by Brett Stevens on April 24, 2015

When the historical background to a time changes, the beliefs held up by those within it adjust, and usually for the worse as they confuse what was with what is and adjust their idea of what should be accordingly. 226 years after the French Revolution, world liberalism has run into a brick wall, and rightists are re-adjusting orientation as a result.

Although it will not be reported in the media, or discussed by politicians, liberalism has reached a point of failure. Accelerating since the French Revolution, it has achieved all of its aims, and society remains in the grip of the problems the left identifies. “The rich” still have power, the people are still apathetic, the environment is still being ecocided and majorities in every indigenous nation are being genocided. “Equality” has not occurred in our lifetimes, social strife is getting worse as is animosity over “race relations” a.k.a. diversity failing. People are miserable because jobs are pointless, the opposite sex are dismal sluts with no ability to bond through love for anything approximating life, the air is polluted and the water unclean. And the kicker: every Western government is dead broke and spending itself into debt so huge it constitutes a punchline more than policy.

Right now, everything is OK, thanks to the technology, learning, wealth and power built up by pre-liberal Western civilization. We have rule by law, social order and the like. But these things are all in fatal decline because the force that maintains them is fading, and what replaces them will clearly be a third world style society with none of what made the West great. Immigrants will get ripped off by having emigrated to find the same mess they left back home, and the indigenous will be assimilated genetically and neutered culturally, leaving another mixed-race state with third world levels of social disorder, corruption, filth and disorganization. Liberalism is the tombstone of empires.

The mainstream right has avoided tackling this problem head-on mainly because it is composed of two elements, “mainstream” and “right.” Mainstream means that it cannot offend the dominant paradigm of this time, egalitarianism, and for that reason cannot be critical of this civilization as an outsider would, attacking obviously non-functional institutions like democracy, diversity, and equality. It is supported in this by fear of the underground far-right, which tends to be so extreme that it alienates normal people and drives them toward the imperfect but “safe” mainstream variety. As the far right harbors both genuine believers in National Socialism and volkisch philosophy as well as outright sociopaths, it creates what is effectively a border driving the audience back toward liberalism.

The New Right came about as an attempt to revitalize conservatism, both mainstream and underground, with a dose of realism. New Righters predict a collapse of industrial society from many factors both external and internal, and posit instead a strong identitarian community. In deference to the success of the left in the postwar period, the New Right avoids obvious fascist iconography and instead talks about existential issues like mass misery in the face of a society of drudgery, obedience and dysfunction. Unfortunately, however, the New Right also chooses to base itself in a derivation of leftist Social Democrat policies, and in doing so, alienates the anti-socialist right.

Neoreaction came about through the libertarian invention of freedom of association through economics. This idea attacks the liberal moral imperative to create a subsidy state by demanding instead freedom for the individual from the obligation to subsidize others. Once the ideological state is removed, however, there is no reason to avoid corporatism, or treating government like a public service instead of handling it with a quasi-religious reverence and identifying a national population with its government. Neoreaction consists of a number of thought experiments in the form of Socratic dialogues inverted from question to discussion as models, and serves as an introduction for the idea that there may be logical, engineering-style and real-world reasons for rightist policies. Neoreaction struggles however with being at the center of a number of divisive forces because its leftist origins in libertarianism result in an individualism that has its adherents choosing divergent paths, and incorporating outside influences, on the basis of personal desire. This creates the same problem as in mainstream conservatism and leftism which is fragmentation disrupting the idea of any coordinated action.

As the New Right developed, many began looking for a solution outside politics and turned to the writings of Rene Guenon and Julius Evola, who advocated a way of life based on “Tradition.” Although this is not an explicitly political system, it has consequences for all political decisions. The dominant idea of Tradition is that an ineffable truth exists to life itself which societies throughout history have discovered that allows them to rise. This “perennial” or recurring idea rejects the notion that history is linear or that there can be “new” ideas in governance. The truth is known, and we implement it to degrees rather than find new forms. For example, we might say that the present day government is 20% of the way to a traditional outlook, where in healthier times the percentage has been higher. This clashes with the modern idea that history has been a steady progression from a primitive past to a Utopian future, and that our ideas are untried and revolutionary. In fact, Tradition says, they are simply lesser versions of known ideas and will succeed proportionately. Traditionalists do not demand a specific political system but tend to favor pre-1789 ideas like nationalism (ethnic nationalism), monarchism and a union between government, religion and learning.

As Neoreaction obliterates itself by becoming a philosophy of a many interpretations but no centrality, people on the right look toward the next revolution. The issues in content remain how to choose government, which economic system to use, whether to be nationalist or not, and the role of religion. New Righters tend to favor a religious ethnostate, Traditionalists see religion as having to fall into line with an eternal truth descending through the line of kings, and Neoreactionaries favor a version of the modern state which removes the ideological in loco parentis of leftist government. Somewhere in the future a hybrid or compromise must be found if the alternative right is to mobilize itself and, as history suggests will work, influence the mainstream right to the point that it can actually effect change.

This goal in itself is not popular. Among Neoreactionaries, it is common to disclaim the possibility of fixing civilization and to look instead for personal “exit” or co-existence without being corrupted or obligated by the herd. History shows us how this will end, as it always does, in show trials and asset confiscation if not outright theft. New Righters tend to be the most politically-inclined, advocating the creation of separate political parties like Marine Le Pen’s Front National but more fundamentally changing society through a cultural revolution that prepares it for them. Traditionalists are the most far removed, believing in a cultural revolution originating in a type of spiritual awakening among the exceptional, but they are short on methods of achieving their ends.

What crushes these movements is that they are more similar than different. Each new movement struggles to differentiate itself, then runs into internal confusion, and then lapses and the cycle repeats itself. Often they are afraid to admit their fundamentally non-leftist outlook and hope for an appeal to leftists. So far this has created groups of dissident intellectuals and social critics who are influencing the mainstream, but never enough to do more than slowly shift its frame of reference to the right.

I propose a simple method of avoiding pitfalls and a new idea, Futurist Traditionalism, which combines the best of these systems with a new outlook that is both Nietzschean and of the oldest religious and philosophical traditions.

To avoid pitfalls, we must focus on a single word: “the.” The right is currently divided by these, with some seeing the solution as ethno-nationalism, making the basis of our society the church, strictly political methods, and strictly economic methods. None of these are “the” singular solution, but part of a solution, and if the right must purge itself of something it is the strong categorical reliance on one tool to fit all tasks. More likely our response will be a single tool comprised of others. It is also necessary to avoid team players, or those who view politics as a kind of sports event where one side must best the other. The point is to reach a certain design of civilization, and to implement that, regardless of what banner it is done under or what it is called. Politics itself disunites us by the need for teams, categories, issues and other symbols for what actually must be done. It is time to cut out the middleman, and look toward what we seek instead.

Futurist Traditionalism proposes a simple union of all that has worked: mercantile economics, or capitalism without usury, a focus on leadership and goals instead of the methods used to select leaders, a removal of criminal law and its replacement with an economic system of justice, and the creation of an aristocracy of wise elders who will represent the nation in religion, leadership and science/philosophy. In the Futurist Traditionalist view what is essential is balancing the different impulses with the goals of past and future, so that instead of compromise we enforce consistency on all parts of the system. Instead of letting “the system” run by itself, the institution of Futurist Traditionalism is the goals itself, enforced by culture and administered by aristocratic leaders, with otherwise a total lack of formal institutions. By de-formalizing, society would reduce red tape and frustration, but also shifts the burden of choice back onto the citizen. A law enable a citizen to say “I did not violate the law” but under Futurist Traditionalism, the only standard is the results that occurred. Thus if a citizen has no law to hide behind, and must compensate others or society as a whole for any ill effects brought about by his actions.

The “futurist” part of this belief system consists of a desire to use technology for positive ends, even when these are the same methods that make people recoil now. Mass production, gene splicing, giant grocery stores, the internet and other “modern” advances must not only be kept, but advanced using the principle of balance to goals. A Futurist Traditionalist moves forward into the future by advancing the quality of knowledge, and sees technology not as a system or institution in itself, but a series of tools for achieving the goals of the civilization.

To moderns, the primary difference in this society is that it has a military-style purpose at all times. The overall goal is to protect and nurture its people so the civilization as a whole continues rising in quality. This means that criminals, retards, shysters, etc. can be exiled and the community is healthier, and also that every action taken by a citizen can be looked at with the question, “Does this move us closer toward our goals or not?” Nothing exists in a vacuum. Toward that end, Futurist Traditionalism embraces power. Where moderns considered themselves witty to have said “Absolute power corrupts absolutely,” Futurist Traditionalism recognizes that most people are corrupt because evolution is in effect and we all fit somewhere on a bell curve not just in intelligence but in integrity. Power goes to those who can wield it and to no others. The ideas of democracy and managerial society are both rejected by this act.

A Futurist Traditionalist society might look a bit odd to us at first. For example, in our current society we have speed limits, police to enforce them and courts to judge them. None of these are necessary. A future society might simply make it a cultural standard to throw rotten vegetables at any vehicle that is traveling too fast for the road on which it is going. Liberals will scream, “But what about abuse?” to which future humans will affirm that yes, it sometimes happens, but it is the exception that proves the rule. Most of the time, drivers slow down because they want to avoid the spectacle of being pelted with rotten vegetables, because in a sane/future society, honor and integrity matter more than police fines. The rent-seeking police with their tickets, courts and endless laws could all go away and the problem would be solved at least as well as that extensive system has, without any of the overhead.

This thinking takes us past the conundrum not just of modernity but of the right trapped within modernity, liberating us to think truly “outside of the box.” That box, more than The CathedralTM, is what confines us in modernity because assumptions outside of its control are not tolerated. With the rise of future rightist movements, the nexus of attack will focus on this idea of settled science, known truths, and other fake history created by leftists in order to expand our scope not just to “exit” or participation in a political system, but reforming society and disenfranchising or exiling those who are incompatible so that they can go to the third-world societies that their leftist outlook inevitably produces, and we can not restore a past civilization but rise to new standards of excellence. That is futurism, and it is the basis of Futurist Traditionalism.

Tags: futurist traditionalism, neoreaction, new right, tradition, traditionalism

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