"Words From the Dead" — How to Lift Society from the Ashes of Postmodernism (plus an important book recommendation)

The Harrowing of Hell, by a follower of
Hieronymus Bosch, c. 1450-1516

One of the most destabilizing aspects of the chaos of the past few years is that the pillars of society—our democratic and academic institutions, along with our courts, media, police, doctors, corporate giants, and thought leaders—have not only been unable to resist the postmodern deconstruction of society but have become active perpetrators in a war on reality that is turning classical liberal democracy into a grotesque parody of itself. 

How did the institutions that were meant to prevent civilized society from devolving into a barbarian free-for-all become the drivers of the current descent into madness? How do we wake society from a nightmare in which nothing is sacred, freedom is blasphemy, and roosters are laying eggs... when society merely shrugs its shoulders in resignation?

It's time to take a deep dive into the myths, stories, and grand narratives that bind society together in order to understand why society is unravelling and how we can put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

A Brave New World Without Rights: Ending Mandates Does Not Strip Government of the Ability to Do This Again

There is something important missing from the conversation surrounding the end of mandates. If the mandates are simply dropped today without calling out the underlying legal and ethical fallacy that was used to justify them, government overreach will have become normalized. We will be left without the legal protections to stop them from doing this to us again. All it will take to put us back in a cage is for the government to point at the next wave, the next virus variant, or the next non-Covid emergency. We will have normalized that our rights, our freedoms, our bodily autonomy, and even access to our lives are conditional privileges, subject to opinion polls and technocratic impulses, and that they can be withdrawn again at any time, “for our safety.”

Bystander at the Switch (updated): The Moral Case Against Mandatory Public Health Measures

(this article is an updated version of my article from February 7th, 2021)

Do you remember the moral riddle taught in grade school called the "Bystander at the Switch" (also known as the Trolley Problem)? It was a story about a runaway train hurtling towards a cluster of people stuck on the tracks ahead. But you have the option to pull the switch and send the train down another track with a smaller number of people on it. You have the option of saving some lives by sacrificing a smaller number of others. Do you pull the switch?

In grade school the riddle was posed as a moral dilemma. But it's not. There was only ever one correct choice. We invented universal human rights to make it clear that no person or government has the right to pull the switch to send the train down another track towards a sacrificial group of victims. 

Democracy in America: The Devil's Bargain, the Bear in the Cage, and the Doorway to Freedom

Once upon a time there was a bear kept in captivity in a small cage. The caged and abused bear spent most of its life restlessly patrolling the perimeter of its cage. Then one day rescuers came and removed the cage. Yet the bear continued to patrol the perimeter of the cage, never stepping outside of its boundaries, which now existed only in its mind.

I used to think this was made-up story to illustrate an important psychological point. Sadly, it was a true story, and it wasn't an isolated case. On January 29th, 2021, Zenger News reported a story about another bear called Ina, which spent 20 years in a tiny cage in a zoo in Romania. In 2014 she was rescued and released onto a wildlife reserve. Seven years later, out in the woods, she still spends many days simply pacing around in a circle, which corresponds exactly to the dimensions of the no longer existent cage. The cage defined her world for so long that she cannot properly comprehend life without it.

Society is that bear. We speak the language of freedom. Yet we use government to wrap ourselves in the chains of yesteryear.

The Digital Speakeasy: Episode 1 - The Inmates Are Running the Asylum

For many of us, the past 18 months have been among the hardest of our lives. The isolation, the shunning, and the sense of betrayal as our loved ones lose themselves to this mass hysteria and as our right to think and speak freely is smothered by righteous busybodies. There is a grey filthy fog that has descended over everything.

But the human spirit does not tolerate being chained for long – it will always find new ways to carve out pockets of freedom. Sadness must give way to smiles. Isolation must give way to new beginnings. Silence must give way to the chatter of fresh voices and to the uncensored laughter that renews the soul. 

So, it’s time to revive the speakeasy, updated for the digital age.

Julius Ruechel Interviewed by Vaccine Choice Canada: Exposing the Pandemic Lies & the Roots of CV-19 Hysteria

I was recently interviewed by Vaccine Choice Canada to discuss the deception during the Covid-19 pandemic and the broader changes happening in society that created fertile ground for the current hysteria to take root. We covered a broad range of topics including: 

• the gradual philosophical shift in the Western world from a society built around respect for individual rights to a society focused on optimizing the "greater good" for the majority at any cost,

• why we have lost the culture of restraint that used to put limits on our authoritarian natural impulses,

• why transparency, evidence, and debate no longer serve as checks and balances in both science and democracy,

• and the cultural battle that needs to be won to get society to re-embrace the values, principles, and responsibilities that underpin a free society.

You can watch the full interview on Bitchute and on Rumble, or in the embedded window below:

"Why Can’t They Just Attend Church Over Zoom?" - Sacrificing Essential Liberty to Purchase a Little Temporary Safety

Throughout the pandemic, churches have emerged as a persistent flash point between public health mandates and constitutionally guaranteed rights and freedoms. As time goes on, the government has turned to increasingly authoritarian measures to browbeat churches into compliance.

Yet far from sparking a public outcry, there is a disturbing consensus of opinion, repeated endlessly by politicians, the media, and the frightened public, that these pastors and their church attendees are selfish and dangerous, and have brought this authoritarian hammer on to themselves. “Why can’t they just attend Church over Zoom?”

The Comprehensive Guide to Win Back (or Lose) Our Rights and Freedoms: Lessons From Martin Luther King Jr, and How to Adapt His Tactics to the Nightmare We Face Today

"We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people." ~ excerpt from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s Letter From Birmingham Jail

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr and his peers in the civil rights movement understood something that the majority of citizens who are horrified by the current attack on our rights and freedoms appear to have forgotten. They understood the importance of standing together, not just when speaking out, but especially when the reprisals were raining down hard and fast. Their civil rights battle succeeded not because they convinced their opponents or the government of the justness of their cause, but because their courage sent a powerful message to hesitant supporters watching silently from the sidelines. If you stand with us, we'll stand by you, through thick and thin, until we see this through. 

Dr. King's struggle and the tactics that he and his peers used have important implications for what we are facing today. But it would also be a mistake to think that the same tactics, precisely replicated in 2021, would achieve the same effect. Quite the contrary. We face a different beast, driven by different motives, and at a different stage in its tyrannical lifecycle. Dr. King's lessons need to be adapted to current circumstances. This guide explains how. The devil is, as always, in the nuanced details.

This guide explores the strengths and weaknesses of the beast we are facing, lays bare its vulnerabilities, and explains which strategies will work to stop it, which will not, and which will backfire to unintentionally strengthen the grip of the regime. Time is not on our side, but winning back our rights and freedoms is still within our reach. I hope with all my heart that the clarity offered by this guide turns our fear and shellshocked inaction into focused courage and fruitful action. 

“If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.” ~ Sun Tzu, The Art of War #CommissionsEarned

Preparing the Ground for Mass Hysteria: What Made Society So Vulnerable to Losing Its Mind During COVID?

Mass hysteria does not arise out of a vacuum. Fear is merely a spark, but whether that spark burns out or turns into a raging wildfire depends entirely on whether the ideas, sentiments, and social conditions of that time provide fuel for the spark to burn.

This virus should merely have been another footnote in history alongside the 1957 Asian Flu, the 1968 Hong Kong Flu, or the 2009 Swine Flu, and barely worth a mention compared to vicious pandemics like the 1918 Spanish Flu. Instead, we have uncontrolled hysteria and draconian unscientific public health measures that annihilate the rights and freedoms of individuals on a level not seen since the bubonic plague swept through medieval Europe.

Nor can the current hysteria be fully explained by the schemes of political opportunists, click-hungry medias, UN agendas, and Davos elites. They certainly play a huge role in driving the hysteria. But would-be conspirators and opportunists trying to exploit the crowd are a dime a dozen in any age. There is no point in history when there isn’t someone screaming that "the end is nigh", trying to sell us snake oil, or trying to frighten people into joining them on some ideological Crusade. Whether they gain traction or are left shouting into the wind depends entirely on whether the people themselves either provide fertile soil or barren ground for their bad ideas.

All of which raises the question, what made society so uniquely vulnerable to losing its mind during the current COVID hysteria?