Michael O’Meara has responded to GuessedWorker. I was going to post my two cents over there, but the brief comment grew into a blog entry.
The most persuasive case for the efficacy of myths is the debate over “scientific racism” itself: the manner in which “progressives” will twist themselves into a pretzel to avoid even the most obvious facts (racial differences exist, at least in morphology). These people will undoubtedly respond to Salterism in the same Foucaultian manner in which they dismiss all of racial science (it’s a power grab by the white man, a discourse that justifies his domination over us!).
The myth of the colorblind society overpowers the facts cited by the race realists time and again. I’ve lost count of how many times I have seen it happen. The most notorious case that comes to mind is Robert Lindsay, a progressive blogger, who is honest enough to admit that the race realists are usually right on their facts. He has studied the IQ data and racial crime statistics at length (going into international comparisons), knows the score, but isn’t moved by raw data.
He says openly that he wants to believe the progressive line on race. It is too comforting of an illusion. In Lindsay’s case, which is about the best we can hope for out of a progressive, the myth of the colorblind society is powerful enough to override facts, self-interest, and critical thinking. It is always this way with these people. Their vision of “social justice” (or whatever they call it) drives their behavior. It is primary; data points are secondary, and are molded and interpreted to fit the preconceived conclusion.
Here’s another angle to the race realist/human biodiversity community: the nerd factor. The Sailersphere tends to disproportionately attract a certain type of individual, the sort of people who really are driven by data points, or “nerds” as we colloquially call them. Sometimes when you see them parsing GSS data, you can almost hear Skolnick, Poindexter, and Wormser chortling behind their computers in the background. You can imagine a pin up calender of “Asian babes” hanging on the wall. I have long suspected that their defense of the Jews, attacks on White Nationalists and “Nazis,” their obsession and crowing about IQ might have more to do with nerd solidarity (social class) than anything else. I’m skeptical that HBD/RR will ever rise above being a nerd subculture.
Americans are not analytical/empirical/objective. I have mentioned elsewhere that Tim LaHaye’s Left Behind series has sold 65 million copies. Even within academia, the progressive mythos dominates entire disciplines, especially in the culture sensitive humanities. I just can’t see an appeal to science winning out (without substantial culture wind behind it); look what happened to James Watson (with all his prestige) when he stepped across the line of political correctness. Geneticists bend over backwards to avoid using the word “race” in lieu of Watson’s fall from grace. Most try to avoid it altogether (smart career move there). They bend to popular opinion and the progressive party line. Remember all that talk about how the Human Genome Project had discredited racialism? That and God talk has done wonders for Francis Collins’ career.
What can be said for self-interest? In our current political environment, it reinforces the LDC system. The career-minded, family-minded selfish individual prefers to go along with the flow. He is content to live in his whitebread suburb, shop at the Big Box stores for plasma televisions, pull the (R) lever at the ballot box in November. The first rule of conservative politics: Number One always comes first, second, and last. If such an individual is feeling really brave, he might go teabagging or do something really radical like visit a paleo website.
Just think about it: the tide of self-interest against us is so strong that White Nationalists have to cheer for a national catastrophe like a Second Great Depression, Hurricane Katrina or Kunstler’s Long Emergency to disrupt the status quo. Self-interest will come into play whenever our success appears plausible (think of the NSDAP) or catastrophic circumstances intervene. That’s when the opportunists and conservatives will flock into our ranks.
Looking at our situation objectively, even with the eye of an analytical empiricist (a bent of mind I share with GuessedWorker), what is needed right now (in the embryonic stage) is fanaticism. There are few incentives to join our movement. Racially conscious Whites are the most despised minority in America. I’m willing to wager we are hated even more than the atheists.
We need myths that are powerful enough to move a vanguard beyond their own rational self-interest. An alluring vision is needed comparable to the colorblind utopia that animates the left. It has to be expressed in art, literature, music and film; vehicles more accessible to the masses than academic texts. I have in mind the role played by the hippies and beatniks (and rock music) in the socialization of the counterculture’s cosmopolitan/expressivist mythos in the 1950′s and 1960′s. This is a task for artists, not intellectuals.
As for EGI, that ship will sail in the scientific community (only) when the headwinds of a popular movement are behind it. Myth, facts, self-interest — in that order, a mass movement progresses from infancy to maturity.