before the french revolution, the people lived in harmony. there were rich aristocrats, creating jobs and innovating science, and their peasants, basking in the light and radiance of their betters and applauding their beauty.

then the french revolution happened, and a great evil was loosed into the world.

Steven Pinker is a pedophile and his entire job is being Bill Gates’ court jester.

Pinker the Thinker with another Stinker

Ah yes because Russia, China, everywhere else, was well on track to a prosperous future before the revolution…

Just taking for granted that the improvements since were going to happen even if the revolution didn’t happen, rather than attributing everything since to the revolution itself.

imagine calling the chinese revolution disastrous as a westerner in 2025

You hate to see it folks; liberals turning their backs on their own greatest achievements.

Napoleon as a protofascist is a surprising take coming from a lib.

https://x.com/RnaudBertrand/status/1965767084530606453

This is such a ridiculous take in so many ways.

First of all, his numbers are WILDLY inflated, and I do mean wildly. The French revolution, for instance, didn’t “kill 2 million people”: most historians would agree that direct deaths from the Revolution (including the Terror) were around 30,000-40,000. He’s off by a factor of 60… He is also WILDLY off for his Russia and China numbers but I won’t go there 😏

Secondly, calling Napoleon a “facist totalitarian dictator” is laughable, if only because fascism is a 20th-century ideology with racial hierarchy at its core.

Napoleon was a classical emperor - brutal at times, but no different from countless emperors before him. By this logic, every Ottoman sultan or Roman emperor was also a ‘fascist totalitarian dictator,’ which either makes the term meaningless or makes Napoleon not the first, which means his affirmation is false either way. Plus, fascism requires strong racial components which Napoleon completely lacked - he was promoting meritocracy and civil equality under the law in Europe, not ethnic supremacy.

Thirdly, yes revolutions tend to be bloody. But guess what: sometimes peacefully requesting for the powerful to voluntarily dismantle the entire system that benefits them doesn’t work out. Strange, isn’t it? Marie-Antoinette wasn’t exactly famous for her empathy toward starving peasants.

Lastly this is such a weird take coming from Pinker whose entire brand is about the supposed triumph of Enlightenment values, of which the French Revolution was the defining political expression.

This may make a little more sense when you consider that his other “brand” is his claim that Liberalism is fundamentally peaceful and rational: you can understand how he isn’t quite comfortable with the fact that the Enlightenment values he champions were won with blood, not debate.

This is quintessential liberal hypocrisy - wanting change without conflict, revolution without revolutionaries. Liberals like Pinker want to live in a world created by revolutionary violence while condemning that violence as barbaric.

Stalin killed 20 million

lol

Me when I hear bonapartism

My enemies are many, my equals are none. In the shade of olive trees, they said Italy could never be conquered.

In the land of Pharaohs and Kings, they said Egypt could never be humbled. In the realm of forest and snow, they said Russia could never be tamed.

Now they say nothing. They fear me, like a force of nature, a dealer in thunder and death! I say: I am Napoleon, I am Emperor.

Napoleon being fascist is hilarious

Stephen pinker is such a fucking moron

You can use “perhaps” as a weasel word except when it is “perhaps a century” and the 3rd french republic was founded less than a century later. then there’s no adverb which can save a provably false statement.

led to the restoration of monarchy

Yeah he really shouldn’t’ve done that to preserve {checks notes] the monarchy?

there twere two reigns of terror. two. TWO!

2