Why don’t all the pro-White organizations unite?

A question posed to Dr. Pierce, from Attack!, Issue No. 42, 1976

Q. Why don’t all the patriotic, pro-White organizations unite instead of each one trying to win the battle against America’s enemies separately? If we could join forces the way those on the other side do, we would begin winning a few battles instead of losing all the time.

A. The answer to that question is readily apparent to anyone in the leadership ranks of any of the organizations in question, but it is difficult to explain convincingly to someone who does not have such a favored view.

Very briefly, the reasons for the disunity among patriots may be roughly broken down into differences in motivation, personality problems, and differences in ideology.

Under the first heading we should note that the actual motivations which various individuals or organization have for taking a certain stand—on racial mixing, say, or communist influences in the government—differ markedly. Some take their stand because it expresses their genuine convictions and they are determined to accomplish something in accordance with those convictions.

But there are, unfortunately, numerous so-called “patriots”—and among them are some of the most “successful”—who have no convictions at all. They are simply businessmen, salesmen, and the product they sell is whatever patriotic Americans are willing to buy at any particular time. They hold a moistened forefinger up to the breeze of patriotic opinion and decide that now is the time to push an anti-busing amendment, or opposition to the Panama Canal “giveaway”—or even “patriotic unity.”

And when a genuine patriot denounces one of these hucksters publicly, the response from the rank and file is, “Don’t attack another patriot! We need unity, not discord.”

Finally, there are a number of individuals—“old fighters”—who are sincere enough in their convictions but who have given up any real hope of accomplishing anything. They have a few devoted followers who subscribe to their newsletters and keep them barely solvent, and so they continue churning out their broadsides. It is what they know how to do, and they feel comfortable with it. They have no interest in anything beyond that.

Personality problems take several forms. There are some patriotic leaders who simply cannot get along with certain other leaders, or who do not trust them, or who are intensely jealous of them. This, happily, is a problem not confined to patriots.

The leaders of some organizations are on a permanent ego trip. Each is thoroughly intoxicated with the feeling of being the biggest frog in his particular pond, and the last thing he wants is to jump from his pond into a lake, where there may be bigger frogs. There are probably more than a hundred one-man “organizations” of this description in the country, and the idea of gaining anything worthwhile by somehow unifying them is simply laughable.

But, discounting the hucksters, the “old fighters,” the ego-trippers, and a few especially sensitive or abrasive personalities, why can’t the remaining minority of patriotic leaders get together—the ones who believe enough in the cause for which they are fighting to put it ahead of personal considerations? Alas, it is usually that fervent devotion to a cause which itself provides the stumbling block in the path of unity.

A businessman, whose sole interest is maximizing his “take,” will readily make whatever compromises are conducive to a bigger profit. Ideology is simply a commodity he sells, and he is always prepared to switch to a new line of goods when sales conditions change—or to take on a new partner or to enter into a merger.

For different reasons, the organizer of a purely ad hoc group, with no vision beyond the achievement of an immediate and practical goal, will often be willing to join forces with whoever can help him, regardless of differences in style or beliefs.

On the other hand, the leader who has struggled for years—giving up his career and any semblance of a normal family life—in order to advance a cause which has a deep ideological significance for him will be less ready to compromise his beliefs for a temporary advantage. He takes the long view of things and is more concerned with keeping his group headed in the right direction toward a distant goal than he is with negotiating the next bump in the road.

To the exasperated patriot who wants immediate relief from creeping communism, crime in the streets, and busing, ideological quibbles may seem unimportant. He simply cannot understand why the fervent libertarian, who abhors busing as a government constraint on the individual’s freedom of choice, cannot collaborate to stop busing with the racial idealist, who abhors busing as a racially and culturally destructive practice. He forgets that the libertarian also abhors “racism” (as a form of “collectivism”), and the racial idealist abhors the egoism, the atomistic hyper-individualism of the libertarian. Neither is willing to signify approval of the philosophy of the other by collaborating openly.

Now, all this does not mean that patriotic groups do not or cannot collaborate. They often do, and there undoubtedly will be more collaboration in the future. The National Alliance, for example, collaborates with several other groups and with individuals whose beliefs to not coincide with our own, even though such collaboration is sometimes not publicized. But it does mean that any sort of close-knit patriotic confederation, incorporating most of the presently existing groups under a unified leadership, is extraordinarily unlikely.

This, however, may not be the unmitigated catastrophe it seems. Combining weaknesses does not necessarily yield strength, just as eight cripples, by joining arms, do not yield one gladiator.

When what is needed is genuine strength, not a combination of weaknesses, the way in which the strength will be achieved is likely to be through a free play of forces—through a selective competition among different groups, from which one will emerge as the most fit to lead our people. It is a wasteful, even tragic process, but it has always been Nature’s way.

Everything beautiful, noble, and of enduring value in this world has come about through such a process, which has ruthlessly weeded out weaknesses, punished mistakes, and corrected errors. That for which we are now striving will only be attained in the same way.

We must do whatever is necessary for us to win—including the joining of forces with other groups, when that can advance our cause—but we must not make the mistake of sacrificing our true strength—which is the correctness of our ideas—for the illusory advantage of a more rapid gain in numbers.