Postmodern Americanism ethos is humanist mythos

[scourge]

Belief in the sacrosanctity of the human animal finds its origins in the US Declaration of Independence, where Thomas Jefferson, defiant toward the pre-modern Divine Right of Kings belief writes, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

This statement and why Jefferson made it (angry rebel) is key to understanding postmodern Americanism, the faith-based anticulture movement that has swallowed Western Europe and Australia and threatens nations of the Asian Pacific Rim (Japan, Taiwan, South Korea) with its dissolution into historic-hereditary-cultural mediocrity.

Secular humanism, it can be reasonbly argued, is the official state religion of the Western Hemisphere and its close trading partners beyond. It is a religion because its adherents have agreed to set aside fact in favor of myth so that the institution's (the human animal is the center of the universe, or, anthrocentricism) ethos, or civilizational moral foundation, as a whole, may retain integrity, or at minimum, the illusion thereof.

What's needed is a sane foundational replacement for modern civilization, one that isn't mired in the error of an endless self-referential loop, but like those great civilizations of old, and those of the future, sets its sights beyond itself (liberal democracy) or its component parts (human animals).

[Goluf]

In Jefferson's (or any of his buddies') other writings on things like education, he makes it clear that he, and the experiment of American democracy, does not support the idiocy you've just outlined. America, in the minds of the founding fathers (all of whom were more than a little more intelligent than you or I), was created by and for white Europeans of English descent.

Thomas Jefferson would never have argued that everyone has innately equal abilities. The revolt against British Monarchy (at that point not the glowing example uncorrupted aristocracy that you make it out to be) was aimed towards providing an environment wherein if someone DID have the same abilities as a king, then there wouldn't be any bureaucracy holding them back.

The modern subversion you describe can be seen more as a result of globalization, resulting in a gross misinterpretation of the ideas of the American Constitution. Keep in mind that Jefferson owned slaves, and (officially) did not consider them people. Does this sound like a man who would simply take certain things, like class and racial superiority, to be self evident? Would that alter how he thought about such statements such as "All men are created equal"?

I think so.

[scourge]

You're overreacting.

1) I did not deny that Jefferson's best intentions were only aimed at the European colonial stock and their posterity.
2) I did not state anything about uncorrupted British aristocracy of the time. You're beating that strawman all by yourself.

So, the spirit or intent of the words of the angry rebels has been twisted into new laws to serve modern interests. Dr. Sunic's book's thesis is as follows: The genealogy of early Calvinist Puritanism mixed with the techno-scientific religion of boundless economic progress and legally veiled in the obscure para-Biblical and Jewish-inspired sense of political self-chosenness, created a system that has little in common with its original design.

Nonetheless, I disagree with Jefferson's Judeo-Christian belief in the Creation of Equal English colonials because it is false, because it is anything but self-evident then as now. Why? Because the evidence indicates we evolved, not that we were created and furthermore there is no metric by which we can demonstrate the universal equality of any or all men; not height, not weight, not intelligence, not character, not fitness, not anything. There is nothing but legislation upon blind faith contra all real facts we have been able to access and the resulting disorganization this myth-ethos causes.

[Cynical]

Belief in the sacrosanctity of the human animal finds its origins in the US Declaration of Independence, where Thomas Jefferson, defiant toward the pre-modern Divine Right of Kings belief writes, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness."

You need to do more reading; that was originally said by John Locke, and Thomas Jefferson merely appropriated it.

[beyond_godlike]

You must look at those words in context. In that time the aristocracy was thought to be superior to everyone else. He was trying to say that the aristocracy was not inherently superior to commoners. He could've chosen other words that were more specific to what he meant, but then the document would lose much of its effect.

[ASBO]

all men are created equal

A violent overreaction to the abuse of power by one king. What an idiot.

All men are created monkeys. Some rise above, others suck 10,000 dicks and like it.

[nous]

Democracy and egalitarianism mean injustice, I agree, but that's not really a recent discovery. And it doesn't make a fucking difference if one wants it for a select group of people only. Same idiocy, only for fewer people?

Belief in the sacrosanctity of the human animal
Secular humanism, it can be reasonbly argued, is the official state religion of the Western Hemisphere and its close trading partners beyond. It is a religion because its adherents have agreed to set aside fact in favor of myth so that the institution's (the human animal is the center of the universe, or, anthrocentricism) ethos, or civilizational moral foundation, as a whole, may retain integrity, or at minimum, the illusion thereof.

Here I disagree with you, because I think you are not precise enough. Humanism is at best a pseudo-religion, but by no means a religion proper, of which a definition would include: a dogma, a cult, and a moral law.

What's needed is a sane foundational replacement for modern civilization, one that isn't mired in the error of an endless self-referential loop, but like those great civilizations of old, and those of the future, sets its sights beyond itself (liberal democracy) or its component parts (human animals).

Sounds like traditional religion to me... but apart from that: how could it set its sights beyond itself, if humans were only animals?

[scourge]

Wealth and technology, that symbiotic pair, have enabled us the luxury to pursue atomized wants. Life is no longer sheer survival each hour on a frozen landscape during an ice age. History between the opulence and desperate subsistence states gives many examples, or possible ways that civilizations were oriented toward other than personal wants and urgent need. Things greater than humanity are that which humanity did not create and cannot control, yet must experience, even to marvel at for inspiration or adapt to for growth in evolution and wisdom. The changing seasons and weather, celestial objects, the passage of time and death, natural beauty and life, are some things greater than humanity.

It seems that past societies made eternal things gods or God, placing them above humanity and according these powers reverence in local customs as befit diverse, separated cultures. Now, for those not utterly lost to modernity, we are reduced to admiring the sagas, the architecture, the sculptures, the valuable lessons, produced by those who came before, because they, unlike us, were awed and inspired by eternal things bigger than humans. We are stagnant and decaying and it shows. Affordable iPods, decades of free time before the TV and the right to vote for legalized gay sex in public parks is not worth the price of the loss of our collective awe toward great eternal things and the resulting strengthening our bodies, minds and cultures undertook as a result.

[nous]

Wealth and technology, that symbiotic pair, have enabled us the luxury to pursue atomized wants. Life is no longer sheer survival each hour on a frozen landscape during an ice age. History between the opulence and desperate subsistence states gives many examples, or possible ways that civilizations were oriented toward other than personal wants and urgent need. Things greater than humanity are that which humanity did not create and cannot control, yet must experience, even to marvel at for inspiration or adapt to for growth in evolution and wisdom. The changing seasons and weather, celestial objects, the passage of time and death, natural beauty and life, are some things greater than humanity.

You sound very sincere about that, somewhat as if you were born with the knowledge of the human past. Sincerity can be a good thing, but it is not so in itself: only when it affirms the right belief is it good. You say that man has always struggled, and this is indeed so. But man has not only struggled for survival. That is only a small part of man's history. If you look at human past cultures, you will see many things that can not be explained by reducing the human state to a struggle for survival. The approach to understanding man that shows through in your writing is "historical materialism", which has, in relation to human history, only recently found widespread acceptance, and which is a product of the "modern spirit". This one should not forget.

It seems that past societies made eternal things gods or God, placing them above humanity and according these powers reverence in local customs as befit diverse, separated cultures. Now, for those not utterly lost to modernity, we are reduced to admiring the sagas, the architecture, the sculptures, the valuable lessons, produced by those who came before, because they, unlike us, were awed and inspired by eternal things bigger than humans. We are stagnant and decaying and it shows. Affordable iPods, decades of free time before the TV and the right to vote for legalized gay sex in public parks is not worth the price of the loss of our collective awe toward great eternal things and the resulting strengthening our bodies, minds and cultures undertook as a result.

The identification of nature with eternity is something which "past societies" (if traditional) would not have agreed with. Boethius says: "When some people hear that Plato thought this world neither had a beginning in time nor will ever have an end, they mistakenly conclude that the created world is coeternal with the Creator. However, to be led through the endless life Plato attributes to the world is one thing; to embrace simultaneously the whole presence of endless life is quite another, and it is this latter that is proper to the divine mind." And St Aquinas adds: "For, if "eternal" be understood in this sense, nothing can in any way be coeternal with God, for nothing but God is immutable." (St Thomas Aquinas: On The Eternity of the World)

[ASBO]

Anything can become religion if the faith invested in it is what determines to the individual his or her own fitness. Atheists are among the worst.