This Week’s Show

Contents

• 01m52s Hurricane Helene
• 11m32s Vice-Presidential debate
• 19m07s The Israel-Iran War
• 30m19s Longshoremen strike
• 33m56s President Carter at 100
• 35m49s The Great (squirrel) Replacement
• 40m04s Signoff with Buck Owens
• 00m00s Signoff

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Transcript

01 — Intro.     And Radio Derb is on the air! Greetings, listeners, from your undeniably genial host John Derbyshire, with a glance at the news as September crumbles down into October.

Before proceeding, just a word of thanks for the encouragement and support I get from listeners and readers. Back in July, when VDARE finally succumbed to the relentless assaults of Letitia Lard-butt and her legions of lawyers, I admit I was in low spirits for a while, but you guys soon got me back to my normal, cheerful, sparkling self. Heck, I may even write another book, possible title We Are More Doomed Than Ever.

Please allow me my weekly reminder that you can make a tax-deductible donation to my work by mailing an earmarked check to: The VDARE Foundation, P.O. Box 211, Litchfield-with-a-“t”, CT 06759.

OK, this week’s news. Top of the headlines: that disastrous storm in the Southeast.

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Every once in a while, I stumble upon a topic idea that vexes me because I am not sure where to go with it. A month or so ago I stumbled upon a Jordan Peterson video in which he explained why Jews are so successful in America. It was a bizarre thing that presented many jumping off points. Then the video disappeared from YouTube, as he no doubt has minions policing the site, so I went looking for it elsewhere.

I did not find it, but I found something similar that he wrote on his site back when he was being stalked by alt-right types asking him about Jews at his events. What came to mind was a post from five years ago where I used Stefan Molyneux and Scott Adams to explain the sophist of ancient Athens. For some reason that brought to mind this interview on the site IM1776.

It seemed like there should be a show about sophistry there or maybe a long post on the topic of profilicity which is related. The trouble is the topic is probably too big for a thousand-word post and maybe not big enough for a show. Anyway, I decided to wing on a show and let the chips fall where they may. That means the show will either be cheered as one of my best or jeered as one of my worst.

Something that did not occur to me while doing the show is that certain topics have become sophists tests. In fact, in retrospect I should have called the show that and made the show about the topics that flush out the sophist from the crowded field of people who present themselves as analysist and critics. If you cannot manage topics related to race or ethnicity, for example, you are a faker.

We got a taste of this in the vice president debate when Walz started ranting about how Finland has low crime but lots of guns. The online audience erupted in “what else does Finland not have?” while others remained puzzled by the question. If you know the answer, you know the truth, but if you do not know the answer or cannot understand the question, then you a faker or simply ignorant.

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. 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 via crypto. You can send money to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 1047 Berkeley Springs, WV 25411-3047. You can also use PayPal to send a few bucks. Thank you for your support!

This Week’s Show

Contents

• Intro
• What We Mean By Sophistry
• What The Ancients Thought
• Leo Strauss
• Modern Sophistry (interview) (Link)
• Sophistry & Democracy

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This Week’s Show

Contents

• 01m30s Canceller gets canceled
• 12m48s Crushing dissent in the Party
• 24m06s The Amy Wax saga latest
• 32m08s Good news about Higher Ed.
• 34m55s A new ministate
• 37m49s Sir Keir is the wurst
• 39m52s Signoff for Springfield
• 00m00s Signoff

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Transcript

01 — Intro.     And Radio Derb is on the air! Welcome, listeners, from your holistically genial host John Derbyshire, looking back on another week of fun and frolic in the public sphere.

Before I begin, my thanks as always for your emails and your support. This is the last podcast of September so it comes with a reminder that my monthly Diary will be up next week, readable at johnderbyshire.com/Opinions and cross-posted to The Unz Review.

And please let me just also remind you that you can make a tax-deductible donation to my work by mailing an earmarked check to: The VDARE Foundation, P.O. Box 211, Litchfield-with-a-“t”, CT 06759.

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The defining feature of this age is the never-ending crisis, always surrounding the latest name for the Devil. Everything about politics surrounds the current panic over Trump, Putin, white supremacy, and so on. These are just names for Old Scratch and the people going on about it are in a panic. It is not just that the Devil is out there, but that we must act now to prevent some terrible thing he is doing.

The theater of American democracy is always the same. The people we call the left are always in a panic about the Devil or a potential victim of the Devil. The point of their panic is to generate a sense of urgency to do something about the Devil or about the alleged victim of the Devil. Sometimes, it is a combination where the agent of the Devil must be stopped in order to save his victim.

Trump has been useful for the regime because he is the Devil, but not an abstract version like climate change or a foreigner like Putin. It is much more difficult to get people excited by a distant threat or one that is hard to explain. Trump is right here, walking among us. For the people we call the left, the last decade has been defined by the great struggle against the orange demon and his minions.

When Trump is gone, they will have a huge hole in their lives, but they will find a replacement as the center of American identity is this concept. What it means to be an American is the crisis of Old Scratch. To be an American means moving from cause to cause, always the same cause though. It is the crisis of what to do right now about Old Scratch and his evil designs on our democracy.

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. 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 via crypto. You can send money to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 1047 Berkeley Springs, WV 25411-3047. You can also use PayPal to send a few bucks. Thank you for your support!

This Week’s Show

Contents

• Introduction: The Crisis & Old Scratch
• Old Scratch
• The Crisis
• Permanent Crisis

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This Week’s Show

Contents

• 02m06s Trump twice lucky
• 09m49s The Grim Beeper
• 15m08s This is not 1954
• 30m12s Trump’s inner gentleman
• 32m19s Scientific American betrays science (again)
• 37m17s Sir Keir speaks American
• 39m08s Et in Arcadia ego
• 42m03s Signoff with Johnny

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01 — Intro.     And Radio Derb is on the air! Greetings, listeners and readers, from your manifestly genial host John Derbyshire, bringing you commentary on the week’s news from a National Conservative point of view.

As I go to tape here midday on Friday, the week’s big stories have been Sunday’s assassination attempt on Donald Trump, and the very interesting advance in military technology we saw in Beirut, Lebanon on Wednesday and Thursday. I shall give full coverage to those.

Humming away in the background are topics less dramatic but at least equally consequential, topics concerning the upcoming election, immigration, and the culture wars. I shall have things to say there, too. In the matter of immigration, I shall in fact engage in argument with the Boss himself, Peter Brimelow, not without some trepidation.

As usual, though, before we start Let me just remind you that you can still make a tax-deductible donation to the Derbyshire retirement account by mailing an earmarked check to: The VDARE Foundation, P.O. Box 211, Litchfield-with-a-“t”, CT 06759.

OK, the news. First that assassination attempt.

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It has been at least a year since I took a deep dive into the published works coming from the grievance studies departments. Back when I did regular Xirl Science segments, I spent a few hours a month perusing the various journals and aggregators, looking for the most amusing items. If that is your intent when reading something like Hypatia, the journal of feminist philosophy, you are spoiled for choice.

Perhaps it has been the long break from reading this material or perhaps they have continued to evolve, but the material seems different now. On the one hand, it is less flamboyantly nutty than I remember. There are far fewer articles that read like satire on the grievance studies rackets. They still exist, but it is clear that the trends have changed, and outrageousness is no longer the in-thing.

Instead, the work is more seriously crazy, as in claims that time itself is a result of oppression and whiteness. They appear to have moved on from claiming that Western culture is a conspiracy by the pale penis people to oppress embodied coloredness and people of uterus, to questioning reality itself. Even though it is loaded with insider jargon, the point of many papers is to question space-time.

This makes sense when you think about the basis of the project. What started out as a belief that culture creates people, so therefore those who “control” the culture create the people to their benefit, must eventually arrive at the conclusion that reality itself is merely a product of cultural control. Therefore, the victim of this can only escape by escaping the reality manufactured by the creators.

There is, of course, a strong whiff of the old gods in this. The culture is the creation of the white patriarchy in the same way the natural world is the creation of the Old Testament God. Alternatively, it is a corruption by white men in the same way Odin and his brothers killed the true creator in order to rule the world. The point of this “scholarship” is to return to the original intent of creation.

In other words, all of this stuff, like the liberal project that proceeded it, operate within the old mental frameworks inherited from both the Christian framing of existence and the pre-Christian framing. They discarded the essential bits and have set about producing things to fill the void of the supernatural. The woke are those most in need of the old gods searching for a modern version of them.

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. 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 via crypto. You can send money to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 1047 Berkeley Springs, WV 25411-3047. You can also use PayPal to send a few bucks. Thank you for your support!

This Week’s Show

Contents

• Introduction
• Chrononormativity (Link)
• Queerness (link)
• Anality (Link)
• Science Inc. (Link)
• A Nation Of Therapists (Link)
• Oppressive Rocks (Link)
• Board Broads (Link)
• Xirl Eggsploitation (Link)
• The Bogeyman (Link)
• Bad Date (Link)

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This Week’s Show

Contents

• 01m44s Haiti comes to Ohio
• 10m22s Population doubles, employers leave
• 18m04s Towards the immigration singularity
• 24m39s The Trump-Harris debate
• 35m47s Signoff

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Transcript

01 — Intro.     And Radio Derb is on the air! Greetings, listeners, from your superabundantly genial host John Derbyshire, currently convalescent after watching the Trump-Harris debate Tuesday evening.

I shall of course have things to say about the debate later in the podcast. Recording these words at midday on Friday, however, Tuesday’s debate is already old news. I shall offer my opinion, but I don’t have anything original to add to what has already been said. That’s the disadvantage of a weekly podcast.

Before I get moving in earnest, permit me my weekly reminder that the VDARE Foundation is still accepting tax-deductible donations by check earmarked to yours truly and sent by snail mail to: The VDARE Foundation, P.O. Box 211, Litchfield-with-a-“t”, CT 06759.

That’s the intro. And now … [Clip:  Ethel Merman, “Let’s go on with the show.”]

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The term “woke” started turning up in mainstream discourse about a decade ago as part of the cultural revolution from the top. When this current phase started is debatable, but the term “woke” started circulating around social media in the Obama years, which means we are into the second decade of the woke phenomenon. In fact, it has been around long enough to become a bit dated.

Interestingly, the word and the concept did not originate inside the academy. A century ago, a black blues singer calling himself Lead Belly urged his listeners to “stay woke” in a song about blacks being falsely accused of rape by whites. The term and concept caught on among blacks as a warning about accepting the reality of white America as advertised and instead accepting the lived reality of black Americans.

In the middle of the last century, upper-middle-class white feminists culturally appropriated the term to criticize what they called the white patriarchy and then woke was off and running in the academy and then society. As with so many things, the managerial class, devoid of any creative or critical thinking, pilfered an idea from black culture in order to pretend to have a culture of their own.

It is why the concept of cultural appropriation was so easily adopted by the people flying the woke flag outside their mansions. They could easily imagine the damage done by frat boys wearing sombreros at their Cinco de Mayo party because they themselves have been pillaging the cultures over which they rule. The culture of the ruling class is a self-critique projected onto the masses.

Putting that aside, the appeal of “woke” to the managerial class, as well as the adjunct professor living in her car, may be caused by something other than cultural barrenness and ideological fervor. When you get past the lunacy, there are traces of the same impulse found in the transcendental movement. There are some strong parallels between the main concepts in both.

That is what the show is about this week. In the first half we cover the two main concepts of what most mean when they use the word “woke”. The second half of the show is a very brief discussion of Emerson and his classic lecture to the Harvard Divinity School, along with a reading from Thoreau. The idea is to see if “woke” is just the current manifestation of the American moral imperative.

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. 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 via crypto. You can send money to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 1047 Berkeley Springs, WV 25411-3047. You can also use PayPal to send a few bucks. Thank you for your support!

This Week’s Show

Contents

• Introduction
• What is Woke?
• Lived Experience
• What Is Going On Here?
• Emerson
• Woke As Deformed Americanism

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This Week’s Show

Contents

• 02m11s Two types of isolationism?
• 09m21s (Some) Germans vote
• 17m41s Scrambling the poles of good and evil
• 27m51s Temporal isolationism
• 32m26s Much ADOS about nothing
• 37m37s The innumerate imagination
• 40m38s No Chi spy here!
• 41m55s The Bell Curve at 30
• 43m19s Hwæt!
• 44m55s Signoff: Remembering Blair Tindall

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Transcript

01 — Intro.     And Radio Derb is on the air! That was a fragment of Haydn’s Derbyshire March No. 2 and this is your generically genial host John Derbyshire covering the week’s news.

Before I begin the podcast proper, I should clarify the matter of donations.

VDARE is no longer posting at the website, but the VDARE Foundation is still a going concern and you can still make tax deductible donations to your genial host by sending a check via snail mail with a note on the memo line of the check saying the donation is earmarked for me.

The address for donations is, as before: The VDARE Foundation, P.O. Box 211, Litchfield, CT 06759. (That “Litchfield” has a “t” in it, by the way — “L-itch-field” — unlike the Lichfield in England that is so dear to the hearts of us Samuel Johnson fans.)

Thank you in advance for your support!

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Tucker Carlson recently hosted a man calling himself Darryl Cooper to discuss a range of things, including alternative narratives of the Second World War. Cooper also calls himself MartyrMade online and hosts the The MartyrMade Podcast. He specializes in historical revisionism and the history of items that get little attention, like Jim Jones and the People’s Temple in the 1970’s.

The great and the good are in a panic, because Cooper, while on the Tucker Carlson show, suggested that Churchill was not the hero the official narrative claims, but more likely the villain of the story. Since the show aired there has been a steady stream of toadies and lickspittles pointing and shrieking at both Tucker and Cooper. By now everyone knows the drill.

As someone pointed out in response to one of the pointers and shriekers, the official narrative around the Second World War is closer to a religion than history. It is tangled up in the founding myths of the United States. It is part of the larger narrative that forms the identity of the American ruling class. To question any part of this narrative is to question the moral legitimacy of the ruling elite.

As an aside, Cooper is not breaking new ground regarding Churchill. Pat Buchanan wrote a book titled, Churchill, Hitler And The Unnecessary War, which sought to break the “cult of Churchill” that had come to dominate the American elite. The same people freaking out now over Cooper, freaked out of Buchanan, so the freakout works as confirmation of both men’s central claim.

The thing is though, the Second Word War is just one part of a larger narrative that makes up the great American myth of existence. The twentieth century saw a rewriting of American history to recast the founding, the war between the states and the emergence of the Global American Empire in the context of a great mission for which the American people have been tasked.

That is the show this week. It is not a comprehensive thesis on revising the American story, but more of a starting point for looking at the key events that make up the myth of the American founding and the myth of American purpose. After all, if a key item like the story of WW2 is fake, then it is reasonable to assume the story around other key events of the myth are fake as well.

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. 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 via crypto. You can send money to: Z Media LLC P.O. Box 1047 Berkeley Springs, WV 25411-3047. You can also use PayPal to send a few bucks. Thank you for your support!

This Week’s Show

Contents

• Introduction
• Darryl Cooper On Tucker
• Revisionism
• Slavery Books
• Civil War As perfecting The Revolution
• Was It A Revolution?
• Was It A Civil War?
• The Ongoing Revolution

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