So I was reading Manboobz, which is usually about as low on the referenced depravity scale as I can go, and I ended up clicking on a link in an article which led me to…Stormfront. They were all outraged that some pick up artist was swarthy, yet he was chasing after beautiful pure European white women. That article was appalling enough, but it linked to something about the Neandertals, which is a subject I find interesting, and I clicked on that, and whoomp, down the rabbit hole I went.
I had discovered the bizarre pseudoscientific and profoundly anti-semitic world of Michael Bradley.
There are many things that you will find offensive at that link: the hideous Geocities style page layout, the incoherent rambling content of the text, the stupidity of the arguments, the goddamn racism, so be warned. It’s not my fault if he wrecks your brain or induces nausea.
Plowing through the wall-of-text interspersed with ads begging you to buy his revolutionary books ($49.95 for an e-book this badly written? No thanks), his message is fairly simple and wrong. He thinks there are two kinds of human, with some interbreeding between them: one kind are the tall browed, lean and handsome Cro Magnon people who are scattered around the lowland areas of the globe; the others are short, stocky, hairy people with receding foreheads who arose in the highlands of an area he calls the “Toxic Lozenge”.
This other contending subspecies originated in what I call the “Toxic Lozenge”, a narrow elongated area extending from the Rift Valley lakes of Tanzania, Kenya and southern Ethiopia to the northern Caucasus Mountains. This Toxic Lozenge therefore encompasses the geographic epicentres of both Homo habilis and later Neanderthal development. This Toxic Lozenge is also the original homeland of the Hamitic languages and the later seemingly related Semitic ones.
In case you didn’t get the hint, these Toxic Lozenge residents were descendants of Neandertals, and are the modern Jews and other Semitic people.
Physically, this subspecies is characterized by very great nasal development, extreme hairiness in males, long torsos and short legs, extremely high numerical and spatial intelligence, very little visual artistic ability, a low level of emotional stability, fanatical monotheism, anti-feminism and a predisposition to control, enslave or exterminate “ordinary humanity”. There is some fairly recent anthropological evidence (1990-1991, see “Homo Georgicus” on Wikipedia), coming from the Caucasus Republic of Georgia, that this subspecies may derive from Homo habilis, through the Neanderthals and on to modern living representatives.
However, not all anthropologists agree that Homo habilis should be considered fully “human” as that term is rather loosely defined, but was possibly an aberrant offshoot of either Homo or Australopithecus (see Esau’s Empire I on this website).
That is, people deriving from this Toxic Lozenge in ancient times may not be exactly human and certainly seem to be incompatible with the values and attitudes of “ordinary humanity”. However, recent historical migrants into the Toxic Lozenge represent mostly ordinary African humanity.
Much more important than physical traits, the aggression of this subspecies is responsible for its expansion from its original Toxic Lozenge both east and west to inhabit most of the “Middle East” (especially mountainous regions) and even parts of Europe, western India and northern and eastern Africa, imposing its religious and social values. In short, the people of this Toxic Lozenge have gradually driven a wedge of perhaps “not-quite-human” genes and culture between the ordinary humanity of the West and the ordinary humanity of the Far East. And this wedge has been inexorably expanded by well-known historical events from 5600 BC to the present. Despite the incessant propaganda and disinformation promulgated by this subspecies, adherence to Judaism, Judeo-Christianity and Judeo-Islam are the symptomatic indications of its biological expansion and/or cultural influence.
Oh, look. He’s in favor of some flavor of feminism, and he’s against monotheism, and he later announces that he’s a humanist. He’s one of us! (Cue projectile vomiting and blinding tears.) The othering of Jews as not quite human and on a mission to enslave “ordinary humanity” is a bit off-putting, isn’t it?
You might be wondering what his evidence for this remarkable thesis might be. Well, there are the pictures:
That’s supposed to be a picture of rampaging Jews erupting out of their homeland in the Toxic Lozenge. It might be a little more persuasive if it weren’t a painting by Frank Frazetta that was used to illustrate some sword-and-sorcery fantasy novel.
What about the scientific evidence? He’s not a fan of Svante Paabo, who sequenced the Neandertal genome and determined that Europeans and Asians have a small infusion of Neandertal genes, on the order of about 4%. Paabo is misinterpreting the data, he thinks. Try to follow this logic:
Anyway, that’s the worldwide “Paabo spin” on Neanderthal DNA in modern humans and, looked at this way, “1 to 4 percent” doesn’t amount to much. Figures don’t lie but liars figure.
On June 5, 2010 the world’s population was estimated to be 6.8-billion-plus people (United States Census Bureau, Wikipedia). One percent of that is roughly 68-million and change. Four percent works out to about 278-million people. Odd, isn’t it, that this is about the population of the Middle East, according to my Bloomsbury Pocket Atlas? And this is the geographic homeland of the Semitic peoples, the present Judeo-Islamic Arabs and the Jews. Work it out for yourself using any good atlas.
With good maps and atlases there is a way of looking at this “1 to 4 percent” of Neanderthal DNA in modern humans that makes a great deal of historical sense. What if this Neanderthal DNA is concentrated in the Caucasus Middle East, where this 2010 study admits that Neanderthals and Cro-Magnons (or “Early Modern Humans”) met and interbred? Surely it is reasonable to suppose that the main concentration of the world’s surviving Neanderthal DNA must be in this area, discounting very modern migrations of some people by railway, steamship and aircraft transportation, and that Neanderthal DNA decreases rapidly as distance from the Caucasus centre of interbreeding increases?
You see, Paabo was reporting an average admixture, but if you just assume that all the Neandertals are living in the Middle East, and no Neandertal genes are anywhere else, then you get the same average! As you read further, you discover that this flawed calculation is gradually assumed to be proof of Bradley’s thesis.
And it gets crazier and crazier, and the font gets bigger.
Basically, I estimate that about seventy percent of the present crisis on this planet can be fairly attributed to the machinations of Neanderthal-Semitic elements of the human population against the Cro-Magnon majority of the human population.
And then…9/11 was a Jewish plot! Obamacare! Hillary Rodham Clinton climbing to the presidency via her Jewish constituency! Jews control Hollywood! Fascism…it isn’t so bad!
It is time for the non-Semitic peoples of the world to come together in a multi-racial alliance under one banner in order to severely limit Semitic activities before they put an end to us and everything else on the planet. I offer the following banner, emblem and symbol. However, I will warn everyone that it may well be too late.
The symbol is a flag with a swastika on it. He thinks he’s too old to run this movement, but he has a suggestion for a charismatic person who could: Mel Gibson.
Then…Roswell — we’re part of a cosmic war! ATLANTIS!!! Aaaah! Argle-bargle! Mene tekel upharsin! Ëa ëa! Blaaarfh!
I think I need to lie down. Or get drunk. It’s always something, someone who has to show how low and stupid and vile humans can get.
Drudge just used that picture to illustrate a story about Biden calling the Republicans Neanderthals, I wouldn’t put it past him to have gotten it from this guys website.
But every proper
incredibly racist assholescientific racistrace realisthuman bio-diversity advocate knows that the Neanderthals had larger brains, therefore Europeans’ 2-4% Neanderthal genes are the reason for their obvious superiority. Of course. So dude has to get with the programme.(Yes, “human bio-diversity” is the current euphemism for “scientific racist”. There’s a whole blogosphere of these people. Also associated with the transhumanists and singularitarians, for more fun.)
That’s some weapons-grade crank right there.
That has to be one of the worst manglings of biology and history I have seen in a while, all in pursuit of frothing anti-semitic bigotry.
He claims to be against monotheism, but for some reason I get the impression that he is probably more comfortable with white dominated christianity of the brand commonly encountered in the US than he is with islam or judaism. I can’t imagine why…
As for his ‘feminism’ – I sincerely doubt that he even begins to grasp the concept. He is just bashing the jewish peoples as hostile to women to try to garner support for his nasty neo-fascist ideology. And being a humanist in any meaningful sense sort of rules out declaring that vast swathes of people are subhuman, so Bradley either doesn’t understand that body of political thought either, and/or is simply lying about it.
Any insight into the far Right mindset is always a disturbing glimpse into the depths of bigoted arse-hattery, but this guy has gone full ‘goats on fire!’ and then some.
I just find Judaism a bit silly (albeit no more silly than most other religions). Some people apparently find it so scary that they perceive it as an existential threat. It’s like it breaks their brains somehow. I do not understand.
Doesn’t Bradley know the Neanderthals were first discovered in the Neandertal (Neander’s Valley) in western Germany near Dusseldorf?
David Gerard @ 2;
Ah yes – the charmers who try to dress up their bilous racial hatred as simply an expression of some supposedly inescapable ‘scientific reality’. They have been doing it since before eugenics was in vogue and ever since. There is something particularly objectionable about people who would seek to subvert science as a shield to hide their prejudice behind.
The fringes of the transhumanist and singularitarian groups attract a variety of bigots. You get the people who aspire to the technological creation of a ‘perfect’ humanity where those elements they consider ‘inferior’ – such as the ethnic groups they despise – are ‘weeded out’ by the superior (and almost always very, very white) transhuman super people (a much more genteel way of terming things than a blunt term like genocide).
Then there are the MRA/PUA ones who creepily fantasise about the day when some kind of virtual reality simulation/’sexbot’ androids/consciousness upload body-swapping means that they will no longer need to ‘put up’ with the actual women who tend to be attached to vulvas*. A whole lot of oblivious transphobia and homophobia is par for the course here, with entitled, cis/het privileged doods going on at length about how of course any guy would love to be in a woman’s body for a little while! Imagine the possibilities! What bloke wouldn’t jump a the chance to experience lesbian sex! And so on, all entirely uncaring about the actual existence of trans* and homosexual people, and how issues of gender identity and sexual orientation respectively mean more to them than just some dudebro’s idle fantasies of taking a holiday in a woman’s body, or alternatively expressing bigoted revulsion for actual trans* people even while they fantasise about uploading into a body with breasts for the weekend.
Even the less objectinable singularitarians have some… odd notions to put it mildly, but their whacky beliefs aren’t the real problem. The movement seems even more incapable of dealing with its misogynistic, racist, homophobic and transphobic elements than atheo-sketpticism is, and lets be honest; atheism has made a pathetically poor fist of things.
———————————————————————————————————————-
* Contemporary sex toys don’t do it for them, apparently.
This guy needs to develop an open mind
I suggest a Dane axe
“The Tuscans have the highest level of Neandertal similarity of any of the 1000 Genomes Project samples. They have around a half-percent more Neandertal similarity than Brits or Finns in these samples. The CEU sample is slightly elevated compared to Brits and Finns as well.” –John Hawks, Paleoanthropologist
“Tuscans are the people of Tuscany: e.g., Florence, Siena, Pisa, the home of the Renaissance. Famous Tuscans include Dante, Brunelleschi, Puccini, and three of the four Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Donatello, Leonardo, and Michelangelo.” -Steve Sailer, Notorious racist
The painting of the Neanderthals are of course from the great sci fantasy artist Frank Frazetta. They are of course rather coarse caricatures of what this human subspecies looked like. Much of his work is definitely not PC today, but he was important to me as a budding artist while growing up.
Physically, this subspecies is characterized by very great nasal development, extreme hairiness in males, long torsos and short legs
Sounds like me, actually. And I’m German on both sides.
Ack! After reading just those few excerpts, I want to take my brain out and scrub it. If you read through the entire thing, PZ, you probably want to jump off a bridge.
Fortunately, I believe I know an antidote:
“It’s really a wonder that I haven’t dropped all my ideals, because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because in spite of everything, I still believe that people are really good at heart.”
― Anne Frank, The Diary of a Young Girl
Real Professor, putting swastika and Mel Gibson in the same paragraph, have you no sense of propriety? As for Mel Gibson as ‘Der Fuehrer’ No, I don’t quite see it selling, and I think that Mr Bradley needs to get out more. Preferably out to the orbit of Pluto.
In case anyone wonders, the term “Hamitic languages” has long been abandoned, because some of them – Ancient Egyptian* and the Berber languages in particular – are more closely related to the Semitic languages than to the other “Hamitic” branches (Chadic, Cushitic, possibly Omotic).
…And then I saw you mention Roswell. I give up.
* So much for fanatical monotheism. Yes, one of them tried, LOL! …And among speakers of Semitic languages, never mind the religions of Akkad/Babylon/Assur, the Phoenicians, Ugarit…
Those who cannot spell Iä! shall be eaten next to last.
Also, Düsseldorf, while I’m at it. :-) And Pääbo.
+++ MESSAGE FROM PARLIAMENT OF PLUTO ++++++ TO POOPYHEADITES OF EARTH ++++++ PLEASE DO NOT SEND FECKWITLESS CUPKACES TO ORBIT OUR PLANET ++++++ MESSAGE COMPLETES +++To Pluto
You aren’t a planet any more.
haha
Jew-hatred never really goes out of style.
You have to admit that Toxic Lozenge would be a great band name.
Honestly, I think his hatred of Islamic people is as great as his hatred of Jewish people. Ironic as it seems, given the great rift between the Semetic peoples due to religion, he seems to think that they are united in purpose against the “true humans of the west”, the “true humans of the east”, and the “mostly ordinary African humanity”. And yes, I did find it odd how “westerners”, “easterners”, and Africans were comparatively described as well.
+++ MESSAGE FROM PARLIAMENT OF PLUTO ++++++ TO POOPYHEADITES OF EARTH ++++++ INTERGALACTIC ASTROMATHSUNION DEFINES "PLANET" AS NATURAL ORBITAL BODY NOT EMITTING RELIGION ++++++ EARTH IS HYPERCOMPUTER OWNED BY MICE AND INFESTED WITH SO MANY KOOKS TRAVELERS FROM SOL SYSTEM MUST BE HELD IN ISOLATION AND DECONTAMINATED ++++++ THANKS A LOT NOT!! ++++++ MESSAGE COMPLETES +++testaha!
Michael Bradley’s much Earlier book The Iceman Inheritance, was a pseudoscientific piece of junk, however, at least in it’s original edition it argued that modern Europeans and their descendants, because of intermarriage with Neandertals were, uniquely aggressive, violent, racist, competitive, sexist and domineering. Certainly bonkers nonsense.
It appears that Bradley decided that making all Europeans wicked hybrids was too much to bear and so he has off loaded all this negativity onto the usual targets. At the same time it enables him to think of some of his some of his fellow humans as not “really” human.
What a load of hateful shit.
First, it’s “Semitic”. Second, in the intellectually respectable human sciences, “Semitic” can refer to languages, or to ancient Semitic-language-speaking population groups, but does not refer to modern “peoples”: neither Jews nor Arabs are correctly referred to as “Semites” or “Semitic peoples”.
Reading the line “very little visual artistic ability” made me think of Marc Chagall. Of course knowing these kind of crackpots he’d find some way to claim Chagall wasn’t a real artist.
Erm, yes. Wow, trying to read this nonsense upon waking does bad, bad things to the brain.
PZ, I don’t think a sulfuric acid could wash this stupid from a brain. I’m going to go protest taxes now, just to feel whole again.
First, it’s “Semitic”. Second, in the intellectually respectable human sciences, “Semitic” can refer to languages, or to ancient Semitic-language-speaking population groups, but does not refer to modern “peoples”: neither Jews nor Arabs are correctly referred to as “Semites” or “Semitic peoples”.
Alright, apologies for both the typo and for taking a short cut. I wanted to specifically referring to Semitic-language-speaking population groups (but Semitic peoples was shorter – sorry, didn’t realize it was considered inappropriate) because I felt uncomfortable with claims that this horrific bullshit was aimed specifically at Jewish people when it seemed obvious that they were trying to claim that everyone in the Middle East were “not fully human” or some such monstrous nonsense.
Argh, sorry, posted before putting in the html. Sorry.
Whenever I see a blog like that, I always take the view that, hey, at least it keeps the guy busy and he’s not bothering people on the bus or something.
Yeah, but his references are unassailable: Wikipedia and a pocket atlas!
Actually the pic looks like something from one of Robert E. Howard Conan series books.
I thought the Toxic Lozenge was what a friend slipped me in high school.
David Marjanović @14
Ï dön’t dö ümläüts.
I pronounce them, but I can’t figure out how to do them on this PC. (Macs since 1985)
sojourner
Ü produces Ü
ü produces ü
Etc for each vowel.
There is no way transhumanism and/or singulatarianism has any necessary connection with the type of racist nonsense mongering PZ is linking to. Transhumanism does attract its share of dingbats and libertarians, so I’m sure you can find a few examples. But I don’t remember anything remotely resembling this from reading Kurzweil or Hughes or J Storrs Hall.
@see_the_galaxy – your claim is simply incorrect. The scientific racists are a plague on LessWrong, for example. They shade completely miscibly into the techno-libertarians.
“Semitic” may not properly refer to modern Jews or Arabs. The geneticists are still working on that one.
Anti-Semitism as a term was used by noted anti-Semite Wilhelm Marr as a more genteel-sounding alternative to the more common term of the day “Jew-Hatred”. It implied the existence of some horrible, conspiratorial (and non-existent) ideology called “Semitism”.
I’m sure
see_the_galaxy:
There’s a considerable amount of linkage. Don’t let preemptive defensiveness do your talking for you here.
David, it’s irrelevant whether or not some racist calls him or herself a transhumanist. Wanting life extension or technological enhancement has nothing to do with it. It’s a boring and elementary mistake to try to discredit a movement based on a fringe. It’s like saying all Christians agree with Westboro Baptist Church, all leftist Americans are Symbionese, all atheists agree with Stalin, all conservatives are going to become like the Oklahoma City bomber, all environmentalists are Earth Firsters, all vegans are ALF zealots, all Muslims support Al Qaeda, and all Germans love Hitler.
Ok everyone get your tartan out!
see_the_galaxy:
You’re playing No True Transhumanist here, don’t do that.
No one is trying to discredit a ‘movement’. What is boring and elementary is someone deciding to ride their high and righteous hobby horse into a thread derail. Do not do this. If you can’t manage to see past your own navel and absolutely must maunder on about this, take it to Thunderdome, please.
I need to see the evidence. And I don’t mean finding a transhumanist horse’s ass someplace; I can find you a horse’s ass in any movement of any kind. No, I need to see the logical connection.
See the definition of “No true Scotsman”, and also the argument I’m making. I’m saying there’s no necessary connection. An asshole does not discredit a good cause, as should be obvious. Second,
I didn’t bring this up. Somebody did a drive-by piss and thought nobody was going to call them on their bullshit. Lazy, lazy.
see_the_galaxy:
This is not a playground. It’s your behaviour which is questionable. You have now shown your upset that other people have a differing opinion, and you’ve hollered about how magnificent and pure transhumanism is -good. Give it a rest, or take it to Thunderdome. Do not keep going into a derail. This is a warning, so please, get a clue. Thank you.
Going to and reading sites like this and being appalled and outraged is rather like a Xian going into a porno shop and doing the same. Whaddaya expect?
There are serious academic types who study this out of actual scientific interest, and other brave people who keep a watch on the goings-on at kook racist sites for the general good (should they step up from abusing free speech to advocating violence, etc.), but why bother with them if there’s no threat?
It might be an important to do a few time when new to the Intertubes, just to see for oneself how many very, very lonely, stupid and potentially dangerous people there are, but why dwell on it? Isn’t the Republican Party of Gohmert, Cruz, the Kings, and Bachmann & Palin enough to be disgusted about, and plenty and too much to fight?
I know they exist, why pick at the scab they are further without further reason?
Yes that’s exactly what it’s like
Tell me…did you give one minute’s thought to how much of a fucking idiot you’d look like if you actually posted this comment?
If any self-appointed thread police want to whine about derailment or playgrounds or anything else, I recommend they go take it up with the bullshitters who got it off track in the first place. When somebody spews bullshit, they have no right to expect anything but derision. Fortunately, it is true there is nothing more to say on the topic at this time.
@See_the_galaxy
Yeah they’re not self appointed.
Ingdigo Jump: by golly, you’re right. That threatening and insulting I got was actually official now that I look at the list of monitors. I shall not return.
Cross-post from [Lounge]. Seems relevant.
Rally in Leith, ND on Sept. 22nd!
Some old friends of mine are organizing a welcoming committee for Jeff Schoep when he visits the town on a “fact-finding tour”.
If you are in the area, please consider joining us in sending a clear message to these folks. You can find details about the protest at UnityND. If you are unable to attend, there is a link down-page whereby you may participate vicariously by kicking down some $$ in support. (Gas money (Leith is in the middle of ever-fucking-loving-nowhere. (Apologies to Caine.)), signage, attorney’s fees, etc.)
I’d love to meet any other Hordelings that can attend. I’ll be the guy in the peace sign tie-dye wearing a straw hat. Probably carrying a sign reading FUCK YOU, YOU FUCKING FUCKS (or something to that effect).
see_the_galaxy:
Goodness, you’re just all tantrum, aren’t you? Tsk. It’s a pity you couldn’t manage to move a finger of your mighty transhumanism to click over to Thunderdome, where a response to you is waiting. Ah well.
By the way, a warning isn’t a threat. I didn’t even bother to put on my monitor hat for ya.
What the fuck does that guy smoke for breakfast?!?
@ pz
Hiw do you get all this INSANE stuff you are blogging about?
Truck tires
@ David, #14,
Seems I learn something new every day. I had assumed that “Hamitic languages” was a bizarre reference to the “curse of Ham” justification for racism among some kinds of fundie Christians.
It would have been amusing if that’s what this maroon meant though…
Ah, the No True Transhumans fallacy.
Why is it that all the Transhumans, Singulatarians, and Posthumans are less bright than my cat?
Are we doomed to extinction when our descendants are unable to open a can and the cats are all out catching mice?
Correct. I’ve added a bit myself. BTW, don’t let the screen door hit your Transhuman ass on the way out.
In truth, I don’t reject Transhumanism, Singulatarianism, or Posthumanism a priori. But their timelines seem to be off by thousands of years at least. We will be lucky to survive the current new Endarkenment of the christofascist Tea Party.
My best understanding: Semitic is the Semitic branch of the Afro-Asiatic languages. Hamitic is the rest, including Egyptian and Berber. Japhetic would be Indo-European, specifically Greek (Yawan in the Bible, from *Iawones “Ionians”) and the Anatolian languages (possibly some of the Iranian languages and proto-Armenian as well), because those are the ones that would have been known in the days the Torah was written. Beyond that, the ancient Hebrews had a painfully limited view of the world outside their little pocket of the Middle East.
raven @57:
Yup. Opposable thumbs are the only things between us and the Catpocalypse.
As a Jew I always find this stuff to be mindnumbingly depressing. Many MRA’s think that we started TEH Feminism b/c we Jews are all ‘Communists!’ AHA!
and the Lords of International Finance, of course! I’ve seen it said somewhere that antisemitism* is the quintessential modern conspiracy theory, in that it is able to account for everything, however apparently inconsistent.
wondering@27,
Thanks. To expand a bit more, one reason “Semitic peoples” is inappropriate is the connection to the racial pseudo-science of the 19th century (I object to “Caucasian” for “white” as well on these grounds), and the further connection of that pseudo-science to the modern forms of antisemitism – the older ones being primarily religious. I’ve heard antisemites saying, in effect, “Oh no, I’m not antisemitic, I’ve nothing against Arabs”, and conversely, anti-Arab racists pointing out how “ironic” it is that antisemitic themes and caricatures appear frequently in Arab media.
*I use the unhyphenated form of the word to emphasize that there aren’t actually any “Semites” to be anti (# 23, #38 above); but “anti-Jewish prejudice” won’t do because one could be prejudiced against Jews, as against any other ethnic group, without buying into the central conspiracy theory.
@Caveat Imperator
It is a reference to the “Curse of Ham”, it’s just not one that this particular racist arsehat came up with. Other equally racist arsehats came up with it a long time ago, back in the middle ages when the Orient hadn’t been discovered and people were thought to be divided into the Japhetic peoples (Whites), Semitic peoples (Arabic, Jewish and other Middle Eastern peoples) and Hamitic peoples (Black people), based on the three sons of Noah; Japheth, Shem and Ham. 19th century “Scientific” racists then further refined the term by dividing black people into Hamitic people (the African cultures they deemed to be more civilised than others) and Negroid people (all the other African cultures). Anyone continuing to use the term these days is indulging in a blatant and disgusting attempt to dress racism up as science.
Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Programs > Character Map. Has everything you might possibly need.