It’s fairly easy to dismiss the ravings of self-proclaimed “neuroscientist” and failed radio host Janeane Garofalo, even when she self-demotes from scientist to mere psychologist holding forth on the “self-loathing” of Michael Steele and non-leftist women as suffering from the “Stockholm syndrome”.
(I confess distraction when watching her, I keep wondering what year she gave up soap and shampoo for Lent and never stopped. But I digress …)
But the meme that somehow conservatives, libertarians — indeed, all free market advocates — are delusional, mentally ill reprobates, now attempts to gain intellectual cachet. Harvard Law School purports to hold a conference on examining “The Free Market Mindset:
History, Psychology, and Consequencesâ€. A review of the schedule is chilling:
10:10 – 10:35: Bernard Harcourt, “ Neoliberal Penality: The Birth of Natural Order, the Illusion of Free Marketsâ€: [...] By relegating the state to the margins of the market and giving it free rein there and there alone, the idea of natural order facilitated the unrestrained expansion of the penal sphere. It gave birth to our modern form of neoliberal penality. In this presentation, I will trace a genealogy of neoliberal penality and explore the effects it has had in the field of crime and punishment specifically, and in the area of economy and society more generally.11:05 – 11:30: Stephen Marglin, “ How Thinking Like an Economist Undermines Communityâ€: [...] If your model of the world is inhabited by self-interested individuals rationally calculating how to consume ever more, for whom society is the nation-state, community is not going to show up on your radar. It goes without saying that economic hardship, especially the kind caused by unemployment and short hours, will make community more necessary and more visible; people will have to rely on each other more and more as the market fails them. It remains to be seen what impact this dose of reality will have on economics.
11:35 – 12:00: Juliet Schor, “ Colossal Failure: The Output Bias of Market Economiesâ€:
Mainstream economic theory claims that a competitive market equilibrium delivers optimal levels of consumption and well-being. The reasoning relies on a number of invalid assumptions, including the crucial premise that individuals’ preference structures are independent. If consumption is social, as considerable social science research shows, then the market delivers excessive levels of consumption, too many hours of work, and too much ecological degradation.2:35 – 3:00: Jaime Napier, “ The Palliative Function of Ideologyâ€:
In this research, we drew on system-justification theory and the notion that conservative ideology serves a palliative function to explain why conservatives are happier than liberals. Specifically, in three studies using nationally representative data from the United States and nine additional countries, we found that right-wing (vs. left-wing) orientation is indeed associated with greater subjective well-being and that the relation between political orientation and subjective well-being is mediated by the rationalization of inequality.3:05 – 3:30: Barry Schwartz, “ Addicted to Incentives: How the Ideology of Self Interest Can Be Self-Fulfillingâ€: [...] In this talk, I will argue that the reductive appeal to self-interest as the master human motive is a false description of human nature. At the same time, it can become a true description if people live in a world in which incentives are presumed to explain everything and are used to produce the behavior we want. Just as people can become addicted to heroin, they can become addicted to incentives. Looking at modern American society as it is gives us a picture of what people can be, but not of what they must be.
Understand, stupid people? Free will is an illusion, morality a sop, and values as ephemeral as an Obama campaign promise. The intellectuals are ascending as due their proper role as leaders and controllers of those whose modest brain power regulates them to servitude (with the proper amount of politically/environmentally correct bread and circuses).
Feudalism is not just for renaissance faires anymore.
(h/t Daniel Mitchell)
Comment by B Moe on 2/28 @ 12:18 am #
I wonder how much acid Barry Schwartz had to eat to attain that station in life.
Comment by Jeffersonian on 2/28 @ 12:18 am #
If there was an ounce of honesty left at Hahvahd, each and every one of these sessions would be subtitled, “The Care and Feeding of Human Cattle.”
Comment by pdbuttons on 2/28 @ 12:28 am #
my sis’ [i'm so proud of her]
is a harvard proffesor
she’s normal
when we argue[?] she always says “i don’t give a fuck”
she’s a fricking genuis!
Comment by happyfeet on 2/28 @ 12:34 am #
Here’s a little more on what Jaime Napier is all about.
Comment by maggie katzen on 2/28 @ 12:47 am #
happiness is soooo overrated.
Comment by Dash Rendar on 2/28 @ 12:52 am #
O, Barry Schwartz. I had a seminar with that guy one time in the way back frehsmen seminar days. He assigned a book ‘The American Paradox’ wherein their was no real paradox and he like to talk about his daughter and how he didn’t much care for her boyfriend. And he wore shorts and high white athletic socks to class like an uberdork.
Comment by Dash Rendar on 2/28 @ 12:56 am #
Whoosh. Typin’ like I just ate some acid myself.
Comment by moviegique on 2/28 @ 1:05 am #
Oh! Well, that’s a relief. Glad we got that all sorted out.
Comment by Adriane on 2/28 @ 1:07 am #
I am wondering … other than the barbed wire and the fire hoses … how is this any different from Plato, (Socrates?) describing those looking at shadows on the wall but never turning to see the fire.
Or the Catholic Church designation of Envy as one of the 7 deadly sins …
Comment by Joe on 2/28 @ 2:37 am #
The camps will be worse than you ever imagine. You get drunk and wake up naked in bed with Janeane Garofalo. And the experience has been taped and sent to everyone you know and put on YouTube.
Comment by router on 2/28 @ 6:19 am #
Liberal Fascism
page 228
Comment by Challeron on 2/28 @ 6:43 am #
Actually, free will is an illusion (but that’s a whole different subject); but that conservative happiness is mediated by the rationalization of inequality? And here I always thought that conservatives were happier because we have a belief that I can succeed; something about a story where a Liberal and a Conservative are looking at a mansion on a hill, and the Liberal says to himself, “Some day I’m gonna get the guy who lives in that mansion”, and the Conservative says to himself, “Some day I’m gonna be the guy who lives in that mansion.”
But, whadda I know?…
Comment by B Moe on 2/28 @ 7:16 am #
Somebody smarter than me said what we need is envy without malice. I can’t remember who it was.
Comment by Rusty on 2/28 @ 7:18 am #
“Actually, free will is an illusion.” Wait right there while I get my 2×4.
I think we’re happier because maybe we understand the basic economics of human nature and are therefore not frustrated trying to get people to do and think things they aren’t predisposed to do or think. Or something along those lines anyway.
Comment by router on 2/28 @ 7:22 am #
Janeane Garofalo i hope she’s part of the body count on 24
Comment by Dan Collins on 2/28 @ 7:37 am #
Here’s more SCIENCE! Just about the flimsiest POS I’ve ever seen. Could it be that folks in more conservative areas of the country buy their porn online because they can’t walk to the corner to get it?
Comment by B Moe on 2/28 @ 7:39 am #
Most Progressives just use a mirror, Dan.
Comment by McGehee on 2/28 @ 9:12 am #
And the syllabus? It’s a cookbook.
Comment by Jeffersonian on 2/28 @ 9:19 am #
And the syllabus? It’s a cookbook.
Wait…it’s all coming together now…John Kerry?
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 9:40 am #
You see, this is why I need to form that Corporation for NFA goodies and buy that sweet M203 grenade launcher what for to slap beneath the handguard on my trusty Colt 6920. I reckon that if William Wallace had one of those puppies, us fellers would be going to work in them fancy plaid skirts everyday.
Comment by cranky-d on 2/28 @ 9:47 am #
Pay for pron? I guess someone somewhere has to.
Comment by happyfeet on 2/28 @ 9:49 am #
Michael Steele should hate himself cause of he is stupid and overrated and a pitiful affirmative action hire.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 10:27 am #
“Michael Steele should hate himself cause of he is stupid and overrated and a pitiful affirmative action hire.”
Well, that’s the thing, Happy – he’s not a “hire.” He was elected to be the public face of the party. If being black helps him do that, so be it.
Comment by Sdferr on 2/28 @ 10:47 am #
Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism, Part II, Eight: Continental Imperialism: the Pan-Movements, iii. Party and Movement
Comment by Darleen on 2/28 @ 11:05 am #
meya
can you link to any ostensibly prestigious university offering conferences examining Socialism/Communism/Collectivism as a mental illness?
thank you.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 11:28 am #
“That’s just popular mythology without any intellectual rigor.”
Well, if we can’t figure that an ideology resting upon so many human bones approaches pathology, it ain’t for lack of rigor.
Comment by Spies, Brigands, and Pirates on 2/28 @ 11:31 am #
Well, if we can’t figure that an ideology resting upon so many human bones approaches pathology, it ain’t for lack of rigor.
Indeed.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 11:34 am #
Methinks meya figures it will be different this time, with a charismatic leader in charge, that is.
Comment by Spies, Brigands, and Pirates on 2/28 @ 11:39 am #
That’s a common delusion, Alec.
The “intellectuals” always think that they’re going to be the ones in charge of the Brave New World.
Never occurs to ‘em that a system that rewards ruthless powerseeking will inevitably fall into the hands of the most ruthless and powerhungry.
The peasants and workers suffer tremendously under one of meya’s Dream Governments, to be sure, but it’s always the “intellectual” class that gets rounded up and sent to the camps first.
Let’s hope SFG doesn’t wind up learning that lesson the hard way.
Comment by Jeff G. on 2/28 @ 11:40 am #
There is plenty of rigor, meya. Like, 125 million or so, I think it’s been.
Comment by Adriane on 2/28 @ 11:42 am #
Dang, SBP, that is quite a list.
(I was expecting a link to maybe a Cambodian photograph …)
Comment by Spies, Brigands, and Pirates on 2/28 @ 11:43 am #
He has photographs, too, Ariadne.
I recommend that whole site to anyone who believes in the perfectibility of the human race by means of government.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 11:50 am #
Nah – meya thinks The Rape of Nan-King happened when a fraternity brother slept with some visiting coed from Long Island after she totally did like three shots of Goldschlager, and he should have known better, and when she saw him the next day he was like not as hot as she thought.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 12:16 pm #
Our saving grace is that the Obama goon squads will consist of his followers, who can typically be divided into two camps – the first, which can’t consistently roll out of bed before 11:00 A.M., and the second, which can’t competently operate any instrument or machinery without touch control and a coverflow function. There is much overlap between the two. History’s previous goon squads had the distinct advantage of not requiring periodic hackey-sack breaks or cutting the day of marauding short to watch 106 & Park.
Comment by happyfeet on 2/28 @ 12:24 pm #
Well, that’s the thing, Happy – he’s not a “hire.†He was elected to be the public face of the party. If being black helps him do that, so be it.
Michael Steele was elected to be the public face of the party. He won 91 votes out of a possible 168, making him the public face of the Republican party.
Last I checked Suzie and Lympia and even droopy diseased Arlen were still very much standing. Feckless twat.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 12:30 pm #
I suspect that one useful method to break up an Obama goon squad would be to have someone run down the street and scream that a Mortgage truck just fell over and spilled a whole bunch of Mortgages all over the next street and that the cops aren’t there yet.
Comment by meya on 2/28 @ 12:31 pm #
“There is plenty of rigor, meya. Like, 125 million or so, I think it’s
been.”
Yeah Michael Savage wrote a book about it!
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 12:38 pm #
“Yeah Michael Savage wrote a book about it!”
Michael Savage also believes that the sky is blue, ice cream is cold, and due North gets you to the Arctic. These must be false as well?
Comment by Jeffersonian on 2/28 @ 1:34 pm #
Yeah Michael Savage wrote a book about it!
So did Stephane Courtois, a former liberal in a hurry.
Comment by meya on 2/28 @ 2:04 pm #
“Michael Savage also believes that the sky is blue, ice cream is cold, and due North gets you to the Arctic. These must be false as well?”
The guy knows his shit:
http://www.amazon.com/Liberalism-Mental-Disorder-Savage-Solutions/dp/1595550062/
Comment by Jamie on 2/28 @ 2:06 pm #
I’m looking at the second talk, “How Thinking Like an Economist Undermines Community,” and chortling to myself that that guy, at any rate, has ceded the premises to conservatism. He seems to take it as given that “economists,” by which he seems to mean free-market economists in the Freidman/Hayek mold rather than, say, Keynes and his “government intervention, as long as the government comprises our sorts of people and the time is just-so, is a societal and economic good,” are right about markets and behavior. Otherwise he wouldn’t set up the dichotomy between “economists” and “community” – since it’s indubitable that community is one important thing that economists are interested in. He just doesn’t like the free-marketeers’ conclusions about how communities can usually be relied on to act, that’s all.
And the “addicted to ideologies” guy? Heinlein put him away a long time ago in his indictment of “altruism” and his clear explanation of what “altruistic” behavior actually is: someone’s deciding that it gives him more pleasure, satisfaction, or what-have-you that’s of value to that person, to do a (which has the appearance of an altruistic act) rather than b. I give to my church and to charity not because I think I should (but don’t actually want to) but because giving affords me more satisfaction than not giving, for reasons that really aren’t the business of anyone outside my own head. Anyone who claims to do something “contrary to self-interest” and out of “altruism,” Heinlein said, needs to examine his motives carefully.
Comment by Alec Leamas on 2/28 @ 2:08 pm #
For the record, I believe that Dr. Savage is a peerless talent akin to a muscularly bourgeois modern version of Voltaire.
Comment by pdbuttons on 2/28 @ 2:11 pm #
to serve man
cookbook?
a quarter teaspoon of nutmeg in your root veggies[spinach is good]
i’m sooo gay
toodles!
Comment by meya on 2/28 @ 2:53 pm #
“I’m looking at the second talk, “How Thinking Like an Economist Undermines Community,†and chortling to myself that that guy, at any rate, has ceded the premises to conservatism. He seems to take it as given that “economists,†by which he seems to mean free-market economists in the Freidman/Hayek mold rather than, say, Keynes and his “government intervention, as long as the government comprises our sorts of people and the time is just-so, is a societal and economic good,†are right about markets and behavior”
That one struck me as the least directed to a particular ideology. Even keynes assumes that people are rational economic actors seeking to increase their consumption — which is often a shorthand for utility.
Comment by happyfeet on 2/28 @ 3:20 pm #
Marglin is on the executive board of this socialist propaganda combine. Here is one of their concerns what is surely not really all that much directed to a particular ideology.
Comment by Stephanie on 2/28 @ 3:27 pm #
How can advertising best be regulated?
Snort… limiting free speech rights? Yep. And I’m sure he’s got ideas on viral marketing too, NOT!!! Like anyone could control the free exchange of ideas… they might try but outlaw is so very… outlawish.
Pingback by Common Sense Political Thought » Blog Archive » Line of the Day . . . on 2/28 @ 4:04 pm #
[...] . . even though she actually wrote it yesterday. From Darleen Click of Protein Wisdom: I confess distraction when watching (Janeane Garofalo), I keep wondering what year she gave up [...]
Comment by Jeff G. on 2/28 @ 9:45 pm #
I think meya looked at her argument, then got all embarrassed by her earlier having brought up rigor and went to get herself a soothing pedicure.
Comment by Chris S. on 3/1 @ 3:48 pm #
I could actually somewhat go along with this:
“ Neoliberal Penality: The Birth of Natural Order, the Illusion of Free Marketsâ€: [...] By relegating the state to the margins of the market and giving it free rein there and there alone, the idea of natural order facilitated the unrestrained expansion of the penal sphere. It gave birth to our modern form of neoliberal penality. In this presentation, I will trace a genealogy of neoliberal penality and explore the effects it has had in the field of crime and punishment specifically, and in the area of economy and society more generally.
…because I’d rather have the government run the prisons that it sends convicts to.
When I read this, however:
“Colossal Failure: The Output Bias of Market Economiesâ€:
If consumption is social, as considerable social science research shows, then the market delivers excessive levels of consumption, too many hours of work, and too much ecological degradation.
… I almost spit at my screen.
“…as considerable social science research shows”
Can we please drop the word “science” from this bullshit and at least call it “Sociology”?? (Or can we at least start requiring 2 more laboratory [hard!] science courses for these frickin’ social fucking “science” majors??)