You won't lead the way.

Over at orthosphere.org contributor Bolland has written a good article (which was inspired by the thoughts in this post) about the site's place amongst other right-o-sphere blogs.

When last I tried to distinguish the Orthosphere with respect to other clusters on the Right, I appealed to what I take to be our defining principles, especially

1. moral community (the social authority of God; rejection of official neutrality)
2. given meanings (an understanding of natural law and tradition)
3. loyalty to the particular (legitimacy of local, national, cultural, and ethnic loyalties)

(See the linked post for an explanation of these points.)

That’s what we are.  It tells us what kind of basic unity we do or don’t have with other groups.
The first principle is our point of overlap with the Catholic Integralists, a group united around the Social Kingship of Christ.  It rejects liberalism’s core principle, affirming the need for an established Church without saying exactly which church that should be.  Naturally, there would be some disagreement about that among us, but no one is hiding his opinion, and we all agree that establishing even a rival Christian church would be far preferable to a secular establishment.  Thus Catholics, Orthodox, Anglicans, and Calvinists can be at home in the Orthosphere; I’m not sure about Baptists.  Classical liberals from all denominations will find themselves in foreign territory.

Okay, I'm following you. I agree for  the most part.

The second principle is, I think our most distinctive one.  One can see its style of thinking even in the early days of View from the Right, and I made it the focal point of Throne and Altar from the beginning.  Many defenses of “traditionalism” involve appeals to the complexity of society and the frailty of reason, or when the meaning traditional morality brings to its practitioners’ lives is acknowledged, this is regarded as a psychological trick, an illusion (albeit a socially necessary one), which can only work to the extent that it is misunderstood.  We must be vigilant in distinguishing ourselves from these lines of thought.  It’s not that pragmatic and functionalist analyses can’t yield valid insights; they often do.  The danger is that our position, being more subtle, can easily be misread by readers expecting the usual defenses of “traditional morality”.

I'm still with you, and interesting thoughts.

Then he became borderline mentally handicapped.

This is the main reason we cannot subordinate ourselves to the neoreactionaries by granting flagship status to their publication Social Matter.  People are already inclined to assume we share their functionalist premises, and failing to make it clear that we are not neoreactionaries would make that danger worse.  One can still acknowledge Mark’s point that we could do a better job working together with our allies and pooling intellectual resources.  And, of course, why not draw attention to quality Social Matter articles when appropriate?

Bolland seems incapable of understanding that, though Social Matter is quite a different site from Orthosphere in its focus and its tone (much  less philosophical and esoteric than Ortho), it's ultimately - to me - an "ally" when looking at modernism with a critical eye. I do not defend whatever weaknesses the site has, but since it covers a wide variety of criticism on modernity (feminism, social media, the role of humanities in higher education) I do not dismiss it. These things are very important to discuss because they are ultimately the lefts way of "getting to" the masses. As someone under the age of 35 social media is the highway that the left uses to gain support and to change whatever controversial reputation into a sterling one, if you're picked to be that narrative. The left practically owns academia. What does the right dominate at? I can't name one thing, honestly. Sure there are podcasts, radio and the blogging world, but these alternatives don't hold a candle to the mammoths that is academia, social media and (not listed) entertainment.

 If there are four wheels to a car, I'd consider both mentioned sites as one of the wheels. Bolland wants Ortho to be in the driver's seat - the leader, the flagship - that when people look back on on what poked the balloon of modernity they'd point to Ortho. As someone who has more so observed the right-o-sphere blogs than actual contributor, I'd say that's a bit arrogant and laughable to even want. The self-importance is a complete turn-off.

I have an ever growing list of links on the right side of my page. It's a mixture of blogs critical of what is insidiously (and not so-insidiously) making home in the minds and therefore the homes of the American populace. I see no reason to subject any blog that is listed as a subordinate to another since each one lacks something another can offer. I might even include white nationalists/pagan/atheistic blogs (who, from my readings, absolutely do not like traditional Christianity) because I see they make decent enough articles against modernity and feminism. I'm not even white. I'll even admit that, as some articles point out, modern Christianity is rather wimpish (see: doormat Catholics at CAF and, to an extent, Pope Francis) and its acceptance of feminism is making it eat its own ass (see: liberal Christianity).

Bolland wants Ortho to be the LeBron James or the Derrick Rose or the Patrick Kane of the right-o-sphere. It can't. It doesn't have the ability. It is a very good sight, it's just the nature that is blogging really doesn't allow for an "it" type of player. Now there's Roosh V for the "game & anti-feminism" corner of the right-o-sphere and I'd consider his site the "it" player for that certain mindset, but that mindset is ultimately simplistic and attracts the bitter loser in almost any male. (I appreciate that he points out that females can be as big of a horny, greedy douche(ttes) like males -- in that way they're equal. I also appreciate that he brings some confidence to the truly pathetic male losers whose only social outing is some strategic card game at some convention.) Roosh V's target area and, um, "specialty" makes it easy for him to be the "it" player. Commenting in favor of traditional morals, Christianity and traditional male masculinity and urging females to embrace innate femininity? That's a much larger task filled with backlash and alienation from secular types, of all political persuasion, and ultimately modernity itself. You can't have an "it" player in this case - you need a committee that attacks the beast at various angles. Sort of like this video.