Monumental Hypocrisy
In 1930, Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset wrote The Revolt of the Masses, a prophetic work identifying and defining the appearance of the “mass-man,” a barbaric figure whose ignorance was a necessary precursor to the rise of the violent masses. When the collectivization of “mass-men” into a unified mob was finally achieved, then the seizure of power through destruction and cultural erasure was at hand.
Anticipating by less than a decade revolutionary elements that would manifest in the Spanish Civil War, Ortega warned that the mass-man could emerge from any social background, and that his behavior destructive to his own culture “does not represent a new civilization struggling with a previous one, but a mere negation.” This type of anarchist “did not care to give reasons or even to be right.” Ortega argued that cultivated irrationality is what set apart 20th-century fascist and communist movements from what came before: “the right not to be right, not to be reasonable: the reason of unreason.”
Ortega’s warning of this irrational and anti-rational unmaking of civilization finds its modern analog in the current riots and violent anarchy sweeping Western nations. Despite widespread prosperity, extensive social-welfare safety nets, universal access to educational opportunities and job training, generous benefits for unassimilated migrants, and numerous social-justice programs that privilege minority populations, large numbers among the younger generations have been conditioned to believe, without evidence or example, that Western culture is overtly and systemically racist, misogynist, and colonialist. Miseducated by radicalized public schools and universities, manipulated by unscrupulous Democratic politicians, and inflamed by the anarchic rhetoric of groups such as Antifa and Black Lives Matter, these burgeoning young radicals perfectly match Ortega’s description of dangerous and ignorant mass-men; his reminder that they might manifest from any social class is borne out by the fact that most of the violent rioters, looters, and arsonists are middle- and upper-middle -class white kids, supported and egged on by elite athletes, artists, entertainers, and one-percenter corporate and tech CEOs.
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