[nmrm2]

Which starts with not obfuscating the history of colonialism in order to push a single-minded obsession with discrediting something called Cathedral that is, vaguely, all the badness of progressivism.

This is kind of my point wrt MM. He says a lot of True Things that, in the end, amount to nothing. And then pretends he's substantiated some grand thesis about the evils of the Cathedral. But it's often all just inane bullshit when you stop to figure out how the pile of highly specific factoids actually substantiates the overall claim. This isn't always true; there are always diamonds in the rough, and MM wrote prolifically. But the style of argument and accompanying rhetoric lends itself to these sorts of logical leaps from cherry-picked particular to validation of over-arching thesis.

Edit: Also, pre-colonialism is a shitload of time. Asserting Africans were categorically better off during High Colonialism than during the millions of years of human history that is lumped together as "pre-colonialism" is a pretty bold assertion.

[devalier]

With reference to Africa, you can define the Cathedral as the permanent staff of the U.S. State Department, the universities and think tanks that operate with a revolving door with the State Department, and the NGOs funded by State (or funded by the UN which is in turn funded by USG according to State Department policy). There was a conventional wisdom among this network of institutions. They had great power, they pushed policies across Africa. They insisted that the colonial rulers give up power and hold universal suffrage elections, and used the hard and soft power of the world hegemon to make it so. They got their wish, and that change resulted in disaster across the continent.