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Notes -
The Two Towers
It is trivial, with the current "very online right" and with the benefit of a (relatively recent) era that didn’t require "diversity", to impose a reactionary reading on the movie trilogy the Lord of the Rings. Having just finished watching the (otherwise pedestrian, at least in relation to the sublime Fellowship of the Ring) Two Towers, the analogies are almost too on the nose. We have a technocratic leader ("a mind of metal and wheels") who leads a rabid horde of third-worlders in a takeover of a 100% white, peaceful, free nation. In the books, the technocratic leader’s "new" cloak is literally rainbow hued. The free nation just wants to be left alone, but is eventually forced into battle. The leaders pine for a simpler, easier time; where valor, honor, and renown were attainable.
Of course, so do all who live to see such times. The folk in the old tales had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn’t. One of Tolkien’s motifs is how easy evil is to defeat: all good has to do is stand up to it. The Ents think that they go to their doom, before utterly decimating Isengard. The Hobbits cower initially during the scouring of the Shire, then win an almost trivial victory. One of my favorite lines from the book is when Theoden decides to go into battle himself, at which Aragorn proclaims, "Then even the defeat of Rohan will be glorious in song!". This is echoed in the movie during the "Forth Eorlingas" last charge. Yet the only thing in the Lord of the Rings that risks genuine defeat is passivity. Ultimately, Theoden’s death in Return of the King is one through which he does win lasting glory: the great Witch king is forever destroyed. Not only will he have no shame in the halls of his fathers, he has a prominent position in their company.
My grandfather served in WWII but never fought. If it wasn’t for the dropping of the Atom bombs in Japan, he would have been in the invading ground force. Given the casualty estimates of a ground invasion, there is a solid chance that his 5 children, his 20+ grandchildren, and his 40+ great-grandchildren would never have been born. He felt some pride in his service, but also regret and shame. Others fought and died. He didn’t.
Two generations removed from WWII, the very thought of storming Iwo Jima or Normandy is unthinkable; both at the national level as well as the individual level. Watch Saving Private Ryan and try to imagine yourself in that scene. My grandfather felt shame, but I can’t even muster that emotion. When I imagine myself in those boats approaching the beach, the only emotion I feel is terror. I am a product of my time, where even the "good" guys lack ambition and will. The world’s richest man trolls on X. The world’s most powerful man trolls on Truth Social.
Another great movie, the Dark Knight, features the iconic (and ironic) line "You either die a hero, or live long enough to see yourself become the villain". As I stare at the beige walls of my cubicle, were that those were my options! We live in an age where everything is flattened. There is great evil but without an obvious source. There are many who live upright lives, but without valor or victory. Our present evil is the insidious slow drip of poison that seeps into us through our surrounding milieu.
The great project of the "online right" is to identify this evil, to name it, and to then fight it. Yet this evil remains amorphous and elusive. Each "influencer" thinks they have the "correct" answer. These answers are typically mutually contradictory. In the face of this hydra, some have returned to recommending the basics: reproduce, guard your family, stay in shape, weather the storm. This is sound advice. But as long as the evil permeates are society, our children and our spouses risk defecting. The halls of power rot even as their power becomes more entrenched, threatening lives and livelihood. What can men do against such reckless hate? The one option that is certainly not available to us moderns is to ride out and meet it.
Needs more continental philosophy.
Joseph de Maistre wrote 'La contre-revolucion n'est pas une revolucion contraire, mais sur le contraire de la revolucion'. An important line, but incomplete by itself- de Maistre left his philosophy on reacting to the French revolution incomplete, because the reactionary impulse, by itself, is simply a leg of a Hegelian dialectic which will synthesize into a less extreme version of the revolution. Which is exactly what happened in France.
By itself, opposition to revolution is merely driving the speed limit. What is needed is a paradigm shift to escape the revolutionary paradigm. And central planning does not have a good historical record for constructing a paradigm.
I notice you talking about guarding your family and weathering the storm. What you don't talk about is forming a community with likeminded families. You must network, man is a social animal. Your children will defect if they don't have friends. They will defect if your subculture does not offer a pathway to becoming an adult. You need other families for this. And out of that group a paradigm will arise organically, a very similar paradigm to the pre-revolution, but not exactly the same because it's a different world. And a different paradigm will naturally tend to form independent institutions, which grow slowly, over generations, until you eat the revolution itself.
I can speak French, I live in Quebec, I am used to people randomly switching languages in mid-conversation, and even I think using a French quote untranslated while speaking English is pretentious.
As if the rest of that comment isn’t?
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