Comment: We need to go back to the debate between Culture(or Kultur) and Civilization in the 19th century.
Culture was about tribe, blood and soil, particularism, localism, heritage, sacredness, passion.
Civilization was about citizenship, rule of law, universalism, cosmopolitanism, progress, secularism, reason.
Culture was right, Civilization was left.
But it wasn’t that simple. Though the French Revolution was seen as the War for Civilization, there was much in the European monarchy that stood for civilizational principles. The Age of Reason began with the Monarchs and Aristocrats. And this was because monarchs and aristocrats didn’t feel a strong bond with their people or land. A French monarch or aristocrat was likely to feel a greater social bond with an Austrian or Russian king or aristocrat than with a French peasant, worker, or soldier. And Russian elites felt the same way.
The elites all spoke French. While simple French folks listened to French folk music and simple French folks listened to Russian folk music, the French and Russian aristocratic elites both listened to classical music that was seen as transcending narrow boundaries of culture and customs. Kings and noblemen saw themselves as above-the-mob, above-the-people, above-the-rabble. So, there was a degree of cosmopolitanism and universalism among the monarchs and aristocrats of Europe who mostly monopolized the privilege of education and the arts. Since the elites could learn stuff and enjoy art, they were more likely to be universalist and rationalist than the illiterate or barely literature masses who never ventured outside their local community all their lives.
But to the extent that the kings and aristocrats used their power to maintain privilege and power, they were seen as enemies of progress, reason, and universal justice, ideas/values that the French Revolution stood for.
So, the French Revolution was ‘leftist’. But, its effect was also rightist. With the fall of the king and aristocrats, the revolution was about the unity of the leaders and the led. The rulers and the ruled became one, an organic whole. French revolutionary elites didn’t identify with elites in other European nations. They identified with the French nation and French people. So, the idea of the nation-state is both left and right, both rational/legalistic and organic/identitarian.
Also, as the French Revolutionaries began to conquer other kingdoms/nations, the effect was both leftist and rightist. It was leftist in that many people welcomed the ideas of freedom and equality spread by the revolution. But the effect was also rightist because non-French nationals resented French troops conquering and occupying their lands, taking their food, and raping their women. Even as Germans may have welcomed the ideas of the Revolution, they also resisted French presence on German soil. Beethoven turned against Napoleon when his homeland was invaded.
It’s like many Russians were drawn to the French revolutionary principles but also willing to fight for the motherland against French invaders.
So, human nature is naturally both leftist and rightist, both universalist and particularist. With our power of reason and curiosity, we want to know more about the world and rise above provincialism. We want to learn from other people and share our ideas with other people But we still want something that is ours and ours alone. So, a true man cannot be simply leftist or rightist. He must seek the balance of the two. So, true ideology is not about purism of leftism or purism of rightism but about what balance of the two is ideal.
it’s like an alloy, a blend of metals. Surely, more of some metals is necessary but other metals are essential too.
Nationalism is bigger than tribalism, and therefore it is leftist in that sense. But it works best with a homogeneous population in a well-defined land, and therefore it is also rightist.
Anyway, the French Revolution eventually failed, and there was the return to aristocratic rule. But this was not the triumph of Kultur.
The struggle of Aristocrats vs revolutionaries was really a conflict between two visions of civilization.
The idea of Kultur took root with the rise of romanticism that inspired a powerful and passionate sense of connection to one’s soil, heritage, and myth. It’s no wonder that Wagner had such a huge impact on a new generation of Germans. It reconnected the Germans with their pagan roots. It dug deeper than respectable German aristocratic conservatism that was Christian and traditional.
And the study of the Greeks via the new science of archaeology and philology revived a sense of ancient mystical roots. it’s like why Byron died fighting for Greek independence. It wasn’t his love of modern day Greece but his passion for the ancient Greece of mythology and dreams. He felt as Odysseus returning to his spiritual home to rid the marauders.
So, the rise of Kultur rightism is really the product of romanticism that unleashed new energies and retrieved forgotten visions. It was impassioned, unpredictable, and creative. It wasn’t just about customs and tradition but visions and dreams. If the story Frankenstein was about reviving the dead back to the living, romanticism sought to revive much of the lost and buried roots of European culture. Since much of the evidence was lost forever, one had to use the archaeology of creativity, dreams, poetry, and music. Wagner’s vision of pagan Germania isn’t accurate, but it is all the more powerful cuz the recovery was a visionary project.
It was as if to say that the true source of German genius isn’t so much in material artifacts — artifacts dug from ruins — but in the heart and mind of every German who dares to unlock his soul and release its spiritual and creative energies, the stuff that Jung talked about.
The two great economic ideologies of the 20th century were both about civilization and necessarily so. Economics must be rational after all. Communism and capitalism were both rational systems. It put forth logical theories and made empirical-based arguments.
To be sure, there was an element of rightism and romanticism in both.
Marx bemoaned the loss of traditional economies that had an organic relation between the maker and consumer. A blacksmith of old was part of a community. He did all his work, and he was valued as a member of a community. But the modern factory worker was a mere cog in the machine. Man into machine. Marx thought communism could break the alienation between the worker and the economy by turning all workers in collective owners of property and means of production. Since they would be working for themselves, their alienation would vanish. He also thought that if all people shared work equally, they could also share in the leisure and take time out to appreciate art, books, and science. A prole could be a poet and a poet could learn to appreciate labor.
As for capitalism, it created the myth of the great captain of industry, the great inventor, the adventurer. A new prometheus later deified by Ayn Rand. The creator of the new world. Such a figure would be revolutionary and hardly conservative but to the extent that he stood for greatness and awesomeness, it would establish a new hierarchy and social order based on merit and talent.
Also, as capitalism would encourage work ethic, it would bind the rulers and ruled into a moral community. Under the aristocratic system, the peasants had to do backbreaking work while the aristocrats rode around in horses and wore funny wigs. When there weren’t any wars, aristocrats took it easy and grew decadent. In contrast, the capitalist bourgeoisie had to work with their minds, manage, invest, organize, and innovate. They stood for hard work too. And for awhile, the culture of work ethic bound the northern protestant elites with the protestant masses. And this work ethic repressed conspicuous displays of vain privilege and glamour among the rich, and this also had a binding effect on the elites and masses in capitalist Europe. A British capitalist or German capitalist was less likely to be show-offy and grandiose with wealth like the Russian or Latin elites.
Still, capitalism and communism were in the Civilization camp. And the fading aristocracy was also, more or less, in the Civilization camp.
Kultur was the domain of the Romanticist Right that preferred lively passion to crusty tradition and power of will to duty to service. It was the difference between warrior and soldier. Warrior is a hero, soldier is a unit.
And this was the role that the Romantic Right played between the cracks of rising capitalism, aging aristocraticism, and threatening communism.
Unfortunately, men like Mussolini and Hitler took the themes of the romantic right and turned them into totalitarian bureaucratic systems.
They also acted like gangsters. What had been organic and eccentric was made institutional and conformist. Nazi art is sterile and doesn’t inspire. Instead of encouraging the flowering of a millions wills, it commanded millions to submit mindlessly to the will of one man, Duce or Fuhrer. In the end, totalitarian fascism got reckless and led to the alliance of capitalism and communism to lay it to waste.
So, following WWII, the idea of Kultur was dead, and it was a battle of Civilizations in the Cold War that pitted materialist capitalism with rationalist communism.
But… another development took place that brought back elements of Kultur.
Jews, who hated the idea of Kultur cuz of Nazism, went for Zionism and formed a Kultur-based nation-state in Israel.
Also, the Third World movements made global conflict into one of ‘indigenous native cultures’ versus soulless capitalist-imperialists.
Initially, many Third World movements adopted communism as official ideology to combat capitalist-imperialism. But when Soviet and China rift happened, the idea of universal communism became untenable. And Soviet occupation stoked nationalist and particularist passions in Eastern Europe. And the US was willing to support arch-rightist elements like the Muslim extremists in Afghanistan in the war against Soviet Occupation. And with Zionism as the new ideology among Jews, many Jews who’d formerly been universalist communists, turned against the USSR and global communism.
As time passed, communism became less the means of resistance against the West by the Third World. Vietnamese used communism to fight the West, but the Iranians turned to Islamism.
Because Western imperialism and ‘racism’ came to be associated with capitalism and even communism(with Soviets being seen as ‘white’), even progressives began to question the ideals of universalism, rationalism, and etc. Were they merely fancy slogans used by the West to gain control and dominance over other peoples? “We are spreading enlightenment, therefore we have a right to rule over you. Our liberalism justifies our imperialism in the name of white man’s burden.”
US was created by white men who invoked freedom and democracy and liberty, but it wiped out the indigenous Indians and enslaved teh Negroes and used Chinese terribly to make choo choo tracks.
And then, the 60s came along with rock music that was heavily influenced by black music, and black culture wasn’t very rational but rhythmic. Revolution came to be more associated with rocking and rolling than with reason and responsibility.
Also, the introduction of drugs turned progressives from clear theories to new age fantasies, and progressives began to romanticize the mystical Hindus and American Indians as noble savages who’d lived in harmony with the land. You can hear that stuff in Neil Young songs. The cult of Kultur began to matter again, and some hippies took inspiration from German Romantic Right.
Also, Jews didn’t like the idea of the melting pot since it would mean abandoning Jewish identity and just becoming part of the goy majority America. So, Jews began to favor a kind of neo-particularism, at least meant for minorities.
And as the black movement progressed, blacks began to feel that blacks aren’t just white people with black skin but different in their souls and rhythms. Many traditional white progressives thought that racial difference was just a matter of skin color. And blacks had bought into this idea for a time. But blacks just couldn’t get in tune with whiteness. They wanted to boogie, oogie, jungle ugabuga, and act like Muhammad Ali. They couldn’t just stand around and sing ‘we shall overcome’.
As blacks insisted on their difference–soulful as well as physical–, this also dealt a blow to colorblind universal liberalism.
Also, with the rise of black crime, even white progressive moved away from integrating areas, and that made for racial consciousness on both sides.
Alt Right is essentially a white acceptance of multi-culturalism, with whiteness as one of the identities that need to be protected.
Originally, multi-culturalism said that whites don’t need an identity and protection since they got all the power and privilege–and the numbers. In contrast, non-whites are vulnerable since they don’t have power, privilege, and wealth–and the numbers. So, they need to stick to their cultural identity to survive and feel empowered.
The Alt Right says that whiteness to is being dispossessed and disenfranchised, therefore, its identity and interests must also be explicit.
So, in that sense, the Alt Right has gone ‘left’ and accepted the tenets of multi-culturalism.
BUT, multi-culturalism developed as the New Left’s partial adoption of rightist tenets, one of racial identity, cultural heritage, and etc(at least among non-whites).
Originally, the American Right was very race-conscious. It was like the Tom Buchanan character in THE GREAT GATSBY going on and on about the white race and the threats it faces. It was identitarian and race-ist.
In contrast, the American Left was anti-identitarian. It spoke of universality and unity of all races. Communists spoke of brotherhood of man and sisterhood of woman of all races and nations. It spoke for colorblindness and equality.
With the defeat of Nazism in WWII, even the American Right came around to the view of the American Left. Eisenhower, who was appalled by Nazi crimes, signed onto civil rights.
Colorblind defense of liberty was the theme of both the Right and the Left. And as communist USSR, the other superpower, was appealing to non-whites with the message of anti-racism, US felt it had no chance but to play the same game.
And in the 60s, colorblind ideology of the civil rights won big.
It should have been a happy ending for the Left, but it wasn’t.
The New Left, in its search for new heroes and causes, came to be obsessed with identity. Black power, brown power, yellow power, and etc. Also, the failure of blacks to make economic progress meant that race had to be taken into account for affirmative action and other race-conscious programs. Also, Jewish radicals like Susan Sontag were emphasizing whiteness as specially sick and diseased.
Also, as black athleticism came to symbolize black power, progress came to be associated with racial show of virility and strength.
So, the politics of identity took over the Left, and it was the Right that found itself insisting that US should be colorblind and meritocratic. Earlier, it had been the Right that was race conscious and the Left that called for colorblindness.
But now, it was the reverse. It was people like Buckley who said ‘we are all Americans who should be judged by content of character, not color of skin’, whereas the Left and non-whites were saying that people need to be considered according to color of skin since the legacy of ‘racism’ still affects so many people negatively and still gives white people ‘white privilege’, if only subtly.
This eventually led to multi-culturalism and the hyphenization of Americans: African-American, Asian-American, Mexican-American, Arab-American, and etc. Of course, whites were denied the right of hypenization, and the American Right accepted this rule and, if anything, begged non-whites to drop their hypenization and just become good ole fellow Americans.
But that didn’t work. Hyphenization remained and only grew stronger. Identitarianism became more radicalized among the non-whites and even extended to sexual deviants like homos and trannies.
Multi-culturalism won, and the Alt Right has decided to adopt hyphenization. So, whites should be European-Americans(than just generic Americans) who, like other groups, should struggle for their own identity and interests.
But then, this isn’t surprising since multi-culturalism was the result of the Left taking themes from the Right.
So, naturally, it’s come full circle, and the Alt Right is taking themes from the Left.
It’s like two snakes swallowing each other by the tail.
Today, the main threat to identity isn’t so much ideology as idolatry.
Globalism is spread less by intellectual ideas than by Hollywood movies, video games, pornified music culture of rap and techno(heavily interracist), fashion models, celebrities, comedy, youtube personalities, cult of black sports heroes, etc.
Look at Korea and Poland, two satellite nations of the globo-West.
K-pop is the dream of yellows looking like whites via plastic surgery and turning their hair blonde. Modern day Koreans are a bunch of pansies and wussies who will gladly sell their homeland to be ‘cool’. Poland is so into globalist pop culture that so many of its young now support homo marriage and march in favor of ‘diversity’.
Poland is an interesting case. For most of its history, it looked westward cuz the West was seen as more white while Russia was seen as ‘Asiatic’ and ‘Oriental despotic’. Russians were seen as part-Mongol. Polish Slavs wanted to win the approval and acceptance of Western Europeans who were seen as purer white and more advanced. Poles insisted they are Catholic and enlightened unlike those Orthodox Russian with who knows how much Mongol blood.
And this attitude is still alive among many Poles. They want to win approval from French and Brits, traditionally seen as whiter and purer Europeans than the barbaric mongoloid Russkies.
BUT, given current demographic trends, Russia will be more white in the future than Western Europe that will become Africanized and Arabized. Look at the French soccer team. Look at all those French and German women having kids with black men. Look at the total cuckization of UK. Sweden, which used to be the whitest part of Europe, will soon be darker than Southern Italy. It will become Morocco on Ice.
While people may not fight and die for an abstract idea like ‘freedom’, they will give up their homeland for pleasure and hedonism. And globalism certainly offers a lot of that. In the 19th century, so many Chinese were willing to give up China for another smoke of opium. American Indians were willing to give up the fight for around swig of whiskey. So many global youths will give up identity and nation for another orgy at a night club with twerking and binge-drinking. Idolatry is the real agent of globalism.
And among the respectable whites, they will remain silent and collaborate out of fear of being called ‘racist’, which has the sting of ‘devil worshiper’ in the Middle Ages. People will fight for homeland but they will also give up homeland for a piece of the pie. Look all throughout history, and collaboration has been par for the course. Look at all those cuckservatives who will surrender everything as long as they get a piece of the pie. People will fight for their homeland only if they are led to do so by those who are willing to take the first bullet.
PS. Nietzsche is another complicating factor in ideological and cultural struggles. Why is Nietzsche more resilient than Marx, Freud, and the rest? Because he got to the root of it all: the Power, what in STAR WARS is called the Force.
Everything is about power, the will to power, struggle for power. This can take the shape of Christianity, Islam, communism, capitalism, individualism, social justice, feminism, and etc. but it’s all about power in the end. So, the core of the struggle is essentially amoral and nihilistic. It’s about who has the power. Sure, ideology and religion can justify the power, and justification is good to have, but in the end, it’s about the power itself. Power without justification feels a lot better than justification without power. Of course, if you have the power, you can buy and control the justification. But then, to gain the power, you have to justify yourself. But you must not be fooled by the purity of that justification. You must use it as an excuse, a ploy, a game. It’s like a drug dealer shouldn’t get high on his own supply.
Notice how Jews have invoked capitalism, communism, socialism, free trade, equality, feminism, Zionism, ‘anti-racism’, etc, etc, etc. to justify themselves morally, but it all comes down to MORE POWER FOR JEWS.
So, it’s wrong to call the Left the ‘left’ anymore. Blacks just want power, and they don’t care how they get it. If capitalism works fine, if communism works, fine. Jews are Jewish-powerists, blacks are black powerists. It’s not about ideology but about power. Ideology is fluid but power is power. It’s like one can learn all sorts of martial arts, but one is really after the power to kick butt. The various martial arts are but a means to power.
It’s like Chinese communists learned the same thing. Black cat or white cat, what does it matter as long as it catches the mice of power?
Ideology is just a means of power, and no ideology is perfect or permanent. But our will to power and need for power is forever. Without power, you are nothing. History is the story of power.
Globalism and the End of History is not about the triumph of liberal democracy. It is about the oligarchic struggle for power by whatever means necessary and useful.
The more the ‘left’ came to be disillusioned with Marx, the more they came to be fascinated with Nietzsche who understood the struggle to be about the Power.
In a way, fascism was the most honest ideology of the 20th century since it was honest and brazen about what it wanted. Power was essential, and fascists were willing to use rightist and leftist means to gain more power.
But Hitler showed one can get addicted to one’s own supply of power-obsession. While one must seek power, one must not be addicted to power for addicts gotta have more and more even when grabbing for more is too much of gamble.
