"That is the problem, in my opinion, with the NRx crowd. They have very good political theory but very poor philosophical insight."
Yes yes yes! I read Yarvin as a moral philosopher and I am just utterly alienated by the fact that he doesn't seem to have any mention of meta-ethics, or even really attempts at moral philosophy or metaphysics.
His essays have been fantastic in seducing me, along with WIAH's psychohistorical analysis of history deducing human nature, but I feel like if I were the me of 2 years ago--one that did not have proper philosophical justifications for right-wing reactionary axioms--I would just brush his political critiques off as insightful but not at all guiding as to what we ought to do.
>If the right wants to win it must win over the intelligentsia
Imo, this is wrong. Curtis Yarvin makes the same mistake when he assumes that
1) The world must be ruled by nerds.
2) Nerds are mostly good people, capable of ruling, but they're doing bad things because their institutions have been corrupted by power.
Curtis Yarvin being a nerd might have something to do with his opinion. These people would never hold any significant amount of power in any previous era. What we're seeing is a huge evolutionary mismatch where people who have evolved to be intelligent slaves have become rulers (not putting Curtis in this category, he's an anomaly). By "nerds" I mostly mean "academics", people of high but not extremely high intelligence and extremely high rule-following. Nietzsche thought that a great man would be able to control them. From Will To Power (128):
>I have as yet found no reason for discouragement. Whoever has preserved, and bred in himself, a strong will, together with an ample spirit, has more favorable opportunities than ever. For the trainability of men has become very great in this democratic Europe; men who learn easily and adapt themselves easily are the rule: the herd animal, even highly intelligent, has been prepared. Whoever can command finds those who must obey: I am thinking, e.g., of Napoleon and Bismarck.
While it's possible that something like this might happen in the future, it's unlikely to happen any time soon. So what is to be done? Our elites are a reflection of our environment. Ancient Greeks weren't strong because they cared about aesthetics and true proportions. They were strong because that was very important in the environment they lived in. If we want to make a meaningful change to the world, we must change the environment. Changing the existing intelligentsia won't work.
> I think that it is uncontroversial to say that the right wing is extremely ineffective. But why is this? Of course, there are many theories, but I believe that the main reason for the right’s failures is that the intellectual class has rejected their ideas and, instead, embraced the ideas of the left; with few exceptions, most of the best directors, writers, journalists, poets, and professors are unequivocally on the left. The fact is that most intellectuals are repulsed by the present state of the right wing and their importance is not to be underestimated.
But why do the intellectuals, who spend their time analyzing ideas, endorse the left? Isn't this evidence that leftwing ideas are very empirical/rational/sound and we should at the very least put a high prior on it being right?
the various groups on the left have an everlasting struggle about the meaning of equality.
Invigorating. Isonomia ( equality before the law ) and lets say gender equality are mutually exclusive. There is nothing empirical about it - it is about concepts.
Intellectually, the modern right only offers a waste land without anything that is remotely interesting. But at least I have the pleasure of knowing that after years of hostility, the contemporary European Right discovers that European Unity as actually worth defending and paying for.
National Socialism was defeated militarily, but not ideologically. Are you sure ethnonationalism cannot be integrated into a successful right-wing movement?
It theoretically can, but as a complement to a more developed ideology. But not by itself, because it will make seducing the intellectuals impossible.
And definitively not in the tasteless, edgy incarnation that we see on the internet today, but instead, in a solemn patriotism that focuses on its own community.
One more thing, the ideological legitimacy of NatSoc was directly tied to its military success, by being defeated and getting their country destroyed they delegitimized the idea of the Herrenrasse.
What is unintellectual about HBD? Steve Sailer, Kevin Macdonald, Jared Taylor, etc. are anything but anti-intellectual, not to mention they are dispassionate, tasteful, reserved and careful in their claims. If anything the ideological claims to legitimacy of NatSoc (which btw were absolutely not based on military success) have been legitimized, buttressed and confirmed a thousand-fold in the years since thanks to advances in genetics and other research by above authors and many others.
It's interesting your graphic above has them labeled as "wignats" but I guess at some point you softened it to "Eth. Nats" for your youtube channel...
I changed it because it feels more clickbait-ish and it is an exonym.
I believe that the online Ethnonationalist movement is made up of guys that do not really care for academic dialogue that does not support their specific brand of ethnonationalism. For example, they are very much into IQ reasearch that confirms HBD, but this does not extend to the parts of this field that do not flatter the movement such as IQ based on political leaning, which regrettably leans heavily towards the left.
But overall, I do not think that people like Steve Sailer, Kevin Macdonald and Jared Taylor will get very far when it comes to convincing the intelligentsia.
As for National Socialism its legitimacy was simple; Deutschland über alles.
Their political formula was that the Germans were superior to all other groups, and that this meant that they should unite and conquer the east and this ideology is essentially dead.
The wider white nationalist movement is a separate ideology that, for example, does not see Slavs as subhuman and does not raise the Germans above other Europeans which was the basis of National Socialism.
You say you are nationalist for your respective country, I presume Israel? I have not read all your other posts maybe you already said this somewhere already.
And if it's the propensity for violence that repels intelligentsia of ethnonationalism, how would a Nietzschean amorality which glorifies war and conquest, rejects pity and compassion, etc. do much better in these circles?
HBD is already gaining traction in the intelligentsia imo (see the reception of Sailers book and fanfare around it), rejection of DEI (Rufo's work), etc. It is a much easier and palatable way for the normie academic to make sense of many of the first world problems than Nietzsche's attempt to completely reverse two thousand years of slave morality.
I'm German but was raised (and currently live) outside of Germany if I said where I would effectively dox myself.
As for the intelligentsia I do not think that it is the violence that they reject, in other cases they are really into violence such as the war in Ukraine. I think the thing that is a turn off is that it is very populist. Tribalism is not overly complex and since intellectuals are they are inherently cosmopolitan they will not be into anything that does not have some sort of universal ethics. Or why do you think that they are not into the right wing?
And I simply think that HBD will not go very far since the universities and most other institutions are so left wing that HBD cannot even establish a bridgehead. Our liberal education has made ideas of, let's call it what it is, scientific racism unacceptable in the minds of most people, so I really do not think that it can get far.
So you are a German Nationalist but reject ethno-nationalism? A little confused because you say you are nationalist for your respective country.
Anyway the intelligentsia doesn't embrace war (such as in Ukraine) in the Nietszchean sense - they see it in the oppressor vs the oppressed context. They are not into the (real) right wing because they are bourgeois, they don't want to embrace struggle, conquest and power as Nietzsche would demand.
So you are right that ethno-nationalism will grow in influence as situations in these countries deteriorate. The key to winning the intelligentsia is to educate them that arguing "racism" "sexism" etc. as "despicable" is in fact unintelligent and unscientific. In fact, they intuitively already know it (see eg dating, school, neighborhood choice demographics).
As The Joker said "Their morals will be dropped at the first sign of trouble. They are only as good as the world allows them to be. These civilized people, they'll eat each other."
A movement of gym goers and old books readers isn't happening, sorry. You can't get the aesthetics of Nietzsche without the bloodshed. (btw i love Nietzsche but realistically a lot has to happen before we return to a war-loving aristocracy of the Greeks)
"That is the problem, in my opinion, with the NRx crowd. They have very good political theory but very poor philosophical insight."
Yes yes yes! I read Yarvin as a moral philosopher and I am just utterly alienated by the fact that he doesn't seem to have any mention of meta-ethics, or even really attempts at moral philosophy or metaphysics.
His essays have been fantastic in seducing me, along with WIAH's psychohistorical analysis of history deducing human nature, but I feel like if I were the me of 2 years ago--one that did not have proper philosophical justifications for right-wing reactionary axioms--I would just brush his political critiques off as insightful but not at all guiding as to what we ought to do.
>If the right wants to win it must win over the intelligentsia
Imo, this is wrong. Curtis Yarvin makes the same mistake when he assumes that
1) The world must be ruled by nerds.
2) Nerds are mostly good people, capable of ruling, but they're doing bad things because their institutions have been corrupted by power.
Curtis Yarvin being a nerd might have something to do with his opinion. These people would never hold any significant amount of power in any previous era. What we're seeing is a huge evolutionary mismatch where people who have evolved to be intelligent slaves have become rulers (not putting Curtis in this category, he's an anomaly). By "nerds" I mostly mean "academics", people of high but not extremely high intelligence and extremely high rule-following. Nietzsche thought that a great man would be able to control them. From Will To Power (128):
>I have as yet found no reason for discouragement. Whoever has preserved, and bred in himself, a strong will, together with an ample spirit, has more favorable opportunities than ever. For the trainability of men has become very great in this democratic Europe; men who learn easily and adapt themselves easily are the rule: the herd animal, even highly intelligent, has been prepared. Whoever can command finds those who must obey: I am thinking, e.g., of Napoleon and Bismarck.
While it's possible that something like this might happen in the future, it's unlikely to happen any time soon. So what is to be done? Our elites are a reflection of our environment. Ancient Greeks weren't strong because they cared about aesthetics and true proportions. They were strong because that was very important in the environment they lived in. If we want to make a meaningful change to the world, we must change the environment. Changing the existing intelligentsia won't work.
> I think that it is uncontroversial to say that the right wing is extremely ineffective. But why is this? Of course, there are many theories, but I believe that the main reason for the right’s failures is that the intellectual class has rejected their ideas and, instead, embraced the ideas of the left; with few exceptions, most of the best directors, writers, journalists, poets, and professors are unequivocally on the left. The fact is that most intellectuals are repulsed by the present state of the right wing and their importance is not to be underestimated.
But why do the intellectuals, who spend their time analyzing ideas, endorse the left? Isn't this evidence that leftwing ideas are very empirical/rational/sound and we should at the very least put a high prior on it being right?
the various groups on the left have an everlasting struggle about the meaning of equality.
Invigorating. Isonomia ( equality before the law ) and lets say gender equality are mutually exclusive. There is nothing empirical about it - it is about concepts.
Intellectually, the modern right only offers a waste land without anything that is remotely interesting. But at least I have the pleasure of knowing that after years of hostility, the contemporary European Right discovers that European Unity as actually worth defending and paying for.
National Socialism was defeated militarily, but not ideologically. Are you sure ethnonationalism cannot be integrated into a successful right-wing movement?
It theoretically can, but as a complement to a more developed ideology. But not by itself, because it will make seducing the intellectuals impossible.
And definitively not in the tasteless, edgy incarnation that we see on the internet today, but instead, in a solemn patriotism that focuses on its own community.
One more thing, the ideological legitimacy of NatSoc was directly tied to its military success, by being defeated and getting their country destroyed they delegitimized the idea of the Herrenrasse.
What is unintellectual about HBD? Steve Sailer, Kevin Macdonald, Jared Taylor, etc. are anything but anti-intellectual, not to mention they are dispassionate, tasteful, reserved and careful in their claims. If anything the ideological claims to legitimacy of NatSoc (which btw were absolutely not based on military success) have been legitimized, buttressed and confirmed a thousand-fold in the years since thanks to advances in genetics and other research by above authors and many others.
It's interesting your graphic above has them labeled as "wignats" but I guess at some point you softened it to "Eth. Nats" for your youtube channel...
I changed it because it feels more clickbait-ish and it is an exonym.
I believe that the online Ethnonationalist movement is made up of guys that do not really care for academic dialogue that does not support their specific brand of ethnonationalism. For example, they are very much into IQ reasearch that confirms HBD, but this does not extend to the parts of this field that do not flatter the movement such as IQ based on political leaning, which regrettably leans heavily towards the left.
But overall, I do not think that people like Steve Sailer, Kevin Macdonald and Jared Taylor will get very far when it comes to convincing the intelligentsia.
As for National Socialism its legitimacy was simple; Deutschland über alles.
Their political formula was that the Germans were superior to all other groups, and that this meant that they should unite and conquer the east and this ideology is essentially dead.
The wider white nationalist movement is a separate ideology that, for example, does not see Slavs as subhuman and does not raise the Germans above other Europeans which was the basis of National Socialism.
You say you are nationalist for your respective country, I presume Israel? I have not read all your other posts maybe you already said this somewhere already.
And if it's the propensity for violence that repels intelligentsia of ethnonationalism, how would a Nietzschean amorality which glorifies war and conquest, rejects pity and compassion, etc. do much better in these circles?
HBD is already gaining traction in the intelligentsia imo (see the reception of Sailers book and fanfare around it), rejection of DEI (Rufo's work), etc. It is a much easier and palatable way for the normie academic to make sense of many of the first world problems than Nietzsche's attempt to completely reverse two thousand years of slave morality.
I'm German but was raised (and currently live) outside of Germany if I said where I would effectively dox myself.
As for the intelligentsia I do not think that it is the violence that they reject, in other cases they are really into violence such as the war in Ukraine. I think the thing that is a turn off is that it is very populist. Tribalism is not overly complex and since intellectuals are they are inherently cosmopolitan they will not be into anything that does not have some sort of universal ethics. Or why do you think that they are not into the right wing?
And I simply think that HBD will not go very far since the universities and most other institutions are so left wing that HBD cannot even establish a bridgehead. Our liberal education has made ideas of, let's call it what it is, scientific racism unacceptable in the minds of most people, so I really do not think that it can get far.
So you are a German Nationalist but reject ethno-nationalism? A little confused because you say you are nationalist for your respective country.
Anyway the intelligentsia doesn't embrace war (such as in Ukraine) in the Nietszchean sense - they see it in the oppressor vs the oppressed context. They are not into the (real) right wing because they are bourgeois, they don't want to embrace struggle, conquest and power as Nietzsche would demand.
So you are right that ethno-nationalism will grow in influence as situations in these countries deteriorate. The key to winning the intelligentsia is to educate them that arguing "racism" "sexism" etc. as "despicable" is in fact unintelligent and unscientific. In fact, they intuitively already know it (see eg dating, school, neighborhood choice demographics).
As The Joker said "Their morals will be dropped at the first sign of trouble. They are only as good as the world allows them to be. These civilized people, they'll eat each other."
A movement of gym goers and old books readers isn't happening, sorry. You can't get the aesthetics of Nietzsche without the bloodshed. (btw i love Nietzsche but realistically a lot has to happen before we return to a war-loving aristocracy of the Greeks)
Did Heidegger live in vain? The ideology did well enough but as it turned out the consequences were ruinous.
It was best said by Bomber Harris L the Nazis had the childish notion they were going to bomb everyone and noone was going to bomb them.
Therein lies the problem for ethnonationalists: not getting that the game works both ways.
Dresden was justice,