Where we are and what we are to do

Kristor expands his recent comment at VFR into an essay at Orthosphere on what is to be done now. He says we should join and build up communities of traditionalists. He frankly admits that we are on unknown ground and have to feel our way forward.

This was why I got a bit impatient the other day with a commenter who said he wanted to know what institutions I was advocating for the building up of a new society. I said, how am I to know that? We are in terra incognita. All this has to be figured out.

There are, however, a few things of which I am certain:

• The American nation as it has existed since 1776 or 1789 is definitively dead and is not coming back.

• The political society and government known as the United States of America (hereinafter the “USA”), which was founded as the political expression of the American nation (a.k.a. white conservatives) has mutated over the last half-century into a leftist, alien entity that has displaced and effectively killed the American nation and is set on destroying any still-living remnants of it.

• Those who identify with the former American nation and still want to be part of an American nation must separate themselves from the leftist USA and create new communities and new political expressions suitable for Americans. Until such communities are created, the separation can only be mental and spiritual. But that is the necessary starting point.

• American separatists must declare, and clearly state the reasons for, our utter rejection of the leftist USA regime. We must show why we think it is beyond reform. This doesn’t mean of course just the Obama presidency but the entire liberal system of beliefs and institutions of which the Obama presidency is the culmination. It is only through the utter rejection of the existing political society that a new political society, based on different principles and different allegiances, can be envisioned, and, it is to be hoped, ultimately formed. Also, over time, the explicit and principled rejection of the existing system will convert more and more conservatives to separatism and help build up the separatist community.

• Since the USA exercises sovereign control over the entire land mass of the former American nation, there is no ready territory or region where a new American nation could form itself. Therefore any new communities that take shape as the seeds of a new nation can only be, for now, communities within the USA, not independent political societies.

• While there is no longer any possibility that Republicans/conservatives can roll back liberalism at the national level, conventional conservative politics within the USA remains necessary to hamper and slow, as much as possible, the tyrannical federal juggernaut.

• And a final point which is only a guess or hope: Over time, the gathering together of Americans in certain regions and states may make it possible for Americans to form quasi-independent political expressions at the state and local level.

That’s all that I or anyone can know or foresee at this point. The rest has to be worked out and developed over time.

* * *

Here are some recent entries that are part of the same discussion about what we are to do and what is the American nation that we seek to renew:

Roebuck on the Catastrophe—and the way forward

Should we go back to the Founding and the thirteen-star flag?

“Blood and Soil,” cont.

- end of initial entry -

Dave T. writes:

It’s very difficult to get anything tangibly done at this point because there aren’t many people who fully understand the reality of our national situation. For the most part, conservatives have been content to stick their heads in the sand like ostriches and pretend that it’s still possible to save America through electoral politics, which typically means reforming the Republican Party and then winning national elections. Not even a remnant of traditional American society will be preserved if conservatives remain doggedly committed to this failed strategy.

Along these lines, it seems to me that we are still in the stage of educating conservatives about the truth of our situation, tangible accoplishments will have to come later. Ergo, some homework for VFR readers, when you meet your disgruntled conservative relatives over the “holidays,” please educate them inasmuch as possible about what has happened to America and the true reality of our situation using the material you’ve digested at places like VFR. Give them a theoretical context in which to understand the liberal shortcomings of Limbaugh-style conservatism and why trying to elect another Ronald Reagan won’t save us (if such a thing is even possible at this point given our national demographics). We need to reproduce ourselves ideologically!

Debra C. writes:

“[Kristor] says we should join and build up communities of traditionalists.”

One question is how open do we want to be about this? That is, should we use our current channels of communicating our ideas, such as our writing at other websites, e.g., Amspec, Legalinsurrection, or pjmedia, to endorse a joining and building up of communities of traditionalists? And what about the idea—that I believe you alluded to two weeks ago—of our migrating to areas that already lean conservative and becoming a dominant force there? Eventually perhaps breaking free of the juggernaut that seeks our harm? Is it time to identify these areas and begin packing?

Posted by Lawrence Auster at November 21, 2012 08:21 AM | Send