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The world's most toxic value system (2001)

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Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#151

Post by jacobolus »

cousin_it wrote: post #103
jacobolus wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My impression is that a lot of honor based societies perpetuate themselves at lower levels because they get battered hard by the overarching society / more powerful external powers. People feel that they need to protect themselves and their tribes from being stomped from above. Combatting power inequality and systemic violence/abuse is probably the biggest counter to turf fights, domestic violence, etc., at least on…

In the past of any European country you'll see peasants being largely peaceful and the aristocracy following honor culture at its worst. Honor culture doesn't arise in response to oppression, it arises when private violence is unchecked by law. The only counter is rule of law.

The peasants being peaceful? Where do you get that idea? Alcoholism, domestic violence, theft, fist fights, mob justice, banditry, etc. seem pretty common in peasant society that I have seen.

Or you just mean the peasants don't often pick fights with the soldiers, and their violence typically doesn't rise to the scale that would make history books?

Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#152

Post by Spooky23 »

taneq wrote: post #43
ajmurmann wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet we are hesitant to push out values on people from other cultures. It's a very different dilemma that I think Houellebecq portrayed fabulously in "Submission". Liberals are eager to defend other cultures whose values could hardly new more opposite. It's fascinating really and a tough position. It's admirable and pathetic at the same time and I'm not sure there is a good answer.

And in the same vein, Liberals show no hesitation in lambasting other people with markedly different values (such as central/southern U.S.) who they lump in as "the same culture" and so consider a valid target.

Whether these places share a culture or not, they are dominated by a particular political culture that has an amplified impact due to a variety of factors.

Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#154

Post by stevenwoo »

nradov wrote: post #50
bryananderson wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something this author gets that most people (of all political stripes) don’t: whether a culture is “better” than another is not even a well-formed question. We must ask “better at what?” We must define some criteria to measure, and speak in those terms, not in ill-defined terms like “just better”. The author speaks mostly in terms of specific consequences of different value systems. This is not the same thing as decl…

It's pretty easy to objectively measure which cultures are better. In general we can just look at long-term trends in voluntary migration rates by country / state / region (or whatever geographic area aligns with a particular culture). Sure there will be some noise in the data based on natural disasters and legal restrictions but those revealed preferences give a good first approximation.

If you read the history of Columbus meeting the Arawaks on Hispaniola in his own words and the subsequent annihilation via genocide of the natives, it's hard to accept that the culture of Columbus is better.

Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#155

Post by wavefunction »

fellellor wrote: post #142
dhimes wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's like saying Facebook is good because everybody uses it.

Or Cocaine. If you try it a few times, you won't ever want to stop using.

Cocaine isn't that addictive, at least not for everyone.

It's more like cocaine is "obviously good" because millions of people around the world use it. I think that's a more apt usage of cocaine in the OP's estimation of popularity === "good."

Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#156

Post by linuxkerneldev »

lawlessone wrote: post #125

Maybe he has confused cause and effect? When you're poor these honor systems may be all you have.

> When you're poor these honor systems may be all you have

I think you're on to something there. I recall something from Steven Pinker's book on violence.

" if I do something stupid when I'm driving, and someone gives me the finger and calls me an asshole, it's not the end of the world: I think to myself, I’m a tenured professor at Harvard. On the other hand, if status among men in the street was my only source of worth in life, I might have road rage and pull out a gun. "

Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#157

Post by GCU-Empiricist »

stevenwoo wrote: post #154
nradov wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's pretty easy to objectively measure which cultures are better. In general we can just look at long-term trends in voluntary migration rates by country / state / region (or whatever geographic area aligns with a particular culture). Sure there will be some noise in the data based on natural disasters and legal restrictions but those revealed preferences give a good first approximation.

If you read the history of Columbus meeting the Arawaks on Hispaniola in his own words and the subsequent annihilation via genocide of the natives, it's hard to accept that the culture of Columbus is better.

Isn't survival, at a minimum, an instrumental value that has to support the objective values of a culture?

Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#158

Post by stevenwoo »

nkurz wrote: post #102
ChuckMcM wrote: post #10

There are a lot of works on the relative impact of honor or shame cultures. I was first exposed to that concept by some of the works of Roland Muller ( http://www.rmuller.com/ ). The thesis that is favored by Christian theology is that Jesus taught forgiveness as the word of God rather than retribution (eye for an eye) which has been the prevailing response, and in so doing changed cultures that had been stagnant for…

If you are interested in the role of "honor" in American culture, and up for lengthy academic treatise filled with incredible tidbits of knowledge, David Hackett Fischer's book "Albion's Seed" is delightful. For example, here's an excerpt that stuck with me regarding President Andrew Jackson's approach to marriage: The border custom of bridal abduction was introduced to the American backcountry. In North and South Ca…

I think breaking up a failing marriage by Jackson mightily pales to his personal role in fulfilling his contemporary American's desires in the Trail of Tears which incidentally also helped open up more land for slave owners in the South.

Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#159

Post by linuxkerneldev »

throwaway43434 wrote: post #77

I feel most of these 'cultural prognosis' are generally just old racial prejudices being justified to fit whatever one sees. You can see how the author extricates Japan from his 'analysis', but not so for other Asian nations; in fact much of this can be said to be true of China and India (amongst others), but many here and elsewhere will somehow extricate China, but not India for obvious fiscal reasons. This trend is…

> I feel most of these 'cultural prognosis' are generally just old racial prejudices being justified to fit whatever one sees.

I think there's an element of truth to your statement. One key sentence in the essay that lends itself to your conclusion is this one:

" A thar-dominated society will never achieve equality, regardless how prosperous it becomes, because prosperity for the masses is a direct affront to the status of the elite. "

But we know that our very own Anglo-Saxon society was very much a "thar-dominated" one until quite recently and although we've not reached ideal levels of equality, we have significantly cut inequality.

Re: The world's most toxic value system (2001)

#160

Post by cousin_it »

jacobolus wrote: post #151
cousin_it wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the past of any European country you'll see peasants being largely peaceful and the aristocracy following honor culture at its worst. Honor culture doesn't arise in response to oppression, it arises when private violence is unchecked by law. The only counter is rule of law.

The peasants being peaceful? Where do you get that idea? Alcoholism, domestic violence, theft, fist fights, mob justice, banditry, etc. seem pretty common in peasant society that I have seen. Or you just mean the peasants don't often pick fights with the soldiers, and their violence typically doesn't rise to the scale that would make history books?

Honor culture is not an umbrella term for evils like alcoholism, theft, or fist fights. It's a sharper, uglier thing. The central idea of honor culture is that a man must kill anyone who insults him, otherwise he's "not a man" and becomes fair game for everyone. It was much more prevalent with the aristocracy than with common folk, for the reason that I explained in the previous comment.

Even today you'll find that honor culture is much more popular with criminals than with law-abiding poorer folk that the criminals prey upon. It's not about how much power your group has, compared to other groups. It's about whether your conflicts within the group are constrained by law.

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