Reflections on the centrality of race; why people think I’m closed-minded; and other issues

VFR’s Swedish conservative reader had some thoughts which I hesitated posting because of his compliments to me. But when someone “gets” so clearly what I’m trying to do at VFR, it ought to be shared with readers.

Mr. Particular Swede to LA:

I just wanted to write a short message and say “Hi,” hope your are doing fine, how I appreciate your site, and that I have much in store once I find the time to write you more again. E.g. I think most of your philosophical conclusions are valid beyond traditionalist conservatism. They are simply true. And as I come from a somewhat different position, and still agree with most of what you say, that’s an example of evidence for that. The important lesson is that liberalism is false.

Keep up the good fight. I’m amazed by your achievements.

Trying to analyse why, I would say that:

* Number one is the topics that you choose to bring up for discussion. Already that selection is distinctively different from other sites, e.g. how you put the focus on the imposition of white guilt in the prevailing paradigm. An issue I wouldn’t myself have chosen to put so much focus on, so you have helped me in opening my eyes here.

* Number two is your analysis and philosophical conclusions around these issues, e.g. how white guilt has to be reversed, and how the only way to do so is to put the focus on white racialism, to win back white pride at least to the level of other races. It’s possible to conclude analytically that this is the minimum requirement, or the destruction will continue. You have demonstrated that any serious thinker in grand social theory will need to address this.

* Number three is your stance and political position, which is Larry Auster’s traditional conservatism, and more concretely for my example issue, Larry Auster’s position on white racialism. And here I will every now and then disagree with you (and even more with some of the VFR readers), not being metaphysically a believer in the Christian God, not being an American, and just for being stubbornly me. But these are very inspiring debates.

* Number four is for being one of the most open-minded persons I know. There are certain things that I have only been able to explain and discuss with you, that other people just cannot take in. I think most people will miss the fact that you are very open- minded, Larry.

LA:

Thank you very much for this, especially for this:

> Number two is your analysis and philosophical conclusions around these issues, e.g. how white guilt has to be reversed, and how the only way to do so is to put the focus on white racialism, to win back white pride at least to the level of other races. It’s possible to analytically conclude that this is the minimum requirement, or the destruction will continue. You have demonstrated that any serious thinker in grand social theory will need to address this.

My thoughts on this go back a long ways. In my speech at the 1994 American Renaissance conference, I laid out a series of propositions about the importance of race and the role it plays in multiculturalism and the war against white America, and concluded:

At bottom, all we are doing is making an appeal to justice. The injustice and unacceptability of the current [racial] double standard will become obvious to any person of good will once it is pointed out. And that is why the principles I’ve described need to be at the center of an anti-multiculturalist, pro-Western civilization politics in this country. In my view, given current demographic realities, any conservative politics that lacks these principles cannot be a serious politics.

Also thank you for seeing that I am not (or at least not always) the uptight, thin-skinned person who cannot handle disagreement, which people have sometimes accused me of being. :-)

Mr. Particular Swede:

Yes, the injustice and double standard issues regarding white race has to be resolved. There’s no way around it.

> Also thank you for seeing that I am not (or at least not always) the uptight, thin-skinned person who cannot handle disagreement, which people have sometimes accused me of being. :-)

This is a complex issue including, among other things, how we react emotionally when under intensive attack. But an important side of it, I think, is the following. You demand a high intellectual standard of the people you debate with. Intellectual sanity checks, such as using a language free from inner contradictions and ambiguities, such as excluding things that are demonstrably false. But most opponents get stuck with you on this level, since their minds are bewildered by the prevailing paradigm of liberalism. Then they will perceive your resistance as a wall. They will not perceive your mind as narrow; since there is not a crack in that wall, they will see your mind as closed.

Another side of it is how you bite onto an issue like a ferret/pit-bull/leech (pick an animal of your choice), to take it to its very conclusion.

But none of that contradicts my assessment of you as very open- minded. On the contrary, these are qualities of yours that take you to new places, and new insights, where others have not been before. And you wouldn’t have ended up as a traditionalist, hadn’t you been a searcher.

Regarding your exchange (confrontation) with Spencer, I found it interesting, since myself I could have been either Auster or Spencer in that exchange. It reminds my of our disagreements about the VFR manifesto, when I took a Spencerish position. So to me it’s clear that you are not the problematic guy in such an exchange. (Even though it is of course possible to complain about certain things you wrote. But once again, it has to be taken into account that we are humans and how we react emotionally when under intensive attack. And I take that in account when I assess Spencer too!).

I separate between life, politics and rhetoric. Privately I pretty much have a liberal life-style, I guess. But to me a fundamental truth in politics is the proposition of Machiavelli, that what is a virtue in private life is, most of the times, a vice in politics. E.g. generosity, which becomes a vice for a politician since it will be other people’s money that he will be spending. So it’s clear to me, that if I want to continue privately with a liberal life-style, then I need to live in a society where the politicians many times act in the opposite way (protecting the nation, the white race, etc.).

Finally, in rhetoric, there are two basic strategies: following the tide, or trying to change the tide. When you and I discussed the secularist anti-Islamist manifesto and the VFR draft manifesto, at that point, I believed more in following the tide, on other issues except for the opposition to Islam (a Spencerish approach). In 99 percent of the cases following the tide is the feasible rhetorical approach. Generally, it would take a Hercules or a Moses to change the direction of the water, so that’s a pretty bold strategy. But there has come so much new turbulence in the water the last few months—such as Hirsi Ali’s demand to ban Vlaams Belang, and the madman position of Bush and the Senate on the immigration bill—that such a Spencerish approach already looks outdated. And the day has broken for a bold Austerish approach. Which is not as bold anymore, but becoming more and more normality. The tide is changing! Even in Sweden the tide is changing. The Sweden Democrats (comparable to BNP) got 12 percent in a youth poll, and 7 percent in a overall poll, recently. And the media already treat them differently. They will surely enter the parliament this year!

Posted by Lawrence Auster at June 14, 2006 01:32 PM | Send