Radicalizing Kith and Kin

It seems to me that Radical Christians and Radical Muslims can be as bad as each other. I used to fall of the idea that since the radical forms of these ideologies are bad, that there must be something inherently wrong with both the Christian and Muslim religion.

Today, I realize that the problem is with radicalization.

Modern radicalization seems to come from the Kantian/Hegelian train of transcendental philosophies. This methodology digs down into a tradition or philosophy and brings out the core conflicts and paradoxes of the ideology. Demagogs inflame the conflicts and rise the storm to power.

The kicker is that you can use these revolutionary techniques to create division and violence in almost any field. For example, radical environmentalist are willing to kill loggers to appease the conflicts faced by gaia. Socialism and communism will produce armies of thugs willing to beat people up, kill and rob in the name of economic justice.

Radicalization is the process of digging up conflict and making conflict the center of existence.

To get around the great conflicts that are tearing apart our society, we have to get back to the place where we can engage in real meaningful discourse. Unfortunately, most of us have been taught foundational systems of reasoning that magnify division.

I was trying to light on this issue of foundational systems based on paradox in the Critique of the Diagonal Method. Of course, I realized that in writing that work, I have never learned proper discourse myself. Modern mathematics is based on paradoxes and conflict, but I have no way other that petty little jabs to point out the problem. The jabs fall on deaf ears.

In school, and the business world, I been taught that reasoning is futile. What you have to do is form alliances and take cheap shots at your enemies. Cheap shot discourse leads to nothing. It magnifies the conflicts of radicalism and does not lead to the optimum solutions that we would have if we had discourse. The cheap shot style of discourse that we engage in today leads to a situation where the worst people get in power. Even worse, those in power start to disengage from the people.

I agree that Muslim, Christian and other forms of radicals pose a threat. Unfortunately, the cheap shot style discourse of today that we think will wave off the radicalization simply feeds the process.