There was a little confusion as to time zones since Mike has been traveling. Just to be clear, the closed Brainstorm event for Mike’s new Embracing Masculinity book is on Saturday from 5:00 PM – 6:30 PM Eastern.
And in Castalia House news, I wanted to thank everyone who made the following possible. We’re doing our best to bring you the best books we can find and publish, but you’re the core support required to make them successful. And while the categories may be a little on the esoteric side, in the long term, don’t count us out for one day doing the same in the larger categories as well. But for now, two simultaneous #1 bestsellers isn’t bad, especially when you only publish one book each month.
UPDATE: It’s also worth noting that in the Military Strategy category, Castalia House currently publishes five of the top 40 bestsellers.
The Polish nationalists are on the march and they’re burning the Fourth Reich flag.
Tens of thousands of protesters poured into Warsaw’s streets on Wednesday for a demonstration organised by the far right, marching under the slogan “Poland for the Polish” and burning an EU flag.
Police said 25,000 people joined the march, which marked the anniversary of Poland’s return to independence after the First World War, while organisers put the numbers at 50,000.
“God, honour, homeland,” chanted the protesters as they marched under a sea of red-and-white Polish flags.
Demonstrators trampled and burned a European Union flag at one point, while a banner added to the anti-EU theme with the slogan “EU macht frei” (“Work makes you free” in German), a reference to the slogan over the gates at Auschwitz.
“Yesterday it was Moscow, today it’s Brussels which takes away our freedom,” chanted one group of protesters.
God, honor, homeland. There are worse causes. And kudos to whoever came up with the “EU macht frei” meme. If the anti-EU campaigners in the UK have any sense whatsoever, we’ll be seeing that phrase a lot in the coming year. And for all the Americans who keep saying that Europe is dead, well, I see a lot of pictures of hundreds of thousands of European nationalists marching and taking action.
I understand that some SJW on wheels (and does anyone know if “wheelchair” trumps “black”, “woman”, or “cyberviolence survivor” in the SJW hierarchy?), recently followed the lead of Mr. Scalzi and others in announcing a Personal Policy regarding future convention attendance.
Since attendance polices are apparently now a Thing in the science fiction world, I decided I would be remiss should I fail to do likewise. Therefore, I am pleased to present the official Vox Day Personal Convention Attendance Policy:
Offer an public statement on the convention website, and a written statement to me submitting to my Supreme Dark Lordship and offering specifics about tributes and sacrifices that will be offered to honor me throughout the course of the event.
A sign over the venue entrance no smaller than 1.6 meters by one meter with the following words inscribed: “SJW delenda est”.
All SJWs in attendance are to be clearly identified with rainbow badges and bar codes. Their next-of-kin shall be notified by convention personnel within 36 hours of the end of the event.
One throne of bones constructed with four silvered skulls; the seat and backrest should be either royal blue or blood-red velvet. The throne shall be placed stage right with sufficient room behind for no less than four armored minions.
An Unsafe Space which only Evil Legion of Evil members, minions, and their invited victims are permitted to enter. It must be equipped with an original Intellivision system and no less than 10 games (not including Las Vegas Poker & Blackjack), a Nespresso machine with Ristretto and Canella capsules, 12 bottles of Prosecco Conegliano Valdobbiadene Superiore DOCG, and either a) a floor-drainage system or b) a large, high-quality wet vac.
I am, granted, only the Supreme Dark Lord of the Evil Legion of Evil, with a mere 456 Vile Faceless Minions at my every whim, beck, and call, but I’m a cruel and arrogant voice that can no longer use my money and time to support conventions that cannot take the time to ensure that my dark reign is not properly recognized. You literally cannot pay me to attend a convention without a submission policy.
See, I’M the nice one in the family. I mean, sure, I might have the massive piles of skulls and everything scattered around the lair, to say nothing of a heating system powered by burning rendered SJW fat, but all the various desecrations and violations and devourings by the Vile Faceless Minions are strictly post-mortem.
Spacebunny, on the other hand, usually prefers to play with the living….
There is more. It’s pretty funny, actually. It’s as if Veggie Tales met the Hugo Awards and they smoked a little peyote-spiked weed together.
#DearVeronica ,In this tech age, how should a novice novelist make an impression and promote his book to grab attention of a lot of people? — Rajat Joshi (@MrRajatJoshi) August 14, 2015
John Scalzi, author of some of my favorite books, is here to help Rajat out!
The answer, as everyone who has read SJWAL knows, is easy: lie about your blog traffic.
After all, who doesn’t want to read a book by someone with 2 MILLION MONTHLY PAGEVIEWS!
It has come to my attention that the World Fantasy Convention has decided to replace the bust of H. P. Lovecraft that constitutes the World Fantasy Award with some other figure. Evidently this move was meant to placate the shrill whining of a handful of social justice warriors who believe that a “vicious racist” like Lovecraft has no business being honoured by such an award. (Let it pass that analogous accusations could be made about Bram Stoker and John W. Campbell, Jr., who also have awards named after them. These figures do not seem to elicit the outrage of the SJWs.) Accordingly, I have returned my two World Fantasy Awards to the co-chairman of the WFC board, David G. Hartwell. Here is my letter to him: Mr. David G. Hartwell Tor Books 175 Fifth Avenue New York, NY 10010
Dear Mr. Hartwell:
I was deeply disappointed with the decision of the World Fantasy Convention to discard the bust of H. P. Lovecraft as the emblem of the World Fantasy Award. The decision seems to me a craven yielding to the worst sort of political correctness and an explicit acceptance of the crude, ignorant, and tendentious slanders against Lovecraft propagated by a small but noisy band of agitators.
I feel I have no alternative but to return my two World Fantasy Awards, as they now strike me as irremediably tainted. Please find them enclosed. You can dispose of them as you see fit.
Please make sure that I am not nominated for any future World Fantasy Award. I will not accept the award if it is bestowed upon me.
I will never attend another World Fantasy Convention as long as I live. And I will do everything in my power to urge a boycott of the World Fantasy Convention among my many friends and colleagues.
Yours, S. T. Joshi
And that is all I will have to say on this ridiculous matter. If anyone feels that Lovecraft’s perennially ascending celebrity, reputation, and influence will suffer the slightest diminution as a result of this silly kerfuffle, they are very much mistaken.
No respect. No contact. No validation. No mercy. No quarter. Those who have read SJWAL have seen that their very worst vituperation is best taken as praise, and their nominal praise is worth less than nothing. I received the following email this morning:
I just got your book in the mail today and am into the prologue and I had to put it down to email you to just plain thank you for writing it. I wish I could hear my enemies sing my praises the way your enemies sing yours.
A man is defined by his enemies as well as by his friends. S.T. Joshi, although a Man of the Left, has done very well indeed to refuse to accept the accolades of the SJWs. And note that, once more, it is TOR BOOKS that is right at the heart of the SJW infestation in science fiction and fantasy.
We find that our democratic theories and forms of government were fashioned by but one of the many races and peoples which have come within their practical operation, and that that race, the so-called Anglo-Saxon, developed them out of its own insular experience unhampered by inroads of alien stock. When once thus established in England and further developed in America we find that other races and peoples, accustomed to despotism and even savagery, and wholly unused to self-government, have been thrust into the delicate fabric. Like a practical people as we pride ourselves, we have begun actually to despotize our institutions in order to control these dissident elements, though still optimistically holding that we retain the original democracy.
Of course, economist John R. Commons was far from the first to observe the obvious:
“Another cause of revolution is difference of races which do not at once acquire a common spirit; for a state is not the growth of a day, any more than it grows out of a multitude brought together by accident. Hence the reception of strangers in colonies, either at the time of their foundation or afterwards, has generally produced revolution; for example, the Achaeans who joined the Troezenians in the foundation of Sybaris, becoming later the more numerous, expelled them; hence the curse fell upon Sybaris. At Thurii the Sybarites quarrelled with their fellow-colonists; thinking that the land belonged to them, they wanted too much of it and were driven out. At Byzantium the new colonists were detected in a conspiracy, and were expelled by force of arms; the people of Antissa, who had received the Chian exiles, fought with them, and drove them out; and the Zancleans, after having received the Samians, were driven by them out of their own city. The citizens of Apollonia on the Euxine, after the introduction of a fresh body of colonists, had a revolution; the Syracusans, after the expulsion of their tyrants, having admitted strangers and mercenaries to the rights of citizenship, quarrelled and came to blows; the people of Amphipolis, having received Chalcidian colonists, were nearly all expelled by them.”
And yes, that would be Aristotle, from the Politics
Written by the author of the landmark Maneuver Warfare Handbook and an active-duty USMC officer with experience in Iraq, 4th Generation Warfare Handbook is the doctrine for a new generation of war. Over the last 40 years, the world has gradually entered into a post-Clausewitzian state where the wars are undeclared, the battlefields can be anywhere, the uniforms are optional, and the combatants as well as the targets are often “civilian”. Conventional militaries have repeatedly attempted to utilize technology to meet the new challenges posed, but even the most advanced technology has provided little more than meaningless short-term victories rendered futile in months, if not weeks.
This inability of Western governments and militaries to come to terms with the changing nature of modern warfare has led to failed interventions, failed occupations, and now even failed states everywhere from Eastern Europe to Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. And with the recent mass movement of peoples around the world, 4th Generation Warfare can be safely expected to appear in Western Europe and the United States before long.
Drawing on their decades of experience with military history and military action, the authors have distilled 4GW theory into a short, concise, easily accessible handbook that provides the soldier, the military analyst, and the civilian observer with a guide to understanding and responding to the changing realities of this challenging new form of war.
4th Generation Warfare Handbook is now available on Amazon for $6.99. If you preordered, you are eligible for a special Brainstorm event featuring the authors. Please send me an email with PREORDER in the subject if you wish to attend; the event has not yet been scheduled.
In an interesting juxtaposition, last night I finished putting the accepted submissions to There Will Be War Vol X in order. What was interesting was that the other non-fiction submissions tended to underline the importance of this handbook, as they both a) appealed to the use of new technology or a combination of 2nd and 3rd Generation tactics, and, b) indicated the need for the very sort of 4GW counterforce that Lind and LtCol Thiele describe in detail in 4th Generation Warfare Handbook. If you’re interested in reading more about 4GW theory, you’ll definitely want to read On War, which is now available on Kindle Unlimited, in which you can see how Lind gradually refined his thinking on the subject.
It will be interesting to see if this handbook eventually becomes officially adopted in the way its predecessor did in the 1980s. In any event, a belated Happy Birthday, Marines. Hope you like your new doctrine!
The SJWs are not bad people. Not at first. Even Lucifer was not totally wretched and evil at first.
That is the important thing to remember.
They are good people with a bad theory who are addicted, like a cocaine addict, to the rush of ego-gratification that comes from self-righteousness.
The Morlocks once were human, once dwelt on the surface, under the sun, and once ate wholesome meats, and did not feast on human flesh. It takes several steps pf evolution to go from being a good man to being a subhuman troglodyte cannibal. Not all have taken all the steps
It is a three stage trap into which they fall, and at each stage, for the best of reasons.
The first stage is an appeal to their sense of fairplay not to make a decision until all the facts are in, not to condemn the wicked until they are proved wicked, and to question everything, to question authority.
But this first stage trap closes when their sense of fairplay comes to the conclusion that no authority, not the authority of morality, not the authority of reason, not the authority of logic, can sit in judgment on any matter. They become so open minded that their brains fall out. They cease to reason in the name of fairplay.
Call this the Appeal to Equality. If all men are equal, no man’s opinion is better than any others’, and so there is no such thing as a right man and the wrong man, a right answer and a wrong answer, a civilized culture or barbaric one. The Appeal to Equality says that to think one answer correct and the other wrong, one behavior a vice and another a virtue, is a hasty judgment, even bigotry.
Reasoning becomes a hate crime.
Once they cease to reason, that is, cease to look at facts for answers, they are thrown back on their emotions and nothing else for a standard of judgment by which to organized their lives, and to build their model of the universe.
At this point, have lost the civilized gift of reason, they are barbarians.
As I said in SJWAL, it was not my purpose to explain the existence of SJWs or attempt to understand them in any way, but merely to describe and anticipate their actions. John Wright has proceeded with the obvious next steps in the process, which is to understand how this intellectual descent of Man takes place, and as always, his perspective is both informative and entertaining.
