A skinsuit cannot survive

The fact that a Christian American country survived unrest in the past says nothing whatsoever about the ability of a post-Christian, post-American state to do so now:

America has survived unrest before, but that was a different country. It had a white, Christian super-majority and a shared history. It had at least a theoretical chance of working out a modus vivendi with its black minority. The language was English and, most of the time, we played by a set of rules to which everyone—liberal conservative, Democrat or Republican—agreed. Elections were not winner-take-all apocalyptic events. Nominations to the U.S. Supreme Court did not occasion brutal, partisan, ideological war. No longer.

If we bank solely on electoral politics, we will lose, especially as the demographic ring closes. The winners will show no quarter.

Political life as we knew it in America is over. Again, the America we grew up in and loved is dead.

The irony here is that the author quotes Sun Tzu about the importance of knowing one’s enemy, but never once dares to utter the name of that enemy. Which tends to underline why Americans lost their country and why other European nations are now at risk of losing theirs; as long even the most die-hard right-wing conservatives still give lip service to “judeo-christianity” and “civic nationalism”, there is no chance of ever winning any battle.

For Sun Tzu also says:“If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”

That being said, while we can, and should, mourn the civilized society that was lost, we should not be surprised that it did not last. It could not last. For as another Chinese sage observed: “The empire, long united, must divide.”

Catching up with Castalia Library

First, this is the mockup for the Castalia Library edition of AWAKE IN THE NIGHT LAND by John C. Wright. Unlike the other Library books, the pages are silvered rather than gilded, in keeping with the style and theme of Mr. Wright’s modern science fiction classic.

Second, if and only if you’re a subscriber, please note that we’re going to do things a little differently going forward, starting today. Instead of making multiple catchup payments to acquire earlier books that you missed, now you can make a single payment for that specific book. In the case of AWAKE IN THE NIGHT LAND, you can make a single payment of $100 if you happened to subscribe after April 30, 2020.

This change will help us keep track of exactly what you want instead of having to contact you via email or hope that you remembered to add a comment to your order. The only reasons to purchase a subscription catchup now are 1) if you happen to subscribe on the second month of any book or 2) if you run into a problem with your credit card.

The same holds true for Libraria Castalia subscribers, although there are a very limited number of books still available. You can see the various options now available to you here. We are rapidly approaching the end of the Book 4 subscription period, so if you’re interested in THE DIVINE COMEDY by Dante Alighieri, you’ll need to subscribe and make one subscription catchup payment before the end of Tuesday.

If there are still books available after the new subscribers get their shot at them, we will consider making them available for sale at the retail prices of $199 and $499.

Below is a preview of the title page. The next book in the subscription, Book 5, will be LIVES OF THE NOBLE GREEKS AND ROMANS, Vol. I by Plutarch.

Parler may be a trap

While it’s possible that some of these restrictions are in place to deal with the inevitable SJW infiltrators and activists, I would not utilize it based on the dichotomy between its public free speech posturing and its Terms of Use. It’s founder’s statements about fighting badthink are also a significant red flag.

14. You agree to defend and indemnify Parler, as well as any of its o cers, directors, employees, and agents, from and against any and all claims, actions, damages, obligations, losses, liabilities, costs or debt, and expenses (including but not limited to all attorneys fees) arising from or relating to your access to and use of the Services. Parler will have the right to conduct its own defense, at your expense, in any action or proceeding covered by this indemnity.

Parler’s claim to be pro-free speech also appears to be somewhat overstated:

9. Parler may remove any content and terminate your access to the Services at anytime and for any reason or no reason, although Parler endeavors to allow all free speech that is lawful and does not infringe the legal rights of others. 

Don’t forget that Twitter and Facebook both used to cloak themselves in free speech rhetoric before unmasking their social justice faces. Parler also mandates AAA arbitration while banning group action, but lacks the California consumer protection laws.

I’m not saying this because we intend SG to compete with the likes of Twitter, Parler, and Gab – we don’t. At best, Parler is for the cons and civnats who are being banished from the SJWsphere. It strikes me as the Breitbart of social media, a gatekeeping action meant to keep conservatives in the corral and ineffectual.

The core problem is that mass social media is now little more than an involuntary resignation machine.

Barnes & Noble in freefall

It’s not looking great for the mainstream literary and comics publishers either:

Barnes & Noble has laid off many of its buyers and plans to reconfigure its buying approach in the Waterstones’ style, which shifted to a more centralized model last year, Shelf Awareness has learned. Other headquarters staff and “some” store employees have apparently also been let go.

The B&N buyers, many or all of whom have been furloughed since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic in the U.S., include such longtime employees as literary fiction buyer Sessalee Hensley, who had been with B&N about 35 years; SF/fantasy and graphics novel buyer James Killen, who had been with B&N 41 years; buyer David Garber, a 25-year veteran; and Lisa Echenthal, a 28-year veteran.

This, of course, is almost certainly good for us, since our books are barely carried by the mainstream. As Amazon takes control of mainstream publishing, more and more people are going to opt out of their feeding trough model.

Silver linings

Of course, it wasn’t Wilson’s racist thinking that was the problem, it was his globalism:

Princeton has stripped the name of 28th President Woodrow Wilson from a college and public policy school due to his ‘racist thinking.’

Princeton University President Christopher Eisgruber announced on Saturday the institution will remove Wilson’s name from its public policy school and a residential college.

‘On my recommendation, the board voted to change the names of both the School of Public and International Affairs and Wilson College,’ Eisgruber said in a statement.

He added: ‘the trustees concluded that Woodrow Wilson’s racist thinking and policies make him an inappropriate namesake for a school or college whose scholars, students, and alumni must stand firmly against racism in all its forms.’

That’s quite the responsibility for the alumni, given the obligations imposed upon them. It’s got to be exhausting standing firmly against racism in all its forms every day.

They done did it

Minneapolis abolishes the Minneapolis Police Department:

Minneapolis City Council votes unanimously for proposal that could replace Police Department

Less than three weeks after they promised to begin work on “ending” the Minneapolis Police Department, some City Council members pushed forward a new vision for law enforcement Friday that could still include officers on the streets.

The council voted unanimously to advance a proposal that would create a new Department of Community Safety and Violence Prevention. Within that, the city could create a division that includes “licensed peace officers,” though it would not be required to do so.

It’s unclear how many, if any, officers would continue to be employed by the city if the proposal passes.

Council Member Cam Gordon said it’s consistent with the pledge from council members to fundamentally alter local policing in the wake of George Floyd’s killing by Minneapolis officers.

“Those things that we called the police department are gone,” Gordon said. “Certainly, there is a provision in here that would allow this council or future councils to maintain a Division of Law Enforcement Services, but I think what we need to do is have that possibility there and talk to people about what the future should look like.”

It’s amusing to see that they’re already trying to go back on their proposal, and the Star Tribune is attempting to give them cover to do so. This is the inevitable problem when parasites try to rule. They have absolutely no ability to actually do anything except subvert and undermine.

That’s why their periods of “rule” tend to be more akin to interregnums.

What Minneapolis will end up with, of course, is the same MPD by another name. Because word play is the only play in the lunatic playbook.

SF creeps are creepy

Yet more sex-related scandals in the freaky world of science fiction:

Over the last 48 hours or so, the science fiction and fantasy literature field has been rocked by multiple accusations of multiple authors of improper behaviour, abuse, gaslighting, racism, misogyny, sexual coercion and authors using their platforms to engage in dogpiling and bullying.

The number of accusations has been almost overwhelming. Genre Grapevine is currently running a list of the allegations where the facts of the matter are not in dispute. Authors Paul Krueger, Myke Cole and Sam Sykes have been accused of inappropriate behaviour (Cole has subsequently been dropped by his publisher and agent, and Krueger by his agent) and others of enabling that behaviour.

It’s the exact opposite of “shocking” to be informed that a field that lionizes convicted and admitted pedophiles and celebrates its sexual freaks is rife with creeps. Like, you know, our old pal McRapey, who has a pain in his tummy over the possibility of his own peccadilloes coming to light.

My friends fucked up. Not accidentally, to be clear. They made choices.

They are responsible for their wholly intentional fuck ups.

Also, I am responsible for my fuck-ups in relation to them — to what extent my friendship implies complicity with their actions, or provides cover, or has allowed me to overlook things I should have been paying attention to, or has allowed me to excuse what they were doing. This is one reason I feel like I have a small ulcer at the moment; the gnawing feeling in my gut that wonders how much of their fuck ups are at my door. In some cases, not much! In others: well, more.

(You should also know right now I definitely have that exasperated part of me that is all, like, look, I haven’t been in the same room as this guy for a couple of years! I don’t have a body cam on him! I don’t see every goddamned thing he does as he does it and to whom he does it! My brain is very full of defensive frustrated whining right now! Which is also a thing I have to work through.)

(And while I’m at it, I’m going through my own interactions with people, especially women, at conventions and other places where it turns out the power differential slides toward me. I can admit that this power differential wasn’t something I truly clued into for a while — I think it took being SFWA President to get it drilled into my head, because that was a big fuckin’ neon sign, wasn’t it — but it was there fairly early, so, uhhh, yeah. I’ve seen people commenting “well, at least we still have Scalzi,” and there’s part of my brain going, oh, man, I sure hope you do! But I also know that I have fucked up before in other places where I didn’t understand my power (see: RaceFail, now a decade back), and because of that what I did or said hurt people. That’s also a thing.)

So, yeah, I have to sit with and work through all of that.

It’s delightful to be able to state that I have absolutely no connection with any of these awful people on either side. And I can’t say that my own tummy hurts from laughing so hard, because I’m not really the laugh-out-loud type. But I may have smiled.

UPDATE: If, like me, you have no idea what the latest tempest in the freakshow teapot is about, it apparently is related to this:

In last night’s episode of The Horror Show With Brian Keene, he said the show’s team was aware of 10 cases of allegations involving everything from sexual coercion to sexual assault that have been made “against ten different individuals in the comic book, horror, science fiction, book-selling, convention organizer, and cosplay sectors of our industry — all of which had publicly come to light in the last 7 days.” When Keene followed up the podcast today with a public Patreon post, “Behind Closed Doors”, he said the number is up to 17.

The soyboys are finally beginning to understand why the men’s club was necessary, even by their idiotic equalitarian standards. It’s fine to decry the creeps and all, and I have no doubt that most of them did what they are accused of and more, but the fact is that there has been a lot of significant art created by very flawed men. I am dubious that all of the art, science, and technology created by sub-Alpha males and good Christian married men can be adequately replaced by female creators.

The War for the Midnight World

Bounding Into Comics notes the release of MIDNIGHT’S WAR:

Vox Day’s Arkhaven Comics recently released a brand new vampire thriller series titled Midnight’s War. The series was released on the popular Web Toons platform and will consist of four episodes. The first episode titled “Not Even The Wicked Dead” was released on June 24th and Vox informs Bounding Into Comics the second episode will be released on June 26th.

The series is set in the distant future following an economic crisis that sees the vampire tribes come out of hiding in an attempt to take control of the Earth and humanity. They usurp Earth’s institutions including their media and governments and establish a new world order under the Great Concord of Gomorrah.

This new world order demanded humans provide a certain amount of blood to the vampire authorities every year.

However, while most of humanity might have fallen to the vampires and their new world, there are some humans who actively resist the vampires and in fact some human blood was not palatable to the vampires.

 The first two episodes of MIDNIGHT’S WAR are live:

  1. Not Even The Wicked Dead
  2. They Also Serve

There will be two more episodes released prior to June 30th, which is when the short story contest ends. MIDNIGHT’S WAR is already one of the ten most popular entries in the Brain category, so it appears to have a decent shot at winning one of the prizes.

There is already serious studio interest in a series of movies based on MIDNIGHT’S WAR. The Legend and I have discussed working together on a regular monthly comic set in the Midnight World, but first we have to figure out how to support that as I don’t wish to do any more crowdfunding campaigns until we deliver AH, AH:Q, and the Junior Classics.

Speaking of the first two series, the Avalon 1-6 omnibus is nearly ready, AH #7 and AH:Q #3 are also rapidly approaching release.

Some of the early reactions to MIDNIGHT’S WAR:

  • It’s amazing to see how the art has improved in Arkhaven Comics as they develop the projects.
  • This needs to be made into a movie ASAP…. The setup here is what makes this extra-creepy.
  • That final panel needs to be a poster!
  • Incredible potential with this.
  • This is the best product around.
  • The level of art is far above mainline comics, you can actually tell what kind of pistol he carries.
  • Love the hero design, it makes me want to be a knight myself.

The other great replacement

One of the reasons Jewish politicians like the feckless Minneapolis mayor Jacob Frey are being parachuted into places like Minnesota to run for office is because they can’t safely expect to win elections in their historical strongholds anymore. Unlike easily-deceived white Americans, the replacements their predecessors summoned in 1965 are not interested in being “represented” by an alien tribe.

Eliot Engel, a Zionist warmonger who has been in Congress since 1989, has been crushed at the ballot box by Bernie Sanders and Ilhan Omar endorsed black leftist Jamaal Bowman in New York’s majority non-white 16th District.

The outcome is a stunning blow for the Zionist lobby. The Israeli Engel is the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee who voted for the Iraq war and advocates extreme neo-conservative policies. While Engel is a Democrat, he is considered to be an important AIPAC asset in Washington.

Engel touted high powered endorsements from Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, and even the bought out Congressional Black Caucus over his black insurgent opponent.

Nevertheless, Bowman’s unexpected momentum prompted a massive avalanche of Jewish money to Engel, including from Republican Party Super PACs, in an attempt to try and save his seat.

While Engel and his Super PACs outspent the underdog many times over, Bowman is currently leading him by 25 points with 670 of 732 precincts reporting.

Notice that even Republicans were donating heavily to the longtime Democrat on purely ethnic grounds. This alone should be sufficient to convince you that an ideological perspective on politics is intrinsically incorrect in a multiracial, multireligious state.