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Postmodernism and "Everyone gets hate mail"

There's been a recent brouhaha connected with Twitter concerning a certain columnist whom I'll just call Kilo. I ignore Twitter as much as possible. I have no Twitter account, and not much in my life would change if Twitter ceased to exist tomorrow. In fact, I doubt it was a very well-conceived idea to begin with.

I'm taking note of this particular brouhaha because of what it reflects about a certain segment of the population that calls itself "conservative" but is anything but.

As near as I can figure out, a certain black, female actress was getting a lot of extremely nasty, racist comments on Twitter. She hadn't apparently realized just what Twitter was like and was shocked. Wisely or unwisely, she retweeted some of these comments to show that she wasn't making it up and, apparently, to show what darkness is in the hearts of mankind. After a while of this, ol' Kilo decided to insert himself into the fracas and posted a "tweet" that strongly implied that she was just a whiner playing the victim in order to draw attention away from the fact that she's a poor actress.

Mind you, the comments she was re-posting seem to have been undeniably genuine. It's not that the whole thing was some kind of hoax. (Though I have no doubt that some in the alternative reality of the alternative right are raising even that possibility, just to throw it into the mix. Or changing the subject and talking incessantly about other people who, they believe, have played such hoaxes.) In the world led by Kilo and his ilk, even pointing out, in shock, that people are making incredibly nasty, insulting comments about oneself is whining and "playing the victim." It is apparently a settled doctrine of this part of the right-o-sphere that no one is really a victim unless life and limb are literally, undeniably in danger. Hence, anyone who so much as draws attention to verbal attacks is whining and "playing" the victim. If the person is a member of a minority group, or a woman, or both, or a feminist, or all of the above, then all the more so: She obviously has some nefarious motive, deserving of mockery, for complaining.

Part of "Kilo's" comment was this: "Everyone gets hate mail."

I am not commenting on whether "Kilo" should have been banned by Twitter, now or in the past. I am not commenting on whether Twitter should ban other people as well, or who those other people or groups are, or what sort of double standards do or do not obtain on Twitter. All of that is beside my point.

I am commenting, rather, on the truly strange idea that we should criticize those who complain about vile insult rather than those who engage in vile insult. Where does this idea come from? And what does "Everyone gets hate mail" have to do with it? If everybody got robbed, would that make robbery no big deal? This is a kind of reverse bandwagon fallacy: If some bad thing happens to everybody, it ceases to be worth mentioning, and you are a whiner if you draw attention to it when it happens to you.

Any such downplaying of vile insult is exactly the opposite of conservative. The conservative believes that ideas have consequences. (Sound familiar?) The conservative is a realist about meanings and about language. He believes that words express ideas in people's minds. So words are important, not to be brushed off lightly. Every idle word that a man shall speak he shall give account of in the day of judgement. Words have consequences because ideas have consequences.

Postmodernists, in contrast, can never be conservative. And the idea that you can dismiss vile insult by saying, "Everybody gets hate mail," that you can and should criticize someone who draws attention to mere insults, mere words, is essentially nominalist and in an important sense postmodernist. The postmodernist holds that words are just marks on paper or sounds coming out of the mouth. They can be made to mean and to do anything at any time. (Inconsistently, many postmodernists of the leftist sort also believe that words are mighty talismans and tools of oppression, but being a postmodernist means not having to be consistent.) Words don't actually have meanings. Meanings aren't in the head. Words don't express ideas.

The alt-right's sneering at anyone who complains about "mere" verbal insult is part of the postmodernism of our age. It is an explicit attack upon standards of public discourse, which conservatives, of all people, ought to uphold. It is part and parcel of the idea that nothing matters. We are all such cynics, so above it all, that we don't care what people say. We don't care about lies, fraud, or insult. We might care if someone actually, physically attacks us or "our own folk." Then we'll fight back, and the prospect of a war of all against all is something we accept fatalistically as the way things are going. The idea of elevating standards, the idea that speech matters (yes, including speech on Twitter), is archaic, worthy of scoffing.

There is another way in which these ideas are postmodern: They embody the doctrine that everything is about power. Hence, we should never condemn those who, in our name, engage in vile insult, because that would be a concession to the "other side." It would be a sign of weakness. Whether preventing, say, vile comments in the comments threads on one's blog, and rejecting and condemning them, would be the right thing to do is not even on the radar. Absolute right and wrong are not the standard. Rather, "Being nice hasn't gotten us anywhere" is the cry. It's all about power and about us vs. them, and if getting out there and engaging in vile insult is somehow going to help us vs. them, then we shouldn't criticize those who are "doing our dirty work for us." This, again, is essentially a postmodern rejection of absolute value and virtue in favor of a Nietzschean pseudo-ethics.

I submit that all of this constitutes a destructive point of view. Every man of good will should reject it utterly. It is a sign that some on the self-styled right have adopted the destructiveness of the left.

For a long time, it was clear that the political conservatives in the West were the preservers. This became clear to me as long ago as graduate school, where I encountered postmodernism. I was shocked at the gleeful destructiveness and the explicit politicism of the postmodern left. That was when I declared war upon postmodernism in all its forms. Back then, there were still a few dinosaurs--the politically left who nonetheless rejected postmodernism and loved Western civilization. They have now largely died out. It is for the most part the political conservatives who have "fought the long defeat" through the ensuing decades, who have played Athenians to the left's Visigoths.

What we are seeing now is the rise of the self-styled right-wing Visigoth. He is a destroyer and a postmodern. Yet such a person still dares to claim the label of "conservatism" and complains, when banned because of at least an attempt to uphold, perhaps inconsistently, perhaps selectively, standards of decency, that it is his conservative politics (in some legitimate sense of "conservative politics") that have gotten him in trouble.

I call foul. We who still believe in truth, justice, beauty, absolute right and wrong, and who still believe that words matter, because ideas matter, we can claim to be conservative. If you don't, you can't. And if your response to a torrent of verbal abuse, even against someone whom you regard as an untalented hack, is to sneer, "Everyone gets hate mail," then you don't, and you can't.

Comments (158)

Lydia,

This part of your post is especially timely:

There is another way in which these ideas are postmodern: They embody the doctrine that everything is about power. Hence, we should never condemn those who, in our name, engage in vile insult, because that would be a concession to the "other side." It would be a sign of weakness. Whether preventing, say, vile comments in the comments threads on one's blog, and rejecting and condemning them, would be the right thing to do is not even on the radar. Absolute right and wrong are not the standard. Rather, "Being nice hasn't gotten us anywhere" is the cry. It's all about power and about us vs. them, and if getting out there and engaging in vile insult is somehow going to help us vs. them, then we shouldn't criticize those who are "doing our dirty work for us." This, again, is essentially a postmodern rejection of absolute value and virtue in favor of a Nietzschean pseudo-ethics.

There is this idea going around in neo-reactionary/alt-right circles called "no enemies to the right": http://freenortherner.com/2016/06/24/no-enemies-to-the-right/

If you read that whole post (which is admittedly tedious) you'll find the author actually says, "We should avoid attacking allies, even if they are overzealous, degenerate, wrong on certain base principles, or if they have tactics we disagree with." If that's not postmodern (and insane) I don't know what is.

Yes, they're very explicit about it, and it's utterly indefensible. Yet they will spend endless pixels defending the indefensible. Notice, too, that it's okay to criticize "traitorous moderates." This means that vileness directed against, say, David French is A-okay, even though by anyone _else's_ standards, French is an honorable, committed conservative who has dedicated his entire life to conservative causes. "Don't criticize fellow rightists" does _not_ mean, "Refrain from sending vile insults to the likes of David French." He doesn't count, because he's been branded a "traitorous moderate."

Even from a strategic point of view, this is counterproductive, since French and his fellows at the ADF are _far_ more practically fruitful allies of the right then all the alt-right bloggers who have ever walked the planet, much less M. Y. and co.

It is worse than arbitrary. It is plain stupid to designate M.Y. an "ally" who must not be criticized while designating David French a "moderate traitor" who may be subjected to the vilest treatment, at least verbally, along with his wife and family.

But aside from that, the unspoken doctrine that strategy is not _itself_ constrained by considerations of virtue, honor, and objective goodness is pervasive, and the deliberate scorn for it verges on question-begging. They must know that those who disagree with them disagree _precisely_ from the point of view of objective morals, objective good and evil, which applies to the actions even of our *so-called* "allies." Yet the talk is all of utilitarian outcomes.

I think most people (certainly myself) were mainly upset at @Nero's banning because of the hypocrisy - if "harassment" at the level Nero was engaging in it is what it takes to get you banned by Twitter, tens of thousands of accounts should have disappeared today. I assure you, they did not. And there does seem to be political bias in who gets dismissed (as there almost always is when words like "harass" or "offense" get thrown around these days). It might not be an exaggeration to say that 95% of the stuff @Nero says, I wouldn't say - but we should all defend his right to say it, if only because, especially if you lean toward the right, if you don't, you could be next.

Blah, blah.

See, in case the main post wasn't clear, let me try one more time:

I DON'T CARE.

I don't _care_ if there is a double standard. What he said, and when he said it, was wrong and showed something disturbing about the movement of which he is a part. That's what I'm writing about. That's what I care about. What he, personally, said wasn't the most vile thing *in and of itself*, but frankly, I'm sick and tired of the pretense that the "lords" of the alt-right who draw negative attention to someone or other as a "whiner" or someone "playing the victim" or a "feminist" or whatever and then sit back and snark quietly while their followers spew bile are innocent flowers. We all know they are not, so let's not engage in hypocrisy (if we're going to speak of hypocrisy).

Twitter isn't a place where you have "a right" to say stuff, any more than this blog is. I wouldn't run Twitter for all the gold in the universe, precisely because it's impossible to control. That's one reason why I said it was probably ill-conceived to begin with.

Are the people who run Twitter politically biased, personally? No doubt. But again, I DON'T CARE.

I care about the Visigoths using, and hence trashing, the conservative label. I care about the destructiveness and evil coming out and calling itself "conservatism" and trying to get sympathy along with _real_ victims of anti-conservative activism like, I dunno, the bakers in Oregon.

And I care about the utterly blinkered vision that makes you, whoever you are, and others like you, more concerned about political bias in Twitter bannings than about the fact that a exhibitionist degenerate is employed by Breitbart, God help us, and goes around representing himself as a conservative and getting speaking gigs under that pretense. Because guess what? That means that you, and everybody else who thinks that way, suffer from a severe lack of perspective.

It is offensive that the [deleted LM] Yannopolis identifies as conservative. [Deleted LM]

But hasn't 'conservatism' been tarnished enough already by the filth who identify as such in Washington and the media, while rolling over to have their tummies tickled (yes, I'm keeping it clean here) by the people ruining society?

Hey, I've gotta great idea. There's all sorts of corruption in Washington already, so let's just not have standards of decency or public discourse anymore. They're inconvenient.

I'm sure that's a great way to promote truth, beauty, and goodness.

Calm civil discourse doesn't work anymore. The statement "I am a person of goodwill and will treat you fairly and honorably as a human being in all aspects of our professional work, but, no, I don't actually believe you are now a woman when last week you were a man." is met with cries of "hateful bigot" and firing.

I think the alt right believes the strategic value of patiently explaining from first principles doesn't work. Maybe they are wrong, but what you are calling vile they call effective rhetoric necessary to combat leftism.

Milo doesn't believe in anything but self-promotion and his own hair and the world would be better with him as a contemplative monk than as a provocateur, but guys like Vox Day are building up actual material advances through culture war wins, a growing publishing company, etc. To write them off as keyboard warriors who are not actually doing anything compared to journalists may be missing the bigger picture.

Haven't you called for a ban on Muslim immigration? Do we really think that can be accomplished through rationally laying out the case using facts and logic? Unfortunately, the only way to actually get that done is through rhetoric and action of the sort we're beginning to see emerge. When opposition to late-term abortion is considered an "extreme" position to hold and indicates one is an "anti-woman fundamentalist", what exactly are the standards of discourse anymore?

The easiest thing to say is that those who have Twitter accounts and use it are, ipso facto, TWITS.

And it is proven over and over.

Calm civil discourse doesn't work anymore.

Correction: it doesn't succeed in achieving some goals. Reasoned discourse STILL works to provide reasons for things, which is a per se proper behavior of men. Whether certain other men are convinced thereby is only ONE aspect of the activity, and not a per se aspect of it.

I think the alt right believes the strategic value of patiently explaining from first principles doesn't work.

You have to define your goals in order to say whether it "works" or "doesn't work". If the prime goal is to exercise power, no, it isn't working. If power is not your prime goal, then it might still work.

Maybe they are wrong, but what you are calling vile they call effective rhetoric necessary to combat leftism.

It would have "worked" to murder Lenin and the early bolsheviks in Russia before they got any real headway. But murder, however "effective", is still vile, despicable, and wrong. Some tactics shouldn't be used EVEN IF THEY WORK with respect to some purposes, because they inherently can't be part of working toward a proper good in its totality. "Do not do evil that good should come of it."

There is plenty of reasoned discourse provided by the likes of Vox Day and others. They realize, as you do, the purpose and limitations of it. To change things, then, they use other tactics, not all of which are evil.

It's not so clear cut as murder, this business of rhetoric. For sure, many if not most of the alt right is in it for personal gain and commit evil in pursuit of the good, a line of action which is rightly condemned. And I am not defending the subject of the OP one bit. But much of the rhetoric they use is unjustly classified as bigoted or racist, and that is the problem here. A person cannot say that marriage is between a man and a woman without that statement being branded a bigot these days. You cannot quote the catechism about certain topics without being charged with hate. How to respond to that is what we're all trying to work out.

Ben, I could keep typing the same thing until my fingers fell off, and you'd still ignore it. So I'll just cut and paste what I said above:

But aside from that, the unspoken doctrine that strategy is not _itself_ constrained by considerations of virtue, honor, and objective goodness is pervasive, and the deliberate scorn for it verges on question-begging. They must know that those who disagree with them disagree _precisely_ from the point of view of objective morals, objective good and evil, which applies to the actions even of our *so-called* "allies." Yet the talk is all of utilitarian outcomes.

Back to quoting you:

Maybe they are wrong, but what you are calling vile they call effective rhetoric necessary to combat leftism.

Oh, because it's evident by the natural light that what is _really_ vile is just a matter of "you say/I say," right? It's all relative, huh? I call B.S. There is such a thing as vileness, and these guys have it.

To write them off as keyboard warriors who are not actually doing anything compared to journalists may be missing the bigger picture.

You need to upgrade either your reading comprehension skills or your googling skills. David French is a _lawyer_ who works for the Alliance Defending Freedom. I believe he was one of the lawyers for Mike Adams, who won an extremely satisfying victory against the leftist bullies at the University of North Carolina.

I'm talking about concrete, in-the-trenches work.

Meanwhile people like you talk on and on and on about what "doesn't work" and imply, bizarrely, that sheer dirty-mouthed talk (which you are pleased to call "rhetoric," I note, sheesh), encouraged and egged on by your fave bloggers, is somehow oh-so-effective in the real world. Get your head out of the alt-right-o-sphere and try taking a look at the _real_ real world, in which David French deserves a medal. But he gets called a fashionable alt-right epithet, over and over and over again, because he dared to criticize them and because he and his wife adopted a child from Africa.

It's both sick _and_ dumb. A twofer.

I am very sorry for having commented. I misread and was not trying to defend what is vile or ignore your words, and I am far from an alt-right cheerleader.

It's just that it adds up. I read insidehighered.com daily and work at a college and the hate for the conservative worldview builds and builds and builds everyday. I see the twitter exchange you reference as an extension of this wider phenomenon, and the articles at that website, where what is true and beautiful and good is constantly labeled as hate and undermined at every turn. Of course we cannot support hate in response, but this particular case is not one of a poor idealistic actress caught unawares by the big bullies on the internet. She's playing this all up as a huge attack on her and demanding twitter give her a safe space. She's a professional comedian and knows exactly how untruthful she's being, and to see a post defending her was awkward.

Regardless, I shouldn't have been drawn into this combox. I clearly need better news sources.

Thank you for the post. It's very good and important as it's so easy, on a human level, to get caught up in wanting something done against what feels like an encroaching cloud of evil and then find a glimmer of hope in "successes" that are not only tainted but probably not all that successful in the first place. It's good to stay more focused than that.

All the best.

How do you feel about the Political Burden of Proof: "As contemporary 'liberals' become ever more extreme, they increasingly assume what I will call the political burden of proof. The onus is now on them to defeat the presumption that they are so morally and intellectually obtuse as not to be worth talking to" or about using Leftist tactics against the Left? I think people are sick and tired of establishment Republicans letting the Left define the terms, set the narrative, and just laying down to be walked over.

http://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2016/05/again-a-racist-dog-whistle-more-leftist-insanity.html

http://maverickphilosopher.typepad.com/maverick_philosopher/2016/06/trump-the-rights-alinsky.html

or about using Leftist tactics against the Left?

That's vague. If all that is meant is, e.g., suing somebody for religious discrimination, when he has in fact engaged in religious discrimination, then I'm all for it. I've endorsed it again and again, and I don't in fact call it a "leftist tactic" anyway.

But if what is meant is sending death threats, anti-semitism, racist epithets, and a fashionable alt-right epithet (I think you know what that is) incessantly either to leftists or to conservatives one dislikes, then that's evil, and don't be evil.

If what you have in mind is the former, why even bring it up on this thread? I'm writing about the latter.

I think people are sick and tired of establishment Republicans letting the Left define the terms, set the narrative, and just laying down to be walked over.

Vague talk, vague talk, vague talk. I support manliness and standing up to leftist bullies *and* so-called rightist bullies. I support Ted Cruz not letting himself be bullied either by the left or the right. I love almost everything Matt Walsh writes, even though wimpier readers don't like Walsh's sarcasm and straight talk. I loved it when Mike Adams won his lawsuit.

Since when is "not laying down to be walked over" identified in *any way, shape, or form* with inundating people with vile insult? Oh, right. Since the rise of the alt-right. Got it.

Which is presumably why you're bringing up such cliches in this thread. Because, I guess, you're confused.

"I think the alt right believes the strategic value of patiently explaining from first principles doesn't work. Maybe they are wrong, but what you are calling vile they call effective rhetoric necessary to combat leftism."

I am sorry to see Ben leave. I think his heart is in the right place, even though he had some problems trying to say what he meant.

If I may try to flesh out what he said:

There has been a shift, especially among young people, towards a stance of strategic shaming when they don't agree with someone. The classic example is the doxing (publishing addresses, phone numbers, and other private information) about someone they disagree with that we saw in the Gamergate scandal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamergate_controversy

Whether this mentality has spilled over into the older population or is a result of the general growing lack of manners and restraint in society as a whole, I cannot say. In any case, the growing sense of hubris and entitlement and self-centeredness is, is suspect, responsible for the Twitter episode, where, "Kilo," was shamed into getting banned.

Of course, this points directly to a moral disorder or illness growing like a cancer in society. I suppose one has to treat such an illness with the proper medicine. Unfortunately, I don't know what the proper medicine or surgery is to correct it, although I can think of some necessary, but unpleasant things that might help.

The Chicken

There has been a shift, especially among young people, towards a stance of strategic shaming when they don't agree with someone. The classic example is the doxing (publishing addresses, phone numbers, and other private information) about someone they disagree with that we saw in the Gamergate scandal.

Chicken, it's interesting you should use that example, since doxxing is, in fact, physically dangerous. It isn't just a matter of posting someone's name--for example, "outing" someone, to shame him, who was previously using a pseudonym. Doxxing might very well get a person killed. At a minimum, it is highly likely to get a person harassed in a sense of "harassed" that is, and always has been, legally chargeable--incessant, abusive phone calls and the like.

Now, what the alt-right will do here is a tu quoque. Immediately they will jump to the fact that the left-wing nasties have been doing that kind of thing for years. That is true.

What is (relatively) _new_ is the defense of such tactics on the self-styled right. And, moreover, the use of such tactics on the self-styled right against those deemed to be moderates or insufficiently tough or scrappy, or even those who criticize the alt-right or criticize their favored political candidate.

I have to say that, even if such tactics did "work" for some purpose or other, they would still be wrong. But I also have to say that it makes no sense to think that they _do_ work. Is straight-up thuggery, racism, and personal insult suddenly the mark of a successful political movement? Or likely to lead to one? I don't see it, even from a strategic point of view.

By all means, if you're tired of being "Mr. Nice Guy," read Matt Walsh. Tell your moderate friends that they are wrong. Just the other day, Walsh had a column making hilarious fun of Obama's statement that it's easier to get hold of a gun than a book. It was very funny, and appropriately so. It didn't contain a single personal insult directed toward Obama. Not a single racial epithet. It was humorous and sarcastic but not in any way abusive. I saw a friend-of-a-friend on Facebook going on and on and on to the effect that this column was wrong because it was mockery, because it was "lowering the tone," because it was mean, etc.

Now _that_ is the kind of thing to stand up to. Just tell such people outright that they are wrong. Defend the place of humor and even sarcasm and of calling a spade a spade in political discourse, by all means.

What is terribly sad is the failure to see the bright line (and it really is quite a bright line) between _that_ and what the alt-right is both doing and defending.

Ben, I'm sorry to see you leave and apologize if I was too harsh with you. I know virtually nothing about this actress. I'm not sure what your evidence is for her alleged dishonesty. I'm still inclined to guess that she is sufficiently used to the taboo on outright racist insult such as she received that she didn't expect to be inundated with it on Twitter. Face to face, such insults towards blacks are still mostly taboo (as they should be).

But in general, other than one or two lines in the post, my intent isn't to give a theory about the entire etiology of the Twitter exchange--what she thought, what she knows, what she believes, etc.

I strongly suspect that what's going on in the alt-right-o-sphere is a lot of sneering talk about how she "should have known" this or that and how she is dishonest, racist herself, and this and that. It's pretty clear that you have read some of that and hence were bothered by those couple of lines in my post because they were not _negative_ about her and because they implied that she was, in fact, taken by surprise by the virulent epithets she received on Twitter.

Now, I want to submit to you (without being harsh to you personally) that all that sort of talk--she's bad, she's dishonest, she should have known better, she's just a whiner, she's playing this up--is a distraction from the badness of the insult and sheer nastiness directed against her. I think you are perhaps open to considering this possibility. Why is it that an immediate reaction of the alt-right to such an event is to try to make the person who has _received_ the vileness as unsympathetic as possible, including conjectures about what that person "must have known" and what-not? Why is that? I think it is because of what Jeff S. linked above: The "no enemies to the right" policy. It's a spin mode. They are committed _explicitly_ and _ideologically_ to not condemning even the vilest epithets used allegedly "from their own side." So when that does happen, and when some action is taken on the basis thereof, or when it's condemned by those they deem leftist (such as the owners of Twitter), their _theory_ demands that they go into spin mode and portray the person on the receiving end, the person who complained, in a bad light, distracting attention from the actual badness of what was said to that person. Because "no enemies to the right."

If I may make a suggestion, I quite seriously suggest that you stop reading such web sites. They are, quite literally, bad for their readers. They _do_ distract from and _do_ excuse evil. Indeed, their leaders are rather insouciant and explicit about doing so. They channel frustration against the left into destructive channels--mentally and morally destructive. It's just messing up the conservative movement and messing up individuals.

"If what you have in mind is the former, why even bring it up on this thread? I'm writing about the latter."

Because I want to know if you think all ridicule and mockery of political enemies is wrong. Is it wrong to personalize and polarize as the Left does? I'm not talking about death threats or threats of violence, which are clearly wrong. Where does ridicule, mockery, and polarization differ from insults? I don't know the comments that were made and I'm sure some of them were clearly wrong, but if there is anything that is vague, it is "racism", which is often nothing more than a blunt instrument used by the Left to shut down disagreement.

I read this blog quite often and respect the bloggers opinions. I'm not here to attack anyone.

Kurt, if you read Matt Walsh as Lydia says I think you'll get a good notion of how ridicule and mockery can be properly applied. Obviously the authors at W4 don't think this is always wrong, and not to be harsh but if you don't get that by now you must not be reading carefully. You should know by now that they're not PC tone police, far from it.

If you do have a look at some of the tweets/comments being made, I think it'll give you a sense of the scale here. People are calling Jones a "c**n," a "n***er," comparing her to Harambe the gorilla, fantasizing about her rape, inventing creatively disgusting ways to insult her looks, and more. That's what we're talking about when we talk about racism.

"If you do have a look at some of the tweets/comments being made, I think it'll give you a sense of the scale here."

Why are we so concerned with what some anonymous trolls on Twitter are saying? I don't think "everyone gets hate mail" is excusing vile insults, but rather pointing out reality. If you are a public figure on Twitter you will be insulted, so stop acting like you are the only person to have ever been insulted on Twitter. I think that is a charitable reading of the comment. I read "Kilo's" review of Ghostbusters on Breitbart and thought it was hilarious, but I guess Breitbart is beyond the pale now.

Kurt,

"Why are we so concerned with what some anonymous trolls on Twitter are saying?"

Yes, why be concerned with public standards of civility and decency -- I mean who ever heard of such a thing?

Or to quote Lydia's original post back at you:

Any such downplaying of vile insult is exactly the opposite of conservative. The conservative believes that ideas have consequences. (Sound familiar?) The conservative is a realist about meanings and about language. He believes that words express ideas in people's minds. So words are important, not to be brushed off lightly. Every idle word that a man shall speak he shall give account of in the day of judgement. Words have consequences because ideas have consequences.

[...]

What we are seeing now is the rise of the self-styled right-wing Visigoth. He is a destroyer and a postmodern. Yet such a person still dares to claim the label of "conservatism" and complains, when banned because of at least an attempt to uphold, perhaps inconsistently, perhaps selectively, standards of decency, that it is his conservative politics (in some legitimate sense of "conservative politics") that have gotten him in trouble.

I call foul. We who still believe in truth, justice, beauty, absolute right and wrong, and who still believe that words matter, because ideas matter, we can claim to be conservative. If you don't, you can't. And if your response to a torrent of verbal abuse, even against someone whom you regard as an untalented hack, is to sneer, "Everyone gets hate mail," then you don't, and you can't.

Likewise, Lydia already discussed how vacuous the comment "everyone gets hate mail" truly is -- it was indeed trying to excuse the inappropriate comments directed at Leslie Jones. We wouldn't say the same thing about homicide (hey, everybody in that neighborhood is at risk of getting killed when they walk around -- no big deal, that's just reality!) We wouldn't or shouldn't say the same thing about all sorts of crazy stuff the Left says about conservatives and/or Christians. We call them out on their nastiness and evil -- just as we should call out racists on their nastiness and evil.

"Yes, why be concerned with public standards of civility and decency -- I mean who ever heard of such a thing?"

A small fraction of Twitter users does not represent general public standards. I don't go around monitoring every Facebook post or Twitter comment, so I don't quite get the selective outrage here. What this is really about is the dislike of Milo Yiannopoulos, which is fine. I certainly do not agree with everything he does. For example, his insults towards Ben Shapiro were uncalled for.

Of course we wouldn't say the same for homicide. There is a huge difference between trolls on Twitter and homicide.

I don't know the comments that were made and I'm sure some of them were clearly wrong, but if there is anything that is vague, it is "racism", which is often nothing more than a blunt instrument used by the Left to shut down disagreement.

Well, goodness! You could use Google and find out, right? If you indeed _respect_ the bloggers here, then why not cut some slack when it comes to a phrase like "vile racist epithets" and figure out if, you know, they were indeed vile, racist, epithets.

But Kurt, I have to say that I find it interesting: First, without research, you said something to the effect that "racism" is vague and you didn't know what was said, but it's used by the left to shut down disagreement, etc.

Then when you were _shown_ that these were, indeed, vile, racist epithets, you switched. You switched *on a dime* to saying, "Oh, well, why do we care what some trolls on Twitter are saying?"

That's a kind of interesting switch, isn't it? From, "Maybe it wasn't really vile racism" to "Oh, well, even if it was, why bother mentioning it?"

I'm sorry, but I'm afraid that what it suggests is the very problem I was writing about in the main post. What is that problem? That problem is a _determination_ to say that *nobody should ever talk about* and *nobody should ever condemn* anything that sounds like something "the left" would condemn. That problem is a _determination_ to turn away from and downplay vileness if it's directed against "our enemies" or carried out by people who, God knows how, have been designated as "our allies."

Now _that's_ why I'm writing about it. And _that's_ the answer to your question. I'm writing about it because of what M.Y. did. What did he do? Here were these *undeniably*, *unambiguously* vile, racist insults and rape fantasies and what-not being directed against somebody on Twitter, and when he chose to bestir himself to insert himself into the story, *his* decision was to state that she was "playing the victim" to draw attention away from her own lack of acting talent.

I'm sorry, that's perverse. That's wrong. That's failing to see evil for what it is. If your response to wicked Twitter trolls is to *make fun of the person they are persistently, obsessively trolling* for mentioning it, to mock that person as a whiny weakling who is "playing" the victim (as opposed to, y'know, *actually* being on the receiving end of some real vileness), then you're badly messed up.

And the fact that M.Y. is taken in some sense or other to represent the right (God help us) and that *that* was his reaction, and that people then in turn are saying that that was the *right* reaction or a *defensible* reaction is what I'm writing about and why I'm writing about it.

I don't know how to make it clearer.

By the way, as Jeff S.'s link above (feel free to look it up) makes clear, this is part of *deliberate and explicit policy* on the alt-right. We don't ever condemn even unequivocally racist harassment, for example, because of a "no enemies to the right" policy.

That's wrong. And it's what I'm writing against.

What I do not quite understand is the extreme emotional devotion to this particular issue. Vile things are said on the internet all the time. Anyone who comments on the Internet has been on the receiving end of it. I suppose the concern here is that Milo Yiannopoulos is a rising star on the Right and you find this problematic. I understand the reasons for the concern, but I can't get emotional over some stupid comments on Twitter, but I have no real objection to calling the comments "vile racist epithets", but I do have a small concern.

I believe that "racism" has no clear definition and is basically a meaningless term, so when the word is given credibility, it is just another way of accepting the language defined by the Left. I think it is important not to use liberal language. Liberal language and narratives should be completely rejected. The Twitter comments were nasty, vile and evil. I don't think "racist" adds anything (I think that anything that is wrong because it is "racist" is wrong for some other reason. For example, American slavery wasn't wrong because it was "racist", but because slavery treats people as property, which is evil). It doesn't make the language any less vile or any more vile. My bigger concern is not Milo, but so-called conservatives who uncritically accept liberal terminology, such as "pro-choice"', "marriage equality", "same-sex marriage ban", "textbook definition of racism"', "war on women", "rape culture", and so on. For instance, as soon as someone uses "pro-choice", he was already given abortion an underserved level of credibility.

Milo was wrong to get involved in the first place. I already admitted he said vile things against Ben Shapiro, which I found disgraceful. He does things he shouldn't, however, I've seen Milo speak multiple times on multiple college campuses, I've seen him on many podcast and shows, and I've read many articles on Breitbart. I don't find him to be the epitome of evil.

I agree that in general "no enemies to the right" is problematic. Part of what distinguishes conservatives from liberals is standards of decency, civility, and adherence to an absolute moral code. The Left does anything and everything that supports the cause. Expediency is the code they live by. Conservatives should not sink to this level. I get that.

I've said enough. Thank you for letting me speak on your blog.

I suppose the concern here is that Milo Yiannopoulos is a rising star on the Right and you find this problematic.

The "this" that I find problematic is the deliberate, by-policy, speaking up to attack someone who has been on the receiving end of such comments and who has complained. And on the part of someone taken to represent "the right" and defended by increasing segments thereof.

Yes, I think that is really bad thing. I don't even write about it very often. I'm not sure where "emotionalism" comes in, but I do care deeply about not being destructive and about the heart of the conservative movement, and this explains the passion in the main post for the deliberate tearing down of the commitment to goodness in that movement.

Sorry if you think this is excessive. Wait, no, I'm not actually sorry, because it isn't excessive.

I disagree that there is no such thing as racism. I understand that that trope is a "thing" in the reactionary-o-sphere and on the alt-right, but it's false. And the fact that anything that could be called racist is bad for other reasons doesn't support it. If someone has, say, a special loathing for Christians and goes around lobbing disgusting epithets about them that make special reference to their being Christians, that can be described on multiple levels and in multiple ways, but the fact that it reflects a particular animus *against Christians per se* is simply true and is not something that anyone should ban taking note of. The same for racial animus. It's not like there is no such thing as special animus against particular groups, and when we start monitoring language to cut out noticing certain things for some political reason, that's hardly being in touch with reality.

It also epitomizes political correctness. How interesting. I thought the alt-right was all about being against political correctness. But they just want different standards of linguistic, ideological self-monitoring. Like "Don't say 'racism.' That's using leftist language."

I really don't follow pop culture, so I just read a news article about this. The actress who was banned from Twitter should sue them for harassment and defamation of character. Free speech is fine, but just as a bartender can be legally liable for letting a drunk get behind the wheel, so should places like Twitter and Facebook be held liable for permitting harassing behavior - at least in a just society. In fact, because Twitter is so unregulated, I would be happy to see it shut down. Free speech is not absolute and while "we are our brother's keeper," is not a part of positive law, I would bet a fair number of Twitter posters don't believe in the Golden Rule. The Internet should not have been made available to the general public. They don't deserve the privilege, in many cases, as experience after experience shows. Geeks have a special name for this: The Eternal September:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September

The term "netiquette," used to mean something. This Twitter mess is not an alt-right behavior. It is a manifestation of the Eternal September, which you is why the behavior is seen on both the right and the left.

The Chicken

This Twitter mess is not an alt-right behavior.

M.Y.'s insertion of himself into it, and the subsequent spin, spin, spin *from* the alt-right, makes it an alt-right matter. It is the alt-right *itself* (see the post Jeff linked) that treats such insults as coming from "their" side of the political aisle or from "allies," etc., and that explicitly and deliberately encourages and excuses such behavior under the "no enemies to the right" policy.

TMC,

Just a point of clarification -- it is my understanding that Ms. Jones, the actress, was not "banned from Twitter" but chose to leave the platform due to the amount of negative messages she was receiving. Whether or not that was wise or warranted I cannot say -- but Twitter did shut down Milo's account supposedly because he was encouraging the harassment. So in one sense Twitter did try and do something about the 'improper' use of their medium. The problem is that Jones would have had to report lots (over 100? over 200? 300? I don't know) of these types of users to Twitter and they would have to police them all. As you say, the medium itself seems ripe for abuse.

I will have read more in-depth about what happened, because it is too easy for me rashly comment.

The Chicken

But they just want different standards of linguistic, ideological self-monitoring. Like "Don't say 'racism.' That's using leftist language."

I am not suggesting PC speech codes. I am saying that "racism" is not well-defined. It is a term that has been hijacked by the Left. It can mean anything from disagreeing with Obama, to pointing out facts about race, or just being born white.

Now I imagine when people say nasty things about Christians it is because of what Christians believe. The Left hates Christians because Christians believe homosexuality is sinful, or because they think it is irrational to believe in a "sky fairy". Are the same nasty things said about liberal Christians? Does an Orthodox Jew who believes the same thing escape the wrath of the Left? I don't think it is as simple as saying the Left hates Christianity per se. What they hate is anyone who opposes homosexuality in any way. That is what they hate per se.

I don't think it is as simple as saying the Left hates Christianity per se.

It was an analogy. A comparison. I was simply pointing out that animus against groups qua groups is both possible and actual and that it is legitimate, part of seeing reality as it is, to note the animus against the group as such. If there are people who hate blacks or other races as such, and/or who make comments that express such animus, it is legitimate to note that, not to obscure it or to refuse to note it. If there are people who hate Christians as such and use terminology that expresses such animus, it is legitimate to note that, not to obscure it. And so forth. I don't really give a rip what has been "hijacked" by the left. I'm not going to let the left's abuse of a term cause me to say that nothing real exists to which that term rightly and understandably refers. I want to be able to talk about real things, about the truth, about the facts of the world as it is, and the fact is that the world as it is _does_ really contain a phenomenon quite understandably and accurately referred to as "racism." I'm not going to let the left's abuse of that term cause me to stop using it where it actually applies.

Lydia:

I am commenting, rather, on the truly strange idea that we should criticize those who complain about vile insult rather than those who engage in vile insult. Where does this idea come from? And what does "Everyone gets hate mail" have to do with it?

...

Now, I want to submit to you (without being harsh to you personally) that all that sort of talk--she's bad, she's dishonest, she should have known better, she's just a whiner, she's playing this up--is a distraction from the badness of the insult and sheer nastiness directed against her. I think you are perhaps open to considering this possibility. Why is it that an immediate reaction of the alt-right to such an event is to try to make the person who has _received_ the vileness as unsympathetic as possible, including conjectures about what that person "must have known" and what-not? Why is that?

Unfortunately, when many have cried wolf it may cause others to be disbelieved whether they are speaking truly or not.

All these talk, including "everyone gets hate mail", makes perfect sense as a counter to the progressives' recent modus operandi of playing the victim card; hallowing of victimhood is met by mocking of alleged victims.

Such backlash is to be expected. A storm in a teacup, really.

Unfortunately, when many have cried wolf it may cause others to be disbelieved whether they are speaking truly or not.

Actually, that is not pertinent in this case. M.Y. himself did not say that she was *faking* the tweets against her, nor do most who are calling her a whiner or what-not. And I gather it would be ludicrous to claim any such thing. The evidence is overwhelming that she really was inundated with this junk. What is rather being claimed is that she is a whiner for even mentioning it, that we shouldn't be talking about it, that it's unimportant, that it doesn't matter, and that it's somehow catering to the leftists to deplore what was said to her.

All these talk, including "everyone gets hate mail", makes perfect sense as a counter to the progressives' recent modus operandi of playing the victim card; hallowing of victimhood is met by mocking of alleged victims.

Such backlash is to be expected. A storm in a teacup, really.

No, the mocking of people who really do receive vile harassment is far from a storm in a teacup. It tracks the erosion of the soul of the conservative movement, the corruption of real, individual, human beings, and possibly even the literal loss of souls through hardening to evil.

I'm sorry that you feel you have to go on spinning.

Indeed, the amount of spin and "Why even talk about it?" and "It's nothing" in this thread alone, though not nastily stated in itself, is a manifestation of the very problem I'm talking about.

Actually, that is not pertinent in this case.

Quite, the general point about crying 'Wolf' and subsequent disbelief does not apply to M.Y. but it is useful to bear in mind ("Though I have no doubt that some in the alternative reality of the alternative right are raising even that possibility, just to throw it into the mix. Or changing the subject and talking incessantly about other people who, they believe, have played such hoaxes").

No, the mocking of people who really do receive vile harassment is far from a storm in a teacup. It tracks the erosion of the soul of the conservative movement, the corruption of real, individual, human beings, and possibly even the literal loss of souls through hardening to evil.

I'm sorry that you feel you have to go on spinning.

How much you do care, Lydia.

Now, you've made it clear that the reason why you've been so emotional about this issue is you, being a conservative, do not want the conservative movement tainted by the above behaviour. So be it. However, not being a conservative I do not share this concern; neither am I aware that the conservative movement has any remaining soul to speak of.

In my main post I anticipated the red herring ("Some people cry 'wolf' and make hoaxes") and you draw that red herring across our trail, changing the subject, and you then quote me from the main post as anticipating it? That's pretty striking. In fact, in this context, it ISN'T "useful to bear in mind." It's sheer spin and subject-changing.

Yes, I do care, because real people are involved. Real people who read these poisonous web sites. Real people who learn to mock at the the notion of standards of discourse. Real people who think they are "being conservative" and just "not being politically correct" by accepting the "no enemies to the right" policy and accepting vile behavior with a wink and a nod. Real people whose hearts are being hardened. Real people who are following and (even if they sometimes say they don't) admiring M.Y. as he smirks, simpers, and sneers his way along. Real people who are competing in comments threads to see who can be most "edgy" in trash-talk "from the right." And so forth. Those are real individuals. This sort of faux conservatism is addictive in its own right. It is drawing in young people, many of them young men, who are embittered and who get a kind of psychological charge out of it. It is changing them and messing them up. But these are often people who actually did start out as politically conservative, who originally cared about the Good, the True, and the Beautiful, and who are having that perception eroded.

So, yes, I do care. And if you don't, so much the worse for you.

In my main post I anticipated the red herring ("Some people cry 'wolf' and make hoaxes") and you draw that red herring across our trail, changing the subject, and you then quote me from the main post as anticipating it? That's pretty striking. In fact, in this context, it ISN'T "useful to bear in mind." It's sheer spin and subject-changing.

It is critical to bear in mind to comprehend the phenomenon - how it makes sense from the adherents' point of view and why it is so popular. That is, of course, assuming that one is actually interested in understanding the "truly strange" idea instead of merely knee-jerking and trying to police mainstream conservatism.

I spent a while, last night, getting up to speed on the background of this situation and, afterwards, I really felt like I needed a shower. Lydia is correct, of course. This behavior is not restricted to the alt-right, but is a type of pathology growing in size endemic to, mostly, the under-30 crowd. I have seen or read of the exact same behavior in such diverse online sites as those devoted to Gnu-atheism (the New Atheist movement), hacker sites, such as 4chan, where the Gamergate mess played out, political sites, the hacktivist behavior of the group, Anonymous, and even the science fiction Hugo Awards. It is a form of kindergarten bullying, a form of pathologically abusive behavior, indeed, if not being outright sociopathic. It is the form of behavior that sees a 5 years old crying on the playground with a skinned knee and mocks them for their tears.

It comes from a lack of an understanding that there is a hierarchy of needs, which they never developed when they were growing up. It has made many of them narcissistic and unable to empathize with the suffering of others. Once cornered, instead of admitting defeat, they will change the subject. They will not accept correction graciously. There is a herd mentality about them reminiscent of gangs - in fact, one might be tempted to call them the equivalent of a type of intellectual gang, complete with turf wars.

It is clear that they have little understanding of charity and even less of wisdom. I may be painting with a broad brush, but their behavior is a mockery of Christianity. They are very intelligent, but not very wise. This is a dangerous combination. They can spell humility in seven different languages, but can't be bothered to see whether or not they have it. This is very much blind spot politics.

Much of their behavior occurs online, as one would expect of the youth of today, but it is really very little different than the mocking mean girl behavior seen in junior high school Facebook postings.

This online behavior springs, in part from the Eternal September I mentioned, above. Once the Internet became flooded with newbies, it became impossible to monitor their behavior in any meaningful way, so that these youth, who would have been restrained in earlier days, felt free to do whatever they pleased. We assume that once people reach the age of majority, that they will have, for the most part, the maturity to govern their speech, but what if they haven't really grown up. While I agree that freedom of speech is a useful component of intellectual discourse, we do restrict the freedom of speech of children, to a certain degree (for instance, most children are at least taught not to swear, even if they might eventually ignore the discipline). What, then are we to do with adults who behave like children? I have no problem with banning them from the Internet, period, until they grow up.

Twitter acted justly in banning M. Y., in my opinion, but it is a useless gesture, because they are doing nothing to address the root cause of the problem - the incivility of many people with accounts. Greed drives much of the social media and, as such, the concern for decorum takes a far distant seat. As much as many, here, might not want to consider this, I have been in favor of something like a state Internet license, comparable to a drivers license, including a test, for years. The Internet is, essentially, very fast telegraphy (with ones and zeros replacing dots and dashes) and all telegraphers needed to be licensed. This would, very quickly, cut down on the rudeness on the Internet, except for the type which is comparable to road rage.

In any case, the sort of behavior of the alt-right is stereotypical behavior of the young, "leet," crowd. It is pathetic, but it is understandable, given current societal pressures and the breakdown of the family (which has rendered many of the alt-right less than pro-life). They have no concept of the Aristotelian idea of final causes (indeed, their general philosophical training is weak), so for them, there is no connection between marriage and reproduction, but everything is seen through an evolutionary lens, where there are no final causes and everything is in a state of becoming. I will have nothing to do with them, because, in my opinion, they are nothing but sound and fury, signifying, nothing.

The Chicken

It is critical to bear in mind to comprehend the phenomenon - how it makes sense from the adherents' point of view and why it is so popular.

It shows me that the "adherents" are irrational, defensive, and childish, because they will bring up hoaxes in a context where, they realize themselves, no hoax is taking place, and because they will talk like it is relevant without being able to show any rational relevance.


That is, of course, assuming that one is actually interested in understanding the "truly strange" idea instead of merely knee-jerking and trying to police mainstream conservatism.

I understand it only too well. It is a form of bullying, a gang mindset (as the Chicken says), anti-virtue signaling, and, when one finds it useful, irrational subject-changing for the sake of giving the superficial appearance of justifying or excusing those one has chosen to designate as one's own gang.

I realize that you, GJ, don't like where I'm coming from. Too jolly bad. I realize that because you don't like it, you will continue to use language that makes my perspective sound uninformed, trivial, confused, merely control-freakish, etc., etc.

But let him who has ears to hear, hear. The concern about real people who are getting badly messed up is a real one, and the phenomenon is there. You shouldn't wish on your enemies, much less your friends, that they would become part of the alt-right hate-fest and think they doing something "conservative" and battling against evil when, in fact, they are first associating with, and then becoming, evil themselves.

Chicken, just for the record, and in case anyone thinks that my silence gives consent, I think the government is a very ill-suited set of people to be handing out or withholding Internet user licenses. I'm sure I wouldn't be able to get one, on the grounds of my positions.

Of course, those who engage in and incite real harassment will make use of that fact: Look at me, I'm being persecuted by Twitter for my political views! Part of the point of this post has been to try to distinguish those who really are persecuted for their political views from those who are restricted or banned from some venue due to their despicable behavior or their knowing and deliberate incitement of such despicable behavior.

But that is best done by non-government entities. It would be extremely dangerous policy to give that power to a governmental entity.

Some of you are being way too nice. This is how you respond to hysterical cat-ladies...

The pharisaical conservative, this authoress being one of the most odious examples, cares firstly about appearance. "Thank God I'm not like the tax collector." Not content to rest in Christ, she relies on the piety of her own politics. You see she is better than those evil alt-righters because she doesn't excuse "racism," doesn't stoop to the level of leftists, doesn't engage in ad hominen. Were she to stop looking at the specks of dust in the eyes' of others and pull out the plank in her own, she'd realize that--when those like her were in charge--conservatism lost eminently winnable social-issues ranging from immigration to same-sex marriage to religious freedom because it was too afraid to attack minority criminality, call out the degenerate behavior of sodomites, or defend the moral rightness of segregation. It's far worse for the American people to live in a society where unbiblical concepts like "racism" or "sexism" are so pervasive that even ostensibly conservative writers are quick to condemn others for these false sins --therefore giving the left complete moral authority to dictate how society should be run--than it is for a few ornery trolls to call someone a n*****. Let the reader not be fooled, what bothers her most about people like Milo is not that they are openly unregenerate sinners, but rather that they criticize the shrieking antics of liberals attempting to garnish undeserved sympathy.

This particular issue is so silly, so ridiculous, so petty--that the fact it caused a 1,300 word response shows how unhinged she is by masculine conservative reactionary political discourse. Fretting about conservative young men, she inserts her own feminine psychology into theirs. Unaware that what is driving men with testosterone to engage in politics isn’t virtue signaling or feelings of self-righteousness--but actually fighting and defeating evil beliefs—any valid criticism she may make is couched in schoolmarmish language and falls on deaf ears. Fighting back doesn’t mess men up like it does women whose psyches are fragile and are much more communitarian. Nor does it disallow men from believing in truth, beauty, or goodness—things which are grounded in realities much deeper than feminized social norms.

Politics is not a good in and of itself. It is a means to an end. It is a means to better social conditions. In particular for this epoch, it is a means to take back ownership and sovereignty of the country that was built by our fathers and has been taken from us by rootless globalists and godless degenerates. Yes, it is a means to power. The real postmodernism is to place virtue within politics itself, to act as if what only matters is being better than the enemy rather than defeating it. Such a view ignores that who is in power matters, and that the social conditions of the West have been hurt just as much from the top-down (activist leftist courts, massive unchecked third-world immigration, government-pushed women’s suffrage) as from the bottom-up (drug use, rejection of God, etc.).

In short, men should not listen to harpies telling them how to behave. They should take their advice from God’s word, fellow honorable men, and the reason they’ve been blessed with. The very real loss of your country—gleefully celebrated by leftists—should drive you much more than the very spurious loss of virtue surrounding inane twitter spats.

GW, I don't need to answer you. You are your own refutation. You are Exhibit A. And, your own protestations to the contrary notwithstanding, you are an enemy of goodness and virtue and show it by your disdain and by your compulsion to slap misogynistic labels upon calls for manly virtue in civic discourse. Real men don't need to lower themselves to the levels you are defending (excusing and dismissing) or to the level of discourse you are exhibiting.

You are also banned, because you have deliberately violated our comments policy against contentless personal insult and because having a troll like you around would just waste everyone's time. I'm leaving this comment here only to show why you were banned.

"But that is best done by non-government entities. It would be extremely dangerous policy to give that power to a governmental entity."

Maybe, maybe not. I can see where it could be a means to censorship, but the government has done well by ham radio.

The Chicken

I don't know enough about ham radio to say exactly where the differences come, but I do know a fair bit about the Internet, and it would *undeniably* be a means to censorship, especially on this broad of a scale.

Now, here's what I *would* support: There are laws on the books everywhere in the country against direct, personal harassment. For example, it isn't first-amendment-protected speech for someone to call me up on my phone 24 hours a day and leave foul-mouthed abuse. Physical threats, it goes without saying, are also against numerous laws.

It would be absolutely fine with me if, to begin with, we ramped up our resources and started enforcing laws against people who engage in threats of physical violence, and if being told that you cannot use the Internet were one of the punishments upon conviction, along with reparations to be paid to the victim. This sort of thing is already part of the terms of some people's parole. This would not be a matter of "prior restraint" but rather an actual punishment for wrong-doing of a sort that has long-standing, settled, legal precedent behind it.

Whether this could be extended to personal harassment or not (e.g., repeated Twitter insults "tagging" the person) is a different matter and would have to be weighed very carefully. It might not be a good idea to extend the existing precedents on personal harassment to that, but it could at least be discussed. I'm pretty sure that state legislatures are examining cyberbullying right now, so this debate is taking place right now. And if there were well-crafted, narrow, legitimate laws of that kind, then being banned from Internet use as a part of the after-the-fact punishment could be legitimate as well for individuals.

I realize that GW has been banned, but his last comment provides some material for rebuttal.

"Let the reader not be fooled, what bothers her most about people like Milo is not that they are openly unregenerate sinners, but rather that they criticize the shrieking antics of liberals attempting to garnish undeserved sympathy."

GW, I strongly doubt that you have had any training as a critic of the arts (both Lydia and I have doctorates in the arts or humanities and I am, also, a professional scientist, so I have backgrounds in both the sciences and the arts). Critics should, all thing being considered, where possible, strike a neutral tone in critiquing an art object, be it a painting, movie, dance, poem, book, or musical composition. The reviewer's emotions are not supposed to be on display, but, rather a careful analysis of the aesthetics and structure of the art object, to point out its strengths and weaknesses. Clearly, the Twitter feed for the latest incarnation of Ghostbusters failed, miserably, to follow these strictures, degenerating into a free-for-all of name calling, ad hominems, and invectives. There have been other re-makes of movies. Would anyone have been particularly upset if, say, The Parent Trap, had been re-made with a set of twin boys rather than girls? One cannot even argue that the original Ghostbusters was simply a superior film (it might be) and that the new one deserves to be repudiated on that basis, because there have been some re-makes, such as, Heaven Can Wait, that were, actually, better than the original. One might argue that it was too soon to re-make the movie, as I have with each new Spider-man movie, but that is a prudential judgment and such a point of view should be stated with equanimity and not as a platform for insulting the actors.

The point is, and the evidence is clear, that "Kilo," as a person, was verbally attacked, rather than the movie being discussed. This is base and would never have been acceptable in polite discourse even 30 years ago - it would have gotten you fired as a critic. The simple fact, on display for all to see, is that these Twitter commenters were ill-mannered, uncharitable, and juvenile. Seeing what were going on, any reasonable person would have tried to intervene with clear reason and try to get things back on track, but instead of even trying to do so, M. Y., stirred the pot and made things worse. That is not politics. That is just bad form. I suppose the adage, "Two wrongs don't make a right," doesn't mean anything. The fundamental rule of moral theology is that one may not do evil that good may come from it and that is exactly what M. Y. and many alt-righter are doing. In a word, their attack plan is simply immoral, according to any standard measure of morality of the last 2000 years. Unfortunately, many young people, thinking themselves so hip, so above the norm, have developed their own moral view point, throwing out the accumulated wisdom of the ages. If that is not the classic definition of hubris, I don't know what is.

Here is how one could have argued that a change in sex in the movie were inappropriate, without causing rancor: it has been an empirical observation over the course of the centuries and supported by Nature, that men and women have different approaches, on the average, to spirituality, with women being more interiorly disposed and men more exteriorly disposed. In most situations, it has been the males who have dealt with ghostly removal, as evidenced by the office of Exorcist being a male-dominated office, while the promotion of spiritual environments has been primarily a female activity. In putting females in the position of being, de facto, exorcists, the movie seems to be taking a stance contrary to the expected, without any real motivation to do so.

See, no rancor, just an argument from historical norms. Twitter supports taking jabs more than it does making reasoned arguments, given its limitations, so why people are using this platform to discuss the movie makes no sense to me.

So, M. Y. wants to assert power, eh, but the problem with that is that there will always be someone more powerful, willing to pull an even bigger club with which to pound someone. This is the stance of the brute, not of a man who is worthy of the name, homo sapiens. There can be brutes on both the right and the left. They, rarely, get anything accomplished that is lasting.

"Politics is not a good in and of itself. It is a means to an end. It is a means to better social conditions. In particular for this epoch, it is a means to take back ownership and sovereignty of the country that was built by our fathers and has been taken from us by rootless globalists and godless degenerates. Yes, it is a means to power. The real postmodernism is to place virtue within politics itself, to act as if what only matters is being better than the enemy rather than defeating it. Such a view ignores that who is in power matters, and that the social conditions of the West have been hurt just as much from the top-down (activist leftist courts, massive unchecked third-world immigration, government-pushed women’s suffrage) as from the bottom-up (drug use, rejection of God, etc.)."

When the alt-right stoops to these tactics, who, then, has rejected God? "Let your light so shine before men that they may see the good that you do and give glory to God." Doing evil to obtain good is not what this means. Whatever happened to, "Love your enemies, yes, love them and do not despise them," or "Bless those who curse you; do good to those who hate you; pray for those who abuse you?" If the alt-right really wants to show power under control, let them, first, learn to control themselves - let them pray for their enemies, and if their enemies are thirty, give them drink, if they are weeping, weep with them. In other words, let them be men, not brutish children. Clearly, the tactics of the alt-right have not elevated them. I will say it, again, "in hoc signo vinces, " - by this sign you will conquer. If the alt-right wants to conquer, let them learn what the Cross really means. Let them remove their own planks rather than complain that others haven't removed theirs.

As Dr. McCoy once said (TOS, The Immunity Syndrome):

McCoy: "'Suffer the death of thy neighbor,' eh, Spock? You wouldn't wish that on us, would you?"
Spock: "It might have rendered your history a bit less bloody."

- McCoy and Spock on feeling empathy for the dead Intrepid crew

I haven't written this much, here, in a long time. I have had to deal with Postmodernism in the concrete, recently, and I have had to deal with this online climate for ages, so I don't really have that much sympathy for the nonsense that passes for human discourse on either Twitter or on the alt-right. Both are symptoms of the degeneration of the worldly realm as it cuts itself off, more and more, from the Truth, who is Christ.

The Chicken

Poor, womanish, Solzhenitsyn, Alfred the Great, and Jesus of Nazareth. And many another. They must all have been under the thumb of some school marm or other to go through their entire lives without endorsing the use of schoolyard epithets.

There's been a recent brouhaha connected with Twitter concerning a certain columnist whom I'll just call Kilo.

That'll show 'im!

Any such downplaying of vile insult is exactly the opposite of conservative.

This kind of posturing is exactly why conservatives have not only been on a multi-decade losing streak, but why they've also lost their own political party. Well, one reason anyway, among a number.

The alt-right's sneering at anyone who complains about "mere" verbal insult is part of the postmodernism of our age.

No, the alt-right is sneering at the cult of the public victim (in this case, one who engaged in nastiness of her own), and the 'conservatives' who more and more seek to prove their moral superiority by posturing as the great defenders of the aggrieved. Of course, no amount of self-purging was ever good enough to win the approval of the left. And the old right has, at long last, sacrificed so many people - and principles - on the pyre that they're now outnumbered by once-allies who have been burned.

But be sure, above all else, not to ask whether or not 'Kilo' and company have a point. No, better to denounce them, as your group grows ever smaller. My advice: be sure to purge from your ranks anyone who mocks the victim culture, or who says anything that the left-wing demagogues declare to be beyond the pale, or who does something that stinks of nationalism or tribalism. It's worked wonders so far, and why mess with such a smart system?

Crude, what you don't understand (I don't know if you _can't_ or whether it's willful) is that we stand on who we are and speak from our own actual identity. We say what we say not to signal, not to posture, not to purge for the sake thereof, but because of what we stand _for_ and believe in, as a positive matter. I know that this is true of myself, and I have confidence that the same is true of my fellow bloggers here.

For some reason, you and others of your ilk don't believe this or don't want to believe it. You want to believe it's all posturing. You don't believe, or don't want to believe, that men of good will could speak out against such things because they _really_ are revolted by them, _really_ have positive standards of action and conduct, _really_ detest anti-virtue signaling and wink-wink, nod-nod incitement of disgusting incivility, _really_ think they are wicked and deserve to be denounced when they are taking on the name of virtue.

You want to despise all such men of good will, so you choose to portray them as insincere, or semi-insincere, or grandstanding, or weak and seeking approval of the left, or various other unflattering claims. You choose to portray them in that way *even when* such a portrayal is manifestly absurd given the other things said by those same people.

You can do that when you choose to. But the record stands, and those who have eyes to read it will read it and see the truth that is there to be seen.

A great irony is that the alt-right are as far as possible from _not_ purging. They purge and attack anyone whom they perceive as being insufficiently like themselves. Any pundit who disagrees with them on a particular issue of foreign policy, who thinks racism is not unreal (and/or who, heaven forbid, actually condemns it when he sees it), who adopts a child from a foreign country, and so forth. Such are highly likely to be on the receiving end of a "purging" action that makes mere banning from Twitter or from a blog (for personal, abusive insult) or being criticized in a blog post like this one look incredibly tame by comparison.

I speak out against what I stand against. If I were an alt-rightist and thought you weren't my kind of conservative, I'd call you by a newly invented racial-sexual insult that one has to look up to discover how vile it is but that they then keep using reflexivly anyway. One _specifically_ invented for _conservatives_ they dislike. And this will then whip their followers up into frenzy to trail such a person around in e-mail, on Twitter, and in comments threads thinking up additional, sick insults to fling at him and at his family. One of the milder and more repeatable things said to and about David French and his family (after he dared to criticize Ann Coulter for dog-whistling the alt-right with not-so-subtle anti-Jewish innuendo) was the statement by an alt-right blogger that maybe he should divorce his wife and marry a younger woman who could give him more white babies.

It would be funny if it weren't so sick and sad to watch alt-rightists then, also reflexively, lecture me or anyone else for a post like this one the grounds that it divisively "purges people from the ranks." What a joke.

Greetings from Санкт-Петербу́рг!

I've a few hours to kill before Carmina Burana at Mariinsky 2 tonight, so I thought I'd do my occasional check-in...

Glad to see Lydia keeping up with the major issues of the day.

That Kilo! He's so, so naughty. And not funny. No. Not funny at all.

@crude: "no amount of self-purging was ever good enough to win the approval of the left. And the old right has, at long last, sacrificed so many people - and principles - on the pyre that they're now outnumbered by once-allies who have been burned."

Precisely so. Let us call the roll:

Sam Francis.

Patrick Buchanan.

Peter Brimelow.

Paul Gottfried.

Ann Coulter.

Steve Sailer.

John Derbyshire.

Lawrence Auster.

Mark Steyn.

Steve,

I'm jealous of your world travels -- my parents have been to Saint Petersburg (and Russia -- I think they cruised down the Neva) and I've wanted to go ever since!!!

Anyway, unless you are a mind-reader like Crude, it is silly to ascribe motives to the editors of National Review (and any other magazine/publication) that decides to drop a contributor. Maybe they are actually principled and for one reason or another simply make a decision that writer X, Y, or Z no longer held views that they comported with their own editorial positions. And someone like Mark Steyn is hardly "purged" or "sacrificed" -- he regularly appears on all sorts of television programs and fills in for Rush frequently. Just because one outlet decides not the publish writer X doesn't mean there aren't other places for that writer to find a voice. You yourself used to criticize Larry Auster for being someone who regularly engaged in misrepresentation -- hardly someone, if I was running a magazine, I'd want on staff.

Well, I'm sure we will continue to agree to disagree about politics -- I can only hope that if you pass through Chicago you'll join me at the opera! The Lyric is putting on a new Ring Cycle this Fall starting with Das Rheingold -- I asked my German-American friend to join me (because it would have been perfect!) but he's in Arizona and probably can't make it. So maybe I can convince you to come up to Chicago for some Wagner in October? I promise to refrain from all political topics :-)

That Kilo! He's so, so naughty. And not funny. No. Not funny at all.

Because naughty funniness is obviously what's most important in a spokesman, a pundit, or a leader in the culture wars.

I'm sure that's exactly what Gandalf, Whittaker Chambers, and God would tell us to look for.

But of course "Kilo's" winky-winky, cute "naughty" funniness is part of what makes claims that he's a poor, purged conservative ring so hollow. He sits around tittering about, e.g., the "mischievousness" of making a fake Twitter account for this actress and pretending that she's sending out tweets she isn't sending. His arch snarkiness, loved by his adoring fans, is a form of wink-n-nod passing-giving to vile behavior.

That's who he wants to be. That's who he is. But nobody is under any obligation either to think that he's a conservative (heck, it used to be understood as a sheer matter of analysis that the libertine end of libertarianism was distinct from conservatism!) or to give him a platform. Or to think that when he gets banned from some platform, it's chiefly for his authentic conservative political opinions.

I just looked up the Steyn brouhaha, which I hadn't followed. Speaking just for myself, I found his fruit cordial joke *exceedingly* mild, not deserving of the phrase "derogatory slur" which I believe Steorts applied to it, and Steorts's written response to be overkill. Indeed, I would go so far as to say that to call that joke a "slur" and to speak of it as beyond civil discourse is likely to desensitize people to _actual_ despicable slurs that do not belong in civil discourse.

But in all honesty, it sounds to me like Steyn himself was extremely frustrated (perhaps justifiedly so) over NR's tepid legal strategy in his lawsuit with Mann and was just as happy to part ways, not as though he was "purged." By Steyn's own accounts, which I've just been reading, it sounds like a mutual breakup borne of mutual annoyance. Based on the one-sided accounts I've seen, my sympathies lie with Steyn, but not in the sense of "sympathies" that means that I consider him to have been a victim of a purge. Indeed, it's hard to imagine regarding Mark Steyn as a victim except in some truly extreme circumstance. He's one tough dude.

Crude, what you don't understand (I don't know if you _can't_ or whether it's willful) is that we stand on who we are and speak from our own actual identity. We say what we say not to signal, not to posture, not to purge for the sake thereof, but because of what we stand _for_ and believe in, as a positive matter.

Insofar as that's true, Lydia, then I have some bad news for you: your principles are terrible, and are little different from those of the SJWs in many respects. If your defense of the various purgings of that alt-right is 'But we too believe that if you offend feminist principles, if you say things that the liberal pop culture regards as racist, then it's from our own commitments and motivations that we seek to destroy you!'... Well. That would mean that conservatism is not just overrun with quislings, but with rotten people.

In the end, I think it's a mix of bad principles and quisling behavior. Not that the alt-right isn't loaded with faults of its own, but what can I say: I prefer faults that lead to advances. Glorify your culture of noble retreat, I suppose. Maybe it will provide some succor when the last 'thoughtfully conservative' church closes its doors.

So no, it's not that I despise men of good will. If your will is wholly and truly that you deserve to be harassed, condemned, fired and hated for the grand crime of saying something the ever-so-delicate culture deems inappropriate, then good will is one thing you don't have. No more than Obama has it when he talks about people clinging bitterly to guns and religion. He may believe it, boys and girls, but his sincerity doesn't make him a good man.

There was a time when conservatives remembered that sincere commitment to a cause, any cause, didn't make a man good in and of itself. Or maybe they were just signalling!

A great irony is that the alt-right are as far as possible from _not_ purging. They purge and attack anyone whom they perceive as being insufficiently like themselves.

Sure, that's why Trump supporters range from Falwell Jr to freaking Nero. That's why, despite reservations, so many Trumpers found it in their hearts to enthusiastically support Pence (despite distaste on all sides), or why you have everything from hardcore social conservatives like myself and out-and-proud curiously Catholic guys like Nero to quasi-lefty atheists like Rubin and more under one roof.

No, Lydia. What generally triggers rejection is outright betrayal or fatal PC-ness. That you regard your PC commitment as 'principled' doesn't change that.

Seriously, it sounds like your big complaint here is that the alt-right has no patience for someone who wants to be treated with respect -and- take a dump on them at the same time. 'Why won't you guys celebrate French as he says you're all terrible racists who need to be put down once and for all?' Gosh, it's a mystery.

Contra Jeff, I don't engage in mind-reading. I do engage in word-reading, though, and from that I glean motives. So do you lot, which is why when Hillary says one thing you all are smart enough to deduce her real motivations. Are you mind-reading, or do you just have some sense?

Anyway, Lydia, maybe you should ask yourself if maybe the alt-right has a freaking point. Y'all have been wrong about them in terms of their success, their capabilities, and their reach. Maybe you're wrong about more? So far this election they've run rings around their 'conservative' opposition, and we're a Trump victory away from a final round of intellectual purging from the GOP.

Tell me, if it comes to that, will you smile and say 'Well, so long as they're doing it out of principle, it's actually kind of noble. They're good men and women.'?

fatal PC-ness

Ahhh. The one crime that deserves purging. Well, then, all is explained. Especially when "fatal PC-ness"means saying, "No, that's an objectively despicable way of behaving." Even if it is, in fact, an objectively despicable way of behaving.

Thank you for telling us that French wanted all the alt-right people killed. I'll bear that in mind. Especially coming from someone like you, Crude, who is so excellent at interpreting and restating what others say. (We've seen that so often in your "summaries" of our positions here at W4.)

If your defense of the various purgings of that alt-right is 'But we too believe that if you offend feminist principles, if you say things that the liberal pop culture regards as racist, then it's from our own commitments and motivations that we seek to destroy you!'

What, you've got it! By golly, how perspicacious of you! I condemn anything that liberal pop culture regards as racist! That's it!

Of course, if what you really mean is that one thinks that there are *some* statements that actually *do* deserve the label "racist," that that category does not denote the null set, and that sometimes people in the real world actually do use epithets in that set, then that's rather different from bowing to liberal PC. I realize that alt-right dogma is that, no matter how vile, how racially loaded, how deliberate and unequivocal the insult, only PC wimps ever condemn anything as racist. It is scarcely evident by the natural light that that dogma is...right. In either sense.

What's amazing is the pretense of *thoughtfulness*. It's so silly. From the leftist "everything is racist" the alt-rightist decides, "If you say that _any comment_ in the real world is racist and deplore it, you're wrong and 'fatally PC' and deserve to be called a ____-servative."

This is scarcely the mark of intelligent, critical thought.

I also have to love "seek to destroy you" as a description of a soberly worded blog post at an obscure blog. It's just luvverly. I guess that goes along with David French's desire to "put down" all alt-rightists. Perhaps we should get together with him to plan the Final Solution.

Crude says,

"Y'all have been wrong about them in terms of their success..."

Huh? What success? Is the alt-right now claiming victory due to Trump's electoral success? (Which remains limited to the Republican primary...I remain...skeptical, but persuadable that he could pull off a general election win...I just bet a liberal friend $20 at 5 to 1 odds on Trump and I'm waiting to hear back if he'll take that bet.)

How else has the alt-right been successful -- have they helped roll back abortion access like conservatives have done at the state level over the past 20+ years? Have they been fighting in the courts for the religious freedom of business owners and schools that are being harassed by the diversity/LGBT crowd? Heck, are they doing anything on any electoral or legal front to push back against Leviathan and/or the welfare/regulatory state? I can point to all sorts of real people and businesses that are being helped by conservative (and libertarian) activists and politicians. Not as many as we'd like, with plenty of set-backs along the way -- but real results and real effort on the ground. And this doesn't even get into spiritual victories that are the fruit of mission work (and church plants) both here in America and abroad -- how many people are alt-right bloggers bringing to Christ? What does the alt-right have to show for itself to date except lots of attitude and websites?

Ahhh. The one crime that deserves purging.

Yes, actually. Adherence to the belief that offending the tender sensibilities of victim classes marks one for denunciation, firing, harassment, etc is a purge-worthy offense. That you think this is an oh-so-silly standard to have explains a lot about how 'conservatism' has ended up where it is.

Thank you for telling us that French wanted all the alt-right people killed.

Thank you for taking 'put down once and for all' to mean 'literally killed' and not 'completely forced into hiding in society' or the like. If you asked for clarification or showed a lick of common sense, it'd have shown you were more reasonable than I was giving you credit for!

I condemn anything that liberal pop culture regards as racist! That's it!

If it quacks like a duck, if it walks like a duck...

I will say, usually the 'conservative' response is to engage in SJW-lite. SJWs says all whites are racist (indeed, that only whites can be racist), but 'conservatives' rush in to say that that goes WAY too far, but admittedly there's still problems of racism in America and we have to take that very seriously, here as a token of goodwill let's condemn one or another conservative and call for their firing and social banishment for one or another slight. Good God 'Kilo' dared tell a black actress to buck up and how everyone gets hate mail, including him, how DARE he, he'll do.

From the leftist "everything is racist" the alt-rightist decides, "If you say that _any comment_ in the real world is racist and deplore it, you're wrong and 'fatally PC' and deserve to be called a ____-servative."

Actually, here's another version: maybe some racist comments are no big deal and not the end of the world. Maybe we shouldn't condemn someone or approve of their destruction for having said something *gasp* offensive. Even truly offensive! Maybe Ann Coulter and Derbyshire and the rest shouldn't have been attacked, condemned, fired and sacrificed for crimes of 'offensiveness'.

Maybe, just maybe, you lot have been making a lot of -bad decisions- and your principles are in some ways rotten.

But wait, maybe you can just continue to caterwaul about how -clearly- I said David French was trying to orchestrate the Final Solution, which is entirely reasonable and not at all Lydia engaging in lunatic theatrics out of desperation.

I say let it all ride on the nazi boxcart interpretation. As WWWtW's endorsement of Cruz shows, Team McGrew knows how to pick winners.

Huh? What success? Is the alt-right now claiming victory due to Trump's electoral success?

Let's see, Jeff.

Won the primary, despite massive opposition. GOPe orchestration, party manipulation, and more.

Eviscerated Nevertrump, over and over.

Humiliated National Review.

Humiliated Ted Cruz, likely ending his presidential aspirations for good.

Chased the Bushes out of the GOP, and quite possibly dealt a death blow to Bush Republicanism.

Made the Wall and talk of deportation go from 'fringe ideas' to 'pretty much the GOP platform mainstream'.

Oh, and the alt right also has pretty much a lock on the pop right culture icons.

have they helped roll back abortion access like conservatives have done at the state level over the past 20+ years?

Strangely ineffective, and done at the cost of regarding all women who procure abortions as innocent victims. Beautiful move, gents.

Have they been fighting in the courts for the religious freedom of business owners and schools that are being harassed by the diversity/LGBT crowd?

A fight you've lost again and again, and which you've typically backed down from - often because (this is the rich part) of pressure from the corporate big-money donors the GOP has spent so much time courting.

And this doesn't even get into spiritual victories that are the fruit of mission work (and church plants) both here in America and abroad -- how many people are alt-right bloggers bringing to Christ?

You may not want to point at the condition of American churches as a point in your favor, pal. What'll you do next - talk about the popularity of Pope Francis?

But, last and not least, let me give you this one...

I can point to all sorts of real people and businesses that are being helped by conservative (and libertarian) activists and politicians.

That's fair.

Good God, if you just count the chinese and the mexicans alone...!

...everything from hardcore social conservatives like myself...

Since when do hardcore social conservatives leap to the defense of drama queens like Milo? Does a hardcore social conservative encourage a hostility for decorum?

Since when do hardcore social conservatives leap to the defense of drama queens like Milo?

Oh, not all of us, to be sure. I'm of the contingent that likes to have some wins in these culture wars, rather than fetishizing losses as noble and preferable. Crazy, I know.

But frankly, Milo's done more to communicate social conservatism to a new audience (with considerable success) than most of his detractors are capable of. And he's managed to do it while actually promoting more social conservative values in the process, whereas 'conservatives' were previously trying to talk themselves into amnesty. Ah, but then there's criticism about his technique...

Does a hardcore social conservative encourage a hostility for decorum?

If they don't, they should, especially when that 'decorum' is what it is on college campuses and in the media. Milo's actually managed to face down angry mobs, and goes to campuses where SJWs panic and attempt to shut him down. He's pointed out the control and manipulation on these sites, rather than sucking up to them like Beck and crew did with Facebook. Maybe he should follow the typical 'conservative' move and cancel his appearances wherever people act up, releasing some passive aggressive press statement before slinking off?

But hey, Step2's shown up to side with Lydia and crew on this one. That's gotta be encouraging! With bedfellows like this and the faculty at DePaul university, you know you're on the right path, eh guys?

No, Crude, I'm pointing out that your claim about yourself was blatantly false and you confirmed it. So thanks for showing you are as fraudulent as your presidential candidate.

Crude,

I asked if the alt-right was claiming "victory" thanks to Trump and you say in response:

Won the primary, despite massive opposition. GOPe orchestration, party manipulation, and more.

Eviscerated Nevertrump, over and over.

Humiliated National Review.

Humiliated Ted Cruz, likely ending his presidential aspirations for good.

Chased the Bushes out of the GOP, and quite possibly dealt a death blow to Bush Republicanism.

Made the Wall and talk of deportation go from 'fringe ideas' to 'pretty much the GOP platform mainstream'.

Oh, and the alt right also has pretty much a lock on the pop right culture icons.

I think my work here is done -- you aren't just wrong about this or that argument, as I previously thought, you are actually delusional. It's been fun.

Step2,

No, Crude, I'm pointing out that your claim about yourself was blatantly false and you confirmed it.

Sure, Step. Because 'respect for decorum' is what makes someone socially conservative, right? Especially 'respect for decorum' where the frantically liberal are concerned, yes?

The lack of your endorsement of my social conservative credentials ain't gonna make me lose sleep, but at least you gave me a laugh!

Jeffrey,

I think my work here is done -- you aren't just wrong about this or that argument, as I previously thought, you are actually delusional.

You asked what I meant by successes, and I gave a list of accomplishments. Accomplishments that have taken place in a very short period of time. It's not my fault my list is recent and noteworthy, whereas yours is a lot more 'Well gosh they tried hard' and 'Look at how great they've been doing with religion in America'.

Here, Jeff, look on the bright side. The 'conservatives' have been reduced to 'conserving' the cultural successes of their opponents. Well, good news: with a combination of work, success, and God's blessing, in a decade or two, 'conservatives' may find themselves 'conserving' cultural successes made possible by right wingers! Sure, you'll complain at first, but you complained with the liberals before giving up. At least if you give up to the alt-right, it will be a surrender to fellow right-wingers.

If you don't like surrender, though, there's an alternative: join us. We could use some more, and we're a hell of a lot more fun than National Review and freaking French!

Because 'respect for decorum' is what makes someone socially conservative, right?

An open hostility for decorum is a not a socially conservative trait, it is a libertine trait.

Especially 'respect for decorum' where the frantically liberal are concerned, yes?

Yeah I'm all about frantic liberalism, obviously.

No, the alt-right is sneering at the cult of the public victim (in this case, one who engaged in nastiness of her own), and the 'conservatives' who more and more seek to prove their moral superiority by posturing as the great defenders of the aggrieved

Crude,

I agree that moral narcissism and virtue signaling are problems. It is part of the liberal PC culture. What is important is not actually doing good, but holding liberal positions. This is the reason that Hillary Clinton is seen as a champion for women. It doesn't matter how you treat actual women as long as you signal the "correct" political positions. As rampant as this is, this criticism does not apply to the writers of this blog. I've been reading this blog since it launched and I am very confident that virtue signaling is not what is going on here. Lydia's critique of the alt-right and Milo is entirely genuine and comes from a sense of goodwill. My previous comments were not at all in full agreement with this concern, but it is disrespectful to assume that these concerns are nothing but virtual signaling.

I also agree that we have a cult of victimhood. We no longer praise men and women of courage, virtue and strength -people we used to call heroes- instead we praise the victim. Victims are our new heroes. Belonging to a perceived victim group increases ones status and worth. As sick as this as, it is important that we do not become numb to actual victims. It is important that we use good sense to distinguish the victicrat from the victim. Is it possible that Leslie Jones was actually a victim of nasty comments?

Maybe we shouldn't condemn someone or approve of their destruction

But remember, Crude doesn't engage in lunatic theatrics. He just thinks being condemned or not kept on staff or brought in to speak, etc., as a pundit counts as "destruction." Got it.

Of course, one _could_ say that the alt-right has its own *highly* prescriptive codes and ideas of what is "beyond the pale." Their code just happens to be, "It is beyond the pale to say that it is beyond the pale to use despicable personal epithets."

Fine and dandy. My preferred pundits would be ill-advised to try to make a living from giving speeches to and writing for Crude's pals, and his preferred pundits shouldn't expect to make a living from giving speeches to and writing for my pals, and this is what we call free association.

Not "destruction."

It should be a cause of head-shaking that someone in the grip of the alt-right complains through pixels and pixels of comments about the terrible purging that goes on in the mainstream right, even calling it "destruction," but then lists the (alleged) harm to the career of Ted Cruz, one of the most intelligent, principled, well-informed, hard-working, and even anti-establishment conservative politicians we have had in a long time, as a major *accomplishment* of the movement the alt-right espouses.

Yeah, what an accomplishment. What a blow for the cause of good and right. What a wonderful leap forward for conservatism. Booing Ted Cruz at the GOP convention! Boo-yah! There's a win for the good guys!

That says it all, in my opinion. "Purging fellow conservatives who don't agree with you is bad, but (allegedly) purging Cruz is a bragging point for my movement."

Got it. Thanks for making that clear.

I watched the entire Cruz speech at the convention. Everyone was cheering his speech up until the very end. It's not even that he didn't endorse Trump, but the fact that he basically told people do not vote for him. He gave a great speech up until the point where he said "vote your conscience" and coming from Cruz this can easily be interrupted as "don't vote for Trump". It was a stab in the back. Cruz wasn't purged from the movement, if anything he chose to leave it.

Kurt, Cruz was deliberately trying to blow up the convention (sowing disunity), damage Trump and set himself up for 2020. Cruz is about Cruz. (what man--or Christian--who actually likes his wife and kids chooses to live away from his family for 8 years for the sake of his career?) Trump, having seen the speech beforehand and knowing the political currents had already shifted his way, let Cruz give the speech anyway and have him hang himself with his own rope. Cruz won't be able to get campaign funding from anywhere now, he's finished.

Somehow Crude has come under the impression that this blog speaks for conservatives, or for the GOP's conservative wing, or for the GOP's social media conservative wing, or for the entire GOP itself.

The alternative explanation is that for Crude history started in June of 2015, when Caesar of the casinos strode out upon social media. That is the only way his list of accomplishments has any real flair to it.

I argue quite a bit with folks who think 2008 is the start of history, but this newest want of historical perspective, dating the Founding of all good and patriotic things to a little over a year ago, is quite something to behold.

Yet even alt-righters would seem at least capable of thinking back to, say, 2007, when their most interesting writer was just getting active. (Wow, 2007 -- back when the editor of this blog wrote for Taki's. Far distant antiquity.)

The following exercise I have neither the time nor energy to pursue; but it would be intriguing to tally accomplishments, for historical comparison's sake, taking 2007 as the beginning of history, between alt-right and normal conservatives. We've at least got two total blowouts, in the off-year elections, which decimated the Democratic bench to the point where Tim Kaine is now described as young.

Now, the conflation of alt-right with Trump presents its own peculiar conundrums.

Like Jeff, I think the old Clown Trumpster has a chance to win the White House, but only a small one. He also may have irretrievably broken the Republican Party, but even that I'm skeptical of. But a little bit more history tells us the parties tend to endure -- until they don't.

Immigration is clearly the only subject, at issue today out there in the Republic, that Trump has bothered to study with any care, and while I largely share his view on that discrete policy question, his blustery ignorance on just about everything else is sufficient ground to overwhelm the good of the former.

Trump is going to run on law and order. It's almost certainly the best shot he's got; and is indubitably a major daily factor in the news and in the lives of citizens.

But this strikes a bit of a discordant note, at least from Crude's perspective. He wants us to admit that alt-right "has a freaking point." Indeed. One of the things I have learned from some offbeat right-wing writers, is that converting our police forces into occupation armies, and handing them a secret statute book that includes the charge of Contempt of Cop, with impunity to lay sentence, up to and including execution, right then and there, may not be the best idea ever thought up. It really wasn't mainstream conservatives who began to question the post-Giuliani defend-the-cops-at-all-costs mentality. Neocons hadn't thought about it since before the iPod was invented. This critique largely came from alternatives to the mainstream Right. And I'm glad it did.

Trump will demolish that nuance, leaving a good fourth of the writers at Taki's, Amcon and Unz out in the cold. In fact, the vast majority of the more sagacious of the alt-right bloggers and writers will, I expect, move very quickly into a very firm opposition to most of a potential President Trump's agenda, leaving Trump's victory as an "alt-right" achievement in very dubious condition.

But here I am interpreting "alt-right" in a charitable way, to encompass writers at the sites associated with it whom I admire and learn from. Were I to argue like Crude, I'd just interpret "alt-right" to mean "dirty libertine racists."

Cruz won't be able to get campaign funding from anywhere now, he's finished.

Pretty easy to put so bold a prediction way down deep in a comment thread, Andrew E. No one will remember it. I'd say his base of support in Texas is still pretty solid, and no one who holds a Senate seat and can instantly command an audience is "finished" in politics.

Another interesting thing about this conflation of Trump and alt-right is that party discipline will now require the latter to side with most GOP apparatchiks, who despise Cruz for their own reasons. We're in for a fascinating four months, as provocateurs who have poured out contempt on all things GOP for years, now leap beside party hacks to defend the honor of a Manhattan magnate whose want of gentlemanly honor is exceeded only by his want philosophical depth.

It was reported that after the speech Cruz tried to go sit with his billionaire funders in their box seats but was turned away emphatically. And it's now reported that his biggest billionaire patron, Robert Mercer, is out too.

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/2016/07/23/woah-robert-mercer-excoriates-ted-cruz-for-his-non-endorsement-convention-speech/

I think any predictions of Cruz's political demise are highly premature, and he has his own ideas about what he is doing. But for my purposes in this thread, the really amazing thing is the utterly insane idea that borking a Cruz political career (for not groveling to Trump) could and should be proudly listed as an accomplishment for the cause of conservatism. It speaks for itself that anyone would list such a thing in such a way, whether the predictions about the future are true or not.

But remember: It's those meanie mainstream conservatives who a) worship weakness, b) hate manliness and standing up for one's own to bullies, and c) desire to purge people from their ranks who won't toe the line on ridiculous standards of some kind.

Right. We've entered an insane age.

If some people choose to call themselves "right" while advocating insanity as a good, I can't stop them. But I can speak out against them.

Lydia - I honor Mark Steyn above pretty much any other writer in the world today, not only for his brilliant way with words, but also for his personal courage. He regularly shows up at events that others understandably shy away from, for fear of terrorism.

As for Jason Lee Steorts' outrage over Steyn mentioning the old fruit cordial chestnut - to heck with him for a fool, and to heck with the shirts at NR for siding with him against their top dude.

Well, Steve, I made a statement about that, above, so I guess in that one area we agree. But as I said there, I don't extend that to a blanket refusal to condemn anything that anyone might call offensive. It's not as though, "So-and-so overreacted and called something offensive that wasn't" could possibly mean "There is no such thing as insult beyond the pale of civilized discourse." Indeed, ironically, I deleted some very offensive language about M.Y. on this very thread, because I don't have a double standard in that regard. I think there *are* such things as standards of discourse, and I regret that Steorts misused the concept in Steyn's case. Steorts's humorless overreaction to an entirely harmless Dean Martin joke was precisely the kind of thing that gives oxygen to those who are advocating and defending *actually* despicable language as some kind of "strategy."

But that's something we philosophers do: We make distinctions.

Jeffrey S.: "The Lyric is putting on a new Ring Cycle this Fall starting with Das Rheingold -- I asked my German-American friend to join me (because it would have been perfect!) but he's in Arizona and probably can't make it. So maybe I can convince you to come up to Chicago for some Wagner in October?"

But the Lyric Opera is just so expensive!

Tickets to the Mariinsky are so insanely cheap that, if you're going to more than a few performances, the savings on tickets pays for your airfare to Russia! And, in the meantime, you're hanging around one of the most beautiful & fascinating cities in the world.

Still, I'll look into it.

Another interesting thing about this conflation of Trump and alt-right is that party discipline will now require the latter to side with most GOP apparatchiks, who despise Cruz for their own reasons. We're in for a fascinating four months, as provocateurs who have poured out contempt on all things GOP for years, now leap beside party hacks

Spin. What would we do without it?

Rather, it is the alt-right who have supported Trump for up to a year now, and it is the party hacks, previously pouring contempt on Trump and the alt-right, who have for reasons of party discipline now jumped on the Trump Train - as they have been invited to do so for many moons.

Regarding Crude:

I write as someone who regularly reads WWWtW and also follows Crude's blog and has read his comments over the years. Initially I was repulsed by his vulgarity and brashness (and I sometimes still am), but I feel called to put in a good word for him now, since he's been under fire as of late: I am actually in awe of his efforts on behalf of Christ and His Church! (Seriously!)

People, this is a pseudonymous guy who will spend hours (even days, weeks) in discussion with mostly pseudonymous Internet nobodies, in low traffic fora, without any prospect of material profit to himself or of public acclaim. I can't even imagine the personal sacrifices he makes to do it, judging by the scope and quality of his output. What I do know is that such an endeavor requires selflessness, tenacity, unyielding love of truth, perseverance, and humility--not to mention a constant practice of the first two Spiritual Works of Mercy.

Crude has helped Christians stay Christian. I have seen it. Crude has consistently defended the Catholic Church and its teachings. I have witnessed it. And he has done it all 'secrete' and 'ad majorem dei gloriam,' following Jesus' counsel as written in the Gospel of St. Matthew: "So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others...But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."

Crude, brother, we'll never meet in this life, but I'm looking forward to meeting you some day in the Kingdom, and sincerely thanking you for all that you've done, both for myself and for others.

Great, perhaps he could add to his works of mercy by making a greater effort to represent those of us on this blog with whom he disagrees fairly, accurately, and without trolling. That would be nice.

In any event, this isn't about how wonderful a Catholic Crude is, or even how bad he is, or whatever. On the topic at hand, I submit that you should consider a different point of view from his and maybe even try to convince him to change his mind. That would be a good work you could do for him, and maybe he'll listen to you. The last thing, the very last thing, I'm going to have this thread turn into is a meta-debate on the badness or goodness of "Crude."

Meanwhile, feel free to browse our archives. We blankety-blank losers (or whatever it is Crude thinks we are) have a few things to say by way of defending Christianity as well, and so far, we haven't made any money for it, either. I hope you can profit from it.

"But this strikes a bit of a discordant note, at least from Crude's perspective. He wants us to admit that alt-right "has a freaking point." Indeed. One of the things I have learned from some offbeat right-wing writers, is that converting our police forces into occupation armies, and handing them a secret statute book that includes the charge of Contempt of Cop, with impunity to lay sentence, up to and including execution, right then and there, may not be the best idea ever thought up."

In what sort of universe is this exegesis of social power structures considered sound, useful or descriptive to the average man?

HERE'S WHAT REALLY HAPPENED, EGGHEAD:

1. Various American police forces had to deal with communities of angry, surly, lying ghetto dwellers of not insignificant political power.

2. Maintaining a minimum level of lawfulness among those ghetto dwellers tends to require quasi or extra-legal actions, especially when being done in parallel to the expansion of the buraucratic state and its Hundred Thousand Statutes.

3. Good police officers generally being nowhere near as cheap as ghetto votes, an extremely protective CULCHA OF CUHRUPTION develops within the police forces, some parts of it justifiable, some not, none really all that accountable or explicable to those not on the force, or who haven't studied the environment which that culture evolved in.

4. Treating police officers as occupying armies would be a massive step in the direction of honesty and effectiveness, as the neighborhoods that made them surly tend to treat them that way anyway. Very possible that those officers in Dallas would have survived had they had the riot gear that the demonstrating militia known as Black Lives Matter traditionally demands!

"It really wasn't mainstream conservatives who began to question the post-Giuliani defend-the-cops-at-all-costs mentality. Neocons hadn't thought about it since before the iPod was invented. This critique largely came from alternatives to the mainstream Right. And I'm glad it did."

The critique has come from libertarians, none of whom have any inkling of what it means to govern in the sense of choosing the best of two bad options, or indeed signaling your support for a bad organ with a good function and a bad organ that never had any good function in the first place.

"Trump will demolish that nuance, leaving a good fourth of the writers at Taki's, Amcon and Unz out in the cold. In fact, the vast majority of the more sagacious of the alt-right bloggers and writers will, I expect, move very quickly into a very firm opposition to most of a potential President Trump's agenda, leaving Trump's victory as an "alt-right" achievement in very dubious condition."

Nah. The alt-right can easily comprehend the libertarian position. You cannot comprehend us, because you run for the banhammer when the discussion gets tough. Might work on your own sites, doesn't work well at all in real life!

"But here I am interpreting "alt-right" in a charitable way, to encompass writers at the sites associated with it whom I admire and learn from. Were I to argue like Crude, I'd just interpret "alt-right" to mean "dirty libertine racists."

Dirty libertine racists like Joe Sobran or Michael Houellebecq? Spare me. You don't need to associate with the men to deal with their ideas, and you have failed to do the latter on the highly dubious justification that this means people will associate you with people who are still practically prudes by any current standards.

Meanwhile, read and critique this before posting any more of that gormless anti-authoritarian drivel:

http://akinokure.blogspot.com/2016/07/for-blacks-anti-police-means-anti-white.html

And while we're at it, ON THE SUBJECT OF GHOSTBUSTERS:

It just sickens me that today, in the current year, a large, loud, black woman can't be paid thousands of dollars to play a large, loud black woman in a super-lazy-cash-grab of a movie without going on Twitter and receiving texts from anonymous users that imply she is, in fact, a large, loud black woman who does resemble other things if you squint hard enough.

Comedy truly belongs to the people who pay lots of money for the right to turn a beloved movie into a Bridesmaids-style parody of itself, and the misues of the technical understanding of free speech to subvert the everyday movie hyping process is probably the end of American ersatz Christianity, since lots of comedians are in fact preacher's kids and comedy serves as preaching for a great many secular people. It's like people heckling in church!

Rather than going out and enjoying their crappy liberal Hollywood remake, these young men instead turned to illegal, immoral, and discredited methods of humor generation on the Twitters. We are mad at this and banning that degenerate(a term never used or abused by the liberals in power) Milo was the only way we could absolve our gigglesins and our need to punish someone for that transgression.

Hopefully in the future moral discourse can be directed only by who qualify for Hollywood funding.

Well, thank you so much for showing us where you are coming from. But remember, folks, remember: When they want to, some members the alt-right will act all injured and say they *aren't* really in favor of the sorts of slurs that were directed at Jones, they're just in favor of the "freedom" to make them, blah, blah. Nope. They're in favor of such slurs. They like 'em. They think they reflect reality. These slurs just imply what the person "is, in fact." Viz. the last commentator.

Well, well, well -- stick around long enough and it looks like everyone is going to show up to the party! For those not in the know (and here your ignorance is a virtue) we have "Chillanodon" who at least attempts something resembling an argument (police abuse is necessary in the inner city because that's the only way to keep civil order?) but surrounds said 'argument' in a farrago of non-sequitur and a failure of basic reading comprehension. With a sugar coating of condescension and snark to help it all go down!

His name links to a website that is a gathering place for the alt-right -- they share links, memes, jokes, etc. and there is lots of laughs to be had -- jokes about minorities, Jews, women, Christians, homosexuals, etc. You can imagine the tenor of those 'jokes.'

Finally, he directs us all to read a blog post of a blogger who I used to drop in on from time to time -- "Akinokure's" claim to fame is the analysis of Hollywood actors who might have hidden lives as closeted homosexuals (he spends long blog posts analyzing facial features for tell-tale signs.) "Akinokure" also has other...interesting ideas...but as you can imagine, I would mostly stop by his blog to get a sense of just how delusional some on the alt-right had become. Birds of a feather and all that.

Well, thank you so much for showing me where you are coming from. But remember, folks, remember: When they want to, some members the WWWtW team will act all injured and say they *aren't* really in favor of the sorts of ill-defined problematic speech-silencing catch-all slurs ('dirty libertine racist', 'degenerate', 'insane', 'vile insult') that were directed at Ben, Crude, and the Republican Presidential Nominee, they're just in favor of the "freedom" to make them, blah, blah. Nope. They're in favor of such slurs. They like 'em. They think they reflect reality. These slurs just imply what the person "is, in fact." Viz. the last commentator.

BUT SERIOUSLY, FOLKS:

"I am commenting, rather, on the truly strange idea that we should criticize those who complain about vile insult rather than those who engage in vile insult."

The general male expectation is that if someone throws a "vile insult" at you in real life, you insult them right back. Interfering with this age-old inherent male bonding ritual is, not to put too fine a point on it, cultural minimization.

"Where does this idea come from?"

Apparently you never watched, or knew people who watched, a certain set of TV shows that had three-letter acronyms beginning with 'W'. Trump, of course, patronized and appeared on those shows consistently, and is thus fluent in the grappling idiom.

"And what does "Everyone gets hate mail" have to do with it? If everybody got robbed, would that make robbery no big deal?"

If the First Amendment of the Communistitution said "All goods are to be held in common, the right of the People to these Goods Shall Not Be Infringed", then yes.

"This is a kind of reverse bandwagon fallacy:"

Leave the logical fetish talk out of this, this is a Christian board.

"If some bad thing happens to everybody, it ceases to be worth mentioning, and you are a whiner if you draw attention to it when it happens to you."

As a woman I don't expect you to hold or be held to male interpersonal norms in your private life, but if you intrude on a male space and all of a sudden those norms are coming at you faster than you can handle, you have no one to blame but yourself.

"we have "Chillanodon" who at least attempts something resembling an argument (police abuse is necessary in the inner city because that's the only way to keep civil order?)"

THERE IT IS, THERE'S THAT LIBERAL RELIANCE ON CATCH-ALL PHRASING WHEN THEY DON'T WANT TO ADDRESS THE ARGUMENT, DATA, OR ANECDOTE!

"but surrounds said 'argument' in a farrago of non-sequitur and a failure of basic reading comprehension. With a sugar coating of condescension and snark to help it all go down!"

I numbered a list of common factors that can very, very easily be tied to common police and non-police observations of their communities. Is Fred Reed too dirty for you, or should I just link directly to the MPC police thread?

"His name links to a website that is a gathering place for the alt-right -- they share links, memes, jokes, etc. and there is lots of laughs to be had -- jokes about minorities, Jews, women, Christians, homosexuals, etc. You can imagine the tenor of those 'jokes.'"

You can get a good distillation of that tenor on the BumblingUSA Twitter feed.

"Finally, he directs us all to read a blog post of a blogger who I used to drop in on from time to time -- "Akinokure's" claim to fame is the analysis of Hollywood actors who might have hidden lives as closeted homosexuals (he spends long blog posts analyzing facial features for tell-tale signs.) "Akinokure" also has other...interesting ideas...but as you can imagine, I would mostly stop by his blog to get a sense of just how delusional some on the alt-right had become. Birds of a feather and all that."

Akinokure, unlike this "Jeffrey S," actually tends to get confirmation of his hypotheses later on (George Clooney was actually later confirmed gay, for instance.)

As a woman I don't expect you to hold or be held to male interpersonal norms in your private life, but if you intrude on a male space and all of a sudden those norms are coming at you faster than you can handle, you have no one to blame but yourself.

Because Twitter is a "male space" where vile insult *just is* the norm, because that's a "male grappling technique." Concepts of standards of discourse are effeminate.

Or some such silly nonsense.

It's just astonishing how many manly heroes there have been throughout all of the history of Western civilization who have managed without vile insult. In point of actual fact, as a woman I'm happy to acknowledge that the high standards by which Western civilization used to operate, including standards of public language and decency, were originally made by men, for the use of (inter alia) men.

The idea that vile insult is a sign of manly valor is an ahistorical joke.

And now I think we've had enough of this folly.

"Because Twitter is a "male space" where vile insult *just is* the norm, because that's a "male grappling technique." Concepts of standards of discourse are effeminate."

There are times when they're not, but it's generally important to remember that The Standards Were Made For Man, Not Man For The Standards.

"Or some such silly nonsense."

They're only as silly as their relative ephemerality. If, say, a large contingent of people say 'To hell with your standards' and end up being much more effective than those shackled by them, then that doesn't reflect to well on the standard-bearers, does it?

"It's just astonishing how many manly heroes there have been throughout all of the history of Western civilization who have managed without vile insult."

Typically they managed with genteel language backed by not-so-genteel force, though what specifically constitutes an insult to us and what constituted an insult to them tends to change over time, and it's a good bet that a lot of their back-and-forth probably didn't make it into the historical record.

"In point of actual fact, as a woman I'm happy to acknowledge that the high standards by which Western civilization used to operate, including standards of public language and decency, were originally made by men, for the use of (inter alia) men."

"Men". Well, that's a starting step. Not any specific descriptive type of men, like the husbands, fathers, lovers, patriarchs, or patricians who most specifically set up the standards for specific purposes, but just any old man off the street will do.

"The idea that vile insult is a sign of manly valor is an ahistorical joke."

The science of taunting and its uses has been around at least since Elijah razzed the prophets of Baal.

"And now I think we've had enough of this folly."

I'm sure you have, Mrs. Royal 'we'. I'm sure the men can probably last a few more rounds.

The very essence of [edited] is whining about "standards of public discourse" while your house is being looted and set on fire. It shows an inability to see what is going on around you, and to "proportionalize" your actions. It's like being a soldier and finding yourself in a hot LZ and admonishing your brother soldiers not to swear. There's something deeply clueless and partially crazy about people who do that.

Friends, your culture is being looted and set on fire. Now is not the time to lecture people on rude language and standards of decorum. Your history is in fact filled with people who employed rude language and indecorous behavior to usurp dictators and powerful thieves. Your genteel preferences are woefully outdated. Time to update your calendar: it's 2016.

Dr. Krune,

You say,

"Friends, your culture is being looted and set on fire. Now is not the time to lecture people on rude language and standards of decorum."

O.K., how about lecturing people about the culture of life? I expect we'll find you at the barricades with all the other alt-right 'warriors' fighting for the conscience rights of doctors in Vermont?

Or how about helping push back against any of these examples of "secularist, anti-sanctity-of-life ideology":

http://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2016/07/religious-and-pro-life-conscience-unwelcome-in-healthcare

We blog about quite a bit around here -- you might want to start combing the archives for a lesson or two on our "genteel preferences" when it comes to pushing back against the Left and Islam.

The science of taunting and its uses has been around at least since Elijah razzed the prophets of Baal.

Yep, the stuff on Twitter (and the stuff we've had to junk) is *just like that*. (eyeroll)

I'm sure you have, Mrs. Royal 'we'. I'm sure the men can probably last a few more rounds.

Buddy, I actually do have the ability to delete or ban your comments. I consider it one of those "tools" that some whiners whine about, but a manly chap like you will no doubt admire strength and a refusal to be put off by such whimpering and cries of, "It's not fair." So bag it with the snark.


Your history is in fact filled with people who employed rude language and indecorous behavior to usurp dictators and powerful thieves.

Because vile, racial-sexual insult is how Jan Sobieski III rescued Vienna from the Moslems, and how Winston Churchill encouraged the pilots to win the Battle of Britain. I'm sure those are the parts that just missed the history books. No great manly achievement is complete without it.

Spare us the faux history as well as the faux masculinity.

Right, Chillanodon: when the Soviet Union, backed by the dupes and useful idiots in the West, set their spycraft upon discrediting Solzhenitsyn, he went out with speeches of prurient gossip about Soviet leaders, flouting his own sexual hedonism but adding shocking racial tropes. I mean, when I first read his speech to the Union of Soviet Writers, around the time In the First Circle was being censored, I couldn't believe all the snarky off-color humor and ethnic jokes.

Oh wait, no, what he actually did was he set his mind upon sustained and substantive research, careful, detailed criticism, gentlemanly conduct, and the occasional defiant (though wholly profanity free) speech.

Boy what a womanly pansy, that Solzhenitsyn.

"Yep, the stuff on Twitter (and the stuff we've had to junk) is *just like that*. (eyeroll)"

Some of it is, some of it ain't, we'd have to get the over-under on just how closely the Twitter targets resemble the old pagan idols and their worshipers (does the @lesdoggg name mean that she secretly worships Zuul? Difficult to know without a thorough analysis!)

"Buddy, I actually do have the ability to delete or ban your comments. I consider it one of those "tools" that some whiners whine about, but a manly chap like you will no doubt admire strength and a refusal to be put off by such whimpering and cries of, "It's not fair." So bag it with the snark."

Yep, one thing expert trolls have never dealt with is admins breaking down in a hissy fit and banning people. I certainly wouldn't have saved screenshots of all applicable posts, posted them on a forum filled with other Disreputable Banned Individuals, and invited them for public perusal whenever considering the arguments of "Lydia Mcgrew"! Provoking hilarious emotional overreactions and publicizing them as the essential epitaph of individuals is ONE THING that trolls never, ever do!

"Because vile, racial-sexual insult is how Jan Sobieski III rescued Vienna from the Moslems, and how Winston Churchill encouraged the pilots to win the Battle of Britain. I'm sure those are the parts that just missed the history books. No great manly achievement is complete without it."

Yes, the fireside chats and everyday conversations probably resembled the press releases to the letter, especially those from known feminist and all-around chivaleer Winston Churchill.

"Spare us the faux history as well as the faux masculinity."

I would never use any history or masculinity derived from the vile (David A) French.

The Founding Fathers had it beat. In the race between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson for president in 1800, Jefferson called Adams "a blind, bald, crippled, toothless man who is a hideous hermaphroditic character with neither the force and fitness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman."

In turn, Adams called Jefferson "a mean-spirited, low-lived fellow, the son of a half-breed Indian squaw, sired by a Virginia mulatto father."

"That bastard brat of a Scottish peddler! His ambition, his restlessness and all his grandiose schemes come, I'm convinced, from a superabundance of secretions, which he couldn't find enough whores to absorb!" - John Adams

The slurs flew back and forth, with John Quincy Adams being labeled a pimp, and Andrew Jackson's wife getting called a slut.

As the election progressed, editorials in the American newspapers read more like bathroom graffiti than political commentary. One paper reported that "General Jackson's mother was a common prostitute, brought to this country by the British soldiers! She afterward married a mulatto man, with whom she had several children, of which number General Jackson is one!"

An article also: http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704911704575326891123551892

Solzhenitsyn wrote a book about the Jews in Russia called "Two Hundred Years Together" which is not even published in English because of, well, it's not exactly nice.

Portions of it are published in English. I've read them. I've posted here specifically on the book which they appeared. But trolling an obscure blog is certainly a better use of your time than finding those portions, reading them, and learning from a great, honorable, vigorous and always gentlemanly writer.

I've read Kevin MacDonald's posts with the excerpts. Guess what your average "conservative" thinks of a guy like Kevin MacDonald, who also writes in these measured tones? It doesn't matter how you say it, it's WHAT you say that sets off the content police. Modern trolls have learned this and don't pretend that sounding nice is most important. FWIW, all movements need both Solzhenitsyns and Adams.

Since I'm not a moral relativist, I don't advocate what I advocate because I believe in "sounding nice." I advocate it because I believe in objective right and wrong.

Duh,

It helps to get your basic facts right first:

The Founding Fathers had it beat. In the race between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson for president in 1800, Jefferson called Adams "a blind, bald, crippled, toothless man who is a hideous hermaphroditic character with neither the force and fitness of a man, nor the gentleness and sensibility of a woman."

In point of fact, neither candidate called each other anything -- these statements came from their various 'camps.' Back in those days candidates for President didn't actively campaign -- both Jefferson and Adams spent much of 1800 in their respective homes. Of course, your broader point is correct -- nastiness and insult is nothing new in our public life -- and yet is it something we should applaud even in 1800? Part of the reason Jefferson was elected back then was that his political hatchet man, Callendar, was very effective in spreading lies about Adams.

It is also amusing that Chillanodon would appeal to someone like Churchill's private conversation, which might have included off-color jokes and cursing, with his voluminous public speeches and writing which are a model of Christian strength and chivalry (we've featured quite a few on this blog.)

Great point, Jeff. You and I have traded a couple off-color remarks in personal interaction (back when we shared a meal near Emory a few years back) that we would never put into print or digital publication. Solzhenitsyn himself was known to have a brilliant sense of humor, with an astonishing capacity for parodic emulation, in his personal interactions. Former fellow prisoners testify to it, as do his surviving family.

But his public voice was always gentlemanly, even when fierce and defiant. (And, note you well, defiant against a far more potent enemy that mere Leftist PC police. We're talking about the KGB at its height here.)

Great, perhaps he could add to his works of mercy by making a greater effort to represent those of us on this blog with whom he disagrees fairly, accurately, and without trolling. That would be nice.

I think his responses are typically tailored to reflect the tone used by the OP; since this post was rather derisive, brief, and generous with labeling (e.g., "Visigoth", "Kilo"), Crude responded in kind.

In any event, this isn't about how wonderful a Catholic Crude is, or even how bad he is, or whatever.

With respect, I think to some extent it is. Crude has been mistreated on this blog, in my judgment, even though he is by and large your religious ally, and is only trying to aid in the conservative cause. At any rate, it seems reasonable to suppose that your assessment of Crude, Lydia, is limited to his constructive (often trenchant) criticisms of this blog. Consequently, you are unfamiliar with--and because unfamiliar, unappreciative of--Crude's total body of work. You see him only in one guise--trenchant critic of this blog--and that colors your impression of him.

I stepped in to put in a word in on Crude's behalf, that's all. Because I've seen this guy sacrifice a lot over the years, defending the Truth and trying to help people keep the faith. While he may seem to be one at times, he is not an a@@hole and doesn't deserve to be treated as such. He is a good dude doing his darndist for the right reasons.

On the topic at hand, I submit that you should consider a different point of view from his and maybe even try to convince him to change his mind. That would be a good work you could do for him, and maybe he'll listen to you. The last thing, the very last thing, I'm going to have this thread turn into is a meta-debate on the badness or goodness of "Crude."

What's interesting is that Crude has (elsewhere) said that not too long ago he was in general agreement with the NR/WWWtW approach to the culture wars. (He can correct me if I'm misrepresenting him.) So, with respect, I believe he has considered the point of view and tactical approach of this blog.

Meanwhile, feel free to browse our archives. We blankety-blank losers (or whatever it is Crude thinks we are) have a few things to say by way of defending Christianity as well, and so far, we haven't made any money for it, either. I hope you can profit from it.

Lydia, I've been following his blog for YEARS--way back when Ed Feser was posting here, and when you were (brilliantly) fighting the APA over its draconian policy changes. I have tremendous respect for the goals of the WWWtW team, and your efforts. But, personally, I think Crude is right in suggesting a new method and approach for making gains on behalf of Christendom in the culture wars.

Lidya,

"But aside from that, the unspoken doctrine that strategy is not _itself_ constrained by considerations of virtue, honor, and objective goodness is pervasive, and the deliberate scorn for it verges on question-begging."

lol, have you ever cracked open a bible? God had enemy children executed (except for virgin girls, who could be saved up for marriage) in the Old Testament. I'm pretty sure my sick twitter burns are not outside the realm of what a God that talks about [edited] considers virtue, honor and objective goodness.

Your standards for virtue, honor and objective goodness are not Christian, they are liberal, and you have been carefully groomed as controlled opposition. You are to the left what the Janissaries were to the Ottomans, and you do the bidding of your enemies without having even the slightest clue that you are doing so.

"Even from a strategic point of view, this is counterproductive, since French and his fellows at the ADF are _far_ more practically fruitful allies of the right then all the alt-right bloggers who have ever walked the planet, much less M. Y. and co."

French is strategic dead weight. He exists as a corporate mouthpiece, and you don't even have to take my word on it. What have French and other NR goons tangibly achieved to push Conservatism further? Absolutely nothing. Your faith, your culture and your conservatism are being destroyed from multiple directions and because you only have clueless incompetent people like French leading the charge there is nothing you can do about it. Meanwhile the alt right has been around less than a decade (and more like 2 years as any cohesive political force) and we already have our Orange Emperor in sight of the Golden Lion Throne.

It's a new kind of war. To prevent further fainting spells, Lydia, I suggest daintily averting your eyes from the ugliness of keyboard-to-keyboard Internet combat.

I've lost the thread of the argument here.

Lydia explicitly says she is not commenting on Twitter's comment policy, the justice of banning someone, etc.

It seems her thesis is that one should direct one's disapprobation to people who make nasty comments, who encourage such behavior, who justify such behavior, etc., and not to people who point out that they are on the receiving end of such behavior. Right? (Lydia can correct me on this.)

So, just to get some focus: what is wrong with her thesis? Is the claim of the dissenters here that it is really okay to say nasty things? Or that the things said weren't nasty? Or that one should never mention or complain when one is on the receiving end of such comments?

I see a lot psychologizing and patronizing about how Lydia doesn't or can't get it because she's a woman, because she isn't a real conservative, etc., but very little response to the substance. There's also a fair amount of misrepresentation. (Crude links through to his blog where he says that Lydia's post is about why the twitter ban was deserved. (Direct quote: "Team Morality at WWWtW huffed and puffed about this, talking about how this was deserved because... well, Milo's followers (not even Milo himself) tweeted mean racist jokes at the actress, and this is absolutely reprehensible." It is explicitly not about that.)

So, explain it to me like I'm four: what, exactly, is wrong with Lydia's thesis, or my understanding thereof?

R.C.

"what, exactly, is wrong with Lydia's thesis, or my understanding thereof?"

The same thing that is wrong with a soldier complaining that he is being shot at in the middle of a war.

The broader problem is that she is propagating a false morality that would make the Biblical patriarchs and Jesus Himself laugh hysterically in their beards.

So, just to get some focus: what is wrong with her thesis? Is the claim of the dissenters here that it is really okay to say nasty things? Or that the things said weren't nasty? Or that one should never mention or complain when one is on the receiving end of such comments?

What's wrong? This:

The alt-right's sneering at anyone who complains about "mere" verbal insult is part of the postmodernism of our age.

Milo took issue not with her complaining about insult; he took issue with her playing the victim, as a method of silencing/obstructing legitimate criticism.

Lydia missed this distinction. Then she churned out an argument based on a mistaken premise. Which means that her conclusions and comments--setting aside their truth value--do not follow.

lol, have you ever cracked open a bible?

Yeah, good one, man. Since you've scoured this blog with great diligence, you've captured the real problem here, which is that no one ever studies the Bible carefully.

Lydia, I suggest daintily averting your eyes from the ugliness of keyboard-to-keyboard Internet combat.

Right, you've studied the arguments over almost ten years of this blog's existence, and concluded rationally that Lydia is averse to keyboard disputes.

Do the rest of y'all alt-right folks see what kind of ignorant trolls you've produced?

This November, you sad people will either vote for Trump or you will stay home like [edited]. Win or lose, you'll come back here to your cocoon, mad as wet hens, and you'll post 888 rants about things just aren't the way they used to be, dagnabit! Either way, you'll be confronted with the brutal truth that the new right has better ideas and better rhetoric than you. (Whether or not you realize that it's because we keep people like Lydia McGrew far, far away from decision-making is another story.)

Milo took issue not with her complaining about insult; he took issue with her playing the victim, as a method of silencing/obstructing legitimate criticism.

Peri: The very use of the phrase "playing the victim" is part of the problem of analysis. Since the insults were genuine, the word "playing" is already loaded. It begs the question of whether or not one should make an issue of it when one is the target of vile insult, whether one should bring it up, mention it, publicize it.

Actually, as for "silencing/obstructing legitimate criticism," I'm told that she explicitly said it was fine to hate the movie. I think this whole "obstructing legitimate criticism" is the sheerest unsupported psychologizing, something the alt-right does a lot of. Ask yourself whether anything would have happened if the people on Twitter had instead said things like, "This movie stinks. Jones is a completely lame, untalented actress," and so forth. Even, "They hired untalented actresses for this job because they were trying to throw a sop to blacks in this country." Even that. If you truly believe that the outrage would have been anywhere near on the level it was concerning what was *actually* said for *those* comments, I say that you are plain wrong.

M.Y. came in and stated that her complaining about insult *was tantamount to* playing the victim to silence legitimate criticism. That is not a misrepresentation. That is what he did. That's what the alt-right always does, because it is an alt-right doctrine that complaining about insult (esp. if you are an unfavored person in their eyes) *is* "playing the victim to silence legitimate criticism." This is not the first instance, either. If you open your eyes you will see other such instances, and you will also see that this is not a misrepresentation of what happened.

You might have a case if the actress had said, "Twitter, I'm outraged that people are saying I'm an untalented actress and criticizing the movie. Since I'm also getting racist insults, please shut down both the people who are throwing racist insults at me and, while you're at it, anybody who criticizes my acting talent." But that wasn't it at all, and you know it.


But, personally, I think Crude is right in suggesting a new method and approach for making gains on behalf of Christendom in the culture wars.

Well, then, since the "new method and approach" is crudity and personal harassment with despicable, vile language, you are the reason I wrote this post.

Because it's people like you who come to use anodyne language for "a new method and approach for making gains on behalf of Christendom" to describe this cesspool, people like you of good will, who become inured to it and get sucked into the darkness of making excuses for this as, God help us, a "new method," who are the ones really being harmed.

People ask why I write this kind of thing from time to time. I don't do it very often, partly because I have a life and partly because I don't need the junk you're seeing in other commentators here, and some that you're not seeing because it was deleted. Who needs that? (And I imagine it'll get worse before it gets better, until I'm forced to close comments on the post.) But people like you are the reason I write it. Because there is a narrow band of people who fall right into the category of being intrigued by the alt-right, maybe at first not being sure what it is, being (as you are) slightly revolted by it, starting to listen to the specious claims that this is a "new method," that this is somehow "a way of being effective," that this is "necessary" that this is "doing your dirty work for you" and all the rest of it, but not wholly sucked in. Sophistry, every last syllable. And then eventually come to be apologists for it. But there is, perhaps a window of time when they can be shown that it *is* sophistry and their minds changed, before they start repeating the rhetoric over and over. When they are still able, like RC, to say, "What exactly is logically wrong with the thesis against the alt-right?"

Whether you're there or not, I don't know. But I warn others like you, who stand on the edge there, who speak still like normal people themselves, who prefer (as I presume you do) not to go on Twitter and spew bile, but who are considering forming new "heroes" from this movement. Stop and ask yourself what you are endorsing and being influenced by, before it starts forming you in the wrong direction. What we make excuses for changes us, all the time. Virtue is like working out. You have to keep at it. Those who appeal to the fallen nature of man, even as a matter of "strategy," all come to resemble one another in the end, and not in good ways.

French is strategic dead weight. He exists as a corporate mouthpiece, and you don't even have to take my word on it. What have French and other NR goons tangibly achieved to push Conservatism further? Absolutely nothing.

Boy, are you ever uninformed. (To put it nicely.)

French works for the Alliance Defending Freedom. They are out there *actually*fighting court battles, and sometimes winning. Ask the people they have successfully defended if they've accomplished "absolutely nothing." I already pointed this out in this thread, by the way.

Paul,

Judging by the folks who are stopping by over here, it is a wonder that I ever spent ANY time over at neo-reactionary and/or alt-right websites! To be fair, we seem to have attracted some of the worst -- but that's part of the exact problem Lydia identified in the OP -- the abandonment of standards (indeed the postmodern contempt for them) makes it harder and harder to separate the wheat from the chaff.

I give Perilanda credit for at least attempting argumentation -- it seems to be an old-fashioned concept to most of our alt-right visitors! However, I think Perilanda is mistaken -- Ms. Jones was indeed a real victim of nasty Twitter rhetoric. There was no "playing" involved -- unless all those Tweets she received were faked?

As R.C. correctly summarizes Lydia's key point -- if you call yourself conservative (and especially if you think of yourself as a Christian) then the kind of rhetoric directed toward Ms. Jones (the actress) was inappropriate and worthy of condemnation. And again, because I'm sure we'll hear from another group of clueless alt-right trolls:

1) the Bible does not endorse or encourage us to direct insults (foul, racial and sexual ones no less) at our enemies;

["I tell you, on the day of judgment people will give account for every careless word they speak," - Matthew 12:36; "Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear." -- Ephesians 4:29; etc.]

2) just because the Left abuses and misuses the definition of a word (like racism) doesn't mean the concept doesn't exist and/or it is fine for conservatives to ignore any and all instances of the phenomenon.

"lol, have you ever cracked open a bible? God had enemy children executed (except for virgin girls, who could be saved up for marriage) in the Old Testament. I'm pretty sure my sick twitter burns are not outside the realm of what a God that talks about taking priests away in a flood of feces considers virtue, honor and objective goodness.

Your standards for virtue, honor and objective goodness are not Christian, they are liberal, and you have been carefully groomed as controlled opposition. You are to the left what the Janissaries were to the Ottomans, and you do the bidding of your enemies without having even the slightest clue that you are doing so."

Dear Johnny,

Please, read the archives. The very subject of God commanding that nations be killed (including children) in the Old Testament has been extensively discussed, here, a few years ago. You are proof-texting in the worst possible way. Pulling Bible actions out of context is hardly good theology. Christian morality (notice, Christian, not the Old Dispensation) recognizes the general right of self-defense, but God ordering the killing of certain nations is a complicated issue having to do with how God revealed himself in varied and fragmentary ways to the Isealites. It comes under the theology of revelations and that theology is more complex than you make it. The mocking on Twitter was not an act of true self-defense, but of bullying. Further, no one received a voice from On High telling them to respond in kind, intemperately, so your Old Testament citation is not fitting for this context.

Speaking no longer to you, but generally, God, in the person of Christ, in the New Testament has a more complete revelation of God's will than in the Old Testament. Now, He did tell Peter, after all to both put away his sword and to buy a sword. There is a legitimate time and a proper way to fight, but nowhere in the New Testament will you find Christ or the apostles engaging in viciousness, returning tit for tat.

While we are at it, people might do some research on the sin of scandal, which Christ talks a lot about. They might, also examine the Sermon on the Mount's commentary about anger and calling someone a fool. Oh, and then, there is the Beatitude about meekness.

In other words, the theological arguments for the Twitter bad behavior are exceedingly weak.

Before anyone goes insulting Lydia's Christianity for being liberal, might I suggest they learn a bit more about theology, Scripture, and the contemporary Christian scene, especially Modernism.

Finally, while it is right, on occasion, to fraternally correct a brother, as I am trying to do, here, many people do not know when and where that is appropriate and who should do it. Fraternal correction goes with admonishing the sinner and even in Scripture the advice given is anti-theical to the approach taken by the alt-right, at least as I understand their tactics in this case. In other words, I see nothing suggesting that the alt-right has the moral high ground. Rather, their brand of Christianity seems to be, based on my limited direct knowledge of the movement, itself, nothing more than situational ethics with a dash of consequentialism thrown in, which amounts to weak Christianity, but it is a common type found primarily among many current young people.

The Chicken

I was a complete twitter/social media skeptic/non-believer as recently as eight months ago. But since starting to follow it closely, primarily twitter, and getting to know the personalities and journalists and observe how twitter reports on, reflects and influences the news cycle I've become a firm believer. Meaning, Twitter, when used properly, has become an extremely powerful tool that can actually influence the larger political and social culture in significant ways. I think this is mainly because Twitter is great for disseminating rhetoric to the masses (meme-ing and such) and rhetoric is extremely effective at exploiting naturally emerging cracks in the dominant but failing and weakening culture.

To that end, Milo is extremely talented at exploiting these breeches using his social media presence combined with his personal appearances. But Milo could use someone just as talented as him to follow up behind and fill in the vacuum Milo creates and to take all the shattered pieces of the old order and build back up a more traditional social order in its place.

Twitter is still something like the wild west. This is the first presidential election where Twitter is a major force and people are still figuring out how it can be used, what's effective, what's allowed, what's out of bounds. The Twitter flare up referenced in the OP is the kind of thing that happens several times per week with notable people often involved. Because these flare ups happen all the time I hadn't followed this one closely. But from what I could tell there were generally nasty and objectively bad insults hurled at the Ghostbusters actress but they weren't coming from Milo personally and Milo wasn't directing people to engage in such behavior. Was he excusing it or providing cover for it? Who knows, maybe, maybe not? I don't think Milo's actions were worthy of the ban. Perhaps Twitter's liberal controllers are getting more and more frightened at how effective the right is becoming at using their own tools to dismantle leftist orthodoxy.

In response I believe Twitter may start requiring all accounts to be verified, that is tied to a specifically named person with email and ID. This could be a welcome development since the people who engage in the really nasty stuff tend to be cowards and will likely shrink from being identified. But regular people will no longer be afraid to verify themselves and continue the disseminating of non-PC truths, because of Trump.

"Boy, are you ever uninformed. (To put it nicely.)

French works for the Alliance Defending Freedom. They are out there *actually*fighting court battles, and sometimes winning. Ask the people they have successfully defended if they've accomplished "absolutely nothing." I already pointed this out in this thread, by the way."

Boy, are you ever uninformed. (To put it nicely.)
Sergei works for the White Army. They are out there *actually* fighting the Red Army, and sometimes winning. Ask the Romanovs if they've accomplished "absolutely nothing." I already pointed this out in the scrawlings I made over by the gulag latrine, by the way.

All the court battles in the world mean nothing if immigration is not stopped into this country. Do you really think winning a measly court battle for religious freedom is going to change the course of this country? Newsflash: we are being invaded, and have been since 1965 by hordes of third-worlders, and the conservative movement has essentially shuffled their feet, looked at the ground and said "Well, we can't be racist so..."

When you change the demographics of a country, you are fundamentally changing it's culture and diluting it's national identity. Respectable people have written books, posted columns and used "genteel language" if you will about the subject for decades, and all they got was a swift kick in the rear as their employers, slavenly tied to the donor class, fired them.

So forgive me if I go and use some rude words on twitter. You think you're fighting for Western Civilization when all you do is write blog posts.

So forgive me if I go and use some rude words on twitter. You think you're fighting for Western Civilization when all you do is write blog posts.

Speaks volumes, doesn't it? Because using vile language on Twitter is *definitely* fighting for Western civilization.

"I am not commenting on whether "Kilo" should have been banned by Twitter, now or in the past. I am not commenting on whether Twitter should ban other people as well, or who those other people or groups are, or what sort of double standards do or do not obtain on Twitter."

Why not?

"Milo took issue not with her complaining about insult; he took issue with her playing the victim, as a method of silencing/obstructing legitimate criticism."

Really? Legitimate criticism? Cite examples of this, please. Were there actors criticizing her acting methods or comedians criticizing her comic timing? Those are legitimate criticisms of her method, her craft. Anything else is ad hominem. The gender changing criticism should have been directed to the producers.

The Chicken

ADF defends "religious freedom", which presumably includes Mohammedans and Berserking Sikhs. We should be defending Christianity explicitly. "Religious freedom" is the framing of liberals, not of Christians.

"Old Dispensation"

Dispensations are made up by people like you who try to explain away contradictions in your own worldview (that you project on Scripture), resulting from attempts to syncretize ancient thought with your own modern sensibilities. The entire scripture is coherent to me, God's morality does not change from one era to the next and I don't need to invent dispensations to make the contradictions go away.

"nowhere in the New Testament will you find Christ or the apostles engaging in viciousness, returning tit for tat."

That's true, Christ is usually picking fights with a corrupt establishment, whether they attack Him first or not. As do we. And Christ was very offensive for His time, why do you think they tried to lynch Him repeatedly?

Some of you don't even realise how silly you sound. "Sure, it's ok to pull out a sword and split someone open from pelvis to neck sometimes but all these Harambe jpgs on twitter are way out of line." It comes off as completely ridiculous to any sane person, which is why you now find yourself on the defense not just from the Left but from a new generation of right wing Christians who are tired of your nonsense.

But from what I could tell there were generally nasty and objectively bad insults hurled at the Ghostbusters actress but they weren't coming from Milo personally and Milo wasn't directing people to engage in such behavior. Was he excusing it or providing cover for it? Who knows, maybe, maybe not? I don't think Milo's actions were worthy of the ban.

I explicitly didn't take any position on the "worthy of the ban" issue. What I argued for in the main post, at length, and stand by, is that he chose to insert himself *on purpose* in order to say that her objections to the generally nasty and objectively bad insults *just were* an attempt to "play the victim" and draw attention away from her own lack of talent. That *was* his first "tweet" in the entire thing. Moreover, as the comments here show at some length, that is utterly consistent with and an expression of a particular alt-right *philosophy* concerning objectively bad insults. They have a theory of it. They promote this theory. They will state that, when someone they disapprove of receives such insults they are "playing the victim" if they deplore them or seek to get others to deplore them. They also will state that one *should not* write about such insults as I have done here, because to do so is ipso facto to talk like a liberal, or even to be a liberal, or to be a ____-servative (a special, vile, racial-sexual epithet they have specially invented for conservatives who ever talk about racism, even when its real, or who criticize the alt-right). They will also insist that somehow the claim that "everybody gets hate mail" means it shouldn't be called out, objected to, or stopped. At least not when it comes to the people they disapprove of. All of this has been explicitly expressed in this thread and on many alt-right sites everywhere. What M.Y. was doing was invoking *those* ideas. He was doing so as explicitly as one possibly can in something the length of a tweet. He was snarking at the person who *received* the insults because she *complained* about the insults.

That's what I wrote my post about. You can decide that that wasn't worthy of banning from Twitter or whatever. But it is by no means innocent. It is profoundly wrong-headed, and it is part of an alt-right culture and theory of personal nastiness as "strategy," as allegedly funny, as merely "mischievous," and as so unworthy of mention that anyone who mentions it should be attacked for doing so.

That's what we're looking at here, and that's what I wrote the post about.

Really? Legitimate criticism? Cite examples of this, please.

MC, and even more, examples of *her* trying to "silence" such legitimate criticism by citing the nasty insults. I have seen *no* evidence of that. No doubt there was criticism of her acting and what-not, either mixed in, in the same comments, with the sheer insult, or by people doing just the legit criticism and nothing else. But as far as I can tell, she never sought to have any legit criticism shut down nor treated it as beyond the pale.

Mind you, she herself uses mother--- pretty often and is not someone I imagine I would get along with, to put it mildly. She is also probably an anti-white racist, based on her repeated negative comments about "white people," though what I saw looked a lot less objectionable than what she was getting. But I think the fact that she is somewhat unpleasant herself causes some people, esp. alt-right fanboys, to think people like me have "been had" or something if we say that the vile stuff directed at her was wrong. The schoolboy lessons that two wrongs don't make a right and that you don't have to like someone to state that x treatment of that person was wrong are apparently too sophisticated as moral theology for the alt-right folks. They traffic in gut reaction and tribal anger than in even the simplest truths of higher ethics.

"I am not commenting on whether "Kilo" should have been banned by Twitter, now or in the past. I am not commenting on whether Twitter should ban other people as well, or who those other people or groups are, or what sort of double standards do or do not obtain on Twitter."

Why not?

Christopher: Because I had other things to write about in the post that were more important. A lot more important. You can read them in the post. Next question?

Sure: Was the Ghostbusters remake any good and why or why not?

I have no idea. I'm deeply uninterested in the movie. Heck, I'm not even interested in the _first_ movie, much less the remake. Based on my general prejudice against Hollywood, remakes, etc., etc., and many other factors, I bet it stunk. That has precisely zero to do with what I wrote my post about. Please, spare us a rant to the effect that the movie was politicized, leftist, that the actress probably was only selected for her race, and so forth. Take all that as read. It doesn't change a thing I wrote.

One more question. You don't see any comparison between the movie critic and his banning from Twitter and Judge Neely?

(Btw her reply brief is online and it is good; I've changed my mind and have high hopes Judge Neely will prevail.)

Thank you, Lydia, for your response. You make a number of good points that I will consider. A couple of things, though.

Well, then, since the "new method and approach" is crudity and personal harassment with despicable, vile language, you are the reason I wrote this post.

Because it's people like you who come to use anodyne language for "a new method and approach for making gains on behalf of Christendom" to describe this cesspool, people like you of good will, who become inured to it and get sucked into the darkness of making excuses for this as, God help us, a "new method," who are the ones really being harmed.

The "new method and approach," which I referred to as being advocated by Crude, does NOT mean either Milo's (or his followers') approach to Leslie nor to the myriad tactics of the alt-right, many of which I find unacceptable.

To give this "approach" a description that perhaps you'll immediately understand and recognize: it is the approach exemplified by Edward Feser in The Last Superstition and suggested by Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany in his book Liberalism is a Sin.

Also, Leslie did indeed 'play the victim' in the culpable sense that she enflamed her trolls by posting insults back at them, did not take measures to prevent their posts from being publicized (which one can do on Twitter), and did this for a period of hours before publicly crying for help and deciding to remove her Twitter account.

At any rate, I think you should reread Crude's first post on here; it seems to me that he was not excusing Milo's conduct but simply asking why you saw fit to condemn it so categorically. To me, he was making a more general observation that conservatives are wasting precious time and energy "purging" such people. Also, that you didn't seem to be able to entertain the credibility of Milo's charge of victim-playing, or recognize that the latter is a pernicious tactic exploited by the SJW side, or give the statement "Everybody gets hate mail" anything other than a malicious interpretation, according to which Milo was excusing the racist conduct of Leslie's hecklers.

...but to add to what I just posted, it is at least possible that Leslie, although she did not immediately try to silence the Twitter-criticism of her movie, intentionally baited the trolls whom she noticed were posting racist/sexist things, in order to associate legitimate criticism of the movie with racist/sexist sentiments, thereby eliciting an outpouring of public sympathy for her and an overall public dismissal of criticism of her movie on account of the manufactured impression that the latter stems from racism/sexism.

Also, Leslie did indeed 'play the victim' in the culpable sense that she enflamed her trolls by posting insults back at them, did not take measures to prevent their posts from being publicized (which one can do on Twitter), and did this for a period of hours before publicly crying for help and deciding to remove her Twitter account.

I'm sorry, but I don't call that "playing the victim" at all. In fact, I think that's a pretty ridiculous thing to call it. You can disagree with her techniques or whatever, but that doesn't even begin to be rightly called "playing the victim." For one thing, reasonable people can disagree about whether there is sometimes a point to publicizing the fact that vile things are being said and even what they are. Sometimes I wonder myself about this when I/we delete the vile comments we get on here (this happened in this very thread) and then someone from that same camp will come along and act all innocent. For example, one commentator we had claimed that there is no anti-semitism on the alt-right, and I have junked comments that prove otherwise. That's just one example. I had a case where a commentator was clearly implying that SJW women have it coming when they are raped by immigrants. I deleted it and reprimanded him, and within five comments was being told nastily by someone else that I was misrepresenting the person I had reprimanded.

Good grief. The idea that one can literally turn a disagreement over a "period of several hours" during which one handled Twitter hazing differently from what you think it should have been into an excuse for M.Y.'s comment (with, I note, _no_ condemnation in the tweet of what was being said to her) is just frankly absurd.


or give the statement "Everybody gets hate mail" anything other than a malicious interpretation, according to which Milo was excusing the racist conduct of Leslie's hecklers.

You interpret ol' Milo in your way, but I stick by my interpretation. Indeed, it makes perfect sense in the alt-right context. If you have eyes to see, you will observe it again and again and again: "Everybody gets hate mail" is the kind of thing that is *constantly* said as one among many so-called "arguments" (really, very poor) that we shouldnotshouldnotshouldnotshouldnot be talking about racist comments. Indeed, that was my point: That he was using that to say that she and others shouldn't be deploring it shouldn't be talking about it, that it was just a distraction from her lack of talent or whatever. That's wrong-headed. Profoundly so. THOU SHALT NOT CONDEMN ANYTHING AS RACISM is one of the ten commandments of the alt-right. If a minority does it, then he's an SJW trying to do something nefarious or other--stifle legitimate criticism, control the culture, attack white people, whatever. And this *even if* the person was pointing to *real* instances of racism. If a white person does it, he's a loser, a self-hater, an SJW, or (if conservative) a ____-servative, an epithet I have already deleted repeatedly in this thread. That commandment, that "thou shalt not" is what M.Y. was pushing in that tweet.

As for "wasting precious time," you use your time as you think Our Lord wants you to, and I'll do the same. I don't consider this post to have been wasting precious time. Indeed, the subsequent thread has convinced me all the more of the urgency of such a post.

One more question. You don't see any comparison between the movie critic and his banning from Twitter and Judge Neely?

The "movie critic" being M.Y.?

And Judge Neely being the Wyoming judge who is in trouble with an ethics board for telling a reporter that she wouldn't perform same-sex "marriages"?

Heck, no.

but to add to what I just posted, it is at least possible that Leslie, although she did not immediately try to silence the Twitter-criticism of her movie, intentionally baited the trolls whom she noticed were posting racist/sexist things, in order to associate legitimate criticism of the movie with racist/sexist sentiments, thereby eliciting an outpouring of public sympathy for her and an overall public dismissal of criticism of her movie on account of the manufactured impression that the latter stems from racism/sexism.

Lots of things are possible. I believe I said something above about "the sheerest unsupported psychologizing." It's a really bad habit. You should avoid developing it. Seriously. It is the road to self-encouraged bias and excuse-making for people like M.Y. who traffic in deliberate, partisan bias and its attendant irrationality.

Peri, I think it's a little ironic that you can't see that Crude's talk about what you call "wasting precious time" is part of the *very phenomenon* I am deploring: That THOU SHALT NOT CONDEMN ANYTHING AS RACISM commandment. If the "argument" isn't "everybody gets hate mail so it isn't worth talking about" it's "'racism' is liberal talk so you shouldn't use it" or "this isn't as important as whatever else I think you should be talking about" or "this is a deliberate technique for winning the West." Heck _all_ of these are represented on this _very thread_. And Crude's is just one variant thereof.

Yes and yes.

Lydia,

Fair enough. But may I ask what you think of "the approach exemplified by Edward Feser in The Last Superstition and suggested by Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany in his book Liberalism is a Sin"?

By the way, this is the approach that I understand Crude to be advocating; as far as I can tell, Crude has never given a blanket endorsement to the alt-right, but merely pointed out its effectiveness in some achieving certain ends in the culture wars. (Incidentally, the Feser/Salvany approach may be viewed as consonant and overlapping with SOME aspects of that of the alt-right.)

Peri, I think it's a little ironic that you can't see that Crude's talk about what you call "wasting precious time" is part of the *very phenomenon* I am deploring: That THOU SHALT NOT CONDEMN ANYTHING AS RACISM commandment. If the "argument" isn't "everybody gets hate mail so it isn't worth talking about" it's "'racism' is liberal talk so you shouldn't use it" or "this isn't as important as whatever else I think you should be talking about" or "this is a deliberate technique for winning the West." Heck _all_ of these are represented on this _very thread_. And Crude's is just one variant thereof.

Again, I'd point out that the claim that 'thou shalt not condemn anything as racism' is conceptually translatable as 'everybody gets hate mail so it isn't worth talking about" is a CLAIM. It is based on your interpretation of Milo's statement, which may in fact be other than his intended meaning.

So again, why waste time drawing conclusions and calling attention to an individual's behavior based on what is merely a probabilistic claim? And why originally present that claim as matter of fact?

A few choice samplings from Fr. Salvany's work, 'Liberalism is a Sin':

If the propagation of good and the necessity of combating evil require the employment of terms somewhat harsh against error and its supporters, this usage is certainly not against charity. This is a corollary or consequence of the principle we have just demonstrated. We must render evil odious and detestable. We cannot attain this result without pointing out the dangers of evil, without showing how and why it is odious, detestable and contemptible. Christian oratory of all ages has ever employed against impiety the most vigorous and emphatic rhetoric in the arsenal of human speech. In the writings of the great athletes of Christianity, the usage of irony, imprecation, execration and of the most crushing epithets is continual. Hence the only law is the opportunity and the truth...St. John the Baptist calls the Pharisees a "race of vipers"; Jesus Christ, Our Divine Saviour, hurls at them the epithets "hypocrites, whitened sepulchres, a perverse and adulterous generation," without thinking for this reason that He sullies the sanctity of His benevolent speech. St. Paul criticizes the schismatic Cretians as "always liars, evil beasts, slothful bellies." The same Apostle calls Elymas the magician a "Seducer, full of guile and deceit, a child of the devil, an enemy of all justice."

If we open the Fathers, we find the same vigorous castigation of heresy and heretics. St. Jerome, arguing against Vigilantius, casts in his face his former occupation of saloon-keeper: "From your infancy," he says to him, "you have learned other things than theology and betaken yourself to other pursuits. To verify at the same time the value of your money accounts and the value of Scriptural texts, to sample wines and grasp the meaning of the prophets and apostles are certainly not occupations which the same man can accomplish with credit." On another occasion, attacking the same Vigilantius, who denied the excellence of virginity and of fasting, St. Jerome, with his usual sprightliness, asks him if he spoke thus "in order not to diminish the receipts of his saloon?" Heavens! what an outcry would be raised if one of our Ultramontane controversialists were to write against a Liberal critic or heretic of our own day in this fashion!

What shall we say of St. John Chrysostom? Is his famous invective against Eutropius not comparable, in its personal and aggressive character, to the cruel invectives of Cicero against Catiline and against Verres! The gentle St. Bernard did not honey his words when he attacked the enemies of the Faith. Addressing Arnold of Brescia, the great Liberal agitator of his times, he calls him in all his letters, "seducer, vase of injuries, scorpion, cruel wolf".

The pacific St. Thomas of Acquin [Aquinas] forgets the calm of his cold syllogisms when he hurls his violent apostrophe against William of St. Amour and his disciples: "Enemies of God" he cries out, "ministers of the devil, members of antichrist, ignorami, perverts, reprobates!" Never did the illustrious Louis Veuillot speak so boldly. The seraphic St. Bonaventure, so full of sweetness, overwhelms his adversary Gerard with such epithets as "impudent, calumniator, spirit of malice, impious, shameless, ignorant, impostor, malefactor, perfidious, ingrate!" Did St. Francis de Sales, so delicately exquisite and tender, ever purr softly over the heretics of his age and country? He pardoned their injuries, heaped benefits on them even to the point of saving the lives of those who sought to take his, but with the enemies of the Faith he preserved neither moderation nor consideration. Asked by a Catholic, who desired to know if it were permissible to speak evil of a heretic who propagated false doctrines, he replied:

"Yes, you can, on the condition that you adhere to the exact truth, to what you know of his bad conduct, presenting that which is doubtful as doubtful, according to the degree of doubt which you may have in this regard." In his Introduction to the Devout Life, that precious and popular work, he expresses himself again: "If the declared enemies of God and of the Church ought to be blamed and censured with all possible vigor, charity obliges us to cry wolf when the wolf slips into the midst of the flock and in every way and place we may meet him."

But enough. What the greatest Catholic polemists and Saints have done is assuredly a fair example for even the humblest defenders of the Faith.

...With reason, therefore, does a great Catholic historian say to the enemies of Catholicity: "You make yourselves infamous by your actions, and I will endeavor to cover you with that infamy by my writings." In this same way the law of the Twelve Tables of the ancient Romans ordained to the virile generations of early Rome: Adversus bostem aeterna auctoritas esto, which may be rendered: "To the enemy no quarter."

The point about French and the Alliance for Defending Freedom was good enough to look up. And yes, score one for the good guys:
...
The settlement revises University Regulation 07.25.12, a solicitation policy that previously required a permit for any form of commercial or non-commercial speech. The policy no longer requires a permit for non-commercial speech. The settlement also specifies that NC State must pay $72,500 in attorneys’ fees to Grace Christian Life’s attorneys.
...

And that's fine, but I can guarantee, without looking, that the presiding judge was neither a muslim nor a negress. So tell me, what will the judiciary look like after 20 more years of open borders?

Given that universities regularly attempt these illiberal measures, what chances are there that these beliefs aren't slopping over into law students now? So what will the judiciary look like then?

Or closer to the present, after 8 years of HIllary?

The problem I have with the David Frenches of the world is that they are content with granting the left the power, by way of the canard of racism, who their friends can be, and what political methods are acceptable, or your tone. Angry white males, clingers and gun nuts all.

If you allow your opponents to box you in like that, defeat is inevitable.

Perilanda,

I go away from the blog for a couple of hours and there are twenty more comments! I'm not going to speak for Lydia, but your comment/question compelled me to chime in:

Fair enough. But may I ask what you think of "the approach exemplified by Edward Feser in The Last Superstition and suggested by Fr. Felix Sarda y Salvany in his book Liberalism is a Sin"?

By the way, this is the approach that I understand Crude to be advocating; as far as I can tell, Crude has never given a blanket endorsement to the alt-right, but merely pointed out its effectiveness in some achieving certain ends in the culture wars.

I'm not familiar with Fr. Sarda y Salvany, so I'll stick with what I know -- Ed Feser's approach to polemic is 180 degrees apart from the approach of the alt-right. He might use sarcasm or snark from time to time but his book TLS is simply hard-hitting. As Ed himself has said in defending his tone:

And of my characterization of certain New Atheist writers as ill-informed, incompetent, intellectually dishonest, etc., Briggs says:

Keep in mind… that these are all questions of fact, not metaphysics. If Feser can prove them—I say he can—this is fine.

This is something that people who complain about the tone of the book should keep in mind. If a critic haughtily dismisses arguments of the caliber of Aquinas’s while at the same time showing that he has got his basic facts about the arguments wrong, then to point out that such a critic is either incompetent or intellectually dishonest is just to make a straightforward statement of fact, and one that is highly relevant to evaluating the critic’s work. If you think it commits an ad hominem fallacy to call attention to unpleasant but relevant truths about a writer’s knowledge of his subject (or lack thereof), then you don’t know what an ad hominem fallacy is. (By the way, it would be an ad hominem fallacy to dismiss my own arguments simply because you don’t like my tone. Just sayin’.)

Ed has a whole series of posts about the tone of his book on his blog -- you should check them out for a fine defense of the proper use of polemics (and why Ed's use is very, very, very different than the alt-right.)

Finally, I have to once again agree to disagree with Crude's assessment that the alt-right is effective in "achieving certain ends in the culture wars." Crude's examples provided in this comment thread were nonsense -- either attacks on other conservatives (although it is unclear what the substance of the attacks were so we can't evaluate the ARGUMENT at stake) and credit for Trump. If that is what counts as success, you can have it.

Hoople,

You have zero evidence that David French and those like him are "content with granting the left the power, by way of the canard of racism, who their friends can be, and what political methods are acceptable, or your tone." Again, this betrays a lack of familiarity with this very blog and its writers (who could care less what the Left thinks of us) and with the way politics work in the U.S. The gang at The National Review, like them or not, get accused of racism (or bigotry or sexism) whenever they don't bow down to the latest left-wing fad (they oppose affirmative action, they want to restrict immigration, they reject the idea of a wage gap, etc.) They would be fools if they were trying to appease the left when they complained about racism -- maybe instead they complain (when they do -- which is rare) because they think something or someone is acting racist? A crazy thought, I know, but it just might be true!

Again, I'd point out that the claim that 'thou shalt not condemn anything as racism' is conceptually translatable as 'everybody gets hate mail so it isn't worth talking about" is a CLAIM. It is based on your interpretation of Milo's statement, which may in fact be other than his intended meaning.

I also strongly disagree with "everybody gets hate mail so it isn't worth talking about" stated as such. I'm glad you agree with _that_ interpretation, anyway. I argued against that proposition in the main post, explicitly. Indeed, that was part of why I wrote the post. I think that's clear in the post itself.

Peri, again, I refuse categorically to have this thread turned into a big meta-thing about "What Crude meant" and "Whether Crude is a great guy" or whatever. I just won't participate in it.

But let me ask _you_ a question: If the approach you, yourself, advocate has *nothing* to do with the epithets hurled at Leslie Jones, or the truly vile ___-servative term used by the alt-right (against, specifically, people like me, Ben Shapiro, David French, and other conservatives who criticize them), or anti-semitic insults, or rape fantasies, or anything of the kind, why are you asking me my opinion the approach you claim to advocate on *this thread*? Or why would anyone bring it up as some kind of counter to my main post? After all, supposedly you *join* me in utterly condemning those usages, that bullying, those tactics, right? That isn't what *you* are advocating at all, right? Then why should you, or anyone with whom you agree, treat advocacy of what *you* are in favor of as a reason to contradict or criticize my main post? They have nothing to do with one another, right? They're totally different, allegedly.

Interesting, Jeffery.

You ignored my claim that non-whites on the bench can't be trusted to be guided by the First Amendment as it was intended.

Instead, you decided to defend Mr. French's non-racist bonafides. DemsRTheRealRacists, don't you agree?

Peri, again, I refuse categorically to have this thread turned into a big meta-thing about "What Crude meant" and "Whether Crude is a great guy" or whatever. I just won't participate in it.

That's a shame. It seems like a fun topic, what with my being an authority on it.

Instead, I'll comment on something else.

But let me ask _you_ a question: If the approach you, yourself, advocate has *nothing* to do with the epithets hurled at Leslie Jones, or the truly vile ___-servative term used by the alt-right (against, specifically, people like me, Ben Shapiro, David French, and other conservatives who criticize them), or anti-semitic insults, or rape fantasies, or anything of the kind, why are you asking me my opinion the approach you claim to advocate on *this thread*?

'Rape fantasies'? What nonsense is this?

What was hurled at Leslie Jones was, by and large, insults about her appearance. By the way: little by Milo. He made a joke about how he was 'rejected by another black dude' and told her to knock off the hammy sassy black 80s stereotype. Little else. But Milo - sorry, Kilo - was banned for life from a major worldwide "open" media platform because of some idiots' antics. Forgetting, by the way, that 'Kilo' himself endured a whole lot of death threats while on twitter, to little action. And considering he just had to cancel a march, and has been physically harassed on stage and on camera, I think he's got a bit more punch to his claims.

Regardless, let me repeat that: Milo was banned for what other idiots did. He didn't direct them to do so. But they were 'his followers' so down came the axe.

And what's your take on that? He had it coming because he didn't dance to the tune of the SJWs - and 'conservative' sympathetic sorts - who assigned the actions of others to him? That he was obligated to get outraged and attack his fans, as leftists are never called upon to do, ever - even when they go and pop off a few cops? (With bullets, mind you, not 'bad language.') That if someone on the right says a racist joke, makes a sexist comment, everyone's obligated to... what, circle around them for a verbal stoning? Demand they apologize on pain of ostracization? We're supposed to eat our own over and over to satisfy... who? You lot?

No thanks.

Come to think of it, I remember National Review talking about how 'white working-class communities deserve to die', how rotten they are, how filthy their white inhabitants are. This blog's response was to defend those articles, not condemn them, and to step very lightly around their actual insulting content. No hand-wringing about their tone, no outrage over the racial baiting that was at work in emphasizing the race of the inhabitants. Of course this was at the height of the nomination battle, and I suppose pissing off the people you lot dislike - even by attacking them and their community in racial terms - is a whole other matter.

What's Wrong With the World, indeed.

Let's get very direct here, Lydia: you lot dislike words like - ha ha, '____servative' - not because insults are beyond the pale, or because it's wrong to demean someone personally, or even mock their race or (God forbid) their sexual proclivities. If that were the case, the collective current inhabitants of this site would be issuing one big mea culpa for your actions in the past year alone. What bugs you about it is how it stings. It's degrading, humiliating and insulting, and you prefer language like that to be deployed only by yourselves and those you hold in esteem, thank you very much. At the same time, you want to reserve the right to demand the denunciation and shaming of anyone who'd dare write anything 'racist' or 'sexist'.

Well, bad news: we just had a nice big vote tally about that, and at least in the GOP, we've determined that every standard-bearer for that kind of thinking is rotten and should sit things out for a while, possibly for good.

In light of a string of cultural and political losses that has finally resulted in power in your own favored political party being yanked out of your hands and given to the upstarts you find so - shall we say, 'problematic'? - maybe time has finally come to slam on the brakes and say, well, maybe you should rethink your long-standing approaches, and how you think right-wingers like 'kilo' should be handled. Maybe you have made some mistakes, and maybe you should be friendlier.

Or maybe you'll double down, and continue to urge for the destruction of the alt-right, and the shaming of those associated with it even now. In which case, get ready for an upcoming popular article: "Why condescending, alt-right-bashing, uptight conservative communities deserve to die."

It may go over a hell of a lot better than Williamson's piece.

That if someone on the right says a racist joke, makes a sexist comment, everyone's obligated to... what, circle around them for a verbal stoning? Demand they apologize on pain of ostracization? We're supposed to eat our own over and over to satisfy... who? You lot?

[snip]

Let's get very direct here, Lydia: you lot dislike words like - ha ha, '____servative' - not because insults are beyond the pale, or because it's wrong to demean someone personally, or even mock their race or (God forbid) their sexual proclivities. If that were the case, the collective current inhabitants of this site would be issuing one big mea culpa for your actions in the past year alone. What bugs you about it is how it stings. It's degrading, humiliating and insulting, and you prefer language like that to be deployed only by yourselves and those you hold in esteem, thank you very much. At the same time, you want to reserve the right to demand the denunciation and shaming of anyone who'd dare write anything 'racist' or 'sexist'.

If you genuinely think that anything that I or any other current contributor has written on this blog in the last year is the linguistic or moral equivalent of the ---servative label or of the kind of racial epithets, anti-semitic epithets, or other terminology that I am condemning in the main post, then you have a major problem. You appear to have a problem making moral distinctions. I tend to think this type of problem is endemic to the alt-right. It results in an odd situation, rhetorically. On the one hand, *occasionally* defenders will say things like, "Oh, no, indeed, neither I nor so-and-so is defending really vile language such as was used in such-and-such a Twitter war. We're just defending speaking frankly, getting tough, and willing to be considered offensive." Or something to that effect. On the other hand, someone like you will come along and speak as though there are no such things that should be condemned, either because a) it's never a good or legitimate use of time (because reasons) or b) something else that the person doing the condemning has done or said is allegedly morally equivalent, c) it counts as "eating our own" to condemn it even if someone actually, deliberately, used a racist epithet, or for some other reason.

That is what you are speaking like here.

I myself think that your comments speak for themselves. You are being quite clear, and quite consistent with the alt-right commandments I have been talking about in this thread. And your moral equivalences speak for themselves as well.

Masked Elephant above in this thread alleges that some of the comments to Jones did involve stating that she deserved to be raped or fantasizing about it. I do not claim to have trawled through the mud to cite chapter and verse, but that is indeed one *among* the kinds of things I have in mind. If you really don't know the sorts of terms I am talking about in addition, I suggest you get more imagination or pay attention to the kinds of things your own movement says, repeatedly, over and over. I've deleted the comments myself from this blog and from my personal blog.

Crude,

This is a lie:

"I remember National Review talking about how 'white working-class communities deserve to die', how rotten they are, how filthy their white inhabitants are."

I mean you might indeed "remember" such things -- that's not the lie. The lie is your description of the content of the article. I can't decide if you have a reading comprehension problem or you misrepresent folks on purpose?

Either way, if you continue to lie and insult the authors of this blog you will no longer be welcome here.

Because vile, racial-sexual insult is how Jan Sobieski III rescued Vienna from the Moslems, and how Winston Churchill encouraged the pilots to win the Battle of Britain. I'm sure those are the parts that just missed the history books. No great manly achievement is complete without it.

I can't speak to Churchill and Sobieski, but you may have heart of an American general in WWII named George Patton, who believed that sort of thing was essential for inspiring his men, and probably knew more about inspiring men than you do. He's actually pretty well known; they made a movie about him with George C. Scott.

However, we've already established that the notion that someone like Patton could exist and have the views he supposedly had is "Faux History." Or possibly "Faux Masculinity." I suppose it's possible that Patton never existed, but was merely invented as part of some sort of Allied psyops program during the war. You know, convince the Jerries we've got a really deep bench or something, make Rommel lose his nerve, that kind of thing.

Hoopoe,

I ignored your comment because it is stupid. Unfortunately, there are plenty of white American citizens who have issues with the First Amendment - witness the efforts on the Left to overturn Citizens United (a 5/4 decision with Thomas in the majority.). Like your buddy Crude, you also seem to have a reading comprehension problem -- my defense of Mr. French and his colleagues had to do with their integrity and their willingness to brave plenty of insults from the Left.

Jeff,

I mean you might indeed "remember" such things -- that's not the lie. The lie is your description of the content of the article.

Alright, Jeff - let's play a game. It's called, "Which article was that?"

The truth about these dysfunctional, downscale communities is that they deserve to die. Economically, they are negative assets. Morally, they are indefensible. Forget all your cheap theatrical Bruce Springsteen crap. Forget your sanctimony about struggling Rust Belt factory towns and your conspiracy theories about the wily Orientals stealing our jobs. Forget your goddamned gypsum, and, if he has a problem with that, forget Ed Burke, too. The white American underclass is in thrall to a vicious, selfish culture whose main products are misery and used heroin needles. Donald Trump’s speeches make them feel good. So does OxyContin. What they need isn’t analgesics, literal or political. They need real opportunity, which means that they need real change, which means that they need U-Haul.

Our first contestant is Jeffrey S. His hobbies include explaining how the above quote does not say that white working-class communities deserve to die, how rotten they are, and how filthy their white inhabitants are. On the side, he also likes to threaten people with banishment for talking about this.

Jeffrey S, for 100 points, can you name the source of the above quote?

Lydia,

I see you've gone for the flat denial and the outrage move! Okay. Let's see how Jeff fares.

By the way, for comparison, let's go with a mock up with a slight change:

The truth about these dysfunctional, downscale communities is that they deserve to die. Economically, they are negative assets. Morally, they are indefensible. Forget all your flashy theatrical rap garbage. Forget your idealism about your life in the hood and your idiotic belief that you can either gangbang, rap or dribble a basketball to success. Forget your goddamned 'people', and while you're at it, forget Malcolm X too. The black American underclass is in thrall to a vicious, selfish culture whose main products are single fathers and crack addictions. Obama's speeches make them feel good. So does dope. What they need isn't analgesics, literal or political. They need real opportunity, which means that they need to stop whining about their lot in life, go to the library, and learn how to read.

I think that's very tame, Lydia. I take it that's a sentiment you can rally behind? Are you nodding your head and murmuring 'Preach it, brother' at your computer while you read that?

Oh, by the by: I already pointed out that Milo didn't do much of anything that needs to be condemned, and I can't help but notice you're not coming at me with quotes proving otherwise. Awfully funny, considering how much you're investing in defending his banishment and condemnation.

Wait, wait. Let me guess: you don't want to dirty our ears with the vileness that 'Kilo' tweeted. Or, better still, you have no idea what he tweeted but you don't see how your lack of knowledge should at all impact your condemnations.

What'll it be? Because so far it seems like I questioned your claim, you admitted you had no evidence, and then snarked at me because can't I just imagine the evidence on my own? Are you now Lydia McGrew, proud proponent of Listen & Believe?

Oh, by the by: I already pointed out that Milo didn't do much of anything that needs to be condemned, and I can't help but notice you're not coming at me with quotes proving otherwise. Awfully funny, considering how much you're investing in defending his banishment and condemnation.

No, you perhaps didn't understand my main article. I said there exactly what he tweeted. And I critiqued it at length. And I explicitly stated that I was not addressing whether what he said there deserved banning. But you have a major, major problem with misrepresentation. I'm not invested in defending his being banned from Twitter. I don't think he should be considered a conservative or be paid money for allegedly being a conservative pundit. As I said above, your bunch can hire your pundits and mine with my standards can hire mine, and that's called free association. But whether Twitter has grounds to ban him then, for what he did in that thread, is a morass I _explicitly_ said I wasn't going to debate. I said it in the main post, and I meant it. However, what he did say, even there, was seriously wrong for the reasons I gave in the post. But I suppose calling something "wrong" is, y'know, destroying people or something in Crude world.

What I asked you to imagine on your own was what the other people _did_ say in that thread and what the alt-right types *do* say, which you know perfectly well. And I brought that up because of your claim of moral equivalence with what we supposedly have said on this blog. Which, at some level, you must know is not equivalent to what I'm talking about.

Actually, I thought at the time when I read the Williamson article that I _did_ think rather similar things could be rightly said about the black communities. Tough love, as it were. And not, ipso facto, racist. Indeed, *mainstream* conservatives used to say that the black community is dysfunctional and its own worst enemy and needs to pull itself up by the bootstraps. I suppose there are still some mainstream conservatives that do, though it's become less acceptable in the last twenty years or so. But I'm old enough to remember when it wasn't.

Which isn't to say that I agree with every bit of your translation. I think in particular substituting "people" for "gypsum" is more than a bit weird. There are other bits I could disagree with as far as their equivalence to the original. But overall, the general level of straight-talk harshness in neither of the quotes offends me and is not the kind of thing I am condemning.

So sorry your experiment backfired. Well, no, actually, I'm not sorry at all. I just tell the truth around here. You don't have to like it.

No, you perhaps didn't understand my main article. I said there exactly what he tweeted. And I critiqued it at length. And I explicitly stated that I was not addressing whether what he said there deserved banning. But you have a major, major problem with misrepresentation.

Actually, you have a considerable problem with snarky, passive-aggressive complaints and misdirection.

So here you are, tweeting about 'Kilo', and you totally don't want to comment about whether or not his banning was justified (hint hint) but you do want to address this particular thing he said which is just wrong, wrong, wrong, and it deserves a whole lot of criticism and condemnation now. Because it's important to talk about the guy whose name isn't important, yet it is important, because everyone immediately knew who you were talking about, and that's no accident.

You know, the old yutzy game of 'Let me condemn, attack, and criticize someone, but I'm going to say it's not about them because I want to defend my hallucinations, not the actual person, their record, or what transpired'. Always a favorite.

What I asked you to imagine on your own was what the other people _did_ say in that thread and what the alt-right types *do* say, which you know perfectly well.

What I know, Lydia, is that a lot of the mean, mean, terrible, horrible things that 'alt-right sorts' say... isn't all that horrible anyway. More interesting is that you would -insist- that it's horrible (for God's sake you can't even bring yourself to say Milo's name, and I bet you'd have an aneurysm if you had to type out what he called his speaking tour) when, really, it isn't. Or at least I'd argue it isn't, and many others would argue it isn't. But that's a debate you don't want to have, so instead you try to fast-forward to 'It's TERRIBLE, and you KNOW it, let's not talk specifics'.

Alt-right language covers everything from '____servative' (completely justified, often, if fierce) to 'comparing a large black actress to Harambe' (funny, utterly un-PC, barely racist and shouldn't be regarded as horrible, especially when she's shamelessly hostile herself) to 'pseudo death threats like telling someone to go die in a fire' (foul and childish but not exactly worrying, and also not exactly alt-right) to 'nasty, obsessed sounding threats' (again, not alt-right exclusive or prominent whatsoever, absolutely condemnable, and something Milo and others get routinely.) To know whether it's rotten, we'll have to deal with the assortment.

"You said I look like Harambe!" is, dare I say it, not a big deal, and Milo is in fact right on that score. Saying "you sucked in that movie and the movie sucks too" is extremely rude. Also not a big deal.

Which, at some level, you must know is not equivalent to what I'm talking about.

No, I'm going to come right out and say it's equivalent. You don't see it as such because, well, they have it coming in your eyes. 'White working-class communities deserve to die' gets a green-light on this place, nothing worrying there. Those bastards support Trump! Mock an actress on Twitter and how DARE you, that's clearly rotten, and you can just imagine what was said.

Once again: Listen & Believe.

But either way, thanks for the clarification. This isn't about Milo (you're not talking about him, even though you are), and certainly not about justifying his banning (you said you don't want to talk about that at all, you just want to say how horrible the thing he said moments before it were). It's instead about how what was said IS a big deal and IS horrible.

What was said that was, in fact, beyond the pale? Well... just imagine.

Actually, I thought at the time when I read the Williamson article that I _did_ think rather similar things could be rightly said about the black communities.

...

So sorry your experiment backfired. Well, no, actually, I'm not sorry at all. I just tell the truth around here. You don't have to like it.

Backfired? Far from it, Lydia. It means that harsh, racially-focused condemnation of a community's failings isn't horrible or condemnable at all. Which means, in one fell swoop, you've managed to defend a whole lot of what the alt-right says yet is routinely attacked and denounced for.

Lydia McGrew... welcome to the alt-right!

Which means, in one fell swoop, you've managed to defend a whole lot of what the alt-right says yet is routinely attacked and denounced for.

I don't give a tinker's damn what other people condemn them for, which I might or might not agree with. I condemn them for what I condemn them for.


completely justified, often, if fierce

Well, thank you so much for clarifying that. Given what it means, I trust Peri will take note. Because, y'know, Crude isn't defending vile sexual-racial insult at all, no, he's defending the tactics of Ed Feser (God help us, one of the best, smartest, most analytically careful philosophers who bothers to write in the blogosphere) and some 19th-century Spanish priest who wrote against heresy.

Good grief.

Now, Crude, a note: You have a behavioral tactic which I guess works well for you but isn't, in fact, so smart: You seem to draw from a bottomless well of poor arguments, threadjacks, red herrings, bad analogies, and more. You will give, say, three of these in a comment. I will take the trouble to pick one and respond to it. You then go into a little routine where you pick one of the _others_ and, through comment after comment, harp, "What about _that_? I notice you didn't respond to _that_! When are you going to say something about _that_, huh?" As though I or anyone else has been struck dumb by the brilliance of whatever poor excuse for an argument "that" happens to be. Of course, if I respond to "that" there will always be another, and another.

Cut it out. Here, now, on this thread. I've given you plenty of oxygen. I've let you state your case and make your points. And I've responded to some of the things you've said. But my not responding to this one or that one does not license you to fill bandwidth with your, "I notice you haven't responded to _that_," over and over. It's very funny that we are told how mean we are to you, but you shamelessly, wordily, and obviously troll, even misrepresent us repeatedly, and we have never yet banned you. If we eventually do, let the record show how much rope you were given first and how many times you were told what to stop doing.

Lydia,

I don't give a tinker's damn what other people condemn them for, which I might or might not agree with.

Thankfully, I don't give a tinker's damn what you give a damn about, so we seem well-situated.

You have a behavioral tactic which I

Lydia, you're boring and predictable.

What I do is I offer criticisms, and I ask for evidence for claims. I analyze what evidence is given, I point out what claims are unsubstantiated. When it comes to you, more often than not you assert, assert, assert - but when you're asked to back up your assertions, you stamp your feet, pout, and talk about how it's all dirty, dirty pool to expect any backing-up. In this case, you've made the bizarre move of denouncing alt-right language and tweets made to Jones, but when it was pointed out that you actually haven't -given- any of these tweets - and that alt-right language constitutes a wide spectrum of things - you've fallen back on 'Listen & Believe'. Or in this case just 'Imagine & believe'.

We generally don't go through this 'again and again', because you tend to collapse the moment I point out a problem with your argument or claims. Weird, eh?

You have a shaky ability to argue and reason about these topics, a tendency to lash out and snark when you fail to make your case, and an eerie reliance on threats when that pattern is highlighted. Complaining that mean ol' Crude has once again engaged in his standard, unfair, shystery tactic of saying 'Hey Lydia, how about you actually provide evidence for some of what you're talking about'? Call it unfair if you like, but by a reasonable measure, it's fair. If it keeps upsetting you to the point where you dream of the day that you finally slam the door shut on this particular treehouse, consider: maybe the problem is your poor arguments and shaky reasoning. What're the odds, right?

but you shamelessly, wordily, and obviously troll,

The Lydia Special: insist your claim is obvious and needs no support, and that denial and a request for support is mere trolling. I've seen it with New Atheists in the past; I was impressed as much then as I am now.

Finally, regarding '____-servative' - 'racist' is vile. 'Neo-nazi' is vile. All kinds of vile things, including sexual, are thrown at the alt-right, or at any conservative who asks the wrong questions on these topics. You should know, since they were deployed like crazy against Trump-supporters and the 'alt-right' this election. It's not their fault they found a shiny, fun new word to insult people with, and did so just as 'racist' and 'misogynist' and the like were starting to lose their effectiveness.

It's funny how that... that WORD is deemed to be utterly beyond the pale, so much so that it should be censored from proper conversation, but the until recently career-ruining slurs still get fired away without pause. It's almost as if the problem isn't grievous insult, but being outgunned. Oh well - such is life.

Crude,

"These communities" is referring to places like Garbutt where economic opportunities are limited to nonexistent and Williamson has focused his rhetoric on (not sure where you get "dirty" from that quote but you were on a roll.). There is no evidence -- I repeat -- no evidence that Williamson has any sort of animus against an economically vibrant working-class town.

As Donald would say, sad!

Crude,

I'm just now going over your last few comments to Lydia and are you seriously -- after 150+ comments just now asking this:

In this case, you've made the bizarre move of denouncing alt-right language and tweets made to Jones, but when it was pointed out that you actually haven't -given- any of these tweets - and that alt-right language constitutes a wide spectrum of things - you've fallen back on 'Listen & Believe'. Or in this case just 'Imagine & believe'.

????

So you are unfamiliar with the Google search engine? Try it out. Once you come back you either will tell us that those tweets to Ms. Jones were (1) fake -- which so far no one has argued; (2) no big deal, because everyone gets them -- in which case Lydia has addressed the argument.

It's fine if ultimately you disagree about standards of decorum in discourse and their importance to maintaining personal virtue. Surprising given your Catholic background and love of Aquinas, but so be it. Nevertheless, Lydia's argument is about the importance of our speech and to repeat her OP:

Any such downplaying of vile insult is exactly the opposite of conservative. The conservative believes that ideas have consequences. (Sound familiar?) The conservative is a realist about meanings and about language. He believes that words express ideas in people's minds. So words are important, not to be brushed off lightly. Every idle word that a man shall speak he shall give account of in the day of judgement. Words have consequences because ideas have consequences.

Jeffrey S,

There is no evidence -- I repeat -- no evidence that Williamson has any sort of animus against an economically vibrant working-class town.

BZZZZT. Sorry Jeffrey. The correct answer was 'That article you keep defending.' But thanks for giving the audience a laugh with your evasions and cowardice!

But I do love the defense of 'He just meant poor white communities that are struggling! THOSE are the only ones he's heaping his scorn on, insulting and demeaning! That makes it okay!'

Tough love, ladies and gentlemen.

So you are unfamiliar with the Google search engine? Try it out.

I saw the tweets at the time, Jeffrey. I followed Milo daily, and I kept my eye on that exchange. And the tweets ran the gamut.

Maybe Lydia should 'try it out', since between the two of us, I'm the only one who's apparently read the damn things. She's relying on a trip to Mister Roger's imaginationland - and would prefer things to stay that way, lest Harambe jokes get cited.

It's fine if ultimately you disagree about standards of decorum in discourse and their importance to maintaining personal virtue. Surprising given your Catholic background and love of Aquinas, but so be it.

Sure Jeffrey. Because Aquinas was an economic free-trade booster who would cherish the values of 'Mockingly calling for the destruction of whole communities because economic decisions of a nation have sold them out in order to enrich others' and 'Falling over oneself to attack one's own allies if said allies happen to be accused of making racially (or God forbid, semitically insensitive) comments'.

Here's the newsflash, Jeffrey S. Between you and Milo, it's an open question who's the more faithful Catholic. At the moment, Milo seems to be at the least a lot more valiant and a better promoter of the faith.

For the record - anyone who wants to see the tweets this actress herself retweeted in order to 'shame' the senders can do so. Her Twitter handle is @Lesdoggg.

Now, some of those comments are racial insults. But if you're expecting them to be a stream of vicious, Hannibal Lecter-ish psychosexual threats, you're going to be disappointed.

You will, however, see a lot of comments which amount to 'You look like a gorilla'.

Milo's view is that this isn't a big deal, and that her caterwauling was much ado about little. It's made a bit more pointed since the movie she was boosting was routinely boosted by insulting its critics, something 'Lesdoggg' and company never complained about. Lydia's view is that this is the stuff of anti-conservative post-modernist betrayal and that conservatives would care very, very much indeed about these insults, as it's an embrace of Nietzchean ethics.

Yeah, I think Milo has the better view here. In fact, I'll go further - Milo's attitude of 'It's not nearly worth the freak-out you're engaging in' is the more Western, 'conservative' value. Lydia's pretending that conservatives would invest heart and soul into denunciations of taunts and insults is the view which comes a whole lot closer to those post-modernists, who - as one look at SJWs will tell you - cannot get enough of language policing, or cries of 'words matter, and that's why you have to expunge Badthink or Wrongword from your minds and dictionaries'.

Go ahead, Jeffrey. Tell me that it's the feminist screaming about pronouns and how 'words matter!' are the -real- defenders of Western civilization. You've been good with the humor so far, why stop?

Finally, regarding '____-servative' - 'racist' is vile. 'Neo-nazi' is vile. All kinds of vile things, including sexual, are thrown at the alt-right, or at any conservative who asks the wrong questions on these topics. You should know, since they were deployed like crazy against Trump-supporters and the 'alt-right' this election. It's not their fault they found a shiny, fun new word to insult people with, and did so just as 'racist' and 'misogynist' and the like were starting to lose their effectiveness.

So there we have it. An insult that means that a man has a sexual fetish that has to do with watching his wife have sex with other men is a "shiny, fun new word" and is comparable to calling someone "racist" or "neo-nazi." (Not that the latter could objectively describe actual phenomena or anything. Not that there actually are racists and neo-nazis around in the world to whom one might be referring.) Indeed, not just comparable, but less bad. The latter are describable as "vile." The former is, according to Crude, "completely justified, often, if fierce."

And it's no big deal to tell a black woman that she looks like an ape. If she complains about it (and other insults such as "c**n," "n*gg*," etc., she also claimed to have received a picture of herself with s**** on her face) she's "caterwauling," and if I complain about either of these (and others, such as the anti-semitic vileness we have received here) and about people who make a professional hobby of downplaying such things, I'm wasting valuable time which would be better spent on "accomplishments" like, I dunno, ruining the career of a conservative politician who criticizes the alt-right.

But remember, Crude is just defending the argumentative tactics of Ed Feser. Or something. Not supporting vile insult at all. Got it.

I think our differences and arguments have been fully aired on this thread, which I am now going to close.