“The Advancement of Despair.”

There’s a fascinating video available on YouTube (embedded below) of an October, 1972 episode of William F. Buckley’s Firing Line TV show with the title “Hating America.” The guests that day were radical Leftist Dotson Rader (really, look this dude up) and political scientist and anti-Communist Arnold Beichman.

There are a couple of things Rader says during the show that I had to transcribe:

Dotson Rader: “We’re talking about that part of the Left that seeks to break down liberal democracy, and the corporate liberal democracy in the United States, by so dividing the country – that is a proportion of the country… A good portion of the Left’s function is the advancement of despair.”

William F. Buckley: “Yeah, polarization.”

Rader: “Right. And it’s to take a strong enough minority – it doesn’t have to be very large – of the population who are so deeply into despair over the possibility of change within the system that they’re willing to form an organization, a revolutionary underground and use any means necessary to bring it down. The experience of my life in this country, I don’t think or believe anymore that we’re going to bring about massive change in this country through democratic electoral means.”

Now, in 1972 Rader was probably 30 years old. He wanted “massive change” in his lifetime. It’s almost 2022. He’s almost 80. Think he got “massive change”?

But here’s the part that he said out loud that shocked me. Not what he said, but the fact that he blatantly admitted to it:

Rader: “One of the differences between this generation and say, revolutions of the 19th Century is we’re not interested fundamentally in equality. We’re fundamentally interested in justice. Which means we have a greater tolerance for ideas of liquidating a class and so on.”

The Left’s agenda has always been “the advancement of despair” for the purpose of polarization, balkanization to create a disaffected class willing to “bring it (all) down” regardless of the cost, and damn the consequences. It’s explicitly why “critical theory” was created by the Frankfurt School. Modern Progressives deny it, but lying is like breathing to them. The Revolution is all. Utopia will come after all the undesirables are liquidated. Anything is justified to reach that goal.

Give it a watch:

19 thoughts on ““The Advancement of Despair.”

  1. What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. Any tool, weapon, tactic or strategy my enemy uses against me is meet and fit for me to use against him.

    Saint Breivik showed us the way.

  2. This reminds me of something I heard Stephen Green say once. I can’t swear this is verbatim, but it’s close:

    “They’re Jacobins. They’re not really trying to build anything at all, they’re trying to destroy everything. The point is to utterly destroy the existing order, declare Year Zero, and start over.”

      1. The Reign of Terror is what comes next. And they either can’t spot that, or they’re cool with it. I’m guessing “B”.

        There have been many times I have heard leftists talk about “the revolution,” and have thought they should look up the death of Robespierre. But the sad news is that never was a single one that I thought would make the connection from looking up that little tidbit.

        1. Agreed. The “starting over,” bit isn’t really anything they’re interested in, as the implication of starting something would necessitate a rational interest in the future, which can only come from the precept of building something, anything, for growth. (Insert at least a half-dozen essays here by Kevin over the last fifteen plus years.)

          These cretins are all nihilists; self-assured, each and every one of them, that they will be sitting on some sort of throne at the end of the death marches, with a pile of bodies of The Enemy at their feet, and Utopia immediately on the horizon.

          Sick, but that’s what happens when you get The Stupid™ fed to the clowns in this world. I think they’ve been slurping the kool-aid so long that none of them actually have a reference for contrast, talk about indoctrination.

    1. That’s always the case. They *always* seek to take the current order and burn it to the ground and salt the ashes where it stood. Then, and only then, can they build Utopia. These people are religious kooks. They believe the hype. If you, deep down, believe Heaven on Earth is possible, then what’s a million, a billion, or more deaths? We are creating perfection!

  3. You ought to go look up Dotson Rader, looks like a total bullshit artist if you ask me. When he was younger he spent time as a male hustler. Then he was the boy toy of some aging actress. He got stuff published by Parade magazine – that fluff piece they throw in the Sunday newspapers. Simply put: he’s full of crap.

    https://www.nndb.com/people/175/000213533/

    1. If you’ll note in the piece I said: ” (really, look this dude up)”.

      None of what you said has any bearing on whether or not he was a radical Leftist. It’s actually more reinforcing. His first book, I’m certain, is what got him on Firing Line in the first place.

  4. They have a point. If we’d been serious about protecting our freedom we would have deported all the shitlibs and commies when McCarthy pointed them out.

      1. As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man—
        There are only four things certain since Social Progress began:—
        That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her mire,
        And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;
        And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
        When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
        As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
        The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!
        – R. Kipling, 1865

  5. Absolutely fascinating.

    “it’s an emotional reaction, not an intellectual one” Perfectly sums up a lot of thinking from the left and the positions they take. Revolution for the sake of revolution.

    1. All the way to the camps, I am afraid. Strongly worded letters will be mailed from the platforms as the sheep are herded onto the boxcars at bayonet point. Cries of “This Can’t Be Happening!” will echo off the hillsides in between the volleys of gunfire. Eyes open wide with disbelief will be filled with bloody dirt as they stare lifelessly skyward from the bottom of the mass graves and their tangled limbs will give the them the unity they should have had in life. No one seems to want to learn the lessons of history. Or no one takes the lessons seriously.

      1. Maybe.

        You get something like the Provos rolling here in the U.S., I guarantee things will get mighty interesting in a hurry.

  6. Leftists are quite simply evil. They subscribe to NO RULES except one….Win. By any means required. They have zero empathy, sympathy or understanding of what others feel. They have zero qualms about destroying or killing as many people as required to achieve their goals. And unless those of us who believe in personal freedoms accept this reality they WILL SUCCEED. They will never quit, never give up, never go away and the ONLY language they will ever listen to is the language of violence.

    1. Listen, and understand. Those leftists are out there. They can’t be reasoned with. They can’t be bargained with. They don’t feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And they absolutely will not stop, EVER, until you are dead.

    2. From Glenn Wishard’s 2004 post at Canus Iratus, “A Thumbnail History of the Twentieth Century,” which I have cited repeatedly:

      “The rise and fall of the Marxist ideal is rather neatly contained in the Twentieth Century, and comprises its central political phenomenon. Fascism and democratic defeatism are its sun-dogs. The common theme is politics as a theology of salvation, with a heroic transformation of the human condition (nothing less) promised to those who will agitate for it. Political activity becomes the highest human vocation. The various socialisms are only the most prominent manifestation of this delusion, which our future historian calls “politicism”. In all its forms, it defines human beings as exclusively political animals, based on characteristics which are largely or entirely beyond human control: ethnicity, nationality, gender, and social class. It claims universal relevance, and so divides the entire human race into heroes and enemies. To be on the correct side of this equation is considered full moral justification in and of itself, while no courtesy or concession can be afforded to those on the other. Therefore, politicism has no conscience whatsoever, no charity, and no mercy.”

      Except for Marxism having faded at the end of the 20th Century, the rest is absolutely spot-on.

  7. “And it’s to take a strong enough minority – it doesn’t have to be very large – of the population who are so deeply into despair over the possibility of change within the system that they’re willing to form an organization, a revolutionary underground and use any means necessary to bring it down.”

    It’s the same as what Hamas told the Israelies: “We know we will win in the end, because we love death more than you love life.”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *