Where do leftists get their ideas? I have argued here that the answer is intellectuals using the authority of science. Maybe I am mistaken. Rather than disagree vehemently, prove it. Where do leftist ideas come from? If you have a better answer, let everyone here know. — comment by Arch Angel, “In Science We Trust” @ Sigma Frame blog

Before we can answer this question, we must first ask the question: what is leftism?

What is Leftism?

Leftism is a philosophy whose origins lie in the anti-spiritual/anti-Christian metaphysics of materalism/positivism/scientism/reductionism and combines with hedonism and utilitarian morality (citation).

Positivism

“The Oxford English Dictionary definition of Positivism is a philosophical system recognising only that which can be scientifically verified or which is capable of logical or mathematical proof, and therefore rejecting metaphysics and theism.

 

To be more exact – Positivism is itself a metaphysical assumption – and that assumption is as above. This despite that Positivism explicitly denies the meaningfulness and/or validity of metaphysics. In sum, that denial of metaphysics and its ‘replacement’ by science/ logic/ mathematics, is itself precisely a metaphysical (not scientific, not logical, not mathematical) assumption. On this clear and deadly contradiction is built modernity.” (citation)

…and…

“Positivism is the (usually implicit) belief system that all valid knowledge comes via the senses (and not, for example, from revelation or imagination) – it is sometimes called Scientism, and is the metaphysics which is mainstream in modernity – although usually only articulated by scientists with a bent for philosophy.” (citation)

You don’t have to be a philosopher to understand positivism. Positivism means that all claims to truth can only come from the five senses and from the working of those senses in the “mind”—the physical brain—either arbitrarily or in the context of the sciences. It is implicitly and explicitly anti-Christian because it denies the reality and validity of the spiritual.

Because positivism rejects the religious, it necessitates moral relativism, subjective morality. There is—and can be—no objective standard of right and wrong, truth and falsehood. Morality is what the individual or group perceives it to be. If you’ve ever heard that morality is cultural, that is positivism. If you’ve ever heard that you can’t legislate morality, that is positivism. If you’ve ever heard that all people are inherently equal, that is positivism.

The most important part of positivism is what it rejects, not what it purports to do. Its key feature is restricting the source of truth to exclude metaphysics and the spiritual. Positivism proposes that all truth comes from science, mathematics, and logic, but it does not require its proper use or its use at all. Thus it begins with a rejection of God and, over time, ends up rejecting logic and reason, the very thing it was founded upon.

“For instance; Cosmology, Physics, Mathematics are abstract and they concern dead (that is un-alive/ non-conscious) phenomena. However, under Positivism; Biology, Psychology, Consciousness all ultimately reduce to Physics: therefore Biology, Psychology and Consciousness are concerned with dead phenomena. [..] Positivism is death and Abstraction is death – when abstraction is assumed to be ‘true’ rather than a model of truth.” (citation)

Once God is rejected and moral relativism takes its place, it inevitably produces moral inversion: where the good/truth/life/creation is treated as evil/falsehood/death/destruction and evil/falsehood/death/destruction is treated as good/truth/life/creation.

Given how this all began, it is thus tempting to point at science, logic, and mathematics—tools that merely model truth—as the source of the errors in leftism, but as these tools are increasingly abandoned in society, it becomes clear that these are not to blame.

Consider, for example, how abortion violates the sanctity of motherhood and brings death but is considered one of the highest attainable virtues (“my body, my choice”) that facilitates career achievements. This is truly a self-centered positivist-inspired belief. Feminism alone contains many such beliefs.

Michelle Williams didn’t use science, mathematics, and logic when she murdered her unborn child so she could be free to pursue an acting career in Hollywood rather than be a mother. She did what seemed best to herself by following the ‘virtues’ that society had established, which say that an unborn human child is not even human, even though this flies against science.

Similarly, when people say that a person can be born in the wrong body, they are not making scientific claims, they are deriving ‘truth’ from whatever conclusions their mind—or the minds of someone else—creates. Indeed, one of the hallmarks of modern life is the active censorship of science.

Science, mathematics, and logic model the truth. If leftism was merely about the use of these tools, there would be no, um, logically necessary reason for leftism to descend into moral inversion. It is the rejection of God—of his absolute morality—that leads to this. And because science, mathematics, and logic are fundamentally about the pursuit of the truth, such things would eventually lead one to God, who is himself truth.

The problem was always the irrational metaphysical rejection of the metaphysical: the rejection of God. Science, mathematics, and logic take on a whole new and different dimension when your metaphysics excludes God versus when it includes Him:

“Another way of thinking about this matter is that Positivism – as such – was actually an expression of divine destiny, and an intended aspect of that line-of-development initiated by Jesus Christ. Its many evils are a consequence of being cut-off from Christianity on the one hand; and also because the Christian Churches cut themselves off from the implications of this new mode of thinking – initially by the Churches excluding and resisting individualism and a spirituality rooted in originative intuition, later (and now) by these same Churches accepting and assimilating-to atheistic-positivism.” (citation)

In other words, it isn’t that logic and reason are bad, per se, but that their application has been divorced from faith in Christ. Indeed, it was Christ himself who initiated as-such positivism—the use of science, mathematics, and reason as a model of God’s truth—as an expression of divine destiny in human development. And so it was no accident that stratospheric rise of the Western world was birthed out of Christianity itself. God created every man and woman with a heart and mind to be used for the glory of God.

But mankind chose a different path, to reject God.

Utilitarianism

As I discussed in “The Political Spectrum is Leftist“, for normal people leftism is less of a stated philosophy and more practically rooted in utilitarianism.

“The assumptions of Leftism (e.g. Leftist concepts of equality, social justice, diversity, environmentalism, antiracism, feminism, sexual revolution, the mainstream hedonic utilitarian morality etc) is pervasive in public discourse as background assumptions.” (citation)

 

“[A]ll the Leftisms are types of utilitarianism in some kind of groupish abstraction – universalism, humankind, the nation, state, class, region, a sex or race, or some other unit. The disagreements on the Left, the differences between the secular Leftisms listed above – which may be very bitter – are merely concerned with the identity of the group for which utility is to be maximised, and how best to maximise utility – that is all. [T]he only way of not being Left, is to be Religious” (citation)

 

In a nutshell, there is no such thing as ‘The Right’: there is only Religion (or Religious systems) or The Left. [..] A nation can be run on Religious lines (as all nations were in the past, and many still are); or else it can be Leftist – which means it pursues mortal utility. (citation)

Most people think of leftism as political in origin and so associate the “left” with a particular set of beliefs. But this isn’t really important to leftism as a philosophy. Underlying each leftist view is utilitarinism. In particular, it pursues mortal utility: the maximization of ‘utility’ during mortal life. This is determined by positive aspects such as happiness, pride, self-esteem, health, and wealth or by the lack of negative aspects such as pain, suffering, violence, and shame.

Why is homosexuality good? Because it increases happiness (‘love’) and pride and reduces shame.

Why is abortion good? Because it maximizes the pursuit of wealth.

Why is euthanasia good? Because it reduces pain and suffering.

Why is covering one’s face good? Because it promotes health and wellness.

There are many other Litmus Tests that indicate a belief in utilitarianism and a rejection of God.

If you support any of all of these; you are objectively on-the-side of mainstream, global, totalitarian Leftist Establishment: which is the side of Satan and against God. And obviously, therefore, you are anti-Christian – despite whatever you may believe or assert. (citation)

…and…

The real point is that the remedies proposed for these supposed material evils are Trojan horses which are used to bring about profound spiritual evils. This is what really matters and what a person of spiritual discernment should able to see. The evils of the virus, of racism and of climate change (real or unreal) are as nothing besides the evils of the proposed solutions to them. Shall I define these evils? Outwardly, it’s a simple matter of totalitarianism and humanity reduced to controlled servitude. Inwardly, it is the closing tight shut of the door to spiritual freedom and truth. It is the absolute enforcement of materialism. (citation)

Leftists can—and do—fight over how to allocate units of utility, but this utilitarian reasoning underlies all that they do. What they end up doing doesn’t really matter, because the competing choices are all determined by mortal utility.

This isn’t about specific beliefs that a person may hold. It’s about recognizing that the system—and the embrace of the system by the people—leads to the freely-chosen alienation from God and damnation of one’s soul. It is the recognition that you have chosen to subordinate yourself to the moral inversion of the age. It puts you in opposition of truth, of good, of God himself.

This is why I implore people to oppose activism and political involvement in any and every form. Don’t even vote! Do not be a part of the evil. You cannot wash evil of its taint. Jesus conquered death, the punishment for sin, but he did not destroy sin itself. That should be a warning to all of us.

Institutional Capture

The Orthodox do not believe in the superlogical Christianity practiced in the West. It is no surprise they are doing better than any other denomination. — Arch Angel, “In Science We Trust”

Every major institution is corrupted by leftism, including every major Christian denomination, whether Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant, or Anabaptist. Some are farther gone than others, but none are untouched and all are heading in the same direction.

“Note – ‘The party of negation’ is more commonly known as Leftism – but it must be understood that as of 2022 all parties are Leftist; including not just all socialist, liberal, progressive parties, but all centre, moderate, right-wing, libertarian and officially-religious (including ‘Christian’ church) parties. This because Leftism is rooted in the anti-spiritual/ anti-Christian metaphysics of materialism/ positivism/ scientism and reductionism – which assumptions pervade and dominate the entirety of public discourse.” (citation)

 

My evaluation is that real Christians are now rare, and are scattered across many denominations and churches – despite that individually all of the denominations and churches are net-corrupted by their convergence with significant policies of atheist-materialist-Leftism (as evidence by the Litmus Tests). (citation)

It is a mistake to point to any denomination and say “look, here is where Christ is to be found” rather than pointing to the rare individual Christians and saying “look, here are the people in whom Christ is to be found.” For the foreseeable future, Christianity is not to be found in institutions. Any institutions. Including the one you think is safe.

While the Eastern Orthodox and certain forms of Anabaptism have a more communal, less individualistic, nature, mankind has changed and there are almost no communities remaining in which this can succeed (see the footnote here), certainly not en masse. Radix Fidem attempts to do this on a small scale, but it has its own problems, and so I cannot recommend it.

The means by which the institutions are captured and controlled is through bureaucracy:

“Bureaucracy is, along with the mass media, the most powerful form of intrinsic evil in the modern world (that is, bureaucracy – like the mass media – is intrinsically and always metaphysically Positivist, hence evil in its form – quite aside from intent, it is evil). [..] We have created a world run only on the basis of necessarily-false models, in which ultimate authority is impersonal. In place, therefore – everywhere, at the highest level – is a global, linked system of bureaucratic power without responsibility: we inhabit a system that is necessarily evil in form and effect.” (citation)

The outcome of this process is obvious when you see it in action. When the CDC made recommendations, the state health departments subsequently made policies by following the recommendations, and then the local school districts just followed the rules set by the health departs. It was all entirely optional, right? No, it was not. There is a huge bureaucratic power that has no responsibility nor accountability that can enact huge changes in people’s lives.  Faces change, but the bureaucratic power remains entrenched. And of course the results of those necessarily-false policies enacted by the faceless bureaucracy were themselves negative and evil.

Did your church/denomination close the doors when the government ordered it to close? If so, then your church/denomination is unambiguously part of the system of evil. It doesn’t matter if it is Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestant, Anabaptist, or Non-denominational/Baptist. You may want to believe otherwise, with your personal identity tied up in it, but no amount of wishful thinking can change what happened.

It’s not just the church either. The right-wing or traditional patriarchal manosphere is also leftist:

“For example; the current (weird) ‘manosphere’ obsessions with the ‘socio-sexual hierarchies’ (alpha, beta, gamma men, and so forth); or the endless discussion of blue, red, black and white ‘pills’… indeed much of the everyday discussion in this general corner of the internet, and among ‘trad’ Christians of several denominations and churches…

 

Yet these discourses are derived from that same toxic set of attitudes and concepts that – broadly – evolved from Freudian psychoanalysis. [..] they work-against Christianity at a structural, metaphysical level. ” (citation)

I’ve spent much time analyzing and explaining why the manosphere is dead, why it preaches a false doctrine, why its metaphysical axioms are broken. In particular, I’ve been very clear that the therapy offered by the manosphere is utterly useless without a primary focus on conversion to Christ and a rejection of leftism. I’ve written about these topics at length on this blog.

“If there is a dominant ideological mode by 2022; that mode is untruthfulness, dishonesty, misrepresentation, lies – our world is built from lies, and by lies. (citation)

A few months ago I wrote “Lying to Combat Lying,” in which I noted that you cannot do good by resisting evil, you must do good only by striving to do actively positive good. Lies cannot be defeated—it is not your job—but we can refuse to participate. Recognize that the institutions have all been captured, and then try to do good despite it. Do not be subsumed by it.

Where Does Leftism Get Its Ideas?

Leftism is characterized by moral relativism:

Leftism gets its ideas anywhere but from God.

It makes no difference whether leftism uses logic and reason to derive knowledge from science, makes conclusions from logical propositions, follows the lead of another (or a faceless bureaucracy), or each person completely arbitrarily makes up ideas in their own head.

The conclusions of leftism are subjective and so necessarily varied, inconsistent, and incoherent. There is a great bounty in the breadth of expression in leftism: equality, social justice, abortion, diversity, environmentalism, antiracism, feminism, sexual revolution, patriotic and nationalist fervor. The list could go on-and-on.

The subjectivity of moral relativism means that the ideas do not have to be logically consistent with each other either. You can’t point to two opposing positions and say “this here is leftism, and that one is not.” Leftism can believe anything within its positivist framework. It must only be anti-spiritual and thus always anti-Christian.

How does one identify a leftist idea? This is not very hard because very nearly all of them are leftists ideas. Regardless, leftist ideas are those that are against the spiritual, against Christ, are subjective, hedonistic, utilitarian,  bureaucratic, and invert morality and values. They are false.

For those who struggle with philosophy, just ask whether or not a thing opposes Christ or Christians. Voluntarily shutting down your church is pretty unambiguously anti-Christ. So is putting causes—whatever they might be—ahead of Christ. “But,” you might say, “wouldn’t that make all government programs anti-Christian because they do not involve Christ?” Yes, the answer is, “Yes.”