Memetic Warfare: The Chaos Magic of the AltRight

Yesterday, ailing US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton raised the profile of the nebulous 'AltRight' simply by devoting a speech to it. Obviously unaware that even giving this much oxygen to the fire would greatly amplify it, Hillary decried the "radical fringe" taking over the Republican Party between dismissing the dangers of black urban zones as well as getting a quick jab in at her opponent's "largely white audiences". She made reference to Twitter user 'WhiteGenocide™' and supposed "anti-semitic death threats" from supporters of Donald Trump. Everything from the National Enquirer to Alex Jones came under some highly scripted scrutiny from Clinton, but the AltRight was singled out as the defining ideological backing of Trump's campaign.

Allow me to speculate for a moment that Trump himself is not particularly right wing in any sense, not at the level of deeply held conviction. If so, we cannot attribute the success of the AltRight to him, but rather to something intrinsic to its very modus operandi. Trump has been a vehicle for sure; his general unscripted take-no-prisoners attitude has allowed him to parrot some of the AltRight's talking points without needing to reflect upon whether it was 'wise' in hindsight. Trump is an amplifier, he is a multiplier, but I dare say the primary cause of the AltRight's current prominence is memetic warfare, that is, the use of a new rhetorical method to penetrate the national discourse, a method which relies on three key ingredients, at least in this instance:

1) Offensive humor
2) Applicability to reality
3) Simplicity

As many will know, the AltRight has been using memes to harass and humiliate a whole range of targets, from concern trolling Jewish journalists to neoconservatives. The on-air tantrum of Republican strategist Rick Wilson was emblematic of the fact that the AltRight had in fact managed to score a win against mainstream Conservatism in terms of online discourse. In the buzzing meme-production district of 4chan's /pol/, there is a memetic dismissal for virtually everything.

Here is an example of a successful meme:

'We Wuz Kangs' (an ebonic brutalization of 'We Were Kings') makes a mockery of the pseudo-historical study of 'Afrocentrism', which is where the achievements of civilizations such as Egypt and Rome are attributed to Sub-Saharan Africans. While this doesn't have any credibility in most university history courses, it is taught in subjects like 'black studies' and other such moneysinks, and is propagated by black media sources. The idea of afrocentrism is of course so ridiculous that it is perfectly ripe material for a meme, and 'We Wuz Kangs' acts as an effective dismissal of all afrocentric claims. It does not matter what claim is made, it can be refuted simply by using 'We Wuz Kangs'. It works because it fulfills the three criteria of a successful meme: It is offensive yet humorous, breaking the taboo of criticizing black people, it is applicable to reality in that afrocentrism is a massive lie, and finally it is simple.

'Le Happy Merchant' has been around for a while, but is commonly misunderstood by Liberals as simply an anti-semitic image. On the contrary, it illustrates perfectly why Liberals remain confused about AltRight discourse, unsure often if the person is serious, or trolling for the biggest reaction. The caricature of the Jew in this picture is so ridiculously exaggerated that it blurs the line between satire and hatred, which does seem to encapsulate the most common stance on the Jews found in these spheres. They are a rather self-important nuisance, often up to no good, but really they aren't something we lose sleep over. The ZOG conspiracy, for the most part, is fictional, and instead you have a high preponderance of Jews doing bad things. Of course, they always place themselves at the center of attention and so it is fun to play on the paranoia of zany organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Anti-Defamation League.

You may not like this rhetoric. You may perhaps prefer things like afrocentrism either be ignored entirely, or refuted point by point in some kind of 'devastating critique'. The sad fact is, there is no time for that in our present culture which is increasingly driven by fast-to-order info, and the left still controls the majority share of information delivery.

Memes are not intended to convince intellectuals of anything, nor are they really a debating tactic per se, but rather they are negation propaganda. They communicate ideas contrary to the prevailing narrative in a memorable way. In some senses, Liberals have been using a similar kind of tool when they shut down the opposition using charges of 'racism' and 'sexism' etc. but contrary to right wing memes, these appeal less to reality, and more to emotional points of contact or the preset bedrocks of Liberalism itself. Once so-called 'equality' has been established as a given, appeals to 'fairness', while not developed in any intellectual sense, become effective easy-bake information weapons.

The offensive meme is the right wing response to this. In seeing the AltRight's meme culture as something that is caustic to the established ideals, we must be careful not to set up a false conflict between the 'chaos' of right wing memes vs. the 'logos' of left wing memes. There is nothing particularly logical about contemporary Liberal discourse, it is almost entirely emotive. What we have found however, is that the logos of good argumentation is not a winning tactic against the emotive culture that the left has developed over successive decades if not centuries. The AltRight has, sensibly in my view, adopted a chaotic form of information war that has allowed it to blow apart the rotting edifice of American Conservatism/Constitutionalism, and its momentum has now carried it through to torment the Cathedral's 'inner party'.

the Jeb! Bush Guac Bowl meme

helped make the would-be candidate a laughing stock online

The AltRight itself is of course notoriously difficult to define, but the media and Hillary are most assuredly using it in its most nebulous sense, since they include the tame outlet Breitbart News alongside Millennial Woes under its umbrella. I have said that if you wanted to define the AltRight, you might simply want to say, "a loose collection of very pissed-off people", with the caveat that whatever they find disagreeable or unsatisfying about the Modern World, they have entertained at least some semblance of a right wing solution. Of course, critics are correct when they point to such and such a figure on the AltRight and declare that they are in fact Liberal on a given issue. There can be no argument on this point. The AltRight, not being an organized body, covers a huge range of people who disagree on a great many fundamental things. However, it should also be acknowledged that a significant portion of what is at present being kvetched about in mainstream news, is in fact Reactionary, and the Reactosphere as a subgrouping has reaped net benefit from the success of the AltRight as a whole. Not because of Trump's potential presidency (which I have given my own reasons for supporting), nor because of some populist desire to convert the masses into firebreathing Reactionaries, but instead to detonate the leftist discourse. In short, the virtue of the nebulous AltRight which when taken as a whole lacks real discernible properties, is its destructive rather than constructive element.

Using memetic warfare, the AltRight is breaking down a dialectic which has been dominant for generations. They are not replacing it with anything workable, after all, man cannot live on memes alone, but this is where we come in. This is what these long tracts of metapolitics and applied theology are for. While some see a conflict between the two: the low culture of 4chan memery, and the high culture of Maistre acolytes, this conflict is a category error. The two are in a form of symbiosis at present. While one destroys, the other builds a parallel replacement fit for those refugees from the void left by what memes help to expose. Whether its 'CurrentYear™' dispatching Liberal belief in the end of history, 'Muhh Feels' lampooning emotional excuses for policy, '*Tips Fedora*' sending up smug pop atheism, 'Wojak' communicating the disillusionment of a generation without purpose, or the omnipresent 'Pepe the Frog' who is now an all-purpose vehicle for any message one can imagine, memes are changing popular discourse. Someone in Hillary's audience even shouted 'Pepe!' when she mentioned the AltRight.

Clearly we are in some kind of political renaissance in far right thought, and because of this it is a vast ship which sails on this tumultuous sea. We're all on it. Of course, it is compartmentalized. There is a first class section where the champagne gets drunk, and the greasy engine room where coarser language is bellowed. There are passengers you might not want to even come within a five cabin radius of, there are some you will be right to make every effort to throw over the side into the freezing water. In such a diffuse 'movement', this is pretty much par for the course and people really shouldn't be getting bent out of shape about it

I don't meme excessively. that isn't my job, but to have an outright aversion to the use of memes (especially considering how effective they are) is a disarmament, often (though not always) motivated by some unfortunate sympathy with the enemy, some desire not to be too offensive, not to stamp on the special snowflake too hard. I couldn't care less about Liberals and their precious feels, that much I hope has been made clear long before now.

Some will use memes, some will not, but memes are a part of the rightist discourse at this point and the hysteria they have generated is evidence of their impact. It is becoming harder and harder, at least on certain mediums like Twitter and image boards, for the Liberal emotive rhetoric to take root in the way it used to because memes are making a mockery of them, triggering their sensibilities, and according to Hillary Clinton, causing parents across the United States to fear that their children might be eaten by racist frogs. 

I'm sure I've mentioned on prior occasions one of my favorite Chinese sayings, "may you live in interesting times", meaning "may chaos and uncertainty come upon you", which applies well to Liberals. Who wouldn't want what is driving them up the wall to continue? Meme on you crazy diamonds.

Mikhail Bulgakov's 'The Master and Margarita'

The first piece of fiction I have reviewed here, but it seems appropriate to provide my own reflections on the novel which has been called by some a 'masterpiece of the 20th Century', since it has theopolitical undertones, and was recommended to me by none other than AntiDem.

Mikhail Bulgakov was a Russian author and playwrite, though his working occupation was in medicine, where he worked for the Red Cross during WWI. During the Revolution, Bulgakov lost contact with most of his family who emigrated to Paris (his brothers fought in the White Army). His literary works were banned or partially censored for the most part, sometimes personally by Stalin himself, however the brutal dictator did recognize Bulgakov's talent, and in some ways sheltered his closely monitored career. He died of an inherited kidney disorder in 1940.

This novel is considered his greatest work, and nowadays many sayings found in the book have found their way into Russian parlance. Though it was not published during Bulgakov's life, his last wife manage to get it out in 1966, and it became appreciated the world over.

I can't be the only one seeing this

'The Master and Margarita' features a dual storyline that is interwoven. The primary story centers around satan and a small retinue of demons visiting Soviet Moscow in the 1930s, and their interaction with a couple who have been separated by 'the Master's voluntary institutionalization. The secondary story is a re-telling of the crucifixion, mainly seen through the eyes of the Roman prefect, Pontius Pilate. While the demons cause much havoc and scandal in Moscow, the events which are now disbelieved in atheist Russia are described in lucid detail.

Unlike most Western novels, this book does not have main characters as such, but rather introduces characters as they become important. These can be hard to keep track of sometimes, as many of the Russian characters have nicknames as well as their real names, which are used somewhat interchangeably. If you can get your head around this however, what you will find is a cast of very memorable protagonists. It is most interesting that the book doesn't really feature antagonists at all, other than perhaps the greedy and the arrogant among Moscow's theater administrators and literary critics. The devil is not an evil character in the book, but rather an agent of exposure. He is there to ridicule the absurdity of Soviet life, an the exploits of his cadre are less sinister and more hilarious. There isn't any menace in this novel, but that doesn't feel out of place at all, because the follies of human life without God are more worthy of mockery than the devil.

During their stay in Moscow, the demons help to reunite the tragic character of Margarita with her institutionalized lover, 'the Master' and secure them peace in exchange for a favor. The Master had his writing career destroyed by Soviet critics (a commentary on Bulgakov's life), and as a result became mentally ill. In Margarita, the devil sees something worthwhile, singling her out from among the teeming masses of Soviet citizens. Others he is not so impressed with, and does all manner of things from decapitating them to instantaneously transporting them to Yalta with the help of his loyal servants; Koroviev the interpreter, Azazello the muscle, Hella the naked succubus, and Behemoth, the wise-cracking alcoholic cat.

The Master and Margarita has been adapted for stage

and screen in Russia

The tale of longing and heartache between the Master and Margarita is so expertly blended into the backdrop of the novel's dark humor that it runs to its end with a seamless charm, and the vivid descriptions of Jerusalem during the Pilate segments are dreamlike, portraying Pilate in a sympathetic light which I found refreshing yet authentic. Undoubtedly the highlight of the whole experience is the treatment of Soviet life itself. Bulgakov skewers everything from tenants in an apartment block fighting like wild dogs over a spare room, to the corrupt literary establishment with its atheistic presumptions, and even the no-doubt ironically named 'lightning telegram' which Bulgakov renders as the 'super lightning telegram'. In the version of the book I had, there was a useful 'notes' section which explained some of the Russian peculiarities that Westerners might not understand. I can say with some satisfaction that I got a lot of the references, though a few were news to me.

I had a lot of fun reading this book (its the first fiction I've read in a while). It provided a much-needed release after the heavy ideological works I've been digesting over the last year and a half. Many thanks to AntiDem for the recommendation, and I am happy to pass it on. Don't miss this classic tale.

the final flight from Moscow

when the Master and Margarita are given peace

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In unrelated news, I wanted to link to a few things I had been involved with recently. I joined Adam Wallace (who recently appeared for a very well delivered speech in London) and Kaiter Enless for a hangout on Europe, religion, and Modernity. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-_PmqqboBY

Then I was party to a very shitpost-heavy hangout with Reactionary Ian and co. Apologies to everyone who got memes when they were expecting a more intellectual discussion. We'll do better next time I'm sure.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KcX2LByCSeE

And finally, there was my one-on-one discussion with Millennial Woes about the situation in Europe right now, the Normandy attack, the US election's relevance, and instability in Turkey. As some noted, including myself, this was me being incredibly blackpilled, and perhaps such negative prognostication was premature (thanks RamZPaul). I'm not invested in Trump, but I'd like to see him win, and it does seem in recent weeks he's gotten back into his groove. I don't want to discourage people at all, so apologies if that is what this video does. Still, it was a great discussion. Thanks to Woes for hosting me.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dd0RQwbdbLs

Finally, you might notice things have been a little slow recently. I'm technically on a hiatus right now. No appearances for a few weeks, just my weekly articles. Hopefully when I return to my usual workload there will be some exciting things going on, so stay tuned!

Should the West Consider Christ's Victory?

I had been planning this article for a few months, but since it was going into some pretty deep theology I wanted to do more research before finalizing it. The Orthosphere have generously published this essay on what I see as the virtues of the Christus Victor or Ransom theory of atonement that was popular among all Christians for the first millennium, and remains the standard belief of the Eastern and Oriental Orthodox today.

https://orthosphere.wordpress.com/2016/08/08/should-the-west-consider-christs-victory/

Can all believers once more recognize the light overcoming the darkness, the snake's head being crushed, the fist that smashes the prison bars which entrap our very souls? "In this sign you will conquer" is as relevant today as it was then, in all but one respect. Our enemy today is emboldened by our weakness and uncertainty, our inability to identify him. Until we can do so, and be confident in our justification and spiritual fortitude, we will have no hope of escaping this prison alive.

Trump has Intrinsic Geopolitical Value

Back in December I offered an official statement on the Trump candidacy, in which I made an outcome judgment, that being the best outcome possible for the radical right would be a very close election in which Donald Trump was cheated out of the presidency through fraud or some other questionable means. So long as some question surrounded the result of a Hillary victory, I felt that these circumstances would present the most gain to us. If people on the right felt disenfranchised, lost faith in both the Republican Party as well as democracy itself, further political radicalization could occur at a much faster rate. The one-party state, which represents the reality of Liberal society, would be exposed, leading to a bubbling well of frustration and disillusionment.

I still hold this to be true. None of the cause-effect calculations have changed. However, in the aggregate, I am now very confident that an outright Trump victory would in fact be a better end result, and here is the reason:

Before, Trump's statements concerning the Bush war record, his approach to Russia, as well as US actions in Syria and Libya, all of these could be considered as very clever maneuvers that distinguished him from the positions of the party's neocon wing. This wing was of course surprised to find out the voting base in many states had shifted away from their colonialist warmongering and towards Trump's more realist positions.

Just for clarity, here are a few of the potential president's positions as they pertain to big international issues:

ON ASSAD

"Personally I've been looking at the different players, and I've been watching Assad, and I've been pretty good at this stuff over the years, ‘cause deals are people. And I’m looking at Assad and saying, ‘Maybe he’s better than the kind of people that we’re supposed to be backing.’ Because we don’t even know who we’re backing."

ON PUTIN

"I'd be willing to bet I would have a great relationship with Putin. It's about leadership."

ON IRAQ & LIBYA

"People are getting their heads chopped off. They're being drowned. Right now it's far worse than ever under Saddam Hussein or Gaddafi."

ON NATO

"N.A.T.O. is obsolete and must be changed to additionally focus on terrorism as well as some of the things it is currently focused on! We pay a disproportionate share of the cost of N.A.T.O. Why? It is time to renegotiate, and the time is now!"

It seems to be becoming more clear as Trump remains adamant on these points, that far from a mere electioneering tactic, he does in fact believe in geopolitical multipolarity, hence why he has been endorsed by leading figures in Russia and Hungary, two states that stick in the craw of the proverbial 'New World Order', i.e - globalist powers. Meanwhile he has been spitefully criticized by the globalist agent and murderer of the French people, François Hollande.

The benefits of an American president finally willing to respect the natural boundaries of America's geographic authority are enormous. If the administration turns its focus towards the myriad domestic problems currently facing the country, as well as construction of a border wall to stem the invasion by Mexicans and Central Americans, the world would be given relief from its destructive machinations which are propogated through a string of embassy contacts and ironically named NGOs. Subversive cultural agendas are forwarded through this neocolonial apparatus which has been a staple of the American outlook for successive presidencies of both parties. The United States routinely interferes in the politics of supposedly sovereign nations to aid not necessarily those who will be of geopolitical use to the United States, but those who will ideologically find 'liberal principles' appealing. Putting an end to this, even if only in part, is a very large reward that comes part and parcel with a Trump victory.

sorry Pablo

you have to go back

Thus, I no longer consider the aim to be the almost-election of Donald Trump, but the actual election of Donald Trump. He's not the Ronald Reagan that Conservatives want, he's not Adolf Hitler that Fascists want, and God knows he isn't the Klemens von Metternich that I want. He is only the epitome of pragmatic industriousness combined with a flair for the dramatic and the offensive. That's fine. That's all we need him to be. For the next president to take his 'tanks' off the lawn of Europe and the rest of the old world, and instead put them on Mexico's lawn, is a blessing of untold value.

I am skeptical about how much Trump would change the domestic situation in America, in keeping with my previous observations about the outcomes of democratic processes, but if a Trumpian viewpoint is applied to the next US State Department, the geopolitical situation might begin to change quite rapidly, to Liberalism's detriment.

We cannot yet predict the outcome of this election, nor can any of what has been said above be taken as set in stone, but I can tentatively advise that it is desirable for the Reactionary cause that Donald Trump be the next president of the United States.

The French Republic is Finished

symbolic irony

during the Nice massacre, a fireworks accident engulfed the Eiffel Tower in smoke

Let me just run through this chronologically so the rest of this short essay is put in its full context and not misunderstood by those who have not been following events in France.

7th January 2015 - Terrorists working for Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula shoot thirteen people in a terrorist attack on the obnoxious French satirical magazine, Charlie Hebdo, including three police officers.

9th January 2015 - A close friend of the brothers who attacked Charlie Hebdo kills four civilians at a Jewish deli in Porte de Vincennes, pledging allegiance to the Islamic State.

19th April 2015 - Algerian Jihadist shoots a woman in Villejuif during an unsuccessful terror attack on two churches.

26th June 2015 - An ISIS linked delivery driver decapitates his employer in Saint-Quentin-Fallavier and tries to blow up a gas works.

13th November 2015 - The deadliest terror incident in French history sees nine Islamic State terror soldiers conduct grenade, shooting, and suicide bombing attacks on a number of targets in Paris including restaurants, a sports stadium, a metal concert, and bars. 130 are murdered.

13th June 2016 - An Islamic State terrorist murders a police officer and his wife in their home in Magnanville by stabbing them to death.

14th July 2016 - Another Islamic State terrorist drives a cargo truck through throngs of people during the Bastille Day celebrations in Nice, murdering a total of 84 people, and leaving hundreds of others with horrific injuries.

Today - A much-beloved local priest Father Jacques Hamel was decapitated in his Church in Normandy by two Islamic State assassins.

victim of the latest atrocity

That is 236 total murdered in cold blood by rampaging Jihadis, just since January of last year. France has more terror attacks now than Yemen, which is considered by many geopolitical analysts to be a failed state. Since the Paris attacks last year, the country has effectively been in a state of emergency with French police now roaming the streets armed. Nowhere is safe, and as the recent Belgian and German attacks attest, the surrounding nations aren't doing so well either, but France is the epicenter of this chaos.

I wrote an open letter to France after the Bataclan shootings, declaring that the Liberal aspirations of the country had doomed it to immolate itself. I'm writing this to succeed that letter in response to the dramatic escalation that has occurred since.

The Fifth French Republic, which was declared in 1958 after a popular referendum dissolved the fourth iteration of this monstrosity, is now hereby defunct. Why do I say this? Because it only exists now as an illusion. Without law and order there is no state, and France has no law and order. Terror agents from the religion of the Arabs commit killings without restraint. They maim and murder, slicing heads and blowing civilians to smithereens, long before even an armed French police can respond. What's more, the current government ACTIVELY ENABLES these terrorists, it harbors them, it shelters them, it clothes them, it feeds them. Butchers from the battlefields of Syria and Iraq as well as other theaters are invited into the nation by the president himself, working in tandem with Germany's Angela Merkel. France cannot be said to even have a functioning occupational government anymore. It has a leading 'gang' of socialist cretins who for some reason still have the no-doubt fraying loyal patience of the army and the police, but make no mistake, with this level of bloodshed and disorder, panic and fear, France is certainly no more of a functioning 'state' than Yemen is.

a reminder of the Nice attack

ten French children were among the dead

What are the implications, especially considering it was a priest who was effectively martyred today, in a chilling reminder of what happens to Christians in the Middle East under Islamic rule, from the beaches of Libya to the deserts of old Antioch?

We must fight or be killed. It is that simple, at least in France. Christians have no obligation to constrain themselves under the law of a non-existent state which has fallen into a particularly agonizing anarchy, in which the treacherous former government has imported an army of men trained in precisely the extermination of Christians, and by extension, all native French people. 

In response to the decapitation of a man who was under his charge, the archbishop of Rouen, Dominique Lebrum (who was in Krakow for World Youth Day) released the following detestable statement:

"I have learned with sadness of the killing this morning at the Church of Saint-Etienne du Rouvray. The three victims: the priest, Father Jacques Hamel, 84, and the perpetrators of the assassination. Three other people were injured, one very seriously. I cry out to God with all men of good will. I would invite non-believers to join in the cry!”

With all due respect, and I assure you that you deserve none, we have cried all the tears that we have. Christians have wept for the dead for decade upon decade, the victims of a barbaric and murderous cult. Our tear ducts are as dry as the lands these killers flow forth from. These two men were not victims in any sense or translation of that word, they were animals, fit for slaughter and I commend the French officers who put bullets in them. You sir, should be removed from your position and probably thrown into a lake somewhere, but alas we know the current Roman Catholic Church will not do that.

The quick-witted Marion Le Pen, who frankly is far more impressive than her flaky mother, had an infinitely better response:

"They kill our children, murdering our policemen and slaughtering our priests. Wake up!"

While some people rub their hands with glee thinking of how this will surely bring the 'far right' Front National into power, they really do not understand the breakdown of the French society. There is no democratic solution to this problem, there is only the solution of survival. Occidental man is under direct and sustained attack. Roman Catholicism, nay the entirety of Christianity is under direct and sustained attack, and this has been tolerated and tolerated endlessly. That toleration must come to an immediate end now that nobody can rely on any protection afforded by the state, which at best might bring your killers to a swift end, but is unlikely to save you from their blades.

There is no course of action, or at least none that is obvious to me, that is unjustified at this time for the self-defense of the people in France. A parasite has been germinating there for generations now, beginning with the first wave of Algerian migrants and now finishing with the tsunami of 'poor refugees' from Obama's wars. The media will obfuscate (BBC recently ran a headline after a German suicide bomb attack that read "Syrian migrant dies in German blast"), the politicians will tell you there is peace and order, and the blood will continue to fill the gutters of every city in the country.

at this point, they might as well be considered a media arm of ISIS

The fate of the French Republic is sealed. It is gone. As this parasitic worm begins to burrow its way out from the inside of the host, who must either kill the worm or bleed to death, it is now the job of the French nation, not the French Republic, to either accept death, flee their ancestral home for perceived safer pastures, or fight for their survival. 

What must be made absolutely clear is that there is not a priest alive, in any Church, not even the high and mighty Pope himself, who can deny a Christian his right to the defense of virtue against evil, for the moral paradox that ensues immediately strips said priest of his spiritual authority. To the Christians of France, and any others from outside who may be involved in the salvation of the French nation, you carry the will of God when you avenge the innocent, when your defense is mounted after every other conceivable avenue has been tried and found inoperable. God helps those who help themselves. Let us all pray that justice is swift for the ghoulish brown demons who infest the entire Occidental world, and their enablers, apologists, and willing concubines who may call themselves 'French' or may call themselves 'believers', but who are wolves in sheep's clothing, active agents of the enemy.

Jesus did not come to make bad people good. He came to make dead people live, but nothing will be done without your consent. You must choose life over death, survival over inertia, justice over inaction. It is choosing time for you now, as it no doubt will be for other nations very soon.

In the 1990s, France participated in the bombing of Serbia, killing countless Christians and destroying beautiful churches, all in the name of the Clintons and America's sick world order, all in the name of helping the Muslim Bosniaks and Albanian thieves to achieve their destructive ends. Then president Milošević, in the wake of his nation's defeat at the hands of NATO, had this chilling warning for the West, and it echoes today, almost two decades later.

Big Sister & Weaponized Nerds

The long-running feud between feminist publishing empires, plus the new wave of social justice warriors, and those fanbases who would be termed 'nerds' by most people has been simmering since the heights of Gamergate in 2014. While nerds won the rhetorical and intellectual contest, logistically, the victory belonged to feminists. Game companies are still inserting social justice garbage into video games, Anita Sarkeesian far from homeless is now executive of Twitter's censorship arm, and the latest assault on all things sacrosanct in the world of hot-pockets and Naruto references... well...

It was unveiled in  2015 that a remake of the beloved classic 'Ghostbusters' was being made, except this remake would have a few minor tweaks. The male humor chemistry from the original movie, the constant back-and-forth between Bill Murray and his costars, that was going to be scrapped. In its place, girl power! Four independent women, unmarried, one some kind of physicist; this was the new cast. Fans who complained that this was indeed like casting Jackie Chan to play Napoleon were promptly told to get lost.

The most prominent of these middle fingers to the cult following of the original movie was the scorn heaped upon Youtube star James Rolfe (otherwise known as the Angry Video Game Nerd). Rolfe in the video shown below didn't even mention problems with the sex of the new protagonists, only that the trailer looked boring and he had no interest in seeing something that didn't feature any of the original cast.

An editorial in the Sydney Morning Herald by the undoubtedly masculine Karl Quinn declared in response to Rolfe:

"The backlash against the all-female Ghostbusters is the last desperate cry of a patriarchy losing its grip."

It then went on to declare that 'troglodytes' would have to be 'dragged out of their caves'. A few articles were more sharp. Here's an extract from Reluctant Habits:

"But the crazed notion that gender isn't just the first way to identify a remake, but the only way to do so, speaks to a disturbing cultural epidemic that must be swiftly remedied by more movies and television starring women in smart and active roles, unsullied by the sexualized gaze of a pornographic oaf like James Rolfe."

That's right, a 'pornographic oaf'. Many were laughing at the absurdity of controversy generated over someone having an opinion, but this wasn't the end of it. Oh, no. Not by a long shot.

This week Breitbart editor and notorious gadfly Milo Yiannopoulos was officially banned from Twitter (at this time having over 300,000 followers) for writing a critical review of the movie and in doing so supposedly encouraging hate crimes or something against the cast, one of whom threw a tantrum and left the platform in outrage. Yes, you read that correctly, Twitter banned someone for having an unfavorable opinion of an agenda movie. I'm not a Milo fan. I find little redeemable about him and I don't give a damn about his contrarian attention-whoring stunts, but that isn't the point, the point is that this event represents a new step in terms of acceptable private censorship, markedly different from the most recent escalation which was a government sponsored terror campaign on guys meeting for drinks.

words on Twitter

the new terror threat

Like Gamergate, in terms of the truth, the nerds have won. The Ghostbusters remake had a pretty abysmal opening weekend and reviews from anyone worth listening to have been awful. But does that really matter? No. Through this movie the Liberal intelligentsia have made a statement of authority, "you are not allowed to have negative opinions of anything we produce". Before, we weren't allowed to criticize what Liberals did, their libertine debauchery for example, but now even their works cannot be criticized. Consider, we were allowed to criticize asinine airy fairy female empowerment bullshit like 'Eat, Pray, Love' as garbage before, but that is now changing. We are going to be 'dragged out of our caves' and thrown off online speech platforms for such heresy.

I had my own Twitter account deleted not too long ago, but it was over stuff they had deleted prior accounts for. Milo's erasure is the next iteration of 'Big Sister' and nothing is safe from her gaze. Since the 1980s, nerd culture has thrived in the shadows of a broken society. Men who don't have obvious purpose in their lives within consumerist modernity have barricaded themselves into overwhelmingly male and overwhelmingly white fandoms for everything from science fiction to Mario 64, and for a long time the kakistocracy was content to leave them to their own devices. Not anymore.

Remember during the height of the 'bullying awareness' craze Liberals demanded that schools crack down on those picking on their peers for 'being different'? Well, in an ironic twist, Liberals now sling at nerds the same high school taunts and insults that were once so zealously condemned to ensure every child knew they were a special snow flake. Now of course, nerds are again basement dwelling losers who need to conform because hey, it's the current year™.They must see and enjoy the bastardization of what they enjoy, full of plus-sized and obnoxiously loud black women apparently. As if nerds weren't already kept from beautiful women usually by social skills issues, but now they can't even enjoy such visuals on their screens.

the most cold-blooded misogynist around

Bear in mind, the actresses in Ghostbusters might be pitching a fit, but they don't matter. It's Hollywood and the other entertainment giants that matter because they are the private entities that are funding these adventures, setting up advisory groups chock-full of social justice warriors to ensure all movies, games, and television series' are as diverse as they should be. Make Moneypenny black? Sure! Let's make James Bond black next! Oh, and while we're at it, Hermione is going to be black too. Back in the 90s, when developers wanted to mix things up, they created Lara Croft: Tomb Raider, they didn't make Indiana Josephine. The point of this revisionism has sinister overtones, it is about erasing even the most minuscule remnant traces of the past, of a bygone era in which women were not viewed as either interchangeable or superior to men, in which whites were entitled to their own heroes.

Do nerds view things this way? Of course not. Most of them are annoyed about the unprovoked invasion of their spaces and the mutilation of what they cherish, and it doesn't really go beyond that. However the discontent is becoming very heated, and I have never had any doubt that it could be exploited for political purposes. There may be incredibly hardworking and intelligent people in these circles who want to find out what exactly makes social justice warriors tick, and the Reactosphere has been brewing the answer for an extended period.

Anyone who has objectively valuable qualities, whatever they may be, is worth the effort of political radicalization. We should be leaning on this, we should be stoking the flames as people get smeared and banned and have their careers destroyed for disobeying the almighty Big Sister, just one satellite power in a nightscape of bad actors. How difficult can it really be to inject some sex-realism, some race-realism, some government-realism into smart people who are typically not ideological and are under a sustained assault?

My message to these cultural refugees who are being pursued for 'borg assimilation', to use a nerd phrase: put down the Final Fantasy fanfiction and pick up some Maistre. You're not going to save the things you love, they will be trampled like so many pairs of rose-tinted glasses under the feet of feminist ogres. Everything that is of value to you will be whitewashed, and clinically turned into a grotesque left wing parody. With that in mind, don't you want some recourse, some 'justice' of your own? There is only one avenue to such a remuneration, and that is the inverted pyramid in flames, the kakistocracy burned to the ground. Ask yourself honestly, what do you have to lose?

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A few cool things to check out. I appeared on the Rebel Yell podcast with Ryan McMahon and co-hosts. This is a pretty long recording, covering a lot of familiar topics as well as some very interesting new ones.

https://radio.therightstuff.biz/2016/07/23/rebel-yell-127-mark-citadel/

Also a shorter talk with Adam Wallace on culture and democracy:

As well as an appearance on Reactionary Ian's Christian Reactionary hangout, a lot of discussion on the truck attack in Nice. (I did fall asleep around half way through this, as it was 2 AM!).

The Knightly Spirit (Companion Commentary)

A while ago, I took an analytical look at Nicolás Gómez Dávila's essay 'The Authentic Reactionary' (Parts I, II). Today I want to engage in a similar kind of analysis, this time delving into an essay by noted white émigré philosopher, Ivan Ilyin. Written sometime after the Russian Civil War, the essay speaks to national renewal and what it requires, not men who perform some necessary mechanical function, but a distinguished men of service, those whose orientation is profoundly non-materialistic and upward-facing. Mark Hackard is credited with translation. 

"Create in me a clean heart, O God; and renew a right spirit within me."

Psalm 51:10

"Through all the great discord of our days, amidst catastrophe, tragedy and loss, in disputes and temptations, we must remember one thing and live by it: the maintenance and propagation of a spirit of knightly service. First and foremost within ourselves, and then within our children, our friends and the like-minded. We should protect this spirit as something sacred; we must strengthen it in those who trust us, those who confide in us, and those who seek our direction. This is what we must advocate to our leaders and pastors, insisting and even demanding it. For this spirit is as the air and oxygen of Russian national salvation, and were it would run out, there would immediately set in an atmosphere of rot and decay, overt or hidden Bolshevism."

The first thing to outline is the pursuit of virtue initially in oneself, analogous to 'riding the tiger' as propounded by Evola. In these times of great tribulation, man is at a loss for guidance in his own conduct. It seems for most, the Church is not explicit enough in giving men direction, and they certainly cannot look to their political leaders for any kind of true north. Some might suggest the father as a role model, but in all but a handful of instances, our fathers are not likely to have been fully aware of the disintegration of civilization, and thus have wallowed in a myopic ignorance, or have actively aided the cause of Liberalism and revolution themselves. In the long shadow cast by the age we have only dead men and our own ingrained cultural memory to act as divining rods, but if by these means we are spiritually and mentally healthy, Ilyin is confident we can sow a healthy crop and reap a bountiful harvest in our own children and like-minded compatriots.

"The decades we have experienced are such that men accustomed to holding indifferent and lukewarm positions, unable or unwilling to fortify themselves and make a decision, have already had their judgment signed in advance. They are condemned to humiliation and the mire, and their vital forces will be used by the tempters of this world. Everywhere that there is no will, the will of the sons of perdition shall take the field. Everywhere that the conscience is silent and greed divides the soul in two, Bolshevism already conquers, and everywhere that the crude lust for power of some irritates the insatiable ambition of others, there is prepared seduction, disintegration and the triumph of the enemy. Everywhere that the spirit of chivalry weakens or disappears, disaster awaits us. So it stands now, and so shall it be henceforth."

What Ilyin condemns here is any notion that one can be neutral in what he in all his writings depicts as the cosmic struggle between transcendence (which might be called 'ultimate unification') and dissolution. He has no quarter with 'conservatives', those who waver, those who can 'see both sides' or attempt to play devils advocate. Within each of us, the will to the better self, the Imago Dei, requires attention lest it wither and die. The option in its stead is not one of quiet living nor respectable disinterest, but instead a contemptible cowardice. You must live under a roof, and are made to decide if the roof is that provided by God or satan, and while God asks you to break your back, satan will gently invite you to put your feet up, relax, and let those who are more fully in service to him go about their work without hindrance. There is no corner of the world in which this is not the case. When Tradition, and service to it, cease to become living realities in the minds of any man, regardless of race or creed, he turns over his land to despoilment. I am particularly reminded of this quote from Cortés:

"At whatever post a man may stand, this duty (if only the cause is not in itself shameful) has its idea giving meaning to his cause, consecrating it not as an occupation, but as service, service to God’s Unified Cause on earth. In distinction from the subject himself, having his own personal interests, sympathies and desires, God’s cause has its Transcendent paths of necessity and exaction. And so man’s personal interests and the Transcendent interest of his Cause at any moment can part and place him before the temptation of self-interest. At any moment, a man can find himself in the position of a mercenary, not knowing upon what course to decide, or the position of a traitor who prefers his interest to the Transcendent. The spirit of chivalry is comprised of steadfast loyalty to the Transcendent path."

Ilyin offers us the choice, sometimes presented in stark terms, between the higher and lower path of human will, that is the capacity for action in service to the self, or action in service to superior forces. God's 'Unified Cause' is analogous to Tradition which raises man towards theosis and salvation by making him more than merely man. Often the virtues espoused routinely by Reactionaries come into conflict with our own immediate desires and interests, and the truly noble always default to the first insomuch as their self-discipline will allow. Accusations against the Reactionary worldview I have heard in the last year, that we are 'Machiavellian' in our reasoning, are preposterous in light of this.

"There are men who do not see the Cause at all and do not comprehend Transcendent requirements. They know only their own business, personal success, and everything else for them is only a means to that end. All their activity proves to be servility and treachery, and from the works of these careerists, flatterers, bribe-takers and time-servers have perished and will perish all human organizations and institutions. Venality is their credo – it matters not for what they sold out the Cause, whether for money, honors or authority, and it matters not what was hidden in their soul behind the betrayal: open nihilism (as among the Bolsheviks) or a sentimental lack of character and justifying sophistry (characteristic of the pre-Bolshevik Philistines)."

The men described here characterize the active betrayer, the Judas serpent in our midst, he who would prostitute his own mother for a cushy job at the Politburo. Always it seems his decisions which are motivated by only the basest of human vice, will be dressed up in elaborate justifications for evil. Ilyin often hits upon the inherent nihilism of the red movement in Russia, possibly relating it to the Neitzschean 'will to power'. Lenin took the observations of Neitzsche, and discarded the philosopher's 'solution' to these observations in favor of his own. Stirneresque moral anarchism was another bourgeois step along the road to the proletariat paradise, and the goals of the advanced Bolsheviks in Russia could be described as having stripped Marxism of any humane element, and nihilism of any libertarian element. A dark void arose to replace faith in every instance where apathy was found abundant and into this void, the snakes of the left have poured forth every parlor trick under the sun to replace God of Man with Man as God. For Ilyin these reasonings mean little, he views all betrayal of the transcendent path in such a manner as described, as an inexcusable and universally capital crime.

our enemy is legion and their contempt for the transcendent knows no end

"There are other men who know of the demands of the Cause and the Transcendent, but who treat them with formal indifference, as if they were a heavy and unpleasant duty or a repellent inevitability – without love, inspiration or creativity. Their activity is “service,” but their service is merely carrying out the next “order” or “item”; they work as hirelings, and in the best case do not curse their labor, or as slaves, weighed down by their every effort. The fate of the Cause makes no difference to them. The demands of the Transcendent, however it might be named – the Church, the Motherland, Orthodoxy, the Army, Science, Art – only belabor and burden them. They are not dedicated to God’s Cause on earth. And from the works of these unfeeling machines, these indifferent men and time servers, all human organizations begin to be emptied internally and die away, disenchanting and irritating all who come into contact with them, provoking censure and straining an atmosphere of destructive protest."

By contrast, the men who fit this profile are those who, while not actively engaged in war with the World of Tradition for their own ends, in the nefarious or bloody schemes of Liberalism, their complete absence as a guard leaving his post maximizes the position of society's worse elements who find a more shallow resistance than would otherwise be apparent. Often lamented, this is the product of the metamorphosis from ritual to chore. When people no longer see the higher meaning of the actions they are required to perform, these actions lose virtually all significance and yield no benefits. One can kneel, place their hands together, close their eyes, and speak, yet are they necessarily at prayer? In 1917, the February Revolution placed a provisional government into power in Russia (we must stress this was not the October Revolution which is when Russia became a communist country), and the government repealed the mandatory requirement of attendance at Orthodox Church services for conscripted soldiers. The soldier's freedom of choice was put to the test, and a stunning 70% ceased attendance. It was not the repeal that killed spirituality in the Russian Army, it had already been killed prior, and the law only kept the phantom motions going as a crude masquerade. 

"Now as never before, Russia needs men capable not of servility or time-serving, but service. Men who not only see the Cause and comprehend the demands of the Transcendent, but who are devoted to God’s Cause on earth. Men not only not indifferent and not unfeeling, but inspired and inspiring others – men who do not concede the interests of the Cause neither for money, honors, and authority, nor over any requests or favors – incorruptible in the fullest and highest meaning of this word. These are men for whom duty is not hard labor and obligation is not repellent, because in their soul, obligation is covered by personal devotion, and duty has been submerged in passionate interest for the cause. These are men who are, of course, gladdened by any personal success, but for them, their own success always remains a means to serving the victory of God’s Cause. These are men who do not fear responsibility precisely because they are wholly invested in the Cause, and not at all do they seek personal good fortune and advancement at whatever cost. These are men of character and civic courage, men of an idea of will, volunteers for the Russian National Cause. Men summoned as organizers of Russia."

The differentiated man, the Reactionary, he whose ultimate service is to the transcendent path and its earthly imitation is the only hope for the salvage of society's ruins. Ilyin is not only looking for men who smile in the face of death, but who take great joy in their duties. These are, in his opinion, the men who can inspire a revival of the Russian spirit, but interestingly he presents the test of worldly 'good fortune' and 'personal success' to the proposed organizers. This was apparent to very few in Russia after the revolution. Once the shroud of ignorance was uncovered, a vanishingly small percentage of Russians had anything to gain from the overthrow of the tsar. In our post-Cold War, unipolar Liberal hegemony, the situation is far more taxing. There are no bread lines, there are no five year plans, and instead we have Xbox and iPhones, microwavable dinners and college sluts in ever club downtown. The immediate and personal benefits of Liberalism are easy to obtain, while those of Communism were placed in some distant future, after much toiling. We who set these idols of the Modern World aside to pursue that which is clearly not in our personal interest are those who pass through the philosopher's trial by fire. Nobody suffers more than the Reactionary, as in a pit of human excrement filled with teeming masses, he is the only one with a sense of smell.

"The spirit of chivalry comprises first and foremost the voluntary and willed acceptance of hardship and danger in the name of God’s Cause on earth. And we must admit that if life expects this from us always, and even in the most happy time it proposes us such burdens and the responsibilities and danger tied to them at every step – then after Russia’s military collapse in the Great War and her defeat in the Revolution, all of her rebirth and restoration will depend totally on whether there shall be found in our land a cadre of men firm in such a spirit and capable of such service. An incorruptible cadre, and therefore selling out nothing to either foreigners or the internal enemies of Russia; loyal in love and conscience, and therefore capable of gathering around themselves trust and dedication in all hearts faithful to the Motherland; knightly, and therefore called to service and the organization of public salvation."

This essay is devoted in part to the men of action, as opposed to the men of thought whom Ilyin typically addresses. He asks his audience to accept 'danger', and in his case this would have meant those committed to the physical removal of the Bolshevik menace from Russia. No alterations to the deepest hollow of society is ever brought about in 'theory', but in 'action' that flows from theory. One is passive, until it is no longer appropriate to be passive and then some process begins to either great success or monumental failure, and the outcome hinges in many cases upon the conviction of the participants (though this is not always the case, as with the tragedy of the Romanian Iron Guard). Can the radical right inspire this kind of conviction in men of action? This is an essential question, for without the emergence of an 'incorruptible cadre' the entire Occident faces extinction.

Codreanu surveys bones of his countrymen fallen in battle

Predeal, 1937

"The essence of knighthood necessary to Russia is first of all not in infringement, but in self-denial. Not one of the contemporary political parties is knightly, for they all infringe upon power and its attendant benefits. What Russia needs is a cadre of men with renewed and ennobled political motivation in their souls. Only new men can create a new regime, “new” not in the sense of age, name or the all-corrupting “revolutionary standing,” but namely in the sense of direction of the will and strength of will: of Transcendent direction and unbreakable strength. He who over these years of disasters, tragedies and losses has been unable to find within his soul new sources of political reason and political activity – sources religious, patriotic and chivalrous – who as before conceives of Russia (regardless of whether from the left or right) as a field for his career and private advancement – such a man is an enemy of Russia, bringing her poison and death from his heart, whatever programs and slogans he would use as cover. Outside of the knightly spirit of national service, all is aimless, harmful and in vain; outside of it, no one will free or restore anything, but will only create new discord, new chaos and a new civil war to Russia’s ruin and the joy of her immemorial adversaries the world over."

It is alluded that those who set in motion the usurpation of left domination will deny themselves any hope of seeing its fruits themselves, thus asking of them a price, that they burn a structure to the ground with themselves inside it, so that something good may come of this monumental evil at long last. When Republican forces in the Spanish Civil War were gearing up to square off with General Franco, there was a string of grizzly murders perpetrated against right wing figures in the areas they controlled. Near Madrid, essayist Ramiro de Maeztu was shot dead, his last words being "You do not know why you kill me, but I know why I'm dying: For your children to be better than you!" Through a needle's eye of violence comes peace, through a tunnel of carnage comes repair, through a spark of chaos comes order. The goals are clear and yet the hazards on the journey are both necessary and obscured. The ones who will not restore anything are those for whom a personal opportunism remains supreme and so we can never rely on such people, for in the end we will have to deal with them as well. Their torpidity has condemned the state once before and it can never be turned over to them again with the delusion of their loyalty. They have none. 

"Here is why those who stand aside from all foreign and Soviet “policy,” from all of these endless “initiatives” (abroad) and treacherous “compromises” (in the underground), from all the concoctions and squabbling of political parties, are right. However, this distancing should hardly signify the denial of sovereignty; not at all does it coincide with political meaninglessness and a lack of will. To the contrary – its entire meaning is in stockpiling political meaning and political will and in the Transcendent purification of the soul, in the concentration of the soul’s capability for comprehension and its most noble forces. This abstinence from the frivolous and the premature, from the vanity and intrigues of party politics, is imperative precisely to set a beginning for a new ideational and volitional approach to sovereignty in general and to Russian statehood in particular – the knightly way."

Unlike all political pieces within the purview of the overton window, the Reactionary stands completely aside from not only the rigged 'party system' of various states, but even the very notion that we should be in dialogue with this extremely narrow ideological spectrum, beyond holding it up to ridicule. There is no legitimacy to present Liberal dominion, just as there was no legitimacy to Communist dominion in Russia. And yet to separate ourselves from sanctioned debate, we have not relinquished an iota of our claim to that which has been so sadistically stolen from us and our progeny. This claim was protected, not by any legal structure, but by one of divine right, and so has endured the fire of war and revolution. We are strengthened by our segregation from the corrupt political world. We transcend it.

"For this we must begin from the establishment of an indisputable maxim that holds: Russia’s ruin was brought about and conditioned by the fact that Russian men possessed insufficient chivalry, and henceforth have flowed all the errors and crimes that have despoiled Russia, all these currents of spinelessness, faint-heartedness, greed, cowardice, venality, betrayal and savagery. And these errors and these crimes will be repeated; and the currents of this cravenness and faint-heartedness will pour out – until Russia paves a course to spiritual and religious renewal; until men of knightly style and knightly character arise and close ranks. And when this takes place, it is then they will found and strengthen a new sovereign tradition, for now dispersed and lost, but conceived many centuries prior in the spirit of Russian Orthodoxy, a tradition that endured through ages of struggle for Russian national greatness. This is the tradition of religiously-rooted state voluntarism that was again reborn in the Russian lands ten years ago."

It is unclear what precisely Ilyin is referencing as having occured in Russia ten years ago, but it could be the failed attempt to stem the rise of and eventual victory of Bolshevism in the empire. The quality of men is paramount, their pursuit of virtue, the knightly duty that is guided by a higher principle which dwarfs simple 'politics' to a triviality, that is what will bring about the restoration of the nation. This strikes me at least as being incredibly Evolian in its methodology, that it is not so much about any set of actions that bring about the downfall of Liberalism, but that the perennial virtues of the past be resurrected in a few who will bring about renewal in very much a natural order of things, the closing of a cycle. Ilyin imagines the Orthodox martyr as the pinnacle of this higher spiritual current that will once more bring the land into the harmony of 'sobornost' which seems to fit his description of 'religiously-rooted state voluntarism' (I will have an essay on this in the coming weeks). With that, I will give the writer under analysis the last word.

"This is what is most elementary and important. If it is not there, then neither shall there be a Russia, but there shall be discord and chaos, shame and disintegration. It is now that we must take this path and begin our renewal, today, without hesitation or delay."

Tsarist Imperial Navy Admiral Alexander Vasilyevich Kolchak

ready to be martyred after capture by the Red Army
Gotov Umeret

(Thanks to Michael Pascal for drawing my attention to this essay. A great find.)