The current orgy of virtual Schadenfreude

The current online orgy of virtual Schadenfreude - triggered by media reports of the activities of the new US Presidential administration - is a dismaying spectacle in many ways, from my Christian perspective.

"Schadenfreude" describes the (spiteful) emotion of gratification at the (real or imagined) sufferings of others - typically of one's enemies. "Real or imagined" is relevant, since the current sufferings are substantially imagined, being learned-of via news-media reports and governmental/ bureaucratic announcements. 

That is why I inserted the word "virtual" - because the information on the sufferings is substantially indirect, secondhand, and obtained via mass/social media and from State sources. 

At least two things should be said about this online delight. 

The first is to clarify that reports of sufferings will almost certainly be misleading. 

The second, and more important, that the reported activities being celebrated are almost-wholly negative and destructive in nature - therefore not driven by any explicit and conscious, positive Christian motivation.

I have been deeply suspicious of claims of destruction of the managerial bureaucracy, since I had inside experience of such events about thirty years ago, within the UK National Health Service. 

The government of that era claimed to be determined to "cut red tape", including severely reducing the particular layer of bureaucracy within-which I was working. 

Official announcements from the specific layer of NHS bureaucracy also claimed (and complained) that it was being reduced severely. About 150 jobs were supposedly to be cut from a single office complex where I worked - and official returns to this effects were submitted. 

The news media duly reported the 150 jobs cut. 

Yet those on the inside knew that this was a kind of theatre for public consumption. 

In reality, hardly any jobs were cut - and these were almost exclusively among those who wanted to leave anyway and were grateful for severance pay. 

Nearly all of the 150 sacked/ let-go were redeployed within the larger organization; and/or rehired into almost the same jobs, shortly after the big announcement of cuts. 

The message is that, when you hear or read about job-cuts, layoffs, closures etc; all this kind of stuff may quite easily be faked - but faked in a way that is not detectable without detailed inside knowledge. 

The deeper problem with this current celebrations of destruction, is that of the underlying motivation. (Because the difference between virtue and sin, between good and evil, is essentially that of motivation - rather than specific action). 

A motivation for destruction as such, is anti-divine-creation, hence an evil motivation - and therefore leads to more and greater evil. 

And this applies pretty much for anything that might be destroyed - almost regardless of how useless or evil it is. 

An historical comparison could be the Dissolution of the Monasteries that happened in England under the rule of Henry the Eighth. 

The Roman Catholic Church itself, and its religious orders in particular - monasteries, friaries, priories, nunneries - owned a vast and still increasing proportion of the national wealth (from memory, something between a third and a half of the land). 

Church abuses were rife and widely experienced by the English population; there was a good deal of exploitation, luxury, self-indulgence, and political activity; and apparently much less (although certainly still a significant amount!) of asceticism, scholarship, piety, charity, and virtue. 

Therefore, there was no shortage of those among the English who celebrated (even when they did not personally benefit from) the truly colossal appropriation, violence and destruction that followed. 

My impression is that there was a good deal of tacit, if not active, public support for the Dissolution - as well as senior political, and a large segment of religious, leadership involvement. 

A great deal, therefore, of Schadenfreude was evident in the Dissolution. 

For instance; when the last major Abbey, in Glastonbury, was closed and demolished, and the greatest monastic library in England was destroyed; and its Abbot and two other senior clerics were publicly hung on top of Glastonbury Tor - it seems that the local population were pleased to observe their ex-landlords get "what was coming to them". 

Yet the Dissolution of the Monasteries was a national catastrophe, especially for the middle and poorer classes, from which it took England generations to recover - if indeed it ever did recover. More than a century of terribly destructive religious wars and exterminations were initiated. For many decades, there were almost no schools or hospitals, and no organized provision for relief of the poor.  

My simple point is that when goals are negative and destruction is the primary aim - and when this is unacknowledged, un-repented; spiritual disaster will surely ensue. Because this is, in effect, a celebration and endorsement of evil. 

No amount of negative action ever amounts to a positive strategy - and almost all current self-styled positive motivations are merely double-negative simulations. Or else, like Western "nationalism" as of 2025; almost wholly wishful, conjectural - hence in practice very secondary to other motives, and far too feeble to be effectual. 

With respect to the native populations of Western nations in 2025; any motivation that is truly good, positive, virtuous; absolutely needs to be consciously chosen and a grass-roots/ bottom-up phenomenon. 

Because, however differently things were in the past, good cannot now be done covertly nor in a top-down fashion. 

So that all fantasies of covert positive top-down agendas among the ruling elites are impossible, as well as unreal.   

  

In sum - the current orgy of online Schadenfreude may concern much that is merely virtual; and by its celebration of negative and destructive motivations, is very likely (from a Christian point of view) to prove multi-valently corrupting of those who engage in it. 

(As, indeed, seems to be the case.) 

Schadenfreude derangement syndrome

The current orgy of Schadenfreude continues to escalate - energized a few days ago by a staged, acted and broadcast PR pseudo-spat over the Fire Nation war; a news-event which has been uncritically accepted at face value, and thereby ecstatically celebrated, by (apparently) hordes of people; individuals who, just a few weeks ago, expressed deep scepticism over the machinations of mainstream politics and the mass media. 

Yet another Litmus Test massively failed! 

It is becoming clear that the double-negative agenda is alive and well, dominating and sweeping-aside what has thereby been revealed as a shallow, feeble, self-gratifying, and this-worldly Christianity.   

Double-negative values are a hallmark of The Left - which is united only by its opposition to (ultimately) God and divine creation. 

The self-identified political "Right", including advocates of an imaginary and impossible "nationalism", have recently come-out as crypto-leftists - which, indeed, is the inevitable convergence of all primarily this-worldly and double-negative ideals.

In sum: The Right is united only by its rejection of The Left (i.e. particular-labelled individuals and institutions) - such that the only powerful source of Right triumphalism is when their Left-identified enemies appear to be getting humiliated and destroyed. 

(Note: In our world, all is of-the-left - except where religion is put first - and where that religion is motivationally-rooted beyond this world). 

There is a strong lure in religion that seems to combine success and status, power and prestige, pride and self-esteem, progress and historical inevitability, with aspects of real Christianity that is "not of this world". 

The proposed syncresis of this and next-world benefits appears in many guises through history - and dominates much of online Christian discourse; which is the reason behind current ecstasies of virtual Schadenfreude. 

The "prosperity Gospel" is indeed much more widespread than its crudest evangelists: the idea that the path to economic, or sexual, success lies via Christianity is a very popular and influential one online. 

Of course, Christianity must and should be-of-this-world as well as the next: not least because the incarnation and mortal life of Jesus Christ is evidence of this. 

In other words our mortal lives have purpose for as long as they are sustained by God. So a retreat from The World is not even a theoretical option for Christians - we must and should engage. 

But... in a civilization and society so completely built upon materialism and the denial of the spirit; in a world dominated by corrupt, and demonic-allied, institutions; it ought to be perfectly clear and evident that goodness cannot, therefore will not, emanate from, nor be gifted top-down by, those with institutional and official power/ wealth/ social status.  

It ought to be evident that politico-media-events intended to demonstrate the humiliation or destruction of people, organizations, nations - are not going to be evidence of, nor harbingers of, goodness. 

Indeed, the likely reality behind the façade of apparent destruction is not even difficult to discern for those with a bit of accurate knowledge who stand-back from the contrived frenzy - even when these people have no religious basis. 

(In a geopolitical world of puppet leaders; the spectacle of one puppet berating another for the cameras, should be obvious as what it is: a puppet-show.)  

The spiritual war of this world is essentially about "hearts and minds" - and the great aim of the various factions of evil is not to impose physical/material slavery or misery; but to induce individuals to choose to commit themselves (hearts and minds) to one or another of the agendas of evil. 

Evil is only spiritually effective when it has been freely embraced. That is why our enthusiasm, support, and hope; are so assiduously cultivated by The Establishment. 

And that embrace of evil is precisely what we are observing, in real time, on a day-by-day basis. People who were, until recently, apparently Christian; are changing sides; abandoning salvation as their primary goal -- 

And instead they are committing more and more of their support, energies, enthusiasm, efforts (and, worst of all, hopes) on what is at root a negative, destructive, demon-motivated agenda. 

"AI" and Schadenfreude

One of the multi-pronged and actively-corrupting effects of the current global establishment push of so-called text and image-generating "AI" is its encouragement (if encouragement were needed!) of that besetting sin of this time: Schadenfreude.  

I have come across many online binges of spiteful (almost erotic) glee, when people imagine the devastating effect that AI will supposedly have on destroying the livelihoods of journalists, illustrators, script-writers, novelists - and in general those involved in the visual and verbal aspects of mainstream media and public relations...

Nearly-all of whom enthusiastically put their talents in service to the agenda of value-corruption, and who appear to be 101% on-board with the demonic program of totalitarianism. 

The orgies of delight at what is hoped will be the deserved sufferings of these myrmidons of Satan is a certain evil in its own right... Which evil has nothing to do with the fact that these most of these people are apparently on the wrong side in the spiritual war of this world.

The idea that those destroyed deserve their sufferings, and that therefore it is right to take pleasure in their misery; is just one of those deadly rationalizations that prevent sin from being repented.

Therefore; the evil I describe comes from  resentment - not repented but instead actively celebrated, and rhetorically-intended to induce celebration in others. 

Of course; this is only a small aspect of the many evils that AI is planned to wreak upon the human spirit; yet it is a calculated consequence of the strategy of implementation, and deserves at least cursory acknowledgement. 

I'm feeling smug today...

The NZ psychiatrist 'Pukeko', blogger at Dark Brightness, and a statistician friend of his, have awarded me the accolade of saying that I was correct about the worthlessness of functional brain imaging some twenty years ago:

http://pukeko.net.nz/blog/2016/07/bruce-you-could-have-schadenfreude

I am grateful to be vindicated in the end!

But I don't feel 'Schadenfreude' because those who published the thousands of worthless FI studies have mostly had spectacularly successful academic careers; fame, travel, power; and are by-now safely retired on lavish pensions. Whereas I have existed in professional obscurity/ notoriety and with relatively modest material rewards.

(Albeit I woudn't swap my life with any one of them! - and have been mostly-cheerful, scientifically fulfilled, free to think, work and write what I wanted, and - at the moment - am feeling rather smug!...)

This is the (unpublished) paper I wrote back in 1995:

http://iqpersonalitygenius.blogspot.co.uk/2015/06/a-critique-of-functional-brain-imaging.html

The time for inter-denominational rivalry is past - all Christian churches need each other

*

I suddenly feel absolutely sick of the way in which Christian denominations snipe at each other, chip-away at each other: at the overt, or barely-concealed, Schadenfreude with which those of one denomination rejoice in the misfortunes of others.

*

Does any denomination really suppose that they will displace the others on a global scale? That they will actually move-in and take-up the space made all over the world by the decline of the Roman Catholics, Eastern Orthodox, Anglicans, Lutherans, Methodists, Presbyterians... all of whom have declined in strength and numbers overall over the past century, and still are declining or in some instances nearly gone?

*

There is a gross unrealism in the way such matters are discussed - the theological and doctrinal and other faults of other Christians are a topic of endless fascination, it seems, as if it is a realistic hope that suddenly everybody in Christendom will agree on the one proper way of doing things!

They never have agreed for very long, and from where we are it seems certain that they never will in the foreseeable future.

*

Since we are stuck with multiple denominations, Mere Christianity is the only hope; in the sense that different kinds of real serious Christians must recognize that there are many other types of real serious Christians - and this is not going to go away - so the only questions is whether we will respect each other, try to appreciate each other, and work together; or not.

Because I am talking about real serious Christians, who put Christianity above modern secularism - and there are so few of these in the West, and they are so outnumbered in all the larger churches and denominations, that the failure to adopt a Mere Christian perspective results in a ludicrous situation of a mere half dozen or few hundred real serious Christians in a single denomination pitting themselves against the rest of the world.

*

It is not all that difficult, and it is getting easier, to pick-out the real serious Christians in any denomination and work with them; because the lines of battle are ever more sharply-drawn - in particular there are high profile hot-button issues or litmus tests (mostly to do with the sexual revolution) which can be deployed swiftly to exclude people from the 'real serious' category - and any devout, self-professed Christians still left standing are therefore allies (or should be).

*

The hungry sheep look up for metaphysics... and are given morals

The quote is slightly adapted from Charles Williams; it struck me as both absurd and true.

Absurd, because of the idea of the modern masses looking up from their mobile phones and asking their Christian pastors (which they don't have) for metaphysics!

(However, if they did; they would still be given morals.)

But the statement is true, nonetheless - in the sense that nothing less will suffice to address the modern malaise than a different basic understanding of the nature of ultimate reality.


Christianity gets nowhere in stressing morals rather than metaphysics; because morals depend on metaphysics; and when the basic understanding is modern materialism, then morals will inevitably be some species of the hedonistic (as well as incoherent): there is nothing else for them to be.


But when Christian metaphysics is dry and abstract - as so much of mainstream traditional Christian theology is dry and abstract; and as Charles William's own metaphysics was dry and abstract - then the sheep may feel that their fundamental problems are not being addressed.


The sheep find The World - the world as described by their assumptions and as experienced in daily life; and indeed them-selves as people, as souls - to be utterly dull and deadly: hence the mobile phones.

Modern Romanticism, as accessed via those mobile phones, and social media; is nothing but distraction, escapism, superficial stimulation: thus cumulative despair. It is just politics, sex and pleasure; the mere stimulation of responses - anger, hatred, resentment, schadenfreude, lust, laughter, luxury, smugness etc.

What the sheep need, what they 'really want' is a Romantic Metaphysics that is true, hence liveable. They don't know they want it; but nothing less will suffice.

Metaphysics needs to be Romantic, hence desirable; and True, hence liveable.

Luckily, it is.


But so far, Romantic Christians have done a poor job of explaining their metaphysics - often because they understand it in ways that are abstract, over-complex, too systematic - until Romantic metaphysics sound like just-more-bureaucracy...

Charles Williams fell into this trap with his writings on Romantic Theology. His basic ideas were exciting: that falling- and being-in love could be a path of Christian life; that a life of creative activity could be a path of Christian life; that life was an adventure quest and we were part of an altruistic and mutually helping fellowship.

But when Williams got down to specifics; the exciting ideas dissolved into complex, incomprehensible terminology. More crucially, Williams's detailed ideas were either wrong or simply incoherent.


In fact, Williams could in practice make around-himself a world of Romance, in which he and his circle of friends, disciples, colleagues could live their lives. It was this magical personal charisma that so impressed so many people; which made Williams so popular and admired.

But this was the person, not the metaphysics. Once Williams had died, it could be seen that his writings held only the shadows of that ecstasy in living that the man' presence could impart.

So, the problem of Romantic metaphysics remains unsolved.. at least by Williams. But there is an answer.


The answer can be found in the writings of fellow Inkling Owen Barfield; albeit again in a complex and abstract way. The answer can also can be found in William Arkle, and at times much more simply expressed; but Arkle is hardly known.

Probably, in practice, people will have to solve it for themselves or it will not be solved at all. And one would suppose that there are strong incentives to do so. Yet who - of the millions of mainstream, miserable, modern hedonists - is making any serious attempt?

There exists an answer. But one thing is sure: without personal effort, there will be no answer.

Just because someone opposes sadistic destructiveness, does not mean they are actually good!

In a geopolitical world where treachery and gratuitous murder are openly and officially celebrated; it's become pretty easy to appear "good" - merely by defending The System, and its continued functionality.

When contrasted with a mainstream moral system increasingly based-upon paranoid resentment and Schadenfreude - those whose vision of the future is 2020-on-steroids may begin to look "good by comparison". 

When routine usage of mass-scale and indiscriminate assassination, and the parasitic scavenger-of -corpses presented as a moral ideal; with its implicit Hobbesian future of eternal war of each against all...

It is easy to fall into supporting the only publicly available and organized alternative: a totalitarian world of omni-surveillance and micro-control (ostensibly) supervised by "AI" and implemented by "robots".  

In other words; the greedy lying tyrants of the lockdown-era start to seem "not so bad" after all... 

(By reasoning that "at least" they don't actively support industrial-scale torture and slaughter, sabotage of production and trade, and environmental annihilation.)

The stage has been set for the masses eagerly to invite their own mental slavery to a materialist-computerized society, built upon absolute denial and exclusion of the divine and human - hoping thereby to avoid the alternative.  

Unless we are alert to this spiritual danger; we will fall willingly into this long-prepared trap of not just choosing between two evils; but inwardly-endorsing that which we regard as the lesser evil - and thereby coming to regard in our hearts that which is fundamentally opposed to God, divine creation and salvation - as if it was good.

All this is presented as a forced-choice - either embrace the global totalitarianism and the systematic destruction of spirit; or else embrace a world of deliberate and spiteful destruction. 

The System is presented as the only bulwark against forever-everywhere war; and chaos is presented as the only escape from eternal mental slavery. 

These are not, of course, the only options; but nobody with power/ influence/ high status is going to tell you about the good alternatives.

Note added: We also need to ask how it became normal and acceptable among the ruling classes to celebrate treachery and assassination; even when these harm the ruling classes own long-term self-interest. This leads to a consideration of the trajectory of evil, of how unrepented evil is dynamic and feeds upon itself - how evil becomes "purer" with time: meaning that it becomes more wholly-negative.    

Superstitious fear of nemesis thwarts joy and hope - Colin Wilson, William Arkle and optimism

The superstitious attitude assumes that there is some cunning and perverted consciousness presiding over all our acts and, if we fail to keep to the special and secret rules, this presiding entity causes unpleasant things to happen to us and our loved ones.

From 'Justice' in William Arkle's Geography of Consciousness (1974).

This above passage struck home hard with me, and I have returned to it often; since it describes a besetting problem of mine - which is that I fear to speak explicitly and honestly about my happiness and hope, or my appreciation of the goodness of things, for fear that this will be seen as arrogance (hubris) and will attract retribution form some kind of 'cunning and perverted consciousness' - that I will be punished for my presumption - I and those I love will suffer the nemesis of the gods.

This attitude runs deep: very deep.

I seem to worry that displaying a sunny and optimistic aspect will attract cosmic schadenfreude, and will get me noticed and singled-out for humiliation and degradation and torment -- that I will be like a butterfly broken on a wheel - and the wheel could be any one (or more than one) of so many hazards and horrors of the world.

Yet this fear-full, dread-full, superstitious attitude may itself be one of the major hazards in the world. If (as I believe) the world is alive and responsive to our attitudes - full of sentient entities, many benign; then this attitude of suspicion and supplication cannot fail to bring out the worst in our environment.

Of course, nobody wants to be 'taken for granted' - but on the other hand we want our good intentions to be appreciated - and if despite we are treated as cunning, perverted, hostile; if we are treated as an implacable foe looking for any excuse to inflict harm - then we are likely to be wounded and dismayed even if we are the most virtuous of entities, and be irritated and angered and proviked if we are neutral.

I have therefore come to recognize a great courage in explicit declarations of joy and hope.

Our culture tends to admire the cynic, the pessimist, the hard-boiled, slyly-corrupt hedonist - the anti-hero. But I feel that the greatest Christian hero is the one who really believes in the goodness and love of God such that full value is accorded to those moment of joy, hope, beauty and inspiration which come our way.

It was a subject that Colin Wilson worked-through over many decades: the difficulty of being an overall-and-in-the-end optimist in a culture which regards pessimism, nihilism and assertions of the meaninglessness and purposelessness of life as being deeper and truer. Wilson got himself called naive, childish, shallow, insensitive - but he was right; and he was braver than his critics.

William Arkle took this optimism even further such that he started even Wilson (the two men were friends). Arkle had been in war, he knew about the harsh, tough and terrible things of life; but he would not allow himself to be deflected from his deepest convictions that this is a benign world, set up by loving Heavenly parents; that we are surrounded by helpers; and that in the end, so long as we strive and stay true, so long as we don't succumb to bitterness and despair, we will be given a prize, a situation, a world more wonderful in its scope and nature than our sweetest dreams.

Spite is all around us; invisible, dominant: the fruit of resentment, fuelled by despair

Spite, spitefulness is a strong candidate for The Worst Sin (I've blogged on this often). 

Another word for (aspects of) spite is Schadenfreude - but this is more often treated as an amusing foible, trivialized; than recognized as among the worst of evils. 

Surely we can all, if honest, recognize in ourselves (and infer in others) this most evil of evils: a desire to harm others, to make others suffer: a motivation that will, at extremes, risk or sacrifice even oneself? 

Surely we have all felt an arising impulse that responds to awareness of happiness, beauty, moral decency, honesty in other people or the world around us... with an impulse of hatred, the urge to destroy it, to smash it. 

We observe perfection; and then a stab of desire to mar that perfection. The urge may even be yielded to, when "harmless" - as when we see a perfect reflection cast by a still pool of water... And then respond by smashing it to smithereens by hurling a rock into it! 

"Harmless" fun, maybe - a tiny lapse, in the scheme of things; no lasting harm done... Yet if we examine the motivations for such everyday (trivial) destructions, we may (if honest) find spite at the root of it.

Likewise for our actions against others. These may be rationalized as necessary, or because "he deserves it"; but at root, the motivation may be spiteful: "I want to see him suffer".  

Most people, most of the time, squash such vile feelings in themselves (and certainly try to forget them) - but surely we have all experienced them? 

And - if we have any insight or capacity to reflect - seen this in other people (including the best people, at times; including those we love the most), and perhaps been at the receiving end of it? 

People who cause trouble among groups of friends - break-up friendships, relationships, even marriages; who spread malicious rumours, mislead, misreport, life; who engage in "he said, she said" betrayals. 

And surely we have at least thought about doing such things ourselves?  

Spite is ignoble, it is despicable - but it is real.

It is found to some degree in almost everybody, and it is the master sin ruling some people (and many demons). It is seen all through human history, and all around us - yet, spite is hardly acknowledged. 

(Except, maybe, in stories about youngish children! Enid Blyton often included spiteful characters, named as such, in her stories - which is how I first put a name to it.)

It is regarded as more sophisticated and pseudo-intelligent to analyse spite in terms of other motivations - especially disguised forms of self-interest. So, the harming of B by A is likely to be described in terms of how harming B benefits A (perhaps indirectly, or over the long-term). 

But the point is not whether spite can be explained-away - Of Course it can! 

The point is to to Ask The Question. Is this spite?

We absolutely need to know whether whether spite is the real motivator behind behaviour; because if it is, then such behaviour cannot be appeased by fulfilling self-interest. 

And, like most sins, spite feeds on its own gratification. When infliction of harm brings gratification, then the infliction of more harm to more targets will probably follow.    

Spite cannot be bought-off. Spite will not be satisfied by less than suffering and destruction. 

Thus when spite is explained-away - this merely allows for the undetected and more effective deployment of more spite. 

And spite is a natural product of the besetting modern sin of resentment - with the dominant ideology of The West being the creation, encouragement, subsidy and protection of ever-more "resentment groups" defined in terms of class, sex, race, sexuality or... whatever*. 

And (in the West, the developed world) this is a world of despair (whether actual or incipient). Because nearly everybody lives-by the assumptions that reality has no purpose or meaning, and that human life is followed by annihilation. 

With such assumptions; existential despair is normal and rational; such that self-distraction from this (supposed-) reality has become perhaps the primary life goal.    

When we have so many people who fundamentally assume themselves to be victims, and who despair; the ground is prepared for the operations of spite - first directed against those who are most resented (i.e. the supposed "oppressors"); but soon (as the sin takes grip) directed against pretty much anyone who in any way irritates us. 

When the most spite-dominated people are also among the most powerful, wealthy, high status, and influential in the world - then we have.... Well, we have exactly what we see around us in the world of geopolitics, global strategy, and the international and national leadership class. 

This world of "Sorathic evil".  

A world in which anything that is (or seems to be) of-God, or Good; anything apparently manifesting the transcendental values of Truth, Beauty or Virtue. Anything wholesome, innocent, natural, spontaneous, care-free... Any such becomes a prime target for spitefully-motivated attack. 

Yet, up to now, spite is invisible. Trivialized. Explained-away. 

By refusing to recognize the operations of spite in ourselves - failing thereby to acknowledge and to repent its sinful nature; we thereby fail to recognize spite in others. 

So spite can be everywhere, dominant, and increasing - yet we choose to be self-blinkered against perceiving it. 

And until we are aware of spite; the operations of spite cannot be resisted - either in ourselves, or others. 

* Leftism now rules the West and much of the world; and Leftism is a negative, oppositional ideology built upon resentment, and depending upon continuing expansion of resentment. The so-called political "Right" (of all types) is merely a variant of Leftism**. This can be seen in its domination by resentments, but of a different inflexion; typically inversions of mainstream Leftism: e.g. resenting women instead of the Leftist resentment of men, resenting the Left-approved races etc. Of course, such motivating resentment is rationalized and explained-away on quasi-objective grounds - yet the actuality of resentment as prime motivator is sometimes revealed when spite-driven desires or fantasies are expressed; as well as by the relentlessly negative and oppositional focus of Rightist discourse (against, against, AGAINST!). 

**The only alternative to the Left is religion. All secularism, all atheism, all materialism is ultimately Leftist. 

H/T - This was stimulated by a comment from Avro G. 

The centre has not moved Left - there is no centre

It is about three years since I started blogging the ideas that found their way into my mini-book about the mass media, Addicted to Distraction -

http://addictedtodistraction.blogspot.co.uk

Since then I have been doing my best not to take notice of the mass media - but to be honest I have not done very well. It is extremely difficult to avoid the most harmful and significant onslaughts of propaganda - since they come at you from all sides, including other people's opinions and questions.

It seems clear that human beings are 'built' so as to 'take sides' on any question, and this - combined with modern Man's lack of any religious centre - is what makes us so easy to manipulate by selective and distorted reporting.


But although everything I see is consistent with the world being run by demons whose goal is the destruction - preferably by inversion - of all that is good; the single most striking thing is that the populations of The West (of Europe and the Anglosphere) seem not to care that they are continually lied-to and manipulated.

Actually, it is far worse than not caring. Although strategic and purposive evil emanates from the leadership elite, not from the population at large; there is a groundswell of active, mass, popular collusion in the process - and it is this which makes the adverse trend literally irresistible (without some mass, powerful religious and spiritual revival).

What seems evident is that there is (for whatever combination of reasons) no centre to modern public life - that is, no point around which oscillation occurs.


I do not mean that the centre has 'moved left' - that was an early phase - things now are much worse than that.

I mean that there isn't any centre at all.

That is not to say that 'anything goes' - because at any moment discourse is heavily constrained - but that there is no cohesive point around-which things are organised. The centre has a location only for the duration of an utterance - then reappears somewhere (unpredictably) elsewhere.


Most of what happens in the mass media is irrelevant and insignificant - but the big news stories are relevant and significant, and these are where the lack of centre shows-up; because there is no position from which to resist the concerted efforts of coordinated elite opinion to shape attitudes and opinions.

So the forces of evil always win - overall and on the whole.

After each major saturation news coverage, there is a permanent and almost universal degradation of public opinion that is not recovered.


The reason that people are not noticing what is happening is precisely that there is no centre and that they themselves have no centre - individuals with no centre do not posses a point of view from which change may be detected and measured.

This is also why the mass of men leads lives of quiet desperation without knowing it. The paradox of modernity is that of people assert that they have good lives in a good society which is engaged in moral progression - but have no hope for anything.

People have a public mask that says one kind of thing, and an invisible shadow that continually plots and schemes for personal and societal extinction. The mask is a fake, and the shadow knows it.

(And when Man has no religion there is nothing else but masks and shadows - it is masks and shadows all the way down.) 


And people are so deeply disgusted at themselves that - from their anti-religious stance, with no other alternatives - annihilation is the best option.

Hence, people actively welcome being lied to, manipulated, whipped-up into fake frenzies of adulation and indignation, crushed down into passive terror and despair. This is what the people want, and this is what the media delivers - and the masses don't just lap it up, but seek it out and pipe it into their minds at high pressure 24/7. They feel that this is no worse than they deserve.

Schadenfreude is the only thriving business in the modern soul - where the only solid reality is the sneering satisfaction of the shadow-self triumphing at the incremental come-uppance of that smug, gullible idiot which is the respectable public persona.

Totalitarianism and/or Chaos: Ahrimanic backlash and/or Sorathic escalation in response to the latest global Litmus Test

The latest global Litmus Test (aka the most recent Establishment agenda theme) is playing-out negatively and for evil - as any change must, when not motivated by positive good. 

Whatever the original intent of the event and its propagation may have been, the existing Establishment power blocs are competing over what it implies.

Competing, often within different parts of the same media outlet! - as would be expected when there is a genuine schism and "civil war" within the Establishment.  

We need to be clear that in this war, both sides are of evil intent; but different types of evil. 

On one side, and this includes the political "Right" (actually, part of the Left); and this also includes the nationalistic "Christian Right" - there are the Ahrimanic totalitarians. 

These desire - first and foremost - an efficient and effective international System... A coherent political-bureaucracy-media complex. 

And the Ahrimanic totalitarians are trying to escalate and use the new Establishment agenda to make the System work better, mainly so-far by undoing some of the more egregious consequences of political correctness. 

This is the true nature of whatever is real in the "anti-woke" backlash assiduously reported by the mainstream sources. 

What motivates these System-reformers is a materialistic and this-worldly desire for a more comfortable, prosperous, and secure life (first and especially for themselves, and those of whom they approve). To be done by means of working-towards an effective and efficient System. 

This is why there is such a strong enthusiasm among such people, for ruthless coercion of individuals justified by "rational" objectives and "the common good." In other words: "enemies" are to be made to conform to the new rules of a better System.

For a truly Ahrimanic totalitarian, this coercion of conformity is done impersonally, without sadism - because it is the result of "objective" calculation of System necessity.  

In sum: For mainstream Establishment totalitarians; it is the individual person's role, whether voluntarily or coerced, to serve the System...

The only difference between the "Political Right" and the "Christian Right", is that the System to be ruthlessly imposed is intended to be one that is explicitly Christian in its forms: a Church System*. 

(Insofar as any totalitarian bureaucracy can really be Christian when it is intrinsically evil!)

Consequently; our old friend The Boromir Strategy is very much in evidence! 

The Political/ Christian Right advocate using the "weapons" of the enemy, including the psychological motivations of leftist materialism - rationalized by the excuse that this is the most effective way to win... 

Under the assumption that "our System winning" (by whatever means are judged to be expedient) is the same thing as "Good". 

In sum: For Christian totalitarians; it is the individual person's role, whether voluntarily or coerced, to serve the Church System...

Mixed-in with totalitarianism (of various stripes) - and sometimes dominant - is explicit expression (across the board, including the "Right", including among self-identified-Christians) of the characteristically "sadistic" emotions of spiteful Schadenfreude. 

In other words, we see the fingerprints of strengthening Sorathic Chaotic Evil.

This is motivated mainly by personal gratification at the sufferings and destruction of "enemies"; or, at first enemies... 

Instead of the impersonal and calculating Ahrimanic justification of coercive imposition for reasons of Systemic-necessity; the Sorathic "Right" will characteristically express positive pleasure in the "need" for imposing suffering on their enemies. 

They typically express delight at the prospect of the misery and destruction of those who will not conform to the new programme. 

...But later, as evil feeds-upon-itself, they will go on to enjoy the suffering and destructions of anybody and anything that opposes or ignores our personal interests and enjoyments.

(And finally the ultimately nihilistic destruction of divine creation - and at last, the suicidal annihilation of their own self; as something created by God.)  

In other words - because people are currently riled-up and feel free to express their dark and usually-secret motivations - we can currently observe the inevitable waxing of evil that happens when both "sides" are actually rival factions of the spiritual war that opposes God and Divine Creation. 

Both totalitarian and chaotic evil are, in their different but overlapping ways, de facto working towards the self-chosen damnation of self-righteous sinners. 

In other words, all varieties of evil are working towards an increase of the self-exclusion of the unrepentant from Heaven; which self-exclusion includes those unrepentant for whom this-worldly expediency is affirmed as primary...

Those for whom their superficial assertion of wanting a more-Christian world and future Heaven, has become an insincere excuse for advocating and doing More Evil Now.

**

*NOTE ADDED: I would like to clarify that I intend the term Church System - which I judge to be the large (or at least vociferous!) majority of Christians who identify with "the Right" or nationalism - to refer to those whose priority is System. here-and-now, in This World - and starting from where we actually are. I mean those many who, at worst (explicitly or covertly), regard their favoured Christian Church as the best or only means to what they really and most deeply want: which is an effective, efficient and "us"-orientated social System. 

(Looking back some 15-plus years; I can see that I was one of these at the time I converted to Christianity. I wanted what I hoped the right Church might do for society during my mortal life and those I love; more than I wanted to follow Jesus to Heaven.) 

I also mean the term Church Systematists to include others, less culpable perhaps, who - sincerely and without covertly-pursued primary self-interest - regard System as a necessary materialistic means to the salvific and next-worldly and spiritual end, of what the uncorrupted Christian Churches advocate. That is to say the Church System totalitarians include those who want System-reform first, to be followed (some unspecified time later) by top-down and imposed Christianization, made possible by the attainment of power (i.e. the Boromir Strategy). These are blind or foolish (if sincere), but not so strategically-bad as those who merely desire to use the Churches for material ends  

But I do Not mean to include in the Church System category, those real Christians who retain loyalty to the spiritual goals of their Church in its ideal form - those who, by discernment and personal evaluation, seek and follow the Christian Truth among the lies and expediencies of the totalitarian-affiliated human institutions of the actual Churches of 2025.  

Some Christian Churches yet retain the capacity to help individuals in their Christian Faith; with political considerations as secondary and derivative consequences of this primary faith. 

The altruism fake

Altruism - helping others, especially at the expense of oneself - is widely regarded as the highest human value. 

This is especially on the Left, but in a modified form also on the self-styled Right - and very commonly among self-identified Christians (who may even claim that helping-others is the single core and essential Christian moral principle...) 

Yet altruism is a massive fake. 

It is not just an actually evil value - but it is also impossible; so the harm is multiplied when altruism is adopted and praised and sought. 

Since Men's minds have lost their spontaneous and immersive communality, since we all became (like it or not) alienated and cut-off; we cannot any more pursue "the group good" - because we do not experience that good in our consciousness. 

Furthermore; the actual human groups we inhabit are too large and too artificial for there to be any meaningful sense of group-good. 

So "altruism" can be recognized as an evil PSYOP (i.e. a manipulative concept originating from the powers of purposive strategic evil) that has been built, propagated and socially-incentivized - for the purpose of destroying people and damaging that-which-is-good wherever it may be found. 

But, of course, reacting-against altruism is also an evil fake! 

A double-negative is not a positive - but just another kind of negative: a sin against sin, advocating sinning against sinners. 

Indeed the supposed "Right wing" reaction-against altruism - i.e. the varieties of claimed political selfishness, enlightened self-interest, libertarianism, market economics etc... do not reject altruism, but actually sustain and reinforce the false value of altruism.

It can easily be seen that the rhetoric of the Right amounts to no more than the claim of a more realistic and effective altruism (e.g. the frequent claim that capitalism is better at abolishing poverty than communism, therefore better at "helping other people").

Or else the Right claims altruism, but for a different sector of the populace than the Left. The Left may claim an altruism directed according to class, sex, race; while the Right may claim to be altruistic on the basis of nation or religion. 

But both Left and Right self-justify in the same altruistic way. 

Even the Nietzschian-type (psychopathic) claim of individuals to be aiming at maximizing "my own" pleasure, power, lusts, status, Schadenfreude; and at the expense of other people -- cannot help but seek justification in altruistic reasoning...

Such as claiming the real world works this way, so that "it would be better" if this was explicitly acknowledged: that it is better for civilization if The System recognizes that people are motivated thus...

Or that civilization is itself a mechanism for oppression -- so that it is "better" overall "for everybody" if the selfish hedonist destroys civilization...

So, even extreme advocates of individualist selfishness* cannot help but ground it in some version of claimed-altruism.  

*(Which is intrinsically a fake thing. A genuinely extreme totally selfish individual would not advertise the fact, nor would he try to make is a philosophical principle to be taught to others! All such rhetoric has some other real purpose.)  

At an opposite end of the altruism fake is "therapy". 

Therapy tries to reduce "helping" to a lowest common denominator of palliating illness, sickness, death; so that "helping others" becomes public health (or charitable, or religious...) programs justified on the basis of alleviating suffering, preventing or curing diseases.

Supposedly this double-negative value is actually is such an obvious good that only a monster of evil could oppose a therapeutic agenda - could oppose "saving lives", "reducing suffering" (of deserving people) etc. 

2020 and its sequelae shows where all that stuff leads. 

Because altruism is fundamentally and inescapably a fake value, therefore all claimed attempts to "help others" - including attempts to alleviate suffering - will not be, cannot be,  motivated by altruism -- and will therefore inevitably and instead actually be motivated by some other covert value - typically selfish-seeking, and/or spitefully destructive.    

Wherever you turn, however you twist; it seems that some claim of altruism is lurking underneath all modern justifications for doing, or not doing, anything. 

And this is inevitable because our society utterly lacks any positive goal or motivation; because this can only be spiritual in nature - and our society is structured-around denial of the reality and significance of the spiritual. 

Altruism is a fake, because society is a fake; and therefore if you personally don't want to live a life pseudo-justified by the harmful, corrupting fake that is altruism - then you will have to find genuinely positive and therefore spiritual values to live-by - and you will have to do this for yourself. 

Who is the real boss of The Left? Wormtongue, Saruman, Sauron, Morgoth

The mass of 'well-meaning' Leftist bureaucrats and propagandists are the Wormtongues - the middle managers of evil; whose ambitions go no higher than bossing minions and henchmen, careerism and sex - plus a bit of petty schadenfreude and sadism. All in the name of a better world...

But Wormtongue works for Saruman; who is like the political leaders of The West - all high rhetoric and ultimate goals, master of persuasion and propaganda masking a  mind of metal and wheels. All 'regrettable sacrifices' and fake nobility. Disguising a desire to become...

Sauron - aspiring demon tyrant-god of this world; seeking the total and willing submission of a planet of servants and slaves; seeking order by total control and terrified worship. But ultimately Sauron too is merely an agent of his god...

Morgoth - the devil. What does he want? What Morgoth wants does not make sense because it is negation and paradox.

*

Morgoth loathes God the creator and he loathes all of creation; because Morgoth is and was and ever shall be second to Him.

And because God made Morgoth, Morgoth hates himself; he wants to be the creator yet also to marr and subvert all of creation.

Ultimately Morgoth wants to annihilate everything except himself - and then he would be forced to destroy himself, being the last remnant of divine creation.

Only when the universe is wiped-clear of all creation will Morgoth be 'satisfied' - by eliminating all satisfaction.

Morgoth is the ultimate nihilist - he desires to replace everything with nothing.

Thus a system of 'hard-nosed', bottom-line materialism, power and gratification is eventually underpinned by pure negative insanity. 

*

This is the hierarchy of Leftism - at each level except the final one, there are what appear to be 'constructive' projects, goals and aims. Each level sees the world in terms of its own satisfactions...

Yet eventually all success at lower levels of evil feeds the domination of the level above, and the level above that; and as the project of evil advances, so it becomes ever more the simple and sheer negation of Good.

(This we are beginning to perceive, ever more clearly. Leftism is eventually merely the destruction of all Good.)

The lower levels of evil are self-consumed or destroyed as the project proceeds - the positive goals (Wormtongue's greed, lust, spite - his life) eliminated from the bottom-up - and behind it all Morgoth feeds upon the negative energies, growing larger, stronger...

When will the mass of Wormtongues and his minions and henchmen, the many Sarumans and Sauron above them - realise that their ultimate justification of their vague Utopian goals and uncompromising aspirations for 'justice' is - deep-down - nothing more than the insane, non-sensical, everything-destroying, self-loathing of Morgoth?

Giants and Albion (the British)

Nightmare fuel for kids

I have already posted on the subject of historical Giants in relation to the British Isles - according to some classical authors Giants seem to have been the original (or first recorded) inhabitants of this island. 

I found another piece of evidence that might be taken to support this assumption; in that (according to some notes in John Rateliff's excellent History of The Hobbit) the only two fairy tales that are considered to be probably native to England; are Jack the Giant Killer, and Jack and the Beanstalk (which also has a Giant as the baddie). 

I decided I owed myself a chance to read these stories in their earliest and definitive versions; which I found in Classic Fairy Tales by Iona and Peter Opie. 

My impression of these Jack stories, especially of "the Giant Killer", was of crude and shallow narratives without any detectable trace of that faery enchantment, which is (for me) the only magic really worth reading about.   

The Giants existed only to be stupid, ridiculous, repulsive, and terrifying; their fate only to be tricked, laughed-at, tormented, and slaughtered. 

I conclude that these tales are likely to be exact examples which Tolkien referred as "impoverished chapbook stuff" in one of his letters:

"I was from early days grieved by the poverty of my own beloved country: it had no stories of its own, not of the quality that I sought, and found in legends of other lands. There was Greek, and Celtic, and Romance, Germanic, Scandinavian, and Finnish, but nothing English, save impoverished chapbook stuff."

The Giant Killer seemed to encourage nothing more virtuous than greed and Schadenfreude; while the Beanstalk Jack larded on some unconvincing moralizing about his later repentance and reform of character.  

All I can say in defence of these un-enchanted and uniquely English Fairy Stories is that I find a similar deficit of enchantment in most other tales from other nations - such a the courtly French stories of Perrault, or the sentimentality of Hans Christian Anderson. 

It is really only the German forest stories of the Brothers' Grimm - such Hansel and Gretel, Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, Snow White - where I find enchantment of the kind I like...

A sense of faery; that parallel and uncanny, perilous, eerily-beautiful world of magic; just off the path or waiting outside of the woodland clearing. 

The hierarchy of evil seen in the Birdemic/Peck and current wars

CS Lewis's demonic supervisor Screwtape is depicted as being strategically-motivated by damnation of humans; while the junior demon Wormwood is mostly just a sadist - enjoying the infliction of human suffering. 

There is a hierarchy of evil (or "lowerarchy", as CS Lewis terms it in The Screwtape Letters) - by which I mean there are degrees of evilness. 

This was evident in the Birdemic of 2020 and the (allegedly preventive) Peck which followed later; and is evident in the ongoing West-provoked/ escalated/sustained global wars. 

The three main levels of the hierarchy of evil can be defined in terms of motivation; and are, in ascending order of evilness of motives:

1. Profit and Pleasure

2. Sadism

3. Damnation

1. Profit and Pleasure 

These are those humans (and lower-status demonic beings) whose motives are essentially selfish and short-termist. 

They cause, continue and use events like the Birdemic to get pleasure and to avoid suffering. For instance; they aim to make money, and to get rich/ famous/ powerful/ popular. 

As example: the people who got massively wealthy from manufacturing and distributing "personal protection" products and the Peck during the Birdemic. Or in wars; the corporate types who manufacture and trade armaments, the politicians and journalists who benefit from bribery and other corruptions. 

This kind of evil is widely acknowledged as a real factor in the world; indeed for most modern people selfish short-termism is in the only kind of evil they acknowledge. They will use it to to explain everything that happens and which they dislike.   

2. Sadism

These are those whose motives are sadistic and destructive. Their main gratification is spiteful: to enjoy the suffering of others, especially when they are involved in inflicting it. 

Such a motive isn't rare; and often finds expression in resentment-fantasy, gloating and Schadenfreude. 

It can be recognized as dominant when people will sacrifice their own profit and pleasure in order to try and damage and destroy those people and entities (e.g. religions, institutions, nations) they most dislike. 

In the Birdemic the sadism-motivated were evident in their eager and sustained support of "face-coverings" and the variety of "social distancing" policies. The resulting loneliness, illness, decline and despair of the coercively-isolated was their primary satisfaction.   

In war, they are recognizable by their tenacious support of policies that have (and are, by them, intended to have) the opposite effect to that claimed. Such as "sanctions" that damage everybody, but mainly those doing the sanctioning. Or military "aid" that leads to the progressive annihilation of the people and society being supplied with aid. 

 

3. Damnation

At the highest level of evil (or more exactly, the highest level at which evil-intent coheres, and remains capable of some cooperation and a degree long-termism in aim - there is a level beyond) - the motivation is to work for the damnation of others. 

In other words, the aim is spiritual. It is to oppose God and divine creation in all ways possible, and in particular to deter or prevent people from choosing to accept the gift of Jesus Christ (i.e. resurrection to eternal Heavenly life). 

Since salvation is a matter of spiritual choice (an "opt-in"); this level of evil works on trying to shape and manipulate what people want.-

To ensure damnation of souls; it is not enough to have people Do evil stuff, they must ultimately Want evil stuff. 

In the Birdemic we saw this in the propaganda that tried to make people accept, demand, and celebrate the measures that were designed to harm them spiritually (as well as physically). 

Many people were induced to desire the escalation and permanence of lock-downs, masking, social distancing; and to advertise positively their own compliance with the Peck (IRL as well as in social media). 

It wasn't just that these things harmed them; but that they wanted the harm - they agreed to being harmed, and sought more of the same. 

And we currently see this damnation motivation among those who use untruthfulness (distortion, selection, outright lying) and knowingly-false interpretations; to depicts their actually-evil-intending (anti-Good-motivated) wars as an ideological/ spiritual conflict with the worse side presented as the better. 

Among those (many) who express such sentiments - and we may infer that these such persons have potentially embraced their own damnation as a personal ideal.  

This is the ultimate success of the demonic powers - to induce people not merely to seek their own pleasure and profit; and not only to enjoy the infliction of pain and destruction - but to hate God/ Creation? Jesus and reject the hope of salvation. 

Instead; to adopt and practice value-inversion... understanding and rejecting Good as evil, and adopting evil as the highest Good.

Because value-inversion (commonplace and official in the modern West) is the surest path to damnation - as by it, the divine is mocked, despised and hated, while the demonic is regarded as heroic, fun and "cool".

And, thereby, the people shall positively affiliate themselves with the demonic agenda of damnation - to become active agents for propagating their own miserable fate.

From the highest levels of the hierarchy of evil, such was-and-is the intent and triumph of 2020; and of the subsequent and ongoing global wars.  

Note added: In case the above induces a feeling of helpless and incipient despair in face of the vast power and influence of evil in the world (and especially the West) - it may be worth reminding oneself that this is a spiritual war I am describing. So that explicitly recognizing the relevant evil motivation for oneself, and inwardly rejecting it; counts as a personal spiritual triumph; and this is exactly the kind of spiritual learning-from-experience that is such a vital aspect of our mortal lives - one of the reasons we are here, and now.  

The unbearability of mainstream public discourse

I hesitate to call it unbearable - because it can be can be borne - but it is so harmful, so horrible to feel one's mind slipping into that world view.

It is everywhere and all the time - and requires active avoidance - it is of course in the mass media, and in government speeches, and in the workings of bureaucracies, and in mainstream charities and churches. Sit down in a meeting it is there; somebody giving a speech somewhere and it is there; at awards ceremonies (any kind of award, for anything - indeed awards are among the very worst situations: and modern zombies are extraordinarily fond of giving each other awards!) and one is certain to be confronted by it.

It is the metaphysics of the thing that gets me: we hear somebody in public life give a speech - and it is the world view that the speech comes-from that is most horrifying, rather than the specific elements. It is not so much the individual lies as the root dishonesty which hits home. And this dishonesty is composed of linked elements - such that the lies cannot be tackled one at a time - and the whole basis needs to be attacked; yet of course that is never permitted, is pooh-poohed as fine spun abstraction in contrast with Real Life.

There is also detectable a kind of demonic laughter behind it - somebody, somewhere is cackling with glee at the millions of people being subjected to pernicious, mind-eroding lies from official propaganda and corporate communications and woven into the best and most popular movies and TV shows and novels; soaking it it up, having their deep metaphysics restructured in the direction of hope-less despair enlivened by active destruction of the good (usually the destruction of a greater good by a lesser, as when some 'freedom' or 'rights' are used to rationalise and institutionalize resentment, hatred, and schadenfreude - in other words normal and dominant and universal Left/ Liberal/ Conservative/ Republican/ Libertarian socio-politics).

And how to cope with the fact that so many people seem to seek-out these occasions of horror - and wish to enforce them on others and structure their lives by them; and regard this as the main thing in life, the justification of life, the basis of a proper existence?

And the reluctance to snap-out-of-it; the truly superstitious terror of (even, especially, mentally) stepping out of line... I think of those hordes of middle-aged nice women who are doing the work of demons with a vaguely kindly motivation - pathetically manipulated and praised into assisting their own destruction; those narcissistic young men who live for the mirror - preening their bodies with weights and drugs, self-mutilating, turned-in upon their own self-image; those young women who seek, and get, attention-attention-attention - always and above all things; those older men who want nothing more than to be young, or appear to be young, or to behave asif young.

It is sad to reflect on the worthlessness of the usual, admired human existence in The West, because it is a chosen worthlessness - built-upon the active and impatient rejection of Goodness; a deliberate worthlessness, a worthlessness embraced and made into a philosophy of leaden-featured, dead-eyed, screeching triviality and waste.  

Sadness and anger are the reaction - sadness at the stupidity and self-deception; anger at the lack of resistance to stupidity on the one hand, and on the other hand anger at the sheer viciousness and excitement with which detectable-Goodness is mocked, infiltrated, subverted and macerated.

The Litmus Tests are really learning opportunities

The Litmus Tests to which I so often refer on this blog, are a mixture of old and new - they are continually being added-to. 

I first conceptualized them in 2020 in reference to the Birdemic and Peck, which were added onto much longer established Totalitarian Establishment strategies - such as pacifism, socialism, feminism and sexual revolution, antiracism, climate change etc. 

Since 2020 there have been further Litmus Tests, such as (especially in the UK) the war against the Fire Nation. And currently there is a Litmus Test with reference to taking sides in the civil war that is splitting the globalist materialists of the Totalitarian Establishment.

(Or apparently so - because the civil war may ultimately, at the highest level, be a faked show put-on to manipulate the masses.)   

It is pretty clear that the Litmus Tests never stop. As commenter Laeth has said; each new Test probes for different vulnerabilities among those people (and institutions) who had been able to hold-out against being assimilated into active support to the Totalitarian Agenda*. 

Thus the healthism of the Birdemic/ Peck led to the corruption of most of the the holdouts among mainstream Christian churches... Conservative Catholics, Evangelicals and Mormons that had resisted the sexual revolution; became wildly-enthusiastic about closing their churches and suspending activities until further notice; and imposing lockdown, atomistic social isolation, and habits of systematic interpersonal fear.  

Later; some of those who had successfully resisted the Birdemic manipulations, then joined with a nationally-orchestrated, media-constructed, Orwellian "two-minute hate session" against the Fire Nation - a two-minutes that has continued for three years, so far (and which is still actively attempting to create a self-annihilating all-out state of war, with the UK as prime target). 

The current situation wit hte new President in the USA is but the most recent Litmus Test. This has, like previous tests, been able to subvert and "turn" a significant proportion of those "holdouts" who had resisted the Birdemic and Fire Nation Tests. It seems that perhaps a majority of "based" online anti-woke, self-identified Christians; have gone all-in for an almost delirious combination of schadenfreude with this-worldly-optimism; the whole thing focused on various Antichrist-figures among the mainstream, totalitarian establishment. 

In one sense these Litmus Tests can be understood as an almost inevitable consequence of the increasing power of Satan and his demons and human servants within this-world - clearly, they will continue to win more-and-more souls to an more-certain (self-chosen) damnation. 

On the other hand they may perhaps be seen as tests allowed by God; because of the opportunities each one brings for a different kind of spiritual learning, and therefore spiritual development - an education in preparation for our post-mortal resurrected life. 

(Which education is, IMO, the purpose of our sustained mortal life. We each continue to live because we have more that it would be good - and perhaps essential - for us to learn.) 

However, I personally do not see the Litmus test as allowed by God nor as a divinely ordained method of spiritual education. Instead I see them as things that God cannot prevent, in this world as it actually is. 

My understanding is: The Litmus Tests originate variously, but become strategies due to their potential for evil and are sustained for that reason. 

They are not of-God; but God can and does (as always) make the best of the bad situations that result, because of his love for each of us, as His divine children. 

And we should take the same attitude of making the best spiritual use of the situations. We should regard the Litmus Tests as direct challenges - not to our peace/ prosperity/ comfort/ convenience; but challenges to our innermost spiritual freedom, the primacy of Christian love, and the requirement for absolute personal responsibility. 

The core part of this is realizing that, for all their geopolitical qualities, the Litmus Tests are Not primarily about material circumstances for large numbers of people in this-world - on the contrary; their true primary reality is directed at the free individual human soul; who always-can and needs-to discern reality in-and-for-himself; whatever the pressures and distractions of this material and social world.   

*Note: As I have previously said; the special significance of Litmus Tests, as with all temptations to sin, is that failure on even a single Test can be sufficient to induce a person to choose reject salvation and choose damnation. Therefore, it is a misunderstanding to express satisfaction that some particular person or institution has passed one, or several, or a majority of the Litmus Tests. In principle and in practice; even when just a single Litmus Test is failed, then that may be a sufficient basis for corruption and inversion of values. And this is made much more likely because the Global Totalitarian Establishment will reward and amplify any such failure; to convert passive acquiesce into active support.     

Good only comes from good motivations - not from the negation of evil

Good only comes from good motivations - not from the negation of evil.

This ought to be obvious, but human beings are confused by the scale and abstraction of modern civilization and life; so they mistakenly come to believe that the defeat or destruction of their "enemies" is evidence of increasing good in the world. 

It is grasping at straws - when it is not an indirect preparation for self-advertisement.

I see a lot of this at present. Al lot of commentators "crowing" over the travails of the most leftist corporations, the most zealously totalitarian nations etc. Predictions that this presages a turn of the wheel of fortune, that from the self-burned ashes of The West shall (inevitably, it seems) arise the beautiful phoenix of a Christian society... 

As the self-hating self-destructiveness of modern totalitarian leftism begins to erode social functionality in ever-more-obvious ways, with the incompetence, decline and collapse of signature evil-tending institutions; it is tempting to suppose this change represents a pendulum swing back towards good. 

It doesn't - at least, not in The West, and not on any socially significant scale. 

What is happening (almost always) is that the organized, bureaucratic evil of globalist/ leftist totalitarianism; is being eaten-away from within by the short-term selfishness and/or spiteful destructiveness of its component parts. 

Yet from a Christian perspective, the infighting of evil is almost irrelevant; because no matter how many evil institutions and persons degrade and impoverish each other; unless there are sufficiently good-motivated institutions and persons that will occupy the vacated social spaces - then matters are no further forward - and indeed whatever evil emerges triumphant will be energized and strengthened.  

Our problem is far deeper than "merely" being-dominated by an evil leadership class, evil government, evil corporations, evil education, an evil mass media etc.  

Our profoundest problem is lack of good. 

Most of those who crow most loudly over the demise of some disfavoured grouping or person, are manifestly core-motivated by one or other evil drive: money, sex, status, power - or a cynical sneering sadistic spitefulness/ Schadenfreude. 

Such people do want want as primary that which Jesus Christ offered - resurrected eternal Heavenly life - even when they have constructed a pseudo-Christian System as their public-consumption objective. 

Yet such people are not necessarily "evil" - overall and in net-effect; they may simply be the normal, average kind of person with mixed motivations; but who have allowed their "base" motivations to take first-place and determine their core allegiance*. Our civilizational problem is that even such-people are statistically among the best of us - and they are Not Good Enough! Nothing like good enough. Only those mixed persons (no matter how mixed) whose primary motivation and core allegiance is to God and Jesus Christ will suffice for what is needed here-and-now - and such persons are (to all appearances) exceedingly rare. 

In sum: beware the false triumphalism that celebrates evil persons and institutions coming to an evil end for evil reasons. 

Mix it how we will; a stew of evils can yield only soul poison - unless we discern, reject and repent the whole nasty brew. 

*A sign of false allegiance (a Litmus Test, if you like) is trying to emulate (to "learn from") the effectiveness of heroes and exemplars of evil. ("Oh, why can't we be more like [fill in the name of some evil success story]?") In sum: Advocating adopting the methods of evil, on the basis that these tactics have a strong track-record of changing the world, that they work.  

This is a Litmus Test of evil allegiance because such people have failed to learn that doing evil and doing good are not symmetrical. Evil is much, much easier than good; because destruction is easier than creation. 

It requires hard, prolonged and skilled labour to make a functional machine or a beautiful artwork; but any idiot can vandalize them in a moment.

Totalitarian PSYOPS are literally black ritual magic

PSYOPS are regarded as top-down mass psychological/ sociological manipulations; and they are all evil by nature; because they are not motivated by love - not in harmony with divine creation. 

Also, since they aim to change "other peoples" behaviour in pre-determined ways, PSYOPS are intrinsically evil in that they are strategically un-truthful. 

In practice; all large scale top-down PSYOPS are also intentionally evil - even if/when those human-tools who implement the PSYOPS (the bureaucrats, managers, professionals, labourers) are ignorant of this evil purpose. 

In 2026 our lives are full of PSYOPS, and have been for decades, accumulating. 

These include the highly prevalent, major totalitarian strategies that I call Litmus Tests - such as class and inter-sex warfare, climatism, antiracism, the Birdemic, and currently "AI"-dolatry.   

There are no good PSYOPS. Supposed good intentions are fake excuses for evil. 

PSYOPS are like The One Ring, a tool of The Enemy, that and cannot be used to fight The Enemy. So, when PSYOPS are used purportedly for "altruistic" purposes - such as Health Promotion or Public Health - supposedly to "help people" in a scientific and medical spirit; if followed through they result in strongly net evil outcomes. 

But to what extent are PSYOPS actual ritual magical practices, performed by black magic techniques? 

In other words, are the methods and intended effects of PSYOPS all operating at the cause-and-effect level of human behaviour and thinking, using quasi-scientific models?

Or, are there spiritual methods at work, with intended spiritually harmful consequences?

Yes, there is a spiritual agenda. Despite that the masses of modern people deny and are ignorant of the spiritual world; nonetheless those at very very top of the totalitarian system are spiritual operatives. 

At the top of the power systems; the ultimate and primary agenda is spiritual warfare; and naturally spiritual methods are deployed - ritual, symbol, charged language, music, "modern" architecture and art, ... the works. 

The phenomenon termed "gaslighting" is pure spiritual warfare: it prepares the way for the necessary invitation for evil to enter the soul. 

Gaslighting induces people - by systemic methods - legal, economic, religious, social, physical (coercion) etc. - to espouse/ support/ propagate/ endorse false assumptions, false logic, stark contradictions, nonsense, paradox... 

Meaninglessness is made to be treated as interesting, amusing, wise; destruction is celebrated as creation; resentment and Schadenfreude are praised as morally exemplary. 

All these are ways by which people are brought to voluntarily open their souls and invite external corruption, occupation - ultimately to hand-over control of the soul to external spiritual authorities.

Black magic is not effective unless it is - to some extent - invited-in. 

Once inside a receptive environment; entities of evil tend to become self-amplifying, by a positive feedback process. 

Therefore spiritual PSYOPS are not effective, unless the masses welcome them... 

However it is apparent that they/we do welcome them! 

Every major new PSYOP has been (at least, to all appearances) - and continues to be eagerly welcomed by large swathes of the Western population. 

People are controlled partly by acknowledged psychological-material techniques; but also - and more effectively - by magical-spiritual methods that harness and direct the malign will of those at high levels of strategic influence. 

It is difficult to resist materialist manipulations, but these are very resource intensive, and limited in effectiveness when they go against human nature. 

By contrast; magical-spiritual manipulations need to be met by open souls, and received with positivity; but when this offer and response happens; black magic is a highly  efficient and powerful malign influence on human behaviour, thinking and feelings. 

 

War and the devil

*

Last Sunday was the English Remembrance Day, dating from the 1914-18 Great War.

As we reached the end of a sermon on war, and the fact that God was present always despite the horror of war, I was aware that while everything which had been said was true, it felt incomplete.

What was missing was the devil.

*

I don't really see how a Christian can properly address the topic of war without reference to Satan.

Without that reference we have - on the one hand, the sinfulness of men and on the other the Goodness of God - but what when the sinfulness of men becomes organized, purposive, when torments are not 'merely' a by product of military necessity but are planned and delighted in, relished?

A particular horror of war is the excuse and opportunity it gives for this kind of strategic sin that delights in inflicting atrocity.

This is, of course, the hallmark of the demonic in its extreme form - and ought to be labelled as such.

*

One reason why Christians should strive not to be worldly, is that in this world Satan is greatly powerful. The same delight in torture, the delight in the act of torture, is evident in at an everyday level in malicious gossip (i.e. 99 percent of discourse in the public arena), and in Schadenfreude - pleasure in the misfortune of others: a species of that most odious vice envy; and an almost ubiquitous and indeed socially-sanctioned sin from which few are immune and of which many openly boast.

*

Not the least evil of Leftism is that it puts envy at the core of politics; celebrates and institutionalizes envy, spite, delight in the misfortune of enemies; builds a vast edifice of policy and sanctions on envy.

The Left just is a coalition of envy.

*

When when it comes to war, Christians need to be aware that leaving-out the devil makes them sound unreal.

Ultimate eternal victory of God is assured; but meanwhile we are here on earth under the dominion of darkness; and we would not be thinking about war if that fact did not affect us.

The world, the flesh and the devil.

*