2. The same point can be put in other words: there's an endless supply of bully pulpits for straight white men who espouse racist, xenophobic, misogynistic, homophobic ideas — until the get "too weird," and that's a very far bridge, indeed.

3. One of the biggest problems the human community faces today is the inordinate power men like that possess through said bully pulpits — and the harm they do via these pulpits. See: Elon Musk, Tucker Carlson, et al.

#RodDreher

/2

Some takeaways (for me) from the story that Rod Dreher's blog at The American Conservative was funded by one person, Howard Ahmanson Jr., who has pulled the plug on said blog after it got — only now?! — "too weird":

1. Straight right-wing white men who purport to be opinion makers will ALWAYS find someone to fund them, until they become too outrageous to merit funding. There's an endless funding stream for such men.

#RodDreher

/1

https://12ft.io/proxy?q=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.vanityfair.com%2Fnews%2F2023%2F03%2Frod-dreher-blog-weird-american-conservative&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

Shocking Hungarians and angering Orbán, Dreher went back to his apartment and published on his American Conservative blog what Orbán had told this private group, including, "We are in a war with Russia."

That headline simply would not do, so Dreher compliantly altered the report to make Orbán's words, "The West is in a war with Russia."

Problem solved, When a dictator says dance, you pick up your feet and dance, principles be damned.

#RodDreher #Hungary #Russia #ViktorOrbán

/2

Balázs Gulyás reports on an international scandal US right-winger Rod Dreher caused in Hungary last week. His marriage having broken up after Dreher spent years representing himself as the champion of family values as he attacked LGBTQ people, Dreher is teaching in Hungary with the Hungarian people partly financing his stay there.

As a right-wing luminary, Dreher was invited last week to a meeting with Orbán.

#RodDreher #Hungary #Russia #ViktorOrbán

/1

https://www.thebulwark.com/how-rod-dreher-caused-an-international-scandal-in-eastern-europe/

@johnquiggin I don't think hashtags work in CWs. Yes, it vexes me too.

With regard to the #RodDreher article, I confess to being pleased and surprised that the Europeans have provided such strong support to #Ukraine — surprised not because of decadence, but because the loss of cheap Russian gas is a major cost to their publics.

Did you think a year ago that Germany would be so willing to stand up against Putin's Russia?

This is from a column lamenting the modern world, and claiming there is no way back.

"The spirit which made all this possible, and which sustained the other many self-restraints which kept the peace, has gone."

Via #RossDouthat and #RodDreher .

#WWI

That's #FreddieDeBoer at https://freddiedeboer.substack.com/p/that-one-side-would-like-to-utterly

Via #RodDreher

"A liberal reporter, commenting on this, told me that the younger generation of journalists think that “fairness” and “balance” are weasel concepts that make it possible for evil people to have a voice that they do not deserve. This is the death of liberalism. Old-fashioned liberals think conservatives are wrong; the Woke think we are evil."

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/radicalizing-to-the-right-viktor-orban-left/

#RodDreher

Most of #RossDouthat 's article is about "the tensions between traditionalism and capitalism, which seems especially relevant now that the right doesn’t know what it’s conserving anymore." But the hook at the end I've quoted is also worth considering. Maybe the left doesn't think we're trending towards a Huxleyan world, or that it wouldn't be so bad? Or is full-socialism the answer to declining birthrates and anomie?

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/08/opinion/sunday/capitalism-conservatism.html

Via #RodDreher

#NYTimes #conservatism

Something Demonic Is In The Air
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/diabolic-demonic-trump-critical-race-theory/

"I wrote last night that “something demonic is in the air.” A reader e-mailed to say:

Man, that’s the truth. That’s this whole year in a nutshell. All summer long my wife and I watched with horror as family and friends were sucked into the Critical Race Theory vortex. [...] And then, post election, we have watched with equal horror as more friends and family not on the Left have gone down the election fraud black hole."

#RodDreher

@EdS Similar quotes are up at #RodDreher 's blog: https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/qanon-kraken-to-be-vanquished-by-leviathan/

@emacsomancer There's a #GlennGreenwald article along those lines at https://greenwald.substack.com/p/violence-in-the-capitol-dangers-in-67f?token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjoyMjU1MTcyLCJwb3N0X2lkIjozMTEzMzI5MSwiXyI6IkJ3Yk9FIiwiaWF0IjoxNjEwMDQ5Njk4LCJleHAiOjE2MTAwNTMyOTgsImlzcyI6InB1Yi0xMjg2NjIiLCJzdWIiOiJwb3N0LXJlYWN0aW9uIn0.XUlGG8R9kGC3EiQPvN9rxwSMnrDiIFwbAFhG4sdWH68

Via #RodDreher
#uspol

The US is a big country and contains all sorts of craziness. How many people really think preserving President Trump in office is their mission from God is hard to say -- people lie to pollsters, sometimes to hide their opinions, sometimes to demonstrate commitment. But as a Christian, this sort of rally distresses me.

What I Saw At The Jericho March | #RodDreher
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/what-i-saw-at-the-jericho-march/

#TheAmericanConservative
#uspol

The Pity Of The Royal Marriage - #RodDreher

"But, having made unwise vows, ought they both have kept them, at the expense of their happiness. I think yes. It is more important that they live out their duty to be what they promised to be, rather than to be what they wanted to be. What if that meant they were miserable together? [... I]f people are not willing to suffer to be faithful to their vows (marital and otherwise), society will disintegrate."

https://roddreher.substack.com/p/the-pity-of-the-royal-marriage

Therapeutic Superstition by #DavidBentleyHart | Articles | #FirstThings
https://www.firstthings.com/article/2012/11/therapeutic-superstition

"Sometimes it is difficult to exaggerate how strange, barbaric, and superstitious an age ours really is."

A story (true, DBH dixit) of a man who saw #fairies.

Via #RodDreher

"I cannot imagine caring so much about politics that I would cut off a friend or family member. I don’t make friends on the basis of politics, so why would I cease being friends with someone I otherwise cared about, because they came to a different political conclusion. I mean, yeah, if it were Germany 1934 or Russia 1917. But we aren’t there. We get there more quickly by becoming the sort of people who value politics more than friends and family." -- #RodDreher

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/hating-your-mama-over-politics-trump-biden-family-friendships/