Posted on January 19, 2022

The End of Fantasy

Gregory Hood, American Renaissance, January 19, 2022

Creators were they who created peoples, and hung a faith and a love over them: thus they served life. Destroyers, are they who lay snares for many, they hang a sword and a hundred cravings over them. Where there is still a people, there the state is not understood, but hated as the evil eye, and as a sin against laws and customs. – Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

Without myth, we aren’t a people. We’re just consumers. Our rulers appear to want it that way.

Friedrich Nietzsche called the state the “coldest of the cold monsters.” He rejected the idea that the state created a people. He championed the Germany of artists and scholars, the German nation defined by culture that predated Bismarck’s Second Reich.

He may have been wrong. (Julius Evola would have disagreed, arguing that it was orders of strong men that created states and then peoples.) However, even Evola would have agreed that those who create a people, whether warrior-kings or poets, ultimately rely on myth. The myth is not a “noble lie,” but a poetic expression of a historic truth, and a way to tell people who they are. The memory of a lost “golden age” or a primordial beginning is necessary to any nationalist movement, from the revanchists of Aztlán to the Anglo-Saxon founders of the United States. Even Abraham Lincoln appealed to the “mystic chords of memory” when he reunited North and South. All people need a story to know who they are and where they come from.

Online, you will find many people quoting Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: “To destroy a people, you must first sever their roots.” Others quote George Orwell: “The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.” These men may not have used these exact phrases, but the sentiment is correct. Orwell did write in 1984 that the tyranny of the Party made sure “every record has been destroyed or falsified” to create an “endless present in which the Party is always right.” It’s hard not to see some of this in today’s iconoclasm. A people without roots is not a people at all. It is a mass of individuals that can be scattered.

Our opponents recognize this. That is why they make every effort to portray women, non-whites, homosexuals, and other protected groups in ways to ensure they can “see themselves” positively. Critics loved Black Panther because its “Afrofuturist” vison spoke to blacks’ myths about themselves. Similarly, the Marvel Cinematic Universe’s movie about “Shang-Chi” wasn’t just the latest in this never-ending franchise, but an “empowering” message to Asians.

T’Challa, after the death of his father, the King of Wakanda, returns home to the isolated, technologically advanced African nation to take his rightful place as king. (Credit Image: © Marvel Studios/Entertainment Pictures/ZUMAPRESS.com)

None of this applies to whites. Consider a minor example, Thor of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Reducing him and the Aesir to comic book heroes is itself a desecration (though less than what progressive preachers have done to Jesus Christ). But even here, Asgard is not a “Eurofuturist” model, but a stale, multicultural nothing — an Apple store in the sky. Whites have nothing to aspire to.

Far more damage is being done to our real history.

Casting non-whites as characters known historically to be white is just “color-blind casting.” A recent series cast Anne Boleyn as a black woman, as if the showrunners were daring us not to laugh.

But who would introduce “color-blind” casting for Porgy and Bess? Blacks were even offended when Gal Gadot played Cleopatra. Many insist Cleopatra was black. She was of an inbred Macedonian dynasty, but it’s a public controversy when filmmakers don’t pander to blacks’ delusions about Egypt. You can find endless complaints about “whitewashing” in film: white actors playing characters some think should be non-white (even if they weren’t).

Critics complain that this is an attempt to write people out of their own history. Isn’t it obvious that this is being done to us? Some medieval and classical scholars even seem to want this. Critics were angry that a video game set in medieval Bohemia didn’t have enough blacks. Why should anyone care? I wouldn’t mind an all-black cast in a movie about the rise of Shaka Zulu or Mansa Musa.

If the argument is that Western myths, stories, and heroes are so universal they belong to the world, this is an implicit admission of white cultural superiority. The Arthurian tradition, Greek dramas, Roman history, Shakespeare’s plays, Western royalty — many non-whites find these stories more interesting than their own pasts. Compare Haitian “emperor” Jean-Jacques Dessalines to Emperor Napoleon.

Still, not having something of our own rips something out of our racial soul. Whites are increasingly rootless, without identity. Without myth, we are a biomass headed for overdose, disgrace, and oblivion while our opponents taunt us about our demographic replacement. It’s surprising more whites don’t kill themselves. Mere echoes of tradition are not enough to sustain a people.

Without a traditional culture, we get pop culture. Many whites disappear into it, especially into fantasy. Look at the thousands of webpages and YouTube videos about the “lore” of fictional universes, from Star Wars to Game of Thrones to countless video games. “Fandoms,” like sports teams, are an artificial identity, a product that replaces the organic identity of a real community. This “lore” is often a simplified version of real European history and myth. This is why we are often drawn to it.

Game of Thrones, for example, is based on The War of the Roses. How many people can describe the battle tactics and intricate strategies of Robert’s Rebellion, but don’t know the first thing about The War of the Roses or any other part of English history? What is fantasy compared to walking the grounds where your ancestors fought for what they believed in?

In some ways, America is a young nation. However, we had our own mythic conflict, the War Between the States. This was our Iliad, with legendary commanders and honorable soldiers fighting for glorious causes on both sides. Walking the battlefields of Antietam or Gettysburg, one feels wonder that such men really existed not so long ago, and anger at interlopers who pretend to be Americans. The destruction of Confederate monuments strips white Southerners of a proud identity. Cultural genocide is something Republicans recognize when it is done to Chinese Muslims but not to their own voters.

Allegorical Engraving from “The Great Civil War: A History Of The Late Rebellion” by Robert Tomes & Benjamin G. Smith (1865) (Credit Image: © Ken Welsh/Design Pics via ZUMA Wire)

Sometimes, history isn’t enough, and fantasy can rise to the level of mythology. The greatest example in modern times is the work of J.R.R. Tolkien. When Professor Tolkien wrote his books, he said his vast, detailed, and infinitely rich world was something he could “dedicate simply to England, to my country.” He may have never said explicitly that he wanted to give England back its mythology, but that is what he did. The history of the Anglo-Saxons, their legends, their religion, and their entire culture can be found in Middle Earth.

While the historic epics that define national cultures are often from antiquity (The Iliad for the Greeks, The Aeneid for the Romans), this brave professor who fought for the Empire in World War I and studied Anglo-Saxon gave the English people a national epic for the 20th century. He also established the genre of “high fantasy” — the world of elves, orcs, men, wizards, and dragons that have inspired countless artists and imitators. In terms of literary influence, he’s the equal of H. P. Lovecraft’s “cosmic horror” and Robert E. Howard’s adventures. Both American authors had strong racial views, far stronger than Tolkien’s.

J. R. R. Tolkien (probably in the 1940s)

Tolkien didn’t just speak to the mind, but to the soul. His work was rooted in the mystic chords of memory that define a nation. He wrote for his people. His work came from his people. Today, does that people still exist? The “International Society of Anglo-Saxonists” changed its very name because non-whites didn’t like such a clear expression of ethnicity. The modern university isn’t capable of producing another Tolkien. He famously opposed National Socialist Germany, but the United Kingdom that “won” the Second World War at the cost of its empire and national prosperity is a perversion of everything he believed in. If the United Kingdom had lost the war, perhaps the English would speak German, but Tolkien’s work would have some respect in academia.

The Lord of the Rings is no longer acceptable as originally written. When the film trilogy was first made, the SPLC promoted an article that said it was too “Eurocentric” and mocked the “whiter than white” heroes and “courageous Anglo-Saxon souls.” Why should this bother anyone? A new Amazon production will be multicultural, with affirmative-action hobbits and other characters to make non-whites feel better about themselves. A recent Tolkien conference discussed “transgender realities in The Lord of the Rings” and the lack of dwarf women. The question of whether Sam and Frodo were gay is also eagerly discussed.

Samwise Gamgee and Frodo Baggins. Credit: NEW LINE PRODUCTIONS / Album

Some might say that Lord of the Rings or Tolkien’s work is irredeemable, no matter how much “diversity” if forced on it. Its vision of high fantasy has the theme (critics would say “trope”) of different races with different personalities: ethereal elves and their high culture, corruptible but brave men, greedy but skilled dwarves, and of course, evil and violent orcs. Today, this portrayal of “orcs” is considered racist. They supposedly show black physical and cultural traits.

Thus, Lord of the Rings is Eurocentric and racist, but there’s money to made from European myth, so Amazon will put in some non-whites so they can “see themselves” in a popular series as something other than orcs. I never saw blacks as orcs. When white leftists see snarling savages and immediately think “black people,” it suggests there’s something to the idea that they subconsciously think blacks are inferior. Perhaps liberals imagine themselves like Saruman the White guiding his orc monstrosities.

The Horrid Orc Grishnakh in ‘The Lord of the Rings; The Two Towers.’ (Credit Image: © Courtesy of New Line Cinema/Entertainment Pictures/ZUMAPRESS.com)

What I notice is that orcs speak like British working-class whites (complete with “oi!” as an interjection). If anyone should be offended, it’s working-class whites. But who cares about their feelings?

As in Middle Earth, races having or lacking certain qualities was an important part of other fantasy books and games. The video game Skyrim let a player change his appearance and race, but each race had different advantages and abilities. The underlying story was about the “Nords,” a fair-skinned people in an arctic land who lived in a multicultural, multiracial, multispecies empire. The player could choose to support secession or fight to keep the empire together.

This idea of racial characteristics is now a problem. For example, Dungeons & Dragons has purged racial characteristics from various creatures, such as the “bloodlust” from orcs. Since orcs don’t actually exist, there’s no reason why they can’t have bloodlust, but we mustn’t insult people eager to be offended on their behalf. “Dungeons & Dragons’ Racial Reckoning Is Long Overdue,” said Wired, complaining about its “regressive” ideas about hierarchy and distinct races. Dungeons & Dragons is also trying to be more “inclusive.” Do people who play this game think minority participation gives them moral permission to play a Eurocentric fantasy game? Clearly, the game writers think so.

Even Warhammer and Warhammer40K, the flagship products of tabletop games pioneer Games Workshop, have succumbed to “wokeness.” The original Warhammer was a fantasy version of Europe, with a sacral “Empire” based on the Holy Roman Empire, a hierarchical “Britannia” based on the chivalric traditions of the Normans, and other human cultures such as “Kislev” (Russia), “Grand Cathay” (China), and the marauding tribes of the artic wastes (the Vikings). There was plenty of satire, but it was a romantic version of what Europeans experienced. The company destroyed the setting (though it lives on as a video game) to create a more abstract “high-fantasy” world in which cultureless humans fight behind masks in the vague interests of “order.” Commercially, it might be more successful, but it lacks soul, because it is so disconnected from anything human.


People playing a game of Warhammer inside the Games Workshop facility in Nottingham. Credit: Jesusbella, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Meanwhile, the more commercially successful “Warhammer40K,” a “grimdark” futuristic dystopia, has schizophrenic marketing. It was originally meant as satire on Thatcherite Britain. One particularly savage Ork is named Ghazghull Mag Urk Thraka. In this universe, a crusade to unite mankind behind secular rationalism and science fails horribly, sparking a terrible civil war. For thousands of years, mankind is trapped in technological stagnation and religious superstition, huddling in a crumbling “Imperium of Man” nominally ruled by The Emperor. He is a psychically powerful revenant who can’t directly speak to those who act in his name but can protect some of them with his godlike powers. The Imperium He “rules” — a galaxy-spanning feudal theocracy mired in endless war and bureaucracy — is the opposite of what He intended.

The Imperium of Man became the default faction for many players. It was meant to be an attack on organized religion and authority, but despite the creators’ intent, they showed why religion, sacral order, tradition, and hierarchy are necessary and good, particularly when you are fighting evil gods and aliens. For this reason, it’s enjoyed a great deal of popularity among rightists who understand the clumsy satire but see through it. Progressive satirists can’t help but undermine their own argument because the logical conclusion of their worldview is entropy and extinction. When you are playing a wargame, no one wants to be the side that is trying to lose.

Marine veteran Anthony Swofford wrote in Jarhead that it is impossible to make an antiwar movie, because even those films intended to discourage war end up promoting it. Full Metal Jacket was a direct insult to the Marine Corps, but the Corps itself embraced it, promoting R. Lee Ermey after his military service. Likewise, Warhammer 40K, by presenting a world outside liberalism, established a right-wing following. Naturally, this made the company unhappy because it is trying to achieve Marvel levels of success with a “mainstream” audience.

Thus, two years ago, Game Workshop issued a statement declaring “Warhammer is for Everyone” that had the effect of ensuring “everyone” would no longer play. It denounced “prejudice [and] hatred,” and promised to diversify the setting. At a recent wargaming tournament in Spain, a single player out of 800 wore Nazi symbols on this clothing. This prompted a statement, “The Imperium Is Driven by Hate. Warhammer Is Not.” It went on rather grandly: “The Imperium of Man stands for a cautionary tale of what could happen should the very worst of Humanity’s lust for power and extreme, unyielding xenophobia set in.” I doubt a hammer and sickle would set off such a reaction.

The foolish statement hurt the company. The Imperium of Man is the “default.” Without getting into the “lore” of the game, the Imperium is not even close to the “worst” faction; it’s fighting alien torturers, undead mechanical horrors, depraved traitors, savage beasts that just want to fight and kill (and talk like English soccer hooligans), insectoid aliens that try to consume all life, and evil gods. The Emperor, for all His faults, wants to save humanity and is the ultimate example of someone operating at his highest potential, something aspirational. If the Imperium were anything else, humanity would be extinct. White people who say they don’t want their race to go extinct are “haters.” Are humans who don’t want their species to go extinct also haters? PETA is already warning people about “speciesism.” The company has made this galaxy-spanning hate group the heroes. And what is the message when Commissars who shoot their own men to prevent retreat can also be sassy, strong females who won’t let men boss them around?

Another video game where you get to be a Space Marine butchering murderous xenos by the score is on the way. The military forces may be “xenophobes” who hate aliens, but they are also racially diverse. If you are non-white, you can “see yourself” as part of the star-faring hate empire. The Imperium includes blacks on the Viking planet and among the space Romans. There are also racially diverse, child-friendly stories and cartoons about heroic Space Marines saving the day against the aliens. You can even start a club at your school. If we accept the Warhammer Community’s claim that its own default faction is a hate group, it’s indoctrinating kids into it.

Whites live in a society that smears them right now, especially in the United Kingdom. Leftists either don’t notice, don’t care, or approve. The British can’t make “satire” about the grooming gangs in British cities that abused white girls. Be careful if you mention the 1,500 acid attacks since 2011 or the rampant street crime that London’s Muslim mayor Sadiq Khan presides over. Anyone can mock the monarch, but don’t joke about protected groups on Twitter or Facebook. Don’t post a flyer saying “it’s okay to be white.” That will be called a “hate incident.” It’s much safer to take jabs at the Catholic church, the military, or traditional patriotism, critiques that have been stale since Voltaire. China is probably the only nation that can compete with the UK’s mass surveillance. The difference is China doesn’t promote self-hatred.

On a deeper level, in fantasy and in the more fundamental myths that it draws from, whites have been robbed of their past. This is being done systematically. In its place there are new myths, and not just Black Lives Matter. Everything that happened in the West before World War II was racist, oppressive, and evil. Even the soldiers who fought Nazi Germany were racist and sexist.

Almost every movie, television series, and, increasingly, news report follows the same boring line about the never-ending threat from a cartoonish “far-right.” Even the outrageous atrocities such as the Waukesha Massacre in December don’t register in mass culture.

R.R. Reno was correct in Return of the Strong Gods when he argued that the intellectual response to World War II was to deconstruct Western culture itself. It was better to destroy the tainted Western tradition rather than risk the “far-right” gaining power. Herbert Marcuse’s deeply influential work was ultimately based on this crude assumption.

What should be our response? Mr. Reno had nothing to offer except a vague Christian spirituality. Considering the current leadership of the Roman Catholic Church, the Southern Baptist Convention, and mainline Protestant churches, that would do more harm than good. Mr. Reno thinks white identity is “perverse.” It’s not. We’re right, he’s wrong, and until more people realize that, they are in no position to complain that things getting worse.

However, before we can make things better, we need to know what “better” looks like. That takes imagination. Throughout history, most peoples have had a mythic story that explains their creation. It may be a lost homeland, a tree of life, or a central pillar that sustains the cosmos, or a divine ancestor. Some elements of this, however dim, survive in fantasy. In the postwar West, we labor under a new founding myth, a death cult that preaches extinction.

It says we are tainted irrevocably. We are defined by World War II, which wasn’t really a war against foreign adversaries, but our own inner racism. Though the war against “hate” is unwinnable (until, presumably, whites are gone), we must continue to fight. Every inequality between the races is our fault. “Racial inequality is evidence of racist policy and the different racial groups are equals,” in the words of Ibram Kendi, describing the thinking behind his proposed “anti-racist” constitutional amendment.

Such a creed doesn’t make for good fantasy. Few want to read a story about self-loathing. There’s no point in learning about a people so pathetic they surrender to outsiders for no reason. If we were to imagine the current Western world as a fictional universe, its “lore” is boring and uninspiring. It has few heroes, ugly aesthetics, hardly any artistic accomplishments. Its value is as an example of what to avoid. Modern America is not a city on a hill, but a mess to be swept under the rug.

Fantasy, even dark fantasy, gives us an alternative. Even thinking another world is possible is dangerous to our rulers. It’s not surprising that fictional universes, including Tolkien’s Middle Earth, Warhammer’s Old World, 40K’s Imperium, and even the “create your own adventure” quests of Dungeons & Dragons are being hammered into the same conformist mold. The same process defiles all media, games, and films. It’s all just variations on the same story about white guilt, an endless fugue that smothers almost our entire culture. It’s also not enough to fantasize about a different world. It’s time to create it. It’s time to have a land of our own, because once we have that, we can build what others can only dream about.