CONSERVATISM INC'S LAST STAND

Conservatism Inc notices something hurtling towards it.

by Bay Area Guy

Lately, I stumbled upon an article on a site called The Federalist which—if the countless comments are any indication—is a popular purveyor of mainstream conservatism. Along with attacking Dota's old post on National Capitalism, this tirade of an article trots out all the hackneyed Conservatism 101 talking points. In order to illustrate the increasing irrelevancy of Conservatism Inc's platitudes, I'm going to go through this post bit by bit.

For starters, the author seems to accept the left's notion that racism is a capital crime; but it's okay, because he has at last found the actual racists:

"Hey, lefties, we finally found your racists for you. For as long as I can remember, people like me—by which I mean advocates of capitalism and free markets and freedom of speech—have been accused by the left of being secret racists who pine for the gold old days of the antebellum South. Tiresome stuff like this. Then along comes a group of actual, declared racists who really do pine for the antebellum South, and who is one of the main targets of their invective? People like me."

"Look, we're so not racist."

I honestly cannot fathom what's going on in the heads of conservatives who make a big show of denouncing racism. Do they believe that they'll be able to win over large numbers of non-whites with their disavowals of white nationalism? Why, despite all evidence to the contrary, do they think that sounding compassionate on race and immigration while composing paeans to the "free market" will make any inroads among Latinos or other non-whites?

Then again, perhaps fiscally conservative but socially moderate whites are their real audience. But of course, the author would be appalled if one thought in such tribal terms:

"If you think that your most important cultural and political priority is to defend the supposed interests of white people in opposition to the interests of other racial groups, then you are a white supremacist, because that’s what 'supremacy' means. Dress it up however you like, but that’s what you stand for."

What a fatuous argument. Since when does supporting one's group interests qualify as "supremacist?" It's one thing to disparage other groups and insist that your people are superior to them. However, simply looking out for your own is human nature. In fact, given that conservatives like him extol the virtues of free markets and competition, I find it interesting that he condemns tribal competition. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, life is a zero-sum game—something every successful group understands.

The esteemed writer, however, thinks that "collectivism" is the bane of the West:

"This 'alt-right' agenda is not really part of the 'right' because it is thoroughly collectivist in a vile and personal way. It says that your most personal, individual, deeply meaningful decisions—such as whom you marry and have children with—should be determined by some larger social program based on group identity."

The horror! It may come as a shocker, but for most of world history—even in the US—marriage was largely determined by practical considerations. Yet again, the writer is subconsciously endorsing the cultural left's post-1960s beliefs. Free love! Marry whomever you want! Just to be clear, I'm mostly indifferent to interracial marriage—I think that low white birthrates are the main problem—but this just goes to show how much the left has dominated the culture war.

After giving Dota some free advertising, he goes on to fulminate against the especially evil menace known as tribalism:

"The central theme of the Western intellectual tradition is about rising above tribalism to arrive at universal values. That’s a common theme that connects both secular and Christian traditions in the West. It was the whole distinctive idea behind the Ancient Greek revolution in thought. Philosophers like Socrates launched the Western tradition by asking probing questions that were meant to sort out which ideas and practices are based merely on historical accident and social convention, versus those that are based on universal laws of human nature. Tribalism, by contrast, is the default state of every culture and can be found among every people in every corner of the world. There is nothing distinctively Western about it, and it runs against the whole grain of the Western intellectual tradition. So by reverting to tribalism, the alt-right is saying that they had to destroy Western Civilization in order to save it."

Not at all. At this point, however, certain aspects of Western culture must be tempered—if not jettisoned—in order to save Western civilization. Like I once said, individualism in Western countries is all fine and dandy when those nations are mostly homogeneous. Unfortunately, once multiculturalism becomes a way of life, then individualism amounts to a major liability. That's why the author, while condemning the Alternative Right as a cesspool of racism, unknowingly displays his own chauvinism; it's as if he thinks that white culture is so omnipotent that non-whites will imbibe Western ways soon after reaching our shores.

But of course, we all know better.

Ultimately, I think that the reason why Conservatism Inc's acolytes are lashing out so hard against Donald Trump and the Alternative Right is because they know that their days are numbered. Irrespective of my views on Trump as a person, the Donald has done us a great service by revealing just how isolated Randroid Republicans truly are. It turns out that at the end of the day, regular white Republicans don't care all that much about "limited government," "balanced budgets," "free markets," "standing with Israel" (though Democrats are also bad offenders in this regard), or other trite conservative platforms.

In conclusion, lofty ideals do not save a people from demographic displacement and economic ruin. Don't let increasingly irrelevant Conservatism Inc propaganda tell you otherwise.