And I am sure epistamericanism as a word is unlikely to gain much traction, so the challenge would be to elucidate what it means in detail, any Joe or Jill could understand and appreciate. "Pissed American" is a good start.
It seems that the first two points defining an Epistamerican are contradictory. If Epistamericans believe that there is an objective reality, and therefore objective truth, doesn't it follow that that reality and truth are universal, and therefore totalizing? How can an Epistamerican have an objective reality and allow anyone else to deny it and live contrary to it? You say that Globohomo must be defeated, so even if you allow for plenty of subjectivity (a detriment in my opinion) there is clearly a moral necessity to destroy or supplant rival systems, and if there is a moral necessity, there must be some source of morality.
To touch on the religious aspect (full disclosure, I am Orthodox), suffice to say that if you are Christian, your religion must be totalizing. Christ commands the baptism of all nations, and through the Scriptures and holy Tradition, the inner life of God and His Kingdom, as well as the telos of creation itself are expressly revealed. There is little room for speculation and opinion. Ultimately, Americanism must be made to conform with the revealed (and all-encompassing) Truth, Christ Himself.
It is commendable to work at explaining the nature of Americans as a distinct ethnos, but it must always be within the bounds set by Christ and His Church.
There is a massive difference between faith in an objective reality and certainty that you understand all aspects of this reality with sufficient clarity to grant you moral authority to wield coercion against those who disagree. Is there any man who can rightly claim to know God's will with certainty from your Orthodox perspective? It is the distinction between faith and certainty that I speak to, and I believe it to be consilient with the beliefs of most Christians, but certainly not all.
An important distinction, certainly, however I would argue it's not necessary to know *all* things to be able to say that *certain* things can be known and should be enforced through coercion, if necessary (though willing repentance of those in error is preferred).
I refer to Ivan Ilyin's On Resistance to Evil by Force for the Orthodox take on using coercion to enforce the Truth; his focus is primarily on law enforcement, though I think it is applicable across society. That is, for example, that there is a moral necessity to use force to stop a criminal, even before he commits a crime (if you were to see it in progress), as well as a duty to restrain a criminal after the fact and attempt to bring him to repentance through penance (whatever judicial punishment) or even death (if he will not repent and remains a danger to society and his own soul).
I think this model can be applied to society as a whole, where errant worldviews can be corrected with either soft means (propaganda, education, religion) or hard means, including imprisonment or exile as an extreme option for those who threaten to tear down society and install an evil regime based on their false worldview, like globohomo or the Bolsheviks before them.
In these cases, it would have been better that these antiChrist worldviews were snuffed before they were able to wreak such havoc on the world, and we now suffer the consequences of a failure to do so.
I could go on, but I don't want to write a dissertation in your comments!
Law enforcement and the legal tradition in America is already aligned with epistamericanism. In the example you give there is no certainty the individual committed a crime, because there are two sides to every story. There can be high degrees of confidence granting the moral authority to intervene, but not certainty. This is why we have the adversarial process in our legal tradition along with a right to trial by impartial jury. These features all scream out and recognition of the truth of what I speak. Faith is great for your own beliefs and foundations, and we all need the objective standard of reality, but everything else requires evidence. And when it comes to using force, our system puts an impartial jury as the arbiter of what was justifiable, not the state nor the church.
This is Water(*. See the ripples waltzing softly? 😊
🗨 There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is *what* to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship [...] is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive.[...] On one level, we all know this stuff already. It's been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, epigrams, parables; the skeleton of every great story. The whole trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness.
I suppose the nature that granted me life. With a dash of anthropomorhisization then I'd be talking about God. It feels more like a deep respect than it does worship.
In the case of Globohomo, the divine is the endpoint of progress, namely a transcendence of the limits of nature to achieve equity.
This needs to be clearly defined so that people know that equity doesn't mean equal, it means everyone will end up the same, usually broke, stupid, and in debt to a tyrannical government.
Since there is so much variance in nature the only means of achieving equality is to tear everyone down (but people aren't likely to tear themselves down, so some will be more equal than others). I think notionally they might think it possible to build everyone up, but they're all economic ignoramuses so they don't know how to do that, and in any case there would still be inequality. Not as bad as we have now with Globohomo setting the conditions for criminals to rob the productive class blind, but still very significant.
To your point on elaborating about equity to obviate confusion, I don't think there is anyone who reads this stack hears the word 'equity' and thinks, "oh that sounds nice!" Maybe I'll throw in a footnote linking to an old video of Thomas Sowell laying it down, or maybe the classic Vonnegut short story Harrison Bergeron. So many have articulated this point so much better than I can ever hope to.
I know in the American context we can say that equality means equality before the law, or equality of opportunity. Neither are really possible in practice, the former we can get way closer with than the latter. Equality of opportunity is dumb. Parents shouldn't be able to pass on the fruits of their labor to their children? What incentive do they have to constrain base impulses towards waste and sloth? Are we really supposed to pretend that social status and reputation can be divorced from how you're treated by the law entirely? Or rather is equality just that everyone should be treated the same? Why? Are we supposed to treat everyone the same even if they hate us? I think both equality and equity are dirty words and dirtier ideals. Equity is perhaps more obviously stupid and anti-American, but equality isn't far behind. I know this is kind of stream of consciousness, but as I write this I can't help but think fairness and equality are mutually exclusive, and I do believe in fairness, which I tried to highlight in my essay about how nature isn't fair but that human beings still can be.
💬 social status and reputation can be divorced from how you're treated by the law entirely?
Should it even if it could?
💬 everyone should be treated the same? Why?
Presactly 🙂 However lamentable the general quality of [lower-tier?] courts, outsourcing them to dispassionately calculating AI would be a sheer nightmare. Not that there's an acute shortage of dolts swooning over some such thoughts.
Who gets to train the AI? Who watches the watchers? Our system would work if people would just quit trying to conquer reality, as if the universe is some kind of heterosexual white Christian male that needs to be put in his place.
Sure these are not the only fundamental disqualifiers 🙂 As to your clever quip (👌😁), Bertolt Brecht would echo with ‘dissolve the people and elect another’ 😏
Great article. I've been trying to come to terms with my own religion (Protestant), my third generation German/American heritage, all that. The American Spirit (not the tobacco but still a legit synch) is a phrase that often accompanies me, and I don't really know what it is, but it isn't what came before. We really do need a religion to combat GloboHomo, but it ain't gonna be like the religions of the past. An American Spirit is still being forged, and that is an exciting time to be alive.
Yes.
And I am sure epistamericanism as a word is unlikely to gain much traction, so the challenge would be to elucidate what it means in detail, any Joe or Jill could understand and appreciate. "Pissed American" is a good start.
I dunno, Pistamericans sounds like a great name for an ethnos.
The connotation sure works for the immediate clownish situation 🤭
🗨 pist = a low barrier around a circus ring
Ha!
>Another was a longer article with a cynical tone doing a deep dive on the American Civic Religion and all its issues.
https://treeofwoe.substack.com/p/the-right-religious-tradition-part-546
Thanks brother!
It seems that the first two points defining an Epistamerican are contradictory. If Epistamericans believe that there is an objective reality, and therefore objective truth, doesn't it follow that that reality and truth are universal, and therefore totalizing? How can an Epistamerican have an objective reality and allow anyone else to deny it and live contrary to it? You say that Globohomo must be defeated, so even if you allow for plenty of subjectivity (a detriment in my opinion) there is clearly a moral necessity to destroy or supplant rival systems, and if there is a moral necessity, there must be some source of morality.
To touch on the religious aspect (full disclosure, I am Orthodox), suffice to say that if you are Christian, your religion must be totalizing. Christ commands the baptism of all nations, and through the Scriptures and holy Tradition, the inner life of God and His Kingdom, as well as the telos of creation itself are expressly revealed. There is little room for speculation and opinion. Ultimately, Americanism must be made to conform with the revealed (and all-encompassing) Truth, Christ Himself.
It is commendable to work at explaining the nature of Americans as a distinct ethnos, but it must always be within the bounds set by Christ and His Church.
God bless!
There is a massive difference between faith in an objective reality and certainty that you understand all aspects of this reality with sufficient clarity to grant you moral authority to wield coercion against those who disagree. Is there any man who can rightly claim to know God's will with certainty from your Orthodox perspective? It is the distinction between faith and certainty that I speak to, and I believe it to be consilient with the beliefs of most Christians, but certainly not all.
I shouldn't say massive, more like subtle and critical
Thank you for your reply!
An important distinction, certainly, however I would argue it's not necessary to know *all* things to be able to say that *certain* things can be known and should be enforced through coercion, if necessary (though willing repentance of those in error is preferred).
I refer to Ivan Ilyin's On Resistance to Evil by Force for the Orthodox take on using coercion to enforce the Truth; his focus is primarily on law enforcement, though I think it is applicable across society. That is, for example, that there is a moral necessity to use force to stop a criminal, even before he commits a crime (if you were to see it in progress), as well as a duty to restrain a criminal after the fact and attempt to bring him to repentance through penance (whatever judicial punishment) or even death (if he will not repent and remains a danger to society and his own soul).
I think this model can be applied to society as a whole, where errant worldviews can be corrected with either soft means (propaganda, education, religion) or hard means, including imprisonment or exile as an extreme option for those who threaten to tear down society and install an evil regime based on their false worldview, like globohomo or the Bolsheviks before them.
In these cases, it would have been better that these antiChrist worldviews were snuffed before they were able to wreak such havoc on the world, and we now suffer the consequences of a failure to do so.
I could go on, but I don't want to write a dissertation in your comments!
Law enforcement and the legal tradition in America is already aligned with epistamericanism. In the example you give there is no certainty the individual committed a crime, because there are two sides to every story. There can be high degrees of confidence granting the moral authority to intervene, but not certainty. This is why we have the adversarial process in our legal tradition along with a right to trial by impartial jury. These features all scream out and recognition of the truth of what I speak. Faith is great for your own beliefs and foundations, and we all need the objective standard of reality, but everything else requires evidence. And when it comes to using force, our system puts an impartial jury as the arbiter of what was justifiable, not the state nor the church.
This is Water(*. See the ripples waltzing softly? 😊
🗨 There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is *what* to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship [...] is that pretty much anything else you worship will eat you alive.[...] On one level, we all know this stuff already. It's been codified as myths, proverbs, clichés, epigrams, parables; the skeleton of every great story. The whole trick is keeping the truth up front in daily consciousness.
--
(* delivered at Kenyon in 2005 --> faculty.winthrop.edu/martinme/Thisiswater.htm
I don't know what I worship.
Then you’d better be quick to bring the what in point out & about to the forefront of your conscious mind 😝
I suppose the nature that granted me life. With a dash of anthropomorhisization then I'd be talking about God. It feels more like a deep respect than it does worship.
Methinks that's pretty close to Mr Wallace's meaning of the word 😊
In the case of Globohomo, the divine is the endpoint of progress, namely a transcendence of the limits of nature to achieve equity.
This needs to be clearly defined so that people know that equity doesn't mean equal, it means everyone will end up the same, usually broke, stupid, and in debt to a tyrannical government.
Since there is so much variance in nature the only means of achieving equality is to tear everyone down (but people aren't likely to tear themselves down, so some will be more equal than others). I think notionally they might think it possible to build everyone up, but they're all economic ignoramuses so they don't know how to do that, and in any case there would still be inequality. Not as bad as we have now with Globohomo setting the conditions for criminals to rob the productive class blind, but still very significant.
To your point on elaborating about equity to obviate confusion, I don't think there is anyone who reads this stack hears the word 'equity' and thinks, "oh that sounds nice!" Maybe I'll throw in a footnote linking to an old video of Thomas Sowell laying it down, or maybe the classic Vonnegut short story Harrison Bergeron. So many have articulated this point so much better than I can ever hope to.
I know in the American context we can say that equality means equality before the law, or equality of opportunity. Neither are really possible in practice, the former we can get way closer with than the latter. Equality of opportunity is dumb. Parents shouldn't be able to pass on the fruits of their labor to their children? What incentive do they have to constrain base impulses towards waste and sloth? Are we really supposed to pretend that social status and reputation can be divorced from how you're treated by the law entirely? Or rather is equality just that everyone should be treated the same? Why? Are we supposed to treat everyone the same even if they hate us? I think both equality and equity are dirty words and dirtier ideals. Equity is perhaps more obviously stupid and anti-American, but equality isn't far behind. I know this is kind of stream of consciousness, but as I write this I can't help but think fairness and equality are mutually exclusive, and I do believe in fairness, which I tried to highlight in my essay about how nature isn't fair but that human beings still can be.
💬 social status and reputation can be divorced from how you're treated by the law entirely?
Should it even if it could?
💬 everyone should be treated the same? Why?
Presactly 🙂 However lamentable the general quality of [lower-tier?] courts, outsourcing them to dispassionately calculating AI would be a sheer nightmare. Not that there's an acute shortage of dolts swooning over some such thoughts.
Who gets to train the AI? Who watches the watchers? Our system would work if people would just quit trying to conquer reality, as if the universe is some kind of heterosexual white Christian male that needs to be put in his place.
Sure these are not the only fundamental disqualifiers 🙂 As to your clever quip (👌😁), Bertolt Brecht would echo with ‘dissolve the people and elect another’ 😏
Great article. I've been trying to come to terms with my own religion (Protestant), my third generation German/American heritage, all that. The American Spirit (not the tobacco but still a legit synch) is a phrase that often accompanies me, and I don't really know what it is, but it isn't what came before. We really do need a religion to combat GloboHomo, but it ain't gonna be like the religions of the past. An American Spirit is still being forged, and that is an exciting time to be alive.