– I’m sure you’ve seen Scharlach’s diagram of the dark enlightenment, but he’s written some good stuff recently as well:
The Cathedral does not preach evolution; the Cathedral doesn’t believe in evolution, except as a tool for bashing fundamentalists into submission about other issues. If certain Traditionalists in the reacto-sphere don’t believe in evolution, that puts them on the opposite side of things in this one case. They know it, I suppose, and that’s why most of them just don’t bring it up.
The fact is, most creationists and ID’ers have more in common with the Cathedral than they would care to admit. Dinesh D’Souza’s book What’s So Great About Christianity has an entire section devoted to “Christianity and Science,” in which D’Souza* toes the same line as the Cathedral: evolution stops at the neck, and it’s something that happened a long time ago, doesn’t concern us today. . . .
The Dark Enlightenment is Dark precisely because it has followed the evidence where it leads, which turns out to be—in a great historical irony—right back to some of the conclusions (emphasis on some of the conclusions) reached by certain Christians pre-Darwin, the intellectual descendants of whom now inhabit the Christian Traditionalist end of the reacto-sphere. . . .
In other words, the HBD worldview turns out to be remarkably similar at certain junctions to the ancient Christian worldview, though very different reasons buttress the worldviews.
– Now I understand why Caucasians are so successful.
– Reactionary poster campaign.
– AnomalyUK on reactionary unity
– Audacious Epigone responds to some ribbing from Heartiste. It’s almost impossible not to agree with Heartiste, but the fact that, “betas appear to do a better job passing along their genes than alphas do,” does give one a certain amount of pause.
– Austerity is a consequence not a punishment. Related thoughts here and here:
There is no macroeconomics that is not Cathedral liturgy, no confidence or ‘animal spirits’ independent of its devotions, no economic cataclysm that is not simultaneously a crisis of faith.
– Add this to the list of things I’m glad I’ve never written while blogging: “The comment section is open, but I’m not going to read them.”
– Book reviews: Elusive Wapiti on Enjoy the Decline and Son of Brock Landers on Bailout. Free Northerner has some thoughts possibly related to the former.
– Problems for Bitcoin in Canada.
– Dartmouth is gay.
Foseti 
Here are a few of my thoughts on the Dark Enlightenment:
The Cathedral does not preach evolution; the Cathedral doesn’t believe in evolution, except as a tool for bashing fundamentalists into submission about other issues.
Evolution is most assuredly a plank of the Cathedral. It may be that this plank exists solely to bash “fundamentalists”, but that’s what the Cathedral *is*; that’s what the Cathedral *does*. See That Hideous Strength.
If you’re a reactionary who doesn’t think that preaching evolution is part of the Cathedral, then you need to look at the trend of American legal decisions throughout the 20th century. What’s the trend? Civil rights decisions in the 1960s that (we argue) conflict with the freedom of association? Subsequent feminist victories, homosexual victories, etc.? Well, what preceded these? The Scopes trial, of course. All part of the same trend. If you’re a reactionary, you should consider that the Cathedral’s victories didn’t begin with Brown vs. Board of Education.
This is why I said, in another thread, that I thought William Jennings Bryan was a hero. I had the idea that he was a bygone warrior-against-the-Cathedral, although it seems that he may not have been what I thought.
From evolution follows racial and sex differences – ie the opposite of the worldview of the Cathedral. Sorry, it’s just wrong to say the Cathedral believes in evolution as anything other than an occasional prop with which to beat those of a certain religious bent.
The Cathedral once believed in libertarian ideals, because they were useful.
The Cathedral once believed in legal equality between the races and genders, because it was useful.
The Cathedral once believed in an isolationist foreign policy, because it was useful, during the Cold War.
The Cathedral currently believes in evolution and considers it very, very important to smash the rubes who would teach the controversy in Kentucky grade schools.
Ultimately you are both right. The Cathedral simultaneously does and does not believe in evolution. It will mock Creationists in one breath, and condemn anyone who believes that evolution actually has any effect on human behaviour in the next.
Yes, but, “The Cathedral simultaneously does and does not believe in evolution” is really not believing in evolution. We all believe in the aspects of ideologies that we like, that doesn’t mean we subscribe to those ideologies.
It’s perfectly valid to make the following brief statements:
1. The Cathedral thinks it believes in something called “Evolution”. More generally, they like to think they believe in Science in general. But they really don’t.
2. They only believe the parts that conveniently fit into Equality Liberalism.
3. Equality Liberalism is a Universalist dogma of Radical Egalitarianism, Profound Human Malleability, and Fundamental Uniformity. Human differences are caused (the consequences of privilege, oppression, hate, social structure and constructs, patriarchy, isms and phobias, etc.), and not the causes of the things we observe. Most “Social Justice” theory completely falls apart unless you have this false view of reality.
4. The Cathedral thinks very poorly (to put it mildly) of anyone who professes (especially genuinely) to not believe in Evolution. Well, not anyone. Mostly Conservative Christian Whites. Who are stupid haters, naive, foolish tools of the greedy corporations, and basically the evil enemy.
You can make a little 4×4 matrix. Humans are:
AA: The product of Evolution and thus HBD.
AB: The product of Evolution and yet EQUAL.
BA: The product of God and thus HBD.
BB: The produce of God and thus EQUAL.
Notice that only AB really requires a “yet” – the contradiction is inherent. God can do anything he wants. Following the logic and evidence of Biology would lead you to AA. But AB needs a whole lot of sophistry and social pressure.
The Cathedral is at AB, obviously, and hates white people according to distance. It can almost tolerate the occasional polite, non-threatening, co-opted heretic who thinks AA – at least he’s part of the “reality community”, perhaps just ‘mistaken’ about a few things – probably because he’s blinded by his privilege.
It can also take in a few Unitarians (or equivalents) who believe BB (and whose God is basically just the deified Progressive God anyway – fashionable Jesus) and who will eagerly help them import endless third world immigrants.
But it cannot, under any circumstances, even tolerate knowing that BA people exist in the world.
Neo-reactionaries are a bit similar to neo-conservatives. Neither are truly conservative, both are liberal in essence.
Neo-reactionaries want the worldview, the aims and the results, of the anti-modern secular liberal enlightenment, without the religion. To have a piece of it, without the essential ingredients, much less the all of the ingredients themselves.
The Christian Traditionalists are right. Evolution is an important characteristic of the modern secular liberal Enlightenment. That’s why progress, evolution, progress, evolution (same thing) is always mentioned. If evolution is given weight here, corruption will follow.
Yes, and traditionalists want to keep fighting the same battle they’ve been losing for 500 years. Maybe this time will be different!
We all have our foibles.
Losers? Isn’t that shaming?
I know no one will believe this, but Canada is ahead of every other government, in every way, when it comes to Bitcoin matters.
“Acting as if we are already there.” YES. Thank the Gods. You’ve found them….
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