Counter-Currents
60:13 minutes / 135 words
Editor’s Note:
Keith Preston’s “Attack the System” will now appear on Counter-Currents Radio. Welcome, Keith!
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Tia Foster, an animal rights activist in upstate New York, shares her experiences on the Left and her exploration of some intellectual currents of the New Right.
Topics include:
- Occupy Wall Street
- political correctness
- white guilt
- animal rights and deep ecology
- feminism
- Holocaust revisionism
- Jewish harassment techniques
- the New Right
- National Anarchism
- Being of mixed Iranian-European ancestry
- Psychedelic drugs
- Mysticism and religion
- Charles Manson and ATWA
- Cracks in the Left coalition
- Che Guevara
- Male feminists
- Zoophiles and their demands for inclusion and tolerance
- Left-wing politics as therapeutic self-affirmation for the damaged and neurotic
- veganism
41 comments
What a fascinating interview with a fascinating woman. I always find interviews with former radical leftists very interesting to listen to, makes you realise that there are certainly people (such as Ms Foster) that we can reach out to and make common cause with, especially regarding environmentalism/deep ecology and animal rights, both of which originally came out of the radical right anyway.
Personally, I’ve found that there are left-wing individuals who are open to criticism of Political Correctness/Totalitarian Humanism.
Also, it’s good to see Keith Preston on Counter-Currents. I’ve been reading his website since 2009 and I always enjoyed listening to his shows on VoR.
Really great interview, but spoilt by her ‘New Age’ waffle about religion (even though she denies being ‘into’ the New Age). I was reminded G. K. Chesterton’s idea that, “The trouble with Christianity is not that it has been tried and found wanting but that it has been found difficult and left untried”.
Her idea of religion as opposed to mysticism is about a main-line as you can get. I suggest reading The System of Antichrist: Truth and Falsehood in Postmodernism and the New Age, by Charles Upton.
Matt,
In all fairness, Matt, she was honest in declaring that she does not consider herself an intellectual or deeply informed about religion. She is speaking as a woman repelled by the degeneracy of the “left” acquired from first hand contact.
Yes, you’re right. I guess I’m just oversensitive to anything that smacks of New Age.
It was, as I said, a really great interview. I was particularly struck by Tia’s idea that many of the middle and upper class white kids actually want to be in an oppressed group, though I don’t agree with her view that they do it because they “think it’s cool”. My hunch is that they too have worked out that to have any standing at all you need to be a member of an oppressed group, and, where does a white middle class ‘privileged’ male go? Communism? Male-feminism? Homosexuality? Ultimately, and I think this is implicit in what Tia says, they are not driven by what they are as a members of their chosen minority, but by what they are not. It’s all a question of recognition. The objective is not to be recognised as a ‘commie’, or whatever, but to not be seen as a white middle/upper class ‘privileged’ male. Of course, as many us who’ve been there know full-well, that recognition is always conditional. Fully getting it is an endless endeavour, leading the victim to ever more absurd and ridiculous convictions and affiliations.
Matt,
Her comments about white kids wanting to seem “cool” were very interesting and resonated with me, too. When I was much younger I also thought there was much that was wrong with the system and the left’s critiques of capitalism and the environmentalists impressed me as likely true. My thinking has evolved much beyond this of course. I still remain very skeptical of those who profess faith in the “free market”. They are usually folks who have little experience with the reality of how crooked businessmen really are (including small businesses) or they are politicians/liars. I suspect white nationalists enamored of libertarian ideology fall into the former category.
I digress. . . I think the idealism of the young is channeled into leftist endeavors by default. If you listen to the mainstream media or your high school teacher, the “right” wing is Romney or GW Bush. When I was in high school, the types of analyses that I see aired here never were available. I had only learned of WL Pierce after he was long dead. When I first read one of his American Dissident Voices broadcasts, I was stunned. He was one of the few people whose observations rang completely true. He was stating what was readily observable AND placing it into context–a systematic program of anti-white discrimination that will ultimately have fatal consequences if not reversed.
Pierce was a genuine American dissident. But did anyone even so much as mention him in a history or sociology class???? No, of course not. How is that for academic honesty? Genuine critics from the right are not subjects of study. The consequence is that many students and young people hear only the voices of the left. The right is reduced to some blowhard libertarian who lives in some theoretical bubble which is impervious to the realities of business or hypocrites like Romney.
The internet has changed all that–at least to some extent. It is my hope that the next generation of young white men and women will come across this site and others like this and it will resonate with them and perhaps one of them may find a way forward beyond the purely intellectual realm in which we are confined right now.
I find it unfortunate that Preston continues to speak of “THE left”, as if it is a found object. It is not discovered and described. Rather, what he and his guests speak of is a definition twisted and conflated with anti-White liberalism, and anti White group advocacies as put across by Jewish interests. It has very little in common with what a White Left would be.
http://majorityrights.com/weblog/comments/leftism_as_a_code_word_part_1_the_white_left
Agreed. Whatever “Liberalism” may have meant in years past, in its current context it can be most simply understood as state-supported anti-white discrimination, institutionalized race-based preference for non-whites regardless of individual merit and accomplishment, and encouragement of racial organization and identity politics for non-whites only.
Hey everyone! So honored to have been able to have done this interview with Keith. I need to make an apology though to the National Anarchists and correct myself on something. I had mentioned that I had experienced some racism on a NA message board. It wasn’t actually a message board but rather my friend Neil Hiatt’s page. Neil is the great person who introduced me to NA in the first place. I was hesitant to say that I saw it on Neil’s page because I hadn’t asked permission to use his name so I said “message board.” Neil was concerned that someone bullied me and asked me about it. When I explained it was on his page, he informed me that the guy who called me mongrel and subhuman was NOT a National Anarchist and rather more like a neo Nazi.He set the guy straight. Although, like I said the guy has a right to be a racist and I have a right to not like him. His point of bringing that up was not to cry racism or speak badly of NA. It was actually to show that although there may be a few bad apples in the movement, it is no reason to avoid it altogether. You can always ignore the few who suck. Also, that we don’t always have to cry victim when someone is racist, we can just walk away. Now, the problem with this is that the guy who said this is a bad apple but does not represent NA at all. I have no problem admitting when I have made a mistake. NA really is a great movement.
As for the mysticism and religion topic, I never claimed to know anything. After I did DMT, I saw crazy and amazing images and I couldn’t help but be fascinated. I don’t have a college degree or know much about how the brain or conciousness works.
I meant “my point of bringing that up”
Really enjoyed your interview. Thank you Tia
Tia,
I had not even heard of DMT until now. Was curious about your experiences. What made you think that what you were seeing had some reality– actually existed in some place/sense? Something not attributable to your own imaginings? I think Aldous Huxley said something similar as well in his book “Doors of Perception”, if I am not mistaken.
The place I was when I did DMT felt more real than the physical world I am in now. It is not just a distortion of reality, it is a totally different reality. This physical world and everything that I knew disappeared. I wish I could describe it better but how can I describe the undescribable. A fact about DMT, it is contained in our own pineal gland and released in large amounts when we die. An excellent movie to watch which you can find on Youtube was done by Dr. Rick Straussman and called DMT: The Spirit Molecule. I have done it about a dozen times. It is crazier and more amazing than anything I have ever experienced. It has NO physical side effects and no chance of addiction.
I really commend Tia for her work with animals and raising awareness about our attitudes towards them and our misuse of them. I don’t think caring about animals and the environment is a right versus left issue at all. I have met and known some of the liberal left of which she speaks and yes she got that right. Walk away. Thanks Tia.
Thank you Rhondda! I am glad there are other right radicals who care about animals and the environment.
You’re very charming Tia. I’m sure you realize that there is one particular animal that shows a particular love and concern for other animals more than any other: White people!
I think you are a beautiful girl and you look white to me!
Good to see a fellow upstate New Yorker on here! Good interview.
I really enjoyed this podcast. I think I agreed with everything she said. I’ve also had similar experiences- when I go out to dinner and order a vegetarian dish, most of my guy friends pause to think about how bizarre my order was for a guy to make, and then the conversation always goes into my support of animal rights and how I only adopt unwanted pets giving the impression of me being left wing. But when my friends talk about politics and I politely complain about political correctness I end up confusing people so much that they have no idea what to think of me. Our kind is such a conundrum for mainstream labels.
One thing that shocked me about the podcast is that I always thought I was saving animal lives by not eating meat! But I suppose companies just ship the meat that vegetarians/vegans don’t eat to other countries. Sadly I have serious doubt that most of the cultures of the world will become vegetarian/pro-animal rights in great numbers.
So glad you enjoyed it. I am glad you are opting for a meat free diet. As far as saving animals lives, even if veganism doesn’t do any direct saving, it is still a very important statement you make. I encourage anyone who feels for these innocent beings to make the step.
The kind of cognitive dissonance that is produced when far right views are set forth articulately reflects the “cutting edge” of our movement. At first they seem strange and uncategorizable, and so the curious become ensnared in the interior logic and consistency of this way of thinking
Yes, you’re right. I guess I’m just oversensitive to anything that smacks of New Age.
It was, as I said, a really great interview. I was particularly struck by Tia’s idea that many of the middle and upper class white kids actually want to be in an oppressed group, though I don’t agree with her view that they do it because they “think it’s cool”. My hunch is that they too have worked out that to have any standing at all you need to be a member of an oppressed group, and, where does a white middle class ‘privileged’ male go? Communism? Male-feminism? Homosexuality? Ultimately, and I think this is implicit in what Tia says, they are not driven by what they are as a members of their chosen minority, but by what they are not. It’s all a question of recognition, and of course, as many us who’ve been there know full-well, that recognition is always conditional and never fully comes.
A very impressive interview done by Keith Preston. I enjoyed it immensely. Tia Foster truly is a interesting young lady.
Fascinating report from the fringes of the hard left. I didn’t realize the hard left was heavily fractured and prone to infighting. At least anti-system White dissidents are not the only ones. Describing the contemporary left as a sect is apt. It fits with Jonathan Haidt’s notion that anti-white egalitarianism amounts to a religious commitment for leftists. It explains why they’re impervious to facts and logic and why they’re so intolerant. The sect idea also fits with KMDs notion of that whites form moral in-groups that define themselves by attacking and shaming outsiders. Those were real-world instances. Her discussion of OWA made it clear White anti-Whites highest value is self-hatred and hating other Whites. While Wall Street loots the country, they concern themselves with how many blacks are speaking.
Fighting to ensure the most human treatment feasible for animals is a great cause. I think animal activists can be more effective, however, by using the language animal welfare rather than rights. Rights are concept that applies to humans. When I hear “animal rights,” I immediately think “nut trying to put animals on par with humans.” I’m sure the only one. When I hear animal welfare, I think “yes; who could possibly be against animal welfare.”
I prefer to use the term animal liberation nowadays.
Keith Preston always seems to dig up and seek out pretty interesting people – ones who sort of “skim the line.” Pretty cool to see some animal liberation (or whatever) people approaching the subject from the alternative position.
Tia seems like a cool chick. That black dude, Miles Joyner, seemed pretty cool too. I like that we’re now getting a real, serious dialogue between representatives of various standpoints long-associated with the left (but who have rejected the complete inanity of of its various shibboleths) and people on the non-mainstream right.
These interviews seem to be proof that Preston’s theory about “cracks in the PC coalition” is totally right.
I want to be kind, Tia seems like a pretty lady, but Charles Manson? Of all the causes to take up, should he be a priority? Moreover, sorry, decent and humane treatment of animals is one thing, but like most people I need meat.
….
I heard Miles Joyner speak disparagingly of the “White Left”, associating it once again with the Jewish left by disrespectfully referring to foolish White practitioners of the Jewish POV as the “White Left” – not cool, an obfuscation that we do not need.
Daniel, I wouldn’t consider my interest in Charles Manson a cause or priority. His case just makes me question how fair our entire judicial system is. He got an unfair shake. As for eating meat, I do not force anyone to believe anything but rather state my opinion and hope people will at least consider it. In my opinion eating meat is no longer a need. There are so many great foods with all the nutrients you need that are plant based.
“In my opinion eating meat is no longer a need.”
I’ll prefer to avoid demyelination of my neurons, thanks.
Tia, if you are interested in taking up the cause of political prisoners, may I suggest that you look into the case of Matt Hale and also Joseph Paul Franklin (who has been on death row). Neither of these men should have been jailed. On the contrary, they are righteous fighters on behalf of our people.
You’re interpreting coolness based on political usefulness or likelihood to join a very specific, very particular political cause. I judge coolness based on whether the person would be fun to have a conversation with.
What is cool for you may not be cool for me and people who care about Whites.
I got a real kick out of this interview. Compassion for all life has been an integral part of our far right tradition from it’s inception (perhaps beginning with Wagner). Having been a longtime vegetarian I often wish there was more about this on the rightist blogosphere. (I’ll have to start writing I guess…)
As a nationalist, I think most of the problems we have can be traced to a perverted or deadened sense of compassion.
Tia, have you read any of Wagner’s essays on the subject?
In my opinion, any further growth of the movement will be founded on the kind of attitude taken by Ms Foster.
Thank you for your kind words Kilroy! I knew Wagner was vegetarian but have not read any of his essays on this. Can you recommend something for me to read?
she mentioned that she posted some videos that upset people. was this done on a public forum or does she have a website or blog of her own?
Ion, the videos were posted on my personal facebook page.
I really liked this interview.
Speaking for myself, as someone who has a similar background, I’m grateful that you had the courage to endure the ugly side of “the left” and had the self-determination to rise above it and recognize them for the kind of “people” they are.
They may have good intentions I’m sure… or they think they do. But a lot of them are hopelessly, hopelessly misguided. And the ones who do know what they’re doing are often devoid of any human qualities altogether, like that male-feminist who happily goes and makes every effort to ruin the life of someone better than him, just to ingratiate himself in the eyes of his “matriarch”… or at least that’s what it sounded like.
Thinking back to when I used to play the part of an “activist” (started out with good intentions, but also out of fashion, right) I can’t even remember how many people I just dismiss and cut off just because their opinion at that particular time and at that particular place didn’t jive with my self-espoused politics which hadn’t come from any adult reflection on society at all, and drained a lot of the revolutionary fire out of me and most people by preoccupying us with endless, endless exercises of democracy and politically correct debate.
I think that’s one of the isolationist aspects to this kind of neurotic “all or nothing” leftist attitude… that, if for example, somebody declares himself to be a White Nationalist, or if they disagree with one of your political doctrines, that you’re now somehow allowed to disregard everything they ever say and attack them out of petty spite. I would’ve done.
And the thought of trying to explain this to myself back then or any of the people I used to work with is just mind-boggling.
the Egyptians said;
“True teaching is not an accumulation of knowledge; it is an awakening of consciousness which goes through successive stages.”
Thanks for sharing your story, it was inspirational, and good luck
JC
wow, ton of topics in this interview. lozlzlz.
here’s the problem though: less carnivorism > more crops (+ synthetic fertilizer) > less nature + more people > more crops (~).
even if humanity could replace one food trap with another, the massive anthropogenic threat to our common habitat would remain. it may even be worse for whites in that other races, above all the chinese and indigenous mesoamericans, are better adapted to a diet with less meat (’tis why they are short and breed a lot). when an idealistic white defender of “animal rights” exhorts humankind to turn from eating meat altogether, they’re making a short-sighted argument for conditions which will favor the growth of more non-whites.
like it or not, carnivory reaches back to the very dawn of european man. those pretty cave drawings in france and spain don’t depict a day in the fields picking wheat berries. we’ve been dependent on this foodstuff for too long; it is part of our evolutionary history and present-day psychological constitution. i’m afraid vegetarianism is nothing more than one more urban “lifestyle” whitey is “free” to take up.
another angle: women are more likely to self-describe as vegetarian than men. explanation is simple: (1) women in our deep ancestral environment had lower calorie/protein intake requirements [men hunting, women gathering]; (2) women have more empathy [aversion to slaughter].
worse, women have been shown to perceive vegetarian men as less attractive and virile, which ought to surprise no one. here we see the same old correlation of what is deemed good and virtuous in our post-christian feminized society with plain effeteness. nietzsche in seinem grab mit überfacepalm rollt.
as usual, the distance the white mind travels from personal preference to moral prescription for all humanity is extremely short.
Your argument is flawed. Humans consume far less food yielded from crops than farmed animals. Did you know that 90% of the world’s soy is grown to feed cattle?? The majority of the world’s wheat also goes to cattle.75% of drinkable water is used by factory farms. I agree that big agribusiness is messed up but using resources to farm animals is far more harmful. As for this nonsense about how going vegan will increase minorities that is laughable. Are you saying Latinos and blacks do not consume huge amounts of meat? I am not some priveled white kid either as you seem to imply. I work in a bar for goodness sakes and live in crumby studio apartment. Yes, humans have consumed meat since the dawn of time. They have also committed rape, pedophilia, and kept slaves. We can rise above the injustices of the past.
I’m not sure I accused you of being a privileged white kid. You’re clearly quite … developed.
Oh, yes yes, I said vegetarianism is an affectation of urban whites — ’tis true. Remember: you, qua vegetarian, are in an extreme minority amid humanity. I would liken you to homosexuals — without implying that I have a visceral antipathy to that condition itself — in that it is never enough simply to be vegetarian or homosexual, but one quickly decides that one’s inclination must be brought to the public’s attention at every opportunity.
Are you saying Latinos and blacks do not consume huge amounts of meat?
Liberally padded with corn and whatever “pink slime” happens to be. I consume neither so I don’t care, but if you were to do a simple dual-column nutrition content reckoning with the average chimichanga or fried chicken wing, at the chemical level, you would find a higher carbohydrate and hydrogenated fat load than protein or animal fat (this would include Omega-6 fat bequeathed to the poor avian from cornmeal, e.g.)
Of course blacks do prefer meat, being savages. Mesoamericans have only recently come into a ready supply of industrial meats. My point, however, was that they have a much longer history of depending preponderantly on corn, beans, squash and other plant matter than Europeans — approx. 75% of their diet going back to the Pleistocene “Paleo-Indian” phase, typified by the Ajuereado culture of Tehuacán Valley, Mexico. This is dated from 9500 – 7000BC, and the complex exhibits, at the upper end, a wealth of stone tools for all the sanguinary pursuits of pre-agricultural man, like butchering and hiding, and at the lower (~8000BC), a sharp decline in bone deposits and an increase in equipment associated with agriculture. In short, they over-hunted their big ungulates, turned briefly to jackrabbits and turtles, over-hunted those, and finally settled on cultivating wild grains.
Now, this isn’t flawed. The carbon-13 load (the kind found in corn) has been found to be higher in Mesoamerican people than people of European descent. All I am suggesting, per basic r/K selection theory, is that these people can do with less of one thing and an abundance of another without a shift in reproductive strategy. As a matter of fact, this is precisely why there are so many of them today.
However, even they are now dependent on meat. Meat is more widely available due to the infrastructure you mention, but close down a few dozen of those giant CAFOs in the Dakotas and Brazil, turn people away from fast food restaurants, and watch various populations revert to associating status with access to meat very quickly. All you’ll have done is set the clock back on humankind and diverted resources to growing more grains, because to compensate for all the people murderously hungry for meat*, you’ll need thousands more acres growing them. And even then they won’t settle for it. Meat would become a scarce commodity, command higher and higher prices, and the ensuing revolt might just be more savage than a gasoline shortage.
All I’m asking you to do is think through the broadest consequences of your ideology. This isn’t only a human problem; consuming other animals is one of two main nourishment strategies of the animal kingdom. It isn’t a sin, it isn’t something to be overcome, and it cannot be, anyhow.
Now, if you agitate merely for better conditions for animals sacrificed to human appetites, so be it, that’s another matter. Still subject to sharp limitations though, and I guess vegetarians realize this and decide halting meat-processing altogether, somehow, is the more efficient path from A to B.
I agree that big agribusiness is messed up but using resources to farm animals is far more harmful.
It isn’t agribusiness: it is agriculture itself. Agribusiness is a highly efficient and innovative response to the exponential growth in human population. The UN has famously projected a peak human population of 10,000,000 from 2070 – 2100.
I believe they will be proved wrong by loss aversion among local human groups in giving up meat. For it isn’t only the consumption of meat; specific subgroups depend on its production and will not willingly incur a loss in their means. I am thinking here of Hutterites (who own many of those Midwest CAFOs), the Brazilian economy as a whole, certain African tribes, in short any people or party whose livelihood comes from the raising, processing, and selling of livestock.
Let’s take a similar case of imposed trade-off by the West not involving meat: the American military’s quixotic attempt to make Afghan poppy farmers instead grow cotton, and their more or less ruthless attempt to eradicate Colombia’s coca crop.
Neither attempt has paid off for anyone (except the Pentagon). The cotton experiment, mainly in Helmand province, is regarded as fragile, tottering, or failed depending on who is consulted. See here for an example of this sort of top-down diktat works out on the ground among real people who are dependent on an entrenched commodity. It’s essentially like a body rejecting a foreign graft or implant. The latter can be done, but this sort of project cuts across too much complex human reality to take.
. Yes, humans have consumed meat since the dawn of time. They have also committed rape, pedophilia, and kept slaves. We can rise above the injustices of the past.
Not above the impulses which occasion them. I promise you: the most awesome, undeniable, deep-seated craving of the human mind experiencing food scarcity is … for animal fat.
Tragic example from my own life. I have a female cousin who has been vegetarian for over twenty years, though recently she has added fish to her diet. She has never been very active. Her thirteen year old daughter has never tasted meat in her life because her mother has discouraged it, so the girl has developed a distaste and fear of something of which she has absolutely no experience.
Unfortunately she is naturally somewhat chubby, and to assuage the desperate cravings for something fatty and once living which rack her brain at night, she has taken to stashing chocolate bars in her dresser, which she doesn’t know mommy discovered some time ago. The poor girl has developed an eating disorder and, last I checked, was gaining significant weight from the clandestine candy gorging.
*Check out the diverse critical functions of leptin, a “hunger hormone”: the most abundant source of this is white adipose tissue, i.e. animal fat. But satiety is biochemically a leptin-response to high caloric intake in all omnivores. This means the mammalian body is not craving just any protein or fat, but one kind of fat. Note, also, that leptin is critical to mammalian fertility; an organism which requires inputs of animal fat and doesn’t receive it can hardly spare anything for an internal parasite. Vegetarianism has been strongly implicated as a cause of infertility in women.
By the way, I’m not blind to the problems caused by the livestock industry.
My point is that a necessary peculiarity of ideologies, because they come from humans, is that they tend to prescribe the replacement of one large-scale technological trap with another (cf. Communism).
A greater large-scale reliance upon plant products would, at a minimum, still affect the nitrogen cycle by more than doubling (doubling was reached decades ago) the amount of fixed nitrogen in the biosphere. We are talking a nitrate load in ground water above 10 mg/1 … where Nature has prescribed 1 mg. Then there are nitric oxide, nitrous oxide, eutrophication, etc. It would require far greater quantities of synthetic fertilizer, you see, which will require greater quantities of favored catalysts in the Haber-Bosch Process (i.e. more and more mining) — as well driving up the 5% consumption rate of the world’s total natural gas reserves to power it.
My purpose here is not to gainsay a vegetarian diet or ignore anthropogenic threats to the environment: only to point out that any alternative, besides being practically impossible, would impose its own long-term costs relative to its short-term benefits. This, you understand, is the ultimate concern of ecology.
Final note: another pesky study from the University of Minnesota — the Starvation Experiment.
Finding: Europeans consuming 1500 calories of vegetable matter per day are an unhappy, undersexed, irritable lot.
I consume ~1300 calories of animal matter per day and am happy, nothing if not libidinous, …. and still irritable, but whatever.
Now again, you might thrive under such conditions, but our people cannot.
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