Candace denounces Fuentes as a liar and a creep —you just threw her name in there with him —ugh —the devil is winning when we demonize and polarize without actually listening to the person you are attacking —listen to one full episode of Candace —just 1.
I have listened to Candace Owens in the past. She lost me when she went full antisemite. I’m glad to hear she’s opposed to Fuentes but she is no innocent.
"She lost me when she went full antisemite." That's it right there. Whenever someone or group goes there, whether it's left, right, or in the middle, it's over. A big problem in the U.S. now, it seems to me, is that we are seeing a lot of it. Of course, there's also the problem that if one opposes Netanyahu speaking to a joint session of Congress, for instance, there are those who will label that person an antisemite. Shouldn't do that--there's enough of the real thing out there to keep us occupied.
Candace is a kookoo bird who has espoused moon landing conspiracy theories, the theory that Bridgette Macron is trans, and other idiocies. Her thoughts about much of anything are unworthy of consideration.
Candace is a notorious liar, Ruth. She spews so many nonsensical conspiracies of which Brigitte Macron being a man is the most idiotic. She also has a clear track-record of playing footsie (and more) with antisemitism. But, yes, Candace is the victim.
Brigitte Macron's lawsuit will bankrupt Candace. Under US media law, truth is the only absolute defense against libel. A public figure like the wife of the French president has a higher bar than most to prove malice, but Candace has made it ridiculously easy for Mme. Macron's lawyers to do. There is no way that B. Macron would have brought this lawsuit if she wasn't sure she could win it, because she knows Candace's lawyers will require a medical examination to prove that Candace is lying. This is going to be an open-and-shut case, and probably won't even make it to trial. I just hope Mme. Macron doesn't settle for a mere apology, but also requires Candace to pay a heavy fine (that Mme. Macron, I hope, donates to charity).
I think you will be proven wrong. I hope and pray you are proven wrong. I don’t think you’ve given her a fair trial in your own mind. Truth speakers get canceled and killed. She’s one of them.
You "hope and pray" that Brigitte Macron has a penis, Ruth?! That's almost as crazy as Candace's contention about her. Take a moment to reflect on how ridiculous that response is. And after you do, go ahead and google Brigitte Macron's brother, who that huckster Owens claims is actually Mrs. Macron. You'll quickly see that he is alive and well and... wait for it... NOT his sister.
Did you actually read the article that you linked to? Rey's was acquitted not on any evidence supporting her preposterous claims, but because the court deemed her content - however outlandish it was - to not meet the threshold for defamation. This is pretty weak tea if it's the best you have to defend Candace's cravenness.
I used to like and admire Candace but I agree that her train has jumped the tracks. She’s undeniably a smart & sharp lady but how folks like her get so offtrack I don’t understand.
I feel the same way. I really suspect that there is some kind of mental illness involved. I must stress though that I have never met her, lack any credentials to make such an assessment, and nobody should believe me.
She provoked the Macrons so unbearably they have sued over it. All over social disease media I have seen nitwitted Owens supporters chortling about how easy it will be for Owens to defend against the suit. Typical sentence: "Just wait until the gynecological exam!"
Apparently, they don't understand that a swab of Brigitte Macron's mouth will be all the evidence the plaintiffs lawyers will need to obliterate Owens. You see, it's XX and XY chromosomes, as some of us remember from tenth grade biology.
Why would any non - imbecile spend a moment in listening to Candace Owens? The most charitable hypothesis I have heard about Owens' behavior since the Kirk assassination is one serious man's idea that she may be schizophrenic.
Otherwise, she's a psychopath.
I can't be charitable toward her. My perception is that she just makes things up. I don't know what her habitual lying in the Kirk matter will do to her ultimately, but with the Macrons, that psychopathic compulsiveness will have proven to be catastrophic for her.
But it occurred to me recently that maybe it won't: her followers may be dumbbells, but she isn't. When she loses the lawsuit, listeners can expect to hear varieties of the following:
"Well, we know who controls the medical establishments of the world, don't we?"
Re: She is insinuating that Erika Kirk and Donald Trump conspired to murder Charlie Kirk.
The lady may be too much of a Christian to do it, but I would applaud Erika Kirk if she also sued Candace Owens to a fare thee well. There are lines of common decency one does not cross ever, and implying that a grieving widow had a hand in her husband's murder when there is not one iota of evidence if well beyond the pale. (See also: Alex Jones and Sandy Hook).
She’s never accused Erika of anything —her main problem is with people who have lied immediately following his death about his support of Israel. Candace is speaking the truth on this matter. Is it possible to be critical of a government without being an anti-Semite? Is it possible to be critical of individual’s actions who just happen to be Jewish? People are throwing around the word anti-Semite and Nazi with such gusto —it’s definitely the work of the evil one. You have to truly listen to Candace for a full episode instead of sound bites because everything can be twisted to fit the narrative on either side of the divide.
Good article, although I would disagree with one point you made. In the article, you imply (although you don't outright say) that embracing Fuentes is not just immoral but potentially detrimental from the standpoint of winning over the public. Although I am 100% with you on Fuentes's malevolence, I am not so sure that he is necessarily unpopular in 2025.
To estimate his popularity, you have to consider the mental and emotional attitudes of Americans in 2025. My case is that there's much within these attitudes that do feed the appeal of people like Fuentes. Those would be widespread distrust of institutions, exhaustion with old-fashioned and highly conventional pre-2015 morality (which is a key underpinning of pro-Israel positions), economic pessimism and resentment, along with angry backlash against woke leftists in the form of right-wing identitarianism.
My theory is that all of these emotional forces will find an outlet one way or another. Fuentes is being boosted because he has found a way to feed off and channel these forces. But, as we both agree, he is a malevolent actor. The question then should be - what could be a better outlet (or ideally, solution) to these emotional attitudes, that would starve Fuentes for support and channel them in a more productive direction.
Re: I am baffled that someone like Mr. Fuentes actually commands a not-insignificant portion of the male populace.
Does he? Can you find numbers showing that? And how much is "a not insignificant portion"? I would put that at a minimum of 5% (and I am being generous).
As you probably know, being able to please a niche in a 340 million person nation can make one rich. Look at Vince McMahon and his fake wrestling. He was a billionaire at one time but his wife's political ambitions burned through a lot of that. Oprah has her niche, Kanye West has his niche, Rush Limbaugh had his niche, Sean Hannity has his niche, Rachel Ray has her niche and so on. Nick Fuentes has his niche. But Fuentes couldn't be elected county commissioner in my 80 % Trump county.
The guy is an obvious psychopath. Psychopaths and psychopaths alone have that high energy, borderline mania, and are that reckless.
Niall Ferguson has advanced the hypothesis that conspiracy thinking cannot catch on in a literate society, and that as literacy declined in the last half century, "conspiracy spotting," as I term it, could have been expected only to thrive.
I have a claim to fame which I can't prove and don't want credit for, anyway: I invented the idea that we faked the Apollo 11 moon landing. I invented it in December, 1970, as I was on my way to take an English final at Batts' Hall at The University of Texas. Well, I didn't invent it, exactly. The idea occurred to me as something which only morons could believe. I remember I thought it was such a funny idea that I started giggling to myself.
I say I invented it, and I did, in the sense that it came to me out of my subconscious. I had never heard anyone else say it. Probably some people had. Probably many more had thought it. But in the rational, still literary though slipping America of 1970, no one who wasn't in need of custodial care thought it.
No one thought the Holocaust hadn't happened.
Fuentes, had he been active then, would have been seen as another George Lincoln Rockwell - like freak.
It's the way of this fallen world that Charlie Kirk is murdered and that keening, giggling creep, Fuentes, is having his moment. Fuentes interests me for a single reason, that his content notwithstanding, that public manner of his has somehow not proven to be an impossible turn off for any audience he might have wanted to have. I suppose they've been waiting for a Fuehrer, and they think they've found one.
Fuentes doesn't shock me, though. The size and commitment of his followership shock me. They remind me of Churchill's line about the Wehrmacht, "dulled, drilled brutes."
What has happened to Carlson does shock me. We are being warred upon by principalities and powers with an intensity I never thought I'd live to see.
Re: Niall Ferguson has advanced the hypothesis that conspiracy thinking cannot catch on in a literate society
What is the definition of "catch on" How many people have to believe something to qualify? The US in the mid 19th century was pretty literate but all kinds of tin foil hattery made the rounds over Lincoln's assassination, implicating everyone from Jefferson Davis to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton to Queen Victoria to the Pope.
Interesting you should bring this up. I'm about to start "Blood on the Moon," which no less than James McPherson takes seriously. It advances the hypothesis that the Confederate Secret Service was far more involved than had previously been believed.
I wish I could remember the author's name, but the novel, "The Judges of the Secret Court," an nyrb book, is well worth the time of anyone who is fascinated by the Lincoln assassination. I am generally a holdout against historical fiction. As an example, I have never had any interest in reading "Lonesome Dove" despite my having been acquainted with Larry McMurtry when I was a teenager. "The Judges of the Secret Court" is a treasure.
Much of the Lincoln assassination speculation was nuttery, but qui bono? always. Much of the South, including its government, would have wanted Lincoln dead.
As for a tipping point in our era, I'd guess sometime in the 1970s.
This is close to my take. I find Fuentes noxious, but he’s mainly a clown and provocateur. He is doing loudly and publicly what pissed off young men have done in out-of-the way online chatrooms for years. Rod and myself aren’t of his generation, so we will tend to misread the gravity of his statements.
Problem is, Fuentes and others now do their online personas as a public political performance. Their peers who spent untold hours blasting away on Reddit and elsewhere see it as just the same thing. Now in the face of the whole public.
But if it’s now a *public* discourse, a politics, it’s no longer the same thing. US policy is not Reddit.
Myself I don’t know what Fuentes really believes, and don’t much care. What’s graver than Fuentes’ overripe provocations is that Tucker Carlson chose to interview him, and apparently (I didn’t watch it) treated the discourse seriously. What the hell happened to Carlson?
I do think JD Vance understands this gang and the dynamic at issue, and that in general it’s fine to let these guys provoke. But at some point, No. A useful smoke bomb to throw at hall monitors is not a politics.
We’ll see where it leads. I don’t however think it’s Weimar.
I have no way of proving this, but I think Fuentes is very much a self-aware manipulator. His goal is something like the creation of a political cult with him at the center, whereas the truth is of secondary importance for him.
There's a few clues that suggest this, including such examples as:
1.) His seemingly random and bizarre adulation of Stalin makes more sense if you understand Fuentes as an aspiring totalitarian taking notes from him. Same with Hitler.
2.) The way he treats his followers. Rod probably hasn't looked into this yet, but Fuentes is known to treat his followers like pawns to be discarded. The internet gossip corner has talked a lot about this, mostly surrounding high-profile defectors like "Jaden McNeill".
3.) His general eclectic embrace of every incel meme and trope while also claiming (at other times) to be a "traditionalist". This gobbledygook of self-contradicting positions make no sense if you assume Fuentes has ideas that he cares about. But if you assume he is a manipulator blowing with the wind to strike poses and gain infamy, it does makes sense.
It seems a plausible reading. I haven’t paid enough attention to him to judge how smart he is (as in: him taking notes from Stalin) but if he combines his love for drama with actual political cunning, then what we’ll see is he’ll begin to choose his main themes. He won’t continue just grabbing at whatever provokes, no matter how incoherent, but there will be a *semi-incoherent* politics of outrage that emerges.
Stalin is a good teacher. I remember Saddam was a careful student of Stalin, and he lasted pretty long. But Mesopotamia isn’t America. Luckily.
Daniel Greenfield has an incisive article, “The Real Split on the Right Is Over America.” On the FRONT PAGE WEBSITE ..He has articulated something I’ve felt for quite a while: as we are now discussing the new movement on the right that cloaks itself in Christian rhetoric but carries within it a rejection of America’s moral and civic inheritance. Greenfield’s warning could not be more urgent.
Alasdair MacIntyre warned that when a civilization loses its shared moral framework, the old moral language survives only as fragments. People still say good and evil, but those words no longer point toward a common good. That is exactly what we see now — Christian terms drained of Christian meaning, weaponized for tribal power rather than moral order.
I’ve sensed this for a while: I recently experienced friends who we talk the talk, but all of a sudden sound like something from an invasion of the body snatchers my very traditional friends just are sounding strange with new weird theories.
I hear of a new faction rising that speaks the language of faith but despises the substance of it. They quote Scripture and talk about “Christendom,” but their faith serves power, not the other way around.
These are not traditional conservatives. They are the alternate right — angry, clever, and hollow. They use Christian words as banners of war, not bridges of meaning. Greenfield has done the a service by naming the danger out loud.
Right now I’m still uncomfortable, mentioning the names of some of my favorite conservatives and broadcasters. some I admired are individuals who are not pushing back on the outlandish theories. They say they’re defending the West. In truth, they’re burning down the very house that sheltered them.
So Daniel Greenfield has drawn the line that had to be drawn. I hope Rod and Daniel continue to write some more on the subject and expose this poisonous threat.
"Myself I don’t know what Fuentes really believes, and don’t much care."
I've listened to all but the last 20 minutes of Carlson's interview. I haven't found much that was offensive though others might say that Fuentes is on his best behavior during the interview. We'll see what the last 20 minutes reveal.
One interesting thing is that Carlson at one point does say he had Fuentes on the show to learn what Fuentes really thinks. Carlson points out that he thought that Fuentes was a Fed and ridiculed him previously (Fuentes also has been a Carlson critic.) So I'm not much offended by the interview unless there is something really provocative in the final minutes. Clearly, other online stuff is offensive if others are to be believed though I have not followed Fuentes at all.
As an aside, my wife, who is no Fuentes fan, thought Carlson wasn't so much soft balling the interview as much as gently trying to pull out what Fuentes really thought, trying to help him see potential error in his thinking, and to see how some of it was harmful.
Yes!!!!! Tucker is very, very smart. He was indeed drawing Fuentes out. The online young men who love to shock the normies and debate each other for sport—how about you older conservative men father them and help them mature! Tucker is so far above Fuentes—you don’t seriously debate children who are play acting. You listen to them, take their concerns seriously, mentor them, and help them mature.
Constantina, they have contempt for us. They see us as intrinsic to their problems. Yesterday, Fuentes was the sole topic of the impossibly badly named podcast he and Heather Heying, his wife, do. You can see it here on YouTube, but you don't need to devote time to it.
The telling things are in the Comments. Maybe the ratio has improved somewhat, but yesterday, it was Groyper and nothing but.
I forced myself to watch the Carlson interview of Fuentes. It was a friendly interview and Fuentes presented himself pretty well. He didn't seem to have evil views. And Rod Dreher has Fuentes calling Hitler "pretty ******* cool." Hitler was one of the worst monsters in world history.
You saw a friendly one. I saw a more subtle, fatherly one.
I acknowledge that Fuentes has made abhorrent statements. So have many people I work with on a daily basis. I am trying to work with one who thinks the abuse of children through transgenderism is appropriate.
Appreciated. I think journalists should be able to interview anyone. Unlike nitwits, I supported Carlson interviewing Putin, though yes, he could have thrown at least a few hardballs at him instead of just let him lecture.
What Carlson did with Fuentes I’ll never know, because I just don’t care what Fuentes thinks. That might change, if Fuentes gains stature beyond smirking troll.
I care more about Carlson’s own positions, and don’t like to see him telegraphing BS, as he’s begun doing. Perhaps I should say I *cared* more about Carlson, before his recent turns.
This is a good point; Fuentes is feeding off of the "vibes", and those vibes are showing the young that the old have thoroughly discredited themselves in every way possible. What is the primary shibboleth of the 20th century? Why, WWII and the Nazis, which came to serve the role in modern materialist mythology that the orcs and Sauron do in the LOTR books. Not saying Hitler and the Nazis weren't evil (they were), but that they do not represent the ultimate powers of darkness; rather Satan, the demons, and the fallen powers of the air do. But for an age that decided it needed to stop believing in the noetic, the Nazis would have to play the role as the ultimate bad guy (ironically, in much the way the Jew had been allowed to fill the roll of the less elevated material scapegoat sporadically throughout much of the Church Age).
Completely agree that Fuentes (and Owens, for that matter) are malevolent actors (I'm still not quite sure I understand Tucker's thread, but I am disheartened by some of what I see; he is a man in need of prayers). But the truth is that this myth of modernity will fall (for a good account of this, recommend some of Jonathan Pageau's content) and the non-malevolent (of less malevolent, at least) forces of conservative thought need to figure out a way to engage with this constructively, while avoiding the pitfalls of this unveiling of the materialist myth devolve into the equally false consciousness of antisemitism. This is hard because the noble lie that is the materialist myth of WWII was built, in part (and not by the Jews, mind you, but as a project of the post-war Western consensus), as a secular bulwark against the potentiality of antisemitism ever arising again.
How to do this precisely? I wish I knew, though I suspect only the strength of true Christian charity, unbent (as it so often is) by the weight of clannish and tribalistic loyalty, is strong enough to thread this particular needle. One thing I do know is that, however well intentioned, appeals to the horrors of the holocaust are unlikely to turn hearts, as this is precisely the mode of manipulation that has disaffected this group of young men enamored with Fuentes' trolling (and for many of them, I would wager, what appeals to them about Fuentes is not what he says--which often makes very little sense--but how he says it; the "vibes" of sticking it to the man as rock and punk did for simpler and less decadent ages). They see appeals to the moral horrors of the holocaust (with, as it has been applied, some justification) as a form of emotional blackmail (and female coded, at that) and also as akin to the constant (again, feminine coded) nagging pertaining to the evils of racism, sexism, etc.
Also, for those of you such as our host--who unlike myself, who have fewer such contacts, actually know some of these people and can talk to them privately or via groups of affiliated interlocutors--maybe start having some of these conversations in private before denouncing one another all over the internet? I know this is a novel concept in this age of universal openness, but not ever damn thing that a person thinks about someone else needs to be splayed all over the internet. I know for those whose livelihoods depend upon content (mine does as well, indirectly) you have an incentive to put everything that comes out of one's head onto the page, but a better part of political writing needs to be knowing how to use the networks one has on the back end before using the oblique means available to one by battling in the public sphere.
The sad fact of the matter is that direct denunciations and appeals to moral authority, even when entirely correct, will never win against the likes of a Fuentes, who feeds and grows off of this type of discourse. Nor is it likely that one will be able to out clown the clown. That leaves the only effective means of battle as coordinated and subtle influence campaigns, and prayer.
"Also, for those of you such as our host--who unlike myself, who have fewer such contacts, actually know some of these people and can talk to them privately or via groups of affiliated interlocutors--maybe start having some of these conversations in private before denouncing one another all over the internet?"
At some level, this is how I saw Carlson's interview with Fuentes. Carlson is trying to understand where Fuentes is coming from and, perhaps too generously, not demanding and immediate conversion/renunciation by Fuentes of his views.
While watching the interview, Carlson took great pains to explain to Fuentes why it was un-Christian to assign blood guilt to Jews as well as to assign guilt to any group in general. He seemed to be trying to talk Fuentes down from a bad place. Do you remember that part of the interview?
Yeah, I don't think Nick Fuentes has left anybody who has ever seen him online the slightest doubt where he's coming from or what he thinks about anything. I honestly cannot figure out the strategy behind granting him credibility, but there surely has to be one.
Again, Carlson stated during the interview that he was trying to figure out what Fuentes thoughts really were. Perhaps he has seen the online stuff but, as many a person's public persona is a cover for other issues, Carlson thought there might be something more to Fuentes. Perhaps Carlson was lying.
Or perhaps, as I note above, his questioning was more of a attempt to get Fuentes to see the folly of some of his thinking, and to reign in his darker impulses.
Clearly Rod, you are keeping some very bad company -- one might even call it demonic, although from me that's a kind of secular analogy. "The right" is a diverse range of people artificially cast into one big pot and stirred by crafty manipulators. Declare your independence. Stand up for what you believe, not who you've kept company with.
I get email from Roberts. My email address probably got onto their list because I sometimes subscribed to the print edition of The American Conservative. I mostly ignore them. Occasionally I have tried to tell them that just because I see the flaws in DEI, CRT, and LGBTQWERTY does not mean I support their dystopian vision of a neo-fascist state. But they just keep sending their email. The bots do what they do.
Nick Fuentes doesn't run jack. He has a big mouth and friends with well equipped studios.
Nice touch, putting a photo of Auschwitz at the top of your post. Very much on point.
I think Rod's strength is his ability to remain loyal and sensitive to the idea of normalcy and the moral center of Western civilization (and its institutions), while also being able to delve through the chaos of intellectual discourse without losing himself therein.
Hence, although I disagree with him a lot on many topics, I view it as a mark of his strength to be friends with very "normie" figures like JD Vance while also being conversant with strange ideas and people very far from the center of culture and society.
That's also why I think he has to be given some leeway when he takes his positions. Intellectual nomads like myself (and maybe you) might want him to strike a "pure" position in defiance of his social connections, but it might be better in the long run if he finds a calculated middle position, allowing him to keep his ties while also paying tribute to the truth.
I don't want Rod to be a "pure" anything, any more than I try to conform to the purist doctrines of any political faction. I might be described as a left-wing populist constitutionalist and an enemy of identity politics... but that would be imprecise too. Rod as an individual with a unique voice -- raised in the diverse southern cultures of Louisiana (which is not Mississippi, nor Texas, nor George, nor Florida, among other southern states it is not), intellectually sophisticated, conservative in temperament, pious in matters of faith and morality, with a good eye for his own weaknesses, has a lot to offer the world. When he self-identifies with the polyglot spectrum of political factions and ideologies that liberal journalists dismiss as "the right," treating it as a coherent body, he seems to lose a good deal of what makes him a unique voice.
I only sense what you are referring to when he's talking about Europe.
His strength on America is that he has so many American friends, so many diverse experiences and has finely attuned his anxieties with input from all political sides to the point he is never a cliche and never just following the stereotype of "American right-winger".
On Europe, in contrast, he just repeats the run-of-the-mill Eurabia talking points that I first heard 15 years ago. I always find it funny when he accuses me of puffing the Murti-Bing inhaler, because I literally have heard his talking points countless times since 2015 (including the Rotherham abuse scandal, which I heard about almost ten years ago) and am tired that his takes are too conventional and lack his usual creative eccentricity.
What Rod really needs in Europe is to get out more. He has some good tradcon friends, but he needs to get some liberal friends, some migrant friends. There's plenty of oyster bars and craft beers in liberal haunts like Hamburg, Amsterdam and Berlin too, so I hope he expands his reach soon.
Yes. Europe has a lot of problems, which are quite different from the USA's. It is not impossible that it will drift into civil war with Islam, but there are various other possibilities. Rod does seem to have a love of US-right talking points in this respect. My hunch is that he's in a bubble in Budapest, unable to speak Hungarian. I wish he'd spend more time in places such as the UK, Ireland, France or Belgium, where he can talk to random people in bars the way he does in the USA.
I myself have been out of the UK a long time, and am out of the loop as to what's happening there, but my friends and relatives, for all their diverse unhappinesses with what's happening, and including some extreme Islamophobes, think civil war is far-fetched.
It's also odd how Rod always links the Islamic problems in Europe with hostility to Israel, yet support for US foreign policy in the Middle East and vs. Russia is a big part of Europe's problems.
We see Rod very differently, and most likely he sees himself differently than either of us, and us differently than we see ourselves. I don't characterize him as "a man of the right." I remember his Crunchy Con days, when I first found his Beliefnet column via a link from ThinkChristian.net. I do pay attention when he himself talks about the right, what the right must do, how the right must police itself, and speaks of the right in the first person plural.
I find his reporting from Europe helpful, even though I take much of it with a grain of salt. The people he talks to and hears from are a real component of the diverse range of classes, experiences, people, nationalities, ideologies, that is modern Europe. Some of the problems he highlights are real -- although I think not the imminent Armageddon that he often sees coming.
Daniel Greenfield has an incisive article, “The Real Split on the Right Is Over America.” On the FRONT PAGE WEBSITE ..He has articulated something I’ve felt for quite a while: as we are now discussing the new movement on the right that cloaks itself in Christian rhetoric but carries within it a rejection of America’s moral and civic inheritance. Greenfield’s warning could not be more urgent.
Alasdair MacIntyre warned that when a civilization loses its shared moral framework, the old moral language survives only as fragments. People still say good and evil, but those words no longer point toward a common good. That is exactly what we see now — Christian terms drained of Christian meaning, weaponized for tribal power rather than moral order.
I’ve sensed this for a while: I recently experienced friends who we talk the talk, but all of a sudden sound like something from an invasion of the body snatchers my very traditional friends just are sounding strange with new weird theories.
I hear of a new faction rising that speaks the language of faith but despises the substance of it. They quote Scripture and talk about “Christendom,” but their faith serves power, not the other way around.
These are not traditional conservatives. They are the alternate right — angry, clever, and hollow. They use Christian words as banners of war, not bridges of meaning. Greenfield has done the a service by naming the danger out loud.
Right now I’m still uncomfortable, mentioning the names of some of my favorite conservatives and broadcasters. some I admired are individuals who are not pushing back on the outlandish theories. They say they’re defending the West. In truth, they’re burning down the very house that sheltered them.
So Daniel Greenfield has drawn the line that had to be drawn. I hope Rod and Daniel continue to write some more on the subject and expose this poisonous threat.
Re: I hear of a new faction rising that speaks the language of faith but despises the substance of it. They quote Scripture and talk about “Christendom,” but their faith serves power, not the other way around.
Sadly, this is nothing new under the sun. Religion coopted for national power and identity has been the bane of Orthodoxy in the Old World countries for centuries. In the West the rulers of Spain and France were adept at claiming divine providence for whatever they got up to, no matter how sordid. "Gott Mit Uns" was a slogan of the armies of Germany since the says of Frederick the Great.
The center cannot hold…we are caught in forces well behind our power to change them. We are the pawns of gods, ring moved about—“influenced” if you will—in ways difficult to understand.
The center has undoubtedly been giving way for some time; so long that it's all but impossible to say exactly what the center even means. I thought the so-called heterodox community had this potential. But to the degree they have anything in common it's their rejection of in-group dynamics, which makes forming a coherent coalition all but impossible. It seems the strong gods currently live on the extremes. God help us.
My fear was that, if the groypers were mainstreamed, it would only be a matter of time until someone more charismatic would weaponize the movement.
But my expectations were too high for even that; unless my definition of charismatic is horribly outdated, it seems Mr. Fuentes can just build it up without any plotting or convincing, without any drop of charisma whatsoever.
Fuentes is a gangster. He plucked the lowest people in society (from an easy pool to draw from, 4chan and such) and compromises them. The Groyper movement is not just Nazi, it's full of pedophiles. Nick expects donations/tribute, which is publicly posted on his streams, and he had his own streaming site (helpfully built by Alex Jones' IT guy) that had no privacy policy. He keeps the data from all of this. Once you get too deep into Groyper world there's no getting out. Beyond the reputational ruin, there's legal risks involved with the pedophilia. I'm not sure why they haven't been broken up yet over this. The blogger I will link to below (warning: NFSW and very long) thinks it's because Nick's a federal informant. I don't know about that, but the rest of that post is a very convincing and difficult read.
Actaully Trump has exactly the kind of charisma that plays really well with most non-Americans. Most non-Americans aren't western European or Canadians. Trump is a lot like poltiicians in Eastern Europe, Asia, and Latin America.
I'm not sure that's true. Obviously populist leaders tend to be strongmen with bracing rhetoric. But compare Trump with Orban or BoJo. Orban could give extemporaneous 45-minute perorations about the importance of Western civilization when Dreher visited. Johnson could appear in an official debate with Mary Beard about whether the Greeks or Romans were the superior civilization.
It's preposterous to imagine Trump doing either such thing.
Of course he does. Longer than 45 minutes. That's obviously not what I'm getting at.
Our gracious host was impressed by the *quality* of Orban's speech (that is, its truth value), not its effectiveness. Trump is great at what Machiavelli called the "effectual truth." But if you have to distinguish "effectual truth" from true truth, then the effectual truth isn't the truth at all. Trump is highly effective in a post-truth era.
I remain convinced that it is preposterous to imagine that Trump could give us 45 enlightening and insightful minutes on the importance of Western Civilization.
Orban is central European, but most people don't really make that distinction anymore, so I could see you bringing that up. Boris Johnson is English, so only not Western European if we don't count the British Isles as part of Europe.
Trump is like the immigrants who built New York, who came from all over the world. He even reminds me sometimes of my dad, an immigrant from Greece. These are the people who raise their glasses on Thanksgiving and proclaim, “God bless America!🇺🇸
Agreed. I have a coworker whose grandfather is Colombian and she told me her grandfather loves Trump. For people in other parts of the world, Trump is not so different from their leaders.
Trump may be the "ugly American" stereotype but what European politician has any charisma? I don't know of any. Does anyone think Keir Starmer is the second-coming of Churchill, Lloyd George, Gladstone or Palmerston? Does anyone think Emmanuel Macron is the second-coming of Charles De Gaulle? What we have in Europe is a bunch of dull placeholders managing welfare states on the decline.
The Kevin Roberts video is so dishonest. Fuentes doesn't merely disagree with the Israeli government. He has made blatant antisemitic statements that his abettor, Tucker Carlson, left completely unchallenged. Please let this odious little twerp be driven from the public square.
His followers see him as a messianic figure. Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying have a podcast with an impossibly poorly chosen name. It's on YouTube. Yesterday, Fuentes was their only topic.
You don't have to devote two hours to the podcast. But check out the comments. It's all Groyper all the time.
I doubt many American are paying attention to Fuentes and his ilk. Trump's disastrous meeting with Xi will affect the GOP in more ways than one next year. Xi holds all the cards.
While we endlessly debate Carlson platforming twerp Fuentes, there's business as usual in China:
Re: Trump's disastrous meeting with Xi will affect the GOP in more ways than one next year. Xi holds all the cards.
Can you expand on that? So far I've seen almost serious analysis of that deal other than from people who, if Trump espoused Mom and apple pie, who espouse matricide and mincemeat pie.
The Financial Times, Bloomberg, various blogs have good takes on the "deal". Bottom line, this isn't 1990. China is vastly more powerful than before and cannot be threatened with tariffs. If you get a chance, check out the video above. Sure, it's made by a pro-China vlogger but there's no denying that attendance at the Canton Fair is proof that the world is moving on. Multi-polarity is here whether we like it or not.
You can be very sure that the Democrats will do their very best to hang Fuentes around the necks of Republicans. There are as many stomach-turning Fuentes quotes as there are stars in the sky.
I also just found out about the "I've had it" podcast where the host is cheeriing on boomers talking about killing off young conservatives. Seriously the well of crazy on the left is so deep that this would be the right's to lose.
As a contrary point of view to Fuentes, the book by Michel Yves Bollore, God, The Science, The Evidence contains a section that shows the Jews are the Chosen People based on history and their collection of writings are now part of the Christian Bible and unusually accurate. It's kind of hard to refute what is presented.
So how can he argue against Jews per se given that Jesus was a Jew and the people were the Chosen People by God.
I say this as a Catholic and a believer that truth will eventually win out.
No one knows what is exactly happening in Israel. We know. the people from Gaza are reprehensible and maybe the Israelis are too. Does anyone know the truth? Certainly not Fuentes.
Fuentes and Carlson are distractions/diversions. The real danger is somewhere else and no one talks about it.
There is an underlying cause to all the chaos and no one addresses it. People believe if you address the chaos of the moment and have a solution, that all will be well. When it is impossible for anything long term to be well when the underlying causes are not even known let alone addressed.
Stop acting like people or movements are capable of more than one thing at a time. One can both pushback on the policies of Woke Progressivism while also shaming and rejecting the Nazi-sympathizers (and their enablers) in the New Right.
The argument is that the Church has replaced Israel (partly true) and that therefore God no longer cares about Jews per se (wrong). While the Church is the "New Israel," per St. Paul God still cares about the "old Israel" for the sake of the fathers (Rom. 11:28).
The idea that the whole thing is cut-and-dry either way is the problem with both Dispensationalism and Catholic/Orthodox anti-Semitism. One says *nothing* has changed w/r/t to the Jews, the other says *everything* has changed. Neither is true.
Simon may have been Jewish, and certainly there is a subtle sense of, if not anti-Christianity, then mild disdain for Christianity, Christian Scriptural exegesis and the like, running through it, well under its surface but discernible, but the book is really great!
My understanding is, at least for the Catholic Church, it is one or the other but some mixture of both. The Church is the New Israel yet there remains God's special relationship with the Jewish people.
I think A.J. Hamilton is reading stuff that wasn't there into the statement of Kevin Roberts.
As I heard it, Kevin makes two points that are very much along the lines of my own in a couple comments here this week when I said:
>>Personally, I don't get why it's so hard to understand the entirely legitimate and non-extreme position that the interests of America do not always exactly correspond to the interests of Israel...that no nation should be given a blank check by the United States...that the welfare of the American people should take priority over the welfare of the Israeli people or the Ukrainian people or the people of any other country on the globe.
This is my view and I believe it's an entirely legitimate expression of patriotism, realism, nationalism...and sanity. As opposed to the non-legitimate and extremist position that Jews are bad, that Jews run the country, that Jews are organized into a sinister cabal, that Jews are threats, blah blah blah -- all of which is classic anti-Semitism with a long historical pedigree. It is frankly a virus of the mind.
So to me, unthinking support for Israel and falsely labeling as antisemitic those opposing such a stance constitute one extreme. Hate-mongering and conspiracy theories about Jews are the actually antisemitic opposite extreme. The rational, defensible, and patriotic middle ground strikes me as the one I outlined above.<<
And:
>>...the much more dangerous and immediate threat is from the Wokeist ideology of the Dem-Media Party and its allies controlling major institutions of our society. Therefore, engaging in ritual denunciations of people on what is loosely called the "Right" is a counterproductive distraction from the real war.
If some other conservatives don't share that view...if they think some people on the Right to include a bunch of snarky nobodies in a group chat...are a problem on par with the forces responsible for the murder of Charlie Kirk, then, OK, it's a free country and they're allowed to hold that view. But they should not impute bad faith to conservatives who disagree with their judgment on that question.<<
Meanwhile, it seems clear to me that the current game of Nick Fuentes and his ilk is to gain respectability by hijacking the mantle of "America First."
But you don't have to be antisemitic, as Fuentes is, to subscribe to America First. In fact, the guy who basically founded the America First movement, fellow by the name of Trump, is not antisemitic and has actually provided Israel with crucial support over the last several turbulent months. (Arguably too much support but that's a different question.)
However you cut it, this ugly and apparently widening rift within the world of conservatism is a huge gift to the real enemy, which is why I think conservatives should not play the game...should not get trapped in this no-win quicksand.
Respectfully, this is a naive take by you and giving grace to Roberts that is undeserved. Rod & AG Hamilton have both pointed out the laughable contradiction of Mr. Heritage simultaneously calling for the open debate with the likes of Nazi-apologist incel like Fuentes while also demanding Tucker's critics on the Right shut up and fall in line. You can't square that circle.
Vince, I didn't take that message from Roberts's statement which I link below.
What I heard in plain English is that he "abhors," a word the dictionary defines as "regards with disgust and hatred," the things that Nick Fuentes says.
Also, I did not hear him "demand" anything from Tucker's critics. Rather, he suggested that treating Tucker as an enemy right now is the wrong way to go and he will not join those conservatives engaged in the attempt.
I think he's right on both counts for reasons that I expressed in my comment.
'No enemies to the Right' is a moral dead end, Jerry. Giving Roberts a pass on playing that card in his defense of Tucker's slobbering interview with Fuentes is misguided.
Vince, I respect your view on that...and Rod's too...but "No Enemies To The Right" is not the way I would frame my position.
Rather, it's "No Enemies Worth Expending Ammunition On To The Right When The Real Enemy And Much More Dangerous Threat Is Located In A Different Direction."
"No Enemies Worth Expending Ammunition On To The Right When The Real Enemy And Much More Dangerous Threat Is Located In A Different Direction."
This is reminds me of Chiang Kai-shek explaining why he wasn't bothering with the Japanese takeover of Manchuria in 1931: 'The Japanese are a disease of the skin; the Communists are a disease of the heart." Six years later he'd come to see it differently.
Also, I know you don't hold this position from the various comments you've made on Rod's Substack, but "No Enemies Worth Expending Ammunition On To The Right" essentially amounts to a should shrug about something as deeply toxic as Nazi-loving antisemitism.
No shrugging here, Vince. I think real antisemitism is a noxious and disgusting thing.
My point is that the Nick Fuentes of the world, whatever their audience, remain on the fringe in the sense that they have no power and no real influence on those who do have power. And I see no evidence this equation will change.
On the other side, however, the toxic ideology that now possesses the Dem-Mediacrats is not on the fringe. It rules their Party. It controls key institutions of our society. It is a deadly threat to me and my family. Thus my No Enemies Worth etc as formulated above.
At this point, Vincent, I'm up to 17 minutes of Nick Fuentes: 15 minutes from various YouTube snippets and 2 minutes from the now infamous Carlson interview. It's like listening to Ben Shapiro while nails on the chalkboard screech in the background.
In contrast, Kevin Roberts' 2 minute 39 second monologue was clear, cogent, and free of the flippancy & gibberish of Fuentes, and yet folks are falling over themselves to lambast Roberts. Say what, honky?
The only consolation here is that the US right seems to be having this argument. Yes, it’s unnecessary and divisive and distracting but at least it’s happening. There is pushback against teh bad actors and extremes and a desire to test the boundary beyond which the right ‘goes too far.’ The left meanwhile …
Except for the most part there is no dialog, merely rock throwing. Tucker spent much of the interview suggesting that Nick would be well served to moderate his positions without caving in his principles. Old guy to young guy kind of thing.
Just one quibble - Charles Lindbergh, who was the chief spokesman for the America First Committee (not a founder, however), expressed clearly antisemitic views. I think the AFC was divided over those views. The relevance of that history, IMHO, is that there's precedent for chunks of an influential group having a mindset that views antisemitism as being perfectly consistent with, or even a key part of, nationalism.
Maybe the AFC had influence disproportionate to its numbers, inasmuch as it was a mere 1-2% sliver of the US population; maybe not. That's hard to measure even with the benefit of historical records and analyses. Does anyone else wonder if the Fuentes furor is a case of sky-is-falling hysteria? How many GOP staffers in DC are under 30 and what is the hard number equaling 35% (midpoint of 30 and 40) of them? How influential are they? What should those numbers and that influence be to constitute a "Very Big Deal" anyway?
Dan, I would have to question Rod's anecdotal information about the number of Groypers on GOP congressional staffs, but as you suggest, we'd have to start by knowing how many under-30s are there in the first place.
In any case, I see very little evidence that Groypers wield important influence on Capital Hill.
From experience doing advocacy in DC, many if not most congressional staffers are 20s-early 30s. Whether GOP staffers are Groypers, it’s anyone’s guess.
I disagree about Lindbergh being an Anti-Semite. After all, he was friends with Daniel Guggenheim, a Jew, and convinced Guggenheim to fund a rocket scientist named Robert Goddard in the 30s. Lindbergh was very naive politically. He said what he thought was true- the British and the Jewish lobbies pushed for American entry into World War Two- and was too naive to think that he would be attacked for saying such a thing.
I think a lot of congressional staffers are in their 20s, it’s very common to do that work for a few years out of college. These younger staff are not the most influential for the most part — but a few years down the line, many of them will hold positions of influence, in politics or elsewhere. Let’s hope they’ve outgrown their Groyper phase by then.
As an aside, I thought James Lindsey was full of it when he starting blasting the term "Woke Right" (I don't think he's in good faith and the term is being used to break up momentum on the Right), but it's hard to argue with when you see people on the Right condemning Tucker so thoroughly for "platforming" some questionable figures on the Right. You can engage with their ideas without approving of them. It's also interesting to see that the "Woke Right" only seems to come out around Isreal/Palestine discourse.
And lastly, to paraphrase Matt Walsh, I have "Isreal fatigue" meaning, I don't get why I have to care so much and spend so much time thinking about their country. We spend too much money and they're waaaay too involved in lobbying and our politics. Does that mean I hate them? No. Does that mean I support Hamas? No. Does that mean I think "the Jews" are somehow running everything? No. I want them to succeed but as an ally of ours, like any ally, we can send them money/weapons when we've gotten our debt and issues under control. That's not antisemitic, that's common sense. If blasting anyone who agrees our ties to Isreal are taking away from America at a critical moment in our country as antisemitic is the strategy, people will stop believing being called an "antisemite" is bad, much like what happened when the Left overused "racist," "misogynist," and "homophobic."
Natalie, you make an excellent point in your 2nd paragraph. Over the years, the charge of antisemitism has been recklessly weaponized to smear not only those deserving of the brand...people like Fuentes and his ilk...but also those whose only sin might be questioning the wisdom of American policy toward Israel.
I can recall decades ago when legendary conservative Pat Buchanan was almost run out of polite society after he famously blasted the Israeli Defense Ministry and what he called its "amen corner" in Washington for supposedly wanting a war in the Middle East. Buchanan was saved only when influential friends like Robert Novak and others across the political spectrum, who knew Pat to be a decent man and NOT an antisemite, stuck up publicly for him.
Antisemitism is a real thing with a long and destructive historical pedigree...and there are many peddlers of it on the scene to this day. But it is an incendiary and damning charge which should not be indiscriminately hurled around on questionable grounds.
What I don’t like is that you can find diverse opinions on the subject of Israeli policy among Jews living in Israel, but if you criticize Israel in any way, here in the United States, people will jump on you for being “anti-Zionist” and “Antisemitic.”
Don't be dishonest, Natalie. The problem isn't just 'the platforming'. It's the slobberfest interviews where he doesn't make the slightest hint of pushing back on the garbage these losers spew.
It's not my country, Vince. Maybe I wouldn't be so fatigued if we didn't send them billions a year when we're trillions in debt and struggling to unite as a country without the whole Isreal/Palestine thing tearing up effectively coalitions on the Right.
Best ally how, exactly? I mean, what do we get from them?
Okay, so some Middle Eastern bases, purchasing from our defense contractors, and some intelligence. Maybe that's useful but is it SO useful as to justify destroying the unity of the Right when our country is falling apart in almost every way and we need to unify more than ever?
"...justify destroying the unity of the Right when our country is falling apart..."
Think about that. The unity of the Right. You're correct, our country is falling apart. Do you think God will bless and restore it if we make common cause with Nazis?
Because they are Nazis. How much do you know about Fuentes? He's a psychopath. He talks about taking over and crushing his opponents. He admires Hitler. He glories in himself as a tyrant. He has made speeches in which he screams that his followers must be willing to "rape, kill, and die" for him. He admires Andrew Tate's Islamic ideas about the way men should treat women
There is abundant evidence that he is a homosexual pedophile.
He is a vile human being.
His followers are of his ilk. They're Nazis. They want the deaths of every Jew on the planet. Don't kid yourself: if they got their chance, they'd come after Christians, too.
I don't see how it's possible for someone to miss the demonic which runs through the movement, and you cannot make common cause with evil and expect that God will bless you. If the "conservative" movement makes common cause with the Groypers, they will have ceased to be a conservative movement. Those of us who are truly Christian will see to that. We do not want to work with people who would like to bring about another Holocaust. And if America turns against Israel, what, exactly, would there be left for us to try to protect, anyway? We would have proven ourselves to be a nation which is so decadent it doesn't deserve to survive.
William F. Buckley, Jr. made his great contribution to American conservatism in the 1950s by doing everything he could to purge it of that era's Groyper types, primarily the anti - Semites who had always been a bane of American conservatism.
I'm still shaken by that consideration of yours: even if the Republican party didn't lose more adherents than gain them if they welcomed the Groypers in, do you think God would be more or less likely to bless us? Maybe the most consistent lesson history teaches us is that God will bless those who bless Israel and curse those who curse it. Genesis 12:3 makes it clear that regimes which turn against Israel sign their own death warrants. This is equally true of individual anti - Semites. No anti - Semite ever has a life which is anything but a curse, to others and to themselves.
As for Israel as an ally, more than any other country on Earth, they share our basic values and unlike most of us, are prepared to die for them. If I were president and had to make a choice between the retention of our allies with the proviso that Israel be excluded and the retention of Israel with the loss of every other ally, I wouldn't hesitate to choose the latter. This doesn't even take into account that soldier for soldier, the IDF must be considered one of the three or four best fighting forces on Earth. And the Mossad does not have its reputation without warrant.
God gave the land to them in Genesis, scattered them when their disobedience had proven too much for Him, and for nearly eighty years, has been bringing them back. Palestine as a country is a fiction. It never existed, and the persuasive power of the fiction of Palestinianism proves that propaganda works.
But I keep coming back to this: please ponder if you think "success" would be worthwhile if in order to obtain it we had to make common cause with people whose policy is murder.
I feel like this, although coming from the opposite side. I have, perhaps, Palestine Fatigue.
My sympathies are basically with the Palestinians, but I loathe Hamas.
I wish Israel hadn't been created in the first place. If I could wave a magic wand, it would disappear, and all the Jews would move to the USA. However, I don't think it's worth having nuclear war for that. I just wish the USA would stop supporting Israel to the hilt, treat it like a small, faraway, rather nasty country, and let its economy decline so that a lot of the ambitious leave.
In geopolitical terms, I'm more Christianity First than anything else. If someone decided to launch a Crusade, and expel all Jews and Muslims from the Holy Land, I don't suppose I'd actually support that, but I'd see the point. As it is, I don't think it's at all clear why I should make a choice between two false religions; no one makes that demand for Sri Lanka, say. If all Jews and Muslims in the Holy Land converted to Christianity, the problems would be eliminated at a stroke; this is a situation in which the best is not the enemy of the good. A Hamas-ruled Palestine would be worse for Christians than Israel, whereas a secular or mildly Islamic Palestine would probably be better; who knows?
I don't believe The Jews (TM) control everything, in the sense of cabals of rabbis in mile-deep bunkers under New York, but I do think AIPAC has too much power in the US government, and Jews have a massively disproportionate voice in the media.
I don't believe the Jews are still the Chosen People, at least not in the full Dispensationalist sense (St. Paul's position is complex, and my personal exegesis is not sorted out; I think various interpretations are legitimate), but I also don't see them as Christ-killers or specially cursed. I'm sceptical that modern Judaism is the same religion as biblical Judaism. I'd rather just view Jews as I do Sikhs. I'd like Sikhs to convert to Christianity, but I don't hate them or seek their harm, and I find them civically respectable, and am happy to make small talk when I buy stuff in their little shop.
Interesting position. I also have wondered if modern Israel should have been founded in the first place. I get the reasoning and I'm not necessarily opposed to it but...I don't know. Doesn't seem like it's been anything but trouble ever since.
Sadly, modern Judaism is not biblical Judaism. The destruction of the temple in Jerusalem required the Rabbis to change it, because there was no longer a place for the levitical sacrifices.
I find it odd that both of you expressed regret that Israel exists today. It came about by the hand of God, and it is clearly His will that it exists. The arabs in the region have launched a number of existential wars against Israel, and Israel has won every single one, often miraculously. There are still unfulfilled prophecies in the Old Testament regarding Israel, and God will bring them to fulfillment in His timing. God continues to be gracious to the Jews even as they live in rebellion against the Messiah.
More hysterical kvetching from the woke Zionists. It's nice to know that now they think the Heritage Foundation is literally Hitler.
One wonders who they will have left in their little bubble when they attempt to push out most other conservatives in their drunken purity spiral. This behavior is precisely why so many people on the Right are distancing themselves from Zionists. Charlie Kirk was right--they really do feed in to every negative stereotype
Fuentes is the Platonic form of incel, Joe. And 'Beware the Zionists!!!' idiocy and his anime love are some foundational incel qualities, so if it screeches like a Groyper...
So any opposition to racist antisemitism = woke Zionism? Really?
I'm very much not a fan of how the Israeli state was established and how it's treated the people who were there before, especially Palestinian Christians, so I'm not sure how I'm a Zionist. That doesn't mean I have to agree with or even condone the evil being peddled by this Hitler fanboy creep, or give Heritage a pass for doing so when they clearly shouldn't.
I watched the entire interview between Nick and Tucker. They explicitly said that you can't hate Jews and be a practicing Christian. Nick made a point of saying he's playing up the dark humor to be edgy. Actually more chats from Nick's discord are coming out where he's said much the same thing and attacked people for blaming Jews for everything. So in light of this, I think the Heritage Foundation's statement is absolutely justified here
It really is coming off that criticism of Israel is a third rail for modern Republicans, and they are not above slandering folks to get Americans in line with the pro-Israel movement. And similar to how all criticism of Obama or BLM was slandered as racism, all criticism of Israel is slandered as anti-semitism.
So yeah Rod et al want to keep this up, fine. But dont be surprised when people finally get tired of this hystrionic schtick
So you certainly give the IMPRESSION that merely suggesting Israel is one of many allies with no special spiritual dispensation is grounds for being accused of hating Jews.
And that is precisely what creates more people that think they hate Jewish people.
"Cooked barbarian" is taken from Paul Kingsnorth's thought, and is ultimately of Chinese origin, meaning a non-Chinese who lives under Chinese rule and appears to be law-abiding, but cannot be trusted, as opposed to a raw barbarian, meaning the tribal people beyond Chinese rule. Kingsnorth uses these terms for the different approaches one may take to Machine rule.
Rod used to talk in these sorts of terms, but he is now pals with Thiel, the Machine Emperor, so I don't think he's a barbarian at all.
You mention again the source that mentioned that 30-40% of under-30 GOP staffers in DC are Groypers. I have no way of knowing whether or not that's true, but I can believe it. Most college-educated normie conservatives that age probably went to a college where they had to keep their mouths shut. Why should they bother getting involved in politics and subjecting themselves to persecution? Furthermore, any twenty-something who's attracted to politics, whether left or right, is probably more extreme in his or her views than the average person of the same age; and people tend to be more extreme in their views at a younger age than they are when they get older.
There's a family I know--big Catholic family, both parents are doctors, a bunch of kids. One of the sons--not a great student, but athletic and popular--left for college (I think he flunked out of one school and either transferred somewhere else or started working). He recently came back home and apparently told all his family at the dinner table that women shouldn't vote and the Holocaust was exaggerated. Needless to say, his parents were appalled.
Thinking that women shouldn’t vote or the Holocaust was exaggerated doesn’t make someone a Groyper. Being a Groyper entails supporting Nick Fuentes and treating Israeli/Jewish influence as the most important issue in politics.
To be fair, I'm a woman and I've recently been questioning whether giving women the right to vote was a good idea. And I've never watched any Fuentes (unless you count clips on Milo Yianopolis's X feed that he uses to roast Nick).
I believe an initial criticism was that it would divide the home, so that instead of 1 vote per family (the husband/leader), you could have a husband and wife voting for different candidates/platforms, which would sow division within the household.
The less nuanced side of me says that women voters are, on the whole, inclined to vote for destructive policies. Their suicidal empathy causes them to approve of insane policies like transing kids, an open border, abortion on-demand until birth, etc, informed only by the dictum "Who am I to judge?" When for a society to function well, we need LOTS of standards and judging and well, logic. Women over the last century have shown policies don't need to be effective, they just need to make them "feel good" about their vote.
It's interesting what you say about dividing the household. I don't know about the USA, but in the UK, when women were given the vote, after WW1, it was also when a switch was made from one vote per household to one vote per adult. It was not women per se, but female-headed households, who had not had the vote. In local elections, female-headed households actually had had the vote, since at least the 18th century.
The history in these respects is a lot more complicated than we tend to realise.
Interesting that you mention this, Rombald. A friend of mine broached the topic of 'patriarchal voting' that I guess has been making the rounds in certain circles. It sounded, from her description, rather like what you're describing, only for male heads of household only. It's helpful to know that there was historical precedent for something similar, but what you refer to here is a nuance of interest.
It's actually quite an important distinction. It gets overlooked in the discussion of sexism, but the issue is whether the quantum of society is the individual or the household.
For a very long time, British women voted Conservative more than the men who were more likely to be members of labor unions. I think this changed in the 70s.
I think it was more recently than the 70s -- it was within my memory, maybe the late 80s.
Women used to aspire to high-class things. There used to be the image of women being more religious, liking the royal family, and also smart clothes, a neat home, etc., all of which fed into conservatism. Men were blue-collar, doing tough jobs, drinking hard, farting and being uncouth, but being forgiven because they put bread on the table, and the unions were part of that.
Various things changed: feminism, contraception, Thatcher making the Conservative Party seem vulgar, uncouth, and masculine-coded (more like the US Republicans), the decline of respectability, the loss of prestige of the Royal Family, the defeat of the miners in the big strike, expansion of the universities, and decline of heavy industry.
Looking back, it's quite extraordinary how respectable women at the upper edge of the working class used to be. There's all this talk now about Muslim women wearing hijabs, but my grandmother would never have dreamt of leaving the house without a headscarf.
Hi, Natalie. Is there a possibility that your "less nuanced" description of the problem is a function of women's suffrage in the specifically Western context? I wonder if there's a difference between our society and that of, say, India in this sense.
Now I'm aware that in certain non-Western societies, there's a definite division between men and women in political outlook generally - thinking here of Korea. But is that because women's voting attitudes there correspond to those in Western Europe and North America (should I try to coin a new abbreviation, WENA?)? Or is it something else?
I think birth control and the general tendency of society to favor women in the last 60 or so years contributes. As does the rise in divorce. Single moms definitely want more entitlement programs and empathy as they feel they need it. And they probably did when single motherhood was rare, but what they need now is honest feedback about what single-parent homes/divorce/etc does to children and society. I have a couple friends who never married but lived with their male "partner" and got Medicaid, food stamps, discounted EVERYTHING for their kids. Then they broke up with their male "partner" when it got boring/tough/he wasn't perfect. Moved out, got even more benefits, work part time.
The birth control pill is one of the most revolutionary medical "advance" in modern times. The girls could be as lusty as the boys. The divorce culture has added an acid to Western Civilization.
For the male partners, some of them don't want to get married because in some cases the children aren't their children. They will have no legal right to see them if the couple breaks up. Other guys, including me, are unsure about marriage because no fault divorce has destroyed the very concept of marriage.
Well put. I would add that every PEW survey I've read over the last twenty-five years demonstrates that men are more knowledgeable about political affairs than women except when it comes to the local schools. But women aren't going to lose the vote. Only a fool would ever propose it.
No. The female vote is not going away and you're absolutely right that any politician who supported that idea would end their career. The best we can hope for is a return to common-sense from women, which MIGHT happen if we run policies through the lens of what's best for "the children" and stop publicly shaming men for building civilization. Lots of women voted for Trump--there's some hope!
I have thought about that, but I know multiple women with good views. I don't women to not vote. I would rather extremely liberal women and men abstain from voting. A friend of mine thinks we need to go back to only property owners voting. I disagree. But I think we need to have a short test before voting and if people can't pass enough questions, then they can't vote. The test would be easy and have questions like how many states are there, who is the president, what are the three branches of government, etc.
Granting women the vote may or may not be a good idea but women aren't going to lose the franchise. If I could, I would raise the voting age back from 18 to 21 but that's not going to happen either.
I would also love to have further requirements, like not just being a total free-loader for no good reason. I'm not talking about the legitimately disabled or elderly, but chronic welfare recipients and professional criminals. I have no idea if it's constitutional or not, but it would be helpful.
We think alike. If you receive SNAP benefits, you should lose the right to vote. Of course, perhaps defense contractors should lose the vote as well as they receive government largesse in a different manner than a welfare recipient.
I would raise it to 25 and require a simple test to prove that someone has enough understanding of government to vote. Some of the questions would be how many states are there, what are the colors of the flag, who is the president, name all three branches of government, etc. If someone couldn't get a majority of those questions right, they shouldn't vote. Also, if you have to be 25 to rent a car, I wish it was 25 to vote. But it will never happen.
I would raise the voting age to twenty-five as well. I would also not allow men over eighty to run for public office. And limit Supreme Court terms to twenty-five years and force justices to retire at eighty. But none of those things will happen.
No to witch hunts? We mustn’t cancel one another. We must persuade. The link referenced is a historical example of what can happen when we demonize the other. Let’s be slow to process what’s going on today.
You're right, Buddy. The Bolsheviks and the Nazis just needed more hugs and empathy, not demonization and rejection. If we had only followed your sensible antidote, I'm confident that the Bolshevik Revolution and WWII could have both been avoided.
What’s your suggestion?Since you said nothing at all in your response. If you didn’t read the link no need to respond, and I won’t cancel you although it’s tempting 😝
I understand. What is your suggestion? Cancel Tucker? I think a lot of what we’re seeing is performative behavior. It’s like shock jocks in 1980’s. I’m concerned and don’t like what Nick F represents. Nick F has no power. What does the attention he’s getting say about us as a society?
I might agree if you also agree that those who promote Marxism or its modern variants should be demonized and marginalized. Perhaps those who took honeymoons in or lead student trips to Communist China or the Soviet Union. Perhaps those who posed with Vietnamese AA guns during the Vietnam War. Those red diaper babies currently in Congress. The list can be quite long.
As is America's relationship with many an authoritarian regime through the years. Practical engagement.
My point, in response to Vince, is if we are going to demonize and marginalize people who support one form of evil (National Socialism) we should equally do so with those who support other evils (Marxism, the New Racism, child abuse through Transgenderism etc.)
Vince, I’m not calling you a troll, but your responses I have read are very Troll like behavior. Gaslighting others. I find it the same as when someone calls one a racist. It’s all they got in a debated issue and really they don’t say anything at all because they can’t make a point effectively.
And by the way, comparison between the witch-craze/burnings of the early modern period and calling out people on the Right who endorse or play footsie with antisemitism is nonsensical. The victims of the former were routinely being denounced and burned with new credible evidence of their supposed witchcraft. These Nazi-loving (or platforming) New Right bleepholes are readily attesting to their beliefs in their videos and social media posts.
Did you read the entire article? If you didn’t I get it. I rarely read links posted by others. If you did read it, great. The article ties what we are potentially becoming today and it ain’t good. It’s not about burning witches from a long time ago. It’s what we (humans) are capable of becoming when someone doesn’t think/worship/vote like us. Who gets to decide who the witches are? What do we do if we suspect a witch? What do you suggest be done with New Right that’s growing? Perhaps I could be wrong about‘gaslighting’. Perhaps it is tone or sarcasm that I find off putting and not effective in a debate. When I get some time I’ll point some possible ‘gaslighting’ examples. I spend too much time on here as it commenting on stuff that doesn’t change a thing.
"Perhaps it is tone or sarcasm that I find off putting and not effective in a debate."
Fair enough.
As I've said throughout the comments of today's post, I think the New Right-ers who platform and play footsie with raging antisemites like Fuentes should be shamed and marginalized - kind of like what TPUSA (under Charlie) was doing to them. [See his recently revealed texts to Dinesh D'Souza.]
Who gets to decide who the witches are today? Who will be the witches next year? The article isn’t about witches from the past only It ties into what we’re in danger of becoming today.
You're right, Buddy. The Bolsheviks and the Nazis just needed more hugs and empathy, not demonization and rejection. If we had only followed your sensible antidote, I'm confident that the Bolshevik Revolution and WWII could have both been avoided.
Hi Vince, this is an example of gaslighting I believe. Yes, maybe sarcasm, can sarcasm be a form of gaslighting? I don’t know. 🤷♂️
If the Czar had given Lenin a hug or two and the Czar's four daughters had baked Lenin a cake, perhaps Lenin would not have had the Romanovs shot and tossed down a mine.
Very sad to see heritage obfuscate. Roberts should know better. Debate is not good in and of itself. If debate is the end, there is no truth. Would Roberts defend those who speak the truth about blacks & IQ? It is actually proven that IQs vary across ethnic lines. Likely he would run away b/c he is morally selective - ignore the hurtfulness towards Jews and run far away from anything to do with science, IQ & blacks. It is just an example but it makes the point. Moral relativism is a poison.
About blacks and IQs. I'd just change the test to one that's less favorable to whites. The Stanford Binet test was just a diagnostic tool anyway, not a test of doom. You've turned it into a goddamn fortune cookie.
the differences in IQ and race are pretty well established (see Charles Murray). Ashkenazi jews are white and have higher IQs than other whites and black. This is my point. one can't even broach a sentence about IQ and race that is proven over and over without fear of condemnation and mocking, but, on the flip side, be welcoming to Tucker and jewish animus and sadly that is accepted as open minded and thoughtful, debatable.
I'm saying they've changed the test from the Stanford-Binet (which I did ok on) to something else which had shocking results to me. Remember Rod's column with the picture that contained a circle (or something like that) that no one could see?
I studied accounting because I figured if I'm right I'm right and if I'm wrong I have some more work to do, unlike the Liberal Arts where I couldn't get started because of my inherent racism. After 30 years I've learned that business is largely horseshit.
I'm saying the two tests were completely different, and I suspect that the newer test was designed to flatten the curve. You recall the Stanford-Binet?
Though I think Murray has pretty well proven that there are statistical differences between the races. This is not to say there are not brilliant blacks nor dull whites. It's all part of the bell curve.
BTW, I think he also shows that Asians have a higher IQ on average than whites.
by the way I am an engineer. do you how many black engineers I've come across in 30 plus of working in the industry and compared to other groups? the number is a tiny fraction. the truth is most people (white, black, asian) don't have the acumen to become engineers. it is just a truth and so what?
I worked for a black engineer for about a year. I believe he was a mediocrity. But black civil engineers are prizes for engineering firms. Engineering firms must deal with black-run cities and it helps having a black engineer in your firm. If you are black and can earn your engineering degree, the world is yours.
Yes. Minority engineers are in great demand and like other technical fields & especially black engineers. I did some part time consulting for Rand corporation, the think tank. The man who hired me was black , and he had an outstanding resume. From my limited relationship with him , He was superb in character & intellect. He was much smarter than I could hope to be.
I understand how the system works. I was hired out as a tech/inspector by a very white Syracuse-based engineering firm for about six months. The firm I was hired out to was black-run who did business with the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission. The engineers of the firm that I dealt with wee mostly Indian. Two Patels and one Bhatt. The whole thing was a honest scam.
Interesting. For 20 plus years I worked for a minority firm. It was a great experience for me. I worked on many high profile public work’s jobs & the most expensive (for the wrong reasons) . The ironic thing is that the minority owner belongs to one of the most successful groups in America - Asian Indian. All a scam to meet minority , women majority owner requirements for gov’t contracting.
You can believe it is horseshit. That is fine. But to claim that that some tests, whether they are the ones you criticize or others, can’t measure some degree of natural intelligence & measure in relation to attributes like ethnicity, race is dumb. Of course we can do this. Is it meaningful is a different question? I never said anything about meaningfulness & iq. Inequities are built into the natural world. Again to say we can’t measure certain intellectual criteria & try & correlate to demographics is just not true.
These tests are diagnostic tools, not tests of doom. They tell me the strengths and weaknesses of the takers. However, I might point out, it seems that they are gamed. The Princeton Review promises a 300 point gain in your SAT score, for instance.
I've an AA (Jazz Studies), BA, MBA, and I'm Enrolled to Practice before the IRS. I also have a license as a Property Tax Consultant here in TX. So bullshit, I know it well.
I never said the tests are a measure of all things knowledge & all things related to god given intelligence or doom & gloom. Your reading comprehension is poor. Maybe that is why you don’t test well? The fact that some tests can be gamed or that some are poor test takers does not disprove that we can’t measure across large sample sizes natural intelligence & that we can’t draw any conclusions. Just look at stem studies & male & female groups. Is it not obvious that males have a greater aptitude? That is not necessarily a measure of pure intelligence but it is an obvious distinction based on natural born abilities between sexes.
The disgruntled Harvard students from yesterday's post all aced the SAT and yet show a remarkable inability to keep up with their coursework. As Mr. G alludes, mommy & daddy spending thousands on test preps is money well spent but clearly cannot improve long-term academic rigor & success.
About Fuentes - he’s a little younger than me, and I feel like I can understand his mentality and motivations. I really don’t think he is serious. Everything he says or does is so deep in irony that it is difficult to determine whether he believes something or is making a joke.
His is a dark, nihilistic kind of humor. I think that this is what motivates him - nihilism, and attention-seeking through trolling. And he’s legitimately amusing or even compelling for the young 20-something men, who feel that they have no future (for good reason, in many cases) feel inclined to burn it all down.
I saw Fuentes in a cafe in suburban Chicago years ago, lecturing an obviously ignorant young man, who was eating it up. Five years prior, I was lecturing my young friends about Marxism in my hometown, receiving the same kind of admiring adulation. Alas, how I’ve changed. Post-2008 youth are susceptible to a demagogue. Now we have one.
I think you're right about Fuentes. Charlie R wrote a comment comparing him to The Sex Pistols in the 70's. I was about to write something similar when I read it. Johnny Rotten and Nick Fuentes don't quite wink at the audience....but there's a trollish dance going on.
I liked Johnny Lydon's schtick......bratty incorrigibility with a dose of wit. Fuentes on the other hand may be creating mini-online-nazis and who knows where that will go? I'm a bit shocked at how much attention he's getting now.
And I believe your comment points more clearly to the larger danger that the desire for anarchy in these younger groups is really the motivating ideal. I've been close witness the past decade of the demographic seemingly most influenced by the irony-coded nihilism you correctly identify. There is no 'there' there - that is, there is absolutely no imaginable future under any conditions of present-day economics, politics, or social/cultural reality toward which they are striving, or even believe they could strive.
As I was typing the above it suddenly occurred to me that the anarchist, nihilist bent of this demographic (that absolutely *does* have, as its central/primary animating proposition, the desire to accelerate the dissolution and destruction of All Accepted Things) is perhaps the secular equivalent of those Christians who actively seek to/believe they can accelerate the return of Christ. Both groups believe fervently they must hurry along the demolition of 'What Is' in order to hasten to establish more tenable conditions that would accelerate their realization of What May Be.
The existential problem of this should be evident. And taken seriously.
The answer to Fuentes isn't attacking Tucker. Too much gaslighting going on here. Go on X and you will see shows from the 1980s and 1990s where actual Nazis and Klan members were allowed uninterrupted to present their views on a host of shows.
Because of the gaslighting, I almost forgot this myself and I could only really remember the George Lincoln Rockwell / Alex Haley example.
Nothing Fuentes said was like what these people said. And we are virtually in 1984 territory when sometimes someone who is "Hispanic" is White, and sometimes they aren't. If Fuentes is 1/4 Mexican as he claims, on average he would be about as much Indigenous American Indian as Kamala Harris is Black African.
The answer to Fuentes is family formation. These so-called groypers need to get married and have kids. Those who call Tucker Carlson a Nazi are often secret Islamists if I had to guess.
No. Cruz is a dope who has a fanatical religious belief that I don't support. When he was with Tucker, I concluded that. I haven't been following D'Souza lately, but he is not pro Islam.
I am saying that not a small number of people who are calling Tucker a Nazi are in favor of Islamic expansion. What percent is that? 10%? 20%? I don't know. Cui bono is something I always ask.
So, when Pat Buchanan was attacked for essentially being a Nazi, what did that mean? They people who did that were (1) Marxists, (2) Moronic fanatics that somehow thought the whole would easily adopt western values if you engaged in regime change, (3) People who claimed to be pro-Israel, but who had poor judgment, and (4) pro Islam expansion.
The problem is that many Christians misunderstand the country of Israel and see it as fulfillment of Biblical prophesy.
Ted Cruz and similar folks worship the State of Israel as an idol and put it first in their loyalties. They also see a Christian duty to support Jewish people no matter what, even to the detriment of Christians and Christianity.
Rod just called himself a "Christian Zionist" but I don't he thinks he understands how extreme the concept has become.
Israel as a country isn't the embodient of prophecy. America is not obligated to support Israel the country no matter what it does. We should be able to see clearly the efforts of supporters of Israel to drag America into conflict to benefit Israel. The UK has done this for a lot longer and more aggressively, and the Chinese have done so a lot as well. Foreign countries use their US-based supporters to manipulate American leaders against US interests.
OK, let me be clear. I am a Christian who believes in the right of the Jewish people to a homeland. I support the state of Israel. I do not hold the views of dispensationalist Christians concerning the eschatological importance of the Israeli state, nor do I think the US is obliged to support Israel, no matter what. I think Israel has done what any other self-respecting nation on earth would have done to an enemy who did to them what Hamas did on 10/7.
The only point I disagree with is that Jews have some basic right to a homeland, their own country.
There is no inherent right for anyone to their own country, whether they be Scots or Basques.
Israel has a country, so they have a right to defend it and do whatever they can to protect their own interests.
Israel is almost 80 years old and is older than a host of other countries and it is horrible that they still need to fight to exist.
However, one can still be supportive of Israel and say that its policies, especially over the last 2 years, have been counterproductive. We don't need to fund its wars against all its neighbors. Israel has lost most of the goodwill, especially of young people, and its heavy-handedness to police thought (including the nonstop campaign against Tucker, as well as the leaked effort to police Kirk related to that) are extremely counterproductive. Enlisting good-natured people in the campaign, often through manipulation, just turns off more people.
At this point, given that Minneapolis and NYC both will probably have Islamic expansionist mayors, i don't care. I'm a bit sad that I don't, but I really don't care anymore.
I am more sad because of what happened to Constantinople, Lebanon and what is happening every day in Nigeria.
Israel can do whatever it wants. When Constantinople, Lebanon and Nigeria become majority Christian again my views might change.
Do I understand you correctly if I say that your support of the state of Israel and the right of the Jewish people to a homeland its based on romantic / sentimental / emotional reasons and not based on theological reasons?
If I understand correctly, then thank you very much for this clarification.
It seems to me extremely fundamental—and oh so difficult—to distinguish between our subjective personal tastes and objective truths. We are all very often tempted to attach our subjective positions to higher truths in order to support/justify them, and in doing so to reinforce our positions. This is in fact intellectual laziness and a spirit of death.
One of the reasons why many Christians and non Christians feel very uncomfortable with the Israelophilia of Christians (Zionist or not) is the implicit or explicit association made between the modern state of Israel and Christianity. The same problem exists by the way with the association between Christianity and the USA, between Christianity and the Republican Party, etc.
Such associations operate according to the logic of co-branding: we benefit from the glory of what we are associated with. But the reverse is also true and leads to the rejection of what we are associated with, and of ourselves.
Let us be extremely cautious and guard against defiling the name of Christ through our worldly associations and / or through a lack of clarity.
Israel at this point of time isn’t the embodiment of prophesy but it is on its way, IMO. The ingathering if the exiles is moving slowly but surely and the Jews there are as a whole much more believers in G-d than ten years ago.
Candace denounces Fuentes as a liar and a creep —you just threw her name in there with him —ugh —the devil is winning when we demonize and polarize without actually listening to the person you are attacking —listen to one full episode of Candace —just 1.
I have listened to Candace Owens in the past. She lost me when she went full antisemite. I’m glad to hear she’s opposed to Fuentes but she is no innocent.
"She lost me when she went full antisemite." That's it right there. Whenever someone or group goes there, whether it's left, right, or in the middle, it's over. A big problem in the U.S. now, it seems to me, is that we are seeing a lot of it. Of course, there's also the problem that if one opposes Netanyahu speaking to a joint session of Congress, for instance, there are those who will label that person an antisemite. Shouldn't do that--there's enough of the real thing out there to keep us occupied.
Let them eat each other.
Candace is a kookoo bird who has espoused moon landing conspiracy theories, the theory that Bridgette Macron is trans, and other idiocies. Her thoughts about much of anything are unworthy of consideration.
Wasn't she going flat earther at one time? I don't know how much of it is just for effect.
"The moon landings idea is just so gay."
Candace is a notorious liar, Ruth. She spews so many nonsensical conspiracies of which Brigitte Macron being a man is the most idiotic. She also has a clear track-record of playing footsie (and more) with antisemitism. But, yes, Candace is the victim.
Vince, she might be not be a liar. I think she's mentally ill. She's nuts.
Brigitte Macron's lawsuit will bankrupt Candace. Under US media law, truth is the only absolute defense against libel. A public figure like the wife of the French president has a higher bar than most to prove malice, but Candace has made it ridiculously easy for Mme. Macron's lawyers to do. There is no way that B. Macron would have brought this lawsuit if she wasn't sure she could win it, because she knows Candace's lawyers will require a medical examination to prove that Candace is lying. This is going to be an open-and-shut case, and probably won't even make it to trial. I just hope Mme. Macron doesn't settle for a mere apology, but also requires Candace to pay a heavy fine (that Mme. Macron, I hope, donates to charity).
I think you will be proven wrong. I hope and pray you are proven wrong. I don’t think you’ve given her a fair trial in your own mind. Truth speakers get canceled and killed. She’s one of them.
She is a lying, vicious ****. Grow up.
You "hope and pray" that Brigitte Macron has a penis, Ruth?! That's almost as crazy as Candace's contention about her. Take a moment to reflect on how ridiculous that response is. And after you do, go ahead and google Brigitte Macron's brother, who that huckster Owens claims is actually Mrs. Macron. You'll quickly see that he is alive and well and... wait for it... NOT his sister.
https://dailytelegraph.co.nz/news/french-court-acquits-women-who-claimed-brigitte-macron-was-born-male/
Did you actually read the article that you linked to? Rey's was acquitted not on any evidence supporting her preposterous claims, but because the court deemed her content - however outlandish it was - to not meet the threshold for defamation. This is pretty weak tea if it's the best you have to defend Candace's cravenness.
I used to like and admire Candace but I agree that her train has jumped the tracks. She’s undeniably a smart & sharp lady but how folks like her get so offtrack I don’t understand.
I feel the same way. I really suspect that there is some kind of mental illness involved. I must stress though that I have never met her, lack any credentials to make such an assessment, and nobody should believe me.
She provoked the Macrons so unbearably they have sued over it. All over social disease media I have seen nitwitted Owens supporters chortling about how easy it will be for Owens to defend against the suit. Typical sentence: "Just wait until the gynecological exam!"
Apparently, they don't understand that a swab of Brigitte Macron's mouth will be all the evidence the plaintiffs lawyers will need to obliterate Owens. You see, it's XX and XY chromosomes, as some of us remember from tenth grade biology.
Why would any non - imbecile spend a moment in listening to Candace Owens? The most charitable hypothesis I have heard about Owens' behavior since the Kirk assassination is one serious man's idea that she may be schizophrenic.
Otherwise, she's a psychopath.
I can't be charitable toward her. My perception is that she just makes things up. I don't know what her habitual lying in the Kirk matter will do to her ultimately, but with the Macrons, that psychopathic compulsiveness will have proven to be catastrophic for her.
But it occurred to me recently that maybe it won't: her followers may be dumbbells, but she isn't. When she loses the lawsuit, listeners can expect to hear varieties of the following:
"Well, we know who controls the medical establishments of the world, don't we?"
"We know who owns the labs, don't we?"
"We knows who really runs the courts, don't we?"
She is evil.
Candace is a jew hating, evil ****. She is insinuating that Erika Kirk and Donald Trump conspired to murder Charlie Kirk. She's a total dirtbag.
Re: She is insinuating that Erika Kirk and Donald Trump conspired to murder Charlie Kirk.
The lady may be too much of a Christian to do it, but I would applaud Erika Kirk if she also sued Candace Owens to a fare thee well. There are lines of common decency one does not cross ever, and implying that a grieving widow had a hand in her husband's murder when there is not one iota of evidence if well beyond the pale. (See also: Alex Jones and Sandy Hook).
She’s never accused Erika of anything —her main problem is with people who have lied immediately following his death about his support of Israel. Candace is speaking the truth on this matter. Is it possible to be critical of a government without being an anti-Semite? Is it possible to be critical of individual’s actions who just happen to be Jewish? People are throwing around the word anti-Semite and Nazi with such gusto —it’s definitely the work of the evil one. You have to truly listen to Candace for a full episode instead of sound bites because everything can be twisted to fit the narrative on either side of the divide.
https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1A19VtZQpB/?mibextid=wwXIfr
Good article, although I would disagree with one point you made. In the article, you imply (although you don't outright say) that embracing Fuentes is not just immoral but potentially detrimental from the standpoint of winning over the public. Although I am 100% with you on Fuentes's malevolence, I am not so sure that he is necessarily unpopular in 2025.
To estimate his popularity, you have to consider the mental and emotional attitudes of Americans in 2025. My case is that there's much within these attitudes that do feed the appeal of people like Fuentes. Those would be widespread distrust of institutions, exhaustion with old-fashioned and highly conventional pre-2015 morality (which is a key underpinning of pro-Israel positions), economic pessimism and resentment, along with angry backlash against woke leftists in the form of right-wing identitarianism.
My theory is that all of these emotional forces will find an outlet one way or another. Fuentes is being boosted because he has found a way to feed off and channel these forces. But, as we both agree, he is a malevolent actor. The question then should be - what could be a better outlet (or ideally, solution) to these emotional attitudes, that would starve Fuentes for support and channel them in a more productive direction.
I am baffled that someone like Mr. Fuentes actually commands a not-insignificant portion of the male populace.
Not Weimar exactly, but there are mighty strong and foul winds blowing in that direction these days.
Re: I am baffled that someone like Mr. Fuentes actually commands a not-insignificant portion of the male populace.
Does he? Can you find numbers showing that? And how much is "a not insignificant portion"? I would put that at a minimum of 5% (and I am being generous).
As you probably know, being able to please a niche in a 340 million person nation can make one rich. Look at Vince McMahon and his fake wrestling. He was a billionaire at one time but his wife's political ambitions burned through a lot of that. Oprah has her niche, Kanye West has his niche, Rush Limbaugh had his niche, Sean Hannity has his niche, Rachel Ray has her niche and so on. Nick Fuentes has his niche. But Fuentes couldn't be elected county commissioner in my 80 % Trump county.
Agree.
The guy is an obvious psychopath. Psychopaths and psychopaths alone have that high energy, borderline mania, and are that reckless.
Niall Ferguson has advanced the hypothesis that conspiracy thinking cannot catch on in a literate society, and that as literacy declined in the last half century, "conspiracy spotting," as I term it, could have been expected only to thrive.
I have a claim to fame which I can't prove and don't want credit for, anyway: I invented the idea that we faked the Apollo 11 moon landing. I invented it in December, 1970, as I was on my way to take an English final at Batts' Hall at The University of Texas. Well, I didn't invent it, exactly. The idea occurred to me as something which only morons could believe. I remember I thought it was such a funny idea that I started giggling to myself.
I say I invented it, and I did, in the sense that it came to me out of my subconscious. I had never heard anyone else say it. Probably some people had. Probably many more had thought it. But in the rational, still literary though slipping America of 1970, no one who wasn't in need of custodial care thought it.
No one thought the Holocaust hadn't happened.
Fuentes, had he been active then, would have been seen as another George Lincoln Rockwell - like freak.
It's the way of this fallen world that Charlie Kirk is murdered and that keening, giggling creep, Fuentes, is having his moment. Fuentes interests me for a single reason, that his content notwithstanding, that public manner of his has somehow not proven to be an impossible turn off for any audience he might have wanted to have. I suppose they've been waiting for a Fuehrer, and they think they've found one.
Fuentes doesn't shock me, though. The size and commitment of his followership shock me. They remind me of Churchill's line about the Wehrmacht, "dulled, drilled brutes."
What has happened to Carlson does shock me. We are being warred upon by principalities and powers with an intensity I never thought I'd live to see.
Re: Niall Ferguson has advanced the hypothesis that conspiracy thinking cannot catch on in a literate society
What is the definition of "catch on" How many people have to believe something to qualify? The US in the mid 19th century was pretty literate but all kinds of tin foil hattery made the rounds over Lincoln's assassination, implicating everyone from Jefferson Davis to Secretary of War Edwin Stanton to Queen Victoria to the Pope.
Interesting you should bring this up. I'm about to start "Blood on the Moon," which no less than James McPherson takes seriously. It advances the hypothesis that the Confederate Secret Service was far more involved than had previously been believed.
I wish I could remember the author's name, but the novel, "The Judges of the Secret Court," an nyrb book, is well worth the time of anyone who is fascinated by the Lincoln assassination. I am generally a holdout against historical fiction. As an example, I have never had any interest in reading "Lonesome Dove" despite my having been acquainted with Larry McMurtry when I was a teenager. "The Judges of the Secret Court" is a treasure.
Much of the Lincoln assassination speculation was nuttery, but qui bono? always. Much of the South, including its government, would have wanted Lincoln dead.
As for a tipping point in our era, I'd guess sometime in the 1970s.
This is close to my take. I find Fuentes noxious, but he’s mainly a clown and provocateur. He is doing loudly and publicly what pissed off young men have done in out-of-the way online chatrooms for years. Rod and myself aren’t of his generation, so we will tend to misread the gravity of his statements.
Problem is, Fuentes and others now do their online personas as a public political performance. Their peers who spent untold hours blasting away on Reddit and elsewhere see it as just the same thing. Now in the face of the whole public.
But if it’s now a *public* discourse, a politics, it’s no longer the same thing. US policy is not Reddit.
Myself I don’t know what Fuentes really believes, and don’t much care. What’s graver than Fuentes’ overripe provocations is that Tucker Carlson chose to interview him, and apparently (I didn’t watch it) treated the discourse seriously. What the hell happened to Carlson?
I do think JD Vance understands this gang and the dynamic at issue, and that in general it’s fine to let these guys provoke. But at some point, No. A useful smoke bomb to throw at hall monitors is not a politics.
We’ll see where it leads. I don’t however think it’s Weimar.
I have no way of proving this, but I think Fuentes is very much a self-aware manipulator. His goal is something like the creation of a political cult with him at the center, whereas the truth is of secondary importance for him.
There's a few clues that suggest this, including such examples as:
1.) His seemingly random and bizarre adulation of Stalin makes more sense if you understand Fuentes as an aspiring totalitarian taking notes from him. Same with Hitler.
2.) The way he treats his followers. Rod probably hasn't looked into this yet, but Fuentes is known to treat his followers like pawns to be discarded. The internet gossip corner has talked a lot about this, mostly surrounding high-profile defectors like "Jaden McNeill".
3.) His general eclectic embrace of every incel meme and trope while also claiming (at other times) to be a "traditionalist". This gobbledygook of self-contradicting positions make no sense if you assume Fuentes has ideas that he cares about. But if you assume he is a manipulator blowing with the wind to strike poses and gain infamy, it does makes sense.
It seems a plausible reading. I haven’t paid enough attention to him to judge how smart he is (as in: him taking notes from Stalin) but if he combines his love for drama with actual political cunning, then what we’ll see is he’ll begin to choose his main themes. He won’t continue just grabbing at whatever provokes, no matter how incoherent, but there will be a *semi-incoherent* politics of outrage that emerges.
Stalin is a good teacher. I remember Saddam was a careful student of Stalin, and he lasted pretty long. But Mesopotamia isn’t America. Luckily.
Daniel Greenfield has an incisive article, “The Real Split on the Right Is Over America.” On the FRONT PAGE WEBSITE ..He has articulated something I’ve felt for quite a while: as we are now discussing the new movement on the right that cloaks itself in Christian rhetoric but carries within it a rejection of America’s moral and civic inheritance. Greenfield’s warning could not be more urgent.
Alasdair MacIntyre warned that when a civilization loses its shared moral framework, the old moral language survives only as fragments. People still say good and evil, but those words no longer point toward a common good. That is exactly what we see now — Christian terms drained of Christian meaning, weaponized for tribal power rather than moral order.
I’ve sensed this for a while: I recently experienced friends who we talk the talk, but all of a sudden sound like something from an invasion of the body snatchers my very traditional friends just are sounding strange with new weird theories.
I hear of a new faction rising that speaks the language of faith but despises the substance of it. They quote Scripture and talk about “Christendom,” but their faith serves power, not the other way around.
These are not traditional conservatives. They are the alternate right — angry, clever, and hollow. They use Christian words as banners of war, not bridges of meaning. Greenfield has done the a service by naming the danger out loud.
Right now I’m still uncomfortable, mentioning the names of some of my favorite conservatives and broadcasters. some I admired are individuals who are not pushing back on the outlandish theories. They say they’re defending the West. In truth, they’re burning down the very house that sheltered them.
So Daniel Greenfield has drawn the line that had to be drawn. I hope Rod and Daniel continue to write some more on the subject and expose this poisonous threat.
"Myself I don’t know what Fuentes really believes, and don’t much care."
I've listened to all but the last 20 minutes of Carlson's interview. I haven't found much that was offensive though others might say that Fuentes is on his best behavior during the interview. We'll see what the last 20 minutes reveal.
One interesting thing is that Carlson at one point does say he had Fuentes on the show to learn what Fuentes really thinks. Carlson points out that he thought that Fuentes was a Fed and ridiculed him previously (Fuentes also has been a Carlson critic.) So I'm not much offended by the interview unless there is something really provocative in the final minutes. Clearly, other online stuff is offensive if others are to be believed though I have not followed Fuentes at all.
As an aside, my wife, who is no Fuentes fan, thought Carlson wasn't so much soft balling the interview as much as gently trying to pull out what Fuentes really thought, trying to help him see potential error in his thinking, and to see how some of it was harmful.
Yes!!!!! Tucker is very, very smart. He was indeed drawing Fuentes out. The online young men who love to shock the normies and debate each other for sport—how about you older conservative men father them and help them mature! Tucker is so far above Fuentes—you don’t seriously debate children who are play acting. You listen to them, take their concerns seriously, mentor them, and help them mature.
We boy moms see this!
Constantina, they have contempt for us. They see us as intrinsic to their problems. Yesterday, Fuentes was the sole topic of the impossibly badly named podcast he and Heather Heying, his wife, do. You can see it here on YouTube, but you don't need to devote time to it.
The telling things are in the Comments. Maybe the ratio has improved somewhat, but yesterday, it was Groyper and nothing but.
I forced myself to watch the Carlson interview of Fuentes. It was a friendly interview and Fuentes presented himself pretty well. He didn't seem to have evil views. And Rod Dreher has Fuentes calling Hitler "pretty ******* cool." Hitler was one of the worst monsters in world history.
You saw a friendly one. I saw a more subtle, fatherly one.
I acknowledge that Fuentes has made abhorrent statements. So have many people I work with on a daily basis. I am trying to work with one who thinks the abuse of children through transgenderism is appropriate.
Appreciated. I think journalists should be able to interview anyone. Unlike nitwits, I supported Carlson interviewing Putin, though yes, he could have thrown at least a few hardballs at him instead of just let him lecture.
What Carlson did with Fuentes I’ll never know, because I just don’t care what Fuentes thinks. That might change, if Fuentes gains stature beyond smirking troll.
I care more about Carlson’s own positions, and don’t like to see him telegraphing BS, as he’s begun doing. Perhaps I should say I *cared* more about Carlson, before his recent turns.
This is a good point; Fuentes is feeding off of the "vibes", and those vibes are showing the young that the old have thoroughly discredited themselves in every way possible. What is the primary shibboleth of the 20th century? Why, WWII and the Nazis, which came to serve the role in modern materialist mythology that the orcs and Sauron do in the LOTR books. Not saying Hitler and the Nazis weren't evil (they were), but that they do not represent the ultimate powers of darkness; rather Satan, the demons, and the fallen powers of the air do. But for an age that decided it needed to stop believing in the noetic, the Nazis would have to play the role as the ultimate bad guy (ironically, in much the way the Jew had been allowed to fill the roll of the less elevated material scapegoat sporadically throughout much of the Church Age).
Completely agree that Fuentes (and Owens, for that matter) are malevolent actors (I'm still not quite sure I understand Tucker's thread, but I am disheartened by some of what I see; he is a man in need of prayers). But the truth is that this myth of modernity will fall (for a good account of this, recommend some of Jonathan Pageau's content) and the non-malevolent (of less malevolent, at least) forces of conservative thought need to figure out a way to engage with this constructively, while avoiding the pitfalls of this unveiling of the materialist myth devolve into the equally false consciousness of antisemitism. This is hard because the noble lie that is the materialist myth of WWII was built, in part (and not by the Jews, mind you, but as a project of the post-war Western consensus), as a secular bulwark against the potentiality of antisemitism ever arising again.
How to do this precisely? I wish I knew, though I suspect only the strength of true Christian charity, unbent (as it so often is) by the weight of clannish and tribalistic loyalty, is strong enough to thread this particular needle. One thing I do know is that, however well intentioned, appeals to the horrors of the holocaust are unlikely to turn hearts, as this is precisely the mode of manipulation that has disaffected this group of young men enamored with Fuentes' trolling (and for many of them, I would wager, what appeals to them about Fuentes is not what he says--which often makes very little sense--but how he says it; the "vibes" of sticking it to the man as rock and punk did for simpler and less decadent ages). They see appeals to the moral horrors of the holocaust (with, as it has been applied, some justification) as a form of emotional blackmail (and female coded, at that) and also as akin to the constant (again, feminine coded) nagging pertaining to the evils of racism, sexism, etc.
Also, for those of you such as our host--who unlike myself, who have fewer such contacts, actually know some of these people and can talk to them privately or via groups of affiliated interlocutors--maybe start having some of these conversations in private before denouncing one another all over the internet? I know this is a novel concept in this age of universal openness, but not ever damn thing that a person thinks about someone else needs to be splayed all over the internet. I know for those whose livelihoods depend upon content (mine does as well, indirectly) you have an incentive to put everything that comes out of one's head onto the page, but a better part of political writing needs to be knowing how to use the networks one has on the back end before using the oblique means available to one by battling in the public sphere.
The sad fact of the matter is that direct denunciations and appeals to moral authority, even when entirely correct, will never win against the likes of a Fuentes, who feeds and grows off of this type of discourse. Nor is it likely that one will be able to out clown the clown. That leaves the only effective means of battle as coordinated and subtle influence campaigns, and prayer.
"Also, for those of you such as our host--who unlike myself, who have fewer such contacts, actually know some of these people and can talk to them privately or via groups of affiliated interlocutors--maybe start having some of these conversations in private before denouncing one another all over the internet?"
At some level, this is how I saw Carlson's interview with Fuentes. Carlson is trying to understand where Fuentes is coming from and, perhaps too generously, not demanding and immediate conversion/renunciation by Fuentes of his views.
Carlson knew where Fuentes was coming from long before the ‘interview’. The only thing new was why Fuentes had dissed him in the past.
Well then Carlson's claim that he was trying to understand where Fuentes was coming from is a lie.
I am willing to give Carlson some benefit of the doubt.
I wish I could but I can't any longer.
While watching the interview, Carlson took great pains to explain to Fuentes why it was un-Christian to assign blood guilt to Jews as well as to assign guilt to any group in general. He seemed to be trying to talk Fuentes down from a bad place. Do you remember that part of the interview?
Yeah, I don't think Nick Fuentes has left anybody who has ever seen him online the slightest doubt where he's coming from or what he thinks about anything. I honestly cannot figure out the strategy behind granting him credibility, but there surely has to be one.
Again, Carlson stated during the interview that he was trying to figure out what Fuentes thoughts really were. Perhaps he has seen the online stuff but, as many a person's public persona is a cover for other issues, Carlson thought there might be something more to Fuentes. Perhaps Carlson was lying.
Or perhaps, as I note above, his questioning was more of a attempt to get Fuentes to see the folly of some of his thinking, and to reign in his darker impulses.
Next patient: A. Hitler.
Thank you for pointing this out and fencing with hist Rod D on this thread.
Some patience is needed.
I think that Carol Swain predicted this moment in her early 2000’s book *The New White Nationalism*.
Clearly Rod, you are keeping some very bad company -- one might even call it demonic, although from me that's a kind of secular analogy. "The right" is a diverse range of people artificially cast into one big pot and stirred by crafty manipulators. Declare your independence. Stand up for what you believe, not who you've kept company with.
I get email from Roberts. My email address probably got onto their list because I sometimes subscribed to the print edition of The American Conservative. I mostly ignore them. Occasionally I have tried to tell them that just because I see the flaws in DEI, CRT, and LGBTQWERTY does not mean I support their dystopian vision of a neo-fascist state. But they just keep sending their email. The bots do what they do.
Nick Fuentes doesn't run jack. He has a big mouth and friends with well equipped studios.
Nice touch, putting a photo of Auschwitz at the top of your post. Very much on point.
I think Rod's strength is his ability to remain loyal and sensitive to the idea of normalcy and the moral center of Western civilization (and its institutions), while also being able to delve through the chaos of intellectual discourse without losing himself therein.
Hence, although I disagree with him a lot on many topics, I view it as a mark of his strength to be friends with very "normie" figures like JD Vance while also being conversant with strange ideas and people very far from the center of culture and society.
That's also why I think he has to be given some leeway when he takes his positions. Intellectual nomads like myself (and maybe you) might want him to strike a "pure" position in defiance of his social connections, but it might be better in the long run if he finds a calculated middle position, allowing him to keep his ties while also paying tribute to the truth.
I don't want Rod to be a "pure" anything, any more than I try to conform to the purist doctrines of any political faction. I might be described as a left-wing populist constitutionalist and an enemy of identity politics... but that would be imprecise too. Rod as an individual with a unique voice -- raised in the diverse southern cultures of Louisiana (which is not Mississippi, nor Texas, nor George, nor Florida, among other southern states it is not), intellectually sophisticated, conservative in temperament, pious in matters of faith and morality, with a good eye for his own weaknesses, has a lot to offer the world. When he self-identifies with the polyglot spectrum of political factions and ideologies that liberal journalists dismiss as "the right," treating it as a coherent body, he seems to lose a good deal of what makes him a unique voice.
I only sense what you are referring to when he's talking about Europe.
His strength on America is that he has so many American friends, so many diverse experiences and has finely attuned his anxieties with input from all political sides to the point he is never a cliche and never just following the stereotype of "American right-winger".
On Europe, in contrast, he just repeats the run-of-the-mill Eurabia talking points that I first heard 15 years ago. I always find it funny when he accuses me of puffing the Murti-Bing inhaler, because I literally have heard his talking points countless times since 2015 (including the Rotherham abuse scandal, which I heard about almost ten years ago) and am tired that his takes are too conventional and lack his usual creative eccentricity.
What Rod really needs in Europe is to get out more. He has some good tradcon friends, but he needs to get some liberal friends, some migrant friends. There's plenty of oyster bars and craft beers in liberal haunts like Hamburg, Amsterdam and Berlin too, so I hope he expands his reach soon.
Yes. Europe has a lot of problems, which are quite different from the USA's. It is not impossible that it will drift into civil war with Islam, but there are various other possibilities. Rod does seem to have a love of US-right talking points in this respect. My hunch is that he's in a bubble in Budapest, unable to speak Hungarian. I wish he'd spend more time in places such as the UK, Ireland, France or Belgium, where he can talk to random people in bars the way he does in the USA.
I myself have been out of the UK a long time, and am out of the loop as to what's happening there, but my friends and relatives, for all their diverse unhappinesses with what's happening, and including some extreme Islamophobes, think civil war is far-fetched.
It's also odd how Rod always links the Islamic problems in Europe with hostility to Israel, yet support for US foreign policy in the Middle East and vs. Russia is a big part of Europe's problems.
We see Rod very differently, and most likely he sees himself differently than either of us, and us differently than we see ourselves. I don't characterize him as "a man of the right." I remember his Crunchy Con days, when I first found his Beliefnet column via a link from ThinkChristian.net. I do pay attention when he himself talks about the right, what the right must do, how the right must police itself, and speaks of the right in the first person plural.
I find his reporting from Europe helpful, even though I take much of it with a grain of salt. The people he talks to and hears from are a real component of the diverse range of classes, experiences, people, nationalities, ideologies, that is modern Europe. Some of the problems he highlights are real -- although I think not the imminent Armageddon that he often sees coming.
Daniel Greenfield has an incisive article, “The Real Split on the Right Is Over America.” On the FRONT PAGE WEBSITE ..He has articulated something I’ve felt for quite a while: as we are now discussing the new movement on the right that cloaks itself in Christian rhetoric but carries within it a rejection of America’s moral and civic inheritance. Greenfield’s warning could not be more urgent.
Alasdair MacIntyre warned that when a civilization loses its shared moral framework, the old moral language survives only as fragments. People still say good and evil, but those words no longer point toward a common good. That is exactly what we see now — Christian terms drained of Christian meaning, weaponized for tribal power rather than moral order.
I’ve sensed this for a while: I recently experienced friends who we talk the talk, but all of a sudden sound like something from an invasion of the body snatchers my very traditional friends just are sounding strange with new weird theories.
I hear of a new faction rising that speaks the language of faith but despises the substance of it. They quote Scripture and talk about “Christendom,” but their faith serves power, not the other way around.
These are not traditional conservatives. They are the alternate right — angry, clever, and hollow. They use Christian words as banners of war, not bridges of meaning. Greenfield has done the a service by naming the danger out loud.
Right now I’m still uncomfortable, mentioning the names of some of my favorite conservatives and broadcasters. some I admired are individuals who are not pushing back on the outlandish theories. They say they’re defending the West. In truth, they’re burning down the very house that sheltered them.
So Daniel Greenfield has drawn the line that had to be drawn. I hope Rod and Daniel continue to write some more on the subject and expose this poisonous threat.
Re: I hear of a new faction rising that speaks the language of faith but despises the substance of it. They quote Scripture and talk about “Christendom,” but their faith serves power, not the other way around.
Sadly, this is nothing new under the sun. Religion coopted for national power and identity has been the bane of Orthodoxy in the Old World countries for centuries. In the West the rulers of Spain and France were adept at claiming divine providence for whatever they got up to, no matter how sordid. "Gott Mit Uns" was a slogan of the armies of Germany since the says of Frederick the Great.
The center cannot hold…we are caught in forces well behind our power to change them. We are the pawns of gods, ring moved about—“influenced” if you will—in ways difficult to understand.
The center has undoubtedly been giving way for some time; so long that it's all but impossible to say exactly what the center even means. I thought the so-called heterodox community had this potential. But to the degree they have anything in common it's their rejection of in-group dynamics, which makes forming a coherent coalition all but impossible. It seems the strong gods currently live on the extremes. God help us.
A pox on both the woke and groypers!
My fear was that, if the groypers were mainstreamed, it would only be a matter of time until someone more charismatic would weaponize the movement.
But my expectations were too high for even that; unless my definition of charismatic is horribly outdated, it seems Mr. Fuentes can just build it up without any plotting or convincing, without any drop of charisma whatsoever.
Fuentes is a gangster. He plucked the lowest people in society (from an easy pool to draw from, 4chan and such) and compromises them. The Groyper movement is not just Nazi, it's full of pedophiles. Nick expects donations/tribute, which is publicly posted on his streams, and he had his own streaming site (helpfully built by Alex Jones' IT guy) that had no privacy policy. He keeps the data from all of this. Once you get too deep into Groyper world there's no getting out. Beyond the reputational ruin, there's legal risks involved with the pedophilia. I'm not sure why they haven't been broken up yet over this. The blogger I will link to below (warning: NFSW and very long) thinks it's because Nick's a federal informant. I don't know about that, but the rest of that post is a very convincing and difficult read.
https://www.chrisbrunet.com/p/top-50-nick-fuentes-pedophile-scandals?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email&utm_content=share&utm_campaign=posts-open-in-app&triedRedirect=true
I've heard the informant theory too
Most non-Americans would consider Trump to have zero charisma. He is the epitome of the "ugly American" stereotype. That clearly didn't stop him.
Actaully Trump has exactly the kind of charisma that plays really well with most non-Americans. Most non-Americans aren't western European or Canadians. Trump is a lot like poltiicians in Eastern Europe, Asia, and Latin America.
I'm not sure that's true. Obviously populist leaders tend to be strongmen with bracing rhetoric. But compare Trump with Orban or BoJo. Orban could give extemporaneous 45-minute perorations about the importance of Western civilization when Dreher visited. Johnson could appear in an official debate with Mary Beard about whether the Greeks or Romans were the superior civilization.
It's preposterous to imagine Trump doing either such thing.
Of course he does. Longer than 45 minutes. That's obviously not what I'm getting at.
Our gracious host was impressed by the *quality* of Orban's speech (that is, its truth value), not its effectiveness. Trump is great at what Machiavelli called the "effectual truth." But if you have to distinguish "effectual truth" from true truth, then the effectual truth isn't the truth at all. Trump is highly effective in a post-truth era.
I remain convinced that it is preposterous to imagine that Trump could give us 45 enlightening and insightful minutes on the importance of Western Civilization.
Orban is central European, but most people don't really make that distinction anymore, so I could see you bringing that up. Boris Johnson is English, so only not Western European if we don't count the British Isles as part of Europe.
Trump is like the immigrants who built New York, who came from all over the world. He even reminds me sometimes of my dad, an immigrant from Greece. These are the people who raise their glasses on Thanksgiving and proclaim, “God bless America!🇺🇸
My father, another immigrant, used to stand up at the table after a big meal, make a big show of rubbing his belly, and exclaim, “God bless America!”
He was trying to be funny—but he wasn’t joking.
Agreed. I have a coworker whose grandfather is Colombian and she told me her grandfather loves Trump. For people in other parts of the world, Trump is not so different from their leaders.
Trump may be the "ugly American" stereotype but what European politician has any charisma? I don't know of any. Does anyone think Keir Starmer is the second-coming of Churchill, Lloyd George, Gladstone or Palmerston? Does anyone think Emmanuel Macron is the second-coming of Charles De Gaulle? What we have in Europe is a bunch of dull placeholders managing welfare states on the decline.
It's curious how a number of them seem to share a certain look, a phenotype, at some point.
The Kevin Roberts video is so dishonest. Fuentes doesn't merely disagree with the Israeli government. He has made blatant antisemitic statements that his abettor, Tucker Carlson, left completely unchallenged. Please let this odious little twerp be driven from the public square.
His followers see him as a messianic figure. Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying have a podcast with an impossibly poorly chosen name. It's on YouTube. Yesterday, Fuentes was their only topic.
You don't have to devote two hours to the podcast. But check out the comments. It's all Groyper all the time.
The GOP is in for a harsh lesson in the midterms if they think they can ask normie voters to coalesce with this.
I doubt many American are paying attention to Fuentes and his ilk. Trump's disastrous meeting with Xi will affect the GOP in more ways than one next year. Xi holds all the cards.
While we endlessly debate Carlson platforming twerp Fuentes, there's business as usual in China:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOvqtnE1kZU
Re: Trump's disastrous meeting with Xi will affect the GOP in more ways than one next year. Xi holds all the cards.
Can you expand on that? So far I've seen almost serious analysis of that deal other than from people who, if Trump espoused Mom and apple pie, who espouse matricide and mincemeat pie.
The Financial Times, Bloomberg, various blogs have good takes on the "deal". Bottom line, this isn't 1990. China is vastly more powerful than before and cannot be threatened with tariffs. If you get a chance, check out the video above. Sure, it's made by a pro-China vlogger but there's no denying that attendance at the Canton Fair is proof that the world is moving on. Multi-polarity is here whether we like it or not.
You can be very sure that the Democrats will do their very best to hang Fuentes around the necks of Republicans. There are as many stomach-turning Fuentes quotes as there are stars in the sky.
The Republicans can play that game too with Destiny and Hassan Piker and plenty others like them.
Only if the Republicans let them, which is a real possiblitiy.
I also just found out about the "I've had it" podcast where the host is cheeriing on boomers talking about killing off young conservatives. Seriously the well of crazy on the left is so deep that this would be the right's to lose.
As a contrary point of view to Fuentes, the book by Michel Yves Bollore, God, The Science, The Evidence contains a section that shows the Jews are the Chosen People based on history and their collection of writings are now part of the Christian Bible and unusually accurate. It's kind of hard to refute what is presented.
So how can he argue against Jews per se given that Jesus was a Jew and the people were the Chosen People by God.
I say this as a Catholic and a believer that truth will eventually win out.
No one knows what is exactly happening in Israel. We know. the people from Gaza are reprehensible and maybe the Israelis are too. Does anyone know the truth? Certainly not Fuentes.
Give Truth a Chance!
Fuentes and Carlson are distractions/diversions. The real danger is somewhere else and no one talks about it.
There is an underlying cause to all the chaos and no one addresses it. People believe if you address the chaos of the moment and have a solution, that all will be well. When it is impossible for anything long term to be well when the underlying causes are not even known let alone addressed.
Stop acting like people or movements are capable of more than one thing at a time. One can both pushback on the policies of Woke Progressivism while also shaming and rejecting the Nazi-sympathizers (and their enablers) in the New Right.
Tru dat.
The argument is that the Church has replaced Israel (partly true) and that therefore God no longer cares about Jews per se (wrong). While the Church is the "New Israel," per St. Paul God still cares about the "old Israel" for the sake of the fathers (Rom. 11:28).
The idea that the whole thing is cut-and-dry either way is the problem with both Dispensationalism and Catholic/Orthodox anti-Semitism. One says *nothing* has changed w/r/t to the Jews, the other says *everything* has changed. Neither is true.
https://utpdistribution.com/9781874774273/verus-israel/
Simon may have been Jewish, and certainly there is a subtle sense of, if not anti-Christianity, then mild disdain for Christianity, Christian Scriptural exegesis and the like, running through it, well under its surface but discernible, but the book is really great!
Sounds interesting to me. On my bucket list.
Remember that there also existed huge Jewish communities outside of the land of Israel at the time. Alexandra , Persia and and Babylon for starters.
I suppose Alexandria was somewhat like Brooklyn in those days.
My understanding is, at least for the Catholic Church, it is one or the other but some mixture of both. The Church is the New Israel yet there remains God's special relationship with the Jewish people.
Yes, give truth a chance. www.ifamericansknew.org
Don't stop bringing the light against evil
I think A.J. Hamilton is reading stuff that wasn't there into the statement of Kevin Roberts.
As I heard it, Kevin makes two points that are very much along the lines of my own in a couple comments here this week when I said:
>>Personally, I don't get why it's so hard to understand the entirely legitimate and non-extreme position that the interests of America do not always exactly correspond to the interests of Israel...that no nation should be given a blank check by the United States...that the welfare of the American people should take priority over the welfare of the Israeli people or the Ukrainian people or the people of any other country on the globe.
This is my view and I believe it's an entirely legitimate expression of patriotism, realism, nationalism...and sanity. As opposed to the non-legitimate and extremist position that Jews are bad, that Jews run the country, that Jews are organized into a sinister cabal, that Jews are threats, blah blah blah -- all of which is classic anti-Semitism with a long historical pedigree. It is frankly a virus of the mind.
So to me, unthinking support for Israel and falsely labeling as antisemitic those opposing such a stance constitute one extreme. Hate-mongering and conspiracy theories about Jews are the actually antisemitic opposite extreme. The rational, defensible, and patriotic middle ground strikes me as the one I outlined above.<<
And:
>>...the much more dangerous and immediate threat is from the Wokeist ideology of the Dem-Media Party and its allies controlling major institutions of our society. Therefore, engaging in ritual denunciations of people on what is loosely called the "Right" is a counterproductive distraction from the real war.
If some other conservatives don't share that view...if they think some people on the Right to include a bunch of snarky nobodies in a group chat...are a problem on par with the forces responsible for the murder of Charlie Kirk, then, OK, it's a free country and they're allowed to hold that view. But they should not impute bad faith to conservatives who disagree with their judgment on that question.<<
Meanwhile, it seems clear to me that the current game of Nick Fuentes and his ilk is to gain respectability by hijacking the mantle of "America First."
But you don't have to be antisemitic, as Fuentes is, to subscribe to America First. In fact, the guy who basically founded the America First movement, fellow by the name of Trump, is not antisemitic and has actually provided Israel with crucial support over the last several turbulent months. (Arguably too much support but that's a different question.)
However you cut it, this ugly and apparently widening rift within the world of conservatism is a huge gift to the real enemy, which is why I think conservatives should not play the game...should not get trapped in this no-win quicksand.
Jerry -
Respectfully, this is a naive take by you and giving grace to Roberts that is undeserved. Rod & AG Hamilton have both pointed out the laughable contradiction of Mr. Heritage simultaneously calling for the open debate with the likes of Nazi-apologist incel like Fuentes while also demanding Tucker's critics on the Right shut up and fall in line. You can't square that circle.
Vince, I didn't take that message from Roberts's statement which I link below.
What I heard in plain English is that he "abhors," a word the dictionary defines as "regards with disgust and hatred," the things that Nick Fuentes says.
Also, I did not hear him "demand" anything from Tucker's critics. Rather, he suggested that treating Tucker as an enemy right now is the wrong way to go and he will not join those conservatives engaged in the attempt.
I think he's right on both counts for reasons that I expressed in my comment.
https://x.com/KevinRobertsTX/status/1983958755613262324
'No enemies to the Right' is a moral dead end, Jerry. Giving Roberts a pass on playing that card in his defense of Tucker's slobbering interview with Fuentes is misguided.
Vince, I respect your view on that...and Rod's too...but "No Enemies To The Right" is not the way I would frame my position.
Rather, it's "No Enemies Worth Expending Ammunition On To The Right When The Real Enemy And Much More Dangerous Threat Is Located In A Different Direction."
"No Enemies Worth Expending Ammunition On To The Right When The Real Enemy And Much More Dangerous Threat Is Located In A Different Direction."
This is reminds me of Chiang Kai-shek explaining why he wasn't bothering with the Japanese takeover of Manchuria in 1931: 'The Japanese are a disease of the skin; the Communists are a disease of the heart." Six years later he'd come to see it differently.
Also, I know you don't hold this position from the various comments you've made on Rod's Substack, but "No Enemies Worth Expending Ammunition On To The Right" essentially amounts to a should shrug about something as deeply toxic as Nazi-loving antisemitism.
No shrugging here, Vince. I think real antisemitism is a noxious and disgusting thing.
My point is that the Nick Fuentes of the world, whatever their audience, remain on the fringe in the sense that they have no power and no real influence on those who do have power. And I see no evidence this equation will change.
On the other side, however, the toxic ideology that now possesses the Dem-Mediacrats is not on the fringe. It rules their Party. It controls key institutions of our society. It is a deadly threat to me and my family. Thus my No Enemies Worth etc as formulated above.
Chaing kai-Sheck was correct; and well paid to say otherwise later.
As you continue to willfully misrepresent the views of people with whom you disagree, you continue to conjure previously quiescent demons.
Where exactly am I misrepresenting Jerry here, genius?
At this point, Vincent, I'm up to 17 minutes of Nick Fuentes: 15 minutes from various YouTube snippets and 2 minutes from the now infamous Carlson interview. It's like listening to Ben Shapiro while nails on the chalkboard screech in the background.
In contrast, Kevin Roberts' 2 minute 39 second monologue was clear, cogent, and free of the flippancy & gibberish of Fuentes, and yet folks are falling over themselves to lambast Roberts. Say what, honky?
The only consolation here is that the US right seems to be having this argument. Yes, it’s unnecessary and divisive and distracting but at least it’s happening. There is pushback against teh bad actors and extremes and a desire to test the boundary beyond which the right ‘goes too far.’ The left meanwhile …
Except for the most part there is no dialog, merely rock throwing. Tucker spent much of the interview suggesting that Nick would be well served to moderate his positions without caving in his principles. Old guy to young guy kind of thing.
Just one quibble - Charles Lindbergh, who was the chief spokesman for the America First Committee (not a founder, however), expressed clearly antisemitic views. I think the AFC was divided over those views. The relevance of that history, IMHO, is that there's precedent for chunks of an influential group having a mindset that views antisemitism as being perfectly consistent with, or even a key part of, nationalism.
Maybe the AFC had influence disproportionate to its numbers, inasmuch as it was a mere 1-2% sliver of the US population; maybe not. That's hard to measure even with the benefit of historical records and analyses. Does anyone else wonder if the Fuentes furor is a case of sky-is-falling hysteria? How many GOP staffers in DC are under 30 and what is the hard number equaling 35% (midpoint of 30 and 40) of them? How influential are they? What should those numbers and that influence be to constitute a "Very Big Deal" anyway?
Dan, I would have to question Rod's anecdotal information about the number of Groypers on GOP congressional staffs, but as you suggest, we'd have to start by knowing how many under-30s are there in the first place.
In any case, I see very little evidence that Groypers wield important influence on Capital Hill.
From experience doing advocacy in DC, many if not most congressional staffers are 20s-early 30s. Whether GOP staffers are Groypers, it’s anyone’s guess.
I disagree about Lindbergh being an Anti-Semite. After all, he was friends with Daniel Guggenheim, a Jew, and convinced Guggenheim to fund a rocket scientist named Robert Goddard in the 30s. Lindbergh was very naive politically. He said what he thought was true- the British and the Jewish lobbies pushed for American entry into World War Two- and was too naive to think that he would be attacked for saying such a thing.
I think a lot of congressional staffers are in their 20s, it’s very common to do that work for a few years out of college. These younger staff are not the most influential for the most part — but a few years down the line, many of them will hold positions of influence, in politics or elsewhere. Let’s hope they’ve outgrown their Groyper phase by then.
Amen to this.
As an aside, I thought James Lindsey was full of it when he starting blasting the term "Woke Right" (I don't think he's in good faith and the term is being used to break up momentum on the Right), but it's hard to argue with when you see people on the Right condemning Tucker so thoroughly for "platforming" some questionable figures on the Right. You can engage with their ideas without approving of them. It's also interesting to see that the "Woke Right" only seems to come out around Isreal/Palestine discourse.
And lastly, to paraphrase Matt Walsh, I have "Isreal fatigue" meaning, I don't get why I have to care so much and spend so much time thinking about their country. We spend too much money and they're waaaay too involved in lobbying and our politics. Does that mean I hate them? No. Does that mean I support Hamas? No. Does that mean I think "the Jews" are somehow running everything? No. I want them to succeed but as an ally of ours, like any ally, we can send them money/weapons when we've gotten our debt and issues under control. That's not antisemitic, that's common sense. If blasting anyone who agrees our ties to Isreal are taking away from America at a critical moment in our country as antisemitic is the strategy, people will stop believing being called an "antisemite" is bad, much like what happened when the Left overused "racist," "misogynist," and "homophobic."
Natalie, you make an excellent point in your 2nd paragraph. Over the years, the charge of antisemitism has been recklessly weaponized to smear not only those deserving of the brand...people like Fuentes and his ilk...but also those whose only sin might be questioning the wisdom of American policy toward Israel.
I can recall decades ago when legendary conservative Pat Buchanan was almost run out of polite society after he famously blasted the Israeli Defense Ministry and what he called its "amen corner" in Washington for supposedly wanting a war in the Middle East. Buchanan was saved only when influential friends like Robert Novak and others across the political spectrum, who knew Pat to be a decent man and NOT an antisemite, stuck up publicly for him.
Antisemitism is a real thing with a long and destructive historical pedigree...and there are many peddlers of it on the scene to this day. But it is an incendiary and damning charge which should not be indiscriminately hurled around on questionable grounds.
Antisemitism is absolutely real and we should save the label for people who actually deserve it.
What I don’t like is that you can find diverse opinions on the subject of Israeli policy among Jews living in Israel, but if you criticize Israel in any way, here in the United States, people will jump on you for being “anti-Zionist” and “Antisemitic.”
Don't be dishonest, Natalie. The problem isn't just 'the platforming'. It's the slobberfest interviews where he doesn't make the slightest hint of pushing back on the garbage these losers spew.
So sorry that you're feeling 'fatigued' by this.
It's not my country, Vince. Maybe I wouldn't be so fatigued if we didn't send them billions a year when we're trillions in debt and struggling to unite as a country without the whole Isreal/Palestine thing tearing up effectively coalitions on the Right.
Natalie, the law requires that Israel spend 90% of that three billion dollars on American manufactured weaponry.
They're far and away our best ally in the world.
Best ally how, exactly? I mean, what do we get from them?
Okay, so some Middle Eastern bases, purchasing from our defense contractors, and some intelligence. Maybe that's useful but is it SO useful as to justify destroying the unity of the Right when our country is falling apart in almost every way and we need to unify more than ever?
"...justify destroying the unity of the Right when our country is falling apart..."
Think about that. The unity of the Right. You're correct, our country is falling apart. Do you think God will bless and restore it if we make common cause with Nazis?
Because they are Nazis. How much do you know about Fuentes? He's a psychopath. He talks about taking over and crushing his opponents. He admires Hitler. He glories in himself as a tyrant. He has made speeches in which he screams that his followers must be willing to "rape, kill, and die" for him. He admires Andrew Tate's Islamic ideas about the way men should treat women
There is abundant evidence that he is a homosexual pedophile.
He is a vile human being.
His followers are of his ilk. They're Nazis. They want the deaths of every Jew on the planet. Don't kid yourself: if they got their chance, they'd come after Christians, too.
I don't see how it's possible for someone to miss the demonic which runs through the movement, and you cannot make common cause with evil and expect that God will bless you. If the "conservative" movement makes common cause with the Groypers, they will have ceased to be a conservative movement. Those of us who are truly Christian will see to that. We do not want to work with people who would like to bring about another Holocaust. And if America turns against Israel, what, exactly, would there be left for us to try to protect, anyway? We would have proven ourselves to be a nation which is so decadent it doesn't deserve to survive.
William F. Buckley, Jr. made his great contribution to American conservatism in the 1950s by doing everything he could to purge it of that era's Groyper types, primarily the anti - Semites who had always been a bane of American conservatism.
I'm still shaken by that consideration of yours: even if the Republican party didn't lose more adherents than gain them if they welcomed the Groypers in, do you think God would be more or less likely to bless us? Maybe the most consistent lesson history teaches us is that God will bless those who bless Israel and curse those who curse it. Genesis 12:3 makes it clear that regimes which turn against Israel sign their own death warrants. This is equally true of individual anti - Semites. No anti - Semite ever has a life which is anything but a curse, to others and to themselves.
As for Israel as an ally, more than any other country on Earth, they share our basic values and unlike most of us, are prepared to die for them. If I were president and had to make a choice between the retention of our allies with the proviso that Israel be excluded and the retention of Israel with the loss of every other ally, I wouldn't hesitate to choose the latter. This doesn't even take into account that soldier for soldier, the IDF must be considered one of the three or four best fighting forces on Earth. And the Mossad does not have its reputation without warrant.
God gave the land to them in Genesis, scattered them when their disobedience had proven too much for Him, and for nearly eighty years, has been bringing them back. Palestine as a country is a fiction. It never existed, and the persuasive power of the fiction of Palestinianism proves that propaganda works.
But I keep coming back to this: please ponder if you think "success" would be worthwhile if in order to obtain it we had to make common cause with people whose policy is murder.
I feel like this, although coming from the opposite side. I have, perhaps, Palestine Fatigue.
My sympathies are basically with the Palestinians, but I loathe Hamas.
I wish Israel hadn't been created in the first place. If I could wave a magic wand, it would disappear, and all the Jews would move to the USA. However, I don't think it's worth having nuclear war for that. I just wish the USA would stop supporting Israel to the hilt, treat it like a small, faraway, rather nasty country, and let its economy decline so that a lot of the ambitious leave.
In geopolitical terms, I'm more Christianity First than anything else. If someone decided to launch a Crusade, and expel all Jews and Muslims from the Holy Land, I don't suppose I'd actually support that, but I'd see the point. As it is, I don't think it's at all clear why I should make a choice between two false religions; no one makes that demand for Sri Lanka, say. If all Jews and Muslims in the Holy Land converted to Christianity, the problems would be eliminated at a stroke; this is a situation in which the best is not the enemy of the good. A Hamas-ruled Palestine would be worse for Christians than Israel, whereas a secular or mildly Islamic Palestine would probably be better; who knows?
I don't believe The Jews (TM) control everything, in the sense of cabals of rabbis in mile-deep bunkers under New York, but I do think AIPAC has too much power in the US government, and Jews have a massively disproportionate voice in the media.
I don't believe the Jews are still the Chosen People, at least not in the full Dispensationalist sense (St. Paul's position is complex, and my personal exegesis is not sorted out; I think various interpretations are legitimate), but I also don't see them as Christ-killers or specially cursed. I'm sceptical that modern Judaism is the same religion as biblical Judaism. I'd rather just view Jews as I do Sikhs. I'd like Sikhs to convert to Christianity, but I don't hate them or seek their harm, and I find them civically respectable, and am happy to make small talk when I buy stuff in their little shop.
Interesting position. I also have wondered if modern Israel should have been founded in the first place. I get the reasoning and I'm not necessarily opposed to it but...I don't know. Doesn't seem like it's been anything but trouble ever since.
Sadly, modern Judaism is not biblical Judaism. The destruction of the temple in Jerusalem required the Rabbis to change it, because there was no longer a place for the levitical sacrifices.
I find it odd that both of you expressed regret that Israel exists today. It came about by the hand of God, and it is clearly His will that it exists. The arabs in the region have launched a number of existential wars against Israel, and Israel has won every single one, often miraculously. There are still unfulfilled prophecies in the Old Testament regarding Israel, and God will bring them to fulfillment in His timing. God continues to be gracious to the Jews even as they live in rebellion against the Messiah.
Divide your allies and get your butt handed to you seems a bad strategy. Just me, I suppose.
'Don't criticize the Nazi-lovers or we won't win!!!' is the outlook of a very morally healthy movement.
You win, by shear force of argument.
More hysterical kvetching from the woke Zionists. It's nice to know that now they think the Heritage Foundation is literally Hitler.
One wonders who they will have left in their little bubble when they attempt to push out most other conservatives in their drunken purity spiral. This behavior is precisely why so many people on the Right are distancing themselves from Zionists. Charlie Kirk was right--they really do feed in to every negative stereotype
Adults don’t make their points with personal insults and nonsensical claims about incels.
Grow up.
Fuentes is the Platonic form of incel, Joe. And 'Beware the Zionists!!!' idiocy and his anime love are some foundational incel qualities, so if it screeches like a Groyper...
So any opposition to racist antisemitism = woke Zionism? Really?
I'm very much not a fan of how the Israeli state was established and how it's treated the people who were there before, especially Palestinian Christians, so I'm not sure how I'm a Zionist. That doesn't mean I have to agree with or even condone the evil being peddled by this Hitler fanboy creep, or give Heritage a pass for doing so when they clearly shouldn't.
I watched the entire interview between Nick and Tucker. They explicitly said that you can't hate Jews and be a practicing Christian. Nick made a point of saying he's playing up the dark humor to be edgy. Actually more chats from Nick's discord are coming out where he's said much the same thing and attacked people for blaming Jews for everything. So in light of this, I think the Heritage Foundation's statement is absolutely justified here
It really is coming off that criticism of Israel is a third rail for modern Republicans, and they are not above slandering folks to get Americans in line with the pro-Israel movement. And similar to how all criticism of Obama or BLM was slandered as racism, all criticism of Israel is slandered as anti-semitism.
So yeah Rod et al want to keep this up, fine. But dont be surprised when people finally get tired of this hystrionic schtick
'Hey guys, Fuentes only sorta-kinda hates Jews now!' is quite the counterpoint, Hiroyuki.
But Heritage did no such thing.
So you certainly give the IMPRESSION that merely suggesting Israel is one of many allies with no special spiritual dispensation is grounds for being accused of hating Jews.
And that is precisely what creates more people that think they hate Jewish people.
'Cooked Barbarian' -- what a based handle!!!
Also, looks like plenty of Heritage associates disagree with you:
https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/nazis-are-bad-heritage-foundation-staffers-subtweet-their-boss-over-his-defense-of-tucker-carlson-and-nick-fuentes/
"Cooked barbarian" is taken from Paul Kingsnorth's thought, and is ultimately of Chinese origin, meaning a non-Chinese who lives under Chinese rule and appears to be law-abiding, but cannot be trusted, as opposed to a raw barbarian, meaning the tribal people beyond Chinese rule. Kingsnorth uses these terms for the different approaches one may take to Machine rule.
Rod used to talk in these sorts of terms, but he is now pals with Thiel, the Machine Emperor, so I don't think he's a barbarian at all.
Rod is a Woke Zionist? who knew?
You mention again the source that mentioned that 30-40% of under-30 GOP staffers in DC are Groypers. I have no way of knowing whether or not that's true, but I can believe it. Most college-educated normie conservatives that age probably went to a college where they had to keep their mouths shut. Why should they bother getting involved in politics and subjecting themselves to persecution? Furthermore, any twenty-something who's attracted to politics, whether left or right, is probably more extreme in his or her views than the average person of the same age; and people tend to be more extreme in their views at a younger age than they are when they get older.
There's a family I know--big Catholic family, both parents are doctors, a bunch of kids. One of the sons--not a great student, but athletic and popular--left for college (I think he flunked out of one school and either transferred somewhere else or started working). He recently came back home and apparently told all his family at the dinner table that women shouldn't vote and the Holocaust was exaggerated. Needless to say, his parents were appalled.
That's pure Fuentes. I've watched videos of him saying exactly that.
If the 30-40% is true find out who they are and fire them. Make Groypers toxic in that way
I don’t think that kind of principled backbone is likely to be found among most members of Congress, alas.
Probably not but that is how you fight back.
Thinking that women shouldn’t vote or the Holocaust was exaggerated doesn’t make someone a Groyper. Being a Groyper entails supporting Nick Fuentes and treating Israeli/Jewish influence as the most important issue in politics.
To be fair, I'm a woman and I've recently been questioning whether giving women the right to vote was a good idea. And I've never watched any Fuentes (unless you count clips on Milo Yianopolis's X feed that he uses to roast Nick).
Out of curiosity, why do you think women should not have been given the vote?
I believe an initial criticism was that it would divide the home, so that instead of 1 vote per family (the husband/leader), you could have a husband and wife voting for different candidates/platforms, which would sow division within the household.
The less nuanced side of me says that women voters are, on the whole, inclined to vote for destructive policies. Their suicidal empathy causes them to approve of insane policies like transing kids, an open border, abortion on-demand until birth, etc, informed only by the dictum "Who am I to judge?" When for a society to function well, we need LOTS of standards and judging and well, logic. Women over the last century have shown policies don't need to be effective, they just need to make them "feel good" about their vote.
Thanks for your reasoned response. I doubt most would go along with it, but I do think these are serious issues you raise.
It's interesting what you say about dividing the household. I don't know about the USA, but in the UK, when women were given the vote, after WW1, it was also when a switch was made from one vote per household to one vote per adult. It was not women per se, but female-headed households, who had not had the vote. In local elections, female-headed households actually had had the vote, since at least the 18th century.
The history in these respects is a lot more complicated than we tend to realise.
Interesting that you mention this, Rombald. A friend of mine broached the topic of 'patriarchal voting' that I guess has been making the rounds in certain circles. It sounded, from her description, rather like what you're describing, only for male heads of household only. It's helpful to know that there was historical precedent for something similar, but what you refer to here is a nuance of interest.
It's actually quite an important distinction. It gets overlooked in the discussion of sexism, but the issue is whether the quantum of society is the individual or the household.
For a very long time, British women voted Conservative more than the men who were more likely to be members of labor unions. I think this changed in the 70s.
I think it was more recently than the 70s -- it was within my memory, maybe the late 80s.
Women used to aspire to high-class things. There used to be the image of women being more religious, liking the royal family, and also smart clothes, a neat home, etc., all of which fed into conservatism. Men were blue-collar, doing tough jobs, drinking hard, farting and being uncouth, but being forgiven because they put bread on the table, and the unions were part of that.
Various things changed: feminism, contraception, Thatcher making the Conservative Party seem vulgar, uncouth, and masculine-coded (more like the US Republicans), the decline of respectability, the loss of prestige of the Royal Family, the defeat of the miners in the big strike, expansion of the universities, and decline of heavy industry.
Looking back, it's quite extraordinary how respectable women at the upper edge of the working class used to be. There's all this talk now about Muslim women wearing hijabs, but my grandmother would never have dreamt of leaving the house without a headscarf.
Hi, Natalie. Is there a possibility that your "less nuanced" description of the problem is a function of women's suffrage in the specifically Western context? I wonder if there's a difference between our society and that of, say, India in this sense.
Now I'm aware that in certain non-Western societies, there's a definite division between men and women in political outlook generally - thinking here of Korea. But is that because women's voting attitudes there correspond to those in Western Europe and North America (should I try to coin a new abbreviation, WENA?)? Or is it something else?
I don't know, but that's a good point.
I think birth control and the general tendency of society to favor women in the last 60 or so years contributes. As does the rise in divorce. Single moms definitely want more entitlement programs and empathy as they feel they need it. And they probably did when single motherhood was rare, but what they need now is honest feedback about what single-parent homes/divorce/etc does to children and society. I have a couple friends who never married but lived with their male "partner" and got Medicaid, food stamps, discounted EVERYTHING for their kids. Then they broke up with their male "partner" when it got boring/tough/he wasn't perfect. Moved out, got even more benefits, work part time.
The birth control pill is one of the most revolutionary medical "advance" in modern times. The girls could be as lusty as the boys. The divorce culture has added an acid to Western Civilization.
For the male partners, some of them don't want to get married because in some cases the children aren't their children. They will have no legal right to see them if the couple breaks up. Other guys, including me, are unsure about marriage because no fault divorce has destroyed the very concept of marriage.
Well put. I would add that every PEW survey I've read over the last twenty-five years demonstrates that men are more knowledgeable about political affairs than women except when it comes to the local schools. But women aren't going to lose the vote. Only a fool would ever propose it.
No. The female vote is not going away and you're absolutely right that any politician who supported that idea would end their career. The best we can hope for is a return to common-sense from women, which MIGHT happen if we run policies through the lens of what's best for "the children" and stop publicly shaming men for building civilization. Lots of women voted for Trump--there's some hope!
Natalie, as another woman who has come to increasingly believe these same things over the past 15 years, thank you for articulating this so well!
My pleasure!
I have thought about that, but I know multiple women with good views. I don't women to not vote. I would rather extremely liberal women and men abstain from voting. A friend of mine thinks we need to go back to only property owners voting. I disagree. But I think we need to have a short test before voting and if people can't pass enough questions, then they can't vote. The test would be easy and have questions like how many states are there, who is the president, what are the three branches of government, etc.
Granting women the vote may or may not be a good idea but women aren't going to lose the franchise. If I could, I would raise the voting age back from 18 to 21 but that's not going to happen either.
I would also love to have further requirements, like not just being a total free-loader for no good reason. I'm not talking about the legitimately disabled or elderly, but chronic welfare recipients and professional criminals. I have no idea if it's constitutional or not, but it would be helpful.
We think alike. If you receive SNAP benefits, you should lose the right to vote. Of course, perhaps defense contractors should lose the vote as well as they receive government largesse in a different manner than a welfare recipient.
YES ABOUT THE DEFENSE CONTRACTORS. How about, if someone's livelihood is dependent on tbe federal government, their vote counts for half?
I would raise it to 25 and require a simple test to prove that someone has enough understanding of government to vote. Some of the questions would be how many states are there, what are the colors of the flag, who is the president, name all three branches of government, etc. If someone couldn't get a majority of those questions right, they shouldn't vote. Also, if you have to be 25 to rent a car, I wish it was 25 to vote. But it will never happen.
I would raise the voting age to twenty-five as well. I would also not allow men over eighty to run for public office. And limit Supreme Court terms to twenty-five years and force justices to retire at eighty. But none of those things will happen.
https://open.substack.com/pub/thecounterrevolution/p/witch-island-a-cautionary-tale?r=fcfps&utm_medium=ios
No to witch hunts? We mustn’t cancel one another. We must persuade. The link referenced is a historical example of what can happen when we demonize the other. Let’s be slow to process what’s going on today.
You're right, Buddy. The Bolsheviks and the Nazis just needed more hugs and empathy, not demonization and rejection. If we had only followed your sensible antidote, I'm confident that the Bolshevik Revolution and WWII could have both been avoided.
What’s your suggestion?Since you said nothing at all in your response. If you didn’t read the link no need to respond, and I won’t cancel you although it’s tempting 😝
I'm (quite clearly!) suggesting that demonizing & marginalizing people who think Hitler is cool is a worthy response.
I understand. What is your suggestion? Cancel Tucker? I think a lot of what we’re seeing is performative behavior. It’s like shock jocks in 1980’s. I’m concerned and don’t like what Nick F represents. Nick F has no power. What does the attention he’s getting say about us as a society?
I might agree if you also agree that those who promote Marxism or its modern variants should be demonized and marginalized. Perhaps those who took honeymoons in or lead student trips to Communist China or the Soviet Union. Perhaps those who posed with Vietnamese AA guns during the Vietnam War. Those red diaper babies currently in Congress. The list can be quite long.
What is American’s relationship with Vietnam today?
As is America's relationship with many an authoritarian regime through the years. Practical engagement.
My point, in response to Vince, is if we are going to demonize and marginalize people who support one form of evil (National Socialism) we should equally do so with those who support other evils (Marxism, the New Racism, child abuse through Transgenderism etc.)
What’s the solution?
Free speech? Perhaps we can write a document that makes it the law of the land.
Vince, I’m not calling you a troll, but your responses I have read are very Troll like behavior. Gaslighting others. I find it the same as when someone calls one a racist. It’s all they got in a debated issue and really they don’t say anything at all because they can’t make a point effectively.
'Gaslighting others' about what exactly?
And by the way, comparison between the witch-craze/burnings of the early modern period and calling out people on the Right who endorse or play footsie with antisemitism is nonsensical. The victims of the former were routinely being denounced and burned with new credible evidence of their supposed witchcraft. These Nazi-loving (or platforming) New Right bleepholes are readily attesting to their beliefs in their videos and social media posts.
Did you read the entire article? If you didn’t I get it. I rarely read links posted by others. If you did read it, great. The article ties what we are potentially becoming today and it ain’t good. It’s not about burning witches from a long time ago. It’s what we (humans) are capable of becoming when someone doesn’t think/worship/vote like us. Who gets to decide who the witches are? What do we do if we suspect a witch? What do you suggest be done with New Right that’s growing? Perhaps I could be wrong about‘gaslighting’. Perhaps it is tone or sarcasm that I find off putting and not effective in a debate. When I get some time I’ll point some possible ‘gaslighting’ examples. I spend too much time on here as it commenting on stuff that doesn’t change a thing.
"Perhaps it is tone or sarcasm that I find off putting and not effective in a debate."
Fair enough.
As I've said throughout the comments of today's post, I think the New Right-ers who platform and play footsie with raging antisemites like Fuentes should be shamed and marginalized - kind of like what TPUSA (under Charlie) was doing to them. [See his recently revealed texts to Dinesh D'Souza.]
Who gets to decide who the witches are today? Who will be the witches next year? The article isn’t about witches from the past only It ties into what we’re in danger of becoming today.
Nick F has no power. He’s not in a position of Power but he is getting plenty of attention as well as Tucker.
You're right, Buddy. The Bolsheviks and the Nazis just needed more hugs and empathy, not demonization and rejection. If we had only followed your sensible antidote, I'm confident that the Bolshevik Revolution and WWII could have both been avoided.
Hi Vince, this is an example of gaslighting I believe. Yes, maybe sarcasm, can sarcasm be a form of gaslighting? I don’t know. 🤷♂️
If the Czar had given Lenin a hug or two and the Czar's four daughters had baked Lenin a cake, perhaps Lenin would not have had the Romanovs shot and tossed down a mine.
Very sad to see heritage obfuscate. Roberts should know better. Debate is not good in and of itself. If debate is the end, there is no truth. Would Roberts defend those who speak the truth about blacks & IQ? It is actually proven that IQs vary across ethnic lines. Likely he would run away b/c he is morally selective - ignore the hurtfulness towards Jews and run far away from anything to do with science, IQ & blacks. It is just an example but it makes the point. Moral relativism is a poison.
About blacks and IQs. I'd just change the test to one that's less favorable to whites. The Stanford Binet test was just a diagnostic tool anyway, not a test of doom. You've turned it into a goddamn fortune cookie.
the differences in IQ and race are pretty well established (see Charles Murray). Ashkenazi jews are white and have higher IQs than other whites and black. This is my point. one can't even broach a sentence about IQ and race that is proven over and over without fear of condemnation and mocking, but, on the flip side, be welcoming to Tucker and jewish animus and sadly that is accepted as open minded and thoughtful, debatable.
I'm saying they've changed the test from the Stanford-Binet (which I did ok on) to something else which had shocking results to me. Remember Rod's column with the picture that contained a circle (or something like that) that no one could see?
I studied accounting because I figured if I'm right I'm right and if I'm wrong I have some more work to do, unlike the Liberal Arts where I couldn't get started because of my inherent racism. After 30 years I've learned that business is largely horseshit.
It's known (and should be broadly known) that the same person can produce a disparity of scores when tested for IQ at different points in time.
I'm saying the two tests were completely different, and I suspect that the newer test was designed to flatten the curve. You recall the Stanford-Binet?
Though I think Murray has pretty well proven that there are statistical differences between the races. This is not to say there are not brilliant blacks nor dull whites. It's all part of the bell curve.
BTW, I think he also shows that Asians have a higher IQ on average than whites.
by the way I am an engineer. do you how many black engineers I've come across in 30 plus of working in the industry and compared to other groups? the number is a tiny fraction. the truth is most people (white, black, asian) don't have the acumen to become engineers. it is just a truth and so what?
I clearly did not have the acumen to be an engineer. And I'm white.
I worked for a black engineer for about a year. I believe he was a mediocrity. But black civil engineers are prizes for engineering firms. Engineering firms must deal with black-run cities and it helps having a black engineer in your firm. If you are black and can earn your engineering degree, the world is yours.
Yes. Minority engineers are in great demand and like other technical fields & especially black engineers. I did some part time consulting for Rand corporation, the think tank. The man who hired me was black , and he had an outstanding resume. From my limited relationship with him , He was superb in character & intellect. He was much smarter than I could hope to be.
I understand how the system works. I was hired out as a tech/inspector by a very white Syracuse-based engineering firm for about six months. The firm I was hired out to was black-run who did business with the Washington Suburban Sanitary Commission. The engineers of the firm that I dealt with wee mostly Indian. Two Patels and one Bhatt. The whole thing was a honest scam.
Interesting. For 20 plus years I worked for a minority firm. It was a great experience for me. I worked on many high profile public work’s jobs & the most expensive (for the wrong reasons) . The ironic thing is that the minority owner belongs to one of the most successful groups in America - Asian Indian. All a scam to meet minority , women majority owner requirements for gov’t contracting.
You can believe it is horseshit. That is fine. But to claim that that some tests, whether they are the ones you criticize or others, can’t measure some degree of natural intelligence & measure in relation to attributes like ethnicity, race is dumb. Of course we can do this. Is it meaningful is a different question? I never said anything about meaningfulness & iq. Inequities are built into the natural world. Again to say we can’t measure certain intellectual criteria & try & correlate to demographics is just not true.
These tests are diagnostic tools, not tests of doom. They tell me the strengths and weaknesses of the takers. However, I might point out, it seems that they are gamed. The Princeton Review promises a 300 point gain in your SAT score, for instance.
I've an AA (Jazz Studies), BA, MBA, and I'm Enrolled to Practice before the IRS. I also have a license as a Property Tax Consultant here in TX. So bullshit, I know it well.
I never said the tests are a measure of all things knowledge & all things related to god given intelligence or doom & gloom. Your reading comprehension is poor. Maybe that is why you don’t test well? The fact that some tests can be gamed or that some are poor test takers does not disprove that we can’t measure across large sample sizes natural intelligence & that we can’t draw any conclusions. Just look at stem studies & male & female groups. Is it not obvious that males have a greater aptitude? That is not necessarily a measure of pure intelligence but it is an obvious distinction based on natural born abilities between sexes.
The disgruntled Harvard students from yesterday's post all aced the SAT and yet show a remarkable inability to keep up with their coursework. As Mr. G alludes, mommy & daddy spending thousands on test preps is money well spent but clearly cannot improve long-term academic rigor & success.
About Fuentes - he’s a little younger than me, and I feel like I can understand his mentality and motivations. I really don’t think he is serious. Everything he says or does is so deep in irony that it is difficult to determine whether he believes something or is making a joke.
His is a dark, nihilistic kind of humor. I think that this is what motivates him - nihilism, and attention-seeking through trolling. And he’s legitimately amusing or even compelling for the young 20-something men, who feel that they have no future (for good reason, in many cases) feel inclined to burn it all down.
I saw Fuentes in a cafe in suburban Chicago years ago, lecturing an obviously ignorant young man, who was eating it up. Five years prior, I was lecturing my young friends about Marxism in my hometown, receiving the same kind of admiring adulation. Alas, how I’ve changed. Post-2008 youth are susceptible to a demagogue. Now we have one.
None of this bodes well for the future.
Is this another case of irony-poisoning?
One can only shock in the name of irony for so long before it starts to grate on the soul.
I think you're right about Fuentes. Charlie R wrote a comment comparing him to The Sex Pistols in the 70's. I was about to write something similar when I read it. Johnny Rotten and Nick Fuentes don't quite wink at the audience....but there's a trollish dance going on.
I liked Johnny Lydon's schtick......bratty incorrigibility with a dose of wit. Fuentes on the other hand may be creating mini-online-nazis and who knows where that will go? I'm a bit shocked at how much attention he's getting now.
Fuentes is Sid Vicious who can't play bass. Then again, Vicious couldn't either.
And I believe your comment points more clearly to the larger danger that the desire for anarchy in these younger groups is really the motivating ideal. I've been close witness the past decade of the demographic seemingly most influenced by the irony-coded nihilism you correctly identify. There is no 'there' there - that is, there is absolutely no imaginable future under any conditions of present-day economics, politics, or social/cultural reality toward which they are striving, or even believe they could strive.
As I was typing the above it suddenly occurred to me that the anarchist, nihilist bent of this demographic (that absolutely *does* have, as its central/primary animating proposition, the desire to accelerate the dissolution and destruction of All Accepted Things) is perhaps the secular equivalent of those Christians who actively seek to/believe they can accelerate the return of Christ. Both groups believe fervently they must hurry along the demolition of 'What Is' in order to hasten to establish more tenable conditions that would accelerate their realization of What May Be.
The existential problem of this should be evident. And taken seriously.
The answer to Fuentes isn't attacking Tucker. Too much gaslighting going on here. Go on X and you will see shows from the 1980s and 1990s where actual Nazis and Klan members were allowed uninterrupted to present their views on a host of shows.
Because of the gaslighting, I almost forgot this myself and I could only really remember the George Lincoln Rockwell / Alex Haley example.
Nothing Fuentes said was like what these people said. And we are virtually in 1984 territory when sometimes someone who is "Hispanic" is White, and sometimes they aren't. If Fuentes is 1/4 Mexican as he claims, on average he would be about as much Indigenous American Indian as Kamala Harris is Black African.
The answer to Fuentes is family formation. These so-called groypers need to get married and have kids. Those who call Tucker Carlson a Nazi are often secret Islamists if I had to guess.
Ted Cruz and Dinesh D'souza are 'secret Islamists'???? Weird take.
Tucker is no doubt grateful for the loyalty of lemmings... er.. subscribers like you, Thomjack!
No. Cruz is a dope who has a fanatical religious belief that I don't support. When he was with Tucker, I concluded that. I haven't been following D'Souza lately, but he is not pro Islam.
I am saying that not a small number of people who are calling Tucker a Nazi are in favor of Islamic expansion. What percent is that? 10%? 20%? I don't know. Cui bono is something I always ask.
So, when Pat Buchanan was attacked for essentially being a Nazi, what did that mean? They people who did that were (1) Marxists, (2) Moronic fanatics that somehow thought the whole would easily adopt western values if you engaged in regime change, (3) People who claimed to be pro-Israel, but who had poor judgment, and (4) pro Islam expansion.
The problem is that many Christians misunderstand the country of Israel and see it as fulfillment of Biblical prophesy.
Ted Cruz and similar folks worship the State of Israel as an idol and put it first in their loyalties. They also see a Christian duty to support Jewish people no matter what, even to the detriment of Christians and Christianity.
Rod just called himself a "Christian Zionist" but I don't he thinks he understands how extreme the concept has become.
Israel as a country isn't the embodient of prophecy. America is not obligated to support Israel the country no matter what it does. We should be able to see clearly the efforts of supporters of Israel to drag America into conflict to benefit Israel. The UK has done this for a lot longer and more aggressively, and the Chinese have done so a lot as well. Foreign countries use their US-based supporters to manipulate American leaders against US interests.
OK, let me be clear. I am a Christian who believes in the right of the Jewish people to a homeland. I support the state of Israel. I do not hold the views of dispensationalist Christians concerning the eschatological importance of the Israeli state, nor do I think the US is obliged to support Israel, no matter what. I think Israel has done what any other self-respecting nation on earth would have done to an enemy who did to them what Hamas did on 10/7.
So you are not a Christian Zionist.
The only point I disagree with is that Jews have some basic right to a homeland, their own country.
There is no inherent right for anyone to their own country, whether they be Scots or Basques.
Israel has a country, so they have a right to defend it and do whatever they can to protect their own interests.
Israel is almost 80 years old and is older than a host of other countries and it is horrible that they still need to fight to exist.
However, one can still be supportive of Israel and say that its policies, especially over the last 2 years, have been counterproductive. We don't need to fund its wars against all its neighbors. Israel has lost most of the goodwill, especially of young people, and its heavy-handedness to police thought (including the nonstop campaign against Tucker, as well as the leaked effort to police Kirk related to that) are extremely counterproductive. Enlisting good-natured people in the campaign, often through manipulation, just turns off more people.
At this point, given that Minneapolis and NYC both will probably have Islamic expansionist mayors, i don't care. I'm a bit sad that I don't, but I really don't care anymore.
I am more sad because of what happened to Constantinople, Lebanon and what is happening every day in Nigeria.
Israel can do whatever it wants. When Constantinople, Lebanon and Nigeria become majority Christian again my views might change.
Do I understand you correctly if I say that your support of the state of Israel and the right of the Jewish people to a homeland its based on romantic / sentimental / emotional reasons and not based on theological reasons?
If I understand correctly, then thank you very much for this clarification.
It seems to me extremely fundamental—and oh so difficult—to distinguish between our subjective personal tastes and objective truths. We are all very often tempted to attach our subjective positions to higher truths in order to support/justify them, and in doing so to reinforce our positions. This is in fact intellectual laziness and a spirit of death.
One of the reasons why many Christians and non Christians feel very uncomfortable with the Israelophilia of Christians (Zionist or not) is the implicit or explicit association made between the modern state of Israel and Christianity. The same problem exists by the way with the association between Christianity and the USA, between Christianity and the Republican Party, etc.
Such associations operate according to the logic of co-branding: we benefit from the glory of what we are associated with. But the reverse is also true and leads to the rejection of what we are associated with, and of ourselves.
Let us be extremely cautious and guard against defiling the name of Christ through our worldly associations and / or through a lack of clarity.
“Foreign countries use their US based supporters to….against US interests.”
Muslim Brotherhood. Qatar. Turkey. To a lesser extent Iran and Saudi Arabia.
It’s ramping up bigger than your can imagine. Will dwarf Israel.
Just wait.
Israel at this point of time isn’t the embodiment of prophesy but it is on its way, IMO. The ingathering if the exiles is moving slowly but surely and the Jews there are as a whole much more believers in G-d than ten years ago.