South Africa on the Precipice of Anarchy?, DEI, Race, and Schooling, Civil Strife Coming to Montana?, Canada to Fuck its Own Farmers a la Sri Lanka, Moldbug vs. The Bard
Thanks for this, Strongbeard. I've heard this about Jackson Hole aka the Cheney Family HQ, but this article is the first time that I read about this situation in Montana.
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I barely remember the first one you listed. Never been to Burning Man, although I know a few guys who have attended. "Dirty" was how they described it.
oh yeah i forget tibet even existed. whatever happened there? guess the choice was between saving some monks and their beautiful homeland vs cheap chinese crap, we chose the latter. values!
In 2016 Peter Hitchens visited Northern Idaho, in a town pretty close to Montana, and wrote of "the faint but insistent sound of coming war, here in this place of sweet, small hills, rich soil and wistful, mountainous horizons."
The Montana piece reminds me of the way most universities in America are set up. Glitzy campuses with exorbitant tuitions beckoning the next generation of well-heeled, often set amidst the backdrop of neighborhoods filled with people worlds away from living that version of the American Dream. Think University of Southern California, or Yale in New Haven. More people are going to start realizing this class divide not only exists, but it’s where the true troubles could arise.
It reminds one of those pictures of South American cities where a wall separates the wealthy elite living in high rise condos next to a slum full of the very poor. The USA isn't anywhere near that at present, but this is why some suggest a "Brazilian Future" is in store.
Exactly. I think of the Duke lacrosse scandal. Obviously it was falsified, but the class dynamics it revealed: privileged sons of the elite vs. members of the surrounding community (in this case, strippers) was very real.
San Francisco is well on its way to becoming that version of Brazil you mention. It’s pretty much the patented progressive position to OK every harebrained governmental policy while simultaneously adhering to the NIMBY (not in my backyard) principle. The ritzy neighborhoods have their own private security and are so far largely immune to the societal poison stewing in the drug-addled civic center. But as the police boss says in Blade Runner 2049, the status quo only exists because of these walls: both real and metaphorical. As the foundations continue to crumble, thanks in large part to elite hubris, strange stuff is going to get through.
USC, Yale, UPenn, U Chicago neighborhoods a lot better than 30-40 years ago. The yuppies spread out and push the locals a few blocks away. Baltimore (Hopkins) might be worse. Maybe St Louis and New Orleans, too. But East Palo Alto is now practically middle class
"Every Night & every Morn/Some to Misery are Born/Every Morn and every Night/Some are Born to sweet delight/Some are Born to sweet delight/Some are Born to Endless Night" William Blake, Auguries of Innocence
I was thinking the same thing. I am down in Waco and you see it here. Though the folks moving down here are perhaps the Evangelical equivalent of the folks moving to Montana, a lot of folks moving to be the Christian equivalent of Austin, while poor folks just get pushed farther and farther out.
Assortative settlement. Much of the political/social dynamic in North America appears to be related to the underlying dynamic of population shifts. Gentrification in New York, Boston and Chicago dispersed African-Americans en masse to other cities, thereby spreading the political and communal expectations developed during the 80s to wide range of other cities and towns. Now the surge in internal migration from California, Portland, Chicago and New York is transforming parts of rural and small/medium sized America. Like everything else this imposes adjustment costs on everyone, above all the poor.
I have heard/read similar stories about southern England, where the exodus to the country has been exceptionally difficult for the poorer locals, especially in picturesque spots like the Cotswolds.
Jul 29, 2022·edited Jul 29, 2022Liked by Niccolo Soldo
Montana piece is very interesting. Considering a huge chunk of the Jan 6th folks were from Montana it gives an insight on their whole thought process as well. And I am sure the last couple of years have galvanized them even more.
After Yarvin's last piece though I am not interested in his work. Call me filtered, but I don't like reading about elves when we live in a world of men (this is coming from a long-term D&D player too). Piece was just inconsistent as well.
A year ago Yarvin wrote an article calling for a much more comprehensive lockdown. Everyone and he meant everyone was to stay at home. Necessities were to be delivered.
Without further ado I removed him from the list of people I ought to pay attention to.
Wow. I’m still trying to get caught up with the magic carpet rides on Niccolo Soldo’s last few flights across our Global Village. Like the alleged Singaporization of the UK, f’rinstance. Not to be ignored. Or Monkeypox. Already a state of emergency in San Francisco, I understand.
But now South Africa? A state of ANARCHY? Not the warm fuzzy libertarian anarchy of my youth, but, it seems, a downright Hobbesian state of nastiness, brutality, and non-longness.
Niccolo, keep up the good journalism (or whatever it’s called now to avoid being confused with the products of MSNBC.) You are doing God’s work.
Okay, maybe not THAT god, but a back-bench girl god called Nemesis. We all need Her grace right now.
«…What seems most likely is that the UK will remain America’s yapping poodle, London will continue to move towards becoming a Singapore-on-the-Thames [with a link], and the country, if it manages to stay together in light of Scottish secessionism, will continue to see its culture Americanized in spite of Brexit and its re-assertion of the Britishness of Britain.…»
The farmers have largely ruined soil fertility using that stuff so I don't know why anyone would defend the practice. The question I have is do these various governments just not want anyone farming?
Jul 29, 2022·edited Jul 29, 2022Liked by Niccolo Soldo
Globalist policy and corporate consolidation have helped a lot to make that the only economically viable path for farmers. I think they deserve a bit of slack. Some larger "stakeholder" will grab that land when they can't produce or sell at a competitive price
Farmers don't have to follow globalist policy. They don't have to own such large tracts of land or use mega machines. That is why they are failing today as these input costs increase. Now that the banks are puckering up I am expecting large numbers of bankruptcies and liquidation, and since the soil is shot, no one will reopen these fields. I have hardly touched the surface of the methods of farmers, to type about how the soil is losing fertility is a HUGE problem - the single most pressing issue facing humanity. Its not my fault they lack basic biological knowledge. I stand by my statement.
But you either spend 80 hrs a week on the farm and scrape by, or use fertilisers, machinery, sprays for 30 hrs and work 40 hrs at another job and do ok.
The inputs are ruining soil fertility. Whether they can scrape by using them or not isn't my issue.
The soil is shot as thus requires ever more inputs to grow crops until the carbon has been reduced to the extent that nothing they are now doing works. Its a Faustian Bargain.
They only exist by government subsidy and bank refinancing and all that is about to end.
Start a garden now or prepare yourself to stand in line for your share of bug soup is about the best advice I can offer about now.
It can, but not with the practices instituted by the Rockefeller Foundation spread since the 40's and 50's, which now have control of the universities and ministries of agriculture, and which are now being sancified through ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) rules on social credit for investment.
Soil can only be regenerated through the practices big ag deplores and works 24/7/365 to eradicate.
Although there are methods that would be lasting, I think treeless agriculture is the problem.
What has worked (that which grows soil fertility) for a very long time is what I call natural succession - agriculture ends this process.
Then on a more serious issue people who aren't directly connected to the food they eat are now dependent on agriculture and the various influences that effect the scheme.
We need a new horticultural paradigm as a public health measure to address chronic metabolic diseases (diabetes, obesity)...small-scale farming should incorporate biochemistry and plant genetics to produce super-foods. Utopian perhaps, but we should aim high.
I hear you, although I do think NAFTA and other policy implementations incentivized a lot of changes that happened.
I lived somewhere that had a lot of homesteaders and local sustainable farmers trying to do things better, and there is enough local support for it, but many people are mostly breaking even doing what they do. At the end of the day most residents go to the big stores and buy the phony "natural" food, don't want to pay extra for better meat or veg, and don't want to change their dependence on retailers.
Economically in my view it lies outside of what farmers do, and in what people are willing to pay. This is how corporate factory farms win and create an economic paradigm that will not incentivize better alternatives. Restaurants won't not buy the cheap stuff because they will go broke and retailers and so on, so without a very carefully coordinated transition when you're talking about the economy of the entire nation and also global economy, there's a lot at stake.
Will check out your Substack and this video though thanks! Ultimately you're talking about taking the high road, which I believe in too. I don't believe when people say it's impossible to support the population without GMOs or factory farming or yadda yadda. Just cutting the fertilizer supply off with no contingency plan is going to have different consequences that don't entail fixing this problem. They will make a lot of things worse that will distract from it even further.
I don't worry about the population, its about being healthy myself and a few people who I am supporting.
I only point towards how farms are wrecking their own land to make money, as thus has an end game for certain.
Seldom offer this advice to work within the system and use surplus funds to buy a bit of land and build it up. Once one starts selling food then all sorts of rules and pressures come into play and one changes philosophy on how to use the land.
Not many people on the high road. No entertainment for them there!
Rick then why should anyone worry about you? Or take your advice? Farming is dangerous and tough work. Should it cease because of concerns from dubious sources ? As far as existing on subsidy that’s pretty much most of the west high, middle, low. The system is rigged that way.
“I don't worry about the population, its about being healthy myself and a few people who I am supporting “
I have no control over what others think. This civilization has made the Faustian Bargain and its best to slowly become less dependent on it.
I am basically addicted to the internet and so far am allowed to type out my thoughts even though seemingly no one really cares. I highly doubt many if any will take my advice, maybe when its too late? How many am I influencing now? I don't know anyone other than people who simply comment. Even then there are a few others who are more entertaining that will capture people's attention that want to think about it.
This becoming less dependent takes lots of thought and time to build up personal resources, the system is too pervasive and people so habituated I believe this won't change until the system collapses from over use of resources. Happening now actually.
You don't have to worry about the farmers, as they wreck soil fertility they will join the other city people and eat bug soup.
As an aside; I have found over the years politics is only a means to ignore the inevitable collapse of the hierarchy.
The problem is that people want dirt cheap food and tastes/expectations have been developed by industrialised food processing and retailing. Small scale agriculture is best for quality produce. We need to balance the needs of farmers for a decent living and educate consumers about the entire range of food issues. It is insane that people everywhere want foods transported at great expense over vast distances and they want produce that is homogenous in taste and appearance. Local, seasonal, fresh and minimally processed are essential for health.
I don't think small scale agriculture will work either. It'll last longer is about it. Maybe market gardens as a means to fill in what people can't grow themselves though.
Interesting to read about South Africa’s issues, especially since the people in my orbit are generally pretty convinced that it’s a good place to live with solid standards of living, tarnished only by—what else?—those nasty racist South African whites. A friend I made from SA has a similarly bleak outlook to the Unherd article, though, so I suspect that side of the argument has more merit.
I haven’t been to Montana but I have been to many different parts of rural Virginia, and the attitudes there can be similar (minus the ticking time bomb feeling, because bourgeoise libs don’t tend to move out to the VA Appalachians at the kind of rate they’re colonizing Montana.) The whole way of life out there really is an incredibly sharp contrast to the more cosmopolitan and urbanized areas, from the politics all the way down to the aesthetics. Not to mention the poverty. There are plenty of towns that have chain grocery stores, pharmacies, and car dealerships, but it’s also not hard to find towns where the term “food desert” becomes vivid. And the extent to which we as a country have largely decided that these people just don’t matter is a genuine tragedy.
Have the people in your orbit ever been to Jo’burg? SA has been a disaster and tinder keg for a long, long time.
The ANC were Marxists, until they got into a position where they had things to steal. The colonialists and racists also stole, but to steal better and live well by doing it, they built industries and cities and farms. The ANC are happy to steal as-is. No need to be greedy and create anything new to increase the future skim. Eat the seed corn.
Good comments on VA. I think someone could take a tour through parts of Richmond and DC and Baltimore and be as easily shocked by the condition of the locals, be as poorly fed, and probably beaten and robbed for their trouble during their walking tour, perhaps shot. Been that way for awhile, got better for a bit and then worse . In poor neighborhoods, people don’t like it if you aren’t from the neighborhood. Whether US, a Sao Paolo favela, or St Denis. And this isn’t a new phenomenon. I wonder if the whole civil war thing is just a sign the observer hates, fears and distrusts the “other” ?
I was transiting through Jo'burg a couple of months ago, with 2 overnights. Both times I did not go any further than walking across the street to the Intercontinental Hotel (wonderful, I might add!). That said, people I encountered on my journey all seem to love Capetown. Of course these were all folks of some means.
I’ve heard Capetown is great- never been. Almost all of my friends in the UK have been and they loved it - wineries, beaches, restaurants. It just doesn’t seem to be the environment that a majority of S Africans get to live in.
I grew up in Western Montana, not far from Bozeman. We would go to Bozeman for shopping or days out.The town I lived in was the original artist-hippy colony of the Northern Californians. During the 70s the first pioneering wave of rugged artistic types and environmentalists settled there and stories of horses tied up in bars frequented by the miners and remaining mountain men while avante-garde artists fought over eco-politics and ‘poetics of nature’ were heard all over. Lots of larger than life characters, both old and new. In the 90s and early 2000s there were fissures showing but by and large the old ranching families and local gentry mixed and intermarried with the transplants.
Now, I do remember early signs if the meth epidemic and lots of what we called “ratty-faced” people ( from no reference to what was going on in) in the shadows and labor and service work, but it was far from a dominant type. There was MASSIVE poverty among many poor whites though. Some families of the emaciated poor (and often with little blackened rotten teeth from malnutrition rather than meth) would bathe their children in the Yellowstone River and I encountered several basically feral families (never seen that before!) in town. I remember fights over lumber (equivalent of oil jobs in other places) and the enviros were always trying to get the industry shut down.
So, there was still at this time lots of Patagonia, lots of outdoorsy yuppie types seemingly coming in from the PNW. I remember when we first visited Missoula in the far West, I was absolutely amazed: it was as crunchy as Boulder/Portland and filled with dreadlocked white people in ‘97-98 and the aroma of weed was everywhere. Very 90s hippy revival which may have taken a few years to filter Westward so maybe the tail end of the trend.
I personally loved growing up there; powerful and palpable natural wonder, very interesting and eccentric people and a great sense of community cohesion. Every couple of weeks there were community events and festivals (maybe half attached to the schools) where nearly every single family in the town was involved or in attendance. Now, being a young autistic bibliomaniac and curious about the world, I ended up becoming either an accessory, a project, but in a few cases I think, a genuine friend of several of these literary and Hollywood expats and spent most of my time with them. While they were Democrats and furious about Bush and Iraq, they were libertarian in spirit. They were often rugged despite being wealthy and would, for example, camp in arctic conditions, live off hunted elk, work on their properties building fences, feeding goats, etc...they modeled themselves on the locals and if you read for instance the Jim Harrison books of the time, the admiration and love of the place was extended to those pioneers, mountain men AND the fierce Indians who harbor its spirit. They sometimes mocked the local sanctimonies or rolled their eyes at big trucks with antlers and gun racks saying ‘what have they got to prove?’...but nothing really contemptuous.
I haven’t been back since mid 00s (though I’d love to) but all of my friends talk about the gentrification getting worse and of prices being exorbitant (esp in Bozeman) and with the general decline of rural life and family agriculture in the US, I can see the elements needed to brew the tornado in a teacup described in that awesome article.
"...when we first visited Missoula in the far West, I was absolutely amazed: it was as crunchy as Boulder/Portland and filled with dreadlocked white people in ‘97-98 and the aroma of weed was everywhere. Very 90s hippy revival which may have taken a few years to filter Westward so maybe the tail end of the trend."
I moved to Missoula two and a half years ago, and while dreadlocks have gone out of style the weed-smoking has not. Missoula boasts the highest dispensary density in America, "with 36.2 retailers per 100,000 residents."
I can confirm anecdotally: everyone I've hung out with partakes of the devil's lettuce, copiously. Not that I'm judging; I love marijuana. But the desire of people here to get canna-blitzed out of their minds is unsettling. Reminds me of a sadder, more desperate version of Boulder, where I lived for a year before dropping out of the University of Colorado. That high-town was fun, whereas Missoulans are clearly self-medicating.
Politically, it's a refreshingly purple apolitical place. I see Trump stuff and rainbow flags, but not ubiquitously. The classes here are still compromising. The libs, far away from Seattle/LA/Denver, intuitively understand that their livelihoods still depend on ranchers. And the ranchers are happy to do business with the 'big city' folk (Missoula drops down to ~75k during summer when college kids go back home).
But I have a foreboding after reading that article about Bozeman / eastern Montana. Because local Missoulans are still Montanans, and they sense the globalist private equity wave coming.
It's fascinating how your superbly vivid description shows how a significant clash of cultures developed there, as it is probably developing, with local variations, all around the Global Village.
Yet the people involved do not differ by skin color or by commitment to externalized sexual conventions.
A more thorough understanding of the stories they tell each other, the people they hang out with, and their more animalistic urges is necessary to get a good grasp of what is going on.
I have been to Aspen, Big Sky, Bozeman and Telluride. I caveat this statement by noting I have only been there during ski season.
The Montana article is a bit hyperbolic but not that much. The key has always been the persistence of the economic divide. No society will ever be equal but in America, there was the promise of social mobility. The contrast can be seen with the Old World. I have seen numbers that in pre 1789 France, the top 1% held 60% of the national wealth. That top 1%, like the hacienda owners in Latin America, would never relinquish their chokehold. Ergo, the French Revolution.
I was in Colorado this March. The array of streets before the ski-lift is quite nice -- no doubt, the brainchild of a P/E shop and their marketing consultants. There was a juice shop that sold smoothies. Good ones, but $9 per smoothie. That's the reality of the KKR impact on America -a $9 smoothie which no blue collar person can afford. You would probably have to go a few miles to get anything cheaper.
We need a town with options for the wealthy and not so wealthy, and ways for the wealthy and the non wealthy to switch places. The cultural wars are only a diversion. Follow the Money. The destruction of safety nets, the massive amounts sucked in by our so called non profit educational entities, political hacks and charity consultants, the ESG scam, the financial intermediaries that rake in fees for mediocre performance - it is no wonder that people are angry. And they should be.
The sad thing is that you don't need yoga pants, $9 dollar smoothies, and artisinial beer to enjoy a ski trip. The mountain has always been there. America does not need this type of inequality but when the government gets involved, things fall apart. Healthcare, education - primary and college, military spending, the COVID debacle - etc.
For the record, the people I have met in Montana are great and welcoming. But this system of raising prices because the rich can afford it, and the poor be damned - well that just sucks all around.
Up unto lately it was always the thing that something was advertised as x price but locals paid x - y at the till. That's become less and less common though with the rise of chain shops and computerised tills.
Prices should be lower for everyone. It should be lower because it means the costs (rent, labor, groceries) are lower as well, and that we can all aspire to enjoy Hawaii/Montana/the California coast, and not just a sliver of Wall Street, tech executives, and Washington fixers. America has a ton of natural beauty - it should be open to everyone.
When the government is involved, you get SoCal. A lot of poor people, a few rich, and the plutocrats fighting to deny the unwashed masses their beaches in Malibu.
Jul 29, 2022·edited Jul 29, 2022Liked by Niccolo Soldo
Perhaps so, but it's not what happens. I'm talking retail here, pubs, cafes, that type of thing. Adverised prices are high but there are rounds on the house, say a wet Wednesday in January, every so often which evens things out.
It doesn't work for houses or land prices. That's a one and done I suppose not much need for repeat loyalty.
No. They care. They are acting intentionally. They take Action A. It leads to result B. Result B is a disaster for normal people. They do it again. And again. There is no course correction because this is the course they want. Sri Lanka has led to no calls to change course. It has led to expansion of the plan to destroy the farming sector and the world's food supply. it is a small scale first step down the road they have chosen for others, not themselves. They will not starve, they will not eat bugs. They will fly on private jets and eat well. None of this is an accident. They know what they are doing. The destruction is intentional. There is no other way to read the facts. We resist that because we don't want to sound like conspiracy theorists. We resist it because it is very terrible and we wish it were otherwise. Sometimes conspiracies are real. The best ones are never discovered. Sometimes reading lots of stray signs to mean that some hidden force actually means to kill you is getting the message correctly. Hate very much to have to reach this conclusion. But I am not seeing any other way to read it.
My pleasure. I was going to let you know later on your Substack, but I guess someone already alerted you to it. Very interesting piece, lots to consider. And it's getting a good deal of play as well.
I was recently in the Olympic National Park area for hiking and a guided fishing trip. After the trip, over a beer the guide let loose on the challenges / frustrations of the local non-Indians and how the powers that be are purposely driving them to poverty by flagrantly abusing fishing data. General anger through out rural Washington state at Seattle and Portland types.
Thanks for this, Strongbeard. I've heard this about Jackson Hole aka the Cheney Family HQ, but this article is the first time that I read about this situation in Montana.
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Tibetan Freedom concert! Lilith fair! Farm aid! Burning Man! Thems were the days
I barely remember the first one you listed. Never been to Burning Man, although I know a few guys who have attended. "Dirty" was how they described it.
Tell me a festival that isn't dirty so I can be sure to avoid it!
oh yeah i forget tibet even existed. whatever happened there? guess the choice was between saving some monks and their beautiful homeland vs cheap chinese crap, we chose the latter. values!
Time to remind everyone with a concert reboot, sticker with Chinese manufactured swag of course!
In 2016 Peter Hitchens visited Northern Idaho, in a town pretty close to Montana, and wrote of "the faint but insistent sound of coming war, here in this place of sweet, small hills, rich soil and wistful, mountainous horizons."
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-3805989/The-world-s-fixated-Trump-Hillary-drag-catastrophic-war-writes-PETER-HITCHENS-America.html
The Montana piece reminds me of the way most universities in America are set up. Glitzy campuses with exorbitant tuitions beckoning the next generation of well-heeled, often set amidst the backdrop of neighborhoods filled with people worlds away from living that version of the American Dream. Think University of Southern California, or Yale in New Haven. More people are going to start realizing this class divide not only exists, but it’s where the true troubles could arise.
It reminds one of those pictures of South American cities where a wall separates the wealthy elite living in high rise condos next to a slum full of the very poor. The USA isn't anywhere near that at present, but this is why some suggest a "Brazilian Future" is in store.
Exactly. I think of the Duke lacrosse scandal. Obviously it was falsified, but the class dynamics it revealed: privileged sons of the elite vs. members of the surrounding community (in this case, strippers) was very real.
San Francisco is well on its way to becoming that version of Brazil you mention. It’s pretty much the patented progressive position to OK every harebrained governmental policy while simultaneously adhering to the NIMBY (not in my backyard) principle. The ritzy neighborhoods have their own private security and are so far largely immune to the societal poison stewing in the drug-addled civic center. But as the police boss says in Blade Runner 2049, the status quo only exists because of these walls: both real and metaphorical. As the foundations continue to crumble, thanks in large part to elite hubris, strange stuff is going to get through.
USC, Yale, UPenn, U Chicago neighborhoods a lot better than 30-40 years ago. The yuppies spread out and push the locals a few blocks away. Baltimore (Hopkins) might be worse. Maybe St Louis and New Orleans, too. But East Palo Alto is now practically middle class
It is where the trouble is created!
"Every Night & every Morn/Some to Misery are Born/Every Morn and every Night/Some are Born to sweet delight/Some are Born to sweet delight/Some are Born to Endless Night" William Blake, Auguries of Innocence
I was thinking the same thing. I am down in Waco and you see it here. Though the folks moving down here are perhaps the Evangelical equivalent of the folks moving to Montana, a lot of folks moving to be the Christian equivalent of Austin, while poor folks just get pushed farther and farther out.
Assortative settlement. Much of the political/social dynamic in North America appears to be related to the underlying dynamic of population shifts. Gentrification in New York, Boston and Chicago dispersed African-Americans en masse to other cities, thereby spreading the political and communal expectations developed during the 80s to wide range of other cities and towns. Now the surge in internal migration from California, Portland, Chicago and New York is transforming parts of rural and small/medium sized America. Like everything else this imposes adjustment costs on everyone, above all the poor.
I have heard/read similar stories about southern England, where the exodus to the country has been exceptionally difficult for the poorer locals, especially in picturesque spots like the Cotswolds.
Montana piece is very interesting. Considering a huge chunk of the Jan 6th folks were from Montana it gives an insight on their whole thought process as well. And I am sure the last couple of years have galvanized them even more.
After Yarvin's last piece though I am not interested in his work. Call me filtered, but I don't like reading about elves when we live in a world of men (this is coming from a long-term D&D player too). Piece was just inconsistent as well.
I think he is having fun writing and is testing things out with his audience.
It’s only fun if I enjoy it!
Agree, he is not afraid to try things on. I listen to this podcast occasionally for fun, and they mocked Yarvin over that in a humorous way: https://open.spotify.com/episode/7HSBeOgyKZyrQx4xZsYDxR?si=8573457a26584bc2
A year ago Yarvin wrote an article calling for a much more comprehensive lockdown. Everyone and he meant everyone was to stay at home. Necessities were to be delivered.
Without further ado I removed him from the list of people I ought to pay attention to.
Yeah, I unsubbed that day.
Yarvin’s on to something, uniquely on to something, he is a must read.
Wow. I’m still trying to get caught up with the magic carpet rides on Niccolo Soldo’s last few flights across our Global Village. Like the alleged Singaporization of the UK, f’rinstance. Not to be ignored. Or Monkeypox. Already a state of emergency in San Francisco, I understand.
But now South Africa? A state of ANARCHY? Not the warm fuzzy libertarian anarchy of my youth, but, it seems, a downright Hobbesian state of nastiness, brutality, and non-longness.
Niccolo, keep up the good journalism (or whatever it’s called now to avoid being confused with the products of MSNBC.) You are doing God’s work.
Okay, maybe not THAT god, but a back-bench girl god called Nemesis. We all need Her grace right now.
What is 'Singaporization of the UK', by the way?
Become a deregulated financial centre and base your entire economy off that. All about London and forget about the provinces.
Oh, so very true.
Good point about the forgotten provinces.
I thought that was already the reality!
«…What seems most likely is that the UK will remain America’s yapping poodle, London will continue to move towards becoming a Singapore-on-the-Thames [with a link], and the country, if it manages to stay together in light of Scottish secessionism, will continue to see its culture Americanized in spite of Brexit and its re-assertion of the Britishness of Britain.…»
A prediction by Niccolo S.
In this:
https://niccolo.substack.com/p/for-whom-the-bong-tolls
Following the link and learning more is on my to-do-soon list.
Not familiar with Montana but a lot of places in Kentucky are the same. And the feeling described is noticeable and growing worse.
You just know Canada will shit on and sanction the farmers even harder when they try to do something about it. I am not looking forward to it.
The farmers have largely ruined soil fertility using that stuff so I don't know why anyone would defend the practice. The question I have is do these various governments just not want anyone farming?
Globalist policy and corporate consolidation have helped a lot to make that the only economically viable path for farmers. I think they deserve a bit of slack. Some larger "stakeholder" will grab that land when they can't produce or sell at a competitive price
Farmers don't have to follow globalist policy. They don't have to own such large tracts of land or use mega machines. That is why they are failing today as these input costs increase. Now that the banks are puckering up I am expecting large numbers of bankruptcies and liquidation, and since the soil is shot, no one will reopen these fields. I have hardly touched the surface of the methods of farmers, to type about how the soil is losing fertility is a HUGE problem - the single most pressing issue facing humanity. Its not my fault they lack basic biological knowledge. I stand by my statement.
Here is an interesting video i am now listening to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EX6eoxxoWKI
They do if they want to earn a living.
I only know about small family farms admittedly.
But you either spend 80 hrs a week on the farm and scrape by, or use fertilisers, machinery, sprays for 30 hrs and work 40 hrs at another job and do ok.
So what would you do?
The inputs are ruining soil fertility. Whether they can scrape by using them or not isn't my issue.
The soil is shot as thus requires ever more inputs to grow crops until the carbon has been reduced to the extent that nothing they are now doing works. Its a Faustian Bargain.
They only exist by government subsidy and bank refinancing and all that is about to end.
Start a garden now or prepare yourself to stand in line for your share of bug soup is about the best advice I can offer about now.
Can't top soil be regenerated though?
It can, but not with the practices instituted by the Rockefeller Foundation spread since the 40's and 50's, which now have control of the universities and ministries of agriculture, and which are now being sancified through ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) rules on social credit for investment.
Soil can only be regenerated through the practices big ag deplores and works 24/7/365 to eradicate.
Although there are methods that would be lasting, I think treeless agriculture is the problem.
What has worked (that which grows soil fertility) for a very long time is what I call natural succession - agriculture ends this process.
Then on a more serious issue people who aren't directly connected to the food they eat are now dependent on agriculture and the various influences that effect the scheme.
We need a new horticultural paradigm as a public health measure to address chronic metabolic diseases (diabetes, obesity)...small-scale farming should incorporate biochemistry and plant genetics to produce super-foods. Utopian perhaps, but we should aim high.
Public health has been corrupted!
I hear you, although I do think NAFTA and other policy implementations incentivized a lot of changes that happened.
I lived somewhere that had a lot of homesteaders and local sustainable farmers trying to do things better, and there is enough local support for it, but many people are mostly breaking even doing what they do. At the end of the day most residents go to the big stores and buy the phony "natural" food, don't want to pay extra for better meat or veg, and don't want to change their dependence on retailers.
Economically in my view it lies outside of what farmers do, and in what people are willing to pay. This is how corporate factory farms win and create an economic paradigm that will not incentivize better alternatives. Restaurants won't not buy the cheap stuff because they will go broke and retailers and so on, so without a very carefully coordinated transition when you're talking about the economy of the entire nation and also global economy, there's a lot at stake.
Will check out your Substack and this video though thanks! Ultimately you're talking about taking the high road, which I believe in too. I don't believe when people say it's impossible to support the population without GMOs or factory farming or yadda yadda. Just cutting the fertilizer supply off with no contingency plan is going to have different consequences that don't entail fixing this problem. They will make a lot of things worse that will distract from it even further.
I don't worry about the population, its about being healthy myself and a few people who I am supporting.
I only point towards how farms are wrecking their own land to make money, as thus has an end game for certain.
Seldom offer this advice to work within the system and use surplus funds to buy a bit of land and build it up. Once one starts selling food then all sorts of rules and pressures come into play and one changes philosophy on how to use the land.
Not many people on the high road. No entertainment for them there!
Good lad.
Rick then why should anyone worry about you? Or take your advice? Farming is dangerous and tough work. Should it cease because of concerns from dubious sources ? As far as existing on subsidy that’s pretty much most of the west high, middle, low. The system is rigged that way.
“I don't worry about the population, its about being healthy myself and a few people who I am supporting “
I have no control over what others think. This civilization has made the Faustian Bargain and its best to slowly become less dependent on it.
I am basically addicted to the internet and so far am allowed to type out my thoughts even though seemingly no one really cares. I highly doubt many if any will take my advice, maybe when its too late? How many am I influencing now? I don't know anyone other than people who simply comment. Even then there are a few others who are more entertaining that will capture people's attention that want to think about it.
This becoming less dependent takes lots of thought and time to build up personal resources, the system is too pervasive and people so habituated I believe this won't change until the system collapses from over use of resources. Happening now actually.
You don't have to worry about the farmers, as they wreck soil fertility they will join the other city people and eat bug soup.
As an aside; I have found over the years politics is only a means to ignore the inevitable collapse of the hierarchy.
They do if people want to eat
The problem is that people want dirt cheap food and tastes/expectations have been developed by industrialised food processing and retailing. Small scale agriculture is best for quality produce. We need to balance the needs of farmers for a decent living and educate consumers about the entire range of food issues. It is insane that people everywhere want foods transported at great expense over vast distances and they want produce that is homogenous in taste and appearance. Local, seasonal, fresh and minimally processed are essential for health.
I don't think small scale agriculture will work either. It'll last longer is about it. Maybe market gardens as a means to fill in what people can't grow themselves though.
Yes, hungry people are easier to control, dead people even easier.
Not kidding.
The ancient Greeks had a saying: necros ou daknei...dead men do not bite.
Right now they only bark
Long Warred, just wondered...did you recently post comments (under a different handle) on BAP's latest article? These were on an another platform.
Interesting to read about South Africa’s issues, especially since the people in my orbit are generally pretty convinced that it’s a good place to live with solid standards of living, tarnished only by—what else?—those nasty racist South African whites. A friend I made from SA has a similarly bleak outlook to the Unherd article, though, so I suspect that side of the argument has more merit.
I haven’t been to Montana but I have been to many different parts of rural Virginia, and the attitudes there can be similar (minus the ticking time bomb feeling, because bourgeoise libs don’t tend to move out to the VA Appalachians at the kind of rate they’re colonizing Montana.) The whole way of life out there really is an incredibly sharp contrast to the more cosmopolitan and urbanized areas, from the politics all the way down to the aesthetics. Not to mention the poverty. There are plenty of towns that have chain grocery stores, pharmacies, and car dealerships, but it’s also not hard to find towns where the term “food desert” becomes vivid. And the extent to which we as a country have largely decided that these people just don’t matter is a genuine tragedy.
I think that you might be talking about this piece that is the first article in that weekend's Substack - https://niccolo.substack.com/p/saturday-commentary-and-review-51
Have the people in your orbit ever been to Jo’burg? SA has been a disaster and tinder keg for a long, long time.
The ANC were Marxists, until they got into a position where they had things to steal. The colonialists and racists also stole, but to steal better and live well by doing it, they built industries and cities and farms. The ANC are happy to steal as-is. No need to be greedy and create anything new to increase the future skim. Eat the seed corn.
Good comments on VA. I think someone could take a tour through parts of Richmond and DC and Baltimore and be as easily shocked by the condition of the locals, be as poorly fed, and probably beaten and robbed for their trouble during their walking tour, perhaps shot. Been that way for awhile, got better for a bit and then worse . In poor neighborhoods, people don’t like it if you aren’t from the neighborhood. Whether US, a Sao Paolo favela, or St Denis. And this isn’t a new phenomenon. I wonder if the whole civil war thing is just a sign the observer hates, fears and distrusts the “other” ?
I was transiting through Jo'burg a couple of months ago, with 2 overnights. Both times I did not go any further than walking across the street to the Intercontinental Hotel (wonderful, I might add!). That said, people I encountered on my journey all seem to love Capetown. Of course these were all folks of some means.
I’ve heard Capetown is great- never been. Almost all of my friends in the UK have been and they loved it - wineries, beaches, restaurants. It just doesn’t seem to be the environment that a majority of S Africans get to live in.
I grew up in Western Montana, not far from Bozeman. We would go to Bozeman for shopping or days out.The town I lived in was the original artist-hippy colony of the Northern Californians. During the 70s the first pioneering wave of rugged artistic types and environmentalists settled there and stories of horses tied up in bars frequented by the miners and remaining mountain men while avante-garde artists fought over eco-politics and ‘poetics of nature’ were heard all over. Lots of larger than life characters, both old and new. In the 90s and early 2000s there were fissures showing but by and large the old ranching families and local gentry mixed and intermarried with the transplants.
Now, I do remember early signs if the meth epidemic and lots of what we called “ratty-faced” people ( from no reference to what was going on in) in the shadows and labor and service work, but it was far from a dominant type. There was MASSIVE poverty among many poor whites though. Some families of the emaciated poor (and often with little blackened rotten teeth from malnutrition rather than meth) would bathe their children in the Yellowstone River and I encountered several basically feral families (never seen that before!) in town. I remember fights over lumber (equivalent of oil jobs in other places) and the enviros were always trying to get the industry shut down.
So, there was still at this time lots of Patagonia, lots of outdoorsy yuppie types seemingly coming in from the PNW. I remember when we first visited Missoula in the far West, I was absolutely amazed: it was as crunchy as Boulder/Portland and filled with dreadlocked white people in ‘97-98 and the aroma of weed was everywhere. Very 90s hippy revival which may have taken a few years to filter Westward so maybe the tail end of the trend.
I personally loved growing up there; powerful and palpable natural wonder, very interesting and eccentric people and a great sense of community cohesion. Every couple of weeks there were community events and festivals (maybe half attached to the schools) where nearly every single family in the town was involved or in attendance. Now, being a young autistic bibliomaniac and curious about the world, I ended up becoming either an accessory, a project, but in a few cases I think, a genuine friend of several of these literary and Hollywood expats and spent most of my time with them. While they were Democrats and furious about Bush and Iraq, they were libertarian in spirit. They were often rugged despite being wealthy and would, for example, camp in arctic conditions, live off hunted elk, work on their properties building fences, feeding goats, etc...they modeled themselves on the locals and if you read for instance the Jim Harrison books of the time, the admiration and love of the place was extended to those pioneers, mountain men AND the fierce Indians who harbor its spirit. They sometimes mocked the local sanctimonies or rolled their eyes at big trucks with antlers and gun racks saying ‘what have they got to prove?’...but nothing really contemptuous.
I haven’t been back since mid 00s (though I’d love to) but all of my friends talk about the gentrification getting worse and of prices being exorbitant (esp in Bozeman) and with the general decline of rural life and family agriculture in the US, I can see the elements needed to brew the tornado in a teacup described in that awesome article.
Thank you for the insight, I appreciate it!
Likewise!
"...when we first visited Missoula in the far West, I was absolutely amazed: it was as crunchy as Boulder/Portland and filled with dreadlocked white people in ‘97-98 and the aroma of weed was everywhere. Very 90s hippy revival which may have taken a few years to filter Westward so maybe the tail end of the trend."
I moved to Missoula two and a half years ago, and while dreadlocks have gone out of style the weed-smoking has not. Missoula boasts the highest dispensary density in America, "with 36.2 retailers per 100,000 residents."
https://www.marijuanaventure.com/the-most-dispensaries-per-capita-in-the-u-s/
I can confirm anecdotally: everyone I've hung out with partakes of the devil's lettuce, copiously. Not that I'm judging; I love marijuana. But the desire of people here to get canna-blitzed out of their minds is unsettling. Reminds me of a sadder, more desperate version of Boulder, where I lived for a year before dropping out of the University of Colorado. That high-town was fun, whereas Missoulans are clearly self-medicating.
Politically, it's a refreshingly purple apolitical place. I see Trump stuff and rainbow flags, but not ubiquitously. The classes here are still compromising. The libs, far away from Seattle/LA/Denver, intuitively understand that their livelihoods still depend on ranchers. And the ranchers are happy to do business with the 'big city' folk (Missoula drops down to ~75k during summer when college kids go back home).
But I have a foreboding after reading that article about Bozeman / eastern Montana. Because local Missoulans are still Montanans, and they sense the globalist private equity wave coming.
Good to hear there’s still a peaceable purple vibe in Missoula. It’s such a beautiful place.
Is weed legal in MT?
I think the film “Winter’s Bone” did a good job of covering some of these issues
Worth a watch?
I thought so. And Jennifer Lawrence’s first big film, I think.
It's fascinating how your superbly vivid description shows how a significant clash of cultures developed there, as it is probably developing, with local variations, all around the Global Village.
Yet the people involved do not differ by skin color or by commitment to externalized sexual conventions.
A more thorough understanding of the stories they tell each other, the people they hang out with, and their more animalistic urges is necessary to get a good grasp of what is going on.
I have been to Aspen, Big Sky, Bozeman and Telluride. I caveat this statement by noting I have only been there during ski season.
The Montana article is a bit hyperbolic but not that much. The key has always been the persistence of the economic divide. No society will ever be equal but in America, there was the promise of social mobility. The contrast can be seen with the Old World. I have seen numbers that in pre 1789 France, the top 1% held 60% of the national wealth. That top 1%, like the hacienda owners in Latin America, would never relinquish their chokehold. Ergo, the French Revolution.
I was in Colorado this March. The array of streets before the ski-lift is quite nice -- no doubt, the brainchild of a P/E shop and their marketing consultants. There was a juice shop that sold smoothies. Good ones, but $9 per smoothie. That's the reality of the KKR impact on America -a $9 smoothie which no blue collar person can afford. You would probably have to go a few miles to get anything cheaper.
We need a town with options for the wealthy and not so wealthy, and ways for the wealthy and the non wealthy to switch places. The cultural wars are only a diversion. Follow the Money. The destruction of safety nets, the massive amounts sucked in by our so called non profit educational entities, political hacks and charity consultants, the ESG scam, the financial intermediaries that rake in fees for mediocre performance - it is no wonder that people are angry. And they should be.
The sad thing is that you don't need yoga pants, $9 dollar smoothies, and artisinial beer to enjoy a ski trip. The mountain has always been there. America does not need this type of inequality but when the government gets involved, things fall apart. Healthcare, education - primary and college, military spending, the COVID debacle - etc.
For the record, the people I have met in Montana are great and welcoming. But this system of raising prices because the rich can afford it, and the poor be damned - well that just sucks all around.
I live in a similar touristy spot.
Up unto lately it was always the thing that something was advertised as x price but locals paid x - y at the till. That's become less and less common though with the rise of chain shops and computerised tills.
Prices should be lower for everyone. It should be lower because it means the costs (rent, labor, groceries) are lower as well, and that we can all aspire to enjoy Hawaii/Montana/the California coast, and not just a sliver of Wall Street, tech executives, and Washington fixers. America has a ton of natural beauty - it should be open to everyone.
When the government is involved, you get SoCal. A lot of poor people, a few rich, and the plutocrats fighting to deny the unwashed masses their beaches in Malibu.
Perhaps so, but it's not what happens. I'm talking retail here, pubs, cafes, that type of thing. Adverised prices are high but there are rounds on the house, say a wet Wednesday in January, every so often which evens things out.
It doesn't work for houses or land prices. That's a one and done I suppose not much need for repeat loyalty.
"But the Masters just don’t care."
No. They care. They are acting intentionally. They take Action A. It leads to result B. Result B is a disaster for normal people. They do it again. And again. There is no course correction because this is the course they want. Sri Lanka has led to no calls to change course. It has led to expansion of the plan to destroy the farming sector and the world's food supply. it is a small scale first step down the road they have chosen for others, not themselves. They will not starve, they will not eat bugs. They will fly on private jets and eat well. None of this is an accident. They know what they are doing. The destruction is intentional. There is no other way to read the facts. We resist that because we don't want to sound like conspiracy theorists. We resist it because it is very terrible and we wish it were otherwise. Sometimes conspiracies are real. The best ones are never discovered. Sometimes reading lots of stray signs to mean that some hidden force actually means to kill you is getting the message correctly. Hate very much to have to reach this conclusion. But I am not seeing any other way to read it.
Oh they care deeply and want us gone.
thanks for the share and the writeup niccolo!
My pleasure. I was going to let you know later on your Substack, but I guess someone already alerted you to it. Very interesting piece, lots to consider. And it's getting a good deal of play as well.
I lived in northern Idaho until 2013 and haven't been back in a while...wonder how things have changed
I was recently in the Olympic National Park area for hiking and a guided fishing trip. After the trip, over a beer the guide let loose on the challenges / frustrations of the local non-Indians and how the powers that be are purposely driving them to poverty by flagrantly abusing fishing data. General anger through out rural Washington state at Seattle and Portland types.