Read this and tell us the noted author and historian isn't channelling this blog:
In classical Athens, public life became dominated by clever and smart-sounding sophists. These mellifluous "really wise guys" made money and gained influence by their rhetorical boasts to "prove" the most amazing "thinkery" that belied common sense.
We are living in a new age of sophism -- but without a modern equivalent of Socrates to remind the public just how silly our highly credentialed and privileged new rhetoricians can often sound.
Damn it, if he keeps this up, TMR's going to offer the ol' boy a job!
Alright, now that the Tea Parties are getting politics taken care of - and are, rightly, warning politicians to stay away from social issues - it's time for the rest of society to get it's collective head on straight.
To that end, The Daily Mail is stepping up with some rules for How To Spot A Quack:
Rule One: They are very, very sensitive to criticism and are liable to reach for their lawyers should anyone pour cold water on their claims. Naturally, and fairly, companies will wish to protect their livelihood and reputation. No one should advocate uninformed criticism that is malicious, deliberately untruthful or personal. But criticising a claim, like criticising the cooking in an expensive restaurant, should come under the definition of fair comment. Rule Two: the more extreme the claim, the less likely it is to be true, aka there is no such thing as a free lunch,...There are (probably) no creams which will give you bigger breasts, smaller breasts, firmer tummies, longer willies or rounder bottoms. There ARE creams which may tone your skin slightly, make it smoother and softer, perhaps even a little plumper. But that is the best you can hope for. Rule Three: The more ‘scientific’ the claims sound, the less likely they are in fact to be true. Beware long lists of obscure chemicals with extremely long names, especially those involving Greek letters. Keywords to be suspicious of include ‘pathways’, ‘DNA’ and, especially, ‘quantum’ and ‘nanotechnology’. Many of the looniest products combine all these terms and more with effortless and shameless ease.
Rule four: water is just water. If it is not water, it is something else; a medicine, a soft drink, a harmless concoction - or a poison. Water on its own cannot restructure your genes, it has no quantum ‘memory’, and nothing that comes out of a bottle will be any purer or better for you than that which comes out of a British tap. We spend several hundred million pounds a year on still bottled water in this country - money literally down the drain.
Rule five: few things you smear on your skin will have much effect on your insides, and if they do they should be treated with respect. Your skin is there to keep the outside world away from your delicate innards, a job it performs with admirable efficacy. Plenty of chemicals can cross this barrier, but they tend to be the sort of chemicals you really want to avoid. And if not, they are drugs, and should be licenced and controlled.
Rule six: ‘Detox’ is a myth. You possess an organ, the liver, which is the most efficient detox system known. If you have eaten too much rich food, drunk too much hard liquor and smoked too many cigarettes, by all means cut down. But ‘detoxing’ for a couple of self-righteous days is no substitute for adopting a healthy lifestyle, and buying products which claim to help you do so is throwing money away.
Rule seven: ‘natural’ is not the equivalent of ‘safe’. Hemlock is ‘natural’, as are arsenic and Death Cap toadstools. And all three will kill you.
Rule eight: ditto for ‘pure’; Poor Socrates must have wished his hemlock was less than pure. Sadly it was first-class stuff, completely unadulterated.
Rule nine: obscure fungi and algae from remote tropical islands or forests may amount to the elixirs of life/youth/wellness, but rest assured that if they are, and it is known that they are, then they are far from secret and that a great deal of money is being invested in finding out how and why. There is a good chance that a great many of the medical breakthroughs of the 21st century will come from nature’s medicine chest; but wait for at least the preliminary results to be published in a scientific journal before throwing your money away. Rule ten: if you hear about a product in an unsolicited email, ignore it (and delete the email, it’s probably infested with viruses). Too obvious to be worth saying? Perhaps. But remember that hundreds of people every year fall for the most outrageous Internet scams. There is one born every minute. Don’t be that one.
These people have "made a fool of everyone" since before the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi arrived in the West. Now's the time to end their run, and for the people of the West to get the upper hand again.
The very first thing NewAge spiritual seekers have got to do is change their name to something real - like Rielle:
"If she can't marry John Edwards, then marrying a famous actor is high up in those dreams of hers!"
That's the first way NewAgers create their manufactured NewAge reality:
"If she can't marry John Edwards, then marrying a famous actor is high up in those dreams of hers!"
As we've seen, this works, but only if they can find a tool to give them an inch. (Pun intended.)
If they can't attract someone by changing their name, then, as you may have guessed, they also rely on manufactured NewAge dreams - because manufactured NewAge dreams are sold as "fun".
Unfortunately, NewAgers have such major problems with the real world (that's why they do so much "self-help") instead of realizing their manufactured NewAge dreams, they end up unleashing their manufactured NewAge nightmares on others - and manufactured NewAge nightmares ain't no joke:
I said, 'I want to go to church here today.' And he said, 'What do you believe in? Are you Christian? What religion are you?'...And I said, 'Well this ain't right, you guys ain't treating me right.'
Anything can happen in a manufactured NewAge nightmare, so it almost doesn't matter what anyone "believes":
It almost didn’t matter. She was suddenly treated as if her decision had been more political than personal and she was now the embodiment of some mystical inner repose. “I’m standing for something that people have a need to feel,” she says, still bewildered, “but it’s not me! I’m not doing anything. I’m just standing there!” Even today, she says, “people come up to me with these Yodalike questions. They want to know what ‘the key’ is. And I don’t have an answer.”
Which kind of makes us wonder, once one understands the dynamics of a manufactured NewAge nightmare, why all the stupid questions to begin with?
What could anyone possibly get out of it?
Maybe, just maybe, the true essence of creating manufactured NewAge nightmares for others - instead of a better reality - is the NewAger's "never-ending search" for someone with Star Wars-like wisdom, or a key to everything? Maybe, just maybe, instead, what they really need to learn is how to accept their own ignorance and just look good and shut-the-fuck- up, huh?
The NewAgers will always be changing their manufactured NewAge names! They will always be searching for their manufactured NewAge gurus! They will always be following their manufactured NewAge dreams! And they will always be the heroes of their own self-created, but also totally manufactured, NewAge nightmares! No matter who they hurt! They'll always have to! It's how they feel good - about their their totally-manufactured NewAge selves!
Same as it ever was! Same as it ever was! Same as it ever was!
They will always know better - because one small hitch is (always) conveniently being overlooked:
"Socrates was wise because he knew he was ignorant. Everyone else was simply ignorant."
And that's your "spiritual" sermon for today, Stupid. From 11 to 12 and beyond. Amen.
"This guy, Socrates, asks everyone why they believe what they believe, and they get confused."
-- Esmerelda, one of the supposedly-stupid minority "skanks" in the film, "The Class," showing the French elites some things never change, like our life's been Spiked.
Read this and tell us the noted author and historian isn't channelling this blog:
