Strangeloop 2015 was this week. Our favorite disinvitee decided it would be a good time to issue an Urbit white paper. Nick Land points to the highlights.
Also from Land, an ☀“Official” #NRx Best of the Week Honorable Mention☀: an Epic Takedown of anglo-utilitarianism in Insect Agonies. That concern for insect suffering should arise in the context of a thing called “Effective Altruism” is at once comical and frightening. Mocking it would be the natural reaction. Land brutalizes the argument far more by taking it at least a little bit seriously.
Atavisionary makes an appearance with a review by proxy of The Kite Runner, a story which, irrespective of its merits, appears to have touched a sweet spot in the progressive concern neural network.
In what we may only hope is the first of thousands of such snapshots, One Irradiated Watson crafts Mapping the Cathedral: ONE Annie Besant. This was an ☀“Official” #NRx Best of the Week Honorable Mention☀
A very perceptive comment by Mircea Eliade from 1942 over at Sydney Trads, in which he advocates the study of man as something greater than a sum of parts.
Over at Future Primaeval, Harold Lee brings us Why study aristocracy? (I mean other than Why Not?) Mostly because they are a caste that is at once utterly foreign to our liberal democratic experience and responsible for virtually all of classical culture.
We don’t have aristocrats today. Oh, we do have plenty of rich people, and even the middle class among us could outspend all but the wealthiest ancient aristocrats. But the key factor that made aristocrats productive wasn’t money; it was freedom. It was the freedom to tinker and engage in intellectual play, to focus on being an excellent person, on living well, and doing things. Being an aristocrat is not about having a lot of stuff, it’s about not having higher ups to please.
And that’s something that even the rich mostly don’t have today.
What would it be like if the aristocracy existed today? It’s not just a LARPy question.
A modern aristocracy would not need to have serfs. It wouldn’t need to have unjust laws separating aristocrats from commoners. As we’ll see, it won’t even require an economic revolution. What it would need is a new social contract, a new culture. The people in that culture may not be the richest or the most influential, but they have to be able to believe that they’re at the top of the food chain and didn’t need someone else’s stamp of approval. And if they could pull this off, we might see the birth of a new Royal Society or a new Athens.
Harold’s well written article is an ☀“Official” #NRx Best of the Week Honorable Mention☀
Reactionary Tree has a nice video up: Stefan Molyneux and Charles Murray.
Jim pops in this week to discuss The British military as a self licking lollipop. (America had the self-licking ice cream cone, which was way different.) Related: The 2007 British surrender incident. Also for those with memories longer-lasting than that of a goldfish, he has The principle of merited impossibility. History doesn’t actually repeats, but it is said to rhyme. No. it repeats.
Bonald exposes The problem of egalitarian superiority.
Bonald also thinks Buddhism may have caused the Enlgihtenment. If so, it didn’t do that in Eastern cultures. Ideas have consequences. But also different ones.
Dividuals has an answer with In Defense of Buddhism. He notes:
Buddhism had a weird way of developing into “one of the five world religions” even though it was never the goal, as the original goal was to have an elite “Jedi Academy” only, for the guys with only a little dust in their eyes. How exactly that happened is long and complicated, suffice to say that Ashoka was a conqueror type and when he converted to Buddhism he started to perform “conquests by the Dharma”. In Tibet a king found Buddhism handy. Long story short, it was more about rulers using Buddhism than Buddhism trying to influence rulers.
Also…
Asia stuck closer to the natural kingship. So there is this bunch of elite philosophers sitting in a secluded monastic community saying there is no duality, no good and evil, only Oneness. And the king still finds murderers are evil and executes them. And the guys in saffron robes don’t oppose it. They don’t have any relationship to each other. They are not trying to tell the king how to do his job anymore than they are not trying to tell shoemaker how to do his job.
So it seems the West’s own unique proclivities are still responsible for its own evolution.
And then this: The Star Wars mythology as a proper political allegory.
Let’s say something happened a long, long time ago, in a galaxy far away. But we are not 100% sure why. All George Lucas had is some newspapers drifting over from the galaxy somehow, with mainly text, a few photos, and perhaps a short video clip or two, but certainly not the whole thing. And he decided to write a movie based on that plot. Unfortunately, it is possible that the articles he based the plot on contain a propaganda narrative, not the actual truth.
Dividuals earns an ☀“Official” #NRx Best of the Week Honorable Mention☀, which is pretty darn good for a new guy.
Also Why “Dividuals”? Isn’t that “Whence”?
Over at The Migration Period, a lot of data in Subtle Trends in Muslim American Assimilation. Subtle, but in the opposite direction of assimilation.
Part III of Empedocles’ epoch-making series Restoring a Virtue-Based Ethics for the 21st Century is up: Some Virtues and Vices. He includes some suggestions on the way they should be enforced.
[D]o not let people produce the characteristic beneficial effect of virtue without displaying the virtue itself. On the account given in this series, virtue is a selected effect, so if someone is not producing that effect, don’t give them the benefits of acting virtuously. If someone in your military unit or police department is a coward, do not reinforce this vice by giving them the good opinion that is deserved of the brave. The military needs to punish cowardice, and squadmates should not let the coward enjoy the same reputation as a brave man. Do not act like someone who is obese is actually attractive (unless you are married to them :)). Do not forgive cheaters. Don’t flatter a women’s vanity. Do not continue to do business with an unjust man, and so on.
Empedocles earns an ☀“Official” #NRx Best of the Week Honorable Mention☀ for this effort.
Adam Wallace continues his Evola Primer series with Pt. 7: On Competition and the Metaphysical Principle. Also at West Coast Reactionaries, Hotherus talks about Choosing Christianity’s Identity. For good and ill, I think that is not something that can be chosen.
Alfred Miller has a poetic lament with The Post Industrials. Henry Dampier has more to say on that subject below.
Poet Laureate E. Anthony Gray brings us an ode: The Novel.
Rounding out This Week in Reactionary Poetry, Free Northerner pulls up Rudyard Kipling’s Cold Iron. As a matter of fact I have kipled, and it was great!
Also from Northerner, a report on the long march through the institutions for Normalization. This time it’s pedophilia. We’ve been here before, in the early to mid-70s. But history wasn’t ready. Now it is. Because, of course, history only goes one way. And NRO is out in front seeding the fields for it.
Mark Citadel has a nice, link-rich rundown on European politics, East and West and East vs. West in Interesting Times Indeed. Also a nice essay on The Great Cosmic Cycle, and how we moderns are not well disposed anymore to see it.
Slumlord thinks “NRx is compromised“. I’m not sure what he means by any of those words. He is right to reject a reductionist “Genes Only” view of human nature, which is a temptation to some within the HBD-sphere, but gets little play within proper NRx circles. It sounds like Slumlord should read CWNY…
CWNY is eloquent as always with Europe and the Daughter of Jairus. He is not enthused by some of the anti-Christian rhetoric that floats in some White Nationalist circles.
Just as Lady Macbeth screamed, “Unsex me here,” so the neopagans scream, “Unsoul me here.” It’s more than depressing, it’s the stuff of Shakespearean tragedy, to see white men who hate white people while loving white chromosomes.
This Week in Social Matter
Ryan Landry kicks off the week with his A Recycled Plan For Syria.
Ever wondered why the mightiest air force in the world cannot bomb ISIS to death? This is a group in the open desert with 20,000 and maybe 50,000 troops. ISIS serves this plan. The Russians are accusing the US of knowing ISIS locations but not bombing ISIS.
America needs ISIS to weaken Assad enough to depose him and create this quilt of micro-states. This is why the US war against ISIS goes nowhere. The moral posturing of American leaders disgusted by Assad is thrown in the trash the moment it leaks that America holds back against ISIS because they want Assad gone. They do not want that message out there, which is why O’Hanlon has to sell you on this patchwork of little safe spaces for Syrians.
David Grant earns an ☀“Official” #NRx Best of the Week Honorable Mention☀ on Tuesday to wrap up his edifying series on ancient Greek history with Final Lessons From Sparta. Grant takes on the notion that a lack of dynamism keeps traditional from responding to changing conditions:
Sparta puts the lie to this claim. For two hundred years, Sparta held political supremacy and embodied Classical virtues. Piety, respect for authority, hierarchy, proper gender roles, and reverence for traditional were all foundational elements of Spartan society for most of its history. At the same time, the Spartans were cutting-edge innovators, capable of adjusting to a wide variety of circumstances. We might say that Sparta squared the circle, combining adherence to tradition with adaptability, but the dichotomy between conservatism and innovation is actually false.
Henry Dampier takes the Wednesday slot to talk about America’s Republican Guard. He explains how the mainstream right, as loyal opposition, plays a more important role than most people understand:
So, the contemporary conservative movement such that it exists is a bargaining organization with fundamentally low leverage. It controls no organs of political authority or prestige. It bargains on behalf of subject peoples against a far more powerful governing apparatus. It enjoys this privilege because the institutional left sees them as responsible negotiating partners, which they are — they’re people that they can work with, whose sensibilities they share, who live in similar cities, and uphold similar mores. In return for being good partners, they receive certain privileges. When they stop being good partners, those privileges tend to be revoked abruptly.
Finally, part one of Anthony DeMarco’s and my Ascending the Tower talk with Sarah Perry came out Friday: Episode X Part 1 – “‘Be Yourself’ Means ‘Be Like Us’”. Sarah was a superb guest. She should probably take over the show.
This Week in Henry Dampier
Henry Dampier kicks off the week by suggesting How To Return Heavy Industry To the US. If America is a post-industrial economy, it is, he argues, only because American opinion and public policy have turned against the IRL of Things, and not at all because the laws of physics or technology have changed. Henry lays out the manifold ways in which America has made herself uncompetitive at building stuff. For this superb analysis, Henry wins the ☀☀“Official” #NRx Best of the Week Award☀☀. Congratulations!
On Tuesday, he discusses Why Corporate Leaders Push For Immigration. There are many reasons. None of them involve much concern for “huddled masses yearning to breathe free”. Quite the contrary.
Next we have Cause & Effect. This yet another of Henry’s patented tours of the vast canyon between the sort of institutions we need for broad-based human thriving and the kind we build instead. Excellent observations all along the way. For example:
None of this [heart-wrenching propaganda] needs to be true for it to be effective as a political narrative. In fact, the less verifiable that it is, the better, and so long as it seems compelling and urgent, the masses will rush to support a story which is emotionally compelling but false than they will be willing to support a story which is emotionally inert but true.
And Friday comes with an admonition: Come To the Dark Side. That an opinion journal, much less an Israeli opinion journal, would find the slightest hint of a genetic basis for intelligence tantamount to Hitler rising from the dead is not news. But a journal dedicated to Zionism, the thus Jewish Nationalism, makes the hypocrisy at least more entertaining. (It’s a religion, not a race. Because it can only be one of those, right?). The memetic autoimmune system has gone haywire, attacking perfectly healthy cells…
Panicked arguments that the exploration of genetics will cause neo-Hitler to rise again are themselves the enemies of clear thought on these issues. It also lends credence to people who would actually like a neo-Hitler to pop up again, just because of the hysterical attempts to suppress the publication of simple truths. By discrediting sober-minded and prestigious scientists in an attempt to buttress stupid and wasteful political doctrines, the Responsible People have given credence to fringe figures who are willing to be public enemies.
Ending that suppression would cut off that air supply. Speaking the truth generates legitimacy. If you make speaking the truth something that only rebels can do, you lend legitimacy to your own enemies, because when your enemies speak obvious truths, the people will tend to be drawn towards their banners and away from yours.
Like always say, if the only people telling the truth are Nazis, then only Nazis will be telling the truth.
This Week in 28 Sherman
Ryan Landry kicks of the week at his home blog with the return of Soros Watch. Best read in with breathless Brit-voice excitement. At least the lede part:
Bond villain. Tentacles all over the globe. Riches to spare on sumptuous accommodations. A hand in the biggest geopolitical events around the globe. Always trying to cause a crisis that he can benefit from immediately. The villain has a tie to a horrible past deed or historical event, like collaborating with Nazis. That is the method and those are the traits of every villain in every Bond film. It also describes George Soros.
So… someones gotta watch him. SoBL does.
Tuesday he has a Trump Poll Revelation. As pointed out by Vox. Trump’s GOP opponents are eating support mostly from each other. Not Trump.
No one wanted to admit immigration is that important. The GOP elite did not want to admit openly that they wanted to sell out their base for open borders, and that Trump knew what a big slice of the base wanted. They cannot call him the crank, loose voter bloc since that bloc seems to be elsewhere. He also has given those voters as us vs. the world feeling, which is a sticky glue for a group. This could be the Grand American Party strategy recommended by others or just an echo of the Perot revolt of 1992. Something feels different about this with open socialist Senator Bernie Sanders beating up on Clinton at the moment.
The GOP is just going to have try harder to remove that damn spot of institutional racism!
They Could Gentrify Cuba. Could? Should! Cuba is basically Florida. Without rednecks. This is actually no joke. Investment in Cuba is almost certain to be opening up soon. And Landry is recommending Strong Buy:
Cuba is also an incredibly close destination. This makes it a prime expat destination. Forget their health care, another key factor giving Cuba an edge over other Caribbean islands: the white population. Expats can retire and with the much lower cost of living, make their meager Boomer retirement savings (jet-skis and $200 total for many) last longer. The major benefit for Cuba being an expat destination is its proximity to the US. Grandma and Grandpa being expats in the Czech republic, Chile or Honduras conjures images of incredible distance. Cuba is just next door.
One could build retirement communities in Cuba for peanuts and still profit handsomely. If the Cuban government partnered with developers and then proactively created a retiree visa program like some other South American nations have, they could pull in thousands of expats immediately. Developers love knowing they have guaranteed demand. Hookers might help here as Boomer men will still be popping their blue pills and trying to feel horny like teenagers even as they hit 75.
A lighter look at WW1 this week: The Ridiculous Uniforms. That which doesn’t kill us, makes us strong. But it usually kills us.
This Week in Kakistocracy
Porter kicks off the week with That’s Just Haram. Mild mannered surgeon by day, Ben Carson appears to be a first class hate thinker by night. His firm, now reiterated, opinion that a Muslim ought not be President, has got our Cultural Masters quoting Constitutional Chapter & Verse. It won’t last of course, but it’s awfully lulzy to witness.
Stalinesque show trials have come to the US, and Porter has the obsequious details of one case in The Comrades Would Like to Confess.
Here we some astute commentary on the Racket (that is) Reunification.
And finally Porter has an autobiographical tale and object lesson all rolled into one: The Trouble with Turtles. Sixty pounds of snapping turtle is one helluva lotta snap.
This Week… Elsewhere
Evolutionist X celebrates her 200th post with an autobiographical sketch. Here are some notes on Creativity and Psychoticism. Also some musings on Bi-modal brains?
Briggs hits The Stream with a duesy this week: Strange New Climate Change Spin: The Hottest Year Ever Inside a Global Warming ‘Pause’? Also he formulates The Pope’s Bargain. Accept It—If You Dare, wherein non-Catholics are admonished not to be Cafeteria non-Catholics.
Also at Briggs’, this was good: Scientists Pretend They Can Answer Why Some Are More Religious. “Religious”, when applied to a person, used to have a nice objective meaning: Having taken vows to a religious order. Nowadays… well… I guess it means whatever the psychological researcher wants it to mean.
Religious in scientism (which permeates our culture) now means somebody who is spiritual, but in a way that is unfriendly to Science. People are allowed, even encouraged, to be spiritual, of course, which is different, because spiritualness (and not spirituality) acknowledges the True Boss, which is Science.
Like I always say, “Just because you’re adapted to infer agency doesn’t mean agency doesn’t exist.” And Briggs is on The Stream again this week with Actually, the UN’s Vision for Lifting Up the World’s Poor Differs Sharply from the Pope’s. So beware that cafeteria anti-Catholicism.
Speaking of agency inference, Kristor examines The Irreducible Remainder of Improper Reduction.
Over at Imaginative Conservative, a nice essay: Opting Out of the Benedict Option? A taste:
We live not in a culture oppressed by one party’s lies; we live in a culture in love with the ability to lie to itself. “Abortion is about me and my body” is just one. “Happiness is what makes me feel satiated” is another. “Tolerance is supporting whatever you want, Caitlyn.” Joseph Pieper could say, “I told you so” because indeed we are seeing abuse of language as abuse of power, but now at a level and ubiquity that is unprecedented, much more fundamental than anything I’ve experienced in reading history or culture-watching prior.
The author, T. Renee Kozinski, is not sanguine about the idea of Catholics “surviv[ing] culturally, economically, and politically as lay communities withdrawn enough from the world to become Benedictine.” Perhaps not Benedictine strictly speaking. It seems to me the value of the so-called “Benedict Option” is to withdraw culturally and economically so far as possible. To me the idea has always been more about a direction than a particular disciplinary endpoint.
Also at Imaginative Conservative, Eva Brann on Socrates on Statesmanship: The Actual Intention. As well, Demolishing Myths About Communism pays honor to the memory and greatness of Robert Conquest.
Esoteric Trad has the scoop on Japan’s rise to prominence in (what I would have thought) an unlikely stage: The Power of Symbols. Rugby and Identity. As well as the ideologically tinged malaise of the South African squad.
Real Gary’s Fed Up series continues. This week it’s the Latvians, the French, and even the Spaniards getting there.
Roman Dmowski over at Man-Sized Target calls Top in the Education Bubble. When your shoe-shine boy is going to college, you know that’s where the dumb money is going.
Cane Caldo reviews the Donald Rumsfeld documentary The Unknown Known. And came away with a renewed respect for the man. Apparently, quite in spite of the documentarist’s intentions.
Chris Gale reminds us The seven deadly sins do not include racism and homophobia.
In fact, if a SJW is against it, it is probably righteous: the only utility they have is the reliably point in the incorrect direction.
Dalrock chronicles the decrepit state of St. Paul’s teaching for wives to to be subject their husbands. The most damning line:
My wife explained that no, she couldn’t see their crosses because she was behind them, but that their extended discussion tearing down their husbands with a litany of petty grievances gave them away.
This brand of Christianity needs to be ovened.
Filed under Too Heavenly-Minded To Be Much Earthly Good, Jordan Bloom wonders what exactly does Michael Gerson think are worth being called racist over?
Speaking of market tops, Kill to Party is calling Peak Fake Rape. The string has been pushed as far as it can go.
[E]very so often I’d encounter a Sally Rapehoax, and I’d know the deal immediately. The stories were never very angry, and the girls were more than happy to share. Basically, the opposite of everything you’ve ever heard about rape.
Now, more than ever, rape is a dire Feminist issue because white American women would otherwise be thrown off the victim hierarchy with unfathomable speed and gusto. White American women are the most privileged class of people in world history… yet, to maintain this unprecedented privilege, they also need to maintain their spot as the top minority.
Al Fin talks about Anxiety and the Dangerous Child.
Welp. That’s all I had time fer. I’ll start rolling this rock back up the mountain tomorrow. Keep on reactin’! Til next week, TRP, over and out!!
Thanks for the roundup! Lots of great essays this week. :)
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Thanks again for the roundup and linkage.
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Thanks for the linkage
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Once again thanks for the links. A useful entryism mechanism ;)
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