If you want more evidence that the left controls academic narrative, look to any "College Republican" clubs on college campuses. Like the modern GOP, they exist in a world governed by progressive, post-Enlightenment principles. The college administration keeps them on a shoestring budget as a token minority, in order to throw a bone to any students who haven't completely bought into 3rd-wave feminism, Black liberation, and rigorous speech codes.
In their gatherings, you will find a preponderance of White male students, with perhaps the occasional Asian, Indian, or criollo Hispanic present. Physiques will be mostly "skinnyfat" or pudgy, and meeting attire will inevitably consist of ill-fitting dress shirts and khaki chinos. Of course, any females in the room will be fawned over, the white knight thirst taking hold of the nerdlings. (NB: any in-shape man with a modicum of confidence can dominate the room, provided he isn't utterly disgusted with the spectacle he beholds)
As if the group's appearance weren't pathetic enough, their culture is one of publishing articles, trying to avoid getting shut down by hostile administrators, and inviting the occasional respectable-right speaker to be heckled by leftist agitators. In other words, all College Republican groups are about treading water against the leftist riptide, and looking as inoffensive about it as possible. They can claim no great victories, no offensives taken, no spoils of war. The culture war, on campuses and on the streets alike, requires warrior-poets, philosopher-tradesmen, and other men of action. As reinforcements, the College Republicans can only offer tepid accountant-types, who of course will beg and plead said hostile administration to begrudgingly allow them to use a classroom or lecture hall once a month, even as organizations to advance Jewish or Black or Hispanic interests get much larger budgets, and perks from sympathetic staff members. If they were concerned with victory, they would be creating their own political spaces on campus or off, without any blessing from enemy forces. Because they are concerned with being liked by aggressive leftist bullies, they will continue to be weak, and they will continue to lose. They are dishonorable, and cannot be relied upon to fight the left.
College Republicans are controlled opposition, playing power bottoms for the academic left. They are barely allowed anything on campus, and when they are, it is with severe restrictions compared to groups that cater to the feelings of fashionable ethnicities and made-up gender identities. They believe they are in control, but in reality are simply treading water. Even using the term "Pyrrhic victory" would be too generous, as College Republican groups, at best, fight to a stalemate, or retake symbolic status that was easily taken from them originally.
It is their need to be accepted by the enemy, it is their constant bleating about "fairness", it is their pathetic, mewling weakness that makes them resent strong, masculine men and organizations. They are more dangerous to us than the left, because any one of us who is more impressionable will take pity on their cries, and allow their weakness to influence what should be an impenetrable fortress.
My suggestion to any current College Republicans who are reading this: find the strongest, healthiest, most tradition-focused group of men on campus that you can, and form your own club. It doesn't need to be on campus, but it does need to be productive and exclusive. Distance yourself from clowns who still hold tight to the sham of post-Enlightenment values, which the left will only use to destroy you. Most of all, don't be afraid.
18 June 2016
Christianity Has Lost Its Aesthetic Spirit
In Christendom today, the sacred must struggle to contest with the profane and secular, which infiltrate all aspects - aesthetic, cultural, spiritual - of its believers.
If you, as merely a casual observer concerned with only your five physical senses, look upon the Christendom of the past twenty years, and compare it against the preceding eras, the difference is stark and vast. The soaring towers that once characterized the West's cathedrals and abbeys are being usurped by squat, smooth rectangular abominations of concrete and metal that speak more to the self-indulgence of architects than to the glory of God, Christ, and the saints. Modern churches, even the 'mega church' buildings of the present age, are assembled in months by construction crews who view it as simply another project. They might as well be building a sports stadium or apartment complex.
Traditional cathedrals were multi-generational undertakings, and the men who laid the foundations knew they would not live to see its completion. However, they did understand that their children or grandchildren would be able to worship there. Traditional Christendom looked simultaneously to its origins in the past and to its future. Cathedrals were also an exercise in civic spirit, as stonemasons, smiths, and carpenters across the land would come together in order to pool their talents in service to God.
Beyond even the changes in architecture, Christianity's music of worship has been fundamentally transformed by the profane. Walk into any modern ostensibly-Christian church, and you will find a "praise band", complete with a drum kit, electric instruments, wireless microphones, and a PA system to amplify the cacophony. If you ignored the lyrical content, the music would not be much of a departure from an outdoor music festival, or a pop-country radio station. Gone are the reverent harmonies of choirs, the vibrant tones of bells, or the majesty of a pipe organ; all have been replaced by what is essentially a sing-along childrens' concert. I was raised in a church whose hymnals contained songs that were written no later than the early 20th century, with complete musical notation. Having attended services in other churches that would be considered mainstream, these pop-country performances, often replete with clapping, swaying, disgustingly breathy falsetto, and spoken-word introductions, make an utter mockery of masculinity and of God.
Christianity's physical and auditory decline can be traced to its relatively recent desire to be accepted and popular by the society around it, rather than to stand apart from a sinful, fallen world. It has given up critical components in order to appeal to a consumer palate, primarily one of women and non-believers. It has chosen to make the flock larger, rather than to strengthen the flock it already has. Just as modern Churchianity seeks to redefine concepts like headship, worship, and even church itself, it manifests a bastardized aesthetic.
But fear not, dear reader; though the so-called followers of Christ have strayed from the straight and narrow path into secular rot, there is salvation in the past. Christendom must look to Eastern Orthodoxy as a return to the core of Christianity. The trappings of modernity are cast off, and the aesthetic is both one of glory, and one of true craftsmanship. You will hear no amplified guitars, no applause after hymns are sung - only clear, strong, virile voices and perhaps the ringing of bells, all echoing through a church built for the purpose of honoring God.
If you, as merely a casual observer concerned with only your five physical senses, look upon the Christendom of the past twenty years, and compare it against the preceding eras, the difference is stark and vast. The soaring towers that once characterized the West's cathedrals and abbeys are being usurped by squat, smooth rectangular abominations of concrete and metal that speak more to the self-indulgence of architects than to the glory of God, Christ, and the saints. Modern churches, even the 'mega church' buildings of the present age, are assembled in months by construction crews who view it as simply another project. They might as well be building a sports stadium or apartment complex.
Traditional cathedrals were multi-generational undertakings, and the men who laid the foundations knew they would not live to see its completion. However, they did understand that their children or grandchildren would be able to worship there. Traditional Christendom looked simultaneously to its origins in the past and to its future. Cathedrals were also an exercise in civic spirit, as stonemasons, smiths, and carpenters across the land would come together in order to pool their talents in service to God.
Beyond even the changes in architecture, Christianity's music of worship has been fundamentally transformed by the profane. Walk into any modern ostensibly-Christian church, and you will find a "praise band", complete with a drum kit, electric instruments, wireless microphones, and a PA system to amplify the cacophony. If you ignored the lyrical content, the music would not be much of a departure from an outdoor music festival, or a pop-country radio station. Gone are the reverent harmonies of choirs, the vibrant tones of bells, or the majesty of a pipe organ; all have been replaced by what is essentially a sing-along childrens' concert. I was raised in a church whose hymnals contained songs that were written no later than the early 20th century, with complete musical notation. Having attended services in other churches that would be considered mainstream, these pop-country performances, often replete with clapping, swaying, disgustingly breathy falsetto, and spoken-word introductions, make an utter mockery of masculinity and of God.
Christianity's physical and auditory decline can be traced to its relatively recent desire to be accepted and popular by the society around it, rather than to stand apart from a sinful, fallen world. It has given up critical components in order to appeal to a consumer palate, primarily one of women and non-believers. It has chosen to make the flock larger, rather than to strengthen the flock it already has. Just as modern Churchianity seeks to redefine concepts like headship, worship, and even church itself, it manifests a bastardized aesthetic.
But fear not, dear reader; though the so-called followers of Christ have strayed from the straight and narrow path into secular rot, there is salvation in the past. Christendom must look to Eastern Orthodoxy as a return to the core of Christianity. The trappings of modernity are cast off, and the aesthetic is both one of glory, and one of true craftsmanship. You will hear no amplified guitars, no applause after hymns are sung - only clear, strong, virile voices and perhaps the ringing of bells, all echoing through a church built for the purpose of honoring God.
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