An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives Quotes

“Reality is the perfect enemy: it always fights back, it can never be defeated, and infinite energy can be expended in unsuccessfully resisting it.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“In many ways nonsense is a more effective organizing tool than the truth. Anyone can believe in the truth. To believe in nonsense is an unforgeable demonstration of loyalty. It serves as a political uniform. And if you have a uniform, you have an army.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“In order to make an impact on the political process, you need quantity. You need moronic, chanting hordes. There is no way around this. Communism was not overthrown by Andrei Sakharov, Joseph Brodsky and Václav Havel. It was overthrown by moronic, chanting hordes. I suppose I shouldn’t be rude about it, but it’s a fact that there is no such thing as a crowd of philosophers.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“In order to make an impact on the political process, you need quantity. You need moronic, chanting hordes. There is no way around this. Communism was not overthrown by Andrei Sakharov, Joseph Brodsky and Václav Havel. It was overthrown by moronic, chanting hordes. I suppose I shouldn’t be rude about it, but it’s a fact that there is no such thing as a crowd of philosophers.

Yet Communism was overthrown by Sakharov, Brodsky and Havel. The philosophers did matter. What was needed was the combination of philosopher and crowd—a rare and volatile mixture, highly potent and highly unnatural.

My view is that up until the very last stage of the reset, quality is everything and quantity is, if anything, undesirable. On the Internet, ideas spread like crazy. And they are much more likely to spread from the smart to the dumb than the other way around.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“There is no way to receive a mainstream university education, read the Times every morning, trust both of them, and not be a progressive. Unless, of course, you’re an idiot. But”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“For example, Britain today is suffering from an “epidemic” of “knife crime.”​ To wit: every day in Great Britain, 60 people are stabbed or mugged with a knife.​ (Admire, for a moment, the passive voice.​ Presumably the knives are floating disembodied in the air, directing themselves with Jedi powers.)​”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“In government, selective disclosure creates a power network between the press and its sources.​ This network does not produce money, but just power.​ The power is shared between the sources and the journalists.​ The whole system is about as transparent as mud.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“In fact, we know exactly what Washington’s policies twenty years from now will be.​ They will certainly have nothing to do with “politics.”​ They will be implementations of the ideas now taught at Harvard, Yale and Berkeley.​ There is a little lag as the memes work their way through the system, as older and wiser civil servants retire and younger, more fanatical ones take their place.​”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“You’ll find that any sentence can be improved by replacing the phrase “international community” with “State Department.”​ State does not impose many obligations on its clients, but one of them is that you can’t be a military government—at least not unless you’re a left-wing military government with friends at Harvard.​ The roots of the present Burmese regime are basically national-socialist: i.e., no friends at Harvard.​”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“Because dependency is another name for power.​ The relationship between dependent and provider is the relationship between client and patron.​ Which is the relationship between parent and child.​ Which also happens to be the relationship between master and slave.​ There’s a reason Aristotle devotes the first book of the Politics to this sort of kitchen government.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“And why, dear open-minded progressive, do you think your theory of government, which you did not invent yourself but received in the usual way, is anything but yet another artifact of power distortion, adapted to retain your rulers in their comfortable seats?”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“This is the genius of classical international law.​ It is based on the concept of actual sovereignty.​ When you establish your Quaker “league for enforcing peace,” or even your British “balance of power,” you establish an international super-sovereign.​ Which is a world government.​ Which is not, in the hands of the Quakers, a workable design.​ It might be a workable design in the hands of the Nazis—but would you want it to be?”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“And so, for the failure of the Tories to suppress the American Revolution to be regarded as evidence for the Whig theory of conciliation, it sure would be nice to know that the reason that the Tories failed isn’t that the Whigs prevented them from succeeding.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“Only, you know what?​ For Gramps and Grandma, who were about the nicest people you could imagine, who certainly had no interest in the Devil or any of his works, not even Mick Jagger, progressive was a code word.​ A sort of dog-whistle.​ What they really were was Communists.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“So the progressive is, indeed, the polar opposite of the reactionary.​ Just as order and stability are essential to reaction, disorder and destruction are essential to progressivism. The progressive never sees it this way.​ His goal is never to produce disorder and destruction.​ Unless he is Alinsky himself, he is very unlikely to think directly in terms of seizing power and smashing his enemies.​”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“The first and most fundamental lesson Obama learned was to reassess his understanding of power.​ Horwitt says that, when Alinsky would ask new students why they wanted to organize, they would invariably respond with selfless bromides about wanting to help others.​ Alinsky would then scream back at them that there was a one-word answer: “You want to organize for power!”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“If the Republicans could somehow dissolve themselves permanently and irrevocably, it would be the most brutal blow ever struck against the Democrats.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“So we believe that, ethically, a policeman’s crimes are no different from a street thug’s.​ Or do we?​ Not as far as I can tell.​ I think San Franciscans are much more likely to express fear and anger at the idea of a policeman committing lawless violence.​ Don’t you find this slightly odd?​ Which would you rather be hit over the head by: a policeman, or a mugger?​ I would rather not be hit over the head at all, thank you.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“The voters, by themselves inconsiderable unities, acquire a value in the hands of dexterous agents.​ This value is realised by many means—mainly, by bribery in innumerable forms, from gifts of money and trifling articles, to the distribution of places in the services, the financial departments, and the administration.​ Little by little a class of electors has been formed which lives by the sale of votes to one or another of the political organisations.​”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“So the continued existence of these reactionary phenomena provides evidence that progressives are struggling against dark forces of titanic and unbounded strength.​ You have to be a bit of a reactionary yourself to see the truth: these institutions are simply a matter of reality.​ So it is reality itself that progressivism attacks.​ Reality is the perfect enemy: it always fights back, it can never be defeated, and infinite energy can be expended in unsuccessfully resisting it.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“And as a progressive, you are no more interested in prying into these questions than the average Catholic is in explaining what makes the Church “One, Holy, and Apostolic.”​ You do not see yourself as a believer in anything.​ You don’t think of the Cathedral as a formal entity, which of course it is not.​ Its institutional infallibility is a matter of definition, not faith.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“Similar majorities of American voters today will tell pollsters that they support Powellian policies: ending immigration, deporting illegals, terminating the racial spoils system.​ These majorities are stable.​ No respectable politician will touch them.​ Why?​ Because they cannot afford to antagonize the Cathedral, whose policies are the opposite.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“I have talked with many people; no one has any confidence in Roosevelt’s notions, but the “organs of public opinion” either praise him or are silent; and no one expects that Congress will call him on the carpet.​ The only certain things are that his fireworks will cost a lot of money, and that they will enlarge our bureaucracy indefinitely.​”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“Progressives, at least the majority of progressives, do not think of themselves as a religious movement.​ In fact, presumably for adaptive reasons, they have discarded almost every trace of theology, though there is still some lingering fondness for the Prince of Peace.​ But the line of descent from the English Dissenters to Bill Moyers is as clear as that from chimp to man.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“Of course, in the Nazi 2008, all “significant views” are Nazi views.​ All “reliable sources” are Nazi sources.​ All the Wikipedia editors, all the contributors, are—you get it.​ Of course, there will be diversity of opinion—there will be radical Nazis, conservative Nazis, and moderate Nazis.​ Nazipedia must reflect all the major currents of the great river of Nazi thought.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“Moreover, the Whig is concerned with his own power rather than with the state of society.​ He would much rather rule in Hell than serve in Heaven, and he will turn any heaven into a hell to get there.​ And yet he is quite sincere in all his Whiggery, which makes him all the more dangerous.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“Why (in the US) did the term stay the same, and the meaning change?​ Because, in fact, the real meaning has not changed.​ In 1858 as in 2008, a “liberal” is a supporter of the Cathedral: i.e., a Whig, a progressive, a Radical, etc.​ It is the Synopsis that shifted, and it is today’s libertarians who are not with the program.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“you see, my family background predisposes me to this suspicion.​ There is no use in trying to convince me that there was never any such thing as an international Communist conspiracy.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“progressivism: it is a “Relationship Built on Self Interest.”​ It is exactly what Alinsky says it is: a way for people who want power to organize.​ It brings them together around the oldest human pleasure other than sex: ganging up on your enemies.​ It lets them rationalize this ruthless, carnivorous activity as a philanthropic cause.​ But the real attraction is the thrill of power and victory—sometimes with a little money thrown in.”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives

“The other fundamental lesson Obama was taught is Alinsky’s maxim that self-interest is the only principle around which to organize people.​ (Galluzzo’s manual goes so far as to advise trainees in block letters: “get rid of do-gooders in your church and your organization.”)​ Obama was a fan of Alinsky’s realistic streak.​ “The key to creating successful organizations was making sure people’s self-interest was met,” he told me, “and not just basing it on pie-in-the-sky idealism.​”
― Mencius Moldbug, An Open Letter to Open-Minded Progressives