Sailer to Taylor 2

I’ll begin with an apology to Geoff, who was off the starting line a lot quicker than me with a response to Steve Sailer’s second instalment of his answer to Jared Taylor.  But I found a great deal in the Sailer argument that merited detailed attention, and a dedicated post was the only way to do it justice.

As we shall see, Sailer’s argument is, unfortunately, pretty lame.  The more salient quotes follow as indents, with my responses beneath.

He’s also emerged as a sort of white nationalist, explicitly defending the interests of whites (who, of course, would have been described as “Americans” before the federal government began electing a new people with the 1965 Immigration Act .)

A facile Sailer comment which evaporates once one starts thinking about it for a second.  Pre-1965, there were Negro, Hispanic, and Oriental citizens.  They were all “Americans”, no?  Or, does Sailer think, that foreigners would only designate whites as “Americans” at that time?  If so, what difference does it make to the current reality?  Thus - a completely meaningless statement.

Taylor is a man of commanding voice and mien, Central Casting’s dream of a U.S. Senator. But, needless to say, he will never become a Senator - because he long ago chose to sacrifice popularity for his principles.

In contrast, politicians – and perhaps Sailer himself? – have decided to ditch principles altogether?  I admire Taylor.  As well, how can Sailer be so sure that Taylor will never be a Senator?  More to the point (see below) our aims are not to “win elections.”

I sense (or perhaps merely hope) that millions of Americans feel as I do, in an unarticulated fashion.

Maybe you are just fooling yourself, Steve?  Question: what is the racial background of those “millions of Americans” who you “sense” “feel” (not think, but feel?) as you do?  White, I presume.  You don’t really think that blacks, Hispanics, and Asians will ever be “citizenists”, do you?

But at the moment, Google suggests that I am just about the only person in the country calling himself a “citizenist.”

Then perhaps your own philosophy is even more impractical, and incapable of “getting the job done” – by your own standards of “do people do it?” – than is WN?

By “citizenism,” I mean that I believe Americans should be biased in favor of the welfare of our current fellow citizens over that of the six billion foreigners.

Here is a major point of difference, and why we and Sailer are essentially speaking different languages.  Many of those that Steve says are “our fellow citizens”, we believe really “are foreigners”, regardless of their official status.  Get it Steve?  WNs simply do not consider non-whites as their “fellow citizens”, so your arguments to them in this regard fall flat.  Surely, you must know this?  Surely, you must know that someone like Taylor really does not view the blacks of NOLA as his “fellow citizens.”

That same logic applies to the valuable right of being an American citizen and living in America….Just as the managers of a public company have a fiduciary duty to the current stockholders not to diminish the value of their shares by selling new ones too cheaply to outsiders, our leaders have a duty to the current citizens and their descendents.

A nation is not, or should not be, a stock company.  Question: given that Sailer defines a race as like an extended family, would he, by analogy, sacrifice the interests of his own children to further his stock market investments?  Would you, Steve?  Now, Sailer would argue that this analogy is not perfect, since he would assert that citizenism, by curtailing immigration, would benefit whites.  However, given that the whites would be an atomized set of individualists in a multiracial state full of strategizing, collectivist non-whites; in the long run, even with limited immigration, interests would suffer.  Thus, I can rephrase the analogy thus: Would Sailer sacrifice the long-term interests of his children in order to bring them some ephemeral short-term benefits?  Would he sacrifice the possibility of having grandchildren in order to give his children more goods today?

Furthermore, given that non-whites are ethnocentric (and Sailer has admitted that on his own site), why does he think they will accept restriction of their own co-ethnic immigration?  And, if it is the white majority that will enforce this, won’t that be de facto racialism?  How stable will this all be without white identity politics?  Won’t organized groups of ethnocentric non-whites always be agitating to overturn the immigration restriction?

That implies the opposite of what Taylor claims. In reality, citizenism entails focusing on the central issue for the future of our country: limiting immigration

What about the relations between people already here, Steve?  Does that count for nothing?  Whites have interests even if all the immigration were to be stopped.  More to the point, what kind of “immigration limitation” do you have in mind?  What your buddies at GNXP propose?  More ethnocentric Asians?  Do you consider EGI at all?

While citizenism is compatible with a realistic appreciation of racial differences, it opposes wasting political capital and energy on expressions of hostility toward our fellow citizens who are African-Americans - energy that could far more profitably be devoted to rallying broad support for preserving the value of our citizenship.

Once again, WNs do not consider African-Americans to be our “fellow citizens”, nor are we interested in “preserving the value of” a citizenship that for us has no value, because it is defined in an a-racial, non-genetic manner.  You may as well try to convince a Hasidic Jew about the importance of rallying support for preserving a crucifix.

Furthermore, since citizenism allows for non-white free-riding on whites (see below), and since that, given an absence of white identity politics in “citizenism”, what guarantee is there that the immigration restriction won’t simply be overturned in the future?  Who would benefit in the long-run from Sailerian “immigration reform?”  Asian cognitive elitists?  Citizenism itself is a grand waste of political capital and energy for white Americans, for even if it works, others will benefit in a relatively greater degree, interacial race problems will still exist, and the “solution” may well be temporary.  Why not attempt a more permanent solution, and one that directly rewards white efforts with an outcome that ensures long-term white EGI be preserved?

Blacks should be ashamed of the level of crime found in their community, but anti-black sentiment is self-defeating.

Guys like Sailer tell us that blacks are less intelligent than other races and have higher levels of testosterone and testosterone receptors, resulting in higher levels of aggression and self-esteem.  Do you really think blacks are ever going to be “ashamed” of anything they do?  Are you kidding us?

But the odds seem a whole lot better that “citizenism” will prove more effective at defending America from harm than that the White Nationalism advocated by Jared Taylor will do so.

Because Sailer says so.

I don’t doubt that immigration will work to make White Nationalism more popular in decades to come.

Here Sailer contradicts his assertions below about white individualism, and supports the contentions of WNs that collectivist ethnocentrism exists along a continuum.  Whites just need more stimulus than other groups, but they can act collectively, as Sailer here admits.

Yet the only scenario likely to make white nationalism effective as an electoral force within, say, three decades would be the utter failure of our current attempts to limit immigration.

Strawman argument!  Who said that the objective of WN is to win elections within the next three decades?  We know that Sailer reads MR, so what’s up, Steve?  WN is about practicing white identity politics in all facets of life, and we promote racial balkanization and destabilization of multiculturalism.  You know full well we have no illusions about “Taylor will be elected President, and solve our problems.”  Knocking down strawmen ill suits you, oh “honest” Steve-o.

Moreover, making immigration restriction into a white nationalist crusade would wreck the chances of immigration reform passing.

That’s the point, Steve, we are not interested in “immigration reform.”  Limiting WN to “immigration restriction” or “reform” or even the ethnostate is another strawman.

Besides such obvious difficulties as that the growing number of interracial marriages means that an increasing number of whites have a nephew or sister-in-law who is part or all nonwhite …

What stupidity!  What’s the point?  Those whites would simply not be part of a white identity movement.  Who said that WN requires all whites to participate?  Gee ... given that an “increasing number” of American “citizens” are from ethnocentric minorities, let’s give up on “citizenism”, right Steve?  Don’t you know that WNs abhor mixed marriages and would not want these people involved?  Don’t you know that by invoking mixed marriages – which harm white genetic interests and white racial preservationism – you are in fact bolstering the WN argument?  If such admixture is viewed as destructive, as we so view it, then the “increasing number” of such marriages is more impetus for us to bypass “reforms” that would stabilize the multiracial state, and instead support destabilization of that state.  Doesn’t Sailer proofread his essays for logical consistency?

…there are two surprising, but fundamental, practical problems with Taylor’s movement as a movement.

Not surprising at all, just more of the same GNXP-style nonsense we’ve long ago refuted.

Another point.  Sailer, like other promoters of CP, seems to have a cognitive deficiency that manifests itself in an inability to distinguish prescriptive from descriptive arguments; an inability to differentiate “would” from “should.”  His argument seems to be that WN is impractical, thus it is wrong, a sort of twisted naturalistic fallacy.  Putting aside practical issues for a moment, we can ask – is WN correct?  Is it justified?  Is it based upon biological reality?  Does it support ultimate (genetic) interests?  Obviously, we believe it is so justified, and one can review posts at MR (#800 being crucial) for more on this.  Thus, if WN is viewed as, theoretically speaking, the correct direction (a question Sailer really doesn’t want to answer, just as he studiously ignores Salter’s “On Genetic Interests” book on his own website), then, and only then, can we move to the practical aspects.  Sailer wishes to denounce WN based on its alleged impracticality, without consideration of its inherent merits.  Indeed, if WN is the only choice that supports EGI, then we should pursue it as long as there is even the slightest chance of success.

Taylor isn’t pro-white enough. American whites are too idealistic, too self-sacrificing for explicit white ethnocentrism to appeal to them broadly enough to succeed.

If that is true (but see below), then whites are too self-sacrificing to live in the same nation as less self-sacrificing non-whites.  The altruism of whites would be exploited by non-white free-riding, and the whites out competed by the ethnocentric non-whites.  Thus, “citizenism” is not evolutionarily stable, in that the altruistic majority group will be displaced by non-altruistic others.

How to prevent that unless the majority group uses rational thought mechanisms to devise majoritorian strategies to defend group interests from others?  As well, if whites are so self-sacrificing, why wouldn’t they sacrifice the well-being of their “American fellow citizens” in favor of the needy of the world?  Sailer is inconsistent. He believes that white Americans are incapable of defending the interests of their own group as a racial group because they are too idealistic, but they will suddenly become hard-headed and non-altruistic when faced with the needy of the world who wish to “have a better life in America by immigrating.”  Yet, if white Americans can rally around a false, non-genetic identity as “Americans” in order to defend against international immigration free-riding, why can’t they coalesce around a racial identity to defend against internal, domestic racial free-riding?  Because Sailer doesn’t want them to.  No other reason.

Why don’t we just try WN, and see for ourselves how whites respond?  Afraid to try, Steve?

Taylor, in fact, is a striking example of this: a man who could have made a fortune in the computer business or been a success in mainstream politics, but chose to sacrifice everything to pursue his unfashionable ideals.

In other words, Taylor sacrificed personal, individualist interests in favor of group, collectivist interests, thus disproving Sailer’s assertions.

In his recent suppressed law review article, Professor Andrew Fraser outlined some of the possible roots of this white tendency toward idealism—stemming from the individualism and nuclear family-orientation that replaced clannishness in north-western Europe….This heritage makes white Americans among the world’s best at working together in corporations with strangers who aren’t their relatives.  But it also means that American whites tend to see tribalism as beneath them.

As I’ve stated a number of times in this essay, collectivism is a continuum.  Sailer himself admits that given a failure of immigration reform, whites may turn to WN.  More to the point, if whites are the only group that is characterized by these traits, then “citizenism” is impossible, because – as Sailer mysteriously leaves out here – Fraser also discusses how whites will be out competed by more collectivist groups.  Cherry-picking your arguments looks bad, Steve.  Again- why don’t we break through establishment propaganda, and see whether American whites really will see tribalism beneath them?

As well, if white Americans are so eager to mix with others, and are so non-tribal, why must multiculturalism be pressed upon whites by the force of law?  And it is not only “black crime” – whites are driven out as areas become more Asian, that despite the “law-orderliness” of “high-IQ” Asians.  The reality is that white Americans had no problems with “tribalism” in the past, the real problem is that anti-tribalism is being enforced by government edict.  That, combined with the fact that whites are relatively (not absolutely) less ethnocentric, causes the problem.

Questions I must ask: In his original “citizenism” post, Sailer asserted that citizenism will be the highest, most uplifting form of allegiance precisely because it is so unnatural.  But, if whites are so naturally non-ethnocentric, as to make WN impractical, then how is citizenism a higher form of allegiance for them?  Isn’t it then just their default state?  Then, isn’t citizenism unnatural, and “higher”, for nonwhites, who are more ethnocentric?  That being so, why do guys like Sailer spend all their time peddling constitutional patriotism toward whites – the folk who presumably do not need to be convinced?  Shouldn’t they instead focus their attention toward the Nation of Islam, La Raza, Model Minority and Monolid, Sepia Mutiny, and AIPAC?  Good luck, Steve!  Certainly those peoples need to be “uplifted” by citizenism as well?

The point is that in the South, a white nationalist appeal would be an election loser.

Is that why Duke won a majority of the white vote in LA?  Is that why the “conservative” South Asian “citizen” Bobby Jindal lost enough support from racialist whites that he is not the governor of that state today?  How do you know whites wouldn’t support someone like Taylor?  Just because you don’t want them to?

Any political philosophy aimed at whites today has to be phrased in high-minded terms because mud-wrestling with Al Sharpton over the racial spoils system simply strikes many whites as too demeaning to bother with.

And why Sharpton gets his way, and can influence Democratic Party politics.  Thus, he is right and whites are wrong.

They are absolutely no threat to take away the job of anybody who is anybody in Hollywood, so nobody notices them.

And is Hollywood – the real movers and shakers – composed primarily of those European-derived whites who are the focus of identity for WNs?  Be honest Steve … I thought you prided yourself on your ever-so-controversial honesty?

As the recenthatefest over Bill Bennett’s abortion-crime remarks pointed out, much (although not all) of this white moralism over race merely consists of white Americans jockeying to claim as morally superior to their rivals—who are, overwhelmingly, other white Americans.

Disregarding the fact that many of these elites are of a certain group that Sailer won’t mention, the betrayal of the elites merely underscores the need for us to eschew the current globalist white elites in favor of guys like Taylor.  Problem solved – but not if supporters of the establishment like Sailer try to delegitimize guys like Taylor.

The American 200,000,000 whites are too numerous, too wealthy, too talented, and too self-absorbed to feel much solidarity with each other….White Americans would rather strive against each other for prestige than against nonwhites because (although they will denounce anyone who suggests this), they generally don’t see many nonwhites as credible rivals.

As they are being displaced by Asians and Jews in the universities and the professions (see Fraser’s article), this may change, no?  This is just the usual facile “It is true because I am saying it” comment by Sailer.  And, Steve, are all 200 million American whites part of the “elite?”  How come VDARE keeps on having articles by Ed Rubenstein about the displacement of American workers?  Surely, of that 200 million white Americans there are millions fed up with the racial situation.  Even if only 5-10% of that 200M to start with would potentially support a WN political force, that’s enough to destabilize multicultural America.

It would be like NBA stars Shaquille O’Neal and Kobe Bryant deciding to patch up their feud so they can fight off the threat to the NBA’s domination of American basketball from the ladies of the WNBA.

Or how about playing foreign teams in the Olympics, you idiot? What a stupid and silly analogy to make about a serious topic.

Question to guys like Sailer and GNXP: if WN is so “impossible”, why do you guys waste so much time trying to refute it?  What exactly are you afraid of?

Now, just because most “minority spokesmen” like Sharpton are tedious and/or tawdry doesn’t mean they aren’t important. But their deleterious impact is felt mostly by the working class, not the chattering class.

Bypass the heavily Jewish “chattering class” and get the working class fused with nationalist elites like Taylor.

But White Nationalism won’t get the job done at all.

Because Sailer says so.  He has no evidence, since it has never been tried.  Sailer simply doesn’t like WN, so he desperately tries to prevent its growth by attempting to convince us that WN is “impossible”.

The problem is that “citizenism”, even if it works, is profoundly destructive of white interests, so let us hope that it does not get the job done.

Since Steve likes descriptive arguments so much, I’ll throw in one of my own here.  I often go into “why” and “why not” arguments in my own mind, trying to track down, step by step, exactly why whites do not pursue their racial interests in the West.  And yes, the greater individualism and lesser ethnocentrism of whites is one reason.  But, it is not decisive because individualism and collectivism is a continuum, not absolutes, and a significant enough motivation can stimulate a collectivist – or shall we say more collectivist - response in whites.  German National Socialism is one example; as Northwest, “Germanic” white Europeans, Germans are expected to be high on the individualist scale, but with a sufficient stimulation of group competition, particularly within-nation competition with a very ethnocentric NEC ethny, the more collectivist instincts of the Germans were unleashed.  Now, I’m not saying that the direction that this “unleashing” took place was optimal – particularly the aggression against other European ethnies – but that is not the point.  The point is that the individualism argument does not suffice.  Guys like Taylor and Fraser themselves are another counter-example: they are white (and in their cases, more NW European than Germans), and somehow their collectivist instincts have been triggered.

You’d think that race replacement/displacement would be sufficient to trigger collectivist responses in white Americans (including those ethnies that may be slightly more ethnocentric than NW Euros – Central, Southern, and Eastern Euro whites - as well as the NW Euros themselves).  There are other factors.  One is the role of the elites, and the fact that many of these “white elites” are of a NEC ethnocentric ethny not included in White Nationalist ideals is of course skipped over completely by Sailer. So, isn’t it true that a sociopolitical cultural war is being waged against white identity and white identity politics by these elites, many of whom are actually of a different, and competing, ethny?  Maybe we need to develop new elites – guys like Taylor and Fraser – who understand white EGI and our interests?

A huge reason for white non-responsiveness is the exact kind of constitutional patriotism that Sailer promotes.  When white response does take place, in its currently attenuated form, it gets diverted from its normal direction of racial identity politics and EGI into the destructive dead-end of “American patriotism” and “citizenism.”  Thus, the ideas of Sailer himself are part of the reason for the very “concerns” he indicates.  In other words, Sailer makes the argument that “white nationalism is impossible”, but by his very actions he is directly contributing to making WN, if not impossible, then extremely difficult.  A bit disingenuous of you, Mr. Sailer?

Note as well that Sailer is unwilling or unable to answer Taylor’s point that, in practice, “citizenism” will only be practiced by whites, thus causing whites to be out competed by ethnocentric, collectivist groups of non-whites (which is in fact what is happening today).  Sailer’s citizenism is flawed by the reality of inter-racial free-riding that will inevitably occur – and is occurring – whenever the least ethnocentric members of a multiracial society eschew race-based identity politics.  Indeed, it is always amusing to me when people invoke intra-racial free-riding as a problem for ethnic nepotism, while ignoring the larger issue of inter-racial free riding that takes place in the context of the multicultural constitutional patriotism they so admire.  Hypocrisy?

In summary, Sailer’s destructive and illogical promotion of “citizenism” causes him to forfeit much of the respect that we have owed to him based on his more non-political writings on human biodiversity.  That is unfortunate, but nonetheless accurate.

Posted by JW Holliday on Sunday, October 9, 2005 at 04:24 PM in The American right
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