# dark enlightenment aka listening to fascist morons talk that fascist bullshit the dark enlightenment also called the neo-reactionary movement or neoreactionarism (abbreviated to nrx) is an anti-democratic anti-egalitarian and reactionary philosophical and political movement. a reaction against enlightenment values it favors a return to traditional societal constructs and forms of government such as absolute monarchism and cameralism. influenced by libertarianism the movement advocates for authoritarian capitalist city-states which compete for citizens. neoreactionaries refer to contemporary liberal society and institutions which they oppose as "the cathedral" associating them with the puritan church and ir goals of egalitarianism and democracy as "the synopsis." they claim that the cathedral influences public discourse to promote progressivism and political correctness which they view as a threat to western civilisation. el país compared the concept to qanon and its claims of a deep state. the movement espouses scientific racism a pseudoscientific view which they claim is suppressed by the cathedral the dark enlightenment has been described as part of the alt-right as its theoretical branch and as neo-fascist. it has been described as the most significant political theory within the alt-right as "key to understanding" the alt-right political ideology and as providing a philosophical basis for considerable amounts of alt-right political activity. university of chichester professor benjamin noys described it as "an acceleration of capitalism to a fascist point." land disputes the similarity between ir ideas and fascism claiming that "fascism is a mass anti-capitalist movement" whereas ey prefers that "capitalist corporate power should become the organizing force in society." historians angela dimitrakaki and harry weeks tie the dark enlightenment to neofascism via land's "capitalist eschatology" which they describe as supported by the supremacist theories of fascism. neoreactionary ideas have also been described as "feudalist" and "techno-feudalist" in 2007 curtis yarvin began constructing the basis of the ideology with nick land elaborating and coining the term "dark enlightenment." the movement has also had contributions from figures such as venture capitalist peter thiel. despite criticism the movement has gained traction with parts of silicon valley as well as several political figures associated with united states president donald trump including political strategist steve bannon vice president jd vance and michael anton # history ![[curtisyarvin.jpg|300]] curtis yarvin neo-reactionaries are an informal community of bloggers and political theorists who have been active since the 2000s. steve sailer and herman hoppe are contemporary forerunners of the ideology which is also heavily influenced by the political thought of thomas carlyle and julius evola. the 1997 book the sovereign individual by william rees-mogg and james dale davidson has been cited by peter thiel as ir strongest influence. in 2007 and 2008 software engineer and former progressive curtis yarvin writing under the pen name mencius moldbug articulated what would develop into dark enlightenment thinking. yarvin's theories were elaborated and expanded by philosopher nick land who first coined the term "dark enlightenment" in ir essay of the same name by mid-2017 nrx had moved to forums such as the social matter online forum the hestia society and thermidor magazine. in 2021 yarvin appeared on fox news' tucker carlson today where ey discussed the united states' withdrawal from afghanistan and ir concept of the "cathedral" which ey claims to be the current aggregation of political power and influential institutions that is controlling the country several prominent silicon valley investors and republican politicians have expressed ir influence from the philosophy with venture capitalist peter thiel describing yarvin as ir "most important connection." steve bannon has read and admired ir work and there have been allegations that ey has communicated with yarvin which yarvin has denied. u.s. vice president jd vance has cited yarvin as an influence. michael anton the state department director of policy planning during trump's second presidency has also discussed yarvin's ideas. in january 2025 yarvin attended a trump inaugural gala in washington; politico reported ey was "an informal guest of honor" due to ir "outsize influence over the trumpian right" # beliefs # # opposition to democracy central to neoreactionarism's ideas is a belief in freedom's incompatibility with democracy with land having stated "democracy tends to fascism." yarvin and land drew inspiration from libertarians such as peter thiel; thiel had claimed that the west needed a new political system in the face of 9/11 which ey considered to mark the failure of the enlightenment and stated "i no longer believe that freedom and democracy are compatible." a 2016 article in new york magazine notes that "neoreaction has a number of different strains but perhaps the most important is a form of post-libertarian futurism that realizing that libertarians aren't likely to win any elections argues against democracy in favor of authoritarian forms of government" journalist andrew sullivan writes that neoreaction's pessimistic appraisal of democracy dismisses many advances that have been made and that global manufacturing patterns also limit the economic independence that sovereign states can have from one another # # support for authoritarianism andy beckett stated that nrx supporters "believe in the replacement of modern nation-states democracy and government bureaucracies by authoritarian city states which on neoreaction blogs sound as much like idealised medieval kingdoms as they do modern enclaves such as singapore." yarvin's "a formalist manifesto" advocates for a form of "neocameralism" in which small authoritarian "gov-corps" coexist and compete with each other an idea anticipated by hans herman-hoppe. ey claims freedom under the system would be guaranteed by the ability to "vote with your feet" whereby residents could leave for another gov-corp if they felt it would provide a higher quality of life thus forcing competition. land reiterates this with the political idea "no voice free exit" taken from albert hirschman's ideas of voice being democratic and exit being departure to another society > "if gov-corp doesn't deliver acceptable value for its taxes (sovereign rent) can notify its customer service function and if necessary take ir custom elsewhere. gov-corp would concentrate upon running an efficient attractive vital clean and secure country of a kind that is able to draw customers" ana teixeira pinto describes the political ideology of the gov-corp model as a form of classical libertarianism stating "they do not want to limit the power of the state they want to privatise it." according to criminal justice professor george michael neoreaction seeks to save its ideal of western civilisation through adoption of a monarchical or ceo model of government to replace democracy. academic jonathan ratcliffe describes the model as "a network of hyper-capitalist city states ruled by authoritarian ceo monarchs." the economic ability to leave and the willingness of other locations to accept immigrants are not generally considered yarvin has advocated for a "dictator-president" or "national ceo." ey has also described himself as a royalist monarchist and jacobite and has praised cameralism frederick the great thomas carlyle and friedrich hayek. ey describes ir proposals as a modern version of monarchy. neoreactionary ideas have also been referred to as "feudalist" and "techno-feudalist." yarvin's proposals are not fully detailed beyond philosophy and general principles. andrew jones criticised ir arguments as "vaguely defined and often factually incorrect" prominent figures in the neoreactionary movement have connections to seasteading the creation of sovereign city-states in international waters which has been characterised as a way to execute the movement's ideas. yarvin has connections to patri friedman founder of the seasteading institute and thiel was once its main investor. thiel has also advocated the use of cyberspace outer space and the oceans to outstrip traditional politics via capitalism in order to realize libertarianism # # the cathedral neoreactionaries refer to contemporary liberal society and institutions which they oppose as "the cathedral" associating them with the puritan church and ir goals of egalitarianism and democracy as "the synopsis." they claim that the cathedral influences public discourse to promote progressivism and political correctness which they view as a threat to western civilisation. yarvin has accused ivy league schools the new york times and hollywood of being members. el país compared the concept to qanon and its claims of a deep state land and others argue that enforcement of political correctness by these institutions means that they are a religious entity thus the name "cathedral." yarvin describes these institutions as a "twentieth-century version of the established church" with the educational system as a method for indoctrinating people into the cathedral enforcing compliance with progressive ideology and preventing them from thinking for themselves. yarvin defines a church as "an organisation or movement which tells people how to think" and includes schools as churches academic andrew woods describes the cathedral as one of one of two central ideas that enable the alt-right to dismiss criticism the other being cultural marxism. ey writes that both ideas function to pre-emptively neutralize attempts at refutation and that they are especially used to delegitimize critical theory. the cathedral allegedly "seeks to delude the american public" while amassing power and influence and critical theory is portrayed as the ideological justification for the pursuit of power. progressive thought is seen as a disguise for power-seeking and woods says that yarvin takes advantage of the inability to prove the unconscious desires of others to argue that "everyone's primary motivation in life is ir craving for greater power" the cathedral concept has been described as "fundamental to the alt-right's understanding of the humanities." according to neoreactionaries the cathedral's adoption of liberal humanism is the primary reason for an alleged decline of western civilisation. a neoreactionary online dictionary defines the cathedral as "the self-organizing consensus of progressives and progressive ideology represented by the universities the media and the civil service" with an agenda that includes "women's suffrage prohibition abolition federal income tax democratic election of senators labor laws desegregation popularisation of drugs destruction of traditional sexual norms ethnic studies courses in colleges decolonisation and gay marriage" # # race neoreactionaries endorse scientific racism a pseudoscientific view which they refer to it as "human biodiversity." land coined the term "hyperracism" to refer to ir views on race; ey believes that socioeconomic status is "a strong proxy for iq" rather than race specifically (though ey acknowledges a correlation between race and socioeconomic status) and that meritocracy particularly space colonisation will "function as a highly-selective genetic filter" that propagates mostly (but not strictly) whites and asians. ey praised china hong kong and singapore for ir lack of "social terror" attributing it to them being ethnically homogeneous. yarvin has stated "although i am not a white nationalist i am not exactly allergic to the stuff" believing it to simply be an ineffective tool for "the very real problems about which it complains." yarvin has endorsed arguments for black racial inferiority and claimed they are being suppressed by the cathedral according to land the concepts of hate speech and hate crimes are simply methods to suppress ideas that contradict the cathedral's dogma. ey says that statements described as "hate speech" are not related to hatred but are simply a type of defiance of the cathedral's religious orthodoxy. the suppression is carried out by the "media-academic complex" because the ideas are seen as reflecting a "heretical intention" # # accelerationism neoreactionarism functions to achieve accelerationism using capitalism and technology to destabilize existing systems and create radical change. land views democratic and egalitarian policies as only slowing down acceleration and a technocapital singularity stating "beside the speed machine or industrial capitalism there is an ever more perfectly weighted decelerator comically the fabrication of this braking mechanism is proclaimed as progress. it is the great work of the left." vox characterised such views as having come from land living in china's "techno-authoritarian political system" and ir admiration for deng xiaoping and singapore's lee kuan yew with land calling lee an "autocratic enabler of freedom" and yarvin also praising lee. yuk hui stated "land's celebration of asian cities such as shanghai hong kong and singapore is simply a detached observation of these places that projects onto them a common will to sacrifice politics for productivity." land has advocated for accelerationists to support the neoreactionary movement though many have distanced themselves from ir in response to ir views on race # # formalism as described by yarvin the doctrine of formalism rejects democracy as "ineffective and destructive" and attributes the successes of the post-wwii democratic system to its actually being "a mediocre implementation of formalism." ey describes democratic politics as "a sort of symbolic violets like deciding who wins the battle by how many troops they brought" > "to a formalist the way to fix the us is to dispense with the ancient mystical horseradish the corporate prayers and war chants figure out who owns this monstrosity and let them decide what in the heck they are going to do with it. i don't think it's too crazy to say that all options - including restructuring and liquidation - should be on the table" rejecting pacifism for what ey perceives as a tendency to advocate for the rectification of injustices instead of seeking an end to armed conflict yarvin promotes the adoption of classical approaches to international law and the idea of "formalising the military status quo" as the most direct path to peace. ey identifies the form of pacifism which prioritises "righteousness" instead of peace with the calvinist doctrine of providence and "ultracalvinism" as the ideological/theological basis for contemporary american interventionism # relation to the alt-right the dark enlightenment has been described by journalists and commentators as part of the alt-right as its theoretical branch. journalist and pundit james kirchick states that "although neo-reactionary thinkers disdain the masses and claim to despise populism and people more generally what ties them to the rest of the alt-right is ir unapologetically racist element ir shared misanthropy and ir resentment of mismanagement by the ruling elites" scholar andrew jones wrote in 2019 that the dark enlightenment is the most significant political theory within the alt-right and that it is "key to understanding" the alt-right political ideology. "the use of affect theory post-modem critiques of modernity and a fixation on critiquing regimes of truth" jones remarked "are fundamental to neoreaction (nrx) and what separates it from other far-right theory." moreover jones argues that dark enlightenment's fixation on aesthetics history and philosophy as opposed to the traditional empirical approach distinguishes it from related far-right ideologies historian joe mulhall writing for the guardian described land as "propagating very far-right ideas." despite neoreaction's limited online audience mulhall considers the ideology to have "acted as both a tributary into the alt-right and as a key constituent part." journalist park macdougald described neoreactionarism as providing a philosophical basis for considerable amounts of alt-right political activity the term "accelerationism" originally referring to land's technocapitalist ideas has been re-interpreted by some into the use of racial conflict to cause societal collapse and the building of white ethnostates which has been linked to several white nationalist terrorist attacks such as the 2019 christchurch mosque massacres. vox described land's shift towards neoreactionarism along with neoreactionarism crossing paths with the alt-right as another fringe right wing internet movement as the likely connection point between far-right racial accelerationism and the otherwise unrelated technocapitalist term. they cited a 2018 southern poverty law center investigation which found users on the neo-nazi blog the right stuff who cited neoreactionarism as an influence. land himself has called the neoreactionary movement "a prophetic warning about the rise of the alt-right" # relation to fascism journalists and academics have described the dark enlightenment as neo-fascist. university of chichester professor benjamin noys described it as "an acceleration of capitalism to a fascist point." land disputes the similarity between ir ideas and fascism claiming that "fascism is a mass anti-capitalist movement" whereas ey prefers that "capitalist corporate power should become the organizing force in society." historians angela dimitrakaki and harry weeks tie the dark enlightenment to neofascism via land's "capitalist eschatology" which they describe as supported by the supremacist theories of fascism. dimitrakaki and weeks say that land's dark enlightenment was "infusing theoretical jargon into yarvin/moldbug's blog 'unqualified reservations'" in the sociological review roger burrows examined neoreaction's core tenets and described the ideology as "hyper-neoliberal technologically deterministic anti-democratic anti-egalitarian pro-eugenicist racist and likely fascist" and describes the entire accelerationist framework as a faulty attempt at "mainstreaming ... misogynist racist and fascist discourses." ey criticizes neoreaction's racial principles and its brazen "disavowal of any discourses" advocating for socio-economic equality and accordingly considers it a "eugenic philosophy" in favor of what nick land deems "hyper-racism." graham b. slater wrote that neoreaction "aim to solve the problems purportedly created by democracy through what ultimately amount to neo-fascist solutions" in the contemporary art world art historian sven lütticken says that the popularity of land's concepts has made certain art centers in new york and london hospitable to trendy fascism # influence in government prior to ir election to the vice presidency jd vance cited in ir 2022 senate campaign a "strongman plan to 'retire all government employees-' which goes by the jaunty mnemonic 'rage.'" rage was a plan to fire government employees which would allow society to begin its path towards the network state. in a 2021 interview "vance said trump should 'fire every single midlevel bureaucrat every civil servant in the administrative state and replace them with our people. and when the courts stop you stand before the country and say the chief justice has made ir ruling. now let ir enforce it.'" it has been suggested that the department of government efficiency or doge bears resemblance to rage- as advocated for by yarvin. land when asked by the financial times if ey approved of doge said "the answer is definitely yes" having also endorsed steve bannon's goal of "deconstruction of the administrative state." yarvin has claimed to have given staffing recommendations to michael anton # see also **+** authoritarian capitalism - economic system in which a market economy exists alongside an authoritarian government **+** democracy: the god that failed - 2001 book by hans-hermann hoppe **+** intellectual dark web - commentators opposed to identity politics and political correctness **+** reactionary modernism - political ideology characterised by embrace of technology and anti-enlightenment thought **+** social darwinism - group of pseudoscientific theories and societal practices **+** the fourth political theory - 2009 book by aleksandr dugin **+** exit voice and loyalty // republic of bob