The Chinese military strategist Sun Tzu on irritating an opponent
Sun Tzu (c. 400 B.C.) was the author of The Art of War, a classic Chinese treatise on military strategy. Sun Tzu's strategies and tactics utilize the "Eastern tradition of strategy that emphasizes outwitting an opponent through speed, stealth, flexibility, and a minimum of effort."[1][2]
"If your opponent is of choleric temperament, seek to irritate him." - Sun Tzu
Research indicates that anger takes resources away from the executive decision making of the prefrontal cortex part of the brain.[3]
Saul Alinsky's book Rules for Radicals
Saul Alinsky was an author, activist, and left-wing community organizer and rabble-rouser in Chicago who developed a method of local organizing that was widely copied by Democrats, and influenced Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. He is credited with coining the term "community organizer." His most well-known accomplishment was the book Rules for Radicals. He wanted reform inside the system by pressuring government officials to take into account the needs and wants of neighborhood residents, and he believed that the end justified any means.
He was opposed by far-left radicals who wanted to destroy capitalism and who feared that Alinsky was strengthening it by resolving the issues most important to the poor, and was nicknamed "The Red" for his radicalism—his book was dedicated tongue-in-cheek to Lucifer, the first radical.[5]
The Rules
- "Power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have."
- "Never go outside the expertise of your people."
- "Whenever possible go outside the expertise of the enemy."
- "Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules."
- "Ridicule is man's most potent weapon. There is no defense. It is almost impossible to counterattack ridicule. Also it infuriates the opposition, who then react to your advantage."
- "A good tactic is one your people enjoy."
- "A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag."
- "Keep the pressure on."
- "The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself. "
- "The major premise for tactics is the development of operations that will maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition."
- "If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside; this is based on the principle that every positive has its negative."
- "The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative."
- "Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it. "
Owning the libs and the mocking of liberals and leftists
"Owning the libs" is a political strategy used by various conservatives in the United States that focuses on upsetting political liberals and leftists who often tend to be thin-skinned.
The Babylon Bee website is an Evangelical Christian satirical internet news site. It models itself after the secular satire news publication The Onion with devastating humorous memes that mostly make liberals the butt of the joke, not exclusively. Many stories focus on satire involving well-known Christian personalities as well as other conservatives, along with articles satirizing current Christian trends.
In at least one instance an article in the Babylon Bee was reported as legitimate news by the mainstream media; eventually, liberal fact-check website Snopes.com had to confirm the article was satire. [6] Snopes treated the Bee as a non-satirical news source. Snopes being an authorized Facebook fact checker would repeatedly hound Babylon Bee until threatened with a lawsuit. [7][8][9]
Democrats are aware of Babylon Bee content as their popularity has shined a light on their work. It's cool, funny and trending content, devastating to the liberal worldview and they are not happy about it.
The Babylon Bee was banned from Twitter due to humor that got under the skin of Twitter's woke employees/management. After the more free speech oriented Elon Musk purchased Twitter, the Babylon Bee returned to Twitter.[10]
Secular left and liberals intolerant of ridicule directed toward secular leftism and liberalism
See also: Atheism and intolerance and Atheism and intolerance and Atheism and humor and Atheism and mockery
Historically, atheists have skewed towards the left side of the political aisle (see: Atheism and politics and Secular left and Atheism and communism).[13][14][15][16][17]
Although the secular left is known for ridiculing religion since at least the time of French Revolution, the secular left is known for its humorlessness when it comes to others mocking its ideology (see also: Atheism and humor and Atheism and intolerance). See also: Mocking of atheism
The writer James Thurber declared:
| “ | The leftists have made a concerted attack on humor as an antisocial, antiracial, antilabor, antiproletarian stereotype,” Thurber wrote in 1960, “and they have left no stereotype unused in their attacks, from ‘no time for comedy’ to the grim warnings that humor is a sickness, a sign of inferiority complex, a shield and not a weapon.[18] | ” |
Heywood Gould wrote in Heatstreet:
| “ | The left is trying to remake the world and feels immune to ridicule. It condemns humor as a bourgeois plot to make the oppressed laugh at and accept their exploitation.
Bernie Sanders admits he has a “bad sense of humor.” He won’t need it once his Revolution comes, According to Marxist theorist Tom McLaughlin: “Under Socialism there will be no classes and consequently no class conflict. Humor will cease to reflect any objective reality and will wither away.”... When Jerry Seinfeld revealed that fellow comedians had warned him away from colleges because they “were too PC,” he was savaged by the left media. Columnist Amanda Marcotte accused him of making excuses for being “a second rate hack.”[19] |
” |
Soviet Union and the Department of Jokes
The Soviet Union practiced state atheism and the atheism was of a militant atheism variety. See also: Soviet atheism and Atheism and communism
Listverse declares in its article 10 Bizarre Ways The Soviet Union Controlled Its People
| “ | For comedians in the Soviet Union, every attempt at humor had to be read from a government-approved list of comedic material. Each year, comedians were required to submit every joke they’d written to a section of The Ministry of Culture called The Department of Jokes, and they couldn’t crack a single one until it had been approved.
Jokes against the state, of course, were forbidden, as was everything even remotely edgy. Even jokes against the United States had to be tame. When the list came back, comedians were usually left with just a handful of tame jokes about their mother-in-laws. For the next year, they could only tell jokes from their approved list. Improvisation was strictly forbidden. The only way a comedian could keep an act fresh was to steal gags from the competition. Plagiarism was fine, as long as the material you stole was approved.[20] |
” |
Atheist mockery and the history of French atheism
See also: Atheism and mockery and French atheism
The Reign of Terror of the French Revolution established a state which was anti-Roman Catholicism/Christian in nature [21] (anti-clerical deism and anti-religious atheism and played a significant role in the French Revolution[22][23]), with the official ideology being the Cult of Reason; during this time thousands of believers were suppressed and executed by the guillotine.[24]
Kenneth Weinstein wrote in The American Interest:
| “ | Charlie Hebdo has suddenly become the best-known example of a venerable French tradition: vituperative and unrelenting anti-religious satire, a provocative yet regular phenomenon of French public life. And now—not, alas, for the first time in that nation’s history—it has occasioned actual bloodshed.
Lampooning of the Bible, Christian doctrine, and clergy dates back almost 400 years to the “strong thinkers,” French learned skeptics in the 16th century. The primary target of anti-religious satire was France’s official religion, Catholicism, the Church’s ties to the state, and its control over education. And the ridiculing wit long directed against these targets would eventually play a central and crucial role in reducing the status and influence of religion in the French Republic... The method of the forerunners of Charlie Hebdo—unrelenting and vicious satire of religion and clergy — proved so effective that France became a fully secular state, to such an extent that certain of its practices, laicité, would be regarded as unsettlingly alien and intolerant by most Americans.[25] |
” |
Mocking of atheism and atheists
See also: Mocking of atheism
Although the secular left is known for ridiculing religion since at least the time of French Revolution (see: Atheism and mockery), the secular left is known for its humorlessness when it comes to others mocking of its ideology (See also: Atheism and humor and Atheism and intolerance).
In 2017, the atheist PZ Myers, quoting fellow leftist Alex Nichols, wrote: "...the growing popularity of jibes associating outspoken atheists with fedoras, neckbeards, and virginity, led to an exodus of liberals and leftists from the “atheist” tent. Those who remained for the most part lacked in social skills and self-awareness, and the results were disastrous."[26]
Humor is central to social life and humor can be a societal expression of ridicule/scorn.[27] Concerning various views on atheists, research in the American Sociological Review finds that among several groups listed, atheists are the group that Americans relate least to in terms of their vision of American society and are the group most likely to be mentioned as one that Americans would not want to have marry into their family. [28] A UK study found atheists widely distrusted - even among themselves (see: UK study regarding the public's views of atheists). Psychologists at the University of British Columbia and the University of Oregon published a study which reported that Americans and Canadians distrust atheists as much as rapists (see: Views on atheists#Americans and Canadians distrust atheists as much as rapists). Dr. Sam Harris is one of the founders of the New Atheism movement. Sam Harris is quite aware of the stigma surrounding atheism and has even advocated that atheists no longer call themselves atheists.[29] In fact, Harris has said concerning the label of atheist, "It's right next to child molester as a designation."[29][30] See also: Atheism and social outcasts and Closet atheist
Reddit post on the mocking of atheism
See also: Reddit atheism and Internet atheism and YouTube atheism
Reddit atheism, also known as r/atheism, is one of the largest internet groups of atheists.[31] See also: Internet atheism
A 2016 Reddit post entitled Why is everyone mocking atheism all of a sudden? declared: "Now making fun of religion gets you labeled as a neckbeard or edgy, when like 2 years ago atheism was the main driving force of reddit?"[32] See also: YouTube atheism
A member of Reddit responded to the post indicating:
| “ | A few years ago r/atheism had a "faces of atheism" campaign where people submitted pictures of themselves with some comment on atheism on them. It was so embarrassing and cringeworthy that the reddit mods removed r/atheism from the frontpage/main reddits because the reputation of the site itself was being tarnished. Since then, people started combining the (already existing) "fat neckbeard" stereotype with atheism and made parodies of the faces of atheism, like some ugly/underage fedora wearer saying cringe stuff like "intellect is my blade" etc.[32] | ” |
See also: Unattractiveness of atheism
Militant atheism, anger and intelligence
See also: Atheism and intelligence
Atheists have a reputation for being angry - especially militant atheists (See: Atheism and anger).
As noted above, research indicates that anger takes resources away from the executive decision making of the prefrontal cortex part of the brain.[33] The foolish nature of atheists and their irrational anger and bouts of rage towards God and/or Christians often causes militant atheists to behave irrationally (See: Atheism and hatred of God).[34]
The militant Soviet atheists who aggressively attempted their atheistic communist ideology around the world had their empire collapse due to their corrupt atheist leaders implementing many foolish policies. Furthermore, the historical data indicates that large sectors of the Soviet Union's populace failed to adopt atheism in significant numbers despite great efforts to try to make this occur.[35]
New Atheism, a recent form of militant atheism, has a reputation for shallow arguments. For example, atheist philosopher Dr. Michael Ruse declared concerning Richard Dawkins' book The God Delusion: "The God Delusion makes me embarrassed to be an atheist."[36]
Dr. William Lane Craig is one of Christianity's leading defenders and many individuals over the years have attempted to arrange a debate between Dr. Craig and Richard Dawkins. Richard Dawkins has offered various ruses on why he will not debate William Lane Craig, which Dr. Craig supporters have shown were inconsistent and merely a dodge to avoid debating one of Christianity's strongest advocates.[37][38]
On May 14, 2011, the British newspaper The Daily Telegraph published a news story entitled "Richard Dawkins accused of cowardice for refusing to debate existence of God".[39] In The Daily Telegraph article Dr. Daniel Came, a member of the Faculty of Philosophy at Oxford University was quoted as writing to fellow atheist Richard Dawkins concerning his refusal to debate Dr. William Lane Craig, "The absence of a debate with the foremost apologist for Christian theism is a glaring omission on your CV and is of course apt to be interpreted as cowardice on your part."[40] In October 2011, Dr. Craig went to England and the Daily Telegraph declared that Dawkins is either a fool or a coward for his refusal to debate William Lane Craig plus declared that Dawkins is a "proud man" and a "coward" who puts on an "illiterate, angry schtick" for the public.[41]
Comedy and satires concerning atheism and evolution
NPC internet meme
The NPC internet meme (derived from non-player character in video gaming), is a politically right-wing internet meme that represents liberals/leftists who do not think for themselves, lack critical thinking skills and have been politically indoctrinated.
According to website The Verge:
| “ | Last week, The New York Times published a piece about an insular 4chan meme that had started to bleed over into political Twitter. At the time, NPC — an acronym for the gaming term “non-playable character” — had been weaponized.. in an attempt to “own the libs” by calling them automatons, but it was still a relatively niche meme very few outlets had touched.
Along with a couple of stories before it, the Times’ article kicked off a domino effect: its publication prompted popular members of the alt-right — including Paul Joseph Watson and Infowars — to amplify the meme to their audiences through YouTube videos, articles, and tweets. Search results for “NPC” increased, according to Google Trends... Suddenly, a meme... [was] telegraphed to a massive audience in a jarringly forced display of virality that highlights just how quickly an inside joke from an insular community can spread with the oxygen of press coverage. [42] |
” |
The rise of the NPC internet meme
There has been a huge rise in the use of the NPC meme on the internet as can be seen by this Google Trends graph of worldwide searches for the term "NPC".
The main factors are:
1. Elon Musk taking over Twitter which gave a boost to the political right.
2. Supporters of right-wing politics are getting more active in culture war issues such as anti-woke backlash.
3. The growing hunger for free speech and anti-cancel culture sentiments.
4. The rise of a few other right-wing friendly social media platforms (Rumble, Gab, etc.).
5. Right-wingers are aggressively building their own ecosystem.
6. A right-wing populist programme normally encompasses factors such as economic protectionism/problems and anti-imigration/anti-illegal immigration sentiments and these factors are rising in some countries.
7. European right-wing political figures (Marine Le Pen, Viktor Orbán, Andrej Duda, etc.) are using the European Union corruption scandal as a political weapon and inciting anti-EU sentiment ahead of the 2024 European Parliament elections which is giving a bounce to right-wingers.
(The popularity of video gaming is somewhat down from its coronavirus pandemic high so that cannot explain why the NPC meme is currently rising in popularity in the above Google trends graph.)
Related quote
"Throw a rock into a pack of dogs, the one that yelps the loudest is usually the one that got hit." - Louis L'Amour
See also
Notes
- ↑ The Seven Military Classics of Ancient China, including The Art of War - Amazon
- ↑ Sun Tzu Compared to Clausewitz by Walter S. Zapotoczny
- ↑ Where did my IQ points go?
- ↑ Where did my IQ points go?
- ↑ Guess who recommended Obama to enter Harvard Worldnetdaily, September 24, 2008
- ↑ https://www.snopes.com/federal-judge-chris-tomlin/
- ↑ Nolte, John (July 31, 2019). "Nolte: Snopes spreads fake news to blacklist Christian satire site The Babylon Bee". Breitbart News. Retrieved July 31, 2019.
- ↑ Freiburger, Calvin (July 31, 2019). "Christian satire site lawyers up after Snopes ‘fact checks’ threaten revenue". LifeSiteNews. Retrieved August 1, 2019.
- ↑ Toto, Christian (September 17, 2019). "Babylon Bee stings left wing with satire, and fact-checkers are not amused". The Washington Times. Retrieved September 17, 2019.
- ↑ Babylon Bee posting to Twitter after their account was restored
- ↑ The Atheist Delusion Movie (2016) HD
- ↑ The Atheist Delusion Movie (2016) HD
- ↑ Atheists & Agnostics in America Tend to be Politically Liberal
- ↑ Marxism. University of Cambridge (2008). Retrieved on 2011–03–15. “The most notable spread of atheism was achieved through the success of the 1917 Russian Revolution, which brought the Marxist-Leninists to power. For the first time in history, atheism thus became the official ideology of a state.”
- ↑ James Adair (2007). Christianity. JBE Online Books. Retrieved on 2011–03–15. “Although the Civil Constitution called for religious liberty, which was extended to Jews as well as Christians, many revolutionaries pushed for the establishment of a new state religion, either the Cult of Reason (atheists) or the Cult of the Supreme Being (Deists). Changes toAlthough the Civil Constitution called for religious liberty, which was extended to Jews as well as Christians, many revolutionaries pushed for the establishment of a new state religion, either the Cult of Reason (atheists) or the Cult of the Supreme Being (Deists). Changes to the calendar eliminated references to Christian holidays, and even the ancient seven-day week, and a ist of officially recognized saints included such famous thinkers such as Socrates, Jesus, Marcus Aurelius, and Jean-Jacques Rosseau. A period of political persecution, often with religious overtones, broke out, known as the Reign of Teror. Thousands of people were executed by the guillotine, including many of the original leaders of the French Revolution.”
- ↑ William Belsham (1801). Memoirs of the reign of George III. to the session of parliament ending A.D. 1793, Volume 5. G.G. & J. Robinson. Retrieved on 2011–03–15. “Reign of this portentous period, it has been eloquently tenor, and energetically observed, " that the reign of atheism in France was avowed the reign of terror. In the full madness of their career, in the highest climax of their horrors, they shut up the temples of God, abolished His worship, and proclaimed death to be an eternal sleep:-in the very centre of Christendom, Revelation underwent a total eclipse, while atheism, performing on a darkened theatre its strange and fearful tragedy, confounded the first elements of society, blended every age, rank, and sex ,indiscriminate proscription and massacre, and convulsed all Europe to its centre, that the imperishable memorial of these events might teach the last generations of mankind to consider religion as the pillar of society, the parent of social order, and the safe-guard of nations." It is wonderful that, amid the horrors of this dismal period, while "the death dance of democratic revolution" was still in rapid movement, among the tears of affliction, and the cries of despair, "the masque, the song, the theatric scene, the buffoon laughter, went on as regularly as in the gay hour of festive peace."”
- ↑ William Kilpatrick (2012). Christianity, Islam, and Atheism: The Struggle for the Soul of the West. Ignatius Press. Retrieved on 2011–03–15. “Actually, it's helpful to think in terms of two Enlightenments: the Enlightenment that cut itself off from God. The former led to the American Revolution, the Declaration of Independence, the abolition of slavery, and the civil rights movement. The latter led to the French Revolution, the Reign of Terror, the suppression of church by state, and the godless philosophies of Marx and Nietzsche and their offspring-National Socialism and communism. More recently the abandonment of God has led to the regime of cultural relativism that regards rights as arbitrary constructions. It's this second Enlightenment tradition that Cardinal Ratzinger referred to when he wrote, "The radical detachment of the Enlightenment philosophy from its roots ultimately leads it to dispense with man." Actually this transition happened no "ultimately" but almost immediately. The first instance occurred when Enlightenment worship of abstract "reason" and "liberty" degenearated quickly into the mass murders committed during the antireligious Reign of Terror in France. "Liberty, what crimes are committed in your name", said Madam Rolande as she faced the statue of Liberty in the Place de la Revolution movements before her death at the guillotine. She was one of the early victims of a succession of secular systems based on rootless notions of "liberty", "equality", and "reason". As many historians have pointed out, the atheist regimes of modern times are guilty of far more crimes than any committed in the name of religion. Communist governments alone were guilty of more than one hundred million murders, most of them committed against their own people.”
- ↑ Notable & Quotable: The Humorless Left, From Stephen E. Kercher’s “Revel With a Cause: Liberal Satire in Postwar America.”, Wall Street Journal
- ↑ Beyond a Joke: Why Millennials are Losing their Sense of Humor
- ↑ 10 Bizarre Ways The Soviet Union Controlled Its People
- ↑
- Tallet, Frank Religion, Society and Politics in France Since 1789, pp. 1-17 1991 Continuum International Publishing
- SPIELVOGEL, Jackson Western Civilization: Combined Volume p. 549, 2005,Thomson Wadsworth
- Latreille, A. FRENCH REVOLUTION, New Catholic Encyclopedia v. 5, pp. 972–973 (Second Ed. 2002 Thompson/Gale) ISBN 0-7876-4004-2
- ↑ War, Terror and Resistence
- ↑ Forging Freedom: The Life of Cerf Berr of M Delsheim by Margaret R. O'Leary, iUniverse (June 1, 2012), pages 1-2
- ↑ Multiple references:
"It is wonderful that, amid the horrors of this dismal period, while 'the death dance of democratic revolution' was still in rapid movement, among the tears of affliction, and the cries of despair, 'the masque, the song, the theatric scene, the buffoon laughter, went on as regularly as in the gay hour of festive peace.'”
"It's this second Enlightenment tradition that Cardinal Ratzinger referred to when he wrote, 'The radical detachment of the Enlightenment philosophy from its roots ultimately leads it to dispense with man.' Actually this transition happened not 'ultimately' but almost immediately. The first instance occurred when Enlightenment worship of abstract 'reason' and 'liberty' degenerated quickly into the mass murders committed during the antireligious Reign of Terror in France. 'Liberty, what crimes are committed in your name', said Madam Rolande as she faced the statue of Liberty in the Place de la Revolution movements before her death at the guillotine. She was one of the early victims of a succession of secular systems based on rootless notions of 'liberty', 'equality', and 'reason'.
"As many historians have pointed out, the atheist regimes of modern times are guilty of far more crimes than any committed in the name of religion. Communist governments alone were guilty of more than one hundred million murders, most of them committed against their own people.” - ↑ Charlie Hebdo and France’s Irreligious Tradition by Kenneth R. Weinstein
- ↑ Poisoning of a movement by PZ Myers
- ↑ The Darkside of humor
- ↑ Edgell, Gerteis & Hartmann 2006
- ↑ 29.0 29.1 Roberts, Jessica, et al. (June 19, 2007). "Interview with an atheist". News21. Retrieved on July 30, 2014.
- ↑ NEWSWEEK Poll: 90% Believe in God, Newsweek 2007
- ↑ Reddit Atheists Have New Leadership After Turbulent Coup
- ↑ 32.0 32.1 Why is everyone mocking atheism all of a sudden?, Reddit post
- ↑ Where did my IQ points go?
- ↑ Irrational Atheists
- ↑ Forced Secularization in Soviet Russia: Why an Atheistic Monopoly Failed
- ↑ http://www.alternet.org/media/47052?page=entire
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SlnVe934u38&feature=related
- ↑ William Lane Craig is avoided by Richard Dawkins
- ↑ https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/religion/8511931/Richard-Dawkins-accused-of-cowardice-for-refusing-to-debate-existence-of-God.html
- ↑ Richard Dawkins accused of cowardice for refusing to debate existence of God, The Daily Telegraph, May 14, 2011
- ↑ Richard Dawkins is either a fool or a coward for refusing to debate William Lane Craig - October 21, 2011 - The Daily Telegraph
- ↑ The NPC meme went viral when the media gave it oxygen, The Verge, 2018