I have a lot more time since being kicked off Twitter for asking for details about all those "threats against her life" for Minnesota nice Omar. In particular I asked for details and how many police reports were filed.
I got the link below via Linkedin. The purpose of the NYT now is to create discord, guilt, unhappiness, further the race war, get Trump....basically the mouthpiece of the Globalists.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/15/opinion/cultural-revolution-meritocracy.html?register=email&auth=register-email
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/15/opinion/cultural-revolution-meritocracy.html?register=email&auth=register-email
They call out 5 "lies" about "American Culture". These seem to me to be not just misguided, but intentionally wrong. You can read their "backup support for their theories" below.
They state that these are important lies that are destroying America
1) Career success is fulfilling
2) I can make myself happy
3) Life is an individual journey
4) You have to find your own truth
5) Rich and successful people are worth more than poorer and less successful people
So folks, the NYT says all the above are lies and we need to think the opposite in order to improve our "culture".
What is equally telling about this NYT article, is the backup arguments they use. Often a straw man or worse, or just plain stupid and not applicable.
For instance, for 5) they rephrase the issue as "aligning yourself with prestigious brands".
So quickly, my rebuttal. Quickly because the NYT is so outrageously stupid (intentionally so is all I can think)....its not worth more time.
1) Our greatest "work", toughest accomplishments, most meaningful contributions can often occur in the midst of "a career". Much less likely to occur in someone freewheeling away in their parents basement.
2) You are the only one who can make yourself happy. What is not totally obvious about this?
3) I see....its not about your journey, its about your being a cog in the machine, a part of the great socialist movement. Ya right.
4) OMG don't try to find your own truth! Get it from the NYT and George Soros who only have your best interest in mind. Don't even look for truth, it will be scary. Instead just focus on what the Main Stream Media tells you is truth, and of course, "GET TRUMP"
5) This is kind of a silly one, because the statement immediately makes the mistake of equating Rich and Successful. Other than that, it is just silly. Are they trying to tell you that it is OK to be poor, it is OK for your life to suck? We are all winners, because.......SJW?
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Four years ago, in the midst of the Obama presidency, I published a book called “The Road to Character.”
American culture seemed to be in decent shape and my focus was on how
individuals can deepen their inner lives.
This week, in the midst of the
Trump presidency, I’ve got another book, “The Second Mountain.” It’s become clear in the interim that things are not in good shape, that our problems are societal. The whole country is going through some sort of spiritual and emotional crisis.
College
mental health facilities are swamped, suicide rates are spiking, the
president’s repulsive behavior is tolerated or even celebrated by tens
of millions of Americans.
At the root of it all is the following
problem: We’ve created a culture based on lies.
Here are some of them:
Career success is fulfilling.
This is the lie we foist on the young. In their tender years we put the
most privileged of them inside a college admissions process that puts
achievement and status anxiety at the center of their lives. That begins
advertising’s lifelong mantra — if you make it, life will be good.
Everybody
who has actually tasted success can tell you that’s not true. I
remember when the editor of my first book called to tell me it had made
the best-seller list. It felt like … nothing. It was external to me.
The
truth is, success spares you from the shame you might experience if you
feel yourself a failure, but career success alone does not provide
positive peace or fulfillment. If you build your life around it, your
ambitions will always race out in front of what you’ve achieved, leaving
you anxious and dissatisfied.
I can make myself happy.
This is the lie of self-sufficiency. This is the lie that happiness is
an individual accomplishment. If I can have just one more victory, lose
15 pounds or get better at meditation, then I will be happy.
But
people looking back on their lives from their deathbeds tell us that
happiness is found amid thick and loving relationships. It is found by
defeating self-sufficiency for a state of mutual dependence. It is found
in the giving and receiving of care.
It’s
easy to say you live for relationships, but it’s very hard to do. It’s
hard to see other people in all their complexity. It’s hard to
communicate from your depths, not your shallows. It’s hard to stop
performing! No one teaches us these skills.
Life is an individual journey. This is the lie books like Dr. Seuss’ “Oh, the Places You’ll Go”
tell. In adulthood, each person goes on a personal trip and racks up a
bunch of experiences, and whoever has the most experiences wins. This
lie encourages people to believe freedom is the absence of restraint. Be
unattached. Stay on the move. Keep your options open.
In
reality, the people who live best tie themselves down. They don’t ask:
What cool thing can I do next? They ask: What is my responsibility here?
They respond to some problem or get called out of themselves by a deep
love.
By planting themselves in one
neighborhood, one organization or one mission, they earn trust. They
have the freedom to make a lasting difference. It’s the chains we choose
that set us free.
You have to find your own truth.
This is the privatization of meaning. It’s not up to the schools to
teach a coherent set of moral values, or a society. Everybody chooses
his or her own values. Come up with your own answers to life’s ultimate
questions! You do you!
The problem is
that unless your name is Aristotle, you probably can’t do it. Most of
us wind up with a few vague moral feelings but no moral clarity or sense
of purpose.
The reality is that
values are created and passed down by strong, self-confident communities
and institutions. People absorb their values by submitting to
communities and institutions and taking part in the conversations that
take place within them. It’s a group process.
Rich and successful people are worth more than poorer and less successful people. We pretend we don’t tell this lie, but our whole meritocracy points to it. In fact, the meritocracy contains a skein of lies.
The
message of the meritocracy is that you are what you accomplish. The
false promise of the meritocracy is that you can earn dignity by
attaching yourself to prestigious brands. The emotion of the meritocracy
is conditional love — that if you perform well, people will love you.
The
sociology of the meritocracy is that society is organized around a set
of inner rings with the high achievers inside and everyone else further
out. The anthropology of the meritocracy is that you are not a soul to
be saved but a set of skills to be maximized.
No
wonder it’s so hard to be a young adult today. No wonder our society is
fragmenting. We’ve taken the lies of hyper-individualism and we’ve made
them the unspoken assumptions that govern how we live.
We talk a lot about the political revolution we need. The cultural revolution is more important.
The Times is committed to publishing a diversity of letters to the editor. We’d like to hear what you think about this or any of our articles. Here are some tips. And here’s our email: letters@nytimes.com.
David
Brooks has been a columnist with The Times since 2003. He is the author
of “The Road to Character” and the forthcoming book, “The Second
Mountain.” @nytdavidbrooks
A version of this article appears in print on , on Page A25 of the New York edition with the headline: Five Lies Our Culture Tells Us. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe
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