A survey for my fellow /his/tory buffs. Fill out as many as you feel like.
1) Are ideologies (Communism, Capitalism, for instance) destined to be different in theory than in practice?
2) When an ideology is different in theory than in practice, is someone/something to blame? If so, who or what?
3) Do proponents of ideology commonly attempt to sabotage the efforts of proponents of other ideologies?
3a) If so, is this a valid way for proponents of an ideology to establish the ideology's dominance? Why?
3b) If so, do the sabotaged proponents of the opposing ideology still constitute a good representative of that ideology, i.e. if a best effort is sabotaged, is that effort representative of the ideology?
4) Can a person be truly post-ideological, i.e. can a person somehow transcend and be above/beyond ideology?
5) Were humans ever pre-ideological, in your mind?
6) Do you subscribe to an ideology (or ideologies)?
6a) If so, which one(s)?
6b) Why?
6c) If more than one, do they conflict?
Does OP understand ideology in any academic sense
4) No
5) No
6a) Post-Marxism
b) Because it's fucking awesome
c) False dichotomy
t. Althusser
>>968882
I understand the dictionary definition of ideology. Which I believe qualifies me to ask others questions about it other than"What is ideology?"
>>968866
>1) Are ideologies (Communism, Capitalism, for instance) destined to be different in theory than in practice?
Theory is not practise by definition, read the Sophists.
>2) When an ideology is different in theory than in practice, is someone/something to blame? If so, who or what?
Above.
>3) Do proponents of ideology commonly attempt to sabotage the efforts of proponents of other ideologies?
Naturally, all ideology is in a give-take relation to other ideology. Do you not know reality is Will to Power?
>3a) If so, is this a valid way for proponents of an ideology to establish the ideology's dominance? Why?
Valid, yes. Sound? Some ideologies are better than others.
>3b) If so, do the sabotaged proponents of the opposing ideology still constitute a good representative of that ideology, i.e. if a best effort is sabotaged, is that effort representative of the ideology?
It's weaker by definition.
>4) Can a person be truly post-ideological, i.e. can a person somehow transcend and be above/beyond ideology?
If their brain gets damaged enough to no longer produce "ideas" then yes. In the romantic terms you use? No, fantastical remnants of Plato.
>5) Were humans ever pre-ideological, in your mind?
Depends how you define "idea" but I think humans are too late in the hominini chain to be pre-ideological.
>6) Do you subscribe to an ideology (or ideologies)?
Yes.
>6a) If so, which one(s)?
The ubermensch within the eternal recurrence of will to power.
>6b) Why?
They comprise the healthiest, most aesthetic and rational ideology to date.
>6c) If more than one, do they conflict?
No.
>>968882
Slave morality.
>>968866
1. Restructure this question, its far too simple for what is widely considered one of the most controversial questions in modern universities.
2. See 1.
3. I think not, but you can easily argue that bias inherently leads to intellectual sabotage.
3a. n/a
3b. n/a
4. I think an individual, and maybe even a small group may become aware of ideology and try to bypass its shackling effects, but on a wider scale I think not.
5. Ideology is anachronistic, this question is unwise to ask.
6. I don't think its wise to subscribe to any ideology wholly, and in the case that I can choose bits and pieces of other ideologies, it'd get too convoluted to share with you.
I can say that I have a soft spot for monarchism though.
>>968866
1) I think so, although I don't think the theory/practice divide is really a dichotomy; they influence each other.
2) Humans can't possibly account for every circumstance.
3) Yes, of course. I don't know how one could argue otherwise.
3a) Yes. It works, doesn't it?
3b) A sabotaged effort isn't a "best effort" so the question is moot.
4) No. This is the biggest problem I have with le spook meme.
5) I doubt it.
6) Yes.
6a) Anarchism.
6b) I don't recognize coerced hierarchy as just.
>>968901
Then it follows that most of your questions are ridiculous pal
There is no outside ideology
>>968924
>Restructure this question.
Thanks for the feedback. Anything you think a good restructuring would home in on?
>>968932
Hmm.
Just thought I'd throw it out there that I'm asking you guys questions because I'm interested in your answers, not because I'm clueless. I want to know how /his/ browsers feel about these subjects, not the century's best academics, though your opinions are allowed to be, and often are, in line with them.
People don't always ask questions because they don't know the answers... but I'm sure everyone knows that.
>>968924
>1. Restructure this question, its far too simple for what is widely considered one of the most controversial questions in modern universities.
Read the Sophists.
>>968925
>6a) Anarchism.
>6b) I don't recognize coerced hierarchy as just.
How can a hierarchy be "uncoerced"? There is no such thing as a singularity/equality so everything dominates or is dominated to some degree, continuing domination between different parties is what makes a hierarchy visible at all.
>>968958
Yeah I just am not sure it's a particularly productive line of questioning here because everyone is going to imagine themselves as Stirneresque transcendents of ideology which won't really reveal anything we don't know about the 4chan userbase, ie, they have no idea what they are talking about when it comes to something that requires you to have completed first year humanities stuff
But maybe I am just more jaded than you
>>968968
See this guy's fetishisation of the Greeks
>>968977
That's precisely what I want to know: What do a group of anonymous, generally-uninformed, occasionally-insightful people in a chaotic web environment think about some of the century's biggest questions? :)
>>968991
Mostly terrible shit that ignores their own ideological subject-position
t. grad student doing his thesis on this
>>968991
No. I would never do this for academic reasons. I would consult the literature in that case. Copy-paste a few research articles, listen to them as text-to-speech. I'm not an idiot. I don't consult 4chan for grad theses LOL.
No. Instead I'm analyzing ordinary people as they appear in the wild (inb4 go out and ask people on the street, that's never fruitful, no, I'd rather text-based answers that at least had a few seconds of thought behind them, and none of the bewilderment of an accosted pedestrian).
>>969020
My theses is specifically on how the medium shapes the message, if we want to get all McLuhan on things
Especially wrt how this is the only way 4chan users typically engage in any sort of public sphere
Yes I am doing my grad thesis on 4chan, there's pretty much fuck all literature on it outside of Coleman, Tramell, Philips and Milner
>>969030
See I misunderstood you completely. I thought you were suggesting that I'm a grad student and that I made this thread to get free material for my paper.
Now I get what you were saying.
>>969036
Nah generally making threads like this isn't great methodology because it encourages people to be conscious of the implications of their response
>>969047
Not a bad point.
>>968866
>1
I believe so.
>2
Too many processes are going on in such a short time. You need to cooperate with the ones with control of the flow.
>3
nah.
>4
yes.
>5
absolutely.
>6
I don't have any close to my heart, although I like to see new perspectives from time to time.
Ideology is anti-reality. It only exists good and evil.
I rate this thread seven mini trash bins out of ten industrial dumpsters.
>>968866
> 1) different in theory than in practice?
All ideologies are language structures, and therefore subject to the same rhetorical blindspots and maturation process (depending on scale). So regardless of which ideological system defines the ruling class's behavior, underlying that behavior will always be the needs of realpolitik: your system need to make sure the trains still run on time.
> 2) blame
scapegoating is a common escape mechanism for when idealistic policy doesn't pan out in practical terms. "The system is not to blame, the system is flawless, it's the people running the system that are the problem."
> 3) sabotage
Only when they are in direct competition for scarce resources, and every sufficiently well developed ideology has a martial tradition which determines when and where the application of force is justified.
> 3a) establish dominance
Not really, because all ideologies are locked in a red queen's race to describe something which is unbound, and intrinsically impossible to describe in totality.
> 3b) if a best effort is sabotaged, is that effort representative of the ideology?
Interesting to note that in the western tradition we have the parable of Jacob and Esau, where Esau was the hairy good old boy who earned the favor and approval of his father, while Jacob was the sissy mamma's boy who had to actually steal Esau's birthright from him by deliberately tricking his elder father. And God shows favor on Jacob for engaging in this willfully deceptive behavior. We could just as easily pan out to an entirely different tradition and recall Sun Tzu's assertion that all warfare is essentially a type of deception.
1/2
>>968866
>>969086
> 4) post-ideological
Absolutely. The first people to embrace the post-ideological model were the existentialists of the late 19th and 20th century. All you have to do is refrain from calling yourself an "-ist"
> 5) pre-ideological
Naturally when all of your free time is occupied with subsistence, you don't have the luxury to sit and think up new justifications as to why you shouldn't need to work as hard as your neighbor does, and why your children deserve a better shot at success than theirs does
> 6) my ideology
non-practicing Catholic. I uphold the Catholic literary and metaphorical tradition, but do not pretend to understand that I know everything there is to know about reality and its functions. My taste for the Catholic theological tradition stems from this interpretation of God as a transcendent being beyond the capacity of language to describe, and that trying to ascribe identity and substance to God through language is, at its core, trying to describe a 5-dimensional object (the unique individual experience) using a mere 2-dimensional sheet of paper. I enjoy the Catholic literary tradition because it has a rich, multi-millenia long history of inspiring humans, but I don't think that it should be made into universal law, which to me is the essence of ideology: trying to translate your personal beliefs into concrete human behavior.
2/2
>>968968
The relationship between physician and patient is one of the better known examples of an uncoerced hierarchy; really it's true of any situation in which one person is more knowledgeable than another, so long as the more knowledgeable party doesn't exploit the less knowledgeable one.
>>969054
>>969073
Clapcloy *sniff* Cleepclek has pointed out how the very notion of post-ideology can enable the deepest, blindest form of ideology. A sort of false consciousness or false cynicism, engaged in for the purpose of lending one's point of view the respect of being objective, pretending neutral cynicism, without truly being so. Rather than help avoiding ideology, this lapse only deepens the commitment to an existing one. Cleepclek calls this "a post-modernist trap".[20] Peter Sloterdijk advanced the same idea already in 1988.
>>969086
> Red Queen's Race
> Jacob and Esau
Nice!
>1) Are ideologies (Communism, Capitalism, for instance) destined to be different in theory than in practice?
There have been anarcho-communist revolutions that did not lead to jillions of people dying. The Spanish Revolution was of libertarian communists. The difference between a libertarian communist and a Marxist-Leninist is that the latter is authoritarian.
I agree with the sentiment that you're using 'ideology' wrong, so I will replace it with 'political belief/theory'.
1. If a political system is not realisable, it is bad in practice. This is discussed in some length in Bentham's book of fallacies; if a theory is not "good in practice" then it is not a good theory.
Of course theory and practice differ though, since a theory is a generalisation, which purposefully simplifies matter, and tries to determine the outcome somehow. When analysing waves in water you'll use sinus-functions and atoms bunching against each other, because the prediction you gain is very good for the time it takes to compute.
Then there are of course philosophical aspects which theories can disagree upon. A reason why we use parsimony as a virtue is because it makes a theory more intelligible, not because the world is simple.
2. See above, if it is "bad in practice", then it is a bad theory.
3. Yes. This is a historical fact. See fascism against anarchism in Spain. Communism contra capitalism in the cold war.
3a. Depends on which moral/political theory you have. If your ideology is the only/most moral one, you might act morally doing so.
b. Depends on previous dependency.
4. No. Your ideological beliefs is a bit of a lens of how you see the world. It isn't that you are "fooled", but it is rather a flaw with beings in general to see things through an ideological lens. If you have an understanding of the world, it will not be an ultimate perfect one, and it will only be a mere aspect, and thus you'll not be transcendent.
I would say asceticism/scepticism/nihilism also are ideological.
5. No. The brain was constructed to predict the world, and thus proto-ideologies were formed with the brain.
6. Yes.
6.a. Anarchism, feminism, socialism.
6.b. I read some political theory and found these positions to be the best ones and to be necessarily intertwined.
Anarchism->Feminism.
Feminism->Socialism
Socialism->Anarchism.
6.c. No.
>>968977
Stop pretending you know anything. Stirner called the ancients "children".
>>969137
>The relationship between physician and patient is one of the better known examples of an uncoerced hierarchy
If you take this idea too far then nothing is uncoerced. At the same time, many would say such a relationship involves indirect coercion.
>>969137
>The relationship between physician and patient is one of the better known examples of an uncoerced hierarchy
W. H. Auden: "We are all here on earth to help others; what on earth the others are here for I don't know." — To be helped. Thus inequality receives its eternal sanction, even from those who myopically claim that they would like to eradicate it.
>>969263
>I read some political theory and found these positions to be the best ones and to be necessarily intertwined.
Read the Genealogy of Morality please.
>>968866
>1) Are ideologies (Communism, Capitalism, for instance) destined to be different in theory than in practice?
>2) When an ideology is different in theory than in practice, is someone/something to blame? If so, who or what?
Until an ideology takes control and the adherents have to walk the talk, its main utility is for moralist signaling and it will mostly be bent to denigrate whatever or whoever the most vocal followers dislike. These applications carry over to the new regime if it does actually take charge, giving it idiosyncrasies unrelated to the original theory.
>3) Do proponents of ideology commonly attempt to sabotage the efforts of proponents of other ideologies?
Pretty rarely, again until it actually takes control the followers are just spouting memes for their immediate social purposes and they're far more likely to use the ideology against people they know but dislike (ie fellow followers) than to seek out unknown people that actually disagree with them.
>4) Can a person be truly post-ideological, i.e. can a person somehow transcend and be above/beyond ideology?
Probably not totally, but quitting clickbait is at least a start
>5) Were humans ever pre-ideological, in your mind?
Maybe before abstract language
>6) Do you subscribe to an ideology (or ideologies)?
a) Novel leftism, I suppose. I favor structural change toward egalitarianism, democracy and liberty but 19th century theories go straight into the trash.
b) I can inform my politics with current science and don't have to associate with the fetishists and dogmatists that populate traditional leftisms or put up with the moralist circus described above.
>>969263
>ideology
is a word I define as pic related
>>969452
> 19th century theories go straight into the trash
I literally don't even care whether they're correct anymore. It's like
>hey guys want to shoot the shit about black holes
>nuh uh can't do that without a thorough review of phlogiston and aether
Every fucking time
>>969511
The book i recommended is said to be quite contemporary.
1) Yes.
2) Living in a world with many variables.
3) Of course.
3a) Yes, it is the other ideology's duty to protect itself.
3b) No.
4) No.
5) No.
6) Yes.
6a) National syndicalism.
6b) I'm a spic.
6c) No.
>>968866
>4) Can a person be truly post-ideological, i.e. can a person somehow transcend and be above/beyond ideology?
No, not entirely, but anyone can be pragmatic and try to not let their biases cloud reality.
>5) Were humans ever pre-ideological, in your mind?
No
>6) Do you subscribe to an ideology (or ideologies)?
Yes
>6a) If so, which one(s)?
Georgism
>6b) Why?
Personally I have come to conclusion that Georgism and the Land Value Tax have the capability to provide a middle-of the-road path between Socialism and Capitalism. I feel that Georgism allows for a sort of left-libertarian society, one where taxes are fair and limited, yet can support a robust welfare system and protect it's most vulnerable citizens.
>>971000
Holy shit, and here I was thinking I was the only one.
>>968866
I WARNED YOU ABOUT THE IDEOLOGY GUYS!
>>968866
IMO,
1) Yes, because ideology rarely takes the temporal circumstances inside the given state into account and what's possible in one state may not be possible in another due to economic situations, culture, etc.
2) Personally I think no, but if we are to place blame then it would lie on the things stated above and also on the human inability to, as a group, remain steadfast and honorable.
3) Entirely circumstantial but mostly yes.
3a) Depends, but mostly yes. Best defense is a good offense etc.
3b) I don't believe so, although that would depend on a lot of things.
4) No. Even great philosophers like Socrates who many claim to be above ideology still had strongly held ideological beliefs. Also I believe that the lack of or shunning of beliefs constitutes a belief in itself.
5) No.
6a) Words that come to mind which describe my worldview would be fascist, stoic, reactionary, and classical. I'm not good with labels and shit though, so take from that what you will.
6b) Because I hold nature as the highest law and seek to obey nature. And I don't mean nature in the faggy neo-Pagan LARP sense, but nature how the Stoics would use the term.
6c) Nope.
>>968866
1. Yes
2. Yes, human nature is to blame
3. Yes
3a. Yes, because it diminishes other ideologies' influence relative to their's
3b. No, and I feel that with this point you're trying to make me say that the attempts at communism were sabotaged by outside forces and communism is therefore ideologically valid
4. Yes, in an uncivilized society, like in the uncontacted Amazonian tribes
5. Yes, prior to the advent of civilization
6. Yes
6a. Fascism
6b. I believe that following natural law is ideal, and that fascism follows natural law
6c. N/A
I'll just forget the fact that you're using words wrong and try to reply to what you're trying to ask.
>1) Are ideologies (Communism, Capitalism, for instance) destined to be different in theory than in practice?
People are generally bad at predicting the effects of putting something into practice. This doesn't mean that an ideology is destined to be different in theory than in practice at all, though.
>2) When an ideology is different in theory than in practice, is someone/something to blame? If so, who or what?
The people who constructed the theory.
>3) Do proponents of ideology commonly attempt to sabotage the efforts of proponents of other ideologies?
Yeah.
>3a) If so, is this a valid way for proponents of an ideology to establish the ideology's dominance? Why?
Depends on what you mean by 'valid'. If you mean that doing this may expand your ideology's dominance in a general sense, in some cases, it will. It isn't a very logical way of doing it, though; if you have to sabotage other people's efforts in order to get people to pay attention to what you have to say, you probably don't have anything all that interesting to say in the first place.
>4) Can a person be truly post-ideological, i.e. can a person somehow transcend and be above/beyond ideology?
You'd have to give an example of what it means to be 'beyond ideology'.
>5) Were humans ever pre-ideological, in your mind?
Possibly before the spoken word.
>6) Do you subscribe to an ideology (or ideologies)?
Sure.
>6a) If so, which one(s)?
Right-libertarian I suppose, though I could probably be convinced to be a Mutualist
>6b) Why?
I just don't like controlling people. I see human beings as part of nature & treat them generally the same. I don't subscribe to it because of economic reasons at all, moreso because it seems like it would lead to the least amount of control.
>>971816
I actually retract what I said about Amazonians. They probably have some sort of religion or belief system that elevates them above animals.
>>971824
I would go further and even say that animals may possibly have ideologies themselves, although not ones which would be considered complex by our standards. But as I said I believe that the lack of an ideology (which could be interpreted as just following instincts) is itself an ideology. Although I do believe that consciousness is required to follow an ideology, so that argument would rest on whether one considers animals to be conscious beings, and also how one factors intelligence into consciousnesses.
I have a question for people in this thread. You'll all probably think it's stupid but I'll ask it anyway. Could an inanimate object like a computer or a robot have an ideology?
>1) Are ideologies (Communism, Capitalism, for instance) destined to be different in theory than in practice?
Yes, as time goes people will always take out or add in new thoughts and ideas to a belief. And it should be this way, trying to tackle new problems with old methods only works for so long.
>2) When an ideology is different in theory than in practice, is someone/something to blame? If so, who or what?
It's up to circumstance/people's decisions influenced by said circumstance. Example: When Lenin was faced with the Red Army losing the civil war, he had to reverse policies and introduce the Cheka, the New Economic Policy, and other changes to ensure victory.
>3) Do proponents of ideology commonly attempt to sabotage the efforts of proponents of other ideologies?
yes, look no further than the American Red Scare and Cold War politics, or Fascism's not-so-exclusive shitlist for a more extreme example.
>3a) If so, is this a valid way for proponents of an ideology to establish the ideology's dominance? Why?
Mostly through violence or diplomatic cunning, mostly violence.
>3b) If so, do the sabotaged proponents of the opposing ideology still constitute a good representative of that ideology, i.e. if a best effort is sabotaged, is that effort representative of the ideology?
ideas don't die that easily, to sum it up quick.
>4) Can a person be truly post-ideological, i.e. can a person somehow transcend and be above/beyond ideology?
Not sure about transcend, but there are refinements and improvements made to ideas. Amendments to Constitutions is a great example.
>5) Were humans ever pre-ideological, in your mind?
Before agriculture and cities, maybe. But there was probably always an "Us v. Them" mentality even then.
>6) Do you subscribe to an ideology (or ideologies)?
sure.
>6a) If so, which one(s)?
to make it short: Laissez faire capitalism with select exceptions.
>6b) Why?
I reached the world limit lol
6c) If more than one, do they conflict?
no
I'm assuming you mean political ideology for the sake of clarity.
>1) Are ideologies (Communism, Capitalism, for instance) destined to be different in theory than in practice?
Yes. Theory and practice are incompatible.
>2) When an ideology is different in theory than in practice, is someone/something to blame? If so, who or what?
The people who dreamt it up.
>3) Do proponents of ideology commonly attempt to sabotage the efforts of proponents of other ideologies?
Yes, because when it comes to the number of adherents, an ideology (and especially a formalized ideology) is mutually exclusive, or rivalrous. You cannot have someone who becomes both a Christian and a Hindu, both a Frenchman and a German, both a Communist and a Liberal; when you try to become both, you wind up becoming wholly neither.
>4) Can a person be truly post-ideological, i.e. can a person somehow transcend and be above/beyond ideology?
Doubtful.
>5) Were humans ever pre-ideological, in your mind?
Ideology developed alongside communication, probably. So, maybe in the primitive stages of Human evolution.
>6) Do you subscribe to an ideology (or ideologies)?
Not strictly. I mostly concern myself with art. So, I'd probably be characterized as a conservative since I don't believe society needs to be remade along any certain lines. And conservatism strikes me as an anti-ideology, something equal but opposite, which draws no distinction between method and objective, because the continuity of the method is the objective itself.
