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Sometimes you see something - a video from a long time ago, or a picture of an old building, or even just of people from another age - which really makes the sheer extent of the decline our civilisation has experienced clear.
I had a conversation with a friend over the summer, wherein I remarked on the social, moral, and cultural decay that is so pervasive in the 21st century. My friend simply didn't recognise this at all. Despite ostensibly conservative leanings, the thought hadn't occurred.
Recently, I received a message from this friend. It said, quite simply, "I see it". I think the speed of this change of perspective is because we all see it. We explain it away, each and every time we do, as a specific and unfortunate deviation from a near universal pattern...
of improvement - the eponymous "progress" of our age. This works, barely, so long as we remain committed to the idea that these events, these situations, are unconnected and unrelated.
The minute we consider, however, the alternative, it becomes obvious. It is then only a matter of letting go.
It's a deeply upsetting realisation, both because it opens one's eyes to the level of decay already rampant, and because it shows the trajectory of the future.
It's a deeply upsetting realisation, both because it opens one's eyes to the level of decay already rampant, and because it shows the trajectory of the future.
It's understandable that many people see this decline and are overwhelmed with desire to return to a previous time - after all, the past was quite simply better than the present, excepting for technological advances. It seems only natural to prefer what is better...
to what is worse, and so just as the progressive prefers the present to the past, the reactionary prefers the past to the present.
I think it's important, though, not to fall into this trap. Yes, it is good and proper to wish for a better, more natural society.
I think it's important, though, not to fall into this trap. Yes, it is good and proper to wish for a better, more natural society.
Yes, better, more natural societies have existed in the past. Yes, currently the direction of movement is negative. To the modern person, therefore, it seems that improvement is synonymous with reversal. This is the fatal error.
The future need not be worse than the present.
The future need not be worse than the present.
The present need not be worse than the past. Whig history is incorrect, but so is it's mirror. It is not simply that the arc of history does not bend towards justice - there is no arc of history. It is shaped by the agency of man and the hand of God.
Thus, I believe it is central to disaggregate notions of improvement from notions of return to some past age, most importantly because such a return is simply not possible. The past is gone, and will never return. It is not a boundless field of opportunity.
The future, however, contrary to what one is conditioned from birth to believe, is truly infinitely so.
The project of the neo-reactionary, then, is to imagine a future which once again makes "traditionalism" irrelevant by arresting the process of decline,
The project of the neo-reactionary, then, is to imagine a future which once again makes "traditionalism" irrelevant by arresting the process of decline,
and once again establishing an upward trajectory for civilisation.
I hope to make some contribution to this project over the next year. I hope some of you will join me. There is a lot of dreaming to be done - and I fear there may not be much time in which to do it.
I hope to make some contribution to this project over the next year. I hope some of you will join me. There is a lot of dreaming to be done - and I fear there may not be much time in which to do it.
