/lit/ - Literature

didn't happen

>>4326700
>it's influence
dropped

>frankfurt school

lol @ this red scare tier shit. wasn't this originally a contention of a right wing radio host?

>>4326700
>it's influence on mainstream western academia

Nope, money rules academia, you need to raise money to find your research no matter how apt your critiques of modern society are.

>>4326753
Fund*

>>4326700
I've heard they force the whole social construct faggotry as if it was useful for society.
I know they are a bunch of losers whose influence only ruins everything they touch.

>>4326753
So you're saying modern Academia does not currently in any way support the ideas of Critical Theory?

>>4326700
I would love to discuss them, but I fear this thread will meat the same fate as did the thread about Adorno's ethics...

inb4 cultural Marxism

Would anyone have suggested reading for understanding more about the Frankfurt school? And reading for understanding opposition to it?

>>4326778
>I've heard they force the whole social construct faggotry as if it was useful for society.

Hacking the dynamics of social construction is very useful for making propaganda or advertising or designing successful products, it's all capitalism honey.

>>4326804
Read Adorno, Marcuse and Horkheimer for opposition read any enlightenment philosopher, or anyone who's optimistic about reason and liberal democracy leading to great benefits for all. That's mainly what they are in opposition to.

>>4326824
Thanks anon. What are your personal thoughts on this school of thought?

>>4326804
Adorno/Horkheimer: Dialectics of Enlightenment
Marcuse: One-Dimensional Man (respectively Critique of Pure Tolerance for shorter reading)
Benjamin: Critique of Violence, Theses on the philosophy of history, his Theologico-Political Fragment

Those would be the core works I would say of the traditional school, I wouldn't add Habermas to them.

>>4326837
For explicite criticism I would read works about the positivism dispute, maybe some works by Popper or Albert. Or Habermas to a certain degree.

>>4326806
Does it help anyone other than the people bending morals to market more products?
I know the whole queer movement shit is just done to unlock a new market.

>>4326824
>anyone who's optimistic about reason and liberal democracy leading to great benefits for all. That's mainly what they are in opposition to.
So /pol/ would actually agree with them.

>>4326833
On the abstract my thoughts are, like with Foucault, their critique is of something that affects us in such basic ways the problems they reveal are so maddeningly complex and pervasive throughout society, that it's almost discouraging and paralyzing. It's something you can talk about but hardly do anything.

>>4326874
>I know the whole queer movement shit is just done to unlock a new market.

It's the other way around, society shows a tendency companies adapt. We're not wizards.

>>4326897
Nope /pol/ is opposite in proposed solution, that's why fascist demagogues scapegoat them, to both hinder their followers in reading any other opposition to liberal democracy that isn't rightwing.

>>4326912
It is portrayed that way. It is made for you to think it is that way, that the people demand and the supply is made, but the idea is rather planted so that the supply can exist and expand.

>>4326949
What the fuck, no this is not how reality works, get a job. That pesky free will is the worst enemy of an advertising agency.

>>4326700

Responsible for the HIV-like spread of Marxism through academia, which then spread to the media (academically-trained writers) which disseminated it to society at large, causing social AIDS (multiculturalism, gay acceptance, feminism, etc.).

The Frankfurt school was the first guy to buttfuck a chimpanzee, metaphorically speaking

So what's the connection between critical theory and feminism, marxism, multiculturalism, lgbtq, etc.? These all sound like buzzwords to me

>>4327449
You serious right now? Wiki that shit nigga. Crash course on critical theory right now!

>>4327709
So if the connection is clearly there why is /lit/ so hell bent on denying it?

>>4327761
Because it is obsessive to the point of ignoring reality for arguments sake. It is often the view of ignorant visionaries hoping for sweeping reform without the proper investments or patient to make a societal change.

For centuries we have know that revolution simply replaces one oppressor with another, yet we continue to seek it. Only through education and expanding our horizons to the troubles of all people rich and poor can we truly change the world. Poverty cannot be ended in a decade and wealth cannot be materialized. The fruits that we wish to give to so many are simply out of reach not because of one party, but because of both. We seek often to blame one party when in fact either is usually just as guilty.

>>4327785
What are you talking about? What's the view of ignorant visionaries? Who's calling for a revolution? The people who are against multiculti whatever don't want to replace anything, they just want IT to stop

>>4327804
The change is to quick, the pressure is far to strong, and the swiftness with which the actions are taking place are not allowing for adjustment. They are simply replacing society with something new, cleansing the old without a care about it. The moving in of new people through immigration, hatred towards religion, and many other social charges are far to sweeping and expected to advanced far to fast for society to come to terms. The quick and violent changes are creating more tension in society and spawning far right groups in Europe and the U.S.

You see this progress as normal, but it has happened like this before and it has not ended well. History is cyclical friend, prepare for the shit storm a comin in our life times.

>>4326747
>red scare tier shit
>implying soviet infiltration of western governmental institutions wasn't a legitimate political concern

Significant Soviet infiltration was definitively proven after the opening of the Soviet archives and the declassification of the Venona decrypts. The cold-war anti-communists were mostly right about the "red scare".

>>4326804
>Would anyone have suggested reading for understanding more about the Frankfurt school? And reading for understanding opposition to it?

Kevin MacDonald's "Culture of Critique" has an extensive critical analysis of the Frankfurt School.

>>4327128

>he actually thinks aids came from fucking a chimp

hahaowwow.exe

>>4326804
>>4327880

I also recommend Paul Gottfried's "The Strange Death of Marxism".

>>4327128
>social AIDS
I thought that was called "AIDS"

I believe the phenomena of critical theory and the new left stems from the death of western culture as a whole. Spengler predicted this idea with great accuracy and detail, noting that the optimistic cowardice of utopian ideals are a sign of a civilizations old age.

>>4327898
Oh shit I read this guy's commentary on Schmitt and I've seen MacDonald mention him a couple times in blog posts

Guess I gotta read his main stuff now, thanks

What is the relationship between decadence and liberalism?

>>4326804
"The Origin of Negative Dialectics" by Susan Buck-Morss

>>4327907
Only if you want to see it that way, that's an interpretation because you are a happeningfag, fantasizing about the end to be the event that makes it all interesting and stops your ennui.

OP: Just read everything Miriam Hansen wrote.

And er, to the rest of you...the Frankfurt School has been alive and a vital part of "mainstream American academia" (by which I take it you mean what is discussed at leading departments across the humanities) since...a very long time.

This year's entering cohort at Hopkins, Chicago, Yale, and Berkeley each included one or two Frankfurt School specialists (avg. cohort size ~6, and I won't name the discipline for obvious reasons).

>>4327938
>implying Spengler's predictions haven't for the most part come true

inb4 MUH ALLIES WON

Caesarism has only been temporarily halted, not destroyed. In fact, our current political climate ripe for a man of Will to take over.

It's just a coincidence that they're all Jews right?

>>4329401
Yes. Nothing to see here, move along

>>4329409
Oh boy here we go

>>4329390
Are you seriously saying that caesarism died because the allies won, the us have if anyone continued the roman tradition of civilizing the world.

>>4327871
Yeah, that's why Adorno and Horkheimer actually voted the conservative party in W.-Germany, because they were agents of the Soviet Union...

So is it true that the concept of Critical Theory stems from the failure of communism taking a foothold as Marx predicted during WWI, and so instead they aimed at applying it to the culture instead?

>>4329421
Why are you surprised? The Paris Review was a CIA front for display of typical liberal western values.

For those denying Soviet infiltration of the US

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qlpODYhnPEo

>>4329401

Well shit. I just checked wiki and they really are all jews, except for Habermas.

Is this the crimson capsule?

>>4329434
the red scare was a propaganda campaign and witch hunt which was wholly separate from the question of soviet infiltration. it's like how the war on terror is separate from (has ulterior motives) the fact that there are in fact terrorists.

>>4329434
Important quote to note

>Most of the people who graduated in the 60's, half-baked intellectuals- are now occupying the positions of power- in the government, civil service, mass media, educational system. You are stuck with them.

Eight Steps to Empire: The usage of diversion and cultural subversion as a form of social control.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qpes-qlkOLU

>>4329432
Ha, yes, of course, if they were voting against that what they actually wanted to achieve, they are some sneaky bastards who are completely adhering to the great jewish plan and if they would have been voting in favour of that, you would have been able to clearly see that the jews are so dominant now, that they don't even care any longer...
Also for your baseless statement:
[citation needed]


Good God, we will never be able to discuss a jewish author, /lit/, if that shit doesn't stop...

>>4329451
In 2007, an article published by The New York Times supported the claim that founding editor Matthiessen was in the CIA but stated that the magazine was used as a cover, rather than a collaborator, for his spying activities.[4] In a May 27, 2008 interview with Charlie Rose, Matthiessen stated that he "invented The Paris Review as cover" for his CIA activities.

http://www.salon.com/2012/05/27/exclusive_the_paris_review_the_cold_war_and_the_cia/

>>4329421
>Yeah, that's why Adorno and Horkheimer actually voted the conservative party in W.-Germany, because they were agents of the Soviet Union.

Who said Adorno or Horkheimer were Soviet agents?

>>4329461
Who questioned that there was in fact Soviet infiltration? Different issue than the Red Scare.

>>4327938
>implying clear patterns can't be found when analyzing the rise and fall of civilizations and empires
>implying there isn't already a fairly consistent cycle which can be deducted from historical analysis
>implying this is about me wanting the "happening" and not simply applying historical patterns to our current position

The problem is most people view history as something in relation to themselves directly instead of looking at it from a more meta transcendental view

>>4329455
>used as a cover
That says nothing about the content the magazin used to have or the state the magazine is in today.

>>4329461
I know, it's even worse. They are jews!!!!!!

>>4329438
>the red scare was a propaganda campaign and witch hunt which was wholly separate from the question of soviet infiltration.

Wholly separate?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Scare
>The Second Red Scare was focused on national and foreign communists influencing society, infiltrating the federal government, or both.

>>4327871
>Soviet infiltration

You're confusing the types of "socialists" out there, probably because you're listening to some wanker who strings together halfarsed conspiracies to explain why he doesn't have a girlfriend. This wasn't the Soviet breed, they were a lot more revisionist, and yes they did influence - or at least are parallel to - modern academia [note: they face a lot of criticism]. You have to also understand that academia has always been left-leaning as the left is more inclined to deal with sociology and the like.

The Frankfurt school is more "jew scare" than "red scare", by the way.

>>4329439
Like Steve Jobs?

>>4329470
Just read the salon article, also are we talking about the state of the magazine today?

>Yale’s American studies “would be ‘positive,’” as one academic has written, “not a matter of preaching against communism, but one of advocacy for the American alternative.” Where the CIA would get into the game — call it cultural propaganda or psychological warfare — it would avail itself of both “positive” and “negative” means, celebrating American cultural achievements on one hand while attacking Soviet ideas and policies on the other. So would the literary magazines created in this period, including the Paris Review

>>4329476
>The Frankfurt school is more "jew scare" than "red scare", by the way.

Nobody said it wasn't. It was originally compared to the red scare, not mentioned as part of it.

>>4329471
The hysteria associated with an incident and the possibility of manipulation of that hysteria is distinct from whether or not the incident took place.

>>4329467
>Who questioned that there was in fact Soviet infiltration? Different issue than the Red Scare.

It wasn't. The second "red scare" was significantly based around revisionist historians allegations that cold-war anti-communists had exaggerated soviet infiltration of American institutions and domestic communist parties. Declassification of government documents has definitively disproven the revisionist narrative of the soviet infiltration "red scare"

Since when was the FS associated with the Red Scare? The red scare was just people calling each other commies. The entire purpose of the FS was to implement Marxism in a way that wasn't overtly Marxist. Get it?

>>4329493
>The entire purpose of the FS was to implement Marxism in a way that wasn't overtly Marxist.
>I know nothing about Adorno and Horkheimer

>>4329493
No, you can't do that. It's pretty obvious if the proletariat of the world unites and borders get dissolved and people get payed for what they actually produce.

>>4329476
>You're confusing the types of "socialists" out there, probably because you're listening to some wanker who strings together halfarsed conspiracies to explain why he doesn't have a girlfriend. This wasn't the Soviet breed, they were a lot more revisionist, and yes they did influence - or at least are parallel to - modern academia [note: they face a lot of criticism]. You have to also understand that academia has always been left-leaning as the left is more inclined to deal with sociology and the like.
>The Frankfurt school is more "jew scare" than "red scare", by the way.

Your the one confusing the Frankfurt issue with "red scare" issue. The reason why the "red scare" was brought up was because >>4326747 made a comparison between the Frankfurt school and the "red scare", implicitly claiming the "red scare" was paranoid nonsense, so >>4327871 responded by pointing out the so called "red-scaremongers" were generally right, while posting a picture of a book authored by 2 respected historians (not halfarsed conspiracisists) of American communism that establishes this thesis.

>>4326804
Nietzsche, Geneology of Morals
Freud, Civilisation and its Discontents

Am I the only one in here who rates Birmingham school higher than Frankfurt school?

British New Left is best New Left

Are these the guys who want enlightened academic elites to rule with an iron fist and lead us all to a communist utopia?

I have no idea what is going on

>>4329544
Yes... keep believing in privilege.. keep importing millions of immigrants... keep supporting the destruction of the family and feminism... betray your race and your country and you will have utopia ;)

>>4329544
>academic elites
>ruling anything

These people has never been to a university, academics are usually kind cultured people in contrast to the vile barbaric brutes of the masses, living futile unexamined petty lives with no reverence to knowledge while having the conceit to think that it's the academics who is foul conniving untermensch like inhabitants of small fly over communities.

It's all projection of lower humans.

>>4329561
Keep not knowing what you're talking about because you saw two terms mentioned in the same breath

>>>/pol/

I for one have had it with these so called urban intellectuals. I believe that power should be restored to the noble priest class. It is THEIR duty to interpret reality and culture to the public, not Tyrese Shekelsbergstein and his exposition on heteronormativity thin-privilege socioeconomics gender hyperintrusive oppression identity consciousness

>>4329566
No, no. I'm not denying that they are cultured and that I am not. I'm saying that they have the mentality of, well, your post. Thanks for the example.
I'm not anti-intellectual, but critical theorists rub me the wrong way sometimes.

>>4329576
My sides have left the building

>>4329576
>I believe that power should be restored to the noble priest class. It is THEIR duty to interpret reality and culture to the public, not Tyrese Shekelsbergstein

Can we have a third option?

>>4329576
Plato pls go

>>4329576

def. some daddy issues here

>>4326804
The Dialectical Imagination: A History of the Frankfurt School and the Institute of Social Research, 1923-1950

>>4329583
But the masses are all idiots, academics are too stuck up their own asses, and STEMfags are STEMfags.

>>4329583
Its evola. You uncultured inbred scum.

>>4329583
No. Its either traditionalism or decadence. There is no other option.

History is organic, civilizations are born, grow old, and eventually die. DEAL WITH IT

>>4329606
>implying this divide you're fueling isn't a part of the downfall

>>4329583
by default, the option is always "progress"

It's often very rare for an entire society to suddenly adopt Tradition again. See Evola disagreed with Spengler on the idea that civilizations were deterministic, he believed that it depended on what choices the civ makes. I've yet to see any notable examples of it actually happening, aside from a few religious revivals

>>4329606
can you post some of your favorite passages from this book?

>>4329576
>heteronormativity thin-privilege socioeconomics gender hyperintrusive oppression identity consciousness

>MFW this is literally what my Humanities class sounded to me
>all those buzzwords
>endless buzzwords

>>4329616
>implying stormfags care about unity

>>4329625
“To-day we live so cowed under the bombardment of this intellectual artillery (the media) that hardly anyone can attain to the inward detachment that is required for a clear view of the monstrous drama. The will-to-power operating under a pure democratic disguise has finished off its masterpiece so well that the object's sense of freedom is actually flattered by the most thorough-going enslavement that has ever existed”

>>4329629
They usually make sense despite their verbosity

You're just a pleb m8

>>4329629
how are those terms "buzzwords"? they have legitimate meanings and uses whether or not you agree with them.

>>4329488
>The hysteria associated with an incident and the possibility of manipulation of that hysteria is distinct from whether or not the incident took place.

Whether or not something is classified as hysterical is codependent on whether it is actually true. For instance, for a number of revisionist scholars of American Communism, the death penalty given to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg for espionage was proof of anti-communist hysteria, because they were convinced the Rosenberg's were innocent victims of a paranoid red scare. This turned out to be completely wrong, because the declassification of documents has definitively proven that they were indeed spies who passed classified military information to the Soviets.

>>4329625
“The question of whether world peace will ever be possible can only be answered by someone familiar with world history. To be familiar with world history means, however, to know human beings as they have been and always will be. There is a vast difference, which most people will never comprehend, between viewing future history as it will be and viewing it as one might like it to be. Peace is a desire, war is a fact; and history has never paid heed to human desires and ideals ..."

>>4329625
The moral imperative as the form of morale is Faustian and only Faustian. It is quite wrong to associate Christianity with the moral imperative. It was not Christianity that transformed Faustian man, but Faustian man who transformed Christianity--and he not only made it a new religious but also gave it a new moral direction. The "it" became "I," the passion- charged centre of the world, the foundation of the great Sacrament of personal contrition. Will-to-power even in ethics, the passionate striving to set up a proper morale as a universal truth, and to enforce it upon humanity, to reinterpret or overcome or destroy everything otherwise constituted--nothing is more characteristically our own than this is. And in virtue of it the Gothic springtime proceeded to a profound--and never yet appreciated--inward transformation of the morale of Jesus. A quite spiritual morale welling from Magian [he uses this term for culture of the Near-East] feeling--a morale or conduct recommended as potent for salvation, a morale the knowledge of which was communicated as a special act of grace-- was recast as a morale of imperative command....

...

Every Classical ethic that we know or can conceive of constitutes man an individual static entity, a body among bodies, and all Western valuations relate to him as a centre of effect in an infinite generality...

>>4329629
Long hard words with many letters != buzzwords

Buzzwords are more akin to 'hype' and 'fad' and also exists in the natural sciences

>welcome to language, where words means something.

We are now able to see a great style sequence as an organism. here, as in so many other matters, Goethe was the first to whom vision came In his Winckelmann he says of Velleius Paterculus; "With his standpoint, it was not given to him to see all art as a living thing that must have an inconspicuous beginning a slow growth, a brilliant moment of fulfillment and a gradual declines like very other organic being, though it is presented in a set of individuals." This sentence contains the entire morphology of art-history. Styles do not follow one another like waves or pulse-beats. It is not the personality or will or brian of the artist that makes the style, but the style that makes the type of the artist. The style, like the Culture, is a prime phenomenon in the strict Goethian sense, be it the style of art or religion or thought, or the style of life itself. it is, as "Nature" is, an ever-new experience of waking man, his alter ego and mirror-image in the world-around. And therefore in the general historical picture of a Culture there can be but one style, the style of the Culture. The error has lain in treating mere style-phases-- Romanesque, Gothic, Baroque, Rococo, Empire--as if they were styles on the same level as units of quite another order such as the Egyptian, the Chinese (or even a "prehistoric") style. Gothic and Baroque are simply the youth and age of one and the same vessel of forms, the style of the West as ripening and ripened. Hence Ionic columns can be as completely combined with Doric building forms as late Gothic is with early Baroque in St. Lorenz at Nürnberg, or late Romanesque with the late Baroque in the beautiful upper part of the West choir at Mainz.

The test before art-history is to write the comparative biographies of the great styles, all of which as organisms of the same genus possess structurally cognate life-histories.

>>4329625
"All reactionaries are stupid and I'm no exception to the rule."

>>4329649
>>4329651
>>4329660
I'm too pleb to understand this. I think he's saying that humans are not the center of the universe, in a sense?

I've only read Adorno and I found him to be an obscurantist, elitist fuckhead. Seriously just listening to the whinging fucker in his writings on popular music of his day is like a precursor to /mu/.

Plus he needlessly distorted every single point he ever made. He's actually readable in Dialectics of Enlightenment where presumably Horkheimer reins him in.

>>4329606
>tfw /lit/ hates this book
>tfw /lit/ loves Wittgenstein
>tfw /lit/ doesn't know Wittgenstein was heavily influenced by the decline

>>4329671
Then dont read it, Oswald Spengler is a dangerous man to read, one might get seriously wrong ideas about what he's saying, kinda like Nietzsche.

>>4329671
why not start here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Decline_of_the_West

>>4329673
>tfw /lit/ hates this book

what /lit/ have you been posting on?

>>4329676
Well, do you know what he's saying? You're probably smarter than I am.

>>4329649
>Peace is a desire, war is a fact; and history has never paid heed to human desires and ideals ..."

What bullshit, I have lived in peace my entire life you could equally well say the opposite; that most people live in peace most of their lives. Peace is a fact, war is a desire; and history has never paid heed to human desires and ideals ..."

Didn't Spengler say that art and philosophy would become increasingly pretentious and without form?

Boy did he hit the nail on the head there

>>4329660
This, if coupled to Hegel, could be a perspective on every diachronic phenomenon ever.

>>4329690
let's be honest, when's the last time you read a modern art publication or went to a new exhibit?

>>4329680
No I'm not sure, it gives me strange ideas at times hailing from might makes right.

>>4329672
This post contains much truth.

Oswald Spengler has a Youtube channel

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DNcwaR2xW1Q
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NaA7yzHh2as
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uha7WWgoeX4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dpof96pVx-c

>>4329689
Really? My country is at war currently. Yours is also most likely, where are you from?

>>4329690
Stupid uncultured people have always been saying that. Because they don't "get" it.

>>4329695
#rekt

>>4329703
No he doesn't. I've seen it and it's white might shit parading as Oswald Spengler.

>>4329708
How does one "get" it?

>>4329716
By studying art theory.

He's right though.

As the West becomes more and more "liberal", it will become increasingly chaotic. There are two centrifugal forces pulling liberalism apart. The first is a demographic one- as the white population of western countries has stabilized, the non-white populations continue to grow at exponential rates. This will manifest itself in politics, as those foreigners have very different ideas on how to run the government. Democracy will become increasingly unworkable, and we will see the rise of Right Wing groups all around (already happening).

The second force that will destroy liberalism is based on resources. Without energy, there can be no economy. There is no economic growth without energy growth. And as the population increases, energy demands will increase, and one has to ask; is this sustainable?

Alas, in the end Roman Hardness will win, through the power of Will and will bring order to the chaos.

>>4329672
>obscurantist
no
>elitist fuckhead
Yes, definitely.
>his writings on popular music of his day is like a precursor to /mu/
His concept of art was pretty strict and elitist as hell. He was that harsh on popular culture as a whole as well though, but music was his area of expertise.
>He's actually readable in Dialectics of Enlightenment where presumably Horkheimer reins him in.
Probably. You could feel though that the parts written by Adorno alone (the cultural industry part especially) are much more convoluted than the rest of the book. Minima Moralia is surprisingly readable for a book written by him alone, so he is able to think straightfoward if he only wants.

>>4329721
>As the West becomes more and more "liberal", it will become increasingly chaotic

When have things ever been stable?

>>4329708
No you fucking idiot, there's a specific reason why that's always being said

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spengler%27s_civilization_model#Artistic_epochs

>>4329695
The modern art world is a tax shelter whose only actual "artistic contributions" are people painting dead cats with their shit. It's also dominated by two or three super wealthy and infallible Jews at the very top.

>>4329724
You don't think the guy was obscurantist? Seriously, his prose is the most convoluted, prolix masturbation I've ever set eyes on. I consider myself well read but it was literally impossible to read "The Culture Industry" without a pen and highlighter in hand.

>>4329726
when cultures were for the most part homogeneous and not entirely dependant on fossil fuels. The global situation we are heading towards is unlike anything that has ever occurred in the entire history of human existence.

>>4329721

I'd say that western social democracies are well on their way to economic collapse without the need for an energy crisis

>>4329706
Fuck countries, are you currently physically at war while browsing 4chan? Shame on you.
Just because an abstract entity that only exists because we have imagined it and made a word for it is having an just as abstract feud with another spooky entity doesn't mean you personally are at war. How brainwashed can you be?

>>4329401
I guess the non-Jews stayed in Germany so they couldn't influence american academia like the ones who fled.

This is, unless they were all jews still in Germany, then it's strange indeed.

>>4329742
if you're going to argue in that way, couldn't one argue that all of life is a war? An endless FIGHT against other humans, animals, and plants as a means to survive? Isn't nature by definition, war?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4343dv0jOUI

>>4329742
I'm guessing that you support that same abstract nation to create laws with minimum wage, free healthcare and good benefits when you're unemployed?

>>4329755
>if you're going to argue in that way, couldn't one argue that all of life is a war? An endless FIGHT against other humans, animals, and plants as a means to survive? Isn't nature by definition, war?

if only there was a good book with this as the theme

recommend me something

>>4329755
No it's ataraxia peace of mind from idiots like you who drag us into all sorts of unnecessary stupid bullshit while you try to 'fix' things.

>>4329734
how were things stable then? they have always been in a state of flux. leaders were killed, revolutions occurred, economic collapses, genocides committed, etc. none of that is unique to post homogeneity or fossil fuel dependency.

Fuck, this is my favorite thread on 4chan right now.

I love when the philosophical world meets the realistic world, shits so god damn interesting

>>4329733
As far as I remember he once said he deliberately wrote that convolutedly in order to make the reader really pay attention and peruse the text and hinder them just to fly over it.
That being said, I also had a hard time reading that passage, but I think he had a point and explained it relatively well albeit unnecessarily complicatedly, so I think the accusation of obscurantism is not justified.

>>4329765
It's like you've never set foot in nature. This is it with all you urban hypocrites, you've totally lost connection with the rest of the animal kingdom and nature.

The system that you prosper from is an on-going genocide of thousand of species as well as our own. That can never change. We will always have to consume something in order to survive.

>>4329544
Not really. All the scare about the Frankfurt School comes from the work of only one of it's members, the most heterodox and dettached himself: Herbert Marcuse. He was the one who wanted to create a Brave New World-like utopia of sexual permissiveness regulated by intellectuals like him who determined everything, even hard sciences.

"The Marcusian union of Eros and Logos can only be realized in the form of a totalitarian state, established and governed by force; the freedom he advocates is non-freedom. If 'true' freedom does not mean freedom of choice but consists in choosing a particular object; if freedom of speech does not mean that people can say what they like, but that they must say the right thing; and if Marcuse and his followers have the sole right to decide what people must choose and what they must say, then 'freedom' has simply taken on the contrary of its normal Sense. In these terms a 'free' society is one that deprives people of freedom to choose either objects or ideas except at the behest of those who know better."

"It should be noted that Marcuse's demands go much further than Soviet totalitarian Communism has ever done: either in theory or in practice. Even in the worst days of Stalinism, despite universal indoctrination and the enslavement of knowledge to ideology, it was recognized that some fields were neutral in themselves and subject only to logical and empirical laws: this was true of mathematics, physics, and also technology except for one or two brief periods. Marcuse, on the other hand,
insists that normative essences must prevail in every domain, that there must be a new technology and a new qualitative science of which we know nothing whatever except that they are new; they must be freed from the prejudices of experience and 'mathematization'-i.e. attainable without any knowledge of mathematics, physics, or any other science and must absolutely transcend our present knowledge."

"Marcuse's programme is [...] to destroy democratic institutions and tolerance in the name of a totalitarian myth, subjecting science and technology (not only in practical application, but in their theoretical aspects as well) to a nebulous 'essential' intuition which is the exclusive property of philosophers hostile to empiricism and positivism"

"There could hardly be a clearer instance of the replacement of Marx's slogan 'either socialism or barbarism' by the version 'socialism equals barbarism'. And there is probably no other philosopher in our day who deserves as completely as Marcuse to be called the ideologist of obscurantism"

Leszek Kolakowski, Main Currents of Marxism

You just need to remember shit like pic related to see how it was influential

>>4329733
>I consider myself well read but it was literally impossible to read "The Culture Industry" without a pen and highlighter in hand.

You should be reading most critical and philosophical works with a pen and highlighter in hand. It has nothing to do with obscurantism.

>>4329776
I refer to the collection of his essays "The Culture Industry", not the passage in Dialectics of Enlightenment. I didn't find DoE too obscure as far as Adorno usually goes.

>>4329766
Well shit man I never said things were stable, I just said things were going to get more chaotic, because the stakes right now are higher than ever (think nukes, high populations, each subsequent world war having millions of more casualties)

>>4329781
>you've totally lost connection with the rest of the animal kingdom and nature.

You say that like it's a bad thing.

>>4329783
Having said that, apart from Marcuse, i know little about other Frankfurt School guys. From the little i know, Walter Benjamin looks like a cool guy and Adorno was a cute old cultural conservative who wouldn't be out of place in /pol/ calling the things he didn't like as degenerate, it made me feel bad to know he died of a heart attack after some female students attacked him taking off their clothes.

>>4329788
In addition, it's not that things will become just more chaotic, it means that the entire system as we know it will change. We will no longer have democracy in the world of the future, because it is simply unworkable. We will have a Caesar to rule with Roman Hardness, because the only alternative is chaos.

>>4329794
Walter Benjamin's Arcades Project is pretty based. Adorno's work with Horkheimer is good. Horkheimer's Eclipse of Reason is underrated.

Talk of world peace is heard today only among the white peoples, and not among the much more numerous colored races. This is a perilous state of affairs. When individual thinkers and idealists talk of peace, as they have done since time immemorial, the effect is always negligible. But when whole peoples become pacifistic it is a symptom of senility. Strong and unspent races are not pacifistic. To adopt such a position is to abandon the future, for the pacifist ideal is a static, terminal condition that is contrary to the basic facts of existence.

As long as man continues to evolve there will be wars. Should the white peoples ever become so tired of war that their governments can no longer incite them to wage it, the earth will inevitably fall a victim to the colored men, just as the Roman Empire succumbed to the Teutons. Pacifism means yielding power to the inveterate nonpacifists. Among the latter there will always be white men — adventurers, conquerors, leader-types — whose following increases with every success. If a revolt against the whites were to occur today in Asia, countless whites would join the rebels simply because they are tired of peaceful living.

Pacifism will remain an ideal, war a fact. If the white races are resolved never to wage war again, the colored will act differently and be rulers of the world.
~Oswald Spengler Selected Essays [paraphrased]

>>4329787
Do you happen to know the original title of those essays ?

>>4329783
>misinterpreting Marcuse so grossly

This clusterfuck of interpretation can only be politically motivated.

>>4329794
>Adorno was a cute old cultural conservative who wouldn't be out of place in /pol/ calling the things he didn't like as degenerate

I haven't directly read Adorno, though MacDonald really savages "The Authoritarian Personality" in "Culture of Critique". /pol/ is full of MacDonald fanboys (CoC is probably the most commonly cited book in their regular recommended reading threads), so I doubt they would be too fond of him.

>>4329813
http://www.public.iastate.edu/~carlos/607/readings/adorno.pdf

That's an extract of it.

>>4329807
That's pretty based

>>4329794
>apart from Marcuse, i know little about other Frankfurt School guys.

doesn't seem like you know much about marcuse either, considering your post is just a bunch of quotes from what some other guy said about him.

>>4329818
>CoC is probably the most commonly cited book in their regular recommended reading threads

Either that or Mein Kampf.

so it's official then? Liberal Jews are responsible for the demise of western culture? Or am I missing something here

>>4329824
To be fair, Mein Kampf has some really inspirational stuff in it.

>>4329819
when does it get obscurantist?

>>4329829
Contemporary liberalism honors diversity and tolerance above all, but what it calls by those names is different from what has been so called in the past. Its diversity denigrates and excludes ordinary people, and its tolerance requires speech codes, quotas, and compulsory training in correct opinions and attitudes. Nor do current liberal totems and tabus have a clear connection with letting people live as they wish. Prohibitions, both grand and petty, multiply. To outsiders the rules often seem simply arbitrary: prayer is forbidden while instruction in the use of condoms is required; smoking and furs are outrages, abortion and sodomy fundamental rights.

Many of these oddities can be explained by reference to the specific understanding of tolerance held by contemporary liberals. "Tolerance" is traditionally understood procedurally, to mean letting people do what they want. Contemporary liberals understand it substantively, to require equal respect as a fact of social life. These understandings are radically inconsistent. As a political matter, procedural tolerance calls for laissez-faire, while substantive tolerance requires pervasive administrative control of social life. A regime that adopts substantive tolerance as its goal must be intolerant procedurally because it must control the attitudes people have toward each other, and any serious attempt to do so will require means that are unforgiving and despotic.

What happened guys?

>>4329831
I have no idea what passage I've linked but I know it's from the collection, and that that was the first and easiest essay.

Still a very predictable reaction though.

>>4329829
>what happened guys?

That's what I'm wondering. People used to be able to express coherent arguments, now they just use inherently flawed memes.

>>4329818
If that's true then I love how he focused on that study and (deliberately ?) misses out Adorno's massive criticism of popular culture, his criticism of the student revolts and his fondness for Spengler...

>>4329836
post a passage you find obscurantist, then. is it so crazy to think that maybe you're just not well-read enough to understand certain material?

>>4329829
I think what happened is that we as a society replaced God with the State

prove me wrong

>>4329829
Nothing. Reason without faith still leads to the Reign of Terror just like 300 years ago.

>>4329838
so what's the inherent flaw?

are you saying there is no difference between enlightenment era leftist thought and contemporary leftist thought? or are you just shitposting?

>>4329848

word it's not like equivalent atrocities were committed before or within those 300 years.

>>4329835
same could be said about modern conservatism (muh freedoms! but you cant let gays marry or have abortions or play violent video games or smoke weed)

To be fair though both ideologies are abominations

>>4329853
I know, just like reason without faith leads to the terror, faith without reason leads to the inquisition.

>>4329852
>so what's the inherent flaw?

The inherent flaw is the fact that the 'then vs. now' meme only works because the examples are cherry-picked. To use a popular example of the meme (men then vs. men now), there are still plenty of "real men" (= masculine men) about nowadays and there were plenty of frail, effeminate men back in the 40s or whatever era stupid people pretend was more "genuine."

Likewise, SRS doesn't represent Liberalism, nor does free speech.

>>4329861
Though the inquisition killed less people in 300 years than the Reign of Terror in 6 months, so i guess reason takes this gruesome trophy rome.

>>4329844
I can't copy-paste from the PDF, and indeed nothing in that PDF is as bad as the following essays on pop music in particular.

>>4329835
It's so they can keep making their money in shelter from criticism of lacking morals.

Like in the racist shithole America no one can call it a racist shithole any more because they have the whitest president ever who just appears to be black. It's a marketeers dream.

If >>>/pol/ isn't invading, why is this thread full of Jew memes and people suggesting we read Mein Kampf?

>>4329870
It seems that you're the one who's cherry-picking.

Please, show me a more representative example of modern liberalism. I'm waiting

>>4329877
I don't think they ever denied where they come from.

You all do realize that the two most devastating wars in mankinds history has played out within a 100 year timespan.

If anything, things are getting worse.

>>4329877
because you're a sensitive cry baby who can't handle opposing arguments and no upboats

>>4329861
But the inquisition was as reasonable as you could get at that time, they even were the first to introduce a code of criminal procedure. And the main agents of the inquisition were members of the Dominican Order (a rather intellectual order).
There is no clear division line between faith in a case and the wits to make that happen.

>>4329884
>two most devastating wars in mankinds history

Because of technology. If the same technology in weaponry had been available in the past many wars would have outstripped our death tolls.

>>4329840
>If that's true then I love how he focused on that study and (deliberately ?) misses out Adorno's massive criticism of popular culture, his criticism of the student revolts and his fondness for Spengler...

TAP is by far Adorno's most influential work, so that is hardly surprising. Google Scholar's citation statistics are revealing:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&q=author%3A%22Theodor+W.+Adorno%22&btnG=&as_sdt=1%2C5&as_sdtp=

>>4329877
>not being able to appreciate someone's good qualities even if they have bad qualities

>>4329877
>implying mein kampf isn't a historically significant book that people who are interested in history should definately read

>>4329877
/pol/ isn't invading you retard, just because there is a flux of visitors from another board that doesn't mean they have organized themselves to "attack" /lit/. It means that they might have gained a sudden interest in books, as can be seen on /pol/ with an increase in literature threads.

Just because someone doesn't share your opinion that doesn't mean they are invading.

>>4329893
>>4329897
>>4329898
/pol/ please stay

I have no respect for those who value equality over liberty

>>4329897
It's essentially an ill-thought out polemic.

>>4329884
The Second World War was basically the same conflict as the First World War and the Franco-Prussian war before it, though. It was resolved by the division of Germany after WWII and ultimately by the ECSC in 1951.

>>4329877
I'm /pol/ and i the only thing i said about jews was defending them from the notion the Frankfurt School was a massive jewish conspiracy >>4329749

Even though i believe it was.

>>4329917
>Even though i believe it was.

Why?

>>4329879
>Please, show me a more representative example of modern liberalism. I'm waiting

Being this brainwashed

>pic related modern liberalism; you

>>4329889
There wasn't much modern technology involved in the Taiping Rebellion.

>>4326700
You know what, I approve of this thread. Tone down the anti-semitism and general conspiracy tardedness and I think we could get pretty decent threads going.

>>4329926
That's kind of the point of my post, dumbass.

>>4329927
Has there even been antisemitism? I think someone pointed out that 98% of the founders were Jews but that's just a fact.

>>4329922
Sorry, i respect /lit/ enough to not answer that question.

>>4329885
>>4329893
>>4329897
>>4329898
>Being this butthurt

Also, I've read Mein Kampf. It was a waste of my time. It's the summit of tedious prose and full of obsessive and distractive Jew-baiting.

>>4329726
the 90's and early 00's

infact things were going really well until 9/11

>>4329879
>It seems that you're the one who's cherry-picking.

What did I cherry pick? Answer this or you're a coward.

And a more representative example of liberalism than SRS? Seriously? You do realize that SRS is a subreddit that trolls message boards, right? They don't do anything real. The DNC is the obvious answer. Did you forget that politics actually exist off the internet?

>>4329840
>he focused on that study and (deliberately ?) misses out Adorno's massive criticism of popular culture, his criticism of the student revolts and his fondness for Spengler...

It's been a few years since I've read CoC, so I'm a bit hazy on the details of what other aspects of Adorno work he discusses, though looking through the bibliography, these are the works of Adorno that MacDonald cites.

>>4329933
Fair enough. I was just preparing to tear into you about the utter ignorance and idiocy of associating a pervasive Jewish interest with the influx of black/brown people and perceived denudation of 'white culture' anyways.

Thing is, I can do that here and people will rationally debate your case and mine. On /pol/ people will post reaction pictures of Jews rubbing their hands, or accuse me of sliding, or being SRS/JIDF/whatever acronym is in vogue with the kiddies these days.

>>4329928
Sorry, after i saw the guy talking about the WWII, WWI and the Franco-Prussian Wars i thought the other guy was talking about the three most devastating wars in history, not two.

Though the point that one of the most devastating wars was fought without modern technology still stands, just like many past bloody wars (the Mongol conquest of Persia for example).

>>4329917
Hey /pol/ if you had used spoilers for that post it'd been a great post. You are welcome here as long as you reads books

So facts are anti-semitic now?

>>4329951
It may still stand but it has absolutely nothing to do with my point, which is that the sole reason WWI/II stand as the two most violent wars in history is the technology we had available with which to kill each other. Past wars would have had similar or higher proportional death tolls had they had access to similar weaponry.

>>4329898
>>4329897
>>4329893
>>4329885
Have you guys heard of universal rule no. 3?

>Do not post the following outside of /b/: Trolls, flames, racism
>Keep /pol/ in /pol/.

>>4329955
No, /pol/, you just think other people think they are because you're, well, retarded.

>>4329933
>>4329948
>shots fired

itz time for you faggots to throw hands

>>4329948
>On /pol/ people will post reaction pictures of Jews rubbing their hands, or accuse me of sliding, or being SRS/JIDF/whatever

But that's not true. If you can support your position there's nothing that can be said. Anything goes on /pol/, it's not an echo chamber. The Jew pictures are mostly for the lels and most of /pol/ understands the difference between Jews and Zionist-Globalists, as well as the difference between Niggers and blacks, etc. /pol/ is more open-minded than you think, and there is a considerable socialist community on /pol/ as well.

>>4329890
It doesn't mitigate the fact that you deliberately omit what the author actually thought. MacDonald alledgedly wrote about those authors, not about the thousands of fools who only cite a mediocre study by said author. It's like saying Marx criticised capitalism in his one book and you leave out what he thought (in his other writings) should be the consequences from this.
Adorno explained what he called an Authoritarian Personality, but the fact that he himself was as elitist as you can get in terms of culture and that he massively disagreed with popular culture and loved Spengler.
Don't you think that wouldn't show him as somebody who at least would be acknwledged to a certain degree by reactionary intellectuals and not as a mindless enabler of a liberal society with all its bullshit ?

>>4329947
>using Prism, Negative Dialectics and Minima Moralia
>focusing on AP
Wow, that's just.....wow....
Thanks though, anon.

>>4329955
What is this context-less self-victimization? What are you even reacting to?

>>4329980
>criticising him

Stop! You're renouncing his free speech!

>>4329974
>But that's not true. If you can support your position there's nothing that can be said. Anything goes on /pol/, it's not an echo chamber

You're hilarious. I admire your optimism, but you're hilarious.

Go to /pol/ right now and start any thread that advocates any kind of position that might conceivably be in the interest of Israel, however vaguely it may be. You'll be absolutely flooded with screams of JIDF and Kike pictures.

>>4329980
>this Jewish oppression

Let's get this JIDF freak! Ron Paul 2016! It's happening!

>>4329987
/pol/ is clueless. Unfortunately, they (we) still think Israeli Jews and Zionists are the problem, instead of liberal western Jews and Bolsheviks.

>>4330004
The problem to what exactly?

>>4329974
Don't defend it, we've all been there it's shit and we prefer the non-shitty intelligent non-mongrelbrute cultured nature of /lit/ and we actually enjoy reading actual books something mongrel brutes are afraid of. Kindly fuck off or discuss books or philosophy if you can handle it.

>>4330004
/pol/ is very aware of how not liberal Israeli-Jews are what with the forced sterilization of ethiopians and the whole genocide against palestinians thing, but they know all about pic related

>>4330004
The Jewish period goes:

Peak: MacDonald-tier intellectuals who actively try to ruin Western countries, plus ADL/AIPAC etc.
Middle: Israel genuinely being a psychopathic Nazi Germany knockoff created by the above
Lower: Pervasive Jewish chauvinism spread by the hasbara and propaganda of the above

The lower level is a complex much larger than "Jews", it encompasses most Westerners as well, who are ridiculously on guard for ANTISEMITISM!! ANTISEMITISM!!!!!! AHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! but would barely care about vitriolic racism against Burmese people or whatever, because they've been taught that Jews are The Best Thing Ever.

Jews themselves aren't a problem. They're just people. The average Jewish guy who partakes in chauvinism can't possibly be held accountable for the massive complex of useful propaganda he has been born into. He's just a dude.

>>4329987
I'm guessing you've never seen all the threads on /pol/ about people pointing out the double standard that /pol/ thinks whites should have their own country and at the same time condemn israel for doing the same?

>>4330027
Oops, pyramid*.

Seriously tho lots of Jews are cool

>>4330030
I couldn't give a fuck about that double standard because the former idea is fucking moronic.

>>4329566
>>4329585
>upholding the presumptous men of the middle stratum as intellectuals
Plebeian is too weak a word for this nonsense.

>>4329987
The great irony is that /pol/ hates Israel for having the same characteristics of Nazi Germany

we live in a complicated world with lots of contradictions and paradoxes. Deal with it

>>4330017
Not this shit again In a good Spengler/Adorno thread

Mods pls delete

Like bronies keep their ponies to /mlp/ keep your red pills to /pol/

>/pol/ is one person
>/v/ is one person
>HERP IS ONE DERP

STOP IT GOD DAMNIT

>>4330040
I don't have to deal with it. I can avoid that containment board of sperging autists like the condemned shithole it is and call any of its run-off on their shit should they venture into /lit/.

>>4330037
what constitutes an intellectual in your eyes?

>>4330037
>le Patrice faec XD

>>4330017
I'm not talking about politics, i'm talking about a morality, a ethos.

The european jews are a mercurian people, in the sense of Yuri Slezkine's The Jewish Century, a people who live by trading (and cheating) in foreign lands, never belonging, in other words. A parasite. This leads to the peculiar morality of the european jew, marked by materialism and a deep hostility against their host populations. The Frankfurt School and it's deep critique of western christian culture is a example of such morality.

The Israeli Jew is different, there the Jew becomes part of the land, he toils the soil, shed the blood in their own wars (ok, sometimes they get the US Army to fight them), the Jew raises himself above his parasite status and morality through Zionism.

Of course, this is unsettling, many Jews prefer to still be parasites, it's easier in a way, so you have the deep hostility of liberal/bolshevik jews toward Israel.

Polite sage for a off-topic post.

>>4330063
>being Zionist
>>>/pol/

>>4330063
All of those descriptions could be used to describe any number of non-Jewish people. Your whole theory is shit. Some of you are just wasting a lot of time on nonsense.

>>4330063
I just wish they didn't have to brutalise the Palestinians to do it.. should have given them some empty land somewhere instead of Israel, to which they have virtually no real connection.

Still, I agree.

>>4330068
Of course, jews are not the only "mercurian" people, you have the Chinese in Southeast Asia, the Lebanese in West Africa and Latin America, the Indians in East Africa and so on...

But Spengler was adamently opposed to anti-semitism.

>“But an entirely new situation was created when, from about the year 1000, the Western portion of the Consensus found itself suddenly in the field of the young Western Culture. The Jews, like the Parsees, the Byzantines and the Moslems, had become by then civilized and cosmopolitan, whereas the German-roman world lived in the townless land, and the settlements that had just come (or were coming) into existence around monasteries and market-places were still many generations short of possessing souls of their own. While the Jews were already almost fellaheen, the Western peoples were still almost primitives. There was mutual hate and contempt, due not to race-distinction, but to difference of phase. Into all the hamlets and country towns the Jewish Consensus built its essentially megalopolitan – proletarian – ghettos. The Judengasse is a thousand years in advance of the Gothic town. Just so, in Jesus’ day, the Roman towns stood in the midst of the villages on the Lake of Genesareth.”

>In his private papers, Spengler denounced Nazi anti-Semitism in even stronger terms, writing "and how much envy of the capability of other people in view of one's lack of it lies hidden in anti-Semitism!" and that "when one would rather destroy business and scholarship than see Jews in them, one is an ideologue, i.e., a danger for the nation. Idiotic."

>>4330063
>materialism

You what mate? You do realise that a large segment of European Jewish philosophers of the last century, such as Levinas or Chouchani, were also theologians or Talmudic scholars?

Your 19th-century stereotypes are not really enlightening at all.

>>4330071
That's Nazi antisemitism, the kind that flips its shit when it sees a Jewish name in a list of newspaper editors. There are gradations of it. The more benign forms are pretty natural.

>>4330069
If i was a Palestine Arab i would thank Allah every day for the mercy of the Jew, for even though he had every opportunity to slaughter them (like the palestinians would do to the Jew if they won the wars) they didn't do it.

Remember what happened to the Germans of Eastern Europe when they lost the war? They got killed. Expelled. No mercy. Nowadays no one talks about returning to Danzig, or Konigsberg. They know they lost the war. But the palestinian can't accept it, they lost three wars and still think they deserve to be treated like they won.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Bolshevism

>>4330070
Mate, those descriptions could be used to describe Anglo-Saxans as well. "Mercurian"? Rubbish.

>>4330078
so /lit/ confirmed for pro-zionist?

>>4330077
If you dowgrade it from an irrational hostility towards all Jews/a belief in an international Jewish conpiracy, all you have is a certain dislike of individual people who do unsavory things. That is not what /pol/ is. In fact, that is how most anti-Israel leftists view the situation.

>>4330085
I doubt it, most people on /lit/ are bolshevists instead.

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Zionism_versus_Bolshevism

It's times like these I wish I was employed instead of sitting on /lit/ and arguing about crypto-jews

>>4330085
Never seen one here before, might be a rusemaster trying to make polshits excited. Maybe he's a polshit himself who can let go of his mask here on /lit/

Zionists feeds on anti semitism, it's what sustains them just like nationalists feeds on the presence of immigrants.

Jesus Christ, how /lit/ has changed...

>>4330124

Resurrecting /pol/ and /r9k/ was the worst decision moot ever made for this website.

>>4330124
We must drive the neo-Nazis back to /pol/ before it's too late.

holy shit. what happened to /lit/?

it should have been an interesting talk on frankfurter school, and the whole thread is about bashing gays, kommies and "liberalism".

we have to get rid of /pol/

>>4330124
/lit/'s changed several times.
I wish we could go back to before all the philsoopher faggotry first started. There were actual book discussions back then and not an obsessive need to connect it to the author, leftist politics or the latest undergraduate class the OP has taken on Hegel.

>>4330138
You think /pol/ will help you in this regard?

>>4330138
Daily nihilism threads are still better than decent threads being derailed by Jew memes.

>>4330142
>>4330144
I don't really give a shit what happens to /lit/ anymore, wether /pol/-types take over or the guys behind the trad threads end in a more balanced discourse than debating which form of post-modernism and which school of intellectual aids is the best, continental or analytical.
In either case I think /lit/ is focused on entirely the wrong things to make for an interesting board, regardless if its shitposting memes consists of posting third-grade interpretations of the Will to Power for the nth time in a day or someone posting Good Goy pics every time something posts something in line with post-68 liberals.

At this point I don't think this board could be saved without shuffling all the crap off into a separate philosophy one.

>>4329898
>HURR DURRR WERE NOT INVADING WERE JUST ARRIVING SIMULTANEOUSLY IN LARGE NUMBERS WHILE CALLING YOU A KIKE

>>4330134
There wasn't much to discuss, actually. The premise of the thread is based on a right-wing delusion, that the Frankfurt School somehow have a influence on mainstream western Academia. In the end the first post nailed it.

>>4326712
/thread.

>>4330166
no one here called anyone a kike, calm your fucking tits and drop your balls, fagpinkcommielibscum

>>4330172
>the Frankfurt School somehow have a influence on mainstream western Academia
But that's not a delusion, unless you consider critical theory to be non-mainstream at least.

>>4330172
Pretty much. Also "western accademia" as if the frankfurt school was not western.
But yeah even if I'm fairly knowledgeable about the adorno and benjamin I don't want to touch this thread.
Maybe someone should open a thread on it disguised as a kant thread. No one from /pol/ will ever read it.

>>4330172
Uhh, >>4328186 begs to differ

>>4330174
>le rusemaster

why is there so much hate for the frankfurter boiz? 2deep4u is more than likely the correct answer. i'm not trying to be facetious, but they can be terribly difficult and many young people with no formal guide to these ideas will likely find them incomprehensible, useless or terrifying. especially for americans whose intellectual traditions and habits are fundamentally opposed to this kind of radical thinking.

it is far easier to digest some nice /pol/ orientated narrative about how the world "actually works" by taking that sweet red pill instead of actually pushing yourself to understand the complexities of history, economy, power structures, etc.

i hope at least some of you can engage with this stuff critically but also take something out of it and apply it to your own thought and your own lives.

to answer OP: Introduction to Critical Theory by David Held is fantastic.

Critical theory and post-modernism is the philosophy of a dead culture.

Phase V: Decadence.

[D]ecadence is a moral and a spiritual disease, not a physical one, resulting from too long a period of wealth and power. The citizens of such a nation will no longer make an effort to save themselves, because they are not convinced that anything in life is worth saving

An empire in decline is marked by several characteristics, first among them a strong prevailing (and self-fulfilling) sense of pessimism among the people, frequently accompanied by frivolity, where the people exchange their hopes and future orientations for a focus on the now…a “let us eat drink and be merry, for tomorrow we die” sort of attitude. Grubb also notes that the empire’s heroes change in declining civilizations according to this focus on frivolity…the actor, the singer, and the athlete–all entertainers–replace the general or the statesman or literary genius as role models for the young.

Another characteristic of the decline is degeneracy and a generalized laxity of discipline during this time. An increasing materialism, the retreat of morality, the advent of feminism, and the appearance and influence of women in public life are all hallmarks of a civilization in decline. An indifference to religion also appears among the culture and, as Glubb attributes to (expansively defined) religion the motivating force for the desire to expand, conquer, subjugate, or extinguish, the spirit of service, of heroic self-sacrifice for the cause also disappears.

A third characteristic is one for which the foundation was laid in the Age of Intellectualism…the Age of Decline is associated with philanthropy, generosity, and sympathy for other races and nations. The culture assumes an attitude of ‘noblesse oblige‘ toward those less fortunate; the notion that it will be always be rich impels the imperial state to spend lavishly, to confer privileges and rights and benefits on all comers. Citizenship rights, once a sign of status, a valued asset, are debased as the State gives them away…in some cases sells them for revenue…again to confer the benefits of prosperity to all. State assistance to the poor is equally generous. At least until the economy collapses, that is.

>>4330189
I like how critical theory and postmodernism get bundled together even if they are contradictory and can't go together at all. That really shows how much everyone here knows about those two topics.

>>4330158
>At this point I don't think this board could be saved without shuffling all the crap off into a separate philosophy one.

That board would be hell though. Apparently, there are enough people here that want to discuss philosophers, historians etc.. There also were a few okayish threads about Spengler or Hegel (i.e. at least better than your average Stirner or Zizek thread) so there is actual interest for discussion here. But look at this thread for instance. This would probably be the standard for that new board.

I agree though, more literary threads (preferably not Infinite Jest or Ayn Rand related) would be nice here.

>>4330193
>>4330184

like clockwork.

>>4330184
>if you don't like something its 2deep4u
cool story bro. is everyone on lit this smart?

>>4330197
what the fuck are you talking about

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_theory#Postmodern_critical_theory

>>4330184
But the Frankfurt school is a /pol/ narrative of how the world "actually works" adopted to leftist goals.
Adorno and co were heavily inspired by conservatives like Spengler (he named him far more perceptive than any of his leftist contemporaries) and attempted to create a marxist aesthetic/cultural alternative.
Personally I would argue that they failed and that most, with maybe the exception of Marcuse, would be horrified by the results. Rather than put forward an alternative based in marxist ideals they put forward a tool to desecrate any possible alternative.

>>4330193
Decadence is only the moment when people are freed from the fear of death and have enough clarity to understand that existence in itself is vanity.

Ofcourse the ruling classes will condemn decadence because what they want is people to work for them and not question the order for which they get paid to preserve.

Anyone who denounces decadence is just saying: shut up, don't think, obey and keep working. Such a convenient rebuttal when voiced by the powerful, and so stupid when in the mouth of the powerless, because then they are twice as slaves: first in the flesh and second in the mind.

>>4330221
but the ruling classes aren't denouncing decadence, they're fully endorsing it!

>>4329829
people grew up

you might wanna try it

nuance is fun

>>4330134

You can't talk about the frankfurter school without talking about the gays, feminism,and communism they spread

/lit/ spends a bit too much time in classrooms surrounded by edgy leftist literature and is somewhat detached from reality. that's why they're so open to liberal ideology which is suicidal in many ways

>>4330212
It is a bad name and not an official definition despite being on wikipedia.

It's like postmodernism, an invention of a certain time done by some academics.
But you can't mass Foucault and Baudrillard as critical theorists. Their aims were different and their methods were different.
I mean the confusion between the two is so gross that I'm appalled that someone is putting them together. If you are interested I can explain further why you cannot confuse them.

>>4330210

>implying its not true in this case

>>4330213

>resistance to domination
>leftist goals

>they put forward a tool to desecrate any possible alternative.

when adorno was in america when the student revolution was on he was highly unpopular because he thought it was a thoughtless reaction, a mere "reactionism". so yeah, you're right, they will always be in opposition and never put forward a positive program of ordered action. but this needs to exist.

the way we think now is that: if you don't like it, why don't you propose exactly how it can be better? the negative is obliged to be positive as well. but i think their attitude was this: let us chip away at the systems of domination with our thought, carve out a space with a negative critique which hopefully will allow something new and better to grow later. they never explicitly refer to this latter stage because they know the flaws of prescriptive revolutionary programs and how they always degrade into totalitarianism.

they destroy what they feel prevents true living, not tell people how to live.

>>4330258

haha fuck off you fascist functionary

>>4330004
but zionists are the problem
my best friend is a jew, he's dope as fuck
zionists are fucking racist assholes though

>>4330030

What about the double standard that everyone thinks Jews should have a country of their own (kept ethnically/religiously pure) but all white/European countries should allow unrestricted nonwhite/noneuropean immigration?

>>4330269
I'm not a fascist, but thanks for playing

>>4330260

foucualt explicitly identified himself with critique in the vain of the frankfurt school and said he wouldn't have written a lot of what he did if he had read them more closely. see his essay "what is critique"

baudrillard is a different kettle of fish entirely

>>4330280

>thinks he is what he calls himself

>>4330230
I don't think they endorse it. The majority of philosophy departments endorse platonism, realism both in ethics and epistemology.

Both ruling parties today in the US are on the right of the ideological political spectrum.

The left and intellectuals are largely unpopular and minoritarian in europe.

In russia putin pushes for a right wing traditionalist point of view.
China is still a highly traditionalist family centered culture.

The whole "the elites endorse decadence" is another lie that the far right declares to feel radical and rebellious when in reality they are just obeying whoever is in power.

Because that what is the right "I'm gonna be cool and rebel by obeying"

>>4330273
No leftist thinks that way, you fuckwit. Why do you think hipsters used to wear keffiyehs?

/pol/s are the one with ridicuolous double standards when it comes to Jewish nationalism.

The entire western world has joined a suicide cult.
Preaching fanatical tolerance whilst gasping for its dying breath. everything low has been made high. Rome is burning, will there be anything to save?

The west has gone insane. the truth is a hate crime. fantasy trumps facts. vice is a virtue. chaos is order.

how long can the lies be contained?

>>4330289
forgot pic

>>4330290

lets round them up and put all the freaks and Others in camps amirite? whitepride worldwide 88

>>4330285
muh false dilemmas

>>4330288
>he thinks the political parties control the US

Toppest of lels. Highest of keks

>>4330301
Not necessary. just stop promoting it and acting like it's normal healthy behavior

>>4330288
>The left and intellectuals are largely unpopular and minoritarian in europe.
Yes and no. The ruling class and particularly the media elite are extremely pro-decadence in many parts of Europe.
The 68-Left and perhaps more important its Neoliberal counterpart dominates the media discourse but the people, if we're going to use an unpleasant term the 'silent majority' (really their views are very carefully kept out of the media space), are more conservative both in terms of what social democracy/corporatism should be and in their social values.

>>4330289
This one does

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MFE0qAiofMQ

>>4330303
>has watched a couple of 90s disney movies.
>thinks the world is controlled by an occult mutliculturalist conspiracy.

>>4330315
I don't see all that decadence going around in Europe. Just because they are showing tits on tv and they are making money with the slutty miley cyrus that is no decadence. Look at the lives they live, at the values tat are communicated.
Family, nation and god are still the repeated everywhere.
Heck even Spielberg is all about that.

>>4330318
She's not a leftst, and even if she was, she's just some inconsequential fuck in Sweden who nobody has heard about. Most of the European New Left is militantly pro-Palestine and anti-Israel. How deluded can you be?

>>4330320
Fuck off m8

The US is on record controlled by transnational globalist corporations. If you haven't noticed by now, all politics are controlled by big money. They own every aspect of your life, from your media, to your religious institutions, to your government.

The US is a Crony Corporatist state, and to deny this is beyond foolishness

>>4330312

then make laws prohibiting it, then accuse people of breaking the law, then strip the lawbreakers of rights and citizenship, then cleanse them from society expediently and finally. nice and easy. sounds familiar tho..

>>4330315

i'm in germany now and was at a party with a bunch of normal euro bros. they were drunk but could still discuss politics to an astounding degree and were roughly social democrats. i think a centre left position is just the default here, even if vanguards have died out or are marginal.

>>4330331
Did that happen in America? Gays always existed, but we never stripped them of their citizenship and cleansed them from society

>>4329566

I'm at university right now, you're full of shit and I think you know you are. Left-wing academics are only "nice" as long as you don't question their orthodoxy. And I say that as someone who has gone out of his way to avoid teachers that seem likely to be cultural Marxist fanatics.

They're more likely to strive to be logically consistent than tumblr-tier social justice warriors, but questioning orthodoxy ist verboten

>>4330339

nah germany.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuremberg_Laws

>>4330328
And why on earth would businesses promote decadence and not family values and work ethics?
Because I'm sure as hell that most products are sold under the slogan "make your house better".
Decadence is not good for business. People making families and working are very good for business.

>>4330324
Tits are not the issue.
The issue is one of mass immigration of low-skilled highly culturally divisive elements and perhaps worse the strong distaste, or even hatred, the ruling elite and their media hold for native culture. You should listen to them, it is honestly a bit horrifying when the leaders and near-leaders of a country can decry their people's culture as inferior or even without any merit whatsoever and get away with it because the media does it's best not to carry this message through the mainstream publications.
>Family, nation and god are still the repeated everywhere.
Family and nation are but only among the normal people. God is a bit more doubtful outside of particular countries with a hard-on for their church.

>>4330312

And stop jailing/discriminating against those who deny that it is a healthy and admirable lifestyle that all children should be exposed to

>>4330331
The centre left and centre neoliberal are defaults but the people voting for them generally hold the view said people held 20 years back or so.
Ask them about what the party/politics means for them and chances are you're going to hear about some political leader from between the 60s and 80s.

>>4330349
>it is honestly a bit horrifying when the leaders and near-leaders of a country can decry their people's culture as inferior
Bwahahahahahaha, yeah, because that's such a popular campaign slogan in the west, or any countries, right ?

>>4330349
>You should listen to them, it is honestly a bit horrifying when the leaders and near-leaders of a country can decry their people's culture as inferior or even without any merit whatsoever and get away with it because the media does it's best not to carry this message through the mainstream publications.

Citation needed. Because I never hear this except in some new age movies of the 90s. Please a world leader saying that.

Also if you think that because europe does not squash anyone who is not christian or because he gives immigration status to some people than it's decadence you are just conflating the term with "any political reform that I don't agree with."

>>4330362
It's not a joke. Take Sweden.
Last, thankfully failed, Social Democrat leader has gone on the record claiming swedes were jealous of the superior turkish culture, then on another occasion she outright stated that she "hates everything typically Swedish".
The current Neoliberal leader is on the record of thinking that any swedish contribution to culture is "pure barbarism" and that "everything good came from the outside".

Note that both of said people also question even the existence of an ethnic swedish people, "what is a swede anyway?", and paradoxically enough the existence of a swedish culture. (despite decrying it before)
It gets even crazier when you realize both of them partake heavily in minority identity politics and are quick to label opposition to ethnic separatists in turkey/kurdistan, kosovo etc as pure racism.
I am not at all surprised by the rapid growth their nationalists have achieved.

>>4330379
[citation needed]

>>4330364
>>4330362
citation = some mad cunt in sweden

>can't argue with facts

>>4330320
but it is

>>4330386
Ex-Social Democrat leader: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mona_Sahlin
"I think that's what makes many Swedes jealous of immigrant groups. You have a culture, an identity, a history, something that brings you together. And what do we have? We have Midsummer's Eve and such silly things."

Neoliberal leader:
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Fredrik_Reinfeldt
Slightly mistranslated on this page. It actually says "Ancient-swedish [culture] is pure barbarism. All other development have come from outside [sweden]."

>>4330350
because only a degenerate society would line up outside wal-mart to buy cheap chinese plastic goods that they don't need or have the money to pay for just for "epic deals :DDD"

only degenerate societies cry about oppression while typing away on their iMac Airs at starbucks

>>4330350
Not him but you're so wrong it hurts.

Look at mainstream media. Does that promote family values and work ethics? Miley Cyrus and Justin Beiber featuring Lil Wayne shaking dat booty season 4 on MTV? Hollywood? Not to mention the government's/banks being extremely lenient on giving people money they can't pay back, welfare, and just all around supportive of a nanny state? Come on man, open your eyes

>>4330411
The first one is probably jokingly cock sucking some Turkish youth, so what? Every fucking politician flatters as hard as he can in order to be popular...
And the context is not clear at all.

And for the second one: every ancient culture was barbaric in a certain way. Plus what do you expect from somebody who is a happy whore of the free market. But once again, without context this citations is just impossible to evaluate for non-Swedes.

Also: Seriously, out of all people you list some Swedes? This country is so strange...

>>4330448
>The first one is probably jokingly cock sucking some Turkish youth
Unfortunately it is completely in line with just about everything else she's said.
On the bright side even people who vote religiously for her party thought she was satan herself so she netted the social democrats one of the worst elections since 1919.
>And for the second one: every ancient culture was barbaric in a certain way.
Yes, but he is expressively denying any form of betterment coming from the Swedes themselves denying them agency in the nation they've built.
>out of all people you list some Swedes?
Because their country is honestly one of the worst case scenarios of just how out of touch their politicans and especially their media are with the people and as one of their neighbours it shows really, really badly.
Take their media. Roughly 40% of it vote for extremist open-the-borders neoliberal greens, 20% vote post-68 "white middle class women in segregated capital neighbourhoods are the most oppressed people in the world" left.

Those two parties hold around 7% and 5.6% of the vote among the regular people. They honestly come across as more biased than Fox News and MSNBC put together a lot of the time.

>>4326700

>>4329629
They are worthy of being terms. The problem is that they become abused and everyone wants to wear a sash around the shoulder with all of their categories listed.It becomes who's the biggest snowflake type of thing.

It is a silly sort of competition to make the people who buy heavily into those ideas feel better. The more oppressed or irregular you are the more your opinion is somehow more valid.