Social Matter

I’ve sat in a dark room and asked myself this question many times: where are the intellectual conservatives—and in particular, where are the conservative political philosophers? The answer for the latter is that they simply don’t exist. Is there a single one?

When referencing the 20^th century, why does T.S. Elliot count as a serious conservative thinker? He was a poet—a wonderful poet, but still a poet. C. S. Lewis was an apologist and had very little to say about meta-politics, except for some great remarks in the Abolition of Man that with minimal effort could be ported over to political philosophy, albeit with minimal scope. But still. Lewis was an apologist.

What about Mises? The blindingly obvious answer is that Mises has nothing to do with conservatism, and conservatism has nothing to do with Mises. Only part of that is true. Conservative organizations regularly include him in their list of recommended authors. Baffling, I know, but understandable, given the shocking absence of any sort of rigorous, foundational work for conservative thought. Who to reference? Surely not Russell Kirk. His seminal work, The Conservative Mind, while doing a half-decent job of coherently expressing a conception of conservatism as such, the principal reason it never achieved critical mass was because Kirk rendered it inextricable from theological foundations. But that’s not the real reason, is it? No, the real reason is that Kirk et al. never engaged in the necessary meta-level analysis beyond superficial platitudes. And that’s it.

Neoreaction is an answer to this lack: How did we get here, where are we going, and what can actually be done?

Conservatives still are content with this model. This is the best explanation for why they offer premises almost everyone now denies or at least questions seriously—it’s almost as if they have no access to societal doxastic nets, to the beliefs of the nation. The nation questions your premises, conservatives, and you just blindly repeat the premises.

Hadley Arkes? Robert P. George? When I said there were no conservative political philosophers, I didn’t mean there were no conservative legal thinkers. In fact, there are quite a few. But legal philosophy is different than political philosophy, and the lion’s share of their work is more or less an adoption of new natural law (developed primarily by Germain Grisez and John Finnis, which itself is arguably a modernist aberration of old natural law heavily rooted in metaphysics—the sort I adhere to), which they use in moral examinations of case law and other cases of public morality: pornography, religious freedom, contraception, marriage, abortion—the works.

The Witherspoon Institute has managed to capture some genuine conservatives, but again, they’re not terribly interesting, mostly because they exist as controlled opposition. They follow the same strategy as First Things: full-speed-ahead-supplication in search of acceptance in public discourse and academia. And because of that underlying rhetorical strategy, in which they are lead by the all-knowing, all-seeing guidance of leftist Jesus, the Witherspoon folks are unable to avail themselves of useful tools outside the liberal framework. The liberal framework has to be rejected and routed out. The Witherspooners et al. is the prime example of blue-pilled conservatism—right motives, but bad analysis.

Whittaker Chambers? No. Barry Goldwater? Turn around, face the wall, have a seat for a while, and think long and hard about that.

Sean Han–. You’re not getting it.

I don’t want to be recommended populist demagoguery. That has its place, certainly. But not when looking for foundations.

It’s this tendency towards populist demagoguery that drives away young, intellectual talent. Where do they go? It’s lonely out there. What do they call themselves? Tory anarchist? Fusionist? Burkean whig? Classical liberal? Ordoliberal? Member of the old right? Traditionalist? Paleo-conservative? Paleo-libertarian? European conservative? 18^th century American conservative? Southern conservative?

Usually they fall prey to the suction effect of libertarianism, which offers an absolute wealth of foundational material. It might be incorrect, ultimately, but there’s enough of the right sort of material to seduce conservative intellectuals. And out they come: the state is the root of all evil, virtue can only arise from liberty, and the government shouldn’t be in the marriage game. On a principled basis. This is fair. I can’t blame them. They were turfed and left in the cold. Conservatives had nothing to give them.

What about John Kekes? What about Roger Scruton? John Kekes doesn’t engage with the literature, and his book A Case for Conservatism, as I remember it, didn’t whet my appetite. Scruton is wonderful on aesthetics, but hasn’t taken the time to seriously enter the battlefield and cross swords with political philosophers. Dinesh D’Souza? His Letters to a Young Conservative informs us quite explicitly that modern conservatism is just 18^th century liberalism. Jonah Goldberg elsewhere agrees. Conservatism is liberalism, and libertarianism is a subset of liberalism. Whither conservatism?

This isn’t just the case in political philosophy. This is the case in social psychology, and virtually across the board, except for some odd exceptions in law and economics. Not all conservatives are cretins, as Moldbug pointed out, but tendencies are tendencies. There’s a distinct, anti-intellectual flavor to conservatism, and it’s enough to drive intellects far from it. Thede dynamics matter. The only intellectuals left either sell their soul to domination-of-yet-subordination-to the feminine masses, or they become embittered, crusty curmudgeons without a platform. Exiled paleo-cons floating around a variety of publications kept on the outer-rims of the American right: World Net Daily, Chronicles, etc.

At the very same time the scenario in Charles Murray’s Coming Apart was coming into play and norms inculcated in university education mattered infinitely more, conservatism spurned the university. When liberal memetic supremacy succeeds in hijacking societal status mechanisms, the battle is fought and won and done with.

Conservatives, indeed the same applies to Christians in general, circled the wagons and developed mirrored, yet baptized institutions. Harvard was ours but no longer, and even conscious wagon-circling beginning in the 1930s with the fundamentalist (fundamentals) movement hasn’t succeeded on any measure at keeping entryism at bay.

Conservative/Christian universities needed to obtain doctorates from somewhere, and often in order to signal prestige, they hired from Ivy Leagues. That sort of strategy is doomed to produce the opposite result of the original mandate, especially in universities where professors can have substantial autonomy and the ability to disregard overall university objectives. Progressive imperialism leads to degradation of institutions. What cultural institution have they invaded that has resulted in revitalization? I’d be curious if our readers can come up with any examples. Colonize, degrade, destroy social capital. Former church buildings now run by a transsexual priest are converted into condos.

You might not be interested in the public sphere, but the public sphere is interested in you. Withdrawal is not an option. But engagement is not an option, either, at least without the slow and gradual cession of tenets to the mainstream. It’s pretty common to see these two themes endlessly in conflict with one another in Christian circles, but the same sort of group-strategy rhetoric present in Christianity exists in other ideologies—libertarianism, for instance. Not too long ago, Jeffrey Tucker penned an article entitled, Why Do People Fall Away From Liberty? Try and read that without mentally replacing ‘liberty’ with Jesus or the Church.

Modern academic libertarianism has opted for the engagement strategy, albeit with significant costs, namely the turn-your-stomach prostration going on over at Bleeding Heart Libertarians (BHL). It comes off as wanting in the club so badly that he’ll go out of his way to signal separation from vulgar libertarianism, saying things like “Krugman is a better economist than Rothbard.” And in a recent article at BHL, in stereotypical fashion, Jason Brennan just dismisses the Let the Baby Boomers Die argument (already an uncharitable way of phrasing it for most proponents of the view, but who’s counting?) outright. It’s hilarious. Have a read of the comments section for good follow up.

In case it’s removed, I’ll preserve it here.

JoshInca:

“There’s a number of problems with this post.

1) The baby boomers are going to die, as has everyone that ever lived. So the dichotomy of let them die vs don’t let them die is a false one.

2) The idea that the baby boomers are universally near destitute is a false one. The vast majority of baby boomers will do just fine.

3) Why shouldn’t individuals suffer the consequences of their decisions? Saying that it’s not their fault is subtle paternalism, stripping ‘them’ of agency and seeking to ameliorate that situation creates ever greater perverse incentives towards more reckless behavior.”

Jason Brennan:

“Jasper wanted me to tell you he agrees.

In fact, Jasper thinks he’s not really the evil twin, and it’s unfair for me to poison the well by calling him that.”

Because in academia, it isn’t about legitimate inquiry. Letting boomers face the consequences of their actions is a legitimate line to pursue, but BHL isn’t having it because it’s distasteful to his colleagues, and just so icky. And if it’s icky, it’s not to be mentioned, except as an aside. To even take it seriously (academics abuse this word, as academics are status-obsessed and just have to be taken seriously by their colleagues, or they’ll just die. Emphasis added for dramatics. Note that this is the favorite argument of boring and stupid graduate students: Nobody takes *that* view seriously, anymore) is a clear sign of sociopathy. And if you believe it, you probably were a fucked up child.

It’s unfortunate seeing academics participate in the form of Brian Leiterness. Having taken it so long from his mainstream colleagues, Brennan and the rest inflict the same on others. Cathy Reisenwitz is of a lesser order, but Reisenwitz is a little different in terms of motivations. It’s fairly obvious that she receives psychic income from hysterical attention, whether it’s good or bad is immaterial. BHLers want validation from the academic community, and Reisenwitz just wants attention.

Someone has to take it, nay? Well, nay. That’s the particularly embarrassing thing. It isn’t even necessary—it’s completely gratuitous. There’s such a rich array of material to draw from, I could write a weekly feature doing a roundup of BHL pieces, noting how most of is reducible to: “See, we’re not like *those* crazy libertarians. Why don’t you love us and give us academic validation? Please?”

If anything, this should result in at least some soul-searching, a leaning back in that leather chair, and a few thoughts along the lines of: “Is this really what I’m doing? What am I doing here when I’m writing this way?” All I’m asking for is a little self-awareness of ingroup/thede dynamics, here. Surely that’s not too much to ask.  Now, that’s not to say that BHL folks don’t ever go outside the mainstream. Obviously markets for organs is a controversial issue, but that doesn’t negate any of my prior points.

It’s all terribly boring to have to maintain stupid pretenses, but I understand. They don’t know any other way. Frame control, thede management, social dynamics—all of those things are elusive.

Had they been a little more conscientious, they could’ve examined groups that had a high degree of internal, ideological purity, yet aggressively overtook the mainstream. Or: groups that completely cut themselves off from civil society and maintained a robust, internal culture.

The real answer to the endless ‘engage or avoid’ debate is that frame control and thede management are the more important causal determiners of success or failure, not the strategies as such—but again, it depends on the goal.

In other words, they (by this I mean conservatives AND libertarians, and any other interested parties) should’ve studied Islam and communism, as just two examples. For an absolutely fascinating account of the internal dynamics of communism, see Dedication and Leadership Techniques.

Because you might not click on it, let me bait you with a few select quotes from the book, which is written by a Catholic Priest, who was a former communist for many years:

“This document helps us to answer a question: “How did the Communists capture one-third of the world’s population by 1950, given the fact that Lenin had only a handful of followers in 1900?”

“How did the Communists mobilize the support of Western intellectuals, Russian terrorists, and peasants in Asia, Africa, and Latin America?”

Speaking of which, as a brief aside, the Catholic Church is an example of an institution that has been reasonably externally robust in spite of successive waves of entryism. And by that, I mean they’ve been raped by many-an-ideology, whether by Protestantism, homosexualism, and communism, specifically in the form of liberation theology. Strong walls on the outside, but rotting from the inside.

Conservative political pundits who secretly read Steve Sailer is the best mainstream conservatism can offer. First Things is the best they can offer. Witherspoon is the best they can offer. Liberalism of thirty years ago is the best they can offer. Appease liberalism and liberalism will swallow you whole. Conservatism sent away its intellectuals, and other ideologies opened their arms wide. Conservatism deserves derision and the fruits of supplication.