The Mind of the Mob

Police lines surround student tuition fee protesters

Two police officers were injured as police contained demonstrators on Whitehall.

There have been occupations in at least 10 universities, including at Oxford University's Bodleian Library.

School pupils walked out of lessons to join university and college students on local protest marches across the UK.

As darkness has fallen, fires have been started and windows broken in Whitehall by demonstrators who are being contained by police.

Earlier a police van was attacked and barricades thrown as protesters tried to break through police lines.

There have been reports of 15 arrests and 11 members of the public are believed to have been injured.

The Prime Minister's spokesman said: "People have a right to engage in lawful and peaceful protest, but there is no place for violence or intimidation".

There is plenty of psychological research that has demonstrated that people ("normies" at least) lose all sense of self in a sufficiently large crown. Fear, hatred and anger spread like wildfire. This is why mass-panic sets in for no reason and people are trampled to death, why protests inevitably reduce to violence.

You cannot consider a gathering of people as human beings. They must be treated like all animals: if they turn rabid, put them down.

Book: The Myth of Morality

I've added a new book to my "Good Books" section. The Myth of Morality by Richard Joyce.
"In The Myth of Morality, Richard Joyce argues that moral discourse is hopelessly flawed. At the heart of ordinary moral judgements is a notion of moral inescapability, or practical authority, which, upon investigation, cannot be reasonably defended. Joyce argues that natural selection is to blame, in that it has provided us with a tendency to invest the world with values that it does not contain, and demands that it does not make. Should we therefore do away with morality, as we did away with other faulty notions such as witches? Possibly not. We may be able to carry on with morality as a 'useful fiction' - allowing it to have a regulative influence on our lives and decisions, perhaps even playing a central role - while not committing ourselves to believing or asserting falsehoods, and thus not being subject to accusations of 'error'."


Most talk of "morality" goes over my head. In my younger years, during one of those lovely philosophical discussions only teenagers can have, I even presented the argument that human conscience is the inherent avoidance of actions which tells us if we do X to Y, Y or their associates will seek revenge. The rest of human morality can be explained by attempts to feel superior, to garner respect and gain allies.

People tend to disagree with me on that subject. It seems whilst they can agree this is most likely how human morality evolved, people seem horrified that I would think this the general rationale behind "moral actions". They often point to the incredibly rare acts of self-sacrifice, of people throwing themselves on grenades and the like. I've aways considered anybody willing to die for another person to be suffering from some kind of mental disorder. A kind of deficiency of the thought that renders them moronic enough to die for any cause, individual or group.

Music: A Very Nasty World

Ready to attack you, we will smack you, better run.
Don't come walking in the wildwood if you haven't got a gun.
Every creature, for survival, has to look out for itself;
Got no nannies here, old grannies dear, to look out for your health.