All posts filed under: Technology

Red Rising (Pierce Brown)

Published by Charles Haywood

“I would have lived in peace, but my enemies brought me war.” This is the attention-grabbing opening line of Red Rising, the first book in a popular young-adult science fiction trilogy, published between 2014 and 2016. The author, Pierce Brown, aims to draw Space Rome in roughly A.D. 3000. Within these books (the other two are Golden Son and Morning Star, and I read all three) are themes that could be fascinating, of hierarchy and oppression, of love and war, of duty and honor, of the price a man will pay to make his dreams real, of how our future should be organized. But, sadly, it’s all downhill after the first line, straight into the pit.

The Revolt of The Public and the Crisis of Authority in the New Millennium (Martin Gurri)

Published by Charles Haywood

As our ruling class drives the West into the ditch, from which a reborn society will probably emerge, but they and their rule will certainly not, it is natural for us to focus on elite theory—that is, who rules? This is an ancient question, although how the question is analyzed has changed with the rise of modern industrial societies. Unsurprisingly, much ink, from James Burnham to Neema Parvini, has been spilled on this important topic. Martin Gurri’s The Revolt of the Public continues the analysis, but he asks not who rules, rather how they maintain their rule, and if those mechanisms will continue.

“What Victory Looks Like”—Discussion with Auron MacIntyre

Published by Charles Haywood

Now available is my discussion with Auron MacIntyre about victory over the Left. We talk about permanent success in building a Left-free society, about “no enemies to the right,” about technology, and much more. You can find the episode here in video on YouTube, or here in audio on Apple Podcasts, or on all the usual podcast platforms. You can follow Auron on his very popular YouTube channel, at his Substack, or on Twitter and Gab. You can support his work on Subscribestar, as well.

On My Lawsuit Against Amazon (Updated)

Published by Charles Haywood

For people who like this sort of thing, I am pleased to present my lawsuit filed, in federal court in Seattle, a few weeks ago against Amazon (mentioned on my recent appearance on Tucker Carlson’s show). As longtime readers know, at one point I was one of the highest-ranking reviewers on Amazon, but they deplatformed me because of my awesome political views. Here is the original complaint, which also explains the background. The suit proceeds in the usual way. Various interesting things are happening in this area of law, as you may have heard. My lawsuit is mostly a question, however, of personal honor, along with my intense megalomania and desire for fame. Update 10/17/22: Here is Amazon’s September 2022 Motion to Dismiss. Here is my October 2022 response.

Dark Age America: Climate Change, Cultural Collapse, and the Hard Future Ahead (John Michael Greer)

Published by Charles Haywood

I am both pessimist and optimist about our future. I expect our civilization, that of the West, to end entirely, and soon. Yet at the same time, I believe we can have an intensely bright future thereafter—not a return, certainly, but something wholly new, informed by the wisdom and knowledge of the past. Moreover, I think that technology, rightly ordered and used, will be a pillar of that future, if we reach it. John Michael Greer, a man hard to categorize politically, agrees with my pessimism, but not with my optimism, especially as regards the future use of technology. Today we will explore whether I should amend my beliefs, through the prism of Greer’s Dark Age America.

Human, Forever (James Poulos)

Published by Charles Haywood

Digital communications technology is yet mostly a formless thing, still being born, upon which we moderns imprint our fears and our hopes. Some dreamers see it as an unalloyed good, which when grown will let us slip the chains of our humanity. Others, more grounded, see it as a genie best stuffed back into his bottle and dropped down a mineshaft, for otherwise its acid will corrode all that is permanent, melting it into the air. James Poulos takes neither approach; he is the apostle of creating the new way of human flourishing, finding the narrow path that threads between false utopia and catastrophe. “Which way, Western man?”, asks the meme. Poulos has an answer for us.

Industrial Society and Its Future (Theodore John Kaczynski)

Published by Charles Haywood

What role should technology—the complex of machines and computers that undergirds our world—play in our future? This is a crucial question, and among thinking people today there exists a distinct split. Some, such as James Poulos in his soon-to-be-released Human, Forever, call for fully accepting that technology exists and is not going away, while refusing to surrender our humanity. Others, such as Paul Kingsnorth, entirely reject what he calls the “Machine,” and intimate that our technology-dictated future is an anti-human grotesquerie, followed by inevitable total collapse. Theodore Kaczynski falls squarely into this latter category, and this, his famous Manifesto, outlines what should be done—goals he notably took to heart.

The Guns of John Moses Browning: The Remarkable Story of the Inventor Whose Firearms Changed the World (Nathan Gorenstein)

Published by Charles Haywood

Some men have minds that are simply not like those of others, but far better, on a different plane entirely. Such men are vanishingly rare, and appear to be even rarer, because their unique talents are often lost to mankind, when they are not recognized by or not applicable to the society in which they are born. John Moses Browning, who lived from 1855 to 1926, was fortunate in that his peerless spatial-mechanical talent, specifically for the manufacture of firearms, coincided with the right time for his talents to achieve their full potential. A substantial majority of all today’s firearms rely on his insights; I cannot think of another field in which one man has dominated the entire modern era—and whose work shows no signs of fading in importance.

The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind (Gustave Le Bon)

Published by Charles Haywood

For eighteen months, I have been infinitely puzzled that most responses to the Wuhan Plague have been irrational. Lack of rationality dominates the discourse and actions of the majority, from individuals to governments. This irrationality has innumerable manifestations, the most obvious being belief in plain fictions, recently the made-up threat of the new “Delta variant,” no doubt not the last in a very long list of fairy tales. The irrationality shows itself in many other ways, both secular ones such as the total rejection of cost-benefit analysis, and quasi-religious ones such as belief in strange new gods, saints, and rituals. I have racked my head trying to understand this very strange phenomenon, and made no progress.

Empires of the Sky: Zeppelins, Airplanes, and Two Men’s Epic Duel to Rule the World (Alexander Rose)

Published by Charles Haywood

Nothing is accomplished by our society today. That little which seems like accomplishment is merely the sating of useless consumerist desires and the serving up of mental frippery and degradation. Apple is valued at trillions of dollars; that fact says all you need to know. Even something that could be thought an accomplishment, such as the rapid creation of vaccines to help counter the modest damage directly inflicted by the Wuhan Plague, is of dubious real value, and is moreover lost in wholly justified suspicion of our rulers. We have collectively marched, or been marched, into the dead end of a box canyon, and we hear the water rushing toward us. Not so long ago, however, as this book shows, the West was a civilization on the arc to glory. Maybe we can be again.