Post: #1

http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/w...come-isis/

Quote:I played fiddle at a small-town, country dance last night with several other musicians and it was a merry enough time because that kind of self-made music has the power to fortify spirits. About half the dancers were over 40 and the rest were teenage girls. The absence of young men was conspicuous. Toward the end of the evening, it was just girls dancing with girls. A wonderful and fundamental tension was not present in the room.

The young men are out there somewhere in the country towns, but this society increasingly has no use or no place for them, except in the army. There is absolutely no public conversation about the near total devaluation of young men in the economic and social life of the USA, though there is near-hysterical triumphalism about the success of young women in every realm from sports to politics to business, and to go with that an equal amount of valorization for people who develop an ambiguous sexual identity.

There really is no local forum for public discussion in the flyover regions of the USA. The few remaining local newspapers are parodies of what newspapers once were, and the schools maintain a fog of sanctimony that penalizes thinking outside the bright-side box. Television and its step-child, the internet, offer only the worst temptations of hyper-sexual stimulation, artificial violence, and grandiose wealth-and-power fantasies. There aren’t even any taverns where people can gather for casual talk.

Many of the remaining jobs “out there” are jobs that can be done by anyone — certainly the office work, but also the jobs with near-zero meaning, minimal income, and no status in the national chain burger shacks and box stores — and young women are more reliably subject to control than young men jacked on testosterone, corn syrup, and Grand Theft Auto.

Of course, the idea that higher education can lift a population out of this vortex of anomie is a cruel joke, especially now with the college loan racket parasitizing that flickering wish to succeed, turning young people into debt donkeys. The shelf-life of that particular set of lies and swindles will hit its sell-by date soon in a massive debt repudiation — and the nation will come to marvel at the mendacious system it allowed itself to get sucked into. But this still only begs the question of what young men will do in such a deceitful system.

My guess is that they will shift their attention and activity from the mind-slavery of the current Potemkin economy to the very monster we find ourselves fighting overseas: a domestic ISIS-style explosion of wrath wrapped in an extreme ideology of one kind or another replete with savagery and vengeance-seeking. The most dangerous thing that any society can do is invalidate young men. When the explosion of youthful male wrath occurs in the USA, it will come along at exactly the same time as all the other benchmarks of order become unmoored — especially the ones in money and politics — which will shatter the faith of the non-young and the non-male, too. Also, just imagine for a moment the numbers of young men America has trained with military skills the past 20 years. Not all of them will be disabled with PTSD, or mollified with rinky-dink jobs at the Wal-Mart, or lost in the transports of heroin and methedrine.

The authorities will have no way to understand what is happening and we are certain to endure a long season of violence and social chaos as a result. The re-set from that will be an economy and a society that few now yammering in the HuffPo or the Tea Party will recognize. That society emerging from the ashes of the current matrix of rackets will desperately need young men to rebuild, and there will be plenty of opportunity for them — though it won’t feature fast cars, Kanye West downloads, or bottle service.

There are other ways for young men to find a useful and valued place in a society, but these are too far beyond the ken of our current meager narratives.

Interesting red-pill perspective from somebody who has no (to my knowledge) association with the manosphere. From his wiki page:

Quote:James Howard Kunstler (born October 19, 1948) is an American author, social critic, public speaker, and blogger. He is best known for his books The Geography of Nowhere (1994), a history of American suburbia and urban development, The Long Emergency (2005) and most recently, Too Much Magic (2012). In The Long Emergency, he argues that declining oil production is likely to result in the end of industrialized society as we know it and force Americans to live in smaller-scale, localized, agrarian (or semi-agrarian) communities. Starting with World Made by Hand in 2008, Kunstler has written a series of science fiction novels conjecturing such a culture in the future.

Kunstler gives lectures on topics related to suburbia, urban development, and the challenges of what he calls "the global oil predicament", and a resultant change in the “American Way of Life.” He has lectured the TED Conference, the American Institute of Architects, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, the International Council of Shopping Centers, the National Association of Science and Technology, as well as at numerous colleges and universities, including Yale, MIT, Harvard, Cornell, University of Illinois, DePaul, Texas A & M, West Point, and Rutgers University.

Also a seasoned journalist, Kunstler continues to write for The Atlantic Monthly, Slate.com, RollingStone, The New York Times Sunday Magazine, and the Op-Ed page where he often covers environmental and economic issues. Kunstler is also a leading supporter of the movement known as "New Urbanism."

Post: #2

I think he starts with accurate observations, but his conclusions are not necessarily justified. I doubt very much that American guys will rise up and start some kind of revolution. On the whole they are lacking aggression due to a steady diet of processed food and incapable of even envisioning a rebellion. They have been controlled masterfully in the prison of their own inaccurate beliefs. As long as the processed food, porn and pointless entertainment(nfl, tv, bread and circuses) keep coming they will remain as they have been for the last 40 years or so. He is dead on about men being treated poorly compared to other countries. Coming back to the US is difficult after travelling because you are automatically treated as a second class citizen by both sexes. There is no sense of male camaraderie and the women are emotionally distant, at least in my area.

Post: #3

(10-05-2014 07:32 PM)n0000 Wrote:  I think he starts with accurate observations, but his conclusions are not necessarily justified. I doubt very much that American guys will rise up and start some kind of revolution. On the whole they are lacking aggression due to a steady diet of processed food and incapable of even envisioning a rebellion. They have been controlled masterfully in the prison of their own inaccurate beliefs. As long as the processed food, porn and pointless entertainment(nfl, tv, bread and circuses) keep coming they will remain as they have been for the last 40 years or so. He is dead on about men being treated poorly compared to other countries. Coming back to the US is difficult after travelling because you are automatically treated as a second class citizen by both sexes. There is no sense of male camaraderie and the women are emotionally distant, at least in my area.

Agree. More likely, they'll just become like Japan's "grasseaters"...shunning women, playing video games...shunning work, too. The tax base will decline, America as a super-power will fade. Eventually, we'll be just be another over-taxed latin American socialist two-class system...the ultra wealthy, and the poor.

Thanks to women voters.

Post: #4

I'm a young male (21 yrs old) and i can say with certainty that there will be no revolution. Don't get me wrong. I believe that societies would do well do hang a few politicians and bankers every now and then but you have to ask yourself the following question; what happens next? Let's say we are successful at overthrowing the current government. What will happen after this? Most men do not have the answer to this. Most men in general are just too distracted, ignorant or apathetic. Even many red pill guys are demoralized and become part of the problem. Young men like myself that is aware of what is going on should drop out of the system (MGTOW) or learn to navigate without becoming part of the problem. I can elaborate on this but I do not feel like it right now.

I believe over the next decade or two (society moves much quicker now) we will see some of the United States resemble certain countries of Latin America. California right now is heading in that direction. We will see what becomes of some of the Southern states like Arizona, Florida, and Texas. New york is a liberal hellhole.

Post: #5

I think a revolution may happen, but it'll take a lot more than what's currently going on. Right now, there's only a small group of disaffected men. There's not massive unemployment or a failing economy.

Revolutions generally start because young men have nothing to do. Young men today (myself included) have an almost infinite number of distractions.

Post: #6

(10-05-2014 07:48 PM)Truth Teller Wrote:  I think a revolution may happen, but it'll take a lot more than what's currently going on. Right now, there's only a small group of disaffected men. There's not massive unemployment or a failing economy.

Revolutions generally start because young men have nothing to do. Young men today (myself included) have an almost infinite number of distractions.

Young men today don't have enough meaningful things to do. I don't necessarily agree with Kunstler that we'll have a domestic version of ISIS terrorizing the population...but I do agree with his thesis that when men don't have an outlet to contribute to society in a meaningful way, bad things happen as a result.

Post: #7

I like to think about this sometimes and there are a couple of possibilities that I keep thinking about. Who knows if they'll happen or not, but it's worth considering.

- No revolution will happen. We will eventually just become a worse version of Argentina, where the government still exists but they're so corrupt no one even really listens to them. High testosterone impoverished men with few job opportunities will turn to the profitable illegal drug business, join the military, or try to start their own businesses. There will always be ways for them to make money and get by.

The others will stick around with their families to try to help them out. There will be grasseaters, but with a severe economic correction there's a good chance most women will calm the fuck down if they want to get by. Maybe not at first, but they'll learn, and gender relations will eventually improve despite the protests of the corrupt politicians because the reality on the street is something they don't even have to deal with.

- Another possibility is we become a complete and total police state. The SWPL, SJW, and other assorted left-wingers use the tech industries and the government they've infiltrated to crush any and all who disagree with them. They redefine crimes, get judges to come up with fancy ways to skirt around the Constitution, and generally wreak havoc until the whole system burns itself out Soviet-style.

All this will take decades to put in place but they've been successful thus far. Do you hear anyone talking about the NSA stuff anymore? No one I talk to seems to care. "I'm not worried because I don't have anything to hide" is a common refrain from them.

Post: #8

Some of you have said "no revolution from young men". You might be missing a point.

Important to understand that it takes very few crazies to cause chaos.

It's the "asymmetry of male violence." You don't need 50% or even 10%. Not even 1% of young men, to go nuts. Even a few tens of thousands of crazies, not even well-organized, could cause dramatic destabilization.

Of course such domestic terrorists always lose, but that's not the point. Even as losers, they cause massive militarization of society. There is a reason the police departments are all buying heavy armor. They are preparing for what the top economic and social scientists have long known is coming.

It's just a few years now till the system collapses and that militarization takes hold. If you are aren't preparing for this well, you aren't preparing. Personally I'll be a Technocrat.

Post: #9

(10-05-2014 07:15 PM)DetlefMourning Wrote:  Interesting red-pill perspective from somebody who has no (to my knowledge) association with the manosphere.

People born pre 1950 will generally have a lot of innate views that would be considered "Red Pill".

Post: #10

I don't think a police state is really possible in this day and age.

Post: #11

I'm looking for a cultural tipping point which will render all of the conversation we have been having on the manosphere in the last half decade out of date. It doesn't have to be a violent revolution, war, or economic collapse, though those things could happen. But the future will not be a straight line extrapolation from the present. There will be some kind of backlash effect against all of the liberalism, feminism and marginalising of men that we have seen, or simply things will move on.

I will be poolside, though.

Post: #12

(10-05-2014 08:44 PM)Old Fritz Wrote:  I don't think a police state is really possible in this day and age.

With all due respect, I don't think you're paying attention.

It's being built around you, but it's happening so slowly that the new normal is constantly changing and becomes accepted old news real fast.

Most people just don't care, even if they have the information available to them, as long as they're not starving or uncomfortable. But by the time things get that bad, if they do, it's too late. It'll already be in place.

You can find the signs easily enough if you're really looking and have some sort of historical perspective.

The question is not if it's possible, because it is. It's whether or not they'll be able to endlessly fund it. Hyperinflation or some economic crisis could either put the brakes on it or accelerate it. It's difficult to say.

You said in an earlier post in this thread that you're 21. That makes you eight years old when 9/11 happened, right? I imagine it might be hard for you to believe, but there was a time when there were police departments without armored personnel carriers, military uniforms, and machine guns. There was a time before widespread government wiretapping, data mining, surveillance, hacking, and invasions of privacy. There was a time when the only "SJWs" around were largely feminists and hippie left-wingers no one outside of those tiny circles took all that seriously. A time when it wasn't controversial to call it as you saw it about fat chicks, homos and trannies and people wouldn't bat an eye. A time when you could get drunk with girls on campus and fool around without having to worry about one of her jealous friends slut-shaming her and then convincing her to tell people she was raped. A time when left-wingers laughed about "crazy" right wing "religious nuts" who were concerned about gay marriage before it was on the radar and said it would never happen. A time when you, as a business owner, could refuse to do business with people who lived a lifestyle that went against your own personal religious convictions without getting sued.

We are living in interesting times now and given the way things have been going I can't imagine what the new normal might actually look like in another decade when you're 31 and I'm 40. It's possible things could be better. Or it's possible we'll be both pining for the "good ol' days" of 2014 when things weren't so bad.

Post: #13

While no one can predict the future with 100% accuracy, it is hard to argue with much of what Mr. Kunstler says. I've thought the same things for a while now. Where we go from here...is not easy to say.

Post: #14

Quote:I played fiddle at a small-town, country dance last night with several other musicians and it was a merry enough time because that kind of self-made music has the power to fortify spirits.

My feeling, on the contrary, is that this kind of self-made music has the power to crush almost any human spirit. But whatever floats your boat, I guess.

James Kunstler is an interesting guy because it's hard to find someone who has made more false predictions and has fanned the flames of more unwarranted hysteria. He got his start with Y2K (for those old enough to remember that idiocy). Here is what he had to say all the way back in 1999:

Quote:Writing this in April of ‘99, I believe that we are in for a serious event. Systems will fail, crash, seize up, cease to function. Not all systems, maybe only a fraction, but enough, and enough interdependent systems to affect many other systems. Y2K is real. Y2K is going to rock our world.

People will consequently suffer. I don’t know how much. Some people may lose their lives - but more likely at the hands of a disabled medical establishment than because of civil disorder, loss of power, starvation, bad water, or other projected horrors (though these, too, are possible). Some will suffer the loss of fortunes, some of any income whatsoever, and many of something in between. Quite a few will find themselves suddenly without an occupation, and few ideas about how to make themselves useful to other people (without occupations themselves). Many will suffer a loss of comfort and modern convenience, and if that goes on any longer than a week, it may escalate into serious problems of public sanitation and infectious disease.

...

We may cycle into a period of cultural darkness as a result of Y2K. If that is our destiny, tough noogies for us. We should have known better. We had some good things going for us: democracy, the movies, space travel, indoor plumbing, painless dentistry, jazz, great restaurants, a beautiful country. . . . We became a fat, complacent, and slovenly culture. I hope that our grandchildren do better.

Needless to say, not a single one of the events he predicted with absolute confidence actually happened. Y2K did not "rock the world" -- instead, it passed without a trace.

The next thing Kunstler was famous for was getting on the "peak oil" bandwagon in 2005. He was touted as the peak oil prophet, and he preached about how we are all going to need to learn how to grow our own food because oil was going to run out very soon and (magically) all the other energy sources would become useless as well. Now, of course, with the rapid development of fracking technology not even the most fanatical environmentalists are really talking about peak oil -- instead, they smoothly switched over to predicting that the glut of oil will kill us all because of "climate change".

So reading Kunstler's gloom and doom prophecies about today's young guys makes me feel a good deal better about their prospects. He rarely fails to be exactly 100% wrong.

Post: #15

I think his piece was accurate. He drew up the same conclusion in detail that I've arrived at a few years ago.

Now those that believe that US society could never tolerate a homegrown ISIS style anarchist group, think for a minute. All you need is the cultural factors present to get young men angry, like individual rights and pop representation of men. An economic downfall would provide the perfect excuse everyone was looking for. Radical Islamists are doing what they are doing because their governments are corrupt, neglectful and imposing. Ideologically, they're angry because they believe their very way of life has been tarnished by outsiders from other cultures and foreign lands. What are some parallel circumstances that would lead American men into a wreck less frenzy? We are already villainess in most mediums the American mind is subjected to each day. Compound that with economic circumstances that forces the young to really see how women and the power structures of the nation don't care for them.

Post: #16

(10-05-2014 09:12 PM)TheWastelander Wrote:  

(10-05-2014 08:44 PM)Old Fritz Wrote:  I don't think a police state is really possible in this day and age.

With all due respect, I don't think you're paying attention.

It's being built around you, but it's happening so slowly that the new normal is constantly changing and becomes accepted old news real fast.

Most people just don't care, even if they have the information available to them, as long as they're not starving or uncomfortable. But by the time things get that bad, if they do, it's too late. It'll already be in place.

You can find the signs easily enough if you're really looking and have some sort of historical perspective.

The question is not if it's possible, because it is. It's whether or not they'll be able to endlessly fund it. Hyperinflation or some economic crisis could either put the brakes on it or accelerate it. It's difficult to say.

You said in an earlier post in this thread that you're 21. That makes you eight years old when 9/11 happened, right? I imagine it might be hard for you to believe, but there was a time when there were police departments without armored personnel carriers, military uniforms, and machine guns. There was a time before widespread government wiretapping, data mining, surveillance, hacking, and invasions of privacy. There was a time when the only "SJWs" around were largely feminists and hippie left-wingers no one outside of those tiny circles took all that seriously. A time when it wasn't controversial to call it as you saw it about fat chicks, homos and trannies and people wouldn't bat an eye. A time when you could get drunk with girls on campus and fool around without having to worry about one of her jealous friends slut-shaming her and then convincing her to tell people she was raped. A time when left-wingers laughed about "crazy" right wing "religious nuts" who were concerned about gay marriage before it was on the radar and said it would never happen. A time when you, as a business owner, could refuse to do business with people who lived a lifestyle that went against your own personal religious convictions without getting sued.

We are living in interesting times now and given the way things have been going I can't imagine what the new normal might actually look like in another decade when you're 31 and I'm 40. It's possible things could be better. Or it's possible we'll be both pining for the "good ol' days" of 2014 when things weren't so bad.

I am paying attention. I am aware of everything you just wrote. When I say police state I am talking Soviet Union type police state. A part of me believes the government isn't competent enough to pull it off. Another part of me questions whether all of the technology today could even allow such a thing. No doubt there are questionable things in place such as the NDA and militarization of the police; but I am not ready to say its possible yet. I also wonder how our military would react.

Post: #17

We know insurgency and counterinsurgency better than the police will ever hope to. They done' fucked up

Post: #18

Good stuff @Lizard!

Never take anyone seriously who jumped on every goddamn doom-and-gloom bandwagon - Y2K, Global Warming (I refuse it to call it Climate Disruption now), Peak Oil and other scams.

It is just like listening to Scott Adams from Dilbert and a few of his Red-Pill-cartoons, while he states openly that Feminism has not gone far enough and that women deserve to be treated even more "special" because they are "superior".

We are not ruled by a bunch of morons as Kunstler seems to believe. Civilization is not going down due to some PC glitch or anything trivial as that.

Post: #19

(10-05-2014 08:44 PM)Old Fritz Wrote:  I don't think a police state is really possible in this day and age.

You have to be kidding. To add to what Wastelander said: the technology is available to make the world of Orwell's 1984 look like the Burning Man festival. Total communications monitoring, storage, and real-time tracking. License-plate scanners. Cameras tied to systems with facial recognition software and national photo databases. All they really need is: (1) a biometric national ID card, (2) to abolish cash and make all transactions digital and tied to your national ID , (3) more checkpoints.

I'll pass on something Fred Reed just wrote on that subject.

Fred Reed Unz Review: Gapple and Oogle, Our Defenders

Quote:NSA spies on us illegally and in detail, recording telephone conversations, reading email, recording our financial transactions, on and on. TSA makes air travel a nightmare, forcing us to hop about barefoot and confiscating toothpaste. The police kick in our doors at night on no-knock raids and shoot our dogs. In bus stations we are subject to search without probable cause. The feds track us through our cell phones. Laws make it a crime to photograph the police, an out-and-out totalitarian step: Cockroaches do not like light. The feds give police forces across the country weaponry normal to militaries. Whatever the intention, it is the hardware of control of dissent. Think Tian An Men Square in China.

And we have no recourse. If you resist, you go to jail, maybe not for long, not yet anyway, but jail is jail. Object to TSA and you miss your flight. They know it and use it. The courts do nothing about this. They too are feds.

Fools say, “If you are not doing anything wrong, you have nothing to fear.” This might be true, or partly true, or sometimes true, or occasionally plausible, if government were benevolent. It isn’t.

The feds—whatever the intention of individuals—are setting up the machinery of a totalitarianism beyond anything yet known on the earth. It falls rapidly into place. You can argue, if you are optimistic enough to make Pollyanna look like a Schopenhaurian gloom-monger, that they would never use such powers. They already do. The only question is how far they will push. What cannot be argued is that they have the powers

Which means that if they decide in a few years, or tomorrow, to crack down on “hate speech,” and then on speech that they say they think might suggest terroristic links, and then on anti-American speech as defined by them (does anyone remember HUAC?), they will have the tools.

The mere knowledge that one is watched, or may be being watches, is enough to subvert political freedom. Already journalists have to assume that their communications are intercepted, and sources, assuming the same thing, stop being sources.

We are in the cross-hairs and what happens in the next very few years will determine in what direction we go.

Post: #20

I think part of the problem with this discussion might be what our image of a "police state" is--a Soviet Union, 1984, Totalitarian regime with soldiers marching goose step. The actual police state works like hell to stay under the radar (the NSA monitoring your every breath; cops working like hell to cover up everything they do; and unless you fly, and most Americans don't own a passport, the TSA intrusions aren't an issue) and has a massive PR budget and Twitter presence.

Post: #21

Journalists create crisis and use exaggeration to sell their columns.

The reality is american society, like a wheel, repeats social trends in a known, predictable manner. The counter-culturalist generation is currently in power, even though its played out and tired. And historically the counter-culturalism generation has always sucked at paternalism or helping younger generations transition.

Post: #22

Young men and men in general have always been dangerous. Who are the most likely to riot? You'll always find it to be men between the ages of 15-30ish.

In Ukraine there were plenty of older guys too.

Riots in ancient cities were driven by the rage of men, not women. If it occurs again in the western hemisphere then there will have to be a fundamental reason for it.

This will only come about through a major world-crushing depression. The likes which see's a lot of people going hungry and bored.

Once people get bored of fucking they will want change and when that change doesn't come then thats when the violence of men comes about. If you dont listen to the mob, the mob will make you listen or kill you.

Imagine if a repeat of the London riots occurred but a large chunk of the male population did it? Across all walks of life. Can you say martial law intervention?

A man will fight for himself or his family. A depression will trigger both of these.

Post: #23

When the author says young men will "rise up" he's not necessarily speaking to some type of revolution. I think the more realistic picture will be an increase in Elliot Rogers coupled with more rioting/looting, and a heightened police state brought on by mainstream media hysteria further targeting men as the enemy.

The revolution, if there is one, will be that of more and more people (men) expatriating. These men will be shunned under the labels of selfish, cowardly, and sex tourist perverts.

Post: #24

(10-05-2014 09:44 PM)The Lizard of Oz Wrote:  

Quote:We may cycle into a period of cultural darkness as a result of Y2K. If that is our destiny, tough noogies for us. We should have known better. We had some good things going for us: democracy, the movies, space travel, indoor plumbing, painless dentistry, jazz, great restaurants, a beautiful country. . . . We became a fat, complacent, and slovenly culture. I hope that our grandchildren do better.

Needless to say, not a single one of the events he predicted with absolute confidence actually happened. Y2K did not "rock the world" -- instead, it passed without a trace.

Interesting discussion, Lizard. I have had a flash of insight that seems like perfect clarity to me, but I will preface all of this by saying I’m about three weeks away from eye surgery from an injury, and am Tripping Balls on painkillers, so I hope this makes some kind of sense.

Firstly, I’m a big believer in the cyclical nature of history, and I believe we are at a crisis point that will be far more self-evident given a couple of more years.

I was playing David Bowie's 1995 album 'Outside' yesterday, and was thinking that the gloomy Fin de siècle predictions of the 90’s seem oddly-quaint today, enough to seem like the retro-futurism of the 50’s.

[Since I am officially high, I’ll just roughly paraphrase Wikipedia on the subject to keep my thoughts on track as I drop others in on top of it.]

The Fin de siècle ('Turn of the century') was a French term for the attitude of cynicism and pessimism that came with the growing belief of cultural decadence that permeated Europe in the 1880's and 1890's. The concept includes the fact that as one cycle is over, another begins, so there is renewed hope once disaster is averted and the new age has clearly begun. (Unfortunately, the 'renewed hope' in Europe resulted the rise in fascism).

It’s generally associated with that period, but if you look back throughout history, this cultural fear seems cyclical with the changing of a century. Apocalyptic fears and panics often arise around these times: the mass penitent displays in France around the Year 1000; Martin Luther predicting the end of the world in 1600; a whole slew of 17th Century theologians, mathematicians and astronomers during the 1690’s, including Cotton Mather, John Jacob Zimmerman, John Napier and John Mason; and the Shaker Sect predicting Christ’s return in the 1790’s. It just seems to be some kind of cultural pessimism that takes root during these periods.

This relates to the 19th century concept of the Mal du siècle (‘The Malady Of The Century’), first appearing in France in 1802, where a younger, privileged generation is gripped with a profound sense of spiritual crisis, becoming discouraged without obvious cause, abandoning concepts of Faith and Duty, resulting in a hopeless sense of ennui. Those afflicted would would often speak of considering the century itself as sick. This eventually reached across all of Europe by the end of the century, birthing the Romantic Movement, where Pessimism and Cynicism were considered signs of a superior intellect.

It was first embedded in popular though by a character in the writings of Francois-Rene de Chateaubriand:

Quote:“He has as it were begotten this ennui, incurable, melancholic, having no cause, so often gentle and enchanting in its expression, savage and arid at its root, and fatal to the heart, fatal to the good and healthy exercises of the domestic virtues – Rene’s sickness has been the sickness of our entire age.”

The domestic virtues, as defined by French Philosopher Constantin-François Chassebœuf in 1750, were: “economy, paternal love, filial love, conjugal love, fraternal love, and the accomplishment of the duties of master and servant.”

Chateaubriand’s description of Rene could be describing your average dismissive-avoidant Millennial leading their snarky, atomised online existence, where narcissism is the only love they consider of value.

So thinking about all this, I continued to listen to Bowie’s quaint Bowie's pre-Y2K fears, and my wandered further. Did this fear simply transmute into something else? Are we still in a Fin de siècle mindset? We dodged Y2K, but instead of the optimism and renewal of a new century / millennium, the first major cultural event of the new age was 9/11: an apocalyptic analogue, broadcast to a confused younger generation. Did this poison them with the Mal du siècle?

Since the Fin de siècle is entwined with a feeling of societal degeneration, what exactly does that encompass?

Zionist Leader Max Nordau wrote a famous study called ‘Degeneration’ in 1892, calling it 'a contempt for the traditional views of custom and morality.' This decadence is seen as coming from a jaded, world-weariness, and the wilful rejection of the moral boundaries governing the world.

Aurini accurately noted this recently describing the Modern Cynic:

Quote:This is a soul that’s rejected Hope – I’m specifically referring to the spiritual virtue. Hope is frightening; it implies the potential for failure. Hope is demanding; it provides an objective to work towards. Hope is humbling; it makes you realize that your own weaknesses are your worst enemy. Living without Hope leads to failure, but it’s a comforting sort of failure. It’s the root of all addiction.

Nordau, describing how Degeneration presented itself in fashionable society:

Quote:'Every single figure strives visibly by some singularity in outline, set, cut or colour, to startle attention violently, and imperiously to detain it. Each one wishes to create a strong nervous excitement, no matter whether agreeably or disagreeably.'

This is the modern Hipster man or woman, the flaming homosexual, or the unique snowflake feminist: all demanding an uncaring world notice them with stupid hair colours, lumberjack beards, excessive tattoos, anachronistic banjos and ukuleles, slutty clothes – particularly paired with obesity, and piercings. This is the Jezebel and Tumblr Feminists, with their strangely-immature potty mouths, calling you a ‘douchecanoe’ or a ‘shitlord’, crying about headmates and triggering.

It’s important to note that Degenerates have an aversion to the natural world, explaining the Millennial Generation’s migration to inner city living and their utter revulsion of anything they consider ‘suburban’.

Of particular interest is Nordau’s concept that Degeneration is entwined with Hysteria, reinforcing my suspicion that of Social Justice as simply being a renewal of the Cult Of Sensibility, popular in Late Victorian England during the Fin de siècle. Interestingly, ‘Sense and Sensibility’, Jane Austen’s comedy of manners cum philosophical critique of the Cult of Sensibility was written in 1795, so the social trend of the Fin de siècle 100 years before was obviously towards the same sort of (what she deemed ‘insufferable’) hysteria.

What sort of hysteria? Nordau suggests the two dominant traits of the degenerate as being:

a) Ego mania – “a pathological degree of self-absorption and unreasonable attention to one's own sentiments and activities”. This attention is Sensibility in action, and self-evident in modern society.

b) Mysticism – “the impaired ability to translate primary perceptions into fully developed ideas”, resulting in symbolist thinking, evoking ideas without relying on an infallible general understanding of the world. This is also self-evident in the muddled reality-ignoring thinking that leads to SJW concepts such as privilege, micro-aggressions, triggering, fat is beautiful etc.

Sub-characteristics that Nordau saw the Genius as sharing with the Imbecile:

a) delusions of grandeur, which ‘begins with a disproportionate sense of importance in one's own activities and results in a sense of alienation’.

b) madness of doubt, ‘which involves intense indecision and extreme preoccupation to minute detail’. I’m sure you’ve noticed the degenerate tendency to fisk, pester, or invalidate an entire argument by focusing on one tiny facet of complex abstract thought. I'd argue indecision is probably related to the inability of a woman to commit to plans, be sure if she wants sex, or even to know if she was raped or not until a friend explains it to them.

Nordau would recognise the genius as possessing specialised knowledge with a resulting belief in one’s superiority, but I’d argue the Modern Imbecile has an overinflated self-perception of their knowledge.

If the modern Millennial is in the grip of Mal du siècle and favours degeneration, the resulting societal progression, based upon the Fin De Siecle political beliefs of emotionalism, irrationalism, subjectivism and vitalism will be, as before, fascism. (Disregard the last, long-discredited by science concept, and you’ll see the other three are currently dominating the discourse of the university-educated set).

The rise of the SJW over the last few years is exactly what the malaise of the Millennium cultivated in the young: the mindset that civilisation is in crisis and requires a total solution, and that extreme measures are necessary because the ends justify the means. “We can be the generation that ends racism / smoking / homophobia!” even if it results in a loss of free speech, requires the truth to be ignored in a story that contradicts ideology, or even fabricating a story entirely if it’s to advance the cause.

The SJW’s seemed like a joke in 2010, but look at the power they’ve already wielded over Gamergate, as well as currently focusing on the concept that online thought needs to be controlled and restricted. Given that these impulses spring from what is most likely a generational problem, I’m not even sure if anyone can combat what is coming, if history suggests inevitability, though I’m hoping Low Emotional Resilience will be the downfall of the Fascist Left.

We’ve all observed we’re in the midst of a Culture War, but it’s greatly-accelerating, particularly over the last 12 months. Smoke ‘em while you’ve got ‘em, fellas.

For those who are curious, 'Degeneration' is available on Project Gutenberg.

Post: #25

It isn't just the NSA that has those abilities. This company sold their wares to a lot of different government clients. Supposedly it went after the bad guys, but in the process plenty of metadata, phone calls, packets and other info were swept up from innocent bystanders. Nothing is private - nothing.

In 1930s Germany, there were 10,000 unemployed and pissed off men mobilized to form the SA, who tried in vain to challenge the German military directly. They failed, Hitler went to jail where he realized the best way to initiate a takeover was not to fight the powers directly but to take it over from within. He emerged a political candidate more than a warrior leader. Those who challenged his new approach like Ernst Rhom were disposed of in the Night of the Long Knives. With the assistance of plenty of eager women voters, he won the election. The rest is history.

Kunstler has been wrong so many times it isn't worth counting - particularly with respect to peak oil. It's one thing to be wrong, but to be so unequivocally married to his own socialist agenda (he's a baby boomer after all) makes all the rest of his writings look like nothing more than changing the subject for attention whoring.

He is right about disaffected men having the potential to cause upheaval, but in the US there are still plenty of distractions, as well as geographic dispersion. Sure, there are plenty of them in the urban centers too, but with weed becoming legal there's another thing to keep them occupied for a bit - provided the government money keeps flowing into programs, disability, unemployment checks, etc.


It won't necessarily be the SWPL men who get roped into this trend. In fact I think it will start at the bottom rungs of male society - think ex-cons and baby daddies. The rampant growth of Islam is already a factor here. Start with a large pool of pissed off, socially manipulated and mostly illiterate unemployed men with no money, no steady sex and no reason to live. Open up a mosque or two and let the conversions begin - one need not delve into hyperbole to predict the results, as they're in the news regularly. It's so powerful an influence even the socialists can't stop Islam.

Hell, I dunno; I guess I can't blame them - 72 virgins doesn't sound all that bad compared with an empty wasted life filled with no hope.