A Response to a Reconsideration of STARSHIP TROOPERS(Paul Verhoeven Movie based on Robert Heinlein Novel) by Trevor Lynch

https://www.counter-currents.com/2019/04/starship-troopers-2/

Of course Verhoven could not film a straightforward adaptation of a novel that glorifies war and denigrates democracy in favor of something that sounds like fascism. So he claimed his movie was satire. But that’s not how the fans see it. Like Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket, Starship Troopers contains over-the-top depictions of brutal military training and combat that actually function as recruiting propaganda.

But why couldn’t he make such a movie? Was STARSHIP TROOPERS really such a bold statement to come out of Hollywood? What about RAMBO and CONAN THE BARBARIAN? Stallone’s Vietnam revenge fantasy says elected politicians were just a bunch of wusses who didn’t allow brave gung ho US soldiers win the war(just like ‘liberal’ politicians stand in the way of ‘fascist’ cop Dirty Harry). And Rambo is one-man Wehrmacht who takes on all the Vietnamese commies and the Soviet war machine… and comes out on top. (Though John Milius’ RED DAWN is also anti-communist, the Americans in it play the reversed-role of humble partisan guerrillas, like the Minutemen in the American Revolutionary War, than ubermensch-like fascist warriors who are represented by the Soviet War Machine.)

And didn’t STAR WARS conclude with a grand Riefenstahlean finale? Furthermore, the rebels in the first movie are all-white and seem to constitute yet another empire not so easy to distinguish from the Vaderian Empire. It’s fascists vs fascists, or ‘Good Nazis’ vs ‘Bad Nazis’ as critic Ray Pride once remarked.

Incidentally, BLACK HAWK DOWN(directed by Ridley Scott) is far more gung-ho and bang-for-the-buck in its depiction of combat than anything in STARSHIP TROOPERS where silliness renders everything cartoonish. A few critics, especially the black Elvis Mitchell, complained of BLACK HAWK DOWN’s ‘racism’ of the retro-imperialist kind, but most ‘liberal’ critics were admiring. (For some reason, most ‘liberal’ critics don’t seem very offended with ZULU either. Perhaps because it was directed by a 'communist', and furthermore, maybe Jewish critics see the British soldiers as akin to Zionist defending Israel from Arabs.)

I didn’t see the BATMAN sequel with Michael Keaton & Danny De Vito, but some commentators hinted at possible cryto-antisemitism in the depiction of Penguin as a composite of what might now be called ‘Anti-Semitic Tropes’. Among the most un-PC movies were Tim Burton’s PLANET OF THE APES and Zach Snyder’s 300, but the latter seems to have gotten a pass as Neocon War Porn.

BLADE RUNNER also had quasi-fascist characters whose stature underwent transition from villainy to heroics. Roy Batty is like a blonde Aryan god-man who ultimately earns our respect and sympathy despite or partially because of his terrifying side.

Now, part of the reason why Jews and the so-called ‘left’ became okay with(and even enthused over)fascist imagery or ‘fascistery’ was:

(1) It was too profitable to ignore at the box office. Even when the bad guys are ‘fascist’ villains, they are regarded and idolized as uber-cool: Terminator and Darth Vader. Also, even the ‘anti-fascist’ heroes must act like ‘cool’ fascists to win: Ultra Violence. Why do kids play video-games? To feel like Mother Teresa? No, to feel badass like Robocop. Even when they are fighting Nazis in video-games, they are ‘playing nazi’. This goes for the cinema of Hayao Miyazaki too. Ideologically, he’s a peacenik(like Cameron and Lucas) but, like his Western counterparts, he waxes awesome about militarist and ‘fascist’ imagery even as he ultimately comes around to condemning it.

(2) Once Jews and globo-homo took over America’s elite institutions/industries, they were in charge of the War Machine with its myriad planet-blasting contraptions. Just like a child with a BB gun wants to shoot at something(or anything), those with lots of power can’t help wanting to bully or blow up some part of the world. Also, Jews are an ambitious people, and homos are a vain people. In order to fight more Wars for Israel and spread globo-homo as new messianic faith, militarism was back in vogue. And to make it work, Jews had to get goyim all excited about war and empire. So, even as Jews rhetorically rail against ‘nazis’ and ‘fascists’, they are the New Nazis with vision of 1000 Year Jewish World Reich. Jews are no longer starving partisans hiding in the woods from Big Bad Aryan Nazis. They are no longer ragtag Zionist guerrillas as Neo-Zealots struggling to found a new nation. They are the oligarcho-uber-commanders of the biggest war machine in the world, and so, they promote militarism to persuade goy suckers to fight for ‘glory’ in more Wars for Israel.

(3) Jews figured one of the most effective way to subvert and weaken white power is to promote a kind of Afro-jungle-fascism. In the Jewish promotion of black athletics, rapper thug antics, and black sexual mania, the current ‘idology’ is no longer about racial equality but the superiority of blacks as the savage-badass-god-race to which white women must put out sexually and to which white boys must cuck. Egalitarianism sounds nice and all, but it’s rather dull and boring, especially to Americans who love winners and champions, not the Average Joe or Median Man. Queen’s hit song wasn’t "We are Average" but "We are the Champions".
If whites were to regard blacks merely as equals, the negative impact on white pride would be limited. In order for whites to lose racial confidence(and power), they must see blacks as SUPERIOR to whites. So, just like Leni Riefenstahl featured Teutonic Aryans(and later Sudanese Nuba) as the most impressive races, Jews employ images of Black Superiority to turn whites into cowering submissive cucks. Of course, promotion of blacks as uber-race is never called ‘fascism’ or ‘racism’ but sold as ‘progress’ and ‘justice’, but the overwhelming impression of the current message is no longer "blacks are as good as you" but "blacks are better than you, white boy, so get on your knees and cuck."

Because Jews now control neo-Heinleinism, the ideas in STARSHIP TROOPERS may seem more appalling than appealing to those in the Alt or Dissident Right. After all, the men in STARSHIP TROOPERS are mental robots not unlike young US servicemen who stormed into Iraq with ‘Rock the Casbah’ ringing in their ears. They never ask questions. They never speak truth to power. They never wonder what it’s all about. Instead, they are cookie-cutter creatures who are easily manipulated by the Power and obediently do as told.
Now, in the movie of course, Earth faces a grave threat from invasive space bugs, so humanity is on high alert and desperately struggling to survive. But, the actual Power that rules over us is not above fanning hysteria and paranoia to fool us into ‘serving’ and ‘defending’ the Order against threats that are, more often than not, bogus or exaggerated. The Deep State and Big Media can turn anything into the New Space Bugs out to destroy us. Russia Collusion Hoax for instance and Putin as New Hitler. We saw how this worked in the lead up to the Iraq War. Back then, Hussein was the New Hitler or the New Space Bug. He had WMD! US had to fight a War on Terror! (Never mind the US did more to build up Alqaeda Jihadis[to use against Soviet Union] while Hussein's Iraq and Iran had been fighting them forever, the ONE thing the two hostile nations had in common.) Shock and Awe, baby! So many people, even the best of Americans, were fooled into supporting the War on the Space Bugs of the Middle East. Many men of HONOR served in the Iraq War. They fought bravely and served honorably. But the lesson of that war is that HONOR is never enough. Honor without understanding and the will to ask questions of the Power is useless. The Power can exploit honor to spread horror. After all, a soldier can serve HONORABLY in any war. Plenty of Germans believed in Der Fuhrer and served with courage and loyalty on the Eastern Front. But seen in the larger context, they were serving a mad regime hellbent on genocide and enslavement. Honor needs to be tempered by skepticism about power and individual conscience.
To the extent that Jews control the deep state & mass media and do NOT want us to ask tough questions, and instead, just trust the Narrative and serve and fight HONORABLY as obedient dogs, those in the Alt Right & Dissident Right must shelve the Honor Cult for the time being. They must ask WHAT is worthy of support, worthy of honor? Certainly not Wars for Israel. Certainly not Wars for globo-homo. Certainly not the new ‘cold war’ with Russia to appease insatiable Jewish rage. If honor is valuable(and it is), it must not be wasted on the wicked agendas of dishonorable tribal supremacists such as globo-homo Jews.

The men(and women) in STARSHIP TROOPERS are like so many clueless idiots in the US military. Sure, they are tough, brave, and capable. But their hearts and minds are so EASY to toy with. They are suckers who don’t ask questions; they’d rather out-source all thinking in blind faith to the ‘cognitive’ elites. Lest thinking lead to anxiety and emotional distress, they prefer being trained and ordered about as attack dogs. Take orders, fetch as told, and bite the ‘enemy’, the New Nazis or Space Bugs.

It’s likely Paul Verhoeven was being rather sly. He claimed to satirize fascism, but it’s more likely that he was spoofing the US war state. After all, the society-at-large in STARSHIP TROOPERS is pretty degenerate, trashy, and hedonistic, much like Modern America as a Giant Mall. It is saturated with dumb pop culture and insipid youth mania. Soldiers take to war and mayhem like it’s college football season. Female soldiers are little more than walking barbie dolls(to their G.I Joe male counterparts). Society is so trashy and degenerate that it’s hardly worth defending from space bugs. Military even has coed showers.

What sort of society is likely to be better governed: a society that reserves political power to an honorable minority proven to have the courage and responsibility to risk their lives for the common good—or a society that gives equal power to everyone, allowing the selfish, cowardly, and irresponsible majority to outvote their betters? The answer is obvious.

Sparta didn’t turn out so well in the end. Also, the ‘noble’ military caste in peace-time turns almost invariably corrupt and parasitic. Japan’s eventual fate under Tokugawa rule wasn’t pretty. And judging by American and European military men, I see little evidence of battle-hardened warriors as ideal elites. It appears many people enter the military mainly for stability and sense of order. They need be told what to do because they, as individuals, are sorely lacking in autonomy and independence to forge their own paths. They are afraid to be free. In the military, one’s place is decided by rank, not notable assertion of individual worth or ability. To move up the ranks, one must flatter and please the superiors(politicians as well as higher-ranked officers) than prove them wrong when they are. Most are careerists like Colin Powell who signed onto Iraq War because it was the thing to do at the moment. And then, consider all the military cucks who cravenly muted their opposition to open enlistment of ‘gays in the military’, women in combat, and even trannies. In the end, brains beat brawn. We think of military guys as tough, but they are tough in the way dogs are. They are incapable of agency and independent thought. They are incurious about what is really happening. They have all these guns, tanks, bombs, and planes at their disposal, but they are never the ones to decide the when and why of war. Instead, they wait around idly until commanded from above to invade a nation they never heard of and drop bombs to kill people about whom they know nothing. The German military failed to stand up to Adolf Hitler even as he spiraled into recklessness. And Japanese military men led the nation to ruin, from which it hasn’t politically and psychologically recovered. A nation run by the likes of John McCain would be a sorry one. And of course, military commanders rarely see real combat. They give orders and take all the credit while their minions do all the dying in gory combat. They use binoculars than rifles.

Democracy recognizes that leadership virtues can be found in all social classes, but it fails by politically empowering everyone indiscriminately, simply by virtue of being born.

That may not be the main problem with democracy. If US politics had indeed empowered everyone, the nation would be in much better shape. Rather, democracy invariably turns into rule by plutocracy and oligarchy. Even when the elites pander to the masses, it is less to serve the people than to serve themselves. They dole out bread-and-circuses to placate the masses so that they themselves can buy time to attain even more profits and privileges. Notice how most Americans are too distracted with junk culture and idiot dogma(pushed by elites) to have much sense of what is going on. 50% of Americans don’t vote. And when politicians renege on their promises, people fail to rise up and just turn to more junk on TV.
If majority demands had shaped policy, the US would be better off. But against populist wishes, the US has been driven by oligarchic donors and their whore politicians with the backing of corrupt activist courts. Politicians mostly ignore the people and just do as donors tell them. US is a moneytocracy before it’s a democracy.

From a technical point of view, Starship Troopers is a brilliant achievement. I recently rewatched it on Blu-ray on a large-screen OLED TV, and I found the special effects to be stunningly realistic. The arachnids are genuinely terrifying.

No way. The special effects in STARSHIP TROOPERS are on the level of STAR TREK TV shows. Despite the considerable budget, everything looks cheap and plastic. We see Earthlings in toylike spaceships doing battle with giant beetles that shoot lasers from their butts. It’s like a movie made with STAR WARS action-figures and cereal boxes from which they came. At best, one might say the aesthetics was intentionally goofy and cartoonish to make the whole thing look like a straight-faced spoof, more SPACEBALLS than STAR WARS. Verhoeven’s clumsy treatment lacks the aesthetic flair of the anime GUNBUSTER that is visually arresting and strikingly realized. Compositions are crisper and the editing sharper.

How was it even possible that such an appealing anti-liberal movie was ever made?

Why? Maybe because Jews became the commanders of the US as Lone Superpower and wanted goy suckers to be like dimwit Rico to go fight the Arab-Arachnids? Jews are loving ‘fascism’ now. Jews bought Disney which then bought STAR WARS, and all that nihilo-fascist-imagery(taken from Riefenstahl, fascist spectacles, classic myths, samurai legends, etc) is being used to promote globo-homo-shlomo-Afro fascism.

Whatever the explanation, Starship Troopers is an anti-liberal classic which has done far more to promote than to undermine Heinlein’s vision of military meritocracy.

No, the movie takes fascistic ideas & images and associates them with multi-culti globo-homo US as the lone superpower, the New Hope. It’s like what happens in James Cameron’s TERMINATOR Part 2. Via reprogramming & appropriation, the once techno-fascist robot is turned into a pro-human-fascist-robot and acts as traitor against his own machine kind. Any side can use generic ‘fascism’, which is more about idolatry than a strict set of ideology applicable only to distinct groups. Though communists were ideologically anti-fascist, one could argue their militarism, the cult of great leader, and collectivism were almost indistinguishable from certain key features of National Socialism(and the more militarist wing of Zionism).
‘Fascism’ doesn’t necessarily favor one side over the other, one nation over another, one people over another. ‘Fascist’ Japan fought White America, i.e. ‘fascism’ could be used by yellows. Fascism has many faces, and perhaps its most vulgar form is the blind worship of power for power’s sake. So, whoever has the most power commands the respect and servility of vulgar fascist passion. It’s like the mass psychology of sports. When whites were champions, white boys and girls idolized white athletes as ‘gods’ and ‘heroes’. When blacks defeated whites and took over sports, white boys and girls began to idolize black athletes. If fascism in its crudest form is about worship of naked power, then whoever has the most power or most trophies becomes the focus of pop fascist passion. When Germany conquered France, French women idolized German soldiers as alpha warriors. Vulgar Fascism favors WHOMEVER has the most power(by any means necessary). After all, the prestige of Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy rested on their ability to win. Once they lost the war, they lost all respect as well. In contrast, some ideologies are more about right and wrong(despite who has the most power) than about might-is-right. A Christian or Marxist will value his creed regardless of victory or defeat as the best means to understand and judge the world. Now, more elevated forms of fascism weren’t merely about might-is-right, but the hubristic fatal fascism of Mussolini and Hitler seared into popular psyche the impression that fascism was nothing more than a ruthless game of power. As in sports, the winner takes all, the loser stands small. As German-and-Italian Fascism lost WWII, it had to lose everything in accordance to its own terms of zero-sum gamesmanship. Ironically, the current US politics, aka ‘liberal democracy’, is largely predicated on vulgar fascism. There is so much cucking to Jews, blacks, and homos because they are seen as top winners in fields that matter most to most Americans: Money, Entertainment, High-Tech, Gambling, Sports, Sexuality, Celebrity, and Narcissism.

By the time STARSHIP TROOPERS was made, the US was pretty much in the hands of Jews. Why should Jews fear ‘fascism’ when THEY got the power? While Jews hate specific forms of fascism such as National Socialism, they love generic vulgar crypto-fascism where hapless minions and careerist cucks pledge their allegiance to the ultimate power. Hillary even pledged to go to war with Russia in the skies over Syria at the behest of super-powerful Jews. As blacks won in brawn and Jews won in brains, vulgar fascism in the US turned into a ritual of whites slobbering over blacks as the badass race and worshiping Jews as the super-rich, genius, and brilliant race. (And later homos as the ‘creative race’.)

STARSHIP TROOPERS is Star-Shit Poopers. Far superior movie along similar lines is ZULU, from which STARSHIP TROOPERS copped some scenes, and ENDER’S GAME, which was almost certainly inspired by Heinlein’s novel(not least because it too has Earthlings at war with space bugs). Instead of just blow-em-up movie, ENDER'S GAME has fun with game theory and ultimately expresses some measure of empathy for the Other Side. As for Heinlein, the Cold War seems to have warped his worldview in some extreme way. In retrospect, his starry-eyed support for Reagan’s SDI defense system and animus toward Arthur C. Clarke for proposing a more peaceful solution with the Soviets now come across as worse than foolish: Clueless.

The military is a meritocracy.

Is it? Military isn’t about the best minds or strongest bodies. It’s about average Joes — the median of society — trained to kill. One may argue a soldier gains in rank for courage under fire or some inspired/extraordinary act in battle, but most promotions are about seniority and hanging around for more stripes. And top officers are more the product of elite academy than performance in war or leadership ability. And those favored for top positions tend to be ones identified as most reliably servile & obedient, especially in our Jewish-controlled order where any white goy with independent or ‘maverick’ streak is weeded out as a threat to the Jewish World Order. To embed white military culture with servility to PC, Jewish Power pushes stuff like homomania via the Pentagon. When big tough white generals must bend over to homos to keep their positions, they are totally owned by Jews.

In the distant past when men battled it out with swords and shields, there was more an element of individual meritocracy. But then, if the toughest men are expended in the battlefield, it will be bad for the gene pool in the long run. Romans got wimpier and wimpier after losing so many tough men over generations. Meanwhile, the wusses who stayed behind survived and had more children with the ladies.

Personally, TWILIGHT OF THE COCKROACHES and GUNBUSTER(despite the insufferable lead character crybaby Noriko) are among the more interesting variations on Pop Fascist themes.
In TWILIGHT, Germany and Japan(cockroaches) are stacked against US and Russia(humans post-cold-war).
In GUNBUSTER, Japan re-fights the Pacific War but this time in space... and it has the ‘nuke’ in the form of the blackhole machine.



Two reviews of the movie:

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1997-11-07-9711070293-story.html

http://www.jonathanrosenbaum.net/1997/11/multinational-pest-control/

Despite the explicit multiracialism of Heinlein’s novel, Verhoven massively Aryanizes his cast and setting. Heinlein’s Johnny Rico is a Pilipino who lives in Buenos Aires.

A James-Michener-ish touch? Race-mixing as basis of imperial expansion. Philippines was the ‘good’ Asian nation, the obedient dog of the US. Race-mixed via European Imperialism too. Making Rico a Filipino was less about being ‘progressive’ than using Diversity as tool of New Imperialism. ‘Good’ Asians vs ‘Bad’ Asians(the Red Chinese and North Vietnam). I hear Rico is ultimately supposed to be black. Like Tiger Woods?

Verhoeven’s attitude is simple: “Hollywood is trashy and Americans are dumb, and so, you morons deserve my dumbed-down versions of Philip K. Dick[TOTAL RECALL] and Robert Heinlein.” His movies are less satire than insult to Americans(and an Americanized world). Yet, he is still serving and propagating that very Americanism he holds in contempt because most people enjoy the willfully ‘idiocratic’ elements of his movies as popcorn entertainment(just like kids watching Godzilla movies hardly fret about them as allegory about atomic power).

But more importantly, STARSHIP TROOPERS is less satire than a work of appropriation. Jewish Hollywood in effect appropriated ‘kewl’ fascist themes & imagery or ‘fascistery’ to put them at the service of the Zionist-Supremacist US empire, aka get dumb young Americans all excited to fight Wars for Israel, hate the ‘Muzzies’, and maybe to hate & even fight Russia IF it cuts loose from the Jewish hegemonic orbit.

With Jews buying up Disney(whose founder was once charged with ‘antisemitism’ by some) and STAR WARS, they finalized their means of appropriation. Notice how the New STAR WARS is a kind of ‘antifascist’ fascism. The white male empire is the evil ‘fascist’ power that must be destroyed, BUT the rebels(the good guys) are also in ‘kewl’ fascist gear, playing imperial politics, relying on the Force, and blowing things up in blitzkrieg fashion.

It’s like Jews and guns. Jews want to take guns away from white goyim, but Jews love gun-ownership in Israel where their tribesmen constitute the solid majority of gun-owning citizens. Gun or Fascistery, Jews love it when they have control of it.

In the 1940s and 50s, American war movies were more-or-less in humanist mode. It was as if Omar Bradley made them. War is presented as unfortunate but a necessary evil at times. But since the 1980s, esp with the super-stardom of Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarznegger, violence-as-spectacle was placed at the center. It was as if their movies were directed by a Pop version of Patton who loved war for war’s sake. Compare the first ROCKY with Part III. First one is a humanist story about a palooka gaining self-respect. Part III is about Rocky as master of the world(and in IV, he single-handedly or double-fistedly wins the Cold War). RAMBO, a huge hit, re-fought the Vietnam War as cartoon fantasy.

Appropriating fascism for globo-homo-shlomo empire is what the US is about. And even ‘literally hitler’ Trump turned out to be puppet-fuhrer for Israel than leader of White America.



If STARSHIP TROOPERS is satire, it is smiley-faced satire or satire-for-dummies. A satire so goofy and obvious that it becomes a spoof of satire itself. Satire that nibbles and kisses than bites and cuts is useless. Irony is the tool of satire, but when the purported satire itself becomes the object of irony by an audience that isn’t so much laughing at the stupidity of militarism(as in DR. STRANGELOVE) as winking at the gentle mockery as yet another layer of joke, the result is declawed satire that is utterly useless: A cat whose scratches are turned into mere pats. People watching STARSHIP TROOPERS are less likely to see it as a satire of war than a satire of satire of war. The ridicule of militarism is ridiculed, and we know a double negative is a positive. The recruitment ad in the movie doesn't so much ridicule military propaganda as 'leftist' mockery of such propaganda. The overall message is, "Lighten up, anti-war progressives. We are hip to the propaganda and manipulation. We aren't fooled, and the real reason we support war is because USA is cool, the land of the right to party."
The effect of STARSHIP TROOPERS is rather like TEAM AMERICA(by the SouthPark guys), which is more like a satire of anti-war satire. The final message is we must be for Team America, warts and all, because Matt Damon sucks. Satire doesn't really work if it's fuzzy-wuzzy and has us laughing more in the spirit of those being satirized than in the spirit of those who despair. As funny as IDIOCRACY is, it fails as satire because, when push comes to shove, we are entertained than distressed by the Dumb Future World. It's so goofy and over-the-top that we care more for laughs than the point. In the age of vulgar irony, people just wink-wink at the whole thing. Satire has been dumbed down to the point where people don’t know what it’s really about.



What may be most dangerous about STARSHIP is that its Neocon War Porn propagandizing slips through the purported ‘satire’. This way, Jewish Hollywood plays it both ways. It promotes globo-homo militarism while telling people to just lighten up cuz it’s all meant as ‘parody’. But, the laughter that it elicits is not of ironic mockery of militarism but of hipster aloofness that says ‘fascism’ is ‘kewl’ too…. as long it’s on the side of globo-homo empire.

* * * * * * * * * *

Dr. Stranglovitz or How Hollywood stopped worrying and learned to love Fascism.

When DIRTY HARRY was released(along with STRAW DOGS and DEATH WISH), there was intense debate about movies with potential fascist messages or nihilistic view of power.

https://s-usih.org/2014/05/fascinating-fascism-the-other-f-word-in-seventies-cultural-criticism/

But after STAR WARS and so many action spectacles, ‘fascistery’ or ‘fascisterics’ just became part of the cultural landscape: So commonplace that no one much noticed anymore. Now, there was always an element of fascistery in superhero comic books, but they were considered lowbrow kiddie fare and didn't much affect cinema until the BATMAN and SPIDERMAN movies. Prior to them(and many others that were soon to follow), SUPERMAN was the only superhero franchise that made any real impact on mainstream cinema.

Same happened with the rise of harlotry. Up to mid-80s, the feminists had sufficient clout to press upon the issue of overt sexualization and exploitation the female image. But the double whammy of madonna and her scribe Camille Paglia changed the paradigm of feminism whereupon being a slut wasn't exploitation but empowerment. Now, harlotry is so much a part of the culture that people don't even notice(or remember how feminists used to rail against it).

In the early 1970s, DIRTY HARRY, STRAW DOGS, and DEATH WISH triggered heated debates about movie violence, law and order, and fascism. But when JUDGE DREDD, a far more 'fascist' movie about law and order, was released in the 90s, no one batted an eye. Fascistery had just become part of movie culture. (And the influence of nihilistic anime, blood-soaked Hong Kong action cinema that raised the ante on senseless violence[influencing Quentin Tarantino], and ever more violent video games also fueled the cultural shift.) Today's progs are not about opposing fascistery but about appropriating it for their side.

Susan Sontag proved wrong about Leni Riefenstahl's long-term influence when she wrote the article "Fascinating Fascism" though her views seemed plausible at the time. The 70s were a time of personalism, naturalism, and experimentalism in American cinema. It seemed then that those trends would define future film-making. But, in fact, most such movies never hit it off with the mass audience.

http://marcuse.faculty.history.ucsb.edu/classes/33d/33dTexts/SontagFascinFascism75.htm

Triumph of the Will and Olympia are undoubtedly superb films (they may be the two greatest documentaries ever made), but they are not really important in the history of cinema as an art form. Nobody making films today alludes to Riefenstahl, while many filmmakers (including myself) regard Dziga Vertov as an inexhaustible provocation and source of ideas about film language.

Most people were waiting for someone like Steven Spielberg and George Lucas to come along, and when they did, they really changed everything. Both were more about grand spectacle and owed more to Riefenstahl than to Dziga Vertov, the appeal of whose works were limited to intellectuals, scholars, and experimentalists. The avant garde or personal side of Lucas that made THX 1138 & AMERICAN GRAFFITI gave way to the showman who came up with STAR WARS and INDIANA JONES movies. Sontag wrote off Riefenstahl as future cinematic influence, but the inspiration lived on and grew ever bigger via Hollywood's new love with fascistery(though masked with anti-fascist message) though most people are loathe to admit this(just like the seminal influence of D.W. Griffith has increasingly been muted due to the ‘impolitics’ of THE BIRTH OF A NATION). Just like Cecil B. DeMille movies' main appeal was pagan idolatry and grandeur — what would 10 COMMANDMENTS be without all that awesome Egyptian stuff? — but marketed as morality tale for good Christians, so many of recent movies are excesses in fascistery packaged as lessons in ‘anti-nazism’.

And yet, there was CLOVERFIELD, a nifty movie that managed to blend fascisterics with spirit of experimentalism. It sure did an effective job of making the audience believe as if giant space bugs as Jihadi-monsters were really laying New York to waste. Suddenly, even deracinated hipster kids harden into tough survivors and turn warrior, redeemer, or romantic. In essence, it’s a dumb movie idea but so powerfully and cleverly(even brilliantly) conceived as film-making. It’s a movie that’s impossible to take ‘seriously’ unless seen with one’s own eyes. It became in instant if minor classic.
It’s all the more effective for opening naturally and persuasively as amateur home-video footage. Because the movie tosses us into the spontaneity of daily life, the sudden horror has an extra impact of verity. It seems to intrude into reality than confined to fantasy space of genre storytelling. It is genuinely shocking and ‘believable’. It’s like Star-hipster Troopers. There’s even some food for thought about nature of memory, data, and the world. Just like the video we are seeing was accidentally recorded over an existing footage of a romantic couple in happier times, the world is being ‘erased’ by space monsters for no rhyme or reason. There’s a sense of absurdity, fragility, and futility in everything, from the intimate to the historic.

Trevor Lynch's Review of FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD(1967) Ignites Richard Spencer vs Greg Johnson Pt II

https://www.counter-currents.com/2019/04/far-from-the-madding-crowd/

The review by Trevor Lynch(Greg Johnson?) is useful as social commentary, sexual politics, and moral judgement, but it mostly overlooks the most important facet of Art. The element of psychology. The best works of art are more about empathy(not to be confused with blind sympathy) and understanding. So, we can believe the characters are acting foolishly or even evil and recognize the ridiculousness of motivations and actions(and the foolishness or injustice of the community as a whole), but art delivers something more than a sermon, lecture, analysis, or diagnosis. Rather, it allows us to empathize and see/feel through the characters and identify with them on some level EVEN IF we disagree with them or loathe them. Oliver Stone has been an uneven director and brazen ideologue, but some of his films can be appreciated as art because his objective was to penetrate and understand. Stone, no fan of Tricky Dick, made a thoughtful political film with NIXON, something he utterly failed with the breathless propagandizing of JFK.

Lynch's Counter-Currents movie reviews too often read like right-wing versions of Proggy treatment of culture. If the 'left' hailed the New STAR WARS because it's Diverse and Multi-Culti(even though it is dreadful), Lynch praised JURASSIC WORLD because it is ostensibly a 'white' movie(even though it too is dreadful by any aesthetic or emotional standard). If progs too often reduce plays, novels, and movies into simple morality tales of heroes & villains and oppressors & victims, a similar ideological pall hangs over Lynch's review of MADDING CROWD. There is too much judgmentalism without any effort to understand the characters(even though I agree with much of Lynch's moral concerns and prescriptions). Now, I'm not opposed to judgement and personal disapproval in arts/culture criticism AS LONG AS there is an effort to understand the why of the characters and situations(and the artist's intentions). Take films like Martin Scorsese's MEAN STREETS and GOODFELLAS, and most of the characters range from childish to vile & disgusting. But it would be too easy to dismiss and condemn the characters for being a bunch of 'goombas'. They are great films because they place us in that cultural-historical milieu and show why people behave as they do in it.

Lynch's review is most lacking in the treatment of Sergeant Troy(Terence Stamp). One almost gets the sense that Lynch's diatribe against Troy is Greg Johnson vs Richard Spencer II by fictional proxy. Yes, Troy is a something of a cad(at times anyway), but he is also something more, and human psychology being what it is, it is totally understandable why Bathsheba is drawn to him(and why William Boldwood[Peter Finch] and Gabriel Oak[Alan Bates] are drawn to Bathsheba in what seems like fatal attractions). Before judgement, the critic should try to empathize and understand. Of course, this applies to works of art, not propaganda. Though I'm not keen on watching homo characters(esp in multi-culti situations), a work of art can make their lives interesting. MY BEAUTIFUL LAUNDRETTE is a genuine work of art. And C.R.A.Z.Y is one of the most deeply felt movies about the pangs of growing up and problems of family life. Such works deserve empathy on our part even if we may not care for homo characters or situations. On the other hand, a movie like PHILADELPHIA that features simple saints and devils doesn't deserve any such effort or respect on our part. It is stupid propaganda. FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD, like Terrence Malick's DAYS OF HEAVEN, is a work with characters of some depth and complexity. Reducing the story to a morality tale doesn't do it justice.

Granted, one of the problems is John Schlesinger pulled his punches in making the film. It doesn't have the auteurist stamp of DAYS OF HEAVEN or Roman Polanski's superb adaptation of TESS. Schlesinger did a very good job as professional and craftsman, but there isn't much of the director-as-author in the adaptation. Stanley Kubrick's BARRY LYNDON and Polanski's TESS are like universes unto themselves, the products of visionary power. We not only sense the keen eye but the keener intelligence, an invisible omnipotence that holds it all together. In contrast, FAR FROM THE MADDING CROWD is all eyes, rather like Ang Lee's very professional version of SENSE AND SENSIBILITY. Impeccably done but mostly an exterior than interior work. We see a world than enter a universe.
TESS unfolds like a dream. We don't merely witness obsessions verging on madness in the characters but sense them as mood and texture in every square inch of the frame. A genius at his best, Polanski had the keenness to pore through the hearts and minds of characters(though often for perverted purposes) and to infuse the entire setting with unloosed spirits. In works of 'horror' like REPULSION and THE TENANT, he blatantly subverted the wall between subjectivity and objectivity, but even in more realistic films like CHINATOWN and TESS, the unease owes to the sense that 'exteriority' is inseparable from 'interiority'. At the ending of CHINATOWN, we don't merely notice that there is corruption in L.A. Rather, we sense it in the very air that people breathe. It is pervasive, everywhere, and inescapable. It's like being in a funeral where everyone breathes the fumes emanating from the dead. TESS is remarkable for being saturated with an air of poignancy. If romantic tragedy could be a perfume, Tess was it and filled the air.
Polanski knew how to get under the skin, which is why his version of MACBETH is one of the best Shakespeare adaptations. There are moments in the film when Macbeth's psychology becomes ours. We become hypnotized and spellbound by the same madness. And TESS has the power of mood and aura. It's like a house of hearts.
This element is missing from Schlesinger's MADDING CROWD, and part of the reason could have been the novel's intimidating stature as literary classic, one that dampened creative freedom by commanding faith and reverence. It's often been said that inferior novels make for better adaptations because film-makers feel free to do as they wish, whereas classics come with towering reputations that tend to overshadow film-makers' confidence.

Now, there are advantages to 'impersonal' professionalism or cinema-of-quality as well. Auteurism is a double-edged sword. In the hands of a master like Kubrick, Kurosawa, Welles, or Polanski, the source material can be transformed into something remarkable, at once true to the spirit of the source and inspired in ways beyond the scope of the original. Ridley Scott's version of BLADE RUNNER, in certain respects, goes beyond Philip K. Dick's novel. And Schlesinger, as auteur, did likewise with his adaptation of MIDNIGHT COWBOY, an excellent novel in its own right.
But, the downside of auteurism is, more often than not, untalented hacks think the mere application of their 'personal' eccentricities will enhance the material. Terry Gilliam is maybe the worst offender, but there are others. MASTERPIECE THEATER, like old Hollywood, has its strengths and limitations. Because it emphasized professionalism, it could be relied on for decent first-rate productions. Its rules hampered artistic personality but also suppressed self-indulgence. More often than not, freedom in cinema has meant freedom to be stupid than genius because stupidity is far more common than genius, which cannot be faked.

A young shepherd, Gabriel Oak (Alan Bates at his handsomest), proposes marriage to Bathsheba Everdene (Julie Christie at her loveliest)... They would make a handsome couple. Gabriel is clearly intelligent, hard-working, and responsible. He pleads his case well. But Bathsheba declines, because she does not “love” him, and to her mind, it is as simple as that. One has to wonder, though, what exactly she means by love, and why it features so prominently in her decision, since rural farm folk tend to be very pragmatic about such matches.

In describing Bates as 'at his handsomest' and Christie 'at her loveliest', Lynch answers his own question. Sure, on the socio-economic level, these are rural farming folks who need to be pragmatic in work and business, but beauty has its own logic. In a way, Gabriel Oak is just as deluded and dreamy as Bathsheba. If he's so pragmatic and responsible, or rooted in the real world, why doesn't he find some nice rural woman and settle down with her? Why does he stick around Bathsheba's manor even though she can be insulting and impetuous? Because he is madly in love with her even though he is careful and hard-nosed enough not to show it. In Bathsheba, he wasn't just looking for a good match, a good farm wife. Surely, he could have found one of those as he is reasonably handsome and capable. But his mind is set on Bathsheba and no one but her. Indeed, it seems even his dream of raising sheep and becoming rich was to win Bathsheba's heart. Outwardly, he is a hardworking and responsible character, but in some ways, his devotion to Bathsheba betrays a mad love that is no less mad than the passion of others in the story.
Also, there is a hierarchy to beauty. While Alan Bates is reasonably handsome, he isn't beautiful. In contrast, Bathsheba is. Just like University of Michigan, though good, isn't Yale or Princeton, the fact is Gabriel Oak isn't on Bathsheba's level.
There is also the element of class. Bathsheba, as inheritor, is a woman of property whereas Oak isn't. Later, we meet William Boldwood who is a man of property, but he's aged and less attractive. Thus, neither is a dream match for Bathsheba. She is a flower in bloom. Oak, like his name, is a tree, but one that nevertheless longs to protect the flower from rain and wind.

Anyway, it misses the point to be sour with Bathsheba because she doesn't make a sensible choice. Furthermore, if she had acted sensibly, there wouldn't be much of a conflict and story as means to tease out the tangled threads of the heart and mind.

Soon Bathsheba moves away, and Gabriel tries to put her out of his mind. But when Gabriel’s flock is killed in a ghastly accident, he is forced to up stakes and seek employment on another man’s farm.

The dog that ran off the leash and drove the sheep over the cliff anticipates Troy's impact on the lives of villagers, and yet can we really blame the dog? A dog's true nature is that of the wolf, a warrior-beast. One part of the dog wants to obey & serve the master, but another part of the dog wants to be its own master and run wild-and-free. It want to be a wolf again. It's understandable why Oak shoots the dog, but we can also understand why the dog acted as it did.
And this applies to Troy as well. In some ways, he is a disruptive figure, rather like Randall McMurphy in ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST and Paul Newman in COOL HAND LUKE. But in another way, we can see why Bathsheba and men in the village are drawn to him. In a society of so many dour rules and regulations, he represents charisma and independence. (Sadly, current UK has moved to the other extreme, made all the worse because its main Troys are now mostly black who lack even the tragic romanticism of Troy. Notice BBC features a Negro as Achilles, the killer of Hector before the gates of Troy.)

When Bathsheba fires the farm’s bailiff for thievery, she decides that she will manage the farm herself. She is, in short, one of those “headstrong, independent women” that every year advertisers and journalists tell us are brand new, not like the shrinking violets and clinging vines of last year... However, unlike today’s strong, independent woman stories, Far from the Madding Crowd is not a feminist morality play. Quite the opposite. Hardy shows that Bathsheba’s independence is actually a source of great suffering for herself and the people around her...

I didn't get the sense that she was supposed to be 'headstrong, independent woman'. If anything, her decision seemed practical at the moment as there wasn't anyone to replace the bailiff. Also, the fact that her uncle/aunt had hired and kept around such a crook for so long goes to show that maybe older people aren't necessarily wiser.

Does the story show that Bathsheba's independence is a source of great suffering? But, didn't things really go south when she abandoned her independence and married Troy, with whom she became tragically besotted? Now, one could argue that female independence is doomed because a woman will use it to eventually surrender her freedom to an alpha-male-type who tends to be vain, narcissistic, and irresponsible. So, maybe it's better to deny women independence and match them with responsible men than let them run free and choose, because what they'll end up doing is surrendering their freedom to some cad, jerk, or a**hole(like maybe loverboy Ricardo Spencerio)? Maybe Nina Koupriovna would have done better to marry some nice bookwormish lad than the cad Spencer, the man who would be 007 crossed with Darth Vader and Batman.

But here's the thing. Given Bathsheba's personal nature, I think things would have been doomed just the same even if she had married or been married off to some responsible kind of man. She's the kind of woman who has to 'sow her wild oates' before she finally comes to her senses.
Some people learn fast or obey orders. Others have to get burned before they finally realize that the normal, the real, and the limited have value. Consider the ending of GREAT EXPECTATIONS. The woman had to undergo rejection and humiliation before finally settling on a life with Pip(than with a pimp).
And then, there is the crazy little thing called love. In DOCTOR ZHIVAGO, the main character has a perfectly good wife, but the real love of his life is Lara, and nothing could be done about that. For some people, essentialism is enough. They heed the timeless advice of eternal truths or conventional wisdom. But other people come to grips with reality only by the way of exisentialist process of experience, actualization, and realization. While most people would do better to stick with the tried-and-true, the West moved beyond tradition because of its power of will to be different, independent, and break free of the mold. Had Bathsheba been a Chinese girl in traditional society, she would likely have done as told, just like most of the men. But she has an independent streak, and it is a double-edged sword, a force of good and bad. Also, even if she acts rather callously with her freedom, it is that very quality that makes her so enticing to men like Oak and Boldwood. She is exciting, like Catherine(Jeanne Moreau) in JULES AND JIM. Though not exactly a femme fatale like Lulu in THE BLUE ANGEL or the nymphet in LOLITA(though, to be sure, that obsession was more Humbert Humbert's own doing), she catches the eyes of men like Oak and Boldwood because of her carefree spirit. Precisely because British society was rigid, regimented, and orderly -- where everyone was supposed to know his or her part -- , someone like Bathsheba really sticks out and enchants those around her.

The basic message of Far from the Madding Crowd is that empowering a person who lacks wisdom and maturity is a bad thing. Indeed, empowering such people actually cuts them off from the sources of wisdom and maturity that they need. But it is not just an anti-feminist message, although in this case the primary victim is a woman. It is an anti-individualist message, for the whole thrust of individualism is to empower people to make their own decisions, regardless of wisdom and maturity.

I'm all for wisdom and maturity, but how does one come upon them? By the trials and errors of life(where errors are sometimes quite valuable and possessed of worth & meaning, just like some foods come with key nutrients along with the toxins; also to get the honey, one must first go through the bees). The thing is to learn from them.
At the end of the story, one might say Bathsheba and Oak are wiser and maturer precisely because they made 'mistakes' and lived through them. It's a story as old as history itself. Take Adam and Eve in Eden. In a way, one might say they didn't deserve the freedom that foolishly made them eat from the Forbidden Tree. But without freedom, they would have been robots, not humans. Also, by the tragedy of disobeying God's wisdom, they set off a complex and fascinating chain of events that made humanity so interesting.

The historical difference between the East and the West is that the former was more about the rule by the wise and mature(the elderly) and obedience by the social inferiors(usually the young). As a result, East Asia has been historically more stable than the West, but it has also been more static and stagnant. Wisdom and maturity are real strengths, but they are also ruses for power, corruption, lack of imagination, fear of change, and/or greed. Furthermore, while it's true that people may grow wiser with age, they may also grow colder and more cynical, resentful(in envy of youth), and bitter. Patriarchy has its advantages and is preferable to rule by young brutes, but it can also be stuffy and stultifying. And when an old dog can't learn new tricks, is it really wise? And even if there could be a perfectly nice society ruled by the wise and mature, would it be ideal for the young to just take advice from wise men instead of breaking out on their own and discovering for themselves what is good and bad? A parent may want his children to do as told and listen to good advice, but if a child always acts 'ideal', is he really living and becoming a man? Isn't defiance a part of what makes life meaningful? After all, a child has to learn from scrapes and bruises what pain and healing are all about. It seems helicopter parenting has done more harm than good to many kids who were, from cradle, told to follow advice than find out or think for themselves.

There is a reason why Germanic Saga needs someone like Siegfried and why Arthurian legend need someone like Perceval. While it's true that Siegfried and Perceval are inexperienced, naive, immature, and foolish at times, they also have spirit, will, and 'idealism' lacking among the established members of the Order whose roles are so set in stone that they themselves cannot bring about necessary change. Just like it took the Young Turks to create Modern Turkey from the corpse of the Ottoman Empire, there is something to be said about youth. Ancient Athens was full of youthful vigor and spirit. It made a lot of mistakes, some of them grave, but it was also a center of innovation and revolution. In contrast, Byzantine Civilization was all about timeless wisdom and truth as revealed by Christ, but it was iron rule by a corrupt elite that suppressed new ideas and thoughts lest they upset the harmonious order of orthodoxy.
And consider 'wisdom' and 'maturity' at play in the films JEAN DE FLORETTE and MANON OF THE SPRING. The old farmer uses all his guile to destroy the upstart young would-be-farmer from the city, just like the Sicilian patriarchs in THE GODFATHER PART II use their 'respected' positions to ruthlessly bump off rivals. Of course, one could argue that such men are not truly wise or mature despite their stations in the community, but too often in history, what passes for 'wisdom' and 'maturity' are tried-and-true means of power than truth or justice at any price. Look around at most aged politicians, academics, journalists, and etc., and we don't see much in the way of wisdom or maturity but merely the guise of such. Besides, people will disagree on what is wise and mature.

Also, true wisdom and maturity come with experience, and that's why Bathsheba's wisdom/maturity at the end has genuine value. She earned it through experience. She lived through her mistakes and failures. But the thing is they weren't merely mistakes and failures but motivated by real dreams and passions. Her wisdom at the end is a lived and attained wisdom. In contrast, had she not been free and merely listened to the advice of elders and did as told, she never would have felt that her wisdom is truly hers since she just received and obeyed without having experienced and learned. This is the problem with academics. So few of them really live and experience reality. Rather, they just receive the 'wisdom' of their elders in colleges. As teachers' pets, they don't need to think or try things out for themselves. They feel they know because they've been told. In contrast, many on the Dissident Right, for good or ill, decided to find out for themselves what is true or not based on their own observations and realizations than on the received 'wisdom' of PC from boomer elders.
Also, today's feminism is not about free and independent women. Rather, it's about all these girls raised by Big Sister and Big Media/Academia. In contrast, Bathsheba is a free spirit, at least for awhile, because she is free of patriarchy, the church, and yet non-existent feminist 'sisterhood'.

Another point of the story is that there is a power greater than wisdom and maturity. The mythic power of romantic love, which simply can't be dismissed as foolishness. And it's not just Bathsheba who comes under this spell in relation to Troy. It affects Gabriel Oak too. He's good at hiding his feelings, but he is madly smitten with Bathsheba. And Boldwood's assumed wisdom and maturity are instantly rendered useless against the charms of Bathsheba, even when she confesses her callous act and rejects his offer of marriage. So, what good is wisdom and maturity when even a hard-headed, responsible, experience, mature, and wise man like Boldwood falls head-over-heels over a tart like Bathsheba? Good or bad, love is what Richard Spencer likes to characterize certain things: "It is what it is." It's like Ace Rothstein just can't let go of Sharon Stone's character in CASINO even though, by all rational calculations, she was not a safe bet. It's likely think Scorsese quoted a scene from MADDING CROWD for CASINO: Bathsheba catches Boldwood's eye when she tosses wheat at bidders at the market, and Stone does the same with the chips at the craps table. For serious buttoned-down men for whom everything is business, it is refreshing to see a spirited woman with devil-may-care attitude.


Also, the element of mystery in love owes to the difference between attraction and obsession. Anyone can feel attracted to any man or woman because he or she happens to be good-looking. But why the obsession that, unlike mere attraction, lingers and clings? Why was Humbert so powerless before Lolita? Why couldn't Zhivago resist his love for Lara? Why did the German professor give up everything for the singer in THE BLUE ANGEL? In the Yukio Mishima short story PRIEST AND HIS LOVE, why did a wise elderly Buddhist priest lose his peace of mind after a glimpse of a woman? American pop scholars Beavis and Butthead might say it was 'boing', but obsession goes beyond 'boing'. It's about Boing and Time, Boing and Nothingness.

Love is strange, which is why Merlin warns against it in EXCALIBUR.

https://ianwinterton.co.uk/what-about-nicol-williamson-as-merlin-in-excalibur/

“I once stood exposed to the dragon’s breath so a man could lie one night with a woman. It took me nine moons to recover and all for this lunacy called love, this mad distemper that strikes down both beggar and king. Never again!”

And yet, without the madness of love, men wouldn't fight for glory. After all, the Trojan War was about Helen of Troy. And there would have been no Arthur if not for Uther's desire for Igraine. There's no new life without mating of men and women. Now, any man or any woman will do to create life, and in the animal world, chimps will hump just about any other chimp, even granny chimps in HAROLD AND MAUDE fashion. But humans developed an eye for beauty like a tooth for sweetness, and so, there is a fascination with romantic love that supposedly transcends mere heat of the moment.

Also, the fascination with the power of love has to do with its odd blend of fragility and tenacity. When a big lug with an ax towers over you, that is an obvious kind of power. Or if some guy is smart and has expertise in organizing men, that kind of power is also easily understood. In contrast, women are weaker than men. And beautiful men are not necessarily the most powerful. Beauty, in and of itself, is useless in the utilitarian sense, and yet it's precious like gold and enchants people in the same way. People fought with swords made of bronze and iron but for gold, which for most of human history, was pretty useless from a pragmatic point of view. Likewise, people struggle with hands and feet to win the pretty face.

In a way, we can dismiss this fixation with love & beauty as foolishness, and we may agree that maturity-and-wisdom means to look beyond romantic enticements. And yet, the power of beauty has its own 'logic'. No matter how much one may be resolved to say NO to beauty, there it is, and even the most mature and learned man whose attitude is 'been there, done that' may instantly go 'gaga' over beauty. Take the film LOVE AND DEATH IN LONG ISLAND which begins with a jaded English writer who feels he's seen and felt just about everything. He's inured to life as same-old same-old routines of boredom and seems impervious to any foolish passion, and yet, upon watching some pretty boy in a teen comedy, he is totally smitten. On the one hand, he is indeed being foolish and begins to act silly. And yet, there is a sense of excitement and vigor that had been missing in his life, and it could only have come from this fascination with the young actor.



Gabriel... consistently demonstrates manly self-discipline, conscientiousness, and technical mastery. He is, in truth, a natural leader—an alpha male... He’s a rock. He’s always there for her. And apparently there’s nothing the least bit loveable or sexy about it from her point of view.

Is he a natural leader? He seems more a natural doer. He is capable, and others rely upon him. But being a good manager isn't quite the same as being a leader who needs the power to inspire others. Gabriel is all hands and feet. He's a carpenter, not an architect. Also, if he's an alpha male, why is he like a loyal dog to a woman who shows no interest in him? He is a sturdy and capable fellow but emotionally as much beta as alpha. And of course there isn't much sexiness about being a 'rock'. Rocks don't rock but stay in place. It's the rolling stones that rock.

One spring day, Bathsheba finds an unused valentine... On a whim, Bathsheba writes “Marry Me” on it and sends it to Mr. Boldwood... A more mature woman would have admitted her mistake, apologized sincerely, and flatly refused him... But Boldwood too was at fault. He was too smitten to grasp Bathsheba’s immaturity and simply would not take no for an answer. Like Gabriel, he should have simply tried to put her out of his mind.

This shoulda-coulda perspective is too schoolmarmish for our understanding of the story. If we take the shoulda-coulda outlook in arts & culture, we can sit around griping endlessly about how foolish a whole bunch of characters acted in plays, novels, and movies. In some cases, the actions are just plain stupid and could have been avoided. But, MADDING CROWD is about individuals acting under a certain power, and the element of free will is only a small part of the whole equation. It's like when a fire is really raging, it has to burn through before people can start to plant and start anew. In the film UGETSU, one may say the potter 'made a mistake' to be seduced by the ghost-temptress, and yet the story makes us understand why the spell was irresistible. If we take a libertarian rationalist perspective, it sure was stupid for Scotty to fall head-over-heels in love with Madeline in VERTIGO, but the mythic power of love was such that he was sucked into the undertow. So, taking a rationalist and moralist approach to MADDING CROWD doesn't make us understand what is going on.
The problem is not that Boldwood is 'at fault'. He is under a spell, and it is just too powerful. Even if he decided to wake up one day and rationally will himself to forget about Bathsheba, her image and voice will haunt him all day and night. It's beyond his personal will.
Also, Oak did NOT put her out of his mind. Because he grew up tough and poor, he knows his place in the world. He knows he's no lover boy nor how to be one. He was compelled to be pragmatic all his life, and so he carries on with nose-to-grindstone. And yet, she has never left his mind. He sticks around not only for work but because he too is quietly smitten with her. The difference is that Boldwood, as a man of means and property, has a chance of winning her whereas Oak hasn't, at least until the very end when Bathsheba's been through so much that she needs a rock to hold onto. Anyway, it was easier for Oak to accept reality because he has slim chance of winning her, especially upon realizing that she's wealthier than he'd assumed at the beginning. In contrast, Boldwood is bound to suffer more because he feels he has the station and wealth to win her over. She seems within his grasp, which is why he can't let go.
Furthermore, Oak has youth and looks, which counts for something in a man. Even if Bathsheba won't have him, he has a kind of pride of strength and health. In contrast, Boldwood is a middle-aged man for whom Bathsheba is the last chance for real love and happiness. As a man of means, he could have married some nice woman long ago, but he devoted himself to work and property and assumed he'd be content with that. But in the encounter with Bathsheba, he realized how empty life was on his own, and it has to be her and her alone because she made him realize that emptiness of his. It's like a man who'd grown accustomed to undernourishment but then eyes a juicy steak that makes his mouth water so much that it has to be that steak and only that steak alone.

A mature and sensitive woman would never have trifled so callously with the old bachelor’s heart.

And yet he's grateful because he feels alive again. A mature and sensitive woman might have left him alone, but then, his entire life would have been the same old same old until he grew old and died without knowing any passion. But despite the agony and ultimately tragedy, Boldwood felt alive because of Bathsheba's high-spirited flirtation that seemed so fresh and flighty. She was like spring to a man who'd settled on never-ending winter. A bear out of hibernation is especially hungry. It's like what the woman brings to the spartan community in BABETTE'S FEAST. It disrupts the social order devoted to piety and virtue, but the folks are also grateful for flavors they'd never known.
Maturity and sensitivity are good generally but also repressive of spontaneity and inspiration. In our time, we need to stress maturity and wisdom as we live in the Age of Shameless Infantilism, but things were different in the world of MADDING CROWD. Back then, British society needed more freedom and individuality, not less. It's like warm tea is for winter, cold lemonade is for summer. We must be careful not to project current problems onto the past. Everything needs balance. It's like Robin Williams' loosening up the classroom in DEAD POETS SOCIETY makes sense in that preppy milieu, and Edward James Olmos was good to bring order & discipline to the rough barrio school in STAND AND DELIVER. Is something too hot, cool it down; if something is too cold, warm it up.

Bathsheba's valentine antic was silly and childish, but it was also unexpected. It had an element of spark. In a world where everything is routine and predictable, what Boldwood never expected came to be and ignited something in him. He received a love offer, and he was bedazzled. In SEPARATE PEACE by John Knowles, Finny certainly lacks 'maturity and sensitivity', but he's the life of the school because he takes chances and has lots of charm, which makes Gene envious and resentful.

Bathsheba might well have ended up marrying Boldwood were it not for the appearance of cavalry sergeant Francis Troy... Although his face entirely lacks beauty or character, the fact that he is tall, dashing, and wears a uniform makes him irresistible to women. Troy, however, is a cad, with a full suite of what the manosphere calls “Dark Triad” traits—narcissism, sociopathy, and manipulativeness—which women commonly mistake for healthy alpha male traits...

Terence Stamp lacks beauty? I suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but Terence Stamp was considered one of the most beautiful men of his time. And he looks fabulous in MADDING CROWD. It's no wonder he was cast in Pasolini's TEOREMA as a god-like figure who comes to a bourgeois family and commit sexual-like acts, homo and straight, with each of the members. John Simon called it 'godomy'.



It seems Lynch sees too much of Richard Spencer in Troy(LOL), and this clouds his judgement about the character. Troy is something of a cad but not entirely, and he is not without certain depths and twisted integrity of his own.

Before Bathsheba came on the scene, Troy had seduced, impregnated, and then abandoned one of the farm girls, Fanny Robin. He actually agreed to marry her. But it was an impromptu affair, and when she went to the wrong church at the appointed time, his vanity was so inflamed that he broke the engagement.

That over-simplifies what really happened. One doesn't get the sense that Troy seduced a farm girl merely for self-amusement. Also, it probably didn't require much in the way of seduction because it's easy to fall for a handsome dashing soldier. And, he didn't abandon her but called off the wedding when she arrived late. This wasn't just a matter of simpering vanity. The fact is, despite Troy being a man without means, he was willing to do the right thing and marry below his station because he had genuine feelings for Fanny. Besides, as he didn't know about the pregnancy, he wasn't acting out of social compulsion. In his view, he was being gracious and going out of his way to do a favor to Fanny. All his men surely heard about the wedding, and he invited some of them to the ceremony. So, he did his part to do something for Fanny, but the simple-minded country girl totally humiliated him in front of his peers. It wasn't really her fault, but we can surely understand his fury. This was a matter of wounded pride, not mere vanity. And back then, a man's reputation relied much on pride and honor. So, it is understandable why he found Fanny's absence at the wedding to be utterly intolerable.

In one of the best scenes of the film, Boldwood tries to bribe Troy into marrying Fanny and leaving Bathsheba to him. Troy toys with Boldwood, then announces that he is too late, for he has married Bathsheba that very morning. Boldwood is crushed.

This is actually to Troy's credit. It shows that he is not just about money and cannot be bought. He does have a sense of pride and, if anything, despises Boldwood for being so weak and ultimately servile.

The honeymoon does not last long... He is immediately accepted as lord of the manor, but he has no knowledge of farming or interest in responsibility. In a scene that beautifully illustrates his character—or lack of it—he regales the adoring farmhands with bawdy military songs while drinking them under the table. Meanwhile, a storm brews up, and when Gabriel tries to get some of the farmhands away from the party to secure the hayricks from being blown away, he is rebuffed by Troy who does not want to lose his audience. It is classic narcissist behavior. So Gabriel and Bathsheba herself struggle in the storm, soaked to the bone, to save the farm from loss while Troy’s revelries continue.

Again, this is an over-simplification of what really happened. It was a festive moment with dancing, music, and food-and-drinks. Anxious of the looming storm, Oak rather feebly tries to convey the message to Troy who, at the moment, is in a middle of a dance with Bathsheba. Naturally, Troy doesn't want to be interrupted. If Oak really cared about recruiting some men to tie the hay down, he should have gone to Troy directly, but he uses a rather ineffective doddering intermediary. Too busy dancing, Troy never heard anything about the storm. So, it's not like he refused aid despite knowledge of the looming storm. He never got the message. Also, Oak could have made his case before the people in the barn AFTER THE DANCE, but he remains tight-lipped. Why didn't Oak himself walk up to Troy. Because he has his own sense of wounded pride. He is quietly sulking over the fact that the woman HE loves married Troy. So, he'd rather use a go-between. And if he really needed a few men to help him, he could pulled them away without permission from Troy who isn't paying much attention anyway.

Also, is it such a bad thing that, once in a long while, the men of the village have a pretty good time with song and drink with Troy who, instead of looking down on them as mere farmhands, treats them as fellow-revelers? The fact is Troy never heard of the storm, and it took some time before the men in the barn were totally drunk. But Oak never once runs back in to call for help.
In a way, he seems almost grateful to go it alone because hard work is his therapy, his way of coping with disappointments. Some people go for comfort-food. Oak goes for comfort-work. It's a way to get his mind off things.
But more importantly, it is his opportunity to demonstrate his true worth to Bathsheba. It is through work and hardship that he is able to bond with her, if only for a moment as she comes out to work alongside him. He can't be the white knight but can be the work-horse who proves his worth. And Bathsheba is impressed and grateful for what seems like selfless devotion on his part. While the sheep are prancing with the wolf in the barn, the loyal dog is weathering the storm to serve the master.

Bathsheba is willing to suffer quite a lot because she is “in love” with Troy.

Mythic love is the strongest and most potent kind of love. What is the appeal of Greek mythology? Why do mortals fall in love with gods and even make love with them? By human standards, gods seem vain, irresponsible, and self-indulgent, but that's because they are gods and live by their own rules. A vulgarized form of this is celebrity worship in our society, and it's often stupid. But we can understand why people feel this way. Children naturally identify with princes and princesses than with hardworking peasants or blacksmiths. In MONTY PYTHON'S HOLY GRAIL, the toiling peasants rail against the exploitative king and nobility, but we are always drawn more to gods, kings, knights, and heroes than with ordinary folks, no matter how decent they are.



Now, I'm all for humanism, but the mythic side of human psychology isn't going away anytime soon. In the end, humanism prevails because no man, however brilliant or handsome, is literally a god. They grow old and die. Look at Sean Connery now. Still, we can understand why Bathsheba fell in love with Troy for his 'vain' and 'irresponsible' godlike qualities. He acts like he's too good for ordinary work. Though not of noble lineage(as far as I could tell), he was of the warrior profession and comports like a man suited for adventure and glamour. In MILDRED PIERCE, why does the eponymous heroine toil to support a man of finesse and class? Because one can't really buy style. Some have it, some don't. Now, is Troy a contemptible figure like the guy in MILDRED PIERCE? Deeply flawed but no. There is a saving grace about Troy to which Lynch is willfully blind.

But things come crashing down when a very pregnant Fanny Robin shows up at the farm asking for Troy’s help, then promptly dies in childbirth. When the coffin is brought to the farm for burial, Gabriel hides the fact that it also contains a baby... Troy then walks in, and... he seems to be filled with love and remorse for Fanny... He is simulating love and dejection merely to spite Bathsheba. Troy then goes to the ocean, undresses, and swims out to sea.

Lynch fails to mention that when Fanny showed up, Troy was kind and gentle with her, and he did try to get the money for her. Troy is not without a soul. He did have and still has genuine feelings for Fanny. Bathsheba misunderstood this by suspecting infidelity on his part. She thought he was asking for money for an affair. It was to do right by Fanny.

As for Troy's sudden rush of emotions about dead Fanny, something he hadn't felt before, it too has to do with the mythic dimensions of love. While alive, Fanny was just a pretty girl he'd been engaged to or a pitiable figure in need of charity, but as a dead woman(especially with his child) she becomes the stuff of myth. There's a blend of guilt, spirituality, and poetry in how Troy feels about Fanny as ghost. It's like Madeleine comes to mean much more to Scotty after she dies in VERTIGO. She goes from sad beauty to the stuff of myth. And in LA STRADA, the death of Gelsomina has a devastating effect on Zampano. She goes from human dog to an angel.

The notion that Troy was merely 'simulating' or faking emotions to spite Bathsheba doesn't do justice to what really happens in that scene. Troy may not be a deep character who carries life lessons wherever he goes, but he is consumed by the passion of the moment, and his pathos upon gazing at dead Fanny was not fake. In that moment at least, he discovered a kind of love he had never known or felt, and compared to this dark love of tragic poetry, Bathsheba looked like a flighty little bird, a nothing. He becomes, at least for awhile, as consumed in his love for mythic Fanny as Bathsheba is for mythic Troy(and as Boldwood is for mythic Bathsheba). In all three cases, the characters see more than there really is, but then love is always an illusion to some degree. To Boldwood, Bathsheba isn't just a pretty woman but a goddess whom he must serve if not possess. To Bathsheba, Troy isn't just a handsome feller but a god-man who lives by his own rules. It's as if he descended from Mt. Olympus. And to Troy, the image of dead Fanny and her child fills him with dark and deep vision of love and beauty he hadn't known but now knows and feels with such power(though not forever as he's not that kind of man).

Love is subjective and relative. It's like the circus scene when Troy in disguise stands before a horse trained to feign death. Some in the audience are laughing, some are amused, some are a bit sad, but one man is bawling in grief. Why? Something especially mushy about his character? Or did he know of a beloved horse that died?
Individuals and objects elicit different responses from us depending on our emotional nature, genetic makeups, life histories, and memories. Fanny, Troy, and Bathsheba belong to a circular trio whereas Oak and Boldwood are left out. What do Fanny, Troy, and Bathsheba have in common? All three were overcome with mad love and were objects of mad love. Bathsheba was the object of mad love by Boldwood and Oak(who hides it beneath his tough and hardened exterior). Troy was the object of mad love by Bathsheba(and perhaps Fanny). And Fanny, at least in death, becomes the object of mad love by Troy. In contrast, no one loved Boldwood and Oak madly.

As Christmas approaches, Boldwood... will be announcing his engagement. But then disaster strikes... Troy reappears. He has faked his death. But having heard of Bathsheba’s prospective engagement, he returns out to spite to assert his marital rights. Bathsheba is shocked and refuses to follow him. So Troy begins to manhandle her. Then we hear a shot. Troy falls dead on the stairs. Boldwood stands with a rifle.

I think saying that he 'faked' his death is too harsh. Based on what is shown, it seems he failed in his death. Drowning oneself at sea isn't easy. Also, what did Troy have to gain by faking his death? Having failed in his death, he hides in shame by traveling around with some hokey circus troupe doing pony tricks.
One thing for sure, he did swim far out to sea after taking his clothes off. If he really just wanted to fake his death, he wouldn't have gone nude at all or ran into the waves. He would have just left some clothes behind and ran off.

Then we witness one of the most wrenching tragic climaxes since Sophocles. Bathsheba breaks down in tears over her beloved Frank. Boldwood looks on, in utter horror, at the abyss of irrationality into which he has now flung his life. He will hang for this, for absolutely nothing. Two men are dead, one noble, the other absolutely base, all for a woman of genuine beauty and goodness who was empowered to make catastrophic decisions that destroyed two lives and brought misery to her own.

LOL. I'm telling you. Troy isn't as bad as Richard Spencer but then Richard Spencer isn't as bad as 'Richard Spencer', the delusional Faustian Batman. He just needs to grow up and put away childish things.

Irrationality, yes, but emotions are irrational. Why was Boldwood so obsessed with Bathsheba? Irrational. And yet, it is too simplistic to say that he will 'hang... for absolutely nothing'. He will hang for the profound truth of love. And if he were given a choice between a scenario where he never fell in love with Bathsheba & lived a quiet life all alone AND a scenario where he faces execution after having fallen in love with her and killed for her, he might still have chosen the latter because it brought him close to love and passion even if it leads to the gallows. Tragedy has its own beauty.
Also, ironically enough, it is his killing of Troy that reignites her mad passion for Troy, just like the death of Fanny made Troy love her more than he could have loved her alive. And in a way, it's fitting that both men's lives end in doom. Troy, the man for whom Bathsheba felt impossible love, and Boldwood, the man who felt impossible love for Bathsheba. Boldwood may hang, but for several years, he has truly lived life and plumbed the depths of human emotions from the high drama. When he killed Troy, did he think he was protecting Bathsheba from him? Did he kill out of jealousy? And yet, even though Bathsheba and Boldwood will never be together, they are united in the same emotions, that of the impossible love. Whatever happens, Troy was the great love of her life, and whatever happens, Bathsheba was the great and only love of Boldwood's life.

When, at the end of STRAW DOGS, Dustin Hoffman's character finally finishes off one of the invaders with a wolf trap, it turns out his wife is more horrified by the death(of her former lover and rapist) than relieved to see her husband triumphant. Irrational perhaps, but there is an underlying rationality to irrationality. If in evolutionary history, women gravitated toward and felt safer with stronger alpha males than weaker males, then women will be genetically programmed to favor alphas over betas. And if we evolved to appreciate beauty as an intoxicant, then it is natural and 'rational' that we would be smitten with it and work so hard to attain it in one form or another. Everything 'irrational' makes sense from another perspective. If beauty is precious and alluring, then people will be drawn to beauty like plants to sunlight. Just like the beautiful Rhine Maiden say NO to the ugly Nibelungen, the game of beauty is where the blessed few get to play gods, at least in the summer of youth.

Also, Boldwood isn't that noble, and Troy isn't that base. If Boldwood were so noble, he would care more about the betterment of the community than fixate so heavily on bliss with Bathsheba. And Troy, like the Burt Lancaster character in THE SWIMMER, is a romantic, a saving grace. He is sometimes a jerk, but he is more, if in surprise even to himself. But then, no one fully understands oneself, and things happen that release emotions that shockingly upend one's sense of self and worldview. There is a gentle kind of wisdom that one learns through study and discourse, but there is another kind of wisdom that can only be attained by trial by fire. It's like there's gentle conversion to a new faith based on sacred texts & rituals, and then, there's impassioned conversion like Paul's Damascus moment. A sense of being born again.

...instead of wasting away in Bathsheba’s friend zone, Gabriel decides to move to America. Only then does Bathsheba truly appreciate him. For she can only really love a man who is independent of her. She rushes to stop him. Gabriel says he will stay under one condition. Then, in a gesture that will pierce even the most cynical hearts, he repeats word for word his vision of married life that she had rejected at the beginning of the film. But this time she says yes. It was the right choice...
The movie ends with Gabriel and Bathsheba settling into married bliss. But then the eye of the camera strays over to Troy’s clock, focusing on the soldier in the tower, like a memento mori to remind us that the Troys of the world and the irrational romanticism they evoke will always threaten marriage and family life.

Did Oak really plan on moving to America or was it a ploy to bind Bathsheba closer to him? And does she suddenly feel love for Oak because of his plan to emigrate, a sign of independence from her? I think not. After all, upon being rebuffed at the beginning of the film, Oak demonstrated his independence by accepting her decision and carrying on. At one time, she banished him from the farm, and he just took up and left. Oak demonstrated, at least outwardly, time and time again that he can go on without her. But all that time, Bathsheba didn't feel any love for him.

In a way, Oak is just as irrational as Boldwood and Troy. If he really wanted a family, he should have found some nice farm girl and started a family. But he remained single because he only cared for one woman. Even when she married Troy and then was about to marry Boldwood, he hung around, unmarried. It was as if he was so smitten with her that he was waiting for second servings and leftovers in case some tragedy struck, and by some luck(or tragedy, but then, one man's misfortune is another man's fortune), chance killed two birds with one stone. Boldwood took out Troy, and the Law took him out. Oak was running third but the first-runner and second-runner tripped over one another, and Oak ended up 'finishing first'.
But then, the fact is Troy had her first, and Boldwood almost had her second. Oak got her by luck, and one wonders what he would have done if she'd married Boldwood and if Troy hadn't returned. Would he have waited around, growing older, in the hope that Boldwood will die and then finally Bathsheba will marry him? There is a slow-burning romanticism in that. The fact is Oak is himself a romantic though he hasn't the style and means to show it. So, he broods silently and takes out his frustrations through hard work. And in the end, he reaps his rewards, but the moral tale isn't just about the primacy of marriage and family. If it were, Oak would have settled down with some nice dependable farm girl than hang around for leftovers because he can't get Bathsheba out of his mind.

Also, in an odd way, Troy was the matchmaker of Bathsheba and Oak because she had to get it out of her system(via her mad burning love with Troy) to finally arrive at a more balanced and stable outlook on life. Her appreciation of Oak couldn't have been possible if not for her tumultuous life journey with Troy, the peaks and pits of her life. It's like it took Dorothy's adventure in the land of Oz for her to finally appreciate that there's no place like home.

The Anglo-Saxon character has been defined by love of risk & adventure and appreciation of security & order. Some on the Alt Right say Spencerism represents the 'imperialist' Anglo will to wander, conquer, and discover whereas 'nationalist' Johnsonism represents the Anglo wish to preserve, defend, and maintain. Both were crucial in the rise of Anglosphere, a spirit of adventure tempered by discipline and sobriety.
After all, the overly cautious are hardly conquerors. East Asian high civilization, conservative and cautious, remained locked within East Asia. In contrast, Europeans were willing to throw caution to the winds and go sailing across oceans just to see what's on the other side. There was an element of madness in all this, but without it, there would have been no triumph of the West. Granted, European adventure was premised on European order, much like church towers are buttressed by support systems, something too many people have forgotten about the West, especially British Civilization.

The tragedy of Troy is he didn't have enough battles to fight. Just like Oak is at his best immersed in work, Troy feels most alive and useful in the battlefield with a saber. Even on the farm, he prefers cockfights to the drudgery of labor, but then that is why Bathsheba married him. She wanted a god with a saber atop a horse, not another farm hand with a pitchfork.

Richard Spencer and the George Bailey Rule — Why Clarence’s Law matters in Politics — Why No One is saying "I am Spencertacus"

If anything seemed certain at the time, Jesus got whupped real bad. He was captured, tried, whipped, stripped, crucified, and humiliated. It’s hard to imagine a worse whupping. The Romans didn’t take Him seriously. He was just another Jew who had to be executed. Most Jews rejoiced as they regarded Him as a heretic and blasphemer. And peoples of various other tribes who assembled to watch the punishment and death of Jesus may have found entertainment value in the spectacle. After all, Romans had crucified scores of people. So, the death of Jesus should have been just one more among the countless, and that would have been that.
But what made a difference? The fact is Jesus inspired such love, devotion, respect, and reverence among His Disciples and followers that even after they scattered, denied, and/or renounced Him, they were overcome with guilt that slowly hardened into a resolve to serve His spirit. And that small but steady fire would gradually spread and even convert & conquer the souls of Romans. Many of Jesus’ followers suffered and even died in their service to the spirit, but they were willing to do so because of their deep love and respect for Jesus. Without such devotion on their part, Christianity wouldn’t have had a chance.

We see something similar in two films, IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE and SPARTACUS. What George Bailey realizes at the end is that all his good deeds and good works made him a beloved figure in the community. Sure, he had to sacrifice his personal ambition, and there were rough roads along the way, but the things he did for the community were remembered by the people of Bedford Falls. Furthermore, people respected him for his intelligence, conscientiousness, and self-sacrifices. In the end, even the capitalist enterpriser Sam Wainright sends him money in time of need. So, when Harry Bailey toasts his older brother as ‘the richest man in town’, it’s not about money. It’s about respect, gratitude, and trust. It is what Mr. Potter will never have despite his immense riches. Even though Bailey had been ground down by daily routine, the fact is every good thing he did earned him respect among members of the community. In the end, he reaps what he’d sown... in the positive sense.
In the case of Spartacus, his rebellion fails. The slaves are killed or enslaved once again. Or they are captured and crucified. The captured men are promised mercy IF they name Spartacus, but none of them does. They respect and admire him so much that they’d rather die with him than spill the beans to the Romans. Spartacus earned such respect because he’d proven by words and deeds that he was for all of them, for freedom and dignity.

Since Charlottesville, Richard Spencer has faced a rough road. And his deplatforming has gotten worse and worse. He is being targeted and isolated for the Kill by the Powers-that-be. A frivolous lawsuit has been made against him, but it carries weight because some of the most powerful Jewish Supremacist law firms and the Jewish-supremacist media are working hand-in-hand to bring him down to set an example for the world. As such, Spencer has asked for support and help, and some have been willing to donate funds to his defense.

But what is most striking is the general lack of care and concern for Spencer despite him being the most well-known face of the Alt Right. There is little affection and love for Spencer, and not much respect or trust either. In his time of need, Spencer is mostly an isolated figure... even though perhaps some might see value in Anti-Spencerism(by the elites) as a welcome lightning-rod. After all, if so much Establishment thunderbolts are aimed at Spencer, then OTHER Alt-Right and Dissident Right figures will be spared. They may figure, "Let Spencer draw and take bulk of the heat while we remain relatively safe and carry on with the conversation and financial transactions." Indeed, lightning rods have spared many communities from being blasted by heavenly rage. Because Spencer is the most recognizable figure of the Alt Right, much of the violence(physical or rhetorical) by everyone from the Establishment Elites to Antifa bottom-feeders has focused on getting HIM. Also, there is the Eastwood factor. Notice that in many Eastwood action movies, we learn that the hero had been nearly lynched by the Mob. It’s as if the mediocre-looking types want to destroy, out of subconscious envy, the figure who looks better than them. Indeed, much of Antifa rage is steeped in what might be called ‘Fassbinderism’(after the famous German director of the 1970s). It is the War of Ugly on Aesthetics. Anyway, the elites generally think a movement can be neutralized or destroyed by taking out the head honcho. So, the French thought their troubles were over in Algeria when they took out the rebel elites. And the Apartheid government of South Africa thought Mandela would be helpless behind bars. But in the end, the Algerian uprising returned with greater fury. And Mandela eventually triumphed. But then, even as those revolutionaries had been vanquished, exterminated, or captured, there was much love and respect among the masses for those people. It’s like the love for the dead rebel leader among the poor folks in UNDER FIRE.

But has any White National leader won such respect and devotion among his fans and followers? I can’t think of one. Perhaps, this is due to the fact that most of Modern History was one of domination of the Rest by the West. It’s far more difficult to feel sympathy for the over-dog or top-dog than for the underdog. And even when white warriors were on the margins and fighting an uphill battle, like the remnants of white colonialist types in Vietnam, Algeria, Rhodesia, and South Africa, they were regarded as struggling to maintain white privilege in lands that were not theirs. Jesus and Spartacus were clearly underdogs. And even though T. E. Lawrence was an agent of the British Empire, he took on an ‘underdog’ role by leading the Arabs against the Ottoman Empire that was allied with Germany.
In contrast, despite the uphill underdog struggles of men like David Duke and Richard Spencer, it’s hard for them to garner wider sympathy because the History and the Narrative for so long has been ‘white hegemony’ over the world. Also, David Duke ruined his chances as a White Advocate by doing stupid stuff like joining the ridiculous KKK and blaming EVERYTHING on Jews. Jewish Power is immensely important as challenge and threat, but Duke turned it into a cartoon. As for Spencer, it’s hard to see him as a man struggling for justice for his people when he spouts off about how the West must be like the Empire in STAR WARS, how super-rich Bruce Wayne(Batman) and amoral James Bond are Alt Right archetypes, how Africa must be conquered again under neo-Kipling-ism, and how the only game left is an endless struggle for Power in a globalized world of constant flux. Spencer’s idea is that the Classic West is over because the Dark Invasion cannot be stopped, therefore, the New White Right must learn how to conquer the world as the world conquers the West. It’s really a futurist-right variation of Soros-ism. In a world where borders and security can no longer be taken for granted, there is an endless struggle for domination, and Spencer thinks the white race can win this game and rule over the world like Darth Vader over Ewoks and Jawas or something. Well, at least Darth Vader had massive starship fleets to mess up entire star systems. And at least Batman had tons of money and all sorts of gadgets with which he could beat up ‘bad guys’. And at least James Bond was so favored by luck that even when he fell out of an airplane, he was sure to land on his feet on a yacht with bikini-clad babes. But reality is another matter. It just sounds ridiculous for Spencer to pontificate about Vaderian greatness when he can’t even pay for a drink with a credit card. It’s close to being comical, even pathetic.

Now, I don’t say anything with glee or personal amusement. I do respect Spencer to the extent that his life could have been smooth sailing IF he’d taken thirty pieces of silver and played the game like Peter Keating in THE FOUNTAINHEAD but did not and took a bold path in life. Spencer could have been someone like Paul Ryan or Mitt Romney. He could have been a well-paid shabbos goy toy of the Jews. Unlike some people who gravitate toward ‘radical’ politics or ‘extremist’ views because of they are ‘losers’ with low status and no talent, Spencer could have had a much better material and social life. He could have played the game. Though no genius, he is intelligent and had written some thoughtful and penetrating pieces about the nature of US politics. And he has the right personality and image that could succeed in politics or the corporate world. So, even his critics have to give him credit for giving up a lot to pursue a risky cause in our PC-dominant world. But like the character of PRINCE OF THE CITY, Spencer hasn’t given up enough, and that, ironically, is one of the main sources of his problems.

If you want to lead a cause, you have to dig deeper and push further. By this, I don’t mean ideological extremism or what is called ‘purity spirals’. If anything, his contacts with Andrew Anglin were unwise to say the least. It was handing ammo to the enemy to shoot him with. What I mean is Connecting with the People. The problem with Spencer is he grew up affluent, pretty, and popular. Though not uber-rich, his family was rich enough. And his childhood and youth were pretty easy. Due to his privileged status, image, and personality, lots of doors could open up to him if he made half the effort. Much of his life was about FUN. As long as he kept his radical politics under wraps, he could be a liked guy. That is all very nice but the wrong attitude(and expectations) to have in the calling of ‘radical’ politics. It’s like one can play toy-soldiers far from battle but not in a real war. And one can play around as a professional wrestler, but it’s real contest of will and muscle in true wrestling or boxing. There is NO MERCY from the enemy in a real war. And Spencer entered a real war but failed to understand this... despite having written time and time again on the Carl-Schmitt-ian theory that Logic of Power than Rule of Law really governs how things work.
How did Spencer fall into this deer-in-the-headlights illusion? For those who had social and economic advantages in life, there is a tendency to believe that destiny is on your side. It leads to vanity, narcissism, over-confidence, and ultimately hubris, usually the deadliest of all sins when the prize or grail is within view.

While Spencer must be credited with heading off the Alt Right movement with his first Alternative Right website, the fact is its momentum soon stalled. While some of the writers were provocative, many were either too fringy(especially Jack Donovon, the ‘machomo’ theorist) or ‘cringy’(especially the second-rate Neo-Nazi Alex Kurtagic). The original Alt Right failed to attract a core staff of first-rate thinkers, theorists, critics, or opinionists. Thus, its quality fluctuated wildly from thoughtful to downright insane. Whatever one may say of THE AMERICAN CONSERVATIVE, it is consistent in tone and quality(even if one disagrees with its general drift and core positions). The original Alternative Right website was like the boat in ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST where no one has firm grip on the steering. It kept veering off in many directions. Also, the fiasco with Colin Liddell and Andy Nowicki(and the bad blood that exists to this day) was the first clear sign that Spencer was capable of ‘betrayal’, as with the character in THE YEAR OF LIVING DANGEROUSLY.

Perhaps, ‘betrayal’ is too strong a word, but he pulled down the site that he’d effectively handed over to Liddell and Nowicki to edit-and-manage without consulting them properly. Why such impetuousness? The answer probably lies in Spencer’s character flaw developed in the formative stages of youth when he coasted through life and generally got what he wanted from loving parents, supportive community, easy connections, and physical likableness. His one liability, especially as he entered college and graduate school, was his un-PC politics, but his natural charm surely allowed him to weather the storm better than others without genetic advantages. The downside of such personality is egotism that may run out of control and sacrifices friendship and loyalty out of personal whim.
This is ironic since Spencer hasn’t been willing to compromise or sacrifice his principles or overarching vision. And yet, precisely because he’s enamored and committed to his Higher Vision, he has tended to grow impatient and indifferent to those around him when things don’t pan out as planned. The first Alternative Right site was supposed to create waves but generally failed to. Instead, it became the vessel of two Alt Right ‘nerds’ Nowicki, the beta-male saint at war with ‘whanking’, and goofy Liddell, the naughtier version of Mark Steyn: Liddell will Name-the-Jew.
This side of Spencer, a willful nature all too dismissive and inconsiderate of others, would set a template for things to come. He made unnecessary enemies of allies. Or, if not exactly ‘enemies’, he lost the respect and, more importantly, the trust of those who’d devoted their time and energy toward serving his project. At this point, Spencer shut down the original Alternative Right site(soon to resurface as a separate venture of Nowicki and Liddell in Blogspot) and started a new site called Radix Journal. In essence, there was no difference between the original Alternative Right site and Radix site except the change in name. In other words, it was as if re-branding could ignite what the original Alternative Right site had failed to. But Radix Journal met the same fate. It failed to generate buzz and didn’t become the focus of conversation in the political and ideological discourse. It was one of the many alternative or dissident political voices and sites on the internet. But far from the first.

Still, Spencer did contribute to a broader awakening that was happening independently of but not entirely disassociated from Spencer’s basic concept of an ‘alternative right’. On their own, many young and fresh voices began to create their own sites, make their own videos, and form their own ideas(and ‘memes’) on sites like 4chan. Though Spencer was far from being the only or the central figure in the new awakening — HBD, Steve Sailer, Jared Taylor, Paul Gottfried, John Derbyshire, Brett Stevens, Greg Johnson, Kevin MacDonald, David Duke, Keith Preston, and many others had played their role — , he had played his part in getting some of the ideas across. It’s arguable and probable that Spencer hadn’t contributed much to the movement in terms of theory. His piece on Donald Trump, "Napoleon of the Current Year", possibly the single best article on the Trump phenomenon, suggests that Spencer could have been a more important figure as thinker, theorist, and pundit, but his main energies were expended on forming a movement and creating networks. If many Alt Right figures prefer to remain in the shadows, focus on theory than practice, or feel more comfortable with words than action, Spencer liked to be out there as the shaker of hands and organizer of men. Such personality types tend to be Natural Politicians, and this was both an advantage and disadvantage for Spencer. If Spencer simply wanted to make it as a political figure, he could have chosen to be more diplomatic and strategic. And this opportunistic side of Spencer is precisely what led to the fallouts between Spencer and others whose dedication to the cause was more earnest and straightforward.

And yet, there is another side of Spencer that is determined and resolute(on the Big Picture), and this has made him rigid at times in strategy, leading to huge miscalculation of the power dynamics. In a way, Spencer’s breakdown of Paul Nehlen’s implosion applies to himself as well. According to Spencer, one can choose the radical way with all its risks and dangers(but also the reward of pride of principle) OR the practical way of serving implicit Alt Right positions by playing it mainstream, a kind of Saul-Alinsky-tactic of the Right. Nehlen simply didn’t have the mind or manners to go the radical path and would have been better off shaking hands and kissing babies. Nehlen didn’t know what he was getting into and badly mixed All-Americanism with Alt-Right Awakening. Spencer’s insights on Nehlen were pretty much spot-on, but the same rules could apply to him as well. Spencer never seemed to ask himself whether he was in the Alt Right movement in a hardcore way to be its theorist & ‘prophet’ or in a middle-of-the-road way to be its manager & diplomat. Was he really in it for Fury or for Fun? If the former, why hasn’t he written a definitive book or tome to explain his position and vision? Why has he been so all over-the-map like a dilettante who does a bit of this, a bit of that, but almost nothing to completion? Or, if he wants to be the suave and smooth diplomatic figure of the Alt Right, why all the squabbles, controversies, hard talk, and hubris(bordering on megalomania of creating an Alt-Sphere as a galactic Darth-Vaderian empire)? It’s as if Spencer is trying to be Hitler and Speer at the same time. Or Mao and Zhou. Or Lenin and Molotov. He wants to come across as the rational, sociable, and approachable face of the Alt Right but then can’t resist personifying the Mad Man Theory. He goes Dr. Jekll and Mr. Hyde. For Jesus to have done what He did, He couldn’t play it like Paul. For Paul to have done what he did, he couldn’t have played it like Jesus. Spencer, like Nehlen, has never chosen a definitive role in the movement. The totally principled theorist, visionary, and/or prophet OR the savvy man of pragmatism attuned to the nature of power and playing the keys accordingly. And it may be this confusion on his part that has been responsible for his ‘betrayals’, i.e. Spencer didn’t mean to betray others, but it felt that way to those who lost faith in him because Spencer’s confusion stemming from a desire to do too much led to a kind of self-betrayal. A man who tries to do everything ends up doing nothing at all, just like a man who tries to save the world will end up saving nothing. In the end, one has to find one’s role or niche in the movement and stick to it. Even Jesus, supposedly the Son of God, couldn’t do everything. He needed the Disciples and especially Paul. Few men in history have been as Total as Muhammad, a man who managed to found a new great religion, inspire countless masses spirituality, and conquer huge areas via diplomacy, conversion, and war.... which is why a certain book considered him as the Most Influential Man that Ever Lived. http://www.iupui.edu/~msaiupui/thetop100.html?id=61. Perhaps, Spencer's Commitment-Deficit-Syndrome owes to an easy childhood where, very possibly, he got whatever he wanted. He grew up feeling used to having things go his way. So, when things don’t work out as he’d planned or hoped, he either loses heart, gets confused, drops allies, and scrambles in new directions as if something else might be more ‘fun’. This lack of constancy and equilibrium seems to have attracted similarly confused personalities, like the half-mad Kyle Bristow who totally crashed and burned. And others in his inner circle seem to have lost heart or a clear sense of direction. Spencer’s general cockiness tends to attract others who are either equally cocky(like Gregory Conte) or toady-like. While a marginalized movement needs men of confidence and will, cockiness can easily turn into arrogance and over-inflated ego. As for toadies, they never know what to do on their own.

If Spencer wanted to play the role of intellectual and visionary, he should have worked on his tome or at least a manifesto, a testament to the world. Instead, there are only bits and fragments of articles here and there, speeches, and youtube debates. Those are all nice but not enough to constitute the Big Mind of the movement. Even if most people these days don’t read books and rely more on social media, the smaller ideas flow from big ideas. It’s like most people get their water from rivers, streams, and brooks BUT it all flows from the Great Source. The film MOUNTAINS OF THE MOON is about the adventure to find just that: The very source of the Nile. Does Spencer want to be a river to his people or not?


Karl Marx chose the lonely path of a scholar and prophet, but he did lay down the core principles of what would become the modern communist movement. He became the source of all future rivers and streams of the Radical Left. But something about Spencer prevents him from playing that role. He doesn’t have the right temperament. He’s too addicted to Fun, the action, the spotlight. There’s too much ‘batman’ and ‘007' in him, too much of the drama queen.
So then, if Spencer prefers the role of people-person, he should have been extra savvy and resourceful in building bridges among the sounder elements of the movement while burning bridges with those who are bound to cause the most trouble or cast the movement in a negative light. And here, Spencer and Daniel Friberg messed up big time. I don’t know what exactly happened between them and Greg Johnson(and John Morgan), but it just made no sense to divide the movement in such nasty manner. Even if Johnson is a jerk — I have no idea whom to trust on the matter — , there’s no doubt that his contributions to the movement have been considerable. Then, the differences could have been resolved among them in a more civil or dignified manner. Even if purges are eventually necessary, keep in mind Stalin’s purge happened AFTER the Bolsheviks came to power. And Hitler purged Rohm AFTER political victory. Clearly, Spencer and Friberg overestimated their power when they began to talk big and wage internecine warfare. Worse, such a move not only created bad blood between Spencer-Friberg Group and Greg Johnson & Counter-Currents but alienated many who remained loyal to Johnson. Also, for most of us who aren’t privy to who-did-what, the mudslinging at Johnson led to counter-mudslinging at Friberg. So, not only was Johnson dirtied but those involved with Arktos. Given rough times ahead, how sounder it would have been if Spencer had done a better job of building bridges. Then, he would have had much greater sympathy and support after the Charlottesville debacle. But because Spencer headed into the movement after having burned too many bridges with other members of the Alt Right — Nowicki & Liddell, Ramzpaul, Greg Johnson & Counter-Currents gang, and etc. — , many in the Alt Right were hesitant to lend him support, especially as their sites had also been attacked or deplatformed despite the fact that they hadn’t been consulted about the rally at Charlottesville. Even though the fiasco was the doing of the nasty Jewish mayor and corrupt city politics, Spencer had really put himself in a bad spot. At Charlottesville, he became associated with too many nutty figures like Andrew Anglin & Chris Cantwell or mediocrities like Baked Alaska. Indeed, why did Spencer approach Anglin at all? Whatever use Daily Stormer may have as a larp-nazi troll-farm, Anglin cannot be taken as a serious individual as thinker or leader. And there was Matt Heimbach, who turned out to be a total bust, which is especially upsetting since Heimbach had set out to do something of great importance, i.e. address issues pertaining to white working class and small-town America. Whether Charlottesville was sound or unsound as a plan, the fact is Spencer found himself mostly isolated afterwards because his egotism had stepped on or rubbed too many people the wrong way. And there are times when he seemed to be lost in the clouds. In the post-Charlottesville press conference, Spencer spouted off about how the media will continue to pay attention to him because what he stands for is so much more interesting than what Conservatism Inc. has to offer. Now, it is true that Alt Right has far more interesting things to say than the GOP and Establishment Conservatism do, but what made Spencer think that the Mass Media give a damn about meaning or truth? The ONLY reason why the Media had paid attention to the Alt Right was to build it up as the Evil Bogeyman with which to smear Donald Trump. The media’s interest in the Alt Right was simply that. But Spencer’s narcissism had led him to believe that the media were showering him with all the attention because they were really fascinated with his views and ideas. On the individual level, maybe some journalists were tantalized or provoked. But by and large, media policy comes from the top, and once the Alt Right was no longer useful to the Establishment as a political tool but instead threatening to emerge as a genuine ‘radical’ white national movement, the media decided to clamp down on Richard Spencer and Co., especially with the full cooperation of Law firms, Big finance, Internet Platforms, and the power of the State.
Spencer seemed even more deluded in the speech at Michigan St. University when he talked about the Power, how it is the real force that controls everything and tramples over principles. Now, if Spencer is cognizant of the fact that the Power trumps any set of principles, how could he have been so naively trusting of the Constitution and the Media to accord him the niceties of fair play and equal treatment?

Indeed, Spencer’s moral position fails because his ultimate vision is simply to be George Soros of the Right. As we all know, Soros is a globalist-imperialist, an empire-builder of the highest order. He creates chaos all over the world to create opportunities to install a new order to be manned and managed by minions educated and funded by his institutions. Soros has no respect for nations, cultures, borders, or sovereignty. He seeks to trample on everyone and everything to get things his way. And he isn’t alone but joined by other globalist Jewish-supremacist oligarchs who see the world as their oyster.

Now, the ONLY reason Spencer opposes such people is because he wants what they got. Ultimately, he wants to play god-emperor and have the Anglo-Roman-empire rule the world with new wars, colonizations, and occupations. Also, just like Jewish supremacists pay lip-service to ‘human rights’, ‘democracy’, and ‘rule of law’ but actually resort to ANY POWER MOVE to push their supremacist agenda, Spencer’s vision of the future is no different. His Order will ban or severely curtain free speech and use the brute force of the law to make us conform to the Order in thought and action. So, Spencerism isn’t about combating Jewish globalist tyranny for freedom & sovereignty for all nations but about replacing Jewish hegemony with Anglo-hegemony... or, it’s about restoring Anglo-hegemony that had been usurped by Jewish hegemony. After all, Jews didn’t create the modern hegemonic world. Rather, they inherited or stole it from those who did. Among the six great empire builders in modern times — Spanish, Ottomans, Anglos, French, Russians, and Japanese — , only the Anglo/Americans triumphed over all others. Ottomans were finished with WWI. Spanish, once very great, had retreated to second-rater status. The French lost WWII and then their empire. Japanese empire was spectacular if short-lived but, at any rate, all gone by end of WWII. Russian empire came crashing down with the fall of the Soviet Union. Now, the British Empire met the same fate as that of the French empire, but the US-Canada-Australia had developed eventually as a super-Anglosphere empire, and that meant UK, even in shrunken state, had a certain prestige that France and Spain no longer had. When 20th century was declared as the American Century, it essentially meant the World Domination by Anglo-Americans. They, not the Jews, had built this order. But Jews took it over with their control of the media(that shaped view of reality), academia(that determine the narrative), finance(that could make or break businesses), entertainment(that created idols and icons, heroes and villains), vice industries(that addicted whites and others to drugs, gambling, and pornography), real estate, and law firms(that could wage lawfare and bankrupt people). So, in a way, it’s not so much that Spencer wants to create a new empire but wants to take it back from the Jews who had stolen it from its rightful owners, the Anglos, who’d done most to build the modern world with its trade routes, networks, and bases of power.
So, Soros and Spencer are essentially on the same page. The main difference is Spencer is, either candidly or foolishly, brazenly honest about what he wants whereas Soros(along with fellow Jewish globalists) is utterly dishonest about his grand vision. Soros is motivated by insatiable power-lust. He wants to be the dark Emperor of a Globalized World. But unlike Spencer who confesses his intoxication with Will to Power, Soros and his ilk wrap themselves with talk of ‘liberty’, ‘openness’, ‘democracy’, ‘freedom’, and ‘justice’. In terms of integrity, Spencer wins hands down with honesty, but in terms of strategy, the Soroses of the World win because Power is most effective when camouflaged and weaponized in deceptive ways. The Corleones didn’t come out on top in THE GODFATHER by stating their intentions. Spencer, like Senator Geary in THE GODFATHER PART 2, laid it all out.

It may feel good, but others know where he’s coming from and what he is about. So, Michael is able to easily outmaneuver Geary. Hyman Roth is a different fish altogether. A slippery eel, very smooth but slimy and ready to shock the enemy when least expected. Spencer’s candor and lack of deviousness are refreshing from an ideological perspective but not very savvy in the game of power. The problem is his position in the movement is confused. If he wants to be the ultimate visionary, he must speak candidly and lay it all out. He must be like John the Baptist who never minced words and paid the ultimate price: He lost his head but gained the respect of others who regarded him as a straight-talking Prophet. There is this side of Spencer, the neo-Nietzschean would-be-visionary of the Alt Right. But there is another side that wants to play the role of someone like Bill Buckley. He wants to rub shoulders with the right kind of people, be chummy with the media, be the go-to-guy for the Establishment on issues pertaining to Alt Right or White Nationalism. To play that sociable role, one has to be far more diplomatic, devious, and deceptive. This is why Bill Buckley couldn’t be as brazen as Joe Sobran, the real thinker at the National Review.

Be that as it may, Spencerism cannot be the basis for any meaningful movement because his ultimate vision is nihilism than moralism. He favors power over justice, and that means his vision is just Soros-ism for the white race. While it’s true that nothing is possible without power, power must serve something higher, and that is justice. Now, justice is a loose term, and there are many kinds of justice. Also, every kind of ‘justice’ means ‘injustice’ to others. There never was a perfect justice. The figures who came closest to conceiving of such were Buddha and Jesus. But Buddha’s justice calls for the eventual extinction of all life because life itself is the problem, i.e. life exists through destroying other life, and desire/attachment of the ego favors one’s pleasures & priorities that trample on the needs of other lives. As for Jesus, His practice of perfect justice led to Him getting whupped and killed real bad.

For the rest of us, we need a more practical, useful, and limited concept of justice. Without the concept of justice, there is just might-is-right, and in a way, people like Spencer have no right to complain because the current troubles befalling the white race has less to do with excessive justice than might-is-right. Sure, the globalists(especially Jewish ones who wield most power) mask their might-is-rightism with PC talk of equality and justice, but that’s just the usual rhetorical smokescreen. It’s really about Jewish Supremacism. Just ask the Palestinians if Jews really care about equality. Just ask the Ukrainians if Jews really care about redressing historical wrongs. Just ask the Russians(whose economy was raped by Jews in the 1990s) if Jews care about fairness. Jews are just 0.2% of the Russian population, but 20% of the richest Russians are Jews, but even THAT isn’t enough for World Jewry that now wages Total War on Russia. Jews bitch about ‘white privilege’ but only as misdirection from the real problem of Jewish power and privilege that rules the US despite the fact that Jews are only 2% of the population. The current system is not about ‘Social Justice’. That is just a front used by Jews to sustain their might-is-rightism. Deep down inside, even so-called ‘leftist’ Jews like Paul Krugman are really Ayn-Randians-at-heart. It’s just that they figure their supremacism is better served hiding in the shadows than being out in the open. When Obama, the pet monkey of Jews, bailed out Jewish banksters on Wall Street, Krugman and fellow ‘leftist’ Jews sure didn’t complain much.
Imagine a theater. Suppose it is owned and managed by Jews who take in all the profits and exploit the performers and workers. But when the spotlight comes on, does it shine on the owners and managers? No, the light goes on the performers on-stage who seem to have all the glory and power. But in fact, they are just tools of those with the real power: People who finance, produce, and manage the production and the building.

Jews are all about Might-is-Rightism. So, all this talk of Power by Spencer is old hat to them. If anything, they find Spencer stupid for spilling all the beans. Deep down inside, Jews agree with Spencer. Yes, it’s about the Power. And they got it. And they will keep it by any-means-necessary. The differences is that, whereas Spencer admits what he is all about, the Jews go for the same thing — THE POWER — but pretend they are nobly resisting SUPREMACISTS like Spencer in the name of defending poor helpless Negroes and other folks of color.

This matters because Spencer has NO moral justification to decry all the nasty things that have been done to him. Spencer’s world-view is POWER MATTERS, therefore THE SIDE WITH POWER MUST DO WHATEVER TO KEEP THE POWER. He says, if and when the Alt Right does come to power, they will ban free speech, lock up enemies, and act like Batman-as-Darth-Vader allied with white clone-army of 007's. Well, if that’s Spencer’s vision of how the world is and must be, what moral argument can he have against Jews doing to him what he would gladly do to others IF he had the Power? It’s like the opening scene of PAT GARRETT & BILLY THE KID where the editing suggests the circular logic of Garrett’s life, i.e. when he turned against freedom and went after Billy and crew, he was effectively killing himself because the very power dynamics that hired him to kill Billy and crew will eventually bring him down as well. But Spencer seems to be blind to all this because of the ‘spoiled brat’ syndrome. He grew up with affluence and affection, and he seems to have this idea that you can have the cake and eat it too. It also looks ridiculous because it’s a near-comical sight to watch someone without Power rant on and on about Power. It’s like all those Randian nobodies fantasizing they are Howard Roark of THE FOUNTAINHEAD, which is useful as a dramatization of archetypal personalities but useless as guide to life.

Given Spencer’s stated world-view, he has no good moral or ethical defense against all the wrongs done to him because, by his own Logic of Power, the Jews did nothing wrong. If those with Power must wield it by-any-means-necessary to secure their power, then the Jewish elites have done the right thing in deplatforming Spencer and denying him myriad financial services. The Jews are right to use Lawfare against Spencer since, by his own account and preferred power-logic, the Ruling Power must do whatever necessary to secure their position. Such political-philosophical rigidity on Spencer’s part makes it difficult for people to feel any sympathy. After all, he’s just being forced to taste his own medicine. He wants to be Batman-Darth-Vader ruler of the universe and do as he wishes with The Power. Well, since Jews now have The Power, they will act like Emperor Palpatine and treat Spencer like a mouse trapped in a maze with no exit.
Indeed, when Spencer said Alt Right is like ‘Zionism for white people’, he was falling into the same trap as the one that ensnared Jared Taylor. Even though Spencer is more hostile to Jewish power than Taylor(who foolish offers a fig leaf from a position of weakness, which is useless) is, a side of him still longs to be recognized and approved by Jews. He understands that Jews rule the world, and he wants to be where the Power and Prestige are. He wants to be like the Jewish globalist hegemonists or wrest back the empire from the Jews(who’d usurped something really built by whites). If Jews have rejected Taylor, there is no reason they will be any nicer to Spencer. Taylor wishes for an alliance between Jews and whites on equal footing. But Jews don’t think this way. Jews are steeped in Covenant-thinking and the idea that their God is the only God and they are the Chosen. Even secular Jews have this habit of mind and personality. Jews cannot allow equal partners. They must dominate, they must rule. So, even though Taylor reaches out to Jews, it’s no use. If anything, Jews have targeted him more than David Duke(who still has presence on Twitter that is now supervised by ADL and SPLC). If anything, Jews hate Taylor more precisely because he comes across as so urbane and reasonable(compared to David Duke who can be cartoonishly goofy with his one-note bash-the-Jew message). Jews want whites to SERVE Jews. They don’t want to be equal partners. In order to make whites serve Jews, Jews paralyze whites with the venom of ‘white guilt’. Thus, having no pride of their own, whites must latch onto the Holy Three — Jews, Homos, and Negroes — to be redeemed. Furthermore, Taylor reaches out to Jews from a position of weakness. He has no support in media, academia, Wall Street, Silicon Valley, Las Vegas, or the government. He is all alone with his small band of followers at American Renaissance. He can’t even use Paypal. If Taylor were powerful like Anglo elites of old, Jews might be willing to cut a deal(if only temporarily until they gain total power), but there is no need for all-powerful Jews to respond to Taylor’s overture. After all, Taylor has nothing to bring to the table whereas Jews got everything. A poor man cannot hope to deal with a rich man.

Anyway, if Jews loathe Taylor, imagine how they feel about Spencer. At least Taylor wants Jews to be equal partners. Prior to Charlottesville, Spencer put forth 20 Alt Right principles, among which one was JEWS MUST GO THEIR OWN WAY. So, in a New White Power Order, the rule would effectively be No Jews Allowed. And yet, Spencer still seems to think there can be an UNDERSTANDING between whites and Jews. He went on Israeli TV to explain that Alt Right is Zionism for whites. Now, Spencer isn’t entirely wrong. There are parallels between white nationalism and Jewish nationalism. But why try to convince Jews of anything, as if that’s going to do any good? If anything, the Alt Right, in the current situation, is far closer to the plight of Palestinians or the BDS movement. But Spencer, being so conceited with Nihilism of Power, would rather associate the Alt Right with Zionism and Jewish Power than with Palestinians and BDS. After all, Jews = Winners whereas Palestinians = Losers. But losers can’t be choosers. And in the current order, Alt Right are big losers and MUST ACCEPT the reality of their loser-status. It’s like a boxer doesn’t become champion by comparing himself with the Best right away. He works up the ranks by fighting the palookas and losers. He starts out as one of the lower-rung losers and then gradually claws his way up to higher ranks. In the current order, the Alt Right is much better off identifying with Palestinians and BDS movement. No amount of stated admiration for Jews, Israel, or Zionism will convince Jews to be any nicer to the Alt Right.

So, from a tactical viewpoint, the Alt Right is better off focusing on Justice than on Power. The powerless that goes on and on about how they’re going to have the power and rule over everyone is like a poor man yammering about what he’s going to do with his millions upon winning the lottery. It’s a pipe dream. Also, it’s crass and arrogant as well as delusional and ridiculous. But even apart from tactical considerations, the idea of justice is necessary because might-is-right is rule of thuggery and megalomania. Even if we could have an all-white society, without a powerful idea of justice, the end-result will be something like North Korea or Animal Farm. Granted, the cult of justice can be invoked and manipulated by the power-hungry. Communist tyranny began as a movement for justice. And Jews always hid behind the shield of justice to dupe goyim into falling for Jewish mendacity and agendas(mostly for Jewish supremacist power). But then, ANYTHING can misused and misapplied by humanity, especially if it's turned into a cult. Communism became more a cult of justice that act of justice. It led to vanity of justice. This is all the more reason why we must fight for true justice.

True justice can be universal, mutual, or pragmatic. Catholicism and Communism present universal visions of justice though, to be sure, in different ways. Catholicism says there is only one God and one path to Salvation: Through Jesus Christ who redeems souls and allows them into God’s domain, Heaven. To be saved, one must hear the word of God and accept Jesus. This is open to anyone, rich or poor, white or non-white. In contrast, classic communism says class dynamics will eventually lead societies to develop capitalism that will culminate in accelerated contradictions that will finally result in communist revolution. Even though communism spread around the world with missionary zeal, Marx didn’t think any people or nation could be ‘converted’ to communism. Instead, they needed to have the necessary material conditions that will lead to economic contradictions that can only be resolved by communism. So, by classic Marxist theory, what happened in relatively backward Russia and very backward Asia(and later even Africa) were not true communist revolutions. Still, Marx thought this Theory of History and Justice would eventually visit much of humanity as economic forces tend to go from primitive to barbarian to feudal to capitalist to socialist to communist.
At this point, it’s fair to say it makes no sense to conceive of a Universal World Order. The world is too big, and there is no authority that can reign over all peoples. Still, universal values don’t have to be executed or managed universally. For example, even if democracy is considered a universal political ideal, it doesn’t mean all the world has to be under a single democratic government. Instead, each nation can have its own government that is elected on the national level, e.g. Mexicans elect their own government, Turks elect their own, and so do Iranians and Taiwanese. Also, a universal value like ‘Thou Shalt Not Kill(meaning murder)’ doesn’t mean all of humanity has to live under one order. Each nation or community can enforce such justice on the local level. So, universal value doesn’t necessary mean universal power. Just because we reject Universal Power doesn’t mean we need to reject every facet of Universal Justice. ‘Thou Shalt Not Kill’, ‘Thou Shalt Not Steal’, and ‘Thou Shalt Not Rape’ are pretty good universal moral standards for all peoples(though I doubt if a bunch of Negroes could practice them well).

The relation between justice and power is a complicated one. Power shapes justice but is, in turn, shaped by justice. Power uses justice to its advantage but is also restrained by justice. It is the idea and authority of justice that allows saner and sounder relations among the various groups that make up society. Without justice, power can only rule by fear, as in the animal world, or by fooling people into believing the power is divine & infallible, as in Stalin’s USSR. But rule-by-fear and rule-by-fooling don’t last very long. One relies on servile cowards and the other relies on dupes and dummies. Ideally, the Power must not only rule and judge but be judged and restrained in turn. The idea that certain people should be Above the Law or Above Justice is bound to corrupt or destroy society. Totalitarian societies stagnate and rot from the inside. A demagogue with god-like powers can do what Hitler or Mao did. In the US, Jews are now Above the Law and Above Justice. They judge others but cannot be judged. They need not face the consequences of all their foul behavior because Jews are virtually worshiped and obeyed as a godlike race. This is why the concept of Justice is necessary. We need to bring Jews to justice. (Spencer's Theory of Power overlooks the fact that the most effective societies are ones that allow adaptation of power to change and progress. The Ottoman and Chinese East was more effective than the West in maintaining the Power status quo, but that also meant stasis and lack of progress in so many fields. In contrast, the power in the West ebbed and flowed among various elites or brought forth new systems, and this led to greater progress and advancement in everything from political theory to agriculture to weaponry to chemistry. And the parliamentary system was devised to ensure legal and peaceful transfer of power from one group to another. And contract laws and property rights made possible the rise of capitalism that led to great transformations in economic might. After all, would it have been better if the once-dominant railroads had prevented the rise of automobiles as a threat to trains? Would it have been right for IBM to prevent the rise of Microsoft in the name of maintaining its power? The advantage of the Western/American system was not in the rigidity of power but in its fluidity, flexibility, and change. The genius was in the system of transferring power from one group/sector/industry to another without violent wars of resistance vs change. Rather, political contracts and norms would allow the losing side to peacefully concede to the winning side that, in turn, would respect the rights of the lesser power. That system allowed far more dynamic change than autocratic system in Spain and Latin America where the traditional elites clung to power by suppressing change, even in science and technology, that might threaten the prevailing way of life.)

But instead of leading a moral crusade against Jewish supremacist power, Spencer’s position has been "We want what the Jews got", which is globalist hegemony. This is all the more ironic since it gives Jewish supremacists an opportunity to blame Spencer and Co. as the supremacist specter haunting mankind. Jews with supremacist power are condemning Spencer for supremacist ambition, thereby making themselves out to be the forces of justice defending mankind from neo-Nazi menace. This is why Alt Right should have moved forward as a Justice Movement for the national liberation of white folks from Jewish supremacist globalism. Framed in that way, the Alt Right would have had firmer moral footing in theory of justice. Instead, Spencer steered Alt Right into some futuristic-sci-fi-Batman-007-Star-Wars fantasy where Alt Right guys, as superior natural-aristocratic specimen, would rule the universe. Such delusional arrogance also had a way of corrupting and poisoning souls. Take Kyle Bristow. He could have been a good guy, a conscientious lawyer working on behalf of white national liberation from Jewish supremacism. Instead, with his head in the clouds just like Spencer, he made a lot of ludicrous and repulsive statements like he’s the prophet of doom or something. What was he on? Drugs? You’d think the Alt Right was led by guys not unlike the nutjobs in THE WOLF OF WALL STREET.

Instead of sobriety, decency, and morality, the Alt Right got doped high on delusions of grandeur, vanity, and reckless egotism. It was like the Boxer Rebellion in China where Martial Arts experts thought their bodies would be shielded from bullets by magic. One way or another, Alt Right vaped on too much self-delusion. Instead of choosing the National Humanist path, it chose the Crypto-Nazi Peter-Pan path. Granted, strictly speaking, Spencer wasn’t directly responsible for much that happened. When he said Hail Trump at the post-election conference, I’m sure he didn’t expect several morons to stand up and give the Nazi salute. There’s nothing wrong with being a bit provocative and enfants-terribles playfulness. Also, strictly speaking, the fiasco at Charlottesville was the doing of the local authorities. Still, given Spencer’s past statements about the nature of power(based on Carl Schmitt), he was naive to trust that the Power would accord his movement the same rights as that of AIPAC and Antifa. As for Spencer’s interaction with Andrew Anglin, that was just plain dumb. Why associate a nascent movement with such utter trash? Now, Anglin and DAILY STORMER may be useful for trolling and mocking PC shibboleths, but it’s best to let them do their thing. They are too crazy and toxic to approach as allies. As for Heimbach and Trad Worker, it’s understandable why Spencer came to rely on them. They were the only ones willing to risk life and limb out in the open against Antifa thugs shielded and enabled by the Power. Still, there was bound to be a huge downside as fatboy Heimbach made no bones about his movement being Neo-Nazi.

Things would have been much better for the Alt Right if it had a humanist and nationalist basis. Instead, Spencer chose ubermenschism and imperialism. When Spencer said the movement needs something more than ethno-nationalism, he was right to the extent that the globalist threat forces all white folks to look beyond their ethnic kin. When all of Europe is threatened by the Afro-Islamic tide, Europeans must think and look beyond ‘saving my little nation’. Just like the combined unity of Christendom that stopped the Muslim tide at the gates of Vienna, every white/European ethnic group must think not only in terms of ‘my ethnic nation’ but ‘our racial sphere’. It’s like various Hellenic city-states had to put their differences aside to defend against the Persian invasion. Such a perspective is compatible with the more nationalist-oriented views of Greg Johnson who prefers to stress the sovereignty of each nation and culture. A people can, at the core, safeguard and preserve their own ethnic kin and nation while also cooperating with other whites to defend the wider Western world from non-white threats and challenges. Whatever divisions may exist among various ethnic whites, they should be able to make common cause against the non-white world. As things stand at the moment, there is no pan-European or pan-white consciousness. American whites are mainly allied to the Empire of Judea. Western Europeans also serve the Empire of Judea and are merging with Africa and Islamic world. Macron calls for Eurafrica. Merkel wants to darken Germany with Muslims and Africans. Anglo-Saxons want to go ‘black’ and turn into Junglo-Saxons. Also, as vassals of the Empire of Judea or EOJ, they are hostile to white Russia, thereby pushing Russia into alliance with Iran and China. Ideally, white North Americans, Western Europeans, Eastern Europeans, and Russians should be working together. But the West has been set against Russia, with Eastern Europe caught in the middle — Eastern Europe is anti-Russia but anti-EU on immigration and demographic replacement. Eastern Europe joined EU to be part of a larger Europe but is discovering that EU is now about union of Europe with Africa and Muslim world as orchestrated by Soros and other Jewish oligarchs.
Asia suffers the same problem. Ideally, China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam, and etc. should all work for the common good of Asia, but China is now allied with Russia while Japan, South Korea, and Vietnam remain servile to the US. Such divisions are most useful to Jews who don’t want racial unity among any people. Indeed, consider how Jews messed things up in the Middle East so that Arabs will fight Arabs and Muslims will fight Muslims. Now, all these divisions had existed for a long time — they were not created by Jews — , but Jewish globalism exacerbated them far beyond what would have been the usual run-of-the-mill tensions and differences. For example, the mess in Ukraine wouldn’t be half-as-bad IF Jews hadn’t interfered in local affairs to set one bunch of Slavs against another. Notice the various kinds of Jews, though divided on many issues, mostly stick together and don’t allow non-Jews to exploit the divisions. Indeed, even during the Cold War, the leftist Jews and rightist Jews felt closer to one another than with any non-Jew. Capitalist Jews covered up for Socialist Jews and vice versa, eventually merging together under Zionist globalism.

Anyway, if Spencer saw the need for wider racial consciousness than just a narrow ethno-nationalism among whites, it would have made good sense. After all, despite all the ethnic conflicts among Europeans, they must surely realize that they all share the same challenges when confronted with demographic imperialism(mostly from Africa and Muslim nations) in a globalized world. However, it is now clear that Spencer meant something far more, and this makes his position untenable both strategically and morally. Spencer isn’t just calling for white unity and sense of shared purpose world-wide but for white hegemony over the world. He’s calling for the white race to do what Soros is doing. On the strategic level, it is crazy because the world today isn’t what it was in the 18th and 19th centuries. Imagine France trying to colonize Vietnam, Algeria, or any other nation today. Imagine UK trying to take over India, or even nuclear-powered Pakistan. When Europeans spread out over the world prior to the 20th century, they had a huge technological advantage and, furthermore, there was a lack of nationalist consciousness among most non-white folks. So, what had been cannot happen again. Also, the idea that white Europeans can be inspired once again to go around shooting people left and right to gain imperial hegemony is really kooky STARSHIP TROOPERS stuff.
But it’s also strategically stupid because it makes the Alt Right sound like a supremacist movement that wants to conquer and rule the world. Who can sympathize with such movement? It also makes Spencer sound like a deluded Don-Quixote-like figure because of the huge discrepancy between his actual status and his dream. It’s like a mouse talking like an elephant. It’s like the story of the dog with bone looking at its own reflection x 1000. Spencer can’t even have a Paypal account but he dreams of ruling over the Third World like the Empire in STAR WARS over the planet Naboo.

But it’s also repulsive from a moral angle. The Age of Empire must not return. Granted, Western Imperialism did a lot of good for the world. It discovered and united all the globe. It forced stagnant, repressive, and backward civilizations/societies to open to new ideas, developments, and opportunities. The process was traumatic and violent but ‘necessary’ and inevitable to the extent that SOME people had to do it. The West did it. It’s like a forest fire is destructive but also clears the way for new growths. But eventually, a people don’t want to be ruled and pushed around by others. Also, now that the entire world is cognizant of the benefits of science, technology, world trade, and communication, there is no more need to FORCE other peoples to open up and learn from others. All the world have opened up and learn from others. If anything, nations like Iran have been prevented from trading with the wider world because of the nastiness of Jews. When all of humanity can benefit and learn from one another through peaceful means via modern communication and agreed-upon rules of trade, what need for more imperialism and empire-building? Why not have each nation defend its independence and sovereignty? That would seem like the sane and moral thing to do.
And, to the extent that globalism prevents such by imposing the hegemonic will of the Empire of Judea on much of the world, the Alt Right could have been an effective MORAL voice for the pragmatic and mutual Justice of National Rights. A Nationalist Theory of Justice is one that works best. Why not let Hungarians decide what is right for Hungary? Why not let Russia decide its own values? Who are Jews to insist that Hungary take in tons of migrant-invaders or that Russians worship Homomania(hatched as a replacement religion in the West by sinister Jewish globalist elites)? It is hubris for Jews to act like they own Universal Justice that applies to all of mankind... which is especially repulsive since what Jews force on other peoples/nations, they don’t force on Israel. Jews turn a blind eye to IDF shooting Palestinians in Gaza but screams ‘far right’ and ‘neo-Nazi’ about Hungary refusing to be inundated by tons of African and Muslim invaders. But with Spencer, such moral logic has no meaning because he’s all about reviving a STAR WARS version of Kipling’s White Man’s Burden policy. It is having one’s head up in the clouds. (Of course, even in a world of universal nationalism, some nations will hold greater sway than others. Russia will be more powerful than Armenia, China more than Burma, and the US more than Costa Rica. But with basic respect for the sovereignty of all nations, the future can be of peace. Contrary to Spencer's view, World Peace doesn't require an empire. If anything, US neo-imperialist financial or military meddling since the end of the Cold War has led to more instability and blowback. Russia, which gave up on empire with the fall of communism, has been a far more stabilizing force than the US on imperial footing.)

Now, I’m not knocking the need to dream. Most dreams don’t come true, but then, no dream ever came true without it having been dreamed in the first place. But there are good dreams and there are nightmares. And Spencer’s dream, if realized, would be a nightmare. Worse, it is already here in the form of hegemony by Empire of Judea, and it sure ain’t pretty. The world would be much nicer if all nations respected one another. But under the Imperial Hegemony of Judea, the US is used to militarily invade nations to serve Israel’s interests. Result is humanitarian horror. And this set off waves of Muslim and African invasions to the West. Of course, Jews want both the ‘invade’ and ‘invite’ aspects of the New(or Jew) World Order. Jews want the US, as lone superpower, to pound all nations hated by Israel. And Jews want to flood the West with Diversity so that Jews can play divide-and-rule over the many goy groups. Jewish Empire also uses financial gangsterism to threaten and destroy nations. It uses Homomania as the New World Religion. It imposes a mono-culture of Hollywood, Rap music, and Jewish-controlled pornography. And many nations are either helpless or loathe to do anything about it because they are so under the thumb of US power(that is controlled by Jews). Jews treat most of humanity like garbage because Jews see goyim as inferior. To the extent that Spencer and his cohorts have such a low opinion of non-white races, how would they be any better in treating the rest of mankind?

Now, as far as I’m concerned, it’s perfectly fine NOT to like other peoples or even to despise them. But at the very least, leave them alone in their own worlds, and let them have their sovereignty. It is not up to the US to be telling Georgians to have homo ‘pride’ parades or pressuring Iran to become more like some degenerate part of Los Angeles. Jewish hegemony is a nightmare for much of the world, and I fail to see how a world ruled by Darth Spencer would be any better. I don’t have a high opinion of Zimbabweans, but at least I don’t want to rule over them crazy ‘groids’. Just leave them be. If they want to trade with some nation or beg for aid, let them. But there is no sense in the West seeking domination over the Rest. China seems to have the right idea when it comes to places like Africa. Just regard it as business. Build them schools and roads in exchange for raw materials. End of story.

Spencer is right that one of the distinguishing features of the Modern West, especially among Anglos, was the spirit of adventure, the daring to go beyond what is deemed impossible. The will to try to run the mile under 4 minutes. The will to climb Everest. While other races had also been great conquerors — Zulus in Africa and Mongols in Asia — , there was an element of Discovery and Quest that went far beyond mere hunger for land, loot, and women. After all, the voyagers who first circumnavigated the Earth did it just to do it. Many Europeans went on ventures not for power or money but to accomplish what no one had done before, what others thought was impossible. Charles Lindbergh embodied this spirit, and indeed Americanism turned that spirit into a formula across a vast continent that seemed limitless in potential. We see that spirit in George Bailey in IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE. He’s a romantic bursting at the seams with imagination and energy. He wants to do wild things and build stuff. He’s been that way since he was a child. And in the novel THE CALL by John Hersey, an American farm boy wants to Evangelize China and bring all those hundreds of millions of heathens to Jesus. That kind of spirit, drive, and passion characterized much that was great about the West.




A man’s dreams and visions can be unreal, even foolish, but still noble and inspiring. All the men who lost their lives in the invention and development of avionics were maybe a tad too reckless, but without such men, we wouldn’t have flight. And the reason why communism got some sympathy despite its horrors was its dream of social justice. And as long as National Socialism remained nationalist and patriotic, it too had plenty of sympathizers among both Conservatives and Liberals. After all, Hitler had restored Germany from the economic and political brink. That was a good and noble kind of dream. But when Hitler turned to war and conquest to create his ‘Aryan’-supremacist empire, it was a nightmare, not a dream. The horrors that ensued couldn’t even be redeemed by nobility of vision because the vision itself was rotten to the core.
Now, I don’t think Spencer ever called for Nazi-like domination of the world... though some of his associates do sound more radical and even amoral. (I get the sense that Gregory Conte actually wishes that Nazis had won in Russia. He seems not to care what would have happened to Russians had that been so.) Spencer’s neo-imperialism is more along the Old British style. But times change, and a new Western Empire would be as foolish as Mussolini playing Roman Caesar. How did that turn out? Or, it’d be like the Russians trying to reconstitute the Soviet Empire. Not going to happen, and even if it were to happen, there would be just more bloodbath and bad blood. Not worth it.
Spencer may argue that globalism is now unstoppable and that the New Normal for All the World is invade-invite, i.e. every nation will be swamped under globalist financial, cultural, demographic, and military domination; there will be no sanctuary. In the New World Order of No-More-Borders and Constant-Invasion, the only game left is to form strong identities(like Jews) and seek dominance over others because, otherwise, they will gain dominance over you. Now, if indeed that were truly the ONLY option left, then Spencer’s argument might have some merit. But, the future is far from certain. Also, globalism may be on the wane in many parts of the world. There seems to be a rise of nationalism in parts of Europe as well.
Furthermore, Spencer’s pro-imperial argument isn’t merely defensive but outright offensive. He seems to believe that it is the white man’s destiny to conquer and rule. It’s just part of the white DNA, and there’s nothing that can be done about it. Whiteness is dynamic, and unless whites conquer other worlds, their energies will be invested in radical social experiments at home that will turn everything neurotic and crazy. Just like young boys have to burn their energies with sports, white energies must expand outwards(and even to the stars). Boys who aren’t allowed to play outdoors end up doing harm to themselves because their energies have no outlet. And perhaps, white energies are now doing so much self-harm because they haven’t been allowed to expand outwards. If whites in the 19th century conquered the American West, too many today expend their energies on tattoos, piercings, and bad drugs.
But then, the main reason for all the nuttery is maybe PC and Jewish domination. After all, there have also been many examples of sane and stable white communities that have long said NO to imperialism. Hungary and Poland seem to be relatively sane in nationalist mode. Also, in retrospect, expansive white energies did good only where the winning was easy and permanent. It was easy for whites to conquer mostly empty North America and Canada. But America’s ventures in Philippines, Korea, and Vietnam have been painful and traumatic. And the more recent neo-imperialist ventures in the Middle East and North Africa have been utterly disgraceful. Spencer opposed the Iraq War as a neocon affair, but would he have supported it as an Anglo-hegemonic venture? Either way, it would have caused too many deaths and heartbreaks. Worth it? No.

Where Spencer failed most was in his inability and unwillingness to connect with the people. A lot of this has to do with his vanity, narcissism, and obsession with aesthetics. He is attracted to the stage, the spotlight, and the glamour. He finds most ordinary and average people to be boring and humdrum. He has no rapport with the white working class or underclass. At most, he wishes them well but doesn’t want to be associated with them. His sensibility is too much Bruce-Wayne-Batman and James-Bond-007 to have a humanist feel for real peoples and cultures. His aestheticism hankers for celebrity and pizzazz. And that’s why his Alt Right fame and notoriety came to rest on ‘favorable’ coverage by the Big Media. (By ‘favorable’, I mean giving him a modicum of benefit-of-doubt and using him as the Face of the Alt Right.) His initial success with the college tour filled his head with the idea that it’s going to be FUN. He’s going to do the tango with the media network that loves-to-hate-him. He would be James-Bond-and-Villain-rolled-into-one. And he figured this would last forever. He would be the new edgy Bill Buckley on the up and up.
Now, there was surely an advantage to this approach. But there was one huge disadvantage: Spencer’s fortunes would come to rely TOTALLY on the whims of media. He’d invested so much on dillydallying and playing cat-and-mouse with the media that he neglected the more important business with connecting with the people. He fell into the Buckley Trap but didn’t even know how it worked. Buckley, as we know, depended totally on the media. Most conservatives didn’t get him. He talked in a snotty way and seemed too ‘intellectual’. He was charming and all but didn’t mean much to an average patriotic American. The Buckley Charm was a media thing. If he had a place in the media, he was still in the game. But if he were shut out of the media, he was nothing as he had no popular backing among the hoi polloi. Like Buckley, Spencer came to rely almost entirely on media access and attention. As long as the media put the spotlight on Spencer, he was a somebody. But the minute the spotlight was turned off and when even the bare minimum benefit-of-doubt vanished(whereupon Spencer was simply vilified as ‘Neo-Nazi’ and ‘white supremacist’), Spencer was suddenly Less-than-Zero, indeed lower than even Milo who could, at the very least, keep shilling for shekels by waving the Israeli flag.
Now, it’s understandable why Spencer didn’t want to work at building a base among the people. Most people are dull, unintelligent, ignorant, and pain in the ass. After all, even Jesus was often frustrated with simple minds who didn’t understand Him. And healing all those sick and wretched made Him want to throw up. And George Bailey in IT’S A WONDERFUL LIFE finds it a drudgery day in and day out to deal with regular people. It’s not glamorous. It’s not fun. But then, humanity is what it is. In the end, we need connection to reality. A doctor goes among the sick, not the healthy. Likewise, a leader must go among the needy and gain their trust than mug for publicity from the greedy and powerful.

But Spencer put all his eggs in the Big Media basket. Blinded by vanity and narcissism, he thought the media would keep treating him as the go-to-guy, the glamorous ‘bad boy’, the indisputable leader, and ‘interesting’ personality(contra those boring dullards of the GOP), but in fact, when the Big Media either had enough of him or deemed him too dangerous(especially after Charlottesville), there was a concerted effort across media, finance, law, and internet to silence him and shut him down. And the sad thing is Spencer doesn’t have much support, affection, or sympathy from the people or from his ideological peers. The nasty business with Greg Johnson and Counter-Currents crowd just led to feelings of Schadenfreude. Perhaps, that’s going too far, but the attitude of many seems to be, "Richard Spencer got his comeuppance."



Not only did Spencer fail to connect with white masses — necessary for a political movement as opposed to merely an ideological agenda — but he seemed to pick fights, often unnecessary and petty, with other people in the same political sphere. For example, he insulted Peter Sweden who, though limited and one-dimensional, does good work in informing the world about the troubles of Diversity. There are times when one must be forthright and critical of others in the movement, but it can be done without creating bad blood. As for guys like Peter Sweden, it’s just best to let them do their thing. But too many barbed attacks and insults didn’t endear Spencer to a lot of people who came to either dislike or distrust him. So, in this most crucial time of need, there aren’t many people to express support for Spencer or come to his aid. A scrooge of vanity than a Bailey of humanism, Spencer has isolated himself. In LAWRENCE OF ARABIA, the hero connects with the Arabs who come to feel affection for him and trust him. They are even willing to die for him. Spencer never attracted that kind of affection because everything about him is about him. Arabs realize that Lawrence really does CARE for them. It makes all the difference. Lawrence says the Best of Them won’t come for money but for him. The Arabs respect and trust him that much. But how many would come for Spencer? This was never about Fun.



Remember Clarence's Law: "No man is a failure who has friends." Spencer has spectacularly failed at friendship by being a selfish player too often dismissive of the advice and feelings of others.