Say My Name

While kayaking the other day, me and an old friend were reminiscing about Breaking Bad.  The "say my name scene" was classic. What a beautiful way to show power reversals.

One of the reasons I loved it so much was how it reminded me of Jehovah Witness missionaries and their insistence that one know and say the right name of God. Every successful proselytizing religion has a similar gambit - although most aren't that overt and strident. Mormonism has authority or modern revelation. Breakaway cults (or sectarian movements) have a verse or meme that they expand on and which quickly becomes a lynch pin point of contention.

From that perspective, watch the following clip.

The intent is to get away from the trees and to start to look at the forest.

Say my name. The name of god is....

This type of stuff is all legit. It is a great way to show where the power is. To deny populist power is to be a tar-and-featherable heretic.

We are at the point where an ideological politically infused (directed, energized and authorized) movement has flipped into the tools of religion and conventional "bend the knee" dynamics.

Say my name!

The obvious rejoinder is that no consequences will come if you don't. You just show how much of a racist you are.

No nuance is possible. There is no alternative to bending the knee. And, this should set off some alarm bells. Why? Because it is painfully obvious that Pence believes that a black life matters. Any and all of them. But it is also painfully obvious that this is an ingenious trope whose ultimate aim is power dynamics. Any one who doesn't bend becomes "othered".

This is great if you want change. It's not so great if you don't want civil war. Or, if you think similar outcomes could be effected by less (inevitably) violent ends.

Oh well.  Once you accept that civil war is largely inevitable (unless democratic norms can be seen as a good idea) these obvious signs of collapse and religious-like authoritarianism become less aggravating. Que sera, sera.  It's just people's glee in the power that gets me. 

I hate the new priest caste

Civil War Escalation: Looking at Systems Moves from the Outside Shows How Crazy Things Are

I've decided to permanently leave twitter. I just can't morally justify things which are obviously energizing the very likely US civil war which is almost certain to come in a couple of election cycles.

The dynamics of how the woke left has evolved and how they and the reactionary right interact now seem pretty well known. I'm not getting anything new from twitter on these fronts. Right now I'm starting to look in more detail how the reactionary right is evolving to counter the existential threat they feel they are facing of overt censorship, deplatforming, racist job firings, mobbing (physical, online, and workplace) and institutional lock out. Gab is a cesspit that I just can't jump into.  Locals and Thinkspot are too paywalled. So, I'm looking at Parler as a potential alternative. While I doubt it will get the liberal voices needed to make a viable community, it may offer some insights into how the reactionary right is going to handle the next phase of civil war escalation.

ESCALATION

The latest round of escalation doesn't involve the obvious online de-platforming escalations and fake news spins. This escalation builds on the removal of physical space. A few years ago I had highlighted (on twitter I think) how the Proud Boys- Antifa conflict was a pissing contest to see whether one's identity could be a cause to void access to communal space. It was one gang signalling that certain people weren't welcome in their territory. The counter protests were largely about trying to keep public space open. Although there was certainly a decent proportion of people looking to rumble. But it was, I think, best viewed as a space battle.

I also said this was a key dynamic to watch. Tommy Robinson and the criminalization of identity in the UK was another key thing I suggested people watch. Could someone's identity curtail what physical spaces they were functionally allowed to attend? The answer was a resounding yes. Just ask Andy Ngo.

The latest escalation on this front is the attempt to prevent Trump rallies/protests from reaching critical mass. Alexandria Ocassio Cortez celebrates a scary escalation here. There was a fairly organized initiative to use up tickets to prevent Trump supporters from achieving a frenzied mob mass.

This is a VERY GOOD strategy. 

Unfortunately it has HUGE social capital costs. The escalation value for Civil War is very large. When large groups of people are unable to even congregate, they loose the last avenue they have for expression. This is a fairly essential aspect of democratic society. Just imagine if no BLM protests, during the day when things were largely peaceful, were functionally allowed.  

Now "burning" a bunch of rally seats isn't the same thing. But, what you have is a move into the same space. Certain identities aren't allowed to congregate. This is what the ante-bellum and Jim Crow south did against blacks. It was very strategic then. It is equally strategic today. It is equally as bad then and now. It's just that now, people see it as supporting a "correct moral". That's of course how segregationists also saw things.  That's a bad sign.

I'll be writing more on the civil war aspect of things over the next few months. Right now I'm writing up some posts on the increasingly obvious moral-religious aspects of the mob movements. To say they fit sectarian religious dynamics is an understatement.

And, I think I'll end up lambasting strident atheists who un-ironically have fallen into the mob mentality of current hysterias.  If they had had the tools to understand metaphorical truth, they probably wouldn't have fallen prey to a new religious movement... But, they gave that up for the sake of factual purity, and now the roosters have come home to roost.