Evan The Punk: Leaving The Alt-Right

Bow before your superiors, plebs … who are broke, unemployed, divorced and live with their parents in their 40s ? pic.twitter.com/ATqyYg6n0v

— Hunter Wallace (@LutherEnjoyer) April 7, 2024

Episode 133 of the @DNWpod is live!@evan_r_mclaren was the executive director of the NPI, Richard Spencer’s white nationalist “think tank”, until he resigned in 2018. We talk about what he saw there, and his journey out of hate.

Don’t miss it!https://t.co/aewhV9tBMf pic.twitter.com/eRu8UdJlGk

— Griff Grza Sombke (@Grzabjj) April 8, 2024

I have a lot less nostalgia for the Alt-Right.

Yesterday, I listened to this interview with Evan the Punk and it reinforced my biases. For those who don’t remember him, Evan McLaren was once the Executive Director of the National Policy Institute although it would be more accurate to describe him as Richard Spencer’s butler.

NPI raised a considerable amount of money from White Nationalists over the years before its tax-exempt status was revoked in 2017 by the IRS for failing to file tax returns. In the interview, McLaren describes how Spencer couldn’t be bothered with things like that. It was a “think tank” which didn’t think. It was a policy institute which didn’t produce any policies. It didn’t lobby politicians either. Instead, it held conferences in Washington, DC which attracted useless fops, pseudo-intellectuals and dilettantes, granted interviews to liberal journalists and started the theatrical torch marches in Charlottesville.

In the interview, Evan McLaren describes how he able to ascend to the apex of the Alt-Right. He was the leader of the institution. He describes finding a void of vision and leadership at the top of the movement which started and ended with people like Spencer and McLaren. They spent their day in the sun lingering around cigar shops in DC and the bar at the Trump Hotel where Spencer liked to go to scope out young women. Spencer left his Russian wife and children back home at his parents house in Montana. Rumors have circulated for years that he screwed the girlfriends of his top lieutenants.

The interview with Evan McLaren confirms the gut instincts of ordinary conservatives about these guys. These two clowns never had any connection to the Trump administration. They were essentially looking through the glass at people like Stephen Miller and Nigel Farage. They were eager to play useful idiots for the media to get on television. Spencer was willing to play a Bond villain for CNN and The Atlantic. He was the guy who was punched in the face by Antifa. He was the guy crying about how Antifa was winning. He was the go to guy who was invited back on CNN to endorse Joe Biden in 2020.

In Lord Spencer’s view, ordinary conservatives are peasants. They are beneath him. They are dumb because they don’t see the value of babbling in vague platitudes about Nietzsche in Twitter spaces and on college campuses. He went to graduate school at Duke to acquire this skill set. These people have productive jobs and invest their time in their families. Unlike Spencer, they have spent their lives building wealth and nurturing relationships. They aren’t driven by narcissism and a sense of entitlement. They are also Christians and value humility which is the exact opposite of Spencer’s course in life.

As for Evan, he repeatedly describes himself as a weak, insecure man and a natural follower who passively absorbs the views of others in the interview. This difference in temperament, character and background explains his reaction to Charlottesville. Stronger men who fared much worse shrugged it off, bounced back and moved forward with their lives. Effeminate spoiled brats couldn’t handle the pressure, cracked and blamed everyone but themselves. He became a rat because he was always a punk.

What would you do with 15 minutes of fame? Would you abandon your family to move across the country to have as many affairs possible? Would you throw your supporters under the bus?