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The Psychology Behind Political Violence Political life carries an appetite for violence beneath the surface. A shooter leaves a manifesto; supporters celebrate; online strangers justify killing over insults, misgendering, and fantasies of execution. We’re told these are separate phenomena—different ideologies, grievances, causes—but they’re deeply connected. The murderer, the celebrant, and the online fantasist share one conviction: blood will build a better world. We often assume ideology comes first, violence second—radicalization infecting an otherwise ordinary person. But corrupted people may seek ideologies that rationalize what they already want to believe. Feeling comes first; philosophy follows. Nietzsche called this *ressentiment*: not ordinary anger, but enduring resentment rooted in surrendered agency and perpetual victimhood. Ressentiment is creative: it turns grievance into virtue and revenge into justice. That’s why movements can sound humanitarian while obsessing over enemies. They promise liberation but focus on who must be eliminated; they call violence self-defense while celebrating destruction. Notice the imbalance: energy goes to identifying who deserves punishment, not to explaining how their better society would work. This is the difference between genuine grievance and pathological ressentiment. Genuine grievance seeks repair; ressentiment seeks subtraction. Its “solutions” are fantasies of punishment—heads cut off, privilege liquidated, wrong pronouns punished. These aren’t coherent doctrines of stability; they’re rationalizations for resentment. Ressentiment also despises self-improvement because it requires admitting agency. Its worldview depends on locating suffering outside oneself. The deepest enemy of these movements, then, is not any specific ideology. It is agency itself.

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A Culture of Violent Ressentiment A lust for violence is spreading through the worst among us. After shootings, murders, and attempted political violence, some celebrate and idolize the attackers—while others online applaud harm done to those deemed deserving, even for things like “misgendering.” People claim these are unrelated, but I see a shared conviction: blood is the only route to a better world. We debate which ideology “caused” a given attack—incel culture, Marxism, anti-Zionism—but the pattern is similar. Radicalization is often treated like infection: belief first, impulse second. I think the reverse is more common. Corrupted people don’t stumble into dangerous ideas. They go looking for them. Ressentiment—Nietzsche’s term for the slow poison of hopeless victims—builds moral systems that make a grudge feel like justice. The feeling takes the throne first; philosophy follows, recruiting whatever justifies what the person already wants. Ressentiment focuses on enemies and punishment while offering vague utopias. It subtracts, locating suffering entirely outside the self and proposing removal of its “source.” That’s why it rejects self-improvement: it requires agency. What we face is not one ideology, but the spirit that turns failure and frustration into someone else’s crime—and therefore treats violence as justice.

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The Elite Origins of Marxist Revolution Bertrand Russell, a socialist who visited Moscow in 1920, observed that the Bolsheviks resembled religious fanatics more than political theorists. Lenin quoted Marx and Engels as a pastor recites Scripture. In his *History of Western Philosophy*, Russell described the parallels: dialectical materialism replaces God, the Communist Party becomes the church, communist revolution the Second Coming, punishment for capitalists hell, and the communist commonwealth heaven. The *Communist Manifesto* declares that its aims can be achieved only through “the forcible overthrow of all existing social conditions.” Marx sought to destroy the existing world and assumed that an undefined utopia would rise. If Marxism claims to speak for the oppressed, why has it so often been adopted by elites? Marx came from an upper-middle-class family that owned vineyards and employed servants. Friedrich Engels, his chief supporter and financier, inherited wealth from his family’s textile business. Lenin’s family owned property and employed servants, while Mao Zedong’s family was considerably wealthier than ordinary Chinese peasants. Fidel Castro’s family owned a large estate, Che Guevara came from an affluent background, and Pol Pot’s family had connections to Cambodia’s royal court. Pol Pot encountered Marxism while studying in Paris. These men went on to create, support, or lead revolutions that killed millions of the people they claimed to represent. This was no accident. The *Communist Manifesto* states that “a portion of the bourgeoisie goes over to the proletariat,” especially those who understand “the historical movement as a whole.” Marx therefore incorporated an explanation for his own class position into the movement’s founding text. Lenin expanded this idea, arguing that workers left to themselves could achieve only “trade-union consciousness.” Socialist theory, he believed, had to be brought to them by educated elites—the revolutionary vanguard. Although Marxism and communism are commonly portrayed as movements created for the poor, the men who developed and led them were, almost without exception, members of the elite.

My former philosophy department at @UGent banned the teaching of this paper by Anomaly & Faria, in a philosophy class by my colleague Bouke De Vries. Why? Because it discusses demography and migration as potential threats to liberal societies, and something called “biocultural https://t.co/7bfIx7SSLy #Philosophy #Migration #Censorship #Thetweetdoesnotmentionanyspecificcountries.Therefore #therearenocountrycodestoreturn.

How to balance 1. Incrementally fixing the misery of the moment; and 2. Long-term advances in science and technology to truly solve the underlying problems; is the most important philosophical question of humanity. It cuts across the political spectrum. Access to novel tech and #Philosophy #Science #Technology #Thetweetdoesnotmentionanyspecificcountries.Therefore #therearenocountrycodestoreturn.

#paobc Η ΧΑΟΤΙΚΗ ΜΑΣ ΔΙΑΦΟΡΑ ☘️ ΑΛΛΟΙ ΚΟΣΜΟΙ ΑΛΛΗ ΚΟΣΜΟΘΕΩΡΙΑ💚 https://t.co/fWIbVpvyVu #chaos #philosophy #worlds

Metaphysics of the Solitary Absolute: Philosophical and Legal Analysis of the Thesis of Solitary Amorality ​The Thesis of Solitary Amorality, formulated by Tom Nesky under the banner of the Axiom of Relationality of Law and Being, constitutes a radical challenge to classical and contemporary normative theories. Its central premise—stating that law, morality, and the category of crime are not inherent properties of reality, but artificial products of social relations—requires a rigorous deconstruction at the intersection of legal positivism, phenomenological existentialism, ontological anarchism, and monistic metaphysics. This paper attempts a systematic analysis of the intellectual pillars of this thesis, examining its internal coherence, genealogical roots, and consequences for the understanding of freedom and human subjectivity. ​The Systemic Construction of Crime vs. Pure Theory of Law ​The first pillar of the Thesis of Solitary Amorality, designated as Nullum Crimen Sine Systema, posits that law does not discover pre-legal categories of evil, but brings them into existence through the very act of establishing a boundary of permissibility. This assertion exhibits a profound convergence with 20th-century legal positivism, particularly with Hans Kelsen's Pure Theory of Law (Reine Rechtslehre). Kelsen advocated for a methodological purification of legal science from ethical, sociological, and political elements, defining law as a normative system founded upon a hypothetical basic norm (Grundnorm). ​In the Kelsenian view, the legal system functions as a coercive apparatus devoid of inherent moral value. A crucial point of intersection with Nesky's thesis is the elimination of the traditional dualism between acts that are inherently evil (mala in se) and acts prohibited merely by law (mala prohibita). Kelsen argued that an act becomes unlawful solely when a legal norm attaches state-enforced coercion to it. Unlawfulness is not an ontological property of the act, but the result of a relationship of normative imputation. This implies that the law does not penalize an act because it is intrinsically evil; rather, an act is considered evil solely because it has been subjected to systemic penalization. ​This clash became prominent during the debates surrounding the Nuremberg trials, where positions based on natural law and legal positivism collided. While prosecutors such as Robert Jackson invoked universal moral norms (mala in se) as the basis for punishing criminals despite the previously binding positive law of the Third Reich, Kelsen pointed out the theoretical inconsistency of such an approach. He argued that judging on the basis of retroactive law (ex post facto) constitutes a breach in the systemic coherence of positivism, even if it might be justified by political and historical necessity. ​Nesky's project imparts an existential dimension of oppression to this structure, bringing it close to the critique of the state formulated by Friedrich Nietzsche. Nietzsche famously described the state as "the coldest of all cold monsters," which devours the individual's singularity and imposes herd morality upon them. The gaze of the state, mediated through the Other, paralyzes the sovereignty of the individual and forces them to navigate within arbitrarily designated normative boundaries. Every stroke drawn across the chaos of reality establishes a boundary, and every boundary instantly creates the concept of its transgression. ​The Paradox of the Systemic Cage and the Limits of Ontological Anarchism ​The second pillar of the thesis—The Paradox of the Systemic Cage—points to the impossibility of escaping the system through rules alone. Every attempt to negate the existing order, from establishing anarchist structures to escaping into geographical isolation, immediately transforms into a new system whose primary imperative becomes the defense and maintenance of that very absence of rules. This process of structural looping finds its reflection in the current of ontological anarchism formulated by Hakim Bey (pseudonym of Peter Lamborn Wilson). ​Bey, drawing on a synthesis of Nietzscheanism, Situationist theory of the spectacle, and chaos esotericism, recognized that classical revolutions striving to overthrow the state inevitably reproduce structures of domination, becoming new forms of confinement. As an alternative, he proposed the concept of the Temporary Autonomous Zone (TAZ). TAZ is a tactic for creating temporary, non-hierarchical spaces that deliberately evade formal structures of state control. The key element of TAZ is its ephemerality: before the system can map, define, and absorb the autonomous zone, it must dissolve itself and relocate to another point in space-time. ​Attempts to transform TAZ into Permanent Autonomous Zones (PAZ) immediately encounter the paradox noted by Nesky. The need to defend and codify freedom within a lasting community gives rise to internal rules, mechanisms of exclusion, and hierarchy. For this reason, Murray Bookchin criticized ontological anarchism (calling it "lifestyle anarchism" or "bourgeois anarchism") for its lack of political realism and its flight from systemic struggle against capital and state in favor of aesthetic rebellion. The convergence of these perspectives demonstrates that freedom defined as reactive resistance to a system remains structurally determined by it. ​The Dissolution of the Relational Mirror: The Existential Gaze and the Collapse of Morality ​The third pillar of the thesis, designated as The Dissolution of the Mirror (L'Autre), posits that good and evil require the presence of an external witness and judge. This assertion represents a direct application of Jean-Paul Sartre's existential phenomenology, particularly his analysis of the Gaze (le look / le regard) and the relation to the Other (l'Autre) presented in Being and Nothingness. ​Sartre illustrates the constitutive role of the Other through an analysis of the voyeur's situation. At the moment of complete absorption in the act of peeping through a keyhole, the subject's consciousness is pre-reflective—the voyeur does not reflect on himself; his consciousness completely merges with the act being performed. Only the sudden sound of footsteps in the hallway shatters this unity. The voyeur realizes that he himself is seen, and is instantly paralyzed by shame. ​For Sartre, shame is not a purely internal emotion; it is shame of oneself before the Other. The Gaze of the Other objectifies the free subject (being-for-itself—pour-soi), freezing them into a specific role and moral evaluation (being-for-others—pour-autrui). As Ellie Anderson points out, Descartes' formula "I think, therefore I am" is replaced in Sartre by "I feel shame, therefore Others exist." The Gaze of the Other marks the birth of social morality, wherein the individual learns to view themselves from a third-person perspective. ​This existential dynamic corresponds to the Nietzschean genealogy of "bad conscience." Nietzsche demonstrates that morality and guilt are products of the forced internalization of human instincts that could no longer be discharged outwardly due to social barriers. Forced into the constraints of society, man turns against himself, creating an internal judge (conscience) modeled on the external tyrant. ​This vision also resonates with the classical theory of Thomas Hobbes. In Leviathan, Hobbes explicitly declares that in the state of nature, where there is no common power, there is no law, and where there is no law, no notion of injustice exists. Concepts of good, evil, justice, and property are attributes of man living in society, not in solitude. Removing the social fabric reverts the individual to a state in which theft and injury lose their raison d'être due to the absence of relational reference to the Other. #philosophy # metaphysics # thesis # morality

Comments? 🤔 Italian philosopher and writer Umberto Eco said: “The tragedy of the Internet is that it has promoted the village idiot to the level of bearer of truth!” https://t.co/MVFw0gaZY6 #UmbertoEco #InternetMatters #Philosophy #IT

Samo Burja Jul 24

A very interesting interview exploring the philosophy of human enhancement, something that will become more and more relevant as reproductive technology advances. #HumanEnhancement #Philosophy #ReproductiveTechnology #Therearenospecificcountriesmentionedinthetweet.Therefore #theresultis:

Germany warns US against election interference after it announces $3 million grants to Europeans who "address national sovereignty, migration, censorship, lawfare challenges, with shared political philosophy, law, common western civilizational heritage” https://t.co/iluwCMFso1 #ElectionInterference #Sovereignty #WesternValues #DE #US

Maria L Jul 12

«Αν οι Έλληνες άγγιξαν την απελπισία, το ‘καναν πάντα με τη συνδρομή της ομορφιάς» Αλμπέρ Καμύ (Καλοκαίρι)🌞🌊 #athenianriviera https://t.co/0eZ2qhyWk3 #Greece #philosophy #beauty

FLORENTIA Jul 9

Αν ήθελα να δώσω έναν τίτλο στην #Οδύσσεια του Νόλαν θα ήταν "Η Άλωση της Ιθάκης"... Φανταστείτε έναν αρχαίο, εύφορο και ιερό κήπο. Για χιλιάδες χρόνια, οι άνθρωποι τον φρόντιζαν, έπιναν από το καθαρό νερό των πηγών του και έτρεφαν το πνεύμα τους με τους καρπούς του. Αυτός ο κήπος είναι η Οδύσσεια του Ομήρου. Ένας τόπος γεμάτος μέτρο, βαθιά φιλοσοφία, νόστο και την αυθεντική ψυχή του ελληνικού πολιτισμού. Ξαφνικά, στα σύνορα του κήπου εμφανίζεται ένας ξένος, πανίσχυρος κατακτητής. Έρχεται από μια μακρινή, λαμπερή αλλά πνευματικά στείρα αυτοκρατορία: το Χόλιγουντ. Αρχηγός του είναι ένας ικανός αλλά αλαζόνας στρατηγός, ο Κρίστοφερ Νόλαν. Ο ξένος αυτός πολιτισμός δεν ενδιαφέρεται να καταλάβει τη σοφία του κήπου. Θέλει απλώς να τον καταστήσει αποικία του και να τον φέρει στα δικά του, σύγχρονα μέτρα.Ο στρατηγός μπαίνει μέσα και αρχίζει το "έργο" του, παραμορφώνοντας τις πιο εμβληματικές μορφές του τόπου για να εξυπηρετήσει τη δική του ατζέντα. Παίρνει τη θεά Αθηνά, το σύμβολο της θεϊκής σοφίας, της στρατηγικής και του μέτρου, και τη μετατρέπει σε αερικό πίσω από μια ποπ φιγούρα της δυτικής κουλτούρας. Παίρνει την Ωραία Ελένη, την απόλυτη, μυθική προσωποποίηση της ομορφιάς που κίνησε χίλια καράβια, και την αποκόπτει εντελώς από τις ιστορικές και πολιτισμικές της ρίζες. Και σαν να μην έφτανε αυτό, εισάγει στον μύθο τον ρόλο του Σίμωνα, αυτού του μικροσκοπικού νανοπλάσματος που μοιάζει εντελώς ξένο με το ομηρικό σύμπαν, τοποθετημένο εκεί μόνο για να προκαλέσει εντύπωση και να γεμίσει τα πλάνα... Αυτός ο ξένος πολιτισμός αφαιρεί την ψυχή και την ταυτότητα του μύθου, κρατώντας μόνο τα ονόματα ως ένα γυαλιστερό περιτύλιγμα για να εντυπωσιάσει τις μάζες. Η ταινία του Νόλαν παρουσιάζεται σήμερα στο κοινό σαν ένα μεγαλοπρεπές "δώρο", μια εντυπωσιακή, τεχνολογικά άρτια υπερπαραγωγή σε οθόνες IMAX που υπόσχεται να τιμήσει το αρχαίο έπος. Όμως, όπως ακριβώς οι Τρώες άνοιξαν τις πύλες τους για να δεχτούν το ξύλινο άλογο, έτσι και οι θεατές υποδέχονται την ταινία με ενθουσιασμό. Στην πραγματικότητα, η "Οδύσσεια" του Νόλαν είναι ένας σύγχρονος Δούρειος Ίππος: μια κατασκευή που κρύβει μέσα της την ολική παραμόρφωση και την άλωση του ελληνικού πολιτισμού. Όταν τα φώτα της δημοσιότητας σβήσουν, το μόνο που απομένει είναι η λεηλασία της αυθεντικής ομηρικής ταυτότητας, αντικατεστημένης από τη δυτική, εμπορική κουλτούρα... -------------------------- If I had to give a title to Christopher Nolan’s #Odyssey, it would be "The Sacking of Ithaca"... Imagine an ancient, fertile, and sacred garden. For thousands of years, people tended to it, drank from its pure springs, and nourished their minds with its fruits. This garden is Homer’s Odyssey, a place defined by balance, deep philosophy, the bittersweet ache of nostos (the longing for home), and the authentic soul of Greek culture. Suddenly, a powerful foreign conqueror appears at the gates of this garden. He arrives from a distant, glittering, yet spiritually hollow empire: Hollywood. At the helm is a highly skilled yet arrogant general, Christopher Nolan. This foreign civilization has no interest in understanding the wisdom of the garden. They simply want to colonize it and reshape it according to their own modern standards. The general marches in and begins his "work," distorting the land's most iconic figures to serve his own agenda. He takes Athena, the very symbol of divine wisdom, strategy, and restraint, and turns her into an ethereal being behind a pop-culture figure of Western media. He takes Helen of Troy, the ultimate, mythical personification of a beauty that launched a thousand ships, and completely detaches her from her historical and cultural roots. And as if that were not enough, he forces the character of Simon into the myth, that tiny nano-creature who feels completely alien to the Homeric universe, placed there merely to shock the audience and fill the frame. This foreign civilization strips away the soul and identity of the myth, keeping nothing but the names as a glossy wrapping paper to impress the masses. Today, Nolan’s film presents itself to the audience as a grand "gift", a visually spectacular, technologically flawless blockbuster in IMAX theaters that promises to honor the ancient epic. Yet, just as the Trojans threw open their gates to welcome the wooden horse, audiences today welcome this film with excitement. In reality, Nolan’s Odyssey is a modern-day Trojan Horse: a construct that hides within it the total distortion and conquest of Greek culture. Once the spotlight fades, all that remains is the pillage of the authentic Homeric identity, replaced by a commercialized Western culture! #Οδύσσεια #Νόλαν #ΕλληνικόςΠολιτισμός

The revenge of the philosophy majors — AI labs are hiring contrarian, chin-stroking, finger-steepling sages. Philosophers are the latest hiring target for AI companies. Who’s underemployed now? https://t.co/s7Ftnhz67Y #Philosophy #AI #JobMarket #Nospecificcountriesarementionedinthetweet.Therefore #therearenocountrycodestoreturn.

Kama Jun 30

Today we were all able to observe the difference in football philosophy between Europe and Latin America. Germany and Brazil faced the exact same parked bus. But where Brazil took risks searching for a goal, Germany refused. And only one of these two is now through to 1/16 #FootballPhilosophy #Germany #Brazil #DE #BR

I am able to discover important things about life.I invite you to read all my notes+ and my texts on the wall also read trough links my sites and you can accept from me, my ability to research and find the truth in essence of things hidden deep down under the surface of phenomenons, which are delusive, to have creative mind able to make own theories and hypothesis which I always do, not reckon to thinking of others only. This is not heavy philosophy but aphorisms, which I use, of great authors and compilations of aphorisms from the world combined with subtle scientific research of the most important things more interesting then films, books, newspapers, magazines, plays, internet, TV and anything else, because the truth can be only short and clear in forms of aphorisms, determinations and concepts. Equally interesting can be music, which is a kind of truth. There are predominantly mediocre songs.There are rare good songs, which is very difficult to be find or composed. I have unique ability to recognize musical harmony in all kind of music in the world.I have genetically inherited intelligence with 4-6 may be 14 thousands years roots from Armenian and Middle East origin.It essence is hundreds generation liberation from heavy work of primitive agriculture, as a consequence improving capillary system in brain and blood supply. That's give ability of complicated associative thinking.High intelligence is in finding connections between as many as possible important facts about one problem or matter. I make comments on inventive scientific level on philosophy, policy, economy, civilisation, personal and social psychology and often know about persons and whole nations what they don't know about themselves.

Cardiovascular disease, diabetes& obesity are closely linked & shouldn’t be addressed in isolation. That’s the philosophy behind #SafeHeartsPlan. We aim to reduce premature cardiovascular deaths by 25% by 2035 with prevention, earlier detection, screening & personalised care. #CardiovascularHealth #DiabetesCare #ObesityPrevention #Nospecificcountrycodescanbeidentifiedinthegiventweet.

Rolf Degen Jun 11

People who believe in free will are happier. Does it matter whether people believe in free will? Over recent decades, this question has sparked a debate across philosophy, sociology, psychology, and cognitive neuroscience. Previous research has largely overlooked how #FreeWill #Happiness #Philosophy #Nospecificcountrycodesarementionedinthetweet.

BBC Jun 8

The article discusses how the Netherlands successfully tackles youth unemployment through its No dead ends philosophy in education and employment, contrasting it with the UK's alarming rates of young people not in education, employment, or training (Neet), and highlighting the Dutch system’s focus on continuous pathways that lead to qualifications and job opportunities. #YouthUnemployment #DutchEducation #EmploymentPathways

'No dead ends': What the Dutch can teach us about tackling youth unemployment
Learn Latin Jun 6

Fīnis hūmānae vītae est beātitūdō — “The end of human life is happiness.” (Thomas Aquinas) https://t.co/CeONKmJ4hc #Happiness #Philosophy #Wisdom

Edwy Plenel Jun 3

Edgar Morin : a journalist in his own way. My tribute to the late philosopher and sociologist, died in Paris on May 29th in his 105th year. This article is freely available. @MediapartEN https://t.co/vzb1JOhOiI #EdgarMorin #Philosophy #Sociology #FR