On occasion, I like to read old books about taboo subjects. I developed the habit as a student, when assigned the task of writing an essay on the 1948 presidential election. We were permitted to use one source and that was the NYTimes archive at our library. That meant staring through a device, resembling a peep show machine, at film on which the archives of the paper were stored.

What I found fascinating were the horribly taboo things written in the Old Gray Lady about blacks, Jews, Catholics, women, etc. The want ads were hilarious. “Two Irishman wanted for painting crew.” Or, “Negros wanted for ditch digging.” Newspapers used the language of the man on the street and reading those old papers gave me a sense of what it was like to live in that age.

The thing is, mass media must respect the sensibilities of the buying public, even if those sensibilities are insane. American newspapers in the 40’s, for example, could not criticize America’s conduct of the war, even in cases where it was warranted. The people simply would not tolerate it. A decade later when passions had cooled, papers could indulge in revisionist history.

Similarly, the mass media of every society must live within the constraints of the ruling classes. They must promote and support the legitimizing ideology of the day. A newspaper man in Nazi Germany could not celebrate diversity. A cable news talker today cannot question the joys of diversity. To do so puts your job and career in jeopardy.

Just as those public sensibilities can be insane, the legitimizing ideology can belch forth its own brand of crazy. Homosexual marriage, for example, is nonsense, but sacred nonsense. Go against it and you reap the whirlwind. Point out the suicidal nature of diversity and cultural Marxism and you will be condemned to a life of penury or worse. Unlike the public, the people in charge can throw you in gaol so you’re wise to tread lightly.

I was thinking about this the other day reading Steve Sailer’s latest Taki column. Sailer is a very smart and a very well trained person. There are maybe a handful of people who possess his social science skills. He also possess the sorts of credentials that lead to riches in modern America. An MBA from UCLA is no small thing.

Sailer also writes and says things that violate the taboos of the ruling class so he is unwelcome in the places run by those serving the ruling class. He maintains a blog and lives off donations. Maybe his wife has a job, I don’t know. Instead of selling books, getting paid by a think tank and doing TV, he begs for donations.

Sailer thinks he is right. So much so he has condemned himself to a life of penury, despite possessing the credentials and intellect to be highly successful. Presumably, he has chosen this path because he values being right over making money. Malcolm Gladwell is wrong about most everything and probably knows it, but he likes money so he has gotten rich uttering nonsense in public.

Sailer is certainly not a martyr or even unique. He made his choices for his own reasons and was surely aware of the consequences. The dissident right is littered with guys and some gals who write interesting things about interesting topics, but do so on the fringe, banned from the respectable salons that dominate public life.

It’s not a new phenomenon. Galileo got himself in trouble not because he challenged dogma, but he refused to play along with the rules and customs of the ruling classes. Copernicus first laid out the heliocentric view long before Galileo, but he played by the rules and avoided challenging the established order. You can say anything you want as long as you don’t threaten the established order.

That’s what you see with a guy like Kevin Williamson at National Review. He’s smart enough to know that Charles Murray is right, for example, but he knows it takes credentials and talent he lacks to walk up to that same line. Instead, he lets Robert Putnam draw the lines and is willing to live within them. Williams has a habit of describing cultural issues precisely, only to avoid drawing the only logical conclusion.

This column from a few months back is a great example. Without freedom of association, you cannot have any freedoms at all. Williams clearly gets that, but also knows that it is a lethal point to make if you earn your living from a legitimate publication. So, when faced with the reality of his observations, he springs for the safety of equivocation. It’s left to commenters to fill in the blanks.

Many on the fringe take comfort in the belief that reality does not go away when you stop believing in it. Eventually, the lunacies of our day will have to give way to math and science. That assumes there will be anyone left capable of sorting fact from fiction. It is axiomatic that you get less of what you punish. Another generation of punishing heretics and who will be left, capable of recognizing reality, much less articulating it?