September 21, 2025 • 25 mins
There is a deep societal void at the root of these acts of violence. It’s up to us to answer the cry buried beneath the hatred, to break the cycle before it consumes another soul that takes many more with them.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
This is an article I wrote december 18th, 2024.
(00:04):
With recent events echoing these and other tragedies in recent history,
I wanted to read it for the podcast.
The Madison Tragedy (00:11):
How a Fractured Society Breeds Despair Alienation,
Nihilism,and the Cultural Crisis Behind a Tragedy By (00:16):
CROAKY CAIMAN “God is dead,
and we have killed him,” Friedrich Nietzsche famously declared—not with the jubilant cry of an atheist reveler,
but the somber dread of a prophet witnessing the unraveling of a world unmoored.
The advancing revolutionary age,not just industrial but politically was causing an ennui among the population that was abandoning the church as the embodiment of purpose in society.
(00:44):
His words were not a celebration but a eulogy,a grim acknowledgment of what was to come in the wake of humanity’s severance from its transcendent anchor.
As an atheist—and more importantly,as a conservative—I find myself resonating with Nietzsche’s warning.
I too see the hollow chasm that has opened within society,
carved out by a negative nihilism that thrives not only through deliberate efforts to dismantle but also through the alienation of a hypermodern world.
(01:12):
Though I lack faith, I cannot deny the role it plays as the scaffolding of civilization.
Faith, when paired with works, is a luminous force—a masterpiece of human aspiration and unity.
But without faith?
Without the idea of something greater than ourselves to guide and tether us?
All that remains is a void.
(01:33):
And the void is not passive.
It festers,churns,and consumes,turning its emptiness into a devouring chaos that erodes everything in its path.
This is my concern and this is the void that consumes those who don’t find meaning through faith or an alternative secular meaning.
I wrote the other day of one form.
(01:53):
The assassination of a healthcare CEO by Luigi Mangione a simultaneously brilliant and yet petulant computer science major who took it upon himself to murder another human being due to an emptiness he found within himself and an obvious attempt to form meaning to his existence after delving too deep into nihilistic abyss without a floatation device.
(02:13):
Now too in Madison, Wisconsin, we saw the void devour a child.
A 15-year-old girl,lost in a storm of alienation and despair,
took a gun and unleashed her anguish in a way that leaves us horrified but,
tragically,no longer shocked.
Her manifesto—a fractured symphony of hatred and nihilism—reads less like the ravings of an individual and more like the epitaph of a society adrift.
(02:40):
It is a grim indictment,not merely of her,but of the culture that shaped her,
failed her,and finally abandoned her.
The Madison tragedy is one manifestation of this unraveling—a tragic result of alienation not only from faith but also from family,
community,and purpose.
This act is not an isolated anomaly but a reflection of deeper societal fractures,
(03:04):
a storm brewed in the void left behind.
Nietzsche’s warning was not merely about the loss of faith in a divine being but about the cultural unraveling that follows.
Normally,I would never dignify a manifesto like this with attention—except perhaps to mock it—but this one demands we confront the deeper problem.
School shootings are not solely about mental health,
(03:26):
nor are they a simplistic call to arms for gun control.
They are a reflection of a society with a festering wound (03:30):
a collapse in cultural meaning,
a dereliction of purpose.
This is also not an attack on progress but a defense of purpose.
I’ll write this without naming the girl,not just because she’s a child,
but also to avoid adding to notoriety to her name.
(03:51):
To name the shooter would only perpetuate the cycle,
granting infamy where there should be nothing but the names of the victims,
of which we still don’t know as I write this.
Even with my small audience,I reject the idea of immortalizing the act but I reject giving the actor even more attention which might encourage others seeking such infamy.
(04:11):
Call it hating the sin,not the sinner—but lets not shy away from hating the sin with every fiber of our being and addressing the cause of the sin.
The manifesto itself,with its unrelenting contempt for humanity,
innocence,and life,stands as more than the deranged scribblings of a lost soul.
It is a cultural artifact—a malignant symptom of a society that has neglected its fields,
(04:35):
leaving them barren and overrun with weeds.
This is the harvest we reap when we surrender to the void.
“Humanity is filth,and I don’t like life,nor want to live in it,
nor should anyone else” This was not the hopeful rebellion of a soul seeking answers;
it was the chilling declaration of surrender.
'Humanity is filth,' she wrote,'and I don’t like life,
(04:59):
nor want to live in it,nor should anyone else.
' These words—raw and unrelenting—are not the voice of righteous anger but of profound resignation.
The world, to her, was irredeemable.
Life itself was the crime.
Hatred drips from its lines—“humanity is filth” is its refrain—but this hatred is not an original creation.
(05:21):
It was learned.
It was nurtured in the absence of anything better.
And we,who live in an age that prides itself on the demolition of every tradition,
every institution,and every article of faith,must ask ourselves (05:31):
what did we expect?
Children are not born nihilists.
They are born seekers.
They look to us innocently—to family,to community,
to church,to teachers—to show them what life is for.
When those structures collapse or fail to provide answers, the void offers its own.
(05:56):
Her writings contained complaints of her parents alleged drinking and drug use,
which might be true and which would add to the idea of the loosening grip of our social cohesion.
Until more is known though I won’t address those comments as if they were factual,
since there’s also the very obvious attempt to gain post-mortem fame by the shooter and possibly to taint her parents as a last act.
(06:19):
What I will address though are her general comments on society,
not because they’re wise or insightful,but because what insight we can gain from them is a mirror to societal decay that could cause a teen to adopt this empty philosophy.
“You’ve pushed me into a corner with no help whatsoever.
” So what strikes me most about this short and childish manifesto is not just its anger but its futility.
(06:42):
The words ring hollow, as if written by someone who has given up before the fight even began.
It lacks the righteous fury of a revolutionary or the pained wisdom of a poet,
not that you would expect it from someone willing to recklessly take human life due to their own condition.
Instead, it reeks of surrender.
“You’ve pushed me into a corner with no help whatsoever.
(07:05):
” This isn’t the voice of rebellion;
it’s the voice of someone who at least in her mind believed she had looked for help and found none.
It’s the voice of a generation taught that life is meaningless and who—shockingly—believed it.
In her words,you can almost hear the suffocating weight of her loneliness (07:19):
Again “You’ve pushed me into a corner with no help whatsoever.
” This is a child not merely angry but abandoned—left to fend for herself or at least believing she is in the emptiness we’ve created.
Now we don’t know her family life,but at least her perception or what she wants the world to perceive of her family life seems to be one of alienation from her parents and even her friends.
(07:44):
Society is a partnership between the living,the dead,
and those yet to be born,but this child as far as can be gleaned had no partnership,
no tether,no guide or at least felt like she didn’t.
When we fail to nurture the mind—or for the faithful the soul—when community collapses,
purpose and faith fades,the result is not freedom.
(08:07):
It’s abandonment.
I’ve grown around people who do not care or give one single care in the world.
” Her contempt is total—”I’ve grown around people who do not care or give one single care in the world.
” This isn’t merely bitterness toward those who wronged her;
it’s a rejection of humanity itself.
When a child grows up believing that no one cares,
(08:30):
that life is indifferent to suffering,the result is not rebellion but nihilism.
Contempt becomes the armor to shield the pain, and hatred becomes the language of the abandoned.
It’s idiotic for people to cause this, but it’s a good thing that this happens.
Perhaps the most chilling line of the manifesto is this (08:45):
“It’s idiotic for people to cause this,
but it’s a good thing that this happens.
” This twisted logic reflects nihilism’s ultimate endgame—destruction becomes its own justification.
If life is worthless, if people are irredeemable, then chaos becomes preferable to existence itself.
(09:07):
She’s not celebrating violence;
she resigns herself to it.
And this resignation reveals the true face of nihilism (09:13):
a surrender so complete that even hatred is hollow.
“The hate I get and the hate you get is mutual;
you hate me, and I will always hate you as well.
” Perhaps the most tragic line in her manifesto reads (09:26):
“The hate I get and the hate you get is mutual;
you hate me, and I will always hate you as well.
” In this, we see the full machinery of nihilism grinding forward.
Hatred begets hatred.
Alienation festers into contempt.
And yet, beneath this mutual loathing lies something deeper—a cry for connection.
(09:51):
Hatred, after all, is not indifference.
It is the misshapen remnant of a soul that still longs to belong, to matter, to be seen.
It is despair clawing for recognition, even as it devours itself.
Let me be clear (10:05):
this manifesto is neither profound nor persuasive.
It is poorly written,riddled with adolescent angst left unchecked,
filled with cliches and devoid of any real insight.
I do not highlight it to elevate it as a work of rhetorical or symbolic importance.
Instead,I point to it and most importantly the shooting—which will likely be forgotten—as yet another example of a culture unraveling,
(10:31):
of a society losing its grip on meaning.
These tragedies are too often reduced to endless debates over gun control,
mental health,or SSRIs—important discussions to a degree,
but ones that miss the broader picture.
What we are truly witnessing is the product of alienation—some of it intentional,
(10:52):
much of it incidental—born from a society so consumed by technological progress that it has forgotten its humanity.
Something we should consider as the we sweep into yet another technological revolution with the advent of Artificial Intelligence and every expanding automation that will breed more alienation.
The question we have to ask ourselves with examples like this one is the classic “Which way Western Man?
(11:16):
” Where do we find meaning and how will we instill it in future generations and combat this alienation.
I use this manifesto not as a definitive diagnosis but as a symptom of a much larger sickness (11:22):
the creeping nihilism that pervades our culture.
As for myself, I identify as a positive nihilist.
What does that mean?
It means I accept that life may lack inherent meaning,
but I find profound purpose in the traditions,history,
(11:44):
and human connections that enrich my existence.
For me,nihilism is not an abyss but a foundation to build upon—a starting point for creating meaning through deliberate effort and reflection,
but we do this by preserving those things that add meaning already,
the institutions,traditions and morality.
But for those without such a tether—be it faith,tradition,
(12:08):
or a grounding in something greater—the result is often far darker negative nihilism.
It manifests in figures like the Madison shooter or Luigi Mangione,
the United Healthcare CEO shooter an act now being considered an act of terrorism.
Mangione’s nihilism was cloaked in the guise of caring about healthcare and fairness but was,
(12:29):
at its core,driven by animus.
We see the same form in his supporters who make arguments like “Yeah its bad that he was killed,
but what does it tell us about US healthcare?
” This is what nihilism unchecked produces (12:41):
not the thoughtful resignation of a positive nihilist,
but the festering rage and excuse of violence by those who have lost all sense of purpose and belonging.
We have to confront this reality with clear eyes.
The solution lies not in slogans or simplistic fixes but in reclaiming the roots of meaning—faith for some,
(13:04):
tradition for others,and community for all.
Without this, the cycle of alienation and despair will continue to claim lives and deepen the void.
It’s up to us to answer the cry buried beneath the hatred,
to break the cycle before it consumes another soul that takes many more with them.
This nihilism doesn’t emerge from a vacuum.
(13:25):
It’s the natural consequence of a society that has forsaken its duty to give life meaning.
Faith, once the bedrock of our moral order, has withered.
Churches are empty;
religion is mocked as superstition without guidance about what to replace it with.
Families, once the cornerstone of belonging, are fragmented and minimized in importance.
(13:47):
Community has been replaced with screens,relationships reduced to data points on social media platforms that connect no one to anything real.
We’re all guilty of it.
The institutions that we once filled the void with have crumbled,
and in their place,we have erected idols (14:02):
the idol of grievance,
the idol of materialism,the idol of “self-expression” that often masks loneliness or alienation.
Nietzsche saw this coming.
When he proclaimed the death of God,he didn’t foresee a utopia of rationalism and progress,
nor do I.
(14:22):
What he saw—and what we now live—is a world untethered,
adrift in subjectively meaninglessness,floundering in its own confusion.
Nietzsche understood a simple yet devastating truth (14:31):
when faith collapses,
a vacuum forms,and something will inevitably rush in to fill it.
What replaces it is rarely better.
Often, it is far darker and far more destructive than what it displaces.
Dostoevsky,ever the sharper observer of human frailty,
made it even clearer (14:52):
without God,everything is permissible.
I lack faith in a deity,but I see the need for those who do to hold tightly to it,
to cultivate it,and to promote it among those who share their beliefs.
For those like me,who find their grounding in the human experience and ordered chaos,
it is equally vital to anchor ourselves to something greater—to principles that transcend the moment,
(15:17):
to the wisdom of ages,to the bonds of community.
And perhaps most importantly,to extend that grounding to those who struggle,
especially the youngest among us.
A child adrift in a world without meaning is the most vulnerable to the encroaching darkness.
If we do not plant seeds of hope and purpose in their lives,
(15:38):
the void will eagerly take root in their hearts.
The young shooter’s manifesto is proof of this terrifying truth.
Without meaning, without a framework to understand her suffering, what remained was violence.
Chaos.
Destruction as a perverse attempt to create order—to make the world match the emptiness she felt inside.
(15:59):
We should not delude ourselves into believing this is an isolated tragedy.
It’s not.
It’s the product of a society that has taught its children to tear down but not to build.
To doubt but never to believe.
To mock but never to revere.
In such a culture, despair becomes the default, and for some, that despair turns lethal.
(16:21):
For those suffering from mental illness it invariably does.
How do we reclaim what’s been lost?
How do we prevent the void from swallowing yet another child?
The answer begins not with our politics or policies,
though those have their place,but with the restoration of meaning itself.
Faith, for all its imperfections, once served as the foundation upon which life was built.
(16:46):
Whether Christian, Jewish, or otherwise, religion offered more than rituals;
it offered a why.
A reason to endure suffering.
A reason to live virtuously.
A reason to hope.
Burke understood this better than most.
He knew that faith wasn’t merely personal belief but the cornerstone of a stable society.
(17:09):
When it fades, chaos follows.
Faith does not stand alone.
It must be partnered with the revival of community—the “little platoons” that Burke so eloquently championed.
These are the family, the neighborhood, the local church, and the humble schoolhouse.
These are not mere relics of a bygone age;
(17:29):
they are the crucibles where belonging is forged,where virtues are instilled,
and where the cold grip of isolation is answered with love and responsibility.
Yet,for too long,we have turned our backs on these little platoons,
dismissing them as outdated or irrelevant.
We have sent children into schools that indoctrinate rather than educate,
(17:51):
teaching them what to think instead of how to think.
We’ve watched as fractured homes became the norm and naively expected resilience to flourish in the cracks.
We abandoned our children to the pixelated void of digital reality and feigned surprise when alienation blossomed.
We stripped morality—even secular morality—from our schools and replaced it with the haze of postmodern deconstruction,
(18:15):
thrusting concepts into minds unprepared to grasp them.
We mocked the very idea of virtue and then wrung our hands in despair when our children could no longer discern right from wrong.
In doing so, we sowed the seeds of despair.
The Madison shooter’s manifesto—like so many others penned by the lost and the broken—is the harvest.
(18:36):
A bitter fruit borne not solely from an individual’s choices but from the soil of a culture that has forsaken its roots.
It is a wake-up call,not to blame faith alone,but to restore the institutions and virtues that faith supports and strengthens.
Only then can we hope to halt the spread of this emptiness before it claims more lives and consumes the culture entirely.
(18:58):
Beauty Will Save the World Yet we can’t live on negation alone.
The restoration of faith and community must be accompanied by the celebration of beauty and creation.
Dostoevsky wrote that “beauty will save the world,” and he was right.
A culture that creates nothing of value will inevitably turn to destruction.
Art, music, literature—these aren’t luxuries but necessities.
(19:23):
They elevate the soul and remind us that life, though fleeting, is precious.
These are things we must share with our children, and I am now more than ever more motivated to do.
These concepts combat the ugliness of nihilism by offering something worth preserving,
something worth expanding.
So, where do we start?
(19:43):
Parents can begin by reclaiming the dinner table—creating a space where conversations happen and values are instilled.
Communities can host events that bring people together, from local festivals to book clubs.
Artists and writers can focus on creation rather than critique,
offering works that uplift rather than deconstruct.
(20:04):
These actions may seem small, but they are the seeds of restoration.
Above all,we must cast off the suffocating yoke of populist grievance that has spread like a plague across both the left and the right.
Populism offers nothing but anger masquerading as action,
resentment in place of resolve,division in the guise of solidarity.
(20:24):
It thrives on destruction, feeding on the very nihilism it claims to oppose.
Beneath its slogans lies a bleak truth (20:30):
populism is nihilism with a campaign slogan.
Consider the rhetoric of populist leaders who reduce every issue to grievance and blame,
offering no path forward beyond division.
On the left and the right,we see this in cries of election fraud without solutions to restore trust.
(20:50):
On the left and the right, it manifests in identity politics that tear down rather than build up.
Both sides offer the same empty promise (20:56):
that anger alone will heal.
In truth, this anger is a mask for nihilism—a void masquerading as a cause.
What we need instead is purpose—real,tangible purpose rooted in history,
anchored in virtue,and directed toward service to something greater than ourselves.
(21:16):
Those of you with faith have it the easiest in this fight—and yes, I’m always a bit envious of that.
This isn’t a simple undertaking.
It won’t be achieved through soundbites or, ugh “hashtags.
(21:29):
It demands labor—real, arduous, often unseen labor.
Parents must rise to the occasion, becoming truly present in their children’s lives.
Communities must awaken,churches must open their doors wider than ever,
artists must craft works of beauty that inspire and elevate.
Leaders must lead, not pander.
And all of us,every single one,must recognize this fundamental truth (21:51):
the void will not fill itself.
The Madison shooter was not a monster, though her actions were monstrous.
She was a child who stumbled into the abyss we allowed to grow unchecked.
Her manifesto,a grim chronicle of despair,is an unintentional warning—a desperate cry for us to reclaim what we have abandoned.
(22:15):
If we fail to heed it,if we continue to abdicate our responsibilities as parents,
as neighbors,as citizens,we won’t merely witness more tragedies like Madison;
we will lose an entire generation to despair.
To the void.
But we are not helpless.
If we act—if we rebuild the pillars of faith,community,
(22:37):
beauty,and purpose—we can begin to turn back the tide.
The void can be conquered.
The soul of our society can be reclaimed.
And with it, the next child who feels lost can be found before it is too late.
For those among you who hold fast to faith,I’ll toss you an assist (22:52):
“And said unto him,
Hearest thou what these say?
And Jesus saith unto them, Yea;
have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?
” Even in this tragedy, from the mouth of babes comes a warning—and a call to action.
(23:13):
It is not too late to save the culture,to nurture meaning where there is emptiness,
to fight back against the creeping nihilism that threatens to engulf us all.
We,as conservatives,must stand firm—not with the aimless fury of a wrecking ball,
but with the deliberate care of architects rebuilding a crumbling foundation.
Our mission is not to wage war on the modern world but to push back against the creeping forces of nihilism that threaten to hollow out the souls of our children.
(23:42):
And yet, amid the despair, there are embers of hope, glowing faintly but resolutely.
In the heart of rural towns and the bustling streets of urban neighborhoods,
the “little platoons” are stirring once more.
Parents are rising—not merely to complain but to act.
They are stepping into school boards,reshaping curricula,
(24:03):
and forming co-ops to reclaim education and,in doing so,
reclaim their role in the lives of their children.
They are not waiting for permission to rebuild what has been lost;
they are taking the reins with a quiet, determined resolve.
Local churches,though diminished in size and voice,
are becoming sanctuaries of connection and healing.
(24:25):
These places of worship,often divided by doctrine,
are finding common ground in their mission to serve—whether through outreach programs or interfaith efforts that forge bonds across sectarian lines.
In these small but powerful acts,there lies the potential for unity—unity behind a shared purpose,
a collective meaning that transcends divisions.
(24:48):
These efforts are rarely loud.
They do not demand headlines or applause.
But they are vital.
They remind us that renewal is not born from sweeping revolutions but from the quiet persistence of neighbors reaching out to neighbors.
It is in these small,deliberate acts of reclamation that the seeds of a greater restoration are sown.
(25:10):
As long as we are willing to fight for meaning,to plant purpose in the fertile soil of our shared humanity,
the darkness cannot and will not win.
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This is an article I wrote december 18th, 2024.
(00:04):
With recent events echoing these and other tragedies in recent history,
I wanted to read it for the podcast.
The Madison Tragedy (00:11):
How a Fractured Society Breeds Despair Alienation,
Nihilism,and the Cultural Crisis Behind a Tragedy By (00:16):
CROAKY CAIMAN “God is dead,
and we have killed him,” Friedrich Nietzsche famously declared—not with the jubilant cry of an atheist reveler,
but the somber dread of a prophet witnessing the unraveling of a world unmoored.
The advancing revolutionary age,not just industrial but politically was causing an ennui among the population that was abandoning the church as the embodiment of purpose in society.
(00:44):
His words were not a celebration but a eulogy,a grim acknowledgment of what was to come in the wake of humanity’s severance from its transcendent anchor.
As an atheist—and more importantly,as a conservative—I find myself resonating with Nietzsche’s warning.
I too see the hollow chasm that has opened within society,
carved out by a negative nihilism that thrives not only through deliberate efforts to dismantle but also through the alienation of a hypermodern world.
(01:12):
Though I lack faith, I cannot deny the role it plays as the scaffolding of civilization.
Faith, when paired with works, is a luminous force—a masterpiece of human aspiration and unity.
But without faith?
Without the idea of something greater than ourselves to guide and tether us?
All that remains is a void.
(01:33):
And the void is not passive.
It festers,churns,and consumes,turning its emptiness into a devouring chaos that erodes everything in its path.
This is my concern and this is the void that consumes those who don’t find meaning through faith or an alternative secular meaning.
I wrote the other day of one form.
(01:53):
The assassination of a healthcare CEO by Luigi Mangione a simultaneously brilliant and yet petulant computer science major who took it upon himself to murder another human being due to an emptiness he found within himself and an obvious attempt to form meaning to his existence after delving too deep into nihilistic abyss without a floatation device.
(02:13):
Now too in Madison, Wisconsin, we saw the void devour a child.
A 15-year-old girl,lost in a storm of alienation and despair,
took a gun and unleashed her anguish in a way that leaves us horrified but,
tragically,no longer shocked.
Her manifesto—a fractured symphony of hatred and nihilism—reads less like the ravings of an individual and more like the epitaph of a society adrift.
(02:40):
It is a grim indictment,not merely of her,but of the culture that shaped her,
failed her,and finally abandoned her.
The Madison tragedy is one manifestation of this unraveling—a tragic result of alienation not only from faith but also from family,
community,and purpose.
This act is not an isolated anomaly but a reflection of deeper societal fractures,
(03:04):
a storm brewed in the void left behind.
Nietzsche’s warning was not merely about the loss of faith in a divine being but about the cultural unraveling that follows.
Normally,I would never dignify a manifesto like this with attention—except perhaps to mock it—but this one demands we confront the deeper problem.
School shootings are not solely about mental health,
(03:26):
nor are they a simplistic call to arms for gun control.
They are a reflection of a society with a festering wound (03:30):
a collapse in cultural meaning,
a dereliction of purpose.
This is also not an attack on progress but a defense of purpose.
I’ll write this without naming the girl,not just because she’s a child,
but also to avoid adding to notoriety to her name.
(03:51):
To name the shooter would only perpetuate the cycle,
granting infamy where there should be nothing but the names of the victims,
of which we still don’t know as I write this.
Even with my small audience,I reject the idea of immortalizing the act but I reject giving the actor even more attention which might encourage others seeking such infamy.
(04:11):
Call it hating the sin,not the sinner—but lets not shy away from hating the sin with every fiber of our being and addressing the cause of the sin.
The manifesto itself,with its unrelenting contempt for humanity,
innocence,and life,stands as more than the deranged scribblings of a lost soul.
It is a cultural artifact—a malignant symptom of a society that has neglected its fields,
(04:35):
leaving them barren and overrun with weeds.
This is the harvest we reap when we surrender to the void.
“Humanity is filth,and I don’t like life,nor want to live in it,
nor should anyone else” This was not the hopeful rebellion of a soul seeking answers;
it was the chilling declaration of surrender.
'Humanity is filth,' she wrote,'and I don’t like life,
(04:59):
nor want to live in it,nor should anyone else.
' These words—raw and unrelenting—are not the voice of righteous anger but of profound resignation.
The world, to her, was irredeemable.
Life itself was the crime.
Hatred drips from its lines—“humanity is filth” is its refrain—but this hatred is not an original creation.
(05:21):
It was learned.
It was nurtured in the absence of anything better.
And we,who live in an age that prides itself on the demolition of every tradition,
every institution,and every article of faith,must ask ourselves (05:31):
what did we expect?
Children are not born nihilists.
They are born seekers.
They look to us innocently—to family,to community,
to church,to teachers—to show them what life is for.
When those structures collapse or fail to provide answers, the void offers its own.
(05:56):
Her writings contained complaints of her parents alleged drinking and drug use,
which might be true and which would add to the idea of the loosening grip of our social cohesion.
Until more is known though I won’t address those comments as if they were factual,
since there’s also the very obvious attempt to gain post-mortem fame by the shooter and possibly to taint her parents as a last act.
(06:19):
What I will address though are her general comments on society,
not because they’re wise or insightful,but because what insight we can gain from them is a mirror to societal decay that could cause a teen to adopt this empty philosophy.
“You’ve pushed me into a corner with no help whatsoever.
” So what strikes me most about this short and childish manifesto is not just its anger but its futility.
(06:42):
The words ring hollow, as if written by someone who has given up before the fight even began.
It lacks the righteous fury of a revolutionary or the pained wisdom of a poet,
not that you would expect it from someone willing to recklessly take human life due to their own condition.
Instead, it reeks of surrender.
“You’ve pushed me into a corner with no help whatsoever.
(07:05):
” This isn’t the voice of rebellion;
it’s the voice of someone who at least in her mind believed she had looked for help and found none.
It’s the voice of a generation taught that life is meaningless and who—shockingly—believed it.
In her words,you can almost hear the suffocating weight of her loneliness (07:19):
Again “You’ve pushed me into a corner with no help whatsoever.
” This is a child not merely angry but abandoned—left to fend for herself or at least believing she is in the emptiness we’ve created.
Now we don’t know her family life,but at least her perception or what she wants the world to perceive of her family life seems to be one of alienation from her parents and even her friends.
(07:44):
Society is a partnership between the living,the dead,
and those yet to be born,but this child as far as can be gleaned had no partnership,
no tether,no guide or at least felt like she didn’t.
When we fail to nurture the mind—or for the faithful the soul—when community collapses,
purpose and faith fades,the result is not freedom.
(08:07):
It’s abandonment.
I’ve grown around people who do not care or give one single care in the world.
” Her contempt is total—”I’ve grown around people who do not care or give one single care in the world.
” This isn’t merely bitterness toward those who wronged her;
it’s a rejection of humanity itself.
When a child grows up believing that no one cares,
(08:30):
that life is indifferent to suffering,the result is not rebellion but nihilism.
Contempt becomes the armor to shield the pain, and hatred becomes the language of the abandoned.
It’s idiotic for people to cause this, but it’s a good thing that this happens.
Perhaps the most chilling line of the manifesto is this (08:45):
“It’s idiotic for people to cause this,
but it’s a good thing that this happens.
” This twisted logic reflects nihilism’s ultimate endgame—destruction becomes its own justification.
If life is worthless, if people are irredeemable, then chaos becomes preferable to existence itself.
(09:07):
She’s not celebrating violence;
she resigns herself to it.
And this resignation reveals the true face of nihilism (09:13):
a surrender so complete that even hatred is hollow.
“The hate I get and the hate you get is mutual;
you hate me, and I will always hate you as well.
” Perhaps the most tragic line in her manifesto reads (09:26):
“The hate I get and the hate you get is mutual;
you hate me, and I will always hate you as well.
” In this, we see the full machinery of nihilism grinding forward.
Hatred begets hatred.
Alienation festers into contempt.
And yet, beneath this mutual loathing lies something deeper—a cry for connection.
(09:51):
Hatred, after all, is not indifference.
It is the misshapen remnant of a soul that still longs to belong, to matter, to be seen.
It is despair clawing for recognition, even as it devours itself.
Let me be clear (10:05):
this manifesto is neither profound nor persuasive.
It is poorly written,riddled with adolescent angst left unchecked,
filled with cliches and devoid of any real insight.
I do not highlight it to elevate it as a work of rhetorical or symbolic importance.
Instead,I point to it and most importantly the shooting—which will likely be forgotten—as yet another example of a culture unraveling,
(10:31):
of a society losing its grip on meaning.
These tragedies are too often reduced to endless debates over gun control,
mental health,or SSRIs—important discussions to a degree,
but ones that miss the broader picture.
What we are truly witnessing is the product of alienation—some of it intentional,
(10:52):
much of it incidental—born from a society so consumed by technological progress that it has forgotten its humanity.
Something we should consider as the we sweep into yet another technological revolution with the advent of Artificial Intelligence and every expanding automation that will breed more alienation.
The question we have to ask ourselves with examples like this one is the classic “Which way Western Man?
(11:16):
” Where do we find meaning and how will we instill it in future generations and combat this alienation.
I use this manifesto not as a definitive diagnosis but as a symptom of a much larger sickness (11:22):
the creeping nihilism that pervades our culture.
As for myself, I identify as a positive nihilist.
What does that mean?
It means I accept that life may lack inherent meaning,
but I find profound purpose in the traditions,history,
(11:44):
and human connections that enrich my existence.
For me,nihilism is not an abyss but a foundation to build upon—a starting point for creating meaning through deliberate effort and reflection,
but we do this by preserving those things that add meaning already,
the institutions,traditions and morality.
But for those without such a tether—be it faith,tradition,
(12:08):
or a grounding in something greater—the result is often far darker negative nihilism.
It manifests in figures like the Madison shooter or Luigi Mangione,
the United Healthcare CEO shooter an act now being considered an act of terrorism.
Mangione’s nihilism was cloaked in the guise of caring about healthcare and fairness but was,
(12:29):
at its core,driven by animus.
We see the same form in his supporters who make arguments like “Yeah its bad that he was killed,
but what does it tell us about US healthcare?
” This is what nihilism unchecked produces (12:41):
not the thoughtful resignation of a positive nihilist,
but the festering rage and excuse of violence by those who have lost all sense of purpose and belonging.
We have to confront this reality with clear eyes.
The solution lies not in slogans or simplistic fixes but in reclaiming the roots of meaning—faith for some,
(13:04):
tradition for others,and community for all.
Without this, the cycle of alienation and despair will continue to claim lives and deepen the void.
It’s up to us to answer the cry buried beneath the hatred,
to break the cycle before it consumes another soul that takes many more with them.
This nihilism doesn’t emerge from a vacuum.
(13:25):
It’s the natural consequence of a society that has forsaken its duty to give life meaning.
Faith, once the bedrock of our moral order, has withered.
Churches are empty;
religion is mocked as superstition without guidance about what to replace it with.
Families, once the cornerstone of belonging, are fragmented and minimized in importance.
(13:47):
Community has been replaced with screens,relationships reduced to data points on social media platforms that connect no one to anything real.
We’re all guilty of it.
The institutions that we once filled the void with have crumbled,
and in their place,we have erected idols (14:02):
the idol of grievance,
the idol of materialism,the idol of “self-expression” that often masks loneliness or alienation.
Nietzsche saw this coming.
When he proclaimed the death of God,he didn’t foresee a utopia of rationalism and progress,
nor do I.
(14:22):
What he saw—and what we now live—is a world untethered,
adrift in subjectively meaninglessness,floundering in its own confusion.
Nietzsche understood a simple yet devastating truth (14:31):
when faith collapses,
a vacuum forms,and something will inevitably rush in to fill it.
What replaces it is rarely better.
Often, it is far darker and far more destructive than what it displaces.
Dostoevsky,ever the sharper observer of human frailty,
made it even clearer (14:52):
without God,everything is permissible.
I lack faith in a deity,but I see the need for those who do to hold tightly to it,
to cultivate it,and to promote it among those who share their beliefs.
For those like me,who find their grounding in the human experience and ordered chaos,
it is equally vital to anchor ourselves to something greater—to principles that transcend the moment,
(15:17):
to the wisdom of ages,to the bonds of community.
And perhaps most importantly,to extend that grounding to those who struggle,
especially the youngest among us.
A child adrift in a world without meaning is the most vulnerable to the encroaching darkness.
If we do not plant seeds of hope and purpose in their lives,
(15:38):
the void will eagerly take root in their hearts.
The young shooter’s manifesto is proof of this terrifying truth.
Without meaning, without a framework to understand her suffering, what remained was violence.
Chaos.
Destruction as a perverse attempt to create order—to make the world match the emptiness she felt inside.
(15:59):
We should not delude ourselves into believing this is an isolated tragedy.
It’s not.
It’s the product of a society that has taught its children to tear down but not to build.
To doubt but never to believe.
To mock but never to revere.
In such a culture, despair becomes the default, and for some, that despair turns lethal.
(16:21):
For those suffering from mental illness it invariably does.
How do we reclaim what’s been lost?
How do we prevent the void from swallowing yet another child?
The answer begins not with our politics or policies,
though those have their place,but with the restoration of meaning itself.
Faith, for all its imperfections, once served as the foundation upon which life was built.
(16:46):
Whether Christian, Jewish, or otherwise, religion offered more than rituals;
it offered a why.
A reason to endure suffering.
A reason to live virtuously.
A reason to hope.
Burke understood this better than most.
He knew that faith wasn’t merely personal belief but the cornerstone of a stable society.
(17:09):
When it fades, chaos follows.
Faith does not stand alone.
It must be partnered with the revival of community—the “little platoons” that Burke so eloquently championed.
These are the family, the neighborhood, the local church, and the humble schoolhouse.
These are not mere relics of a bygone age;
(17:29):
they are the crucibles where belonging is forged,where virtues are instilled,
and where the cold grip of isolation is answered with love and responsibility.
Yet,for too long,we have turned our backs on these little platoons,
dismissing them as outdated or irrelevant.
We have sent children into schools that indoctrinate rather than educate,
(17:51):
teaching them what to think instead of how to think.
We’ve watched as fractured homes became the norm and naively expected resilience to flourish in the cracks.
We abandoned our children to the pixelated void of digital reality and feigned surprise when alienation blossomed.
We stripped morality—even secular morality—from our schools and replaced it with the haze of postmodern deconstruction,
(18:15):
thrusting concepts into minds unprepared to grasp them.
We mocked the very idea of virtue and then wrung our hands in despair when our children could no longer discern right from wrong.
In doing so, we sowed the seeds of despair.
The Madison shooter’s manifesto—like so many others penned by the lost and the broken—is the harvest.
(18:36):
A bitter fruit borne not solely from an individual’s choices but from the soil of a culture that has forsaken its roots.
It is a wake-up call,not to blame faith alone,but to restore the institutions and virtues that faith supports and strengthens.
Only then can we hope to halt the spread of this emptiness before it claims more lives and consumes the culture entirely.
(18:58):
Beauty Will Save the World Yet we can’t live on negation alone.
The restoration of faith and community must be accompanied by the celebration of beauty and creation.
Dostoevsky wrote that “beauty will save the world,” and he was right.
A culture that creates nothing of value will inevitably turn to destruction.
Art, music, literature—these aren’t luxuries but necessities.
(19:23):
They elevate the soul and remind us that life, though fleeting, is precious.
These are things we must share with our children, and I am now more than ever more motivated to do.
These concepts combat the ugliness of nihilism by offering something worth preserving,
something worth expanding.
So, where do we start?
(19:43):
Parents can begin by reclaiming the dinner table—creating a space where conversations happen and values are instilled.
Communities can host events that bring people together, from local festivals to book clubs.
Artists and writers can focus on creation rather than critique,
offering works that uplift rather than deconstruct.
(20:04):
These actions may seem small, but they are the seeds of restoration.
Above all,we must cast off the suffocating yoke of populist grievance that has spread like a plague across both the left and the right.
Populism offers nothing but anger masquerading as action,
resentment in place of resolve,division in the guise of solidarity.
(20:24):
It thrives on destruction, feeding on the very nihilism it claims to oppose.
Beneath its slogans lies a bleak truth (20:30):
populism is nihilism with a campaign slogan.
Consider the rhetoric of populist leaders who reduce every issue to grievance and blame,
offering no path forward beyond division.
On the left and the right,we see this in cries of election fraud without solutions to restore trust.
(20:50):
On the left and the right, it manifests in identity politics that tear down rather than build up.
Both sides offer the same empty promise (20:56):
that anger alone will heal.
In truth, this anger is a mask for nihilism—a void masquerading as a cause.
What we need instead is purpose—real,tangible purpose rooted in history,
anchored in virtue,and directed toward service to something greater than ourselves.
(21:16):
Those of you with faith have it the easiest in this fight—and yes, I’m always a bit envious of that.
This isn’t a simple undertaking.
It won’t be achieved through soundbites or, ugh “hashtags.
(21:29):
It demands labor—real, arduous, often unseen labor.
Parents must rise to the occasion, becoming truly present in their children’s lives.
Communities must awaken,churches must open their doors wider than ever,
artists must craft works of beauty that inspire and elevate.
Leaders must lead, not pander.
And all of us,every single one,must recognize this fundamental truth (21:51):
the void will not fill itself.
The Madison shooter was not a monster, though her actions were monstrous.
She was a child who stumbled into the abyss we allowed to grow unchecked.
Her manifesto,a grim chronicle of despair,is an unintentional warning—a desperate cry for us to reclaim what we have abandoned.
(22:15):
If we fail to heed it,if we continue to abdicate our responsibilities as parents,
as neighbors,as citizens,we won’t merely witness more tragedies like Madison;
we will lose an entire generation to despair.
To the void.
But we are not helpless.
If we act—if we rebuild the pillars of faith,community,
(22:37):
beauty,and purpose—we can begin to turn back the tide.
The void can be conquered.
The soul of our society can be reclaimed.
And with it, the next child who feels lost can be found before it is too late.
For those among you who hold fast to faith,I’ll toss you an assist (22:52):
“And said unto him,
Hearest thou what these say?
And Jesus saith unto them, Yea;
have ye never read, Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise?
” Even in this tragedy, from the mouth of babes comes a warning—and a call to action.
(23:13):
It is not too late to save the culture,to nurture meaning where there is emptiness,
to fight back against the creeping nihilism that threatens to engulf us all.
We,as conservatives,must stand firm—not with the aimless fury of a wrecking ball,
but with the deliberate care of architects rebuilding a crumbling foundation.
Our mission is not to wage war on the modern world but to push back against the creeping forces of nihilism that threaten to hollow out the souls of our children.
(23:42):
And yet, amid the despair, there are embers of hope, glowing faintly but resolutely.
In the heart of rural towns and the bustling streets of urban neighborhoods,
the “little platoons” are stirring once more.
Parents are rising—not merely to complain but to act.
They are stepping into school boards,reshaping curricula,
(24:03):
and forming co-ops to reclaim education and,in doing so,
reclaim their role in the lives of their children.
They are not waiting for permission to rebuild what has been lost;
they are taking the reins with a quiet, determined resolve.
Local churches,though diminished in size and voice,
are becoming sanctuaries of connection and healing.
(24:25):
These places of worship,often divided by doctrine,
are finding common ground in their mission to serve—whether through outreach programs or interfaith efforts that forge bonds across sectarian lines.
In these small but powerful acts,there lies the potential for unity—unity behind a shared purpose,
a collective meaning that transcends divisions.
(24:48):
These efforts are rarely loud.
They do not demand headlines or applause.
But they are vital.
They remind us that renewal is not born from sweeping revolutions but from the quiet persistence of neighbors reaching out to neighbors.
It is in these small,deliberate acts of reclamation that the seeds of a greater restoration are sown.
(25:10):
As long as we are willing to fight for meaning,to plant purpose in the fertile soil of our shared humanity,
the darkness cannot and will not win.
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