This is a quote from a 2003 review of Charles Murray’s book Human Accomplishment:

Murray expects that almost no art from the second half of the 20th century will be remembered in 200 years. Indeed, Europe, homeland of geniuses, has collapsed into a comfortable cultural stasis reminiscent of Rome in the 2nd century A.D. In addition to Murray’s philosophical explanations, I’d also point to causes such as the genocide of Europe’s highest-achieving ethnic group (Jews were about six times more likely than gentiles to become significant figures from 1870 onward); the rise of anti-elitist ideologies; and the decline of nationalism. From Vergil to Verdi, great men engendered great works to celebrate their nations. Nobody, however, seems likely to create an epic glorifying the European Union.

Noticing (2024)

The review also mentions that female achievement only grew in literature but not in other fields since the 1950s. The percentage of women receiving Novel Prizes was actually cut in half in the second half of the twentieth century compared to the first. This confirms the findings of my first book that women responded to the triumph of feminism by embracing high degrees of self-infantilization (see the first post of the day, as well.)

The difference in correlation with voting between this standard-of-housing index and the overall standard-of-living index suggests, once again, that it’s housing costs, rather than other costs such as groceries or health care, that are crucial to voting Republican or Democrat.
Despite the explanatory power of the Dirt Gap and the Mortgage Gap, these concepts have not been widely discussed.
The problem limiting their popularity may be that they are too objective, too morally neutral.
What people want to hear instead are explanations for why they, personally, are ethically and culturally better than their enemies.

Noticing, Steve Sailer

This is an article from 2005, way before the current inflation that is changing people’s strategy. But the highlighted portion is very true. Moral superiority is addictive, and people seek it out everywhere.

I know, the commenting function has gone to the dogs recently. It’s not you, it’s WordPress futzing with a system that worked perfectly and needed exactly zero improvement. But employees have to justify their salaries, so they improved the comment box into a sorry state. I hope the changes get rolled back soon.

Yes, it’s totally a Tesla Cybertruck. Klara says the owner is the Dad of one of the girls at school. I never expected any rich kids to be at that school, so now I wonder.

Technological advances aren’t always great, and that’s a theme that unites Tesla and the WordPress comment box.

We have removed ourselves to an unpeopled place for a mini-vacation:

It’s not completely unpeopled, to be honest. We came across the owner several times. He used to be in the Secret Service, so it’s impossible to predict where he’s going to crop up.

I’m becoming persuaded that women in Congress from both parties have been bribed by an organization promoting the idea that women are too stupid to be in politics. Or anywhere outside a seraglio.

And even after this, people will flock in droves to vote for the ditzy MTGs, AOCs, and all the rest of them.

Representative democracy only works if everybody is educated to at least some baseline level of civilized discourse and if norms of public behavior are collectively imposed. Once public education collapses and the very idea of civilized behavior and self-restraint is vilified, many people lose their only method of finding out that the disgraceful behavior we are seeing in Congress is not OK. As a result, they vote for the politicians who most closely mirror their own unchecked behavior.