All posts filed under: Analysis

On the “Dark Enlightenment,” and of Curtis Yarvin / Mencius Moldbug

Published by Charles

My project here is to analyze, in the detail required for all necessary understanding, the thought of Curtis Yarvin, who wrote under the pseudonym Mencius Moldbug.  Yarvin is the most prominent figure of what has been called the Dark Enlightenment, one thread of modern reactionary thought.  My short summary is that he offers mediocre analysis with quite a few flashes of insight.  Even so, his thought is mostly worthless, because his program for political change is silly, since it fails to understand both history and human nature, and is ultimately indistinguishable from the program of the Left.  Overall I was very disappointed, and this write-up is shorter than I expected when beginning my project, since there is not all that much interesting to talk about. As I read and write on Reaction, I continue to divide its modern thought into three basic groups, at least as far as its American incarnation.  The first is those who endorse the Enlightenment and merely think that the American experiment has gone wrong from its ideal position, either in …

On Rebellion

Published by Charles

[This post duplicates my review of Captain Blood, without the book-specific parts.  I am cross-posting it because it fits in two categories, Reviews and Analysis.] American history is full of rebellion—the War of Independence and the Civil War, of course, but also unsuccessful smaller-scale rebellions—Shay’s Rebellion, the Whiskey Rebellion, Nat Turner’s Rebellion, John Brown’s assault on Harper’s Ferry, and the leftist rebellions of the 1970s. We can conclude that rebellion is relatively commonplace and that it arises from different causes.  What I want to talk about is when it is intellectually and morally justified.  We will examine theory and practice, Aquinas and Rogue One.  I am sure that writing this will probably get me on some list, or rather some additional lists, and prevent my being appointed to any government position—at least, in the current dispensation.  But since I doubt if the current dispensation will last, this is probably not the hobbling it seems.

On The Growth In Political Intolerance; Or, The Days of Rage

Published by Charles

As we all know, one of the results of the rise of social media is that people are able to communicate their political views more often, in fact continuously, to their friends and acquaintances. We can leave aside that most of this is utterly inane, most of this is virtue-signaling, and little of it is helpful in reaching common ground. My focus here is on a subset of such discussions—those among highly educated, intelligent and rational people who have personally known each other for a long time. We can call these people the “Rationals Known To Each Other,” or “RKTEOs.”

Does Political Correctness Exist Among Conservatives?

Published by Charles

[This is a reaction requested from me regarding a Washington Post article, by Alex Nowrasteh, titled “The right has its own version of political correctness. It’s just as stifling.”] This is not convincing, because it posits a false analogy.  (It is also extremely badly written.)  The analogy is false because it falsely defines “political correctness.”  Conservatives don’t regard PC as bad because it shows that people have strong feelings, or because those feelings are believed to be irrational.  (A side note:  PC has been around for 30 years, not 10.  See my review of Thiel’s “The Diversity Myth,” which was written in 1996.)  They regard PC as bad because in wide swathes of America, and disproportionately in elite occupations, it is used as both reason and mechanism to punish those who fail to toe the line on whatever today’s PC orthodoxy is.  (That orthodoxy, and the weighting of its different tenets, as with any religion substitute ideology, shifts constantly—see, e.g., transgender rights.)  That is, PC imports ideological concepts as a tool to punish and silence ideological opponents, …