Featured Articles

In Russia, Ten Years in Jail for “Extremist” Speech

/5 Comments/in /by

Editor’s note: Below is short article by Igor Artemov, chairman of the Russian All-National Union (RONS). The view of Vladimir Putin presented by Artemov contrasts sharply with the previous featured article, by Robert Bonomo. There is no doubt that the Western media harps on restrictions on free speech in Russia directed against Pussy Riot and propagandists for homosexuality—implying that Russian policies are illiberal, if not fascist. Such policies are clearly out of step with “enlightened opinion” in the West and hence detested by the New York Times, the target of Bonomo’s article.  Bonomo also implicitly suggests that the Western media and the NY Times in particular are concerned with the treatment of certain Jews who have run afoul of the Russian legal system (Browder, Magnitsky, Khodorkovsky), all of whom have become causes célèbres in the West, especially among neocons (e.g., Richard Perle led the campaign to free Khodorkovsky). And of course, Putin is also in disfavor in the West because of policies supporting the Syrian government and Iran, as well as strong ties between Russia and Ukraine.

However, Putin’s policies against the cultural Marxist zeitgeist that  dominates the West is only part of the story. Roman Frolov, who translated Artemov’s article and is in touch with nationalist circles  in Russia, writes that “for each persecuted Pussy Riot member there are thousands of Russian men persecuted for as little as derogatory remarks about migrants made in social networks. However, you have heard nothing about them because mass media is not interested in them and they don’t have powerful advocates.”

The NY Times et al. completely ignore the jailing of Russian nationalists; homosexual activists and Pussy Riot are another matter altogether.

The use of the legal system against Russian nationalists has been described in a previous TOO article by Pyotr Antonov (“Russian political prisoners in the Russian Federation,” August 6, 2013).  Antonov notes that

when reporting about the problem of political prisoners in Russia, mass media in Russia and abroad almost exclusively focus on Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the late Sergei Magnitsky and the “prisoners of May 6, 2012. “This creates an impression that the list of victims of political persecutions in Russia is limited by these people. However, in truth this is only the tip of the iceberg. Many, many others have been imprisoned during last several years for the sole ‘crime’ of being publically active Russian Nationalists. Read more

Vladimir Vladimirovich and the Grey Lady

/1 Comment/in , /by
Editorial note: This article originally appeared on Robert Bonomo’s http://www.thecactusland.com/ and is re-posted here with permission.
Putin and the Grey Lady

Bill Keller, editorialist for The NY Times and former executive editor of the paper, has recently penned a strong attack on Vladimir Putin arguing that Putin’s leadership “deliberately distances Russia from the socially and culturally liberal West”, describing the Kremlin’s policies as “laws giving official sanction to the terrorizing of gays and lesbians, the jailing of members of a punk protest group for offenses against the Russian Orthodox Church, the demonizing of Western-backed pro-democracy organizations as ‘foreign agents’, expansive new laws on treason, limits on foreign adoptions.”

Keller, who during his tenure as executive editor of The NY Times argued for the invasion of Iraq and wrote glowingly of Paul Wolfowitz, makes no mention of Moscow’s diplomatic maneuvers that successfully avoided a US military intervention in Syria or the Russian asylum given to Eric Snowden.  Keller, who had supported the US intervention in Syria by writing, “but in Syria, I fear prudence has become fatalism, and our caution has been the father of missed opportunities, diminished credibility and enlarged tragedy,” also made no mention of Seymour Hersh’s stinging dissection of the Obama administration’s misinformation campaign regarding the sarin attacks in Syria.  Hersh’s piece, which drives grave doubts into the case against Assad actually having carried out the attacks, was not published in The New Yorker or in The Washington Post, publications that regularly run his work. Read more

TOO Annual Fundraiser for 2013: Much to be optimistic about

/1 Comment/in , /by

It’s time for our annual year-end fundraising appeal—our only appeal of the year. I’d like to first thank those who have contributed during 2013. Much appreciated. With your generous support, we have been able to put out well over 200 articles and blogs in the past year.

A very promising trend is that we are attracting many excellent writers—people like Domitius Corbulo whose review of Filipe Fernandez-Armesto’s Pathfinders is has recently been our featured article. Armesto’s book is typical of the cultural Marxism that pervades the academic world: lack of concern for the empirical evidence and seething with hostility to Europeans, their history and their culture. The good news is that we now have a critical mass of writers on this site and on other like-minded sites—writers who are on board with our issues and are willing and able to write articles that provide insight into our malaise and provide the sort of cultural confidence that is necessary for long-term success. One of the exciting things about the present state of the Internet is that there are quite a few excellent outlets for White advocacy and other sites opposed to the constant barrage of propaganda from the mainstream media on all things related to immigration and multiculturalism.

Read more

Felipe Fernandez-Armesto: Cosmic Goddess Explorer

/in , /by

filipeIn the egalitarian world of academia the deeds of great European men stand like an irritating thorn. Allowing university students (the majority of whom are now females) to learn that practically every great philosopher, scientist, architect, composer, or simply, everyone great, has been a male makes them uncomfortable. Academics feel even less comfortable, terrified even, at the thought of teaching their increasingly multiracial classrooms that these males are overwhelmingly European. While universities cannot ignore altogether the cultural achievements of Europeans, otherwise they would have little to teach — all the disciplines, after all, were created by Europeans — the emphasis tends to be on the evolution of “progressive” ideas framed as if they were universal ideals by and for humanity.  Egalitarians particularly enjoy teaching how these ideas have been improved upon, and continue to be, through the “critical thinking” of teachers and activists. Hail to the professors fighting for humanity’s liberation right inside their classrooms!

But it is not always easy to “critically” hide European greatness. It stands out in every subject of human endeavor. I would say that, when it comes to the teaching of history, academics have implemented four major discursive strategies to deal with this irksome issue in an age of egalitarian expectations. The first strategy, and possibly the most influential, is to argue that Europe’s history has to be seen in the context of “reciprocal connections” with the rest of the globe. The Greek classical world was part of a wider network of cultures within the Mediterranean Basin, predated and “fundamentally” shaped by the “foundational” civilizations of Mesopotamia and Egypt. Rome was both Western and Eastern. Christianity originated in the East. Medieval Europe borrowed its technology from China. “Without the Islamic Golden Age there would have been no Renaissance.” The Enlightenment was “the work of historical actors around the world”. Read more

An Identitarian Crisis

/in , /by

Wilmot Robertson’s epic and masterful tome, The Dispossessed Majority, ends with a chapter entitled “Northern European Ingathering” which calls for just that, a kind of “Pax Euramerica.” According to the late Mr. Robertson, only a sense of race-consciousness on that level would be enough to save Whites worldwide against all the forces aligned against them — or rather — us.

I, and presumably most readers, agree with this; the trouble, of course, lies in praxis. For those of you rolling your eyes, do not worry; I am not here going to recycle the issue of getting our ideas heard amongst the political class or inside academia. Those problems concern people dwelling towards the top of society, while I am currently much more in touch and concerned with those at the bottom. My trouble is best illustrated with the anecdote below.

I am currently living in a ghetto that is a mix of Mexicans, Somalis, Blacks, and Whites. It is dangerous, but not unlivable, particularly for someone like me who grew used to environments like it from going to public schools and always taking public transit. I still use public transit almost everyday, being too poor to own a vehicle of my own, and the other day as I was walking to the nearest train station, I made a mistake.

The mistake was getting involved, because as anyone who has ever lived in the ghetto knows, the first rule is to never get involved. Never make eye contact, never give a dollar, never let someone use your phone, etc. I must have been only fifty feet from my train stop when I noticed a group of about ten or so young Black males running from a fallen figure. As I got closer I noticed the figure was a White woman and I could hear her crying. Keeping my eyes to the pavement, I kept heading towards the train; after all, I was going to meet a friend on the other side of town that I do not get to see very often. Then I heard her cry out to me, asking if she could use my phone. Knowing it was a bad idea as I was doing it, I caved and started walking over to her with my phone outreached. Read more

Reflections on Nelson Mandela and a Post-Mandela South Africa

/2 Comments/in , , /by

The death and funeral of Nelson Mandela have triggered a tsunami of commentary — an endless orgy of eulogies and tributes — from media talking heads, assorted scribes, and politicians. Beltway “conservatives,” such as Newt Gingrich and Ted Cruz, have praised Mandela. Bill O’Reilly even noted that Mandela was “a communist” before concluding that Mandela was a “great man.” The Daily Telegraph, a right-of-center newspaper, compared Mandela to Christ, noting

There are very few human beings who can be compared to Jesus Christ. Nelson Mandela is one. This is because he was a spiritual leader as much as a statesman. His colossal moral strength enabled him to embark on new and unimaginable forms of action.

What sets this coverage apart from similar media iconic myths is sheer volume. The nonstop reporting is virtually unprecedented. Shortly after Mandela’s death was announced last week, National Public Radio (NPR) devoted expansive news segment after news segment to the former ANC terrorist-turned-president of South Africa. A “special series” is posted on the NPR site, which spans several angles: “An ‘Incomparable Force of Leadership,’” “Nelson Mandela and the Virtue of Compromise,” the photo essay, “Honoring Mandela, In Gestures Large and Small,” “How Mandela Expanded the Art of the Possible,” and “U.S. Flags Lowered for Mandela, A Rare Honor for Foreign Leaders.”

You know you’ve made it big when Maya Angelou memorializes the deceased with a poem. The U.S. Department of State, of all places, commissioned Angelou to write a tribute poem — “His Day Is Done” — which has been featured on countless news programs. Not to be outdone, the New York Times obituary, written by Bill Keller, is 6,500 words.

The Sunday “news” shows explored Mandela’s death with the usual “civil rights leaders,” which included the predictable semi-literate insights of Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton of Tawana Brawley rape-hoax fame, and the verbose, hyper-opinionated Michael Eric Dyson.

From which one may conclude that the canonization of Mandela is far more about reinforcing the elite consensus on multiculturalism, immigration, and the general eclipse of White political power than it is about Mandela. Just as Whites ceded power in South Africa to non-Whites, Whites throughout the world should accept the moral imperative of giving up political power as their countries are inundated by non-Whites. Read more

Reply to John Derbyshire

/3 Comments/in , /by

John Derbyshire discusses several reasons for why Whites have become such wimps, including a couple where he mentions me:

What needs explaining—what always needs explaining—is white ethnomasochism.”

We are not short of offered explanations. Most popular:

• It’s the Jews. The theory: Nursing an atavistic hatred of gentiles, and fearful of being the only noticeable minority in an otherwise homogenous society, Jews seek to demoralize and shatter gentile culture.

Occasional VDARE.com contributor Kevin MacDonald takes this line, drawing on evolutionary psychology to fortify his explanations.

It seems to me, though, that MacDonald just replaces something that’s difficult to explain with something that’s even more difficult to explain.

Britain’s population, for example, is only one percent Jewish on the most generous assumptions, perhaps less than 0.5 percent. Why do 99 percent allow themselves to be dictated to by one percent?Why are they such wimps? And we’re back where we started.

• It’s the Enlightenment. London University’s Eric Kaufmann is the fugleman here, arguing that the Enlightenment contained within itself a cosmopolitanism and moral universalism that eroded WASP hegemony from within. See Verdict: Suicide—Eric Kaufmann Replies To *Kevin MacDonald.

This I think gets a good piece of the truth. One driving force of the Enlightenment was curiosity, an open-minded interest in other peoples and ways of life. It’s not implausible that this could curdle into disdain for one’s own ethny. Why it actually did so when it did—in the second half of the 20th century—is less easy to understand, though I think Kaufmann does a fair job with the American case.

1. Invoking the Enlightenment to explain what happened in post-World War II America is obviously an inadequate explanation without a whole lot of additional analysis, so Derbyshire’s move is to simply follow Kaufmann without dealing with my objections. To make a convincing argument, he would have to reply to my objections to Kaufmann’s analysis, which can be found in  my reply to Kaufmann (appended at the end of Kaufmann’s critique). For example, I write that  “especially as elaborated in this section of the longer version of my review, …  Jewish intellectuals were in the driver’s seat by the 1940s, that they dominated the New York Intellectuals, and that they promoted [non-Jews] like Dewey who advanced ideas that were compatible with theirs.”

Of course, Derbyshire and I have been disagreeing about my basic statement on all this, my book The Culture of Critique, for quite a while, so I guess nothing has changed. Read more