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Bill Vallicella #crackpot #dunning-kruger #fundie #quack #wingnut maverickphilosopher.typepad.com

Recycle or Dump in the Trash?

My wife recycles religiously. I have long been agnostic about its value and efficacy. Here is an article by Ross Pomeroy that supports my skepticism.

Just as I suspected, a lot of what people dutifully recycle, after wasting water washing the containers, gets thrown into landfills anyway. My wife's a good Catholic girl. She doesn't worship the Green Goddess, but some of my neighbors do. Across the street there lives a pussy-hatted liberal lady, single and reclusive, who actually trekked to Trump's inaugural there to protest the Orange Racist in her pussyhat. Said neighbor pays for a special recyclables pickup. She allows us to use her barrel gratis. Now we already have two scheduled trash pickups per week. The recyclables one makes for a third. This causes further environmental damage. The heavy truck stresses our street, burns fossil fuels, and makes a godawful, cat-scaring racket worse than the "infernal cracking of whips" about which Schopenhauer so eloquently complained in his classic On Noise.

When wifey is not looking, I just throw the trash in the normal receptacle and cover it up with used cat litter and the output of the shredder, all the while thinking mean thoughts about Miss Occasional Cortex.

As I always say: No day without political incorrectness!

Mirabile dictu, you may be saving the oceans by not recycling! Read the article for the reasoning behind this startling claim.

As for Bergoglio the Benighted, he too should read the article, stop worrying about straws in the ocean, and start teaching the Four Last Things. Assuming he hasn't forgotten what they are.

Bill Vallicella #dunning-kruger #fundie #crackpot #wingnut maverickphilosopher.typepad.com

The Way Forward

It seems we are condemned helplessly to watch our country be destroyed. The drift of events is ever downward. To turn things around would require something most of don't want to talk about -- and for good reason. Angelo Codevilla ends his analysis with talk of "rebuilding the Republic" but he offers no concrete proposals. What he and almost everyone else on our side offers is just more talk, more analysis. Our enemies are impervious to reason and appeals to reason. There can be no reasoned discourse with people who maintain absurdities -- e.g., that mathematics is racist -- and subvert language with their Orwellian innovations. To attempt to engage with them on the plane of reason in search of the truth is to fail to understand that it is power, not truth that they seek.

So what do you do? You secure your own little space and live the best life you can within it. That's the main thing. Retreat within your physical citadel, but even more importantly, retreat within your inner citadel to cultivate the soil therein. Properly cultivated, it should bring you to the insight that this world is a passing scene, a vanishing quantity, and nothing worthy of the full measure of your love and attention. But we ought not give up on it entirely. We watch and we wait. If there is an opportunity to make a difference, we do so. We may have only one night to spend in this bad inn, but it is a long night, and it is better to be warm than to shiver.

Bill Vallicella #crackpot #dunning-kruger #fundie #quack #racist #wingnut maverickphilosopher.typepad.com

Is Grammar Racist?

It has to be. Whatever blacks and other 'people of color' are not good at is racist; blacks and other 'people of color' are not good at grammar; ergo, etc. This also explains why logic, mathematics, natural science, chess, self-control, self-reliance, deferral of gratification, pulling up your pants, etc. are all racist.

It is also clear that in this Age of Pan-Racism, when everything is racist, grammar, etc. is racist. Racism is itself racist!

Seriously, the Rutgers English Department is in dire need of 'cancellation' or at least fumigation. Here:

In short, the Rutgers English Department wants to make sure that students who come to Rutgers with a poor grasp of standard written English not only remain in that state, but come to believe that learning standard English is a concession to racism. I remember when keeping "people of color" ignorant was considered part of white supremacy.

Bill Vallicella #crackpot #dunning-kruger #fundie #racist maverickphilosopher.typepad.com

[From “'Systemic Racism' is a Vicious, Hate-America, Leftist Myth”]

The Democrat Party is a party of race-hustlers. Clear proof of this is their endlessly repeated lie about 'systemic' or 'structural' or 'institutional' racism. David Horowitz, Big Agenda (Humanix, 2017), p. 51:

While institutional or systemic racism has been illegal in America for 50 years, the 2016 Democratic Party platform promises that "Democrats will fight to end institutional and systemic racism in our society." There is no evidence that such racism actually exists. It is asserted in a sleight of hand that attributes every statistical disparity affecting allegedly "oppressed" groups to prejudice against them because of their identity. This "prejudice," however, is a progressive myth. This is not to say that there aren't individuals who are prejudiced. But there is no systemic racism in America's institutions, and if there is, it is already illegal and easily remedied.

The Dem's race-obsession is an amazing thing to behold. With every passing day it becomes more insane. An Asian man becomes the focus of a controversy because his surname 'Lee,' which is a mere sound-preserving transliteration of some Asian characters, reminds some idiots of Robert E. Lee. Soon thereafter, a banana peel ignites a controversy at Ole Miss. One can only hope that the Dems keep it up and destroy themselves. They have found that playing the race card has gotten them what they want in many cases. But they need to think twice about transforming every card in the deck into a race card. For while the leaders of the party are extremists, many of the rank and file retain a modicum of common sense.