The Criminalization Of The Survival Instinct

     Yes, Gentle Reader, it’s really happening.

     I wrote very recently about the reaction, among American whites, to the violence and disruptions issuing from among American blacks (with a few profit-minded whites included for seasoning). Today, Ol’ Remus adds some thoughts of his own:

     Riots—arson, assault, looting—aren't demonstrations, they're not a legitimate part of "the marketplace of ideas", even when they're federally funded and sanctioned by municipalities. If Black Lives Matter believes otherwise, especially if they're dumb enough to take it outside their own 'hood, they invite a return to former times when invasive violence was answered in kind, to general applause from the citizenry. Martin King advised the hot heads among his followers to think about the real meaning of the word "minority."...

     Things aren't likely to remain as they are, nor is there any obvious way for it to get better, partly because there's no honest conversation. After decades of lavish appeasement, BLM and the like, their federal sponsors and the media have come to believe it's their right and duty to set bounds on what we can say. You'll notice they're surprised and disappointed we talk among ourselves without their supervision, it's possible we may take our own side.

     There's nothing in any of this for sincere people of good will. The opportunity for live and let live has come and gone. Stay away from crowds.

     Concise and to the point. Yet there’s more to say, for the “Black Lives Matter” obscenity and the associated rampages are part of a wider phenomenon. So, indeed, is the reaction to them, which has acquired a name certain persons are straining to vilify: the “Alt-Right.”

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     Every totalitarian movement needs a chimera to rail against. The Nazis of the Thirties employed the Jews. The Communists of Lenin’s time exploited the “capitalists” and the kulaks. Mao’s Communists condemned “class enemies,” a handily flexible category. Hillary Clinton, today’s most prominent totalitarian in a Democrat’s clothing, has chosen hers: the “Alt-Right.”

     Of course, such chimeras are almost never real forces organized or aimed as their detractors proclaim. They’re mostly loose categories of persons following their personal interests as best they can. They might agree upon certain things. They might share a religious faith. What they don’t have is a common vision of “the enemy.” No, not even the “Alt-Right,” though that category does share certain convictions about what’s gone (and is still going) wrong with American society and its political system.

     Theodore “Vox Day” Beale has produced an “Alt-Right” manifesto of sorts. However, not everyone who likes the label agrees. For example, Brett Stevens has produced his own summation of what he thinks the Alt-Right is or should be. There are others attempting to define the term to their liking. Each adds his own flavor to the icing.

     In my opinion, all of these attempts miss the essence of the thing. And so – as you, perspicacious Gentle Reader, no doubt have already guessed – here I am to offer my own thoughts.

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     The “traditional” political spectrum of Left versus Right has taken some body blows these past few years. The contrast between JFK liberals and contemporary left-liberals is quite stark; that between Reagan conservatives and those who call themselves conservatives today is even starker. A principal difference, which tends to color every more specific difference each contrast reveals, is the change in attitude toward the other side:

• Whereas JFK liberals were agreed that America is worthy of both celebration and defense, contemporary left-liberals tend to castigate, if not condemn, the very country they seek to govern.
• Whereas Reagan conservatives were stoutly opposed to the expansion of the federal government – indeed, were committed in principle to rolling it back – contemporary conservatives content themselves with merely slowing the expansion of federal power.

     The transitions involved were not simultaneous. The Left began its journey during the Johnson Administration. The Right’s metamorphosis commenced with the failure of Reagan’s Congresses to cooperate with any of his aims other than the two tax-rate-reduction bills and the reinvigoration of America’s military. In both cases, the changes began “at the top:” among the strategists and kingmakers in the Democrat and Republican parties. The effects “trickled down” to well regarded opinion leaders on both sides, who dutifully promulgated the new gospels, which then permeated officeholders in their respective parties.

     In short, as the Left pressed for total power over all things, the Right committed itself to a rearguard action, accepting the Left’s advances as “inevitable.” This did not meet with the approval of ordinary citizens of conservative bent, who felt their well-being – in some cases, their survival – was at stake. They felt they were being betrayed by the very people to whom they’d given their money and votes.

     They were right to feel betrayed. It would take some time for the enormity of that betrayal to become visible.

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     The survival instinct, once triggered, supersedes all other impulses and interests. We’re hard-wired that way, incapable of acting otherwise. When it’s triggered by the sense of an enemy approaching, the response is either to fight or to flee. I submit that this is the characteristic that, however divergent their policy preferences might be, unites the Alt-Right in our time:

     Some Alt-Rightists are inclined to fortify personal, familial, or community redoubts against the enemies they most fear. This is a form of “fleeing in place,” which recognizes that the world beyond America’s shores is just as deep in the mire, if not even deeper. Such persons are often called “preppers.” Not all those who style them such are benevolently disposed toward them.

     Other Alt-Rightists are girding for battle, whether political or explicit. The politically inclined are seeking champions outside the Republican mainstream, for obvious reasons. Those who feel that it must come to bloodshed are sharpening their weapons skills, stocking up on arms and ammo, and in some cases collaborating on community preparations for what they believe must eventually arrive. That they don’t all prioritize the same enemies or fear them to the same degree is of little importance.

     The commonality of Alt-Rightists in their sense of a looming threat, whether to their prosperity, to the freedoms they cherish, or to their very lives, utterly dwarfs any specific differences in policy or orientation among them. Some are religious, but others are not. Some are white, but others are not. Some support the presidential candidacy of Donald Trump, but others do not. Some are heterosexual, but as Milo Yiannopoulos makes clear, others are not. Nor do the differences end there.

     Those differences are of no real importance to Hillary Rodham Clinton or her lust for power. She needs a chimera with which to terrify and mobilize her supporters, and she’s chosen the Alt-Right for the role.

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     If I may coin a word to describe the key commonality among the Alt-Right, it would be antiarchonic: i.e., they are opposed to the ruling class of our time and place, regardless of the labels worn by specific persons. That’s entirely consistent with their common sense of betrayal by their nominal representatives within that class, and with the sense of threat they share. Those who seek to displace the ruling class and install another frequently draw the amused sarcasm of those who maintain that “the system is the real enemy.” Nevertheless, their animosity toward those who purport to “govern” us is common and deeply felt.

     Now, please remember that this is all one man’s opinion. I sometimes see myself as a part of this very diffuse movement, but at other times, with regard to specific persons who claim to speak for it, I draw back in dismay. The current of anti-Semitism I condemned here disturbs me greatly. That’s an error Americans should know better than to repeat. Similarly, contemplating the possibility of the sort of racial pogrom I depicted fictionally makes me shudder. What I find meritorious is good Americans’ willingness to recognize that they’re seriously threatened by their ruling elite, and their consequent willingness to take some sort of stance from which to battle it. You cannot defeat an enemy you refuse to identify.

     By adopting the Alt-Right as the bug-bear with which to animate her followers, Hillary Clinton has implied a willingness to criminalize the survival instinct of those Americans. That follows from the tacit endorsement she and her supporters have given to the demands and tactics of groups such as Black Lives Matter, Occupy, the gender-war feminists, and the enviro-fascist activists. Recognition of her posture will harden the opposition she has called “Alt-Right” into something more coherent – something unified around a single aim.

     There may yet be time for it to rise in wrath and effect her downfall. Stay tuned.