Just to be clear, I don’t think even most neoreactionaries would classify as white nationalists? Though maybe now we are arguing over the definition of white nationalism, which is definitely a vague term and could be interpreted many ways. I was thinking about it from the perspective of racism, though I can imagine a much broader definition that includes something more like “advocating for nations based on values historically associated with whiteness”, which would obviously include neoreaction, but would also presumably be a much more tenable position in discourse. So for now I am going to assume you mean something much more straightforwardly based on racial superiority, which also appears to be the Wikipedia definition.
I’ve debated with a number of neoreactionaries, and I’ve never seen them bring up much stuff about racial superiority. Usually just arguing against democracy and in favor of centralized control and various arguments derived from that, though I also don’t have a ton of datapoints. There is definitely a focus on the superiority of western culture in their writing and rhetoric, much of which is flawed and I am deeply opposed to many of the things I’ve seen at least some neoreactionaries propose, but my sense is that I wouldn’t characterize the philosophy fundamentally as white nationalist in the racist sense of the term. Though of course the few neoreactionaries that I have debated are probably selected in various ways that reduces the likelihood of having extreme opinions on these dimensions (though they are also the ones that are most likely to engage with EA, so I do think the sample should carry substantial weight).
Of course, some neoreactionaries are also going to be white nationalists, and being a neoreactionary will probably correlate with white nationalism at least a bit, but my guess is that at least the people adjacent to EA and Rationality that I’ve seen engage with that philosophy haven’t been very focused on white nationalism, and I’ve frequently seen them actively argue against it.
Just to be clear, I don’t think even most neoreactionaries would classify as white nationalists? Though maybe now we are arguing over the definition of white nationalism, which is definitely a vague term and could be interpreted many ways. I was thinking about it from the perspective of racism, though I can imagine a much broader definition that includes something more like “advocating for nations based on values historically associated with whiteness”, which would obviously include neoreaction, but would also presumably be a much more tenable position in discourse. So for now I am going to assume you mean something much more straightforwardly based on racial superiority, which also appears to be the Wikipedia definition.
I’ve debated with a number of neoreactionaries, and I’ve never seen them bring up much stuff about racial superiority. Usually just arguing against democracy and in favor of centralized control and various arguments derived from that, though I also don’t have a ton of datapoints. There is definitely a focus on the superiority of western culture in their writing and rhetoric, much of which is flawed and I am deeply opposed to many of the things I’ve seen at least some neoreactionaries propose, but my sense is that I wouldn’t characterize the philosophy fundamentally as white nationalist in the racist sense of the term. Though of course the few neoreactionaries that I have debated are probably selected in various ways that reduces the likelihood of having extreme opinions on these dimensions (though they are also the ones that are most likely to engage with EA, so I do think the sample should carry substantial weight).
Of course, some neoreactionaries are also going to be white nationalists, and being a neoreactionary will probably correlate with white nationalism at least a bit, but my guess is that at least the people adjacent to EA and Rationality that I’ve seen engage with that philosophy haven’t been very focused on white nationalism, and I’ve frequently seen them actively argue against it.