The Logic of To-Day; A Review of A Most Fascinating Book

In this newsletter, I review a book that most wouldn't dare to read.

I want to start by saying it's difficult to review a book like Might is Right without inadvertently writing another book. That is as much care and trouble as the book deserves. I recently finished the first volume of the chronicles of Narnia, and in the book Aslan is described as both good and terrible at the same time. That is perhaps the most correct description of Might is Right. Unfortunately, the book isn't like Aslan — oh no! It's even more terrible than that. It's racist, anti-semitic, sexist, and mostly true.

Since I cannot write a book to review it (for who will read it? And more importantly, who will write it?), you'll have to make do with this essay. It is pretty long. But Might is Right deserves it.

The point of Might is Right is quite simple and easy to grasp. Most of us have heard of the saying. Might is Right. It simply means the powerful can do as they please. And that they do as they please. Might is Right is not a controversial statement to make in the presence of polite company. When you say it, everyone nods their heads along as if to say, of course Might is Right — like the day is bright.

However, I daresay that many — perhaps even you reading this — will find it hard to come to terms with what that truly means. And that's what Ragnar Redbeard, the author of this terrible book, goes to great lengths to show us.

There Is No Such Thing As Morality

Ragnar Redbeard starts by writing a long poem where he proudly proclaims that weak people don't deserve anything. To him, there is no such thing as right or wrong. When I first started reading, I believed he would later add caveats to this point and say something like “obviously guys, genocide, rape, armed robbery and all those other stuff are wrong".

But he never does. In the end, it's shown that when he says there's no such thing as right or wrong, that's precisely what he means. There are no caveats, no objections, no allowances, NOTHING. The logic of To-day, as he puts it, is quite simple.

If you're FIT you'll rule and reign,

That's the logic of To-day.

It's hard to express just how totally Ragnar Redbeard means this, and I believe it's best to do that by showing you his own words.

What is RIGHT — what is WRONG? These elemental interrogatories have been asked in every age, and every age formulates replies to suit itself. DE FACTO Right and Wrong are no more than arbitrary algebraic signs, representing hypnagogic phantasies. They are mere symbols emblematic of belated fragments of insolent ecclesiastical crudities. In nature, all developments are essentially one and the same phenomenon infinitely transfused and intermingled. Good and Evil are human inventions, born of human foolery, narrowness, and shortsightedness.

To him, what decides right and wrong isn't some universal objective rule — instead it's power. Everywhere, and anywhere. If, for instance, some powerful empire were to wipe out a certain ethnic group off the face of the earth, that action would be right since the conquering power would have earned the right to do that through their might. If some remnant of the conquered group regrouped and wiped out their oppressors ( with children and pregnant women in tow), they would also be right.

Right and Wrong, like Up and Down, East and West, are relative terms, without any fixed or finite meaning. What is good for the goose is not always good for the gander. Newfoundland lies East from Chicago, but West from Berlin. All depends upon the point of view. Consequently what may be ‘right’ in one age may, in another age, be wholly ‘wrong.

So what's the justification for this absurd and extraordinary belief? What would make a man believe this?

There are two answers to that question. The first, as explained in the quote above, is that morality is extremely relative. This is one position on which I agree completely with Redbeard. People who haven't explored their moral assumptions or beliefs have a hard time parsing this, but it's nonetheless true.

Murder may be immoral, but it totally depends on who's doing the killing and who's getting killed. Pacifists may say they oppose all murders, but is there even one pacifist on the face of the earth who wouldn't applaud the death of a killer on the verge of killing him, even if not done by his own hands?

Theft may be immoral, but it completely depends on who is being stolen from and who's doing the stealing. When the state collects needless taxes invented by mischievous legalese to fill its coffers and support the livelihood of a thousand useless workers and a hundred useless politicians, very few regard that as immoral. When a pauper — or even an enterprising youth or scholar does the same from a supermarket, the majority look upon him as immoral and the priest condemns him to hell forever.

That is, the same act can be immoral and moral at the same time. It all depends on what assumptions a person is starting with and what incentives they have.

Even what is right to one man, under one set of circumstances, may be utterly wrong to the same man under a different set of circumstances. Cromwell as colonel of the Ironsides, thought regal absolutism the essence of all diabolism; but as President of the Republic, he defended it (in himself) as — ‘a crowning mercy.’

He further makes his point here.

Common-sense provides no precise solution of Right or Wrong. “All moral philosophy is false and vain,” for man is unlimited. In the realm of Ethics, most modern wiselings are fanatical and unreasonable bigots. They really believe that Ethical Principles are as a house built on a rock; whereas ‘the House’ is an unfounded hypothesis, and ‘the Rock’ non existent.

The second reason is implicit, not explicit. Redbeard is an atheist, and as such has a decidedly dim view of Christ (much more on that later). This means that he necessarily doesn't agree with any notion of objective morality. His reasons for this, as stated in the book, aren't just atheistic. He argues that Christian morality is a perfect example of how morality is often invented for the benefits of the ruling (or conquering) class.

His argument is this;

Among virile conquering tribes, the Ideal Man is ever the all-daring Jove, the splendid Apollo, the self-reliant Achilles, or the Constructive Genius. It is only in centuries of dotage — in ages of cankersome down- going and nervous disease, that the Model Man becomes a Christ. The Model Man of our forefathers was Odin, a War Lord, but our Ideal Man is a weeping, horsewhipped Jew. A Jew for a God!

These two reasons make it all clear to Redbeard that morality of any hue is nothing but a human invention that can be discarded by the powerful at any time. Some may disagree with this, and argue that Redbeard's argument is antisemitic, and as such not logical. But I disagree.

In this instance, Redbeard is right, even if a little provocative. Christianity — with its message of peace, timidity and meekness (the meek shall inherit the earth — WHY? The meek deserve nothing but death and suffering, and that's what the logic of To-day guarantees that they will get, Redbeard says!) — is unlike most religions to have come before it.

Even its sister religions, Judaism and Islam, aren't half as timid as Christianity. The Talmund tells Jews they can deal unfavorably with a gentile, and the Koran tells Muslims they will have the chance to hunt Jews to death one day. Jesus, on the other hand, tells you to turn the other cheek when you're slapped. Redbeard says to hell with that.

(There are some — many Christians — who may argue that Christianity being so different from what came before it is one of the reasons why it is true. I don't think that's a logical conclusion. A thing isn't true or valid or legitimate just because it's different.)

The fact that Christian morality pervades most of Western society (and southern Nigeria) when it didn't before, shows that morality isn't set in stone and is interchangeable. And if it is, Redbeard seems to be arguing, then it's ALL FAKE; shadows on the wall; smoke fumes that are here today and gone tomorrow. Just as we wouldn't die on the hill of fashion trends that come and go, Redbeard says a smart man shouldn't die on the hill of moralities that come and go.

Power To The Self and The State of Nature

There are certain rough implications to this perspective on life. The first is that Red ward is saying all acts — moral or immoral — are permissible. Like I wrote earlier, this means genocide, mass rape, infanticide, and all such heinous things are alright. Redbeard makes this really clear. Remember, this book was written before the holocaust, so he didn't have Jews in mind when he wrote this.

Every People that have been blotted-out, were rightfully blotted-out. What a frightful maggot-heap this earth would now be, if the ‘civilized’ populations of the past, had not perished? If nature had permitted them to live and multiply and propagate their ‘progress,’ that is to say, their iniquity, what a noisome sink it would be? What must near Futurity be like, if wars and plagues do not come, burning up contemporary infernalisms and purifying the air?

The only limiting principle, Redbeard says, is might. A man should do whatever he can, however he can, to satisfy himself and defeat his enemies. He shouldn't let the moralities of today — which are nothing more than fashion trends — stop him.

Redbeard says that the most important goal of a man (and he means this in the strictest sense — Redbeard is an old school sexist, not misognynist, in the sense that he regards women to be nothing but adult children) must be to defeat his enemies.

“You must tread on the necks of your enemies if you would win renown. It is success that makes the great man” was Napoleon’s dicta. The whole duty of man in this world is to SUCCEED — to help himself, defeat his foes; outstrip his rivals. He who conquers not, is conquered. He who is unable to trample rough-shod over others, will assuredly be trampled over by them.

And for a man to do this, he must be willing to fight his enemies through any means possible. He must not let morals or principles hinder him.

In all practical operations, non-principled persons possess a distinctive advantage over ‘principled’ ones. Honesty never succeeds for when it succeeds, it is not honesty. There is not fair play in Love or War; and all life is made up of Love and War. Genuinely honest men, die as a rule like dogs — in a ditch; and in their business affairs they are ‘nowhere.’ In their dotage or ‘in God’s good time’ — they (nearly always) go over the hill to State Infirmaries, unknown, friendless.

It's difficult to express in words just how correct Redbeard is here.

He doesn't just mean physical enemies. He also means success in the material sense. Make no mistake. Redbeard endorses theft, murder, arson, and all manner of criminal hijinks in the pursuit of property, wealth, and power.

Scorn all insolent dictation as to right and wrong. Decide right and wrong for yourself. Get property, honestly if you can; but remember ‘business is business.’

The only limiting principle to the smart and powerful man should be his own sense of right and wrong and his ability to get what he wants, and he must not let another person decide that for him. In the quote above, it's clear that Redbeard does believe in some sense of honesty, but it's obvious that this is his own interpretation of the term, and he nonetheless advises men to get property if they cannot do so through honest means.

The reasoning is this; if they are successful, it wouldn't matter since there's no all-seeing eye that can prosecute them (but their own conscience). And if they don't because of abstract principle, there's no all-seeing that will reward them (but their own conscience). Therefore, people who refuse to commit criminal acts because they are hoping on some heavenly reward are beyond cursed and stupid, because there is no reward coming. They will die and pass away poverty stricken, for business is merely business. The same goes for people who refuse to take revenge and destroy their enemies. Karma won't do it for them, Redbeard says, because Karma doesn't exist. The only way they can impose their will on their reality is to go all out and use their brains and brawn to do it. No one will do it for them.

When Redbeard pens this down, he isn't merely speaking to the criminal. He's also speaking to people who oppose crime — that is, the state apparatus. Both classes of people must rise up, Redbeard reasons, and trace their fate in the iron game. They must test their might, and whoever loses will have deserved to lose, since might maketh right is the only absolute law of human society. If the criminal wins, good for him. If he loses, bad for him. The same rule applies for everyone.

A larger point of Redbeard is that the distinction between gold and evil remains arbitrary. When the British attacked foreign people and took their lands and sweat centuries ago, they regarded themselves as nobel men imposing their superior ways on the world. Today, their descendants regard those acts as criminal. Is there one British politician today willing to say that colonialism was good? Mandela was universally condemned for sabotaging government infrastructure with bombs and was a criminal of his day. Is there one person willing to call him — or even those same acts — criminal today?

The difference between the man who rules in the Castle, and the other man who is chained in the castle-dungeon, is the difference between success and failure. There is a strong affinity between the criminal and the conqueror. If Washington for example, had failed, he would (most probably) have been hunted-down, and hung as an outlaw and traitor. However he ‘won’ by force, and consequently became a mighty potentate. King David was a sheep-stealer and blackmailer, until he triumphed. Then he became ‘a man after God’s own heart.’ William the Norman was also a criminal, and fifty per cent of his invading army were exiled outlaws; but by conquest he became king of England, and his followers blossomed into nobles.

This merely means that the good man of today is the criminal of history. Who's to say that the criminal of today won't be the Nobel man of history? What's most important is that the agent — that is the man — satisfies his own yearnings and crafts his own reality. History and attendant moral arguments will sort themselves out. And if they don't, tough luck — with any luck he won't be around to grief over it.

One might argue that values such as honesty have some universal moral value. I disagree, and so does Redbeard.

If all men were scrupulously honest, then honesty might be all right (although even that is questionable), but if one per cent are deliberately dishonest, then it is assuredly all wrong. Under such resultant circumstances the ‘ninety nine’ actually become victims of ‘the one.’ Honest merchants are ruined by dishonest merchants, honest commanders out-maneuvered by dishonest commanders, honest workmen displaced by dishonest workmen, honest judges undermined by dishonest judges, and honest nations reduced to beggary and vassalage by dishonest nations.

The point of all of this is that man must, as a matter of necessity, worship himself because he is all he has. (Of course this means fighting for all that he holds dear — be it his wallet, his family, or his God).

Every age and nation must interpret Right and Wrong for itself. So must every man. It is each man’s manifest duty to invent his own Ethical Credo. If he neglects this duty, and supinely (without thinking) adopts the Credo of the herd into which he is born; then his individuality is merged and lost.

If he worships any other thing — laws, morals, authorities — that his soul doesn't willingly accept, he's nothing more than a slave who would have given his most expensive asset (his very life) in the service of others for no material benefit.

Every man who is free (and freedom means something more than the mere privilege of dropping regulation pieces of print into a Majority Box) should judge ‘all things’ by his own personality. He should regard himself as the measuring rod — the determinant — the unit of value, and carefully abstain from blindly adopting other men’s measurements, without personal verification and reasonable tests.

Redbeard argues that man must consider himself first because the world is a jungle.

Self preservation first, foremost, above all things, and at whatever cost, is the law of the jungle. So must it be among human carnivores. So it is, for society is a jungle. Therefore, O reader! Go forth and win! Possess all you can of earth’s good things. Man does live by bread alone. Be strong and fear not, for all obstruction melts away before real strength of deed and strength of character. Nothing succeeds like success. Do not quibble over the order of your succeeding but — succeed. Thou shalt give thy heart to no god, for that is idiocy; neither shalt thou love thy neighbors as thyself, for that is madness.

So why should man worship himself? Simple, Redbeard says; because he lives in the state of nature. Hobbes describes the state of nature as the period before the state of government where people lived according to the law of the jungle. In this state of nature, you only get what you can get through cunning strategy, theft, or power. The state is also characterised by brutality and death. It's essentially the state that wild animals, who have no laws to guard them, live in. The young wolf challenges the alpha and either wins or dies by his hand, and the old alpha has to defend his position through regular bloody battles of abscond — or PERISH.

Hobbes says the modern state and its monopoly on lawful violence has removed from us this state of nature. Redbeard disagrees and says that we still live in a state of nature; the only difference is that the powerful have found a formula to perpetuate themselves in power without constant bloody battles and physically endangering their lives like wild animals do. This method, Redbeard says, is morals, religion, the state, the government, and all adjacent concepts. They are merely tools for the powerful. The poor and the powerless, he argues, still live in that state of nature. They are merely being robbed and killed through alternative means.

Foolish and blind (or mad) are they who think the struggle for existence ended. It is only begun. This Planet is in its infancy, not in its decrepitude.

As we can see, Redbeard argues that we are still in this phase of humanity; and that we will be in this phase forever.

Now, if we agree with Redbeard's axioms; that god isn't real, morality is fake, we live in a state of nature, doesn't it follow that his larger point, that might will always make right, would be correct? It seems so to me, despite the atrocities that this may excuse. Or rather, explain.

Redbeard on Christianity

In the past few years, I've read a lot of antisemites (on Twitter and elsewhere — you cannot escape antisemitism if you go searching for the old masters, and you cannot escape it when engaging deeply with any political theory at depth — yes, even the communist and anarchist left), and I've never met one that condemned Jesus on the basis of his Jewry. And why would they? Most anti-semites are Christians. Redbeard is the first I've read to condemn Jesus as nothing but a subversive Jew.

Redbeard hates Christianity and its attendant moralising because he believes it's a cancer on the Anglo-Saxon (like I said, Redbeard is completely racist) race. He believes it's a specifically Jewish cancer meant to destroy the AngloSaxon race and turn them into meek nonentities unable to protest Jewish influence. You see, Redbeard doesn't just hate the concept of morality. He specifically hates the concept of Christians morality because of how weak it is.

Thou hast listened full oft, to the diabolic philosophy of the ‘Divine’ Creepling!

“Love your enemies and bless them that hate you and despitefully use you.”

But I say unto you: — Love thy kindred, love thy friends, love thyself, and hate thine enemies with a whole heart.

He continues.

An Evil Spirit hath inoculated our race with the hideous gospel of submissiveness, of degeneracy: —

“Resist not evil” it whines and “If a man smite thee on one cheek, turn the other to him and the other also.”

But I say unto you: — “If a man smite you on one cheek, smash him on the other”.

His main grouse with Christianity is this;

Why is it that our modern philosophers are so mortally afraid to boldly challenge the ‘inspired’ utopianism of this poor self-deluded Galilean mountaineer, — this preacher of all eunuch-virtues — of self abasement, of passive suffering?

The sickly humanitarian ethics, so eloquently rayed forth by Jesus Christ and his superstitious successors, in ancient Judea, and throughout the moribund Roman empire, are generally accepted in Anglo-Saxondom as the very elixir of immortal wisdom, the purest, wisest, grandest, most incontrovertible of all ‘divine revelations,’ of occult thaumaturgies. And yet when closely examined, they are found to be neither divine, occult, reasonable, nor even honest; but composed, almost exclusively of the stuff that nightmares are made of, together with a strong dash of oriental legerdemain.

To fully understand why Redbeard hates Christianity (believe me, it isn't just his anti-semitic instincts working out — he has a valid complaint), it's important to consider his conception of social Darwinism.

the utter extermination of enfeebled breeds is in accordance with the Highest Wisdom; and whether we personally approve thereof or not, it must persist. There is nothing unjust, nothing ultra-natural, nothing diabolic about the elimination of the vile — to make room for the ‘sound in mind and limb.’

Clearly therefore, in every department of life, the lesser force must be overthrown by the greater; which (being interpreted) meaneth: — MIGHT IS RIGHT, absolutely, unreservedly.

Redbeard believes that war, strife, and all other such antagonisms may bring death and destruction, but it enthrones the fit. That is, the more warlike a people and a polity, the fitter they end up being.

But Christianity doesn't like this. This means that the Christian state will end up getting degenerate, which is they will become less fit. Which, of course, is something Redbeard hates.

The fact that Christian morals encourages meekness, democracy, human equality, liberalism, and all the pop moral values of this age annoys Redbeard to no end. He says this reduces the vitality of the state, and makes its members weak nonentities.

The problem is that the sort of social constitution decided by Christianity discourages open rebellion and open show of might, which in the end discourages the bloody renewal of the social contract (he means this, as far as I can tell, literally). In this sense, he argues that Christianity is a sort of virus that stops the body from fighting off illnesses through natural means. Christ, he argues, is literally AIDS.

The survival of the Fittest — the Toughest is the logic of events and of all time. They who declare otherwise are blind. The chief point is this: that Fitness must honestly demonstrate itself not by ignoble theft and theory, but by open conflict as per Darwin’s law of battle.

His argument is that the meek and weak nature of Christian doctrine (here he also means the things that come with Christian doctrine, such as democracy and rule of law — no matter how dishonest it is) makes it possible for fitness to dishonestly perpetuate itself.

Much of the book is filled with fantastic passages such as this one that shows just how dim a view Redbeard has of Christianity and the retarding effect it has on human societies.

Christ might well and truthfully have said unto his followers “Come unto me all ye that are weary and heavy laden and I will bind you in unbreakable bonds, and load you down like an ass between two burdens.”

The ‘poor and ignorant’ were his first followers — the vagrants, the disinherited shiftless classes; and to this very day, the poorer and more ignorant men and women are, the more eager are they to follow his religious ideals, or the political millennialisms that are distilled out of his delusions.

“If we only lived as Christ lived, what a beautiful world this would be,” saith all thoughtless ones. If we lived as Christ lived, there would be none of us left to live. He begat no children; he labored not for his bread; he possessed neither house nor home; he merely talked. Consequently, he must have existed on charity or have stolen bread. “If we all lived like Christ,” would there have been anyone left to labor, to be begged from, to be stolen from? “If we all lived like Christ” is, thus a self-evident absurdity.

No wonder that it is recorded: “Not many wise after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called; but God chose the foolish things of the world, and God chose the weak things of the world, and the things that are despised.” Nothing else would have anything to do with him.

Redbeard is really passionate about this. I cannot blame him.

I'll explain whether or not I agree with this view at the end of the article.

The Rights of Men, The Equality of Men.

Since Redbeard holds all these axioms, it's obvious that he would not believe in the rights of men.

“The right of Nature, which writers commonly call JUS NATURALE, is the liberty each man hath, to use his own power for the preservation of his own nature; that is to say his own life, and consequently of doing anything, which in his own judgment and reason he shall conceive to be the aptest means thereto” writes Hobbes in his “LEVIATHAN.”

A man only has the right to pursue what he can get, and no more. What he cannot do, he has no right to do. And what he can do, he has every right to do. Indeed, who can stop him? If he can be stopped, then he isn't fit to do it, but if he can't be, who can ask about his right to do it? Whatever “rights” the state gives, Redbeard reasons, is merely the privilege a jailer gives to a prisoner. They can be taken away at any point.

Of course, he has a deem view of the American declaration of Independence.

Even the giddy doctrinaire who so cunningly concocted the bombastes-furioso fictions of the Declaration could not apparently have believed them himself. Was he not a slave-driver (residing among slave- drivers) who bought and auctioned human cattle for dollars and cents all the days of his life? No doubt for purposes of state-craft and necessary war-craft he wove his philosophic preamble of Strong Deceit. Probably also, he was comparatively honest, and even sincere but among the alluring priests of Unreason, the most dangerous is the fanatical propagandist.

He also has a ready-made answer for the oft spoken about clarification around equality made by clever liberals who cannot deny inherent human inequality.

But, Equality before the Law is all we mean, whimpers the everlasting sophist — the cunning liar! Let us see! By what rational method can any two litigants be placed in a position of unconditional ‘Equality before the Law?’ First of all, plaintiff and defendant always possess totally different physical and mental characteristics, different personal magnetisms, and — different sized bank balances.’

The Equality superstition is tolerated by clear-seeing men, for one reason only. It assists them to govern the thoughts: and by governing the thoughts, to exploit the property, energy, and labor-force, of their soft- minded, good natured neighbors: who really believe it to be true — who think it, glad tidings of Great Joy.

Inequality is summed up in the scientific axiom “inferior organisms succumb, that superior organisms may survive, propagate, and possess.” In other words, the proper place for Lazarus is to rot among the dogs. And the proper place for Cæsar is at the head of his irresistible legions

(This is funny because Caesar got stabbed to death).

Women

Redbeard also had a fair bit to say about women, but it's nothing men haven't written or said before.

He makes the observation that women also believe that might is right, and are instinctively drawn to mighty men regardless of their morals. This is obviously true. Serial killers and cold blooded murderers are often written hundreds of letters by awestruck females who want nothing but to be fucked senseless by them.

Redbeard wrote his book before the 20th century, but has now been vindicated by it, especially in this point. Psychiatrists now speak of a certain mental illness (but is it really a mental illness or an extreme display of a latent tendency amongst many women?) that drives women to be attracted to men who commit violent crimes. The illness is called Hybristophilia.

Some notable examples of this illness include the large number of women who wrote letters declaring their love to Ted Bundy after he was arrested. This is a uniquely female (and gay men) illness, as men NEVER write such letters in appreciable numbers to women who commit crimes. It's foolhardy to not realize that this propensity is a result of genetics.

Redbeard explores this illness in this passage.

But whether a criminal is successful or not, he seems to have a peculiar fascination for women. He who ‘risks his life to advance his fortunes’ may reckon beforehand upon unlimited feminine approval. If he succeeds and becomes a millionaire, a chancellor, a president, or a king; he has only to ‘hold up his hand’ to be literally ‘rushed’ by the handsomest feminines in the land; and even if he fails bravely, women will gather in shoals to visit him in gaol, besieging him with bouquets and proposals of marriage, even at the gallows. In Michigan a law has lately been enacted, to prohibit female adorers, from sending flowers to condemned murderers.

Aside from this, Redbeard generally has a very dim view of women. But he says that men who plan to win them must also understand that their loins, as it were, are generally quickened by daring acts and strength. They don't choose weakness except when they absolutely have to.

University professors (priests disguised) and supersanct demagogues, may rail in florid prose and honeyed lines of rhyme, against ‘militarism’ and the ‘horrors of war,’ but they might, much more logically, rear-up on their hind legs and bray furiously at the belts of Orion; or kick out in silly desperation, at the glancing spears of the Northern Lights. Those literary ‘luminaries’ (whose business is to dwarf public opinion) wit spectacles on their noses — madness in their cerebrums — congestion in their livers — saplessness in their bones — fear in their hearts and pens between their snaky fingers, are never enthusiastically ‘selected’ by virile women. When these poor miserable manlings (geniuses they name each other) do happen (by some lucky chance), to get a woman, they make her life a torment, and scarcely ever leave any progeny behind them, for the doom of degeneracy is upon every nerve and filament of their bodies. Who ever heard of a lovelorn virgin risking her life, or her reputation, to mate herself with a sanctimonious creeping-thing, or bespectacled savant? Did you ever look upon a great drama wherein the hero did not do a bit of fighting? Prince Charming is ever a performer of gallant actions — he conquers giants — outwits knaves — slaughters monsters — pulverizes wicked enchanters and is an all round perambulating Terror to the wicked — that is to say to ‘the other fellow…

I honestly don't know why Redbeard dedicated an entire chapter talking about how women are the worst things in the world, but still love strength, no matter how it shows up. Does he think that this will somehow inspire men to believe him? Maybe. Most men are retarded anyway. I didn't enjoy this chapter at all. This isn't to say that he was wrong.

The man Ragnar Redbeard

If you've read up till this point, you'll agree with me that Redbeard is at least an interesting and brilliant man, no matter what you have to say about his philosophy (and I have plenty!). Might is Right, like I said, is a racist, anti-Semitic, and sexist book. He didn't have much to say about gay people, but I suppose if he'd written that book today they might have gotten their own chapter.

Anyway, his book fascinated me, so I decided to do some digging about to find out about the life of someone who would write something like this. It turns out Redbeard is merely a pseudonym. His real name is Arthur Desmond, and his real life is somewhat interesting.

He held no political power in his lifetime, and while he contested for elections, he didn't win any. However, for a while he became a terroristic nuisance who published strongly worded pamphlets that frightened the Australian government. He consistently advocated for open rebellion against the government through his pamphlets, and for a while he was the most wanted man in New Zealand. He was so notorious that the ruling party decided to give him a seat at parliament, but he refused. Too bad.

I also found it interesting that despite being a virulent racist, Desmond almost got himself lynched by standing by an aboriginal New Zealand chief in a land dispute against fellow Europeans. He even wrote a poem for the chief.

When I told my friend about this, he said don't you know that the racist community is the most diverse in the world? They really don't care about your race, as long as you're being racist.

Perhaps he only became racist as he grew older. Now let us get to the meat of the matter.

Some Objections and Agreements

Whether or not you agree with the gospel of might is right is irrelevant. It's obviously true, nonetheless. This includes all the attendant atrocities that it excuses. Or explains. All of it.

In Mere Christianity ( a review of this book is coming next), Mr. Lewis describes what he calls a natural moral law. That is, he observed that all human societies have some conception of good and evil despite the different hues that their moralities take. They know that it's good to be kind to one's family, to not be cowardly, and not be evil to the weak.

Some may use this argument to disprove Might is Right, and argue that morality isn't as subjective as Redbeard says it is. But they would be wrong. The reason why all human societies have that conception of good and evil is merely a result of evolution, not some iron law.

Chimpanzee communities all over the world, for example, have certain rules that bind them together as a gang. The same goes for wolves, lions, and all social animals. Those rules and conceptions aren't evidence for the existence of a chimp Jesus, or a Wolf Buddha. They are merely evidence of evolutionary necessity.

If an alien force were to invade earth today, and decides to kill all the selfless people and their societies first and leave the selfish to reproduce and expand, humans all over the world would suddenly adopt selfishness as ideal. Within a century, you'd scarcely meet any child who didn't have selfishness baked right into his genome. You'd hardly find a person whose conscience didn't tell them to be as selfish as they can be.

Values like kindness, courage, selflessness and all other things that you may regard as universal moral dictas are merely conventions that evolution has proven to be important to the survival of a tribe. They are useful only in the sense that they make the tribe fit. After all, a tribe filled with selfish mothers who ignore their children immediately after birth would soon see itself wiped off the face of the earth with its own hands. The same goes for a pack of wolves that fights and kills its members everyday. It would need no natural or man made disaster to rend it asunder — it would do that work by itself.

So in that sense, yes, I agree with Redbeard.

However, his concept of social Darwinism and the honest way for it to be negotiated is what I take issue with. He seems to believe that war, strife and death are necessary aspects of life that man must encourage. I don't believe that in the least. I don't believe one needs war to honestly become fit (for what does that even mean? Honestly? Why should people who can't fight resort to honest warfare to prove their might when they can just indoctrinate their enemies into timidity?). Might isn't situated in the gun or sword alone.

A man who can influence powerful men through well thought out strategies and arguments (for they can be influenced and even brainwashed), is worth more than ten thousand soldiers who have nothing to shoot but their weapons. After all, even if we agree with his anti-semitic logic, isn't that how the enterprising Jew takes hold of institutions? And haven't they won?

If victory were due to physical might and bravery alone, the British would never have conquered the world. I think Redbeard is merely apprehensive because the Jews he hates are beating his race so soundly that he wants to change the rules of the game. Perhaps if the rules are changed, then that will happen. But one needs might to do that, don't they? And right now it doesn't seem like anyone is thirsty for the sort of bloody renewal of the social contract that Redbeard wants.

Unfortunately, Redbeard believes only in the honest might-test of war. Too bad Redbeard. As you said, your enemy doesn't believe in that, and is winning anyway. What can you do?

Besides, those noblemen from those interesting days didn’t all risk their lives in battle. Some of them got handed their positions by men who risked their lives, just as Americans have had their titles and wealth and whatnot handed down to them by no less a noble tradition.

So his insistence on acts of battle only delivering right is incorrect.

To this, Redbeard says;

Competition must be to the death. If retarded in any way it fails of beneficial results. The chief intent of false religions and false moralisms is to arrest competition half-way, to safe-guard degenerates in possessing that which they could neither seize nor defend if competition were unlimited. Humanitarian institutionalisms have been invented to handicap and eliminate the elite of mankind — vainly however.

To that I ask; what if the mighty don't want competition to be to the death? What happens then? Because that seems to have been what has been decided. If they decide that, well then Redbeard, might maketh right.

In the end, I don't agree with Redbeard's general grouse with Christianity. I prefer this meek and timid morality, even if false. I'm powerless, you see, and this meek and timid tradition provides as much protection for me as possible in a civilized state of nature such as ours. I have no doubt that I have a better fate in today, in this civilization, than I would have had merely 200 years ago in the same area. It's merely enlightened self-interest, dear Redbeard, to throw in with the subversive Jews, at least on this matter.

One important problem that Redbeard's perspective on reality throws up is the issue of advocacy and activism. If might maketh right and equality is impossible, then of what point is advocating for human equality? Why should one begrudge the racist, or the evil politician, or the robber-policeman, or the sexist boss or teacher? Should one not simply accept that they are being bullied by their betters, and should move out of the way? Or fight them in the iron game?

Perhaps. However, I believe that a grim look at advocacy as merely a gigantic but legal blackmailing campaign solves this issue. If one has the psychopathic and clear eyed perspective that their advocacy is merely using the tools of the state against it to generate desired ends for them (not fighting for some abstract principle such as equality before the law), then it makes sense. It requires understanding that you aren't fighting for human rights — but your own rights, and those of people you know.

In that way, one is still playing the iron game, but with different rules. Perhaps it isn't the iron game. Perhaps it's the wooden game.

When one looks at the landscape of social activism, we find that this is already true. Many social activists are even more psychopathic and clear-eyed about the reality of the state than the state organs they are fighting against. A good example is someone like David Hyundai who is doubtless using his present predicaments to fight for asylum in Europe. Good luck to him.

One last thing to write about is Redbeard's hilarious but failed prophecies. Here is one of such;

What white father for example, would encourage the marriage of a hulking thick-skulled Negro with his beautiful and accomplished daughter? Would he enthusiastically ‘give her away’ to the matrimonial embraces of a Chinaman, a Coolie or the leper-hugs of a polluted ‘mean white?’ Are there ten such citizens even in North America, where equality of birth and condition is so much speechified and — never seen? Are there five? Is there one who would not rather see the daughter of his loins, stiff, stark and cold in her shroud? Should that one exist (he being of sound mind) let him speak. Then and only then, can this diabolical gospel of intrinsic equality be reconsidered.

Despite being quite intelligent, Redbeard here allows his racism to get in the way of clear thinking. If we followed his dicta, the fact that racism is almost completely stamped out in the West should mean that intrinsic equality is true. But no matter what Redbeard says, a million interracial marriages can never prove that Einstein was born just like Redbeard was. (This is an intentional example). We are not blank slates. That's a forgone conclusion, no matter how many Charlottes marry Mohammeds, or no matter how many Chens marry Aaliyahs.

A practical issue where we can apply this perspective that might maketh right is this Israel and Palestine business. What does Ragnar Redbeard tells us will happen here? He says no God will intervene. No one will be judged by magical karma. Morality will be used as a tool for navigating interests (my 40 beheaded and burnt children are more important than your bombed hospital parking lot!). And the strongest person will win in the end.

I believe that is precisely what's happening, and as such I have no moral arguments for or against it. It is what it is. It is the logic of today.

Blessed are the Strong for they shall possess the earth — Cursed are the Weak for they shall inherit the yoke. Blessed are the Powerful for they shall be reverenced among men — Cursed are the Feeble for they shall be blotted out.

Blessed are the Bold for they shall be masters of the world — Cursed are the Humble for they shall be trodden under hoofs. Blessed are the Victorious for victory is the basis of Right — Cursed are the Vanquished for they shall be vassals for ever.

Blessed are the battle-blooded, Beauty shall smile upon them — Cursed are the Poor-in-Spirit, they shall be spat upon. Blessed are the Audacious for they have imbibed true wisdom — Cursed are the Obedient for they shall breed Creeplings.

Blessed are the iron-handed, the unfit shall flee before them — Cursed are the haters of battle, subjugation is their portion. Blessed are the Death defiant, their days shall be long in the land — Cursed are the feeble brained, for they shall perish amidst plenty.

Blessed are the destroyers of false hope, they are the true Messiahs — Cursed are the God-adorers, they shall be shorn sheep. Blessed are the Valiant for they shall obtain great treasure — Cursed are the believers in Good and Evil for they are frightened by shadows.

Blessed are they who believe in Nothing, never shall it terrorize their minds — Cursed are the ‘lambs of God,’ they shall be bled ‘whiter than snow.’ Blessed is the man who hath powerful enemies, they shall make him a hero — Cursed is he who ‘doeth good’ unto others, he shall be despised.

Blessed is the man whose foot is swift to serve his friend, he is a friend indeed — Cursed are the organizers of Charities, they are propagators of plagues. Blessed are the Wise and Brave, for in the Struggle they shall win — Cursed are the unfit for they shall be righteously exterminated.

Ragnar Redbeard.