We love to fling poo at the Left around here, and it may initially sound like that's what I'm doing now, but I think if you follow my line of reasoning, you'll see that NXIVM perfectly illustrates the Left's renowned inability to grasp the law of unintended consequences.
In a nutshell, the failing of leftist ideology where NXIVM is concerned lies in its insistence on collectivizing what ought to be individual pursuits.
I'm talking about the movement to advance women in traditionally male-dominated sectors wherein much effort is geared towards propping up women as a group by, for example, re-tailoring male-oriented fields through social engineering to make them uniquely amenable to women, as opposed to the traditional meritocratic course of personal advancement.
I'm not saying women shouldn't use networking to get ahead. Even for men, who you know often counts for more than what you know. One would be unwise not to use their connections to their advantage.
What I'm saying, rather, is that the drive to advance women collectively as a protected class often serves as a crutch and a shortcut for many women who haven't earned their promotion on their own merits. The Left teaches women and other minorities to expect, and even demand, such crutches and shortcuts, while misleading them into thinking the results obtained by taking shortcuts are the result of their own efforts. This is akin to the Boomers' assertion that they "pulled themselves up by their bootstraps," when in fact it was the extreme sacrifices of the previous generation that laid out a nearly effortless road to success before them.
Neil Armstrong's rhetorical moon landing speech aside, when a man succeeds, we don't usually leap to the conclusion that his individual achievement is somehow a collective achievement for all men. Yet, that's exactly how the Left views the achievements of an individual woman. They falsely assume that the value one woman brings to an enterprise reflects the value all women would bring.
What does all of that have to do with NXIVM?
The genius of NXIVM is that it exploited the Left's propensity for collectively promoting a protected class of people - a propensity that has predisposed the individual members of said class to shift the responsibility for their success onto a group or society at large.
The irony of NXIVM is that the women who fell victim to the cult had already received their cult indoctrination from the Left before they encountered NXIVM. They were groomed by the Left to believe that adhering to a group identity was crucial for their success.
In a nutshell, the failing of leftist ideology where NXIVM is concerned lies in its insistence on collectivizing what ought to be individual pursuits.
I'm talking about the movement to advance women in traditionally male-dominated sectors wherein much effort is geared towards propping up women as a group by, for example, re-tailoring male-oriented fields through social engineering to make them uniquely amenable to women, as opposed to the traditional meritocratic course of personal advancement.
I'm not saying women shouldn't use networking to get ahead. Even for men, who you know often counts for more than what you know. One would be unwise not to use their connections to their advantage.
What I'm saying, rather, is that the drive to advance women collectively as a protected class often serves as a crutch and a shortcut for many women who haven't earned their promotion on their own merits. The Left teaches women and other minorities to expect, and even demand, such crutches and shortcuts, while misleading them into thinking the results obtained by taking shortcuts are the result of their own efforts. This is akin to the Boomers' assertion that they "pulled themselves up by their bootstraps," when in fact it was the extreme sacrifices of the previous generation that laid out a nearly effortless road to success before them.
Neil Armstrong's rhetorical moon landing speech aside, when a man succeeds, we don't usually leap to the conclusion that his individual achievement is somehow a collective achievement for all men. Yet, that's exactly how the Left views the achievements of an individual woman. They falsely assume that the value one woman brings to an enterprise reflects the value all women would bring.
What does all of that have to do with NXIVM?
The genius of NXIVM is that it exploited the Left's propensity for collectively promoting a protected class of people - a propensity that has predisposed the individual members of said class to shift the responsibility for their success onto a group or society at large.
The irony of NXIVM is that the women who fell victim to the cult had already received their cult indoctrination from the Left before they encountered NXIVM. They were groomed by the Left to believe that adhering to a group identity was crucial for their success.
