LAKOFF AND HIS DEFENDER

"Strange Semantics" is an anonymous "cognitive psychologist" -- apparently a cross between a psychologist and a linguist. His views, though Leftist, are somewhat more reasoned than the usual Leftist torrent of abuse featuring words like "scary" so I thought I might make a brief reply to his post about Leftist linguist George Lakoff. He refers to my article on Lakoff and says that I have misinterpreted what Lakoff says in his book about the Left/Right divide. I may well have done that. I cannot take Lakoff seriously enough to study him in any depth. (His work seems to be a branch of that solipsistic body of Leftist thought known as "postmodernism" and, after the Sokal hoax, I think one must suspect all postmodernism of being essentially contentless -- and hence worthy of yawns only). But I was guided in my interpretation of Lakoff by Lakoff himself in his interview here. I think my article is a fair comment on Lakoff's version of Lakoff. A comment on Lakoff's theories by Bernhardt Varenius at the foot of the "Strange Semantics" post is good too: "The liberal worldview, the indulgent parent model, assumes that the world is nothing but puppy dogs and rainbows and children are born good and only become bad if their parents are conservative...." etc.

A reflection on projection: Over 30 years ago I put into the academic literature the view that the Leftists who were throwing rocks and bombs in the cause of "peace" (a common phenomenon at that time) were a prime example of what psychologists call "projection" -- seeing and hating their own faults in others. The slogan at the top of this blog asking why Leftists are always going on about "hate" ("Hate crimes" etc) also embodies that view of Leftist motivations. I suspect that our academic friend at "Strange Semantics" is another case in point. I asked him why he was clinging to anonymity and asked was he ashamed of his views. He replied: "No, I'm not ashamed of my views. I'm just wary of people on the internet". The idea that people on the internet are particularly dangerous sounds pretty paranoid to me but I will credit him with sanity and look for another reason why he holds that view. Lots of conservative bloggers with views that many would violently disagree with -- such as myself -- put their names and personal particulars on their blogs so why is this Leftist blogger so cowardly? What has he got to fear? I think the aggression against conservatives that is so often unleashed by Leftists in power (such as Stalin or modern-day campus Leftists) gives us the answer. He knows how hate- and rage-filled he and his fellow Leftists are and assumes that conservatives are at least as bad in that respect. So he fears from conservatives the sort of treatment that Leftists themselves dish out. That conservatives are generally happy and law-abiding people just does not enter into his calculations.

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