I’m so glad I put up my posts about White Boy Summer and The Moscow Mood & No Quarter November last week. So often I think about something in-depth, but don’t write about it so I don’t get to point out that I was correct about something. (Hey, when you live with an active mind and you figure things out, the little things like that matter!)
So the NQN 2024 video dropped on November 1. If you’ve read those posts, see what jumps out at you.
I thought there were a couple of funny parts, but overall it didn’t wow me. I haven’t figured it out yet, but there is something about it that’s off. I’m still thinking about it.
So Moscow is burning bridges, including apparently with the white boy summer folks. Or, more specifically, the men who have questions about the Jews, Israel, World War 2, the USA’s involvement with Israel, Israel’s influence on our country, etc.
Someone shared this on Twitter in one of the threads I was reading.
The Rational Redhead made this observation:
The RR is alluding to the fact that there was another huge blow-up over the past two weeks involving all of these same people. That would be another post, but it had to do with antisemitism.
Go figure.
(I told you all a couple of years ago to figure out what you believe about the Jews and Israel both theologically and politically because it was clear it would become a huge issue. It’s not over yet.)
I can summarize that particular situation with this image.
If you want to read some comments I made on X about it, go here. I’ll eventually make that into a post because I have more to say, but there’s too much to already cover in this post.
Next up are a couple of related posts from Twitter/X. I thought each offered a helpful viewpoint. I think the first one especially is insightful.
I’ll offer one point of background so this first entry makes sense. Doug Wilson says one of the reasons that people don’t like the Jews is because they are envious of the Jews (their intelligence, drive, success, etc.). My personal opinion after spending a lot of time in these rabbit holes and discussions is that isn’t the case. The interest in these topics goes way beyond anything like that. Might it be true for some? Sure. But that’s not what is driving what is going on right now. Not at all. It is a theological and political issue.
Attacking the Sacred Cows by Pvt Aureliano Buendia on X
I’m not big on the Christian fights, but on this first day of #NoQuarterNovember I’ll note that DW, whom I treasure, made his bones attacking the sacred cows of his prime: feminism, LGBTQ, etc.
His spiritual sons learned well his tactics and set out to conquer their own: Zionism, cultural genocide, etc., but those fattened calves are still sacred to the old guard, outside their personal Overton Windows
Just as DW was falsely accused of hating women because they’re women, so his generation accuses the next of hating Jews for being Jews.
And, as he well knows, no amount of explanation will suffice when your enemy has it in his mind that you’re motivated by petty hatred and personal envy.
Do some so-called TheoBros just hate women? I’m sure. Do some just hate Jews? Also sure. But the mass condemnation of energetic Christian men who love God’s Word and hate His enemies by establishment figures is the very hurdle DW was forced to jump his whole career.
So yes, I see a real inability for the old guard to see younger versions of themselves in the vanguard, but I also see something like a nervous terror at Moscow surveying what it created.
They wanted dragon slayers and they got them. Young men bought all the books, read them, and came out fighting. Now the authors are busy trying to explain that the big winged thing with all the talons isn’t really a dragon, or that it’s a friendly one with a special pass.
As Uncle Douglas himself might put it, channeling Mather, “Radicalism begat revolution and the daughter devoured the mother.”
Before anyone makes whatever assumption, I’m for honoring fathers like Doug Wilson and James White.
I’m also a mix of nauseated and bored by all the actual Nazi stuff. I know it’s out there and Christians do well to maintain distance from it.
I just see a massive blockage around certain topics that are deemed entirely verboten, unapproachable from any direction.
That breeds distrust, needlessly sacrifices credibility, and alienates otherwise allies. Young men sniff it immediately, run, and often to bad places.
If the elder statesmen mean to maintain their offices they’ll need to be willing to discuss even the thorniest topics honestly and accurately.
If the young men are wrong they need to be instructed, not called names for doing what they were trained to do.
The Sons of Boomerdom by Michael Foster on X
I’m not planning to do a ‘No Quarter November,’ but I think I’ll have a ‘call it like I see it on topics I usually avoid’ November here and there.
Let’s start with the much-discussed ‘young, Reformed man.’
I care about this group. I want to see these men become all God has made them to be for the good of others and the glory of God. I was once part of it myself. I’m not that old, but I’m no longer young either (very much a Gen-Xer).
Some of the anonymous accounts I know personally, who have decried the alienation of young Reformed men—including themselves—by older Reformed men, are actually in their mid-to-late 30s.
Is that really what we mean by “young”? Your late 30s is very much mid-life in the States. If this is what we mean by young, it seems we’re adopting the surrounding culture’s delayed maturation scale. Maybe we are. If so, I think I categorize these men as something more like late bloomers or something other than young.
One reason I bring this up is that I notice much less angst and anger in the truly younger men, especially those in their mid-20s or younger. This age group isn’t PC at all—they say “gay” and “retarded,” they work out, mock feminism, and love Trump. But they’re not disaffected. There is less father hunger and, correspondingly, father resentment. It’s a surprising development.
This brings me back to the other group of men. They may be younger in the grand scheme of things, but they differ in that I sense a lot of anger and resentment, particularly directed at Boomers. In many cases, these men are younger Millennials and, therefore, the sons of Boomers. That’s how I tend to think about and categorize them. All sons are men, and I don’t want to see any Christian men unnecessarily alienated. However, it’s clear we are dealing with two different groups of Reformed men: the young men and the sons of Boomerdom.
One feature of the Boomer generation that I’ve observed across multiple areas is a hesitancy to retire or hand off an institution to a successor. For various reasons (and I can think of a few), this phenomenon hasn’t impacted Gen Xers quite as much as it has Millennials. I think this is one of the major sources of deep generational resentment you see swirling in Sons of Boomerdom. They are stuck on the outside or at the very bottom of the pyramid of authority. It has led to a patricidal mindset: if you want the keys to the kingdom, you must kill your father. Never mind whether or not you even have the skills to rule the kingdom.
There are some Sons of Boomerdom who haven’t demanded, “Dad, hand over the keys.” These men are the outliers who, often waiting years for a promotion, have decided they need to build something on their own. It’s a good thing. However, you can understand why such men would be especially defensive of criticism coming from those who remind them of their generation of withholding fathers.
I don’t think we can afford to spare a generation of Christian men, whether they are young or middle-aged. We need as many as we can get. This will require adopting different tactics with men based on the challenges they are trying to overcome. The goal of every father is to see his son grow into a peer, while the goal of a son should be to be worthy of a good father’s mantle. May the Lord turn the hearts of the fathers to the sons and vice versa.
Archbishop Viganò – Open Letter to American Catholics on the Eve of the 2024 Presidential Election