The recent reorganization under Hestia Society was less sudden than it seems. The sudden bit which I didn’t know anything about until it actually happened was the shift made by the volunteer staff at More Right, along with the closer cooperation under the Hestia umbrella organization.

It’s been the product of a couple years of social jostling, getting to know people in person, attempts to quell open drama, and work behind the scenes to create formal organizations to coordinate our efforts better and to socialize profitably.

Most people are passive. They don’t tend to understand all the informal and formal work that has to go into making it possible for a bunch of strangers, most of whom have never met or worked together before, from different backgrounds, in different parts of the world, to cohere into a functional institution (or in our case, some affiliated proto-institutions). People tend to expect the benefits of new institutions without putting in much of the work that goes into organizing them.

For a long time, people in the ‘peanut gallery’ have asked us to go get organized and get our moon base together — and have been carping that it didn’t happen in an hour. This gets  mirrored by the complaining that the various high-grade people who got this whole ball rolling, many of whom are high earners outside the unpaid blogosphere, don’t donate their effortful time (sometimes worth $100s, $1,000s, or more per hour) to various ungrateful blog readers and commenters in return for nothing.

When everyone started taking the first steps last year, it wasn’t really feasible to do this, because people just didn’t know each other well enough, opinion hadn’t gelled sufficiently. Most of us were communicating on public channels, often generating more noise than communication.

There were several abortive attempts to create private channels for communication. It took a bunch of false starts before people started using the things consistently and actually coordinating on projects. And we’re still a lot worse at that than an ordinary for-profit company would be.

Trust takes time to develop, in part because it’s based on people building a reputation and a track record for behavior. There’s no shortcut around that.

What happens when you build up a large crowd of contributors who are disorganized is that the work environment comes to resemble an open plan office, but worse. The chatter increases the cost of coordination, making it so that the only way for anyone to get anything done is to put on the noise cancelling headphones and work in solitude.

Now that we have the beginnings of some more formal organization in place, the noisy drama should be reduced. That formal organization couldn’t exist without a quorum, and it took some time to accumulate that stable number of people. At least within that smaller group, our communication costs are low enough to actually get some things done.

As far as what I do, very little is changing. I now have an editorial role at Social Matter, and we’re going to continue to improve it as a publication. In particular, I’d like to do better at soliciting submissions on certain topics. We’re also doing better at raising and managing funds — to start, internally, and later, through other operations. At the very least, I’d like to encourage just about every project that we put together to be materially self-sustaining without demanding self-sacrifice from all the contributors involved, without creating too much of a racket.

The other plus is that, because we now have a sort of virtual back office, it’s becoming less necessary for people to be effective hacks to be useful to our general intellectual and political goals. Most people don’t want to be hacks or to have to address the public. It’s easy to get over your head when serving in a public role. Further, getting out in front of people paints a target on your back. Most people don’t like being pelted by things by the mob — nor should everyone have to do that in order to be useful.

That’s about all there is to say at this point. Over the past year, a lot of the writing going on in our space could have been intended for a smaller, more internal audience. Now that those various private speaking clubs have been put together, more of what makes its way to the general public will be more polished and organized.

Brett published a better piece today about what he calls the ‘crisis of neoreaction,’ which has been bubbling up in my comment section, in e-mails, and all around.

From the article:

People on an individual level respond more energetically to pleasant visions with an emotion (not factual) basis. Ideas like equality, freedom and pacifism appeal to all of us because they abrogate the struggle of life, which is Darwinism itself: the struggle to adapt. When civilization is founded, adaptation switches from reality to civilization itself, and with that, decay begins.

This does not mean that civilization is bad, but that it must be aware of these problems, much like we still use fire and internal combustion engines despite the possible dangers associated with them.

Liberalism succeeds because it creates fanaticism. The thought of what “should be” swells people with a sense of purpose, which appeals to the vast majority of humans who are — since we are speaking frankly — evolutionarily unfit for anything but subsistence living. Left to their own devices, they ferment the potatoes and eat the seed corn, then exist in perpetual alternation between apathy and starvation. Never forget our glorious simian heritage and the fact that most humans want to return to that state if they can.

The right has no such fanaticism. Its members merely want to adapt to reality and set up the best society they possibly can. This goal does not break down into issues, talking points or ideology. It is a gut-level instinct that incorporates as well the highest function of the brain, which is integrating and synthesizing many issues into a big picture.

Liberalism denies the big picture by replacing it with ideology and attacks the conservative majority on “issues” by looking for exceptions which are presumed to invalidate rules. The ultimate goal of liberalism is to abolish all social standards so that the individual is unconstrained by any accountability, and yet can still enjoy the benefits of civilization. It fails because liberals do not understand time and how over time, society changes with liberal alterations and what is left offers few of the benefits of civilization.

Conservatives create 18th century Europe; liberals create 2015 Brazil.

The left grew exponentially after 1789 despite constantly creating disasters, the two biggest of which are the Napoleonic era and the Bolshevik revolution. Where prosperous societies once stood, third world ruins remained. France went from being a superpower to a nobody and quickly fell into radical social decay, prompting in part the first world war. German intervention in WWII saved much of their society from utter confusion, if nothing else by giving them an enemy.

But as Evola observed, all of us in the post-war period are men among the ruins, because with WWII liberalism achieved its final victory over conservatism. In Europe, states became what we might call 60% liberal, in contrast to the 100% liberal of pure Communism in the Soviet Union. The United States, hovering at 50%, shot upward such that in the present day it hovers in the 90s somewhere.

Neoreaction rejects not only liberalism as politics but its social effects, comprised of the twin dragon-heads of Cultural Marxism and mass culture, as well. Where conservatism has traditionally tried to hold on to power, Neoreaction remains fond of the idea of “exit,” which originates in its post-libertarian theoretical roots.

and

This leads to two suggestions: first, Neoreaction needs a goal, and second, it needs to start making hard decisions about what is relevant. Too many bloggers trying to differentiate themselves will come up with “unique” theories as a means of advertising themselves, and will create a fragmented philosophy that rapidly becomes internally inconsistent. This will attract opportunists, who will use the “radical” image of Neoreaction to pose and self-advertise — think of flowers offering up bright colors to bees, or the sexual display inherent in the plumage of tropical birds — while doing absolutely nothing.

Like a liberal society, Neoreaction will accumulate dependents because they make Neoreactionary writers famous.

To counter this, Neoreactionaries can regain control of their movement by keeping it on topic. This is a cultural rather than governmental approach, which means the best people must begin to take unpopular stances and exclude those who do not understand them. This includes telling many bloggers that their endless theorizing is calcification and decay rather than innovation.

I don’t mind most of the criticism, and think it’s generally correct. It’s what other people agitate me to do regularly, even when I’m short capacity to achieve most of those things.

I’ve generally not tried to portray myself as some sort of original thinker. Any original thought that comes out of me has happened by unintended consequence or some chance unique observation.

The part that I do mind is the bit about fame, which is an unavoidable byproduct of actually organizing people to achieve certain goals. Jesus had his apostles, followers, and divine powers, but the rest of us who are less holy than Jesus must use time, money, material, power, and energy to achieve our political ends.

Popularity and admiration are natural byproducts of success. It’s generally good to downplay them and shed the byproducts when it’s feasible, but such behaviors can’t be eliminated entirely.

You can’t succeed and also remain obscure. You cannot be a leader without followers. The fame ought not to be an end within itself, but a means to achieve a given end. Managing fame is a high cost activity (the cost actually starts at around $3-5,000 a month at the low end), and most people can’t and don’t want to handle the annoyance that comes with it. It’s a luxury habit, like a heroin addiction, unless it’s used as a means to a profitable end.

What I haven’t articulated directly is that some of Brett’s criticism to me seems to be that we ought to have divine powers, like Jesus, which would prevent us from having to get our hands dirty with the whole money and manipulation business, because sheer purity and disinterested practicality would carry the day. This may be my resentful misinterpretation of his criticism, but it’s my instinctive reaction nonetheless.

Although I respect Brett and have enjoyed his work, much like Moldbug, my thinking is deeply rooted in the works of the Austrian economists. The tension there should be predictable, because Ludwig von Mises made no effort to conceal his admiration for the revolutionaries of 1789. He’s called the ‘last knight of liberalism’ for a reason. And libertarianism is the Monty Python parody of the knights of liberalism’s broken round table.

This tension and near contradiction is also present in Moldbug’s work, which is what brought me from my former outlook to my current one. Brett is generally skeptical of capitalism as a means of organizing people, and tends to have a more of a mystic’s attitude towards what moves the human creature. I can appreciate it from an aesthetic point of view, even a symbolic one, without completely buying it from a practical perspective.

Brett writes:

Neoreaction can influence both libertarians and Tea Party style conservatives (70%) into adopting many of the Neoreactionary ideas as part of their own outlook.

…which is a perfectly fine goal; one I’m willing to compromise and cooperate on. It’s one we’ve made a fair amount of positive progress on, indeed on a shoestring budget, with no money at all, really, just gumption, effort, and magic persuasion powers.

It’s just a whole lot easier to achieve that goal without a lot of odd mystical hang-ups about the use of money and the art of politics. Having no magic powers, not being mythical aristocrats from outer space or the center of the earth, we must make do with the tangible tools at our disposal.

Alas, I only have blue eyes, but no blond hair. And when looking for practical advice on the use of power, my favored Italian adviser is Machiavelli, rather than the others.

This is not the first episode of this sort of disagreement, between the mystics who believe in magic, and the more mundane types who don’t. Jim already addressed it in greater detail, to a different article.

Hoping that the state will whither away or become obsolete is a hope shared by the communists and the more radical libertarians who, like Hoppe, logically deduce that there is only one moral form of government, which is anarcho-capitalism, so perhaps this confusion and conflation between the New Right and Neoreaction, to the extent that either are coherent concepts, was baked in from the beginning.

The other tension is between the continentals and the ocean-goers, which is setting up to be the next World War. The continentals have a certain outlook and desire that isn’t shared by the ‘Atlanticists.’ America’s unique geography makes it so that tension is also internal, with the conflict between the decadent coastal culture and the sick, besieged culture of the interior.

Without getting too obscure and intellectual, this conflict is healthy, normal, inevitable, and transcends ideological questions of left and right. It’s a practical question of statecraft which isn’t globally applicable.

It’s also a little odd for ‘traditionalists’ of a certain tradition which claims to be an ur-tradition to speak as if their tradition is universal, and then to berate rival traditions as being false rather than particular to a certain culture and geography.

So, for example, I get along much better with American and English traditionalists. Because that’s my background and ancestry. I can’t pretend to be a Spanish traditionalist, a Russian, or a German, because my roots aren’t there. Pretending otherwise would be pretentious and false.

When I went along the ‘sick journey’ with Moldbug, I assumed that I was also leaving behind my fantasy, which was fervently held, that the state and aggression could be done away with. The modern, popular nation-state is on the way out. That much is becoming obvious even in mainstream elite political thought. What will replace it will be either civilization lead by natural elites, or it’ll be barbarism.

I also generally agree with Brett’s criticism of the fantasy of ‘exit’ — I’ve modified some of my views in that area. He also describes the roots of the champagne socialist phenomenon quite well.

For that matter, it’s a good jumping off point for me to reiterate the goal that I made up for this website for this year: to investigate the passing of the grand tradition of higher education and to make some progress towards restoring it in a practical way for the people who read this. It’s also always been my approach to focus on the natural elites, and to disdain the others.

That means that I’m mostly looking to appeal to professionals, doctors, lawyers, and the occasional disaffected right-wing academic, small business person, engineer, and investor. I also especially want to get to know and appeal to parents of large families who are right-wing. I generally don’t care about young people or derelicts unless they’re ambitious, at least trying sincerely to be morally upright, and on the make.

Making direct appeals to the natural followers is pointless for this sort of cultural project.

I’ve never really tried to conceal that — rather the opposite — but it bears some restating in a way that can’t be misinterpreted.

Kantbot is a smart guy with a bad attitude, but he wrote a good post today. I can tolerate a fair amount of sass and bad behavior from a person when they’re contributing, but that doesn’t mean that I endorse some of the snarky, Gawkerish behavior which he’s become known for.

Here’s an excerpt which I’ll respond to:

Retention of talent in Neoreaction is a serious problem. There has been a great deal of controversy recently over people like Hurlock and Bryce leaving. Beyond people directly leaving however there is also the (perhaps more serious) problem of Neoreactionary exhaustion. Many bloggers and contributors to Neoreaction stop producing content and material the longer they engage with culture. This is a serious downfall of Neoreactionary culture. Neoreaction must produce, and must reward production, both in terms of volume and quality of content created. If bloggers feel as if their writing isn’t having the sort impact or recognition that they would like, they become disincentivized to produce.

People enter into Neoreaction because they want to be recognized, because they want to have their writings and ideas disseminated and because they want to advance their own personal careers and brands. In my experience though Neoreaction is deeply opposed to allowing people to do this.

Culture is important, from a functional perspective, and right now, the state of Neoreactionary culture is quite dire. If anything this is problem the single most important issue the community should be working on right now and as I consider the issue more I’ll try to share my thoughts and analysis whenever possible in hopes of solving this problem.

This made me think of the children’s fable of the hen who prepares a bunch of food, asking all the other animals for help.  All the other animals refuse except for a couple. Eventually, they’re all hungry, but only the hen  and her helpers put in the effort to make anything. Only the hen and the few animals who helped get to eat, later on.

The moral of the story is if “any would not work, neither should he eat.”

This ought to be in the thoughts of people who prefer to lounge in the peanut gallery, yukking it up, while other people are working.

Anyway, most people who get into writing about politics and social issues tend not to realize how low the demand is for this sort of writing. The problems that most people have tend to have nothing at all to do with political theory. Most of the demand for political theory instruction is quite well-absorbed by the university system. It’s easy to get any student to shell out hundreds of dollars for ponderous textbooks which he’s not likely to even read, not to mention thousands of dollars per credit-hour in tuition.

It’s much more difficult to create demand for independent works of theory and opinion from scratch.

Just as an illustration of this point, the biggest seller by units (not revenue) on this site so far has been Mangan’s fat loss book. Losing weight is a real problem people have. Lack of a better political theory is not a burning problem that most people have. Jelly-bellies are a bigger problem for most people than a better critique of the zeitgeist.

That doesn’t mean that it’s not important. It’s just that it’s a bit tougher to make it immediately economically viable.

Someone like Athol Kay has become good at solving problems for people. Others who are more focused on abstract thought are not particularly solving many problems. Neoreaction tends towards abstraction and higher level thought, which means that it’s an expensive pursuit with low immediate returns and limited appeal.

Whenever I get around to publishing my first book, it will probably return less in revenue than a short project would, while absorbing far, far more hours in labor. Which is entirely alright, because my ambitions for this aren’t primarily financial, and I’m willing to invest the effort because I hope that it will generate far greater non-monetary results. Part of my motivation is that this site is good practice, in that it gives me a space where I can try things out on my own dime doing something that I already enjoy doing.

That doesn’t change the fact that I could earn more per hour doing almost anything, including dancing around waving a sign on a street corner for a hot dog shop or panhandling, much less my day job.

People who jump into this sort of thing expecting to be able to replace a primary income immediately, even for a basic job like being a truck driver, are mistaken. The stereotype about philosophizing being a road to pauper-hood is a stereotype because it’s mostly true. It also takes a lot of sustained effort, perhaps an insane amount, and most people are not dedicated and aggressive enough to keep that alive for the years that it requires.

The biggest difficulty in working on the cultural fringes is the crab bucket mentality, which is common on the fringes of neoreaction, but is really a sort of basic human behavior that requires a lot of moral instruction to counteract, having its roots in the sin of envy.

No one owes you recognition or attention or fame or anything for your effort. Most people in the peanut gallery have absolutely no idea how logistically complicated it is to keep large numbers of people coordinated and focused on achieving a task. It requires money, trust, leadership, and a shared sense of purpose. Logistics aren’t an afterthought — they’re close to the only thing that really matters, much to the consternation of all the dreamers of the world who think that the naked idea will carry the day by itself.

So it is good to see some positive discussion of cultural logistics in a way that isn’t whining about why pure magical good intentions, in which everyone holds hands and giggles about how intellectually pristine and uncontaminated by personal interest they are, aren’t getting anything done.

The other thing is that most writers have a lot more trouble handling success than handling failure. Yes, people will go after you personally when you become more prominent. Friends will stab you in the back. Your opponents will raise lynch mobs against you. Critics will piss on your face. Who cares? That’s just part of the job description, and the real reason why it’s competitively difficult. But that’s at least better than obscurity.

For what it’s worth, I think that ‘we,’ to the extent that there even is a ‘we,’ are better at that than most. In particular, I would caution people against seeking love from an audience. Always better to be respected, even better to be feared, still better to be both respected and feared. Love is for private relations. To tie your sense of satisfaction to the love you believe you receive from the crowd is to tie your heart to a cement block that can be kicked off a pier into a deep pool at any second, because the crowd is even more fickle about you and your work than they are about their favored brand of toothpaste.