Does Society Guilt You?

We all know CML is the language of the herd and that it is intended to be unspoken moral laws. It is not automatically bad. It is only as good as the herd structure that enables it.

We all know where I'm going with this one.

But here's the twist. I'm going to attempt to highlight a basic understanding of critical commonsense by analogy and example from current CML.

For those that don't know, CML is the fabric of moral rules laid upon the world. It is not the product of a group of malevolent dictatorial herd witches. It is almost subconscious; it is not outwardly constructed; it is an inevitable Freudian realm that has a "mind" of its own.

How am I going to use an example of corrupt CML to demonstrate critical commonsense? Let's see. I'm sure it's going to consist of my usualy bold, evidence-less argumentation. Let's hope it resonates.

Someone tied my hands behind my back and made me watch reality TV. During an episode a guy was guilted into regretting his belief that physical attraction must come first in a substantive relationship. We all know this one. Ugly people deserve the L word and everyone would be attracted to them if given time. Anyone who calls them ugly or reacts negatively towards them because of "looks" is a selfish villian. This is CML working overtime.

That is the premise. But first let me do my CML duty. Ugly is somewhat subjective, yes: and beauty is somewhat defined by advertising and Hollywood. I get this. But let's just make this point and assume that people have a concept of beauty, whether permanent in the world or temporal and defined by advertising.

The guy on the show was racked with guilt because everyone, as they do on reality TV, pressured him into trying to "grow" attraction. He finally just said basically, she's ugly, sorry.

Whether he went to reality TV jail or served time in the violent criminal section of herd prison, he made an interesting point. And that is that no matter what herd people say while using CML at its most manipulative, beauty is still beauty. We all still know what he means. Land-locked herd people will despise him in their simple, little worldviews; but the fact that we know what beauty is and that we can't become romantic until physical attraction happens (whatever that is to us in the realm of objective beauty) is fundamentally true.

What I mean is that no matter what CML tells us to feel, we cannot escape this guy's truth. Ugly chicks bore him. On some level there is all of our manufactured truth and then, beneath this, there is a basic, real truth that sits waiting. It is like pretending your not hungry when you are. No amount of bullshit religious intellectualizing is going to change it. I know this is a Rand argument, but sorry. To put it another way, we all feel this commonsense truth as if it was an instinct (which in some ways it is) and we cannot escape it no matter how far we run.

To attempt, through cultural baggage and guilt, to change that "modern romance requires physicality," is useless. Even fat actresses have pretty faces. That's how it works. Only men, like Steve Buscemi, get to be on screen and be ugly.

This is not Thomas Reid or me telling you this. This is not Rand forcing objective truth down your earballs. This is a product of objectivity. You can go force yourself to date someone you think is ugly, but eventually it won't work romantically. The friend component can be explored all you want. Learning their mind if, despite our modern lack of this, they have one, is unlimited. You merely cannot overcome a basic biological drive to produce healthy offspring that is predicated on the notion of physical success in the real world. It not only cannot be done, but it would pervert the success of the species. Nature always wins, unfortunately. The guilt of the fallacy of is/ought, here in this example, cannot trump fundamental biology.

The same is true for the new "fat ethic." This ethic is: Fat people deserve to be celebrated just like anyone else, just like someone winning an academy award. But when they go out in the real world, if they are actually unhealthy fat (rather than some version of big-boned) they will fall over dead from coronary disease. CML tells us to stay fat, doctors tell us to diet and exercise. It's a clash of values. But the winner is nature. Fat people still fall over dead and if life is the end-goal, nature wins.

My point is that if you want to understand critical commonsense, it is the basic truth, not defined by critical methods (obsessive evidence and rhetoric), but it is an accepted given that persists, especially despite the pressure of cultural/moral language, and basic truth or nature is one to which we all inevitably have to succumb.