Political Corruption?

In this post I accused Charlie Kirk of being politically corrupt; after all, he stands accused of spreading COVID-19 misinformation,  supporting the white genocide conspiracy theory and promoting false claims of electoral fraud in 2020.... contrast the latter with the 2024 election which was a genuine win for Trump and where there were little in the way of claims of electoral fraud by the losing side; the losing side accepted that the American voting system was basically reliable.  Now, when I saw the quotes below from Kirk I concluded that he was also intellectually corrupt...

At first I wondered if these quotes were mischief making by anti-Kirk commentators, but they are all over the internet with no contradiction I can find.

With no knowledge of the "new age" in the early 1970s I was using the term "empathy" to explain the process by which one center of conscious cognition projects conscious feelings into another first person perspective. That was before the New Age became a noticeable popularist movement. The word "compassion" is not disconnected from "empathy"; compassion makes no sense if we don't have the initial first step of empathy which enables us to identify others as centers of conscious cognition. In the above quotes Kirk is mindlessly playing with words which chime with his supporters. 

Computer game players have no compassion about the simulated foes they shoot-up in their games: That's because no empathetic projection of consciousness need be made toward a simulant no matter how intelligently that simulant acts.  In the quotes above Kirk is virtue signaling to his constituency, a constituency who may well pejoratively label empathetic parties as "snow flakes" and "social justice warriors".  

Here's Hannah Arendt using the term "empathy" well before Kirk was born and well before New Age was a thing. But she would probably be written off by the Trumpite-right as a communist & "social justice warrior".  

Finally, seeing the picture below was no surprise. The irony is that Musk and Kirk only add fuel to the fire of those far-left revolutionary Marxists whose case will look stronger in the dark shadows of Musk and Kirk. Worst of all, Kirk has help corrupt Christian culture from within bringing it into disrepute (In this connection note that the 1st graphic above is from tTGA). 

An enthusiastic supporter of Kirk is fundamentalist theme park manager Ken Ham. Ken is as intellectually compromised as Kirk, But if you disagree with Ken look at the kind of thing he says about Christians who don't swing into line behind his views!

Interesting Links

1. Trump vs MTG

Being an unwoke right-winger doesn't in anyway excise the fundamental problems of power, ambition and divisiveness....

Trump targets ally Marjorie Taylor Greene ahead of Epstein files vote - BBC News

Marjorie Taylor Greene doubles down on calls to release Epstein files - BBC News

QUOTE....

She (MTG) said she's also focused on ending hate and division in politics, which she said is splitting apart American families, friends and neighbours.

"I think America needs to come together and end all the toxic, dangerous rhetoric and divide, and I'm leading the way with my own example, and I hope that President Trump can do the same," she told Bash.

It's a stark messaging shift for Greene, who has previously been accused of stoking political divides by promoting antisemitic conspiracy theories and elevating controversial posts on social media. She liked a post that called for the executions of former Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and former President Barack Obama, and posted a photo of herself holding a gun beside images of three progressive Democratic congresswomen.

When Bash brought up some of these examples, Greene reiterated her past apologies and said a core part of her Christian faith is forgiveness.

Well, I hope she stays true to that new message. Perhaps at last Marj has seen the light. Trouble is, given Marj's track record Donald's accusation of her being "wacky" and a "ranting lunatic" will have some traction.

See also here:

Will Marjorie Taylor Greene turn the Maga movement against Trump?

2. The Christian nationalist's war against empathy

Kirk and musk aren't alone

Religious scholar explains how Christian nationalists use and abuse the Bible

McClellan noted that Christian nationalists are demonizing the word "empathy" and railing against "the sin of empathy." Claiming that "empathy" is inherently bad, according to McClellan, is a distortion of scripture.

McClellan told Letson, "Those are the people who are overwhelmingly trying to defend precisely parochial empathy because they're trying to convince others it's bad for us to empathize with undocumented immigrants. It's bad for us to empathize with people from other nations. It's bad for us to empathize with either conservatives or liberals. I think empathy that is outward looking is good."