PHALANX CUCKS!

by Daniel Barge

With the Alt-Right about to march into another “street battle”—actually a peaceful demonstration where antifa will probably bombard our guys with piss bombs, mace, and worse—the big debate in the Alt-Right is all about optics.

On one side, you have the likes of Matt Parrott and Mike Enoch saying, more or less, “Don’t sweat the optics” and “So what if a few guys do a little harmless Naziing?”

While on the other side you have Andrew Anglin—yes, I know—and Ricky Vaughn saying “C’mon guiz, whose picture do you think the media is going to put on the packet if you allow people to heil Hitler and swastika at the demo?”

Tell me this. How do people invite National Socialist Movement to their rally and then get mad about a guy flying a swastika flag? — Spooky Ricky👻🎃☠️😱 (@DSAStillWithHer) October 28, 2017

In my view, Anglin and Vaughn are clearly in the right here. Public demonstrations like this are (1) PR events and (2) a competence test of our movement to be a disciplined and unified group that normies can ultimately rely on to behave responsibility.

The now infamous Charlottesville swastika flag with its mystery bearer and neat fold lines.

If we can’t stop some doofus parading around with a swastika, then it’s clearly not a vote of confidence in our ability to run a future state, ethno of otherwise.

Those who think we shouldn’t sweat the swastika stuff have come up with a memey term to get their message across — “opticscucks” — and a whole way of thinking that is actually quite leftist in its crass individualism.

🐸 hbd nrx 🐸@HbdNrxOpticscucks are wrong not because they're wrong about optics but because they think the optics can be controlled. There will always be someone with swastikas on the edges.8:22 PM - Oct 27, 2017

This is partly a repackaging of the meme “they’re going to call you a Nazi anyway so you may as well go full lampshades and ovens, 1488, sieg heil!” But there is also more than a hint of ex-libertarianism in there as well, along the lines of “Freedom, bro, you can’t stop it.”

Nice theory, but let’s just put this notion in another context, that of the supreme military machine of the classical world, namely the almighty phalanx.

This formation was quintessentially European in nature, and gave ancient Greeks and Macedonians a massive edge over their less coordinated and unified opponents. Now, imagine saying what is said about “opticscucks” to the hoplites in the phalanx.

"Phalanxscucks are wrong not because they’re wrong about having twenty-foot long spears, but because they think the phalanx can be controlled. There will always be someone who just doesn’t want to stand in line."

A phalanx that operated on that principle wouldn’t survive too many battles intact. So it is with these street demonstrations. Some unity and discipline is essential, even if not on the scale of the ancient Greek hoplites.

We all know that something really bad is going to happen some day — maybe today. It will probably be caused by antifa or someone just losing their cool, and, when it does, all that the media will need to start the next crucifixion of the Alt-Right will be evidence that (a) we condoned violence in some way and (b) a few swastikas to hang the whole scary story on.

After that we can expect another even more brutal crackdown followed by a few months or years of wasted time as we repair the damage.