To me, it all comes back to exercising one's personal responsibility to live a moral life. 'I was just following orders' didn't cut it at Nuremburg, and it doesn't cut it now.
Or, as I learned from you: it sadly did cut it at Nuremburg for almost everyone, save a few scapegoats.
With my current opinion of the majority of people's moral compass, I guess I find it more inspiring to imagine 'systems' of accountability which hum along regardless of an individuals intention to live a moral life. The fantasy of it just being so darn difficult to act poorly then shirk responsibility, that people who are inclined that way choose not to bother, or suffer real consequences if they do feel the need to try.
Good point about Nuremburg. I should have been more precise in my language. The underlings who were tried at Nuremburg were told that they couldn't use the excuse 'I was just following orders'. Meanwhile the ones who issued those orders were being spirited away to the US under Operation Paperclip. And as Antony Sutton points out in Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler, the American corporate oligarchs who provided Hitler with all the synthetic oil, rubber, planes, trucks and tanks he needed to wage war, and whose companies used the slave labour provided by the Nazis' network of camps across Europe, never went on trial.
Now, as for systems of accountability, this is something that the anarchocapitalist thinkers have spent a lot of time figuring out. To be honest, I haven't spent a lot of time delving into the mechanics of how they believe a free society can be structured, because it seems like such a pipe dream at this point. But if the Doctor Strangeloves running US foreign policy get their way and manage to provoke a nuclear conflict with Russia, any surviving humans had better get themselves up to speed on it!
"For thinking individuals, this leads to rampant inefficiencies. For example, we have now been exposed to a long, unrefuted, and consistent history of conspiracy facts. Only those most intent on not exercising their critical faculties could refrain from thence turning into a conspiracy theorist. However Bret Weinstein’s thoughts which introduced this paragraph cannot be denied: All of us are receiving terrible data, and building decision trees based on too many ambiguities. Reality will not seem stable again any time soon."
This is why I approach information agnostically. Over the past 15 years I have been down too many ( most likely engineered) rabbit holes to nowhere. At this point what I know is enough to know the oublic narrative is always a demonstrable lie, but what is true is elusive. I have settled on focusing on my family for now, as well as remembering what it is I can and cannot control. (Not to be interpreted as though I am giving up. I am in a regrouping phase per se)
As to 5th generation warfare.. whew. It is nasty business. Rand corps NETWAR still gives me chills, especially knowimg the modus operandi is to say "they" are doing this.. not us. Then they have their proxies do it and then sit back and say see.. we told you they were doing it. National security states create self fulfilling projects.
The initial problem, before any solutions can be considered, is for people to understand they are a party to a war this very moment. It doesn't look or feel like yesterday's wars nor is the battlespace just a physical location. While we do not have to necessarily identify the enemy, which is incredibly difficult to pin down, we at least have to learn how not to become its advocate by default. ( like your example with the pharmaceutical company... an example that hits for me considering I am a Pharmacist)
Again, thanks for the article. Very much enjoy slowly going through your work.
To me, it all comes back to exercising one's personal responsibility to live a moral life. 'I was just following orders' didn't cut it at Nuremburg, and it doesn't cut it now.
Or, as I learned from you: it sadly did cut it at Nuremburg for almost everyone, save a few scapegoats.
With my current opinion of the majority of people's moral compass, I guess I find it more inspiring to imagine 'systems' of accountability which hum along regardless of an individuals intention to live a moral life. The fantasy of it just being so darn difficult to act poorly then shirk responsibility, that people who are inclined that way choose not to bother, or suffer real consequences if they do feel the need to try.
Good point about Nuremburg. I should have been more precise in my language. The underlings who were tried at Nuremburg were told that they couldn't use the excuse 'I was just following orders'. Meanwhile the ones who issued those orders were being spirited away to the US under Operation Paperclip. And as Antony Sutton points out in Wall Street and the Rise of Hitler, the American corporate oligarchs who provided Hitler with all the synthetic oil, rubber, planes, trucks and tanks he needed to wage war, and whose companies used the slave labour provided by the Nazis' network of camps across Europe, never went on trial.
Now, as for systems of accountability, this is something that the anarchocapitalist thinkers have spent a lot of time figuring out. To be honest, I haven't spent a lot of time delving into the mechanics of how they believe a free society can be structured, because it seems like such a pipe dream at this point. But if the Doctor Strangeloves running US foreign policy get their way and manage to provoke a nuclear conflict with Russia, any surviving humans had better get themselves up to speed on it!
Very nice. I really felt this:
"For thinking individuals, this leads to rampant inefficiencies. For example, we have now been exposed to a long, unrefuted, and consistent history of conspiracy facts. Only those most intent on not exercising their critical faculties could refrain from thence turning into a conspiracy theorist. However Bret Weinstein’s thoughts which introduced this paragraph cannot be denied: All of us are receiving terrible data, and building decision trees based on too many ambiguities. Reality will not seem stable again any time soon."
This is why I approach information agnostically. Over the past 15 years I have been down too many ( most likely engineered) rabbit holes to nowhere. At this point what I know is enough to know the oublic narrative is always a demonstrable lie, but what is true is elusive. I have settled on focusing on my family for now, as well as remembering what it is I can and cannot control. (Not to be interpreted as though I am giving up. I am in a regrouping phase per se)
As to 5th generation warfare.. whew. It is nasty business. Rand corps NETWAR still gives me chills, especially knowimg the modus operandi is to say "they" are doing this.. not us. Then they have their proxies do it and then sit back and say see.. we told you they were doing it. National security states create self fulfilling projects.
The initial problem, before any solutions can be considered, is for people to understand they are a party to a war this very moment. It doesn't look or feel like yesterday's wars nor is the battlespace just a physical location. While we do not have to necessarily identify the enemy, which is incredibly difficult to pin down, we at least have to learn how not to become its advocate by default. ( like your example with the pharmaceutical company... an example that hits for me considering I am a Pharmacist)
Again, thanks for the article. Very much enjoy slowly going through your work.
Excellent article thank you Shane