Steve was so funny here. My comment in parentheses.
“Hispanic voters really liked Trump's personality. He reminds them of the tall blond Conquistador they'd defer to back home. They liked his (lack of in my opinion) tastes in decor, women, and vocabulary.”
Hispanic aesthetics and tastes are more cringe and gauche than mainstream black culture.
Gangsta rap, yes. But nothing is more cringe than the kind of content Latinos especially older Latinos who don't speak English consume all day on TV. Plus it's completely foreign to America. Rap for all its cringe is still American. Latino culture isn't. It's a wholly imported culture that is subversive to any cohesive national identity. (with exceptions like Texan hispanics who have been here for centuries ofc)
But I do have to say that those who value Rap don't seem all that interested in a "cohesive national identity." On the contrary, they've taken self-absorption to the vanishing point. And self-absorbed and cohesvie are two different things.
I don’t know much Hispanics but I do know that in 2024 a big issue with citizens in the US, Canada and the UK is out of control immigration. People are furious.
Karl Rove’s comments are from a different world. Completely irrelevant today.
Karl Rove and the Bushes still haven't noticed they were wrong. They are still calling any immigration policy that emphasizes the needs of US citizens nativist.
Latinos see an opportunity to move north, so, they're moving north. It's as simple as that, for them. Though the hostile elite likes to showcase individuals who are anti-American, or anti-white, for the most part the Latinos I know are more interested in opportunities than hostilities.
The whole push north is sheer quantity. It's an unstoppable force at this point. But that's the problem. Not Latino Migration. The problem is that any unstoppable force is, and must be, over time - a maladaptive force. And that is what Globalization has become - a maladaptive force.
I realize that this statement requires clarification. But I also know that a comment section is not the place to do it. So I'll just let it go at that. Though not without adding that it does seem unfortunate that such a talented thinker/writer as Steve, and his commenters, who are HBD savy, have yet to look at this problem from the point of view of human adaptation.
His insights, and that of his commenters, would certainly be welcome, and timely.
Because it seems pretty obvious that this problem has reached a dangerously maladaptive level. One, moreover, for which there is NO political solution, since all of politics and governing are controlled by the hostile elite. And the last thing they're interested in is directing attention to a problem that they, in effect, have caused. A vicious cycle indeed. But unsolvable? Let's hope not.
I'm having troubles this AM (too old and not enough caffeine yet) getting a grip on what a "maladaptive force" is. I can envision that at a certain scope an unstoppable force will, by definition, continue until it reaches its own stasis, wherever that might be, but can't yet see it as absolutely maladaptive--in all cases. It perturbs the existing system, the system ostensibly reaches a new equilibrium--which may result in the stasis I mentioned. Anyway, that's how it seems to me this AM.
Can you give any concrete examples? It is key to my understanding of your point.
For a concrete example of a maladaptive force, with particular relevance to today, I’d say using simple 18th century models, documents, etc. to solve complex 21st century problems would qualify.
The J6’ers shouting “2021 is 1776!” comes irresistably to mind. As well as those who prate about the USA being a Constitutional Republic, as opposed to asking themselves the simple question, Is that model adequate to the demands being put on it now?
But the real maladaptive force I had in mind was tyranny in general, and the super tyranny of the hostile elite in particular.
Though my use of the phrase “maladaptive force” wasn’t taken from Darwin, it was inspired by him.
An ever changing organism to an ever changing environment is the dynamics of evolution, which is why he said, in so many words, that any adaptation is and must be over time a maldaptation.
Since explanation itself is a human adaptational mechanism (we can’t survive without it, at least not very well or for very long), they can only be adaptive if those explanations are open-ended and unresolved from both ends, theory and data.
What a tyranny does as soon as it gets into power is cut off all explanatory behavior except its own, which is all top-down and asserted to be perfect and final, which no explanation can ever be.
This is why the hostile elite is now attacking science, exactly because modern science (pre-Woke) recognized the inherent instability of all knowledge. That’s why it was commonly referred to as the model of knowing. Because it is (or was).
This is also why, speaking of Darwin, by the fourth edition of his Origin he began referring to scientific theory as “a mental convenience.” When was the last time anyone in politics or religion (same thing) ever said that about their “truth”?
Anyway, tryannies cut off all feedback and correction, which is the two-fold source of human adaptability. The more power they have, the greater the threat.
Also, a culture, or country, is stable to the extent that force is obviated. But the hostile elite is quite obviously force-dependent. And when force fails, there’s no alternative. That’s why the whole point of a civilization is the circumnavigation of the use of force. Something, again, the hostile elite is not interested in. This would be my justification for referring to the hostile elite as a maladaptive force.
Of course, I’ll be the first to admit that we can only know for sure if we are free from the threat of extinction when there are no more people left to know it. In the meantime, as I’ve said before here, and not just here, we’re in no position to laugh at the dinosaurs for getting themselves extinct. After all, they lasted a lot longer than we have so far.
Maladaptive is a great term. I don’t want to hate these people but I don’t them here. I work in the court system and see a lot - this is not a good development for America
I agree that, strictly speaking, it’s not unstoppable. But my justification for using that phrase is exactly becxause, as you rightly point out, there is no will to stop it. Plus, as I’m sure you know only too well, the elite do have the will - to never stop it.
I reserve "unstoppable" for conditionms that cannot b e changed, not merely for processes that will not easily be changed. The "elites" are in competition and can split apart, and noxious factions can be dragged through the streets or hung. That wouldn't be pleasant, but it could be doable.
My use of "unstoppable force" had more to do with the word "maladaptive."
As in, "This force can't be stopped until it reaches a maladaptive level."
Unfortunately, events of late have borne me out in this regard.
And the justification for saying that it can't be stopped is because there is no one in a position of power interested in stopping it.
Though you may be right that the "elites" are in competition, they are all operating out of the same Globalist template, the destruction of the West, nation-state, etc. and the imposition by force of mass migration and the surveillance state.
Trump made inroads with Hispanics by playing up his macho image? Isn't that racist, or a microagression, or cultural appropriation or something? It feels like something you "can't say"
Trump as the classic "caudillo." I think the Sailer commentariat has proposed this. It is one of those ideas that, once heard, one realizes immediately it is true.
One may want to expand on one's point. The top right hand corner of the state map is sparsely populated and the least Hispanic areas of the state if that is what one means.
It's a joke you see because "what part of the macho image helped in California" doesn't make much sense. The point of the guy's question is that since Trump didn't win California the idea that his macho image helped him with Hispanics is obviously false. That assertion shows a lack of understanding of statistics (and reality) and there wasn't much point to responding to it. So instead I made a joke about the "what part" aspect. But, as you know, if you have to explain the joke...
But the Republicans complete failure in Orange County and semi-failure in San Diego County is why the Republican Party in California is no longer relevant. The Democrats can screw up continuously and the best answer of the Republicans is Larry Elder?
My point is not that it helped him to win anything in CA, but it kept him from losing as badly.
I agree with the rest of your points. Orange county was a sort of joke among CA college students in the 1960s--predictably ultra-conservative. I was at San Diego State at the time.
I'm starting to see a pattern here. Are you the guy who doesn't read carefully, or are you the guy who doesn't understand humor? This comments section could use either
I worked in Lukeville Az on a portion of border wall and many of the workers were middle class Hispanics from Phoenix or LA who were glad to build a wall to keep out migrants.
A lot of the racist/bigoted comments made by Hispanic members of the Los Angeles City Council made were about other Hispanics and certain ethnic groups from Mexico.
These elections really are basically ethnocultural censuses, with an occasional dice-roll to determine close results.
Positions on specific issues are usually less important than a form of ethno-signalling so pure and so shocking that it makes an honest man want to vote to end democracy. Michelle Obama's recent line about the U.S. presidency being "a Black job" comes to mind, in her endorsement of quadroon Kamala.
For the purposes of the civic ritual of voting, there is a three-way split: D-voter vs. R-voter vs. Non-Voter. Most forms of Hispanic lean towards the Non-Voter side. They punch FAR below their population numbers (in part for having lots of illegals, foreign-citizens, and clueless people almost-completely unplugged from mainstream-English-speaking society).
Most forms of Hispanic have extremely weak R-voter contingents. There are exceptions. The balance of "Hispanics" in Florida, for example (and not just the Cubans) is heavy on the R-voters.
Little about tweaks in immigration policy or "rhetoric" changes any of this, in a baseline way.
CA Latinos I think have derived from seasonal field hands more so than in Texas, perhaps.
I lived in CA and grew up in the Central Valley agricultural belt. My father sold agricultural equipment and from about 14 onward I often helped him deliver it to the large farms. The braceros basically lived apart, in workers' housing, compounds, and appeared to live much as they would in Mexico id they did agricultural work. They spoke only Spanish, and often either moved to another farm whose crop was coming ripe, or back across the border until the next harvest season started. Truck farms were all year seasons, and these workers (Salinas valley, Ventura/Oxnard/Santa Maria) might stay most of the year. Large parts of the Central Valley were seasonal: grapes, citrus, stonefruits, nuts.
Later, after the bracero program wound down, some stayed and started families, but still did seasonal labor and moved a lot; in the 70s/80s I taught their kids for a while. These Latinos were gradually organized under Caesar Chavez's labor organization, and like almost all such labor movements, found support in the Democratic party.
Maybe it did not develop that way in Texas, I don't know.
As an equestrian (of sorts) I heartily agree the whip -really a Latigo- was indeed ancient respected manner of directing the horse - and why must those cultures with a horse tradition give it up because less fortunate peoples have never developed one?
Steve you and I had some fun joking about this on Twitter a while back as you might recall, lol.
https://x.com/Steve_Sailer/status/1410419125877305350
Steve was so funny here. My comment in parentheses.
“Hispanic voters really liked Trump's personality. He reminds them of the tall blond Conquistador they'd defer to back home. They liked his (lack of in my opinion) tastes in decor, women, and vocabulary.”
Hispanic aesthetics and tastes are more cringe and gauche than mainstream black culture.
There is nothing more cringe and gauche than rap.
Gangsta rap, yes. But nothing is more cringe than the kind of content Latinos especially older Latinos who don't speak English consume all day on TV. Plus it's completely foreign to America. Rap for all its cringe is still American. Latino culture isn't. It's a wholly imported culture that is subversive to any cohesive national identity. (with exceptions like Texan hispanics who have been here for centuries ofc)
Good points and interesting exchange.
But I do have to say that those who value Rap don't seem all that interested in a "cohesive national identity." On the contrary, they've taken self-absorption to the vanishing point. And self-absorbed and cohesvie are two different things.
A coalition based on the two groups that hate each other the most. TERF's and trannies have the animosity but not the numbers.
TERFs are gone. The Dems repeatedly told us to eff off and so we have.
It was a poor metaphor in service to a cheap laugh.
Just don't.
Derb's "Black vs. Non-Black" in action.
I don’t know much Hispanics but I do know that in 2024 a big issue with citizens in the US, Canada and the UK is out of control immigration. People are furious.
Karl Rove’s comments are from a different world. Completely irrelevant today.
Karl Rove and the Bushes still haven't noticed they were wrong. They are still calling any immigration policy that emphasizes the needs of US citizens nativist.
Latinos see an opportunity to move north, so, they're moving north. It's as simple as that, for them. Though the hostile elite likes to showcase individuals who are anti-American, or anti-white, for the most part the Latinos I know are more interested in opportunities than hostilities.
The whole push north is sheer quantity. It's an unstoppable force at this point. But that's the problem. Not Latino Migration. The problem is that any unstoppable force is, and must be, over time - a maladaptive force. And that is what Globalization has become - a maladaptive force.
I realize that this statement requires clarification. But I also know that a comment section is not the place to do it. So I'll just let it go at that. Though not without adding that it does seem unfortunate that such a talented thinker/writer as Steve, and his commenters, who are HBD savy, have yet to look at this problem from the point of view of human adaptation.
His insights, and that of his commenters, would certainly be welcome, and timely.
Because it seems pretty obvious that this problem has reached a dangerously maladaptive level. One, moreover, for which there is NO political solution, since all of politics and governing are controlled by the hostile elite. And the last thing they're interested in is directing attention to a problem that they, in effect, have caused. A vicious cycle indeed. But unsolvable? Let's hope not.
Very interesting points.
I'm having troubles this AM (too old and not enough caffeine yet) getting a grip on what a "maladaptive force" is. I can envision that at a certain scope an unstoppable force will, by definition, continue until it reaches its own stasis, wherever that might be, but can't yet see it as absolutely maladaptive--in all cases. It perturbs the existing system, the system ostensibly reaches a new equilibrium--which may result in the stasis I mentioned. Anyway, that's how it seems to me this AM.
Can you give any concrete examples? It is key to my understanding of your point.
Thanks in advance.
Thanks for your response. And great question.
For a concrete example of a maladaptive force, with particular relevance to today, I’d say using simple 18th century models, documents, etc. to solve complex 21st century problems would qualify.
The J6’ers shouting “2021 is 1776!” comes irresistably to mind. As well as those who prate about the USA being a Constitutional Republic, as opposed to asking themselves the simple question, Is that model adequate to the demands being put on it now?
But the real maladaptive force I had in mind was tyranny in general, and the super tyranny of the hostile elite in particular.
Though my use of the phrase “maladaptive force” wasn’t taken from Darwin, it was inspired by him.
An ever changing organism to an ever changing environment is the dynamics of evolution, which is why he said, in so many words, that any adaptation is and must be over time a maldaptation.
Since explanation itself is a human adaptational mechanism (we can’t survive without it, at least not very well or for very long), they can only be adaptive if those explanations are open-ended and unresolved from both ends, theory and data.
What a tyranny does as soon as it gets into power is cut off all explanatory behavior except its own, which is all top-down and asserted to be perfect and final, which no explanation can ever be.
This is why the hostile elite is now attacking science, exactly because modern science (pre-Woke) recognized the inherent instability of all knowledge. That’s why it was commonly referred to as the model of knowing. Because it is (or was).
This is also why, speaking of Darwin, by the fourth edition of his Origin he began referring to scientific theory as “a mental convenience.” When was the last time anyone in politics or religion (same thing) ever said that about their “truth”?
Anyway, tryannies cut off all feedback and correction, which is the two-fold source of human adaptability. The more power they have, the greater the threat.
Also, a culture, or country, is stable to the extent that force is obviated. But the hostile elite is quite obviously force-dependent. And when force fails, there’s no alternative. That’s why the whole point of a civilization is the circumnavigation of the use of force. Something, again, the hostile elite is not interested in. This would be my justification for referring to the hostile elite as a maladaptive force.
Of course, I’ll be the first to admit that we can only know for sure if we are free from the threat of extinction when there are no more people left to know it. In the meantime, as I’ve said before here, and not just here, we’re in no position to laugh at the dinosaurs for getting themselves extinct. After all, they lasted a lot longer than we have so far.
Thanks again for your response and question.
Maladaptive is a great term. I don’t want to hate these people but I don’t them here. I work in the court system and see a lot - this is not a good development for America
It's not unstoppable. The will to stop it may not exist, but there's no physical obstacle to doing it.
I agree that, strictly speaking, it’s not unstoppable. But my justification for using that phrase is exactly becxause, as you rightly point out, there is no will to stop it. Plus, as I’m sure you know only too well, the elite do have the will - to never stop it.
I reserve "unstoppable" for conditionms that cannot b e changed, not merely for processes that will not easily be changed. The "elites" are in competition and can split apart, and noxious factions can be dragged through the streets or hung. That wouldn't be pleasant, but it could be doable.
My use of "unstoppable force" had more to do with the word "maladaptive."
As in, "This force can't be stopped until it reaches a maladaptive level."
Unfortunately, events of late have borne me out in this regard.
And the justification for saying that it can't be stopped is because there is no one in a position of power interested in stopping it.
Though you may be right that the "elites" are in competition, they are all operating out of the same Globalist template, the destruction of the West, nation-state, etc. and the imposition by force of mass migration and the surveillance state.
"Elites" are not as uniform as you are imagining them to be. Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg are not the same person.
Trump made inroads with Hispanics by playing up his macho image? Isn't that racist, or a microagression, or cultural appropriation or something? It feels like something you "can't say"
Wasn’t Trump somehow involved in the professional wrestling world? Mexicans love WWE.
Yes. If you made one of those evolution of man posters for presidents, Trump would be three steps before president Camacho
Hah!
Good one!
The Rock would be two steps before
Trump as the classic "caudillo." I think the Sailer commentariat has proposed this. It is one of those ideas that, once heard, one realizes immediately it is true.
Trump received 34% of the vote in California in 2020. What part of the macho image helped in California?
Uh- the top right hand corner?
One may want to expand on one's point. The top right hand corner of the state map is sparsely populated and the least Hispanic areas of the state if that is what one means.
No- the top right hand corner of the macho image. See your own question
Your answer still doesn't make any sense.
It's a joke you see because "what part of the macho image helped in California" doesn't make much sense. The point of the guy's question is that since Trump didn't win California the idea that his macho image helped him with Hispanics is obviously false. That assertion shows a lack of understanding of statistics (and reality) and there wasn't much point to responding to it. So instead I made a joke about the "what part" aspect. But, as you know, if you have to explain the joke...
It's what pushed him over 30%.
But the Republicans complete failure in Orange County and semi-failure in San Diego County is why the Republican Party in California is no longer relevant. The Democrats can screw up continuously and the best answer of the Republicans is Larry Elder?
My point is not that it helped him to win anything in CA, but it kept him from losing as badly.
I agree with the rest of your points. Orange county was a sort of joke among CA college students in the 1960s--predictably ultra-conservative. I was at San Diego State at the time.
Romney received a higher percentage of the California vote in 2012 (37%) than Trump received in either 2016 (31%) or 2020 (34%).
I suspect that we are talking past each other. We are on different wavelengths.
THe number of people who both care if it's "racist" and would oitherwise vote for Trump must be approaching zero, so who cares?
I'm starting to see a pattern here. Are you the guy who doesn't read carefully, or are you the guy who doesn't understand humor? This comments section could use either
You're the one who thinks things are "funny" when they are merely repulsively stupid.
I worked in Lukeville Az on a portion of border wall and many of the workers were middle class Hispanics from Phoenix or LA who were glad to build a wall to keep out migrants.
A lot of the racist/bigoted comments made by Hispanic members of the Los Angeles City Council made were about other Hispanics and certain ethnic groups from Mexico.
https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-10-09/city-council-leaked-audio-nury-martinez-kevin-de-leon-gil-cedillo
These racial conflicts will get much worse. Poor Chicago blacks are already getting mad about migrants
People basically do vote their race.
These elections really are basically ethnocultural censuses, with an occasional dice-roll to determine close results.
Positions on specific issues are usually less important than a form of ethno-signalling so pure and so shocking that it makes an honest man want to vote to end democracy. Michelle Obama's recent line about the U.S. presidency being "a Black job" comes to mind, in her endorsement of quadroon Kamala.
For the purposes of the civic ritual of voting, there is a three-way split: D-voter vs. R-voter vs. Non-Voter. Most forms of Hispanic lean towards the Non-Voter side. They punch FAR below their population numbers (in part for having lots of illegals, foreign-citizens, and clueless people almost-completely unplugged from mainstream-English-speaking society).
Most forms of Hispanic have extremely weak R-voter contingents. There are exceptions. The balance of "Hispanics" in Florida, for example (and not just the Cubans) is heavy on the R-voters.
Little about tweaks in immigration policy or "rhetoric" changes any of this, in a baseline way.
Non-Hispanic white split their vote 60/40 between the two parties. All other ethnic groups lean much more for one party.
Do CA Latinos become more woke than TX Latinos because each group is assimilating to the dominant culture of its respective state?
TX Latinos seem rather Trumpy in a way that I'm not sure exists in CA
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/11/17/trump-latinos-south-texas-tejanos-437027
CA Latinos I think have derived from seasonal field hands more so than in Texas, perhaps.
I lived in CA and grew up in the Central Valley agricultural belt. My father sold agricultural equipment and from about 14 onward I often helped him deliver it to the large farms. The braceros basically lived apart, in workers' housing, compounds, and appeared to live much as they would in Mexico id they did agricultural work. They spoke only Spanish, and often either moved to another farm whose crop was coming ripe, or back across the border until the next harvest season started. Truck farms were all year seasons, and these workers (Salinas valley, Ventura/Oxnard/Santa Maria) might stay most of the year. Large parts of the Central Valley were seasonal: grapes, citrus, stonefruits, nuts.
Later, after the bracero program wound down, some stayed and started families, but still did seasonal labor and moved a lot; in the 70s/80s I taught their kids for a while. These Latinos were gradually organized under Caesar Chavez's labor organization, and like almost all such labor movements, found support in the Democratic party.
Maybe it did not develop that way in Texas, I don't know.
1) Self selection, more right wing latinos are going to choose TX of CA.
2) Status emulation, higher status Texans lean right and so Hispanics wanting to move up in the world lean right to emulate.
3) Urban/Not Urban, TX is defined by more sprawl/less dense urban living
4) Middle Class Friendly, TX economy is more amenable to becoming middle class homeowner with family
5) Industries, CA defined by left wing industries and TX by right ring ones.
I don't mean to overstate this case. Hispanics are still voting 10-30% more D in any given election. But there is defiantly a difference.
As an equestrian (of sorts) I heartily agree the whip -really a Latigo- was indeed ancient respected manner of directing the horse - and why must those cultures with a horse tradition give it up because less fortunate peoples have never developed one?
Hey Stevo, Instapundit quoting this article.