Bernie Sanders

[kieranperez]

This is funny for me because this shows how radically different I am in a lot of ways in my own worldviews, what I held as true, etc. back then I was basically a mindset in between Jordan Peterson & Sam Harris with a very Orange libertarian view on economics, politics, etc. because that’s what I grew up under. 

Safe to say, I got the partial truths in those views but have tossed the rest and no longer subscribe to any of that. Anyways... I digress. 

As a lot of us Americans are (hopefully) aware, Bernie Sanders is back running for president. For those that are even the slightest bit familiar with Spiral Dynamics, Bernie Sanders is of course Stage Green. Spiral Dynamics really has helped me fine tune my understanding of (democratic) socialism along with a bunch of others things. Believe it or not I was a total anti Bernie supporter in 2016 (I was a very militant Orange). However, I’m definitely in support for him this upcoming election. Definitely voting for him.

With all of that said, I wanted to raise some concerns, interesting points, and also a question regarding some side effects of his policies:

• I’m skeptical as to how much of his agenda he realistically can make a reality (I don’t see how in 4 years he can make Harvard or even state schools like UC Berkeley free of tuition). 
• One of the things I notice from a Spiral perspective is that Bernie actually talks Green values. Evolution takes place, as Ken Wilber puts it so clearly, as a process of transcend and include. One of the things I see that’s been missing in US politics is that it Orange and Green candidates tend to avoid talking interior (moral) values and instead talks economic policy and such issues. Thus leaving value talk to conservative ethnocentric Stage Blue. I notice that most Orange and especially Green candidates end up struggling because of this very point, they exclude rather than include Blue through “values talk”. Both Green and Blue are “others oriented” and I think Bernie fits the bill well because he’s the kinda candidate who was able to get a lot of people with his talk on values. Which is at least partially why, at least I think, when Bernie lost in 2016 a lot of Bernie supporters either gave up and didn’t vote or instead ended up voting for Trump. I think candidates who talk values & policy together have a way of getting people more involved emotionally and actually help evolve. 
• What do you think a Bernie election will mean for smaller businesses?

 

[Zizzero]

Stage green believes it's the highest stage on the spiral and it believes that everyone should be stage green as well. I, for one, hope that Sanders will not become president; I don't share his values and beliefs.

[kieranperez]

51 minutes ago, Zizzero said:

Stage green believes it's the highest stage on the spiral and it believes that everyone should be stage green as well. I, for one, hope that Sanders will not become president; I don't share his values and beliefs.

Such an irrelevant point. Blue thinks everybody should be Blue and serve it’s ethnocentric moralism and serve it’s clan. Stage Orange thinks everybody should individual success chasers and min max life and be scientific and strategic and damn the costs so long as it’s in the name of personal growth because they think that’s what life is a about. Stage Green is beyond the majority of the US. No one is saying Green is perfect. Green has its flaws. So does Yellow and even Turuqoise. For example, Western Buddhism and Zen is largely diluted in its actual nondual teaching because it takes relativism as absolute truth and for me that can be a bit frustrating since I live in San Francisco where there’s a lot of Green. However, if the majority of say middle America was as environmentally conscious as coastal cities like SF, NYC, etc. and also more accepting of different opinions, sexual orientations, just to name a few things, we’d be a lot closer to moving into Tier 2 (although I don’t see that happening in my lifetime and I’m 23). All 1st tier tends to think they have the whole truth. That’s missing the point. Your little beliefs and values are irrelevant. Start understanding your place doesn’t matter. Start understanding the evolution that needs to be taking place and go beyond this Blue/Orange paradigm. It’s killing the environment, other species, exploiting other countries, and even people if you look at how Orange manipulates the pharmaceutical industry and the entire way we look at and treat mental and even physical health. Start thinking more integrally and beyond your personal beliefs and preferences. 

Edited February 20, 2019 by kieranperez

[Zizzero]

17 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

Start understanding the evolution that needs to be taking place and go beyond this Blue/Orange paradigm.

Why do you assume I'm blue or orange? What if I told you I was yellow, turquoise or coral? See, green is so convinced that it is the spiral's highest stage that it perceives every dislike of green as below it.

20 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

if the majority of say middle America was as environmentally conscious as coastal cities like SF, NYC, etc. and also more accepting of different opinions, sexual orientations, just to name a few things, we’d be a lot closer to moving into Tier 2 [...] It’s killing the environment, other species, exploiting other countries, and even people if you look at how Orange manipulates the pharmaceutical industry and the entire way we look at and treat mental and even physical health. 

Green is convinced that the issues he sees are the ones that matter. What you named here is just values - your values. There's nothing noble about them; they are in no shape or form superior to values like preserving traditional marriage, having a strong economy or having a strong military

Greens cannot believe for one second that his values could be wrong. Green likes to claim that he supports ideas like

31 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

accepting of different opinions, 

and then green goes on to say how one opinion is superior to another. That was my entire point.

[Shadowraix]

Out of all of the options of people running for president I'd pick Bernie. But socialism and communism are big fear tactic buzzwords for a lot of people and they think Bernie is for pure socialism comparing it to say Venezuela. 

Bernie is actually after using socialism as a capitalist regulator. Setting min and max thresholds. It's not the best solution but it's probably better in terms of ensuring everybody can survive and earn their way to thriving. 

But a lot of west society doesn't like contributing for the well being of others on the premise of ownership and individual decision making instead of group cooperation. They don't want to be forced to do it. But the plan would fail if people could opt out. 

So for success it's either force or collective consensus. 

[Forestluv]

@Zizzero Why not vote for the highest conscious candidate?

[Quicksilver]

Im surprised at the naive notion peddled here that somehow one can use spiral dynamics to choose a candidate. 

In reality all politics is nothing but lust for power and the politicians involved will embrace some sound bites of a certain level of the spiral because thats what resonates with a good number of their target base. 

In general politics is nothing but hypocritical power hungry crooks fighting for survival. 

So if you want my advice, vote for the guy who promises to change the least amount of things, the less revolutionary the better and then strive to fix things at the local level. Macro level policy will fix itself of the micro does first. 

Read about fractal localism. 

[Outer]

What is to be discussed in this thread?

[Zizzero]

2 hours ago, Serotoninluv said:

@Zizzero Why not vote for the highest conscious candidate?

I don't see higher consciousness as intrinsically valuable. I agree that it would be more desirable to live in a society full of people high on the spiral than full of people low on the spiral. But, just because someone's higher doesn't mean this person is better suited to lead a country or solve societal issues. But generally yes, a green person has a way broader perspective than a blue/orange one which is a factor in favor of the green candidate.

However, I don't know whether a green president really raises the overall level of consciousness more than a low level consciousness president. The way I see it with stage green in particular is this: I love to surround myself with green people and I'd love to live in a society where people treat one another based on green ideals. But, if you want people act green-ish you have two choices which @Shadowraix described: Either everyone buys in; green people will follow green ideals voluntarily or you have to force them through laws. I generally don't like laws that tell people what's right and what's wrong because you are not going to make a blue person any more green if you make him pay higher taxes to save the environment; he does not yet care too much about these issues and will just demonize green further. 

Basically, I strongly disagree with many stage green people on most political issues even though I generally love many core values of this stage. The reason is what I wrote in my earlier posts: because green thinks it's the highest stage, green feels like they have the responsibility to teach blue and orange people and to make laws which ensure green behavior. That just creates further polarization and it neglects the worries of blue and orange people. And the concerns that blue and orange people have are just as real to them as climate change is to green. I think who the best candidate is depends a lot on who the people are that he's supposed to govern. 

[TheAvatarState]

6 hours ago, Zizzero said:

What if I told you I was yellow, turquoise or coral?

If you were, you'd realize that what we need is a green president, so it's not much of an assumption. Green thinking it's the highest stage is completely unavoidable, it's baked in. You have to zoom way out, take a holistic perspective, and realize that's par for the course. We as a society have to move into green. What are you going to do, vote for a yellow president? Good luck. 

[Forestluv]

2 hours ago, Zizzero said:

The reason is what I wrote in my earlier posts: because green thinks it's the highest stage, green feels like they have the responsibility to teach blue and orange people and to make laws which ensure green behavior. That just creates further polarization and it neglects the worries of blue and orange people. And the concerns that blue and orange people have are just as real to them as climate change is to green. 

That is true for each Tier 1 stage. I agree with you that a Tier 2 president is likely too advanced for the average social consciousness. In the U.S. the average collective consciousness is stage Orange. So, stage Yellow would be two full stages higher and the jump from Tier1 to Tier2 is enormous. That leaves us with the option of a Tier 1 president. It seems to me a healthy Green level president is more capable of leading the collective consciousness up the Spiral. If the average consciousness in the U.S. is Orange, how can a Blue or Orange level president help the country evolve up? That person hasn't even evolved passed Orange, they have no clue about Green and would likely demonize Green. If you were upper Orange and wanted to evolve upward, would  you choose an Orange level teacher? Of course not. How on earth can an Orange teacher help you evolve to Green? They haven't developed to Green and likely have resistance and internal repression of Green. 

Ego backlash is a component of Spiral evolution - at both the individual and collective levels. As an individual, as a person evolves into Green there will be an ego backlash and they may resist and return to unhealthy Orange behaviors. Similarly at the collective level, as the collective moves up the Spiral, there will be backlash from the collective ego. This is a totally normal component of spiral evolution. 

8 hours ago, Zizzero said:

Why do you assume I'm blue or orange? What if I told you I was yellow, turquoise or coral? See, green is so convinced that it is the spiral's highest stage that it perceives every dislike of green as below it.

The perspective you offer does not appear to be Yellow. In general, a primary motivation of Yellow is to help evolve the collective consciousness up the spiral. That does not seem to be a primary motivation for you. Much of what you write seems consistent with maintaining the status quo below Green.

[Forestluv]

2 hours ago, Quicksilver said:

In reality all politics is nothing but lust for power and the politicians involved will embrace some sound bites of a certain level of the spiral because thats what resonates with a good number of their target base. 

In general politics is nothing but hypocritical power hungry crooks fighting for survival. 

That is an assumption from an Orange perspective. Once you become Green-centered you will understand and embody a more evolved perspective.

[Outer]

Where is Authoritarianism-Libertarianism spectrum with Spiral dynamics? @Zizzero You appear to know much about Spiral Dynamics so I figure I'd ask.

Edited February 20, 2019 by Outer

[Zizzero]

46 minutes ago, Serotoninluv said:

That is true for each Tier 1 stage. I agree with you that a Tier 2 president is likely too advanced for the average social consciousness. In the U.S. the average collective consciousness is stage Orange. So, stage Yellow would be two full stages higher and the jump from Tier1 to Tier2 is enormous. That leaves us with the option of a Tier 1 president. 

Yes, but green is a more interesting case because green kind of is aware that there is something like a spiral. Green realizes how advanced he is. This leaves green in a tricky situation; he doesn't perceive orange or blue as evil (what blue tends to do with other stages), but rather as individuals who don't quite get it. Green's intentions are very kind. This makes green very comfortable with being loud and politically active stage, but he can also tend to push things a bit too far. I agree that the average collective level is orange, and that's especially true when it comes to lifestyle decisions people make; what stage they actually embody, but green seems to be the dominant meme in the public debates of the west. Cognitively, a lot of people are at green and the media is full of green values. 
The reason I am more hesitant towards a strong left than a strong right is that I don't see the right wing nearly as strong as his counterpart in today's politics. There's Trump and his supporters, but those are mostly conservatives who support rather moderate values and typically conservative values. The right of today is actually very boring; they just want things to stay the same. Most attempts to limit free speech and expand political correctness in the last years came from the left. The conservative in the US, while having a lot of regressive beliefs, does generally support free speech and pluralism which I see as crucial requirements to effectively move up the spiral; by questioning everything is how you get to yellow.

55 minutes ago, Serotoninluv said:

It seems to me a healthy Green level president is more capable of leading the collective consciousness up the Spiral.

I agree that orange or blue presidents don't care about raising the collective consciousness. But neither does green. The goals of blue, orange and green are not to move towards yellow/turquoise. But as written above, I see a free society ("free" as how a libertarian would define it) as a more effective foundation to enable his citizens to move up the spiral since there is no demonization of any stage from the elites. I don't think the government telling you to be green is going to motivate you to be green, but the government letting you live how you want to live will remove a lot of resistance. So, I believe a more balanced or moderate political landscape is better than a left domination to collectively move up the spiral. The very strong counterargument of course being: How long can the environment survive our orange way of life until people naturally moved up to embodying green. That is a legitimate question I don't know the answer to.

1 hour ago, Serotoninluv said:

The perspective you offer does not appear to be Yellow. In general, a primary motivation of Yellow is to help evolve the collective consciousness up the spiral. That does not seem to be a primary motivation for you. Much of what you write seems consistent with maintaining the status quo below Green.

Two genuine question:
-What would a typical yellow perspective be on this political matter in your opinion?
-What is generally yellow's attitude towards orange politics and green politics?

[Zizzero]

54 minutes ago, Outer said:

Where is Authoritarianism-Libertarianism spectrum with Spiral dynamics? @Zizzero You appear to know much about Spiral Dynamics so I figure I'd ask.

I think political ideologies in general are not so simple in spiral dynamics; while green definitely has a pull towards the political left and blue towards whatever their parents told them was right , I currently believe that we cannot reduce ideology to spiral stages. Meaning; you can be green and a trump supporter, and you can be orange and a feminist. I just see too many examples that suggest that besides spiral dynamics factors like personality, gender, culture, your personal experiences and knowledge all shape your values. In fact, the idea that people makes those crazy swings as they move up where they turn from christian conservative to libertarian businessman to feminist hippie is rare; most people stay roughly the same as they move up. I just wanted to clarify my position on that.

I haven't really thought deeply about what you're asking, so I'm not too confident with my answer, but here's my take:
Blue seems to like authoritarianism; left or right doesn't matter. Blue is convinced of the truth of his values, so far that he puts opinions in the categories of right or wrong; no third option which is the opposite of the kind of tolerance and open-mindedness to different lifestyle designs libertarians generally have. However, if a child grows up in a household with very libertarian parents, teaching him libertarian values, I believe when this child reaches stage blue, it is most likely going to be a libertarian as well. 

I believe there is a general movement towards libertarianism (left and right) as one moves up. Orange people often are attracted to free marked libertarian ideas, and most green people would be somewhere in the libertarian left quarter. And I also cannot see how yellow would be authoritarian; a very central epiphany that yellow had contrary to tier 1 is yellow realizes that there is no objective answer to the question what is good and what is wrong. Yellow is too open-minded to be very authoritarian, I think. However, since yellow values helping people move up the spiral, I could imagine yellow thinkers being somewhere in the authoritarian half when he thinks this accomplishes that goal; yellow isn't as idealistic about politics as his predecessor.

Also, as people move up the spiral, rules become less and less necessary. While there is a legitimate threat that a red person murders you, I typically feel very safe when I'm surrounded by a green people. So, strict laws to prevent you from doing bad stuff will just be less and less necessary as the people under those laws move up.

[Forestluv]

1 hour ago, Zizzero said:

-What would a typical yellow perspective be on this political matter in your opinion?

There are various forms of Yellow expression and there are various developmental lines along the spiral. In general, a couple core Yellow features are they have reached a trans-personal level of consciousness and the underlying motivational energy is no longer driven to satisfy personal needs. Yellow desires to pull people up the spiral, yet not for personal gain.

Your rationale does not strike me as Yellow-centered because I don't sense it's fundamental motivational energy is to pull Orange people up the spiral into Green. If the source of the energy was to pull people up, for every concern you raised about the Orange to Green transition would naturally have solutions. Most of the energy would be focused on solutions to get Orange into Green and not focused on transition concerns.

For example, imagine our primary goal is to help evolve people from understanding algebra to understanding calculus. We have two groups at different developmental levels:

Group 1 - children that are currently taking an algebra course

Group 2 - adults that have taken an algebra course and are currently taking a calculus course (or have completed a calculus course).

If our primary goal is to help people evolve upward toward learning calculus - it's totally obvious Group 2 is better qualified. Group 1 is absolutely incapable of teaching others calculus. From a yellow perspective, we choose Group 2 as the teachers and do our best to help them become better teachers. You raise concerns about Group 2, yet seem oriented toward their flaws rather than how to utilize them the best we can to teach the community calculus.

Some concerns you seem to suggest:

1. Some Group 2 people are arrogant and think they are superior than Group 1 algebra students.

2. Some Group 2 people think calculus is superior to algebra

3. Some Group 1 people don't want to learn calculus and shouldn't be legally forced to learn calculus.

4. Society should be balanced between people who know calculus and people who don't know calculus.

5. People should have the right of free speech to speak out against calculus.

6. Group 2 people haven't yet learned advanced calculus II

7. Group 2 people are not motivated to teach people advanced calculus II

8. There are things I don't like about calculus.

With the primary objective to help people evolve upward in learning Calculus, none of these concerns would suggest a Group 1 teacher would be better. If we are oriented toward helping people evolve upward, we still choose Group 2 as our teachers and we address the concerns from a Yellow-level of consciousness to help develop them into more effective teachers. Remember, at the Yellow stage we are helping Green to transition to Yellow. I'd say about 20% of the energy should be about recognizing teaching inefficiencies and 80% of the energy in developing solutions to increase the teaching efficiency. My sense of your argument is that about 98% of the energy is focused on teaching inefficiencies and virtually nothing about how to address this to get Orange into Green. This suggests that your argument has not accepted the fundamental goal of evolving people through Green.

 

[kieranperez]

@Zizzero You keep bringing up this same thing on “Green thinks it has the highest truth.” Every stage below Yellow thinks it has the whole truth. This is not new information. If you want to move towards 2nd tier in a society, you need to move up the spiral, period. End of story. Right now we’re in a mostly Orange and Blue country. That isn’t a debate. That’s a statistical fact. If you look at the damage Orange and Blue causes in the world today, in some of the examples I’ve listed, those results are not my opinion. I AM NOT SAYING GREEN IS PERFECT. Green has flaws and yeah the postmodernism can turn toxic but that’s not a postmodernism problem, that’s an ideological/dogma problem. Green takes the environment seriously, Green takes racial equality seriously, Green takes gender equality seriously, Green takes breaking up big banks and corporations seriously. It’s not merely my opinion that these are necessary changes that need to happen. It’s not my opinion that Green is more advanced and beyond Orange and Blue. That’s not a judgment. That’s fact. If you want to disagree with that, call up Wilber, Beck, and Coen and all these other leading developmental psychologists. Yes, on the Absolute perspective, everything is fine and is what it is. If we got a strong Yellow visionary candidate, that hallelujah bring him/her out. However, there ain’t one right now because integral politicians are incredibly rare. Much less ones that can get votes and build a campaign. 

1 hour ago, Outer said:

Where is Authoritarianism-Libertarianism spectrum with Spiral dynamics? @Zizzero

Orange

2 hours ago, Serotoninluv said:

That is true for each Tier 1 stage. I agree with you that a Tier 2 president is likely too advanced for the average social consciousness. In the U.S. the average collective consciousness is stage Orange. So, stage Yellow would be two full stages higher and the jump from Tier1 to Tier2 is enormous. That leaves us with the option of a Tier 1 president. It seems to me a healthy Green level president is more capable of leading the collective consciousness up the Spiral. If the average consciousness in the U.S. is Orange, how can a Blue or Orange level president help the country evolve up? That person hasn't even evolved passed Orange, they have no clue about Green and would likely demonize Green. If you were upper Orange and wanted to evolve upward, would  you choose an Orange level teacher? Of course not. How on earth can an Orange teacher help you evolve to Green? They haven't developed to Green and likely have resistance and internal repression of Green. 

Ego backlash is a component of Spiral evolution - at both the individual and collective levels. As an individual, as a person evolves into Green there will be an ego backlash and they may resist and return to unhealthy Orange behaviors. Similarly at the collective level, as the collective moves up the Spiral, there will be backlash from the collective ego. This is a totally normal component of spiral evolution. 

The perspective you offer does not appear to be Yellow. In general, a primary motivation of Yellow is to help evolve the collective consciousness up the spiral. That does not seem to be a primary motivation for you. Much of what you write seems consistent with maintaining the status quo below Green.

Exactly what I saying

[Zizzero]

@Serotoninluv I like your thoughts. Even though you strawman-ed me with what my concerns are 

 

My question would be this:
-Why is raising the collective level of the spiral desirable/valuable? - why does yellow have this goal?

[Zizzero]

15 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

@Zizzero You keep bringing up this same thing on “Green thinks it has the highest truth.” Every stage below Yellow thinks it has the whole truth.

Never denied that. I stated what makes green's self-righteousness more interesting than blue or orange's in a post above.

 

18 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

If you look at the damage Orange and Blue causes in the world today, in some of the examples I’ve listed, those results are not my opinion. I AM NOT SAYING GREEN IS PERFECT. Green has flaws and yeah the postmodernism can turn toxic but that’s not a postmodernism problem, that’s an ideological/dogma problem. Green takes the environment seriously, Green takes racial equality seriously, Green takes gender equality seriously, Green takes breaking up big banks and corporations seriously. It’s not merely my opinion that these are necessary changes that need to happen.

No, these are opinions; your opinions. If those are facts; prove them. Prove that, let's say, racial equality is a necessary change that needs to happen. And try to stay away from justifications like: "if you moved up to green, you'd know". You are claiming that these are facts. Back up this claim or any other normative claim you made in your post.

 

23 minutes ago, kieranperez said:

It’s not my opinion that Green is more advanced and beyond Orange and Blue. That’s not a judgment. That’s fact

Agreed, but is green better or more right than orange and blue?

[Shadowraix]

This feels like one of those threads where people are just talking sharing information but each person keeps grasping at some argument to refute when there is none.