What is a Liberal Hick?

PLEASUREMAN - MyPostingCareer.com

I might write a piece on it someday if hicks ever interest me enough to do so.  For now, just a short note.

The defining characteristic of a hick is that, despite evidence that he is sheltered and insulated from anything more stimulating than a bingo game, he assumes otherwise because he owns a television and/or radio.  Were he to be aware of the outside world and his relative inexperience with it, he would cease to be a hick and instead would probably rise to the level of bumpkin.

I describe the hick as he is; I am neither for nor against him.  In a healthy society he is perfectly acceptable--if a little sure of ideas he has merely selected from a choice of two or three large print books.  But then, his conviction that his hamlet or town has really settled the ideal way for man to live is part of his charm--he's not one for very much novelty.

On the other hand, these very circumstances have left him vulnerable to pathological thinking--his mental immune system is very weak and the noise of mass society easily overrides it.  At best he stubbornly (but inconsistently) resists the propaganda, telling people that God does not want gay people to marry and that blacks were better off before the civil rights era, but the result is that his own children think he's bigoted and stupid.  He's never had to think about why or how his hick town functions, much less the world beyond his county line.

At worst the noise of mass society causes him to become more extreme than conventional liberals--he naively and eagerly accepts the new programming, and points his small-minded small town indignation at anyone who doesn't.  That indignation was an organic way to make sure people in town cut their lawns and didn't start trouble, but once the hick is infected with this mental virus he attacks anyone who cautions against his new programming.  You might get a liberal to admit that he feels safer, even though it's totally racist, now that his kid is in a white school.  The hick will double down and say he wishes his children were in an all black school so they could serve as role models on white privilege day (Louis CK was so right!).  The non-hick liberal is a reasonable hypocrite--the hick is just an idiot.

The problem is that the hick gets full exposure to mass society through the media, but his local customs and institutions aren't strong enough to defend against it.  This is predictable, because for most of the existence of hick habitats no such thing as mass society existed.  The hick as he was could only survive thanks to the gentleness of nature--a gale blowing from New York was barely a breeze by the time it reached him.  But now nature--mass society--is massive in its turmoil and destructive reach.  The hick is sure the storm will blow some wonderful nigger families into his area so he can show everyone how much he's learned from television.

And of course when trouble comes as a result of his naivete, he'll be the first to point his finger J'Accuse style and rage about racism.  He'd vote for the cornball nigga Obama twenty times if he could.  Hicks learn what they can learn (not much) and are then certain about it forever.  Therein lies the problem.

Dalai Lama on Cultural Genocide

From the messageboard MPC

The Dalai Lama speaking about Tibet in Geneva, Switzerland, on March 10, 1997:

"The unabated influx of immigrants to (our country), has the effect of overwhelming (our) distinct cultural and religious identity and reducing (my people) to an insignificant minority in their own country, amounts to a policy of cultural genocide"

Terrence Rhine:

I've always sort of respected real leftists who hate the Dalai Lama. They're being consistent; airhead Hollywood-type libs are going completely against their intra-national beliefs (anti-religion, anti-nationalism, socially liberal) when they gush over him because of their ditsy crush on Buddhism

PLEASUREMAN:

It's a good line to save for a dinner party where some friend of a friend pipes up about gay marriage:  "With all due respect, I have to side with the Dalai Lama on this one."

TAO:


The Dalai Lama is great for trolling because 99% of shitlibs believe he's this peaceful and gentle man who talks about tolerance and enlightenment and non-violence (which for them means he'll agree with all their poz and insanity) unlike that NAZI OLD BACHELOR from Rome, while in reality he's also a Horrible Bigot and Unacceptable Socially Regressive Individual.

Some old quotes:

"I feed birds, peaceful birds. I'm non-violent, but if a hawk comes when I'm feeding birds, I lose my temper and get my air rifle."

"But if someone has a gun and is trying to kill you ... it would be reasonable to shoot back with your own gun."

KhalidSheikhHorowitz:

The liberal doublethink on this issue is hilarious. Tibet was an agrarian, feudal, theocratic state before the Chinese invaded. Buddhists/Shintoists were banzai charging and launching kamikaze attacks throughout the Pacific War for the God-Emperor. Muslims stone adulterers, behead infidels and martyr themselves with regularity but no the neutered and emasculated caricature of Christianity that exists in the West, that's the real threat to liberal society.

Peace loving Buddhist 

Sinister Albanian Dwarf and Hateful Bigot

See also
Dalai Lama Lite

Zorba the Israeli

* Zorba the Israeli By Sh1ri L3v-Ar1 | Jul.08, 2008


"I expect nothing. I fear nothing. I am free," reads the epitaph on the grave of Nikos Kazantzakis, located in a cemetery in Heraklion on the island of Crete. Kazantzakis, of "Zorba the Greek" fame, is not merely an author, poet, translator, and philosopher - he is an institution.

His status as an institution extends beyond the borders of Greece. The International Society of Friends of Nikos Kazantzakis operates throughout the world in order to preserve his heritage. Among its activities is the publication of an annual journal and the organization of events focusing on the author and his work. The society was established in Geneva 20 years ago and has branches throughout the world, including in Syria, Egypt, Lebanon and of course Israel.

On Saturday evening, a few dozen people convened in the expansive, lovely home of Greek Ambassador to Israel Nicholas Zafiropoulos in Kfar Shmaryahu, at round tables on the pool patio. A Cretan-style meal was already laid on the tables, accompanied by ouzo-spiked lemonade. A small stage was set up on the side. This was the annual meeting of the Israeli branch of the International Society of Friends of Nikos Kazantzakis.

Established in 2005, the branch currently has about 20 members, who meet to talk about Kazantzakis and his work.

The first two annual lectures were delivered in a private home in Tel Aviv, but last year Zafiropoulos opened his home to the group, which returned for this year's annual event as well.

Breaking teeth

Daniel Dalyot, a geriatrician from Tel Aviv, founded the society's Israeli branch. "I've had an attachment to Greek culture since childhood," he says. "I received 'The Iliad' and 'The Odyssey,' as gifts and have loved Greek culture ever since. I first traveled [to Greece] when I was 16, and I love Greek music very much."

Dalyot is not alone. Many Israelis have fallen in love with Greek culture.

Many are attracted primarily to Greek music and food, but they are not the only draws. A growing number of Israelis in the arts, media, and other professions study Greek, travel to Greece frequently and draw inspiration from Greek culture.

Several members of the society study Greek with teacher Leon Siam, a singer and native of Thessaloniki who immigrated to Israel in the 1970s.

They listen to familiar Greek songs and study their lyrics. "It is an extremely difficult language," Dalyot says. "We are still breaking our teeth after a year." Screenwriter and film critic Kobi Niv, who attended the event on Saturday night and who studies Greek with Siam, explains, "I got involved with Greek culture via Aris San [a Greek singer who emigrated to Israel] and Yehuda Poliker [an Israeli singer-songwriter who is the son of Greek immigrants]."

Yehuda Melzer, publisher of Sifrei Aliyat Hagag (Books in the Attic) and a former philosophy professor, connected with Greek culture by means of his partner, Lily Eiss-Perahia, who divides her time between Israel and an Aegean island.

He spends two months a year on the island and has already befriended some of its prominent cultural figures, including director Theo Angelopoulos and a few writers.

"It's the combination of the landscape and the people," Melzer says. "Greeks have an endless ability to be happy, and we Israelis can only learn from them."

Nikos Kazantzakis was born in Heraklion on the island of Crete in 1883. He studied law at the University of Athens and, later, philosophy at The University of Paris-Sorbonne.

He translated Friedrich Nietzsche, Charles Darwin and Henri Bergson into and wrote poems, stories, novels and diaries of his travels to Spain, Italy, Egypt, and Russia. Kazantzakis died in Germany in 1957 and was buried in his birthplace.

His most famous book, "Zorba the Greek," was published in 1946. Its appearance in English in the United States, in 1954, made its author a runaway success that exposed him to the rest of the world.

The novel was published in Hebrew long before Greece became a popular tourist destination for Israelis. In 1958, Hanoch Kalai's Hebrew translation of "Zorba the Greek" became the first title in Am Oved's Sifriya La'am (People's Library) imprint.

A new Hebrew translation by Amir Zuckerman was issued in 1995 with the book's original title, "The Life and Adventures of Alexis Zorbas."

The novel was also adapted into a monumental film starring Anthony Quinn, Alan Bates and Irene Papas.

The acclaimed novel depicted a friendship between a European intellectual and a miner, who was also a con-man, a potter and a santuri player - and above all an artist in living the good life with an expert ability to seize the day and realize his passions.

Zorbas became an adored figure in Western culture, and his prescription for life, passions and animal instincts were idealized. He came to represent all of Greek culture.

Kazantzakis wrote many books. "The Last Temptation of Christ" roused a storm of controversy when it appeared.

The novel presented Jesus as a human, flesh-and-blood figure who grappled with passions and with temptation.

In 1988, the film version of the book was released, directed by Martin Scorsese with a soundtrack composed by Peter Gabriel.

The film also provoked scandal and was banned in some countries.

On Saturday the novel was the subject of a lecture given by Kazantzakis society member Stelian Luznan. Luznan, an electrical engineer from Tel Aviv, spoke about the association between Kazantzakis's theological approach and the thinkers who inspired him - Buddha, Nietzsche and Lenin.

Kazantzakis is considered a national writer in Greece, and some consider him to be a nationalistic writer. He was a proponent of the use of the popular Greek spoken on the street, and engaged in frequent battles with Athens intellectuals after arriving there in 1906.

Some considered Kazantzakis to be a kind of Zorba himself. He drew his glorification of the instinctual, the passionate, from the philosophies of Nietzsche and Bergson. As a boy he attempted to work in the coal mines in Crete, where he befriended a full-of-life Macedonian named Yorgos Zorbas.

Kazantzakis was also a great fan of the Jewish people. He made many Jewish friends during his years in Europe. "He was fond of Jewish subjects and studied Hebrew with a rabbi in Crete," Dalyot says.

* Kazantzakis The Judeophile
from Selected Letters of Nikos Kazantzakis