Platt, I agree that Nazism was never a purely social pattern. But I go further and claim that nothing ever is.
Like all human cultures, it was a mix. An intellectually derived system of social control, bent on using social forces, police and armies, to eradicate competitive intellectual questioning. That is, it was an intellectual system that valued itself more than it valued openness and dynamicism. Same could be said for Communism, and other failed (and failing) ideologies. The basis of moral judgement for any social system is not whether it's pragmatically successful in the short run, it's whether it's open to dynamic change and self-questioning. This has been the strength of the so-called "Westernized Democratic tradition". I just posted a new thread along these lines to explain further. The main challenge today, as I see it, is the media revolution which has subordinated intellectual questioning to show biz propaganda. People are losing the ability to intellectually individuate from the "religion" of modernity and thus even when there are good solutions to the problems facing modern man, there's not enough intellectual consensus to implement the good, even when it's plainly before us. John PS: I concur - nice posting, DT; I too look forward to pt. 2 Moq_Discuss mailing list Listinfo, Unsubscribing etc. http://lists.moqtalk.org/listinfo.cgi/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org Archives: http://lists.moqtalk.org/pipermail/moq_discuss-moqtalk.org/ http://moq.org.uk/pipermail/moq_discuss_archive/
