When Murray Rothbard gave his famous speech at the 1992 meeting of the John Randolph Club, I had not yet been born. Whether someone my age can be accurately described as a "Paleo", a "post-Paleo", or something else entirely is a debate for another time. What can be said with certainty though, is that whatever side I am on, it is the wrong side. It is the side that is losing, the side that no one would choose to be on.
As I often tell fellow students who are in a state of shock after learning my thoughts on this or that topic, "Beliefs seem to choose us, not the other way around." I have met atheists who desperately want to believe in God but do not. Likewise, I have met Christians who agree logically with every atheist argument in the book—yet cannot bring themselves into a permanent state of disbelief.
I often feel as though I am in a similar situation. It would make my life a great deal easier if I just started reading The Nation and agreeing with every editorial. But that would not work: I read VDARE.com and Takimag for the simple reason that I agree with most of their articles—for better or for worse.
The "resignation" of Jason Richwine is just another reminder that I will likely spend my life in deep trouble for the beliefs I hold—a problem that is compounded by my young age. Paul Gottfried spoke on this some years ago at a meeting of the H.L. Mencken Club:
I’m especially impressed by those young people who are here. To say they have embraced the non-authorized Right indicates more than simply an ideological address. It betokens their willingness to become non-authorized dissenters, that is, to turn their backs on the characteristically stale conversations of media debates and the allowable differences of opinion within the Beltway.
Turning one’s back on this prescribed discourse means forfeiting the perks that flow from those in power. It also means being labeled as a troublemaker or extremist—and for those who persist in their orneriness, this choice may also mean being pushed out of magazines for which one previously wrote and having one’s books snubbed by the arbiters of acceptable political concerns.
A Call to the Alternative Right, takimag.com, November 10, 2009
Although some may not think it possible, my perspective is somewhat more pessimistic than Gottfried's.
He spoke of marginalization, which I do not fear. Perhaps I am being paranoid, but what I fear is complete blacklist status. I do not write under my real name, but what should happen if I am exposed is not a comfortable thought.
Unlike many of the authors across the Dissident Right, I was not yet born during what seems to have been the more "liberal" time when Joe Sobran was not synonymous with Holocaust denial, Pat Buchanan synonymous with Nazism, etc. I grew up after the Cultural Marxist Left had gotten a stranglehold on public discourse.
Simply put, all my heroes have been fired—and in some cases, I learned who they were precisely because their firing made headlines.
Should my real name come out, I would be "pre-fired", permanently marked in a way that could keep me from obtaining almost most any professional job.
The reminders of such a fate are becoming more and more frequent. I now call the phenomenon of being fired in the name of political correctness "getting Derbed"—everyone reading VDARE.com understands the reference. I could go over a long list of folks who have gotten Derbed, but I would not be informing readers of anything new. To wallow in self-pity is quite easy—and it is especially easy to do so on an occasion as deplorable as this Jason Richwine affair.
However, there is an upside to all.
Consider the positive implication of my earlier line: "In some cases I learned who they were simply because their firing made headlines." By now, everyone who pays any attention to the news has heard about Jason Richwine. Most everyone heard it from a media outlet championing his resignation. But, rest assured, there are people out there right now who heard about the ordeal through the nightly news and are in the process of sifting through the results of a "Jason Richwine" Google search looking for anybody willing to defend him.
Granted, the first people our sympathetic Googler will find will be Michelle Malkin via CNS or RCP and Rush Limbaugh. But many will push further, and eventually they will discover VDARE.com and its ilk—particularly given how many articles VDARE.com has posted on the matter.
Richard Spencer was not playing spin-doctor when he wrote that Alternative Right and NPI’s being featured on Rachel Maddow was a great thing. I find it somewhat embarrassing to admit, but I discovered Takimag because I read about John Derbyshire getting fired from National Review on... The Huffington Post.
It really does happen. Even if the first wave is directed at conventional outlets, anyone who likes what they see there will travel over to VDARE.com soon enough.
When one is plugged in to the Dissident Right corner of the web, it is easy to forget how few people know about it—again, a phrase that sounds worse than it is. People are unaware because so much is done to repress it.
The irony comes with events like the Derbing of Richwine: when the Main Stream Media celebrates the vanquishing of a foe, it lets lonely dissidents know that there are others out there who think like them—such was the case with me and the Derb's Talk.
Jason Richwine will be fine. With a Harvard PhD, he will likely find something high paying in the corporate world. And I still feel confident that the remnants of the Tea Party in the House will keep any kind of amnesty from passing. The ultimate winner? Likely VDARE.com, Alternative Right, and Takimag.
Gilbert Cavanaugh is a Middle American Radical and college student.
