The first part of the conclusion to my Cultural History of the United States series focuses on how our cultural effects the individual in the US. Part II will explore how these patterns influence the rest of the world.
My first day as a senior in high school , our guidance counselor told us that if we didn’t already apply for college you were behind and losing. I got so depressed I gave up and went to trade school.
When Wes was talking about the devaluation of the qualitative experience and the substitutive heightening of quantitative abstractions, it reminded me of a cannabinated rant by psychedelic raconteur Terence McKenna from the 90's, and I wanted to share it with you all in hopes that you can see it map onto to that which Wes is talking about, with the caveat that the rhetoric comes from an admittedly inflammatory angle. It goes: "Catalysts (in reference to psychedelic drugs) to say what has never been said. To see what has never been seen. To draw, paint, sing, sculpt, dance, and act what has never before been done. To push the envelope of creativity and language. And, what's really important, is, I call it, 'the felt presence of direct experience,' which is a fancy term which just simply means: we have to stop consuming our culture. We have to create culture. Don't watch TV, don't read magazines, don't even listen to NPR. Create your own roadshow. The nexus of space and time where you are, now, is the most immediate sector of your universe, and, if you are worrying about Michael Jackson or Bill Clinton or somebody else, then you are disempowered. You're giving it all away to icons. Icons which are maintained by an electronic media, so that you want to dress like X or have lips like Y. This is shit brained this kind of thinking. That is all cultural diversion, and what is real is you, and your friends, and your associations, your highs, your orgasms, your hopes, your plans, your fears. And we are told no, we're unimportant, we're peripheral, get a degree, get a job, get a this, get a that, and then you're a player. You don't even want to play in that game. You want to reclaim your mind, and get it out of the hands of the cultural engineers who want to turn you into a half-baked moron consuming all of this trash that's being manufactured out of the bones of a dying world. Where's that at?"
This is a fantastic lecture. You're able to perfectly articulate a set of social ills that are so vast, we all recognize them but can scarcly call them out. Thank you, Wes.
I think it’s so true that the idea of a meeting-with-self is not appreciated in the states. Its incredible paradox that amid all this individualism, the self is forgotten.
thanks for this panacea. i feel slightly more awake now!! i do feel the scarcity of recognition does cause our compensatory movement, which, as you said, leads us away from the ways we naturally wish to be socially constructive
One thing I noticed about the United States is as being born in America vs my parents country of Guyana is that is this. In my parents country of Guyana individualism is frowned upon, one most support his or own community, and the wider collective. In the United States, the big emphasis is in the individual in relation to the community, and the importance of the community. The united states on the other hand is the importance of the individual and the individual relation to the community and importance of the community. The united states culturally and socially does not like collectivism, anarchism Marxism, communism, fascism, Marxism, catholicism, eastern othrodoxy because these ideas imposes a threat or moral issue against the individual and agaisnt the community.
I have a question. So, my read of the situation of individualism as you lay it out is a lack of recognition of interdependency. We are interdependent upon each other to survive, but we don't recognize this on a conscious level because of the historical momentum enforcing individualist attitudes. My question is: How in the history of philosophy have philosophers dealt with a problem like this, where there is a dissonance between the societal facts of the matter, in our case, super surplus and huge webs of interdependency, and the considerations of the culture that manifest to deny that, again, in our case, artificial scarcity and faux paus individualism?
Good men are scarce as an effect of women's choices. Women go for the best men and men are forced to compete in the mating market and women very much do pick winners and losers. The men who are picked by women aren't just picked by a few of them, and a lot of men who women don't pick will never be picked by any of them. Women would rather share a winner than commit to a loser. They created that with their choices and it creates competition in most other aspects of society. This has almost nothing to do with school and education. Women can't be taught to not be like this, only to subvert their own desires. And that creates losers of women who must subvert their desires vs those who don't.
@@elinope4745 in one of his lectures, Wes said that supposedly loneliness is worse than diabetes and cancer from smoking. I want to find out if he was unhappy and depressed. I can't believe loneliness is so awful. I live on my own and I don't feel anything like that. I like my life.
@@_catra He was unhappy sometimes, depressed sometimes, happy sometimes. His time alone was sometimes lonely and sometimes solitude. All people are like that, even you.
Being alone =/= being lonely. Some people do not have the mental tools they need to be independent due to upbringing. It can be bad for you, it ties into your value as an individual. But others just get used to it. As humans we are aligned more with a group dynamic but we couldn't evolve without the ability to be alone. In babies we can see certain things like crying when mom is not in sight for up to 3 years, because they physically cannot do anything and their concept of themselves is not fully developed.
I disagree about "good" education. TH-cam has good education, Khan academy is good education, about one in twenty universities have good education. They are propaganda shops for the most part.
@@JHimminy I said it has good education, not that it doesn't also have bad education or that it is particularly easy to parse them. It's still better than most schools which don't have methods for good education. My country was a plurality of cultures from it's inception. The government was intentionally handicapped and limited as an agreeable middle ground for them to meet and unite against foreign enemies.
I think most people fundamentally fail to understand what relationships could be or what social events could necessarily come about because of the way that capitalism organizes people, right now its pretty shit here and there is no incentive to fix it because it works. The ownership class will always take the path of least resistance in order to not fuck anything else up. I think on some level Americans need to experience pain to understand it as a motivator. Then people can use that experience down the road, as long as they remember the pain. There is a way to experience a good, constructive life without pain and it involves having a good social network. Pain works if you need to motivate someone to do something but it does not help them do what they want to do. While a good social network could conceivably create real problems for some bad people who want to keep exploiting everyone.
It's crazy, how much society fights people who choose to live off the grid in solitude. There have always been hermits that chose to survive as islands in the wilderness.
Because people are a product of society. Anyone who wishes to "live off the grid" is an example of society rejecting itself. Society is right to be displeased with such so-called individuals. Individuals whose ability to think in language is a gift from the society. Without that gift they wouldn't be able to think the thought of "living off the grid". They are traitors.
@@Beehive151 Would you get angry at slaves who escaped their masters, just because their masters taught them to speak? Social contract means nothing if there is not a hinterlands to flee too. Society has no right to exist if it would usurp all of the wilderness.
![ตีสิบเดย์ [FULL] | อาจารย์โอเล่ ญาณสัมผัส ผ่าดวงคนดัง ประเทศไทยจะเป็นยังไงหลังจากนี้!](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/gszT2O76fL4/mqdefault.jpg)
My first day as a senior in high school , our guidance counselor told us that if we didn’t already apply for college you were behind and losing. I got so depressed I gave up and went to trade school.
Saved you from the rigor of college. Probably for the better.
When Wes was talking about the devaluation of the qualitative experience and the substitutive heightening of quantitative abstractions, it reminded me of a cannabinated rant by psychedelic raconteur Terence McKenna from the 90's, and I wanted to share it with you all in hopes that you can see it map onto to that which Wes is talking about, with the caveat that the rhetoric comes from an admittedly inflammatory angle.
It goes: "Catalysts (in reference to psychedelic drugs) to say what has never been said. To see what has never been seen. To draw, paint, sing, sculpt, dance, and act what has never before been done. To push the envelope of creativity and language. And, what's really important, is, I call it, 'the felt presence of direct experience,' which is a fancy term which just simply means: we have to stop consuming our culture. We have to create culture. Don't watch TV, don't read magazines, don't even listen to NPR. Create your own roadshow. The nexus of space and time where you are, now, is the most immediate sector of your universe, and, if you are worrying about Michael Jackson or Bill Clinton or somebody else, then you are disempowered. You're giving it all away to icons. Icons which are maintained by an electronic media, so that you want to dress like X or have lips like Y. This is shit brained this kind of thinking. That is all cultural diversion, and what is real is you, and your friends, and your associations, your highs, your orgasms, your hopes, your plans, your fears. And we are told no, we're unimportant, we're peripheral, get a degree, get a job, get a this, get a that, and then you're a player. You don't even want to play in that game. You want to reclaim your mind, and get it out of the hands of the cultural engineers who want to turn you into a half-baked moron consuming all of this trash that's being manufactured out of the bones of a dying world. Where's that at?"
God bless that man. Such a burst of fresh air.
This is a fantastic lecture. You're able to perfectly articulate a set of social ills that are so vast, we all recognize them but can scarcly call them out. Thank you, Wes.
I think it’s so true that the idea of a meeting-with-self is not appreciated in the states. Its incredible paradox that amid all this individualism, the self is forgotten.
thanks for this panacea. i feel slightly more awake now!! i do feel the scarcity of recognition does cause our compensatory movement, which, as you said, leads us away from the ways we naturally wish to be socially constructive
Great stuff!
Thank you, Professor Wes Cecil.
Thanks Wes!
One thing I noticed about the United States is as being born in America vs my parents country of Guyana is that is this. In my parents country of Guyana individualism is frowned upon, one most support his or own community, and the wider collective. In the United States, the big emphasis is in the individual in relation to the community, and the importance of the community. The united states on the other hand is the importance of the individual and the individual relation to the community and importance of the community. The united states culturally and socially does not like collectivism, anarchism Marxism, communism, fascism, Marxism, catholicism, eastern othrodoxy because these ideas imposes a threat or moral issue against the individual and agaisnt the community.
I have a question.
So, my read of the situation of individualism as you lay it out is a lack of recognition of interdependency. We are interdependent upon each other to survive, but we don't recognize this on a conscious level because of the historical momentum enforcing individualist attitudes. My question is: How in the history of philosophy have philosophers dealt with a problem like this, where there is a dissonance between the societal facts of the matter, in our case, super surplus and huge webs of interdependency, and the considerations of the culture that manifest to deny that, again, in our case, artificial scarcity and faux paus individualism?
Good men are scarce as an effect of women's choices. Women go for the best men and men are forced to compete in the mating market and women very much do pick winners and losers. The men who are picked by women aren't just picked by a few of them, and a lot of men who women don't pick will never be picked by any of them.
Women would rather share a winner than commit to a loser. They created that with their choices and it creates competition in most other aspects of society.
This has almost nothing to do with school and education. Women can't be taught to not be like this, only to subvert their own desires. And that creates losers of women who must subvert their desires vs those who don't.
Game theory and 80/20 rule at best.
What if they are all just stuck hidden away somewhere like you?
@@woverniox There are many of those. But they aren't making men winners are they? The mate market is the primary market, all other markets serve it.
@@woverniox I'm the kind that a lot of wives would cheat with. I stay hidden because they are nothing but trouble. I don't want them.
@@elinope4745 I hate to be the dude who pisses on your pity parade but there is a whole ocean of fish out there man. You only need one of them
Awesome
If Newton was unsociable and a loner, was he unhappy despite doing something he enjoyed?
Was he unhappy, did he enjoy those things? I don't accept these oversimplified premises.
Lol
@@elinope4745 in one of his lectures, Wes said that supposedly loneliness is worse than diabetes and cancer from smoking. I want to find out if he was unhappy and depressed. I can't believe loneliness is so awful. I live on my own and I don't feel anything like that. I like my life.
@@_catra He was unhappy sometimes, depressed sometimes, happy sometimes. His time alone was sometimes lonely and sometimes solitude. All people are like that, even you.
Being alone =/= being lonely. Some people do not have the mental tools they need to be independent due to upbringing. It can be bad for you, it ties into your value as an individual. But others just get used to it. As humans we are aligned more with a group dynamic but we couldn't evolve without the ability to be alone. In babies we can see certain things like crying when mom is not in sight for up to 3 years, because they physically cannot do anything and their concept of themselves is not fully developed.
Divide to rule. It's what predators do by default.
I disagree about "good" education. TH-cam has good education, Khan academy is good education, about one in twenty universities have good education. They are propaganda shops for the most part.
@@JHimminy I said it has good education, not that it doesn't also have bad education or that it is particularly easy to parse them.
It's still better than most schools which don't have methods for good education. My country was a plurality of cultures from it's inception. The government was intentionally handicapped and limited as an agreeable middle ground for them to meet and unite against foreign enemies.
Where's The Louisiana episode?
I think most people fundamentally fail to understand what relationships could be or what social events could necessarily come about because of the way that capitalism organizes people, right now its pretty shit here and there is no incentive to fix it because it works. The ownership class will always take the path of least resistance in order to not fuck anything else up. I think on some level Americans need to experience pain to understand it as a motivator. Then people can use that experience down the road, as long as they remember the pain. There is a way to experience a good, constructive life without pain and it involves having a good social network. Pain works if you need to motivate someone to do something but it does not help them do what they want to do. While a good social network could conceivably create real problems for some bad people who want to keep exploiting everyone.
Everyone says this before dying.
Gah, life is complicated.
It's crazy, how much society fights people who choose to live off the grid in solitude. There have always been hermits that chose to survive as islands in the wilderness.
Because people are a product of society. Anyone who wishes to "live off the grid" is an example of society rejecting itself. Society is right to be displeased with such so-called individuals. Individuals whose ability to think in language is a gift from the society. Without that gift they wouldn't be able to think the thought of "living off the grid". They are traitors.
@@Beehive151 Would you get angry at slaves who escaped their masters, just because their masters taught them to speak? Social contract means nothing if there is not a hinterlands to flee too. Society has no right to exist if it would usurp all of the wilderness.