WHY I AM NO LONGER ON THE ONLINE RIGHT

It’s been a while. Which is related to one reason I am no longer on the online right. I’m just not really that much online. Ever since our son was born I simply can’t afford the pleasures of battling it out on Twitter or this blog.

I do browse through Substack here and there though and when stuck in traffic I listen to the occasional podcast so I suppose I have some access to the zeitgeist of the old Twitter gang.

Can’t say I like it!

The unpleasantness of the online right had been brewing for a while even before I relinquished Twitter due to parental and work obligations. Basically, in a bizarre demonstration of the theory of linear systems, the online right has become a system (or a “filter” as we used to call it) that turns every good thing into shit.

You can read more about linear systems here. It’s a useful mechanism that as an engineering student I employed quite a bit in signal processing. A signal comes, goes through a filter (that is the crux of the system), and then comes out as something new. When the signal is a linear function and the filter a linear operator, this can be further computed using the convolution integral, and if the integral is too complex one can use a Laplace transform to simplify it — but I digress (nor do I remember much any of this, it’s been 20 years).

But anyhow, a simple system would be something like this:

A function comes in, an operator applies (say, multiplying the function by 2), and an output function emerges.

The online right can be modeled thus:

Meaning, at this point and for quite a while the online right has been functioning as a system that turns everything into shit.

The input function, I can attest, used to be pure and not crappy at all. Under all kinds of personas and pseudonyms, I’ve been a member of the online right since at least 2016. One could say I’ve been floating in that sphere since even before that. The input, x(t), used to be fun and pure. We would discover together Burke and De Maistre, the meaning of faith, the importance of beauty, the sophisticated lens of elite theory, the powerful truths of Machiavelli, a wistful page from Spengler here and there, Roger Scruton was still alive!

Since, I don’t know, 2022 maybe, things have quickly changed, and then in a bizarro acceleration (probably Iranian/Qatari induced, the timing is just too perfect) things have further changed on October 7, 2023.

All the beautiful things, the clever Twitter spaces, and the ultra-intellectual debate groups have become, sadly, shit.

The interesting lens of elite theory now means zero nuance, an absolute theory that explains everything, and a short leap from that – nothing but the “Jewish Question.” Every analysis of power in America must end with the “tribe” or the “tiny hat” people pulling the strings by creating “Jewslop” movies and coordinating to flood America with third-world immigrants to watch them.

The rediscovery of faith, Soul of the World style initially, or C. S. Lewis, has long transformed through the shit function into throngs of crazed peasant biomass barking “Christ is King!” like Mujahideen crying “Allahu Akbar.” (As I posted before, due to the circumstances of our mixed marriage we regularly go to a fairly conservative church and I’ve never witnessed any normal Christians shouting “Christ is King!” at anybody. People do engage quite a bit in charity, which seems like a much higher bar to me).

The worship of beauty, the living human figure or in classical art, now spawns strange personal trainer-crypto traders who deem Trump the “antichrist” and prophesize about red heifers being slaughtered in the Temple in Jerusalem.

Gone is the fun irony of 2016 when the occasional Pinoche meme was sort of funny. The kids these days *actually* believe in this stuff. Only a few days ago on Substack, I encountered the exchange below. A wholesome fellow was providing wholesome advice, only to be filtered through the shit system into “re-establishing Christendom and expelling all the Jews.”

I mean, let’s have your mother expel you from her basement first.

But in any case, I’m not sure what a discerning person should do with this crowd beyond simply saying “goodbye.”

The reasons for this avalanche of shit are interesting and not completely clear to me. Beyond the obvious Iranian/Qatari campaigns, I think we mostly see the result of an overly politicized society. Most people, like 90% of people, are not supposed to think about grand theories or even national politics. Most of us were only meant to grill. And when we do engage in things we cannot truly understand (“Muh! Carl Schmitt and the state of exception!”) it simply becomes idiotic crap. But who knows! Maybe I’ll further analyze this at another time.

In any case, the experience reminds me of my years (now over) in a men’s club, let’s say it was called “The Happy Lads.” Our local branch used to be indeed a load of lighthearted fun. Sure, it had always had its share of over-indulgent partying and senseless infighting, but it had been fairly wholesome overall. Gradually, however, then suddenly, it became pretty much all about infighting and cocaine. Since I’ve never been much interested in either, I had to say goodbye.

So let me say goodbye to the “online right,” whatever its prospects may be. So long!