In Praise of Anonymity
One of the comments I hear frequently is “I’m not able to speak about this publicly like you do – I wish that I could.” Often it’s said with an air of apology, and it’s almost always followed with a story from their personal lives – some woman who’s mentally destroying her sons, or a guy who’s marrying his future ex-wife, or a young girl who’s ruining herself on a series drug dealers. I wish those were stereotypes I just made up; on the contrary, they’re based upon real stories I’ve heard first-hand (and the detailed-versions justify the “stern warning of things to come” assessment).
The men and (occasionally) women who share these stories want to say something, they want to stop the train before it flies off the cliff, but the consequences of exercising Free Speech in today’s world are too dire; caution and good sense keeps them silent, and plagues them with guilt.
You have nothing to feel guilty for. I think it’s time we discussed our strategy.
The Outreach Program
One of the foundational values of the Neoreactionary/Manosphere movement is a deep concern with the future of Western civilization. I’m repeatedly blown away by the level of discourse which happens over on the RooshV Forums; for a site that’s ostensibly about picking up women, there’s an incredible amount of erudition amongst the members. While some of the ‘professional’ PUAs might embrace the Hollywood Psychopath/State of Nature/Every Alpha For Himself mentality, it isn’t something I run into in any of my readings. Each and every one of the Game bloggers I read recognizes that “The Beta Male is my brother!” That, whether or not you’re sitting poolside yourself, it was civilization that built the plumbing which supplies the pool, and that civilization is built by Betas who have a wife at home to motivate them.
On a personal level the Alpha Harem makes sense, but on a civilizational level it’s suicide.
Game bloggers, and the Manosphere in general (as opposed to PUA Hollywood Psychopaths) should be seen as an outreach program. They aren’t advocating that you divorce your faithful wife and move to the Philippines – they’re warning the best and brightest of our generation against the dangers inherent in most marriages – even the ones that work. A divorce rate of 50% is not a success-rate of 50%; the same factors which led to half of the marriages failing are going to be present within the marriages that didn’t quite fail.
Devil’s Advocate: it’s entirely possible that marriages have always been miserable affairs, because most people are idiots. The only difference between today’s culture and that of the 1950s is that divorce is now socially acceptable, ergo the worst marriages are dissolving. Your probability of achieving happiness in marriage is higher than it was fifty years ago, because now you’re allowed a mulligan.
Refutation: it’s the economy, stupid.
Debt Slavery
I happen to disagree with the Devil’s Advocate (declining happiness levels from the General Social Survey refute it), but let’s accept its premise for sake of argument: 90% of marriages have always been broken (because people enjoy making themselves miserable), but so long as the proles keep working and breeding it’s all good – civilization will keep ticking along.
Is marriage a form of slavery? Of course it is – but don’t tell anyone! If the temple isn’t covered in blood, the sun won’t rise tomorrow!
So, Beta Male Joe of the 1950s got duped into this whole “romantic love” nonsense, got himself married, got himself a mortgage, and got himself kids, so now he’s stuck working at the Box Factory for the rest of his life, instead of pursuing his dreams of performing in a Broadway Musical. Just another pig, sacrificed to the Great God Leviathan. Nothing to see here, folks.
Only one problem with this arrangement: the Box Factory moved overseas twenty years ago. Nowadays Joe’s working for the Customer Service Department, and if you believe the rumours, another round of layoffs is coming soon.
To sum up: even if you believe that marriage is a necessary evil in society – that it’s our duty to work hard, and produce children, while married to a shrew of a woman – none of that matters with the state that the economy’s in. Joe’s Box Factory doesn’t exist anymore; we’ve replaced production with credit card and student loan debt, and as the working world becomes increasingly pointless, it becomes increasingly regulated, and increasingly unstable. Fewer and fewer Joes are going to be raising a healthy family of four, no matter how hard they suppress their misery, no matter how hard they try and live by the standards of the 1950s.
It would seem that the Great God Leviathan has failed us.
The Apparent Contradiction
On the one hand, the Manosphere/Neoreaction understands how sensible the 1950s were: motivate men by giving them a wife, engage the men in productive work, and civilization flourishes. On the other hand, it prescribes the exact opposite: live minimalistically, invest in yourself instead of your career, and avoid marriage to any but the most virtuous of women. We bemoan the decline of civilization, while simultaneously living in such a way so as to hasten its collapse.
The contradiction resolves itself when you realize that these are two separate levels of thinking: the personal and the societal. “Individuals are important, but demographics are destiny.”
Understanding the societal-level reasons behind the decline are important, both as an intellectual exercise, and so that we can maintain our own civilized natures, despite the chaos. However, in our personal lives, all we can do is respond rationally to the system we’re in. We don’t have access to the levers of power, and we won’t, not any time soon, and not by any obvious methods. While the firebrand patriots in Europe (UKIP, Golden Dawn, Génération Identitaire) have managed to forestall the worst excesses of the European Union with their recent democratic agitation, they haven’t overcome the fundamental demographic issues which underlie all of these social ills…
…and they’re not going to.
We’re Not Going to Save Everyone
To put it bluntly, a great culling is underway. Feminists, Atheists, Trangenderend Otherkin – these groups are not reproducing at replacement levels. Even amongst the groups which are having children, there is a predominance of r-strategy reproduction; the ghetto single-mother model (which is fast overtaking white society, as well) might be producing the greatest quantity of children, but they’re not producing the sort of fit competitors who’ll be able to survive the upcoming economic hangover.
Analysis can be difficult, because the illness manifests a variety of symptoms. It’s hard to envision an umbrella which covers Lesbian Professors, Divorced Dads, Ghetto Trash, and Corporate Slaves. In my view, however, the underlying cause can be summed up thusly: where once our civilization taught people to be productive, engaged, and responsible members, it now creates a series of useful cogs: corporate and institutional slaves who will fulfil their purpose (votes, labour, consumer purchases) without ever questioning the nature of the system.
This is what it looks like when a Mechanical God dies: the human refuse in its veins flows straight into the sewer… all the while, continuing to sing praises to the Great God Leviathan.
These people are not going to listen. You’ve seen the arguments on Twitter, on Facebook – you’ve seen their inability to think rationally, or report honestly. These people have bought into the religion of Modernism™ hook, line, and sinker, and for their sins they shall suffer.
This whole Neoreactionary/Manosphere thing? It’s nothing but an outreach program for those who would be saved, offering them Grace. It’s a survival strategy for the zombie apocalypse, because no apocalypse lasts forever.
Tip of the Iceberg
It’s all well and good that so many writers in this movement are operating under their real names – it’s nice that there’s a “face” to put to the whole thing – but the stuff that matters is happening under the water line. The faces of the movement are just connecting the dots; the real engine behind all of this is the Anonymous Commenters who’ve started to think for themselves.
Great God Leviathan is dead; we’re just waiting for the last of His structures to rust away, and for the last of His human effluent to return to the earth. There is no High Priesthood in the Cathedral – there is no Illuminati. There’s nobody for us to fight.
The only struggle worth waging is that of your own life.
The Chinese symbol for “Crisis” is formed of the symbols “Danger+Opportunity“; and there’s a lot of opportunity out there right now. The Lefties like to ask, “What if there were a war, and nobody showed up?” Well – what if marriage were a bum deal, the economy was a bum deal, and the culture was a bum deal, and the best and brightest of a generation were holding out for something better?
Don’t underestimate the power of the silent boycott, and don’t underestimate the power of thinking for yourself. As far as I can see, things are ticking along quite well.
Marriage didn’t always be a cross between Abrahamic religions and secular society. Muslims are fervently pro-marriage: just walk into Walmart on 36th St or anywhere near 52nd and McKnight. They have societal (heh, not civilizational backing since…. you know) backing for marriage: can’t have kids without it, can’t have sex without it, etc.
Churchianity got soft on the morality of marriage once it acceded to the State. If Christianity ever got away from it and went back to congregational recognition of it only and, through shaming, ostracizing and other behaviours, actually enforced the vows before God, marriage would cease to be such a bad deal.
Until then, lots of Christian guys like me are poolside.
There is at least one full blown reactionary party that got into the EU parliament this time – Congress of the New Right got 7% in the election in Poland – this means only 4 MEPs but I recommend watching them closely especially their leader.
Janusz Korwin-Mikke is highly eccentric and controversial figure with not a single politically correct bone in his body. He is a monarchist and the enemy of universal suffrage especially women suffrage which as he says always leads to the growth of state (socialism) and in effect destruction of country/civilization.
He is currently under investigation for saying:
“What do you mean raped? If you would know women you would know one always rapes them a bit. They always pretend to hold back. One should know when one can and when one cannot.”
If he is controversial in Poland where political correctness is not as advanced as in some other countries I long to see the outrage of the mass media when this 72 year old grandpa in bow-tie will give his speeches in his funny Polish accent (if he will be speaking in English).
As Polonius would say:
“Though this be madness, yet there is method in’t”
“There is no High Priesthood in the Cathedral – there is no Illuminati. There’s nobody for us to fight.”
Except for that part, I agree totally with the post. Why do I get the impression you like to contradict yourself? I don’t know if it is sadistic madness or advanced didactics similar to the Socratic Method. What we have had since the Mercantile Revoluition at the end of the Dark Ages, I believe, is family heritages in the business of debt slavery. I think those familys have formed a syndicate, and they will stand together so long as they are outnumbered by outsiders. I am not worried that the genes and memes of the sheeple will not be culled by natural forces automagically. I wish for a Western civilization that has the strongest aversion to financial engineering. Evolution is my God, or God’s rep here on earth.
@ramram, great comment. Weird thing is, I totally agree with that Polish politician’s controversial statement. It seems crazy on the surface, but crazy is being used by women and their handlers over and over and over…
I’m going to have to check that Polish man out.
I agree with you on the financial-manipulation families, but I point towards Paris Hilton. There’s a degenerate elite, but not an illuminati, not exactly. And, yeah, Usury… I’ve been meaning to write more about that. It really is the most dangerous form of magic out there.
Davis, this is “Sean,” decided to change my name to distinguish myself from Calgary Sean. This post may be tl;dr, but hear me out.
I’ve been mulling over the merits of Christianity and Paganism/Heathenry. I think that, even though Christianity and P/H are theologically opposed, there is still plenty of room for respect between them. I know that C.S. Lewis is derided around here as something of a grade-school theologian, but his poem, “Cliche Come Out of its Cage,” is such a great homage to Western Paganism and Heathenry, praising the social order and propriety of the Greeks and Romans and the valor of the Norse; all as a defense against the accusation that society was becoming “pagan”: society wasn’t regressing to pre-Christian mores, it was decaying to post-modernist mores.
Ironically, you can blame a Christian theologian for getting interested in Heathenry as an alternative towards Christianity, which has become way too infected with progressive degeneracy. But as I was thinking, I said to myself, “Why not both?”
The way I see it, Western Civilization’s religious history is like a tree: Paganism/Heathenry is the roots, absorbing nutrients (raw natural spirituality) from nature while anchoring the tree; Christianity is the trunk and the main branches, giving the tree structure, connecting the roots and branches while carrying the nutrients/spirituality taken up by the roots. We are the small branches and the leaves, taking in the energy of the sun (technology and science) and using it to feed the tree itself. All three parts are necessary. You might be able to have a “tree” without leaves or twigs, but not without roots, trunk, or branches.
Right now, the roots have been cut off from the branches, the trunk is rotting, the branches are not using photosynthesis to make food for the trees, and each of the three sections deny the necessity of the others. If Western Civilization is to survive, it will need the aid of all of its gods: both the ones created by its native peoples, and the Semite god who hung himself on a tree to save all mankind from the endless cycle of sin and atonement sacrifices. It will take effort, but I think we can create a system that revives the old pantheons of Europe and practice them on a cultural/ethnic basis, but use elements of Christianity to provide common ground between these groups, just as Christianity was a grand unifier in Europe before the Reformation.
Is Christian-Pagan/Heathen syncretism a longshot? Yes. Are both groups actively hostile to one another? Yes. But they are both parts of the Western heritage, and we will have both use and need for both in the Reconstruction. Was the healing touch of Apollo that different from that of Christ? Did not both Odin and Christ crucify themselves for the sake of humanity’s progress? Are not Ragnarok and Armageddon two perspectives on the same final battle between Evil and Good, Chaos and Order? (Hint: Tolkien seemed to think so!)
I like the concept, Sean; the tree’s not dead, it’s just desperately in need of pruning.
And for the record, I love C.S. Lewis.
@Reality Doug – exactly, his eccentricity is a double edged sword – some will see him as a clown the other will stop and think. His other qoute: “Justice is to social justice like a chair is to an electric chair”
@Aurini – there is not much in English about this guy at the moment unfortunately, the most extensive article being the one in The Telegraph: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/poland/10836329/EU-elections-2014-the-Polish-party-that-wants-to-turn-EC-building-in-Brussels-into-brothel.html
Not being a democrat myself I do not believe in the reversal of the decline through the democratic means but since I have already bought beer and popcorn, I might as well enjoy the show!
This post is scarily similar to a message I sent today to a good friend who has feminist leanings but is otherwise a decent fellow. The text:
Virtually all of the issues I have with feminism boil down to one argument: that it destabilizes civilization, and that is a very bad thing. I personally am not threatened by feminism. Quite to the contrary: feminism greatly benefits me personally, but that personal benefit is a very bad thing for society. Here’s why:
(1) Men are primarily motivated by the prospect of sex with women. Particularly between the ages of 10 and 35, this is literally the sole motivation for almost everything that men do. This is a self-evident statement: our species would have died out long ago were this not the case. In fairness (and essential to my argument), women are also primarily motivated by sex, but in a very different way. But the fact remains that men have roughly 18 times the testosterone levels that women do, and this leads men between the aforementioned ages to think about the prospect of sexual intercourse literally during almost every waking minute and to factor it into all but the most mundane decisions. (Case in point: I made a very mundane timing decision to leave the gym this morning in the midst of a conversation with you based solely on the off chance that I might make eye contact with the blonde yoga uber-hottie with poor parallel parking skills. Unfortunately, no eye contact was made, but the risk/potential reward was a no-brainer). My personal belief is that excess testosterone has also historically been the driving force behind most great works of creativity and invention, but this particular point is not central to my argument.
(2) Humanity does not require civilization in order to survive as a species. However, I believe that civilization is a good thing. Yes, it allows for great atrocities, but the net benefit is much greater than the potential detriment. Mud huts with no medical care doesn’t sound all that wonderful to me, and I think the vast majority of people, even the most disenfranchised citizens, would agree with me on this.
(3) I don’t want to directly compare the growth of civilizations to evolution, because the mechanism is different, but there is a parallel: civilizations which have certain attributes thrive, and civilizations lacking these attributes fail. The three most important of these attributes are democracy, free trade/capitalism, and strictly enforced monogamy, because they give everyone a stake in society and create incentives for hard work. But of these three attributes , monogamy is far and away the most important.
(4) In a state of nature, most men do not reproduce. Genetic testing shows that while roughly 80% of women in the history of mankind reproduced, only 40% of men did. This means that in a state of nature, there are big reproductive/sexual winners and big losers among the males.
(5) Stable civilizations level the “winner take all” playing field by providing every man with his own vagina/womb, as it were, based upon the general principle of assortive mating, provided that the male first establishes that he is capable of generating the excess production necessary to support a mate and offspring. The male, in turn, provides the required excess production and thus contributes to the growth and maintenance of civilization. The productive male is then rewarded with the benefits of civilization (primarily a womb for his offspring) in an ongoing positive feedback cycle.
(6) The above description likely sounds sexist, and it probably is. Hey, nature is sexist (although usually against men, I might add). But set aside the value judgments for a moments and let’s delve into the (largely) unintended consequences of feminism.
(7) Feminism ultimately seeks to remove restraints on female sexuality, the most fundamental of which is strictly enforced monogamy. As shown above, strictly enforced monogamy is primarily a restraint on female sexuality, not on male sexuality, as most males have great trouble obtaining sex in a state of nature and most females do not. I anticipate that you will counter that this is not what feminism is about, it’s actually about greater opportunity for women. Regardless of the motivation, the net effect is the same: feminism seeks to make women less reliant upon men financially, which is simply another way of freeing women to follow their base sexual desires rather than their material needs. Either way, strictly enforced lifetime monogamy becomes a quaint artifact of a more civilized time.
(8) Female sexuality is wildly different from male sexuality despite what the feminists would have you believe. Despite men’s polygamous instincts, most men will gladly suppress those instincts in exchange for assortive lifetime monogamous mating (“assortive” means the 10s get the 10s, the 9s get the 9s, all the way down to the male sexual dregs getting the female sexual dregs). However, female sexuality does not work that way: all women want the highest status/most attractive men they think they can get and, due to a variety of biological factors, they are more capable of holding out for those higher status males. So what happens where there is unrestrained female sexuality is that the female 6s, 7s, 8s and 9s all go for male 9s and 10s (while mostly ignoring the 6s, 7s and 8s, their assortive counterparts), all the way down to the bottom, where even the female 1s and 2s are going for male 4s and 5s, who generally will at least throw them a “bone” due to said high testosterone levels. But assortive mating is destroyed, leaving a few male winners getting most of the attractive women but most men with nothing or very little of sexual value.
(9) Being roughly a 9 myself, I GREATLY BENEFIT FROM FEMINISM and the destruction of strictly enforced assortive monogamous mating. It is not particularly difficult for me to have sex with attractive women and, if I were the unscrupulous sort who had no problem with letting women think I was interested in a long-term relationship when I in fact have no such intention, it would be even easier. So no, I am not personally threatened by feminism in the slightest. Sure, there are certain legal ramifications that I need to be wary of, but they are greatly outweighed by the fact that I have potential sexual access to relatively large numbers of attractive women in a way that none but the most powerful men in society could have achieved even just 60-70 years ago.
(10) But the huge problem is this: feminism has freed female sexuality such that it is no longer based on a male’s capacity for excess production but rather on his “attractiveness,” or simply, “how hot a guy is.” What this means is that the (unattractive) male have-nots like Elliott Rodger cannot get laid no matter how much excess production they create. So as a result the (non-insane) males often (quite rationally) opt out of the societal work hard/excess production/reward model by submerging themselves in video games and pornography, rightfully reasoning that succeeding in society will not make them any more likely to get laid by their assortive counterparts.
(11) Even more insidiously, the male “haves” will also effectively drop out of this work/production/reward model, because they ARE getting laid based solely upon their attractiveness and not on their capacity for excess production. So it makes no sense for them to be excess producers because there is no additional reward, only an additional burden, as the fundamental male reward (getting laid as much as they want) is being granted without any having to be an excess producer, but only by being attractive/hot. This phenomenon could not have happened 60 years ago when women were largely dependent upon men for support and protection and monogamy was much more rigorously enforced, both through legal means and through societal shaming.
(12) I am not arguing that women do not benefit from feminism. They unquestionably benefit greatly (at least the ones who are able to secure higher value mates during their sexual primes). But the hierarchical structure has always been as follows: very top males (1-10%) > all females >>> the rest of the males. It has always been thus and, due to women’s sexual nature as the ultimate selectors of mates, will always be thus. The only question is do we want to encourage a model which gives the rest of the males a stake in society and thus creates a stable civilization, or do we want to essentially have unrestrained female sexuality which leaves most males without mates and thus destabilizes civilization? Think polygynous Islamic societies for an example of what the latter might look like. Unfortunately, I do not think it is possible at this point to get off of this train wreck, which is why I have made a rational decision to opt out of potential entanglements to the greatest extent possible and to look out only for myself and my immediate blood kin. But I am just the tip of the iceberg, the proverbial canary in the coalmine; once the systemic failure of the societal reward mechanism becomes obvious to all, I predict a rapid decline of Western civilization in a generation or two, as most of the potentially productive males effectively “drop out” due to disincentivization. When this happens, the tax base will plummet, state-sponsored benefits will soar, and today’s national debt will look like a sunny walk in the park. Not a good situation. And an even worse one for women, most of whom cannot survive on their own without either protection/support from individual men or state-sponsored largesse. There will be no “strong, independent women” in the absence of civilization. It will be ugly, my friend.
So Davis, if you were to adopt my proposal, which pantheon would you be worshipping, based on highest proportion of ancestry? I don’t have the exact percentages worked out, but I’m fairly certain I would be quaffing mead to the Aesir and Vanir. Praise Odin!
For another great Christian thinker’s defense of paganism (relative to modernism) see http://www.chesterton.org/sex-and-property/
@Aurini, if you’re going to tackle Usury, then you could do worse than read what John Medaille has said on the subject, like:
– http://www.frontporchrepublic.com/2014/05/pikettys-challenge-past-consumes-future/
– http://www.medaille.com/newsabbathland.htm
@Mofo: “The three most important of these attributes are democracy, free trade/capitalism, and strictly enforced monogamy” General flow of your argument is correct, but I need to argue with your choice of the important attributes to the civilization.
1. Democracy. Your view of democracy as one of the most important attributes of civilization is ahistoric at least – in fact I would estimate 99% (but don’t hold me for this particular number) of all previous and existing civilizations were some form of Monarchy, eventually Republic. Democracy if occured was usually a final stage to the civilization, a stage of consumption of previously generated wealth and rejection of values that created the civilization. You can’t expect civilization to thrive if it’s up to mass sentiment to decide on the values that govern it.
You may personally like and appreciate democracy (unlike me) but you shouldn’t put a side effect of developed civilization as its attribute.
The attribute would be “stable governance”.
2. Free trade/Capitalism. Using these terms (especially Capitalism) is a bit ahistoric and for this reason I would rather call it “organic division of labor”, free trade being the effect of the division and a tool for its spread.
3. Monogamy. As to monogamy it is also not an attribute, but possibly the most peaceful mean for “channeling of the sexual energy”. As you’ve pointed out Islam is to some extent polygynous and its method for channeling the excess of sexual energy is focused on utilizing the frustration in the form of martyrdom and/or expansion to new regions with fresh supply of females.
There are also other attributes I would include like “a dominant culture and its enforcing institutions (eg. religion)” but that would become never ending discussion so I will stop here.
Great article Aurini.
I always thought Roosh forums were anathema, but now I’ll have to check them out. Hope you had a pleasant Pentecost.
“Trangenderend”
Transgendered
“fast”
quickly
Fast refers to high speed, while quickly refers to happening in a short/shorter than expected time (fast food is an exception, for alliterative purposes)
@mofo
You said:
You have attributed common sense, rational agency, to the majority. They do not have it. They can’t compare. They can’t live it both ways. They only follow the greatest authority and become what that authority defines as the common good. They would agree if they could compare, but they can’t.
@mofo, .your main thesis is of course totally correct. Any minor disagreements or major ignorances don’t change the fact that mud huts and no health care sucks compared to civilization. Glad to you there is someone out there who thinks similiarly. I’m pissed I am not a 9 enjoying what there is now that I realize the virtue in it. Alas.
The quiet lurkers and commenters have noted the neoreactionary movement. It’s a wake up call to stop living on an engineered rollercoaster. A handful of bloggers and youtubers have helped us, shown us a way towards higher ideals. I just hope this chance to attain something more than decadence doesn’t end up being a fluke, sand washed away by tidal wave of history.
When we talk about “democracy,” there are a couple elements of need to be examined: citizen representation and universal suffrage. One is, in my view, good. The other is a terrible, terrible idea.
Citizen representation is good for any government because it placates the people with the reassurance that the government is not doing things on a whim. Some corners of the Dark Enlightenment favor a government-as-corporation model, but I say to that: a corporation? Like the banks and businesses that game the system as they screw you over, without concern that you will be able to have any input on the matter?
Citizen representation in some form at least gives people a chance to present their needs and concerns to the government. Whether a hereditary noble bringing his subjects’ petitions before the Crown, or an elected MP or Congressperson voting on constituents’ behalf, citizen representation puts a check on the ruler.
Universal suffrage is a God-awful idea. The idea that a person simply needs to be a legal adult and have a body temperature of 97 degrees Fahrenheit (though Democrats seem to think that the dead have a right to vote, too), regardless of income, education level, social class, or what have you, is moronic.
Universal suffrage, which is little more than camouflaged plebiscite, is the element of democracy that we reject first and foremost.
Regarding your latest video:
Your portrayal of Jews as “having angered the Germans” and thus insinuating that they perhaps were in-part deserving of the holocaust is a gross mischaracterization of Germanic motivations towards the Jews. The “Jewels” were a scapegoat, plain and simple. You certainly are not making the argument that Jewish behavior in Germany of old was as destructive as Black behavior in America today (Yet you do not criticize the blacks nearly as harshly), or was the Jew-spell that captivated the dumb Goy so powerful as to be considered as degenerate as current-day Black disorder?
It’s a shame such a great mind like yours is stuck with plebe drinking buddies in Canada who are the descendants of Cult-Denomination Anglo Christians – who have been brainwashed by their elders to hate their chief competition in coin clipping and usury – the Jews. The Jews were banned from the trade guilds, one could thus argue that their actions may have been criminal but necessary to their own survival. What were the Presbytarians, Pentecostals, Quakers, Calvinists, etc… engaged in this for?
You’re falling into the same trap as fringeelements – that is – revising history to conform to your world viewpoints. Your baso-ganglia is doing these videos, not your neo-cortex. Stay with the cigarettes – you’re right, a couple here and there will do you good, but lay off the alcohol.
I’m breaking my Jew-rules posting here, ordinarily I’d be done with you long ago. But something about you tells me that if I sat down with you one-on-one over a few pale ales, we’d see eye-to-eye in no time.
I remember you mentioned you were in the army, and that if you were an officer you would have stayed in, but isnt that the opposite of the tone of this article? This was essentially a ‘its over society is a joke’ which I generally agree with, but what of your prior statements?