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Devil's Dictionary of Political Terminology

Confusion about what political and economic labels mean IRL is vexing enough. Trying to compute how these concepts apply to eRep is the Devil's work. So I went and had a long discussion about it with the Devil. Now I feel it's my patrio-pedantic duty to provide the community with a guide to these pressing ontological matters, as explained by Satan himself.

What follows are the Devilish definition of what these words mean.

In a follow-up article, I hope to provide a few meagre opinions as to how Old Nick may have mis-interpreted some of them, as well as a few conjectures as to how they may or may not have any relevance to eRepublik, along with some additional nonsense if I feel up to it and there's nothing worth watching on TV.


ENJOY!



Capitalism

* Proclaimed in 1980 as the new state religion of the United States. This religion is very popular because it requires no moral grounding whatsoever, celebrating selfishness and greed as the supreme virtues. First proclaimed by the Prophetess Ayn Rand, it's since been vulgarized into a pop movement. Side effects include poverty, war, social strife, moronification and occasional vomiting due to lack of access to health care.


Communism

* Proclaimed in about 1926 as the new state religion of the Soviet Union, and in 1949 as the new state religion of the Peoples Republic of China. This religion is very popular because it requires no moral grounding whatsoever, celebrating historical inevitability rather than personal responsibility and social solidarity. First proclaimed by Jesus of Nazareth, it's since been vulgarized even further into a clever way to say "Authoritarian Autarky with a Human Face". Side effects include poverty, war, social strife, pontifical tendencies and occasional severe headaches due to imprisonment in gulags.


Socialism

* The Rorschach Test of secular religions, socialism usually means whatever you think you want it to mean, although in some cases it means whatever some drug-addled moron on the television told you to believe it means. It can reveal your deepest fears, such as fear of the postman, as in "ZOMG! I'll never use the Post Office again! It's a quasi-government organization and that's socialism!" Or it can reveal your deepest fantasies and desires, as in "Some day everybody will be as nice and friendly as me and that's socialism!". Socialism is pretty good as therapy, but should be used with caution as it can lead to obfuscatory discharges.


Anarchism

* Those opposed to Archism (that is, rules or rulers; also known as parents) follow the anti-religion of an-archism. This is a popular religion amongst teenagers who have never even read anything about Hegel, Habermas or Hayek. It's fun because it doesn't require much thinking, but you do get to wear whatever you want, insult everybody, and smash stuff up. Caution: long-term use can lead to job loss and the need for reconstructive tattooing.


Marxism

* Marxism is not a religion; it's a school of sociology. However it can encourage scientism, which is a quasi-religious tendency. This is because it accepts as science certain unscientific principles, such as historical inevitableness. In this regard, it's similar to Hayekism, also known as the monetarism of free-market libertarianism. Both pretend to be science but succumb to a ludic fallacy, which means assigning an un-proven degree of certainty to the value of probablistic variables. It's like pretending you can predict long-term weather patterns (or the rate of return on improperly-valued derivatives) with absolute certainty.


Agnosticism

* Those opposed to Gnosticism (the search for wisdom) believe in a-gnosticism, which is the search for stupidity. Instead of searching through the world's traditions for gems of learning and enlightenment, a task that is time-consuming and somewhat difficult, agnostics prudently seek out all that is ridiculous and moronic and then cheerfully point out thier ludicrous discoveries, or more precisely, their discovery of inanities, to other people. This makes one feel great, but side effects include superiority and a tendency towards uncontrollable trolling.


Atheism

* Those opposed to Theism (belief in The) have faith in a-theism, meaning they believe there is no The. They hold that the "The" is simply a meaningless sound invented to fill in some onomatapoetic gaps in English-speak. Mostly, they're Russians. This should not be confused with Apatheism, which is the belief that G*d does not exist because we don't need him.


Liberalism

* In all of the world except for the United States, liberalism is a word used to describe the belief that a democratic political system that upholds the universal values of personal dignity and social solidarity which emerged from the Englightenment and have become increasingly juridified into international law ever since the Peace of Westphalia, but especially in the wake of the Shoah, is superior to one that doesn't. In the United States, it means socialism, as defined above.


Conservatism

* Again, there is semantic split between Americans and others over the meaning of this term. In the USA, believing in conservativism means one has an uncontrollable penchant for yelling, "Hey! You kids get off my lawn!" Elsewhere, conservates are believers in Liberalism who are more skeptical than others about the internationalist aspects of the Kantian project.


Neo-Liberalism

* See definition below of Imperialism. Neo-Liberalism is a clever way to say "Imposing a Narrow View of Liberalism on Others by Use of Brute Force".


Libertarianism

* A unique American religion, Libertarianism is an off-shoot of the new American Capitalist religion. In the same way that it's difficult to distinguish all the various Jesusite sects in the USA, it's likewise not always easy to tell one variant of Capitalist religion from another. In this case, the key marker is that the ones who prefer marijuana over beer are Libertarians. Another way to think about is that Libertarianism is that it's Anarchism for grown-ups who have still not read either Karl Marx or Adam Smith, but do have a gun permit.


Imperialism

Imperialism has its origin in the psyche. When expressed externally it takes various forms, such as capitalism, communism, nationalism, provincialism, socialism, theocracy, male chauvinism, lingualism and so on. Goaded by this emotional ailment, a stronger power forces its own selfish national or group interests on others in order to establish its suzerainty politically, militarily, culturally, economically, etc. The imperialist impulse wants to dominate and exploit others: a powerful linguistic group suppresses other minority linguistic groups; the so-called upper castes subjugate the so-called lower castes; opportunistic males curtail the rights of women in various ways; and so on and so forth. In all these cases, the same inherent psychological malady of imperialism prevails. Imperialism is anti-human. It runs counter to the spirit of neo-humanism and the ethics of human life (see Liberalism above). In a word, it thwarts human progress and creates global wars and all sorts of divisive and destructive forces in society. As the Prince of Darkness, it is my true religion.

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A brief note: I'm pretty sure that Beelzebubba got a few of these definitions a bit skewed. He's quite a conniver, after all. I'll try to straighten this mess out and explain the relevance of these terms to eRep in a future article. (Hint: it's a game that very loosely models some aspects of reality.)

Thanks for reading. You may now resume your normal activities.