Ilya Yefimovitch Repin, The Zaporozhye Cossacks Write a Mocking Letter to the Turkish Sultan, 1880-81
1,305 words
Part 2 of 3 (Part 1 here, Part 3 here)
As I hope I’ve shown in the first part of this series, embarrassment and/or humor are operative with virtually all people under all circumstances. The heart of clown world in the present is no exception; indeed, these elements played a big part in bringing our mad, mad world about, as I can attest from personal experience, having been in high school during the early years of the Global War on Terror and the ironically-named USA PATRIOT Act that gave it teeth.
Although at that time the neoconservative frauds’ gimcrack patriotism seemed ubiquitous and culturally dominant, it only remained so until the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan got bogged down with no end in sight. At that point, the increasingly militant liberalism that had been a constant undercurrent — the dominant current being that of the ex-Trotskyist Zionists, who saw liberalism as an engine and conservatism as merely a brake — came to the fore, all the more powerful for having been associated with that half of our false political dichotomy that was ostensibly opposed to the warfare state.
Even during the early War on Terror years, I remember how everyone in my Catholic prep school, whose families were typical normiecons, idolized Jon Stewart and the other late-night liberal comedians. Although I never liked them, saw them as degenerate, and saw their glamorizing of blacks and Jews as obvious propaganda, in some ways I did allow myself to adopt many of their prejudices, especially toward Southerners. As I was living in a city in northern Ohio, I saw far too many blacks for the media to deceive me about them, whereas I knew Southerners only from television and history textbooks, for reasons best explained in Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice: Elizabeth Bennet admits to herself why she, who was normally so thoughtful, had never allowed herself a moment’s thought about her scorn for Mr. Darcy:
And yet I meant to be uncommonly clever in taking so decided a dislike to him, without any reason. It is such a spur to one’s genius, such an opening for wit to have a dislike of that kind. One may be continually abusive without saying any thing just; but one cannot be always laughing at a man without now and then stumbling on something witty.
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So it was with us. The sort of jokes about the kind of people who go wife-hunting at a family reunion were not made out of raw hatred for Southerners, but rather out of an excuse to indulge our wit at the expense of those to whom we felt superior. We did the same with blacks, deviants, and the other groups liberals lionize.
The Left’s media monopoly on humor did us as much harm as the liberals themselves, but in a different way. For liberals, it functions to instill in them a raw hatred and scorn for Southerners, Christianity, and so on — thus making them good shock troops in the culture wars. For us, it functioned to turn us into passive bystanders: Our lighthearted contempt for the South preemptively killed our curiosity for anything having to do with it, and our love of wit and humor, and admiration for those who could wield it, combined with our lack of respect for those we presumed couldn’t in order to make us ashamed to defend our own faith and birthright.
Thus, in our arrogance we not only didn’t heed, but didn’t even hear the words of those who had lived through the radicals’ reconstructive work, be they predominantly Yankee WASPs or Yankee Jews (from the civil rights era to the present). As a result, they couldn’t warn us about what lay ahead for us, and in our embarrassment we shied away from standing with the perhaps simple, yet truly honest Christians who were seeking to put an end to the rising tide of atheism and, if only indirectly, the degeneracy it allowed. (Although in our defense, it must be admitted that most of the churches were already compromised and never presented a strong theological response to liberalism, which could have at least appealed to our respect for intellectual arguments.) But having now come to know the true nature of the South and its history through my own reading, let me apologize to you — not in the phony groveling liberal way, but by simply acknowledging that we non-Yankees of the north should have listened to you, if only to save ourselves. If we had, we would have acknowledged the wisdom of Lord Acton’s words to Robert E. Lee:
I saw in State Rights the only availing check upon the absolutism of the sovereign will, and secession filled me with hope, not as the destruction but as the redemption of Democracy. . . . Therefore I deemed that you were fighting the battles of our liberty, our progress, and our civilization; and I mourn for the stake which was lost at Richmond more deeply than I rejoice over that which was saved at Waterloo. (“Acton and Lee,” Klugewicz)
There is still time. The battle is not yet over, and the more normiecons and other neutrals we can reach, the harder they will find it to keep all of our peoples under Washington’s oppressive thumb.
In this battle for our freedom, humor and embarrassment must be made to play the same role in dismantling the present tyranny and madness as they once did in building it, leading to effects both direct and indirect. Directly, it will endow those inclining toward our side with all the confidence that comes from fighting an enemy who is not only dishonest and insane, but hilariously so. The ridicule we can generate for wokeness will then cause those normies who would ordinarily simply parrot the official position become embarrassed to do so. With that, we can begin to break wokeism’s hold on the private social sphere, and from there move to pushing it out of the work sphere (that task being greatly aided by institutional solutions for punishing woke companies, which I’ll likely cover in a later essay). This will leave it dominant solely in the political realm, where it can make its final stand, taking down with it those regime shills who still cling to its corpse.
Indirectly or weaponized, the mastery of humor and embarrassment will convince those who appreciate such skills — and who mourn their loss on mainstream television since the coming of wokeism’s dour, cult-like mannerisms — to toss such taboos to the wind and actually look at our side without the mainstream media’s filtering, thus bringing the smarter among them into our camp.
In this way, direct and indirect effects taken together can greatly enhance our ability to break down the walls which the regime has built, in all its forms, to keep us from reaching the normiecons and other heritage Americans. This will least at least be the case if they are used in combination with other tactics and the alternative institutions that we must build to make those tactics truly effective (again, that being a topic for a later essay).
While the power of humor and embarrassment alone will not win the fight for our peoples’ freedom, it can become one of the most effective intellectual weapons in our arsenal, especially if crafted into the form I call info-parody — the methods of which shall be the subject of the final essay in this series. For, as Martin Luther famously knew, “The best way to drive out the devil, if he will not yield to texts of Scripture, is to jeer and flout him, for he cannot bear scorn.”
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Bibliography
Austen, Jane, Pride and Prejudice, Chapter 7, vol. 2, Wikisource, ch. 40, accessed August 23, 2022: https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Pride_and_Prejudice/Chapter_40.
Klugewicz, Stephen M., “Acton and Lee: A Conversation on Liberty,” The Imaginative Conservative, August 2, 2014: https://theimaginativeconservative.org/2014/08/lord-acton-robert-e-lee-conversation-liberty-stephen-klugewicz.html.
7 comments
It will take a specific demoralization, which we are starting to really see. Trump being disqualified from office as is happening, even though he wouldn’t win anyway, is quintessential because he is poisoning the well for his replacement. Half the country (majority of whites) has lost faith in elections and are losing faith in democracy itself because of the clear derogation of how the law is applied depending on race, sex and politics. They are embracing nihilism in a way previously unimaginable. They root for the opposition in any Olympics or any war now. They have nothing to believe in anymore besides their people.
Excellent comment. I agree with 100% of it.
I am enjoying this series. This coupled with Greg Johnson’s new video and constructive articles I have seen on other DR sites recently are the path forward. Despair is not a plan nor a set of constructive actions. Thank you for taking the reins on this. In addition to these articles, the next step is organization for implementation in the real world.
I, like you, was conditioned to ridicule southerners. In my case, it is a terrible sin, because I have family from the South and visited them regularly starting from early in my childhood. That ridicule was also a gateway to self ridicule and flagellation for my nation and my race. That said, once I entered the libertarian phase of the path to Healthy Folkhood and Homeland Traditionalism, I began to stick up for Southerners when in company that denigrated them. I saw how the Southerner held on to the roots of our national and ethnic heritage. Many could not articulate the philosophy but they felt it in their bones and embodied the common sense that is so essential to the American character and culture.
For all readers here who are of Southern heritage, I apologize for the ridicule and disdain I held and expressed toward you when embracing the Hollywood caricature and cartoon assemblage of your stereotype. Now more than ever, we need your roots lest we become completely untethered. No more scorn and supercilious denigration, only water, affection and enrichments to the firmament you stand tall in. God bless you and thank you for holding tight to honor, tradition and healthy pride in who you are and what you stand for in wanting to live free as a folk united in preserving self determination and a common destiny.
If I had a good post-modern carpetbagger joke or insult I would bust it out. Looks like I’ve got work to do.
But poll after poll says that only a very small, militant minority support so-called “Christian Nationalism” or any variant of Christianity having state power.
Which begs the question: What do you want? Actual political policies that relate to immigration, gun control, welfare, etc. etc. etc. or just a crucifix in every classroom and stamping out freedom of association used by Woke Gays?
What is a “heritage American”? Do you mean a white person? What about blacks descended from plantation workers in the slave trade? Are they part of America’s heritage? Etc. Do you consider Christian blacks to be “heritage Americans”? What about their rights? etc.
What freedom from Washington are you talking about specifically? Is it Constitutional?
What is it you want to do that you believe you are not allowed to do, that prompted you to write this article?
Being snarky on Twitter is not the same as having an actual political movement.
Pew research:
“For example, about three-quarters of U.S. adults (77%) say that churches and other houses of worship should not endorse candidates for political offices. Two-thirds (67%) say that religious institutions should keep out of political matters rather than expressing their views on day-to-day social or political questions. And the new survey – along with other recent Center research – makes clear that there is far more support for the idea of separation of church and state than opposition to it among Americans overall.”
https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2022/10/27/45-of-americans-say-u-s-should-be-a-christian-nation/
Havent seen the polls but the writer’s not spruiking Christian nationalism, but a championing of traditional morality and healthy racial spirit. He’s suggesting vigorous lampooning of ‘wokery’ wherever feasible. My thought is you’d really need to know your audience to make sure you don’t wind up in jail. Babylon Bee and JP come to mind as doing this well, albeit from a Christian civic nationalist viewpoint.
Blacks were called blacks or coloreds or other things, rather than black- or African-Americans, until at least mid-century. Americans were known to be of European, mostly North-Western, stock. There’s a whole continent waiting for blacks where whitey won’t bother them.
Yeah, he’s not “speaking Christian Nationalism”, he’s just advocating for “the Christian order” and “Christian civilisation”, and closes with a quote about scripture.
“Inf0-parody” seems to be just ‘owning the libs’. How’s that worked out over the past three decades?
If “healthy racial spirit” means Bible-bashing, I’m out.
Good one there. I’ve had similar thoughts for a while. Being mocked drives them berserk, and there’s plenty of absurdity to be found on their side.
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