Friday, November 28, 2008

How Many Divisions Does the Counterjihad Have?

Takuan Seiyo has posted an excellent essay, “From Meccania to Atlantis — Part 3: From Encirclement to Breakout”, at the Brussels Journal. I strongly recommend reading the entire piece.

Part of it is a response to Gates of Vienna, and in particular Zenster, who posted earlier this month about the execution of the Bali bombers in Indonesia.

Mr. Seiyo raises an important point:

Zenster comments that [the statement of the Bali bomber] promises the eternal cycle of violence that Islam has been delivering since 630 AD. He wonders why so few Westerners seem to feel a similar desire for retribution over their kinsmen’s blood spilled in so many Islamic atrocities. “Should Western leaders continue tolerating such hideous rapacity,” Zenster concludes, “their collective inaction must eventually be construed as criminal.”

So here is our dilemma. On one side is Larry Page and Sergei Brin with Google’s resources, and Bill Gates, and George Soros and Maurice Strong, and Hollywood’s tinsel and Barack Obama and Angela Merkel and Al Gore and the European Union and the Roman Catholic Church, and the National Council of Churches USA, and the West’s universities, and a host of expensively packaged, solipsistic magic lanterns such as CNN, The New York Times and Der Spiegel, and dhimmi training institutes such as the American Society for Muslim Advancement and Soliya. On the other side is Zenster, and the middle-aged couple in Virginia that maintains the Gates of Vienna blog, and the rest of the few of us here and there.

By whom will the Western leaders’ collective inaction be construed as criminal, and what will such construing be worth in view of such a balance of power? To paraphrase again that great teacher, Stalin, “Zenster? How many divisions has he got?”
- - - - - - - - -
We haven’t got the divisions. We haven’t got the numbers. We haven’t got the unlimited funds the other side has, including its ability to print money. We are surrounded everywhere by Body Snatchers and Pods hatching further Body Snatchers. And they, by far, are the more dangerous and, in the foreseeable future invincible, foe.

Islam is indeed in its essence a creed of desert savages, imbued with the bloody ethos of 7th century Arabia. But it’s not nearly the mighty, unstoppable force that we few, we happy few, will repulse at Thermopylae. For one, our ruling elite of Body Snatchers and the great majority of the Pod-citizens, wouldn’t allow it. And it is they who control the police and the armed forces, the sources of employment and the tax collectors, the TV programs and the book publishers.

So what do you think, folks? How many divisions do we have?

I know I don’t have any. If I work hard, I can manage to get a few dozen middle-aged Counterjihadis (along with a smattering of young people) together in a room to talk about what can be done. Afterwards they return home to do the best they can to implement a plan of resistance, working in their spare time while making a living, raising a family, and generally trying to have a life in the face of the imminent destruction which is about to descend upon us all.

But Al Qaeda doesn’t have many divisions, either. They may be somewhat younger than we are, and have more AK-47s and Semtex, but otherwise they are organizing and operating in a manner similar to ours — a bunch of like-minded people forming fluid distributed networks to coordinate action in an attempt to achieve their ends. Like us, they are opposed by their own governments.

We Westerners have only recently been traduced by our religious, political, and cultural leaders, and that puts us at a strong disadvantage.

The fact that 43% of white American voters preferred Obama is not proof that they have been brain-snatched. It’s merely evidence of massive ignorance, an indication that the media (and the Republican establishment) were successful in their attempts to conceal any and all relevant facts about The One. In the next few months Barack Hussein Obama will attempt to implement his agenda while 75% of America’s capital assets rapidly evaporate. The Obama/Soros/CAIR operation will not be a piece of cake after the productive tax base of this country has become a shell of its former self. After all, the ACORN “community organizing” agenda requires hordes of wealthy heavily-taxed drones to finance its socialist fantasies.

If one assumes that Obama wants to be more than just an unusually corrupt President running the traditional Democrat national patronage machine, then the nature of his intentions will eventually become crystal-clear to people who have never heard of Bill Ayers or Barry Soetoro or Tony Rezko. They’ll notice the new administration’s attempts to surgically remove what little money remains in their wallets. And at that point, the 43% will begin to drop precipitously.

Europe is another matter. I’ll leave it to the Europeans themselves to tell us how much native resistance is possible in the continent formerly known as Europe.

As I have said before, we’re an army of midgets. But how many midgets are we?

How many divisions do we have?

23 comments:

Henrik R Clausen said...

What is more important than 'divisions' is the Rapid Deployment Force, be it either in the media or to conferences and other events, where intelligent people can appear as needed and ask the relevant questions.

That's what we need. For now, at least.

Zenster said...

For those who do not read all of Takuan Seiyo's superb essay, here is the closing paragraph:

Nor can all the legume Pods in Hell overcome a small group of thinking, united Western people of sound character, minds grounded in traditional wisdom and learning, staunchly determined to refuse to partake in Pod society’s problems and their “solutions.”

This must not be forgotten, even as we continue to struggle against enormous odds.

As to his cogent question:

“Zenster? How many divisions has he got?”

I am recruiting on a daily basis. Changing one mind at a time. Here's an example.

Over a bottle or two of excellent California wine I carefully outlined to my Obamaton neighbors the pillars of Islam and how it is impossible to negotiate with an opponent whose goals are not only non-negotiable but one that is religiously sanctioned to lie and deceive about anything.

While these important points did not manage to overcome one of theirs adamant clinging to Cultural Relativism, I did manage to change their thinking on having "mandatory volunteerism" in Third World countries as part of required American school curiculum.

Yes, you read that correctly, Mandatory Volunteerism.

I carefully explained how Mandatory Volunteerism is nothing but enforced altruism and a total poison to all forms of productive enterprise. Any lesson about helping others who are less fortunate would be lost in resentment and feelings of servitude.

While the ostensibly honorable intention was to make American school children more appreciative of the immense prosperity and stability that they enjoy here in The United States, I managed to make clear how the lesson would be lost were it imposed by fiat.

We finally agreed that a far more intelligent approach would be to compensate such volunteerism with incentives such as qualifying for scholarships and so forth. As a capitalist, it was gratifying to see them come around to the notion that work should be rewarded and not mandated.

This is how I do it. I recruit my "divisions", albeit slowly, but I recruit them by changing one mind at a time.

The Baron and Takuan Seiyo do this on an even larger scale and it is incumbent upon all of us who are able to pierce the veil of Socialism's intellectual murk that we continuing changing thinking minds whenever and wherever we find them.

Ypp said...

Our chance to win is not because the number of our divisions, but because of the terrorists' roughness. They could win politically, but they dont want. They want to be terrible and savage, and that's what will disvalidate their case in the eyes of the world powers. As Israeli ex-prime minister Abba Eban famously said, "Arabs never missed the opportunity to miss the opportunity".

I would say it the other way: God's will is always shown in prticular actions". That means, that we are better in his eyes not only because we think so, but because the other side is really bad.

thll said...

Stalin no doubt had many divisions - but where are they now? And what real impact did they have on Russia's destiny? The Russian people are what they are now in spite of Stalin not because of him.

Europeans have been complacent. But then Europe's ruling elites are baby-boomers - well known for their complacency. Fear not. We are beginning to stir - curiously enough as much as Europeans as members of our respective nations.

Bilgeman said...

Baron;

"How many divisions do we have?"

Wrong question to ask.

The answer, of course, is that we don't know.
And that's a Good Thing, because if WE don't know, then our opponents ALSO don't know.

But this isn't that kind of battle, is it? Nothing so formal as General Orders or Prime Directives and morning musters and suchlike.

This is a clash of cultures, of civilizations, and the "orders" are what individuals, in the collective, decide SHOULD be done.

Much like the Islamist threat, the leadership is diffuse, and wildly individualistic...every Muslim approves of the expansion of Islam into infidel lands,(how could he be a Muslim and NOT favor this?), some go further than that by emigrating and colonizing,(as El Ingles termed it), and some actively attack the cultural institutions of the target populations,(Al-Qaeda and their ilk).

There's no "Pope" or "President" or "King" on the other side of the line making THEIR strategy.
And there should be none on OUR side either.

In the struggle to maintain our broad Western culture, the spectrum runs from middle-class suburban types,to Israelis, Charles Johnson and his precious bicycle, to the British National Party and the Vlaams Belang, and perhaps a few ad hoc groupings of like-minded individuals whose existence give Western security forces insomnia.

And like the threat WE face, they REALLY don't know what quarter the attacks will come from.

Nor should they.

Czechmade said...

To arm your divisions you need your soldiers to use properly the words like God, religion, blasphemy.

Then you go and disarm the soldiers of islam using the same words for no reason.

For ex. the muslim commit a "blasphemy" against their islam by seeking refuge in dar-al-harb.

They think nothing of the institute of zakat providing billions for the needy in dar-al-islam. So let us tell them they are apostates if they come here pure and simply. They are walking insults to their religion/dar-al-islam and they should never claim to be muslims or visit a mosque.

Disarm them further: There is no God in islam. Most muslims live in abject poverty unable to develop their brains/souls or live with other muslims peacefully. Instead of ploughing their brains/souls they plough their women treating them like slaves. Instead of cultivating themselves (which might be the only reason for having a religion) they bring to the world other identic handicapped persons in huge numbers in hope to solve their problems.

Use their Pavlov reflexes to make them dislike their "traditions".
Adopt their wording and turn it against them like a gun.

Being disabled for ever they have the only chance to amend their miserable fate by searching for free productive developped people to make them work for them.

Islam in nutshell.

Sagunto said...

"..But this isn't that kind of battle, is it?.."

@Bilgeman,

My thoughts exactly! No divisions.
I like the name "Counterjihad" for its clarity, but there's no special need for a movement to be erected in order to rise against Islam. The movement is already there, still existing under the old name: Civilization.

Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.

Baron Bodissey said...

Bilgeman and Sagunto --

Yes, that was my point.

It's a common mistake, to think that just because it doesn't make the news, the resistance doesn't exist or isn't widespread.

The entire political and media structure of the West is designed to suppress any such information, in order to keep potential dissenters fragmented and demoralized.

But the elites make the mistake of believing their own propaganda that they put on the TV. Things continue to happen that are beyond their control, but such events occur beyond the edge of floodlit areas and thus remain unseen by the powers that be.

People who look to the actions of government or the news media for evidence of what's happening are looking in the wrong direction.

Abraham said...

I'm on Individual Ready Reserve, let me know when you need me.

ɱØяñιηg$ʇðя ©™ said...

I liked the sci-fi analogy with Body Snatchers although I think it is even more fitting to compare islam to the borgs of Star Trek-fame. "You will all be assimilated! Resistance is futile!"

Abu Abdullah said...

You can do a rough estimate.

Take the UK, for example, where the cleavage is quite clear. The BNP is the only party with an openly anti-Islam agenda, so we can safely assume that all their supporters are anti-Islamists. If memory serves, it garnered something like half a millions votes in the last local elections (the BNP lurkers here can correct me on that).

As for the U.S., one can go by the U.S. readership of Jihad Watch.

Conservative Swede said...

Very nice articles by Takuan Seiyo.

Zenster is right in pinpointing the Westerners lack of desire for retribution. This is indeed at the core of the problem. Look at all those cases with an underage girl, utterly defenceless and innocent, being gang raped for hours (sometimes days) by Muslim thugs, involving torture and permanent disfiguration of their bodies (by using acid e.g.). There are hundreds, well thousands of such cases in the West by now (Tottenham Lad e.g. has an extensive collection). AND STILL NO OUTRAGE OVER IT! Not even a registrable reaction at all. The Westerners have found a way to pacify themselves into not seeing this or not caring about it.

To me, it is clear that any honourable society wouldn't accept even *one* such case. THERE'S SUPPOSED TO BE AN OUTRAGE ALREADY THE VERY FIRST TIME! Otherwise, there is no true solidarity within the community, no true community at all actually. The outrage over such acts is the basis for any morality among humans. Without such an outrage there simply is no morality at all, only nihilism.

So how many divisions do we have?

None, actually. Unless we start counting as the Swedish Army: "Oh, we could have 30,000 men defending our country, but it takes a year for them to get prepared" (No I kid you not, this it what they say today). Same with us, we might have a number of divisions on our side, only that they will take some 10 years to prepare... or 15... (we don't even know actually).

Easier then to count the number of "divisions" we have, by counting in how many ways we are divided. Put a handful of anti-jihadists in a room, and you will have virtually as many antagonistic differences, which are all deeply emotional and non-negotiable. One see the rise of Euro-fascism as the greatest threat and want to fight that even before Islam (CJ, Islam in Europe, Pastorius, etc.). Another one would like to see an alliance with Russia against Islam. A third one would rather escalate the conflict with Russia into war. And then there are the combination of these fears as well as in addition the fear/despise -- amounting to a veto against any alliance -- of America, France, Israel, China, and Germany of course.

A wider alliance is simply impossible given this. It certainly won't grow naturally. The resentments against group X or country Y goes so deep, into the very bones of people. And there seems to be no way to overcome it. The only alliances we would see are the once made under the gallows, as the one with Stalin in WWII. But by at that point things will already have gone terminally bad.

So forget about international alliances, you'd say. Better to work locally, in each country. Well apart from not being able to talk about one anti-jihad movement anymore, there are a similar number of divisions within any country, about who's a fascist and not, then there are the David Duke folks, and the ones that are so liberal that they are hysterically paralyzed even if they have acquired proper knowledge about the situation, etc. And in addition to that, most of the sentiments mentioned above, regarding which countries that cannot be accepted as allies, will strongly divide people within any country, even if no such international alliance is attempted.

This is the situation we are in.

But maybe in ten years we will have our divisions... But that won't grow from any grass-root movement (I believe that I have demonstrated the impossibility of that above). People will (obviously) need to be herded into joint action by a new leadership after an "Inglesian" discontinuity. Think Franco or Pinochet.

Whiskey said...

I have significant criticisms of Seiyo's conclusions.

First, it is in my mind laughable and dancing around the obvious to say that the West, including Europe and America have been captured by "Pod People" and "Bodysnatchers." People are very good at figuring out their own interests, and this is no exception. Once you understand that the supplanting of the Average White guy BENEFITS certain segments you understand the deep social support that guys like Obama have, or for that matter Gordon Brown.

I've read the YMCA cite in the Seiyo article, note how he ignores the obvious: GENERATIONAL differences between women on "Leftist" stuff:

Healthcare reform is a key priority for 18-29 women by 87% to 76% older women. Quality and cost of education, 85% to 76%, Housing Crisis (83%-69%) and HIV/AIDS (66-45%). These are generational differences, and some indicate (Young Women are healthy, and don't own homes) initial attitudes against their own self-interests. Older women need healthcare for example, much more than 18-29 year old women.

It is the GENERATIONAL gap in attitudes that should provide us with our clues. Cultural Marxism and the idea that hard-left ideas just "grow" is IMHO bunk, it does not explain how these ideas find beyond the small group of University graduates and Entertainment people. After all, even Rosie's Variety hour was a flop and has been canceled.

Young women 18-29 can expect to be single pretty much their entire lives now. They very likely won't get married, and therefore their female support and social networks, AND THEIR STATUS IN THEM, dominates their concern.

This is the mechanism by which PC is grown, maintained, enforced, and spread.

The social attitudes of single young female social networks, which dominate the Gen Y women (and Gen X, too) explain most if not all of the PC-Multiculturalist attitudes.

It is HARD for conservatives to do this, but imagine you are a young woman. Above all you dislike to hate the nerdy, clueless guys who bother you and block the uber-Alpha men you really desire. Your peer group hates them too, for the same reason. If Caesar divided Gaul into three, single young women divide them into two: the "hot" socially dominant Alpha men, and the rest of us. Non-White guys from Africa and Latin America and the Middle East are seen as "Alpha" and socially dominant. East Asian men are regarded as at best "cute" which equates to total lack of sexual desire and the fervent hope they'll simply become "fabulous" gay designers. The treatment of "Hiro" on the NBC-TV series "Heroes" is pretty indicative. Young Asian men know it well and resent the hell out of it.

In short the growth of a huge, critical mass of single young women who above all need the approval of their peer social network, and hate most of all the ordinary White guy, explains the "why/how/who" of PC far better than any theories about Pod People. In fact, you could graph growth in women's incomes, literacy, independence, the use of the pill/condom, delayed childbirth and lack of marriage, urban anonymous living, and hard-leftism PC, and come up with a one-to-one correspondence.

The strength of the West, it's independent and free women, are also it's greatest weakness. The generational aspects in the YMCA report lend credence to this interpretation.

Yes, long term women face restrictions in their freedoms when the pesky average White guys who pester them are gone from the scene or marginalized. The same long-term problems smoking has for one's health. Yet millions of women, more than ever in the West, smoke because it keeps the weight off and they make the short-term trade. As they do for Breast Cancer (enhanced risk if no kids before 30).

Whiskey said...

Look at the support healthy young women give to Health Care. It is far higher than that of the older women.

They do so because the hip, cool, "Alpha Male" media god, whom celebrities and media people worship as a Living God, thinks Health Care is important.

Trading off short-term gains (approval from female peer social networks that hate "Joe the Plumber" with a passion) for the long term certainty of discrimination is something young women do every day. Check out places where young women hang out. You will be shocked at how many smoke. Despite the known and obvious dangers. Young men do similar things too, so it's not Gender specific either.

People generally WILL make time-related trade-offs and take higher risk later for short term gains in the now unless that strategy faces social disapproval and the loss of face and networks.

Moreover, Young women fundamentally over-estimate their social power over men. The average man will simply go away meekly when faced with social disapproval and PC/Multiculturalism exclusion is powerful on men seeking female behaviors. Young women think a police force arresting sexual assailants and preventing violence against women happens by "magic" because it's part of the modern infrastructure that just "happens" ... as if a nation of laws does not actually depend on the social attitudes mandating vigorous enforcement behind it. It's the same mistake young women make time after time in estimating their control over dangerous but attractive boyfriends.

This gender-age difference suggests that anti-Jihad will only succeed when the fight becomes brutal, unavoidable, and a bare fight over women in a tribal setting. Because young women have solid, self-interested reasons to side with Jihad for now.

Michael Servetus said...

Conservative Swede:"Zenster is right in pinpointing the Westerners lack of desire for retribution. This is indeed at the core of the problem. Look at all those cases with an underage girl, utterly defenceless and innocent, being gang raped for hours (sometimes days) by Muslim thugs, involving torture and permanent disfiguration of their bodies (by using acid e.g.). There are hundreds, well thousands of such cases in the West by now (Tottenham Lad e.g. has an extensive collection). AND STILL NO OUTRAGE OVER IT! Not even a registrable reaction at all. The Westerners have found a way to pacify themselves into not seeing this or not caring about it.

To me, it is clear that any honourable society wouldn't accept even *one* such case. THERE'S SUPPOSED TO BE AN OUTRAGE ALREADY THE VERY FIRST TIME!".

Let me just say, this really gets to me. It appeals to and strikes at my sense of honor as a man, which is something that is avoided in modern Western Civilization, for that very reason and for all the reasons mentioned by several here including Whiskey's comments.

We have become to accustomed to not going out into the streets, not taking matters into our own hands. There was a time when America and what was formerly Europe would be out on the streets for good or for evil but at least they were out on the streets.Now we sit and wait for someone else to come and protect us, our manly responsibilites have been taken away and now we are afraid of it.

laine said...

I think Whiskey is on to something in that PC has risen in tandem with women's power. Women make up the majority of university students now, even in medicine in many faculties. They dominate public education staff and soon universities as well. They are also disproportionately the busybody social workers that riddle government bureaucracy now.

The wimpiest socialist countries of Europe like Spain and Sweden are basically run by female politicians and a few male eunuchs. Even the capitalist titans such as Bill Gates and Warren Buffet seem to defer to their wives on social issues. And so it goes.

Obama is the fantasy boyfriend of women across the board no matter what age or marital status. He's the good looking smooth talker, slightly out of bounds because he's black but with a Harvard degree and Brooks Brothers suit, loyal and properly deferential to his wife and therefore women in general, promising to look after them to their dying day with public health care etc. Even Hillary's grizzled old femnazis didn't switch their vote to McCain but became all dewy eyed for the cool black dude.

What was that Native saying, something about a nation being lost if its women lose faith in it? A Native American professor quoted it in response to a young white coed who burbled her admiration for his culture and basically said that she and other whites had nothing to contribute.

Well too many Western women have emasculated their own men and created a vacuum for men with more than old fashioned ideas to come in and take over. When they say the 50's they mean the 1250's or even earlier...

But you know, when I look at my own offspring, sons or daughters, they are lovely people who are simply living their lives decently and don't pay too close attention to politics. They dismiss my attempts to warn them as I once dismissed my parents' political guidance as the ranting of out of touch fuddy duddies. Ironically, it's they who are out of touch.

So it's not something consciously planned in most cases, but more a case of blissfully unaware sheep herded by a small and driven group like Soros and his puppet Obama etc.

I blame most of this on leftist domination of our education system and media and resulting indoctrination of our young people who spend more hours listening to their idiot socialist teachers and Hollywood product than their own parents.

As the recent post on the Yuri Bezmenov interview made clear, once indoctrinated, it cannot easily be reversed. The only hope is that those kids who have received some counter-programming, whose parents have done some home schooling on politics if nothing else can rapidly switch gears when the true face of socialism starts to be revealed.

Slender hope, but hope nevertheless. Look where hope got Obamamaniacs.

Sagunto said...

I second the analysis of @Wiskey and I see a contrast with the way figures are used, more or less to be taken at face value, by Seiyo in his essay.

Instead of denouncing - however morally justified perhaps - it makes much more sense i.m.o., to try and actually understand phenomena that seem to weaken the support for a counterjihad.

And that would be my point of criticism. There are many reasons to applaud the moral fervor of extended comments on the decay of conservative values in the West, but I see little strategic value in denouncing groups of people that could prove to be potential allies in the long run. I have some serious reservations when the Roman Catholic Church and other Christian Churches are condemned in the article of Seiyo, nor do I think that merely blaming "consumer capitalism" is the way to go.

Kind regs from Amsterdam,
Sag.

Czechmade said...

Sagunto:

"but I see little strategic value in denouncing groups of people that could prove to be potential allies in the long run."

That is why I regularly stress education as a tool in my comments.

By putting the conservative label you
split people in advance. Most people are a mixture of tendencies.
Labeling them you get stuck for no reasons.

For a quality debate we need lot of people taking serious interest in our history and cultural heritage.

We need a neutre (which is education) ground attracting various people to wash away their leftist ballast they got at school or from their friends circles.

In oppressed societies also the role of purely cultural events is on the rise. We should promote our culture as an indirect vehicle of our voice and strenghtening background.

Do not dream of making jumps, real strategy is thinking of step one two, three etc. and implementing every step as a precondition for efficient and unreversible taking step x.

Pondering on our disease only makes us permanent confortable inhabitants of the Kafka castle.

Break out of the castle and start breathing fresh air.

Conservative Swede said...

Czechmade,

That is why I regularly stress education as a tool in my comments.

So don't forget logic as part of your education then. Any number of books read become virtually useless if unable to stick to basic logic. We have seen recently in this forum a number of more frequent posters loudly attacking others for the opposite of what they said. It is obvious that this destroys the fabric of dialog, and derails the purpose of a forum like this.

Bilgeman said...

"I'm on Individual Ready Reserve, let me know when you need me."-Abraham

Respectfully, no.
You're either actively engaged or you're sitting on your ass.

There isn't a "middle ground".

And if you need someone to tell you what to do and when to do it, you're not much good to the cause.

You should know the "WHY" deep down in your guts, after that, the "what, where and when?" is a matter of strategy and tactics.

X said...

Respectfully, bilgeman, that's bunk. The majority know nothing; never have, never will. They follow the orders of whoever catches the greatest part of their attention for the longest period. Take the American revolution, and ask yourself, how many of those fighting for the revolutionaries actually believed what they were fighting for, and how many people simply saw themselves as fighting simply to feed and clothe themselves? How many of those people behind the lines - not fighting, but supporting the revolutionary cause - actually believed in the statements of those they followed, and how many went along with it because it was simply the way they were asked to go? I'd hazard that the majority didn't give two hoots who was in charge and did what they did merely because they were asked to do so.

People who need to be told what to do are invaluable to a cause. such as this. Lets look at it this way: if we're not telling them what to do, someone else will be, and at that point they'll be fighting against us. Such people are a force multiplier that should not be rejected simply because they aren't "actively engaged".

Unknown said...

Graham,

Take the American revolution, and ask yourself, how many of those fighting for the revolutionaries actually believed what they were fighting for, and how many people simply saw themselves as fighting simply to feed and clothe themselves?.... I'd hazard that the majority didn't give two hoots who was in charge and did what they did merely because they were asked to do so.

The British settlers of present-day Ontario and New Brunswick were Loyalists who fled America during the war.

Bilgeman said...

" Take the American revolution, and ask yourself, how many of those fighting for the revolutionaries actually believed what they were fighting for, and how many people simply saw themselves as fighting simply to feed and clothe themselves? "-Graham Dawson

I'd observe that the winters at Valley Forge and the even worse one after that would rather have had the effect of thinning out the "summer soldiers".
The Continental Army, and the Confederate Army, were spectacularly BAD at victualling and clothing their troops,and neither were great shakes at arming them also.

"Lets look at it this way: if we're not telling them what to do, someone else will be, and at that point they'll be fighting against us."

Ahhh, here's where all those years of fun with the militia-types pays off.

Dude shows up in a forum and practically BEGS someone to go tell him what to do.
D'ye think he's here asking for a boycott list or a schedule of peaceful demonstrations?

Nope..."Father" Abraham up above used a military terminology to describe his status...he wants "Shootin' Orders", see?

Well our chum Abe is going to have to work THAT one out for himself, as far as I'm concerned.

Because you can never be ABSOLUTELY SURE that "Abraham" isn't actually an Eff Bee Aye agent snooping here because he's on his SAIC's "sh*tlist", right?

Y'know, back in the day some of the most strident and vocal Christian Identity and neo-Nazi posters would e-mail on the QT and assert that they were ACTUALLY nice Jewish kids in the Student Union, trolling for B'nai B'rith.

"People who need to be told what to do are invaluable to a cause."

We're not at that stage yet.