I'm considering making a follow-pack of fags - people that irritate me.

Experientia docet If you believe you must first learn how others do a thing before attempting it yourself, you will eventually discover that those others learned by doing first. Their methods worked because they were fitted to their temperament, circumstances, incentives, and support structures. Once abstracted from those conditions, the method no longer transfers. What you call “learning” was delay. You would have learned more, faster, by beginning directly and allowing reality to correct you. Experience has no substitute because it cannot be borrowed.

# Roads Without Roots: Mobility, Christianity, and the Fragility of Moral Order Here is a claim that sounds strange until it becomes obvious, and frightening once it does: **Moral order depends on friction.** When exit becomes cheap, responsibility erodes. When responsibility erodes, respect collapses. This is not a story about decadence, ideology, or bad intentions. It is a story about infrastructure. --- ## Roads Are Not Neutral Large-scale road systems do more than move goods and armies. They **reconfigure human accountability**. Roads: - collapse distance - lower exit costs - dissolve reputational enforcement - weaken local obligation - enable anonymity at scale This is not moral speculation. It is structural reality. Where people can leave easily, promises weaken. Where obligations can be escaped cheaply, permanence feels irrational. Civilizations have encountered this problem before. --- ## Rome Knew the Danger The Romans built the greatest road system the world had ever seen — and they noticed the consequences. As roads expanded: - people detached from land and kin - cities filled with rootless populations - crime became mobile - trust declined - household authority weakened - marriage and birthrates among citizens collapsed Rome responded not by restoring friction, but by **centralizing control**: - marriage laws - penalties for childlessness - legal intrusion into family life - moral regulation by decree They understood the problem. They chose management over covenant. It didn’t work. --- ## Christianity Was Not an Accident of the Roads — It Was a Solution to Them Christianity emerged inside a high-mobility empire and did something unprecedented: It **reconstructed moral constraint inside the will**, rather than relying on place, blood, or civic status. Christianity offered: - covenant without geography - obligation without enforcement - brotherhood without kinship - permanence without enclosure This made it uniquely portable. A Christian remained bound: - on the road - in exile - in prison - in diaspora - in slavery Christianity was not merely compatible with Roman roads — it was the only moral ontology that could survive them. --- ## Feudalism: Reintroducing Friction After Rome’s collapse, medieval society did something unfashionable but effective: It **raised exit costs**. Feudalism, guilds, parishes, and manorial systems: - bound people to place - thickened reputation - enforced obligation socially rather than bureaucratically - stabilized family, work, and worship This was not enlightened, but it was functional. Christian morality endured because society **reintroduced friction** to support it. --- ## America Repeats the Pattern — Faster Railroads reopened the problem. Automobiles accelerated it. Highways completed it. By the mid-20th century: - exit became cheap - abandonment became anonymous - reputation became optional - permanence became fragile The Interstate Highway System did not cause moral collapse — it **made collapse scalable**. By the late 1960s: - obligation felt punitive - permanence felt naive - fault felt cruel - exit felt therapeutic Law followed reality. --- ## No-Fault Divorce: Covenant Admitted Dead No-fault divorce did not liberate marriage. It **ratified the death of enforceable permanence**. Once exit was cheap: - fault could no longer be coherently enforced - responsibility could no longer be symmetrically imposed - respect collapsed by structural necessity Marriage became an administrated preference, not a covenant. --- ## Fiat Money: The Same Move, One Level Up In 1971, the U.S. closed the gold window. Obligation was severed from settlement. Constraint was replaced with credibility theater. Default was reframed as policy. This was not coincidence. A society that cannot sustain lifelong vows cannot sustain redeemable money. Both depend on the same thing: **the ability to bind the future**. --- ## The Invariant Here is the law underneath it all: > **Respect exists only where one will must still account for another will as an irreducible source of constraint.** Cheap exit destroys that condition. Roads dissolve local enforcement. Law replaces covenant. Management replaces respect. --- ## Why This Matters Now Modern society has: - maximal mobility - minimal friction - declining trust - collapsing commitment - expanding enforcement - moral language without moral leverage We are not witnessing moral failure. We are witnessing **structural unbinding**. --- ## Final Compression Roads did not make people worse. They made responsibility optional. Christianity once solved this by moving covenant into the will. Modern systems rejected that solution and chose administration instead. When exit is free, respect cannot survive. And when respect collapses, no amount of policy can restore it. This is not a culture war. It is a civilizational constraint problem. And almost no one is prepared to name it.

## No-Fault divorce and WTF happened in 1971? When the law removes one spouse’s ability to refuse, exit, or impose cost, respect collapses by structural necessity, not by moral failure. --- ### How This Happened So Fast (1960s → 1970s) No-fault divorce did not emerge because society calmly reasoned its way to justice. It emerged because **multiple social shocks converged**, creating an opening that legal and bureaucratic elites exploited. #### 1. The Sexual Revolution (Technological Shock) - Oral contraception decoupled sex from reproduction. - Marriage lost its function as the primary regulator of sexual behavior. - Long-term obligation no longer matched short-term incentives. This created instability *before* the law changed. #### 2. Therapeutic Psychology Replaced Moral Language - Duty was reframed as repression. - Suffering was reclassified as pathology. - Commitment became conditional on “personal fulfillment.” Once permanence is pathologized, fault becomes cruelty. #### 3. Second-Wave Feminism (Legitimate Grievance, Asymmetric Fix) - Real injustices existed: dependency traps, abuse ignored by courts. - But the solution chosen was not symmetry. - It was **risk transfer**. Marriage was transformed from a bilateral covenant into a **unilateral option with enforced financial extraction**. #### 4. Bureaucratic and Judicial Incentives Fault-based divorce was: - evidentiary - adversarial - morally complex No-fault divorce was: - administratively simple - caseload-efficient - discretion-expanding Courts preferred manageability over justice. --- ### Why Elites Benefited This was not accidental. **Beneficiaries included:** - Legal systems (expanded authority, reduced burden) - The therapeutic class (ongoing intervention, expert dependency) - The state (greater leverage over family formation) - Financial institutions (two-income necessity, debt expansion) The family unit was weakened. The individual became administratively legible. Dependency shifted upward. --- ### How Coordination Happened (Globally, Rapidly) This was not voted in by deep public consensus. It followed a familiar pattern: 1. Cultural narratives shifted first (films, novels, TV) 2. Permanence was portrayed as naïve or oppressive 3. Reform was framed as “modernization” 4. Early adopters were praised; dissenters shamed 5. International policy imitation followed This is **elite Schelling-point coordination**, not organic moral discovery. Within a decade, deviation looked regressive. Alignment became mandatory. --- ### Why This Outcome Is Structural and Inevitable Here is the theorem: > **Respect exists only where one will must still account for another will as an irreducible source of constraint.** No-fault divorce, as implemented: - Removes male exit leverage - Presumes financial guilt without fault - Makes refusal symbolic - Makes compliance enforceable Once a will is trapped, it is no longer modeled as an agent. It is modeled as a resource. At that point: - Respect cannot be demanded - Deference cannot be expected - Reciprocity becomes incoherent This is not about intentions. It is about **incentive geometry**. --- ### Final Compression The 1960s did not liberate marriage. They **restructured it so that one will became optional and the other became captive**. Once law enforces asymmetry, disrespect is not a vice. It is the equilibrium. You cannot moralize your way out of a structural violation of agency. You can only restore constraint—or accept the consequences. View quoted note →

You cannot legislate respect. You can only make disregard costly. Where constraint returns, respect follows View quoted note →

# Why Governments Don’t Respect Their Citizens — and Why Bitcoin Changes the Equation Many liberty-minded people sense this intuitively: as government power expands, respect for the populace evaporates. This is not a moral failure. It is a structural law. ## Respect Is Not a Virtue — It’s a Signal Respect is not kindness, civility, or rhetoric. Respect is the recognition that another party remains a **source of constraint** on your will. You respect what you cannot fully: - dominate - replace - extract from - ignore Respect tracks **irreducible agency**, not good intentions. ## Power Concentration Destroys Respect When a government gains power while the people lose options: - Exit becomes costly or illegal - Refusal becomes symbolic - Noncompliance becomes punishable - Dependence becomes engineered The populace ceases to be a counterparty and becomes an **input**. At that point, respect is no longer rational. Not because rulers become wicked, but because **they no longer have to ask**. ## Why Democratic Rituals Feel Hollow When real constraint disappears, governments simulate respect: - Elections without exit - “Public comment” without veto - Managed dissent - Narrative flattery (“the will of the people”) These are not expressions of deference. They are signs that deference is no longer structurally required. Consent becomes theater once refusal has no teeth. ## Taxation as a Diagnostic Voluntary payment implies respect. Forced extraction implies ownership. When taxation is unavoidable, unescapable, and non-negotiable, the relationship has already shifted: From partner → resource From citizen → yield The moral language may intensify, but respect is already gone. ## Governments Respect What Can Leave States do not fear: - atomized individuals - captive labor - compliant populations They fear: - capital flight - skilled exit - parallel systems - jurisdictional arbitrage Respect follows leverage, not legitimacy claims. ## Bitcoin Reintroduces Constraint Bitcoin is not moral reform. It is **structural resistance**. It restores: - exit without permission - refusal without violence - value storage without capture - coordination without central approval This is why it provokes hostility rather than debate. Bitcoin doesn’t ask the state to be virtuous. It makes the populace optional again. ## Why Deference Will Never Be Granted Voluntarily No centralized power gives up leverage out of enlightenment. It gives it up only when constraint reappears. Bitcoin does not overthrow governments. It **forces negotiation** back into a relationship that had become unilateral. ## Final Compression Governments don’t disrespect citizens because they hate them. They disrespect them because they don’t need them. Respect only exists where power must still ask. Bitcoin doesn’t demand respect. It makes disrespect expensive.

In a functional society, respect was demanded because if you didn't show it, your reputation would suffer. In today's society, respect is rare and only afforded to those who might provide something of value you. Respect is not only earned, it is also sold.

You can't see dysfunction until you step outside of it.

I'm coming out of the dark ages and changing the LED bulbs over my kitchen table to incandescent.

We almost hit 100k again today. Did anyone notice?

Sometimes the firehose is off

I support March 4 Life, but I do not support children marching for life outdoors in the midst of societal collapse, where leftist domestic terrorists could take our children from us. I go so far as to say it is irresponsible for Catholic high schools to pressure parents to allow their children to march in front of state capitols, out in the open, and pretend as if our country is stable and civil enough to make such an activity even remotely safe. If your aim is to send your children to be martyrs for Christ, that's your business, but schools should ensure a high level of security in such an event. To provide none is not a reasonable assessment of risk.

I tried this for first time today. It worked! Will be scheduling another post for tomorrow. Very powerful! View quoted note →

What basic and ubiquitous things do we have today that will be considered toxic waste requiring costly abatement in 50 years?

Some things I think Jimmy Dore is lit. Other times I think he's delusional. He does not have a reliable take. I think he surrounds himself with blue collar liberals.

This is my attempt at honoring the late Scott Adams’ contribution to the world. Over time, Adams articulated what he called a *user interface for reality*—a practical framework for navigating the world as it actually operates, not as we wish it did. These ideas are not about moral virtue-signaling or abstract truth-seeking; they are about agency, persuasion, survival, and authorship in a reality mediated by human perception. I will be posting one of his core bits of advice each day—what he referred to as the *knobs*: adjustable parameters that determine how effectively you author your own life, influence outcomes, and interact with other people inside complex social systems. --- ## Knob #1: Accept the Frame (Subjective Reality) **One-sentence formulation:** *Reality is experienced through narrative frames, not raw facts; if you argue facts without first identifying the frame, you are operating inside someone else’s interface.* ### What “the frame” is A *frame* is the invisible boundary that defines how information is interpreted before reasoning begins. It determines what counts as relevant, what is assumed, what is emotional, what is moral, and what is even allowed to be questioned. Frames are not facts. They are **contextual lenses**. Most people mistake the frame for reality itself. That mistake is the primary source of confusion, manipulation, and wasted effort in politics, business, relationships, and public discourse. ### Subjective reality, not relativism Adams is not claiming that objective truth does not exist. He is pointing out that humans do not interact with objective truth directly. They interact with **compressed, biased, story-driven models** of reality that feel true because they are coherent, emotionally resonant, and socially reinforced. In practice: - Truth does not persuade. - Frames persuade. - Facts are interpreted *after* the frame is accepted. This is why intelligent people can look at the same data and reach opposite conclusions—because the disagreement is upstream of the data. ### Why arguing facts usually fails When you argue facts inside a hostile frame, you legitimize the frame itself. You accept its premises, its moral structure, and its implied authority. Examples: - Answering a loaded question accepts the accusation. - Defending yourself inside a false narrative validates the narrative. - Providing data to someone who has framed the issue emotionally is ignored or reinterpreted. Once you are inside the wrong frame, no amount of factual accuracy will save you. ### What “accept the frame” actually means It does **not** mean agreeing with the frame. It means recognizing that: 1. A frame is present. 2. It is shaping perception. 3. It is optional. Once you see the frame as a construct rather than reality, you regain freedom of movement. You can: - Reframe the issue - Step outside the frame entirely - Or use the frame tactically without believing it The key shift is epistemic: *the frame is not the truth; it is the interface.* ### Why this is the first knob Every other knob—persuasion, confidence, identity, leverage, emotion, narrative—depends on framing. If you misidentify perception as reality, you will constantly fight uphill battles against invisible constraints you never agreed to. Adams’ insight is brutal but accurate: **You don’t lose most arguments because you’re wrong. You lose because you never noticed the rules of the game.** Seeing the frame is the beginning of authorship. Tomorrow’s knob builds on this: once you see the interface, the question becomes how to move within it without being owned by it.

Give me low interest rates or give Jerome Powell life! - Donrick Trumery

When the government and banks are building, America is not.

Virtue signal ahead View quoted note →