The populist rebellion against the establishment presently comes in two main flavors, the alt-right and the alt-left.
Of these the alt-right has met with much greater real world success so far for it is heir to years of internet dissident thought, which while considered right wing cares little for conventional political parties. The alt-right discourse has tapped into the anger of the working classes while guided by a priesthood of savvy students of human nature. Alt-lite civic nationalists market a less threatening entry-level brand to normie republican voters who then are given tacit permission to radicalize until some of them progress to the alt-right where the ideas are formed and taken to their logical conclusions.
The alt-left is still being formed from increasingly disillusioned white middle class progressives who have typically affiliated with the democrat party or third parties. Some of this cohort freak out and go off the deep end into nutty socialist utopianism and impotent activism as a coping mechanism but others realize there’s something incomplete in how they understand the world. They begin by reading a bit about the dark arts and soon find themselves falling as Lucifer fell. One day it hits them: the nepotistic minority groups who pushed them out of their own party are a major reason why we can’t have nice things.
As things stand, the alt-lite and alt-right often see themselves as rivals and the to the extent they know about an alt-left, they’re just more enemies in the direction they’re told to always punch.
I’ve observed, though, since I was watching Bernie Sanders’ efforts in the primaries last year that populists on both sides of an obsolete political spectrum possess pieces of the puzzle.
For all their sudden and dizzying victories, the alt-right has little idea what to do next. By decoding the obfuscation of political correctness, they established a superior understanding of the political situation, applied their knowledge, and spent long years gnawing on the roots of the world tree, Ygdrasil.
The weakness of the alt-right is it lacks any compelling or coherent vision, or even any motivation to establish a functional society. They indulge in warmed over libertarian theories every bit as fanciful as progressive dreams of US universal socialism, telling themselves they’re going Galt any day now. Attitudes of personal responsibility, taking initiative, and every-man-for-himself served them well in the days when they just wanted to get laid more but now the question is how to have a society that doesn’t suck to begin with.
To be fair, there are those who grapple with these problems and their prevailing impulse is to try to go back in time to a more traditional society. We see pickup artists getting grey hair, losing their youthful horniness, and suddenly wondering what to do with the rest of their lives. They end up advocating for traditional family and marriage they never had any interest in—making them eerie parallels to feminist relationship and marriage advice columnists who always seem to be divorced and single in their 30s.
Bizarrely, they look to a historically backward Russia with deep social problems, low fertility rates, and millions of Muslims and Central Asians as an example of the ideal white nation. There are indeed good reasons to admire Putin’s strong leadership and the staunchly nationalist direction he is taking his country, but mayor of a city-on-a-hill he is not.
The alt-right types including red pillers and neo-reactionaries are undisputed masters of understanding the darker corners of human nature but so far they have failed to apply their cynical worldly wisdom to create a viable new culture. This is where they can benefit from fallen progressives.
The alt-leftists started out believing in all the feelgood ideas about human nature taught by school and well-meaning boomer parents but they went down a path to heresy as the world view they were taught was torn apart by cold and pitiless reality. As they absorb some of the hard lessons of race, sex, and general human scumminess it dawns on them they’ll never have a nice society until they are selective and give the smart, responsible people most of the power and resources.
The fallen leftists understood even under egalitarian tutelage that hostile elites exert great control by rigging the economic system itself and especially the financial system. They tried to make sense of their situation, like the alt-right did, by studying history. I have actually come to think of Graeber’s Debt: The First 5000 Years as one of their founding works. For many middle class progressive kids their first big red pill was graduating from college and finding there weren’t any jobs and everything the schools and their parents had told them was a lie. So as manospherians studied Ancient Rome to gain insights into feminist cultural decay, unemployed hipsters who took out big loans to get useless degrees read about debt forgiveness in Ancient Mesopotamia.
The key insight the alt-left arrived at was that people need actual incentives to care about society whether we’re looking at hunter gatherers or the inhabitants of the first cities. An endless war between the butcher and the baker isn’t the basis of the social contract, mutual obligation is. There was no primitive system of barter engaged in by atomized Smithian savages—instead, credit predates coinage by tens of thousands of years.
Thus, these inquiries led alt-leftists to challenge a core assumption of Marxism—that the market is the central concern of human affairs and religion, tradition, and aesthetics mere distractions compared.
Alt-rightists, including the dark enlightenment, actually double down on flawed enlightenment theories of human motivation when they advocate for ultra individualism and atomization where everyone has to prove themselves from scratch and pull themselves up by their own bootstraps in the market economy.
The way successful human groups really work is by helping each other out, giving the most help to the best but always remembering no one can get far alone.
The alt-rightists though, can teach the fallen leftists the underclasses are the way they are for a reason and most resources given them disappear without a trace. The most you can accomplish is prevent riots caused by empty stomachs. Their unapologetic Randian ubermensch self-interest is unsuitable for a society, but it is just the medicine ex-leftists need to get past sentimental egalitarian attitudes, take responsibility, and be willing accept harsh truths. With some tough lessons, the alt-left can acquire the will-to-power and pragmatism they need to rise above wishful thinking.
When we combine a matter-of-fact understanding of the harsh competitiveness of cruel nature with the principle that societies are made successful by reciprocity and shared purpose we end up with a new synthesis. We have arrived at the alt-center.
FORWARD BASE B 
18 replies on “Combining The Alt-Right and the Alt-Left”
Noone wants the alt-center. It looks too Biblical. 🙂 But if you look at theologians and preachers like Rushdoony (now deceased) and his successor Ted Weiland, they do promote an alt-center society, based on the original core of the Abrahamic religion.
Every large system, no matter how incoherent, if it is successful, you will find a small coherent core behind it that really doesn’t change. Judaism, Churchianity, even offshoots like Islam and Mormonism, have the core. They stray from it, but retain it to return in times of need. Spain became Christian again when they returned to their core, and I’m not talking about dirty smelly hermits living lives of abstinence.
Similar in programming languages; if you look at LISP, Haskell, and C++, they do have small coherent cores, that gives them enough stability to grow and adapt even when they go all whacky and wierd.
I want Alt-Center.
“…Alt-rightists, including the dark enlightenment, actually double down on flawed enlightenment theories of human motivation when they advocate for ultra individualism and atomization where everyone has to prove themselves from scratch and pull themselves up by their own bootstraps in the market economy.
The way successful human groups really work is by helping each other out…”
I agree.
The only strong Alt-Left I know is Robert Lindsay. I wrote a lot on his site before I was banned for saying bad things to a Jew on his site. I admit she outsmarted me. She triggered me on purpose and I reacted, as expected. I also believe she provides a lot of funding for him. I’m almost sure of it the way she orders him to do things. Anyways. Robert is fully race genetics aware but close, if not, an outright Commie. I kept telling him if we have a Commie government the first thing they would do would be to shoot him and then move the psychopaths in charge. Unlimited power being super neural candy for psychopaths. Torment to their delight!!! He, I think like most Liberals, think that when the mighty people’s Republic is formed HE will be in charge. I don’t think it works that way and there will never be a Commie country that doesn’t end up repressing the people in very bad ways.
I agree with a lot of stuff he says but don’t believe in some of the Socialist structures put in place to deal with the problems. So what do we do? I think we need to provide raw funding, like you’ve talked about. The Basic Income with some health care for accidents.
We also REALLY need, for Whites, to look at some kind of segregation. Some kind of ability to bring back the old restrictions on who you can sell property to and it be legal. These things worked great because if you bought into a all White neighborhood and no one could block bust with Negros you could be somewhat assured of decent property values. It took a lot of guessing out of the equation.
We also should do away with laws where you as a business owner could decide to deal with whoever you wanted. You don’t want to bake cakes for Homos. Ok your bakery, you’re business. There would be plenty of people who were happy to bake as many cakes as they want. The idea being people, while having a financial backstop from living in the streets, would be free to live with who they wanted, when they wanted and to segregate if they wish.
You would HAVE to find some way to keep Blacks and others from breeding kids for money. Maybe refuse to provide for kids and force birth control on those that ruin their affairs.
I think a lot of people would just do nothing but they’re probably the same people doing nothing now. I really believe you would see a huge flowering in small specialty high tech stuff. People working on fusion. New computers. Whacky super involved art projects. Lots of neat stuff. Also a lot of super involved hobby stuff that would be interesting. Kind of like an amped up “Whole Earth Review” techno paradise.
I suspect that mere free association(like every other group has) will solve most of those problems on its own. The trick will be securing the power to do that. Might take a war and like most wars everyone won’t be back “by christmas.”
As for “strong” alt-left, I might mention Hipcrime Vocab(on my blogroll) and Archdruid Report. Archdruid unfortunately just deleted his blog and will be selling it as a book sometime. But he’s the only one I know of who wrote semi-favorably of Trump’s populist appeal while simultaneously talking about a minimalist post-peak fossil fuel society. His base in the Scotch-Irish panhandle of Maryland probably has something to do with that.
If your hippie tolerance is reasonably high, Ran Prieur might be worth a look. The guy probably hates Trump but has a lot of ideas about homesteading and minimalism.
I remember ribbonfarm had kind of an alt-left tone before it was “cool” but I always found it unnecessarily pedantic kind of like slate star codex or shtetl optimized is today.
Hell, some neo-reactionaries, especially of the technologist bent are basically dark elf leftists who also adopt that style. Look at moldbug and Nick Land.
Advocatus Diaboli(on my blogroll) was always extremely critical of the establishment from a left-wing perspective. He’s an expat to the west from India who rejects most virtue signalling, posts porn, and advises people how to use escorts. He’s been writing some anti-white stuff lately, but to be fair he’s also called his own people autistic and stupid and written favorably of the prospect of human extinction.
Randist views are pretty much on the decline, in large part due to the corrupt kleptocracy of the last decade. While that shouldn’t bother the goldbugs, many of them are out of favor as “the system” proved far more reliant than they predicted.
Objectivism is a 20th century take on Nietzsche’s philosophy, lesser than the 1st iteration by far but has potential to teach healthy self-reliance if not taken too seriously. Very influential men like Paul Ryan are influenced by Rand, let alone the ones that claim to lean libertarian. I suspect it is very appealing that they can go through their lives as important people cosplaying as Hank Rearden.
Goldbugs epitomize stupidly atomized individualism. When I try to read about finance, I immediately next anyone who pushes precious metals as anything more than a potential store of value, especially if they use the world “collapse” even once. Like the true selfish individuals they idolize they constantly agitate for a tulip craze that will make them rich at the expense of others.
“Bizarrely, they look to a historically backward Russia with deep social problems, low fertility rates, and millions of Muslims and Central Asians as an example of the ideal white nation.”
Joke: USG has to be dismantled.
Woke: USG, Russia, and China have to be dismantled.
Alt-leftists can be red-pilled to some extent and you are right that the Alt-Right needs to learn how to cooperate.
But in the tale of the scorpion and the frog, the scorpion stays the scorpion. Tell them that the underclasses are the way they are for a reason, they will nod and agree, but the moment they can use these same underclasses against you, they will. The alt-left make treacherous allies.
You like to describe leftists as status maximizers. They are not getting status where they’re at. They’ve been relegated to a barely-tolerated fringe of their coalition so taking their nature into account, what direction might they end up going from here as pressures on them mount?
> They are not getting status where they’re at.
Are they not? How is your blog faring vs slate star codex?
Of course the younger generation leftists is having some trouble. But the main question on their minds is, how do I maximise status in a world that increasingly dislikes SJWs? They might listen to you but only insofar your advice helps answering this question.
You make a pretty solid, biting point there. Well played.
But will these guys be content with getting status points in an online sausage fest?
Basic human nature suggests they will also want attention from young women and access to political power and influence.
Their present alignment means they have to suck to up to minorities and career women who want them to sit at the back of the bus.
The opposing coalition sees them as weak, effeminate, traitors who possess intellect but not wisdom. They aren’t big or powerful enough alone to get what they want. It’s telling perhaps that this is talent pool that seems to be producing the most political violence at the moment.
So I guess I would ask: who is their current audience? If you’re a commenter on slate star codex what is the socio-sexual niche that sustains your interest? The female academics who might appreciate this kind of signalling are always in short supply, in high demand, and less attractive than average.
The status game is played as much offline as online.
From my limited knowledge of SSC; his audience is high socio-economic / low socio-sexual. ‘I may only be laying the incidental retired slut and blue-haired girl, plus I have some strange sexual fetishes, but at least I am building a better civilisation!’ It’s uncool brahmin-y betas rationalising their place in the universe.
Offline leftists play the game by signalling edgy lefty memes. Lots of those going around in Western city swiss cheese social circles. Plenty of opportunity to get laid; women don’t punish leftists for… doing leftist stuff.
There is always political power to be had. For this leftists defer to the cathedral, and if to you, then they do so thinking to themselves ‘aren’t I smart for keeping my enemies close to me?’
There is however less attention of young women to be had as young women increasingly choose to have sex with outlaws. This might subtly worry them. To address, see plan Jim.
So they don’t get that good of a deal and even what little they’ve got is coming under threat? Sounds to me like we’ve got a group of people ripe to be offered a better deal and that’s what I see happening in the near future. Your astute critique here will likely figure into my next post.
My view is likely skewed because leftists enjoy more prestige in Netherlands than in US. Looking forward to your next post, though my money remains on US civil war / coup.
The Bernie movement was an attempt to create a socialism not based on the dispossesion and extermination of straight white men, and it was gaining momentum until it came to states with large non-white populations. What fun watching white Bernie Bros struggle to explain their defeat without sounding racist. I guess blacks instinctively understand that more free shit for white kids means less free shit for them.
Dave, I’ve written on the commonality of populists whatever their political or class alignment since last year during the election. Problem is cultural divides are surprisingly resilient even against the fundamentals of self-interest. My guess is and has been that the cognitive dissidence of having their sanguine hopes crushed into a dirty ashtray by the uniform bloc of the black vote will eventually cause them to crack. They have been waiting in hopes of taking over the democrat party in the wake of Hillary’s failure but so long as ethnic minorities who hate them are at the core of the coalition, they will fail.
I suspect a lackluster dem performance in 2018 midterms + Kamala Harris in 2020 instead of Warren, Gabbard, or Sanders on his deathbed might finally send them over the edge into the Lovecraftian unthinkable.
“When we combine a matter-of-fact understanding of the harsh competitiveness of cruel nature with the principle that societies are made successful by reciprocity and shared purpose we end up with a new synthesis. We have arrived at the alt-center.”
Great way of putting it. This is basically my personal take as well. I have always understood inequality is unavoidable but some corrections of it are necessary for a society to be functional.