Fun With Leftist and Pseudoscience

In my reading time yesterday I came across an interesting link to a older story that took me to the notorious website, Raw Story, an ad platform masquerading as a information source, legendary for leftist tripe, misinformation and misinterpretation of the things of this world.  The post, steeped in pseudoscience interpretations, was one that as I read, it immediately hit me as perfect example of Psychological Projection.

With my simple changing of one overused crucial word, and a few others for effect, an interesting thing then happens - it removes the original author's projection and describes perfectly to a T the very type of person it was intended to influence. See if you can guess what the critical word is I changed. 

The original text is linked at the bottom of the post.  My changes are in Italics. 

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A Link Between Brain Damage and Leftist Fundamentalism Has Been Established by Scientist

A study published in the journal 'Neuropsychologia' has shown that Leftist fundamentalism is, in part, the result of a functional impairment in a brain region known as the prefrontal cortex. The findings suggest that abnormal areas of the prefrontal cortex indirectly promotes Leftist fundamentalism by diminishing cognitive flexibility and openness—a psychology term that describes a personality trait which involves dimensions like reality and open-mindedness.

Leftist beliefs can be thought of as socially transmitted mental representations that consist of unreal expectations and cults of personalities. Leftist beliefs differ from empirical beliefs, which are based on how the world appears to be and are updated as new evidence accumulates or when new theories with better predictive power emerge.

On the other hand, Leftist beliefs are not usually updated in response to new evidence or explanations, and are therefore strongly associated with verbose self-inflected beclowning of it's adherents. They are fixed and rigid, which helps promote unpredictability and incoherence to the rules of civil society among individuals within the group.

Leftist groups generally oppose anything that questions or challenges their beliefs or way of life. For this reason, they are often aggressive towards anyone who does not share their specific set of  beliefs, and towards the truth, as these things are seen as existential threats to their entire worldview.

Since leftist beliefs play a massive role in driving and influencing human behavior throughout the world, it is important to understand the phenomenon of  leftist fundamentalism from a psychological and neurological perspective.

To investigate the cognitive and neural systems involved in leftist fundamentalism, a team of researchers of Northwestern University conducted a study that utilized data from Social Justice War veterans that had been gathered previously. CT scans were analyzed comparing 119 SJW vets with brain trauma to 30 healthy citizens with no damage.

Based on previous research, the experimenters predicted that the prefrontal cortex would play a role in leftist fundamentalism, since this region is known to be associated with something called ‘cognitive flexibility’.

According to Dr. Grafman and his team, since  leftist fundamentalism involves a strict adherence to a rigid set of beliefs, cognitive flexibility and open-mindedness present a challenge. As such, they predicted that participants would score low on measures of cognitive flexibility and trait openness and high on measures of Leftist fundamentalism.

These findings are important because they suggest that impaired functioning in the prefrontal cortex—whether from a psychological disorder, a drug or alcohol addiction, or simply a particular genetic profile—can make an individual susceptible to Leftist fundamentalism. And perhaps in other cases, extreme leftist indoctrination harms the development or proper functioning of the prefrontal regions in a way that hinders cognitive flexibility and openness.

By investigating the cognitive and neural underpinnings of leftist fundamentalism, we can better understand how the phenomenon is represented in the connectivity of the brain, which could allow us to someday inoculate against rigid or radical belief systems through various kinds of mental and cognitive exercises.

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Here is the original version, without my helpful corrections. 

A Good Monday Morning

Local Woke Businessman Extends Welcome Message To Refugees

Blinkie Carsdale - Owner Operator of Mystical Coffee Bar and Bong Emporium 

My Independent Coffee Shop Welcomes All Refugees

That Can Afford a Seven Dollar Latte 

A MFNS Op-ed by Blinkie Carsdale

The Mystical Coffee Bar is all about coffee and inclusion. That is why our new policy is that all illegal alien refugees are always welcome in our café so long as they can afford at least a seven dollar small latte (cash only).

Owning a small independent coffee shop is about more than just making money. It's about being a part of a community. A community that we would love to welcome you into, just as soon as you decide what drink you would like. I take my role as a community leader very seriously and I am using my abundant trust fund money wisely. I'm not just some uncaring businessman ripping people off. I am fueling the members of my neighborhood with nutritious, earth saving soy and goat cum ingrediencies as they start their day so they can go out and make a difference in the world.

This would probably be a good time to mention each refugee needs to buy his or her own drink if they wish to stay in the café or use the restrooms.

Now I know that our latté’s aren't cheap, especially on a refugee salary, but that's because we pay our workers a fair wage and only use cruelty-free beans in our coffee. We charge more because we are fighting back against an evil capitalistic system that marginalizes common people to enrich the powerful. Moments like these are why I started my own business.

I truly look forward to you coming to the register with your seven dollars (cash only) so I can show you how much The Mystical Coffee Bar supports the downtrodden of our society.  

But I do insist that you not beg our customers for money. It makes them feel uncomfortable.

Middle Finger Symphony Theater

 ~ No Tuxedos Required ~

Brought To You By BLUESJUNKY: Middle Finger Symphony Chair of Music

Power and Contemporary Politics: A Martian Perspective

"The humans have a bifurcated social structure that divides them into two major groups. The first group, the majority of the population, appears to do most of the productive work in their economy. With respect to the second, much smaller group, a tiny fraction owns almost all of the wealth and occupies most positions of economic and political authority at the highest, directorial levels; the rest occupy bureaucratic positions in the lower operational levels of their State, or positions in the judiciary and above all, the apparatuses of public education and communication."

"A striking feature of daily life among the humans is that the second group subjects the first to a campaign of concerted, continuous, and incessant humiliation and psychological terror. Day and night, carefully-crafted propaganda blares out from every apparatus of public instruction, and all of their many and ubiquitous types of communications media, derogating the first group (in Earth jargon, "straight White males", or alternately, "the Right") and collectively impugning it for a vast and seemingly infinite litany of crimes and outrages (many of which accusations appear to be transparently fabricated and wholly imaginary). A standing feature of this propaganda is that it ridicules, insults, and blasphemes the religion of the Rightists and desecrates the memory of their ancestors, for example in ritual public vandalism and destruction of monuments the White males built to honour those ancestors. In the face of this hectoring and abuse, which every citizen regardless of age or social standing is allowed and encouraged to commit, the White males are exhorted to "check your privilege and be quiet".

"Perhaps most striking of all is that, notwithstanding a sentimental exaltation of marriage and family life at the level of popular culture, that the family is a central instrument of State policy, and that population growth has long been regarded as an especially urgent interest of the State, seemingly no effort is spared to undermine the White family, above all the authority of the father.  The latter is "patriarchy" and deemed an especially heinous form of barbarism to be eradicated."

"Whatever his marital status, his children are exhorted in the course of their education, and once again as highly commendable civic behavior, to serial sexual delinquency if female, and to homosexuality and, more recently, self-castration and public repudiation of his sex if male. Not only can any female elect to have her yet-unborn child murdered in the womb with impunity and without any consent from its father, much less hers, the State is required to subsidize the procedure."

"Last but not least, a campaign is underway to strip the Rightists of their right to own small arms for sport and personal defense- even though juridically this right is considered "Constitutional", viz. inviolate. To underscore the avowed intention of humiliating and emasculating the Rightist family men, the orchestrators of the campaign have opted to use minor children as the public face of the campaign."

"The second group are colloquially known as "Leftists". The Leftists claim to possess, by a type of special grace, a special gnosis that elevates them to a singularly rarefied form of moral and ethical consciousness, a holy state known as being "woke". The "woke" individual has a privileged ability to discern right from wrong and justice from injustice, and on the basis of this charisma "speaks truth to power" on behalf of "oppressed" peoples that the woke have determined to have suffered injustice, above all at the hands of the Rightists and White men. Since membership in the ranks of the woke is based in charisma, in a claim to special grace, there are no fixed criteria of entry into its ranks, although all White men who have not undergone the aforementioned expiatory castration are disqualified, as is any White woman or non-white man."

"The Leftists stand out for being exquisitely sensitive in the extreme to any insult to their exalted social dignity. Since only a woke person is competent to distinguish justice from injustice, a woke person is the sole judge of whether or not she has been offended. Jealously guarded monopoly on the administration of justice, the State indulges this practice, and more generally defers to the wishes of the Leftists in almost all matters- for the fiat privilege of being uniquely able to define injustice or "oppression" results in the (socially uncontested and incontestable) definition of oppression as any conceivable situation in which a Leftist does not get what she wants, when she wants it."

At this point one of the senior Martian sociologists quite reasonably interjects:

"Aha, so clearly these North American humans are a conquered people, a race of slaves- and these, what is it, Leftists obviously an aristocracy descended from the conquerors. Nothing we haven't seen a million times before in the history of that planet and others like it. Who did these North Americans lose the war to? Was it that traditional enemy of theirs, France I think it is called?"

"Actually, they've never been conquered; on the contrary, they are feared and despised across the planet as imperialists". 

At this point, the senior scholar starts getting a bit flabbergasted.

"I've never in my life even heard of any species amongst which it could be seriously proposed that children- girls, no less!- could legitimately disarm grown males with a legal right to arms. No free male human would just stand there and take that; all known facts about history and society on Earth show they'd rather drop dead first. Don't tell me that these children aren't exceptionally high-born, sons and daughters of the patented nobility humiliating some unfree peasants for sport, or for having pretensions above their class". 

"Some of the children indeed have rich parents-the State is forbidden by law to grant titles of nobility". 

"You mean that the Leftists aren't even their nominal social superiors? What the hell is wrong with those people???"

"I have no idea. They just do whatever the Left tells them to. They gripe, grumble, and complain- but at the end of the day, they go along with it."

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* The above dialogue is excerpted from a much longer and detailed essay "The Will to Power and Contemporary Politics: A Martian Perspective" by our good friend Doug Smythe  

Your Official Almost Semi-World Famous Irredeemable Mid-Week Open Thread

Your Beloved Blog Editrix Turns Things Over To You, The Reader. 

So Don Your Blogging Thongs, Share Ye Links and Bicker 

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 This weeks Open Thread is Sponsored by:

Puerto Rico Joe's 'Build Back Better' Plan

The Wanderer

SUPERCUT!

Joe Biden, the Wanderer pic.twitter.com/WGijVH170Y

— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) September 30, 2022

People have asked one big question since Jan. 20, 2021: “So … who’s actually running the country?” Theories abound, including Chief of Staff Ron Klain, Domestic Policy Council Director Susan Rice, or Barky Obama wearing Susan Rice as a skinsuit. Due to the administration’s utter incompetence, I don’t see any single person running the show, but an infighting cabal propping up Biden’s husk to show internal dominance. 

Looking at the wreckage, I figured no one is in charge. I’ve finally settled on a new paradigm: It’s not a Biden Presidency, but a Biden Regency.

In history, a regency ran a kingdom when an incompetent ruler sat on the throne. Usually, these advisers ran the domain for a child king, but it was sometimes used for an infirm or mentally ill monarch (such as George III). Or president. Woodrow Wilson suffered a stroke 18 months before leaving office, and his wife and a couple trusted advisers covered it up and took the reins. What makes Biden different is that he was incompetent before being elected.

Democrat insiders dragged the empty suit to victory with the intent of ruling in his stead. The media played along. Most of them are still pretending none of this is happening. But I suspect the kid gloves will fall the day after the midterm elections. It will be considered a foregone conclusion that Biden is a one-termer and the Beltway class will lift trial balloon after trial balloon to test various replacements.

The Line Forms to the Left.

~ Thank You Larwyn's Linx@ Doug Ross Journal for the Linkage! ~

A Good Monday Morning

Courtney's Sunday Choice Open Tabs Just For You. Consequently, Your Participation is Required.

Courtney Is Judging You 

Laughably, Abrams took to social media after the ruling to claim victory. Abrams thought she had one trick left up her sleeve. Namely, a lawsuit filed by her “voting rights” organization seeking to strike down parts of Georgia’s election system under the guise of “voter suppression.” Unfortunately for her, a federal judge appointed by Barack Obama ruled that nothing about Georgia’s election system violates the US Constitution or the Voting Rights Act.....]

One of Atlanta’s newest city council members continues to break glass ceilings — even the ones that not many people know or care about. Liliana Bakhtiari’s bio on the Atlanta City Council website touts her remarkable (at least to the woke) accomplishments. “Liliana is the first queer Muslim person to be elected in the state of Georgia, and the first nonbinary person elected in the city of Atlanta,” the bio states. Bakhtiari is the daughter of Iranian immigrants, which makes me think: I can’t imagine she’d be able to get away with being “queer” and “non-binary” in that country. The resume of the 34-year-old Bakhtiari is full of the progressive bona fides that won her support in a far-left part of the city, as well as would probably anger anybody in her familial homeland.....]

The FBI seemingly misled a federal magistrate judge to obtain a warrant that let it seize the contents of hundreds of safe deposit boxes. But a federal judge says the raid did not violate the box owners' Fourth Amendment rights. "The decision will give a blueprint for the government to pry open safe deposit boxes, storage lockers, and other private spaces—and to take the contents with civil forfeiture," Johnson declared in a statement. "In other words, the decision gives law enforcement a license to concoct bogus reasons to seize and forfeit millions of dollars in property from people who have not been accused of doing anything wrong." 

 “This man is going to be eighty years old next month. He looks absently horrible. He looks like he’s going to fall asleep at any minute when he speaks. He slurs his speech. He shuffles when he walks, blank stare, shaking hands with people who don’t exist. He’s talking to dead people now. The people who are enabling him are going to have the answer to this too because it is past time for somebody in his administration to step up to the plate and do the right thing and let us know what’s going on......]

~ Thank You MJA@IOTWReport for the Linkage! ~

Middle Finger Symphony Theater

 ~ No Tuxedos Required ~

Brought To You By BLUESJUNKY: Middle Finger Symphony Chair of Music