Counter-Currents
Counter-Currents Radio Podcast No. 628
Dutton on Bowden
Counter-Currents Radio
92 words / 1:05:59
Edward Dutton joined Greg Johnson to discuss his new biography of Jonathan Bowden, Shaman of the Radical Right. It is now available to download or listen to online.
Topics include:
1:00 – How did the book come about?
4:56 – Who were Bowden’s heroes and influences?
12:00 – Bowden was an unstable genius
19:58 – Bowden’s family history of illness
24:25 – Flourishes with the truth
33:26 – How would Bowden view today’s “dissident right”?
39:40 – Did Bowden ever talk about Sam Francis?
48:25 – Bowden’s legacy
1:02:57 – Conclusions
To listen in a player, click here or below. To download, right-click the link and click “save as.”
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3 comments
Interesting interview. I have a theory about the lying. Im not a medical expert, but I think it was his illness. Schizophrenia is highly comorbid with delusional disorder. This can occur as a part of schizophrenia, or it can be a separate illness, but it usually occurs in families in which schizophrenia is also present, and as you mention, Bowden had schizophrenic family members. Delusional people have fixed inner false belief systems, which usually have a grandiose or paranoid nature, sometimes a bit of both, which grow into complex systems and structures. The reason it’s so compelling is that the belief is true in his mind. And it’s highly internally consistent, and it becomes part of their identity so he doesn’t change the story over time. I’ve known people like this. They can be highly beguiling, because as you mention, we all tell small lies or white lies at times, but as in the big lie of mein kampf, few of us expect someone to tell an absolute whopper. So you have to kind of get to know them to figure out and verify that in fact these things aren’t really true. Things like they own land somewhere, they’re friends with a famous person, in the mafia, or really governor of some place are typical of grandiose delusions. As far as you’ve told, he didn’t have other bad character traits to suggest psychopathy of a high-level.
The movie Big Fish is actually a pretty good affectionate portrait of a person with delusional disorder.
Great interview! I’ve watched several Bowden speeches on YouTube. His “we’re not sorry” speech (I believe ‘Western Civilization Bites Back’ is the title) is one of the best I’ve ever heard. Clearly an extremely interesting man with interesting things to say. It’s a shame he died so young.
I am going to promote Katharina Jörder’s book again: “Building a White Nation – Propaganda, Photography, and the Apartheid Regime Between the Late 1940s and the Mid-1970s” (Belgium, Leuven University Press, 2023, 330 pages). Although the book is written with a hostile tone, I think it would be interesting to do a critical review of it on Counter-Currents. The book can be downloaded for free from the website archive.org
https://archive.org/details/oapen-20.500.12657-86073
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