"Since this is an essay about the theory of foreign policy, rather than some kind of Moscow-sponsored tongue bath, let us imagine an abstract, ideal Putin." Now that's an interesting argument. It shows how far from "ideal" the real world is, and how even the most supposedly "realist" foreign policy thinking is in fact driven by the exact same "abstract, ideal" model.
I read the piece (despite finding him rather dreary to read, honestly) and that quoted section is theorycrafting what an ideal Trump figure would do to achieve its Trumpy goals.
I think the whole Curtis Yarvin is a Crazy Person stuff is a bit overdone, honestly. Had a couple of drinks with the fellow at the old Urbit place in SOMA ages ago and he seemed fairly normal. He's got these kooky reactionary ideas in his writing, for sure, but he's not this Hitler figure people make him out to be.
Anyway, not for me to defend him, just trying to insert some lived experience. I tried to like Urbit and Hoon and Nock but it wasn't for me. Perhaps for a better man.
I don't think this thread is an appropriate place to litigate Curtis Yarvin.
If you use the "search" feature at the bottom of the page, with "author:lisper", you'll find what I think are several trenchant critiques of the technical ideas behind Urbit.
> I don't think this thread is an appropriate place to litigate Curtis Yarvin.
In general, I'm pretty good about separating art from artist, but this thread root did launch that explicit discussion so perhaps your comment is better placed near the root than here.
I made a good faith attempt to build on Urbit (still have my ship from then somewhere) and failed so you don't need to convince me.
But fine, I'm not playing defence attorney since I don't even like this Dark Enlightenment crap. If you want to construct shadowy fanged figures and then decide it is inappropriate to question if they're fanged or really all that shadowy, then fine.
I'm not singling you out so much as I started writing a response to "I sat down for drinks with this person and they seemed nice" and realized I was getting sucked into the same drama. We can just not talk about the guy at all; that's an option we have. Let's do it that way.
Amusingly, your comment did make me feel some amount of embarrassment because I suspect you are right. That's probably a bad mode of evaluation of someone. I just don't think we should go all the way to Godwin, but who can tell, maybe that's exactly how it goes. After all, from Leonard Cohen:
Is he important/relevant outside of HN fancies in the US?