Notes on Survival Amid the Madness

Posted on | July 26, 2015 | 282 Comments

We live in an Orwellian dystopia, where the Thought Police constantly monitor our every word for evidence of any tendency we might have to think for ourselves. We are supposed to think only what government school officials teach us to think, and expected to believe whatever the Democrat-controlled entertainment/media industry wants us to believe. If we begin to doubt — if we “Question Authority” as the old hippie bumper sticker urged us to do — we find ourselves confronted with insanity. Without a quasi-religious faith in liberalism, an hour’s worth of watching CNN becomes an ordeal, psychologically traumatizing, and MSNBC is like shock therapy, or perhaps a lobotomy.

Mental toughness is necessary to withstand the constant psychic assault we must daily endure in a world gone mad. Having spent years diving head-first into the swirling cultural vortex of a society descending into chaotic lunacy, I’ve learned the secrets of survival:

Focus — Keep your mind on your chosen or assigned task. You cannot cover every story or worry about every problem in the world. If you let yourself be constantly distracted by whatever Big Story is headlined on the Drudge Report or getting wall-to-wall coverage on CNN, you will find yourself whiplashed back and forth, and risk becoming disoriented and overwhelmed by it all.
Objectivity — No one is ever actually objective about anything. We all have our opinions. However, if we are to survive inside the 21st-century asylum, we must maintain some kind of emotional distance from the events and people we write about. I once said that, in the news business, objectivity is just a way of saying “I don’t actually give a damn about these people.” You have to imagine the daily work I did as a news editor years. Six people killed by tornados in Oklahoma? Grab the AP story off the wire, cut it down to two paragraphs, stick it in the National Briefs column and move on to the next story. “File it and forget it,” as they say. There is no time to mourn the dead or become emotionally involved with the suffering of those Oklahoma tornado survivors. Your job is not to care about them, your job is to put their stories in the newspaper. Murder, mayhem, war, famine, disease — these are just so many column-inches of news copy with which to fill the pages. Fit the headlines, write the captions, crop the pictures, and get it all done by deadline. The news business is not the Red Cross. It’s not the Peace Corps. Learning not to care is part of the job.
Reality — The problem of the 24-hour news cycle and the constant connection of the online environment is that we are easily tempted to think of that (the stories in the news) as “real life,” so that our own actual flesh-and-blood existence seems unimportant. More than once during the 2012 presidential campaign, I noticed how reporters at rallies were glued to their iPhones. Instead of observing the event they were assigned to cover, they were checking their emails or scrolling their Twitter feeds. To be at a major rally and see political reporters all staring into their phones was disturbing to me. What’s the point of being “on the scene” if you’re not paying attention to the scene? By the same token, now that I’m back home doing the blog thing, I find it necessary to remind myself that real life (my home, my wife, my children) is actually more important than, for example, the problems of queer feminist artists on Tumblr. That is to say, blogging is what I do to pay the bills, thus enabling me to enjoy real life. It’s important to be able to tell the difference, or else you can’t enjoy real life at all.

All of this is preamble to discussing the #cuckservative furor that has erupted in online warfare in recent days. This is a distraction to me — at a time where I’m racing a book deadline next month — even though, on the other hand, it involves subjects which I am perhaps uniquely qualified to address as a conservative journalist. I am personally familiar with many people on what is called the “New Right” or the “alt-right.” In the past couple of days, I’ve made phone calls to some of these sources/friends, and one of them informed me of the proximate origins of the #cuckservative swarm. In the past six months, there was a bitter schism among the so-called “neo-reactionary” (NRx) online community, with purges and counter-purges. It was a multi-faction quarrel. Certain ultra-traditionalist Catholic/Orthodox activists were involved, as were various European nationalist types and futurist “singularity” devotees.

After months of this factional infighting, somehow the Donald Trump presidential candidacy — especially Trump’s controversial remarks about immigration — became a rallying point for many of these “alt-right” people and, amid this, the slur “cuckservative” was coined to describe the cowardice of mainstream Republicans.

Frankly, I’ve been paying as little attention as possible to the 2016 campaign, because (a) I spent 18 months covering the 2012 campaign so it’s “been there, done that,” (b) I’ve been busy working on the Sex Trouble project, and (c) my gut hunch is that, when the dust settles, Scott Walker will be the Republican nominee. I like Walker, who thrice defeated the full power of the Left in Wisconsin, and think he will be good enough to beat to Hillary next fall. If my hunch is correct, therefore, it will not be necessary for me to become directly involved in the fight for the GOP nomination. Walker obviously knows a thing or two about winning tough campaigns, so that if he wins the 2016 Iowa caucus, it should be green lights all the way to the nomination for him, and I don’t have to worry about it at all.

So I’ve made up my mind to ignore the campaign to the greatest possible extent and, if my hunch is correct, the Trump candidacy will ultimately prove to be a flash in the pan except for this: By proving how popular a blunt-talking “get tough” approach to immigration enforcement is among GOP primary voters, Trump is pushing the borders/sovereignty/culture discourse onto center stage. The sheep will be separated from the goats, and the Open Borders candidates (e.g., Jeb Bush) will be flushed out of their hiding behind vague talk about “comprehensive reform.”

Well done, Mr. Trump. Well done, I say.

This has happened without me having to lift a finger, and I’ve barely even commented about it. Yet this #cuckservative thing sprang up, Ace of Spades commented on it, and when I took notice, people started attacking me, as if I were some kind of Chamber of Commerce shill or RINO Establishmentarian. So I blogged about it, and the comments exploded with trolls, and among the comments I offered this explanation:

You see that racialists (of whatever persuasion) must always impute dishonorable motives to their critics. This is a mirror-reverse of the way that the Left is forever accusing the Right of racism. The fact that I have been hate-listed by the SPLC does nothing to defend me from the accusation by racialists that I am, somehow, insufficiently aware, lacking “racial consciousness.”
Caught between the Devil of the SPLC and the “deep blue sea” of racialism, I have no answer except to say that (a) I am profoundly interested in facts, and (b) I consider the conservative cause to be a defense of American liberty. On the latter point, I consider that our liberty is threatened both by cultural decline and by the remorseless expanison of federal authority. These are related, because as immorality flourishes, the people are less able to govern their own passions and to provide for their own material needs, so that government expands to fill the vacuum created by the collapse of organic institutions, i.e., faith, family and community.
As to point (a), we ought to be able to candidly discuss the facts regarding human behavior without being required to endorse any particular theory to explain these facts. For example, liberals look at facts about racial groups and attribute observable differences to discrimination, prejudice and historical oppression. Conservatives, while not denying that any of the factors cited by liberals are relevant, insist that what is important are the (equally real) opportunities available to individuals in a free and prosperous society. Even before the civil-rights revolution of the 1960s, many black Americans were remarkably successful, even in the segregated South. As a matter of fact, Thomas Sowell has pointed out that many socioeconomic measures show the black community was (generally) advancing more before the mid-1960s than afterwards. Sowell attributes the problems that affected the black community after the 1960s to the vast expansion of the Welfare State that began under LBJ’s “Great Society.”
Of course, Sowell’s analysis is more complex than that brief summary suggests, and we are under no obligation to endorse Sowell’s analysis. My point is that the Left/Right argument over the causes of racial problems in America is about ideas — it is a debate over public policy — and is not (as the Left claims) a matter of the Right’s “racism.” And really, why should it matter whether or not anyone is “racist” in any sense of that word? This word has become a mere epithet, a slur used to silence critics of liberalism, so that liberal policies can be enacted without any real debate over the efficacy of those policies.
Perhaps I am more “racist” than some people and less “racist” than others, but what does this have to do with anything in terms of debating public policy? Why are we expected to subject ourselves to a sort of public psychoanalysis where it is to be determined (by whom?) whether we pass the Not-a-Racist Test?
The attempt to debate public policy (or to discuss social and cultural problems) is not helped when you have a swarm of avowed white racialists insisting that any conservative who does not adopt racialist rhetoric (and subscribe to whatever theorythis rhetoric expresses) is a coward, a “race traitor.”
Three words: Bull. Fucking. Shit.
Just as I will not let feminists dictate to me what I can or cannot say about sex, neither will I let anyone (Left or Right) tell me what to think about race. I will say, in concession to the “New Right” (or “alt-right” as they sometimes style themselves) that they are essentially correct that discourse about race is hemmed in by artificial constraints imposed by Cultural Marxism. Anyone attempting to talk about race relations is required to tiptoe around a minefield where any false step produces explosive accusations from the Left that one has exposed his own racism. The mainstream Right frequently cooperates with the Left in this project by periodically purging someone (e.g., Sam Francis, Trent Lott, John Derbyshire) who has transgressed the boundaries of permissible racial discourse. I myself was targeted for such destruction, and miraculously survived, because I had watched what happened to Sam Francis (whom I knew personally) and learned a lot about the tactics of the Left.
Notice this: I have never apologized for anything, and this drives the Left insane. How could someone hate-listed by the SPLC manage to continue a career in conservative journalism with such remarkable success? The Left’s theory, of course, is that my success proves that everybody on the Right secretly endorses the racism of which I am accused. Yet the truth is that my friends on the Right know I was unjustly accused — that I am not the hateful bogeyman depicted by the SPLC — and so the Left is confronted with its failure to destroy me. Grant that I have been harmed by the Left’s attack, it was my destruction they had in mind, and I am manifestly not destroyed. This example of the Left’s impotence might encourage others to defy the Thought Police, and I hope this possibility troubles their sleep.

People need to calm down and get a grip. Either we are doomed, or else the American people will come to their senses. Either way, the Cuckservative Crisis is a controversy ginned up by people with too much time on their hands, and my plan is this: File it and forget it.

I am an objective journalist. I don’t give a damn about these people.

Category: Immigration, Neutral Objective Journalism, Racism

Comments

282 Responses to “Notes on Survival Amid the Madness”

M. Thompson
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:03 pm

Amen.
RS
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:04 pm

It would probably be wise to disable comments to this post, otherwise Wombat’s going to spend the next year cleaning up the mess.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:15 pm

And we thought the feminists were harpies. These #cuckservatives are like PMS on methamphetamine.
joethefatman
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:16 pm

I was/am on social media vacation at a good time apparently. I read the post from Ace and then read yours, but it wasn’t until I read the comments on it that I really got what y’all were talking about. And… Holy Sh!t! I’m glad I haven’t been on teh twitters. I don’t want any part of that mess. Keep the faith Mr McCain.
Sirkay
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:17 pm

Question: How to survive amidst the madness?

Answer: Just enjoy yourself
Adobe_Walls
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:19 pm

Actually given the parameters of their world view I thought the majority of the comments in the previous post were surprisingly restrained. I’ll stipulate that I haven’t read the last 400 or so.
Trazymarch
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:22 pm

Liberty is not only endangered by: “by cultural decline and by the remorseless expanison of federal authority.” but also by rampant consumerism. And also by destruction of the family in which the so called “free market” plays big role.
Evi L. Bloggerlady
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:23 pm

Some of them were. Most of them were obsessing over race (as it that matters)–its culture and ideology that matter.
Adobe_Walls
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:24 pm

I must agree that the left’s plan is to make white folks a minority in this hemisphere. The motives behind this movement are obviously nefarious and ”diversity” is obviously a smoke screen. After all one never hears the left saying that there ought be more white guys running things in Uganda or China or South West Asia.
Adobe_Walls
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:29 pm

The two will never be wholly separate. Race will always be a major determinate of culture if not ideology.
MrPaulRevere
July 26th, 2015 @ 4:37 pm

An outstanding post, full of wisdom. By the way, I love your book and found it likewise full of wisdom. Even though I’ve read all (or almost all) of the posts here re. feminism you tie it all together nicely in a very readable way.
Daniel Freeman
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:07 pm

I actually had to switch to a different browser. Disqus in Firefox wasn’t robust enough to handle the volume gracefully.
three fingers
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:09 pm

Well done in not cowering before leftist censors. The thing is that we need to look beyond electoral cycles and think about the long-term future of our country. In 100 years, will America have a population that any of the founders would have recognized as representing their posterity? Will America be a a state of liberty in the Anglo-Saxon tradition, or will it be a state with a population that looks like that of a central American nation? If the latter, then it will have politics to match. You can’t have a first world country with a third world population.

You can win all the electoral battles you like, but if you lose the demographic war, liberty on this continent is doomed. But nobody in the GOP is willing to stand up and fight for white America. Why, then, should white America vote for the GOP?
Bob Belvedere
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:15 pm

They are Ideologues, which shows that, but for differences on the surface, they are just the same as the Leftists…and just as ignorant.
mole
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:22 pm

Thats my stance entirely. To keep the radical race mob happy ill concede there are averages, high and low of traits in various broad ethnic groups, but without a civilised culture “whites” would still be making mud pies in a hovel somewhere.
I see Aboriginal culture here in Australia which currently serves to wreck lives, yet, with a little tweaking would resemble the highly successful Jewish culture. Family assistance, being able to draw on the group, strong things, unless its abused.

For instance being able to call on the groups resources has been perverted to “empty out your cupboard” by anyone passing through. What this has led to is parents buying take aways every night instead of meals, a terrible outcome.

Culture, always culture.
joethefatman
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:24 pm

Bingo
Matthew T. Mason
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:24 pm

my gut hunch is that, when the dust settles, Scott Walker will be the Republican nominee.

Holy crap, Stacy! Were you not paying attention in the 2012 election? GOP leadership made a point of throwing every single conservative candidate under the bus. They had already decided early on they wanted Romney, and did whatever they could to make it so.

The GOP nominee in 2016 will likely be Jeb Bush, unless he drops out. You read it here first.
Adjoran
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:34 pm

So are we going to limit the subject areas people can be crazy about and still be considered conservatives, or are we excommunicating all the nuts? Because the white supremacy boys ain’t all, by a long shot.
RS
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:35 pm

The problem is not that people disagree regarding things like immigration and culture. The problem is, the alt-right people insist upon turning the discussion toward antisemitic, white supremacist fantasies. Whether these people know it or not, they are making it difficult to discuss the issues intelligently, because no one wishes to be seen as guilty by association with those loons.
Bumr50
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:36 pm

I think, since nobody of any consequence really knows what it means, we should just start calling the white supremacists #Cuckservatives.
RS
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:36 pm

No, because f-bombs and incoherent, delusional assertions serve no purpose. Rant away on your own blog.
Adjoran
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:37 pm

Who died and appointed you the Grand Commissar of Conservative Values, Zippy?
Doug
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:37 pm

Edmund Burke.
JadedByPolitics
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:40 pm

Hey zippy get a life you freak; you had your screed on the other thread; McCain doesn’t need the ugly you people bring to his site.
CaptDMO
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:40 pm

Pro Tip:

But if you start making noises about “international bankers” or “neocons” or otherwise signaling to me that you have a paranoid hostility toward Jews — what I call conspiratorial anti-semitism …”
I’ll IMMEDIATELY know you’re citing a script made mandatory for you, and are of no further “intellectual” use to me.
How many 100 IQ “Masters” and PhDs” can the education industrial complex economically tolerate?
Bumr50
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:41 pm

I’m down with that!

Both parties want to destroy the middle class. Race is just a sideshow. Class is the real target.
Bumr50
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:41 pm

Mama Told Me Not To Come.
Doug
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:42 pm

Hey Bungle, McCain needs to wind his neck in.
JadedByPolitics
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:42 pm

then bend over bitch!
JadedByPolitics
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:43 pm

Exactly 🙂 I started that #Cockservatives over on the twittahs to remove the Aryan brotherhood freaks from what could’ve been a great hashtag!
RS
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:44 pm

How many 100 IQ “Masters” and PhDs” can the education industrial complex economically tolerate?

As long as we keep subsidizing graduate school with federally secured loans to 100 percent of the cost of education, the EIC will keep pumping them out.
JadedByPolitics
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:44 pm

Been there done that got a t-shirt.
Wombat_socho
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:44 pm

That’s enough of that. You want to get banned along with the neo-Nazis?
JadedByPolitics
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:44 pm

responded by you like a true freak!
JadedByPolitics
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:45 pm

NO need to ban me I will leave of my own accord; enjoy!
JadedByPolitics
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:46 pm

OBTW don’t ever put me in a the same sentence with neo-Nazi’s!
Wombat_socho
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:47 pm

SHUT UP, YOU TWO. LAST WARNING.
Dan Poole
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:50 pm

“cleaning up the mess.” <—— In a post about cuckservatives and how they love to watch the left screw over White people.

I just can't even.
CaptDMO
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:55 pm

Well, the National, and Socialist, parts are pretty clear, where’s your stance on “organized labor”?
Richard Stallman
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:56 pm

(scared cuck)
Hyperborean Shitlord (Thulean)
July 26th, 2015 @ 5:56 pm

>muh safe space
Zyclone Autoclaves®
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:01 pm

You don’t think that different races produce vastly divergent cultures and ideologies? And just for giggles, which race produced the Western Civilization that America was wholly built upon? Pan-oriental-Afro-Indian-Arabs? Race does matter. Ethnocentric cultural identity matters. Sorry if it “triggers” you that a bunch of cis-hetero-patriarchal males of European descent built this country, but it surely wasn’t tranny Africans.
Doug
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:09 pm

Interesting that this:

“Just out of interest, can any of you #cuckservatives name the key thinkers behind conservatism?”

Gets removed. Can’t you name them?
Wombat_socho
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:26 pm

More like I’m tired of the whole #cuckservative BS and in the mood to ban anyone pushing it. You wanna get smacked with the banhammer, punk? Well, do you?
Doug
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:36 pm

I’ve had worse 🙂

But it’s an interesting question anyway: how many people who claim that they’re conservative actually know what a conservative is?

I tend to recommend Roger Scruton as an introduction…
Wombat_socho
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:39 pm

Conservatism doesn’t require academic credentials. It would be nice if more people knew its intellectual roots, but it’s not mandatory.
Doug
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:44 pm

If you don’t know what conservatism is, how can you claim to be a conservative?

It’s not about academic credentials, it’s about understanding why the conservative movement started, what it stands for, and why certain things are incompatible with it.
Finrod Felagund
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:47 pm

From what I saw when my ex was a math education grad student (long story), adding those with IQ 100 to that crowd might well raise their average.
Finrod Felagund
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:48 pm

How about #cuckpremacists?
Finrod Felagund
July 26th, 2015 @ 6:50 pm

(plays funky piano riff) “That ain’t the way to have fun, son”