold" objective reasoning over human problems, but became intrinsically linked to it.

And peaceful parenting! The ill effects of child abuse, the self-perpetuating cycles of violence and anger that last for generations, were exactly what I'd been observing in people I'd known over the years, and whose families I'd met. It's like each person's demeanor was a table of contents that almost flawlessly described what the chapters of his childhood were like. (That metaphor might be a bit ugly but I'm not changing it.) It's such a simple answer, a single variable, but it correlates to everything I've noticed without actually noticing before. (If that makes any sense.) The idea of almost all the evil being "bred" out of the human race through multigenerational refusal to do to your kids what was done to you as a kid, well, it really does seem plausible. And more importantly, it seems possible.

...And, further, that that's how we will achieve real change in society. Not through violent revolution, not a regime change, not voting someone into power who will make things better. A multigenerational revolution of thought. The dissemination of ideas, each bulletproof in its own merit. Even as a libertarian I had delusions of stopgap solutions (*insert Ron Paul-sounding sinus clearing noise*). The real path is clear now, it's simple, and it's really a lot more beautiful. Truth will prevail because it's truth. All that needs to happen is for people to change their minds. We have the technology. The ball is already rolling, and the trend seems inevitable. Eventual anarchy. I've never felt a part of anything this big before.

I think the bottom line is that my introduction to FDR stamped out the defeatism and nihilism that plagued me. Light, tunnel, etc. So, thanks Stef.

 

And I'm really glad to be here with you fine people! Don't expect any of my non-introductory posts to be this long or stupid (you're welcome). I just love to make a bad first impression.

 

Yeesh, what a mess. I should have my 9 and 0 keys blow-torched off my keyboard. (In other words, sorry for the parenthetical brain-vomit.) I'm going to sleep before I post this, so I can wake up and delete half of it. (At random.) Yes, what you just read is, technically, the edited version.

 

tl;dr Hi.

[MysterionMuffles]

hey welcome to the boards! I, like you, had grown up thinking about equality for children. Glad to hear that despite your parents being Catholic, they were still peaceful people. That is a lucky straw pulled in your favour, sir! As a kid, I always knew it was wrong to be so small and treated so poorly, because every time something happened that made me think that, I always dreamed of having revenge when I got older. Never getting revenge on kids when I'd become an adult, just the aggressors.

Isn't it enlightening to find Stef's content to resonate with you on every possible way? All the aspects of philosiphy are things we question throughout our lives from one time or another, but then when we discover FDR, all of it rings true and comes full circle!

And hey don't worry about long posts, I think we're all infamous for that, so no need to be too self conscious about it. 

[Brandon Buck _BB_]

I like the table of contents metaphor, although I agree that it could use some polishing. Welcome to the forum!

[Steinhauser]

Thanks for the words of welcome!

Glad to hear that despite your parents being Catholic, they were still peaceful people. That is a lucky straw pulled in your favour, sir!

Don't I know it! I count that blessing pretty much daily. My dad had the fortitude to break the cycle of child abuse so my siblings and I didn't have to. My mum, the real Catholic influence in the household, was still Boomer-gen enough to concede spiritual egalitarianism. (I'm still not sure if she clings to Catholicism because she actually believes the stuff, or just as a matter of rote, but she's as far from hardline gay-hating pope-worshipper as you can get in that church.)

Never getting revenge on kids when I'd become an adult, just the aggressors.

As a kid, I saw the child abuse cycle in action (often in media) and always wondered, "Why take it out on your kids? How does that make you any better than your abusers? Your anger is misplaced, man!" At that age I could never fathom the subconscious depths to which that abuse could be internalized.

Isn't it enlightening to find Stef's content to resonate with you on every possible way?

Yes by Jove. It's like an archipelago of idea-islands finally figured out how to communicate to each other in morse code. And now they can start to triangulate their positions and draw maps. (Come to think of it, maybe your handle inspired that metaphor before I realized it.)

And hey don't worry about long posts, I think we're all infamous for that, so no need to be too self conscious about it.

I'm gonna like it here.

 

I like the table of contents metaphor, although I agree that it could use some polishing.

It's not that kind of table!

[MysterionMuffles]

that is such a good metaphor about the islands and morse code