Anglofuturism is Not Conservative or Reactionary. It is 'Progressive'
To call yourself ‘conservative’ is to always be on the losing side.
Conservatives always lose. That’s what we’re told over and over again by the ‘progressive’ left.
Apparently, resisting any new cultural trend that the cultural left comes up with, any new ‘civil rights struggle’ as they term it, is simply doomed to fail. In a few decades time, people currently resisting the mutilation of children claiming to be ‘trans’, will be seen as no different than Southern segregationists who refused to serve Black people in restaurants.
But who’s ‘progress’ are we talking about? Is the left-liberal view of progress, that has reigned in the West since 1945, the only possible view of it?
Whilst people like Ubersoy will say that progress is something objective and measurable, I would argue that ‘progress’, at least when it comes to the organisation of society, is entirely dependent on one’s own personal values. Each ideology will view ‘progress’ as moving closer to their ideological vision
This article will explore the differing conceptions of progress, and why as opposed to ‘conservative’, or even ‘reactionary’, Anglofuturism is, or should be presented as being, a thoroughly ‘progressive’ movement.
Differing Conceptions of Progress
When it comes to technology, ‘progress’ as defined as the increasing complexity of subjects relative to competitors, has undoubtedly happened. In this, Ubersoy is correct.
But when it comes to social progress, Ubersoy contradicts himself. He calls progress objective and inevitable, defined as the complexity of systems relative to their competitors. But yet acknowledges that whilst technological progress has objectively occurred, its dysgenic effects have moved society in the opposite direction, towards ‘regress’, suggesting it is in fact not ‘inevitable’.
He is simply arguing that his vision of social progress is superior to how it is viewed by the Woke left, which judges it on the basis of ever expanded ‘rights’; of which I agree with him. However, by defining himself as a ‘right-wing progressive’ rather than simply a ‘progressive’, he implicitly is agreeing that ‘social progress’ is a matter of perspective. He is arguing that his right-wing ‘progressive’ is better than the Woke left-wing ‘progressive’.
This is common to every successful ideology.
Marxists strongly believed they were on the ‘right side of history’, and that the triumph of socialism was inevitable. The capitalist West was simply delaying the foregone conclusion. Nikita Khrushchev took it as an article of faith that one day the United States would be under the red flag.
But in 1989, that millenarian vision fell completely apart, as the people of the socialist world revolted. Despite the initial hopes of Trotskyists and Eurocommunists, the protestors, many of whom were working-class, did not simply desire the replacement of authoritarian socialism with a democratic socialism. In fact, they demanded something that in the Marxist worldview would be simply inconceivable: a return to capitalism.
The Marxist worldview has never since regained the credibility it once had.
However, whilst for the Marxist-Leninist, the 1989 revolutions represented a huge step backwards, for the liberal they represented a huge step forwards.
Liberalism’s own form of historicism and teleology goes back to the Whig historiography of the 19th century, but gained a new lease of life after WWII and during the Civil Rights Movement, with Martin Luther King’s famous quote: ‘the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice’. This ‘right side of history’ discourse was even further emboldened in 1989, with Francis Fukuyama declaring ‘the end of history’, just when the Marxists saw their worldview crumble.
So, when it comes to society, ‘progress’ is always in the eye of the beholder. However, every successful political movement has had a distinct vision of what ‘progress' means. In many ways it is what defines a positive ideology from merely a reactive one; the progressive vision of the future.
Conservatism vs Alternative Conceptions of Progress
‘Conservatism’ is by definition doomed to lose, as it is oriented towards the status quo, and as the Ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus said: ‘the only constant is change’.
Whilst Edmund Burke did make some valuable insights about the danger of abstract declarations of ‘rights’ when criticising the French Revolution’s ‘Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen’, at the core of Burke’s ‘Reflections on the Revolution in France’ was tradition.
But the traditions of England that he valorised, like the 1688 Glorious Revolution, were simply the product of 17th century liberals. Burke simply wanted to maintain an earlier tradition of liberalism, but those traditions did not emerge out of thin air; they had largely been created a century prior, which in France they had not been. He therefore is the original ‘speed limit liberal’, taking the liberalism of the past for granted whilst saying that its latest form goes too far, or at the very least must be slowed down, and conservatism has played this role ever since.
Conservatives ‘lost’ every cultural battle because they never put forward an alternative vision of progress to the left-liberal one. They only sought to stop it, slow it down, or filter it, accepting that left-liberals determined the direction of travel, in what Auron MacIntyre terms the ‘ratchet effect’.
But there have been occasions where the right has gone beyond merely conservatism, and sought to establish an ideology based on entirely different values.
The reason why liberals are so afraid of ‘fascism’ is that it did in fact reclaim the mantle of ‘progress’ from the liberals. It did not simply wish to slow down the ever greater march of liberalism, but provide an entirely different worldview and set of values that were both antithetical to liberalism and oriented towards the future.
Even the Taliban, as primitive and backward as they may seem, are not merely ‘conservatives’. They have a distinct view of ‘progress’ which involves shaping Afghanistan in the image of their God.
One does not have to like either of these ideologies to understand they instil much more fear into the hearts of the Woke than merely a ‘conservative’ who seeks to preserve the status quo, not realising that it is in fact the Woke that control the status quo, and the conservative is just the Woke from less than a decade ago.
The Framing of Anglofuturism
And what are we ‘conserving’ now anyway?
Since the 1960s, the Woke left has torn down the traditional western society, in which virtually nothing substantial remains. The institutions we once venerated have become thoroughly corrupted by Wokeism, dutifully flying the rainbow flag out of deference to the status quo, just like Vaclav Havel’s greengrocer. The status-quo belongs to the Woke, and it is they who want to ‘conserve’ their power. They are therefore conservatives.
But this is not the only time in history that the political left have represented the elite power structure and preservation of the status quo. During the opening up of China under Deng Xiaoping, this dynamic was also present, though on economics rather than culture. The ‘conservatives’ were those that supported the maintenance of state socialism, whereas the ‘reformers’ were those that embraced market reforms.
We also should not be ‘reactionaries’, those that simply demand the restoration of the status-quo ante. History never repeats itself exactly, and it is impossible to completely restore an old order.
To give a historical example, despite the defeat of Napoleon and the Bourbon Restoration in 1815, the Bourbons and their reactionary Legitimist supporters were never able to completely reverse the impact of the French Revolution. When Charles X pushed too far, he upset the fragile balance his older brother Louis XVIII had set up, and he was deposed.
By dogmatically sticking to an idealised version of the past, the early 19th century reactionaries, personified by groups like the Legitimists, abandoned the pursuit of ‘progress’, leading for liberal nationalists and socialists to take it up instead.
‘Progressivism’ is simply a semantic and aesthetic style, and is defined by the winners. Whilst technological progress can be objectively measured, social progress cannot.
Although in a previous article I mentioned how the romanticist artistic movement, that dominated the middle-classes in the 19th century, had reactionary themes, it still represented something ‘new’. It was far detached from the reactionarism of tendencies like the Legitimists, relying less on Christianity and more on the spiritual and Pagan reconstructionism. In addition, despite its reactionary aesthetics, it was ultimately used as a vehicle for the ‘progressive’ ideology of nationalism, offering national nostalgia and myth more than an actual desire to return to the medieval.
The Romanticist movement, despite its romantic attachment to the ‘Age of Heroes’, could not stop the progression of society, nor did it necessarily intend to. Its connection with nationalism however, would influence the development of fascism, another ‘progressive’ ideology.
Whilst inspired by certain elements of the Romanticist vision, particularly its presentation of the ideal, Anglofuturism does not look to the past for the source of its ideals, but the future, a form of aesthetic known as Technological Romanticism. Recognising the inevitability of progress, it seeks to claim it for itself, in opposition to Wokeism.
Overton Window, Public Opinion, and ‘Sensible Centrism’
As N.S Lyons points out in his essay about Right-Wing Progressivism, the most fundamental difference between the left and the right is that the left believes in equality (however hypocritically) and the right believes in (formalised) hierarchy.
Whilst Anglofuturism has many similarities to ‘Right-Wing Progressivism’, it would not use the descriptor. Whilst it falls under the umbrella of ‘Dissident Right’, as an identifier of where it sits on the current (culturally far-left extremist) Overton Window, it considers itself to be, and aspires to be seen as, on the political centre.
This framing is somewhat similar to Sensible Centrism, coined by Academic Agent, but it has some differences.
As Ubersoy points out when criticising AA’s term, despite Academic Agent’s opposition to populism, the ‘Sensible Centrist’ label ironically leans towards it. It claims to appeal towards a somewhat imaginary ‘centre-ground’ in order to signify social status and so the majority of people will support your programme. However, whilst presentation is important, it can only get you so far, as our beliefs are far to the right of the British public, and the content of our views will clearly demonstrate as such, no matter what we call ourselves.
I do not believe, nor particularly care, if the public agrees with us or not, as history frequently shows, time and time again, that the public is indoctrinated into believing whatever is considered ‘high status’. Like the Woke counter-culture before us, we should deem ourselves ‘progressives’ and more enlightened than the brainwashed masses, giving ourselves the legitimacy to impose our ideology against their initial will.
Elite brainwashing is a trend throughout history. Whilst there is a ‘time-lag’, whereby elites will adopt a new ideology before it trickles down to the masses, it still trickles down eventually if not stopped.
This is what one saw when Rome turned Christian from Paganism, when Persia turned Islamic from Zoroastrianism, and when England turned Protestant from Catholicism.
It also defined the period of the ‘Moral Majority’, whereby the elite of America was staunchly liberal by the 1960s but the people were still socially conservative up until around the late 2000s.
However, because of poor leadership and infiltration of Neocons into the GOP, this opportunity was wasted. The elites were able to indoctrinate the majority of Americans so that the ‘Silent Majority’, whilst once existing, unfortunately no longer existed by the 2010s.
Recognising the reality of public opinion does not have to be a black-pill. Darel E. Paul’s ‘From Tolerance to Equality: How Elites Brought America to Same-Sex Marriage’ shows that current public opinion is irrelevant, and that all ‘progressive’ movements don’t simply follow public sentiment, but create public sentiment. Just as the Woke did, if we truly will it, we can do the same.
Unlike ‘sensible centrism’, that appeals to an imaginary centre-ground, and to the ‘small c’ conservative sentiments of the middle-aged that don’t want to ‘rock the boat’, Anglofuturism would be a movement of the youth, and would decry the ‘sensible’. In every generation, the young have desired change, eager to mark themselves out from the generation of their parents.
To be ‘progressive’ is the sentiment of a young person. As it is the young that control the future, our energy should be spent appealing to the youth, not middle-aged voters who have a stake in the system and something to lose.
Anglofuturism desires a more hierarchical society than the current Woke one claims to be (though in practice it is not because its egalitarian ideals are impossible to fulfil, so it is simply dishonest). But it is not Absolutist or Neo-Feudal. It does not want to bring back property qualifications for voting (opposing universal suffrage but still supporting majority suffrage), nor does it want to take the vote away from women.
In the 19th century, Anglofuturism would be a left-wing progressive ideology, and looking across both history and the current global population, it is probably at least somewhere in the middle of the political spectrum.
But because on cultural issues the current Overton Window has moved so far leftwards, it would be considered far right-wing today.
This is similar to how Vaclav Havel was considered ‘far-right’ for being a left-liberal in communist Czechoslovakia, but this did not mean he was a man of the right in any real sense.
The Anglofuturist View of Progress and The Enlightenment
I found N.S Lyons’ essay informative and interesting, but I disagree with some of his conclusions, particularly his ultimate rejection of progressivism. The bottom line is that ‘conservatism’ is a completely failed project. The Woke won because they claimed to be on the side of ‘progress’, and we can likewise only win if we present an alternative view of progress. If we reject the pursuit of progress all together, we simply lose the future.
This does not need to be Marc Andreessen’s blind and uncritical ‘techno-optimism’. It can instead be a more sustainable, human-centric vision that valorises activities like space exploration whilst also promoting human flourishing, and seeing ‘progress’ as the advancement of that human flourishing
I do not believe we should go back to believing in religious superstition, and do believe in at least the scientific and secularist elements of the Enlightenment, even though I reject its emphasis on equality and expressive individualism.
Charles Haywood claims that the Enlightenment does not include the scientific revolution, with his right-wing futurist ideology ‘Foundationalism’ claiming to be scientifically oriented whilst rejecting the Enlightenment completely. Haywood defines the Enlightenment as the belief in equality and emancipation from unchosen bonds.
However, even if we ignore the debate as to whether empiricism and materialism were a feature of the Enlightenment, or if the preceding ‘Scientific Revolution’ can be separated completely from Enlightenment thinking, Haywood is also a Christian and desires a society built around Christian morality, which naturally I do not consider viable or desirable as a secular agnostic.
There were two strands of the Enlightenment, the empirical, constitutionalist tradition personified by people like Montesquieu, David Hume, and John Adams, and the radical liberal tradition of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Immanuel Kant, and Thomas Jefferson. Whilst sharing some similarities, I consider the two trends substantially different enough to warrant distinction.
Anglofuturism would embrace the former thinkers whilst very much rejecting the latter. It embraces the empirical and secularist elements of the Enlightenment, whilst rejecting the belief in human equality, universalism, and utopianism that is present in both the American ‘Declaration of Independence’ and the French ‘Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen.’
One can also make the argument, as Ubersoy has done, that Woke culture represents a ‘regression’ away from emphasising empirical scientific understanding, and of the quality of the human gene pool. It is true that the belief in equality and individualism has devoured and superseded the belief in empiricism and the scientific method, in other words, the utopian radicalist Enlightenment tradition has destroyed the rationalist empirical one, and made itself supreme. A true form of progressivism would embrace technological innovation and space exploration, the only form of progress that can be objectively measured.
Ultimately, I do not believe in any objective view of ‘social progress’, unlike technological progress, for as we have seen, it is highly subjective and ideologically dependent. However, as a matter of metapolitics, it is politically advantageous to describe yourself as the ‘progressives’ and your opponents as the ‘conservatives’.
Being progressive does not mean tearing down the vestiges of the past, but simply understanding that a successful society must be oriented towards advancement and the future.
A good form of progressivism preserves old buildings and the environment, and does not destroy them. But it also creates a new form of architecture and aesthetics which will define our new age, certainly inspired by the past but not imprisoned by it.
Art Deco architecture was a prime example of past-inspired futurism, taking the best of western traditional architecture but also putting a distinct modernist spin on it.
One also does not need to have Marc Andreessen’s focus on technological innovation as a good in and of itself. A positive variety of progressivism would believe that technology can be a means of improving humanity, but it must be used correctly.
If technology falls into the wrong hands, it can be a facilitator of tyranny. Mass surveillance technology being utilised by the Woke regime is a terrifying prospect, as we saw during the Covid lockdowns.
We must instead create a technological ecosystem which weakens the overreach of the state in our personal lives, which is possible with technologies like cryptocurrency, P2P networks, and open source software. We must reorient our technology to prevent what the internet turned into in the 2010s, a surveillance censorship hell, from happening again.
Is Anglofuturism a Form of Fascism?
Those familiar with political philosophy may think that this Anglofuturist vision of progress I have mentioned has similarities with Fascism.
And yes, it does have similarities. It admires the alternative conception of progress and modernity that fascist movements developed, particularly Italian Fascism in its very early years, as well as the emphasis on national rebirth.
The form of alternative progressivism that Fascism provided is superior to both ‘conservatism’ that simply wishes to either conserve the status quo or at least slow down/filter social change (inevitably always in a liberal direction), and ‘reactionarism’, consisting of the ultra-tradcaths and Christian fundamentalists that desire a return to the primitive superstition of the past.
However, there are also fundamental differences.
It does not have the fascist emphasis on militarism, rejecting nationalist expansionism and imperialism in favour of space exploration. Whilst it is patriotic, it does not believe in British nationalism at the expense of other nations, just like loyalty to one’s family does not have to be at the expense of other families. The extreme racialism and antisemitism of Nazism are also nowhere to be found.
It is also distinctly anti-totalitarian, seeing the current liberal democracy as being totalitarian in practice despite its claiming of democracy, and the rainbow flag being a totalitarian symbol. As opposed to fascist’s centralising tendencies, Anglofuturism supports subsidiarity and decentralisation.
It is built on a genuine belief in the Rule of Law, which leads it to support the Formalism of Curtis Yarvin, i.e., the belief that the written laws should as closely correspond to the real nature of power as possible.
Whilst not absolutist, the state should be honest about its hierarchical nature, instead of presenting itself as egalitarian and ‘democratic’, whilst obscuring the real nature of power (i.e, the Deep State, media, education system, and Blob/Cathedral). This is totally different to the ad-hoc nature of fascism, which was built on charismatic authority, totalitarian democracy, and the one-party state. The system will not be absolutist, it would have accountability mechanisms, but these accountability mechanisms would recognise the realities of power, and therefore be more effective.
Some may call it a secular, futurist-oriented, Anglo-Saxon version of French Integral Nationalism and Action Française, with Anglofuturism admiring the ideology’s empirical justification for monarchy. I hope to one day write an article on the work of Charles Maurras, a criminally underrated figure who has many similarities to the modern Neoreactionary movement, and who’s political vision has a lot to offer the world today.
Conclusion
Anglofuturism maintains the importance of a future-oriented, positive vision that is not conservative or reactionary, but something distinctly new. Something which can take the essential spirit that defined Britain in its golden age, yet does not seek to completely restore the past or its values, but synthesise traditional British values and an alternative, anti-Woke conception of modernity.
To call oneself a ‘conservative’ is to call oneself bland, stale, and an upholder of the status quo, which in 2024 has very little worth defending. To call oneself a reactionary is to be a resentful loser who is in practice powerless to do anything other than ‘cope and seethe’.
A winning movement always describes itself as progressive; what that ‘progress’ means in the social realm is highly subjective, but it is always there, and it always wishes to progress towards it through changing the status quo.
The "right" has a real problem with framing. If you try to approach people by saying that you oppose "progress", that you're an "irrationalist", and so on, you have already lost them. Not progress, but what passes for progress according to the dominant ideology, is the problem. If you want to own the future you had better have a clear conception of what that future will look like.
Interesting article. I agree the right is stuck between conserving the past and finding a future to push for. I agree with the space travel part, that and conservationism/genuine environmentalism as well. I think the "Conservative Revolution" in 1920s Germany was a good example of right wingers striving for a new Germany that's still inspired by its past.
P.S. I think Christianity will have a part to play in the future, but it will share that with new philosophies on the right.