Exhausting the Woke Funnel

There has never been an easier time for a religious community to melt away and disintegrate into nothingness. Modernity has lowered institutional and cultural barriers to such a degree, that one cannot distinguish them from the fleeting fashions of pop culture.

If you have read this blog, you have realised there is no love lost between myself and Evangelical communities. And still, I do not wish to see them crumble.

When I first realised there were serious problems inside my religious community, my impulse was to try to fix them. When almost no one within the community seemed interested in doing that, I turned to satire as a creative outlet for my discontent. This was obviously subverted by a group of former believers turned anti-theists, who saw it as an opportunity to connect with the disenchanted ‘customers’ of that church and funnel them in the same progressive direction. I was part of a group of students who met IRL and on facebook in order to discuss various topics without being forced into doctrinal conformity. When I invited a former Gen X-er pastor to be part of the facebook group, he dragged his buddies with him, subverting every topic to their own obssessions. I remember the older anti-theist Marxist pastor showing empathy and understanding to my points of contention, while using every opportunity to preach about the absolute moral good of the French Revolution and Marxian critique.

My satire gradually borrowed from the pastor’s talking points. Without thinking twice, I was protesting against the misogyny of the church fathers; the xenophobia that transpires in the Old Testament; the dishonesty of ‘reactionary predators’ who proclaim a post-lapsarian order only to maintain their privileges and abuses. I had never been a woke type, but the anti-theists had found an effective way to funnel my discontent with the church into a leftward direction. While they repeatedly proclaimed in self-congratulatory tones that the truth has finally set us free, sprinkling the blog with cringy slogans (‘man will survive, further more – he will win’), they were in fact turning us into obedient volunteers for the political system that has now been fully consolidated in the Western world.

Fast forward 7 or 8 years, the anti-theist blog is a cesspit of spite, vitriol and grandstanding. And since very few visitors linger in that atmosphere, its stale nature creates an echo chamber effect, shifting the views of its admins and moderators ever further to the left.

Over the years, various satirical blogs or forums have been funneled into the woke direction by their aggressive subversion, with one minor exception – a blog called ‘Buricul Pamantului’. The authors started with small points of contention, common to all younger millenials and Gen Z-ers. Not very sophisticated, lacking a clear ethos or critical fiber, but having fun nonetheless. It so happened that I have come in contact with some of the readers and content-creators of the blog, and after talking briefly about Jordan Peterson and the cringy IDW, they had a taste of something else, which immunised them to the propaganda of our spiteful anti-theists. ‘Buricul’ slowly acquired a principled character and its critique started gaining backbone. Of course, I am not naive to believe for a second that I have funneled the blog’s readers into a different, less enthropic direction. The young Evangelicals follow it for the lulz and more intelligent posts always go unnoticed.

My goal is not to subvert and transform ‘Buricul Pamantului’ into an anti-woke comedic medium. Using erosion tactics only works for left wing activists. Besides, I don’t think we should perpetuate the illusion that the non-progressive dissidents are on a level playing field with the volunteers of the ruling system. When you are a 2nd rate citizen, better watch your language! The goal is simply to exhaust their funnel. Stop the bleeding, clean the wound, lose the scavengers. Only after that has been accomplished we can discuss ‘building back better’. Here are a few tips on achieving that:

1. Shut down all satire pages. Keep humour decentralised and difficult to pin down. I have finally closed down the inactive Troparul. Do the same with Buricu, in the bowels of Christ I beseech thee. Or if you choose to keep it, do not make it one of your core projects and identity. You are already in a different place than when you started. The followers want the old product; you are not a wokie to ‘educate them’ and if life itself has not redpilled them, it is not your duty to do so.

2. Do not lend credibility to the anti-theists by engaging in debates and sparring. We all know the funnel goes in one direction only. If their viewers become disenchanted with their content, they will never return to a more balanced, cultured [ex] SDA portal. They will want NOTHING to do with their old milieu and run as far as possible from it. ‘You have not changed a bit, you were born an SDA, you will die an SDA!’ They will throw this accusation at you all the time, not because there is any truth to it, but because it is cathartic – they need this spell to exorcise their past. And anything with a semblance of religion is, for them, part of that.
   
   As for the woke anti-theists who still gravitate around their old denomination only for the joys of headhunting, these guys are junkies. You feed their addiction by engaging in debates and drama. It’s what they live for.
   
   The funnel is already clogged. Liberation struggles always start as big fires and end up as ritualistic reenactments. Every contemporary art student copies the punk modernists, including their radical claims to irreverence and iconoclasm. After the initial fire has been extinguished, the radical bloggers are in deep crisis. The crisis of maintaining the attention of their followers; of manufacturing drama, of shouting at the same intensity as they did in the past. You can tell they are in crisis when simply dissing one of their moderators on social media, or telling them they are in an echo chamber, results in an explosion of rage and reactivity. Or when, after mentioning Peterson in passing, you generate a wave of anti-Petersonian poasts circling around reductio ad hitlerum – even long after you stopped watching the videos of the lobster daddy. You can even bait them into lashing out against ghosts. Let’s see: ‘I am a Randian Objectivist’. GO! Or: ‘I think QAnon makes some good points; always opt for a balanced news diet’.’
   
   
3. Don’t let the scumbags think you owe them anything. Every ex-believer encountering a fellow ex-believer will feel the urge to accuse them of ‘not having changed at all’. The woke anti-theists will do the same. They will claim that you are in fact not so different from them; since you spent time on their blogs, everything you say against them is ackshually a self-accusation. Since you sent a few donations to Marxist daddy, you must be bound forever in eternity. They will psychoanalyse you; they will alternate cursing with moral grandstanding; they will try every trick in the book to punish the audacity of standing up to their bullying and telling them to fuck off. ‘NO, we are the ones telling you to fuck off! NO, we were the nice ones and you were a traitor!! Now talk to us!!!’ Don’t talk to them.
   
   
4. Practice discipline and devotion to the Sacred Heart. Your boomer relatives have been the victims of an increasing wave of online propaganda. There is little you can do about it. Don’t argue with your uncles and parents; you will only antagonise them further. Apply the Franklin‘s corollary: ‘if life has not redpilled you, neither will I’.
   
   You can, however, show them a better alternative by refusing to engage in internet blood sports. By refusing to argue with strangers on facebook or on forums. By discussing books and ideas, instead of endless venting and political commentary. While the woke junkies rush for their daily dose of Twitter outrage, you can practice Zen and Wim Hof Breathing. Or the Rosary and the Jesus Prayer. You can live an embodied existence, run, lift, meet with friends IRL. You can look for practical ways of becoming self-reliant, preserving your attention economy and overcoming Social Media addiction. If any of your relatives puts that into practice, every minute spent in that way will be a minute away from the leeches of propaganda and the perverse attention drainage of smart devices. Also, by practicing all these things, the anti-theists will be tricked into attacking yet another straw man – that of self improvement and motivation.