Ted Kaczynski’s recent suicide prompted me to finally take a look at his manifesto, which opens with these words:
The industrial revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race. They have greatly increased the life-expectancy of those of us who live in “advanced” countries, but they have destabilized society, have made life unfulfilling, have subjected human beings to indignities, have led to widespread psychological suffering (in the Third World to physical suffering as well) and have inflicted severe damage on the natural world. The continued development of technology will worsen the situation. It will certainly subject human beings to greater indignities and inflict greater damage on the natural world, it will probably lead to greater social disruption and psychological suffering, and it may lead to increased physical suffering even in “advanced” countries.
The first section after the introduction addresses the psychology of modern leftism:
Almost everyone will agree that we live in a deeply troubled society. One of the most widespread manifestations of the craziness of our world is leftism, so a discussion of the psychology of leftism can serve as an introduction to the discussion of the problems of modern society in general.
But what is leftism? During the first half of the twentieth century leftism could have been practically identified with socialism. Today the movement is fragmented and it is not clear who can properly be called a leftist. When we speak of leftists in this article we have in mind mainly socialists, collectivists, “politically correct” types, feminists, gay and disability activists, animal-rights activists and the like. But not everyone who is associated with one of these movements is a leftist. What we are trying to get at in discussing leftism is not so much a movement or an ideology as a psychological type, or rather a collection of related types. Thus, what we mean by “leftism” will emerge more clearly in the course of our discussion of leftist psychology. (Also, see paragraphs 227-230.)
Even so, our conception of leftism will remain a good deal less clear than we would wish, but there doesn’t seem to be any remedy for this. All we are trying to do here is indicate in a rough and approximate way the two psychological tendencies that we believe are the main driving force of modern leftism. We by no means claim to be telling the WHOLE truth about leftist psychology. Also, our discussion is meant to apply to modern leftism only. We leave open the question of the extent to which our discussion could be applied to the leftists of the 19th and early 20th centuries.
The two psychological tendencies that underlie modern leftism we call feelings of inferiority and oversocialization. Feelings of inferiority are characteristic of modern leftism as a whole, while oversocialization is characteristic only of a certain segment of modern leftism; but this segment is highly influential.
Spandrell calls this Biological Leninism:
The Coalition of the Fringes, Sailer calls it. It’s worse than that really. it’s the coalition of everyone who would lose status the better society were run. It’s the coalition of the bad. Literal Kakistocracy.
Young Theo was a certifiable genius, which makes the tragedy of his abuse in MKULTRA “experiments” by those gnostic sadists calling themselves Harvard University all the more regretful.
The one major flaw of his work is that he credulously if unwittingly accepted the propaganda whigs told about themselves; the equivocation of themselves and their program for destroying civilization, with advances in civilization achieved by other men, most particularly with respect to instrumental techne.
An understandable if not excusable trap to fall in, given that the 19th Century technical revolution was coincidentally taking place in the background while the fatal ascendance of whig imperium over the Anglo-Saxon world (and subsequently the whole world) took place.
The coincidence of course was rapidly wound down the moment they achieved supremacy. A temporary stay of execution was granted to the naive technocrats as their services were needed for destroying their brothers and cousins on the continent, who stood in the way of Making The World Safe For Democracy. And in any case our later day inheritors of the theocracy make it very obvious in the assiduous dedication to smoking out all unprincipled exceptions to the hateful existence of human civilization besmirching the demesne of their demon goddess Gaia, complete with mandatory liquidation of exclusionary ‘techbros’ and helicoptering in Tech Lead Shaniqua for doin’ Wakanda Shiet.
I, like all eminent posters, am a constant Ted K. respecter, and think it a horrible tragedy that any gentle soul were tortured by the Harvard branch of the CIA, betrayed by his own brother, and condemned to eight consecutive life sentences in solitary confinement consequent to a guilty plea coerced by a “former” CIA chief’s federal judge sitting in a U.S. District Court inexplicably resident in the State of California.
However, the late, great Mr. Kaczynski was a man of elementally republican bent, and believed, despite his brutal torture at the hands of the Harvard branch of a U.S. intelligence agency without admitted or claimed authority to operate within the States, absolutely in the essential mythos of America as land, society, and government of the people, by the people, for the people.
Fortunately, now that the D.C. nomenklatura has fully and finally exposed itself to all the world, including and especially its children, as the international standard-bearer of (in its clinical description) female homosexualism, male homosexualism, part-time male and female homosexualism, miscellaneous queerdom, hermaphroditism, and eunuchry—commonly known by its participant lesbians, sodomists, part-time lesbians and sodomists, queers, hermaphroditists, and eunuchs as the cute and innocent, if confusing, LGBTQIA+—and of masks and vaccines mandatory to support and defend the health and safety of lesbians, sodomists, part-time lesbians and sodomists, queers, hermaphroditists, and eunuchs, normal people—commonly known by political lesbians, sodomists, part-time lesbians and sodomists, queers, hermaphroditists, and eunuchs as cis-hetero-patriarchical white-supremacist fascists—more and more easily glimpse through the ever more threadbare red, white, and blue velvet curtain of human rights, democracy, rule of law, and voting to the cheeky hipster Exposed Interior Red Brick Wall of Ultimate Power lying just beyond.
There is, in other words, no “leftism”—and never was. Nor are there now nor were there ever any incidents to any supposed leftism or theory thereof. There is now and ever was only Power and its Devoted Loyalists.
Unfortunately, what made Mr. Kaczynski a once-living legend is also what robbed him of his forest and his freedom. But in this he is beyond blame, for the U.S. reality distortion field was vastly stronger back then. TV gripped the mind of man and formed it in its image, yet today, even as the looking-glass of smartphones and social media furiously homogenize and level the world as never before, the edges fracture more and more completely than ever before. The Universe takes with one hand even as it gives with the other. And as for me, I look forward, with great anticipation, to the Apple Vision Pro.
Rest in peace, Uncle Ted—for you were the bomb.
“Uncle Ted” was crazy. He had insights but did nothing except maim a few individuals who caught his attention. An idea by an intelligent loser.
The drugs that “Teddy” encountered at Harvard were cleaner and more benign than the drugs commonly sold on the street. He had what probably would be diagnosed as schizophrenia. It appears in the young, gets worse with age until it mellows into “old Uncle Wilber living in Aunt Bess’s basement”. He had an idea but was too deranged to teach/write/speak, so just one more crazy who occasionally sent letter bombs to an insignificant number of people who caught his attention. Whoopie!
He did have the insight that the Woke Progressives were not “Leftist”, i.e. traditional Socialists, but were used by those seeking power, because the Progressives were entranced by the words of the “narrative”. Those entrapped may be “woolly headed” Leftist true-believers or right-wing “neocons”, RINOs, etc who are on a quest for power. If you manipulate the narrative, you can get shat you want, “Power”. There is no “reality”, just the narrative. It might include different people, i.e. LGBTQ, African Americans, or some kind of anti-Capitalist system, but it is just some narrative leading to power over the system for someone.
Unfortunately, “Theo” was trapped with a brain that had interesting insights but was useless to accomplish anything relevant. Maiming people and suicide were the best it could come up with. His “Manifesto” may be of some use to others. He certainly was useless. Such is the human condition.
Man is chimp arisen to Sol cracking over stark Kubrickean monolith. Women reflexively moisten at the thought of serial killers of women, and men can’t help but to respect philosophers willing to bomb their opposition. In the war of all against all, violence is the universal language, the tongue of tongues. Primordially it looms behind all things, including and especially the secret police.