Friday, February 7, 2014

Red Pill Republic

The Dark Enlightenment is a topic that is getting more and more attention, even from mainstream publications.  I've touched on it here ("Barack Obama is a communist" is perhaps the best opening line to a post I've ever written), but an old post from Isegoria (you do read him every day, don't you?) gives the best introduction to the topic, phrased in explicitly "Blue Pill"/"Red Pill" terminology:
The nature of the state
    • The state is established by citizens to serve their needs. Its actions are generally righteous.
    • The state is just another giant corporation. Its actions generally advance its own interests. Sometimes these interests coincide with ours, sometimes they don’t.
The power structure of the West
    • Power in the West is held by the people, who have to guard it closely against corrupt politicians and corporations.
    • Power in the West is held by the civil service, that is, the permanent employees of the state. In any struggle between the civil service and politicians or corporations, the civil service wins.
The extent of the state
    • The state consists of elected officials and their appointees.
    • The state consists of all those whose interests are aligned with the state. This includes NGOs, universities, and the press, all of whose employees are effectively civil servants, and side with the civil service in almost all conflicts.
The last one in particular is a concise description of what is called the "Cathedral" - social institutions not directly subject to the Throne but which work in explicit or implicit ways to support it.

I have come to believe that we will not likely vote ourselves out of this.  However, there is another way.  It is the Tao of the Dark Enlightment.  The maddening  thing is that this cannot really be told - at least, nobody has (yet) found a voice to do so.  Moldbug is thick going, even distilled by Isegoria or your humble host.

The Tao that can be told is not the eternal Tao, after all.  And so metaphor is what is most accessible to most people.

The Red Pill reference, of course, if from the film The Matrix:



This is the first truly revolutionary philosophy that we've seen in a hundred years, and it is just now emergent.  Whether you accept or reject its arguments, this is the intellectual structure that will battle Progressivism.  And not a moment too soon.  The battle is joined, the game afoot.  Cry havoc and let slip the dogs of class war.

8 comments:

Eagle said...

No, we won't vote ourselves out of this. Not because we can't: because too many voters have been bought, financially and emotionally, by the idea of free stuff.

Heck, even the CBO is now admitting that the ACPPA is a *disincentive* to work due to its oppressive and overwhelmingly unbalanced income redistribution effects. And when have a government propose, pass, and implement a law that acts to destroy the last remaining motivation to work, the next step is either absolute passivity or revolution.

Me? I don't think revolution is in the cards. I *DO* think that the United States, as it is currently constituted, has less than 30 years left to it. We've gone so far down the wrong road that at least a dozen states are now considering secession as a means to their own survival. THAT'S what I think will happen: and, this time, I don't think there will be a war to stop it.

Old NFO said...

Sadly, I think Burt is correct... This is NOT the America I wanted to see at the end of my life... Nor is it what I spent 22 years defending...

Isegoria said...

"This is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back. You take the blue pill – the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill – you stay in Wonderland, and I show you how deep the rabbit hole goes. Remember, all I'm offering is the truth – nothing more."

(Thanks for the link and the kind words.)

Comrade Misfit said...

Name one Republican president (or a nominee) in the last eighty years who would have changed this around.

Reagan? Pro gun control. Nixon? Bush? Hell, the elder one was a CIA director and the younger one was an enthusiastic implementer of the national security state and torture.

Possibly Goldwater, but he got shellacked about as badly as a little league team playing the New York Yankees.

McCain wouldn't have changed it. And if there ever was a candidate who was pro-corporations, it was Romney.

(As an aside, it took Snowden re reveal what anyone who was paying attention already knew what was going on, for most of the Snowden revelations were already out there.)

You're not going to take this country back to the 1920s.

Borepatch said...

Comrade Misfit, you are correct. George W. Bush dramatically increased the problem.

Kansas Scout said...

I am moving in these directions too. I agree we will not vote our way out of this. I think it's actually not fully in control of anyone. I think this has become a semi autonomous system that defies control from any quarter. Even the people who have their hands on some of the controls find the beast does not respond well to their commands. I think Obama has discovered this, as Bush might have. I think we are along for the ride whether we want it or not.

Overload in Colorado said...

Even before Neo was given his choice he wasn't an upstanding member of society. If he had been, he might not have taken the red pill.

Six said...

I've been dipping my toes into Dark Enlightenment lately. You got me started. Vox Day has some thoughts on it (as one of the so named Sith Lords). It has been somewhat...disquieting but fascinating. I wish I was smart enough to understand more than half of what I've read.