Wednesday, July 27, 2005

primitivism

Joe N at No Pasaran! sums up the neo-luddites,
The new primitivists of the developed world... sentimentally yearn for simplicity, but forgot that it came with great harshness. They look fondly on a nasty, short, and brutal life to satisfy a yearning for innocence that they have been unable to find in their relations with people or in other disappointments they find with themselves.
makes this recommendation,
The least one can do is ignore them. The best one can do is to continue to prove their world view otherwise by living well in a modern world, and occasionally asking them to empirically examine the basis of their reasoning, and why living examples of it only can be found in the least equitable and poorest societies on earth.
and concludes thus,
In a good society people help the disadvantaged on either the conservative or collectivist model. Either way, they are helped. If a social theory causes that society to help more of them, we aren’t just being stupid, we’re being cruel by bringing more people into mediocrity and misery. The more of them you have to serve, the harder it is on the remainder supporting them, and they too are victimized by a tyranny of bad ideas. Intended to pander to a comfortable sliver of the population that thinks compassion is about helping the greatest number of people, they should be more concerned with the conditions which require so many people to need any help at all.

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