Just the musing thoughts of someone who is classically a liberal and up until very recently assumed he was a left winger. Of course, what was once considered left wing has changed dramatically in the last 10 years. On thinking about this, I have come to the realization the entire governing world order established after World War 2 is being held up by people who are basing their actions on a deeply flawed view of how human societies work. The above titles "False Assumptions".
False assumption 1: Peace can be preserved so long as food is plentiful and wealth is abundant. This ignores historical facts that people are not always rational in how they perceive the "fairness" of the systems they are a part of, and a people too long used to excess forget what its lack even is and so are more quick to take a hammer to the system then they should be.
False assumption 2: Culture is relative and malleable, easily changed, and happily so. In point of fact in Evolutionary psychology it is evident Culture is innately programmed into the brain at a very early age and is part of how the human animal knows what the rules are and that it is safe. Which is why everyone feels some level of unease when they step outside their culture into another country, from mild awareness of the difference to outright terror. Changing the entire cultural matrix of a country in the span of a generation, or introducing rapid foreign elements too it can trigger the same reaction in people to varying degrees. Depending on how badly the cultural matrix is damages, these people may even become violent in an effort to restore the rules they understood at an animalistic level were necessary for their safety.
False Assumption 3. People can ignore race. This ties back into the cultural framework that the mind develops, but at an even more basic level. Racial identity is tied directly to the parts of the mind that govern survival and perpetuation of the species. The same instincts that make us want to protect family/mates over "other people". Nothing is more "other" and removed from your own desire for genetic preservation then someone from another racial group entirely. There is a reason the most virulently racist people are also easily triggered by pictures of interracial couples as an example, or that miscegenation laws existed for the longest time. People can learn to not let racial differences hinder the functioning of a good society, but you will never be able to make anyone colorblind and race will factor into human interpersonal relations to varying degrees. Without intervention, people will by default tend to favor their own race over others. This can be learned to be avoided, but that requires external factors. It is not something that will develop on its own except in the rarest of circumstances.
This leads to False Assumption 4. Historically ethnically homogeneous countries will happily become racially and culturally diverse. The fact that the Austrian Nazi Party is now part of the majority governing coalition in that country should be a huge warning bell to the rest of Europe. False assumptions 2 and 3 dictate pretty strongly that there will be negative blowback as a result of these policies of varying severity. Brexit as an example, would never have happened without the added push of the migrant crisis. For now people still believe in the liberal governing systems of the post World War 2 era, but such belief is predicted solely upon the faith that these systems can preserve the good functioning of the economy and the social order. With the social order manifestly breaking down rapidly all it will take is an economic crisis to create a scenario that could see the dissolution of the entire pan-European experiment.
False assumption 5. People in western countries will not revolt against the liberal world order. This should go without saying, but I will say it. Many people value "intangibles" over "tangibles". All the wars fought over deities should be the warning enough on that front. This goes to the heart of why so many people on the Right "vote against their economic self interest". They value cultural and religious things (Clinging to God and Guns) over the economic things. It is a massive mistake for people on the left to disregard this, because lurking behind this disregard is the false assumption that while they may vote for God and Guns, they will never fight and die for God and Guns.
And that is the biggest false assumption of them all.
False assumption 1: Peace can be preserved so long as food is plentiful and wealth is abundant. This ignores historical facts that people are not always rational in how they perceive the "fairness" of the systems they are a part of, and a people too long used to excess forget what its lack even is and so are more quick to take a hammer to the system then they should be.
False assumption 2: Culture is relative and malleable, easily changed, and happily so. In point of fact in Evolutionary psychology it is evident Culture is innately programmed into the brain at a very early age and is part of how the human animal knows what the rules are and that it is safe. Which is why everyone feels some level of unease when they step outside their culture into another country, from mild awareness of the difference to outright terror. Changing the entire cultural matrix of a country in the span of a generation, or introducing rapid foreign elements too it can trigger the same reaction in people to varying degrees. Depending on how badly the cultural matrix is damages, these people may even become violent in an effort to restore the rules they understood at an animalistic level were necessary for their safety.
False Assumption 3. People can ignore race. This ties back into the cultural framework that the mind develops, but at an even more basic level. Racial identity is tied directly to the parts of the mind that govern survival and perpetuation of the species. The same instincts that make us want to protect family/mates over "other people". Nothing is more "other" and removed from your own desire for genetic preservation then someone from another racial group entirely. There is a reason the most virulently racist people are also easily triggered by pictures of interracial couples as an example, or that miscegenation laws existed for the longest time. People can learn to not let racial differences hinder the functioning of a good society, but you will never be able to make anyone colorblind and race will factor into human interpersonal relations to varying degrees. Without intervention, people will by default tend to favor their own race over others. This can be learned to be avoided, but that requires external factors. It is not something that will develop on its own except in the rarest of circumstances.
This leads to False Assumption 4. Historically ethnically homogeneous countries will happily become racially and culturally diverse. The fact that the Austrian Nazi Party is now part of the majority governing coalition in that country should be a huge warning bell to the rest of Europe. False assumptions 2 and 3 dictate pretty strongly that there will be negative blowback as a result of these policies of varying severity. Brexit as an example, would never have happened without the added push of the migrant crisis. For now people still believe in the liberal governing systems of the post World War 2 era, but such belief is predicted solely upon the faith that these systems can preserve the good functioning of the economy and the social order. With the social order manifestly breaking down rapidly all it will take is an economic crisis to create a scenario that could see the dissolution of the entire pan-European experiment.
False assumption 5. People in western countries will not revolt against the liberal world order. This should go without saying, but I will say it. Many people value "intangibles" over "tangibles". All the wars fought over deities should be the warning enough on that front. This goes to the heart of why so many people on the Right "vote against their economic self interest". They value cultural and religious things (Clinging to God and Guns) over the economic things. It is a massive mistake for people on the left to disregard this, because lurking behind this disregard is the false assumption that while they may vote for God and Guns, they will never fight and die for God and Guns.
And that is the biggest false assumption of them all.
