Rebuttal of the Ignorant Review by David P. Goldman

[@selimgure]

There should be an "oikophobia index" to help assess the rate of cultural decline in a given developed country.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Ha, not a bad idea!

[@Nowhy]

Well, Canada, UK, Australia, NZ are on top - then Germany and France and certain states in the USA (its constitution is quite under attack and with it, dignity in general)..

[@davidchou1675]

I mean the only thing worse than finding out that you're the product of rape is finding out that you're the product of incest so no wonder LOL

[@neverletmego1948]

Dear Dr Beckeld, as a result of your rebuttal of Goldman's review, I have just ordered a copy of your book. Thank you for your intelligent and in-depth discussions.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Thank you, I appreciate that! It's good to know the rebuttal is making at least some difference. I hope you'll enjoy the reading.

[@ZolliT]

Oh the irony of Goldman choosing to employ an adjective such as supercilious in the very first sentence of his review.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

You're quite right; I thought the same thing.

[@b_uppy]

Maybe sue him and the publication, especially as the publication is considered 'serious.'

[@BenedictBeckeld]

I'll have to respect the First Amendment, but otherwise it would certainly have been a tempting proposition.

[@b_uppy]

@@BenedictBeckeld Think this was a vicious thing, and not all aspects of speech are protected.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

You're quite right, but I don't think the legal criteria for actual libel are met here, because the falsehoods probably wouldn't be considered specific or concrete enough.

[@davidchou1675]

I'm with ya there, chief -- I was expecting actual Gore Vidal-like ad hominem since Goldman enjoys attempting dry if brutal wit but while I understand your intellectual outrage (that famous "xkcd" web-comic about someone being wrong on the internet comes to mind), I was surprised how "technical" the ad hominem is, it turns out, smacking of calling someone a modernist when he feels himself a postmodernist (socialist/communist, patriot/nationalist, Jew/Jew [LOL], whatever)...so yeah, not gonna be countenanced by any jurisdiction (would make a for a great episode of "The People's Court" -- especially if hemlock were the stakes hahahahahhahaha!!!).

[@princemishkin1601]

Nobody has ever made a statue of a critic. Good rebuttal.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Ha ha, that's a good line! And thank you.

[@tomgmaples]

I don't understand the importance of loving Israel and Jewish ethnicity? How does virtue signaling in such a way coordinate with the theme of your writing?

[@BenedictBeckeld]

If you read the review you'll see that he writes certain parts as if I didn't know and/or didn't care about Judaism etc., so since I'm taking pains to rebut every substantive point, I had to point out that in fact the opposite is true (but that it has nothing to do with my book).

[@tomgmaples]

@@BenedictBeckeld I have no regard at all for any abrahamic superstition . I absolutely agree with your observations of how the West is losing its prestige and why. I'm a southerner and have many family veterans and friends. They see the mockery is made of military going woke and lowering your standards to accommodate delusional people is gender dysphoria. The military cannot meet its recruiting and it's only going to get worse. This is another example I don't believe I heard you speak about.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

In this video I'm only talking about the points that Goldman writes about, but I certainly agree with you about what's happening with the military, as with many other areas of our society. And thank you to your family for their service!

[@johnnypik]

This seams to be an unfortunate trend on social media. People will state something as fact when they have no clue or very little clue about the subject they are reading. I hope Goldman listens to this video an updates his review. If not you might want to have your lawyer send him a letter to correct the inaccuracies.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Ah, if only I had a lawyer. But you're certainly right about the modern trend. Ironically, this phenomenon of the illusion of expertise is something I actually discuss in the book itself. But I guess he missed that part, like so much else.

[@Nowhy]

Irony and ethics is lost on most, 21th century ethics especially and the most with almost all of academia, which so easily is stuck in books and dogmas of the past (natural "sciences" are full of them - scientism.)

[@Nowhy]

And if he listens, will he be able to do so without bias?

[@davidchou1675]

Modern trend??? Didn't Socrates get poisoned for explaining the idiocy of democracy to the youth of Athens or something LOL

[@davidchou1675]

He lives in Great Neck -- "you understand this?"

[@claymanwayfaerer]

I came by this video since the algo picked up that I watch a video on Goldman discussing his book on how China is going to Sino-Form the rest of the world. I become deeply skeptical of an “Economist” describing the all the ways in which Chinese will outperform and dominant the world and this rebuttal furthers my skepticism of Mr. Goldman. Thanks for the video and I will order your book just because it’s probably a good counter-signal to read anything he critiques.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Thank you, I appreciate that. Indeed Goldman is out of his depth, at least in philosophy, and it takes a special kind of arrogance to write with such confidence about things one doesn't understand at all and has never studied. (In fact, in the book itself I also talk a bit about the problem of public intellectuals not staying in their lanes, but he evidently missed that as well.)

[@wanghui562]

What Goldman really wants is for you to crusade against either the narrative or phenomenon of the decline of the west and go into rambo mode for american exceptionalism. Goldman believes snapping out of self-contempt is more useful than musing about self-contempt. I guess he has a point there (but he was unnecessarily rude about it), but I will still buy and read your book because I like unifying theories about history and surveys of philosophy. I am especially glad your book will be sold in China because civilizational self-contempt is a big problem in China. Without having read many books on the subject, I conjecture that civilizational self-contempt is usually a result of some power struggle within the civilization, i.e. some out-of-power group wants to take out the in-power group by attacking politically not only them but also everything that keeps them in power, going as far as attacking the pillar values of the civilization. This also fits in nicely with the elite overproduction theory by Peter Turchin, i.e. a civilization that produces too many out-of-power elites is one that is ripe for revolution, and revolutionaries out of political necessity say nasty things about the establishment. This process from afar looks like civilizational self-contempt, but is really civilizational infighting.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

I think that's probably part of it, yes, though he should know that he is thereby partaking in that anti-intellectualism that is socially quite corrosive. People want foot soldiers, not thinkers. But such "rambo"-books generally won't be remembered beyond their time (there are masses of them being published, each as mediocre as the next), while a book like mine is more universal in that it is a definitive statement about its era. But his anger, whatever its cause, does lead him into trying to challenge me in the intellectual area, and that's where he commits numerous errors and utters outright falsehoods. But it's interesting to hear you say that there's a lot of self-contempt in China. I thought there was more jingoism than self-contempt there (among regular Chinese people, that is; Chinese intellectuals may be another story).

[@wanghui562]

​@@BenedictBeckeld Outward anger/jingoism is almost always a manifestation of inward fear/insecurity. Goldman is outwardly angry at you because he is afraid the tendencies you discuss in your book have set in too deep for western free will to overcome. You accidentally triggered some sense of dread and foreboding in him about the outcome of one of his life missions at this point. China is insecure about our lack of values (we chucked out all our values during the cultural revolution, the pinnacle example of political infighting cascading into civilizational self-hate), and now our elites resort to jingoism to correct this self-hate that has become a geopolitical danger to their rule. America has a lot to be insecure about and is therefore more aggressive than ever to prove uncle sam's still got it. Humans in general are shrill when on the verge of losing something as important as reason for being.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

You seem to know Goldman very well, but perhaps you're right. And thanks for your remark about China. Indeed the Cultural Revolution was anti-Chinese in many ways, as you say, but it was done for the purpose of (as they perceived it) strengthening China, and in that sense was similar to the Meiji restoration in Japan, in that the latter went against many traditional Japanese values, but for the purpose of (again, as they perceived it) strengthening Japan. These two events are different from our Western oikophobia in the sense that Western oikophobes aren't interested in strengthening the West in any way, be it culturally or politically, and in many cases wouldn't mind seeing us weakened on the world stage.

[@wanghui562]

@@BenedictBeckeld Looking forward to reading your book.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Thanks, I hope you'll enjoy it! (And feel free afterwards to share your thoughts if you like, either here or on Amazon.)

[@yisyvonne]

Randomly found this and it couldn’t have come at a better time! I’m currently attending Uni, my majors are History and Philosophy. Will be getting your book!

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Great, good luck with your studies! And I hope you'll enjoy the book.

[@obrotherwhereartliam]

now that's one hell of a library. Also, why didn't you write an article or reply on paper or in a medium article? I always find written reviews have a stronger thrust than a video, but that's just my opinion.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Thank you! Only a small fraction of it is visible. And yes, I agree that the written word is preferable. But most media would be unwilling to publish a rebuttal involving another outlet. As for Law & Liberty itself, they ignored me when I reached out, and a colleague of mine, who of course also understood that the review was utter nonsense, was also ignored when he reached out to them about it. I never expected them to be willing to publish my rebuttal anyway, since Goldman is one of the top people there.

[@obrotherwhereartliam]

@@BenedictBeckeld that’s unfortunate. I’ve never understood people who critique so viciously and then close themselves off to a challenge of their views.

[@Theembodimentchannel]

“Never read the comments” can apply to more than youtube :-) But I feel ya mate, not easy to be unfairly attacked. Been there

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Thanks! Yes, I'm still getting used to it.

[@davidchou1675]

Unfortunately it's not that easy -- as China's been riding out (ignote Westoid libel and slander and it takes root; engage their lies with truth and they cry you're being aggressive [pigs enjoy mud-wrestling, after all])...it's forever been the lot of the honest -- why, just look at God's sadism vis-à-vis Job!

[@plekkchand]

I've not read Goldman's review, but from the excerpts alone it appears that Goldman displays considerable intellectual irresponsibility and even vulgarity.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Yes, that just about sums it up.

[@davidchou1675]

LOL You should hear him talk about China and Chinese culture in front of a politically conservative crowd.

[@qingzhou9983]

I do respect your rebuttals and accept your key points that David did not understand your book. But this also persuade me, as layman, could not understand your book because I do not have the philological training that required to understand it. I did read David's Review and listen your responses. I do think David is much smarter than me. Since David did not know you and he is not in your field, he must write that review because your book impacted profoundly on something he cares about a lot. What is that? After reading his review, my guess is that as a concretive David may be very unhappy about the fatalistic view of Western Decline presumed in your book, "Oikophobia in the Decline of Civilizations". Hence the heavy critics on "cycle theory of history", Fate, Non-Free will etc. Like you pointed out in your rebuttal, David did a political takes on your philosophic book. But that is the same attitude all Non-Philosophical readers have. Do you think West is in decline? If you don't, please present your rebuttal on That. This is the KEY for David and his movement. The attacks on David's lack of Philosophical trainings, is not helpful even though it is truthful. I, as an outsider of Western Tradition, really appreciate and respect the Self-Critics by the Western elites on themselves, especially during the Peaks of Western Powers.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

Thank you for your comment, and for the other ones you also made, which I answered separately. No high degree of philological or philosophical training is required for being able to follow my line of argument, because I avoid opaque academic jargon, and I explain the meaning of technical terms whenever it's necessary for me to use them. But in case you think you'd have difficulty understanding the book, perhaps you can read the Chinese version (Simplified Chinese), which is supposed to be published in a month or two. (I'm going to make a short video announcing it when that's the case.) There is no fatalistic view in the book, which is part of what Goldman did not understand, as I explain in the video. He didn't read the Epilogue (or anything) attentively, which is where I explain this point. But yes, of course the West is in decline; there's no real argument about that from anyone in this discussion, and I say explicitly in the book that we are declining. But that is not the same as fatalism.

[@qingzhou9983]

@@BenedictBeckeld Actually I do not believe US is in decline. It is only in decline related to China's rise. PRC will pass US in GDP total. But US will be still much higher in GDP per capital forever. If India does everything right. It will also possible to pass US in GDP total. But that does not mean US is not number one power in the World. It would just not be the Sole Superpower. At the beginning of the Chinese Century of Humiliation, 1840s Opium War, China's total GDP was several times bigger than UK.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

@@qingzhou9983 But that in itself is a form of decline, because it is measured relative to other nations. The world is moving in a multipolar direction, which entails relative American decline. And it's mostly a cultural issue in any case, as I discuss in the book, not only a geopolitical issue.

[@qingzhou9983]

@@BenedictBeckeld I know for Human Psychic relative position to its peer is very important. But the absolute living standard is more important. (US currently has a inequality problem, but not an decline problem) To prevent China's rise, or India's rise, is impossible and will only lead to over-reach of an empire and serious failures, like Vietnam. The correct way to response to this challenge is the Self-Improvement and proper perspectives. To America, there is No China Threat, but an America Threat.

[@BenedictBeckeld]

What's important depends entirely on what area of knowledge and human endeavor we're dealing with. When you read the book I'm sure you'll see what I mean.

[@conshe]

yes, yes - but more importantly - who is the portrait above the mirror...? enquiring minds want to know...

[@BenedictBeckeld]

It's of my brother, who tragically died of cancer in 2018. My "Western Self-Contempt" is dedicated to him.

[@conshe]

@@BenedictBeckeld sorry if that sounded flippant. So sorry about your brother. What a lovely tribute to him, though 🙏

[@BenedictBeckeld]

No, don't worry, I don't mind answering such questions at all. And thank you!

[@conshe]

@@BenedictBeckeld 💜