The cancer eating away at the modern West is a lack of authority to which people can point to judge public policy, public debate on those polices, as well as the reactions to those policies and debates. As a result, debate has degraded into various camps striking poses, usually by signaling their unhappiness with the pose of other camps in the public sphere. The lack of an agreed upon authority means there is no way to judge the merits of any claim. Instead, it leaves force to resolve disputes.
A good recent example is the neocon opposition to Trump. These people are entirely defined by their hysterical reaction to Trump. There is no substantive issue around which they base their opposition. They are not pointing to ideological authority, tradition or even rules within the party. Their opposition to Trump rests on no authority other than their emotional reaction. That’s not an appeal to authority. It is a tantrum, the sort of thing you expect from toddlers. It is also the norm in the public space.
Now, there are two types of authority. One rises from objective knowledge accumulated over time about the natural world. An authority on engineering is someone, who has been trained as an engineer. His credentials are determined by meeting a set of objective criteria, like engineering exams, but also by remaining in good standing with other engineers. The same is true of all areas of expertise. These are the authorities on what is or what is not empirically true about their area of expertise.
In this regard, the West is in surplus. No matter the specialty, you can find someone who knows the material and can explain what is known about the topic. If you have an interest in statistics, you can find books written for every level of reader. You can find on-line courses covering just about any bit of knowledge you seek. If you have a desire to read Homer in the original, you can take on-line courses in ancient Greek. When it comes to what is factually true about the world, we have a surplus.
Where there is a shortage is in the area of what ought to be. What is true in the world is a very different thing than what ought to be true. What is true does not rely on a human authority to make it true. It does not need a supernatural authority to validate it. Two plus two will always be four as long as the universe exists. What ought to be true, however, relies on people, either as the authority or the voice of authority. This is the basis of moral codes, hierarchy, dissent and the collective action of society.
For most of Western history, religion was the authority upon which society relied to determine what ought to be. In the early Middle Ages, there was a great debate about the nature of that authority. That finally was settled and the Catholic Church was the worldly manifestation of that authority. After the Reformation, that authority was eroded, but replaced with Scripture as the source of authority. The story of the West, until the Industrial Age, was the story of Christian authority over man.
Of course, Christianity is a relatively new thing, so there have been other sources of authority in the West. The authority of blood is a universal. The great men of a people rise to the top of society. Their descendants, having inherited their great qualities, are assumed to be a source of authority. The king may not have done anything other than be born to the right father, but he has the magic blood. If it turns out that it did not take or the magic has lost its power, someone new must come along.
That’s where tradition fills in the gaps. The king’s heir may be less than the king, but the institutions that rose up around the king are now invested with authority. The reason the heir should be king, the reason he and no one else ought to have final authority, is this is how it has always been done. Tradition is probably the most powerful source of authority, as it assumes the is, as well as the ought. The custom, through trial and error, is proven to be the best, so it ought to be maintained.
In the current age, normal religion has been sidelined, not only as a source of authority, but as a legitimate part of public discourse. Fifty years ago, a public discussion of morality would have had representatives of various faiths to discuss what ought to be according their religions. A century ago those representatives would have provided authority for the current morality. Today, no public debate about moral issues, about what ought to be, includes religion, much less priests or theologians.
Tradition, of course, is by default eliminated from consideration. Much of what is passed off as public discourse is really a debate about how best to tear down the remaining traditions of society. The entirety of Progressive thought can be symbolized by the toppling over of statues on the college campus. The only thing they insist ought to be true is that truth itself must be overturned. Progressive morality, such as it is, is both the negation of moral truth and the denial of objective reality.
A world without authority, especially an agreed upon authority, is anarchy, but humans naturally retreat from anarchy. This is because anarchism is just mob rule. The ideal of anarchism is the mob mutually and magically agreeing to not murder one another, while the reality of it is the mob demanding authority to bring order. It is why democracy, which is just mob rule, is always a transition state. It is the period between the respect for natural, hierarchical authority and authoritarianism.
An example of this from history is the slow collapse of the Western Roman Empire, first into constant warfare, then into chaos and finally into the anarchy of local authority in the early medieval period. The end of the republic was not the end of a natural authority in Rome. The rulers still had to respect the gods and traditions. It is when those sources of authority collapsed that the end was clear for the Empire. The subsequent rise of the West was the rise of authority, Christian authority.
The modern West is undergoing the same sort of collapse of authority. Christianity, like the pagan faiths of the ancient world, has receded to the fringe. Tradition and hierarchy has given way to mob rule and force. What’s missing from the analogy is a new religion that provides a coherent order to the gathering chaos. Progressivism is an anti-religion, in that does not provide order to the natural world. Instead it preaches a denial of order and the denial of reason. It’s a primitive revolt against the natural order.
For sites like this to exist, it requires people like you chipping in a few bucks a month to keep the lights on and the people fed. It turns out that you can’t live on clicks and compliments. Five bucks a month is not a lot to ask. If you don’t want to commit to a subscription, make a one time donation. Or, you can send money to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 432 Cockeysville, MD 21030-0432. You can also use PayPal to send a few bucks, rather than have that latte at Starbucks. Thank you for your support!
the bumper sticker:
Question Authority
only applies until they are in power
then you must genuflect before them
meet the new boss
but don’t question his Authority
same as the old boss
The first question is whether the “ought” is objectively true. Lewis answers “yes” in Abolition of Man, as does Ayn Rand with her objectivism. Before you celebrate “science”, between Climate Change and Transgenderism, people are anti-science. The “is” depends on your opinion? Just because you don’t believe there is a war between God and the Devil, Good and Evil, doesn’t mean that they and the war doesn’t exist. That is the point of propaganda, to deflect attention into trying for a futile peace or convincing us there is no war so we don’t fight when we would fight on the… Read more »
I became an outhouse objectivist of sorts in my younger days, and find little wrong with the philosophy today. It wasn’t perfect, but the closest I could come with what I knew then. The problem my political enemies always threw at me was this: “By what right do you feel justified in imposing your moral and ethical code on me…?”. I had no ready answer. Later I found that Christianity… and I believe I found an honest rebuttal to that one: “By what right do you abandon all morals responsibilities and ethics?” Z, like so many, gets this one absolutely… Read more »
Christianity isn’t about controlling others. It’s about controlling YOURSELF
Yes. But ZMan did not ‘get it wrong,’ as he did NOT postulate that Christianity was about controlling others. All he said was that Christianity was the authority in moral matters.
“Real, honest Christianity isn’t about controlling others. It’s about controlling YOURSELF.” Yes, but don’t get carried away with this. Does God have designs for society as well (e.g. the Social Kingship of Christ)? You can coerce others if their behavior harms others, including in the sense of leading people away from the Faith, leading them toward false and evil thinking that will keep them from controlling themselves and obeying God, if we’re talking about very traditional Christianity. I remember Donoso Cortes, in one of his essays (not his book titled ‘Essays’) or speeches writing that men who will not control… Read more »
Christianity is about conformity. A convert conforms himself to God and a community of believers. One born into the faith is conformed to the community but then needs to conform to God. Z Man is completely right about moral authority underlying a culture. Paganism failed, now Christianity has failed, (Scientism is rather a joke), and so what comes next out of the chaos? I contend it can only be a new form of Christianity less dependent on Tradition and Scripture, more dependent on Experience and Faith. Perhaps the monastic experience (personal knowledge and revelation) having a wider acceptance and embrace… Read more »
The crazy pentecostals are based on Experience and Faith. “God wants you to send me money so I can get another jet”.
The idea of “ought” implies that there are moral laws in the universe and that is explicitly denied by the left. I wager they will find out that they are wrong
Well said. We are in a transitory time, and we should remember that. Our opponents have no plan beyond tearing down white society. That destruction will succeed in most white countries because whites as a whole lost their way and no longer have the will to fight back. But that destructive process will destroy our opponents’ ability to function themselves as they have no ability to maintain a functioning society. We are not taking on an organized force with a grand plan for the future. We’re watching an emotionally-charged mob destroy and ransack the palace. There’s not much that we… Read more »
Ah, but what comes next is indeed the million dollar question. I wonder how the Japanese hold it all together (or seem to) with no religion? It certainly helps that they are not multi cultural, but so were the European countries until recently. It seems like multi racial might be doable, but certainly not multi cultural.
The Japanese have hundreds of shrines that are well maintained and millions of people visit them regularly. Japan also supports traditional crafts and customs, giving high honors to the best artisans.
The answer is that the Japanese hold it together by maintaining and cherishing the traditions of their culture. They have not needed religion in the Western sense.
Anyway, Western religion has given up on Western culture so it is no longer of any use.
I saw a piece a long time ago about the Japanese funding traditional and cultural artists and artisans. I think they were called “Living Treasures”.
Fantastic idea. If we can first stop the hordes from tearing down our statues, portraits, dedication names and generally erasing our past… first.
That is because Western religion like our pseudoscience is Universalist and Christianity in particular believes that it needs to preach to and save anyone. This dilutes its ability to serve the West by drawing away attention from our peoples and since Men of the West have different folkways than Men of the East
On the other Shinto is a Japanese religion and while occasionally others may practice it, the faith is by the Japanese for the Japanese and so still serves them
they don’t let any non-japanese live there.
Are they “holding it together”? I’ve heard their latest generation of ‘grass eaters’ put our soy boys to shame. They don’t pursue women, they don’t have any interests in home ownership, and live only to work, play video games and read manga comic books.
The fertility rate here is only a bit higher higher here than there (White TFR 1.6, Asian US or japan TFR 1.4) and it would not surprise me if the Gen Y US TFR is lower still
Overall practically no one is having children in the developed world, even Latinos in my part of So Cal have conspicuously less children than 10 years ago. with a TFR of 2 or less, under replacement
However Japan is safe, clean and orderly unlike our nation.
Next comes economic collapse and war. In the war new and capable leaders emerge, they form new elite and then will be western rebirth. Like it have always been. Rotten degenerate elite and institutions away and then new ones. Things come beyond repair and must replaced time to time.
The Muslims, who our opponents so gleefully welcome into the west in large numbers will be very happy to be that organized force to fill that space the left destroyed. Be careful what you wish for, left.
Muslims are motivated but not particularly capable. Right now, Muslims look impressive because they’re marginally organized and willing to physically fight day in and day out in the streets. Whites are not. If whites ever regain their willingness to fight back on the ground, in their own neighborhoods, we’d take Muslims out in a couple of weeks. Look at what happened to blacks in L.A. They scared away whites but have been ethnically cleansed from many areas by Mexicans, who aren’t exactly the most capable people on the planet but are willing to fight. There’s no group on this planet… Read more »
There’s no question whites are the most capable, but it’s the willingness that’s in question. There’s also the question of numbers. That’s a bigger problem in Europe than the US in regard to Muslims. They may not be very capable, but at some point numbers matter and they’re still flooding the West, as almost every white person is still terrified of being called a racist.
That’s the problem with the moderate muslim neighbor everyone knows. As soon as they are in the majority, that moderate neighbor votes for sharia and the muslim brotherhood. Democracy is then extinguished by demographics.
A similar issue arises with the “nice black couple” moving into your neighborhood. They may be nice and reasonably bright, but their kids will regress to the mean and their nieces and nephews who inevitably come to live with them will already be at the mean.
It’s why you can – and should – judge an individual on the basis of race if you’re going to have any interaction with them beyond one generation. My CivNat and libertarian friends hate that example because they know that I’m right.
Techies are highly organized and motivated. Some of them must be getting sick of empowering the mob.
Our “opponents” – are parasites. A parasite that kills the host and/or stops it’s chosen host from propagating is not going to be a very successful parasite. But to your point about an “organized force with a grand plan for the future”….. I’m going to disagree somewhat. They do seem to be organized, but for as long as I have paid attention to the Commie left – they definitely have never had any “grand plan for the future” – at least not one based in anything in the objective knowledge that Zman talked about. From my observation they have had… Read more »
Calsdad. They are ideologues that believe in the infinite perfectibility of man—without of course sufficient understanding of, or belief in, the causes (Natural) for those imperfectabilities. Christianity stands in their way, Science stands in their way. So both must be destroyed, or controlled through subversion. So Z-man asks (rhetorically) for the new authority that we can turn to when seeking truth. A century or so, that looked it might be Science—and their high priests, scientists—but today that is seen to be fruitless as so many scientists are willing to speak falsely when science conflicts with their Lefty ideology.
tearing down white society.
Don’t be naive. The opponents are also tearing down Christian society in Africa, the Middle East, and China. Maybe they don’t count because they’re not “white”?
Excellent analysis of our present state in the west.
To me I see it in my lifetime like with the Beatles John Lennon song Imagine. The lyrics imagined a world without religion and hierarchy.
And this world was magic.
“ a lack of what ought to be” and what that means in the modern world is very insightful.
The Z Man is one of our best!!!
>>>In the current age, normal religion has been sidelined, not only as a source of authority, but as a legitimate part of public discourse. <<<
One religious group is still the final authority on all matters….guess which one!
The Amish?
They pretty much own the solid wood furniture market, so it’s a natural step to assume Total Global Mastery isn’t far behind…
Those who give up Christ eventually must pay their respects to Muhammad.
True authority is organic. It is the cultural equivalent of what ecologists term a “climax community.” It does not – cannot – spring up overnight, and while it has to be tended, it cannot be willed into existence.
But as we are up against a clock, some sort of placeholder has to be arranged. But what ought this to look like?
100% agree. Authority derived from legitimacy/consent is an emergent property. Imposed authority can become legitimized but Machiavelli spends a lot of The Prince detailing the problems usurpers face before they are both loved and feared. My ideal ethnostate order would approach authority like Rome, as pietas, a merger of honoring the gods, the state and the culture, and that takes a long time to develop. The “placeholder” would be a syncretism of existing authorities along the Jewish model – sorting our what’s required to live as Whites on this Earth and making that the new “right.” White is right.
We have no commonly agreed upon source of truth and authority. The only things holding us together are inertia and greed. Either civil war or revolution will be inevitable, probably after the next economic downturn.
I’d add that part of the clown world glue that holds this ship of fools together is the anarcho-tyranny of state monopolistic violence and coercion that holds a certain group to a standard while exempting a growing collective of groups from not just those standards, but any standards. One idea that gets lost in the civil war now debates is that one side is already violent and has been for a long time. One side has undermined natural, voluntary compliance with authority grounded in truth, ie earned via competence and pro-community generative efforts, with complete submission to illegitimate authority grounded… Read more »
Sure we see examples of anarcho-tyrrany all the time. However most of us, myself included are too damn comfortable. Pay the occasional ticket, swallow humiliation that our ancestors would killed over, do not kick up a fuss, and we are left alone for the most part. Things need to get worse. As long as a critical mass can insulate themselves from the worst of the poz, things will continue as they are. We need the American left to react the way the British did after the Boston Tea Party. We then need to give our people a convincing alternative that… Read more »
Agree. Along some axis of comfort/discomfort and risk/reward we choose to be held under tyranny until the pain of such is too much. That is understandable, a natural human response – especially absent the moral and spiritual universal as an anchor. The trick for me, and I assume many others, is to move toward an alternative in advance of extreme pain, chaos, collapse etc. That requires not just an appetite for some measure of discomfort, but first, a large measure of awareness that (a) the risk is already greater than we think, (b) our comfort is largely a precarious facade… Read more »
The rabble tears it all down, in the absence of any authority, yet it wears the cloaks of authority (religion, government, “science”, the courts, and even history) as deceptive clothing. The cloaks have no meaning any more, yet the rabble parades around in them, acting as if they still count for something. The idea that the rest of us do not recognize their credentials and costumes really pisses them off. They think the costume makes the man, and because we won’t afford them the same respect we used to give others similarly costumed, it drives them nuts.
“They think the costume makes the man, and because we won’t afford them the same respect we used to give others similarly costumed, it drives them nuts.”
“I’m not a doctor but I play one on TV…” Then the actor speaks excathedra about some health issue. You’ve hit the nail on the head: the illusion is reality to them.
The hysterical reaction to Trump actually can be analyzed if you break it down a bit. 1. A lot of leftists were genuinely blind to the fact that Hillary is a shrill, bitter, hideous demon-thing. They actually thought she was a Nice White Lady On the Right Side of History, And It Was Her Turn. Trump was the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. 2. Other leftists thought the demographic fix was finally locked in permanently, whites would be outflanked for good, and the presidency would be an endless conga line of Obama clones and Nice White Ladies until the rise of… Read more »
Of these, I’d say that number two is probably the most important. After the Romney debacle of 2012, the Left honestly thought that they had all future elections in the bag. Like the Marxists that they are, they thought that they understood the underlying dynamic of history. Like Marx, they turned out to be mistaken.
The left thought that the Democrats would continue to rule with a succession of Obama-like authoritarians and a complicit and ever more creative judiciary. Trump temporarily snatched away the prize they were sure they had, and tjis epic tantrum ensued.
The Left always overreaches. It has been our saving grace.
Yes, this. As my Dad always said, the Devil always overplays his hand.
They actually thought she was a Nice White Lady On the Right Side of History, And It Was Her Turn. Trump was the Grinch Who Stole Christmas.
Reminds me of this brilliant meme from election day.
Since the reaction to Trump and his supporters has been so hysterical, what’s going to happen when actual white nationalism becomes more out in the open, such as when mainstream political leaders or media figures espouse it? If that day comes, the reaction will be something we’ve never seen.
Violence of course. But violence out in the open is not to be feared. It will wake people up and lend awareness to the lie within which we now live.
That would be an existential threat to their vision and way of life. They would have no choice but to react accordingly.
Hillary was the gorilla on the stage that all the lefties refused to see: https://www.theguardian.com/global/2018/jan/21/jordan-peterson-self-help-author-12-steps-interview So if we are all monsters, how are we to be saved? The first thing is to understand how our worldview evolves. Crucial to this is a 20-year-old experiment on inattention – the famous Invisible Gorilla experiment. This involved recording two teams of basketball players and playing back the game to observers, who were asked to count the number of passes their team made. During the game, a man in a gorilla suit walks on to the court, pounds his chest and then walks off.… Read more »
Religion (in in the most general sense) is present in all human societies. As the West rejects Christianity as the organizing religion, candidate replacements are regularly being put forth. Global warming/climate change/etc., was tried, but its reliance on apocalyptic prophecies make it problematic in the long run. The latest candidate is anti-whiteness, which provides a hierarchy of good and evil. In particular, the ultimate evil is a traditionalist white Christian straight male. As each of these elements is removed the evil gets less and goodness grows, until the ultimate good is achieved: the progressive non-white (((non-Christian))) pan-sexual non-binary. This construct,… Read more »
Everything the left promotes leads to chaos. All the way down the line from attacks on religion, law and order, the border, down to the family unit, including attacks on fathers and masculinity, and the blurring of genders and so on. When every Dem presidential candidate supports free health care for invaders and the left promotes gender choice for very young children, that can only bring chaos. Increasingly to think the US will hold together seems laughable, unless it’s held together by force.
Wolf, you are a bit backward on cause and effect. Everything the Left does promotes chaos because everything the Left does is *designed/intended* to promote chaos. To promote chaos/anarchy is to undermine the current status quo and legitimacy of the governing consensus. When the governing consensus disintegrates, the governmental authority dissolves. The Left may then take over and install a new government with themselves in charge. Now this sounds very conspirous in nature, as if millions of people take their marching orders from a central command. But it is not. Most Lefties as they say, are useful idiots. They haven’t… Read more »
Z’s tugging at the toughest of roots in citing the need for a new religion. We’re fighting a religious war right now without a unified front. The Anti-White faith, animated by its founding myth of Holocaustianity, has to be countered on an existential and moral level. Modern “Judeo-Christianity” is too doctrinally and institutionally subverted to hold the line. The other major faiths suffer from similar entanglements with Talmudry and universalism that runs counter to everything we know of human biology and psychology. We might be able to overcome the worst in ourselves, but trying to overcome our own biology is… Read more »
Muslims have mastered the “BFYTW” of their faith. Don’t be fooled by the soft and friendly outliers. The basis of the Muslim following is extremely tribal. The tribe itself is established for the perpetuation of a low IQ people living in a place with few resources and little to sustain human life. The aggressive exercise of “enslave, tax and kill” is a logical response to such an environment. Some Muslims living in the west have given a self-actualizing and ecumenical sheen to their faith, but freely exercising such things is apostasy. The root of Muslim faith is kill the others… Read more »
I read Richard Spencer’s stuff back in my neo-con days, I’m not fooled. They’re no significant threat to us if we don’t live with them though. Western Muslims are the ones who go splodey, the idea that they were hatching world domination plots in caves in A-Stan and Iraq was Jewish taqiyya.
I’m just setting ground rules for a theology that harmonizes the legitimacy and primacy of ethno-nationalism for all faiths. That’s not to say we should mix with or lay down for any foreign tribe. Let them worship Allah in their lands and stay out of ours.
Spot in Dutch.
Paganism already allows for multiple gods of multiple peoples. Our Greek and Roman ancestors believed every family had its own spirits, as well as tribes and nations. Buddhism has no problem with everyone finding their own “path” to what it sees as enlightenment – there is no “one” way. That doesn’t seem much better than liberalism to me. One of my problems with modern Christians is, that it seems that everybody is allowed their own, personal Jesus, a Savior who is custom-fitted to your individual moral flavor. Against gay marriage? Your Jesus just so happens to agree with you! Pro… Read more »
Real theologians will probably tear apart my simpleton understanding, but modern Protestant Christianity, as it is practiced today, most closely aligns with examining the king’s turds and deciding what it means, IMO. Everything is up for grabs in some sort of debating society among the credentialed ministry. Catholicism and American Jews are following that lead. To Felix’s point, all theological roads seem to lead to a defense of the biases of any given speaker. Helluva way to try to establish authority.
Trying to impose authority contrary to the admixture of existing religion and morality is the hardest method. Adapting the religion/morality to biological and secular priorities is what I’m aiming for.
You missed my point. The point is we’re not looking for “one true faith” for the here-and-now movement. I’m talking about a secular moral framework that each of these religions has to fit into to be compatible with an ethno-state. particularly that we’re not letting religious authorities claim “higher law” over the secular powers. You’re going to lose 80% of your American allies if you start with the Asatru stuff. We can have a framework that legitimizes both and we must subordinate religion to secular tribalism and biology-first priorities of race survival. Religion serves the people.
You missed my point. I’m talking about a secular moral framework that each of these religions has to fit into to be compatible with an ethno-state.
I see. But I don’t understand why we can’t just cut out the mumbo-jumbo and go straight to the underlying, secular moral framework.
You’re going to lose 80% of your American allies if you start with the Asatru stuff.
Asatru is not a thing in Europe. Yes, we’ve got a few fart-sniffing hippies imbibing holy chamomile tea and whatnot, but the hardcore Asatru societies are in America.
The secular morals are a lot easier to push when you can use the existing religious-moral framework rather than push against it. A lot of our in-fighting starts with religion and I’m looking to adopt a framework that minimizes that friction. No matter what flavor of paganism you favor, American Christians won’t go there. I’m an exception, have a Greco-Roman view already, but when we’re talking about a moral framework we can all work within, I think it’s important to remind Christians that Germanized medieval Christianity was ethno-centric, not kumbaya, and that being dissident Right doesn’t mean you’re a heretic… Read more »
That’s a rather jaded view on religion, isn’t it? Just tell people that their religion is really about whatever morals you want them to subscribe to? I’d hope we wouldn’t need biblical exegeses to explain why ethno-centric nations are better than multicultural ones.
being dissident Right doesn’t mean you’re a heretic or pagan. Globohomo has been peeling Christians away from us with that line of argument.
Fair point, but it also speaks to the divisive potential of religion.
It’s not jaded, it’s factual. How else does syncretism happen? Scripture doesn’t say what day to celebrate Jesus’ birthday. Christian doctrine on divestment of wealth piggy-backed on an existing pagan tradition of civic largesse/noblesse oblige. The more compatible a belief system can be presented to be with existing mores, the less resistance it encounters. Like any other exercise in rhetoric and persuasion, the less “buy in” you demand, the easier the sell. Neither the transcendent beliefs of pagan-style spirituality or Christianity are profaned by this approach except to the extent that it rejects “hard monotheism,” which is itself an imperfect… Read more »
I see what you mean and I understand the utility, but I still think it’s bordering intellectual sharp practice. If I were a Christian, I’d not be prone to take moral lectures from a crypto-atheist playing the God Game for political reasons, no offense.
I consider Christians allies, but I believe they should be left to sort out their own politics. God knows the discussion always goes tits-up when I chip in.
Jung noted “what you resist not only persists, but will grow in size.” Since our society is avoiding entering an unavoidable collapse anyway most attempts at solutions are too complicated and on a large scale will make things worse Trying to invent a new philosophy or a new religion rarely works You can save you and yours , maybe a tribe and if we are able to organize remove a lot of people and close the border. Over time, everything will work itself out and in a longer time frame, a couple of hundred years , the US will mostly… Read more »
Jung noted: “what you resist not only persists, but will grow in size.” Talmudic nonsense. in a couple of hundred years , the US will mostly be devout and back to Christian, White, Agrarian. I doubt it. Atheism is a red pill – a one-way ticket. If you’re not Christianized from birth, you’re as likely to become Christian, as a devout Christian is to convert to Hinduism, or (and I’m sorry to reproduce this hateful analogy, but it is necessary) suddenly decide to believe in Santa. Which is to say that it sometimes happens, but that’s humans for you: not… Read more »
Talmudic or not, In the case of catabolic collapse do to complexity and cost most actions and efforts will make things worse. Some things are inevitable just and I while I could be wrong, I suspect complexity driven collapse is a done deal Right now though, more or less, every machine we make is one less baby born. And note we’ve been in this cycle for around 50 years (1.8 TFR in 1973) non stop and every action has been to double down Amusingly a friend of mine went from Catholic to Hindu having learned from a friend of ours… Read more »
The Anti-White faith, animated by its founding myth of Holocaustianity,
Not Holocaustianity. Slavery. Have you slept through the last 4 weeks??
“What’s missing from the analogy is a new religion that provides a coherent order to the gathering chaos.” I’m inclined to think we need nothing new, primarily because I trust Solomon on this point – “there’s nothing new under the sun” when it comes to contrasting the various philosophies and worldviews. Humans are good at updating and retreading the old paths, but ultimately there’s a finite set of possible worldviews. The necessary discussion, then, is which extant worldview makes all of human experience coherent and intelligible. Yes, there will be knowledge gaps that science is unable to answer; enter philosophy,… Read more »
“What’s missing from the analogy is a new religion that provides a coherent order to the gathering chaos.” We were progressing toward such a religion a century or so ago as Christianity was fading in the West. It was called “Scientism” and was based on observable reality and the scientific method for determining/verifying such. The conflict then was between the old religion, Christianity, and the new religion, Scientism. There were skirmishes and great battles, but a new authority was being established. A line was being draw between moral teachings and Natural law. In the end, both “isms” would be more… Read more »
Science is a wonderful field of study, but scientism was found wanting; scientism’s bastard children were humanism and postmodernism because science couldn’t (and simply cannot) answer the great philosophical question “What is the purpose of man?” Scientism’s answer to that question is … there IS no purpose – it’s all meaningless chaos. The moral teachings of scientism? There aren’t any. When there is no purpose and nothing that transcends the material world you get the “God is dead” philosophy … the prevailing worldview of the 20th century. And that hasn’t worked out so well. So to Z-man’s original point, we… Read more »
First, “truth” is the accurate perception or conception of reality, and nothing more. “Wisdom” is the encapsulation of knowledge about what “works” for any particular group of people in a particular environment, and “works” means that it maximizes the ability of these people to survive and thrive. “Religion” is the mechanism of passing wisdom between generations and ensuring that the “people” possess the tool of wisdom to help them survive and thrive. “Authority” is a term of civilization and incorporates the various ancillary sources of wisdom that have arisen subsequent to religious practices; for example science.
Tom, well said. One must attempt to adapt from those universal truths if one wishes to establish a “new” working morality as Exile pointed out.
Oh, and one more point. Two plus two equals four is not a “truth”, it is a tautology.
In other words it’s a ‘trivial truth” which is to say it’s always true because it’s proof is a tautology. 😉
I think you guys, and especially our host here, need to read Ilana Mercer’s book, which provides a much more positive spin on the collapse of (corrupt) authority: https://www.amazon.com/Trump-Revolution-Creative-Destruction-Deconstructed-ebook/dp/B01HQN8V6I
This book is partly responsible for a increase of optimism on my part even if the Democrats win next year.
I think this book will help change your perspective on what’s going on. It certainly did for me.
Maybe what comes next for philosophy is a major turning point in our understanding of the nature of reality? Last 25 years of quantum mechanics (double slit experiment, quantum eraser, entanglement) have raised the probability that Neil’s Bohr was right “everything we think is real, is made of things that are fundamentally not real”.
If matter is ultimately discredited (and time & space) as unreal in the underlying reality, that opens the door wide for replacing materialism with idealism. Religious thinking and practice could flourish under that kind of revaluation in understanding.
Different types of societies have different central principles and the central principle of democracy is equality. Taken to its logical conclusion, this inevitably leads to the rejection of any kind of higher authority because everyone’s equal and no one has the right to tell you what to do or not to do. In today’s West, the only sin is to offend against D(versity), I(nclusion) and E(quality). Before the 20th Century, it was difficult to find anyone who had a good word to say about democracy. The framers warned against it. They knew their history, philosophy and human nature and realized… Read more »
Let us not panic, and view this dispassionately and objectively. There are some good things happening. Consider: The democrats – those pillars of multiculturalism, social justice, and political correctness… are falling apart at the seams. They are a microcosm for the multicultural nation – it simply won’t work. They can’t run a political party, never mind a nation. Their lickspittles in the high tech industry won’t be able to do their dirty work for them – they can’t even do their own. All the leftst controlled institutions are failing now too: the newspapers can’t sell a subscription, the schools are… Read more »
Epic, John Smith, just bloody epic. Cheers!
This column contains two fundamental errors: 1) It states: “There is no substantive issue around which [the neocons] base their opposition.” It’s very clear exactly what issue at least 95% of the neocons base their opposition around, their very clear opposition of Heritage America and their very clear opposition to anyone who thinks the USA is not simply a war machine for their own nefarious ends. 2) It also states: “It does not need a supernatural authority to validate it.” This is a fundamental error. EVERY human society from ancient times requires a supernatural authority. Or aliens. Whatever you want… Read more »
In other words, I agree with John Smith. I am unaware of any society in human history that was set up without any reference whatsoever to something supernatural. The only ones I can think of are the recent forms of the commies and we saw what nightmares ensued. Whether in Egypt, in Rome, in Sumeria, Persia, Judea, and ALL European royalty, China, Japan, the rulers all relate or hold some blood line claim to whatever supernatural authority/reference/power is of their own people. I would be very interested to hear of any human society before the commies that completely eschewed a… Read more »
I’m going to disagree with you, Johnny55, as to “atheism” killing millions. It wasn’t ‘a belief in nothing’, no, it was the influence of a very real, unseen god. Not the god who speaks through you, but a different one. The malevolent ones who feed on pain, gods as real as your own, except in that they can only live here- and we are trapped with them. Intelligence arose as an antibody to their influence. Your god of Life, a force beyond this world, can only use us, frail vessels, to fight this Infection here, on this ground. Does your… Read more »
Yup. And the Declaration specifically referenced “nature’s God” which was a clear indication that Natural Law was understood to be authoritative because it was “God’s.”
Hats off and a deep bow to all involved in this capital discussion. I must blame Exile for pointing the ship in the right direction.
Real meritocracy, given rein, gifts us with true stewardry and leadership. Excellent job, gentlemen and ladies, you make me so proud of my people, the White Dissidents.
Today in my various newsfeeds I saw an article about how we can’t let that archaic old Constitution stand in the way of eliminating the electoral college, because nothing can be allowed to stand in the way of pure democracy. The author showed no awareness that pure democracy has been tried many times, failed every time, and that the founders understood this very well. It’s as if there is no past to these people. They act as if their ideas are new and profound and have no interest in testing them against history, yet these are things that average school… Read more »
Vizzini, you are probably overthinking this. They want to get rid of the EC because they think doing that will give them an electoral advantage. Believe me, if they thought they had a political advantage in retaining it, they’d be singing praises of the constitutional protections provided by the EC.
All their talk about democracy is just noise. Useful until it’s not.
From twitter:
“Conservatism use to be smart enough to bring a guy like Allsup under their umbrella to serve their purposes and absorb them into mainstream conservatism. Their purge mentality is leaving them with nothing but people like Kathy Zhu.”
(Found @westland_will)