Sincere Belief in BS: Philosophy Club call link for 2pm EST

What to do when we encounter sincere and passionate belief in BS.

The link to the Philosophical Club call for paid subscribers (2pm EST today) is behind the paywall, after the essay and the video. If you don’t see the link and you think you should, please send me a note. As usual, the call ia not recorded to maintain the “old normal” spirit as much as we can. The topic of the call is the paradox of sincere belief in BS. This postwas going to be short especially due to the fact that I have a cold but then I opened my mouth, and… now it’s not a short post. :)

Personally, I am very gentle about people’s sacred talking points. I am gentle about it for three reasons:

• Realism about just how readily people change their minds about their sacred talking points especially if they are dead wrong (lol)

• Humility about my own evolution, zigzags, walking in circles, and past blind spots

• Trust of the very wise universe (God, spiritual powers, however you think about it for yourself) and resulting love for the my fellow travelers’ outworldly souls

All three are rooted in the fact that over the years and through some very dramatic life experiences, I found non-fake peace. Yes, my heart aches over the harm inflicted on the innocents, over wars, injustices, massacres, lies, abuses, and the sheer tragedy of killing people for talking points. But I have come to accept that the world is moving slowly—very slowly and in zigzags—toward straightening it out, and that we may not see a harmonious world for millennia, yet every brave breath of ours counts.

Elephant in the room

Here is the elephant in the room though. Most contemporary ideologies and cultural myths are phantasmagoric concoctions made from scraps of our primordial thirst for respect, strong ghost addiction, and elaborate psyops.

Yes, cultural myths—like metaphorical dignity sugar pills—may be competing with each other in a deadly manner for the spiritual and physical real estate. They may be used by the psychopaths for bloody, soul-demeaning carnage and war. But in the grand scheme of things, those talking points are usually just sophisticated mafia tricks to keep the peasants down. Angry, wobbly, easily triggered and motivated toward bad choices—and down.

Have you noticed how similar “triggered” people act regardless of the “flavor” of their sacred talking point? Have you experienced situations where a person would be totally pro-free-speech … until someone steps on their ghost, and then they would be frothing at their mouth and demanding “consequences” for the perpetuator of the wrongthink? Yeah, me too. I’ve seen it, I’ve grieved it many times, and now I just shake my head and pray for the kindest healing experience for all, including myself.

To my senses, it seems almost as if all contemporary ideologies and cultural myths originated from metaphorical witchcraft, and they work accordingly. Once a person internalizes metaphorical witchcraft, good luck arguing with him about his adopted talking points.

Miracles happen, and I’ve seen them—but as a rule, he will only change his mind when the metaphorical witchcraft wears off or when he experiences pain so terrible that it forces him to toss the lie out. Before that point, he would crucify and betray you, the wrongthink criminal, more readily than he would change his mind—and in betraying you, he would feel righteous, fair, and justified.

Drugs for the soul

It works much like drugs for the soul. He would insist—sincerely—that his sacred talking points are self-evident, and that objections to his talking points are the devil himself. And ironically, he wouldn’t suspect that the pain that he feels is the cunning metaphorical ghost eating his dear heart—and not your differing position imposing on his “sacred” talking points.

Very often, people form a union with the metaphorical ghost and partially or fully self-zombify, they forget how to do things from the inside. Sometimes, I think it happens when small kids are never shown the thing that they crave the most, performance-independent unconditional love.

Very often, when people who were broken somehow, and whose “ghost interface” is still present, move “camps” overtime, they merely swap talking points, while still driven by the ghost. That explains why people defend their chosen humanitarian cause but are very happy to dehumanize the members of “alien” groups. That also explains why it’s so easy to predict one’s opinion about everything based on one’s opinion about one thing.

I have seen that “ghost interface continuity” phenomenon many times. For example, after the fall of the USSR, a great number of endearing but very unhappy Soviet atheists became endearing but still extremely unhappy and very fanatical adherents of the Russian Orthodox Church. Some seemed to get even more aggressive after their transformation because they had empowered themselves with the notion that they were speaking for God. I didn’t like it. They were as miserable as they were before, only more preachy. I didn’t like it but observing that transformation taught me a lot.

Healing Trauma: Better Than Holding on to Trauma

Anyway, we will be talking about all this in the Philosophy Club, and for now, here is is a video from a famous Soviet film about how love was replaced with “winter” in the protagonists’ sweetheart’s heart, and how, with the help of this kid, he brought the love back.