I've been saying essentially the same thing for decades. This essay zeroes in on the hypocrisy of an ideology that creates its 'science' out of its own imaginings rather from facts and research.
I have a strong physical science background. I made my living from manipulating physical reality. Being a legend in my own mind does not pay well. Getting the job done, right the first time, pays the bills.
In my world, pontificating gets you laughed at. Coming in on budget gets respect and admiration.
When will people realize this "game" of renaming things is un-winnable? There is no person, thing or organization that will ever be moral enough to please the un-pleasable. (Un-pleaseable was just auto-corrected to "unappeasable" which is actually true as well.)
Magellan was a man of his time, but not an ordinary one. Even if his circumnavigation was not the FIRST it is surely the first which we have the documentation for. Even if he is not a man we would celebrate today, his accomplishments certainly are. Will the future judge our profligate deficit spending and unwillingness to defend our borders at least as harshly as we judge "slavers and colonizers" in our own history? Will the late 20th and early 21st centuries be thought of as a Golden Age to those in the future? A time of legend and myth that serves only to highlight our hubris and how badly our generation served the ones that come after? With US debt accounting for a sixth of the total money supply on the planet, "unsustainable" seems like almost British understatement.
The future will indeed judge us, should we be lucky enough to have their eyes on us. Nero played the violin; we established committees to rename schools and sports teams, birds and galaxies. Still, Rome burns.
Humans gotta human. They lie, steal, conquer and enslave. They also innovate, show compassion and sow peace. Like the differences between individuals, some groups tend to be more or less toward either extremes in behavior, and we do seem to have record of those who have been on the tapering ends of that bell curve. I would agree that the “decolonizers” are showing themselves to be heavily on the negative side of that graph, and are using sly techniques for their imagined righteousness.
Well, this moment makes me sad. I need to take a break from supporting this Substack, at least for a while. Because it looks very much like you have fallen for exactly the same type of fallacy you're criticizing, Heather. Not the Noble Savage, but the Noble Israel. Why else, when reviling all the current evils in the world do you waste not one word on the horror of bombing civilians, many of them children? Is that not in any way at least as bad as tearing down posters?
Your larger point is sound enough, but it may be time to examine the plank in your own eye. In the mean time, I really can't face having to suffer the grief and frustration of watching you take the side of a genocidal nation without even examining the possibility that you may have been misled. You of all people should have some skepticism of the narrative of the mainstream press, but on this it seems you do not. I hate this, but I can't watch any more.
This seems very much like a shtick, one crafted to create empathy and action. You say you’re leaving, yet have posted several more comments since saying you would go. I believe you made similar comments on relevant posts of mine earlier; it was (more) appropriate there, but is not here.
I think the Israeli right to protect themselves takes precedent over anything that they have done to Gaza. The Israelis left Gaza in 2005. The only ones keeping Gazans imprisoned are Hamas. Hamas, the people that spend the aid that they are given buy missiles and build tunnels. The Israelis still control the West Bank and conditions there are much better than in Gaza. Antisemitism has been a regular feature in the West for a long time. Only the atrocities of the Nazis made Antisemitism keep a low profile in shame. Like slavery, it thrives among Muslims. And seems to be increasingly more acceptable by secular Westerners.
So the "right to protect themselves" justifies ethnic cleansing and genocide? Cool. Israel is thus the moral equivalent of Nazi Germany, as far as you're concerned.
I have to wonder, whenever I see comments so rife with propaganda talking points in ignorance of the facts whether the source is an AIPAC/ADL bot, or merely a tool.
The Israelis go out of their way to prevent civilian casualties. Hamas goes out of its way to inflict the maximum casualties among civilians. Hardly equivalency. The Egyptians were more than willing to let the Gazans become the Israelis' problem. Perhaps they have a bigger beef with the Egyptians than they have with the Israelis. Oh, yeah. The Egyptians are much less concerned with civilian casualties and would have treated Gaza like the nest of vipers that it has become if the Gazans had been stupid enough to attack Egyptians. After almost 60 years, the Arab countries seem to be losing interest in the Gazans as well. The Persians still seem to support the Palestinians, but not for the Palestinians' sake. The Shi'ites consider them apostates after all. Valuable as cannon fodder but little else.
Identity politics much? Are you comfortable telling Heather and Brett what they should and shouldn't talk about - and how they must discuss it? Your loss.
Golly it would be so cool if people would learn to read for content instead of just flailing out of emotional response. Criticizing an identity politics position is not inherently an instance of identity politics. And asking people to give thought to what they're saying and what it implies is certainly not telling them what they can talk about or how. It is asking them to reconsider. And in particular, since Heather obviously knows that idealizing and romanticizing the behavior of an entire people based on mythology rather than a grasp of actual historical events, her apparent stance on the rights and wrongs of Israel/Palestine is excruciating to have to watch. Yes, it's my loss, but it's hers as well.
But when tacitly talking about that current event in 3 out of 3 examples, it is extremely revealing when all three focus on the grievances of one side over the other.
It is extremely revealing how you seem to assume without saying that you believe it is that in a conflict where there is a huge imbalance in power that the weaker power is the most "virtuous". Is that how Western liberals justify the most atrocious treatment of groups that they disagree with?
There is no mention of Israel in this piece. Only Jewish genocide. We should be able to agree that calling for the death to all Jews is abhorrent without any reservation.
Ethnic cleansing of a people whose number has increase 5x? Why didn't Egypt demand the repatriation of every Gazan after 1967? They could have gone to the UN and probably gotten that strip of coastline back while leaving the rest of the Sinai to the Israelis to worry about. Why do do no Arab nations allow emigration from Gaza? Who keeps the Gazans locked inside and poor? Not the Israelis. You seem to be the one that has no understanding of the root of this conflict.
I don't see anyone calling for ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. Only of eliminating Hamas, a terrorist organization that I believe lots of Palestinians would like to have freedom from.
And for anyone genuinely interested in the ways that many North Americans in particular may have been misled in their beliefs about the history leading up to the events of October 7th, and in whether criticism of Israel is tantamount to antisemitism I commend you to this longer interview with Gabor Maté, and the reading list he suggests.
The list:
The Birth of Israel: Myths and Realities by Simha Flapan
The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017 by Rashid Khalidi
Gaza: An Inquest Into Its Martyrdom by Norman Finkelstein
If we grant that the idea of the noble savage is an extension of our desire to exercise dominion over the world by perfecting man (the bloodiest of recurring themes in history) than I think it is fair to say this ethos has found it's audience once again in the 21st century as woke.
Decolonization practically defines woke. Woke purports to perfect everything, but always, incrementally and superficially, relabelling everything into submission, never arriving at the destination - dodging all measurements.
But more than that, woke, sneaking in the door as the noble savage, has been tooled as a philosophical and legal cudgel to implement the UN global sustainability goals. This process can be traced to at least 1990 in a global meeting a year ahead of the UN Rio Summit - where the 'liberators' bulldozed the interests of the 'savages' in their own bankyard while rolling out their 'enobling goals'.
'Appeal to the Noble Savage' is exactly the right term. And after reading your piece I wonder if idealizing a historical version of the noble savage is both a clever ploy to re-colonize our world and also our unconscious desire to find proof of concept for the promised land, where there simply is none.
Ancient history is as maleable as the perfection we are promised beyond the horizon. It is the perfect place to point to and say 'See! Look at those stars, it worked then, it will work tomorrow.'
Dan, David Horowitz saw the same and wrote so in "Radical Son: A Generational Odyssey".
It's barbarism in the name of progress/betterment/perfection/utopia/heaven-on-earth.
He wrote:
"Irving Kristol, who had second thoughts before me, has observed that every generation faces a barbarian threat in its own children, who need to be civilized. This is the challenge perennially before us: to re-teach the young the conditions of being human, of managing life's tasks in a world that is and must remain forever imperfect. The refusal to come to terms with this reality is the heart of the radical impulse and accounts for its destructiveness, and thus for much of the bloody history of our age."
I recommend "Radical Son" to anyone who hasn't read it yet, btw.
Wow, there is so much there to consider, what a profound insight. To think that we face the barbarian threat in our own children is both exactly right and jarring. I have to admit I never thought to frame it that way. It's much easier to think about in the abstract, but 'the children' are in fact my own and that hit's home. I will absolutely get Radical Son. thank you for the recommendation.
Thank you Dr. Heying for reporting on Megellen renaming threat. As I type this, I am seated in my apartment that is located 0.4 miles north of Hastings Law School- the premier law school on the west coast. Our governor Newsom has stripped the name “Hastings” so that it is now “College of Law” because California’s first supreme court justice was not woke by 2020 standards and for alleged but not evidenced harm to American Indians (what they actually call themselves). I have observed that city and state and institution members of Rockefeller-funded Equity Program are engaged in renaming to counter colonialism effect on indigenous. I can relate to that concern as I am indigenous to SF Bay Area and I am fighting to repel the Equity Program colonization. That you for observing “prior” vs. “first” status of inhabitants. I also made same correction in letter to SF Supervisors.
I am going to invoke Jordan Peterson as I mention the importance of rules to guide downstream activity. The “renaming” enthusiasts cite reasons, not rules. This is ill-advised because anyone can conjure up reasons for glass half-empty/full. When I find myself in a philosophical dilemma, I try to construct a rule for forward direction.
Thank you for the “what they actually call themselves” comment, that’s been mostly my experience as well. For example, one of my favorite neighbors calls himself Eskimo not Inuit, dear friends who are Dena’ina (or Athabaskan) are more likely to call themselved Indian in regular conversation. I think it’s a small number of wokesters who are running around policing words, but they are very noisy and motivated
Magellan went on his famous 43,000 mile tour in 1519 to ~1521/22 (Google highlights). Maybe this professor could do the same thing (up the game---same technology!) and then she could name this astrological gem after herself. He didn’t make it--but if she does...
Perhaps you've also heard of the American Ornithological Society's project to rename English bird names? From their website: "The AOS commits to changing all English-language names of birds within its geographic jurisdiction that are named directly after people (eponyms), along with other names deemed offensive and exclusionary, focusing first on those species that occur primarily within the U.S. or Canada." The downward spiral of supposedly scientific organizations is awful. They'll soon rename the Bald Eagle since everyone with alopecia is surely upset by this humiliation. Please keep up the good fight!
Heather and Bret spoke about this a couple of months ago. its all just as insane. my take is that these wokers (wokees, woke-e-dokes... whatever) must not have anything better to do. maybe they need to volunteer at a soup kitchen or something. at least that will actually be of benefit to someone other than THEMSELVES. cuz really, it all comes down to self-aggrandizement anyway.
I can definitely agree that people with too much time on their hands are notoriously prone to mischief. Much easier to virtue signal than to analyze a problem and work towards its solution. Even better when you can find a problem that doesn't exist (such as the far right coming after the gender-confused) that you can turn into a "cause".
Silly people making spurious arguments. Respond to this as one would any wailing child throwing a tantrum in the store; their emotional heft is on that level.
I've been saying essentially the same thing for decades. This essay zeroes in on the hypocrisy of an ideology that creates its 'science' out of its own imaginings rather from facts and research.
I have a strong physical science background. I made my living from manipulating physical reality. Being a legend in my own mind does not pay well. Getting the job done, right the first time, pays the bills.
In my world, pontificating gets you laughed at. Coming in on budget gets respect and admiration.
When will people realize this "game" of renaming things is un-winnable? There is no person, thing or organization that will ever be moral enough to please the un-pleasable. (Un-pleaseable was just auto-corrected to "unappeasable" which is actually true as well.)
Magellan was a man of his time, but not an ordinary one. Even if his circumnavigation was not the FIRST it is surely the first which we have the documentation for. Even if he is not a man we would celebrate today, his accomplishments certainly are. Will the future judge our profligate deficit spending and unwillingness to defend our borders at least as harshly as we judge "slavers and colonizers" in our own history? Will the late 20th and early 21st centuries be thought of as a Golden Age to those in the future? A time of legend and myth that serves only to highlight our hubris and how badly our generation served the ones that come after? With US debt accounting for a sixth of the total money supply on the planet, "unsustainable" seems like almost British understatement.
The future will indeed judge us, should we be lucky enough to have their eyes on us. Nero played the violin; we established committees to rename schools and sports teams, birds and galaxies. Still, Rome burns.
Humans gotta human. They lie, steal, conquer and enslave. They also innovate, show compassion and sow peace. Like the differences between individuals, some groups tend to be more or less toward either extremes in behavior, and we do seem to have record of those who have been on the tapering ends of that bell curve. I would agree that the “decolonizers” are showing themselves to be heavily on the negative side of that graph, and are using sly techniques for their imagined righteousness.
'humans gotta human'. we need that on a t-shirt ;)
or Humans gonna human ... :-)
Well, this moment makes me sad. I need to take a break from supporting this Substack, at least for a while. Because it looks very much like you have fallen for exactly the same type of fallacy you're criticizing, Heather. Not the Noble Savage, but the Noble Israel. Why else, when reviling all the current evils in the world do you waste not one word on the horror of bombing civilians, many of them children? Is that not in any way at least as bad as tearing down posters?
Your larger point is sound enough, but it may be time to examine the plank in your own eye. In the mean time, I really can't face having to suffer the grief and frustration of watching you take the side of a genocidal nation without even examining the possibility that you may have been misled. You of all people should have some skepticism of the narrative of the mainstream press, but on this it seems you do not. I hate this, but I can't watch any more.
This seems very much like a shtick, one crafted to create empathy and action. You say you’re leaving, yet have posted several more comments since saying you would go. I believe you made similar comments on relevant posts of mine earlier; it was (more) appropriate there, but is not here.
I think the Israeli right to protect themselves takes precedent over anything that they have done to Gaza. The Israelis left Gaza in 2005. The only ones keeping Gazans imprisoned are Hamas. Hamas, the people that spend the aid that they are given buy missiles and build tunnels. The Israelis still control the West Bank and conditions there are much better than in Gaza. Antisemitism has been a regular feature in the West for a long time. Only the atrocities of the Nazis made Antisemitism keep a low profile in shame. Like slavery, it thrives among Muslims. And seems to be increasingly more acceptable by secular Westerners.
So the "right to protect themselves" justifies ethnic cleansing and genocide? Cool. Israel is thus the moral equivalent of Nazi Germany, as far as you're concerned.
I have to wonder, whenever I see comments so rife with propaganda talking points in ignorance of the facts whether the source is an AIPAC/ADL bot, or merely a tool.
The Israelis go out of their way to prevent civilian casualties. Hamas goes out of its way to inflict the maximum casualties among civilians. Hardly equivalency. The Egyptians were more than willing to let the Gazans become the Israelis' problem. Perhaps they have a bigger beef with the Egyptians than they have with the Israelis. Oh, yeah. The Egyptians are much less concerned with civilian casualties and would have treated Gaza like the nest of vipers that it has become if the Gazans had been stupid enough to attack Egyptians. After almost 60 years, the Arab countries seem to be losing interest in the Gazans as well. The Persians still seem to support the Palestinians, but not for the Palestinians' sake. The Shi'ites consider them apostates after all. Valuable as cannon fodder but little else.
Identity politics much? Are you comfortable telling Heather and Brett what they should and shouldn't talk about - and how they must discuss it? Your loss.
Golly it would be so cool if people would learn to read for content instead of just flailing out of emotional response. Criticizing an identity politics position is not inherently an instance of identity politics. And asking people to give thought to what they're saying and what it implies is certainly not telling them what they can talk about or how. It is asking them to reconsider. And in particular, since Heather obviously knows that idealizing and romanticizing the behavior of an entire people based on mythology rather than a grasp of actual historical events, her apparent stance on the rights and wrongs of Israel/Palestine is excruciating to have to watch. Yes, it's my loss, but it's hers as well.
Please. This is insane. No one should be expected to focus 100% of every breathing and writing moment to a current event.
But when tacitly talking about that current event in 3 out of 3 examples, it is extremely revealing when all three focus on the grievances of one side over the other.
It is extremely revealing how you seem to assume without saying that you believe it is that in a conflict where there is a huge imbalance in power that the weaker power is the most "virtuous". Is that how Western liberals justify the most atrocious treatment of groups that they disagree with?
You claim "misled" without any backup. Elaborate.
There is no mention of Israel in this piece. Only Jewish genocide. We should be able to agree that calling for the death to all Jews is abhorrent without any reservation.
As long as we agree that the engaging in genocide and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians is at least as abhorrent. You on board with that?
Ethnic cleansing of a people whose number has increase 5x? Why didn't Egypt demand the repatriation of every Gazan after 1967? They could have gone to the UN and probably gotten that strip of coastline back while leaving the rest of the Sinai to the Israelis to worry about. Why do do no Arab nations allow emigration from Gaza? Who keeps the Gazans locked inside and poor? Not the Israelis. You seem to be the one that has no understanding of the root of this conflict.
I don't see anyone calling for ethnic cleansing of Palestinians. Only of eliminating Hamas, a terrorist organization that I believe lots of Palestinians would like to have freedom from.
well at this moment i need to quote The Radical Individualist: "In my world, pontificating gets you laughed at" 🤣
And for anyone genuinely interested in the ways that many North Americans in particular may have been misled in their beliefs about the history leading up to the events of October 7th, and in whether criticism of Israel is tantamount to antisemitism I commend you to this longer interview with Gabor Maté, and the reading list he suggests.
The list:
The Birth of Israel: Myths and Realities by Simha Flapan
The Hundred Years' War on Palestine: A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017 by Rashid Khalidi
Gaza: An Inquest Into Its Martyrdom by Norman Finkelstein
The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine by Ilan Pappé
The interview:
https://youtu.be/SHDBw-wx6w0?si=He9Ezf3LwWme3p9P
If we grant that the idea of the noble savage is an extension of our desire to exercise dominion over the world by perfecting man (the bloodiest of recurring themes in history) than I think it is fair to say this ethos has found it's audience once again in the 21st century as woke.
Decolonization practically defines woke. Woke purports to perfect everything, but always, incrementally and superficially, relabelling everything into submission, never arriving at the destination - dodging all measurements.
But more than that, woke, sneaking in the door as the noble savage, has been tooled as a philosophical and legal cudgel to implement the UN global sustainability goals. This process can be traced to at least 1990 in a global meeting a year ahead of the UN Rio Summit - where the 'liberators' bulldozed the interests of the 'savages' in their own bankyard while rolling out their 'enobling goals'.
'Appeal to the Noble Savage' is exactly the right term. And after reading your piece I wonder if idealizing a historical version of the noble savage is both a clever ploy to re-colonize our world and also our unconscious desire to find proof of concept for the promised land, where there simply is none.
Ancient history is as maleable as the perfection we are promised beyond the horizon. It is the perfect place to point to and say 'See! Look at those stars, it worked then, it will work tomorrow.'
Dan, David Horowitz saw the same and wrote so in "Radical Son: A Generational Odyssey".
It's barbarism in the name of progress/betterment/perfection/utopia/heaven-on-earth.
He wrote:
"Irving Kristol, who had second thoughts before me, has observed that every generation faces a barbarian threat in its own children, who need to be civilized. This is the challenge perennially before us: to re-teach the young the conditions of being human, of managing life's tasks in a world that is and must remain forever imperfect. The refusal to come to terms with this reality is the heart of the radical impulse and accounts for its destructiveness, and thus for much of the bloody history of our age."
I recommend "Radical Son" to anyone who hasn't read it yet, btw.
Wow, there is so much there to consider, what a profound insight. To think that we face the barbarian threat in our own children is both exactly right and jarring. I have to admit I never thought to frame it that way. It's much easier to think about in the abstract, but 'the children' are in fact my own and that hit's home. I will absolutely get Radical Son. thank you for the recommendation.
David Horowitz is a powerful writer, never more so than when he describes the radical left from the inside.
I just ordered this book. Thanks for the recommendation.
You're welcome.
It's also a study in how people end up being communists -or socialists- even when they've come from oppressive regimes to free countries.
I hope you enjoy it.
Isn't the "noble savage" an idea of Rousseau's? A savage man but hardly noble. Fathering bastards and abandoning them to orphanages.
Yes, it is. And you're right to point out the contradiction. To some people fixated on the perfect man, it's easier to fix 'them' than me.
Thank you Dr. Heying for reporting on Megellen renaming threat. As I type this, I am seated in my apartment that is located 0.4 miles north of Hastings Law School- the premier law school on the west coast. Our governor Newsom has stripped the name “Hastings” so that it is now “College of Law” because California’s first supreme court justice was not woke by 2020 standards and for alleged but not evidenced harm to American Indians (what they actually call themselves). I have observed that city and state and institution members of Rockefeller-funded Equity Program are engaged in renaming to counter colonialism effect on indigenous. I can relate to that concern as I am indigenous to SF Bay Area and I am fighting to repel the Equity Program colonization. That you for observing “prior” vs. “first” status of inhabitants. I also made same correction in letter to SF Supervisors.
I am going to invoke Jordan Peterson as I mention the importance of rules to guide downstream activity. The “renaming” enthusiasts cite reasons, not rules. This is ill-advised because anyone can conjure up reasons for glass half-empty/full. When I find myself in a philosophical dilemma, I try to construct a rule for forward direction.
Thank you for the “what they actually call themselves” comment, that’s been mostly my experience as well. For example, one of my favorite neighbors calls himself Eskimo not Inuit, dear friends who are Dena’ina (or Athabaskan) are more likely to call themselved Indian in regular conversation. I think it’s a small number of wokesters who are running around policing words, but they are very noisy and motivated
LMAO!! This is what comedians used to do! Love the irony!
"Perhaps Amherst should rebrand."
Ah, the twist back! The boomerang always returns to the hurler.
Yes, perhaps Amherst should. And Yale. And ____.
But the finger pointers and cancelers do pride themselves on their diplomas showing off these very same institutions.
Magellan went on his famous 43,000 mile tour in 1519 to ~1521/22 (Google highlights). Maybe this professor could do the same thing (up the game---same technology!) and then she could name this astrological gem after herself. He didn’t make it--but if she does...
Perhaps you've also heard of the American Ornithological Society's project to rename English bird names? From their website: "The AOS commits to changing all English-language names of birds within its geographic jurisdiction that are named directly after people (eponyms), along with other names deemed offensive and exclusionary, focusing first on those species that occur primarily within the U.S. or Canada." The downward spiral of supposedly scientific organizations is awful. They'll soon rename the Bald Eagle since everyone with alopecia is surely upset by this humiliation. Please keep up the good fight!
Heather and Bret spoke about this a couple of months ago. its all just as insane. my take is that these wokers (wokees, woke-e-dokes... whatever) must not have anything better to do. maybe they need to volunteer at a soup kitchen or something. at least that will actually be of benefit to someone other than THEMSELVES. cuz really, it all comes down to self-aggrandizement anyway.
I can definitely agree that people with too much time on their hands are notoriously prone to mischief. Much easier to virtue signal than to analyze a problem and work towards its solution. Even better when you can find a problem that doesn't exist (such as the far right coming after the gender-confused) that you can turn into a "cause".
This is an excellent article. I want to double my subscription right now!
From a university the name of which celebrates the inventor of the smallpox laden blanket ...
This professor will leave her position because of “toxic work place” and “feeling she doesn’t belong” You watch...
Silly people making spurious arguments. Respond to this as one would any wailing child throwing a tantrum in the store; their emotional heft is on that level.
Now just wait a second, or perhaps a few herded thousand years. I've been bumping into Neanderthal factoids lately.
If we can believe scientists using genetics in their investigations, it would appear that homo sapiens
interbreed with Neanderthal, generically appropriating, as they colonized across Eurasia. to the point of extermination of our cousins.
If Lucy were alive today, and of a woke persuasion, might she feel justified in her feeling that 5 million years worth of succession should be erased?
Personally, I'm not feeling a lot of remorse.