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The Darkness Before The Right - The Awl
The Darkness Before The Right - The Awl
byParkMacDougaldSeptember28,2015
Its hard to talk seriously about something with a silly name, and
neoreaction is no exception. At first glance, it appears little
more than a fever swamp of feudal misogynists, racist
programmers, and fascist teenage dungeon master[s],
gathering on subreddits to await the collapse of Western
civilization. Neoreactionaka NRx or the Dark Enlightenment
combines all of the awful things you always suspected about
libertarianism with odds and ends from PUA culture, Victorian
Social Darwinism, and an only semi-ironic attachment to
absolutism. Insofar as neoreactionaries have a political project,
ADVERTISEMENT
All that aside, Lands politics are not simply the lunatic ravings
of a reddit red piller; even if you hate them, they might be a
fairly realistic description of what would need to happen to
bring back laissez-faire capitalism. The most intriguing aspect of
Libertarians like F.A. Hayek have typically argued that this sort
of state intervention obliterates the price signals necessary for
economic decision-making, producing distortions and
malinvestment as an inevitable result. Land gives this a
cybernetic twistin his view, the politically motivated
management of economies negates the market feedback
necessary to sustain accelerative growth, dragging the system as
a whole back towards equilibrium, where we may once again
encounter those Malthusian limits. In this view, wherever
capitalism is taking us, the Cathedral is whats preventing us
from getting there.
As with all futurism, its difficult to tell what relation any of this
has to reality. Prediction is hard. And even if wild sci-fi scenarios
are all the rage among experts, the burden of proof is on those
trumpeting the arrival of SkyNet.
GOOGLE+
ALTERNATIVES SUCH AS WAR BUT WHAT DOES THIS HAVE TO DO WITH CONTENT
THE SINGULARITY YOU MIGHT ALSO NOTICE A QUIET AGREEMENT AMONG THE TECH
ELITE THAT THERE IS NOTHING SPECIFIC TO BE DONE ABOUT THE COMING
CONFLUENCES EXCEPT WAIT
I dislike soviet communism, but I could be far more even handed and intellectually honest
in discussing it than this article was discussing the political right and its economic
philosophies.
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largemarge (233,602)
so, you read this whole thing, links and all, and your take away is that the author
is making a clarion call for communism? huh.
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Now in fact I disagree with this. I do not think it possible for a commie
to engage in disinterested discussion of, for example, the teleological
identification of capital with artificial intelligence, because
communists *have an overriding contrary interest*. But MacDougald
made a better go of it than most would have, so due credit to him.
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It is interesting the moderate comment I posted earlier doesn't appear here now. Is this
how the author of a brittle, flawed polemic copes with rational criticism?
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riotnrrd (840)
You don't understand how webpages work.
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@Basic_Chunnel (326,383)
At this point it seems the only people who actually believe AI is imminent are dick-tugging
forumites and the political philosophers (I've a degree in this - it's an oxymoron) who cater
to them. It's a fantasy in every scenario except those in which some functionalist theory of
mind prevails, such that anything that mimics the physical dynamics of a human brain is, in
fact, a human brain, and all human brains contain a mind, and all minds have will.
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ragold (2,746)
Excellent. Most exhilarating thing I've read in a while.
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Steverino53@twitter (326,690)
Nearly incomprehensible first paragraph. My takeaway- the next few decades will be
difficult for hippies
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@MGTOW_Atheist (326,691)
Hi guys, I don't really agree with any of the stuff these neoreactionary people say, but I will
say this - I am a computer programmer who plays a lot of video games, hates women and
minorities, dreams of a world where opinionated white men like me make all the decisions
and have an *extremely* punchable face and I would like to distract everyone here with a lot
of semantic arguments and derail the conversation to something other than what this
article is talking about. Thanks!
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@jayccc7 (326,710)
This has been eye-opening. I am of Chinese extraction, and every time I read about this
neoreaction, it sounds very close to the underlying current of East Asian pragmatism, even
up to the transhumanism.
Until now I've always thought it miraculous how a few white guys managed to arrive
independently at such a similar conclusion in just a decade. I did not know about one of its
founders' early experiences in China, which suddenly makes a lot more sense.
However, unlike pragmatism in the Far East, neoreaction has not gone through refinement,
and is still beholden to the basic constraints of Western thought. Progress, as defined by
Western Enlightenment values, is not progress. It is at best an improvement of societal
comfort, and at worst a form of societal regression. True progress is one of greater wealth
(and wealth disparity as a result), greater technology, leading to the expansion of human
occupied space, an increased harnessing of resources, and the eventual amelioration of the
species through artificial modification. Under the correct definition of progress, values
such as equality, tolerance, compassion, safety, comfort, happiness etc, are merely variables
to be optimally adjusted for serving the aforementioned goals, not infallible virtues to
strive towards. You only need enough compassion to keep society from cohesive, enough
happiness to prevent revolt, enough safety to maintain productivity. This concept is
important because both Western proponents and critics of neoreaction fall into the trap of
justifying/criticizing it based on the less important values.
The Western world is mired in angst over fairly trivial social causes, as is common for
affluent societies. Dogmatic religious morality has been replaced with dogmatic humanist
morality under the guise of progress, also predictable. Both positions are backwards, and
hold undue sway over the rest of the world. Therefore, the downfall of egalitarianism and
democracy should not to be feared, but welcomed as a step towards the future.
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@TJBreen (242,564)
This is a fascinating article, and very well done.
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C_Z_Codreanu@twitter (326,724)
Well, i'll congratulate you for doing at least some homework, but you largely miss the boat.
The entire far right now is working in loose conjunction for a similar goal, the destruction
of the Western order, and the project of liberal enlightened democracy. It is not though,
monolithic.
Some see financial opportunities, others religious goals, and still more with ethnic aims.
What you should be aware of is that we are growing, and our theories are becoming more
involved, our critiques sharper, building off of past philosophers you didn't mention.
By any means necessary, we will restore state of affairs prior to the ancien regime. Call this
the end of the world, if you like. Most only see it as a new beginning.
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C_Z_Codreanu@twitter (326,724)
*fall of the ancien regime.
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mikehoncho8742@twitter (326,744)
a little turned off by the intro and conclusion, but real solid interesting read about Land &
co. Long time lefty follower of his blog; formidable opponent unlike the pitiful slime NRx
followers are
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@J4CKH3CK (326,746)
very well written examination of neoreactionary thought and the diverse communities
which populate the forbidden shadow of 21st century 'politics'. truly, those attached to the
egalitarian, pseudo-socialist dreams of the 90's must pray that the 'racist police' they so
despise continue to do their jobs, and that the West continues to suck the blood out of
poorer countries, because to borrow from Guy Ritchie, Kaku's immortal liberal democracy
is on thin fucking ice, and we, the New Right, and they, the New Left, shall be under it when
it breaks.
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Nick_B_Steves@twitter (327,211)
a new economic boom, for one, would do a lot to soothe the disaffection on
which [neoreaction] feeds
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