Some right-wingers have responded to the piece, but their responses are mostly “but I like being bad and cruel” - which seems to prove Bulldog’s point.
I think we can do better - that it’s possible to make a case against “slave morality” that doesn’t rely on being pro-badness and cruelty.
Fuck me, you’re making me read Slatescott again. I can’t wait to see how he will case for badness and cruelty without relying on being pro badness and cruelty.
Skimmed a bit up to the discussion of architecture not being as impressive nowadays or something.
Ok here we go:
Tate has, in some sense, many good qualities. He’s strong, athletic, and motivated. He earned tens of millions of dollars through hustle and hard work. He’s charismatic and compelling and, before his arrest, was one of the Internet’s most iconic influencers. I think master morality has to approve of all these things.
“Hustle and hard work”? That’s what we’re gonna call being a sex trafficker?
Hand tipped here:
I would like to end up with an overall negative view of Tate. And if I do a simple calculation, (virtues - vices), then it seems like if his nonmoral virtues were strong enough, they could overcome the moral vices. If Tate was a really really good kickboxer, he might still end up in the black. It seems much more intuitive to say that no amount of nonmoral virtues can make up for his moral vices. But now we’re back at the full slave moralist package again! Some “compromise”!
If we accept that there are some vices that cannot be made up for by virtues, we might need to cancel someone. People might need to be held responsible for the things they do. So Scott cannot accept it. There has to be a way to let the baddies in as long as they’re actually doing important work.
You can argue “master morality is about being strong and good; slave morality is just about preserving your pathetic little feelings”. But most of life is people’s pathetic little feelings. People have proven over and over again that their decisions - about what to do, what to buy, who to vote for, even what to die for - depend more on what lets them feel dignity and self-respect than on any purely material considerations.
Slight of hand: now slave morality is all about feelings and master morality is about material needs. What the heck? We established that slave morality was based on the idea that masters inflicting real hardships on their peasants was bad, didn’t we? You could make the same argument about Scott morality (as described above) because the objective would be to allow you to feel good about supporting people who do bad things as long as they also do good things.
And speaking of slight of hand, this is going to be my pull quote:
Tate has, in some sense, many good qualities. He’s strong, athletic, and motivated.
Really telling since none of those are good characteristics in the moral sense of “good”. Like what the fuck is “motivated” even doing there, Sauron was also extremely motivated, mate.
Fuck me, you’re making me read Slatescott again. I can’t wait to see how he will case for badness and cruelty without relying on being pro badness and cruelty.
Skimmed a bit up to the discussion of architecture not being as impressive nowadays or something.
Ok here we go:
“Hustle and hard work”? That’s what we’re gonna call being a sex trafficker?
Hand tipped here:
If we accept that there are some vices that cannot be made up for by virtues, we might need to cancel someone. People might need to be held responsible for the things they do. So Scott cannot accept it. There has to be a way to let the baddies in as long as they’re actually doing important work.
Slight of hand: now slave morality is all about feelings and master morality is about material needs. What the heck? We established that slave morality was based on the idea that masters inflicting real hardships on their peasants was bad, didn’t we? You could make the same argument about Scott morality (as described above) because the objective would be to allow you to feel good about supporting people who do bad things as long as they also do good things.
And speaking of slight of hand, this is going to be my pull quote:
Really telling since none of those are good characteristics in the moral sense of “good”. Like what the fuck is “motivated” even doing there, Sauron was also extremely motivated, mate.
“…then I have shit for brains.”