Scrap note (#13)¶
Yes, the Baffler
piece
was comically bad. The title tells you everything you need to know
about
the level it’s pitched at. Apparently NRx is based in San Francisco
and Shanghai because it hates Asian people, but if it just read some
Rawls (and “role-played the part of the peasant”)
it could sort itself out. Nydrwracu has the most appropriate
response. Mike Anissimov takes the trouble to do a decent
review. Klint Finley’s brief
remarks
about it are far better than the piece itself. Crude stereotypes
triumph again: “The Baffler Foundation Inc., P.O. Box 390049,
Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139 USA.”
The sociological construction of neoreaction was incompetent, but interestingly so. Entirely techno-commercialist in orientation, with an emphasis upon Silicon Valley, it was extended to include Justine Tunney, Balaji Srinivasan, Patri Friedman, and Peter Thiel. The picture is ~~paints~~ daubs of an American tech elite peeling off into neoreaction isn’t very convincing, but it’s certainly extraordinarily attractive.
***
It’s probably worth being explicit about the fact that for the techno-commercial strain of NRx, the model of action is what advanced tech companies do. The cry for ‘action’ is always going up in our dark little community, with the implication that the only alternative to some kind of putsch preparation is tweeting about metaphysics. Actually, the alternative to politicking is making stuff, or — secondarily — running ideological interference on behalf of those who are able to make stuff.
The practical problems of polycentric governance are rapidly becoming inextricable from emerging technology — blockchain cryptosystems most prominently. The idea that the cutting edge of effective action is going to be found outside the sphere of technological innovation is already clearly untenable. Any kind of ‘social action’ that doesn’t contribute quite directly to the creation of autonomizing machinery needs to be firmly discouraged, since it’s almost certainly inhibitory in effect. (“Quite directly” means within two or three intelligible steps, at most.)
The principal (positive) role of non-technological intellectuals is to keep intellectuals out of power. The principal (positive) role of mobs is to engage in as little action as possible. If you’re not Satoshi Nakamoto, the simple reality of the situation is that — in the great scheme of things — you don’t matter very much, nor should you. (And the less like Satoshi Nakamoto you are, the less you matter.)
***
This new blog is working hard to raise the level of discussion. The fact that it’s still so hard to tell where it’s heading is a strong point in its favor.
***
***
Evola is beginning to scare people. Perhaps someone who knows their way around this material could help to clear up one source of confusion: Isn’t Evola’s historical fatalism the exact opposite of a ‘call to action’? How, then, has the Evolan strain of NRx become so tightly associated with activist exhortation?
ADDED: More criticism from communists. (NRx as Silicon Valley’s “cadre of aspiring thought-Führers … working on new theories of racist Social Darwinism, bolstered by the fashion for Malthusianism among the superrich”.) It would be helpful if they could get their class war going, since it would speed the rush to the exits, but I somehow doubt they’re capable of it.
ADDED: Corey “I don’t like comments” Pein posts some responses to his piece (o.s.).
ADDED: The best ‘critique’ yet.