Baileyism - Neutral Good and Thugs

First of all, let's address the elephant in the room using a "Christmas Movie" after Christmas.  I had to start somewhere, with something, and let's also remember the fact that it's a wonderful like was originally release Jan 7, 1947 which isn't even in the stretchy definition of what Christmas constitutes like Epiphany.   Second of all, this movie still checks every box I'm looking for as a framing device to discuss what we need.  So if using Christmas Movies released after Christmas to fix the god damn planet bothers you, there's the door and feel free to step out while the world around you burns.

Ahem.

Anyway.   The DND alignment system is trite and simplified but a highly useful framework to demonstrate the kind of philosophical thought exercise I wish to describe in Baileyism.  The whole POINT of the entire exercise is to strengthen the commons, strengthen civil society in SPITE of government.   Until we have enough non governmental infrastructure to educate and unite against Hard Right Maga liars, until we have enough anti capitalist inertia to be able to tell the truth against Nihilionares no matter what they do, we need to use our still existing right to free association to bypass them.   Using the DND alignment axiom; with Chaos representing the individual and Law representing government, Neutral Good is where there is an alignment between them.

George Bailey is Neutral Good.  The Bailey Building and Loan is an institution, created by private individuals that can empower the rest of us to have enough power, time and prosperity to unite against tyranny.  Time and again in every problem facing society, we see 'we can't solve this problem because of X' usually with X being something related to Capitalism.   The infamous Powell Memo should not just be a historical evidence of crimes against humanity but also a blue print of how to fight capitalism.   Everything they did, we can do better and build parallel infrastructure that doesnt depend on government, doesn't depend on magical supermen coming from the sky to save us.  We need to build the tools to help us build private neutral good infrastructure that can, by private association, exclude Hard Right and Maga ruiners or agents of chaos that mean no good for society.

Government, as powerful as it is, is a tool that the left has relied on for far too long.  A properly done government has significant disadvantages that a private civil society does not have.  A government must equate for all its citizens; ergo it cannot exclude Christian Nationalists.  A government is often slow to adapt.  A government also responds to elected representatives, which ensures that the rich corporate oligarchic masters are able to wield disproportionate policy.  

This philosophy requires courage and faith.   Just like George Bailey.  Which is why I choose him as a template.  No one MAKES George Bailey sit with the building and loan and ensure the decency in the lives of the people he helps in the movie; it is a private choice by a private individual.  But he makes a world of difference.   Can you imagine how much better the world would be with more such individuals and the equivalent of the Building and Loan in finance, in tech, in newspapers, communication, entertainment and more?  Altruism is a powerful tool that can build more altruism.  The belief in Eucatastrophe, a better world despite what the cynics say has the power to make it so.

Mr. Potter, and his rampant greed is objectively Neutral Evil.  The two men stand in silent but legal conflict for the soul of the town.   While entirely off screen, there is zero doubt in my mind that from time to time Mr. Potter has employed Chaotic Evil thugs to terrorize the opposition to get what he wants, especially in the darker mirror world of Potterville.   To the Neutral Evil capitalist, any tool is a means to an end.  So too, for the Baileyist, should any tool that isn't evil be a means to save the Bailey Building and Loan.  The Government? Sure.  But also the work of people, always striving towards its mission to provide the people of the town better homes.

Neutral Good is the central point I make about the philosophy.  Government is a useful tool but at the end of the day, it is critical to remember it takes a village and a village is more than town hall.   So often Anticapitalist dogmas get lost in the weeds with this kind of argument.  As problematic as the DND alignment system is for any moral or civic framework; remember that its a better starting point than the libertarian lie which tries to make libertarianism some special ideology whilst ignoring its roots as a tool for capitalists and utterly ignoring the anticapitalist roots of true anarchism.  Capitalism is evil.   There are few exceptions and certainly no conservative ones.

Baileyism - The Spirit of Eucatastrophe

Eucatastrophe is a word created by Tolkien to represent dramatic saves at the last minute where catastrophe is averted.  Like when the eagles rescued the party in Mirkwood in the Hobbit.  To me, Christmas as we celebrate it is much more about Eucastastrophe than Easter ever was.   Christmas is a celebration of deliverance; Easter is a chance to eat candy, paint eggs and dress nice for church.

This is the Christmas Dickens invented with the Christmas Carol.  Satanic Long Termers have coopted the term, but Baileyism is the epitome of the opposite of that.  Longtermism is the belief that you can be Archer and make no personal sacrifices and your money and good looks and plot armor frees you from what you do just because you are the White Male protoganist.  This is why Long Termers are all fine making women objects and slaves and drilling more oil.  They will get deliverance because they deserve it.

Baileyism is about doing the right thing, on your own, day in and day out and BECOMING the Eucatastrophe.  One is a shirking of personal responsibility and demanding the universe comply with your magickal thinking, and the latter is becoming the thing you most desire for others until the universe gives you what you need because of the Karma you have accrued.   You do it is because it is the right thing to do and bring hope to others and hope deep down you get it for yourself.

Christmas as manifest in the real world is a mechanism to steal wealth from the lower classes to the wealthy with no consequences to them.  Christmas as it is sold to us is decent people being given a miracle by some last minute eucastrophe.  The first is disgusting and non sustainable, the latter is how we make a better world.

Baileyism - The FBI Scowled At Its a Wonderful Life

So lit out of my mind a few nights ago while watching It's a Wonderful Life, I proposed a philosophy that I was originally going to attribute to Star Trek.  But the problem with Star Trek is, as science fiction, it is easily dismissible by the skeptic.   I'm of course not the only person to think of creating a utopian society using it as a hook, but while I firmly believe it is possible to achieve the utopian ideal of such a society; the lack of transporters, FTL and replicators (especially the replicators) will be hand waved by those of a limited mind set as fundamental impossible.  

Anyway, I'm not the first one who noticed how awesome the movie is.  Indeed, here are some examples:

Reddit, Current Affairs, The Institute for Christian Socialism, the Society for US Intellectual History, the Federalist, the Mary Sue, TheSerpent'sHouse, the Stalin Loving Socialists of the Nation, and the WSJ which thinks it's pro capitalism.  

But did you know that the FBI and demonic HUAC investigated the movie? They felt that it villanized capitalism and our Aristocratic Masters.  You see before the 1960's, the quiet part was said more out loud that this has always been a capitalist slaver nation for capitalist slavers and the FBI existed and exists to help and serve them; not us.  Indeed, a lot of the ammunition that the demonic HUAC used for their blacklists came from the LA Field Office of the FBI.  They felt that because it smeared "Free enterprise" that it was subversive to "the American Dream."

Look, the fact of the matter is, that if the FBI thinks that this movie is the devil, and everyone on the left and the right wants to claim this movie or decry this movie as the devil, then maybe its worth a second look.  This movie is also particularly interesting as the basis for an anti capitalist philosophy because it is unique in that it went into the public domain and was so popular that it actually GOT CLAWED BACK to make money for for profit corporations again.  It went public domain in the mid seventies and then in the midninesies the people who owned the original book got that and bought the sound track and now NBC Universal owns it.

It became popular because small independent television stations could play it again and again during Christmas because it was cheap and free and it became a beloved American tradition.  And at the same time, then Wall Street stuck a flag in it and made money off of it.  Maybe the fact that the movie is all about not clawing things back from the public domain and that the FBI thinks is unamerican because it makes our capitalist masters look like dogshit is worth a second glance.

Star Trek is where you wanna go; Its a Wonderful Life is how you get there.

Domestic Politics

 I will not vote for Harris again under any circumstances, and no amount of shrill lecturing will convince me otherwise.  Every time a dem of any kind lectures me on voting for centrist nazi enablers, all recurring contributions to ANY dem will cease for 90 days

I will not vote for any dem that takes a dime from Aipac

I will not vote for any dem if South Kkkarolina, New Hampshire and Iowa, all red nazi states, determine the candidate

No republican will ever be worse than Trump; the dems rolled the dice on Harris and Failed and I am done propping up their weak ass

Go ahead and lecture me and hurt the aclu and justice dems

Baileyism - A Manifesto on a Eucatastrophic Iterative Neoreverent AnCapitalist Utopian Philosophy

 Why if I told you there was a utopian work that was not religious, not governmental, not economic but that simply involved private individuals creating the perfect town in the perfect timeline where they really do live Happily Ever After?  I speak of "It's a Wonderful Life."  The government exists in this work, but it doesn't save the people.  The economy exists, and capitalism exists, but people manage to come together and build a better life in spite of it.  And it's not really unrealistic.  There is some Eucatastrophic intervention from an Angel, but no one counted on it.   Everyone worked for themselves and hoped for the best, giving thanks in a reverent fashion but prominent religious displays are very rare except the most secular of holiday decorations, celebrating the reverence of Christmas without needing to have a particular sect favored; spirituality without dogma.  If one can have a Christmas movie that is Spiritual, but without Dogma, can one also have a philosophy of private individuals who come together in sufficient numbers together over time to help each other overcome those who wanna hurt everyone else and be assholes and psychopaths to each other.  They do their duty to help their neighbor and fight the war to defend their country, but they live their lives and give to each other and give back without giving everything.  

This is a Neutral Good Movie.

And it is an iterative movie; people don't get it right the first time, but by being decent to each other and helping each other as a shield against capitalist shitbags, like the ants that make a raft by holding on to each other, they survive the Great Depression together.  They survive the Great War together, but George Bailey is the quinstisential individual who gives and gives and gives of his own choice, and moral obligation and then is finally helped by the community around him in his hour of direst need.  It is a movie about rugged non toxic individualism but understanding the best American balance between the individual need and the good of the collective without dogma.  There were no parties, there were no hidden agendas or insane hierarchies, though people still had their societal roles.  

And nobody. had to die.  They just did this for each other.  They built institutions.  They build a Bailey Building and Loan that acted as the framework for that liferaft that kept the whole town together.  If it hadn't been for George Bailey, there would have been no Building and Loan.  So it also teaches the valuable lesson that there is no someone else. 

You want to make the world a better place? Then you need to be the one to do it, on an individual level and build your raft and help others and hope they will help you; do the best you can, not asking anyone for anything but being a decent human being.  And sometimes it isn't a scam.  And sometimes it isn't a con, and sometimes you can beat the Capitalist Nationalist Lying Potters.  Mr. Potter Never lied about he was, and that makes him morally superior to the ones that sit in the shadows and broligarch us to death.

We need Baileyism.

Postponing the LARP

 Due to recent events in the news, is gratifying and frustrating.  There is clearly a great thirst for batlarps, but it also appears no one wants to run games except one in a million; so if one in three wants to play but one in a million wants to run; providing case files will help no one if they make characters but never use them

Going straight to philospophy

This is why we lost

 Fuck the dem elite

Fuck the boomer wealthy limo liberals

Fuck the word police

Fuck liberals

FUCK. Liberals.

Fuck Daily kos

Fuck them in the ear