Ferdinand is closing his site. He writes (no link, as he will take the site down this week)

I was miserable and cranky, which was reflected both in the name of the blog and my pseudonym. I imagined myself a daring anti-hero, a ruthless teller of uncomfortable truths, a rebel sniggering at the status quo.

Which is normal. All bloggers are narcissists and attention whores, every single one. It’s a prerequisite for being here. We’re all little Stepan Trofimovichs, enamored with the sounds of our own voices.

My problem is that In Mala Fide no longer reflects who I am. I’m no longer subject to the conditions that led me to start blogging to begin with. I’m not in the same state of mind, and I’m tired of keeping up the charade. I’m tired of logging in twice a week and punching up articles in a voice that is no longer mine. I’m tired of the negativity and the bleakness of it all. Writing under a pen name was once liberating and freeing — now it feels confining, a straitjacket asphyxiating me and preventing me from spreading my wings.

To put it simply, I no longer want to be “Ferdinand Bardamu.”

I’m glad for him as a person, because remaining nihilistic leads to total despair. Apparently he has a new job, and is looking to a new future. Personally, he led me to find Alte and what is now the tradosphere, mainly because Alte posted on his site. Since he is taking the site down, I am going to repost it here.

___ this is a quotation ___

Since I have entered the Manosphere, I have been called many things. Some were positive, some were negative, some were justified, some were outrageous, but there was one term that I found perplexing. I have been called a moderate. I’m never quite sure what to reply to that, except to note the inherent immoderation of Catholic traditionalism. Our entire philosophy can be summed up as: Do as we say or burn in hell for all eternity. That is not very moderate, balanced, or expedient. That is immoderate, extreme, and absolute.

But why should moderation be expected in traditionalism? Moderation is the result of compromise, and compromise is not how you form a coherent ideology. As Chesterton wrote in What’s Wrong With the World:

People have begun to be terrified of an improvement merely because it is complete. They call it utopian and revolutionary that anyone should really have his own way, or anything be really done, and done with. Compromise used to mean that half a loaf was better than no bread. Among modern statesmen it really seems to mean that half a loaf is better than a whole loaf.

If there is one thing the feminists have taught us, it is that you should always “go for broke” if you want to change minds, save souls or…overthrow a dominant ideology. By all means, use a moderate and reasonable tone to promote extreme and radical ideas. Feign academic disinterest if the battle is most precious to you.

Tone aside, you need to be radical and extreme in your actual argument. It is only by claiming a stake outside of the normal “moderate” boundaries that you can pull the center of political gravity in your direction. The extremes determine the center. The further out your claim, the further you can pull the center in your direction. The leftward-extreme has already been set, so we must now pull rightward all the more energetically.

For this reason, I do not actively promote the reform of our present government (although I actively support it), as I do not consider it reformable. The political center is so far to the left that only a full-scale economic collapse will facilitate a true, wide-ranging reform. What traditionalists can do now is to make the unspeakable speakable, to make the immoderate sound moderate, to make the far-right the center-right, by shifting the center and establishing a new extreme.

Here are reforms I hold tightly to, and wait for the center to move in my direction.

• An end to divorce. All legal divorce should be abolished, to be replaced by legal separation (i.e. no remarriage) only. In the event of legal separation, sole paternal custody should be the default. There should be no alimony or child support granted, other than what the couple has predefined by contract. No child support outside of marriage. Barring that, marriage should be moved completely into the private sphere and handled under contract law.
• An end to all domestic violence laws. Severe instances can be handled by legal separation or criminal assault charges. Everything else… suck it up and deal. We need to get out of the habit of meddling in people’s homes. No more family courts.
• An end to public schooling, including public universities. All education should be selected and directed by the parent, with the public providing vouchers as needed.
• An end to female suffrage. I’m not sure yet what I’d like to replace it with, or if I’m even sure I wish for voting to continue. All I am certain of is that it is an abomination for women to rule the country through the ballot box.
• An end to abortion, and severe restrictions on artificial birth control.
• An end to bloated government and a return to subsidiarity. The government should be cut down to about half of its current size, and a tax-overhaul should rid us of the vote-buying and coercion rampant in the current revenue system. Power should be devolved down to the male heads of family, the community, the state, and only then the federal government.
• An end to mass immigration and liberal immigration policies. A country should only take in as many immigrants as it can assimilate. Anything else is to welcome a conquering horde, which goes beyond the bounds of neighborly generosity.
• An end to affirmative action, quotas, unequal entrance qualifications, etc.
• An end to feminist criminology, and the rampant injustice that results from it. All felonies must be proved beyond a reasonable doubt, including sex crimes.

Whether the center does move or not, we shall see. Perhaps it will simply fall, and we will sink into anarchy. Perhaps they will swamp everything remaining, or devour it like locusts. I only know that it won’t move further left on my account, that is for sure. I am not giving an inch, for they will surely take a mile. I want the whole loaf.

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I suggest you all go onto his site, Yes, there is some pretty nasty stuff there, But we need to mine it for the gold while it is still up.