Counter-Currents
Glenn Youngkin
1,126 words
Surprisingly, moderate Republican Glenn Youngkin won the Virginia gubernatorial race this week. Once a battleground, Virginia has become a solid blue state in recent years. Republicans last won a statewide race in 2009, and few commentators gave Youngkin a shot to win. Donald Trump lost the state by 10 points in 2020, and Republicans lost the gubernatorial race in 2017 by the same margin. This time, however, the Republican candidate won it by over two points.
What was the difference? Contrary to the wishes of many Never Trumpers, it wasn’t due to the GOP candidate returning to cuck principles and dispensing with Trump. It was due to white identity politics. This may surprise some readers. “How could the former CEO of the Carlyle Group, an establishment Republican, and a candidate who never talked about immigration win due to white identity politics?” That’s because the decisive issue in the race was “Critical Race Theory” (CRT), which is really just a euphemism for anti-white racism.
Polls showed that a significant number of Virginia voters were swayed by the issue. A quarter of voters said CRT was their top issue heading into the race; 72% said it was an important factor to them. Of those who said it was their top issue, 70% voted for Youngkin. The Republican candidate pledged to eradicate it as Governor. He used cringe rhetoric to condemn it, but the point was still conveyed:
[I]n the immortal words of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., we’re called to judge one another based on the content of our character and not the color of our skin. And that’s why there’s no place for critical race theory in our school system, and why, on day one, I’m going to ban it.
He further added in that stump speech that CRT “teaches children to see everything through a lens of race and then to divide them into buckets and have children [who] are called privileged and others [who] are victims.” It would’ve been nice to make it clear who CRT is racist towards, but it is better than claiming it’s just racist towards Asians or the “gifted.”
Others who supported Youngkin were more explicit. In a speech delivered a week before the election, former Vice President Mike Pence condemned CRT for teaching white kids to hate themselves. It’s a notable thing for such a high-profile Republican to make such a statement. It would’ve been unthinkable just a few years ago.
You can buy Greg Johnson’s White Identity Politics here.
But now anti-white racism is mainstream and campaigning against it is winning elections. Conservative media and other sources made sure to highlight how anti-white racism is taught in Virginia schools. Examples included the state’s Department of Education instructing teachers to embrace CRT way back in 2015, and certain counties incorporating the ideas of Ibram X. Kendi. Even though liberals insisted that the threat from Critical Race Theory was invented, the news stories and whites parents’ own experiences said otherwise.
The electorate was also whiter in this election than at any point since the Republicans last won statewide office in 2009. The white share of the vote was 74%, a 7% increase over 2020’s share. Additionally, more of the white vote went for Youngkin than it did for Trump in 2020: 61% versus 53%. A lot of conservatives want to credit Hispanics or even Asians for Youngkin’s victory, but it was clearly whites who delivered it to him.
Conservatives are too fixated on how moderate Youngkin is and how he presents a party devoid of Trump. They think this finally means that the specter of nationalism is gone and that they can now return to the good old days of Paul Ryan and Mitt Romney. That’s not the case. Youngkin shows that the only way the party can win is if they address issues the Left considers “white identity politics” — whether it’s anti-white racism in schools or mass immigration. Youngkin didn’t win on corporate tax cuts.
Liberals understand this better. They claim this election is evidence of a white backlash. Daily Beast columnist Wajahat Ali tweeted: “Whiteness remains undefeated.” He then wrote an entire article condemning “Karens” for electing Youngkin: “[T]he cult of Karen will always turn on people of color on a dime to uphold oppressive systems that ensure they remain influential and powerful handmaidens of white supremacy.”
The Atlantic’s Jemele Hill said the election proves “this country simply loves white supremacy.” MSNBC host Joy Reid said that education is code for white parents not wanting racial lectures in their kids’ schools. Liberal FOX News contributor Juan Williams made a similar point, arguing that “parents’ rights” are code for “white racial politics.” “It is a campaign to stop classroom discussion of Black Lives Matter protests or slavery because it could upset some children, especially white children who might feel guilt,” he wrote of Youngkin’s campaign.
Election analyst Larry Sabato said the election is evidence of “white backlash.” He pointed to the discussion around Critical Race Theory as the core issue:
The operative word is not critical. And it’s not theory. It’s race. What a shock, huh? Race. That is what matters. And that’s why it sticks. . . . There’s a lot of, we can call it white backlash, white resistance, whatever you want to call it. It has to do with race . . . It’s this generalized attitude that whites are being put upon and we’ve got to do something about it. We being white voters.
Conservatives want to ignore this and pretend that the black Republican who was elected as Lieutenant Governor disproves any racial intent. But the data says otherwise.
Youngkin will probably disappoint and even enrage nationalists once he is Governor. He’s not even a Josh Hawley, much less a Paul Gosar. He’s an establishment guy who realized the power of white identity politics — and he won on it.
One of the lessons here is that white voters will vote for an implicitly racial message if it is delivered by a presentable figure. The fact that he looks like a stereotypical suburban dad — complete with a fleece vest and khakis — made him a respectable choice for suburbanites. This was not some maniac or boomer meme come to life. This was a man who suburbanites saw as their own, and as someone who understood their concerns.
It should also be noted that Youngkin did extremely well in Virginia’s rural white areas, often besting Trump’s numbers in many of those counties. Whites throughout the state saw him as their guy.
Maybe Youngkin is the first “respectable” Republican to engage in white identity politics, and perhaps it heralds a new strategy going forward. Or maybe the Republicans will take the wrong lessons from this and ignore the identity issues that propelled them to power in Virginia. Whatever happens, the real message is clear: White identity politics is the only path for victory.
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28 comments
A hopeful take on a dismal candidate. The GOP electorate is demanding White Identity politics but the purpose of the GOP is to destroy all hope for White people. I predict that Youngkin will remove ‘CRT’ only to return to the pre-CRT practice of ‘celebrating’ non-White (and Jewish) history and ‘contributions’ and culture and race but nothing to celebrate Whites as Whites.
Trump was elected by the same people and he spit all over them.
Youngkin is going to do the same thing, just more subtly.
It isn’t an endorsement of the candidate. It is an analysis of the electoral potency of white identity politics. Let’s hope this gets in the inboxes of better candidates.
From June 17th:
https://vaticancatholic.com/youngkin-announces-plan-to-combat-anti-semitism-in-virginia/
We lost.
Youngkin is a member of Con Inc. (I just love how that term can be applied in two ways) He won and now just watch as the same thing that happened with Trump is going to repeat.
Another promising, yet lukewarm leader without a sense of vision or moral character. Another elected republican who’ll get himself into a scandal or two before his term is up.
Anyway, stay strong in the faith, brothers. We cannot despair regardless of our losses.
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A little wishfulness here. The election of that Jamaican woman as Lt. Gov cannot simply be glossed over. Moreover, there were many nonwhites who were unhappy with CRT and the schools (along with Covid issues), and who were part of Youngkin’s coalition. I think Hampton is reaching a bit. He is dismissive of the possibility that many people are genuinely angry at CRT (and Biden’s crummy performance more broadly), but would be horrified at being thought of as “racists”. This doesn’t mean that prowhite issues can’t win. They most certainly can. Immigration clearly helped Trump more than it hurt him.
Opposing the increasingly radical black agenda is a winner. But many white people oppose aspects of the nonwhite power agenda on sincerely nonracist grounds. I oppose immigration because I want what’s left of America to remain majority white. But I’ve known people who opposed it on totally nonracialist grounds (ecological, economic, law and order, among others). We shouldn’t pretend that “coincidences of wants” (as economists say) means that everyone who votes our way is secretly on our side.
As usual, the Left understands the issues better than the Right. The battlefront in this country is race. The Left are attacking us as a race, and when they see resistance, they interpret it racially. However, the racism taboo is still strong, and normies still think they can have a nice white country without going racial. The Left is increasingly forcing the issue, because they are racializing things like math, science, and manners and demanding people retreat on those issues. Once a choice is forced, some will fold (the cuck types) and others will stiffen resistance and go racial. This is why white consciousness and with it white identity politics are on the rise. You won’t see that trend if you just focus on the lagging indicator of polite conversation.
Greg Johnson: “The battlefront in this country is race.” Yes, yes, and yes. Always keep that in mind when we despair. Race consciousness is a good thing and it is indeed growing. It should always have been so.
I work around a lot of white Progressives (the types that ushered this shit in through academia) and I think this race issue is sinking in, big-time. The power struggles going on in the institution and around the country…not what they expected at all. I think they thought they would share (diversity!) but always be in control of things. Not so. And a few have actually said this (albeit not in so many words–to me). I do sense they (in management) understand things are going to get real ugly in this country with or without European whites as a majority. There’s no putting that genie back in the bottle.
I know five of these Progressives are taking an early retirement (they dislike the DEI program now in place) and are moving to white areas (Scottsdale, Maine, and South Dakota, for example). I don’t know if it’s hypocrisy, but I do think they “get it” now. I really do. Some of them. This is promising because some people can and do change. I changed (from a so-called “classical liberal” to a dissident and it was because of ethnicity–loss of my country as a heritage American–and of course, race. It’s a real eye opener.
I tend to agree with Greg’s broad analysis, but it needs to be pointed out that Youngskin was fully cucked on the issue of the virulently anti-White, Cultural Marxist, white race hating left’s obsession to tear down the commemorative statue of Robert E. Lee in Charlottesville. Which means, when he cucked on that issue, he sent a signal to these same White race hating lefties that he will not object when they continue to attack, deface, and scream to erase every other statue, tribute, or symbol of every other White man or woman who played an important role in the founding, exploring, taming, and creation of Western Civilization on the North American continent.
Oh, and as far as that POC the GOP establishment picked for his Lt Governor’s job, I found it almost comical how they made sure she was kept in the background and given a low profile during the campaign, and about the only campaign literature photographs that were seen of her was that staged photo of her with an AR-15 slung around her neck.
That photo shows us how much contempt the GOP establishment has for the intelligence of the average populist-nationalist-MAGA White voters. They believe that their white conservative base is so incredibly dumb and gullible that all they have to do is trot out one of their numinous Magic Negros and hang an AR-15 around her neck, and Whites are so dumb that they will vote for a racial minority who is a fake conservative?
Are the White conservative voters of the RINO infested GOP really so stupid as to believe for a single second that a black of either sex is someone they can trust to look out after the racially specific interests of White people? Case in point: In her post-election victory speech, she loudly proclaims that ‘The race card is dead!” Then, two seconds later she is boasting about her and Glenn Youngskin are going to make sure that those Historic Black Colleges are going to be fully funded………subsidized almost entirely by the tax dollars that are stolen out of the paychecks of White people, of course.
Let me translate what she actually said. “The race card is not really dead. It’s just changed hands, and now I control it and I intend to use it in the exact same fashion as have the democrats and I’ll use it to squeeze as much money as I can out of the wallets of White Virginian voters to pay for all the free dibs that MY race of people think they are entitled to have without working for it themselves.”
You’re right about the non huWhite parents. These Indian, Paki, Chinese and Iranian parents are deadly serious about the education of their children and ‘American meritocracy’. They want math, science, high culture, and a ticket to a great university for their kids, and not bl@ck hiskry mumf, guilt trips about excelling, and the elimination of gifted programs. They likewise don’t want their kids to be shaken down or robbed by bl@cks or Portorican mulattos nor raped by cross dressers or trannies.
I can imagine as well the coronachan hysteria with its masks, distancing, jabs, and lockdowns has wrecked havoc with their big plans for their kids’ futures.
It’s true, but they’re so small a minority they don’t really influence outcomes. They probably go to private schools too.
I live near and partially within an Asian neighborhood in Southern California, and there are several ‘after school academies’ in strip malls teaching math intensive and language as well, not to mention martial arts which includes history and culture. There is also a ‘Saturday School’ at the local Buddhist temple teaching language, history, culture and religion, and it looks to be well-attended, when I walk through the gardens alongside the large temple. These academies are what we need to be building as well — it’s like a “private school” in the afternoon for kids whose parents really care about education.
A great victory of white identity politics which will be converted into gains for Con Inc.
If I may be allowed to draw a historical parallel, this puts white identitarians in the position of the free Polish army in WWII. They fought, often like lions, so that Poland would be thrown in the maw of Bolshevism.
I have to concur that this is a win for Con Inc. But moreso for its surrounding apparatus, the machine which generates CRT (for example), as well as evry other canard and outrage, and their predictable and thus containable opposition — containable within the rigged but rotting mainstream political culture. Its inevitable collapse or abandonment is simply retarded by the electoral charade. Political change, in the interest of whites, is driven into a ditch in Virginia, but not metapolitics.
I mean, there is something to be optimistic about, though obviously not the victory of a Republican over a Democrat. The intellectual aimlessness, the insipid vocabulary, the incessant ugliness of the anti-white hatred of the ruling cult are on full display. It’s a bit like Rope-A-Dope, a little pushback in the mainstream goes a long way toward exhausting and neutralizing that cult.
Opposition to CRT from conservatives is rooted in racial egalitarianism. Take a look at Christopher Rufo, the leader of the anti-CRT movement, who has biracial children.
I grew up in a family (after age 10 when my mom remarried a widower) with three half-Latino, older siblings’ who made life difficult for me. I’m totally against CRT from the first I heard of it. I’m thrilled with anything that stops the invasion of further Latinos into this country. This is from first-hand knowledge.
I an so happy for this election in Virginia, which is our first glimmer of hope in many years, especially after the ups and downs of Trump’s election, reign and defeat. He was also a ‘first glimmer’, and now we must work to polish our goals for the future and find better candidates.
Egalitarianism and kinship-blindness is a far greater problem than CRT. In many ways, CRT is the gift that keeps on giving, because it openly reveals that the system is antiwhite. However, Youngkin is saying that the worst possible thing in the world is to care about your own race. What Youngkin is championing is the root of the entire issue we face. He is just further cementing that if you are White, and even if you are clearly being attacked for being White, you still cannot have White identity. I’d rather have CRT, where at least we are acknowledged as a people. That’s a starting point we can work from. There is no starting point from egalitarianism; it’s a dead end for our race.
A guy who’s first act of victory is to declare war on anti-semitism is not a victory, but a very bad indication.
It was better than the alternative no doubt, but Whites need more than that. Much more.
Only if you are a one-issue guy, and Jews are the issue.
The right to speak freely on the subject of Jewish enmity is a core white identitarian position. It may not be the sexiest part of the dissident right, but all identities have a negative element and the right to point out, criticize and defend against the racial other, and here specifically the Jewish other, cannot be excised out of the identitarian position.
Therefore, regardless of the method he used to gain power, that Youngkin now uses this power to attack a dissident position indicates that the victory pronouncements may have been premature.
Whites are the issue, not Jews. That is the one issue.
ARe you not aware of the hostility of Jews to any pro-White action, especially legislative action. Of course its a problem.
Who comes out after winning election and does such a thing?
A Republican who knows the power structure.
It does not negate the fact that the VA election is a good sign.
Youngkin will almost certainly be the limp-wristed disappointment we predict, but he’s the least important part of the metapolitical story. The far more significant takeaways are:
When whites unite, we can still be extremely powerful, despite our demographic decline and even in a reliably blue state like Virginia (DC’s backyard!). This is a massive white pill we should celebrate and constantly remind our racially unaware neighbors, friends and family. Reports of our political death have been grossly exaggerated.
Whites are willing to tolerate a lot of abuse…until you f**k with our kids. We spend hours trying to convince our kin to take their own side. Despite the strength of our arguments and the reams of data we present, it often seems like our words fall on deaf ears. But with CRT creeping into our public schools, we have found a unifying identity issue that white parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles can’t ignore; in fact they are clearly very passionate about this. This is a political strategy that can and should be replicated and amplified in every district where Democrats even think of CRT. The dissident right is here to protect your kids!
The third point dovetails into the first two. Look at the breakdown of votes by race and sex. Whites went for Youngkin 62:38, while blacks voted for the Democrat 86:13, Hispanics 66:32, Asians 67:33. This of course reiterates the political clout whites still maintain when they choose to wield it. But it also puts a spotlight on how minorities feel about us. By wide margins (Hispanics 2:1, Asians 2:1, and blacks almost 9:1!) every minority group voted to subject our children to poisonous psychological abuse. Every normie that jabbers on about minority outreach should take a long hard look at those numbers. Furthermore, 57% of white women voted for Youngkin. Many on the dissident right take a dim view of women. But this electoral data shows that we can still count on our women, particularly if we frame the issues around their kids. Mothers are much less sympathetic to the globohomo agenda when the welfare of their kids is on the line.
It’s true, the unity that whites demonstrated here was predicated on fighting anti-white curricula, rather than promoting an explicitly pro-white issue. But convincing the public to fight for overtly pro-white issues will take time to cultivate. This victory was a small step in that direction.
In my opinion, one of the ways forward is being implicitly pro-white, while presenting like someone from Con inc.
Use their tricks against them.
I think it’s great Youngkin won as the election was a referendum on CRT. The thing is, is that Trump lost by 10 points in Virginia. I’m cautiously optimistic that even people turned off by Trump because of the media’s gaslighting are even more turned off by Biden’s inflation and high gas prices. It’ll be interesting to see a Trump redemption arc.
Whites and the left are jockeying for power. The boundary of how far the pendulum of power between whites and non-whites can swing is set by the percentage of whites versus non-whites. There are still enough whites around capable of adopting pro-white stances to thwart CRT, but even if they become more ardently pro-white in the future, the decline of their numbers may make CRT possible.
I believe Jared Taylor quoted a survey that showed small minority groups amongst a large majority cause less conflict than competing ones with equal numbers, so as whites become less numerous, maybe the conflict will escalate enough that they start taking their own side more.
Of course, there is one small minority group that causes a lot of conflict, but look huwhite to Taylor.
https://www.cfr.org/membership/roster
Scroll down to the Y entries.
The CFR has pushed the idea of a world government for decades. An article printed in Foreign Affairs in 1974 stated “We shall have world government whether or not you like it–by conquest or consent.” Some other articles published in Foreign Affairs had titles such as “Toward European Integration,” “Beginnings in Agriculture,” “Toward Unity in Africa,” “Toward a Caribbean Federation.”
Rural Virginians didn’t vote for Youngkin. They simply voted against McAuliffe. There’s no real enthusiasm for Youngkin, who is just a rich privileged Richmond insider.
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