#what needs abolishing isnt suits

[7ven-devils]

A really long overanlysis of minecraft servers.

This will be my only warning, this shit is really long.

I promised this to @ivi-prism 2 weeks ago (hi, i am Svetla) but university said no and then i feel my notes were incomplete so i have to do more research.

So let's talk about anarchism and capitalism. As a future political scientist, really bugs me how the fandom and some content creators (im looking at you techno) misinterpret both theories.

Yeah this will be a overanalysis about the political, social and economic system of two minecraft servers. Why? Cause i like analysis things like this and finally i can solved what is the system of hermitcraft and thats make me happy.

Things to consider:

First im not native english speaker and im lazy so im not often write or talk in english so my typos can make Doc really proud.

Second i don't watch Dsmp i only know things about the server by the animatics, the constant information wich pop up here on tumblr, the crossover fanfics and the tiny vods that youtube insist play when i have activate automatic reproduction.

Third i tried to simplified this much as i can because this analysis i maded talking with my friends (also political scientists) and a former professor, so it got quite technical while i was writing it.

And finally don't take this seriously, I'm not trying to insult anyone, I only started this because the hermitfandom started saying that hermitcraft was capitalist and then everyone started comparing the Dsmp with hermitcraft saying anarchism vs capitalism, that's why the dsmp entered into this analysis.

Guys, seriously chaos isn't anarchism and "sucefully economic" isn't capitalism, even paid with "money" (diamonds in this case) isnt necessary capitalism.

First, mini glossary:

I understand a server like a Society/State (country) with Mr Weber definition. In really vague words a State is anyone that has a territory and has legal control of violence (the laws, no the abuse of authority).

I understand the private property as the hermits bases and/or shops (i suppose only base in dsmp? Idk)

I understand the mass production as the farms and resources.

Capitalism is a economic, politic and social theory, wich it considers private property essential and tends to monopolize the resources 'cause this it also considered private property.

Anarchy means "without government" it has its origin in the Ancient Greece. And Anarchism theory is just a society free from any political authority, but respecting the liberties of the others.

A Failed State is which one lose control of the legal violence, and can't provide the peace, essential human rights and the basics for a normal lifestyle to its people.

I think thats all the bored shit (i hope so). Now the interesting shit.

Why hermitcraft isnt capitalist?

Short answer, their idea of private property is not the same as capitalism has.

Long answer, even if they have their own stuff, they had a really strong sense of community and dont really care if someone take things from them.

We can see this in the beginning of season when Iskall take some mini blocks from Etho and he didn't really care (yeah, iskall "paid" him, but later i will explain this) or the multiple times Grian "borrow" things from Iskall and Mumbo in season 6 or Scar in season 7, the team ZIT constantly take things from each other and i can go on and on with examples, but the point here is this couldn't happen if they had a capitalist society because this would break the "private" part of private property and mass production.

Basically their friendship made so strong their sense of community that they are basically inmune to capitalism, Uncle Marx would be proud of them (not really, but would be funny). So they are communist? Nope, communist don't believe in private property and the hermits does.

But you just said-? I said they dont has the SAME idea of private property as capitalism does. They still have their bases, farms and shops, but for them their private property isnt sacred like in a capitalism system would be.

They're respect each other things because they appreciated the effort and values the time the person puts on their buildings and not only because doesn't belongs to them (and obviously cause theyre frends, but shush, this is a overanalysis, the obvious things doesn't have place here) i mean even for the shenanigans they are really polite and try to cause the least damage possible not because is not of them but because they valued the person.

Basically the famous honor code of hermitcraft.

What about the economic system and the shopping district?

Lets talk about the elephant in the room.

If Hermitcraft isnt a capitalist system, why they have a economic system based in diamonds?

Well, despite the exchange based in money for resources or services is a principal characteristic of capitalism, it isnt exclusive of that theory.

The money is a social consensus, cause barter has becomes obsolete and gold isnt cheap or infinite to use as payment. And basically, this is why we use money on this days (if you want to know the history of money ask to your trusted historian or Wikipedia).

What does this remind us? Yep, diamonds and iou's are a consensus too. When the 1.16 came out some hermits tried to change to netherite as payment and didn't suit, so they ignored it and continued with their current payment system.

And as much as Mr Smith likes to say that this is how the free market (and his stupid invisible hand) works, capitalism needs the monopoly of resources and people who works to pay for those resources.

But in Hermitcraft nobody really controlled the resources, anyone can go and collect their materials or made a farm. They just decided don't do it and go and buy it, because they save the time to go and collect for themselves, in other words they paid for the time.

Various hermits say they saved so much time go and buy the materials instead to collect themself or trade with the villagers (cause theyre the worst and all of us know it) thats why the barge and lookie lookie at my bookie are so profitable.

The shopping district it wasn't a thing before season 4, i dont really sure how it worked before, because i started watch in season six and sadly i have a boring adult life to saw the old seasons, but i assume it works in the same way that the trades the hermits does between them to accord a discount or a collab, and speak directly with the interested hermit or directly take it and pays what's considered it was fair, like iskall did with etho.

Like i said all what's happen in hermitcraft is a consensus, even the shopping district.

So yeah, that isnt a thing that would happen in a capitalism system, probably you would be dead, because "how are you dare to entered to my property", or in the jail, "because thats not yours".

So, what is hermitcraft?

For the surprise from much of you, Hermitcraft has an anarchist system.

What?! But their server is so peaceful, they don't steal from each other, they doesn't griefing, hows that possible?!

Well, the anarchism isn't really a violent political theory, at least in its beginning, actually anarchism is one of the most peaceful theories i studied, thats why i dont really thing it will worked in our society, but work in a server of 24 friends. Its too idealist.

I don't really study all of the thoughts corrents of anarchism because they are a lot. But the one we are interested is one of original thought corrent, The Mutualism, this in contrast with their cousin Communism doesn't believes the private property was something bad and considered like one of the rights from the individual, but different as capitalism because like i said before it wasn't sacred and communal things will exist to help others to start or recover.

Proudhon, one of it intellectuals, considered not paid for the work of the other it was a form to violate their liberties and feel horrofied with Marx when he said we have to abolish the private property.

The mutualists believes that each person should possess a means of production, either individually or collectively, and the products obtained would be trade in the market for the amount equivalent of their work.

This sound familiar, isnt it? Hermitcraft works in this way.

The thing with anarchism is they don't believes in a government over the people. And the hermits doesn't have one, yeah there's Scar being the mayor, but he isnt have a power over the rest and only is in charge of the "cowmercial district" even aquatown isn't part of his jurisdiction, his function is more of organization, like when we put a friend in charge to organizing part of a roadtrip.

It's the same with Xisuma figure, we all put him in a position of the admin of hermitcraft, but the truth is he isnt the only one with admin commands (but apparently some or all of them losed their admin status, at least in one of the last tango's streams, he hasnt it anymore) and various hermits said that he is more like an ambassador of them in the legal things of the server.

The hermits take all of they decisions in group and in the majority of things all of them needs to be agreed with the decision or they simple doesn't do it. And this is a characteristic of the mutualism because for them anyone are over the other.

And if you aren't already bored at this point and you put attention to what i wrote of the concept of private property in the mutualism, you would see it is practically the way hermitcraft works. They make their bases and farms, recolect resources and sell what they don't will use, buy mostly to save time and paid for the price what they considered fair. Yeah i know sometimes they do some farm specifically for one shop, but this is more "yeah, this is my thing" (Tango and Iron; Ren and wood) or a division of activities "if you do that, i do this".

The perfect utopia.

What about the Dsmp?

If you do it to here, congratulations.

So what about the Dsmp, i entered here because i want to read of them and the only thing i read was about hermitcraft.

Well, the Dsmp only entered in the equation because much of you said they were an anarchist server, but i see it more like a "failed state" and when i was talked with an exprofessor he agreed with me.

I know the term of failed state is controversial and is almost obsolete, but is the best way to describe the server and stop said it is anarchist.

So why failed state and not an anarchist state? Because they have a government (or apparently multiples) a failed one, but is there, if it were an anarchist server wouldn't have one.

Usually the failed states are known for being violent and volatile places in which ones their governments can't provides the basics to their people to live, normally are places with ethnics conflicts, civil wars, authoritarian governments or states in wars. The most common examples are Haití, Somalia or Syria.

And i am sure you can see the similarities with the Dsmp, so yeah, theyre chaotic but not anarchist.

The wars ruined the stability from the server, have a multiple sides and a megalomaniac for admin, but the goverment still there and they are fighting for the power wich wouldn't happen if the server were anarchist because anarchism don't believe the power should be possess for someone.

The server simply is failed state wich struggles under a violent fight for power.

--------------------------------------------------

If you read this far, you're a hero and had my gratitude for read my useless thoughts. Maybe some day i do it other overanalysis of this servers. I hope you enjoyed and dont confused so much.

Thanks for read.

And if there are some angry economist with me for "misrepresent" the capitalist i am completely open to a debate, my only condition is it would be in chilean spanish ;)

[maeve-of-winter]

so cheryl isnt allowed to have an independent identity because she joined, why is bad to one but not the other? why is bad with betty because she didnt help the serpents on their transition (for plot) while cheryl publicy rejected them? why can cheryl join just because even if she has never cared beyond toni? 😧 but no, lets say no one forced betty into that stage even tho they tell her she has to dance if she wants to join, and lets not have toni saying it can be private when it can

Hello anon. You brought up a lot of points, so I’m going to address them one by one.

1. I actually don’t like Cheryl becoming a Serpent, same as I don’t like Betty becoming a Serpent. It’s one thing to have it as an iddy fanfic plot, but it happening in canon is something that annoys me, as neither Betty or Cheryl were raised on the Southside or had to face the same risks, indiginities, or persecution as Southside citizens did. In fact, up until very recently, neither of them actually did anything to help the Southside, and Cheryl was actively against them. Making the two of them Serpents seems insulting to the people that actually are Serpents and didn’t have the same advantages as Northsiders.

I do have slightly more reservations about Betty in particular being a Serpent, though, because she’s taking a leadership position as part of the Southside Serpents, when she is actually from the Northside, and her main connection is that she’s dating Jughead, the gang’s current leader. She is assuming a position of power above those who have been Serpents for years and who have had to deal with persecution from the Northside. It’s yet another example of privilege that she can not only be accepted as Serpent in spite of having to endure none disadvantages, but she can also hold power over the Serpents who actually are disadvantaged and have suffered for it. She did not earn this position; she is being spontaneously awarded it over members who actually did earn it, and she will now be able to command to them in spite of having zero solidarity with them other than dating their leader. 

And let’s not forget that it was Cheryl and Betty’s ancestor who helped slaughter the Uktena, which makes this a whole other level of weird. I’m not saying they should be held responsible for what their ancestor did, but it adds a somewhat uncomfortable level to Betty instantly being able to take a position of power over the living descendants of the Uktena.

2. Cheryl was openly insulting and malicious toward the Southside students, and I wish that canon had actually addressed that instead of sweeping it under the rug so that Toni could instantly be an Amazing Supportive Girlfriend™. However, I don’t think it was plot-related reasons that prevented Betty from reaching out to them or helping them. I think it was more of the writers not thinking of it. 

I’ve noticed in particular that the writers haven’t really given Betty many friends outside of the other Core Four. Veronica had (has?) the Pussycats, Archie has the Bulldogs, Jughead had the Serpents, and Betty sometimes has Kevin when the show remembers that it was not him but Jason Blossom who died. But they seem really reluctant to give Betty many connections that she earned on her own, and I’m not sure why. I guess we’re maybe supposed to assume Polly was her best and closest girl friend before Veronica came to town, and that’s why she doesn’t have any other female friends?

But regardless of the reason, Betty didn’t reach out to the teen Serpents when they came to her school. We didn’t get any scenes of her bonding with them in a group or one-on-one. We have no evidence that she ever considered them friends or that she ever showed concern for their personal situations beyond how it affected Jughead. Yet she seems completely flummoxed as to why they’re not her and her mom’s biggest fans in 2x17. Hence why I don’t think she’d make a particularly good leader to them when she’s made no effort to help them in the transition or anything else that impacts them individually and not Jughead. Hell, given how irritated she was with Jughead in 2x14, sometimes she doesn’t even seem overly concerned with important things that do directly impact Jughead. And I’m not trying to say that she’s irredeemable for that, but it does make me think that maybe she’s not best suited to be a leader to this particular group of people if she neither understands nor is concerned about their problems.

3. Let’s review how the Snake Dance was introduced.

How it went down: Betty asked Toni how she could be closer to Jughead. Older Serpent Lady at a different table brought up the Snake Dance. Betty asked about the Snake Dance. Toni immediately warned Betty away from it, telling her it was “outdated” and “misogynistic” and that she’d “tried to get it outlawed.” She tried to discourage Betty. 

Witness, verbatim quotes from 2x08:

Toni: It’s an outdated, sexist Serpent tradition.Tried to get it outlawed, but misogyny dies hard.You don’t wanna know. 

Betty: Uh, yeah, I do.I wanna know everything.There we have it. Betty learned about the Snake Dance, Toni tried to warn her away from it, and Betty didn’t listen. No one did force Betty onto that stage. She made the decision to do so, and in fact, she didn’t seem traumatized by it or anything. In fact, she seemed so into the idea of taking off her clothes for strangers that she went ahead and became a cam girl later in the season.

Let me be clear: I am not endorsing the Snake Dance. I agree with Toni’s assessment of it being misogynistic. But I do wonder: if fans are so deeply concerned about Betty having to do the Snake Dance, why are they so eager to see Cheryl get the same treatment? If fans are outraged about Betty, an underage girl, stripping for the amusement of middle-aged men, shouldn’t we be glad that Cheryl, another underage girl, doesn’t have to strip for the amusement of middle-aged men?

After all, it’s progress. The Serpents seemed to have abandoned a misogynistic practice. Hell, if Jughead is now king and has inducted Cheryl into the Serpents without making her strip, that could mean Jughead has helped end a misogynistic practice. Toni may succeeded in having the Snake Dance abolished, and if that’s the case, we should be glad that the Serpents are doing away with this type of initiation. It’s weird to see fans clamoring to see it brought back and insisting that Cheryl should have to strip when it was apparently such an indignity that Betty chose to strip. If it was so traumatic and horrifying for Betty (which I personally don’t think it was, but as I said, I do think it’s misogynistic), why the lobbying for Cheryl to have to go through the same horror and trauma? Why not be glad it seems like no one else might have to suffer through it?

Also, I tend to think that the reason Cheryl didn’t have to do the Snake Dance is because she came to the Serpents’ aid during an immense crisis that they had never before experienced and then they thought she’d already proved her loyalty and thus didn’t have to strip. But like I said, if Jughead has abolished the Snake Dance, we should see it as a step in the right direction, not insist that all women must endure the Snake Dance because Betty decided it was something she wanted to do. Women getting a raw deal in the past isn’t any reason to maintain that all women should continue to get a raw deal in the future. If a misogynistic practice has ended, we need to take that victory to heart and see it as evidence that misogyny can and should be stopped.

[ohkimani]

I think she needs to do more than just send out a tweet denouncing white supremacy. She should at the very least write a letter just like she did with Apple Music

there has been plenty of silence throughout her career in regards to these social issues and before it was one of those things that was just easily ignored. but now, as things get worse in our society, it’s not necessarily one of those things where everyone is looking at her to abolish racism and violence and it’s not people putting the whole world on her back. being a celebrity, it’s easy to have things tacked onto your brand. hell, that’s the meaning of this whole album we’re about to get in a couple of days. at this point, it’s not even worrying about what’s going to come after saying something. as a poc fan i know taylor is nothing like the people who are latching onto her but......i’d rather hear that from her than from her lawyers or todrick. 

if she can post snarky story pics in response to the body suit fiasco then why isnt this worthy of being publicly addressed.

[justsomeantifas]

I have a genuine question, I'm seemingly in the middle and trying to get view points and perspectives. I assume you speak of Marxism, where the people rule? It has always been an ideology and never taken into effect unless with a dictator. Socialism is seemingly great, but it always fails. People don't want to work just to be taxed an insane amount so people who don't work get a check. That's why it usually fails, because people stop working and money ceases. Why are you for communism?

theres so much here thats wrong and simply assumed that i really don’t want to get into it because it’s obnoxious and we get asked the same shit all the time. like you could literally go through our blog a bit and have every single one of your points knocked down because they’re all wrong. but I digress.1) there have been countless communities where the people ruled, which exist before marxism was ever even written about, kropotkin talks about a few in the very beginning of the conquest of bread, but as you should know humans have been around for 200,000+ years, and during this time we’ve lived under countless social structures, which includes, but is not limited to, a rule of the people. It worked. It worked for a long time. The state and capitalism fucked it up. But that’s something you’ll have to research on your own because this is already fuck long.2) There are no taxes under communism, none, because there is no capital … no private property, there is nothing to tax, capital does not exist. so try to comprehend that for a second before applying capitalist ideas onto a communist framework3) people don’t want to do fuck nothing. People get bored as shit. notwithstanding the fact that people already do shit they aren’t paid to do: laundry, dishes, vacuuming, organizing, showering, brushing their teeth, etc. You know what happens when a person isn’t capable of doing this shit? They typically get help or die, because if you can’t or have no want to work at all on anything there is literally something wrong with you, it’s not the typical human experience. 

And I suppose I could show you the whole cities using the universal basic income shit and how people still work under that but I feel like you should already understand people do shit all the time without monetary compensation, and when people aren’t worrying about if they’re going to die or not from their job they tend to produce a lot better content and work in places more suited to their interests and skills

You think all these people on tumblr who write pages and pages of informational texts, or make graphs just for fun, or draw all the time just for fun, or do hours and hours of research and so on for no compensation just would stop fucking working if they had their basic needs provided for? thats fuck ignorant and completely lacks a basic understanding of people4) again, there are no checks, capital is abolished, there is no state, there are no taxes, you fundamentally misunderstand the most basic aspects of communism. please do some research before coming to random people on the internet and spewing bullshit that isn’t goddamn true and stating it as fact when it goddamn well isnt. 

[samanthasroberts]

CPAC conservatives drink the Trump Kool-Aid, but who will pick up the tab?

A once-fringe presidential candidate has turned his doubters into cheerleaders. But the spiritual and financial cost of Trumpism has yet to be tallied

The writing is on the wall. God bless Trump, America first, Peace through strength!!!, Capitalism is beautiful, Drain the swamp, One nation under God, Make America gay again!, Adorable deplorable and Trump is star! are among the messages scrawled in the exhibition hall at this years Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) near Washington.

Look close and there is a thread of defiance too: CPAC abandoned principles to support a big government strongman.

This week America held its biggest gathering of conservative activists since Donald Trumps stunning election as president. The festival of political incorrectness was a moment of giddy vindication after eight years in the wilderness.

This is suddenly a wonderful, wonderful glorious morning in America, isnt it? Lou Dobbs, a host on the Fox Business Network, asked the crowd. But at what price? Observers said it also marked the death of the conservative movement of former president Ronald Reagan and a rush to embrace a new authoritarianism.

If Reaganism is to be succeeded by Trumpism, then White House chief strategist Steve Bannon gave the clearest outline yet of what that will look like: sovereignty and security, including the building of walls; economic nationalism to rewrite trade deals and bring jobs home; a radical deconstruction of the administrative state to tear down the system of taxes and regulations seen as choking economic growth.

When Trump addresses both houses of Congress on Tuesday, he is likely to put more flesh on those bones. He will seek to bring the Republican party to heel, just as he has the conservative grassroots. It is only a matter of time, however, before he will have to explain how he intends to pay for a populist, protectionist agenda that shreds fiscal conservative orthodoxy.

I would say this is a moment of existential crisis for the conservative movement because its being replaced by Trumpism, said Charlie Sykes, a conservative author and commentator who stayed away from CPAC this year. There is a very real capitulation among conservatives. The disturbing process of the last year was seeing conservatives convince themselves that Trump is their new saviour.

CPAC was established in the 1970s by the nascent conservative movement, in a successful bid to push the Republican party to the right. During Barack Obamas presidency, it could feel in danger of irrelevance: the further its voices were from power, it seemed, the louder they shouted. Among the speakers in 2011 was a businessman, TV celebrity and former Democrat from New York: Donald Trump.

Many of the themes he hit that day America needs to win, we dont have free trade, China is manipulating the currency were the same as in 2017, but their time had not yet come.

Trump at CPAC: I oppose fake news, not the media

Even a year ago, CPAC appeared peripheral to the national conversation and Trump appeared peripheral to CPAC. With the Republican primary in full swing, Ted Cruz, a hardliner by most measures, seemed a natural choice for this constituency. But Trump beat Cruz and in November he shocked the world by beating Hillary Clinton too. Many in a once sceptical Republican party have since rallied around him, brushing off charges that they are spineless and seduced by power.

CPAC, suddenly thrust from the sidelines to centre stage, likewise surrendered to Trump. In a raucous atmosphere reminiscent of a campaign rally, his speech, full of populist fire and bilious attacks on the media, was clapped and cheered and met with chants of USA! USA, Build the wall and in reference to Clinton Lock her up. Make America great again baseball caps, scarce a year ago, were worn with pride. Republican establishment figures, including senators, congressmen and governors, were thin on the ground. Leading Brexit campaigner Nigel Farage was treated like a rock star.

Attendee Deborah Aldrich, 60, from Salt Lake City, Utah, said: Last year Trump didnt even come and he was booed during a debate on TV. It was a real pro-Cruz group. To see all the conservatives who were booing him last year applauding him this year feels like a real victory.

These are grassroots, these are activists

At first glance, the exhibition hall at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center, a vast complex on the Potomac river, appeared to be a celebration of a movement emboldened and on the march. Organisations included Tea Party Patriots, VotingCatholic.com and, less expectedly, Gays for Guns.

The National Rifle Association was running a gun giveaway, a chance to win a free weapon, while the anti-abortion group Save the Storks had set up a van offering free pregnancy tests. Merchandise ranged from Trump and Clinton bobbleheads (the latter wearing prison stripes) to T-shirts with slogans such as God is great, beer is good & liberals are crazy, Girls just want to have guns and Free speech is burning, and even babygrows that said Capitalist or carried a gun silhouette.

Richard Spencer talks to the media during CPAC. Photograph: UPI / Barcroft Images

Among the books on sale were Marriage Done Right: One Man, One Woman, The Truth About Muhammad: Founder of the Worlds Most Intolerant Religion, Sex Scandal: The Drive to Abolish Male and Female, The Problem with Socialism, and The Worst President in History: The Legacy of Barack Obama (Contains 200 reasons). Shoppers could buy USA baseball caps and Trump T-shirts, then pose for a photo against an image of the White House.

Bridgett Wagner, vice-president of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative thinktank which had a prominent location in the hall, said Trump was popular here: These are grassroots, these are activists, not the beltway community. They want change.

Our real friends in the world speak English, Nigel Farage tells CPAC

They are ready for somebody to go in and stop the growth of government, stop Obamacare. Washington and the establishment pays attention to [the controversies around Trump] but I honestly think the average American is looking at results.

Yet beneath the show of unity, there were cracks. Asked for their views on Trump, some organisers manning stalls smiled uneasily and said they could not comment. Attendance was widely said to be down on past years.

Bradley Matthews, editorial manager of the Conservative Book Club, said many had chosen to stay away: This year seems a lot more low key. There is more of a Trump crowd. A lot of establishment people are not here, a lot of traditional actors are not here. Well see if that holds in 2018 but for now its Trump, Trump, Trump.

One man who did return was Richard Spencer, a white nationalist and leading ideologue of the alt-right, a far-right group that senses a historic opportunity. He was asked directly by a Dutch TV journalist: Are you a fascist? It was the kind of question that many felt belonged to a bygone era but suddenly, in 2017, seems serious and urgent again. Spencer insisted not and denied any contact with the Ku Klux Klan. He also tried to explain away his infamous Hail Trump! salute last November as a moment of exuberance.

Spencer, 38, did not claim Trump for the alt-right but said his arrow points in our direction.

Donald Trump came like a miracle, he said, in many ways. No one predicted him, no one predicted that at the very beginning of his campaign he would define himself on the immigration issue, which is fundamentally a racial issue, and so I couldnt believe it.

But the fact is when the world changed, you have to change too, and so I do think there are amazing new opportunities now because hes bringing nationalism to the fore, hes bringing it into the mainstream, hes asking these existential questions like: are we a nation? And those questions werent being asked by Republicans before him.

If you ask George W Bush what is America, he would be like, a universalistic, eternal force of democracy and capitalism for all times. Donald Trump doesnt think like that. Donald Trump thinks No, we have an organic nation, there is an American people that has a history, they have a particular experience and Im going to stick up with them.

Donald Trump is not a fiscal conservative

The alt-right was denounced from the CPAC stage as a hateful, leftwing fascist group trying to worm its way into conservative ranks. Spencer was expelled from the event soon after. But some fear it is too late to slam the Pandoras box shut and that Trump and Bannon have given an electric shock to long-dormant extremists, stirring them to life. CPAC also controversially invited and then disinvited rightwing provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos to give a speech.

Bannon scorns media in rare public appearance at CPAC

The awkward marriage of convenience between factions was vividly displayed on Thursday when Bannon sat on stage alongside Reince Priebus, former chairman of the Republican national committee, now White House chief of staff. Bannon was casual with open-collared shirt, Priebus more staid in suit and tie. At one point Bannon attempted to put his left hand on Priebuss knee, only for Priebus to curtly brush him off.

The pugnacious Bannon, a former head of the rightwing Bretibart News who has been dubbed Trumps Rasputin, spoke as if on permanent war footing. He said the president was maniacally focused on fulfilling his campaign promises and predicted a daily fight against the media, airing grievances against what he called the opposition party. Cancelling trade deals, Bannon argued, was part of a broader push toward the deconstruction of the administrative state.

He explained: Every business leader weve had in is saying not just taxes, but it is also the regulation. I think the consistent, if you look at these cabinet appointees, they were selected for a reason and that is the deconstruction. The way the progressive left runs is if they cant get it passed, theyre just gonna put in some sort of regulation in an agency. Thats all gonna be deconstructed and I think that thats why this regulatory thing is so important.

One such Trump appointee is Scott Pruitt as head of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) despite his ties to the fossil fuel industry and fierce opposition from environmental groups. Pruitt is an opponent of what he regards as federal overreach. It will be little surprise if the White House now begins to dismantle the EPAs Clean Power Plan, which set the first carbon pollution standards for power plants, and other components of Obamas Climate Action Plan.

But despite the talk of aggressively moving forward, the administration faces a moment of reckoning in Congress. The border wall will cost billions. Trumps daughter Ivanka seemed poised to launch an expensive childcare programme to help working mothers. In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter last November, Bannon vowed to push a trillion-dollar infrastructure plan, boasting: The conservatives are going to go crazy. The Trump White House has promised to make wide-ranging tax cuts yet also slash the national deficit.

Sykes said: I keep trying to figure out how Trump and Bannon are going to pay for all these things. I remember when conservatives used to care about this stuff. I dont see how theyre going to square that circle. Donald Trump is not a fiscal conservative. He likes to spend money, borrow money and build things. It should not be a shock hes not going to be a deficit hawk.

Trump has no intention of shrinking the federal government, Sykes added, and his praise of the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, would have been unthinkable to cold warrior Reagan.

This CPAC marks a definite end to the Reagan era. If you define conservatism or Reaganism as small government constitutionalism, that does not describe the isolationist, protectionist, authoritarian themes Trump delivered. Conservatism has become less about ideas than a cult of personality: if a leader tells them to reject a principle they have held for 50 years, they are willing to do that.

More powerful than they have been for a decade, many conservatives are grateful for what Trump is not Clinton but remain wary of what he is. Pragmatism is all.

Reagans son, Michael, said: I dont think Donald Trump is a true conservative at all. I think Donald Trump is a great salesman and hes sold the conservatives on swallowing their tongues and saying follow me, and conservatives said, Listen, were gonna go with this guy, a businessman, because were $20tn in debt. Were gonna go with him because we know what would happen if we in fact elected Hillary Clinton to be president of the United States of America.

Reagan, 71, head of the Reagan Legacy Foundation, nonetheless urged conservatives to move with the times and support the new president. This is the time for Trump; my father had his time in the sun In the world we live in today, Donald Trump would have beaten Ronald Reagan for the nomination of the Republican party. But Ronald Reagan would have beaten Donald Trump in 1980 for the nomination of the Republican party.

Source: http://allofbeer.com/2017/11/03/cpac-conservatives-drink-the-trump-kool-aid-but-who-will-pick-up-the-tab/

from All of Beer https://allofbeer.wordpress.com/2017/11/03/cpac-conservatives-drink-the-trump-kool-aid-but-who-will-pick-up-the-tab/

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We need to talk about culture appropriation: why Lionel Shriver’s speech touched a nerve

Is it OK for white scribes to take on a black spokesperson? The assert that followed the American novelists address in Brisbane has shed new light on one of cultures hottest debates one that has hundreds of years of backstory and has sounded through literature, rap, stone and Hollywood movies

Lionel Shriver knew she was going to annoy beings. Inviting a renowned iconoclast to speak about community and belonging is like expecting a great grey shark to balance a beach ball on its nose, she articulated. She then used her keynote speech at the Brisbane columnists festival to tear into the debate that novelists most particularly grey writers are guilty of cultural appropriation by writing from the point of view of references from other culture backgrounds.

Referring to occurrences in which members of student authority at an American university faced impeachment after attended a tequila party wearing sombreros, and reports of a ban on a Mexican eatery from making out sombreros, the author of We Necessity to Talk About Kevin announced: The moral of the sombrero scandals is clear: youre not supposed to try on other people hats . Yet thats what were paid to time, isnt it? Step into other folks shoes, and try on their hats.

The response was instant. Sudanese-born Australian social activist Yassmin Abdel-Magied, who was attending the event, walked out and then rapidly wrote a comment part which was contended that Shrivers speech was a celebration of the unfettered exploitation of the experiences of others, for the purposes of the guise of fiction.

The argument is one of the most parted yet in a conversation that has a long record across literature, music, arts and rendition. While story might be the catalyst for this discussion, in the eyes of Abdel-Magied and others the issues are deeply rooted in real-world politics and a long history.

The image of the blackface singer creator of 1830s America the lily-white musician decorated up to look like a caricature of an African-American person and play-act comic skits is perhaps the most oft-invoked illustration of culture appropriation from record. The ethnic dynamic of minstrelsy was complex it was performed by African-American and Anglo actors alike but while African-American performers often sought to gain fiscal insurance from these best practices and in some cases use their scaffold to counter negative public stereotypes of themselves, white-hot performers reinforced those stereotypes. This produced within a society which continues to be has not been able to abolished bondage, and in which the political ability dynamic was very much racialized. As the civil right crusade thrived, so did criticism of white people attempting to exploit the pictures and events of people of colour for social and financial gain.

This pattern is recurred of all the countries, particularly in places that experienced colonisation and slavery, such as India, Australia and South Africa. As students, creators, activists and writers of emblazon fought to gain access to mainly grey institutions and public seats, and gained visibility in the cultural globule, they began to criticise the inaccurate images of themselves they construed created by and for the profit of others.

The issue has been heavily explored within the establishments but has reaped momentum in popular culture over the past decade. It underpins criticism of, among other things, Iggy Azaleas sonic blackness, Coldplays myopic construction of India in their music videos, and Miley Cyruss dance moves. Director Cameron Crowe lately apologised for casting Anglo-American actor Emma Stone as a part-Asian reputation in the 2015 movie Aloha not the first time a grey performer has been thrown to play a reputation from a different ethnic background in mainstream cinema. The proof has been assisted particularly by the feminist parish focus on intersectionality crudely the idea that discrimination takes on different forms depending on the hasten, class and/ or gender of the person or persons subject to discrimination.

The charge of culture appropriation is not confined to fiction, but at the moment thats perhaps the most heatedly raced terrain . In March, Harry Potter author JK Rowling was accused of proper the living institution of a marginalised people after a tale produced to her Pottermore website drew upon Navajo narratives about skinwalkers. Shriver herself mentioned the case of vehicles of grey British scribe Chris Cleave, whose novel The Other Hand is partly narrated by the character of a teenage Nigerian girl. In principle, I admire his firmnes, Shriver replied. She then went on to item reviewer Margot Kaminskis concerns that Cleave was manipulating the character, that he ought to be taking special care with representing its own experience that was not his own.

Shriver took aim at the proposal that an scribe should not use a reference they created for the service of a plot they saw. Of trend hes using them for his patch! she suggested. How could he not? They are his personas, to be operated at his caprice, to fulfil whatever purpose he cares to apply them to.

What borderlines around our own lives are we mandated to remain within? questioned Shriver. I would argue that any floor you are able to draw yours is yours to tell, and trying to push the boundaries of the authors its own experience is part of a fiction columnists job.

While it seems obvious that novelists of myth will endeavour to write from perspectives that are not their own, numerous writers of quality bicker there is a direct relationship between certain difficulties they face trying to make headway in the literary industry and the success of grey scribes who illustrate people of colour in their myth and who go on to build a successful literary profession off that. The difference between cultural illustration and cultural rights appropriation, by this logic, lies in the grey novelist telling storeys( and therefore taking producing possibilities) that would be better suited to a novelist of colour.

Some writers argue that it works in reverse, more. In an phenomenon for the Guardian in November last year, Booker Prize-winning author Marlon James told publishers too often pander to the white-hot wife( the majority of members of the book-buying public ), making writers of colouring to do the same. In a Facebook post responding to novelist Claire Vaye Watkins widely circulated essay On Pandering, James used to say the kind of storey favoured by publishers and bestows committees abode suburban white woman in the middle of ennui knowledge keenly observed epiphany pushed columnists of colour into literary conformity for fear of losing out on a journal deal.

Speaking to Guardian Australia, Indigenous Australian author and Miles Franklin winner Kim Scott adds its crucial to listen to the expressions of marginalised people who may not be given enough space to tell their own floors. Fibs are provides; theyre about reform and opening up interior macrocosms in the interests of expanding the shared nature and the common sense of community. So if theres many articulations telling we need more of us addressing our tales, from wherever theyre saying that, then that needs to be listened to.

Omar Musa, the Malaysian-Australian poet, rapper and novelist, told Guardian Australia: There is a history of stereotypes being continued by lily-white the authors and very, exceedingly reductive narrations. Beings are just generally much more cautious of that.

Musa supposes grey scribes should read, support and promote the operational activities of the novelists of emblazon before attempting to encroach on that cavity themselves, if that is something they want to do. But he admits he experiences the issue difficult; the suggestion that writers shouldnt move outside the boundaries of their own experiences comes into direct conflict with what he sees as the purpose of fiction: to empathise with and understand other families lives.

If youre going to write from someone elses perspective, Musa says, its important to shun stereotypes, especially if you want to move the specific characteristics rich and flawed as a good character should be.

Australian columnist Maxine Beneba Clarke. There are two schools of thought about[ culture appropriation] I dont know what the answer is but I can understand both views. Photograph: Nicholas Walton-Healey

Musa has his own experience of writing across the cultural subdivide. His first novel, Here Come The Dogs,was told from the perspective of a reference with a Samoan background. Musa answers consenting criticism is a crucial part of this process: There will be people who will tell you that maybe you didnt quite get this right, and you just have to cop that flack.

Maxine Beneba Clarke is an Australian-based novelist of African-Caribbean descent. Her memoir The Hate Race was prompted by a flow of racial insult; her accumulation of short narratives, Foreign Soil, was published to great acclaim after she won the Victorian Premiers Literary award for anunpublished manuscript in 2013. I think there are two situations in which Ive written outside of the African diaspora, she mentions. In both cases the latter are parts of short fiction and the process of writing them took several years, simply because of that consultation.

Beneba Clarke conceives consultation is all-important, but so is examining your own impulse to write from the perspective of another. What does it mean to be a writer “whos not” national minorities writer and wanting to change your literature? How do you do that? I think that was the opportunity for conversation that was missed[ in Shrivers speech] … How do we feel about writing each others stories and how do we go about it? Whats the respectful practice to go about it?

In some ways it comes down to personal ethics, she answers. Whether you feel you are doing no damage; whether you feel you are doing it sensitively; and, I believe, whether the publisher or the reader been agreed that you have done it sensitively.

Helen Young from the University of Sydney English department speaks fiction can have a very real impact on marginalised people. Individual journals have an impact on individual lives, but representation overall composes a seat and an environment in which people can feel like its OK to be who they are.

The politics of representation is a huge question in the science fiction and fantasy worlds very, speaks Young. This was exemplified by the recent expeditions against a comprehended leftwing bias in the Hugo gifts, in which disgruntled rightwing science fiction and fantasy columnists bickered the awards were being diminished by what the hell is experienced as the tendency of voters to opt studies simply about racial prejudice and exploitation and the like over traditional swashbuckling adventures.

Referring to the JK Rowling occurrence, Young suggests precisely because imagination is often to be considered as escapist, doesnt symbolize those stories dont stuff, or that authors should not treat different sources of their brainchild with respect. Theyre still the lived, hallowed narrations of living cultures, she supposes. Theyre the beliefs of real parties. So if from a western view you go, oh well, its just myth, I can do whatever I like with it, thats a problem.

Kate Grenville said she find writing Indigenous attributes was beyond her when she wrote The Secret River. Image: Sarah Lee for the Guardian

In some respects, the dirt seems to be changing. When Kate Grenville wrote her highly acclaimed historic romance about colonial Australia, The Secret River, in 2005, she shunned writing from the standpoint of Indigenous characters because she felt it was beyond her. Speaking to Ramona Koval on ABC radio, she alleged: What I didnt want to do was step into the heads of any of the Aboriginal attributes. I think that kind of appropriation … theres been too much of that in our writing. In her tale The Lieutenant, the sequel to The Secret River, nonetheless, Grenville did go into outlining more rounded Indigenous reputations, but only after deep and careful involvement with the historical records upon which her characters were based.

All the writers who spoke to Guardian Australia say they believe that considering the question of cultural appropriation is decisive, but the tenor of that discussion matters. They say that making a mockery of marginalised peoples concerns about image and appropriation does not constitute a constructive debate.

Scott, who has previously suggested a postponement on grey columnists used to describe Indigenous Australia, speaks lily-white columnists could use fiction itself to explore the tension about representation. Even the desire to occupy the consciousness of the other, that can be explored in story.

For Musa, the transformation needs to go beyond volumes: You probably cant have a change in literary culture without a change in the whole culture of the two countries, he says.

On the question of progress, in Australia at least, Beneba Clarke replies: “Theres” two institutions of was just thinking about this: that Australian literature is not diverse enough for Anglo-Australian novelists to be even considering writing from other cultures, and the other school of thought is, well, how do we change literature then, given that most of our writers are Anglo-Australian? Are we locking ourselves into an inevitably whitewashed world of literature?

And I dont really subscribe to either thought; I dont know what the answer is but I can understand both positions. But I think what I perfectly cant understand is disregard for any kind of consultation and an inability to understand when people of colour are outraged.

Such articles has been amended to clarify that the Hugo awardings are voted on by the public.

Read more: www.theguardian.com

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