[tjradcliffe]

The neoreactionaries aren't interested in the Enlightenment as a set of fundamental ideas, but as a time in history they find congenial: after the scientific revolution, before democratic, industrial capitalism steamrolled the aristocracy.

They are like an alternative version of the Society for Creative Anachronism, re-imagining the Enlightenment historical period in ways that leave out the things they find icky but that are in fact inevitable consequences of the times. For SCA that's reimagining the High Middle Ages without the plague. For neoreactionaries it's reimagining the Enlightenment without the end of slavery, or the rise of individualism and democracy.

For those of us who pursue Enlightenment ideals rather than Enlightenment historical accidents, they are an unfortunate bunch. SCA members would feel the same way about anyone who was serious about bringing back feudalism, or reducing society to "warriors, priests and peasants."

[amcastillo]

Most neoreactionaries I know don't care much for the Enlightenment at all. Some pine for monarchy, others for Skynet, still more for the farm. A difficult bunch to generalize, united only by their shared (but uneven) disdain for democracy, (post-)modernism, and egalitarianism.