The Macho Response: Gays, Women & Warping Reality

• Straight women and homosexual men are the most natural allies 

 • Relationship characterised by a lack of sexual competition and deception 

 • Straight women more trusting of gay men over women or straight men

“The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.”

― George Orwell

Worse is the evangelism, full of wide-eyed enthusiasm that comes across as the arrogance of youth and groupthink. It has its own lingo, its own social norms, and of course you must pay top dollar to enter. No wonder it reminds me of Landmark Forum.

After working for the company for six months, Wilson would pay for employees to attend Landmark Forum, a kind of "group therapy-cum-self-help seminar."

"The idea that you could shape reality to look however you wanted suddenly seemed dangerous, easily abused, especially among my Type A co-workers, who exercised and worked and exercised and worked and ate so little that it was not really a surprise that someone, eventually, snapped."

"Too Bad (Our Gay & Feminist Friends Said Otherwise)"

-TMR, December 23, 2013

"Hey, it's cheaper than therapy," a therapist-turned-real estate agent tells me. He ponders how to persuade one of his employees to pony up for the Forum. She's going through a rough patch, he explains—the recession, her marriage.

The central character, Amelia, arrives at Sutton McGrath and Feingold to help one particularly stressed-out employee, Jun Suk, with his presentation skills. But, Amelia quickly gets swept up in the turbulence of downsizing, office hook-ups and self-medicating.

"The Consultant" looks at one,...company office to get at the bigger picture of working life today.

Along the way, the play pokes fun at a lot of aspects of contemporary New York City, from the putdowns aimed at those who live in Murray Hill, to the way that graduates of the "The Forum" -- 1970s guru Werner Erhard's offshoot of est -- can drive their friends and co-workers crazy with tales of the way their lives have improved after the seminars.

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Decoding NewAge: So Simple Even A Socialist Can Do It

Ehrenreich: Did Positive Thinking Crash US Economy? from Commonwealth Club on FORA.tv

"Whatever Spirits They Believe In" Are The Key Words,...

And this goes waaay beyond economics,...

ADDED:

Until we understand this stuff, I don't think we'll be out of the woods yet,...

A Fact Of Life: Honesty Doesn't Require A Smile (And Neither Does Doing A Hard Job Well)

Now this is interesting.

According to The Daily Mail "almost half of British Workers are fed up in their jobs".

Isn't that weird?

Even weirder is - contrary to what Glenn "funemployment" Reynolds and his readers think, British workers feel that way even though they aren't being "less productive" and Barack Obama isn't over there leaning on the managers!

Instead the workers think they should be "setting up their own business, with two-thirds believing they would only be truly content at work if they were self-employed."

Now why would anybody be thinking that way, when they're so unproductive, but with wonderful managers and unemployment benefits?

Maybe there's something else happening in the workplace, huh?

Here, let's play this silly old thing again - paying special attention to the parts about how nobody cares if you have experience and are competent (a "good attitude" is everything!) and how you can get fired for pointing out problems others don't see and telling the truth:



Isn't that something? If you ask us, it kind of works like Instapundit does:

No "good attitude" - Glenn Reynolds doesn't know you're alive.

Point out problems others don't see - no posty-posty for you!

Tell the truth - Instapundit don't need to post no stinking truth!

No, it's much better for a well-paid professor to claim it's "fun" being unemployed, our country's Maharishi/The Secret management style is just fine-and-dandy (as the economy sits in the toilet) and, of course, we're all lazy.

Even us, and we rise, most mornings, around 4:30AM.

Yes, that Instapundit, he's a fine, smart, fair-minded guy who understands libertarianism - and the average worker out there - to the fullest.

Because, he knows, a "good attitude" is what's most important, since we've got to like each other to work together, sort out this country's problems, and get it going again - even though everyone's quitting.

Managers are gate-keepers, and they're all alike.

The Instapundit: Making Sure Being Right Will Be It's Own Reward (By Making Sure Nobody Knows When He's Wrong: An Asshole Move!)

Oh goody! Look at what British meteorologist Piers Corbyn has to say about Global Warming:

Complete nonsense, it’s fiction, it comes from a cult ideology. There’s no science in there, no facts to back [it] up.

"A cult ideology" huh? Well isn't that interesting? And, of course, our old friend, Glenn Reynolds - commenting on Corbyn's prediction of a "brutal" winter - adds "I hope he’s wrong. Unfortunately, his predictions so far have been quite accurate." The Instapundit doesn't even mention the cult claim. Hmmm.

Yesterday we said, despite Reynolds' jackassery, he still provided a pretty good service. Today - based on this obvious omission - we're starting to wonder if the Instapundit provides any kind of service at all.

What he does is starting to look more and more like the "lamestream media" after this one - holding back important information from his readers, because he doesn't like someone, is fucked. He's the shit-faced Instapundit, for Christ's sake! Tell the people we're assholes (like he does Matt Yglesias) but don't keep them in the dark about the other issues, when others keep agreeing with us, or we turn out to be right. Hey, Glenn, even assholes can be right! (Or even smarter than you,...lamer.)

Reynolds did it again, yesterday, with our aptly-titled post "And Not Posting Critics Is Part Of The Problem". Instead of, at least, adding it to the list of opinions he got on why people would quit a job without having another lined up - we say, more than anything else, it's because of this Maharishi/The Secret-inspired management technique that (thanks to Boomers attending cult seminars) has swept the nation:



Instead of even mentioning that, though, Reynolds posted two opinions that almost sound just as deranged as we can - one, from someone named Grace McLoughlin, blaming it on Obama's abuse of management (Oh, how our hearts bleed for those in management - who, as far as we can tell, mostly all voted for Obama and are the ones who strictly enforce the Maharishi/The Secret-inspired management techniques) and another, from someone named Dave Price, blaming "the less productive". No, we're not kidding you - "the less productive". That's who's to blame out there. "Less productive" than who, Mr. Price (nor Mr. Reynolds) says, but they're out there - they just know it - sitting on fat piles of cash, being lazy.

It was at that point we asked ourselves the same question Reynolds must ask when he sees a critical post arrive from us:

Where does he get these people?

TMR's Christmas Gift To You - An Extended Explanation With Links: (Just Like) Starting Over

The links in this post will tell you the whoooole story of this blog:

We want you to consider an alternate universe, where John Lennon was a passionate black artist, living in San Francisco, and Yoko Ono was his French NewAge bride and actually liked.

And, instead of John cheating on Yoko at a New York party and she sends him away to California, Yoko cheated on John while in France and, upon discovery, ran back to that country to join her lover - a Dr. Timothy Leary/Charles Manson type.

And finally - rather than this change of events leading eventually to Mark David Chapman killing John - this new trajectory led Leary/Manson and Yoko Ono to killing others.

What do you think John's reaction would've been? Do you think he would've taken the advice of most NewAgers and just "moved on", or do you think he would've gone the primal scream route to exorcise his pain and call attention to the murders?

Do you think he would've attacked the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi/NewAge hippie culture that led to this turn of events? (For instance, do you think he would've stayed shy, or become emboldened enough to call the song "Sexy Sadie" by it's real name, "Maharishi"?)

And how virulent would've been the reaction of the hippies - now siding with Dr. Timothy Leary/Charles Manson and the likable Yoko - if John had done so?

This is kind of the situation TMR found itself in, not long after it started in 2005. (The blog did not begin in 2007, as it appears now, but was sabotaged - twice - by NewAge "friends" upset with the direction it had taken, and the attention it had garnered.)

And just as we're surprised that - in this universe - even Charlie Manson has supporters after all he's done, and everything he (apparently) is, we're even more surprised at the level of hostility we've received over the years for suggesting there's something wrong with the culture that produced him - and a coming reckoning for the many crimes that culture's bestowed on the rest of us.

We've admitted, many times, that we know we're probably not the best representative for our position.

But honestly - because of a cultural acceptance of the views and positions that's produced the many crimes we've documented - there are very few attempting to bring these issues to the public, and even they don't have the up-close-and-personal experience (or insight) that someone who's been intimate with a believer - or been a believer themselves - carries.

So we're kind of stuck.

Fortunately for us (if not our readers) the immediate problems we face in this work are pretty self-evident.

We think The San Francisco Chronicle's Mick LaSalle sums it up nicely in his review of the new (former Scientologist) Nicole Kidman movie, "Rabbit Hole":

The movie's area of inquiry is essentially undramatic, a tale told in a minor key, but it's sensitive and illuminates areas of experience that usually go unexplored. What happens to the couple, each one grieving separately, each one associating the other with loss? How do friends talk to them? It's easy to console people when you don't think their misfortune is all that bad, but what do you say to somebody experiencing your own worst nightmare? "Rabbit Hole" depicts the isolating nature of grief, a self-isolation that is also, to some degree, community enforced.

In other words, no matter what you may think of us, divorced and/or broken - or how we're choosing to alert others to the dangers of cultism in general, and NewAge culture in particular - like those Charlie Manson fans, many of you are part of the problem as well.

Believe it or not, despite our apparent glee at saying something is cultish (or someone is in a cult) it still tears us up, as much as the accused, to discover this is the situation we live currently in; realizing it's the Western World's 21st century. The difference is only in our comprehension of it all.

You have to understand, though we knew nothing of cultism, homeopathy, quackery, or numerology, or any other such things, we do remember what life was like before our wife's murders and we were forced to grapple with them.

We remember what it's like to think of NewAge, and it's many tentacles, as "harmless".

We remember what it was like to unabashedly admire Oprah Winfrey, and her many accomplishments, including the legion of women who listen to, and "follow" her.

We remember what it was like to vote Democrat, to side with environmentalists, feminists, and gays.

We remember what it was like to admire aspects of socialism, and communism, and multiculturalism, and to reject sexism, and racism, and all the other "isms" that have been brought to our attention from our first days growing up in the ghettos of South Central, Los Angeles.

But now - since replacing all of that with the glory of being an un-hypenated American - we just can't stomach any of it any longer.

Now, eschewing conspiracy theories (and conspiracy theorists) and all those words imply, we stand with those who have examined this entire social phenomena anew - Christopher Locke, Jonah Goldberg, Bill Whittle, Neil Davenport, Barbara Ehrenreich, and others - and who have found a sinister threat to all we hold dear.

We stand with those who have called for a new Nuremberg Trial for it's ringleaders - and for many of it's fellow travelers.

And we stand with those who have called for a new emphasis in our schools (and especially our media) on real science, critical thinking, and common sense, for the common good.

We embrace the American Founder's "enlightenment" - and no one else's.

We have stood before you, for five long years, as merely a betrayed artist with a certain insight - and, yes, a lot of anger and resentment - that we've refused to abandon until it's acknowledged as accurate, right, and good.

We are John Lennon - across the universe - declaring, "the dream is over".

And "Merry Christmas" from The Crack Emcee.

A Breakdown Of Cultish Thinking In America

We watch things like this and wonder, not only how so many others miss it, but how ideas that are so patently wrong could ever catch on to begin with - to the point where they're the dominant thoughts in the corporate world. It paints a picture of a nation of idiots.

Your thoughts control the world? That's not Rhonda Byrne and The Secret - it's the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi! This is why we're always dissing baby Boomers and the 1960s - all of this comes from them being too stupid to see through it, and then inflicting it on the rest of us. (We've lost countless jobs because we wouldn't go along with this kind of thinking, and there was nothing we could do, and no one we could appeal to, to save our jobs because every imbecile in the organization "believed" in this NewAge nonsense.)

Another problem, here, is that Barbara Ehrenreich is a hardcore socialist. So, while we can accept her spot-on critique of destructive cultish NewAge thinking, we're also stuck enduring her gratuitous shot at George W. Bush which (as we have seen over the last few months) is nothing like his detractors have ever sold him as. Needless to say, when it comes to politics, we don't trust this woman and we suggest you don't either.

Otherwise, we think this video - and her book on the subject, Bright-Sided - are fine contributions to the emerging thinking on the perils of cultism in American society. We need more of it, and - as the Democrats continue to lose their grip on power - it certainly looks like we're going to get it.

Big thanks to Beth! Click the tags, below, for more on these topics.

Jonah Goldberg Has Forgotten His Own Meme!

Almost exactly one month ago, I wrote:

"Can't others - especially in politics - see something's odd about this picture and address it?"

Now here comes Jonah Goldberg - of all people - the author of Liberal Fascism, wondering "When Did The Rules Change?"

"I'm beginning to wonder if the political moment is much, much, more significant than most of us realize. The rules may have changed in ways no one would have predicted two years ago. And perhaps 10 years from now we'll look back on this moment and it will all seem so obvious."

Many may do just that, Jonah, but they don't have to, because the "why?" and "how?" are already being documented and answered by people like yourself.

But, just as Edward Hugh learned before the euro zone's collapse - and financial investigator Harry Markopolos discovered long before the Bernie Madoff Scandal broke - most of today's power brokers (including your fellow commentators) are not only in love with the sound of their own words and voices, but wearing blinders to that which they think of as silly.

Seriously, isn't that, kinda, how Liberal Fascism was received?

NewAge is received the same way. But not by you:

"Many of the progressive and holistic ideas that lie at the heart of today’s lifestyle Left, the environmental Left, and the New Age movement share numerous unquestioned philosophical, emotional, and practical similarities with the intellectual and cultural currents that fed into and sustained Nazism."

Except for the words "progressive" and "Nazism", the other subjects you've mentioned seem hardly political at all - they're spiritual - but now embedded in our culture and seeping everywhere. As you said:

"The Gulf oil spill should be a Gaiasend for environmentalists,...."

Yes, "Gaia" - see, you get it.

Now, before you think "uh-oh", let me point out that liberal author, Barbara Ehrenriech, describes the same "New Age Wingnuttery" in her book, Bright-Sided.

It's about NewAge in the world of medicine.

But find me a popular progressive cultural meme - almost any popular progressive cultural meme - and I can probably find you a popular progressive modern NewAge connection.

Unfortunately, few allow that NewAge - a spiritual practice -could be playing a role in our politics, though, as you point out, it's part of what-seem-to-be some of the most pressing issues of the day.

One of the reasons Liberal Fascism got snickered at in some quarters (along with any other modern references to the Nazis in American politics) is because we Americans tend to focus on the end result of the Holocaust:

The slaughter of the Jews.

But the beginning of the saga, when such things as the spiritual underpinnings of the Nazis - or, more accurately, the occult underpinnings - were coalescing, is ignored.

Again, you identified them as exactly the same as what we see today.

And, in so many ways, you're not alone.

Reporter Oliver Burkeman was so kind as to give a warning:

"New agers are often unfairly maligned: look at life through a slightly different lens, and you instantly get associated with a tiny handful of crystals-cure-cancer maniacs. But if they want their preferred candidate to win, they might consider keeping quiet for now."

Conservative columnist Mark Hemingway once observed:

"I think this country is ready for a black president, though that’s a separate question than whether America should vote for Barack Obama. In fact, at the moment chief among my questions about his fitness for office is why he would want to stand on a stage next to Oprah Winfrey."

How about Orac, the online cancer surgeon, commenting on that all-important healthcare overhaul:

Ugh,...This is not what I want to hear from a new President. I realize that I won't like everything Obama does, but this pandering to unscientific health care modalities does not bode particularly well."

I could go on. And on and on and on.

So, when did it all begin, in the modern era?

I'd put it right around the time of the Harmonic Convergence, and what we are currently witnessing - putting the political scene into terms a NewAger can understand - is The Law of Quantum Failure.

The American culture - especially in our politics - is in the grips of NewAge cultish thinking.

I would've thought you, Jonah, could take aim at this better than most.

There are few more qualified to address it.