I will send a strong delusion...(2 Thess. 2:11) LOTR 55
Quem Iuppiter vult perdere, dementat prius
τὸ κακὸν δοκεῖν ποτ᾽ ἐσθλὸν τῷδ᾽ ἔμμεν' ὅτῳ φρένας θεὸς ἄγει πρὸς ἄταν
Is this really the best we can do? All we have to look forward to?
Dmitri Orlov, a particularly mordant observer of the du jour Western milieu, has remarked in interviews that when social collapse occurs, "people stop resembling people" and "start resembling animals, instead". His thesis is that, in the West, we underwent a social collapse first, hollowing out the political and financial infrastructures, setting the stage for a quite rapid implosion. John Michael Greer, another "collapsitarian", has pointed out that the West rose rapidly, & is quite likely to decline just as rapidly. Easy come, easy go. Yet the time honored, conventional, traditional wisdom says that these guys (Greer, Orlov, Chris Martenson, and James Howard Kunstler) are wingnuts, and that we are centuries away from real decline, if it even ever occurs. They would tell you, with a kind of simper, that these gentleman are pulling your leg, in order to turn a buck - that they enjoy (as the English say) "having you on".
Barring a “Black Swan event,” celestial or man-made, the projected Dark Age is many generations away.
I suppose only old Father Time and old Mother Nature alone will settle this question definitively, but that remains true in any case. We can "sin that grace may abound", and God will always work good out of it, because He works good out of anything. Yet this is a horrible way to use one's moral agency and freedom. Because understanding the possibilities and the probabilities, and conforming to living Wisdom, that is the true glory of man - to know.
Our current pundits do not deal with Truth, Beauty, or Goodness, only with statistics, modern myths, and conventions, assumed to be under their complete analytical purview and control. Yet because no artificial (or human) intelligence can have complete Data, the older Tradition points us to the world of Forms and transcendent mystery, in order to know anything at all:
“The intellectual apprehension of Truth “is not an indifferent speculation; it is rather a beautiful Ratio which is instantiated between things and the mind which leaves neither things nor the mind unchanged…If, for example, one were to know a willow tree overhanging the Cherwell, our knowing of it would be just as much an event in the life of the form ‘Tree’ as the tree in its willowness and in its growing.” (Catherine Pickstock, “Truth and Correspondence”, p9, quoted in Jonathan McIntosh, The Flame Imperishable, p. 82)
The completeness of Data (which would be one of the requirements of Knowledge in an empirical world), it turns out, can only be gained when one acquires a transcendental method. In turn, this method will involve, not a theory of consciousness (that too, later), but the actual experience of it.
Can you consciously imagine, having no consciousness? No? Then consciousness is anterior, or prior, to what we call matter, reality, or particular beliefs. Knowledge is either grounded in consciousness, self-consciousness, and transcendence of that self, or it is nothing. You cannot derive eternal truth from Economics or Psychoanalysis, as a stand-alone-something "external". Eternal Truth is a gift that consciousness gives to itself, as it grows, matures, & becomes more self-aware, more Itself.
“Actually the Elves believed that the 'lightening of the heart' or the 'stirring of joy' (to which they often refer), which may accompany the hearing of a proposition or an argument, is not an indication of its falsity but of the recognition by the fëa that it is on the path of truth.)” p.58 of the Athrabeth
The question is, Dear Reader, do you really think that we "cannot know" what is happening, out there and in here? That we are truly just passive spectators and recipients of a Reality that remains confusing and vast, which must only be interpreted (for us) by middle managers, experts, and professional government commissars? Do you really think that your conscious perception is so purblind and accursed that God (Iluvatar) would have left you with nothing, defenseless against the Liars who run what we call "the world"? "Show it to me in the Bible".
"Plenty of people in our age do entertain the monstrous dreams of power that Mr Lewis attributes to his characters [the N.I.C.E. scientists], and we are within sight of the time when such dreams will be realizable." - George Orwell, on Lewis' That Hideous Strength
Those who interpret the world, control it, for awhile...Those who frame a debate, can determine its conclusions, for the time being...Those who understand the magic of illusion and rhetoric, master the will of others, for now. They do seem invincible, yet it is, and for that very reason, utterly transient. The see of Rome seemed forever in 1500. 100 years later, its spiritual Empire was gone. Rome may not have been built in a day, but it seemed to fall in just a few, both the Empire and the See.
For the Christian (or the historian, for that matter), there can be no question of "accepting" the world's standards, no matter what they say bad about us (which they will). Our standards do not go out of date, change, or collapse, unlike the man made artificial systems around us, be they paved roads, governments, fiat money, or passionate political norms. The Sorcerer-States currently controlling the globe are not eternal. The Sub Specie Aeternitatis of the Christian will eclipse them. For the Zeitgeist (Time Spirit) always pretends to be "forever". How else to run the saeculum (world)? For the time being?
What we are interested in, is not the final outcome or the present valuation or the past verdict (all known already), but the timing and precise mode that these events are going to take, so that, seeing trouble afar off, we can be wise, and hide ourselves. In other words, we want to take a peek behind the curtain. We may not be a prophet or a vates, but we can certainly aspire to be a rational creature and astute student of history, wide awake and paying attention after doing the homework. This is not proleptic prophecy, but ecbatic.
Eventually, the official perversion of money — especially of borrowing an awesome lot it with no intention of ever repaying — leads to the unhappy circumstance of money disappearing until nobody has any money. And by such, the broke-ness of the government transmogrifies to a whole land full of broke people. Many banks go broke as well. Even the high-fliers who hoarded things that purport to represent money go broke. Then, nobody has the means to buy anything. Businesses that can’t sell anything stop being businesses. After a while, no activity is meaningful except grubbing in the soil to grow some food, or stealing it from those who grubbed and grew it. By then, you can barely even call it a society. Link
Dishonest Money corrupts the Governments that issue it, since it is a breaking of one's word. Dishonest governments corrupt the people they rule. And dishonest people eventually collapse. The Fish rots from the head, down. Sorcerer-societies go broke slowly, at first, and then all at once (Ernest Hemingway). Things continue, until they can't. Our Western world is about to get a lot smaller, more local, and less affluent, very quickly. The writing is on the wall, for those who wish to see it: Mene, Mene, Tekel Upharsin.
I am sure the Empire of Babylon didn't expect it to end in one night, either.
All of this has happened before, all the traditional signs are there, for example, the debasement of currency and the importation of barbarian rabble, which signaled the Fall of Rome. The new thinking is that Rome did not ultimately fall from external pressure, but from ordinary Romans realizing that they would be better off, under Gothic and Lombard and Frank barbarian war lords, than their own Tax Masters. When that percentage reaches critical mass (say, 60-70%), after the destruction of the 5-10% of natural aristoi who can competently see how corrupt things are, Collapse is merely a matter of mathematics and knowledge of Human Nature. All Empires lose battles. Byzantium endured for a 1000 years longer, because its people trusted their government, for another millenia.
Does America really have "another millenia of trust" left in her? What do you think?
Forward thinking, past confident, present aware Civilizations have something to "look forward to" (Dmitri Orlov). What, if anything, do Americans have to look forward to? Rising debt, crime, and illegal immigration? Crappification and Third Worldification? Higher Misery Index? The Afterlife?
This kind of internal stress (eg., gaslighting and polarization), unresolved, will end in total collapse:
Progressives understand the importance of confusion, manipulation of language, and beneficial propaganda to shift unsuspecting naysayers and adversaries into a state of paranoia that causes them to leave behind their original principles.
And even this fact, like War, has short term winners. Other stressors, just as much so, will cause the same long term result:
Sadly, many families don’t even want to imagine what harder times might look like, because they are already deeply, deeply suffering right now. (see also here)
Or this.
Debt is not the reason for the problems which the world is now facing. Instead debt is a consequence of the falsehood culture that that is toxifying the world. Unacceptable increases in sovereign debt arises when governments can no longer tell the truth, if they ever could...Imagine a football stadium which is filled with water. Every minute one drop is added. The number of drops doubles every minute. Thus it goes from 1 to 2, 4, 8 16 etc. So how long would it take to fill the entire stadium? One day, one month or a year? No it would be a lot quicker and only take 50 minutes! That in itself is hard to understand but even more interestingly, how full is the stadium after 45 minutes? Most people would guess 75-90%. Totally wrong. After 45 minutes the stadium is only 7% full! In the final 5 minutes the stadium goes from 7% full to 100% full.
Financial illiteracy and Innumeracy in general, as well as miseducation, are the modern equivalents of "don't let the slaves read or write".
These multiple stressors, in synergistic mutual feedback loops, intensify each other for the selfish and short term libido dominandi of a senescent, sclerotic, professional idiot class, all by design. The question is a matter of timing and other intangible factors, as so many eggs are being juggled in the air. It is not If, but When. You cannot take holidays from History (Charles De Gaulle).
A Society that is designed as a Panopticon, is Auto-Cephagic - it will eat itself up.
If enough of the plebs, the rabble and the useless eaters can be convinced to accept this virtual reality as genuine, or at least a reasonable facsimile of life – possibly even preferable to many, then a lot of big, macro problems get solved. For starters, us commoners won’t be able (permitted, really), to continue despoiling the real world. Then while the rest of us are in our virtual realities, living on UBI, delivered by CBDCs, being fed plant-based sludge intravenously, the real world will be deftly managed by expert technocrats and super-wealthy elites – whose private jets, multiple residences and super yachts are somehow exempt from the wanton environmental destruction the rest of us would cause with our single use plastic straws, pet dogs and meat consumption. The pretext for all this is a curious faith in Scientism (as opposed to the scientific method), being carpet bombed across the MSM and big tech platforms that is tantamount to brainwashing:
It is distinctly Malthusian
It is based on principles that are fundamentally Marxist
It is driven by an elitist sense of entitlement and misanthropy
It provides the intellectual grounding for the WEF-inspired “Fourth Industrial Revolution” framework which utterly failed in it’s first big test: the COVID-19 pandemic, wherein every core tenet turned out to be wrong, and every policy response failed. Undaunted, this thin scab of elites who sit atop the global cap table have already pivoted to rhetoric around a group of unfalsifiable, logical fallacies collectively branded as The Climate Crisis™ and are now trying to make the case that these same experts and technocrats who botched the pandemic response across the board should get to decide how much time and space the rest of us get to take up in the real world.
This will not end well. Historically, it ends in the fall of the Government, and/or the collapse of an entire Civilization. We did it to ourselves. Christopher Lasch pointed out long ago that the "Elites" are no such thing, but in fact a dysfunctional kleptocratic oligarchy. This has been true, or becoming so, for a hundred years or more, in America. We have become a giant racket (Dmitri Orlov).
Pantopticon in Cuba - Rooms, with a View
Still a skeptic? Are you aware that 4 out of 5 dollars, now in existence, have been printed since 2019?
Why would they do this? Because they can. The average person does not understand that the dishonest money system is actually guaranteed to fail, not just him, but itself. But then again, the average American still thinks there is something magical about Democracy, per se. More incantations!
For example, Charles High Smith gets it wrong. It's not just Democracies that are threatened by wealth and power stratification. All Societies and the Social Fabric have been destroyed whenever Pyramid Ideology (wealth and power to the top) has been implemented. There is not a single known Empire in history that has not succumbed to precisely the very concentration, or consequences of such concentration. No Society can be stable upon a foundation of Slaves, whether Chattel or Debt. Slavery is Dumb. But it makes short term economic sense, and is gratifying to those in lust with power. So it will be tried, is being tried, again.
One can do anything with bayonets, sire, except sit upon them. - Talleyrand
One suspects they know this, and simply do not care. That the plan is just to re-assemble The Empire (like a Death Star) on a new scale or slightly different center location. The Kingdom of God is opposed to the Kingdom of Man; St. Augustine taught this a long time ago, & no one got the memo. It is the slumber of the Church, and the cooperation of Christians with the "World", which retards and slows the growth of God's Kingdom.
Since the theandric activity of the God-man is willed, we are justified in assuming that motion as a result of human activity and freedom is fitting for the human nature. Motion, change, and dialogue are God-intended realities manifest in creation. To put this another way, God does not will a static universe, but one filled with activity, which moves in accord with its nature. The logoi do not set up creation as a static reality but one in which God wills growth and movement. Moving in accordance with one’s individuated logos does not mean a sort of fated, uniform action, but a free response. This is consistent with Maximus’ view that God contemplates created beings as moving.
Still unconvinced? This (below) is what rebellion against God looks like. Or, if you prefer Abstractions, this is what being out of touch with Reality, for a long time, does to your Dear Leaders. Ireland is going to execute 200,000 cows, to save the climate. Scotland is cutting down 14 million trees, to save the planet. Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad...
Where models can be created on whiteboards and reality is expected to conform to these models. It never does, yet we live in a world where people who point out that the models are flawed are demonized while those who bear no consequences for being wrong, double down and are awarded Nobel Prizes...Without that tether, we eventually wind up in a clown world where central bankers get Nobels for blowing up the financial system, where climate alarmists want to end oil on one hand yet advocate for nuclear warfare on the other. Link
The System is irrevocably broken.
If there was something that could be done about it, it would have already been addressed and fixed. If it was fixable, it would not have been allowed to occur in the first place. That is how bad these things are. It is not simple a generational clash over shallow issues, or a minor disagreement about operating philosophies. It is not the normal, natural, sane, healthy change of History. It is Revolution, forever, against God.
Our civilization abandoned its First Principles. That was 3 generations ago.
The safeties are off and have been removed from the firing pins.
The only way to fix our System, is for it to crash. Anything else, would simply not only fail, but actually lead to worse abuses and stress on the entire System.
The current clash between the West and Russia – and increasingly between the West and the rest of the world – is becoming a clash between the incompetent and irrational and the competent and rational. The result is obvious – but what happens when an irrational person who is backed into a corner has access to nuclear weapons? That’s anybody’s guess. By putting its societies on an ideological footing the western elite has backed itself into a corner. They can’t compete; they can’t develop their economies or societies; and they can’t go back. Fixing the problems of the West will require an economic revival, where a real economy will replace the current fake financialized service economy. This cannot be done without putting the hated 1.5/8 group into positions of power. Therefore, it will not be done as long as the current western ruling class is in power. Western societies will not survive an economic revival in their current ideological configuration. Conflict is therefore the only remaining option for the ruling class to hang on to power. Link
All we have now, to look forward to, is the intervention of God in the form of Tolkien's eucatastrophe. Which, all things considered, is not only better than we deserve, but the only thing necessary.
It likely won't happen in 5 years, but also likely won't take 5 decades, either.