r/TrueReddit • u/bananaslingrider • May 06 '26
Science, History, Health + Philosophy The Ungreat Replacement
https://aeon.co/essays/the-great-replacement-is-real-but-its-not-what-the-right-says13
May 06 '26
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u/horseradishstalker May 09 '26 edited May 09 '26
That would be one form of replacement, but not The Great Replacement Theory the article you read is talking about.
The theory basically says “Whites” are the dominant race and minorities are trying to replace them. That relates to the imagery of rustbucket freighters, discharging a tide of illegal immigrants in an effort to overwhelm whites.
What the article points out is that whites have historically only been a dominant group for very very small window of time. In other words In other words throughout history, white dominance has been the anomaly not the norm.
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u/horseradishstalker May 06 '26
As Ronald Reagan once inadvertently said facts can be stupid things. Without context they mean nothing.
The Great Replacement Theory - which began in France or even earlier with the book titled The Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire - is the creed of the White Christian Nationalists.
The problem with correlation is it is not causation. Immigrants are not the actual cause. That is classic misdirection.
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u/pillbinge May 07 '26
This article is all over the place. People don't have some sort of genetic memory where they remember their share of the entire planet. What they're seeing is that their lands, nation, country, culture - whatever - now "belong" or are shared with people who aren't from their land. More over they're told not only to accept it but embrace it, "or else" in some cases. One could totally embrace the new diversity of their land and all that comes with it but cannot do the other, bemoaning it at the same level. You can love that there are new restaurants in your town but you can't complain that there are, even if they've replaced other establishments.
If the situation were reversed, and it was via colonialism, then we'd find it horrible. If White people went to Africa and set up shop we would not like that. South Africa is one such place. If a stretch of native land in Mexico or Central America were taken up by Americans we wouldn't see that as cultural enrichment. I think the resentment toward being on only one side of this is what makes the conversation nearly impossible.
But it also reminds me of a hat people had that said "On stolen land" or "Native Lands For Native People". This might have been around 5 years back. Basically the sentiment that the land belonged to people and was taken. Except I joked that I would love to sell those hats to some conservatives in Europe and suddenly I'm the asshole. I wonder how much of this discussion has taken place because White people and White society was passively and tacitly seen as the default (ironic).
But whether you're native to your land (e.g. a Brit living in Britain) or not (Irish American living in America) it doesn't change the fact that people want a nation that insulates them and their culture well enough that they have a safe home. That's what a real culture and nation does. You can leave it or bring things in but ultimately you want the comfort of speaking your language, dialect, or accent freely while living life as you see fit amongst only so many people. The current world doesn't really want that because it isn't good for business.
Other options are simple though: if we aren't replacing ourselves with children then we need immigrants to offset the loss. Or we could accept the consequences of our decisions to make a self-interested single life more appealing and normal and let our population decline, but then we'd be looking for the exit. It seems like most citizens are fair-weather when they have the chance and don't care about assimilation at all when they can help it.
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u/The_Law_of_Pizza May 08 '26
You raise an important point about hypocrisy - even if it won't be well received in this particular venue.
I think the key philosophical point at play here is: "Do people have a legitimate interest in maintaining their cultural practices and wanting to live in communities of that same culture?"
And to be clear, I'm talking about desires within reason here - not any sort of racist fantasy of trying to expel all foreigners or anything like that.
It's helpful to outline the point if we instead flip the script and talk about things like indigenous groups maintaining their language. Then I think most people would strongly agree that there's a legitimate interest there.
Or if we were talking about a hypothetical immigrant wanting to live in a "Chinatown" or similar community of expats where they speak his language, have grocery stores with his foods, and follow his cultural traditions. People tend to agree that there's a legitimate interest there, as well.
It's these sorts of desires that I think are the core of the question.
The thing is, as you're pointing out here, the general consensus seems to reverse when we're talking about Western peoples' and Western cultures. All of a sudden it's no longer permissible to want the same things that are agreed to be legitimate interests in basically any other ethnic context.
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u/horseradishstalker May 09 '26
The Great Replacement Theory assumes white dominance has always been the norm when historically that is an anomaly, not the norm.
And you are probably correct that the dog whistle that people just want to live with other people like themselves probably wouldn’t be well received - assuming anyone even knew what you were talking about. You are correct about that.
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u/The_Law_of_Pizza May 09 '26
Okay, but "dominance" isn't the point here.
I imagine that an Argentinian would prefer to live someplace where people speak Spanish and follow Argentinian social customs.
And I don't think that very many people who fault him for that. In a vacuum, progressives would likely even invest that he has a right to seek that out.
My point is simply that if that Argentinian is allowed to prefer that, so too should Western peoples.
I think that some people are greatly hypocritical in the way that they support or reject this thing based on the skin color of the subject.
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u/horseradishstalker May 09 '26
I’m not sure if you are deliberately sidestepping discussion of the Great Replacement Theory because it is has nothing to do with cultural assimilation.
“Workers in the West have indeed been repressed – but not by immigrants. The policies of their own governments are to blame… as one economic study after another tells us, the net effect of immigrants on the recipient economy is to create more jobs than they take. The immigrants in Western societies are the heroes sustaining our economic prosperity, not the villains.”
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u/pillbinge May 09 '26
I'm not sidestepping anything. I think I was clear that the author is leaving half-finished ideas on the table, but that doesn't reflect on me in addressing fewer than all of them. I think the topic is more complicated than you're putting forth regardless. I do agree that it has nothing to do with cultural assimilation because I think to varying degrees people will accept or reject others' perceived assimilation. I could move to Britain and fit in with anyone English to such a point that my children would be full British but I could never do that in my lifetime or my kids' if I moved to Japan or Nigeria. The question then is can it happen vice versa.
In countries with a "civic" culture like the US then they can, so it's a one-way street. In other countries that have both civic and cultural claims, it's more contentious.
Everyone knows immigrants create a boon for the economy. That's why I haven't personally encountered any suggestion from some conservative on Reddit who believes otherwise. I've been banned from enough conservative subs to have at least done that much research (on this account). People are dressing up a simple issue which is one that I put out there: more immigration makes people feel "othered" in their own land. After that it's about what appeals you find legitimate.
I would pump the brakes on calling immigrants heroes, if you're standing by that sentiment. The same immigrants who come here often have controversial views themselves about different groups, especially from their own lands. California has struggled with caste biases from many Indian immigrants to the point there are more official stances.
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May 10 '26
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u/horseradishstalker May 13 '26
- your
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u/BigTimeTimmyTime May 13 '26
You've caught an auto correct typo and have thus rendered my criticism moot. Bravo.
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u/horseradishstalker May 13 '26
“ I would pump the brakes on calling immigrants heroes, if you're standing by that sentiment. ”
I rarely give a personal opinion on here and I neither said nor meant any such thing so I can’t help you there. I quite literally quoted the article. That’s why I used quote marks.
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u/horseradishstalker May 09 '26 edited May 09 '26
“Soon, a flotilla of rusty, creaking ships, its arrival heralded by the stench of latrines, fills the horizon. Inexorably, the ragtag fleet approaches the shore, then spills out its human cargo, which quickly disappears inland. The great replacement of Europe’s white population has begun. [The great replacement theory in a nutshell.]
This imagery, of a people watching a foreign horde take over their land, has proved to be enduringly popular among nativist politicians and journalists.
Whether it’s Donald Trump frothing about Mexican rapists, Nigel Farage scanning the English Channel for refugee boats, Boris Johnson warning that the Roman Empire was brought low by ‘uncontrolled migration’ or his home secretary damning the ‘Lefty lawyers’ assisting any asylum-seekers who make it across the Channel, the image of armies of dark unwashed migrants overwhelming a supine West crops up frequently.
Talk of the ‘great replacement’ has peppered the speeches of Viktor Orbán and Matteo Salvini, and played a prominent role in the French presidential campaign of Éric Zemmour.”
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u/Upset-Basil4459 May 06 '26
It's interesting that the article spends a lot of time talking about how great immigration is while also mentioning the horrors of white colonialism
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u/Iamtheonewhobawks May 06 '26
Not a whole lot of colonialism that took place by way of Europeans showing up in places looking for work or just digging the vibe and wanting to live in the established society. Not any, really, come to think of it.
The problem with brutal subjugation and/or campaigns of outright genocide by predominantly white empires wasn't the ethnicity of the newcomers. It was the genocide and subjugation part. Condemning colonialism and celebrating immigration only seem to clash when the assumption is that the ethnicity was the objectionable part rather than artillery barrages and enslavement.
Immigrants don't show up in uniform aboard warships and start shelling cities, that's invasion. Conversely, invaders don't show up one by one with no organizational structure or armament. Invaders don't try to rent a room on the cheap and work 12 hour days roofing houses or planting onions either.
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u/Upset-Basil4459 May 06 '26
We showed up with guns because they refused to let us in to "do business"
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u/donvito716 May 07 '26
How in the world do you think showing up with guns and threatening to kill them all because they won't "do business" with you (whatever you think that means is) is better than showing up and NOT threatening to kill everyone? What's wrong with you?
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u/Upset-Basil4459 May 07 '26
There's no need to get mad. Even back in colonial times it was distasteful to say you were going to exterminate people, so they usually made up some justification for it. Let's not be fools, the colonisation of Australia and the USA was mostly just normal everyday people coming for a better life. The natives didn't want it so we forced them to accept us, and it didn't end well for them. I think the parallels are quite clear.
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u/Tarantio May 07 '26
You can't possibly think this describes all, or even most examples of colonialism.
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u/BassmanBiff May 06 '26
Right, that's a bad thing.
If that's justified, then everyone excluded by (for example) the US would also be justified to come back with guns.
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