Posted by wintermute on Mon, 02 Apr 2007 22:53 | #

Again, one is entitled to ask: What has happened to these people that they have been turned into willing servants of a programme that would draw the approbation of any revolutionary Marxist?

This is just an obstinate question, GW. These are conservatives, for heaven’s sake. They have just spent one hundred years - or more - capitulating to the tiniest whims of the Opposition. Why should they start resisting now? That you evince such surprise at their behavior demonstrates that you are reasoning and acting from unexamined presuppositions.

I’ll be more blunt, since this question has given you especial difficulty over the years: what is deemed ‘conservatism’ has three primary components. The first is moneygetting, which we distinguish from the pursuit of livelihood by the degree to which the pursuit of money displaces other values. Moneygetting, for the conservative, is also mixed up with status competition, not only ‘keeping up with the Joneses’ - though that is vital to the conservative project - but also doing harm to the working classes, when this is possible. The passion for distinction leads to cruelty just as reliably as other passions, if not more frequently. Despite the fact that moneygetting and status are intertwined for the conservative, we must persist in our attempt at differential diagnosis: these are two drives at work, not one. The conservative is not a moneygetter solely on account of status.

Moneygettting also explains (partly) the oft observed impotence, if not outright betrayal, of societal interest by conservatives. For the conservative, the first question must be, is my money safe? In order to guard the safety of his money and position, he will make any number of tactical retreats (a limitless number, in fact). To stave off revolution brought about by bad conservative management - or even just Jewish mob-agitation - a simple act - like tossing the colleges and the whole of academia to the wolves - is nothing. What is culture for a conservative? Another trading chip and nothing more. Conservatives traded the means of transmission of culture and the means of creating and legitimating public opinion when they caved to sixties radicals and student demonstrations. Now, forty years after this particular great betrayal, they all alone bemoan their outcast state. How has the world grown so foolish? they yawp, unaware they are barking at their own shadows. The world has grown old through the ministrations of ‘conservatives’, who now regard their handiwork with equal parts of shock and scorn. Are we supposed to laugh or cry?

You will note that, though our cultures and nations are rotting before their eyes, the first law - moneygetting - has actually been safely conserved. The fact that a larger proportion of the population slips into poverty on account of rampant inflation, increasing land prices, and the destruction of a living wage - why should this bother a conservative any more than the handing over of our universities? It doesn’t because his money is still safe. So, from a short and medium term perspective, conservatism must be accounted a partial success on its own terms. It has conserved the material fortune of the families that prop it up, and it has passed off the negative externalities to the larger society.

The moneygetting of the conservative and the moneygetting of the Jew should be distinguished: the Jew knows that money is a means to power, and uses it as such. With enough money, the opinions and actions of the whole world could be manipulated like a puppet on a string, as Walter Lippman and Edmund Bernays saw almost a century ago. Lippman even coined the phrase, “the manufacture of consent”, a process he not only named, but initatied in the modern world. The conserative vaguely understands that money can be used, via lobbying and newspapers, to make moneygetting more profitable. His conception of what money can do, other than make more money, is very limited vis a vis the Jew. Whatever else one might say of George Soros, he knows how to use money to the best effect: how many hundreds of colleges and newspapers and NGO’s has he founded in Eastern Europe? Teaching “tolerance” (race replacement) 24-7. What ‘conservative’ has ever shown such foresight?

Never. Not one. The very idea is oxymoronic. “Foresight”, for a conservative, is buying only blue-chip stocks. It does not extend to matters of culture or metapolitics. Indeed, we might label “foresight” the prototypical anti-conservative act. Since it accepts and refers to the one Reality which the conservative fears most - Change - it is simply never indulged in. The idea of environmentalism - to take but one example -  is the province of Progressives (Teddy Roosevelt), Fascists (Hitler), and the Left (Rachel Carson). Any “conservatives” to add to that list? I didn’t think so - though all conservatives now carefully toe the party line that the Left has prepared for them on this issue. The Left (Progressives, Communists, whomever) leads, and the conservatives grumble and then give in. There has never been an exception to this rule so far as I know. Even Edmund Burke eventually moderated his rhetoric on the French Revolution so as to not appear to be at odds with Providence itself.

A group of people who deny the Dynamic nature of reality is in no position to fend off change - which they couldn’t do anyway - or even to effectively anticipate it. From a standpoint of practical politics, there never was so lame a beast as “Conservatism”. He is the ultimate loser in the Red Queen’s race: he thinks that he can hold his position by standing in place. But the fact of the matter is, to even do that, one must run and run and run, endlessly. It is no accident that Lewis Carroll’s literary diversion has become a metaphor for Darwinian reality: all must run just to stay in place.

Moving on: the status drive of the conservative must be examined. Though central to conservative identity, the universal passion for distinction takes on a particular flavor in the conservative psyche. It is not an overweening pride, like Lucifer or Napoleon, nor is it a passion for notoriety, as might drive a criminal or an artist. It is not even garden variety hankering for fame, as we see with actors. Rather, it is the very peculiar passion to be as much like one’s neighbors as is humanly possible. We might even recast the phrase ‘the passion for distinction’, in the case of the conservative, as ‘the passion for indistinctness’. The conservative wishes for the neighbors to see he has a nice car, but does not wish to be seen in an ostentatious one - though often, because he has not cultivated his tastes, he ends up in one anyway!  Conservative status drives are not univalent, as we have seen in the examples of world conquerers, criminals, artists, or actors. It is always tempered by the ideal of respectability.

The conservative does not ask, “Who? Whom?” His life is not an elaboration of that premise. The conservative does not ask, “How then shall we live?” or “Who benefits?” or “How do the Many proceed from the One?” or any other similar question, (possibly excepting “Am I my brother’s keeper?”).

Rather, the conservative life is an elaboration of the principle, “What will the neighbors think?”.

So, between the first principle of conservatism, moneygetting, and the second, the passion for indistinction, we are already in a position to not only describe, but to predict, conservative behavior. However, there is a third leg to the stool of conservatism that we should examine: the law of requisite moderation, and its primary correlate, physical and mental ease.

This is a subtle point, so I beg the reader’s indulgence. The Law of Requisite Moderation states that any any activity which does not further moneygetting or status is illegimate if it is pursued to a degree which interferes with the above stated objectives. And yes, this does most certainly apply to religion and every other pursuit: love, the arts, the sciences, literature, invention, etc. ‘Conservatism’ is an eros-killer and eros-hater. Whatever is not money or respectability is a regarded as a mortal enemy of these supreme goals.

Again, I wish to state: this is description and not judgement. Since scientific, religious, and artistic pursuits most likely will either result in the pursuer either not realizing his earning potential OR violating the ‘status with indistinction’ law, conservatism correctly , and let me repeat that, correctly identifies these pursuits as prima facie illegitimate. A man can have a hobby, even two or three - but a passion, never. The man who regards religion as something more than a visit to church on a Sunday and a smattering of moral guidelines is a fanatic. A man who writes poetry has a hobby. A man who is a poet is probably an anarchist and therefore to be avoided. And so forth.

I hardly need add that anyone who talks too much about the Jews is endangering both his earning potential and the possibility he will be talked about, and is therefore an almost perfect object of hatred for the conservative mind: a mind capable of passion and foresight, a veritable anti-conservative. Someone who has a passion for the life of his race is already convicted by conservatism: he has placed a value on something that is not money or status with indistinction and is therefore a blood enemy. That this passion will likely expose its holder to comment by others - and negative comment at that! - makes it further unaccaceptable to conservative tastes.

Don’t take my word for it: go and talk to some conservatives.

Finally, I should mention the chief correlate to the Law of Requisite Moderation: physical and mental ease.

Regarding the first, we may take it as descriptive of conservatism that there is no excess in the pursuit of physical and mental ease. The path that leads to hot baths and blessed quiet in the home, and not hard questions about life or politics (except as they relate to money and status) can never be an excessive one. Therefore the pursuit of physical ease can never violate the Law of Requisite Moderation, nor can the pursuit of mental ease. Mental toil is as disdained as physical toil, and is regarded by the conservative as twice as unpleasant.

Hence no conservative Gramsci - the conservative does not play to win, he plays to preserve money, “kept appearances”, and maximum personal comfort while trying to pretend that a life and death game isn’t going on all around him.

To review, the three laws of Conservatism:

1)Moneygetting: all values are subordinate to the acquisition of cash.

2)Status with Indistinction: After cash-acquisition is initiated, status should be pursued, though not in a way that draws attention to the status seeker.

3)The Law of Requisite Moderation: all human pursuits, including but not limited to: religion, painting, communion with nature, science, invention, poetry, sport, etc. are and must remain subordinate to A)Moneygetting and B)Status with Indistinction. The pursuit of these other goals, if they conflict with A or B, have exceeded what is moderate and must be discontinued or attenuated.

3a)The pursuit of physical and mental ease is intrinsically incapable of becoming immoderate, and is therefore exempt from the third Law.

Given these three laws, is there any conservative act of the past century which is not predictable, including the very story above which you find so alarming?

There is not.

Therefore we may may deduce from this, that conservatism, far from being an optimal strategy for the goal of the preservation of this Race-Culture, is in fact its enemy, and must be torn out, root and branch, that we might have any chance of success.

More specifically, you - GW - should cease to be surprised at the things that conservatives have been doing since before you were born, and lay down the burden of your endless apologia. The Holocaust Deniers will sooner be invited to White House dinners, than conservatism will be of some aid to the White Race.

Finally, I would like you stop retreating into counterfactuals during our discussions of conservatism. This is ‘bait and switch’ at its very worst. Everytime discussion of real conservatism appears, you repair to the Forest of Arden. No-one appreciates misty Druidism more than myself, but your Stonehenge-upon-Avon appeals to ‘wise kings’ and such as useful instances of conservatism are just laughable. Likewise your other favorite retreat, C.S. Lewis’ appropriation of Taoism for his book, The Abolition of Man. Taoism is not conservatism, and the attempt to make it appear so is both a slander against Taoism and an unearned accolade for conservatism. If you adhere to the ideals as presented in Lewis’ Abolition of Man, call yourself a Lewistonian or a Taoist. The “Right”, as it is presently constituted, has only two varieties: haute and petit. Because if the apologia for conservatism I constantly see here is for something besides the interests of the bourgeoisie, including their mental comfort,  I cannot make it out.

I do think you have real political ideals, GW, but you’re going to have to articulate them outside the realm of reaction and foggy idealisation. Your current state of outraged surprise at conservatives and conservatism, expressed above, indicate that you are inwardly positing a period when conservatism was something besides the three laws that I describe. In other words, your feeling while perusing conservative websites, that you have been betrayed, indicates to me that you have been holding false ideas about conservatism and protecting them from scrutiny, precisely by retreating to Lewis or sometime before legal memory, when they are discussed.

In many ways, your stated ideals are nothing more than an elaboration on the “No True Scotsman” fallacy. No true conservative would . . . ah, but they do and they always have.

A word of friendly advice: you will not emerge from the struggle you have allied yourself with unscathed. Specifically, your petty nationalism, your atheism, and your conservatism will be joining your economic opinions on the the ash-heap of memory. I know you to be a very stubborn man, we have been arguing the same topics for three years now. The longer you put off the sacrifices entailed by your committment to your Race-Culture, the more terrible they will be when they come. Therefore, I commend to you a willing spirit and not a conservative one during these unavoidable changes. You cannot have continued life for our Race-Culture and conservatism at the same time, to grasp the next rung on the ladder it is needful to let go of the one you are clinging to.

I wish you as painless a transition as is possible.

Posted by Daniel J on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 03:31 | #

Perhaps the two of you wouldn’t phrase it this way, but you are battling for my soul…

You appear to have given me much food for thought Wintermute.

Would you mind sending me your “recommended reading” list?

Perhaps, you would as well GW?

.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

Posted by Piltdown Mann on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 11:58 | #

“Perhaps the two of you wouldn’t phrase it this way, but you are battling for my soul… “

Iam now picturing Daniel J as Daffy Duck or Bugs Bunny, with a little cartoon Hitler on one shoulder, and Lord Liverpool on the other.  But which has the halo, and which the pitchfork?

Posted by Proofreader on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 14:07 | #

Wintermute´s conservatism is the American variety, quite a different animal from British or continental conservatism. In Europe, status is still more important than cash, and cannot always be bought.

Posted by Questionable on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 15:35 | #

An interesting and informative mini-essay by Wintermute; as it meshes well with my own opinion of “conservatism” and is consistent with observable facts, I cannot find any particular points of objection.

One can speculate if Wintermute’s description of “the conservative” matches a former MR blogger who prided himself on his “right-wing” and “conservative” credentials.

Posted by Questionable on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 16:11 | #

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070404/ap_on_el_pr/giuliani2008

Ah, yes, Giuliani (should we spell that name phonetically?).

If Rudy really were a “conserrvative”, he shouldn’t need to “convince” these mid-west conservative voters of that - it should be obvious based on his views, ideals, and actions.  But then, since these nitwits apparently believe that McCain is a “conservative”, then what really is the difference?

Practical American media definition of a “conservative”: any Republican that the media decides to dub as a “conservative” in order to maintain the illusion that “substantial differences” exist between candidates.

After all, remember how “polarized” America was in the 2004 election?  Yes, indeed.  Two candidates with virtually identical positions on race, diversity, immigration, the demographic future of America, affirmative action (which Bush supports - Bush “opposes” “quotas” with the same semantic “skill” he “opposes” “amnesty”), support for Israel, initial support for the war in Iraq (didn’t Kerry vote for that?), ad infinitum.

Of course, Bush throws an ocassional rhetorical bone to his “evangelical” supporters (as the queer-infested Bush team mocks them in private) over nonsensical side-issues, but in what _real_ sense was Bush and Kerry different on the issues that matter?

Giulini/McCain vs. Hillary/Obama is a football game, of opposing teams, rallying around “party identity” and manufactored issues and false “polarization”, there are no differences between these candidates on issues of primary concern.

None.

Posted by Daniel J on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 16:43 | #

I also meant to say that some of the points wintermute was making were a little bit in line with what GW had just written to me and Fred the other day…

(“How to Get Intellectually Wiped…..”)

I don’t know what you speak about privately, but the two of you don’t appear to be as different publicly…

Posted by Bo Sears on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 17:01 | #

CONSERVATISM = ANTI-EUROPEAN AMERICANS

Conservatism in America is completely opposed to any kind of recognition of, much less protection from, the problems of young European Americans qua young European Americans.

These problems can be as prosaic as over-representation in tobacco & methamphetimane abuse, or as fundamental as suffering from teachings of hate toward their ancestors on a daily basis on TV and in classrooms.

Whatever Conservatism means in Europe, in America it opposes any awareness of problems specific to the well-being of young European Americans and, in fact, prides itself on its unwillingness to defend and guard young European Americans while celebrating the heroes and triumphs of the members of every other continental-origin group.

When Resisting Defamation began to work on cleaning up one little corner of the social & media environment in which it lives, it was Conservatives who attacked the idea with the most vigor and hatefulness. In America, Conservatism is a lively & literal enemy of the idea that young European Americans have the right to a decent sense of self-respect.

In the past 16 years, members of Resisting Defamation have had many occasions to wonder at the malice of the Conservatives who seem to defend each new destructive tentacle of the cancer-like Liberal and Collectivist mind into the institutions of our society.

Citizenism, Constitutionalism, Conservatism, and similar ideologies have proved to be the deepest enemies of young European Americans, their futures, and their well-being.

Two of our biggest problems are (a) framing the issues and (b) confusion caused by misleading categories of discourse.

FRAMING

Framing an issue dictates how it is to be decided. Conservatism offers no help in framing rebuttals to defamation except to attack European American officials and celebrities who say something nasty. While Resisting Defamation is well aware that its activities take place in the outer ring of the European Diaspora, we believe that it is an important part of living in this multicultural society whether we like living in a multicultural society or not. But our efforts are certainly not Conservative.

Because we had no American Conservative intellectual assistance in creating a body of reasoning to defend young European Americans, we had to pluck such concepts as presented themselves to us to support such an effort. None of these came from Conservatism. And no Conservative whom we know subscribes to our effort in any way to this day.

Help in framing issues about young European Americans is a clear case of Conservatism AWOL.

CATEGORIES OF DISCOURSE

One of the problems we face in protecting & enhancing the well-being of young European Americans is the constant intrusion of other concepts like Conservatism, Citizenism, and Constitutionalism. But none of these bear on the questions of the day in fora like this one. Majority Rights is an important and defining concept, but its underpinning memes and ideology are not Conservative in any sense that we understand. Working for Conservatism is not the same as working to enhance the well-being of the diverse and vibrant European-origin peoples in Europe and its Diaspora.

Yes, Majority Rights apears to us Americans as an implicitly radical undertaking, explicitly seeking to change contemporary politics and the social order. It is not a concept that is congruent with Conservatism.

Posted by Ernest on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 18:07 | #

wintermute bravo! Well said! Conservatives conserve nothing. At least nothing that I consider important.

“From a standpoint of practical politics, there never was so lame a beast as “Conservatism”. He is the ultimate loser in the Red Queen’s race: he thinks that he can hold his position by standing in place. But the fact of the matter is, to even do that, one must run and run and run, endlessly. It is no accident that Lewis Carroll’s literary diversion has become a metaphor for Darwinian reality: all must run just to stay in place.”

Indeed! This has been the conservatives stance in America for over 50 years.

“The Holocaust Deniers will sooner be invited to White House dinners, than conservatism will be of some aid to the White Race.”

Truer today then it has ever been.

Thanks for this well thought out and well written piece. It sums up conservatism about as well as anything else I’ve ever read. This should be sent to all people who are concerned and involved in the battle for our survival. Conservatives are NOT our friends.

Posted by James OMeara on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 20:40 | #

“There is nothing in Nature to say that normal, healthy human beings should not feel aversion to homosexuality.  Quite the opposite.”

Why do I suspect that, if confronted with the obvious and endless counterexamples in the historical record, we would find that the author’s response would show that “normal and healthy” is being surreptitiously *defined as* “hates buggers,” thus making this bluff statement, so reminiscent of Chesterton’s man in the pub, pounding the table and spewing cheese crumbs from his mouth as he shouts he’ll ‘have no more nonsense’, nothing more than a time-wasting tautology?

As always, the appeal to ‘nature’ amounts to capitulating to Judaism, the inventors of homophobia.  If you are concerned with European survival, I suggest you read more de Benoist, and less Talmud.

Posted by Guessedworker on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 21:25 | #

James,

The natural, unconditioned, “real world” response of the great unwashed (you know ... our people) to homosexuality is what it is.  Philosophy it ain’t.  Teenagers defining their own usage is, I think, quite unconnected to the thoughts of Alain de Benoist.

Now go away and don’t be silly.

I will post on the Conservatism issue when I get more time.

Posted by Desmond Jones on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 22:09 | #

The idea of environmentalism - to take but one example - is the province of Progressives (Teddy Roosevelt), Fascists (Hitler), and the Left (Rachel Carson). Any “conservatives” to add to that list?

Madison Grant.

Mankind emerged from savagery and barbarism under the leadership of selected individuals whose personal prowess, capacity, or wisdom gave them the right to lead and the power to compel obedience. Such leaders have always been a minute fraction of the whole, but as long as the tradition of their predominance persisted they were able to use the brute strength of the unthinking herd as part of their own force, and were able to direct at will the blind dynamic impulse of the slaves, peasants, or lower classes. Such a despot had an enormous power at his disposal which, if he were benevolent or even intelligent, could be used, and most frequently was used, for the general uplift of the race. Even those rulers who most abused this power put down with merciless rigor the antisocial elements, such as pirates, brigands, or anarchists, which impair the progress of a community, as disease or wounds cripple an individual.

True aristocracy is government by the wisest and best, always a small minority in any population. Human society is like a serpent dragging its long body on the ground, but with the head always thrust a little in advance and a little elevated above the earth. The serpent’s tail, in human society represented by the antisocial forces, was in the past dragged by sheer force along the path of progress. Such has been the organization of mankind from the beginning, and such it still is in older communities than ours. What progress humanity can make under the control of universal suffrage, or the rule of the average, may find a further analogy in the habits of certain snakes which wiggle sideways and disregard the head with its brains and eyes. Such serpents, however, are not noted for their ability to make rapid progress.

Conservationism;

Grant was a close friend of many U.S. presidents, including Theodore Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover, and also was an avid conservationist. He is credited with saving many natural species from extinction, and cofounded the Save-the-Redwoods League with John C. Merriam and Henry Fairfield Osborn in 1918. He is also credited with helping develop the first deer hunting laws in New York state, legislation which spread to other states as well over time. He was also the creator of wildlife management, helped to found the Bronx Zoo, build the Bronx River Parkway, save the American bison as an organizer of the American Bison Society, and helped to create Glacier National Park and Denali National Park. As head of the New York Zoological Society from 1925 until his death, he lobbied to put Ota Benga, a Congolese pygmy, on display alongside apes at the Bronx Zoo.

Posted by Desmond Jones on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 22:20 | #

Lothrop Stoddard, a lifelong Unitarian and Republican, advocated for a “neo-Aristocracy”, in his book The Revolt Against Civilization a treatise refuting the Bolshevik “underman” concept. Stoddard advocated for a hierarchical structure in society, not only of races but of individuals.

Posted by Fred Scrooby on Wed, 04 Apr 2007 22:41 | #

“Yes, Majority Rights [I assume Bo means this web-site, MajorityRights.com] apears to us Americans as an implicitly radical undertaking, explicitly seeking to change contemporary politics and the social order. It is not a concept that is congruent with Conservatism.”  (—Bo)

Well put.  I second that.  I also second those who praised Wintermute’s exposure of Conservatism as the pure stinking excrement it is, and I add high praise for Bo’s statement statement on Conservatism as well.  In this thread Conservatism has well and truly been put in its proper place:  the dung heap.  As everyone is saying, the old categories no longer apply and what we are here is a third thing orthogonal to everything that’s on offer in the mainstream.

“If you are concerned with European survival, I suggest you read more de Benoist, and less Talmud.”  (—James O’M)

Does de B. oppose race-replacement, as Faye does?  Or does he merely find ways to accommodate himself to it?  I haven’t read lots of his stuff (it’s long-winded and drags) but I’ve seen some that suggests he accepts a Moslem France with the proviso that Frenchmen retain the option of forming their separate little communities.  Is he fricking joking???  I totally reject that.  France is the whole country (minus French Flanders and Alsace-Lorraine, of course, which aren’t part of France).  None of France — not one bit of it, not a square inch — goes to Moslems or Arabs.  Let’s slightly amend James O’M's suggestion to make Fred Scrooby’s suggestion: 

If you are concerned with European survival, I suggest you read more Charles Martel, and less de Benoist or Talmud.

Posted by Al Ross on Thu, 05 Apr 2007 23:11 | #

GW, a search of the Cheshire Police website provided a telling glimpse of their Marxianly skewed priorities, viz., the word ‘diversity’ produced 709 results whereas the word ‘arrests’ only turned up 261 results.

Posted by Guessedworker on Thu, 05 Apr 2007 23:20 | #

The Met must be off the scale then, Al.