Still pointing fingers. Still ideological. Still playing into culture wars. Still the same old us vs them horseshit let’s be real. And still shaming. No, this is not in any way groundbreaking or even thoughtful.
Me too. I was really disappointed, I came to Iain through the Stoa movement and this is such a thin, partisan, strawman argument. you literally write the same article from the pov of alt-right violence. I guess it shows that even intelligent people can have strong cognitive bias when in an emotionally charged setting. Its such an unskillful article and a unproductive time to share it.
This Is a culture war, Josh. It Is ideologically based on stark differences in what we believe is real and true and good. Just as someone’s useless horseshit is someone else’s fertilizer, the good doctor is merely sharing an analysis of the cult mindset that may have infected the alleged perpetrator of Charlie Kirk’s killing last week. And, yes! Let’s be real! Her thoughts may help some of us to understand the motive behind an innocent man’s death by gun. This isn’t about understanding the alleged shooter’s existential anxiety about explaining to his old man why he stole grampa’s rifle. This is about hating and snuffing out the life of a stranger because you don’t like (hate?)what he has to say. What sideline do you think you’ve found where you can sling spoiled twaddle with impunity? Get real, indeed.
If it’s a culture war I’m a conscientious objector. I refuse to participate in any of these so called ideological mindsets. The use of the word progressive to prove a point is exactly the same as what the other side has done. As I said, what’s horseshit is the us vs them narrative that both sides perpetrate. What surprises me the most is not what “the good doctor” says but that McGilchrist supports this post. Essentially this has become the George Floyd moment for the right except that Floyd was killed on video by someone within the system and it’s completely unclear who killed Kirk, at least as of today despite all the theories bouncing around. What would have been interesting to read is a purely neutral analysis, one that examines both sides and comes to a conclusion that we have clearly lost any real grasp of mental and perceptual sovereignty. I follow McGilchrist’s work precisely because of his non partisan approach to describing how the bicameral mind works for us Homo sapiens sapiens but he now seems to be slanting his way into a rather murky hemisphere, succumbing to an algorithmic sinkhole called confirmation bias like most of us saps.
Sorry Josh. I’m not Charlie Kirk although I greatly admire his forebearing and humility. You are free not to participate, although I’m glad you are. We humans are value-laden as you demonstrate. We have an innate sense of right, wrong, better, worse, useful, bad, good, … We have judgement. Comes with the human mind don’t you know. We want to understand one another. We want to learn from one another. But some of us want to control others, and when you add power to that heady mix, bad things can happen. Why do some of us fall into ways of thinking and feeling and acting that do harm to themselves and other people?? These are important questions, Josh, and I think it’s better to try to understand before we act.
The realm of ideas that Dr. McGilchrist investigates for his and our benefit, investigation that you seem to admire, is not value free. There is no such thing as a neutral analysis coming from a human. We are flawed and inadequate, every last one. There have been rare exceptions to this rule, but, being human, that is debatable. Life ought to be a humbling experience. I didn’t learn how humbling until very late. My hope for you is that you learn this sooner. Have a good life my friend.
Having seen the Hannah Spier piece, I suspect Iain may have agreed to converse with the other author without knowing too much about their other writings. I could be wrong, I’d be interested to hear his thoughts about the Planet Critical Charlie Kirk piece
I'm in the middle of watching that YouTube interview; started it last night and was planning to finish it today. I am stunned at what she says in her Substack post about Charlie Kirk and his death. I cannot imagine Iain knew in that interview that he was talking to a committed nihilist. I've never read such a twisted exoneration of evil as a moral good. Feeling gobsmacked.
To be clear, even if he knew her philosophical position going into the interview, I don't think it was wrong on Iain's part to agree to it. But it pains me to see his work cited in service of such a grossly anti-human argument. And I really can't fathom how she could read and love The Master and His Emissary and yet somehow completely miss the fact that her worldview is steeped in the Godless delusion of left hemisphere thinking. Yikes.
Oh my, no! Spier is completely sane and on point. I think you maybe missed the discussion earlier in this thread about the Planet Critical author who interviewed Iain. She wrote an amoral essay about Kirk's expendability as a human. Here's the link:
Well Josh, another name for finger pointing is accountability- a cornerstone of any functional society. Something that the left refuses to take- as evidenced by these tone deaf comments.
Josh Liveright you are pathetic. Your page is filled with the most generic progressive activism—telltale signs of someone deeply immersed in and committed to the worldview discussed in the article. No wonder you reacted so strongly to it. You have no leg to stand on. You are another emotionally incontinent adult incapable of critical evaluation of his own position. Stop scapegoating those who call to attention what is self-evident to so many. You lack self-awareness.
There is no unity or benefit of the doubt anymore with people who openly applaud political murder. We all saw it, we saw mildly left wing, mostly apolitical people suddenly emerge into a blood orgy. There’s no unseeing it, there’s no more acting like this is normal or both-sided. One side is much more likely than the other to applaud political murder. That’s just how it is, and you cannot fault us for noticing it, fault your comrades for acting like animals
same Jewish problem as ever. covert operations for mind control. they put Charlie Kirk in for divide and conquer, as a counterpoint to the new woke agenda that the same Jews also empowered. they control both sides. THIS is real reporting right here : https://substack.com/home/post/p-173468890
This piece is full of misinformation and conjecture. It’s more fuel on the partisan, culture war insanity. Please research more carefully before sharing.
When you level an accusation of misinformation have the decency to give a specific example. Your comment is baseless slander. Baseless slander is what leads to impressionable youths murdering innocent activists. Please research more carefully before posting.
lots of falsified info in this post. for example, none of the slogans on the bullets were antifascist - they were all gamer lingo, groyper meme language from far-right wing and video game culture.
I noticed that too, after reading the first-hand accounts from his friend explaining the gamer quotes.
This post is a little too passionate for my taste. I believe the main point is somewhat valid, but knowing about a few of the references prior, the common thread is exaggerated. Cancel culture is on the rise no matter “the side”.
Deployed in antifascist earnestness. Some lefties like video games too. His texts show he ‘had enough of his hatred”. The idea that he killed Kirk for not being right wing enough is close to absurd on its face. It is such a reach that it speaks to a need to maintain a pristine self image and disown accountability for the incessant inflammatory rhetoric about punching ‘Nazi’s’, justifying riots etc etc.
No this is just either ignorant or willfully ignorant. Your boy charlie was killed by a far right groyper who thought charlie wasn’t fascist enough. Stop yelling at clouds.
What was the hate that he had had enough of? What was the hate that he couldn’t negotiate with? > The text messages. You think this Groyper thought Charlie was too full of hate? Make that make sense. Obvs he was mad that he thought Charlie was down on trans people. You already look silly to those who know but yes, soon you will feel very daft for stringing together some shoddy points to go against the obvious.
I suppose when your fellow conservatives turn on you, as all fascism eventually does turn on their own, you can rest well blaming “the left” or black people or trans people or the muppets or space aliens or anyone other than taking a real honest look at your own ideology and its inevitable implications.
Groypers, operaters, femcels , all connected and part of far right wing subcultures. You have no clue and are uneducated. But sure, “pity” ppl who are smarter than you who put in the work to be educated.
You mean those clearly manufactured text messages? Ok, fellow kid. I would like to explain my plan in full sentences as if i am a character in a bad novel. This is definitely not corruption.
Thank you...exactly. Rather than complete blame for 'progressivism' - how about the effect of on-line culture that substituted for real world relationships? Loneliness seemed to me a huge feature in Robinson's psychology.
One knows immediately this piece is ideologically driven when the writer claims Tyler Robinson's family is "wholesome." There is literally no way to know this.
This would be disturbing from anyone, but especially a medical doctor with a psychiatric background.
I was baffled and curious so I went to her podcast and read the “about” page. She writes: “Her distinctive perspective, shaped by her personal journey from a modern career woman to a conservative stay-at-home mom, coupled with her extensive psychological and medical knowledge, offers a truly unique approach to the issues at hand.”
She is a stay at home mum compulsively trawling the internet to inspire think-pieces about how bad progressive politics is. This, for me, undermines her message because, frankly, she comes across as bored. She fortifies her bias with psychological analysis. She is, like just about everyone writing on Substack, interesting on some things and flawed on others.
Or scrap the whole democracy experiment by starving the Administrative State as of it were a 10 headed dragon. That is what the takeover of the GOP is in the process of doing while we are pitted against one another. The murder of Charlie Kirk aside, did you ever notice that there is one scripted outrage of distraction after another? 🤔
I’d love to share this with my indoctrinated friends, if only there was more to say on the woke right as well as the woke left. I agree wholeheartedly with everything, just wish it was more balanced.
What's really disappointing about this, is that I really want to have respect for my elders - people like Iain - who have done really good work in their field of expertise, and I really don't want to see them becoming 'grumpy old anti-woke men' just because they happen to not have any real experience of youth culture, and what's happening in it right now.
I saw the exact same thing with Terry Gilliam, who is an AMAZING filmmaker and illustrator from Monty Python, who I really respect, but who couldn't help himself but start ranting about woke culture, and how you 'can't say anything any more'. I really wanted to sit Terry down and say, 'hey Terry, you've done amazing things in this world, but your political identity was forged like 40 years ago, at a different time, so just chill the fuck out and let the youth go through that same process themselves. Don't feel judged by it. You've done great things'.
I want to say the same to Iain. I really don't want to lose respect for you by seeing you post this half-assed anti-woke stuff that we've heard a thousand times before from every social conservative. I understand that maybe you as a person feels a bit out-of-sync with that youth culture, but just chill out, and let them do their thing
I really don't want to see them becoming 'grumpy old anti-woke men' just because they happen to not have any real experience of youth culture
Growing up in the 90s, I was effectively a poster child for the Left (broken family, extreme bullying, too cool for anything) — I could post pictures that look like they were taken yesterday (purple hair and all)… and even I was “anti-woke” before “woke” was even a thing. I saw it coming a mile away. It’s not just for “old grumpy men”.
Let them do their thing? When their thing leans into evil, suicidal empathy, victim worship, and societal self-destruction? Woke is not new. The underlying psychopathy is thousands of years old. It’s also not a “youth” thing. They are indoctrinated into the cult by hoards of adults who judge the past based on a fictional utopian future. Note this cult has been funded by our enemies, foreign and domestic.
Sadly, we are likely all going to learn the hard way what happens when an enough people in a society can no longer discern right from wrong. What’s to be done? Not much I’m afraid. The subversion has reached a point where it is self-sustaining.
Some “old people” have more “lived experience” and were raised in a time prior to the great subversion and so some of us can recognize patterns most “youth cannot yet perceive.
Recognize that Hanna’s essay was a bit black and white. The “cult” i.e., secular progressive religion, is not homogeneous. It exists in degrees in people of all ages. People’s inability to recognize or discern evil is in part a bi-product of the West’s never before experienced levels of comfort and safety. It’s cliche but true - hard time make hard men. Hard men make good times. Good times make weak men. Weak men make hard times. Feel free to correct my problematic usage of the word “men”.
I pray that it’s not too late to right our cultural ship. But I doubt it will happen. Evil eats its own. Hopefully you won’t be dinner.
I mean, maybe you should just consider the fact that they're different to you. I grew up in a structurally racist Christian conservative state, and there were a bunch of people who liked that - it made them feel tethered and safe - but I experienced it as a terrible close-minded, even fascist, reality. I'd take woke youth culture a thousand times before I took apartheid South Africa again.
So, rather than lamenting the evil of the youth, maybe you should just recognise the fact that humans experience the same reality differently to each other, because there is no way in hell you'll ever be able to eradicate this thing you hate
Thank you very much for taking the time to read what I wrote.
I don’t hate, that is self-destructive. My wife and I too struggled with organized religion for much of our lives and turned away from it in our late teens and twenties. We had to because it became unhealthy for us. We have come back now older and wiser.
It seems you skipped some parts of my comment. I don’t blame our youth. I do lament evil. Belief is the most powerful force on the planet. Thing is that reality is only partially socially constructed. There is a tentative objective reality. And reality always wins over the utopias humans so often seek to construct.
My advice to you is study the past objectively. Research woke post-modernist philosophy. Trace its roots. Understand the historical fruit of that tree. You will likely come out seeing reality differently. Fingers crossed and thanks for your time.
Different isn't always an improvement. One of the reasons not to trust the youth is their lack of life experience makes them not realize that.
Progressives tend to believe change is always good. But as C.S. Lewis said, "when you're on the wrong road, the most progressive man is the one who turns around first."
Unfortunately woke is not just a culture war or young kids doing their thing. It’s been a direct attack on secular society and the separation of church and state because it is a faith based religion that has captured our institutions in dangerous ways. Universities have become ideological factories where critical thinking and knowledge has gone to die. (See the grievance studies affair) the pseudo science of gender medicine has been a nightmare of harm. Gay rights women’s rights and children’s rights have been trampled on by a neo religion that demands submission and compliance- or else. It’s dangerous.
This is hyperbole. It's also naive to imagine that other forms of secular culture are not full of religious dynamics. Every cultural movement throughout time has religious dynamics, including the anti-woke community
Yes that's right. But again, it's not culture. It's the secular institutions of academia, medicine and law. And we must seek to remove religion from our institutions, including christianity. and especially those that normalize the abuse and harm of children.
Well the Trump government is doing their best to install a far more powerful and conservative religion into academia of course. It's back to my childhood in Christian nationalist South Africa, with academic institutions as means to indoctrinate people into a form of conservatism that's deeply harmful to the human spirit. But hey, I'm probably just suffering from the woke mind virus
Unfortunately, letting them do their thing as you put it meant being cancelled in the case of Terry Gilliam. His production of Into the Woods was literally cancelled because “people’s thing” was feeling “unsafe” and deciding to try and censor one of the leading artists in this or any other generation. Letting the youth do their thing sounds reasonable and easy going but when that means censoring art and killing people its just not OK.
Wow, Iain. This person has bought wholesale a big pile of excrement and propaganda. She has failed to do the most elementary analysis of a government narrative. There's a whole lot of lack of nuance and just plain falsehood in her basic story of what happened.
This is an interesting analysis, granting the reliance on generalisations which short articles require - but it applies equally to those who join far-Right groups such as White Supremacists, Neo-Nazis, Incels, Groypers, Christian Nationalists and the rest. It is not just the 'progressive storyline' but the storyline of every cultish group. Substitute 'immigrants, women, liberals, people of colour' etc. as those to blame, and defence of 'White', 'American', 'Christian' and associated values as those to promote, and the analysis fits perfectly. Moreover, it would seem that whereas rhetoric by those on the more vigorous margin of progressive views might consist in calls for otherings and cancellings, no-platforming and in-group allegiance, so far the actual guns have been toted and fired almost exclusively by those on the far Right of the spectrum. May I suggest a reading of Dr Julie Ebner (Oxford University research group on extremism) 'Going Mainstream'. The suggestion that Charlie Kirk was murdered by someone influenced by the anti-Kirk (because even further to the Right than he) Groyper outlook is not without plausibility. Alas, that matters have come to this. And alas too that the label 'progressive', which to my ear chiefly denotes those wedded to aspirations for a fair, inclusive, tolerant and decent society where human rights, civil liberties and peaceful democratic processes constitute the norm, is associated in this way with the kind of cultism that genuine extremist and fundamentalist groups display. It's parallel to saying that 'conservative' automatically denotes far-Right cultism. A more accurate nomenclature for extremists on both wings would do better.
Thanks for wading in. The problem is that this comment thread (which is much more humane than most on social media) confirms the perspective bias that leftists are angry, judgemental and quick to cancel, while conservatives are calm and rational. I can hear Iain saying, 'People on the right are much more open-minded than people on the left!'
Iain's inability to read the bias and conjecture in this article makes me question his whole project.
Since you are so concerned with balance I wonder why you don’t refer to a far-Left but rather euphemistically refer to “the more vigorous margins of progressive views.” Or can we please have ‘the more vigorous margins of conservative views’ instead of ‘far Right’, which is used with hideous and inappropriate abandon in the media now.
I strongly agree. The challenge is extremism and radicalisation that can happen with *any* ideology. Ironically the pattern is pretty much the same regardless of cult and the triggers are psychological. This has been studies and documented rigorously which is why I was so dissapointed with this as its so thin. You could literally 'find and replace' any key ideoloogy and replace it with another. I strongly recommend the work of Deeya Kahan who has made a number of documentaries interviewing everyone from Radical Islam through to White supremacist listening without judgement on how they got into the movements and what triggered them to act - https://deeyah.com/documentary-films-by-deeyah-khan/ Also the work of Joshua Citarella and his research of Gen Z radical online subcultures https://donotresearch.substack.com/p/joshua-citarella-how-to-plant-a-meme
Wonderful analysis. Thank you for writing this, despite likely being ostracized for doing so. We are increasingly held hostage by a very persistent and not-so-tolerant minority. We need articles like this to unsee our increasingly questionable narratives that define our societies and ourselves.
These situations are like a rorschach test for your own bias. Watching the narratives blaming political/ideological extremes is very revealing. However, there is an extreme that is a commonality across many of the awful shootings. It is not that they are extreme progressives or extreme right wingers. The commonality that they are all extremely online. (and yes...that is my bias...I think the digital mediation of human experience is deeply problematic).
Such a disappointment, Iain! So one-sided which I didn't see as the crux of your work.
I'm a contemplative practice teacher who works in spaces across the political spectrum. I've been following Charlie Kirk for some time now and found his vision of Christianity narrow and one-sided.
Prior to his death, I was writing a piece on the difference between Christian nationalism and the transformation of the heart called forth by Jesus and those who followed in his path as exemplars of his teaching.
Your work on the right side of the brain as Master is extremely supportive for contemplative teachers because contemplation invites us into Wholeness and forces us out of our reactive, predictable left brained mental habit.
Yet you share a piece where Hannah places the blame firmly at the feet of the left without articulating some of the alarming right wing and highly reactive people and spaces like Groyper and Trumpism.
There's plenty of blame to go around and we don't need more of it. We need a collective Pause and an examination of conscience to ask,
What are my biases?
What am I projecting onto my neighbor?
When do I shut down to the love of neighbor?
What do I have a hard time seeing in myself that I can see so clearly in others?
I have no problem, identifying the excesses of wokeism. Yet, it's more of the same if we can't see the plank in our own eyes while seeing the speck in the eyes of the other side.
I think Hannah makes her point clear: this isn’t “right vs. left” and framing it as that actually proves her point. Her critique is about a progressive mindset that often turns on moderates and liberals as much as conservatives. To dismiss it as ideological finger-pointing is to fall into the exact left/right reflex she’s describing. Not every analysis has to spread blame equally; sometimes you have to name one pattern directly.
This isn't about problems on the right wing though, which undoubtedly exist. This is about the problems on the left that led to this tragedy and that are manifest by the ongoing hateful rhetoric and outright lies being spewed by Jimmy Kimmel etc al. Your 'what aboutism' is sorely misplaced.
An interesting take and I can understand your critique given the excess of whataboutism in popular discourse! That being said, my response was not grounded in whataboutism of which I'm a critic for all the obvious reasons.
It was positioned in how I understand in Iain’s work. He's a refreshing voice in not giving into one sidedness.
As I understand his work, much of modern politics is dominated by the left hemisphere’s mode: abstract ideology, rigid categories, reductionism. Each side clings to simplified maps of reality, treating the other as an object to be dismantled rather than a living person to be encountered.
This fuels binary thinking: us/them, right/wrong, winners/losers.
Also, as a contemplative practitioner and teacher, I have found his work congruent with what happens inside in a state of contemplative prayer.
In contemplative prayer, the shift is from left hemisphere habits of analyzing, producing, filling silence with words into right hemisphere presence which cultivates openness, receptivity, awareness of the whole. We learn to let go of the controlling emissary and entrust ourselves to the spaciousness of the master.
Thanks for weighing in as in these times, I wonder if all of us aren't vulnerable to whataboutism. After all, we've been well-trained in left hemispheric thinking
A critique of Hannah's one sidedness devolves into the belief that I don't see this pattern on the left. I've been hammered by progressive friends for my critiques of wokeism and in one respect, I've had some good conversations that have helped me develop more nuance.
In this current climate, critique of Charlie Kirk devolves into the projection that I would advocate his assassination or not feel compassion for the brutal way he was murdered in front of his family. The leap is astounding and it often comes from people who have never heard of him prior to his assassination.
I've been following him for a long time and my critiques are not born in out of context quotes on the internet by leftists. My critiques are born in my sadness that the heart of Christianity gets lost (again).
What lead to this tragedy was the man’s own words. Speak evil things, evil will come. For instance, broadcasting to the world his belief that, A - he thinks black people are too dumb to fly airplanes, or B - so evil and vindictive as to down a plane full of white passengers. ( can’t quite figure out what he was trying to imply with that one.)
what lead to the reaction from leftists, his belief that empathy is a made up new age concept. Actually, the first place it is found is in scripture.
Despite his belief while living, he does in fact deserve our empathy. And his death was in fact NOT necessary.
Looking forward to the accusations of victim blaming.
And who will punish you for your evil words and your slander? Everyone alive is simply waiting for the bullet, if what you’re saying is true. He wasn’t shot because of anything evil he said but because he was popular and “on the other side”
Brother, I’m sorry my comments offended you. I must say though, based on your post history - which is nothing but right wing political commentary - nothing I could have said would have pleased you much. After rereading my comment I don’t see anything slanderous. I simply stated Kirk’s comments and critiqued them. Hardly an offense. I admit the way I phrased some things were a bit stingy.
Charlie Kirk did not deserve to die. He did not HAVE to die. He chose the way of a zealot, and he met a zealots end. Christ criticized the way of the zealot and demonstrated a new way. I choose the way of Christ.
If you think a zealot is someone going on college campuses and hosting debates, then you are insane. A zealot doesn’t say things like “When we stop talking, we start hurting each other”, dedicating their life to talking out the issues with the other side. Rather, the zealot is the guy who shoots that guy because he cannot stand for the other side of an issue to be able to be expressed
This equalizing speech with violence and actual violence with “the voice of the unheard” needs to end, you guys are turning into unhinged murderers and their accomplices because of these ridiculous beliefs.
Fundamentally Charlie Kirk did not do anything differently than how Christ did things. Christ preached an affirmative direction people should take, He didn’t use violence (except in the temple once), but He was authoritative when He spoke, He didn’t mince words when He spoke about what was evil and what was righteous (ie. He chose a side and spoke with authority) , but He primarily used the spoken word like Charlie did. This is not the tactic or toolkit of a zealot at all. The zealots murdered people for their beliefs or the roles they played in society.
Wow. “You guys” ? You are saying I am turning into an unhinged murderer? Take a breath. Read the screwtape letters. It has a lot to say about political idolatry. Since you’re such a proud orthobro, maybe do a little soul searching. Funny you call me insane, if this were an in person discussion and you spoke to me the way you did, I’d think you might psychotic.
So glad I stepped back from the abyss of political extremism. Could only have been because of the grace of God. I was just like you once.
Charlie Kirk was your neighbor. I would say you have "shut down the love of your neighbor" when you're making apologies for people who are celebrating his murder.
Honey, you're going to have to bring that assumption home. I've never made an apology for celebration of somebody else's murder, for heaven's sake. Trying to see where you made that leap! We humans are far more complex than the black-and-white reductions that happen in media spaces.
Your entire post is lamenting how disappointed you are with the author for not understanding the nuances and complexities of the case or playing phony bothside-ism.
It's not complex. It's not nuanced. And it's not both-sides.
Of course the Right has crazies. All groups do. The problem isn't the crazies. The problem is the response of the larger group. And the response of the Left over the last week has been, "we deplore political violence, of course, but Charlie Kirk really was a mean and bad man, oh and look at all the violent right-wingers too." Their response mirrors your comment almost perfectly.
I've read the rest of your comments on this thread, and I suspect you and I see the world similarly. I'm not saying you intend to trivialize or justify Charlie's murder. But you are justifying it. Just saying "look at all the groypers" is a rationalization. For you to do that, and then in the same breath accuse your fellow Christians of not loving their neighbor correctly is pretty ripe.
The Left owns this. They called conservatives Nazis and fascists and declared resistance "by any means necessary." Tyler Robinson just took their words seriously and acted. If the Left's words were correct -- if Donald Trump really is Hitler and Charlie Kirk helped him subvert democracy and turn America into a fascist dictatorship -- violence is the appropriate response. One can not sit by and allow Hitler to come to power (see Bonhoeffer, Dietrich.)
What should scare all of us is that an apparently normal, smart and promising kid from Utah radicalized himself (via online trans and furry subcultures) into an assassin in just a couple of years. That's terrifying. That's something we need to address. And that problem ought to be nonpartisan. But I doubt it will be, because nothing can be nonpartisan anymore.
Yes, cold blooded murder is wrong. But who owns responsibility is a much deeper question and plunges us into an examination of conscience. I know Christians who are just as fervent holding the opposite view you articulate.
As we make assumptions about all sorts of other people and their motives, perhaps the question we have to ask ourselves, What kind of world do we desire to live in?
What's our invitation right now?
Are we creating that new world?
How are we participating in creating that new world?
The world you seem to want to create is a world where it’s ok and common for people to respond to gruesome murders of fathers in front of their children with “Yes cold blooded murder is wrong BUT”
Didn't realize that the MAGA personality cult was responsible for the whole 'I disagree with you, therefore you're a Nazi and I can shoot you.' paradigm.
Likewise all the right wing violence and riots upon CK's death. You know, kind of like what happend w. Geo. Floyd.
But there is nothing new under the sun. We've had political violence in this country before. Likewise those caterwauling about all the violence actually being the ones largely responsible for it, if not deceived by that lie.
But like Goebbels said. If you are going to lie, go big.
When people react to “one-sidedness” they reveal their priority to their cultish inclination. The description of cult-like behavior in this piece is the bulk of its value. Yet you highlight the least important part of the article due to your upside down value system
Thank you for saying this. As an admirer, I was disappointed to read Mr. McGilchrists reaction to the responses to the article he restacked. He - and the author of the article - seem to ignore the very obvious double standard. It’s clear that both political teams partake in this awfulness. I very much look forward to Mr. Mcgilcrists next restack, pointing out the awful behavior of the right wing.
Still pointing fingers. Still ideological. Still playing into culture wars. Still the same old us vs them horseshit let’s be real. And still shaming. No, this is not in any way groundbreaking or even thoughtful.
Thank you. I expected more out of Iain. Such a disappointment.
It doesn't challenge each of us to do an examination of conscience and to look at our own shadow in these culture wars.
The work isn't pointing fingers out there. The work is self reflection so we can shine light in the corners and reflect on our own part in this mess.
Makes we wonder if Iain was hacked.
I know. I'm taken aback by its one-sidedness as it seems counter to his work.
I hope he was hacked. I felt gut punched. So unlike him.
Since TMAHE Ian has been setting you up for the truth…
His Bifurcated Hegel-Ian dialectic brought all the bois to the yard.
It was likely written by his Emissary…
The left and right halves of the cerebrum only contain a combined 20% of the brains neurons.
Where is the other 80% ?
We don’t discuss the Sarah Bellum
In 2,300 pages of brain talk - Ian devotes a scant few sentences to obfuscating the buttons behind you ears.
Enjoy your Bluetooth podcast on 200 dollar micro microwaves !
Well, he said he is travelling insanely. Might be the jet lag.
Me too. I was really disappointed, I came to Iain through the Stoa movement and this is such a thin, partisan, strawman argument. you literally write the same article from the pov of alt-right violence. I guess it shows that even intelligent people can have strong cognitive bias when in an emotionally charged setting. Its such an unskillful article and a unproductive time to share it.
Ian’s simplistic polarizing Hegel-Ian dialectic has brought both sides to the pseudo-intellectual trough. Half are now sad.
Bye
This Is a culture war, Josh. It Is ideologically based on stark differences in what we believe is real and true and good. Just as someone’s useless horseshit is someone else’s fertilizer, the good doctor is merely sharing an analysis of the cult mindset that may have infected the alleged perpetrator of Charlie Kirk’s killing last week. And, yes! Let’s be real! Her thoughts may help some of us to understand the motive behind an innocent man’s death by gun. This isn’t about understanding the alleged shooter’s existential anxiety about explaining to his old man why he stole grampa’s rifle. This is about hating and snuffing out the life of a stranger because you don’t like (hate?)what he has to say. What sideline do you think you’ve found where you can sling spoiled twaddle with impunity? Get real, indeed.
If it’s a culture war I’m a conscientious objector. I refuse to participate in any of these so called ideological mindsets. The use of the word progressive to prove a point is exactly the same as what the other side has done. As I said, what’s horseshit is the us vs them narrative that both sides perpetrate. What surprises me the most is not what “the good doctor” says but that McGilchrist supports this post. Essentially this has become the George Floyd moment for the right except that Floyd was killed on video by someone within the system and it’s completely unclear who killed Kirk, at least as of today despite all the theories bouncing around. What would have been interesting to read is a purely neutral analysis, one that examines both sides and comes to a conclusion that we have clearly lost any real grasp of mental and perceptual sovereignty. I follow McGilchrist’s work precisely because of his non partisan approach to describing how the bicameral mind works for us Homo sapiens sapiens but he now seems to be slanting his way into a rather murky hemisphere, succumbing to an algorithmic sinkhole called confirmation bias like most of us saps.
Sorry Josh. I’m not Charlie Kirk although I greatly admire his forebearing and humility. You are free not to participate, although I’m glad you are. We humans are value-laden as you demonstrate. We have an innate sense of right, wrong, better, worse, useful, bad, good, … We have judgement. Comes with the human mind don’t you know. We want to understand one another. We want to learn from one another. But some of us want to control others, and when you add power to that heady mix, bad things can happen. Why do some of us fall into ways of thinking and feeling and acting that do harm to themselves and other people?? These are important questions, Josh, and I think it’s better to try to understand before we act.
The realm of ideas that Dr. McGilchrist investigates for his and our benefit, investigation that you seem to admire, is not value free. There is no such thing as a neutral analysis coming from a human. We are flawed and inadequate, every last one. There have been rare exceptions to this rule, but, being human, that is debatable. Life ought to be a humbling experience. I didn’t learn how humbling until very late. My hope for you is that you learn this sooner. Have a good life my friend.
In an interview he explained how wokeness is a left brain phenomenon.
Your reaction appears to be a left brain phenomenon.
I'm pleasantly surprised he has shared this as I'm subscribed to Hannah's YouTube channel.
What "both sides?" One man is dead. The other shot him assassination style. Those are the both sides to this story
Yes...Im confused. Just read some Substack piece that was unhinged....and it referenced McGilchrists interview from a week ago? Wtf?
Can you share the link to that?
Trying to locate hold on
I think you mean this? https://open.substack.com/pub/planetcritical/p/charlie-kirk?r=84vqr&utm_medium=ios
Yes. Tbf, I only read that piece and haven't listened to discussion linked w/McGilchrist. I am unclear here
Having seen the Hannah Spier piece, I suspect Iain may have agreed to converse with the other author without knowing too much about their other writings. I could be wrong, I’d be interested to hear his thoughts about the Planet Critical Charlie Kirk piece
https://substack.com/@racheldonald/note/p-173621456?r=88ej9
That piece is gaining some attn (mostly negative). Thoughts?
It’s interesting that she changed the title of it from ‘Charlie Kirk (Probably) Deserved to Die’, to ‘You Don’t Have to Mourn Charlie Kirk’
Just a slight edit...lol. wtf?
I'm in the middle of watching that YouTube interview; started it last night and was planning to finish it today. I am stunned at what she says in her Substack post about Charlie Kirk and his death. I cannot imagine Iain knew in that interview that he was talking to a committed nihilist. I've never read such a twisted exoneration of evil as a moral good. Feeling gobsmacked.
Which YT interview? Would you mind linking if possible?
https://youtu.be/N3fLRF4Ca1A?si=nYlsSRbfS7raw0mT
Ty. I do have that cued up.
To be clear, even if he knew her philosophical position going into the interview, I don't think it was wrong on Iain's part to agree to it. But it pains me to see his work cited in service of such a grossly anti-human argument. And I really can't fathom how she could read and love The Master and His Emissary and yet somehow completely miss the fact that her worldview is steeped in the Godless delusion of left hemisphere thinking. Yikes.
Agreed, and I think what you point to is what has gotten folks upset. Or at least gobsmacked, as you say.
I'm confused, who's a committed nihilist?
The woman who interviewed him…at least if her Substack post in response to Charlie Kirk’s death is anything to go by.
You mean Hannah Spier? Just having read this post, and scanning the rest of her stuff quickly, that seems unlikely?
Oh my, no! Spier is completely sane and on point. I think you maybe missed the discussion earlier in this thread about the Planet Critical author who interviewed Iain. She wrote an amoral essay about Kirk's expendability as a human. Here's the link:
https://www.planetcritical.com/p/charlie-kirk
I linked Iain's YouTube interview with her in a comment above, but here it is again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3fLRF4Ca1A&feature=youtu.be
It’s an accurate account. Must be painful.
Did you write this purposefully ironic, or was that a mistake on your part?
He wrote an article that brought criticism to extreme conduct.
You wrote nothing but accusations of "pointing fingers and shaming people".
You *are* familiar with the term "projection", yes?
Well Josh, another name for finger pointing is accountability- a cornerstone of any functional society. Something that the left refuses to take- as evidenced by these tone deaf comments.
Josh Liveright you are pathetic. Your page is filled with the most generic progressive activism—telltale signs of someone deeply immersed in and committed to the worldview discussed in the article. No wonder you reacted so strongly to it. You have no leg to stand on. You are another emotionally incontinent adult incapable of critical evaluation of his own position. Stop scapegoating those who call to attention what is self-evident to so many. You lack self-awareness.
There is no unity or benefit of the doubt anymore with people who openly applaud political murder. We all saw it, we saw mildly left wing, mostly apolitical people suddenly emerge into a blood orgy. There’s no unseeing it, there’s no more acting like this is normal or both-sided. One side is much more likely than the other to applaud political murder. That’s just how it is, and you cannot fault us for noticing it, fault your comrades for acting like animals
same Jewish problem as ever. covert operations for mind control. they put Charlie Kirk in for divide and conquer, as a counterpoint to the new woke agenda that the same Jews also empowered. they control both sides. THIS is real reporting right here : https://substack.com/home/post/p-173468890
Summary: Hannah wants people to be socially conservative again
This piece is full of misinformation and conjecture. It’s more fuel on the partisan, culture war insanity. Please research more carefully before sharing.
When you level an accusation of misinformation have the decency to give a specific example. Your comment is baseless slander. Baseless slander is what leads to impressionable youths murdering innocent activists. Please research more carefully before posting.
lots of falsified info in this post. for example, none of the slogans on the bullets were antifascist - they were all gamer lingo, groyper meme language from far-right wing and video game culture.
I noticed that too, after reading the first-hand accounts from his friend explaining the gamer quotes.
This post is a little too passionate for my taste. I believe the main point is somewhat valid, but knowing about a few of the references prior, the common thread is exaggerated. Cancel culture is on the rise no matter “the side”.
Nonsense. He was not a right winger. Bella ciao is an old antifascist song. One of the encasing said “Hey fascist. Catch.” Hellooo!
that line is a gamer quote
Deployed in antifascist earnestness. Some lefties like video games too. His texts show he ‘had enough of his hatred”. The idea that he killed Kirk for not being right wing enough is close to absurd on its face. It is such a reach that it speaks to a need to maintain a pristine self image and disown accountability for the incessant inflammatory rhetoric about punching ‘Nazi’s’, justifying riots etc etc.
No this is just either ignorant or willfully ignorant. Your boy charlie was killed by a far right groyper who thought charlie wasn’t fascist enough. Stop yelling at clouds.
What was the hate that he had had enough of? What was the hate that he couldn’t negotiate with? > The text messages. You think this Groyper thought Charlie was too full of hate? Make that make sense. Obvs he was mad that he thought Charlie was down on trans people. You already look silly to those who know but yes, soon you will feel very daft for stringing together some shoddy points to go against the obvious.
I suppose when your fellow conservatives turn on you, as all fascism eventually does turn on their own, you can rest well blaming “the left” or black people or trans people or the muppets or space aliens or anyone other than taking a real honest look at your own ideology and its inevitable implications.
Is that why he had a boyfriend who was transitioning to a female?
Groypers, operaters, femcels , all connected and part of far right wing subcultures. You have no clue and are uneducated. But sure, “pity” ppl who are smarter than you who put in the work to be educated.
Nope. Wrong on all points according to most recent revelations.
You mean those clearly manufactured text messages? Ok, fellow kid. I would like to explain my plan in full sentences as if i am a character in a bad novel. This is definitely not corruption.
Who wrote"fascist, catch” with the three downward arrows symbol of antifa ???
Those are gamer quotes in 2025 world. You are being played because older ppl are not as chronically online as gen z.
I suppose your insight into far-right wing culture comes from first hand experience. How are you finding it over there?
Thank you...exactly. Rather than complete blame for 'progressivism' - how about the effect of on-line culture that substituted for real world relationships? Loneliness seemed to me a huge feature in Robinson's psychology.
"Hey fascist, catch!" written on a bullet (with the three diagonal down arrows of antifa) is not "anti-fascist?"
One knows immediately this piece is ideologically driven when the writer claims Tyler Robinson's family is "wholesome." There is literally no way to know this.
This would be disturbing from anyone, but especially a medical doctor with a psychiatric background.
I was baffled and curious so I went to her podcast and read the “about” page. She writes: “Her distinctive perspective, shaped by her personal journey from a modern career woman to a conservative stay-at-home mom, coupled with her extensive psychological and medical knowledge, offers a truly unique approach to the issues at hand.”
Her “perspective” is pretty damn biased IMO.
Her life arc shows wisdom hard won through experience.
She is a stay at home mum compulsively trawling the internet to inspire think-pieces about how bad progressive politics is. This, for me, undermines her message because, frankly, she comes across as bored. She fortifies her bias with psychological analysis. She is, like just about everyone writing on Substack, interesting on some things and flawed on others.
The lady doth protest too much me thinks.
Excellent article. To save the west we should close all universities. Personally, I'd scrap the Internet too
Or scrap the whole democracy experiment by starving the Administrative State as of it were a 10 headed dragon. That is what the takeover of the GOP is in the process of doing while we are pitted against one another. The murder of Charlie Kirk aside, did you ever notice that there is one scripted outrage of distraction after another? 🤔
This essay is full of inaccuracies concerning the shooter and poisonous, calculated, bad faith political rhetoric. This does not benefit anyone.
What a disappointment, Iain.
I’d love to share this with my indoctrinated friends, if only there was more to say on the woke right as well as the woke left. I agree wholeheartedly with everything, just wish it was more balanced.
What's really disappointing about this, is that I really want to have respect for my elders - people like Iain - who have done really good work in their field of expertise, and I really don't want to see them becoming 'grumpy old anti-woke men' just because they happen to not have any real experience of youth culture, and what's happening in it right now.
I saw the exact same thing with Terry Gilliam, who is an AMAZING filmmaker and illustrator from Monty Python, who I really respect, but who couldn't help himself but start ranting about woke culture, and how you 'can't say anything any more'. I really wanted to sit Terry down and say, 'hey Terry, you've done amazing things in this world, but your political identity was forged like 40 years ago, at a different time, so just chill the fuck out and let the youth go through that same process themselves. Don't feel judged by it. You've done great things'.
I want to say the same to Iain. I really don't want to lose respect for you by seeing you post this half-assed anti-woke stuff that we've heard a thousand times before from every social conservative. I understand that maybe you as a person feels a bit out-of-sync with that youth culture, but just chill out, and let them do their thing
I really don't want to see them becoming 'grumpy old anti-woke men' just because they happen to not have any real experience of youth culture
Growing up in the 90s, I was effectively a poster child for the Left (broken family, extreme bullying, too cool for anything) — I could post pictures that look like they were taken yesterday (purple hair and all)… and even I was “anti-woke” before “woke” was even a thing. I saw it coming a mile away. It’s not just for “old grumpy men”.
Let them do their thing? When their thing leans into evil, suicidal empathy, victim worship, and societal self-destruction? Woke is not new. The underlying psychopathy is thousands of years old. It’s also not a “youth” thing. They are indoctrinated into the cult by hoards of adults who judge the past based on a fictional utopian future. Note this cult has been funded by our enemies, foreign and domestic.
Sadly, we are likely all going to learn the hard way what happens when an enough people in a society can no longer discern right from wrong. What’s to be done? Not much I’m afraid. The subversion has reached a point where it is self-sustaining.
Some “old people” have more “lived experience” and were raised in a time prior to the great subversion and so some of us can recognize patterns most “youth cannot yet perceive.
Recognize that Hanna’s essay was a bit black and white. The “cult” i.e., secular progressive religion, is not homogeneous. It exists in degrees in people of all ages. People’s inability to recognize or discern evil is in part a bi-product of the West’s never before experienced levels of comfort and safety. It’s cliche but true - hard time make hard men. Hard men make good times. Good times make weak men. Weak men make hard times. Feel free to correct my problematic usage of the word “men”.
I pray that it’s not too late to right our cultural ship. But I doubt it will happen. Evil eats its own. Hopefully you won’t be dinner.
I mean, maybe you should just consider the fact that they're different to you. I grew up in a structurally racist Christian conservative state, and there were a bunch of people who liked that - it made them feel tethered and safe - but I experienced it as a terrible close-minded, even fascist, reality. I'd take woke youth culture a thousand times before I took apartheid South Africa again.
So, rather than lamenting the evil of the youth, maybe you should just recognise the fact that humans experience the same reality differently to each other, because there is no way in hell you'll ever be able to eradicate this thing you hate
Thank you very much for taking the time to read what I wrote.
I don’t hate, that is self-destructive. My wife and I too struggled with organized religion for much of our lives and turned away from it in our late teens and twenties. We had to because it became unhealthy for us. We have come back now older and wiser.
It seems you skipped some parts of my comment. I don’t blame our youth. I do lament evil. Belief is the most powerful force on the planet. Thing is that reality is only partially socially constructed. There is a tentative objective reality. And reality always wins over the utopias humans so often seek to construct.
My advice to you is study the past objectively. Research woke post-modernist philosophy. Trace its roots. Understand the historical fruit of that tree. You will likely come out seeing reality differently. Fingers crossed and thanks for your time.
So are you equally worried about alt-right violence then?
Different isn't always an improvement. One of the reasons not to trust the youth is their lack of life experience makes them not realize that.
Progressives tend to believe change is always good. But as C.S. Lewis said, "when you're on the wrong road, the most progressive man is the one who turns around first."
Unfortunately woke is not just a culture war or young kids doing their thing. It’s been a direct attack on secular society and the separation of church and state because it is a faith based religion that has captured our institutions in dangerous ways. Universities have become ideological factories where critical thinking and knowledge has gone to die. (See the grievance studies affair) the pseudo science of gender medicine has been a nightmare of harm. Gay rights women’s rights and children’s rights have been trampled on by a neo religion that demands submission and compliance- or else. It’s dangerous.
This is hyperbole. It's also naive to imagine that other forms of secular culture are not full of religious dynamics. Every cultural movement throughout time has religious dynamics, including the anti-woke community
Yes that's right. But again, it's not culture. It's the secular institutions of academia, medicine and law. And we must seek to remove religion from our institutions, including christianity. and especially those that normalize the abuse and harm of children.
Well the Trump government is doing their best to install a far more powerful and conservative religion into academia of course. It's back to my childhood in Christian nationalist South Africa, with academic institutions as means to indoctrinate people into a form of conservatism that's deeply harmful to the human spirit. But hey, I'm probably just suffering from the woke mind virus
Unfortunately, letting them do their thing as you put it meant being cancelled in the case of Terry Gilliam. His production of Into the Woods was literally cancelled because “people’s thing” was feeling “unsafe” and deciding to try and censor one of the leading artists in this or any other generation. Letting the youth do their thing sounds reasonable and easy going but when that means censoring art and killing people its just not OK.
thx Brett! I feel the same!
Wow, Iain. This person has bought wholesale a big pile of excrement and propaganda. She has failed to do the most elementary analysis of a government narrative. There's a whole lot of lack of nuance and just plain falsehood in her basic story of what happened.
This is an interesting analysis, granting the reliance on generalisations which short articles require - but it applies equally to those who join far-Right groups such as White Supremacists, Neo-Nazis, Incels, Groypers, Christian Nationalists and the rest. It is not just the 'progressive storyline' but the storyline of every cultish group. Substitute 'immigrants, women, liberals, people of colour' etc. as those to blame, and defence of 'White', 'American', 'Christian' and associated values as those to promote, and the analysis fits perfectly. Moreover, it would seem that whereas rhetoric by those on the more vigorous margin of progressive views might consist in calls for otherings and cancellings, no-platforming and in-group allegiance, so far the actual guns have been toted and fired almost exclusively by those on the far Right of the spectrum. May I suggest a reading of Dr Julie Ebner (Oxford University research group on extremism) 'Going Mainstream'. The suggestion that Charlie Kirk was murdered by someone influenced by the anti-Kirk (because even further to the Right than he) Groyper outlook is not without plausibility. Alas, that matters have come to this. And alas too that the label 'progressive', which to my ear chiefly denotes those wedded to aspirations for a fair, inclusive, tolerant and decent society where human rights, civil liberties and peaceful democratic processes constitute the norm, is associated in this way with the kind of cultism that genuine extremist and fundamentalist groups display. It's parallel to saying that 'conservative' automatically denotes far-Right cultism. A more accurate nomenclature for extremists on both wings would do better.
Thanks for wading in. The problem is that this comment thread (which is much more humane than most on social media) confirms the perspective bias that leftists are angry, judgemental and quick to cancel, while conservatives are calm and rational. I can hear Iain saying, 'People on the right are much more open-minded than people on the left!'
Iain's inability to read the bias and conjecture in this article makes me question his whole project.
lol. Arrogant prick.
Since you are so concerned with balance I wonder why you don’t refer to a far-Left but rather euphemistically refer to “the more vigorous margins of progressive views.” Or can we please have ‘the more vigorous margins of conservative views’ instead of ‘far Right’, which is used with hideous and inappropriate abandon in the media now.
The leftist cultthink has taken over the institutions and has virtually a monopoly on young minds. That's why the article is important.
I strongly agree. The challenge is extremism and radicalisation that can happen with *any* ideology. Ironically the pattern is pretty much the same regardless of cult and the triggers are psychological. This has been studies and documented rigorously which is why I was so dissapointed with this as its so thin. You could literally 'find and replace' any key ideoloogy and replace it with another. I strongly recommend the work of Deeya Kahan who has made a number of documentaries interviewing everyone from Radical Islam through to White supremacist listening without judgement on how they got into the movements and what triggered them to act - https://deeyah.com/documentary-films-by-deeyah-khan/ Also the work of Joshua Citarella and his research of Gen Z radical online subcultures https://donotresearch.substack.com/p/joshua-citarella-how-to-plant-a-meme
Well said.
Wonderful analysis. Thank you for writing this, despite likely being ostracized for doing so. We are increasingly held hostage by a very persistent and not-so-tolerant minority. We need articles like this to unsee our increasingly questionable narratives that define our societies and ourselves.
Thank you!
Great piece. You can tell you’re over the target by all the righteous indignation.
These situations are like a rorschach test for your own bias. Watching the narratives blaming political/ideological extremes is very revealing. However, there is an extreme that is a commonality across many of the awful shootings. It is not that they are extreme progressives or extreme right wingers. The commonality that they are all extremely online. (and yes...that is my bias...I think the digital mediation of human experience is deeply problematic).
I feel compassion for most of the Commentors heretofore ( he screams into the bubble).
Such a disappointment, Iain! So one-sided which I didn't see as the crux of your work.
I'm a contemplative practice teacher who works in spaces across the political spectrum. I've been following Charlie Kirk for some time now and found his vision of Christianity narrow and one-sided.
Prior to his death, I was writing a piece on the difference between Christian nationalism and the transformation of the heart called forth by Jesus and those who followed in his path as exemplars of his teaching.
Your work on the right side of the brain as Master is extremely supportive for contemplative teachers because contemplation invites us into Wholeness and forces us out of our reactive, predictable left brained mental habit.
Yet you share a piece where Hannah places the blame firmly at the feet of the left without articulating some of the alarming right wing and highly reactive people and spaces like Groyper and Trumpism.
There's plenty of blame to go around and we don't need more of it. We need a collective Pause and an examination of conscience to ask,
What are my biases?
What am I projecting onto my neighbor?
When do I shut down to the love of neighbor?
What do I have a hard time seeing in myself that I can see so clearly in others?
I have no problem, identifying the excesses of wokeism. Yet, it's more of the same if we can't see the plank in our own eyes while seeing the speck in the eyes of the other side.
Thank you! ❤️
I think Hannah makes her point clear: this isn’t “right vs. left” and framing it as that actually proves her point. Her critique is about a progressive mindset that often turns on moderates and liberals as much as conservatives. To dismiss it as ideological finger-pointing is to fall into the exact left/right reflex she’s describing. Not every analysis has to spread blame equally; sometimes you have to name one pattern directly.
This isn't about problems on the right wing though, which undoubtedly exist. This is about the problems on the left that led to this tragedy and that are manifest by the ongoing hateful rhetoric and outright lies being spewed by Jimmy Kimmel etc al. Your 'what aboutism' is sorely misplaced.
An interesting take and I can understand your critique given the excess of whataboutism in popular discourse! That being said, my response was not grounded in whataboutism of which I'm a critic for all the obvious reasons.
It was positioned in how I understand in Iain’s work. He's a refreshing voice in not giving into one sidedness.
As I understand his work, much of modern politics is dominated by the left hemisphere’s mode: abstract ideology, rigid categories, reductionism. Each side clings to simplified maps of reality, treating the other as an object to be dismantled rather than a living person to be encountered.
This fuels binary thinking: us/them, right/wrong, winners/losers.
Also, as a contemplative practitioner and teacher, I have found his work congruent with what happens inside in a state of contemplative prayer.
In contemplative prayer, the shift is from left hemisphere habits of analyzing, producing, filling silence with words into right hemisphere presence which cultivates openness, receptivity, awareness of the whole. We learn to let go of the controlling emissary and entrust ourselves to the spaciousness of the master.
Thanks for weighing in as in these times, I wonder if all of us aren't vulnerable to whataboutism. After all, we've been well-trained in left hemispheric thinking
Indeed - and progressive ideology fits that left brain paradigm very well indeed. Hence the backlash to this article I suspect.
Exactly. One sidedness is left brained.
A critique of Hannah's one sidedness devolves into the belief that I don't see this pattern on the left. I've been hammered by progressive friends for my critiques of wokeism and in one respect, I've had some good conversations that have helped me develop more nuance.
In this current climate, critique of Charlie Kirk devolves into the projection that I would advocate his assassination or not feel compassion for the brutal way he was murdered in front of his family. The leap is astounding and it often comes from people who have never heard of him prior to his assassination.
I've been following him for a long time and my critiques are not born in out of context quotes on the internet by leftists. My critiques are born in my sadness that the heart of Christianity gets lost (again).
Even McGilcrist himself argued otherwise, that in fact the hemispheric divide is not political.
What lead to this tragedy was the man’s own words. Speak evil things, evil will come. For instance, broadcasting to the world his belief that, A - he thinks black people are too dumb to fly airplanes, or B - so evil and vindictive as to down a plane full of white passengers. ( can’t quite figure out what he was trying to imply with that one.)
what lead to the reaction from leftists, his belief that empathy is a made up new age concept. Actually, the first place it is found is in scripture.
Despite his belief while living, he does in fact deserve our empathy. And his death was in fact NOT necessary.
Looking forward to the accusations of victim blaming.
And who will punish you for your evil words and your slander? Everyone alive is simply waiting for the bullet, if what you’re saying is true. He wasn’t shot because of anything evil he said but because he was popular and “on the other side”
Brother, I’m sorry my comments offended you. I must say though, based on your post history - which is nothing but right wing political commentary - nothing I could have said would have pleased you much. After rereading my comment I don’t see anything slanderous. I simply stated Kirk’s comments and critiqued them. Hardly an offense. I admit the way I phrased some things were a bit stingy.
Charlie Kirk did not deserve to die. He did not HAVE to die. He chose the way of a zealot, and he met a zealots end. Christ criticized the way of the zealot and demonstrated a new way. I choose the way of Christ.
If you think a zealot is someone going on college campuses and hosting debates, then you are insane. A zealot doesn’t say things like “When we stop talking, we start hurting each other”, dedicating their life to talking out the issues with the other side. Rather, the zealot is the guy who shoots that guy because he cannot stand for the other side of an issue to be able to be expressed
This equalizing speech with violence and actual violence with “the voice of the unheard” needs to end, you guys are turning into unhinged murderers and their accomplices because of these ridiculous beliefs.
Fundamentally Charlie Kirk did not do anything differently than how Christ did things. Christ preached an affirmative direction people should take, He didn’t use violence (except in the temple once), but He was authoritative when He spoke, He didn’t mince words when He spoke about what was evil and what was righteous (ie. He chose a side and spoke with authority) , but He primarily used the spoken word like Charlie did. This is not the tactic or toolkit of a zealot at all. The zealots murdered people for their beliefs or the roles they played in society.
Wow. “You guys” ? You are saying I am turning into an unhinged murderer? Take a breath. Read the screwtape letters. It has a lot to say about political idolatry. Since you’re such a proud orthobro, maybe do a little soul searching. Funny you call me insane, if this were an in person discussion and you spoke to me the way you did, I’d think you might psychotic.
So glad I stepped back from the abyss of political extremism. Could only have been because of the grace of God. I was just like you once.
Charlie Kirk was your neighbor. I would say you have "shut down the love of your neighbor" when you're making apologies for people who are celebrating his murder.
Honey, you're going to have to bring that assumption home. I've never made an apology for celebration of somebody else's murder, for heaven's sake. Trying to see where you made that leap! We humans are far more complex than the black-and-white reductions that happen in media spaces.
Your entire post is lamenting how disappointed you are with the author for not understanding the nuances and complexities of the case or playing phony bothside-ism.
It's not complex. It's not nuanced. And it's not both-sides.
Of course the Right has crazies. All groups do. The problem isn't the crazies. The problem is the response of the larger group. And the response of the Left over the last week has been, "we deplore political violence, of course, but Charlie Kirk really was a mean and bad man, oh and look at all the violent right-wingers too." Their response mirrors your comment almost perfectly.
I've read the rest of your comments on this thread, and I suspect you and I see the world similarly. I'm not saying you intend to trivialize or justify Charlie's murder. But you are justifying it. Just saying "look at all the groypers" is a rationalization. For you to do that, and then in the same breath accuse your fellow Christians of not loving their neighbor correctly is pretty ripe.
The Left owns this. They called conservatives Nazis and fascists and declared resistance "by any means necessary." Tyler Robinson just took their words seriously and acted. If the Left's words were correct -- if Donald Trump really is Hitler and Charlie Kirk helped him subvert democracy and turn America into a fascist dictatorship -- violence is the appropriate response. One can not sit by and allow Hitler to come to power (see Bonhoeffer, Dietrich.)
What should scare all of us is that an apparently normal, smart and promising kid from Utah radicalized himself (via online trans and furry subcultures) into an assassin in just a couple of years. That's terrifying. That's something we need to address. And that problem ought to be nonpartisan. But I doubt it will be, because nothing can be nonpartisan anymore.
Thank you and amen!! Everything about this comment is Spot On.
Yes, cold blooded murder is wrong. But who owns responsibility is a much deeper question and plunges us into an examination of conscience. I know Christians who are just as fervent holding the opposite view you articulate.
As we make assumptions about all sorts of other people and their motives, perhaps the question we have to ask ourselves, What kind of world do we desire to live in?
What's our invitation right now?
Are we creating that new world?
How are we participating in creating that new world?
Less definitive nouns and more curious verbs.
The world you seem to want to create is a world where it’s ok and common for people to respond to gruesome murders of fathers in front of their children with “Yes cold blooded murder is wrong BUT”
I don’t want to live in that world. At all. Ever.
I'm curious how you made that assumption! (It might've been your left brain dominant self responding in a left brained dominant way!)
Didn't realize that the MAGA personality cult was responsible for the whole 'I disagree with you, therefore you're a Nazi and I can shoot you.' paradigm.
Likewise all the right wing violence and riots upon CK's death. You know, kind of like what happend w. Geo. Floyd.
But there is nothing new under the sun. We've had political violence in this country before. Likewise those caterwauling about all the violence actually being the ones largely responsible for it, if not deceived by that lie.
But like Goebbels said. If you are going to lie, go big.
Some things never change.
ciao
Leslie, well said!
When people react to “one-sidedness” they reveal their priority to their cultish inclination. The description of cult-like behavior in this piece is the bulk of its value. Yet you highlight the least important part of the article due to your upside down value system
Thank you for saying this. As an admirer, I was disappointed to read Mr. McGilchrists reaction to the responses to the article he restacked. He - and the author of the article - seem to ignore the very obvious double standard. It’s clear that both political teams partake in this awfulness. I very much look forward to Mr. Mcgilcrists next restack, pointing out the awful behavior of the right wing.
So well said - thank you!
Et tU Ian?