Looking at Steve Fuller’s Book (2020) “A Player’s Guide to the Post-Truth Condition” (Part 6 of 26)

0054 “What type of guide is this?”, I ask myself as I turn to chapter three.

What are the fates of truth, reason (as we commonly imagine it to be, rather than as the normal context and potential of the scrappy player) and reality, when the post-truth condition is a game2b to arrive at a judgment2c that leads to action?

So let me leave the image of the ships of Athens burning in the harbor at Syracuse in favor of a more recent example.  Some contemporaries call this example, “The Cold War”, technically ranging from 1945 to 1989 anno domini.  I prefer to call it The Third Battle Among the Enlightenment Gods: The Cold War Among Materialist Ideologies.

Materialist ideologies?

Think capitalism versus communism.

0055 In this example, the opponents are mirror images.  Just swap USSR for USA, then swap them back.

0056 Both parties agree that a nuclear war must be ruled out, because neither party can achieve the victory of a completely nullifying first strike.

Both parties agree that war is necessary in order to advance a materialist ideology.

0057 Success2b turns out to be a series of proxy wars that leaves many relativized jurisdictions in ruin.  Success2b turns out to be an inversion of what “capitalism” means, because the USA markets are regulated in such a fashion as to maximize positive publicity for the “capitalist” materialist ideology and negative publicity for the opposing “communist” materialist ideology.  That means, for the most part, fighting the commies is good for business.

Plus, creating false flags into order to validate the so-called domino theory turns out to be advantageous.

One can say the same for the USSR, because “communism” turns out to be state-capitalism. Or, maybe “capital” has been redefined as “party membership”.  The state regulates every level of the organization tier in order to conduct various proxy wars that the proxies would rather not participate in.  That means, for the most part, pay is not so good to fight the capitalists.  

Such as the Taliban?

Or anti-materialist ideologies such as Christianity?

0058 I know that this is difficult to fathom.

Truth, reason and even, reality, must be sacrificed in order to maintain the opportunity1c underlying success2c, which may be defined as a judgment that leads to a course of action2c, rather than… what most scrappy players3a consider to be “success2a“.  

0059 Here is what happens after the collapse of the Berlin Wall.

Yes, the USA continues to conduct proxy wars, even after the USSR disintegrates.

Weirdly, established players in the USA preserve their Cold War post-truth success2cby confabulating a novel materialist ideology2b that weirdly distorts capitalist truth, reason and reality1b and then conducting a crusade2c as if their dynamic hybridization of materialist ideologies2b is more righteous than what capitalism used to be.

0060 Say what?

What is the name of this novel materialist ideology that preserves the necessity of proxy wars even though the USSR has fallen?

More on that, later.