Wow! This was a masterpiece, each separate theme insightfully articulated and woven together into a powerful whole. The tribute to your grandmother was beautiful, the comparison of her memorial to your godmother's funeral was amazingly apt, and the analogy of individual life-cycles and death to that of entire cultures was profoundly perfect. If you publish a book with your best essays, this one has to be in there. This piece warrants multiple readings and much contemplation and conversation between readings. You really captured so much, so concisely, and so memorably.
That's one thing that encourages me about substacks like yours: the same spirit that inspired the greatest art and science and philosophy through the ages is still very much alive and well. Our culture may be dying, and its parasitic elites may have no care or concern beyond feeding on its corpse until nothing is left, but given the creative genius that is so palpably flowing through substack and other such hangouts for the dissident right today, we can be sure that another renaissance of cultural beauty will come. As you said, it's Springtime!
Beautifully written, John, and glorious illustrations. I think the world is the hallucination of our collective death wish, the suicide urge of an eternal being. But that's a story for another time.
The past three years certainly have brought a lot into focus. Before covid, I thought that people were basically good, the government was basically doing its job, and that I would never be faced with any real crisis in my life. But growth is not possible without a crisis. Covid has been the great mirror of our time -- it shows us who we really are and what we really value. There will be some bad years ahead, but that's preferable to the slow creep of mediocrity.
1) In Spengler's model of civilizational winter he predicts the rise of populist strongmen. He predicted that “the 20th century has and will continue to be …a period of imperialism and annihilation wars. Science will stop reaching certainties (although technology continues to accelerate…). The people reject common goals. Art is reduced to fashion, and innovation as a concept is cheapened and trivialized. Between the 21st and 23rd centuries, Caesarism [will rise] again in the continuation of ‘civilizational winter'. The politics of brute force returns to break the stranglehold of money…it seems that tribal strength surges and ‘impersonal’ institutions decay. Weak ties and complex bureaucracies (fueled by “money”) are severed in favor of strong ties and absolutism (fueled by “blood”). Nuance and the essence of the high culture decays gently into the dirt.”
That being said, is that what we are seeing? One can see the possibility with Brexit, Trump, Bolsonaro, Viktor Orban, and Putin. A counter to this argument, though, is that these strongmen are losing re-elections (Trump, Bolsonaro), they are weak on the world stage (Orban), and/or continuing massive cooperation with globohomo (Putin, for multiple reasons). It looks like this system, highly reliant on technology for ever increasing control, is *rapidly advancing* instead of buckling before populist politicians; if so, it would disprove Spengler’s thesis, although it remains to be seen if these trends continue.
2) Is western civilization dying as a result of suicide, or is it being (or has it been) murdered -- perhaps as a result of the forces of capitalism, which seeks to *convert* every non-tangible element of life (community trust, concepts of honor, integrity, religion, etc) into something commoditized and tradable in a market -- or a combination? That is a very complicated question, requiring a great deal of analysis...
Good news and bad news. First the good news: this was so good that when I finished I actually went back to the beginning and read it all over again. The bad news? You've forced me to become a paid subscriber, you b*astard!
I've noticed something. The worldwide madness has bypassed certain places. Small, insignificant, humble communities. Many don't know what's going on, but they want to live. They love what is good, true and beautiful. Young people still fall in love, marry and have babies. Maybe this is an instance of the meek inheriting the earth.
John, you could be my twin with what you express but your writing suggests a somewhat younger man.
One thing that got me through the red pill experience is personal physical pursuits and sometimes, accomplishments. Be they they frozen desolate mountain tops, huge granite walls, vast and deep oceans, or soaring with the birds.... Physical trials you set for yourself not against (cause you'll lose) but in conjunction with nature.
Don't get too wrapped up in the bullshit cycle because it is all bullshit and there's nothing external to yourself that you control.
This is the most beautiful, harsh and poignant article I have read probably ever. Thankyou
"the soil must be receptive to the seed" genius.
I would only add that " the unyeilding snaps" and the addaptable might yet survive to begin this whole hullabaloo over again. Kind of makes me want to Riverdance.
It seems that even Bertrand Russell couldn't escape the shortcomings of his own assumptions. Tellingly, he wrote:
"The centre of me is always and eternally a terrible pain—a curious wild pain—a searching for something beyond what the world contains, something transfigured and infinite—the beatific vision—God…"
Pastel-light yet distinct serene melancholy suits you 😔 And soothes grateful souls. The multitudes must have gone rogue and refuse to remain contained 😉
Yeah, shouting into hurricanes . . . very appropriate. We are far beyond reasoning or convincing, the body of the West is indeed just a husk now. I saw this exact thing happen with my grandmother and mother, they were dead long before their bodies stopped living. An extended period of grief and loss as you describe.
A really great, though painful, analogy for how I feel about our society, culture and many people around me. I think many of us are now at the acceptance stage of grief. Only from here can we move on. And we will move on. Empires may crumble, but strong individuals remain.
damn. I don't know who U are or how I even found U but this is one of the top 5 best things I've read on Substack. right up there with Paul Kingsnorth.
Wow! This was a masterpiece, each separate theme insightfully articulated and woven together into a powerful whole. The tribute to your grandmother was beautiful, the comparison of her memorial to your godmother's funeral was amazingly apt, and the analogy of individual life-cycles and death to that of entire cultures was profoundly perfect. If you publish a book with your best essays, this one has to be in there. This piece warrants multiple readings and much contemplation and conversation between readings. You really captured so much, so concisely, and so memorably.
That's one thing that encourages me about substacks like yours: the same spirit that inspired the greatest art and science and philosophy through the ages is still very much alive and well. Our culture may be dying, and its parasitic elites may have no care or concern beyond feeding on its corpse until nothing is left, but given the creative genius that is so palpably flowing through substack and other such hangouts for the dissident right today, we can be sure that another renaissance of cultural beauty will come. As you said, it's Springtime!
Beautifully written, John, and glorious illustrations. I think the world is the hallucination of our collective death wish, the suicide urge of an eternal being. But that's a story for another time.
The past three years certainly have brought a lot into focus. Before covid, I thought that people were basically good, the government was basically doing its job, and that I would never be faced with any real crisis in my life. But growth is not possible without a crisis. Covid has been the great mirror of our time -- it shows us who we really are and what we really value. There will be some bad years ahead, but that's preferable to the slow creep of mediocrity.
Very nice post. A couple of comments:
1) In Spengler's model of civilizational winter he predicts the rise of populist strongmen. He predicted that “the 20th century has and will continue to be …a period of imperialism and annihilation wars. Science will stop reaching certainties (although technology continues to accelerate…). The people reject common goals. Art is reduced to fashion, and innovation as a concept is cheapened and trivialized. Between the 21st and 23rd centuries, Caesarism [will rise] again in the continuation of ‘civilizational winter'. The politics of brute force returns to break the stranglehold of money…it seems that tribal strength surges and ‘impersonal’ institutions decay. Weak ties and complex bureaucracies (fueled by “money”) are severed in favor of strong ties and absolutism (fueled by “blood”). Nuance and the essence of the high culture decays gently into the dirt.”
That being said, is that what we are seeing? One can see the possibility with Brexit, Trump, Bolsonaro, Viktor Orban, and Putin. A counter to this argument, though, is that these strongmen are losing re-elections (Trump, Bolsonaro), they are weak on the world stage (Orban), and/or continuing massive cooperation with globohomo (Putin, for multiple reasons). It looks like this system, highly reliant on technology for ever increasing control, is *rapidly advancing* instead of buckling before populist politicians; if so, it would disprove Spengler’s thesis, although it remains to be seen if these trends continue.
2) Is western civilization dying as a result of suicide, or is it being (or has it been) murdered -- perhaps as a result of the forces of capitalism, which seeks to *convert* every non-tangible element of life (community trust, concepts of honor, integrity, religion, etc) into something commoditized and tradable in a market -- or a combination? That is a very complicated question, requiring a great deal of analysis...
Remember when Atlas Shrugged was considered fiction? Pepperidge Farms remembers, too.
Good news and bad news. First the good news: this was so good that when I finished I actually went back to the beginning and read it all over again. The bad news? You've forced me to become a paid subscriber, you b*astard!
I've noticed something. The worldwide madness has bypassed certain places. Small, insignificant, humble communities. Many don't know what's going on, but they want to live. They love what is good, true and beautiful. Young people still fall in love, marry and have babies. Maybe this is an instance of the meek inheriting the earth.
John, you could be my twin with what you express but your writing suggests a somewhat younger man.
One thing that got me through the red pill experience is personal physical pursuits and sometimes, accomplishments. Be they they frozen desolate mountain tops, huge granite walls, vast and deep oceans, or soaring with the birds.... Physical trials you set for yourself not against (cause you'll lose) but in conjunction with nature.
Don't get too wrapped up in the bullshit cycle because it is all bullshit and there's nothing external to yourself that you control.
Great article btw.
This is the most beautiful, harsh and poignant article I have read probably ever. Thankyou
"the soil must be receptive to the seed" genius.
I would only add that " the unyeilding snaps" and the addaptable might yet survive to begin this whole hullabaloo over again. Kind of makes me want to Riverdance.
Terrific.
It seems that even Bertrand Russell couldn't escape the shortcomings of his own assumptions. Tellingly, he wrote:
"The centre of me is always and eternally a terrible pain—a curious wild pain—a searching for something beyond what the world contains, something transfigured and infinite—the beatific vision—God…"
Pastel-light yet distinct serene melancholy suits you 😔 And soothes grateful souls. The multitudes must have gone rogue and refuse to remain contained 😉
Thank you for writing. There’s a lot of beauty still around, it’s true. I feel like everything is going to be ok in the end.
Albedo, citrinas, rubedo, negredo..
The putrefaction, the separation of the salts.
The rapid heating, volatisation brings out the essence, and the fermentation followed by the distillation brings forth the spirit.
Recombination into tonic
Yeah, shouting into hurricanes . . . very appropriate. We are far beyond reasoning or convincing, the body of the West is indeed just a husk now. I saw this exact thing happen with my grandmother and mother, they were dead long before their bodies stopped living. An extended period of grief and loss as you describe.
A really great, though painful, analogy for how I feel about our society, culture and many people around me. I think many of us are now at the acceptance stage of grief. Only from here can we move on. And we will move on. Empires may crumble, but strong individuals remain.
damn. I don't know who U are or how I even found U but this is one of the top 5 best things I've read on Substack. right up there with Paul Kingsnorth.
keep it up sir...
this is the essay I needed to read today. thank you.