Mini-Feature: White Pill Issues

Maybe there's hope after all

In case you do not keep track of the various colors of pills, being white pilled is “the moment or series of events by which a person abandons despair and surrenders to the inevitability of hope; not out of sheer optimism, but from facing difficulty and nihilism head-on through the use of reason and inquiry . . . It is named after the white-hot fire of hope in a pill form, and is medicine for the soul.” — Eds.

What issue are you most white pilled about?

The most positive development is that the base is based. That is, half the nation increasingly sees the political landscape and understands it is under siege. They see the corruption that is the true "norm" of American politics. What can be done about this without a new caste of leaders (especially in red states) and new media and tech platforms is unclear. But the first step towards those goals is clarity of sight. And I think the rank and file on the Right now possess it.

-Matt Peterson

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For a long time the main threat to our innate pride came from having to submit to the rule of fellow human beings. Tocqueville suggests that, before the passing away of aristocratic life, the offense to our pride came from how few limits could stop elites from ruling poorly by devouring wealth and debasing themselves; whereas, in democratic life, the offense comes from seeing someone interchangeable with us do far better and comfortably order us around. Well, now things have changed: we are realizing we’re now being told to submit to digital middle managers. I think this is a humiliation so profound, new, and unnatural that just seeing the reality of this future coming will break people’s mindsets of resignation and impotence and cause a big snapback. If indeed this happens we’ll be on a much better, even if much messier, path. (If it doesn’t, America is toast.)

-James Poulos

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I’m most white pilled on the potential for human beings to reject in ways large and small the false promise of our technocratic, technological future. One sees evidence of this everywhere. From the home and classical-school movements to the bi-partisan unease with Silicon Valley to the simple decision that this weekend will be social-media free, what is human—not programmatic—will always assert itself. If I didn’t believe this, I would not have had children.  

And that’s the truth, Ruth.  

-David Bahr

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Ironically, I am most white pilled about Latinos. OK, OK, that’s not quite right. What I’m really excited about is the demographic shifts in voting statistics this November, which absolutely confounded woke expectations re: the shape of the GOP going forward and the appeal of a strong-borders, pro-natalist, America-first message. Turns out—who could have guessed?—those things actually have more purchase with working-class folks of every stripe than the invitation to a post-gender Latinx future (on pain of excommunication). Actually almost everyone could have guessed that, which is why it’s so richly satisfying to see the American people—eminently sensible as they are—affirm that yes, they do realize “diversity” is a code for “variously flavored sub-cults within the same elite cabal.” The GOP I want to be a part of is a scrappy, pugnacious band of misfits and weirdos united by a shared commitment to the integrity of this land and her founding values. That’s where all the energy is right now and let me say, you love to see it.

-Spencer Klavan

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If you don’t live in California, you could be forgiven for not having heard that Governor Newsom recently ate at the French Laundry, a high end restaurant where the “cheap” meals are $350, without any of the safety precautions he’s been zealously preaching about for months. There were no masks, they ate indoors, there was no social distancing. In attendance at his dinner was the CEO of the California Medical Association and another of its top lobbyists, among other elites. Hypocrisy at its most brazen. You can see the photos for yourself here. That was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

My politically apathetic friends, up until that event transpired, were lukewarm to the elites in government and beyond. They thought the elites had the right intentions, even if they didn’t always live up to them. No more. Seeing such flagrant disregard for the rules Newsom has been jamming unilaterally down our throats out here really lit a fire in them. I’ve been treated to several rants in the last week about how the elites are in it for themselves. Theirs is a gambit for more power without a good reason, and without end, they’re saying. I love and encourage such rants. Younger people have finally been kicked into looking critically at the elites who rule us, both in and out of government, by those very elites. The irony is so thick you could cut it with a knife from the French Laundry. To be sure, not all elites are bad, but the ratio of bad to good is far too high to be workable. I’m increasingly white pilled about the potential for the elites to bring about the end to their own gravy train.

-Jake Gannon