Tuesday, March 22, 2011

You are in a maze of twisty little passages, all alike.

Oh look! There's a Wikipedia article entitled "List of political ideologies". Let's go look at that!

Wow, there sure are a lot of them...

The list contains everything from "Jewish anarchism" to "Ecofeminism" to "Islamic feminism" to "Queer nationalism" to "Christian communism" to "Libertarian socialism".

Each one of those dozens and dozens of links leads to its own Wikipedia article, no doubt assiduously maintained and argued over and edited and re-edited by people who consider themselves devotees of the purest form of said ideology and who denounce each other as "Splitters!" and each and every one of them sure that they have decoded the message on the back of the cosmic cereal box.

I think it might be simultaneously the funniest and most depressing thing I've stumbled across on the interwebs so far this week.

34 comments:

og said...

yeah, it explains a few things.

McVee said...

If it keeps them busy continuously updating their wiki entry's so as to not have the time to mess with the rest of us all the better.
Hopefully they are on twitter too.
@Ecofeminism... does hanes use organic cotton?
Idle minds are the devils playground.

Tango Juliet said...

Make mine Menckenism.

Anonymous said...

Sign me up for the Splitters.

AT

Ed Foster said...

Stakhanovite revisionists, every one of them.

Anonymous said...

That doesn't even count people like me, who are busily trying to define a new one.

Regards,
Ric

John said...

Hey, everyone!!!! I know!!!

Let's all get together and make Broadway Musical!!!!!!!!!

Not that there's anything wrong that.

And we would have to perform the event on bicycles if you really, really cared about the politico-social validity of it's meaning and our actions.


verify: spotsbio -- so, the central character could be a dog, too. Species-inclusive,that's us.

PS -- was it Lord Byron who quoth: "and if I laugh at any living thing,'tis that I may not weep."

North said...

"decoded the message"

B e s u

Just a minute, ma.

r e t o d r i

Hold on! I need a minute!

n k y o u r o

Just a minute!

v a l t

All right already!

i n e


Aw. Damn.

Stranger said...

Yep, 8,400 plus weaseling as well as hair splitting definitions of "The State Shall Control All Means Of Production And Distribution Of Goods." There are only two sorts of Socialism, equally evil. Either the State owns as well as controls the means of production, or it does not.

Make mine "Jeffersonian Republicanism," with the minimum amount of government needed for necessary services. Like securing the borders.

Failing that, "no archon," anarchy is preferable to too much government.

Stranger

Glenn Kelley said...

It's the human thing to do.When I was a kid the town had 70,000 people, 14 different variations on Baptist and only 5 political parties.The politicos would do coalitions to get things done,the baptists wouldn't.

Glenn

Blackwing1 said...

If you think that's funny and/or depressing, check out Kevin Baker's link at Smallest Minority...the problem as diagnosed at DogFireLake...no, LakeFire...no, ReadyFireAim is that the O isn't statist/collectivist ENOUGH.

NotClauswitz said...

Split me and double-down!! Hard!

Growing up in a church-family I heard about those damn splitters - ever since 1612.
There was once a single shining Baptist Church upon a hill...not! Originating in 1609 in the low and watery country of Amsterdam with a notion of a further water-ritual as a personal confession of faith they...didn't get very far, really it was hopeless since they were rigid, tendentious, heavily doctrinaire, and freakin' English Separatists to begin with - they lacked the basic simple impulse to join cleave together, not without special conditions attached. Nooo...they liked already to *broke it down y'all*... The breaking-up started in 1612, and they still argue today whether the Providence or Newport church deserved the label 'first' in America (1639).
Sheesh.
Glenn Kelly is right.

Kristophr said...

Look up nazi dot org sometime.

Now there is a group of splitters ...


The page header is enough to give several political groups fits. Or a raging headache trying to figure it out.

Wayne said...

Drop one of your possesions, other than the lamp, explore the maze, and when you are back here, the way out is 'down'

North said...

Whatever direction you go, 'North' is probably wrong.

:-P

Sigivald said...

I think the "libertarian socialists" might have some definition issues there.

(Like, say, "fascist anarchists".)

perlhaqr said...

Sigivald: The ironic thing is that they screech about how us market oriented folks aren't actually libertarians (or anarchists, for the so called anarcho-socialists). The usual slur they use is "propertarians".

It would make me laugh if I wasn't too busy crying.

Jason said...

"Queer Nationalism"

Wow. Talk about the Politics of Dancing.

wv: herisin. Heresy ruining your purist dogmas? Try new Herisin and watch heterodoxy melt away! Herisin! Ask for it by name!

Tam said...

perlhaqr,

"The usual slur they use is "propertarians"."

Wait, that's a slur?!?

Old NFO said...

You have arrived in a large room, down leads back to the ism maze, you see a light coming from above. Your lamp is getting weak, you must make a choice before the lamp dies.

Scott said...

All this proves is that you used to play the original, text only, version of Adventure. Did you draw maps too?

Alan J. said...

ZOMG! For just a second or two there, I was hoping for a little snark about my favorite geeky college pasttime of AD&D.

And then, it turned into a discussion of politics...well, CRAP!!!

The snerkiest thing is that I'm still on the computer in the basement - but at least now it's my Man-cave and I own my own home.

Stretch said...

Damn! How many bags of Doritos and bottles of Jolt did it take to compile that Wiki entry?

To be fair some were probably done over brie and white wine spritzers.

Drang said...

Wow, that's quite the entertaining read.

perlhaqr said...

Wait, that's a slur?!?

Apparently socialists think so. *shrug*

rickn8or said...

DirtCrashr-- A former brother-in-law of mine posited that somewhere in the South, there is an intersection with a Baptist church on each of the four corners, all of which split off from the oldest church.

My retirement quest is to find this intersection.

Ken said...

I'm with Stranger...wait, no, I'm gonna split with Stranger by listing his preferences in the opposite order.

Which makes this a heck of a lot like the Church of the SubGenius, wherein one's first official act (for given values of official) is supposed to be to declare a schism.

Praise Bob!

ExurbanKevin said...

"Not that I condone fascism, or any -ism for that matter. -Ism's in my opinion are not good. A person should not believe in an -ism, he should believe in himself. I quote John Lennon, "I don't believe in Beatles, I just believe in me." Good point there. After all, he was the walrus. I could be the walrus. I'd still have to bum rides off people. "

- F. Bueller

Joe in PNG said...

Umm, the Walrus was Paul...

John said...

Tam, I don't know how to get this to you in a timely manner, so pliz 'scuse this ersatz E-mail. However, given the recent discussion-cluster about a Snubnosed Revolver in a woman's hands, thot it might be of interest to the assembled.

If we've gone as far afield as the Walrus, I think Pink .38's are a fair addition:

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/03/22/armed-beauty-queen-fatally-shoots-intruder-florida-home-invasion/#ixzz1HNTXyuWL

'fireste': she did, several times to good effect.

Außenseiter said...

Propertarians? Seeing how many people put A.S. as their favorite books.. I thought 'randroid' was the definitive slur for anyone who managed to stomach Atlas Shrugged without getting heartily sick of Rand's ideological prattling..

perlhaqr said...

Randroid only applies to people who fall into the cult of personality, not simply people who found her philosophy appealing.

Britt said...

From the Man Who Is Always Relevant.

* Political tags — such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth — are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors than the other sort.

Justthisguy said...

Ya know, I could be a racial-collectivist White Nationalist just on aesthetic grounds (Tam's yachting pic is 'way cute) except that I seem to have enough of the autitude that my immediate family, who are the people who are most genetically similar to me in the whole world, mostly refuse to have anything to do with me.

I think there's something else going on, there.