Miscellaneous thoughts on the right wing of politics

Conservatives and children

1- I cannot prove this, but I strongly suspect conservatives view having children as a way to cheat death, much more so than liberals do. They want to mold their children into copies of what they see as exemplary in themself, in order to "continue their line". Certainly, every lunatic I have encountered online who talks unironically of “propagating their lineage” or some such is rightwing, and there’s a surprisingly large number of them. In this theory, for the rightwing, the idea of their children being fully separate persons to themselves, free and autonomous to choose from an unlimited number of lives, is anathema, because it prevents the transmission of self in a way that avoids death.

2- Even though this desire to propagate self through the family is far from selfless, nonetheless connection with family gets coded as altruistic in our society. Family motives can be particularly dark in political practice, as they combine an occluding combination of selfishness and perceived altruism. Here’s a comical example- Alex Jones, host of Infowars, explaining, in a way that presumably his audience finds acceptable- that he would butcher his neighbors to keep his daughters alive a little longer. It’s very funny and presumably intended to be scandalous, but I tend to think it’s only three or four steps from the conservative mainstream: after all, ten million people visit Infowars a month. Alex wasn’t worried about his viewers finding this offensive, and that says something.

3- From a selfish perspective, the conservative wants to erase other modes of life so they can better mold their family. Thus the voice of selfishness says “do it”. However, there is no counter-voice to hold them back with guilt, because they perceive themselves as acting out of altruistic motives- protecting their family. Both the angel and the devil on the shoulder have been coopted, and so there is nothing to restrain them. “In order to protect my extended self-interest- family, I must eliminate. In order to follow the altruistic path I must protect my family and thus eliminate”.

4- It’s often a conservative trope, but it is true to say that the most dangerous man when it comes to politics is the one who is absolutely convinced he’s doing the right thing.

5- Remember, this was never really about saving the children, this is about saving my children and grandchildren, and thus, by extension, myself. Other people’s children might be included to a limited degree if I perceive them as kin. That’s why conservatives couldn’t give a fuck about arguments like “saving the children means eliminating child poverty”. This isn’t about a philanthropic principle, it’s the expansion of the self.

An illustration of the dangers of “moral cruelty” from the other side of politics

6- I have nothing new to say here but: It doesn’t take a genius to guess that as cultural diversity becomes ever more present through the internet, the conservative desire to shape their children’s microclimate will become increasingly desperate and paranoid. This is one of the causes of the “all my children’s teachers are groomers” panic. The kids are getting alternative attitudes and modes of life off the internet and off each other of course, but the illusion of control is an attractive idea. Left to their devices, they would absolutely demand that society be remade so as to remove alternative models and ways of being for their children. Their children will always find these models. There’s a crack in everything, that’s where the light gets in.

7- I read somewhere once, though I can’t find the source, a pithy quote. The reason both the right and the left are absolutely convinced that they’re losing is that they want different things. The left wants to control policy, whereas the right wants to stop the process of cohort replacement. They want to prevent the cultural alienation of each generation from the generation that succeeds it.

8- Being a sane adult in modernity means accepting that your children will be aliens to you. We know this because every generation has been alien to their parents, even the Talmud says that man’s great love is for his son, but his son’s great love is not for his father but his own son. Alienation between generations is the way of things. Modernity can only amplify that. Technology can only amplify that. It’s never, ever, going to change until there are no more humans left and we’ve all died or ascended.

9- It is not a coincidence that a section of the right is obsessed with protecting children from so-called (not actually) “groomers” at the exact same time as another, partially overlapping, segment of the right is obsessed with seducing and/or marrying children (the pedophilic section of the anime community, etc.). Both groups are interested in children for the same reasons viz, they view children as plastic that can very easily be molded into any shape they desire. Those that want to keep queer content away from children are afraid they will be molded by it. Those who are sexually obsessed with children or child-like characters also view them as malleable, and thus still “saveable”. Among non-pedophiles on the right (and to be clear I am not claiming that right-wingers are unusually likely to be pedophiles), we see an echo of this desire, among those who specifically look for women who haven’t been to college and haven’t got much life experience. Also in the creepy view that women “hit the wall” at 20.

The right online: Yuck conservatism and the yuckification of politics

1- The online right has made as one of its main catchphrases: “I will not eat the bugs, I will not get in the pod”. Many have pointed out that this phrase reduces politics to consumption choices, which is true, but notice also that it makes politics about disgust. About a moment of yuck. I have no particular interest in living in a pod or eating bugs either, yet I’d like to think that my politics is more meaningful than a yuck instinct. The slogan is just disgust, not love, not yearning, not even rage (although this is of course present in a subsumed form). Just disgust at consumption choices, like a toddler with food anxiety.

2- For what it’s worth, psychological evidence that conservatives have always been more prone to feelings of disgust than the left is not hard to find. For example, it’s implicit in Haidt’s moral foundation’s theory.

3- But we have seen the creation of “yuck” conservatism, a conservatism unmediated by any kind of supernatural or secular ideology (or at least any ideology very explicitly enters as a secondary moment). It’s a conservatism just based on reactions like “What if my wife slept with someone else, yuck”, “what if my kid was gay, yuck”, “what if my daughter was a thot, yuck”, “what if I didn’t feel fully masculine, yuck”. There’s no theorization here of a celestial father that disapproves of these things. There’s not even an attempt to tell a just-so story about how these things will destroy society. it’s just a direct emotional reaction. The role of “yuck” seems to be more immediate than in previous conservative ideologies, and the role of a cohesive religious or socio-political worldview seems diminished.

4- Granted, there is a section of the right which is solidifying its connection with Christianity, but in the main, it’s dropping away. The Christianity that remains increasingly becomes not a bedrock of the conservative belief system, but a mere synecdoche meaning, “the things I like”. This is old ground, but what’s semi-novel is that we’re seeing a style of conservatism that rejects homosexuality, casual sex, etc. etc. without any kind of metaphysical foundation. A simple, unmediated sneer of hateful disgust exhausts the whole content. There’s no particular reason these conservatives dislike, say, non-monogamy, they just find it ugly. It’s the aestheticization not just of politics, but of ethics, and even of prudence (the sense of what will make one’s own life go well).

5- If Walter Benjamin is right that fascism is the aestheticization of politics -the stripping away of ethical and prudential concerns and their replacement of an obsession with a kind of beauty- then the emergence of yuck conservatism may be a very bad sign. An aestheticized, rather than theologized or even sociologized, ethics may be an ideological movement towards fascism.

6- Ultimately, this kind of “yuck, yuck, yuck” is fragile. It is fragile in the same paradoxical way masculinity is. Masculinity is meant to be hard and strong, yet it is treated as so fragile and vulnerable, that crossdressing once threatens masculinity. If your whole life is characterized by layers and layers of fears about things being yucky, you’re not an ubermensch, you’re a toddler with food anxiety. Such a personification of fragility! Isn’t there, ironically, something yucky about all this sneering and calling things yuck?

“Advertising conservatism”, “Waifu conservatism” and the inability to face reality due to being caught in a disgust trap where everything is sickening and scary

1- One of the most interesting manifestations of the aestheticization of politics on the right is fictionalism- the inability to cope with the world as it is, and the choice to inhabit fictional worlds

2- Although I do not fully understand it, fictionalism is not exclusive to the right. Liberals have their own version where they run to Harry Potter and the Marvel Cinematic universe. The unironic version of “Ruthkanda forever”. The liberal versions tend to be driven by emotions other than disgust though- most notably a kind of upset fearfulness at the cruelty of the world.

3- Among the very online right, fictionalism appears to be driven by disgust. Consider, for example, the waifu phenomenon in which internet users, disproportionately rightwing, will fixate on fictional women from Japanese cartoons. There’s no mystery as to why, they’ll tell you themselves. They like fictional women because they don’t have the flaws of real women, whether physical or “historical”. A selling point is that many waifus don’t have a sexual history, and these men are terrified of women who have slept with anyone before them.

4- A friend of mine put the dynamic this way. These people like sexy pictures of women. Unfortunately, they are so sickened by women who have had sex with anyone previously that they are disgusted by a real photo of a woman looking sexy- because the fact that she has taken a sexy photo is evidence that she has had sex previously. Fictional women are the “solution”.

5-Of course the waifu phenomenon is also driven by a fear of rejection by real women, but even this tends to blend into disgust in interesting ways. See for example this random tweet that put it very directly:

6- But it goes far beyond the waifu phenomenon. Find some unironic conservative memes that say “retvrn” or “never forget what they took from you”. Notice that they’re rarely actual honest photographs of the past. They’re usually ads from the past- idealized pictures of happy families made in the 50’s, 60’s 70’s and 80’s to sell products. These people aren’t pining for a world that was, they’re pining for a world that was advertised. Why? Because the actual world with its suffering, screaming, teeming, shitting, living, and dying masses disgusts them. This isn’t really a revolt against the present. This is a revolt against reality from people whose sense of disgust has become so hypersensitized that the real world makes them naseous.

Occultism and the aestheticization of belief

1- A lot of the very online right are getting into the occult these days. That takes a lot of forms. Vague references to the spirit world, and to demons, in a way that has become unhinged from Christianity. Belief in the power of curative potions and poultices. Strange talk of “manifesting” and “energy”.

2- Occultism is a kind of perfect post-belief belief system for an aestheticized view of the world, because contemporary western occultism, post theosophy, and chaos magic, are basically the substitution of aesthetics for belief, of vibes. “What I want makes the world” occultism even shares the narcissism implicit in aestheticization, “what will be depends upon my taste!”. The westernized idea of the Tulpa, something that exists just because you want it to, belief preceding the world rather than the world preceding belief, is the ultimate summation of this view of things. Knowing is replaced with willing. Truth is replaced with appeal.

3- Unsurprisingly then, the very online right has embraced occultism with enthusiasm. It’s a boneless form of occultism, with reference to “forces” and “spirits” but few names or set stories. But then they managed to create a whole theory of politics without once talking about the mode of production, so why should we be surprised that they managed to make a whole practice of magic without ever actually theorizing the sinews of another world. Above all, occultism allows the right to externalize their sense of bad vibes and disgust by attributing it to “spirits”. Watch Cernovich here seamlessly move from “this makes me uncomfortable and sickened” to “this involves dark spirits”.

4-I don’t think it can be emphasized enough that these people are fearful failures deadly dull.

Back to the mainstream right: Post-neoliberal politics

1- Thus far I’ve been talking about the lunatic online right and their desire to kill reality and replace it with something that doesn’t make them feel disgusted. Now we’ll talk about something much saner. The “official” “sanctioned” right and their aim to kill the planet.

2- In post-neoliberal politics, everyone agrees on no serious efforts at redistribution. Even more sacred, everyone in the political class agrees on privatizing everything. The last remaining political vista, the last remaining thing over which we fight in the economic sphere, is whether or not people should have to pay for their externalities. Liberalism says yes, and conservatives say no.

3- In an environment where redistribution is off the table “not paying for your externalities” can take on a strange left-wing sheen as Pigouvian taxes -taxes on negative externalities- are basically just flat taxes that will not be compensated. This explains much of the “populist” flavor of the right on economics in recent years. In a situation in which the public had confidence in the power of the government to redistribute the public might have much more faith in measures like carbon taxes.

Hot and cold

1- The internet right can be seen as made up of two groups of active agents, the nihilists, and the opportunists. The nihilists and opportunists are opposites in an interesting way. To be clear, there are those on the right who don’t fall into either group, but the ones in these two groups tend to be the doers and leaders, the others just sort of passively follow along.

2- The nihilists don’t give a fuck about their own life. The real world disgusts them so much that they’d be happy to die in a flame of narratively-rich glory, transcending this world for the legends they much prefer.

3- The opportunists look at the world, look at their (real and imagined) skills and capacities, and look at the boomers and think “hey, why ain’t I rich like the boomers”. So they look for the cheat code. Crypto looked like it might be the cheat code until it wasn’t. They have zero interest in overthrowing the power elite en masse, rather they fantasize about being recognized for their unique talent and genius by a portion of the power elite, and invited to join.

4- The opportunists would never join the left because what they want is to have a prosperous family (and perhaps also plenty of chances to play the field on the side). They know that any kind of project to negate the existing power structure of society is not their best bet to secure for themselves a prosperous family. They’re not wrong about any of this, from an individual perspective, trying to make the world a better place by taking the fight to almost all of the power elite simultaneously is not going to make your life go better for you. From this point of view, gambling your money on crypto or praying that Elon Musk notices your tweets is an infinitely better strategy for trying to change your life.

5- The opportunists aligning with the right is dangerous in a way that the nihilists aligning with the right isn’t. The opportunists may seem non-serious, blinded by cupidity, but actually, they are serious in a way that the nihilists aren’t.

6- The natural weakness of both these poles of the right is that they’re shithouse at organizing. The opportunists can’t organize because of their deep individualism. The nihilists can’t organize because they’re too unstable. Unfortunately, that doesn’t slow them down all that much because the online right has something the far left doesn’t have- a media infrastructure that organizes for them, that tells them what lines to spout, what strategies to adopt, etc.

7- The left stands, in an odd way, in the middle between these two groups. They hate bourgeoise society too much to want to join it. They’re not filled with the same kind of all-consuming anger at life that makes the nihilists want to lash out at everything. Life and even bourgeoise freedom, are beautiful things, but they are being parasitized/colonized by capital. Implicitly or explicitly they hold their own life lightly enough to risk it, for anyone who calls for a revolution- a metaphorical or literal revolution- is at least calling for an opportunity to wager their life.

Why hypocrisy is built into the right on questions of criminal justice

1- The right is perpetually getting caught doing this or that hypocritical thing about criminal justice. Endorsing harsh punishments for others, but not when their own friends or kin, metaphorical or literal kin, get caught. The reason is very basic and easy to understand, but I think it is still worth spelling out.

2- There is a sense on which this is not hypocrisy on behalf of the right. What the right believe is that there is a dangerous rabble who are not quite people. We must be cruel to this rabble. Exuberantly so. We have to draw hard lines, and the sharpness of these lines against some people who are relatively innocent is no argument against these lines- on the contrary- it is evidence that these lines are working. To use a cliche, the cruelty, or rather the excessiveness is the point. The mob itself is excess, only excess will control it. The mob isn’t really human anyway. At worst the odd life imprisonment for someone stealing a biscuit on a three-strikes law is regrettable at best it is a positive good- culling the herd.

3- But because the right want these lines to be cruel and sharp against the ill-defined mob, it is no surprise that they don’t want them used against people they actually consider people. Obviously, my kin and friends aren’t part of the rabble, they are real people. The whole point was to be excessive against the mob, but tautologically you don’t want to behave excessively towards actual people. Far from betraying its own principles by endorsing different standards of punishment, supporting different standards of punishment is the only way the right can faithfully express its view that only some people are people, only it can’t quite say these things openly, so it comes across as inconsistent.

The correct line on cancel culture- revealed!

1- Cancel culture is real and horrible, it’s even killed a bunch of people through suicide. There are real, vicious idiots who will think nothing about destroying lives over sincere mistakes and honest disagreement. The right do it too whenever they get the chance don’t you worry.

2- My sense is that the left have, for the most part, targeted celebrities, microcelebrities and people with ambitions of becoming celebrities and microcelebrities. The right are not so discriminating, recently they have targeted a lot of individual teachers for example. These aren’t hard rules though, everyone will go after anyone, to a degree it’s the war of all against all out there. There ain’t no one respecting the laws of Lashon Hara, or very few.

3- But the main thing to remember about cancel culture, right or left, is on the scale of politics, it is a relatively minor problem. I don’t know exactly what the right policy is on COVID, but it’s killed a million people so far. There are two million people in jail or prison in the US at any given time, and the lifetime chances of going to either at some point are much higher. Nuclear war, climate change, these are the real stakes of politics. Anyone who uses cancel culture as a reason not to be on the left is an idiot. Almost all the danger cancel culture poses is that it weakens the left, at a time the left desperately needs to be strong. I say this as someone who is as at risk of being canceled as anyone. As someone whose OCD makes them especially fearful of being canceled. This stuff could very well kill me one day, if anything drove me to suicide it would probably be this. Yet on the scale of the world’s problems, it’s as dust. That’s the truth about cancel culture. It kills people, yet it is not a first-order concern. Again, politics is about wars and rumors of wars, starvation, imprisonment, mass disenfranchisement, homelessness, murder, and social murder in all its various forms. This is small fry.

4- Side point: I saw a great point about identity politics, and by extension cancel culture, on Twitter recently that I think bears repeating. A lot of the complaints about cancel culture now are coming from the centrist establishment. The establishment has been blaming cancel culture on the left. but if you actually look at who has inflicted “cancellation”, it’s often awful centrists. The centrists created this HR-bullshit-identity-politics-complex, and now they’re blaming the left for it. Remember when Clinton was like “we could break up the banks tomorrow, but would that end racism”? A lot of this shit came from the center, and now the Matthew Yglesiases of the world are wringing their hands and complaining that we the left have chased the voters off with this stuff. Look at your own hands, sir! This is not to deny that there has been a real cancel culture, at times, in the left, but don’t let the right or the center try to worm out of their share of responsibility.