The Faith Of The Left

The reason the Left has gone from triumph to triumph is that they are not motivated by reason, but rather by a quest for salvation. The social issues that they champion, regardless of any practical considerations, are always cast in moral terms. The issue itself is immaterial. It is being on the right side of the issue that matters. Politics is an endless series of tests they must pass in order to remain on the path of the righteous, leading to the promised land.

This story about Obama’s reaction to the election is a good example.

Riding in a motorcade in Lima, Peru, shortly after the 2016 election, President Barack Obama was struggling to understand Donald J. Trump’s victory.

“What if we were wrong?” he asked aides riding with him in the armored presidential limousine.

He had read a column asserting that liberals had forgotten how important identity was to people and had promoted an empty cosmopolitan globalism that made many feel left behind. “Maybe we pushed too far,” Mr. Obama said. “Maybe people just want to fall back into their tribe.”

His aides reassured him that he still would have won had he been able to run for another term and that the next generation had more in common with him than with Mr. Trump. Mr. Obama, the first black man elected president, did not seem convinced. “Sometimes I wonder whether I was 10 or 20 years too early,” he said.

This is a recurring theme with the American Left. It is the reason they embraced the term “Progressive” as their preferred label. They start with the unspoken belief that the story of man is written. It is the duty of the righteous to live it. It is why “being on the right side of history” comes up so often. The struggle as between those on the side of the great historical force and those who are standing in the way of it. The righteous are always looking forward and moving forward.

It is also why they think of the past as a dark age dominated by sinners. There is no romanticism on the American Left, because the past is by definition further away from the glorious future. Instead, the past is filled with monsters that were either slain by the righteous, or locked away, but ready to return at any moment. For example, they remain forever vigilant about the return of Nazis, as if they still exist. In the mind of the American progressive “Nazi” is just another name for Old Scratch.

Notice in that Times piece that the Trump voters are described as “left behind” rather than unhappy or in disagreement. In other words, the people voting for Trump did so because they were sad for having been left behind by the righteous. Voting for Trump was a cry for help. It is tempting to see this as part of Obama’s narcissism, but in reality, his narcissism is also the result of this deep belief in the flow of history. He was chosen to lead the faithful, so of course he is a narcissist.

You will notice that Progressives are forever warning about some attempt to “turn back the clock” and return us to a former state of sin. It resonates with Progressives, because for them, the eternal quest for salvation means going forward, breaking away from the degraded past. Trump’s “turning the clock back” is viewed as the wages of sin. Obama thinks he tried too hard to deliver his people to the promised land. The result was the great leap backward into Trumpism.

American Progressives are the purest form of true believers because they have disconnected their beliefs from practical considerations. Therefore, they are immune to facts and reason. When you examine the language they use to describe politics and culture, you see the extreme mysticism. Obama does not even really know what “left behind” means, but he is sure it is a bad thing. For him, it is a purely a spiritual issue to be thought of in those terms.

The error the Right has made for generations is to think it is possible to prove the Left wrong, and therefore force them to abandon their agenda. That is like thinking you can disprove sections of the Koran and cause the Muslims to abandon their faith. In fact, efforts to do so will always be met with a fierce defense of the faith. Practical arguments always embolden the righteous, as it confirms their belief in themselves as moral agents in a holy cause. Your irrational resistance is proof they are on the righteous path.

It is why the Left have been so effective since the end of the Cold War, but also why it has become so extreme and bizarre. Defending socialism meant ceding authority to objective data like the unemployment rate or GDP growth. That served as a check on the more unhinged elements. Once free of these objective measures, it became a race to produce the most extreme and bizarre identity group to champion. Lacking a limiting principle, and untethered from practical reality, the Left got increasingly extreme.

While it looks like the Left is headed for some sort of crack up, it is important to remember that people have to believe in something. The reason conservatism was such a flop is it never tried to appeal to this aspect of man’s nature. It was the ideology of the bookkeeper. No matter how fat, dumb and happy, people will always yearn for the eternal. If there is to be an alternative to the prevailing orthodoxy, it is going to have to offer an alternative to those who desire to be on the side of angels.

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Dirtnapninja
Dirtnapninja
6 years ago

The left works like Hinduism. You are born into caste. Each caste has a certain karma. There is good karma, earned by victim points. There is bad karma, earned by “privilege”. The level of your caste is decided by the difference between the two. The more victim karma your caste has, be more inherently moral you are and the higher your caste Nothing you can personally do will affect this Karma. A mass rapist from a high caste will always be morally superior to a saintly person from a low caste. This is how a rich black woman can still… Read more »

PrimiPilus
PrimiPilus
Reply to  Dirtnapninja
6 years ago

Gads … you’ e captured something tremendously important, and seemingly true, about the left and about human mental functioning in general. We have to break free of our vestigial and powerless concept of just what we are facing, and I think this construct – in the context of the host’s post – is somehow important. Thanks.

Saml Adams
Saml Adams
Reply to  Dirtnapninja
6 years ago

You’ve actually managed to reduce the madness of intersectionality into a few coherent paragraphs. The only difference being the number of castes is not fixed, but nearly infinite.

Teapartydoc
Member
Reply to  Saml Adams
6 years ago

Dirtnapninja gnosticism has its origins in neoplatonism. Have you not read about this? It was covered in the tenth volume of Coplestone’s History of Philosophy.

Actually, I’ve been thinking about rereading Vogelin’s Science, Politics and Gnosticism. Maybe it’s time .

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Teapartydoc
6 years ago

“Have you not read about this? It was covered in the tenth volume of …”

Bloody eggheads. Must be an Eton lad.

wjkathman
wjkathman
Reply to  Dirtnapninja
6 years ago

Stellar commentary. You’ve distilled the Progressivist theology to its basic essence. Bravo!

Member
Reply to  Dirtnapninja
6 years ago

Brilliant comparison! And that last line….

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Dirtnapninja
6 years ago

Remarkable. They are the Moghuls with their Brahmin puppets, and we are the Sikh. So many parallels.

Frip
Member
Reply to  Dirtnapninja
6 years ago

Great stuff Dirtnap. I could never understand why Hindus couldn’t see past caste. But since you compared it to the current situation in the West, I can easily see it. There really is an aura to everyone now, based on race, gender, etc. Which is why in classroom discussions, I’d just keep quiet. It’s fruitless to argue against the special rights of the good karma people, or argue on behalf of the bad karma people. I differ a bit on your race mixing point. In the eyes of our new society, I think the mulatto child/adult is still tainted with… Read more »

Zeroth Tollrants
Zeroth Tollrants
Reply to  Dirtnapninja
6 years ago

I was going to comment that I thought this post was one of the top ten best Z has ever written, and I do believe this, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t add DirtNapNinja’s comment is one of the top ten best comments I’ve read here, as well.

Saml Adams
Saml Adams
6 years ago

Personally vote for a “crack up” akin to a wounded Cape Buffalo putting all its remaining life force into stomping the hunter into a bloody puddle. Good example in my highly affluent little suburb is the local leftist women’s group that formed after Trump was elected. Their motto, proudly stuck on every piece of literature? “Activism is the antidote to despair”. I am not kidding. And in a manic phase over the last year have worked to try to re-engineer every political thing they can get their hands on. Latest efforts–completely unhinged local gun control laws, “sanctuary village” laws and… Read more »

Tim
Tim
Member
Reply to  Saml Adams
6 years ago

Samuel, I gotta tell you, you really need to move to redneckistan. Maybe when you retire, but it’s gotta happen.

Saml Adams
Saml Adams
Reply to  Tim
6 years ago

Oh, I will. Just an inconvenience of employment and kid’s schooling at the moment. But Trump largely forced the issue since my tax caste is one that, at NY state and local rates, does not make me a beneficiary of tax bill.

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  Saml Adams
6 years ago

Do your kids a favor and get out of the cesspool the sooner the better…Jobs you can find just about anywhere these days and I bet you can find better schooling somewhere else also if you can’t homeschool…Good Luck…

Saml Adams
Saml Adams
Reply to  Lineman
6 years ago

As an old colleague once told me. “Move your daughter in the last two years of high school and you might as well just stock her room in the new house with booze, drugs and condoms”. I private schooled everyone. And the necessity of living in NY versus flying in a few times a month may come to pass this year. But it’s rather like Ron Swanson visiting the local Whole Foods, who needs to go to the zoo?

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Saml Adams
6 years ago

You’re a gold miner working in Sierra Leone.

Teapartydoc
Member
Reply to  Saml Adams
6 years ago

And Every. Single. Time?

Member
Reply to  Saml Adams
6 years ago

In a highly affluent suburb. I’ve been saying for years that what we need is a good depression. Give those ladies something real to worry about. Food. Shelter. Protection from predators.

Saml Adams
Saml Adams
Reply to  MBlanc46
6 years ago

Think we made the top 50 zip code list for income. But yeah, you’d be amazed at the sort of first world problems that are treated as existential around here. Sandy was an interesting experience for many of them.

PrimiPilus
PrimiPilus
Reply to  MBlanc46
6 years ago

The Wolf-at-the-Door keeps humanity’s incipient lunacy at bay. In it’s absence, we slowly turn to madness. Fully-developed men seem to me oriented on addressing the immediate threat; women seem best suited to no or low-threat circumstances.

AntiDem
Member
6 years ago

This. The left cannot be understood as a political and/or philosophical movement, and the mistake that conservatives have made for 250 years has been trying to engage them as if they were. In fact, leftism is a fanatical utopian cult – that’s what it behaves like, and its members consistently behave like cultists. (Have you ever tried arguing with a leftist? They argue exactly like cult members do, including the steadfast but never openly stated belief that where reality contradicts the precepts of their faith, reality is irrelevant.) This, as much as anything, explains their antipathy to Christianity. They claim… Read more »

A.B. Prosper
A.B. Prosper
Reply to  AntiDem
6 years ago

The Right is just as religious on some political issues as the Left. I’m certainly willing to forgo judgment on anyone who is a devout Christian and whose views on something like abortion are colored by it but on economics? Really? If you doubt me try telling good chunks of the Republican party that you can’t opt out of paying for society, kicking money down and having a State and expect things to work . You’ll hear reeeeee’s as bad as a Leftists Hell there was an article today on Instapundit about another record low year of fertility and pretty… Read more »

AntiDem
Member
Reply to  A.B. Prosper
6 years ago

tl;dr, but from what I skimmed it looks like you’ve been watching too many Michael Moore documentaries on Netflix.

SWRichmond
SWRichmond
Reply to  AntiDem
6 years ago

The prog left IS a cult, it is an alternate religion. Z Man acknowledges this in the often-used language in the piece. Their obvious, outward and proud irrationality on so many subjects is the most reliable indicator of this. And forgive me for pointing out the also-obvious: the right is centered around another religion. Since we are also beset by a third religion which clearly intends world domination-by-swarm, the future seems one of continuous conflict simply for self-preservation. Some minority of us hew towards a world view informed by reason and rationality. We know we are a minority, meaning we… Read more »

AntiDem
Member
Reply to  SWRichmond
6 years ago

>”This is a contradiction to traditional, New-Testament Christian passivity”

That traditional, New-Testament Christianity is passive is news to me. Whenever anyone asks me “What Would Jesus Do?”, I do like to remind them that knocking over the furniture and chasing motherfuckers around with a whip *is* an option that’s on the table.

Member
Reply to  SWRichmond
6 years ago

Your limited government won’t avail you much in a world of huge transnational corporations that are richer than most governments.

A.B. Prosper
A.B. Prosper
Reply to  MBlanc46
6 years ago

or CRISPR for that matter,

c matt
c matt
Reply to  SWRichmond
6 years ago

though it is easy to prefer the Christians with your live-and-let-live attitude.

To some extent it is. But Christians do have a duty to convert others, at least by exposing them the Christianity. In that sense, it is more of a live-and-let-die, that is, if I did my duty to preach the Gospel, it remains up to you to voluntarily accept it. If you don’t, post-death consequences are your own. Better than the Muslim option of accept or be killed, but a Christian really wouldn’t be doing his duty if he didn’t at least explain Christianity to you.

A.B. Prosper
A.B. Prosper
Reply to  AntiDem
6 years ago

Its hard to make a smart comment on things you haven’t read. Feel welcome to disagree on any or all points, but realize that the reason the Left is losing power is they went to far not because Roosevelt created a larger state. Generally pre cultural Marxisms and immigration, people liked what the coalition that would become the Cathedral did a lot. I’ve read a lot of your stuff and baring Mad Max you are not getting what you want, neo monarchists and petty tyrants are not welcome and will end up shot by one faction or another if there… Read more »

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  A.B. Prosper
6 years ago

Where can we find this “Scourge of Westeros”?

A.B. Prosper
A.B. Prosper
Reply to  Alzaebo
6 years ago

Here you go

https://antidem.wordpress.com/2015/04/27/the-scourge-of-westeros/

This article is about the gaining and application of power and duty BTW Game of Thrones is just the example used

Member
Reply to  A.B. Prosper
6 years ago

Free market radicalism is as divorced from the realities of soial life as cultural Marxism is. Most Americans see a place for state involvement in economic life, although there is a lot of disagreement about the details (which the founders’ federalism would go a long way to resolving). The Repubs dance to the tune of the financial and corporate elites. Most of their voters would prefer a change in the music.

Ivan
Ivan
Reply to  MBlanc46
6 years ago

Austrian economics is a sort of economic religion with money being the inviolable sacred idol. Even the dissident right harps on the “muh shekels” mentality as non-white, implying sound money and savings is against our ethnos while also decrying socialism. Is it any wonder so many Christians define a Jew as a westerner who denies Jesus? It’s not any different than leftists who want to destroy the concept of money to “get money out of politics” while they ignore the fact that if they were successful, all we would be left with is a worthless currency and still burdened by… Read more »

A.B. Prosper
A.B. Prosper
Reply to  MBlanc46
6 years ago

Trade policy can’t be left to the States. Its rightly a Federal matter. The funny thing is the crisis started 70 years ago with the double whammy of improved automation and the modular shipping container and when the rest of the world got its own economies, the situation changed The thing about the USG Is that it pre selects for Captain of the Titanic types unable to change course no matter how bad it gets . Roosevelt for good and ill was an exception but otherwise the only way the ship of state could be changed was for stainless steel… Read more »

anon111
anon111
6 years ago

>Mr. Obama, the first black man elected president, did not seem convinced. “Sometimes I wonder whether I was 10 or 20 years too early,” he said.

i wonder if he ever wonders about the four men in Benghazi or the youtube fella he blamed everything on

Saml Adams
Saml Adams
Reply to  anon111
6 years ago

No, such things would never soil his mind. It is one thing to spin a story for political positioning. It is another to walk into a hangar, face the families and tell them the same fiction. That requires a certain soullessness.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Saml Adams
6 years ago

While recently, Trump broke away from his security detail on the tarmac, to go shake the hands of the cops standing there.

Auntie Analogue
Auntie Analogue
6 years ago

“Notice in that Times piece that the Trump voters are described as ‘left behind’ rather than unhappy or in disagreement.” My dear Z-Man, in more than one of his works Tom Wolfe pointed out that in modern America the most embarrassing gaffe, the most unpardonable sin, is to be “Left Behind.” This passage from Joan Didion’s 1967 essay “Slouching Towards Bethlehem” always struck me as being eerily prescient [italics in original; illumination in brackets is mine]: “‘Anybody who thinks this [the then-emerging Left-“progressive” counterculture] is about drugs has his head in a bag. It’s a social movement, quintessentially romantic, the… Read more »

Teapartydoc
Member
Reply to  Auntie Analogue
6 years ago

The “left behind” thing reminded me of the millenarian belief in a taking up of believers prior to the reign of the anti-Christ, except in this case it is a rapture of the left being chosen to institute Christ’s (Obama’s) thousand year reign prior to the final judgement. The soteriology is practically the same, and those placing their hope in it may not even realize the current they swim in, but they are literally programmed by their family histories to swim in it. I know this sounds deterministic, but I am not a determinist. Cicero said that those who forsake… Read more »

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Auntie Analogue
6 years ago

@HermannBillung on twitter: Frame

“…Want to stop making weak arguments?
Want to keep the initiative in any debate?

Then it’s time for you to understand Frame.”

*************************
Well worth your time.
He explains why we fail attempting to argue against the Left, and how to correct it, simply, easily, near-automatically, as Trump does.

About 20 tweets.
Pinned tweet (at the top).
I dont have twitter or FB; one can simply read it on any browser.
Go to: @HermannBillung

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Alzaebo
6 years ago

PS- simply put, reject the base foundation of their premise.

For example, my favorites:
“Why? Why is racism bad? Is it unnatural?”
“Are you assuming you’re better than me?”

DWEEZIL THE WEASEL
DWEEZIL THE WEASEL
6 years ago

The Left are not only true believers, but they also control the narrative. It started with Camelot and their slobbering, juvenile obsession of ALL THINGS KENNEDY. LIFE magazine led the charge. It has just gotten exponentially worse.
While you write the truth, you are also giving all of us Deplorables fair warning. These Satanic Marxist criminals will never capitulate. The scenario which Mr. Bracken painted in his short story sometime back(WHAT I SAW AT THE REVOLUTION) is what will play out. We owe ourselves, our tribes, and our families the obligation of vigilance and preparedness. Bleib ubrig.

Andy Texan
6 years ago

Good analysis. However, the question remains, can zealots be defeated (for good) by argumentation and voting? I think not. They are barbarians.

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  Andy Texan
6 years ago

Until the right figure out that we are at war they will keep on voting and arguing about what the left is doing now…

active pu-ter
active pu-ter
Reply to  Lineman
6 years ago

but who is the Dissident Right at war with? The Left? LOL…the “Left” is just a tool of the globalist corporations, just as the establishment Right is just a tool of the globalist corporations…the Left activist base is directed by the media…and the media gets its money from advertising purchases by big corporations, and so of course the media speaks for the big corporations…this discussion about “the Left” is meaningless…it’s like man who gets hit by a hammer and then decides that the enemy is all hammers…the enemy is the man wielding the hammer… the Leftist white voter base is… Read more »

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  active pu-ter
6 years ago

The right needs to be at war with any that seeks to kill or enslave them whether by words or actions…

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  active pu-ter
6 years ago

AP blames “the global corporations and plutocrat shareholders & CEOs.” I’m sincerely curious about how you would fix this problem. A ban on global corporations within the US? A progressive income tax that approaches 100% beyond a certain income?

I laugh because I am now amenable to these solutions while 5 years ago I would have attacked them as communist. What has changed is that I no longer seek universal principles and solutions. Instead I ask, “who is doing what to whom?” My foundational observation is that my people are under attack by various groups.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 years ago

I really appreciate MBlanc46’s ‘free market radicalism’. We are harried and hounded, unable to put down roots.

active pu-ter
active pu-ter
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 years ago

first steps come first…fundamentals…before any complex problem can be solved there must first be an understanding of the problem…attacking “The Left” as the enemy is cargo cult analysis…start with understanding the causal chain..cause and effect…otherwise, you will be building hollow infrastructure in hopes of calling down cargo planes full of goodies…

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  active pu-ter
6 years ago

Good points, cute, except for the pissy attack on our host as a bot.

For that, you can get stuffed.
He said it, he clarified it, no one else had.
A small retraction would be appreciated.

Primi Pilus
Primi Pilus
Reply to  Alzaebo
6 years ago

Amen. Clearly un-called for hit on the site’s host … unless the comment writier is some sort of uber-intellectual with insight far deeper than the rest of us simple minds. I believe if one looks across the full sweep of the host’s postings, you’ll see that he paints a much richer picture than can be captured in one brief post. Discussions are narrow of necessity. Now, I agree in large part with A-P’s assignment of the threat, though it itself is not all-encompassing. Most of us, however, cannot hold the whole of the issue at once in our minds, and… Read more »

active pu-ter
active pu-ter
Reply to  Primi Pilus
6 years ago

well, anyway, I make a foray over here to this blog from time to time…Z is a good writer, like steve sailer in many ways…but an article can be well written and still yet be deficient in deeper understanding…I mostly post and read over on xoxohth (autoadmit), which started out as a forum for people going to law school…but is now composed mostly of working lawyers or people who have gone to law school, and also various and sundry other sorts…but one thing I like about them is that they (most of them) marry Dissident Right perspectives with an understanding… Read more »

active pu-ter
active pu-ter
Reply to  Alzaebo
6 years ago

a retraction of what, exactly? He and almost every other Dissident Right pundit of any prominence is always going on about the enemy being The Left …there is no Left in america! The media is the enforcer of the Left, and they are a corporate media that lives off of corporate profit and they push an ideology calculated to increase corporate profits and increase asset prices…how on earth is that Leftist in any way???

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  active pu-ter
6 years ago

Thanks, Zman is the only writer I’ve found who illustrates that politics is religion; I come from the view that religion began as politics.

Really liked your ant analogy, and always appreciate the funding factor- that’s what I look for first. It’s heartening to hear that young lawyers are redpilled, as I imagine most of the white-collar world is. I hope they become subversives instead of mercenaries.

Please don’t disrespect the host.
He is educated, profound, and a blessed relief. Linger here more often, and you’ll see what I mean. Bring your friends.

c matt
c matt
Reply to  active pu-ter
6 years ago

Only one thing can wake these woke Liberals, it seems. It is feeling the consequences of their views. As long as the multinationals can insulate enough of them from such consequences, they will ever-remain woke. And even them, I am not so sure a significant number would resist reality.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  c matt
6 years ago

About that- I read an article about a high school bully and Kim Jong Un. The author’s conclusion was that they both had limited, rigid internal models to fall back on. They could only be dealt with, persuasion was a waste of time. They both expected for their ass to be kissed, but would buckle to the one role model who could dominate them- their authitorian fathers. When the intended victim (high school) or the President (CIC of the US military) assumed a dominant stance, they reacted by submitting, as they would with their dads. They fell into a well-worn… Read more »

King Tut
King Tut
6 years ago

Good analysis and in this regard I have always regarded William Buckley’s definition of the mission of Conservatives as being to “stand athwart history shouting stop” to have been a huge error. It automatically places the right on the backfoot, in defensive mode without a vision but defined entirely as being against any vision. It cedes the mantle of “progress” to the left by default. And let’s face it, who wants to be seen to be opposed to “progress”? That is why it has been so easy for the left to characterize the right as old, fuddy-duddy dinosaurs longing for… Read more »

dad29
Reply to  King Tut
6 years ago

Yah, well….to the Actual Conservative, “progress” is growth in virtue to obtain the reward of Heaven. The Left’s great success was in proposing that Heaven can be obtained on Earth–an un-truth which corresponds very well with ‘the fruit of the tree of knowledge,’ as TeaPartyDoc will attest. As a result, the Left offers ‘heaven’ on Earth. Material satisfaction, all the sex you can handle (and more), the perfection of climate-controls, and medicines for every disease. (They’re still working on eternal life.) The Happiness of Here-and-Now is a chimera, but it’s a helluva religion to preach. Beats the crap out of… Read more »

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  dad29
6 years ago

As a result, the Left offers ‘heaven’ on Earth. Material satisfaction, all the sex you can handle (and more), the perfection of climate-controls, and medicines for every disease. (They’re still working on eternal life.)
Well Said…They have to though because that’s all they have…That is why they are so insatiable and nothing can ever satisfy…They are like a drowning man and will grasp at anything to save them even kill others to get one more breath…Why do you think they want to tear down everything instead of building…

David Wright
Member
6 years ago

I have always like the description of conservatism as a negation of ideology. Although good, Z is right, nothing to steel one’s soul for a fight and a cause.

Right now survival of our kind and the things we hold dear are enough to push me forward now. As for belief, I already have a religion.

Primi Pilus
Primi Pilus
Reply to  David Wright
6 years ago

Critical observation, I think, that last sentence of your comment. Humans seem to need those two — intellectual function and the irrational. Without something to fill the latter need, men go mad. And that irrational has to provide a strong positive, as did Christianity. The hard strain of the left sought to kill this old form of the latter in the West, to live and rule with reason alone in the form of the technocratic elites. I guess they ended up falling into madness, and re-instituting their own religion, now madness itself. Just musing at this early hour. We had… Read more »

Teapartydoc
Member
Reply to  Primi Pilus
6 years ago

Thinking about going back to church to praise God, reather than entreat him, the way things have been going.

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  Teapartydoc
6 years ago

You don’t need a church to praise him Brother…

SWRichmond
SWRichmond
Reply to  Primi Pilus
6 years ago

“We had the balance before — perhaps what demarks old America remaining, is that place where functional belief and reason still work together.”

Time lurches forward all on its own. What you perceive was not “balance” but rather a snapshot of a different (and no doubt in many ways better) moment in time, one which quickly ended and was replaced. I am not arguing we need to embrace the “now”. Providing stability is the goal of things like “Constitutions” and “Commandments” in the face of human drive for change.

Primi Pilus
Primi Pilus
Reply to  SWRichmond
6 years ago

Yes …. Just puzzling through all the thoughts that exploded in my mind when I read this post and the comments early this morning. I can’t help but think that Z-Man is edging into something fundamentally important about people in general, the LEFT in particular, and about what we have to do if we are to survive — something we’ve been missing (understandably) about how to flesh out the phenomena and the ways to combat it. Certainly it will involve a radical change in common understanding among those on our side … a new “religion” of sorts, perhaps. I also… Read more »

TomA
TomA
6 years ago

You really have to go a couple of levels deeper. Yes, Progressives are degenerate true believers, but that is not the foundational problem. In a prior age of natural competition, this behavior would have got them dead at an early age because fitness selection would have favored efficacious survival skills and robustness. But they are not dying off in the present era of extreme affluence, dependence, and hive-minded conformity. Rather, our political system is co-opting natural evolution to favor parasitism and debt slavery.

Epaminondas
Member
6 years ago

Whites have a glorious history of accomplishment stretching all the way back to ancient Greece and perhaps beyond. Teaching young people about that grandeur and achievement is what will give us the victory, if we can regain control over education. Progressives can carry their weird obsession with race and gender to the point of sheer madness. It will be fun to watch.

Random Dude on the Internet
Random Dude on the Internet
6 years ago

One thing that I always noted about Obama is that the media’s portrayal of him is that he is the smartest guy in any given room, or in this case, a limo. I wonder how this will clash with the left’s growing derangement in the future when it becomes progressive orthodoxy that a “straight”, half black man is considered too low on the progressive stack and is therefore inherently racist, sexist, etc.

Chet
Chet
Reply to  Random Dude on the Internet
6 years ago

Obama isn’t “straight” he’s as queer as a three dollar bill. And many, including myself, don’t count “black” by fractions. Any black blood they are a nigger. Period.

Frip
Member
Reply to  Chet
6 years ago

Dude, wtf

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Random Dude on the Internet
6 years ago

Not the Messiah, but Moses.
He led us towards the Promised Land, but wasn’t allowed to enter.

Electing Michelle- the longed-for third term, the Return- was foiled by the sinners.

Whitney
Member
6 years ago

I’m reading a book by Hilaire Belloc about the reformation and this quote seems relevant to your point. I also like to point out that this is exactly how Jordan Peterson defeats his opponents

“When you meet the falsehood of an opponent by picking holes in the details of what he says, while still admitting his general thesis, you only confirm the error which he desires to propagate: the right way of meeting false propaganda is by the statement of the truth and the vigorous erection of a true picture which shall cancel the false one.”

Teapartydoc
Member
Reply to  Whitney
6 years ago

I have a book of his on the English Reformation. Interesting take on it you won’t find elsewhere. Got me to thinking of it as a political strategy that should be repeated here sometime in breaking up our own religious establishments (universities, corrupt philanthropies, foundations, etc.).

Ris Eruwaedhiel
Ris Eruwaedhiel
6 years ago

Leftism as secular Protestantism. The Protestant Deformation:

https://www.the-american-interest.com/2005/12/01/the-protestant-deformation/

Teapartydoc
Member
Reply to  Ris Eruwaedhiel
6 years ago

Haven’t read that, but the very origin of modern leftism, the French Revolution, is said by many historians to have been impossible without the Reformation and Calvinist influence. Rousseau was Calvinist in his origins, as was the finance minister that oversaw the transfer of authority from the king to the people, Necker, whose daughter was a big radical influence for some time. Germaine D’Stael.

Anonymous Reactionary
Reply to  Ris Eruwaedhiel
6 years ago

Strict, conservative Protestantism is engineered to produce a secular backlash, which curiously contains much of the residual cultural misery of its origin but none of the essential Christian dogma. Catholic slackers, just like communists, avoid modern bourgeois decadence simply by not being as wealthy from a hypertrophic plethora of work and capital. The rank and file Protestants cuck out so easily because they’re totalitarian, not authoritarian, so their own discipline is very easily used against them. As long as a remnant can LARP another round of “great awakening”, they can keep playing controlled opposition which never amounts to anything. Great… Read more »

dad29
Reply to  Ris Eruwaedhiel
6 years ago

VERY solid historical analysis in that article. And since I’ve said several times that Bush & Co.’s “democratization” project in the Middle East was doomed to failure specifically because Bush & Co. ignored religious realities in that region, it is very nice to have a scholar say the same thing.

Dutch
Dutch
6 years ago

Don’t be fooled, “they” already have a full file on each of us. “They” have a better idea of what we will be doing at 3:30 next Wednesday afternoon than we do. If things stay organized, filed, monitored, and tracked, the only hope we have for not being rounded up one day, en masse, as blasphemers to the one true cause, is local disorganization. I root for it. I want to see bonfires in the streets and chaos in the halls of power. Not because I like to see things burn. But instead for there lies our opportunity to escape… Read more »

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  Dutch
6 years ago

The biggest black pill in your post is that you refer to our attackers as only “they.” I’m not expecting anyone to say anything intemperate in these comments, but when we speak together in person we must be more precise about who orchestrated our predicament.

We can’t fight something as vague as “liberalism” or “cultural marxism” or “globalism.”

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 years ago

We can’t fight something as vague as “liberalism” or “cultural marxism” or “globalism.”
How about fighting Communism? Or is that still to broad for you and you want a narrower focus?

Dutch
Dutch
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 years ago

I have little interest in who they are. They are untouchable by any of us, so that element of the situation is not relevant to me, other than as an intellectual exercise.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Dutch
6 years ago

Agree somewhat. The principle of too much, too soon applies.

We can still talk about it ourselves, and away from here. Got to slow-walk this pitch to the normies… otherwise they’ll see us as shouting from the courthouse steps with snakes in both hands.

Elon Musk got approval.
Mel Gibson got panned.
And people in Europe got jail.

Primi Pilus
Primi Pilus
Reply to  LineInTheSand
6 years ago

Is it us — mankind? Is it that potential in each human to selfishness and great evil? Perhaps this is what the early Christians were attempting to build a barricade against. I worked with some like this in Govt. Those I knew over many years and through advancing positions didn’t start out like they ended up. I often wished I had the insight to see what it was that made some into part of that problem, while others remained immune to the virus. The scenario advanced by Dutch above might not be so far off as we’d like … though… Read more »

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  Dutch
6 years ago

I think you would be playing right into their hands if you promote that…They thrive on chaos and destruction because it gains them power when the scared sheeple vote for more security measures…Unless of course you think that you can get it to a point where there is no order whatsoever and it’s back to kill or be killed and if you want that then your just as insane as they are…Is building to hard in your mind so you want to destroy? Sad That…

Dutch
Dutch
Reply to  Lineman
6 years ago

Another element of all of this is the role that Trump ultimately plays. In one sense, he stirs the pot for those who think as we do to reveal ourselves, and he also creates just enough societal disruption of the status quo for the idea of mass arrests and confinement to be mainstreamed in certain quarters. On the other hand, he also informs the “average person” with some of what is really going on, and perhaps he can create an environment where the powerful cannot convince their servants (law enforcement, the military) to do the dirty work. Trump has probably… Read more »

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  Dutch
6 years ago

perhaps he can create an environment where the powerful cannot convince their servants (law enforcement, the military) to do the dirty work. Trump has probably accomplished some of both. Perhaps an ideal scenario from here is one where law enforcement simply arrests those thought to be untouchable when the time comes, instead of the rest of us. One can hope…

Change that he to a we and be working towards that end and then your hope has a better chance of being fulfilled…That’s why I stress building Communities where the law is your servant not the elites…

Frip
Member
Reply to  Dutch
6 years ago

So you’re saying I made a big mistake registering with Disqus? Or that it won’t matter anyway.

Dutch
Dutch
Reply to  Frip
6 years ago

Won’t matter. They have your number, a hundred different ways, without it.

Mark Taylor
Member
6 years ago

Good observations Z. It appears there is a moral story and the facts are subordinate to the story. You have to choose the facts to craft your epic tale. WW2 has to have a hero and a villain. Black tribal politics in America have to be cast as a moral story, facts that don’t fit are omitted for dramatic effect. I suppose that’s the carrot of politics. People generally want to feel they’re fighting for the angels, a good political movement convinces them. As long as whitey remains cast as the villain people will try to finish the ending of… Read more »

Joseph Suber
Joseph Suber
6 years ago

When youth are casting about for an ideology, they want something vital that recommends action against problems, real or imagined. Since the repudiation of fascism, the Right has been merely the party of “No!” – and thus a hard sell. Our renewed vitality coincides with the revival of fascism (if by other names) as a serious alternative to the globo-homo-sjw-consumerist-gayplex. That CAN be a civic religion of sorts, because it offers some vigorous solutions to particular problems. We are making great progress on that front in all the alternative media. The censorship just makes us stronger and more desirable, and… Read more »

SidVic
SidVic
Member
6 years ago

I’ve often wondered, given modern tech and construction methods, how big of a pyramid we could build? Could we hollow out the moon and throw some engines on it. Take it to mars and terriform mars. Then head out to alpha centauri. The point is conservatism is reactive, thus it will lose. Maybe we need some grand projects to work towards. Obviously mine are crackpot. I guess what i mean is that we are only a couple hundred years out of the short brutish existence which mostly consisted of finding enuf food . Will we allow ourselves to sink back… Read more »

NightBreaker
NightBreaker
Reply to  SidVic
6 years ago

The Earth is the cradle of humanity, but mankind cannot stay in the cradle forever. – Konstantin Tsiolkovsky –

The future lies not to the fainthearted only to the brave,
Yesterdays dreams , are today hopes and tomorrows realities
we only lack the will , our future is unwritten make it happen one person at a time. Prepare , share your skills with like kind, our heritage is unique. Remember that , come what may.

Ad Astra Per Ardua

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  NightBreaker
6 years ago

Amen Brother…Build Yourself, Build Your Family, and then Build Communities…

Sidvic
Sidvic
Member
Reply to  Lineman
6 years ago

Communities, to do what?

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  Sidvic
6 years ago

Communities, to do what? Use your imagination;)
All jokes aside the Main Reason to do this is to further the goals of that Community that can only be done through Community…The left do it all the time maybe we need to be doing the same so our culture, our families, our country can be preserved…JMHO…

Dutch
Dutch
Reply to  Lineman
6 years ago

You can’t rebuild from the bottom up without communities of like-minded people.

Lineman
Lineman
Reply to  Dutch
6 years ago

@Dutch
Glad some people are awake enough to see that…Here’s to opening more eyes…God Bless Ya…

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Sidvic
6 years ago

To borrow a cup of sugar. Everything flows from there.

Member
6 years ago

This essay fails to some extent at the end, because conservatism is not an ideology.

However, because American conservatives have failed miserably in defending the extremely successful Judeo-Christian ideology, the confused and chaos-promoting Progressive ideology, with all its evil consequences, has gained the upper hand.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  ffarkle
6 years ago

They failed to defend their People. The Race. That’s why conservatism was a pale shadow of faith- because Faith is rooted in one’s People. From our ancestors through our children, we are rooted. Even Europeans don’t choose their religion or tribe, but are born into it only. This is also why Christianity is so weakened. Romano-Christianity is a White thing. It can be adopted by others as a common language, but each race will make it in their own version. It’s also under attack for that same reason. We stole their Book, and made something better of it. It’s supposed… Read more »

Christopher S. Johns
Christopher S. Johns
6 years ago

Well, I came upon a child of God He was walking along the road And I asked him, Tell where are you going? This he told me Said, I’m going down to Yasgur’s Farm, Gonna join in a rock and roll band. Got to get back to the land and set my soul free. We are stardust, we are golden, We are billion year old carbon, And we got to get ourselves back to the garden. Well, then can I walk beside you? I have come to lose the smog, And I feel myself a cog in somethin’ turning. But… Read more »

cerulean
cerulean
6 years ago

I am sure the worker-ants of the Left fit Z’s description. However, I imagine there are very capable and intelligent people actually *managing* our descent. People who make plans, fund them, staff them, tend the interfaces, track progress, and adjust course as needed. I suspect what we see for 2Q 2018 is a triangle on someone’s schedule chart. Or a rather large number of schedule charts. Whether you call us The Dissident Right or something else, we don’t have a lot of people who do that for our side. I don’t say this to denigrate the good people who are… Read more »

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  cerulean
6 years ago

That’s it, that’s it exactly. Asymmetric, planned, and managed. Parasitism as an Industry sector, a breakaway economy unto itself.

Burner Prime
Burner Prime
6 years ago

This is good stuff, and hints of a possible way forward.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Burner Prime
6 years ago

A better way may already be happening.
Trust the plan.

I say “trust the plan”, because I found this:

https://www.reddit.com/r/greatawakening/comments/8leaq6/q1433_rr_problems_or_the_brilliant_playbook_that/

I had only heard hints of the Q thing, but this explanation thread left me gaping.

And filled, filled to bursting, with hope.
May the God and all the gods bless our patriots and our people!

Dutch
Dutch
Reply to  Alzaebo
6 years ago

Interesting stuff. If true, it explains a lot of what has been going on lately.

SidVic
SidVic
Member
Reply to  Alzaebo
6 years ago

I’ve been highly skeptical of the “trump playing 3D chess meme” . However, the sessions business sets me aback. I’ve watched sessions for a long time and concluded that he is a totally solid dog. He was the first to come out for Trump by a blue mile too. I really think that trumps twitter war on him is artifice. Cooked up to distance Sessions from trump. Sessions is the hatchet man. They were shocked when Rogers laid it out them- hence the rapid 1 day move outa trump tower. They cooked up a gameplan and we are watching it… Read more »

Jim
Jim
6 years ago

I just heard eri c holder was giving a speach. I thought he was executed for crimes against the constitution… I guess a real American needs to deal with our problems…

Member
6 years ago

The main attraction of the so-called “Progressives” is to enrich others with resources from the progressive defined “rich”. This works pretty well until, per Mrs.Thatcher, you run out of other people’s money. There is always a constituency for freebies. To paraphrase Milton Friedman, you can always count on Paul’s support if you rob Peter to pay Paul. There are few among the masses who understand reasoned thought and arguments, so the left will continue to hide their redistributionist zeal behind dubious pleas to morality.

Stina
Stina
6 years ago

This is a recurring theme with the American Left. It is the reason they embraced the term “Progressive” as their preferred label. They start with the unspoken belief that the story of man is written. It is the duty of the righteous to live it out in order to reach salvation. It’s why “being on the right side of history” comes up so often. They think of the struggle as between those on the side of the great historical force and those who are standing in the way of it. The righteous are always looking forward and moving forward. It’s… Read more »

Teapartydoc
Member
Reply to  Stina
6 years ago

I like the way you see. The view of history goes back to Hegel and German Idealism in general. Hegel saw history as a way of the Logos of the universe engaging in self realization wherein the history of man serves as a proxy for the self realization of the divine spirit. The end of history is a melding of temporal progress with the divine spirit and a final state consisting of absolute mind. This is mirrored somewhat in some writings of Arthur C. Clark where evolutionarily man reaches a state where he is all mind and no body. Or… Read more »

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Stina
6 years ago

“cyclical history need not be feared nor does it threaten the foundations of faith – peace is found in the assurance that God is in control.”

Ooh. I really, really like that. Very illuminating, since I can’t see a God, nor even conceive of the need for one.

I don’t think it reasonable for other minds to work like mine. Fricking hate angry, militant atheists with their juvenile sneering.

I have, however, always pondered the stability the believers have. They’re able to focus on things to be done without worrying about it. Many thanks.

Member
6 years ago

Moldbug described progressives as something like Quakers who had dropped God in favor of man.

sirlancelot
sirlancelot
6 years ago

Have always viewed the left as childish. Thoughts and decisions based on pure emotion, throwing temper tantrums when they don’t get their way and devoid of reality a k a living in a fantasy fantasy land. Not good qualities for an adult especially those in positions of power. Our state treasurer has got some competition this fall and seems genuinely concerned. The radio played a sound bite and it sounded something like this, “Our state needs someone like me with the experience because if you don’t think President Trump and the Russians are going to try and throw the midterm… Read more »

Pimpkin's Nephew
Pimpkin's Nephew
6 years ago

So, here we are, in a world where we find ourselves alone; no community, no religion, no agreed traditions, no common feel for history, no agreement on what is to be done, families dispersed, marriage in the toilet… Our enemies daily consolidate their power, add converts, and just go on winning. But who are these enemies, and who are we? Can it be that some deep structure – consistent with the overall nature of our species – is working itself out, that we – the ‘biological realists’ – are contending against some species-level instinct that takes us back to ‘who… Read more »

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Pimpkin's Nephew
6 years ago

The wisdom of the flesh works on far longer scales than any sage.
Each face is a map inscribed with 20,000 years of history.

This is an old, old war. Nature never ends.
Yet we are each of us so small, adrift on these tides!

Pimpkin's Nephew
Pimpkin's Nephew
6 years ago

Except for its scope, it’s hard to distinguish the Jonestown cult from current leftism, at any rate in the USA. Jones’ mercurial changes in doctrine from week to week were – are – a template for what passes for ‘progressivism’ today. And Jim Jones WAS very much a progressive; he had friends in high places – he was no David Koresh, whose ‘compound’ was incinerated by Clinton via his personal Himmler, Janet Reno, with all its women and children; it was a late 20th century imitation of the 1864 Sandy Creek massacre – not that 1 in 100,000 of our… Read more »

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Pimpkin's Nephew
6 years ago

Yes, and Jones was a thumbreaker for the Bay Area Democrat Party, heavily involved in effecting their corrupt real estate, union, moneylaundering, and child-trafficking deals.

bluebird of bitterness
6 years ago

This nails it.

Georgiaboy61
Georgiaboy61
6 years ago

“When men choose not to believe in God, they do not thereafter believe in nothing, they then become capable of believing in anything.” – G.K. Chesterton

If the post-modern secular left are any indication, Chesterton was absolutely correct in his assessment, years before the fact. The man was nothing if not prescient.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Georgiaboy61
6 years ago

Aha. A pet peeve. I always hated the more common, simplified version. (David C. Wright nudged me in the side for it.) I see what gets me all hot and bothered. “Choose not to believe in God” is like “choose my sexual preference”. You’re born that way (seeing or not), even if some are born a bit more flexible and can come to it later. (I don’t “choose God” because I’d be lying through my teeth. I don’t see Him. I will not lie to you, because you deserve better than that- I know and trust that you will not… Read more »

Frip
Member
6 years ago

Confused. I’m pretty new to the Alt Right. Sometimes the terms Alt Right and Dissident Right are used interchangeably. Leading one to think they’re just different names for the same thing…semantics. But at other times, it seems there’s a difference in kind, and history. I’ve looked around on the web for clarity, or an article on the topic of just what is Alt Right compared to Dissident Right. If anyone can link me to an article or discussion, please do.

Wolf Barney
Wolf Barney
Reply to  Frip
6 years ago

Frip, I think it’s all the same generally. I think many ran away from the term “alt right” after Charlottesville and real life rallies. When it was online and was about attacking the left and laughing at them through memes and comment sections and song parodies on TRS, it was edgy and cool. The first time I heard the term “dissident right” was from John Derbyshire maybe 10 years ago or so (maybe longer?) But before that, there was Paleoconservativism, which included Pat Buchanan, Sam Francis, and Chronicles magazine and was an alternative to the neo-conservatism of endless war, free… Read more »

Frip
Member
Reply to  Wolf Barney
6 years ago

Thanks Wolf. I’m familiar with much of that background. When you say “I think it’s all the same generally.” At first flinch I agree. But when you see Zman declare the death of the Alt Right specifically, it makes you think the Alt Right is an entirely separate thing. And definitely removed from Dissident Right.

Again, there’s surprisingly little comparison of the two supposed factions on the web. Most writers just include Dissident Right (if they mention the term at all) under Alt Right.

trackback
6 years ago

[…] has its pretty lies, of course. This is the grease that keeps the gears moving. There are also the things everyone knows are true, but everyone agrees to not discuss. Then there is the official dogma, the […]

Clayton Barnett
6 years ago

And to-date the Dissident Right offers… knifing each other. That’ll sell.

Clayton Barnett
Reply to  thezman
6 years ago

Then besides – and for the benefit of the Feds monitoring this site, I’m writing in a purely hypothetical sense – Death Squads and pyramids of human skulls, are we to roll left and die with everyone else?

What is our counter? Is there any path to victory? If not, then do we walk into the gulag or go down in an orgy of blood?

Asking for a friend.

Name
Name
Reply to  thezman
6 years ago

People like Savoni and Orban are the materialization of the Alt-Right in the mainstream.
It didn’t spend itself, it just grew beyond the brand capacity and changed into something else.

Name
Name
Reply to  thezman
6 years ago

So, you’re talking about the clown Spencer.
I used “Alt-Right” as the umbrella term, what you call Dissident Right.

Ivan
Ivan
Reply to  thezman
6 years ago

You’re talking about a standard with a capital S. There is no useful human cooperation without a standard to rally around. That’s what a flag is. That’s what Trump is. That’s what a little league football coach is and the team can’t play with any confidence if coach doesn’t show up. The left is in the business of destroying standards so that their opposition has nowhere to rally. But they misunderstand the purpose of standards. They think the purpose of a standard is to convince ourselves of how powerful we are. That all that matters is enough people drink the… Read more »

rented mule
rented mule
Reply to  thezman
6 years ago

why did you bother to do the daily shoah ?

Tax Slave
Tax Slave
Reply to  rented mule
6 years ago

The same reason you recite passages from Mein Kampf everyday.

Alzaebo
Alzaebo
Reply to  Tax Slave
6 years ago

Read them? No. Memorize them. Along with the Protocols!
**shining his “special” helmet**

LineInTheSand
LineInTheSand
Reply to  Tax Slave
6 years ago

You win the prize for most nervous “rootless cosmopolitan.” Congratulations.

Jackson
Jackson
Reply to  thezman
6 years ago

So far nothing of any significance other than the alt right has risen from the dissident right. So as the alt right fades away with lawsuits and factionalism as the last act we are left with nothing much in the way of either organization or motif. At it’s height the alt right was, at least, a web phenomena. It was hillarious to watch Clinton attack Pepe the frog. The alt right got normies talking and thinking. It pierced the veil of media complacency. Both NPR and The Atlantic did long form interviews with Richard Spencer. It seems now that the… Read more »

Joseph Suber
Joseph Suber
Reply to  Jackson
6 years ago

The vitality of the right is in moving young people to think the unthinkable. It is happening despite the enemy actions, and has gained the aegis of being “cool.” There isn’t anyone as funny or true or as smart, man for man, in the establishment left. The Right has a message and a messenger for every “power-level” as well. The only thing we lack is the critical mass to overthrow the diversity police in the workplace. Once that is achieved, the question will be asked, “Were you with us when it counted?”

Pimpkin's Nephew
Pimpkin's Nephew
Reply to  Joseph Suber
6 years ago

The good news for our team is that ‘samizdat’ can be presented in so many ways. Remember, our controllers – or rather their low-paid minions fishing the internet – have one view, the “One Big Thing”.

Call it an ‘event horizon’ on the edge of a Black Hole. We choose not to be sucked into it.

‘Conservatism’, broadly understood, is merely the resistance of normal people to being sucked in the Black Hole.

Severian
Reply to  Jackson
6 years ago

The problem with the “alt right” (or whatever) that you describe are exactly why the “movement” hasn’t gone further. At this point, the only people who are willing to carry the fight to the enemy are those who are willing to be doxxed, divorced, banned, and unemployed (and, indeed, unemployable). Baby Boomers on motorcycles used to flatter themselves (shocking, I know) by proclaiming that when riding is outlawed, only outlaws will ride. Same thing here. Dissenting from the Cloud is, for all intents and purposes, outlawed (how long before WordPress de-platforms our host? 6 months? A year?). Therefore, only outlaws… Read more »