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David McElroy

making sense of a dysfunctional culture

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The egalitarian lie: Every group has leaders, even Occupy Wall Street

By David McElroy · October 27, 2011

For reasons that will never make sense to me, many on the political left don’t like leaders. What’s more, many of them go so far as to say that their groups don’t even have leaders. The various “Occupy” groups around the country claim that they make decisions by consensus and that none of the groups has leaders.

I don’t know whether they actually believe this, but I do know it’s not true. Unless you have a very limited variety of people, opinions are going to diverge quickly in any group. When a group is new and goals are fuzzy and everybody is happy with everybody, consensus might be easy. Pretty quickly, though, things can turn ugly. For instance:

  • At the original Occupy group — the one on Wall Street — the issue has become drums. That’s right, drums. Some of the protesters have brought in drums and beat on them incessantly. It attracts attention, but it would get irritating very, very quickly. (Here’s a short video to give you an idea of what it’s like.) Because it was annoying so many people (and preventing some protesters from sleeping and preventing kids from studying at a nearby school), the group decided — allegedly by consensus — to limit drumming to two hours a day. However, if you read the details, the people who wanted unlimited drumming say they were prevented from bringing up their own proposal. That’s clearly not consensus. It’s clearly a matter of the majority forcing its will on the nuts who wanted to beat on drums all day. (I have no sympathy with the drummers, but the actions make it clear that “consensus” is a lie.)

  • In Portland, Ore., the Occupy group there is in an uproar — and at least one person received death threats — because the finance committee registered with the state as a non-profit corporation. (Isn’t that ironic?) The group’s PayPal account had something like $20,000 go missing because there was no accountability, so the finance committee took steps to protect the money. The rest of the group is apoplectic. At least one member of the finance committee has received death threats. It certainly sounds as though consensus is working there, huh?
  • In Charlotte, N.C., one of the organizers of the Occupy group there was kicked out of what he started after he admitted to media that, yes, he was indeed a leader of the group. That didn’t go over very well with people who were blinded by their “no leader” ideology.

I don’t follow orders very well, so I understand the desire not to be forced to follow a leader. But the difference between a libertarian or anarchist who doesn’t like leaders and one of the Occupy types who don’t like leaders is simple. We believe that everyone has the private right to go his own way. The basic flaw of the ideology of the Occupy types is that they don’t believe people do (or should) have a choice. They believe everyone must follow the “consensus” — which they will happily enforce, since it’s ultimately their own will. And they will happily use coercion to force you to obey them in the end.

All of the communist dictatorships that took control of dozens of countries last century followed the same plan. They took over in the name of “the people.” It just so happened that “the people” wanted what the people with control wanted. It always ended up strongly dictatorial, but the rhetoric was always about everyone. This is the way leftist dictatorships work. The Occupy people have the same basic flaw in their ideology. They believe there can be One True Way that everyone must follow — but they believe it’s their way that must be followed. As groups such as this splinter and fight, someone always takes control over the long run, but the fiction is maintained that he’s just a “comrade” making decisions and sacrificing for the group.

The entire Occupy “movement” is ultimately nothing but a continuation of collectivist ideology. It was originally organized by the Canadian anti-market group called AdBusters, and some of the Wall Street organizers are now from the NYC office of the disbanded and discredited “community activist” group, ACORN.

If the radical left wants to pursue its collectivist goals, it certainly has that right, but what it’s doing now is dishonest. This isn’t a leader-less outpouring that’s spontaneously springing up. This is an orchestrated campaign by leaders on the organized political left. It needs to be seen for what it is.

If you favor a socialist system, that’s your business. But if you don’t favor a socialist or collectivist system, these people are not your friends. They are not fighting for liberty. They’re fighting to take away even more of our liberty.

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This was the view just after sunset Tuesday evenin This was the view just after sunset Tuesday evening near my house. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
At sunset Tuesday evening, the cloud cover over me At sunset Tuesday evening, the cloud cover over me was solidly gray and black, but one tiny break in the clouds appeared just for a few minutes to show a little bit of sunset’s colorful light. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
I just remembered that I caught the sun just befor I just remembered that I caught the sun just before it slipped beneath the horizon Tuesday evening. This is near my house just east of Birmingham. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
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I don’t have the right lens to photograph the mo I don’t have the right lens to photograph the moon properly, but there are some nights when I try anyway. The longest lens I have goes to 240mm, which means I have to enlarge a tiny part of the frame way too much. But even if I had the right lens, I’m not sure I’ve figured out how to expose the moon decently while still showing some stars around it. Tonight’s attempt has given me a grainy moon and pinpricks of stars that become invisible when viewed at normal size. (Blow this up with your fingers in the app and you can see the tiny stars.) I really want to learn how to do this better, so if anyone has tips for me, I’d be happy to hear them. #nature #naturephotography #sky #moon
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I just remembered this sunset photo that I took th I just remembered this sunset photo that I took this evening when I had stopped to get gasoline on I-20 just east of Birmingham. I was pumping gas when I suddenly realized the sky had erupted with bright pastel colors. I didn’t have time to get my “real” camera, so I just quickly shot two frames with my iPhone at the edge of the parking lot. It keeps surprising me just how good cameras on our smartphones have become. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
We had dark and stormy skies all day in Birmingham We had dark and stormy skies all day in Birmingham, but there was a little bit of light that was finally able to poke through the darkness right at sunset along U.S. 411 just east of Birmingham. #nature #naturephotography #sky #colorful #clouds #sunset #birmingham #alabama
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Alex still seems confused tonight, but he finally Alex still seems confused tonight, but he finally ate a little bit of food. I know that he’ll be back to his normal self pretty quickly, but it really does seem as though Thomas’s death this afternoon has left him perplexed. #cat #cats #catstagram #catsofinstagram #cute #cutecat #pets #petstagram #petsofinstagram #tabby #tabbycat #instacat #ilovecats #birmingham #alabama
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On a live awards show Sunday night, one man made a joke about a female celebrity. The husband of the celebrity was offended and hit the man who made the joke. Or maybe it was staged for entertainment. Who knows? Who cares? Social media is full of discussion — and even arguments — about this idiocy today. This baffles me. Let’s assume for a moment that the event happened as reported. People have been having such idiotic fights ever since there have been humans. Half the bars in the world see such brief dustups regularly. It simply doesn’t matter. The fact that so many people believe they need to talk about this — or even need to have opinions about it — is more evidence of the bizarre media brainwashing that convinces many to care passionately about brain-dead trivia. Your life will be happier and saner if you focus on yourself, your family and your friends, not on whatever scripted (or spontaneous) bilge that the media wants to pipe into your home.

I’m in the middle of migrating this website to new servers this week. This means you might encounter some unexpected behavior until I get all the bugs worked out. Clicking on my links (including this one) might cause your browser to give you the message that it’s a site without a current security certificate. It’s not actually unsafe, but there’s something which isn’t yet set up for the security certificate. I apologize for any such errors you might encounter while the process is going on. If you notice any problems with content which didn’t migrate properly, I would appreciate you letting me know the details at davidmcelroy@mac.com. Thanks for your patience.

I often wonder what animals think when they look at us and consider the society we’ve created. Yes, I know this is fanciful and unrealistic, but what if they could? Would they be astounded at how we treat each other? Would they be disgusted by the ugliness and pettiness which fill so many of our daily interactions? The truth is that I’m feeling pretty disgusted with humanity tonight. I made the mistake of reading some online interactions that I should have avoided — and it sickened me. The people involved appeared to be vile and stupid and arrogant. I wish I could pretend they’re a tiny minority, but I know better. It’s times such as this when I most need to escape much of “civilization” and disconnect from their world. If humans are going to be worthy of “ruling this planet,” we have a lot of growth to do. And I fear that growth is nowhere in sight. So my buddy Thomas, above, and all of his friends would be right to judge us harshly — and to think, “Why do you folks get to be in charge?”

I should have expected this, but I honestly didn’t. The article I wrote last week about disagreements over treatment for autistic children brought me angry emails. You could almost call it “hate mail.” Of the five emails about it so far, two have been to tell me that I’m wrong to even listen to critics of the most popular therapy for autistic children — and the other three tell me I’m wrong for not condemning the treatment as the “obvious” abuse it is. If you read the article, you know I didn’t take a position on the issue, because I simply don’t know enough to have an opinion. But by talking about the issue, I stepped into a heated controversy. The emails from the two sides convinced me of nothing. But they did give me even more empathy for the unfortunate parents who have to figure out for themselves where the truth lies for their children.

Have you ever had what you thought was a new idea — and then discovered that “old you” had the same idea years ago? I had that experience tonight. And it’s been wonderful. I came up with an idea tonight for a very short satirical film that would be a promotion for a fictitious college. The point is to make the college promote — as good things — everything which is actually terrible about most modern colleges. Then I remembered a fake college that I invented back when I was in college. I had created student recruitment brochures and various newsletters back then, so I decided to call my “new” college by the same name I’d invented years ago: Ochita College. As I searched my computer for any old material I might still have about Ochita from the past, I discovered an email I sent to someone in 2009 — outlining essentially the same idea which I came up with tonight. Since I didn’t remember writing that, it felt like magic. So my next film project just might be this one instead. If all goes well, you might soon see “Ochita College: Your Future Starts Here.” This should be fun.

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