Those of a progressive disposition have differing moral foundations to those on the right. Moral foundations theory was first proposed by Jonathan Haidt and subsequently developed in his 2012 book, The Righteous Mind. The theory’s intention is to explain human variation in moral reasoning based on innate moral foundations. Right-wing foundations would be best characterised as group-oriented values centred around order and hierarchy; left-wing foundations would be best characterised as individualistic values.
Rightists value all five moral foundations, but uniquely value in-group loyalty, purity and obedience to authority. Right-wingers care about harm avoidance and fairness, but to a lesser extent than their left-wing counterparts — leftists only care about these foundations. This creates a situation of asymmetric empathy. The right can empathise with the left, as they share the two individualistic foundations; the left can’t empathise with the right, as they don’t share the three group-oriented foundations. As a result, the left perceives the right as fundamentally nasty and wicked, whereas the right views the left as misguided and ignorant. This asymmetric empathy has been a persistent factor throughout time and allows the left to seize control of culture, pushing ever leftward as they take advantage of the right’s empathy for them. This condition persists until a point of such disorder is reached that a conservative backlash takes place within the society’s elite. A clear historic example of this backlashing tendency would be the social conservatism of the Victorian era juxtaposed with the decadence of 18th century England.
Psychologically speaking, progressives lack a full set of moral foundations, but leftism also correlates with mental illness. Slate Star Codex carried out a survey of more than 8,000 people which showed that those on the further left are more likely to be “formally diagnosed with depression, borderline personality disorder, bipolar disorder, or schizophrenia”.
This is an excerpt from “Progress”. To continue reading, visit The Mallard’s Shopify.
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The Anglo-American Alliance: Neither Special Nor Subserviant
The ongoing crisis between Ukraine and Russia has once again put into the limelight the strong Anglo-American alliance in foreign affairs. Both the United Kingdom and United States have been resolute in their efforts to avert a crisis by diplomatic dialogue and agreement. Their rhetoric has also been aligned in telling Putin to back down and warning of a “barrage of sanctions” for Russia’s invasion of Ukrainian sovereign territory. These threats have been backed up by the severe sanctions imposed against individuals linked to Putin’s regime.
The alignment of actions by the US and the UK against Russian aggression has given credence to two different views about the nature of the Anglo-American alliance. First, that Britain is a lapdog doing everything that the greater power America tells them to do. Secondly, that the alliance is simply a restatement of the ‘special relationship’ between Britain and the United States because of shared values and principles. This dichotomous view of the Anglo-American alliance misses the Archimedean point; the Anglo-American alliance is contingent on shared domestic and foreign interests and the commonality of these interests is not eternal.
The Anglo-American alliance has a long history beginning with the ‘great reproachment’ (1895-1915), where both countries’ interests aligned leading to the alliance in the First World War. Despite the United States’ isolationism after the Great War, the Second World War brought the two countries together again in opposing Fascism and Communism leading to Winston Churchill’s in 1946 describing the alliance as the ‘special relationship.’
The ‘special relationship’ has seen the US and the UK standing side by side during the Cold War, Gulf War and the War on Terror. Hence, it shouldn’t be surprising that the US and UK have acted together and within the same foreign policy line during the Russia-Ukraine crisis. Furthermore, the level of intelligence, military and economic cooperation is unparalleled between major powers in the international sphere. The latest example of this cooperation is the security pact between Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States known as AUKUS in response to the growing power of China in South-East Asia.
This strong alliance between countries is also reflected in the strong relationship between US presidents and British prime ministers. The most notable example is the relationship between Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher. Leaders who shared the same political and philosophical outlooks and had a common disdain for communism. Similarly, the ‘bromance’ between Tony Blair and George W. Bush particularly in relation to the Iraq War is reflective of how strong an alliance can be when both leaders get along. Simply being political soulmates, however, is not a necessary prerequisite for a strong relationship.
This strong relationship between countries and leaders has also resulted in accusations that Britain is America’s lapdog adopting policy positions to please the United States. Since the UK has usually followed American foreign policy positions.This is, once again, an overly simplistic view of British Foreign Policy. We only need to look into the modern history of the Anglo-American alliance to see these two countries disagreeing when their national interests are at loggerheads . For example, British and American interests collided in the 1956 Suez crisis when President Eisenhower forced Britain to back down in its intervention in Egypt, Harold Wilson’s refusal to send British troops to Vietnam, David Cameron’s approach to China and the US invasion of Grenada. These examples aren’t reflective of Britain’s lapdog status or a special relationship, but of a realistic relationship between two powers.
The Anglo-American alliance is strong because both countries share many interests, namely, security and free trade. Crucially it is also a pragmatic alliance, where both countries will not entirely agree on everything since foreign policy is directed at maximising the interests of the state. This maximisation of interests leads both countries to take the path that best suits their interest. If the UK’s and US’s interests coalesce or not this merely reflects the volatile nature of foreign affairs.
The alliance should not be viewed as a special relationship nor as an alliance where the lesser power unquestioningly follows the greater power. Understanding this is vital to demonstrating the alliance’s significance to the preservation of peace, security and economic prosperity domestically and internationally. Hence, the strong ties between the US and the UK will continue to be pivotal to coordinating the west’s response to the ongoing war in Ukraine. In short, The United States and the United Kingdom are partners, but it’s time to have a more realistic view of their relationship instead of categorising it as either special or subservient.
Ojel Rodríguez Burgos is a Policy Fellow of The Pinsker Centre, a campus-based think tank which facilitates discussion on global affairs and free speech. The views in this article are the author’s own.
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Zero Seats isn’t Over
Keep going. The target isn’t eliminated yet. There is more to do. There is more you must do.
You have felt mush. You must keep pushing. The target must not be allowed time to recover. It is not enough that they’re tired, meandering, and feel like they’re under a slow but inevitable gravitational pull toward irrelevancy. Where they are making mistakes, they must be helped along, not just left uninterrupted.
Waiting for the next general election for the double tap isn’t enough. You must be more ambitious and more aggressive. The work must be put in now. The fight isn’t won in the ring, it’s won long before you dance under the lights.
Certainly, the opportunity for zero seats is still open. Is it possible before the next general election?
The target’s prospects are dim. There are two things a party needs to keep going and they have neither: an offer which enough of the right people want, or an ability to inspire any confidence.
If you have one, preferably both, of these, everything else (people, enthusiasm, money, effect) comes easier.
Sundries
Let’s get two small things out of the way first. Money and supporters.
Money. They’re broke.
Donors ran while their rivals raised 15 times more in large donations. They had to cut spending on cut spending on social media advertising because they ran out of money. They’ve been in trouble for a long time, even firing cleaning and security staff ahead of the campaign to make savings. Now the target is squeezing its leadership candidates. What a convenient way of weeding out the biggest of the timewasters.
Conference this year is looking ropey. Businesses don’t see any reason to go and spend lots of money for a stall or to sponsor an event or two, apparently. Previous years have earned up to £2m profit. Pretty meagre to begin with, but better than an imminent zero. Nobody to influence. That’s long before you consider what the content of Conference will be about. Nothing motivating. This will mean less money.
Money is a real problem. They never had a lot of people dedicated to the political work, or to the grind of knocking on doors, delivering leaflets, etc. and settled for a good chunk of their supporters quietly paying membership fees and other donations, which allowed them to make up for the small number of activists compared to their competitors.
Supporters. What supporters?
One estimate puts the target’s membership numbers at 172,000 as of July 2022. Do you think it has gone up or down since then? You can assume some boost ahead of the leadership election. The results of that vote will produce a number for totals and turnout. Now is a good time to buy low, perhaps, but are the signs particularly good?
Signs from the General Election and associated polling. Certainly, the winners didn’t receive very many votes in absolute – the lowest of any winning party since the 1880s, apparently. Goodness. Well, what does that mean for everyone else? They received even fewer votes. (For a particular newer party this may not mean the same thing – perhaps it’s best judged against other new entries/debuts over the years like the Brexit Party or UKIP more recently, or even going back in further psephological history to the birth of the Labour Party, perhaps).
And of this much reduced voter support, how long will that last? In the +70-age bracket, 46%. For the 60-69 range, 33%. For 50-59, 24%, much lower than the winner’s 34%.
Assuming things stay approximately the same, with the, er, normal circle of life, one projection has the target’s vote share in total declining at a rate of 2% per year. From 2025 to 2029 that would be a reduction of 24% to 16%.
Things never stay approximately the same, though, and why take the chance?
There’s no need to be nasty. Instead, be persistently, relentlessly, merely matter of fact. The target must be made to feel like it is neither hot or cold, just straightforward inevitability that it is empty and pointless. It has no energy and looks a lot like UKIP did after Nigel Farage left it all those years ago.
What is the point of you? What are you even doing? Just give it up and try again aligned with people who might actually take you somewhere.
Leadership election
Their leadership election is certainly reminiscent of those early post-Farage death throes.
This whole thing is set to be one big example of why zero seats is not over yet.
They haven’t even technically gotten rid of the “old” disgraced leader yet. And he’s going to hang around all the way until November? Past the reopening of parliament, the budget, conference season, and whatever unforeseen opportunities and scandals and events of importance might happen in the meantime?
Losing the election and the vast reduction of their MPs was bad enough. In the winner-takes-all system the UK has they might as well have had zero seats. Now they won’t have any coordinated response to anything until November? Isn’t that going to look an awful lot more like zero seats in functionality and practice?
And who have they got? The same old ding-dongs who got them there in the first place.
Many are flexing what little they have for the pony show, it seems. The pattern from the 2019 leadership race is so far re-emerging. Never mind the “front runners”, a series of true nobodies are also taking the chance to float their names. How pointless. There are so few of you that you’ll all almost certainly get a job as a shadow this or that anyway, without having to raise your profile.
And indeed, there are very, very few of you. With only 121 MPs the biggest contenders may well only just scrape together the 10 or so nominations (including themselves) needed to proceed. This is weenie. Why is nobody treating them as weenie? Treat them as weenie. They’re weenie.
Who have they got who can take on the Prime Minister (even if he is Keir Starmer) or Nigel Farage?
They’re not just weenie, they’re totally without any creativity. These people are so empty I reckon I could write every single one of their leadership pitches without having actually seen a single one of them. I’d much rather inflict that slovenly indignity on you, duckies. Does the following sound at all familiar?
“Hi, my name is Blah Blahson, and I’m standing to lead the target.
We need to be honest about where we went wrong. We didn’t listen. We broke all of our promises. We did in fact do too much of [insert random thing that was never the real issue, but something on the side or a symptom like divisiveness and infighting]. I will put an end to all that and start the difficult task of earning back your trust in time for the next election.
Here’s a bit about me and how I grew up to make me seem more relatable or sympathetic or something. Economy. Aspiration. Your dreams.
I want to be a tough ole grind-stoning cliché, cliché, cliché. I am proud of my record as [insert not totally unimpressive but generally not uncommon non-political working background here] + of my record as [insert whatever non-detailed and highly questionable ministerial gubbins they want to puff themselves up with]. I am a true conservative blah blah blah, and that is why I believe I am the right person to deserve your trust and lead us back to glory.
Next time, we’re going to be totally honest. I’m a no-BS kind of politician. It’s time for us all to unite. That’s what real leadership means to me.
That is why I am but humbly putting myself forward for leadership of the target, and I ask for your support.”
What do you reckon? That’s about right, isn’t it? Good grief.
November’s a good while away. You can expect a few relaunches of the same leadership campaign. As in, from the same politician. They’ll either fail to hit the mark or they’ll just be doing it again and again on some excuse to try to get more media attention.
And you know what? They’ll probably go through at least two leaders before the next election. And it’ll be from the same pool of MPs. People are going to get really sick of seeing the same unimpressive bunch over and over again. This is only going to be worse if, because there are so few MPs, shadow ministers are going to have to hold multiple briefs and work multiple appearances. It’ll get worse. Do you think these people have enough capacity for the mental arsenal on multiple briefs? What will this mean for their ability to cut through, to work detail, and nuance, and out-fox civil servant-resourced ministers?
All of this will perpetuate the idea that they’re disorganised and pointless. Weak.
Keep pushing on all of this. Keep pushing zero seats. It’s not over.
The target won’t reorganise
The target’s MPs don’t have it in them. There are a few reasons.
First, they’re scrabbling and struggling to keep their heads above zero seats as it is. What does this mean for reorganisation? At the best of times, MPs are looking to pick party leaders who will win them their seat, secure their seat, increate their majority, etc. First and foremost. The strongest incentive is for them personally, above anything else first, to be in office. (This is not the same as them being in power, but they think it is). It’s just that this means their own job, money, perceived prestige, pomp, etc., it’s at least somewhere in the correct 180° arc that you need to be in officer (power) to actually do anything, and that once you get some office (power) the correct thing to do politically is to keep getting more and more and more of it. The problem for the target is that they are desperate, which has its own ick, but this will also make them short-termist and wrong about what they need to do.
Second, the target has the same problem that the dying days of the Gordon Brown Labour Party had, and the first few post-2010 years. Same old people. The ideal best thing they could have done would have been to fire probably almost all of their sitting MPs and brought in a much fresher (not necessarily younger, though that might not have hurt) and energetic bunch. Even if it was naivety they’d at least sound enthusiastic and eager about whatever ideas they’d cooked up while they were dreaming of being MPs. And they wouldn’t be coming with the same dismal tainted track records. Instead, you’ve just got a bunch of blockers hanging around.
Third, the target doesn’t have anyone willing, let alone capable, of reorganising themselves. They might be making some of the right noises (see the accurate leadership pitch above) but they’ll almost certainly all be missing the point. They’ll be doing it on purpose. What’s the pitch otherwise? Here’s all these truthful reasons about why the target is awful but this time the same people will sort it out despite not understanding what was wrong before? If they understood, why didn’t they do something about it? If they didn’t understand, why humour them now? They should resign, but they won’t. Where else have they got to go? There is nothing so “ex” as an “ex-MP”. Maybe they genuinely, deludedly think that they can turn things around? Does it matter? They’re not going to go. It’s why the target is going to stay in a terrible spot.
Zero Seats is right there. Keep pushing it.
They won’t learn the right lessons
A related, but distinct-enough separate point. They won’t reorganise because they won’t learn the right lessons.
The incentives aren’t set up that way. It would mean admitting they were wrong. If they were wrong, why keep them around? Why not just start fresh with some people who were right?
They’re locked into failing to learn the lessons of the 2019 voter realignment. Reform will probably keep at it. This also incentivises them not to change. You can’t really mimic another party. At a certain point your remaining supporters leave, the ones who left will stick with the real deal, and those tempted will also just go to the real deal.
The same applies to the wets. Why not just go with the absolutely soaking in the form of the Lib Dems? Holiday-fun Ed Davey is already promising to come and kill you, at your house, in real life, and wear your dresses and makeup like the ancient Irish did, from the left.
The target is almost entirely ersatz, at best. Will that inspire at Conference?
You’ve known how empty they are for a while. It seems just as likely that they didn’t win because they were totally without plans (except for banning people from buying cigarettes or something? Who knows?) – not because they weren’t left or right enough or didn’t do anything or deliver on promises.
Beyond substance, do they even have the form for a good pitch? More on that next.
They sit out of the Pareto distribution
A lot of you were hoping for a genuine zero seats. Some of you thought sub-hundred would create the same effect.
You’re all too soft. I wanted to see one seat. Just one. Just one only lonely solely wholly put upon target MP in the whole of the country. Rishi Sunak. Could you imagine that humiliation? And then the humiliation of all the other decisions he would have had to make after that?
Anyway, a lot of you were disappointed that the target retained over one hundred seats. You suspect that this might be enough to keep them alive. Maybe, but also maybe not.
It’s still not a strong position to be in. They’re not clearly in one side of the niche of the pareto distribution or the other, are they? Genuine question.
For the uninitiated, the Pareto distribution is also known as the 80/20 rule. This is approximately that 80% of any phenomenon, market, etc. is due to 20% of the factors/actors involved. It’s never an exact 80/20 ratio, but one example might be that 80% of groceries are sold by 20% of all the grocery providers around. In other words, a small number of individual actors do most, but not all, of the business, and that remaining portion is likely done by many much smaller competitors.
In business in particular, this is important, because you either have the size and scale to do a large amount of generic mass market business, or you go smaller and niche and specialise. Think the difference between a mass market M&S suit versus Savile Row. Each has their place doing a particular sort of thing.
In the political case, does the target neatly sit in the big party or small party category? Too small to have a crack at the 80% market share, but too big to really be niche like the Green Party or Plaid Cymru or whoever?
Reform might have the opposite problem – are they genuinely going to try to break into and have a crack at being on the big boy side of that Pareto distribution? Or is it enough to function as a glorified pressure group like UKIP did (hey, not knocking it, it worked) without the full “mainstream” breakthrough?
The target is sitting very awkwardly right now.
What’s next?
Well, really, continue the Zero Seats campaign.
It’s not over. Slog it out. You didn’t think politics was going to be all excitement and meme wars, did you? Politics is a strong and slow boring of hard boards.
The way forward: take their oldies.
The target is pretty much only supported by old people now. As mentioned above, all other things remaining the same, this would see their vote share dwindling at a rate of about 2% per year. But all other things will not remain the same. There will be more oldies along in a minute. The target might start doing good politics and start making a meagre recovery.
No!
I don’t care if it’s Reform UK or the Lib Dems or the Greens or whoever or all of them. Start coming out with plausible policies, announcements, attacks, aimed at splitting off the oldies from the target.
Come on. Zero Seats!
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Breakfast with Thierry Baudet (Part I)
In mid-July, The Mallard was fortunate to have breakfast with Thierry Baudet, leader of the Dutch ‘Forum for Democracy’ (FVD) party in the Netherlands. We discussed his views on manufactured consent, immigration, CBDC, and climate change; and his new book ‘The Covid Conspiracy’.
The Mallard (TM): The Mallard knows your youth movement, JFVD. Their performance is very impressive. How did FVD start?
Thierry Baudet (TB): FVD began as a Eurosceptic think tank. In 2016, we organised a national referendum in the Netherlands opposing the association agreement with Ukraine. We won this referendum with more than 60% of the vote. The government, however, decided to ignore the outcome and sign the agreement anyway. That is when I decided to run for parliament.
I was elected in 2017.
It was clear from the beginning that we had substantial support amongst the young. Once we founded our youth movement, we had a thousand paying members within three hours.
We realised that people do not necessarily want to come together just for political discussion, they also want social and economic contact. That is why we organise sports events, social events, trips to the countryside, and so on.
We have an app now so people can sell products, offer services, send in job applications. We even have a Tinder function for dating so that FVDers can reproduce.
Fundamentally, we go about things with an energy which is truly different from that of any of our competitors. I denounce them in my book as ‘conservatards’ – the conservative establishment across the Western world which has become part of the deep state.
TM: The Blob?
TB: Yes. Or the Swamp. These people are afraid of speaking about any of the real issues. For example, they say ‘Sure there is climate change, we need to do something about our emissions, but let’s build nuclear power stations and not wind turbines’. Or, ‘Yes, illegal immigration is bad, but we need legal immigration,’ and ‘Yes, Covid is a big problem but let’s not do a 9pm curfew, instead an 11pm curfew.’ They accept the underlying assumptions and therefore never come up with truly different ideas.
They are unwilling to step out of the parameters set by the enemy. They are fighting a battle on the enemy’s ground, so they lose. But the price of not fighting on the enemy’s ground is to be labelled. That is how taboos work. So when you say ‘I want to leave the European Union, I do not think our sovereignty should be diminished by a supranational body,’ then you are labelled a nationalist. If you were to say, ‘It does not matter if immigrants come in legally or illegally, the problem is immigration as such. It is the transformation of our society from a cultural, ethnic, and historical point of view – that is the real issue,’ then you are denounced as a racist.
So, all of these taboos, these labels, function to protect the fundamental assumptions. If you live by them you also belittle yourself. You undermine your self-confidence; you undermine the energy with which you can bring your message across because you are not actually saying what you believe.
So, because we do not do that, unlike all the other so-called right-wing parties, we have a very special energy which you have noticed. People are happy with us, they are free.
TM: At most conservative events, there are very few women. When we attended your summer JFVD conference, it was pretty much half and half. Why?
TB: Because women understand that it is pointless to talk to people who are not willing to fight the real fight. They love men who take risks, who take pride in going their own way, taking their own route, believing in their own ideals. These are very important masculine values.
I do not see any sensible woman being attracted to the sort of effeminate bureaucrat the other parties produce. I do not see conservatards getting laid.
TM: Why do you think young men are attracted to your movement?
TB: Because men have a very hard time when they are young. Their chances of becoming financially well-off are slim. Their life is extremely difficult because of all these policies imposed on them. You are not allowed to be a meat-eater in all aspects of life. It is vital for men, especially young men, to have an aspirational goal – to be fighting for something.
TM: You want to be the hero of your own story. That is very difficult in a society which regards boys as defective girls.
TB: Boys are not allowed to play in the woods anymore, they are not allowed to be boys. It is only normal that a counter movement is rising.
TM: Talking of counter movements, what are your thoughts on the BBB (Boer Burger Beweging, the Farmers’ Citizen Movement)?
TB: Oh, it is a typical party cartel trick. BBB is a party consisting of former Liberal Party members and Christian Democrats. They operate entirely within the accepted ideological framework. That is also they are celebrated so much in the press. Nothing will change with them in government.
TM: If that’s the case, will the situation ever change in the Netherlands or Europe?
TB: The system is very strong and very difficult to break through via the democratic process – because it is not really democratic. We in the West are living in a heavily controlled oligarchy where certain groups are allowed to win elections. If a dark horse comes through, like Donald Trump, the entire system turns against him. It makes it effectively impossible to change things through the political process.
Things can change only if peoples’ trust in the system as such – and by that, I mean, the permanent political class and its media – crumbles. That is what happened when the Communist system failed in Europe. That is one scenario. The other scenario is that things will carry on as they are but that we will build a parallel society. We will be able to live in our own way, as the Amish do in America. We will be minorities in our own countries but we will survive.
TM: Is this linked to your App? What is it that your app does?
(*At this point Thierry got out his phone and showed me his app*)
TB: Here is a map which shows every FVD supporting company. We add new businesses every week. There is a commerce section where people can buy and sell goods. It has a coupon function so that you can get discounts at FVD-supporter-owned shops. It is very comprehensive. We are trying to expand this internationally so that people can organise parallel networks to help add value to themselves and thousands of others.
You see, I’m fighting on two tracks. First, the national platform to reach out to people and to wake them up to the consequences of current policies and governments. Second, I am faced with the globalist establishment from which there is no escape. We cannot avoid the fight because it is what we are here to do. We are part of a civilisation. If you run away from it, the fight becomes internal – you begin to eat yourself up.
TM: Just in the Netherlands?
TB: Across the whole world. During Covid as now on Ukraine. I find it absolutely stunning that every mainstream outlet supports NATO’s war against Russia in Ukraine. There is a genuine economic and ideological cartel of the deep state which is follows decisions of the military industrial complexes.
TM: What really depressed me during Covid was that so many seemingly normal and rational people fully and wholly supported the lockdowns. People demanded that they be locked into their own homes.
TB: The conclusions that we should draw are about more than merely societal or economic costs. This is why I wrote my book. I was the only elected politician in the world to have opposed all Covid measures radically. It is why I am not allowed on television anymore. All the institutions set up which in theory create checks and balances do not function anymore. The media and every mainstream party went along with it. It was not a national decision; everything had already been decided at the international level and was merely implemented at national level through fake discussions. That is how the world really works.
This is Part I of The Mallard’s interview with Thierry Baudet. To read Part II, click here.
