I just saw this map (here’s the post in which it is embedded) of anti-liberal blogs at Habitable Worlds, and it’s pretty cool. At least at a quick check, both the groupings and the connections seem about right. Presumably, the Orthosphere would be placed in the middle of “Christian Traditionalists” (hereafter “CTs”) with no connections to other groupings. The map has an obvious focus on secular reactionaries–not that there’s anything wrong with that. It is obvious that CTs are the cluster least integrated with others. This is to be expected, given that the various groups of secular reactionaries aren’t separated by any sort of deep philosophical differences from each other the way they all are from us. The map correctly shows some CT sites leaning toward manosphere/femininity territory. One might have expected us to blend in seamlessly with the Christian manosphere, but if you read their blogs like I do, you know that they despise us. A tighter connection to the “Political Philosophy” cluster might be an unrealized possibility. Our goal is 1) to be right and 2) to make our arguments strong and interesting enough that we can seed ideas among the wider class of people disaffected with the modern world.
The Orthosphere 
You might consider linking the specific entry rather than the blog. It’s not hard to find, but it is confusing when you click the link.
Okay, now there are three links: the map, the post, and the blog itself.
Do you think I despise Christian traditionalists?
If you do, what gives you that impression?
In my arguments with Bruce Charlton, he argues that I cannot support right conduct, except God commands it, to which I reply that God commands a Church that is profoundly socially conservative – which no observable churches ever are.
I don’t know about the USA, but there are lots of profoundly socially conservative churches in Brazil, for example:
http://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congregação_Cristã_no_Brasil
http://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igreja_Presbiteriana_do_Brasil
http://pt.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assembleia_de_Deus
I doubt that there aren’t any in the USA. Of course that despite this they still have a lot of difficulty in fighting political battles, but I think that this something very natural: Fighting political battles should be the job of a political party, not the church.
Maybe you actually mean that there is no proper political party for reactionaries in the USA, and then it is true. The 2-party system is stupid. More parties are necessary.
I don’t see how classic liberals and traditionalists could possibly live alongsides in the Republican Party. I never deeply hater classic liberals, my hate was exclusively for marxists. But the more I talk to classic liberals, the more they insult me and show how they absolutely hate and despise traditionalists, specially Christians ones. So I am starting to grow a hate for them in exchange of the favor. Funny that they usually say they like muslims but christians, oh no!!! Those horrible violent creatures! I ask myself if they live in some kind of parallel reality where Christians are doing suicide bombings.
There should be links from Bruce Charlton and Larry Auster to HBD.
Nicely done image. I’m a bit dumb founded by the techno commercialists/futurists though. Are they just people who have a vision of the future (?) or do they provide some form of construction essential to the dark contra enlightenment?
you know that they despise us
Who specifically are you referring to? This seems a bit overstated. To the extent that places like this are noticed, people like Dalrock tend to lump them in with mainstream social conservatives, both Catholic and Protestant, who indeed have questionable views of male-female relations. To add to the confusion, some of these mainstream social conservatives refer to themselves as traditionalists.
I was primarily thinking of Dalrock and Laura Robbins, not because they are unusually hostile, but because their blogs are good and I read them regularly. As you surely know, “TradCon” and “SoCon” are terms of abuse on Christian manosphere sites. In fact, I sense more hostility from them than I do from secular “game” sites. David Flory’s comment accurately describes the divisions of the manosphere and their impression of us.
It’s like TMWW says, though. Neocons/NeoCaths move ever leftward in substance and ever rightward in naming. This dilutes the right’s message. Actually it makes it impossible for there to be a right. To continue to work in public, either we have to name ourselves after a person the neo’s unalterably despise or after an idea or movement the neo’s unalterably despise. Otherwise you get “I’m a rightist MLK fan!!!” and “I’m a Catholic Traditionalist: Santo Subito!!!”
I think both neo-conservatives and neo-reactionaries are flavours of watered down liberalism (emphasis on the “neo”, which means new, which means progress/new/evolution).
Contrast neoconservative versus paleoconservative. A prominent neoconservative would have been former U.S.A. President George W. Bush. A prominent paleoconservative would have been someone like Pat Buchanan.
you are right, neoconservatism is nothing more than a pro-war classic liberal. Impose democracy by bombing Irak, Lybia, etc? The bombing for democracy is nothing more than conversion by the sword. But it is not conversion to Christianism, it is conversion to liberalism that is the aim of liberal leaders.
I get what you’re saying, but I’m not sure I’d use the word watered down. Perhaps selective would be better. A lot of these different groups radically challenge liberalism in one of more areas, but hold on to liberal (or at least modernist) ways of thinking in others.
Any Christian traditionalist that complains that other neoreactionaries are insufficiently pure and holy, and complains because Heartiste openly admits to being a minion of Satan, should ask himself:
Are women in his church allowed to speak to their husbands and fathers while in Church, under circumstances where their husbands and fathers are allowed to speak to each other?
Do the women in his church wear clothing symbolizing modesty and submission?
How would his church deal with a male whose dress and manner was effeminate?
First, deal with the beam in your own eye.
The claim that Christianity is essential to true reaction is pharasaism, which is the essence of leftism, and the observed behavior of Christian Churches casts doubt on the claim.
Hello jamesd127,
Could you explain what prompted this comment? I don’t think anyone made the complaint you’re responding to.
Bonald,
jamesd127 is an autistic anti-Christian who argument consists solely of goalpost shifting. Do not waste your time.
I was reacting to ” One might have expected us to blend in seamlessly with the Christian manosphere, but if you read their blogs like I do, you know that they despise us.”
Christian Traditionalists should uphold the socially conservative and anti pharisee parts of the New Testament. Theoretically they do uphold those parts, but, that being a hard row to hoe, they tend to go easy.
When Christian Traditionalists go easy on sexual equality and phariseeism, they catch flack from the rest of the reactionary movement, especially the Christian manosphere – because they deserve that flack.
One pretty regularly sees atheist neoreactionaries and the Christian manosphere flat out upholding patriarchy. Should that not be the Christian Traditionalists job?
Looks like you would like to join the “Congregacao Crista no Brasil”: http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_bE3kEf3jbes/TCrJ_6S–iI/AAAAAAAAAlc/JB96UkiJHDY/s1600/orquestraCCB.jpg
Woman wear veils, wear long skirts and sit separately in the service even. Man wear suits like orthodox jews.
It’s the church 2 of my grandparents.
I have a feeling he doesn’t do for himself what he thinks we’re supposed to do ourselves.
The hostility you perceive in the traditionalist manosphere is directed at the trad-cons who ignore the toxic legal and economic situation of men, and demand that they “man up” as if it were the 1950s and there were ample jobs, little economic competition from women (let alone preferential hiring of women), legal and social sanctions against frivolous divorce, and many young women with feminine graces and skills, little or no sexual history, and the desire and ability to be good wives and mothers.
Dalrock is orthodox in his Christian faith, and attacks “churchians” for falling away from a biblical and Realist understanding of the relationship between man and woman.
On the other hand, the more “MRA “wing, such as “A Voice for Men” is inherently hostile to Christianity because it rejects even traditional relationships between the sexes. This wing tends to embrace homosexuality as a valid expression of manhood, and is primarily interested in promoting the autonomy of men by co-opting the language of victim-rights groups.
It is important to distinguish between these two branches of the manosphere. One desires to restore a recognizably Christian role for men in society, whereas the other is primarily reactionary against feminism and will strike at anything that limits men’s autonomy. The first should be the allies of Christians, and I agree with them that mainstream “traditional” Christians have been seriously corrupted by feminism and leftism in general, and have made most churches hostile or unhelpful to men who are willing to fulfill their traditional role and place in the family.
There’s also a lot of conflation between traditionalists and mainstream social conservatives. The latter are far more likely to be white knights and pedestalizers, making excuses for bad female behaviour like out of wedlock motherhood and frivolous divorce. As far as I can tell, a trad-con in manosphere-speak is someone who advocates for traditional gender roles (at least according to their lights) while making excuses for female bad behaviour or placing women on a pedestal. I don’t think it is intended to refer to us, not least because we don’t tend to do that. We’re just not really on their radar.
Now some genuine traditionalists have objected to “game.” But the reasons haven’t really had anything to do with white knighting or pedestalization. First, many trads don’t like game because it treats relationships between men and women in a mechanistic way. Second, the insights and techniques that make up game were discovered and propagated by mass fornicators, so they are strongly associated with things traditionalists consider immoral. Both objections to game may be overstated, but they aren’t really the same as the objections of mainstream social conservatives. Unfortunately, to the extent that the Christian manosphere notices us, they may not make this distinction and lump us in with mainstream social conservatives. Again, our modes of thought aren’t really on their radar.
Finally, I have to say, I find the Christian manosphere critique of mainstream social conservatives is largely dead on. There’s a lot of “man up and marry those whores,” “single moms are heroes,” and “he was looking at dirty pictures, so it’s ok to divorce him” rhetoric from that side of things. As much as we may be tempted to identify with mainstream social conservatives, who we do share a lot in common with, they aren’t really “our team” so to speak, so we shouldn’t take insults to them personally.
I think definitions are important. In manosphere parlance, so-con seems to mean someone who is opposed to premarital sex, abortion and homosexual activity. The Catholic version may also be opposed to contraception. Aside from those issues, they often accept a good deal of feminist ideology. They may even call themselves feminists. A good example might be Sarah Palin and her ilk.
Trad-con, as I said before, goes further and in manosphere speak seems to mean someone who celebrates traditional sex roles, such as men being the primary breadwinners while the women focus more on children and the home. This can still go along with a fair amount of pedestalization, excuse making and outright delusion about female bad behaviour. People like Mark Driscoll, Albert Mohler, and Focus on the Family would seem to fall into this category.
These two types are what I have referred to as mainstream social conservatives and they aren’t really “us,” though of course we share much in common with them and support much of what they are doing.
A creature like Sarah Palin is a neoconservative and supported contraception (she’s not that “pro-life” either). She was airbrushed heavily by the mainstream media as some “far right wing” woman, but to the ruling zeitgeist anyone and anybody who is not ever more leftist, ever more modern, ever more atheist, is a terrible right winger. She’s more of a right-liberal than a left-liberal, but does not mean that she is against modernity, liberalism and the enlightenment. Think the hatred against Palin the same as against Bush. I never understood the hatred Bush got, and finally realized that it’s because he’s a pro-war classical liberal (classical liberal instead of modern liberal).
Well, duh, Sarah Palin is a neo-conservative, but she’s also definitely a social conservative by the common use of the term.
I think that simply traditional roles for man and woman in the general society is not given emphasis because:
1> is considered less prioritary. Many Christians consider saving lives more prioritary, so stopping pre-natal infanticide is a choice for many. For me personally the top priority is stopping the bigotry and defamation against Christians and whites, as well as demographic death (the dead can’t discuss the proper role of main and woman).
2> If you want traditional roles in your own family you can have it already. Just set it up like that with your wife. If you want a church with a traditional leadership it is easy, just choose a church which does not ordain woman.
3> It is a really explosive and hard topic, with a lot of potential of alienating a huge part of the population from other fights.
4> can be considered a lost cause in the west, and it was lost a very long time ago, like 100 years ago. It is already hard enough to have traditional roles in Christian families. I’m pretty sure that any attempt at this for the general, non-christian or nominally christian population, would be completely massacrated by the liberal powers.
So it is a tremendouly difficult battle, one with potential to alienate a lot of allies which would be useful in more relevant battles and one which at least I don’t consider a minimum pre-requisite to live with dignity.
I would already consider it a miracle if any western society reliably showed that it fulfills what I consider minimum pre-requisites for living with dignity, so I have no energy to waste fighting non-essential impossible battles.
> The hostility you perceive in the traditionalist manosphere is directed at the trad-cons who
> ignore the toxic legal and economic situation of men, and demand that they “man up” as if it
> were the 1950s and there were ample jobs,
Honestly I don’t see man doing that badly in the work force as you say.
> little economic competition from women (let alone preferential hiring of women),
I work with informatics where there are almost no woman.
> legal and social sanctions against frivolous divorce,
If your wife is deeply religious, I think that the chances of getting a frivolous divorce are virtually zero.
> and many young women with feminine graces and skills, little or no sexual history,
> and the desire and ability to be good wives and mothers.
They might not be easy to find as the typical liberal is, but I’m pretty sure they exist. I found one for myself.
Try searching in a conservative church, it shouldn’t be that hard. Maybe the real problem is that you expect them to also look like Gisele Bundchen: http://www.howmuchdotheyweigh.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/02/gisele-bundchen.jpg
A normal-looking conservative wife shouldn’t be that hard to find in a conservative church.
But I’m not from the USA, maybe things there are really as bad as you say.
Felipe,
Thank you for the interesting perspective from elsewhere. It’s good to know that there are traditionalists in other countries, too.
In the US, things are pretty bad for men in employment. Because of the massive influx of both women and foreigners, it’s hard to get a job, and when you do get one, they don’t pay as well as they did, comparatively, for our fathers. In the US, the current crop of young men is the first generation ever that, on the whole, makes less than their fathers (adjusted for inflation, of course).
Add to that all the Affirmative Action, Equal Employment Opportunity, feminism, and other laws and practices, and the overall environment is very bad indeed.
demographic death
The demographic question is very much related to sex roles. Because of education and career, women are waiting a long time to have kids.
Oops. I meant to say, “Because of the massive influx of both women and foreigners in to the workforce.”
As Mr. Was observes, women in the workforce have deleterious effects beyond increasing competition, lowering wages, and demanding various forms of “accommodation.”
On an earlier post, there is a quiz concerning one’s “neo-reactionary” type.
I’m (mostly) a “neo-reactionary hate machine.”
My thoughts on the Dark Enlightenment:
..
The Dark Enlightenment doesn’t seem all that different from liberalism. They both accept the modernist beliefs in biological evolution, progress and other myths of scientism. True, the Dark Enlightenment believes that cadres of intelligent, powerful men should be in charge of the different parts of the world, free to lead their racially homogenous Vaterländer in whatever way they see fit. Liberalism sees true social progress as a homogenization of various races, sexes and religions into an unpalatable pottage ruled by the tyranny of the mob. Neither seems able to admit the existence of an eternal metaphysical order on which it is necessary to pattern human cultures if they are to be civilized.
Reaction begins with the rejection of the contemporary narrative based on a belief in progress. The truth, of course, is the opposite, regress. Humans did not evolve from shrew-like insectivores; they devolved from beings possessed of subtle material bodies. As we become more material, we become less intelligent and more susceptible to the lies of the Devil, the ape of God. To refuse to accept or to live according to materialist lies is what is most important if we are to, in any small way, create a place where we can live in accord with the Real.
Would you prefer to live in a pre-penicillin world?
If it means a choice between living in a traditional civilization geared toward the spiritual health of its citizens or living in a barbaric society geared toward the physical wellbeing of its inhabitants, I would choose the first, even sans penicillin. As has been said, “For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” (Mark 8:36)
Mr. Clark,
You make a false dichotomy. We cannot move backwards into the past, so there is no question of living “in a pre-penicillin world.” However, we can observe what our ancestors did versus what we do, and decide who, on the whole, did it better. We can also pick and choose, and say that while practice X of our ancestors was clearly better than what we do now, practice Y rightly belongs on the dust-heap of history.
Incidentally, I never hear people on the right side of the political scale indicate a desire to live in the past. It is only a ploy used by those on the left to smear those on the right.
Well, there might be a pre-universally available, on demand penicillin world if we re-established a proper ordering of society. But under those circumstances how much penicillin would we really need?
Don’t get me wrong. I’m not anti-tradition nor anti-Christian. Dark Enlightenment / neoreactionary / archeofuturist types aren’t really anti-tradition; many are radical traditionalists. They want to maintain aspects of tradition while not rejecting science. For instance, the findings of HBD / evolutionary psychology often support the views held by traditionalists. You have certainly HBD traditional Christians like Generation5 and Bruce Charleton.
The biggest problem with current Christianity is its radical universalization: the deracination of man from his biological and ethnic roots. Christianity today needs a strong dose of HBD.
I may do a blog post on this. Stay tuned.
Where can a religious traditionalist who embraces ethno-nationalism feel at home? Kinism?
Where can a religious traditionalist who embraces ethno-nationalism feel at home?
Here.
Agreed. But probably not so much if you’re an ethno-nationalist embracing religious tradition.
Actually yeah, I’m probably the second one. I don’t think they’re mutually exclusive at all though.
As genuine white Supremacist… The only pure anti-liberal.
What unites reaction?
A moral outlook that sees value in things other than utility and how it is divided up. A recognition that things like loyalty, respect for authority and holiness have value in themselves.
Obviously, most secular reactionaries would have a hard time getting away from the utilitarian calculus. The way I like to frame it for the purposes of practical unity is that “things like loyalty, respect for authority and holiness” have group adaptive advantages, which is why they arose in the first place. Taken together, such things amount to culture, and strong cultures win over weak ones. What we mean by “good, in and of itself” is therefore quite different to what a secular rightist would mean by it, even if he would use the term at all. But there is at bottom a remarkable coincidence in that list of “goods”.
The reaction, if it is to mean anything must disown Sartre’s ‘Existence precedes Essence’
That is a really cool map, but I’m not so sure about it. Shouldn’t Christian Traditionalism fly off more to itself, yet loosely connected to HBD and its natural outliers – sort of like M51 in Canes Venatici – or is this just wishful thinking on my part?
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Regarding the discussion we were having above, here are my thoughts:
I also put up a poll on traditional Christianity vs paganism vs atheism. Last time I put up a similar poll, traditional Christianity won.
..
The question of true reaction is not one of ends but of foundational belief. Without an understanding of the metaphysical and ethical realities that support the world of appearances, any activity, reactionary or otherwise, is nothing more than amusing ourselves in the void.
I came across an article at Staff and Scrip that does a very good at explaining the Traditional Reactionary view:
http://www.staffandscrip.com/pp006.shtml
a very good job at explaining… (Typing on an iPad is a skill I have yet to master.)
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