Vox Day "If you're still foolish enough to swallow the false assertion that free trade is beneficial to America, perhaps you should consider if you believe any of the other lies you are being told by the same people."
Me (no link, as he deleted the post, as I was sure he would): "If you're still foolish enough to swallow the false assertion that [using government violence to compel the many who are not politically connected to subsidize the choices of the few who are politically connected] is beneficial to America, perhaps you should consider if you believe any of the other lies you are being told by the same people.
Fixed it for you."
Vox Day "I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt, Ilion, and merely delete your comment. Never, ever "fix" my words or attempt to speak for me again.
You can speak for yourself. You do not speak for me even in jest. You are not my editor, you are not my employer, you are a guest here and you are expected to comport yourself accordingly."
Look at this pathetic (*) God-damned (**) -- and I mean that quite literally -- liar. He knows full well that I wasn't even pretending to "speak for" him.
And *I* know full well that (in this instance) "comport yourself accordingly" is Voxspeak for "don't you ever *explain*, in any venue where I can suppress it, what the protectionism I espouse cashes out to in practice".
Look everyone, in the end, Vox Day -- that self-proclaimed opponent of The State As God -- will be advocating full-on fascism (***) (not that he is that far from it even now), which is to say, The State As God (**).
(*) Have you seen and heard the man? In his "philosophy", he's sub-"beta". In his "philosophy", the mere sight of his mesomorphic mug, or fluting of his 12-year old girl voice, causes pussies around the world to fill up with sand.
(**) He is *not* a Christian, but he does seek to use semi-Christians to further a political agenda; he is *not* for the individual's liberty from government busybody interference; he is *not* for the individual's ownership of, and enjoyment of the fruit of, his own labor
(***) Shoot! He has already half way boarded the German version of that particular train. One may notice not just many of his "Ilk" (most of whom are functionally idiots), but also he himself employing the (((echo))) "meme". Because, after all, every problem in the world is traceable to (((Teh Jooos!)))
Friday, August 5, 2016
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15 comments:
And yet you post a link to your idiot drivel there. Why? We're all fascists two steps from rounding up the Jews, why would you want even to speak to us?
This time, you sort will be going for the Christians first.
Meanwhile, back in his "safe space", Master Whiplash posts "Post ing a link to your inane drivel, where you call us all idiots and German fascists one step from killing Jews, because we don't think "Free Trade" as it is practiced has benefited us.
You're a fool and tool of the corporate fascists, and you're damn proud of it."
It is impossible to reason with Vox Day, or his "Ilk", as it is to reason with any other leftist.
What none of us will *ever* see is either Master Whiplash or Vox Day explaining to anyone else where it is, or why it is, that anything I write is "idiot/inane drivel"
Here's a novel thought: Post your idea in the affirmative, first person.
You know, as if you were trying to make a cogent point and engage in actual dialog - as opposed to snarkily and self-righteously trying to virtue signal.
Say your sorry for being a douchenozzle first. I bet Vox will post it!
It's logically impossible to "dialogue" with intellectual hypocrites.
I never "virtue signal", though I do snark. You know, same as ol' VD does.
I *never* apologize when I have done nothing wrong.
And, lastly, as a personal failing, of which I'm justly ashamed, I have a hard time taking seriously people who don't know the difference between "you're" and "your".
Can't stand bloggers who delete dissenting comments
Since when did "fixed it for you" become illegal? It's a common mockery all across the Interwebs.
Oh well. If you have to come up with an excuse, why bother taking the time to come up with a good one. You might as well slap one together and move on.
As for the assertion that free trade is bad, at what scale does it become bad? As an individual, I've traded room and board for grades with my children. As a family, we trade labor for dollars and dollars for scuba gear. As a state, California trades borrowed money for electricity and global-warming, err, climate-change smugness. As a nation, we trade border laws for access to tomatoes in our supermarkets instead of leaving them on the vines.
Where does it become"bad?"
You know, as if you were trying to make a cogent point and engage in actual dialog - as opposed to snarkily and self-righteously trying to virtue signal.
Dave, the issue is that Vox does that all the time, followed up by crowing about how the plebs don't get rhetoric. The hypocrisy comes from Ilion playing the same rhetoric game on VD and then Vox Day suddenly declaring the game not fun any more. It's rather disappointing to see the guy play the "dish it out but can't take it" card.
Where does it become"bad?
It's rather ironic that Vox disproves the assertion about immigration by his own actions. Think about it. Right now* if I click on his site, i can go buy a book written by an American (John C Wright), edited by an Italian (Vox day) and published by a Swede (I think? I forget which country Markku's from). At what point in all that trade was it ever required for one of those people to immigrate to the country of the other two? Or just the question, if we abolish free trade, what happens to the price of the book? If I'm American, do I get to buy it cheaper since an American produced it? If I'm Canadian, do I have to pay more for it than anyone else since nobody from my country was involved? Once you start working out how exactly non-free trade is supposed to work out, you realize how much easier it will generally be on everybody.
*Usually. At the time of writing I can't find "one bright star..." on Castalia House, but it's at Amazon. Highly recommended.
"I forget which country Markku's from"
Finland.
That's right, thanks, Ilion.
Ok, so correct my previous statement to "published by a Finn."
Drew: "Can't stand bloggers who delete dissenting comments"
Nate Winchester: "... the issue is that Vox does that all the time, followed up by crowing about how the plebs don't get rhetoric. The hypocrisy comes from Ilion playing the same rhetoric game on VD and then Vox Day suddenly declaring the game not fun any more."
Deleting dissenting comments is bad enough, but Vox Day is always boasting that he welcomes rational/logical dissent and counter-argument. Anyone who has paid attention to his commbox knows that that isn't the case at all.
Oh, sure, if someone posts a pointless personal insult of Vox Day (as little Master Whiplash has toward me above and there), VD may well let it be, and probably won't even respond to it.
But, post a substantive critique of some claim or argument he has made, and he'll use his position as owner of the blog to silence you. It tends to go this way -- he'll misrepresent something you said, and demand you answer to the misrepresentation. When you don't answer to his satisfation (and how can you, seeing that it's not what you said?), he'll inform you that you're skating on this ice. Meanwhile, his little ankle-biters are ganging up on you, yapping away ... and when you try to respond to (some of) them, he'll start accusing you of stalling and trying to dodge the issue ... of his misrepresentation of what you said. So, trying to get what you assumed was a rational discussion back on track, you may try to get back to what he actually said and the critique of it that you actually made. Then the hammer drops, and you're informed that he doesn't allow stalling and changing the subject and had better ANSWER THE QUESTION or be banned.
I have seen that and similar scenarios played out multiple times; I have no illusions of having an open and rational discussion with him.
K T Cat: "Since when did "fixed it for you" become illegal? It's a common mockery all across the Interwebs."
VD said, "If you're still foolish enough to swallow the false assertion that free trade is beneficial to America, perhaps you should consider if you believe any of the other lies you are being told by the same people."
Now, I might have replied with a simple replacement of the key term: "If you're still foolish enough to swallow the false assertion that [protectionism] is beneficial to America, perhaps you should consider if you believe any of the other lies you are being told by the same people." followed by the "fixed it for you."
In that case, my response would have amounted to mocking what he said -- "OK, we can both call one another fools ... and where does that get us?"
But, how I did reply was even worse. I was, as Nate has said, rhetoric, an appeal to one's emotions, but it was also an appeal to one's reason. What I mean is this: rather than simply replacing the term for the policy which he opposes with ther term for its diametric opposite which he approves, I replaced the term for the policy he opposes with the a description of the inevitable practical application of the policy he approves.
K T Cat: "As for the assertion that free trade is bad, at what scale does it become bad? As an individual, I've traded room and board for grades with my children. As a family, we trade labor for dollars and dollars for scuba gear. As a state, California trades borrowed money for electricity and global-warming, err, climate-change smugness. As a nation, we trade border laws for access to tomatoes in our supermarkets instead of leaving them on the vines.
Where does it become "bad?""
Free trade becomes "bad" when a politically organized group makes enough noise because other citizens exercising their human right to spend their own labor as they see fit ends up "diverting" money away from themselves and to "outsiders" (who may be foreigners, or may simply be in the next town).
International free trade is exactly the same thing in kind as you trading the tomatoes you grew in your garden for the sweet corn your neighbor across the street grew in his.
Protectionism is exactly the same thing in kind as your next-door neighbor demanding that you must either:
1) trade your tomatoes for his corn (and he wants more tomatoes! ... and his corn is really field corn)
2) give him a percentage of the tomatoes you traded across the street as recompense for his "loss"
In a true (*) free trade situation, the trading is occurring between actual human persons, not between the imaginary persons that are societies and polities. That is, if you buy a bottle of French wine, it is not the People of California nor the People of America engaging in trade with the People of France, nor is it the Stare of California nor the United States of America engaging in trade with the Republic of France. It is *you* engaging in the free exchange of the fruit of your labor for the fruit the labor of the French vintner.
(*) As China is one huge slave-labor camp, we can't really engage in free trade with China. Same with Cuba, North Korea and other such.
Nate Winchester: "Or just the question, if we abolish free trade, what happens to the price of the book? If I'm American, do I get to buy it cheaper since an American produced it? If I'm Canadian, do I have to pay more for it than anyone else since nobody from my country was involved? Once you start working out how exactly non-free trade is supposed to work out, you realize how much easier it will generally be on everybody."
The generally unspoken argument of the proponents of protectionism amounts to this -- "As a member of the same society/polity as I, *you* have the *moral* obligation to trade the fruit of you labor for this good or service I am offering rather than trading with the fellow from a different society/polity, even if I am demanding significantly more than he is ... and I have the *moral* right to use government violence to compel you to do so."
Left unasked and unanswered is this: "Why, as a member of the same society/polity as I, do *you* not have the *moral* obligation to offer me that good or service for significantly less than that fellow from a different society/polity is demanding?"
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