With Nancy Robertson
Stella Morabito is a journalist whose work I respect immensely. Her new book “The Weaponization of Loneliness,” is a tour de force examination of how tyrants move populations toward their totalitarian interests. Stella’s perspective as a historian of Russian and Soviet propaganda, is filtered through the lens of Soviet tyranny and herewith is her detailed and brilliant discussion with Nancy Robertson, which I find extremely valuable.
I have studied the tyranny underlying the gender industry from a capitalist perspective. In other words: Tyranny, American style. A capitalist market that is unfettered, uncontrolled, and left to run away, by its design, forces all the wealth of society upward, into the hands of oligarchs who then instill their tyranny on the populace via the market, which we see repeatedly with the gender industry and elsewhere.
An ideology of transhumanism, positioned as a human right for a male sexual fetish of owning womanhood, is being forced into our universities, institutions, public policies, laws, and language, by capital, and those governing the capital. Oligarchs, such as the Pritzker family, Marc Benioff, Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and Elon Musk, and capital assets management firms such as Black Rock and Vanguard, who have technological and medical investments in transhumanism and the profits to be garnered from transhumanist augmentations, are tyrannically forcing on the public an ideology that is anti-reality/anti-human. They are doing so with the threat of financial isolation and abandonment from the market, The unfettered capitalist market has functioned as well as any dictator with an ideological bent and a drive for absolute control. It has led to a commoditization of all life, manifesting extreme isolation for all of us, from our families, from our communities, from meaningful rituals, from our land base, and now, with the burgeoning gender industry, from our bodies.
All avenues of tyranny lead us to the same dark place from which we will eventually be unable to resist. I hope this discussion inspires you to political action soon. It is my assessment that we are rapidly running out of time to resist this global, totalitarian, juggernaut.
Many thanks to Nancy Robertson for outlining and facilitating this important discussion.
- Jennifer Bilek
The following transcript has been edited for clarity.
Nancy Robertson: Every year, the Human Rights Campaign sends one of their representatives to each company and issues a long and detailed list of demands. One of these demands is creating ads that promote LGBTQ+ people. That’s how Budweiser got embroiled in the Dylan Mulvaney controversy. The mathematician and cultural critic James Lindsay has called the “Corporate Equality Index” (CEI) ranking system “an extortion racket like the Mafia.” CEI scores range from one to 100, and companies are threatened that if they don’t comply with the HRC’s annual demands they’ll lose their CEI scores. Corporations jump through a lot of hoops to comply. Of Fortune Magazine’s top 20 companies, 15 received a perfect score of 100. And over 800 corporations received high scores.
Stella Morabito: They really have a stranglehold. It’s insidious, and you're exactly right, Nancy. James Lindsey's correct that it’s an extortion racket, of the worst kind, I’d add. And it's gotten really bad over the years, largely because of these ranking systems like CEI and ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance.)
Most people have a sense of goodwill. They trust our institutions, and they trust that things couldn't ever get this bad. But in the meantime, we have these actors who want to control everyone and everything, using the CEI and the ESG. ”Transgender” activism” is a big part of this, because it's a destabilizing force that interferes with our sense of identity. If you have a healthy sense of identity, you can establish strong, healthy human relationships. And that stands in the way of the totalitarians who view any relationships that they cannot control as a threat to their power..
What better way to threaten people than with the livelihoods people depend on? Today, small businesses are being swallowed by large businesses. And we haven’t even mentioned how Covid has accelerated our sense of isolation. All this crap from corporate wokeness trickles down to the employees who are required to attend training sessions on “diversity.” Lockheed held the first such training session about 30 years ago and it’s reaching an inflection point now.
NR: Yes. The situation has gotten completely out of hand.
SM: I would be curious to hear what Jennifer Bilek has to say about how this relates to capitalism. What we have in totalitarianism is an extreme monopoly. Healthy capitalism would not allow this. One hundred years ago we had trust-busting in this country. But now all these huge high-tech companies like Vanguard and Black Rock are allowed to lord it over everyone. We don’t have a healthy market economy.
NR: We definitely don’t have a healthy market economy. We have a metastasizing monopoly. Black Rock actually owns a big chunk of Vanguard. And Vanguard owns part of Black Rock. And it’s destroying our whole society.
SM: I used to play a board game called “Acquire.” I think it’s still be around. The game was all about eating up and merging companies. The winner was the last man standing. It was a really cutthroat game. I suppose that’s how corporate heads see themselves today. I don’t know where this is going to go, but it's anti-human. It's dehumanizing. Part of me thinks all the CEOs admire Larry Fink of Black Rock. But he also seems to be a sad example of human being who can’t comprehend the richness of a strong, healthy human relationship. The evil he and others like him create, however, must be opposed. Larry Fink and his colleagues are a minuscule minority. They can’t stand the idea that they could have only one ballot in an honest election—just like everybody else. They want to control everything, which is why they devised all these extortion schemes.
NR: Do you think the Larry Finks of the world had it in mind from the beginning, or did it just evolve over time?
SM: Well, I think they’re incontinent when it comes to controlling their totalitarian impulse. Still, I believe the totalitarian impulse lies within each one of us. But if we are thoughtful people we learn to reject that temptation. Some people simply won’t regulate it though. And I think we must try to speculate on their psychology to figure out the puzzle and our way out of it. We have to try to understand what’s going on in their minds. But that’s a conversation for another day.
NR: Lately, we’ve seen increasing mob violence against those who oppose “transgender” ideology. The victims are always women like Kellie Jay Keen, the swimmer Riley Gaines, and K Yang the woman at the NYC “Pride” Parade. The victims are never men. Do you think those mob attacks on “gender” critical women will escalate?
SM: Yes. It's a sign of how desperate the other side has become. They know there’s been pushback, and that pushback has been effective. More and more people can see how insane that agenda is. These are desperate measures. Mobs are enlisted to enforce identity politics and political correctness, to make us fearful of speaking up. One chapter in my book, The Weaponization of Loneliness deals with the mob mindset. But the violence will burn itself out eventually. The question is how much damage is done before then.
NR: A few months ago, a young woman, who claimed she was a man, shot and killed three young children and three adults at a Christian school in Nashville, TN. Of course, the media said she wasn’t really “transgender.”
SM: Individuals like her are not grounded. I suspect their minds have been captured and raped by those who push the agenda. It’s so tragic. Given another set of circumstances, that young woman might have been a happy person. Our environment has so much of an effect on behavior. Look at Antifa and other mobs that push this stuff. The members are not grounded people. They just act on their emotions, and they mimic the behavior of those around them in the mob. One individual standing in the mob can ignite the mob. That individual might not even be part of that mob. But everyone reacts. It’s like a conditioned emotional reflex. They’re not having a thoughtful conversation. Mobs can become very violent because they don’t think, and they can be emotionally triggered easily. Even a sign that says a woman is an adult human female can cause them to react in a violent way.
So yes, unfortunately, the violence will escalate because those who push that agenda will become increasingly desperate to prevent any non-compliance with their agenda. And how do you do that? You do it through terror. Terror has an enormous impact on people. Members of mobs tend to be atomized people, easily terrorized.
Hanna Arendt’s book, The Origins of Totalitarianism makes the point that terror can only have a grip when people are isolated against one another. That’s why all tyrannical governments seek to bring about that isolation. When you look at people in cults or gangs, they are all untethered from reality and from strong human relationships where they can have real conversations with people.If we could bring more people into the fold of real conversations, that could really help.
NR: what would be the fastest, most effective way to reverse the “transgender” takeover? Would electing Republicans to politics work? What are your thoughts about that?
SM: Well, I think the vast majority of the population finds this whole thing insane. The question is, how many are willing to speak out. So many institutions and the media (with the possible exception of Twitter) have been captured by “transgender” ideology. There are not as many platforms for reaching large numbers of people.
But the thing to remember is that very pithy line in Jacques Ellul’s book Propaganda. And that is: “propaganda ends where simple dialogue begins.” That means one-on-one conversation.That may seem like a small thing to a lot of people. They might ask: “What difference will it make if I talk to my aunt about how I feel about this? Or if I just talk?” Well, it makes a huge difference because it has a trickle-down effect, an influencing effect. And that’s where the power of the powerless resides. If everyone spoke openly, it could amount to victory by a thousand cuts.
Vaclav Havel’s 1978 essay, The Power of the Powerless, that I cite several times in my book states that our power, our strength lies in the “hidden sphere,” the private sphere of life. The more we talk to one another as individuals, the more our ideas ripple outward. It has a huge effect. It’s not going to happen overnight, but it will have the deepest effect on fighting this thing.
And the totalitarians among us, know this. Their goal has always been to destroy the private sphere of life so that they can control all our relationships. They know we get our inner strength from personal relationships and from our relationship with God. History has shown that they’ve always tried to destroy those relationships of trust. So, there’s no fast way, there’s no shortcut. But I think the most effective way to reverse this is through everyday conversation, everyday friendship, and everyday relationships.
So we should connect with people of good will. Also follow blogs like Jennifer Bilek’s amazing 11th Hour Blog, and some good folks on Twitter. If people trust you, even if they don’t know you well and they’re just neighbors or coworkers, sharing your opinion, what you believe, can have a powerful impact. And that’s because people fear expressing their beliefs if they seem politically incorrect. We’re all hardwired to avoid ostracism.
But if you express what you believe to someone who trusts you but doesn’t know where you stand, three things can happen. Number 1, you can embolden a like-minded thinker to realize they’re not alone in rejecting the propaganda. And you gain a friend. The second possibility is that the person you’re speaking to may never have thought about it before. And you’ve influenced a fence sitter. We tend to fear the third type:the person who has been captured by the propaganda and who gets angry by your beliefs. But you’ve still done something extremely powerful by speaking up. That’s because they know you face to face, and even though they reject what you said, they’ll have to think about it. You’ve watered down the stereotype that the person associated with your viewpoint
These one-on-one conversations are critical And if we have millions or billions of these conversations, totalitarians can’t survive. We can fight in little ways as well as big ways.
NR: Yes we can fight, and we must fight. All of us who care about the future of humanity need to see that..
SM: Yes. In order to assure that we're not the last! You had mentioned the upcoming elections and whether electing Republicans could turn the tide. I don’t believe it would make much of a difference these days. That’s because there are really only two political camps – pro-thought and anti-thought. I wrote an article on that at The Federalist a couple of years ago. Being pro-thought means being willing to have conversations and engage other ideas. Anti-thought means you're locked into the propaganda. And that’s where I see the Great Divide. Being pro-thought means being pro-human.
Being anti-thought is anti-human because it gets in the way of our ability to have conversations. It's being captured by the weaponization of loneliness. We see so many people of high influence, not just Republicans, but CEOs, folding. People in positions of power in Congress or the Supreme Court and governors who should know better are susceptible to the propaganda.
So, the more people become emboldened to speak out, even on a small scale, the better our chances.
NR: A couple of months ago, I spoke by phone with a very woke cousin whom I don’t know well. I told her “transgenderism” was a lie and that children should never be indoctrinated with the “gender” talk. During our discussion, she completely disagreed with me.
But the next time she called me, she admitted she had changed her mind and now believes children should not be indoctrinated, which is a start. I was astonished to hear that because she was very woke. So, these one-on-one conversations can be very powerful in getting people to change their opinions even when those opinions are firmly held, as I’m sure my cousin’s opinions were.
SM: Wow. Nancy, that’s a wonderful example of the power of real conversation. Your experience should remind us that much of this insanity is brought on by social contagion. I suspect your cousin was feeling the sort of peer pressure that stifled any other thoughts. If she didn’t accept that line, she would be ostracized and rejected. But having someone she knew speak with her and ultimately make her think it all through made a huge difference. And congratulations to you for that. Those kinds of conversations will save us.
NR: When I spoke with her the first time I was sure she’d never change her mind. But I told myself I’m just going to say exactly what I feel because I just had to speak. I couldn’t stay silent.
SM: You certainly made an impact by doing so. Sometimes people just need exposure to a different point of view. The echo chamber of propaganda is stifling. And if you hadn’t spoken up, she would have probably assumed that you and she were both part of that same program. It’s so important that we let people know we’re not with this.
Of course, everyone has their own threshold for speaking up. So many people don’t feel they can do it and they’re fearful. But the more people who do speak up and lead the way, the more that fear can wear off. And that creates a larger and larger pool. A force that these tyrants have to reckon with and can’t. Also, If they start getting violent, then you know you’re right over the target.
NR: Have you ever seen the original movie Spartacus starring Kirk Douglas from 1960? The film was based on a novel written by Howard Fast when he was imprisoned for refusing to name names during the McCarthy era of the 1950s. The movie was set in ancient Rome in Biblical times, a few decades before the start of the Christian era. Spartacus, played by Kirk Douglas, leads a revolt by a hundred enslaved gladiators against the brutal and tyrannical Roman Republic.
The key scene takes place shortly after the slave revolt fails. In this scene, the Roman officer in charge tells the enslaved gladiators that their lives will be spared, but only if they identify the living person or the dead body of Spartacus. Spartacus stands immediately. And less than half a second later, one by one, all the slaves stand and say, “I am Spartacus.” So, by standing up together, united in their defiance, the slaves made it impossible for the Roman tyrants to execute Spartacus.
This movie shows the power of the individual. If one person stands up, that encourages other people to stand up, too. Think of how effective it would have been if, during those first corporate indoctrination sessions where they were pushing this ideology, one person had stood up to say, “You know, what you’re saying doesn’t make any sense.” And then, one by one, more people might have stood up against this ideology.
SM: Oh, absolutely! Spartacus is a great illustration here. It shows why todays trans tyrants have to hang over you the threat of losing your livelihood if you don't comply. But we need to be able to see how weak they really are, how much they depend upon our fear, our vulnerability to that fear of isolation. Once understand how much they depend on exploiting our fear of isolation, we an see that they’re actually very weak. In terms of numbers, the elites are miniscule. That’s why they depend on mobs, and of course, the investment of a bureaucratic apparatus to prop them up. elites When others can see the weakness, they will follow suit. Back in the 1950s, the social psychologist Solomon Asch conducted a series of experiments that showed how easy it is to get someone to conform to group opinions -- even when those opinions are obviously wrong. In this experiment, Asch presented an individual with a picture of a line and asked that person to match that line up from a choice of three lines. It was a trivial task. But the subject was surrounded by collaborators of the experiment who after a couple of rounds all gave the wrong answer. Quite often, the subject of the experiment went with the incorrect answer only because of the social pressure.
But a variation of that experiment was very encouraging. If the person being tested had even one partner in the group who agreed with their judgment, conformity dropped like a rock. You just need to puncture the illusion of unanimity to bring people back to Earth. In a group, you can see what happens when people speak up and then are confirmed by others. People follow suit, especially if it’s what they really believe. It’s a ripple effect. The truth becomes obvious, and people are much more inclined to speak up. And that’s the bright note on how the conformity impulse can be defeated.
NR: We need that bright note that helps us become more courageous in standing up to tyranny.
SM: But you're so right about what would have happened in that corporate meeting on diversity if only one person had stood up and said it was nonsense. It seems so scary with your job at stake. But the alternative is much more frightening. If we let this go unchecked, we end up in a world where we really are atomized and completely silenced. Where we really are isolated, like in a form of solitary confinement. This is the real horror, and something we should be much more aware of. I wrote The Weaponization of Loneliness to help build a conscious awareness of how our very human fear of being ostracized is so easily exploited by bad actors.
NR: Yes. Very bad actors. Stella, it's been an honor and privilege to speak with you today. I know I speak for everyone in thanking you for shedding light on the tyranny we face today and how we can work together to defeat it.
I urge everyone who’s reading this interview to read Stella's excellent and eye-opening book, The Weaponization of Loneliness. I urge you all to follow the recommendations outlined in the book and during this interview. To find your courage. To find your voice. To speak out to family, friends, and acquaintances. To oppose tyranny and totalitarianism in all its forms, including “transgender” activism.
SR: Thank you very much, Nancy. It's been great talking to you.
END
READ PARTS I HERE:
READ PART II HERE:
Stella Morabito is a senior contributor at The Federalist. She is author of "The Weaponization of Loneliness: How Tyrants Stoke Our Fear of Isolation to Silence, Divide, and Conquer." Her essays have appeared in various publications, including the Washington Examiner, American Greatness, Townhall, Public Discourse, and The Human Life Review. In her previous work as an intelligence analyst, Morabito focused on various aspects of Russian and Soviet politics, including communist media and propaganda. She has a Master's degree in Russian and Soviet history.
Nancy Robertson graduated from Barnard College with a BA in psychology and then received a Ph.D. in educational psychology from Stanford University. Nancy is retired and has written articles for WoLF, and Women are Human. She grew up in New York City in the middle of the last century. In 2022, she learned that three daughters of a deceased, old college friend were trying to become men through they/them pronouns, wrong sex hormones, and mutilating surgeries. She realized a strange cult of "transgender" madness had sprung up, infecting the US and much of the world. Nancy began to research and write about the gender industry to stop it.
