The Political: NRx, Neoreactionism Archived.

This one is eclectic and for the record.

The techno-commercialists appear to have largely arrived at neoreaction via right-wing libertarianism. They are defiant free marketeers, sharing with other ultra-capitalists such as Randian Objectivists a preoccupation with “efficiency,” a blind trust in the power of the free market, private property, globalism and the onward march of technology. However, they are also believers in the ideal of small states, free movement and absolute or feudal monarchies with no form of democracy. The idea of “exit,” predominantly a techno-commercialist viewpoint but found among other neoreactionaries too, essentially comes down to the idea that people should be able to freely exit their native country if they are unsatisfied with its governance-essentially an application of market economics and consumer action to statehood. Indeed, countries are often described in corporate terms, with the King being the CEO and the aristocracy shareholders.

The “theonomists” place more emphasis on the religious dimension of neoreaction. They emphasise tradition, divine law, religion rather than race as the defining characteristic of “tribes” of peoples and traditional, patriarchal families. They are the closest group in terms of ideology to “classical” or, if you will, “palaeo-reactionaries” such as the High Tories, the Carlists and French Ultra-royalists. Often Catholic and often ultramontanist. Finally, there’s the “ethnicist” lot, who believe in racial segregation and have developed a new form of racial ideology called “Human Biodiversity” (HBD) which says people of African heritage are naturally less intelligent than people of Caucasian and east Asian heritage. Of course, the scientific community considers the idea that there are any genetic differences between human races beyond melanin levels in the skin and other cosmetic factors to be utterly false, but presumably this is because they are controlled by “The Cathedral.” They like “tribal solidarity,” tribes being defined by shared ethnicity, and distrust outsiders.

Overlap between these groups is considerable, but there are also vast differences not just between them but within them. What binds them together is common opposition to “The Cathedral” and to “progressive” ideology. Some of their criticisms of democracy and modern society are well-founded, and some of them make good points in defence of the monarchical system. However, I don’t much like them, and I doubt they’d much like me.

Whereas neoreactionaries are keen on the free market and praise capitalism, unregulated capitalism is something I am wary of. Capitalism saw the collapse of traditional monarchies in Europe in the 19th century, and the first revolutions were by capitalists seeking to establish democratic, capitalist republics where the bourgeoisie replaced the aristocratic elite as the ruling class; setting an example revolutionary socialists would later follow. Capitalism, when unregulated, leads to monopolies, exploitation of the working class, unsustainable practices in pursuit of increased short-term profits, globalisation and materialism. Personally, I prefer distributist economics, which embrace private property rights but emphasise widespread ownership of wealth, small partnerships and cooperatives replacing private corporations as the basic units of the nation’s economy. And although critical of democracy, the idea that any form of elected representation for the lower classes is anathaema is not consistent with my viewpoint; my ideal government would not be absolute or feudal monarchy, but executive constitutional monarchy with a strong monarch exercising executive powers and the legislative role being at least partially controlled by an elected parliament-more like the Bourbon Restoration than the Ancien Régime, though I occasionally say “Vive l’Ancien Régime!” on forums or in comments to annoy progressive types. Finally, I don’t believe in racialism in any form. I tend to attribute preoccupations with racial superiority to deep insecurity which people find the need to suppress by convincing themselves that they are “racially superior” to others, in absence of any actual talent or especial ability to take pride in. The 20th century has shown us where dividing people up based on their genetics leads us, and it is not somewhere I care to return to.

I do think it is important to go into why Reactionaries think Cthulhu always swims left, because without that they’re vulnerable to the charge that they have no a priori reason to expect our society to have the biases it does, and then the whole meta-suspicion of the modern Inquisition doesn’t work or at least doesn’t work in that particular direction. Unfortunately (for this theory) I don’t think their explanation is all that great (though this deserves substantive treatment) and we should revert to a strong materialist prior, but of course I would say that, wouldn’t I.

And of course you could get locked up for wanting fifty Stalins! Just try saying how great Enver Hoxha was at certain places and times. Of course saying you want fifty Stalins is not actually advocating that Stalinism become more like itself – as Leibniz pointed out, a neat way of telling whether something is something is checking whether it is exactly like that thing, and nothing could possibly be more like Stalinism than Stalinism. Of course fifty Stalins is further in the direction that one Stalin is from our implied default of zero Stalins. But then from an implied default of 1.3 kSt it’s a plea for moderation among hypostalinist extremists. As Mayberry Mobmuck himself says, “sovereign is he who determines the null hypothesis.”

Speaking of Stalinism, I think it does provide plenty of evidence that policy can do wonderful things for life expectancy and so on, and I mean that in a totally unironic “hail glorious comrade Stalin!” way, not in a “ha ha Stalin sure did kill a lot people way.” But this is a super-unintuitive claim to most people today, so ill try to get around to summarizing the evidence at some point.

‘Neath an eyeless sky, the inkblack sea
Moves softly, utters not save a quiet sound
A lapping-sound, not saying what may be
The reach of its voice a furthest bound;
And beyond it, nothing, nothing known
Though the wind the boat has gently blown
Unsteady on shifting and traceless ground
And quickly away from it has flown.

Allow us a map, and a lamp electric
That by instrument we may probe the dark
Unheard sounds and an unseen metric
Keep alive in us that unknown spark
To burn bright and not consume or mar
Has the unbounded one come yet so far
For night over night the days to mark
His journey — adrift, without a star?

Chaos is the substrate, and the unseen action (or non-action) against disorder, the interloper. Disorder is a mere ‘messing up order’.  Chaos is substantial where disorder is insubstantial. Chaos is the ‘quintessence’ of things, chaotic itself and yet always-begetting order. Breaking down disorder, since disorder is maladaptive. Exit is a way to induce bifurcation, to quickly reduce entropy through separation from the highly entropic system. If no immediate exit is available, Chaos will create one.

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