Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
Harry Baird wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 5:11 amThat doesn't answer my question, and, moreover it assumes not only that land theft after land theft after land theft - into the indeterminate past - on all lands is the reality, but also that land theft is thereby justified. It isn't.
So, I ask you again: why do you preference the view of the thief over that of the thieved-from in determining the "unrevised" history of land theft?
In order to examine the issue and the problem that, according to my determination, has you in its grip, I have to try to explain where it originates.
Let's, then, bracket the question for now until you - finally, after great lengths - return to it.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
The catch-all term is 'the Woke' is it not?
I don't self-identify as "woke". The term has connotations of some sort of enlightenment. I wouldn't presume to declare myself enlightened, and nor do I share every belief of those who are typically labelled with the term, but if
you consider me to be enlightened, then please feel free to continue to honour me as such.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
But then I have to state, as a sort of preamble, that I do not, and cannot, subscribe to the ethical system that informs you.
Let's, then, explore more explicitly and carefully exactly what you're rejecting and why. Here's a direct question to start with:
Do you recognise the basic principles that (1) it is wrong (tautologically; by definition) to steal property, and that (2) property that is anyway stolen should, where possible, be returned to its rightful owner(s)?
If not, why not, and under what circumstances, according to what principles of exception?
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
And with that I have to them sharpen my statement, the one that is forming, into something more solid, more concrete: this sort of thinking is bad thinking.
You are probably aware that the basis of my position is largely encapsulated in the two principles on which I questioned you above. It seems like very reasonable thinking to me. What, in your view, makes it bad?
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
If I were to adopt it I feel I would be taking on a sickness.
Is it sick to think that property shouldn't be stolen, and that, when it is anyway, it should be returned?
It seems sick to me to think
otherwise.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
Yet
according to your views, if they were non-contradictory, you should rally to the defense of those who say they are being 'displaced' and 'replaced'.
Those people are themselves displacing the original inhabitants of the land. That has to be the primary consideration. I don't see how it couldn't be.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
'war against whiteness' [...] 'replacement theory'
These deserve their own light-hearted mockery, but I don't have the patience for it at the moment. Maybe in a later post.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
You become walking self-negation.
Advocating for what you believe in is empowering, not self-negating.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
Your central activity must be in *righting the wrong* but in fact this is quite impossible.
If it is impossible, then we fight for the best that we can achieve, even if we can't achieve the ideal - negotiations have to begin from the strongest demand.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
It does not matter what the indigenous decide or do not decide. You have the moral responsibility to, allow me to put it plainly,
annihilate yourself.
This is where
you become a little unhinged, losing touch with reality.
There is
nothing -
literally nothing - in my political views that entails or even suggests at any need for me to commit suicide. Perhaps you have overdosed on that delightful mushrooms-n-meth combo?
My position is consistent in its recognition of self-determination: that the legitimate sovereigns of this land have the right to decide its future - and thus that I should not presume the nature of that decision in advance. It is realistic in that even if I, personally, were to leave this country - and even if I convinced others to join me - nothing much would change, and, thus, a realistic solution requires agreement and recognition at a collective (political) level.
Granted, I allowed for the possibility that the collective agreement
might involve depopulation (via emigration, birth control, or some other reasonable means - *not*, I think I need to emphasis, by any *lethal* means) of non-indigenous people. That was largely for consistency. I don't actually expect that it would be part of a realistic agreement. As I wrote though: I would respect it if it was to be.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
Harry wrote: So, I ask you again: why do you preference the view of the thief over that of the thieved-from in determining the "unrevised" history of land theft?
In respect to, let's say, the establishment of South Africa (a convoluted history involving also war between two European peoples), my answer is I absolutely *support* (to use that tacky word) the establishment of the European colony in that area of southern Africa.
Here's how that looks from my perspective: you like what the thieves did with the stolen property, so you don't
care that stealing is wrong.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
In many instances their occupation involved displacement (of the Zulus for example) not annihilation.
This is just a euphemistic way of acknowledging that land was
stolen from the Zulus.
Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Fri Dec 02, 2022 2:43 pm
How then does my attitude differ from yours? How is it that I can take the attitude that I do which, according to you, involves an immoral stance and position? That is the question, isn't it? Well the answer is that I have to *overcome* everything in your view that is inhibitive and self-destructive.
You seem to be saying here that your attitude differs from mine in that mine is inhibitive and self-destructive, and yours is not, or at least that you are developing it so as not to be (in more or less explicit
reaction to mine).
Obviously, I don't see my view as inhibitive and self-destructive. I don't see how righting wrongs could meaningfully be described in that way. Your answer, then, makes little sense to me.