What are your thoughts on Neoreaction/Dark Enlightenment - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#14810624
And I forgot to add "So what are your thoughts on this political ideology? Do you agree or disagree? And if so, why?"

I'm still getting used to PoFo. I don't use it that often, sorry.

Anyways I'm surprised this hasn't been brought up before but I have to admit it may be obscure. I personally disagree with it but I'm not going to go talk about my thoughts in this post because this isn't about my thoughts, it's about yours.
#14810627
People wanting to drag history backwards are idiots. You can dress reactionary positions up as somehow new and shiny and yet life is better now for the west than it ever was.

If they wanted to move forward into something new then I might be interested in hearing them out. Instead they want to do what has already been tried because they don't like the current state of race relations.

They aren't edgy, they're whiny.
#14810629
Oxymandias wrote:And I forgot to add "So what are your thoughts on this political ideology? Do you agree or disagree? And if so, why?"

I'm still getting used to PoFo. I don't use it that often, sorry.

Anyways I'm surprised this hasn't been brought up before but I have to admit it may be obscure. I personally disagree with it but I'm not going to go talk about my thoughts in this post because this isn't about my thoughts, it's about yours.


Welcome to PoFo. It's odd to bring up a topic and not want to discuss it yourself, though.

The "Dark Enlightenment" / "Neo-reactionary" stuff has been brought up on PoFo in the past once or twice. It amounts to the mental masturbation of lolbertarians on the autism spectrum. People describing themselves as Sith lords, worshiping capitalism (in so many words), and literally talking about going back to a feudal arrangement? :lol:

PoFo's been there, done that with that whole nonsense.
#14810636
This philosophy sounds like it's from whiny folks who disagree with what the majority of people actually want (democracy) and so because they feel helpless that their political ideas can't get any traction by the majority and put into power, they want to hijack the system via a tyrant in order to get their way.

In other words, they sound like most every third-world dictator bastard.
#14810643
This about sums it up:

Trotsky wrote:Recollections of the “happy” days of free competition, and hazy evocations of the stability of class society; hopes for the regeneration of the colonial empire, and dreams of a shut-in economy; phrases about a return from Roman law back to the Germanic, and pleas for an American moratorium; an envious hostility to inequality in the person of a proprietor in an automobile, and animal fear of equality in the person of a worker in a cap and without a collar; the frenzy of nationalism, and the fear of world creditors ... all the refuse of international political thought has gone to fill up the spiritual treasury of the new Germanic Messianism.

Fascism has opened up the depths of society for politics. Today, not only in peasant homes but also in city skyscrapers, there lives alongside of the twentieth century the tenth or the thirteenth. A hundred million people use electricity and still believe in the magic power of signs and exorcisms. The Pope of Rome broadcasts over the radio about the miraculous transformation of water into wine. Movie stars go to mediums. Aviators who pilot miraculous mechanisms created by man’s genius wear amulets on their sweaters. What inexhaustible reserves they possess of darkness, ignorance, and savagery! Despair has raised them to their feet fascism has given them a banner. Everything that should have been eliminated from the national organism in the form of cultural excrement in the course of the normal development of society has now come gushing out from the throat; capitalist society is puking up the undigested barbarism. Such is the physiology of National Socialism.

German fascism, like Italian fascism, raised itself to power on the backs of the petty bourgeoisie, which it turned into a battering ram against the organizations of the working class and the institutions of democracy. But fascism in power is least of all the rule of the petty bourgeoisie. On the contrary, it is the most ruthless dictatorship of monopoly capital. Mussolini is right: the middle classes are incapable of independent policies. During periods of great crisis they are called upon to reduce to absurdity the policies of one of the two basic classes. Fascism succeeded in putting them at the service of capital Such slogans as state control of trusts and the elimination of unearned income were thrown overboard immediately upon the assumption of power. Instead, the particularism of German “lands” leaning upon the peculiarities of the petty bourgeoisie gave way to capitalist-police centralism. Every success of the internal and foreign policies of National Socialism will inevitably mean the further crushing of small capital by large.

The program of petty-bourgeois illusions is not discarded; it is simply torn away from reality, and dissolved in ritualistic acts.
#14810649
Bulaba Jones

This article here seems to sum up the entirety of my thoughts on Neoreaction and the Dark Enlightenment:

http://slatestarcodex.com/2013/10/20/th ... onary-faq/

I also forgot, Scott also had a good explaination about what Neoreaction/Dark Enlightenment is as well:

http://slatestarcodex.com/2013/03/03/re ... -nutshell/

In my own words, I think Neoreaction is just like Red Pill, a group of insecure individuals who, instead of being insecure about their own sexuality and sex life, are insecure about their identity and feel victimized. However, as a political ideology it can grow in numbers and, with the current political climate, become the dominant ideology in Red/Rural America or (although it is unlikely) Western Europe. But luckily, most people in Rural America don't have that much computers or have bad internet access which means that Neoreaction will stay locked up in the underbelly of Silicon Valley forever. And even better is that, although people in Western Europe have more access to the internet than America, Western Europe has too much experience with fascism and because Neoreaction is an American thing, the Dark Enlightenment will never reach Western Europe.
#14810799
I've read some Mencius Moldbug, it's been a while but I have. My take is that what the neo-reactionary wants to happen will happen anyway because as Mao said "political power grows out of the barrel of a gun" and science and technology has delivered super guns like cruise missiles, ICMBS and the like that are way beyond what joe average can afford or master the use of.

Political representation hinges on military potential.

Joe Average's military potential was huge thanks to the rifle during the WW1 era that consequently saw universal sufferage become a thing just about everywhere but now in the age of cruise missiles and stealth bombers and the soon to come age of AI piloted cruise missiles and stealth fighters Joe Average's military potential is practically reduced to zero no matter what personal arms he may have (assault rifle or suicide vest) following that it is inevitable that when push comes to shove he will lose his political leverage as a legacy of an earlier age and not be able to get it back, it's just a matter of time.

For this reason the sands are running out for democracy.

The neo-reactionary message that "too many cooks spoil the broth" applies to politics just as much as it does to everything else then is a consolation not a prescription.
#14810863
My thoughts are that those people need Jesus/God/Buddha/something in their life. Stuff like this is why I can't be an atheist. People are too willing to throw away humanity for their own good, and their selfishness will ruin us all. Every religion teaches us to love our fellow man because our fellow man is just as much a part of us as we are, and it's true. The people that use religion for their own self-righteous reasons are always failing to recognize that self-righteousness is selfishness. If you think killing a certain group of people will guarantee you a place in heaven, your heaven is probably hell anyway.
#14810872
It doesn't matter if most people can act morally without a higher power when the people who have the most power on Earth can't act morally without a higher power. Yeah, it's easy for someone who has no authority over anybody to be a good person, but what about people like George Bush, Reagan, Trump, J Edgar Hoover, Putin, Hitler, Stalin, etc? Sure, most people aren't going to go out and murder, rob, steal just because there's no God, but the people at the top aren't going to give anyone the same courtesy. Furthermore when you're willing to do whatever it takes to get in power, you are more likely to get that power and be able to do even more damage to more people. It's no secret that CEO's are more likely to be sociopaths, because sociopathic behavior will get you ahead in this world. Read the 48 Laws of Power and tell me that that type of behavior won't get you ahead or isn't sociopathic.
#14810904
@LV-GUCCI-PRADA-FLEX

I am afraid that does not change anything really. Even if neoreactionaires had a Jesus/God/Buddha (and there are religious neoreactionaires, usually Catholics) this wouldn't change their own political views. This is because political views are gained and are influenced by experience along with personality at least that's what I think. It isn't influenced by prior ideology. In regards to experience, although all experience is a factor in your political views usually it's your environmental experiences that is the biggest factor. So in conclusion, neoreactionaires would still be neoreactionaires regardless of whether or not religion is apart of their lives because your experiences, environment, and personality triumph religion unfortunately.
#14810909
Oxymandias wrote:Then what are your thoughts on it Saeko? Did you find those links interesting?


There's way too much in there to just paint it all with a single brush.

If there's any argument in particular you find interesting, point it out.

One thing I remember though, is the argument that we should bring back corporal punishment because it is more humane than our current prison system (true) and cheaper (also true).

I disagree with this because the point of a prison system is not to merely punish criminals but also to remove them from society (in order to keep the victim as well as any potential victims safe). Furthermore, punishing someone with a lashing and then releasing them immediately could cause them to seek revenge against the victim.
#14811110
@Saeko

Well what are your thoughts on the social system it advocates, which seems to be a form of modern feudalism. I also would like to know your thoughts on the economic system that is favored by neoreaction. I think you may feel a sense of deja vu when it comes to the concepts neoreaction discusses. It takes many elements and ideas from parentalist/fascist literature as well as the values of such literature. Another thing I would like to ask is what is it that you think of the potential neoreaction in terms of political power i.e. would it be possible for neoreaction as a movement to gain traction in the world or anywhere for that matter.

I agree that corporal punishment is more humane than the American prision system, but I disagree that we should replace it with corporal punishment. I live in a country that uses corporal punishment and death sentences often (Iraq, Iran) and I have to say that it is ineffective at best and causes distain towards the government at worst. This is especially true if the citizens of the country are both educated and have insight to the outside world. Is corporal punishment more humane compared to the psychological torture of the American prision system? Yes, of course, but corporal punishment in the way you describe is no more better than that. Currently the American prison system psychological tortures prisoners. Your version would both psychologically torture them and physically torture them, which would make them more psychologically unstable at a faster rate. Especially if you eliminate re-enterance into society.

If I could change your version into something better, I would allow corporal punishment but it will be only there to punish them and that's that. Their punishment is over. Afterward prisoners spend the rest of their time doing actually good rehabilitating which is the biggest problem with prisons everywhere and even then I wouldn't agree with this version. Because corporal punishment can cause psychological harm and thus make the rehabilitation process harder. So in order to make rehabilitation effective, we need to not have corporal punishment.
#14811112
@Oxymandias


I said that I disagree with re-introducing corporal punishment.

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I don't think that fascism and neo-reaction have anything in common except their opposition to modern liberalism. Any apparent commonalities are the result of "tough-guy" posturing on the part of neoreactionaries.

Neo-reaction is a very utopian (in the Marxist sense), individualistic, and laissez-faire (in its own weird way) ideology. Basically it's libertarianism for edgelords.

Fascism on the other hand, is transcendent, collectivist, and totalitarian.
#14811119
Saeko wrote:Neo-reaction is a very utopian (in the Marxist sense), individualistic, and laissez-faire (in its own weird way) ideology. Basically its libertarianism for edgelords.

Fascism on the other hand, is transcendent, collectivist, and totalitarian.


Fascism doesn't actually work, does it? The same failure that damned communism damns fascism. We have to judge by actual historical instances, otherwise we are no better than Objectivists talking about capitalism "the unknown ideal."

I suspect the transcendent part of fascism would ultimate prove as fatal as the utopian part of Marxism. You won't be transcending human nature any time soon. Of course, I could be wrong here, but let's see some fascism faithfully executed in the real world - and then see how it works out.
#14811121
quetzalcoatl wrote:Fascism doesn't actually work, does it? The same failure that damned communism damns fascism. We have to judge by actual historical instances, otherwise we are no better than Objectivists talking about capitalism "the unknown ideal."

I suspect the transcendent part of fascism would ultimate prove as fatal as the utopian part of Marxism. You won't be transcending human nature any time soon. Of course, I could be wrong here, but let's see some fascism faithfully executed in the real world - and then see how it works out.


Well someone at some point is going to have to take this leap of faith, warnings of "but it's never worked before!" be damned.

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