I have recently been making the argument that neoreaction is a school, not a movement and not an ideology. I did not see far enough.

Bryce Laliberte’s eyes were keener —neoreaction is a culture, a culture of striving rightward:

First, neoreaction is not a movement. It cannot be identified with any individual person or group. It is a culture, with its own bywords and norms which are intended to exclude anyone who might shrink from the task of striving rightward. Individuals, groups, and organizations may persist within neoreaction, but neoreaction is always an idea beyond capture of any person, doctrine, or magisterium.

This is much better, much clearer, and more powerful. Neoreaction is not owned or managed as a school would be, because it is a culture and a culture is the creation of a society. He sees what eluded me: that while the interactions of the neoreactionaries may take the form of detailed debates among peers, academic in nature, this is merely the expression of the culture. There may be a school of neoreaction but the physical manifestation is not the thought or the soul or the animating force, merely its expression. When the finger points to the sky, the fool looks at the finger. Neoreaction as a school is the finger, but the finger points to neoreaction as a culture.

Then Bryce takes us a step further. A culture exists outside of the group, and this culture exists outside of us and has its own destiny, quite separate from ours. We cannot bend it to our will, we must bend to it. One is called into its service, for a purpose not yet foretold:

Third, neoreaction is always to your right. It does not exist for any right-oriented group’s purpose. Rather, those on the right exist for it. Neoreaction is not even for so-called neoreactionaries. You are allowed to enter its salons and discuss ideas with other like-minded and intellectually virtuous individuals, but this not for your own purposes but the purpose of neoreaction. Neoreaction is memetically sovereign; it picks and chooses what it likes from you, and not you from it.

The next step is unthinkable, logical to the point of madness.

Bryce leads us to a precipice, to an abyss and bids us stare into it.

As we peer into the infinite expanse, the mind flails and shudders:

Fourth, neoreaction cannot ally itself with anyone, but you can ally yourself with neoreaction. It cannot be subordinated, but as it is the manifestation of an organic, rightward telos, whatever would subordinate it misunderstands neoreaction and thus fails. You simply cannot get to the right of neoreaction, because neoreaction already occupies the extreme limit of rightward thought. Or at least that is the intent, and if it has not yet gone as far as it can, it will find its way there.

A culture. Striving rightward. Always to our right. At the extreme limit. Expanding across infinity, an unknown destination. It is outsideness. Nick Land called it ‘Draconian Teleology‘.

To our left is our animal nature: barbarism and savagery. To our right is transcendence. To our right lies the path to transcend our animal nature, to become more than an animal, to become something better. Man is stage of development, a path to something more than an animal. But small is the gate and narrow is the road that leads to transcendence. On either side of the road lies annihilation, oblivion, extinction. The path is narrow, stretching like a rope over an abyss. Our destiny awaits on the other side. The call comes from outside, calling forth our best. Nothing but our best will suffice. Each generation of Man is a step along the path, or a step onto the steep and slippery slope into the abyss, into annihilation, into extinction. The odds are against us.

Great men have seen this rightward voyage, this narrow path, and the black oblivion that waits to swallow all Mankind should we fail in the endeavor. Should we fail in becoming capable of making the dangerous journey. Should we fail in our striving rightward. Thus spoke Zarathustra:

Man is a rope stretched between the animal and the Overman — a rope over an abyss. A dangerous crossing, a dangerous wayfaring, a dangerous looking-back, a dangerous trembling and halting. What is great in man is that he is a bridge and not a goal: what is lovable in man is that he is an over-going and a down-going. I love those that know not how to live except as down-goers, for they are the over-goers. I love the great despisers, because they are the great adorers, and arrows of longing for the other shore. I love those who do not first seek a reason beyond the stars for going down and being sacrifices, but sacrifice themselves to the earth, that the earth may become the Overman’s. I love him who lives in order to know, and seeks to know in order that the Overman may hereafter live. Thus he seeks his own down-going. I love him who labors and invents, that he may build the house for the Overman, and prepare for him earth, animal, and plant: for thus he seeks his own down-going. I love him who loves his virtue: for virtue is the will to down-going, and an arrow of longing. I love him who reserves no share of spirit for himself, but wants to be wholly the spirit of his virtue: thus he walks as spirit over the bridge. I love him who makes his virtue his inclination and destiny: thus, for the sake of his virtue, he is willing to live on, or live no more. I love him who desires not too many virtues. One virtue is more of a virtue than two, because it is more of a knot for one’s destiny to cling to. I love him whose soul is lavish, who wants no thanks and does not give back: for he always gives, and desires not to keep for himself. I love him who is ashamed when the dice fall in his favor, and who then asks: “Am I a cheat?” — for he wants to perish. I love him who scatters golden words in advance of his deeds, and always does more than he promises: for he seeks his own down-going. I love him who justifies the future ones, and redeems the past ones: for he is willing to perish through the present ones. I love him who chastens his God, because he loves his God: for he must perish through the wrath of his God. I love him whose soul is deep even in the wounding, and may perish through a small matter: thus he goes willingly over the bridge. I love him whose soul is so overfull that he forgets himself, and all things are in him: thus all things become his down-going. I love him who is of a free spirit and a free heart: thus is his head only the bowels of his heart; his heart, however, causes his down-going. I love all who are like heavy drops falling one by one out of the dark cloud that lowers over man: they herald the coming of the lightning, and perish as heralds. Lo, I am a herald of the lightning, and a heavy drop out of the cloud: the lightning, however, is the Overman!

What is the culture of neoreaction? It is obvious now, we have named it before. It is the Cult of Gnon.

“Gnon is the Vast Abrupt, and the crossing. Gnon is the Great Propeller.“