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Grant Smith's avatar

Thank you for the insightful and thought-provoking essay. I have a deep conviction that hypocrisy necessarily produces nasty second and third order effects, which is why I consider it inherently immoral/evil. Most people I discuss this with find it persuasive, but only to a point. I think at some level people don't want to let go of the efficient self-deception that the hypocrisy they allow themselves and others poses an existential threat to civilization if it crosses some decisive point. Everyone with a modicum of self-awareness and life experience knows Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's quote "The line separating good and evil runs not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either - but right through every human heart" touches upon a deep truth. There are a lot of ways to frame this, but my current favorite relates to two competing psychological theories regarding what drives us, the hierometer and sociometer theories. Are we driven to ascend in a zero-sum status hierarchy, or are we driven to belong? I think there is a distinct balance in every given person, because these are, to an extent, oppositional drives that we all experience. Emotions like jealousy make it impossible to optimize for getting along with everyone around you while simultaneously prioritizing getting ahead. Having a smaller community where you're sure you belong while operating in a larger society mercilessly striving to get ahead in seems to be a way of hacking this paradox, but living such a strategy isn't without cost. This only amplifies the jealousy and resentment of those you're getting ahead of, especially if you have the temerity to gloat about how thrilled you are to belong within your segregated community. While it is most tempting to believe if you are the beneficiary of such an arrangement, there is no way to hack this balance of striving and belonging without undoing the underlying fabric of the civilization we all share in. Hopefully this is a simple enough point that people can come to understand it en masse and we can avoid the terrible futures you describe.

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Daniel D's avatar

This is excellent, nuanced, and as comprehensive an overview of this critically important issue as could realistically be done in a single post. Well done!

There is one thing that I question: whether Christianity really could have been intentionally engineered like a psyop against the Roman empire. I admit, when framed a certain way, it does appear to be the case. However, it ascribes to the Jewish elites of that era a godlike level of foresight and sophistication that seems too incredible to believe. That, in turn, leads me back to a question that no longer seems as absurd to me as it once did: what if the esoteric inner circle of ancient Jewry, the British royal family, the Chinese Communist Party, and the modern-day central bankster cabal are themselves merely the useful idiot junior partners of some superhuman dark spiritual power? The way this cabal so adroitly manipulated modern geopolitics to its advantage, expertly playing both sides of various conflicts, speaks to an intelligence and will that frankly seem to me to be beyond what even the smartest and most committed humans are capable of, on their own.

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