False Premises
To fell a tree, you start by sawing it at the ground level, you don’t start at the top by trimming each leaf and limb.
Throughout history, certain books - whether authored by or about controversial figures - have served as intellectual cornerstones for movements that have caused significant harm. Figures like Adolf Hitler, Mao Zedong, Hassan Nasrallah, and even Saul Alinsky have either written or inspired texts that have been used to justify actions and ideologies widely regarded as destructive or "objectively evil." These works, ranging from Mein Kampf to Mao’s Little Red Book, share a common flaw: they are built on false or distorted premises.
Such premises, when accepted uncritically, fuel harmful movements, drawing parallels with recent events like the Ferguson riots, ANTIFA and BLM protests, and the lionization of figures like Luigi Mangione and Karmelo Anthony.
At the heart of this issue is the power of narrative to shape belief and action. Books by or about figures like Hitler or Mao provide a framework that their followers use to interpret the world. Mein Kampf, for instance, propagated the false premise of racial superiority and Jewish conspiracies, fueling the atrocities of the Holocaust. Similarly, Mao’s writings promoted the idea that class struggle necessitated violent revolution, leading to millions of deaths during the Cultural Revolution. Hassan Nasrallah’s rhetoric, often documented in texts extolling Hezbollah’s cause, falsely frames violence as a legitimate response to perceived oppression, justifying terrorism. Even Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, though less overtly violent, has been accused of promoting manipulative tactics that prioritize power over truth, influencing divisive political strategies.
The danger lies not only in the content of these works but in their ability to present distorted premises as self-evident truths. A false premise—such as the notion that one group is inherently evil or that systemic injustice can only be addressed through destruction—gains traction when it resonates emotionally or exploits existing grievances. Once accepted, these premises become the foundation for ideologies that justify extreme actions, from genocide to riots.
Recent events illustrate this pattern, albeit one accelerated by the internet and social media. The Ferguson riots of 2014, sparked by the shooting of Michael Brown, were fueled by the narrative of systemic police racism. While issues of policing and race are complex, the premise that Brown’s death was an unprovoked act of racial violence was later challenged by evidence suggesting a more nuanced situation. Yet, the narrative, amplified by activists and media, drove widespread unrest. Similarly, the 2020 protests led by ANTIFA and Black Lives Matter, while rooted in legitimate concerns about inequality, often rested on exaggerated or misleading claims, such as the idea that police systematically target minorities without cause. These distortions justified vandalism, looting, and violence in some cases, alienating potential allies and undermining the movements’ goals.
More recently, the lionization of figures like Luigi Mangione, who killed a healthcare CEO over grievances with the system, and Karmelo Anthony, a fictional or misattributed figure in this context, reflects how distorted narratives can elevate individuals to heroic status. Social media and public discourse often amplify these stories, presenting flawed premises—such as the idea that vigilante justice is a valid response to systemic issues—as moral imperatives.
The persistence of such movements underscores the need for critical scrutiny of foundational texts and narratives. When premises go unchallenged, they can lead to catastrophic outcomes, as history has shown. To counter this, individuals must engage with ideas skeptically, questioning the assumptions underlying influential works and the movements they inspire. Only through such vigilance can society guard against the seductive but destructive power of false premises.
As you observe the most effective arguments - even in our digital age - you will notice something that has existed since formal logic was developed. Scott Jennings, a Republican CNN contributor, has gained a bit of a cult following for his uncanny ability to “own” the CNN libs – but the key to his success is as old as logic itself – he simply cuts through the noise and eviscerates the false or flawed premise of the CNN panelists’ arguments. William F. Buckley was great at this – as are people like Thomas Sowell and Victor Davis Hanson.
The power of destroying a false premise is the power to eviscerate an entire argument.
The seller of distorted or false-premised narratives also needs a “market:” ears eager to devour and minds open to being conquered by the seductions of the aspiring charismatic leader(s). In his book “The True Believer,” Eric Hoffer surveys the geography of the minds of those willing to be recruited into a social movement. Hoffer stresses that the “true believer” can very easily switch from one ideological cause to another, perhaps even an opposed cause, so long as the new cause fulfills the believer’s “need” for a self-validating cause. For example after WWII in East Germany many of the former Hitler Youth became enthusiastic inductees into the youth wing of the new ruling communist party. To take a more recent and weirder example a decade or so ago some wings of the LGBT movement began a crusade against circumcision of male infants, whether for traditional religious reason or else for purely hygienic reasons, even decrying it as “involuntary infant sexual mutilation.” But more recently the same or similar groups have taken up the “cause” of “gender affirming therapy” using drugs and surgical procedures that also can be regarded as genital mutilation imposed upon children enjoying no meaningful consent to these actions.
So how did this “market” of souls hungry for ideological causes come about? My view is that the propagation of a secular materialist worldview contemptuous of traditional Judeo-Christian and other Western civilizational values left hearts empty and aching for meaning. The newer secular ideologies of the left and of the right became the ersatz substitutes for those discarded traditional worldviews which at least had the collective experience of 3,500 years to work out their own rough edges. Our educational and other socialization institutes need to chuck the ersatz and bogus ideologies in favor of restoring authentic civilizational values.
Mayhem is the catharsis of a miserable soul. An alcoholic reads that the source of his malaise is the liquor store. Vindicated in his destruction of the premises, he escapes with a bottle of puloined hooch.