Jordan Peterson and Pieter Thiel walk into a bar - ARC Forum diary

Revolutions devour their own children and turn into their own opposites.

“We are afraid to put men to live and trade each on his own private stock of reason, because we suspect that this stock in each man is small,” ~Edmund Burke, Reflections on the Revolution in France.

“It is a frequent vice of radical polemic to assert, and even to believe, that once you have found the lowest motive for an antagonist, you have identified the correct one.” ~Christopher Hitchens, defending Edmund Burke, the Atlantic, 2004

“Attention is a moral act; it creates and brings aspects of things into being but, in doing so, makes others recede.” ~Iain McGilchrist , The Master and His Emissary.

“I was with British right-wingers last night, and they all knew you.”

“Ah, what did they say?”

“The boys love you; the girls hate you.”

He looked like a young Alec Baldwin searching for his Hilaria. Arm candy to make people take him seriously. They must be in their 20s, but he said I don’t look 30, so I make the cut. He came up to me on my second day at ARC Forum, the Jordan Peterson-spearheaded conference that got the British media scandalised last week. He told me he’s been trying to speak to me all day and invite me to the after-party he was organising. I was already signed up, but it’s always good to be reminded I am considered party fodder.

He curates Sovereign House in NYC, the Dimes Square establishment where I met the young nazi. I followed him out of a warehouse exit by the dock. He took a bottle of Jack Daniels out of his bag and two coffee cups. I handed him one of my Greek bitch sticks, and he poured me two fingers.

“A journalist from the Telegraph said you sleep with right-wing men. She scolded me for talking to you because you’ll write about me.”

Sleep with right-wing men? What, like, sex? I wish I were that lucky. I mostly just write poems about them.

The difference between me and other left-wingers writing about the right is that I find the people I write about equally pleasant to be around as I find left-wingers. We are all God’s children. Difficult. Redeemable.

When left-wingers learn that I attended ARC, they express their condolences. "I’m so sorry you have to go through that, thank you for your service," they say. But I don’t suffer. The right keeps me on my toes. They regularly tell me how much they need me to lend their events and media outlets an air of neutrality. Young Baldwin said the same thing, though I could tell he only said it because he instinctively understood that Machiavellian signalling - an appeal to dark triad traits - resonates with women on the borderline. When left-wingers raise the same point with concern, they do so, implying treason. They, too, keep me on my toes.

The way I feel about British Tories, the Michael Gove variety, does not map out onto the amalgamation on display at ARC. My imaginary right-winger is intellectual, impeccably polite and conscientious. They have the air of someone who will do the right thing when nobody is watching. They use words like ‘public service’ in earnest. They don’t complain, don’t explain. They avoid confrontation at all costs but never surrender a debate until the timer is off. Speaking to them, you understand why the British are world-class diplomats; an invisible hand caresses your ego but never touches your bruises. Infuriating. Irresistible.

But this lot ain’t it. I am offended to no end at the wheeling out of gesticulating charlatans and Yankee hooligans in every other session. If they really wanted to exorcise the woke mind virus from pliable lefties with small ‘c’ conservative sensibilities like myself, all they needed to do was bottle Theresa May’s cracking voice during her resignation speech:

I will shortly leave the job that it has been the honour of my life to hold – the second female Prime Minister but certainly not the last.

I do so with no ill-will, but with enormous and enduring gratitude to have had the opportunity to serve the country I love.

When I first read Jordan Peterson’s book 12 Rules of Life in 2018, aspects of it appealed to me. I find it infuriating when people cannot bring themselves to see anything of value in their enemies. Peterson, before his public mental decline, wrote in a unique voice that is rare to find today. He wove together philosophy, history, religion and psychology into a narrative that someone who doesn’t read much can understand and someone who reads more can enjoy. He was part of a broader ecosystem sprung from the Intellectual Dark Web and the backlash to ‘culture wars’/’cancel culture’, which had sanitised debate in mainstream spaces. His corner was adjacent to the manosphere and the poetic corner of the self-help genre. I recall one lecture of his that helped me identify a blind spot within me. He said people say they want to be strong but won’t let go of what makes them weak because they are afraid, lazy, or both. For example, someone with abusive parents or a toxic spouse who refuses to cut them off might be holding onto an emotional attachment or a sense of duty tied to their upbringing. Peterson argued that this person is, in effect, choosing weakness by not making the difficult but necessary decision to distance themselves from their kin. I could not imagine him making the same argument and giving the same example today; it would not fit his newfound authoritarian traditionalism. He no longer offers universal therapeutic advice; he delivers messianic sermons, with Trumpism being his revealed religion.

The conference, as I see it, was divided into 3 groups. Half were the social conservatives/communitarians/religious types. Within them, you had the full spectrum, from garden variety small ‘c’ conservatives to Christian ethnonationalists. The second group was the libertarian US chamber of commerce lobby: oil, gas, defence, tech and other representatives of US industries and interests. A third, tiny group amongst the participants was overrepresented in the agenda. These are the anarchocapitalists, free market fundamentalists and the dog whistlers of accelerationism and transhumanism. Peter Thiel’s people.

The politics on display were utterly schizophrenic, especially from the British right-wing politicians who graced the stage. The conference wasn’t just centred on issues that primarily interest Americans but dedicated to promoting policies that serve U.S. interests at the expense of the British people and our allies. Several speakers echoed JD Vance’s sentiment that China is no longer our biggest threat - the real danger comes from within Europe. Eric Weinstein delivered a presentation suggesting entire areas of physics ‘went dark’ after WWII, with the Allied forces deliberately suppressing certain scientific advancements through a propaganda campaign to refocus physics on quantum mechanics. He even argued that France is more of a threat to "us" than Russia or China. But who exactly is "us"?

It is certainly not the UK. American capitalists stand to gain greatly from the decline of European and British industries. They can’t compete with Chinese markets, nor do they desire to; instead, they’re much more interested in acquiring Europe’s higher-quality industries. Politically, this also makes sense- American voters are far more inclined to see well-paid, skilled engineering jobs shift away from European factories than to see the return of low-tech, labour-intensive assembly-line work they lost to China. Why, then, are self-proclaimed patriots Badenoch and Farage sucking up to Trump? This was traitorous behaviour even before he gave carte blanche to Putin.

Conflicting interests existed not only between continents but also within the ideological strands in attendance. In one session, Sophie Winkleman, the Peep Show actress turned political activist, convincingly argued against keeping tech out of schools, not replacing humans with AI, and investing more in our schools and teachers. Her presentation would not be out of place in a Labour Party conference. In the next session, Peter Thiel discussed AI and urged us to fight against Woke Hollywood, portraying technology as a threat to humanity in every Marvel movie.

Blink, and you miss it, but the genius of this broad association is that they funnel people with fundamentally contradicting values and policy aims to vote for the same political candidate whose policies primarily benefit one camp- the one who can pay the most. They either don’t understand they are sabotaging their moral values or are willing to contaminate said values if it means making their enemies, the left, suffer for their sins. When this ‘movement’ first started, it was about people alienated by cancel culture, feeling isolated in the emerging technocracy, and wanting to reclaim a higher purpose. It wasn’t even explicitly partisan before Covid; it was right-coded but not attached to any particular candidate or party. Since then, it has been quietly hijacked for more lucrative goals.

The ecosystem nourished by Peter Thiel and other tech libertarians like him is vast because he understands that to influence politics, you need to shape culture alongside it. Over the years, he has funded thousands of individuals and ventures, large and small, spanning business, politics, and the arts. Thiel is not only a financier but also deeply philosophical, actively participating in intellectual circles. He holds some views I find dangerous for humanity’s welfare; he has also produced insightful writing I find valuable.

Thiel has strong ties with Tyler Cowen, who leads the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, a research institution focused on advancing understanding of the free market and public policy. I've been a follower of Tyler's work for years, and recently, I received an Emergent Ventures (EV) grant- a programme which has received funding from Thiel’s foundation. The tagline for EV is funding "zero to one" ideas for meaningfully improving society, echoing Thiel’s most famous book. I often spot Thiel in events with EV grantees.

Everyone I’ve met through EV is brilliantly talented and malevolently motivated, but the ‘growth movement’, techno-optimism, rationalists, and Effective Altruists are communities encompassing extremes from all directions. At their best, they are hotbeds of rigorous intellectual expansion; at their worst, they form murderous cults and prop up fascism apologists.

Those older or less engaged with the online world may not be familiar with the full range of ideologies circulating in these ecosystems. Many might recognise Curtis Yarvin since the New York Times wrote about him, but how many are aware of more niche ideas like accelerationism or the seasteading movement?

These are ideological spaces that Pieter Thiel has helped foster through his patronage. However, the end goals of these movements are far from aligned with the family-centred, duty-driven, faith-based communities the social conservatives dream of. Accelerationists want to see rapid automation and the complete merging of the digital and the human, the opposite of what Winkleman poignantly pleaded by decrying smartphone use in classes. Seasteders want to create autonomous nations - free from taxes and the obligations of supporting the vulnerable or the poor. Ideally, they leave the wretched majority to perish in the declining old world while they repopulate their libertarian utopias on floating cities or Mars.

If I stretched my intellectual generosity, a sentiment rarely granted to the left, I could see that the immediate interests of anarchocapitalists overlap with those of economic conservatives: reduce taxes and eliminate red tape. But on social issues? On morals and values?

My favourite speech at ARC was by David Brooks, the conservative New York Times columnist. David has written before that ‘The two conservative tendencies of social patronage and economic liberalism live in tension. But together, they embody a truth that the child psychologist John Bowlby put into words: life is best organised as a series of daring ventures from a secure base.’

He opened his speech by declaring that Trump was not a conservative. The right-wingers who paid £1500 to discuss their commitment to conservative values heckled while he spoke. One left winger got goosebumps. I went home and listened to his speech thrice over.

On the last day of the conference, someone leaked the location of the after-party, and they managed to get the venue to cancel it. Young Baldwin, prepared to feel betrayed, asked if I had done it. I said no. I don’t cancel right-wing parties; I attend them.

Later in the week, during a late-night X livestream by two 23-year-old fascist curious e-girls I came across at the conference, I heard that the Christian counter-party organised on the night also tried to cancel the Sovereign House event because they thought young Baldwin was a paganist, so maybe their alarm has been activated after all.

So, where does that leave me, a pro-growth, small ‘c’ conservative, Bernie-would-have-won truther, lefty? Suppose I despair at the conservatives deserting their duty to conserve. Am I equally concerned about my vulnerability to vanity, naivety, fear of economic hardship and irrelevance, and compulsion to please? After all, I don’t attend these things to mock people. I am not even an imposter in Sovereign House; I am an active participant in its culture. I am one degree of separation from Pieter Thiel, in a sense, literally funded by him.

Throughout my political journey, I have embraced my internal contradictions and indulged people from the far left to the far right. By hanging around, I hoped two things would happen. First, my opinions would always be sense-checked by a broad coalition of friends and acquaintances. We abhor cancel culture now, but social shame serves its purpose in moderation. Only psychopaths are not concerned about what others think.

The second is that I genuinely believe the right will go through its season of authoritarian wokeness faster than we did and will release far more feral elements of our society (racists, fascists, religious zealots). By 2030, moderate conservatives will be crying out loud for a return to the days of being asked for their pronouns by blue-haired, trauma-informed baristas like Democrats eulogising John McCain’s civility post-2016.

Young Baldwin told me he used to be a socialist who went down the Red Scare route to Trumpism- before it was cool - and that facilitating a lot of socialising, no matter the politics of the attendees, helped their cause. His insinuation is that by me, a lefty, being around Trumpists, Trumpism is normalised, and I may eventually soften to it.

The opposite is also true. I want the fascist-curious youths I make eye contact with at smoking areas to feel a little bit embarrassed when they sail into dark waters with their shitposting. And I want them to know that I am so proud of them when they finally decide they’ve had enough, when they realise LARPing nazism is beneath them, and that smirks and irony are poor substitutes for kindness, curiosity and tolerance. All humans want to be told they are fundamentally good. We all crave to transcend our human meat suits.

Democracy is not perfect, but it is the best we got. Human institutions and movements depend on compromise and are, by nature, infuriating. This is why I defend my party even when its actions test my loyalty like a US Marine waterboarded for the nuke codes. My small ‘c’ conservatism sentiments lead me to trust the wisdom of the collective, the general direction of a movement whose spirit transcends my own.

David Brooks, defending conservatism, said back in 2012, ‘The individual is foolish, but the species is wise.’ For me, the activist flails and flounders, but the broad church of social democracy carries us all.

So, we stick around to remind our social connections that fanning the flames of fascism is deplorable, but they are not irredeemable people. The centre must hold, come back to the fold.