Over the last several months, the use of the phrase “Woke Right” has both gained in popularity and subsequently lost steam, as the term has proven untenable and its primary proponents are not philosophically adept on political theory, among them being James Lindsay and mathematician and, within Evangelicalism, Neil Shenvi, who is a chemist. Absent comprehension of political thought, they have resorted to the use of this term to denote real or perceived parallels on the Left to those on the right, which sounds intelligent until one, studying the history of political thought, realizes that parallels exist in ideologically distinct movements all the time.
Immediately after defending JD Greear’s heretical belief that Christians and Muslims worship the same god, Neil Shenvi appeared on Benjamin Boyce’s podcast in a debate against Dave Greene, also called Dave the Distributist. Greene has 48K subscribers and is widely influential in the online space, particularly with those on the so-called Dissident Right. He has much overlap with Auron MacIntyre and The Prudentialist. Ironically, the moniker “Distributist” would be called Marxist by the very framework of James Lindsay due to the shared criticisms with Marx despite disparate solutions, which is why “woke right” as a term does not work.
The debate lasted for 2 hours, and while there are not fireworks or fierce disagreement, it is very apparent that Shenvi is ignorant on matters of political theory, mainly Elite Theory, and his solutions resort to his contention that the “church is the answer.”
Elite Theory
The first portion of the debate covers Elite Theory’s significance in the formation of political movements. The New Right acknowledges the role elites play in political movements. This is most easily depicted by the role Elon Musk played in supporting Trump in 2024. It could also be demonstrated why gay “marriage” succeeded in America despite majoritarian opposition, even in states like California. The proponents of “woke right” assert that the use of Elites is like Marx’s use of Capitalists. Generally, Elites refer to those of the upper class or institutional power, which across societies would be the Patricians, Upper Gentry, etc. but is simplified to Elites within the theory.
Shenvi objects to the idea that narratives are hegemonic, claiming that the ability of movements to rise and fall refutes Elite Theory. He specifically identifies Trump’s victories and even Newt Gingrich’s contract with America as proof that narratives are not hegemonic. Greene counters first by arguing that Trump’s ascendency was the result of the internet while Gingrich’s success in the 90s was not narrative-breaking.
Though not exclusive, Greene argued that narrative changes are driven by elites, citing that even America’s founding was driven by elites like Washington and Jefferson. He does clarify that not all movements are elite driven, citing the Haitian revolution or Sparticus as primary examples, which often end poorly because of the inability for proper management.
Essentially, the debate over where narratives come from is more of a Q&A with Greene attempting to educate Shenvi on the dynamics of narrative formation.
Racial Collectivization vs. The Good Samaritan
After the first forty minutes, the debate shifts towards collectivism along racial lines. Greene argues that the left argues collectively while the right has responded by arguing individually, but the Right is increasingly fine with arguing collectively. This is where Shenvi begins to use the parable of the Good Samaritan to argue the sin of partiality, which was his primary prooftext throughout the debate. The constant problem with Shenvi’s use of the parable is the issue of scale. He applies individual dynamics to nations when Christ clearly refers to individuals based on proximity. He uses the parable to contend for his version of Ordo Amoris.
Greene’s response is that the term racism was always a progressive cudgel that was designed to broaden the sin of bigotry to assert “a Christian moral requirement for total universalism and ethnic non-particularism.” Simply stated, one is not allowed to view race. Greene further argues that rendering help to someone does not erase loyalties or obligations to, family, ethnic group, and nation, something he contends is consistent with historic Christian thought.
Greene does not distinguish between Race and Ethnicity or otherwise finds it to be moot. He argues that blacks see a “special connection” with other blacks and see themselves as a unique group whereas Shenvi articulated that America was one ethnicity despite different races. Greene would contend that White Americans and Black Americans underwent their own ethnogenesis. Shenvi’s absurdity becomes further apparent as he affirms that Blacks are their own ethnic group but refuses to affirm that Whites are one as well. Shenvi’s denial that there is a White race is a product of progressivism and the revolution of the 60s. Greene would argue that America proactively unified its whites via ethnogenesis, citing how even though his family was not in America very long, he still identified with the pilgrims at Plymouth Rock.
Greene argues that racial collectiveness is unavoidable.
The West used to be more or less homogenous. Now it’s not. We’re not going to have a politics that is ‘everyone else votes in blocs, everyone else has ethnic identity, except for people of European origin. That’s not going to happen, and once they do start seeing themselves that way, that’s going to trigger a whole heck of a bunch of other questions about the last 60 years and the ideology that got us here.
This is Greene’s assertion that all politics is identity politics, which is undefeated. Elections are ethnic censuses with religion and gender being the other two identities that most predict how one would vote.
Church vs. State
This debate is best summarized by Dave Greene arguing “what is” and how to navigate it while Neil Shenvi attempts to argue “what ought to be.” This is seen especially towards the end where they are discussing the common good. Shenvi seems to assert that it is the Church’s job to teach and persuade people of the common good and break down racial barriers, which juxtaposes to Greene asserting the reality of political dynamics.
What is blatantly hypocritical (and unacknowledged by Greene) is that Shenvi asserts that he does not want these dynamics entering the church and that it “destroyed the church” when his pastor, JD Greear, was notorious for bringing anti-white racism into the church. Because he addresses the American Church’s role in ethnogenesis, he is arguing the need for “multi-ethnic churches.” The push for the “diverse church” has led to anti-white racism in the church, DEI practices, and egalitarianism—all of which are promoted by JD Greear. Ultimately, Shenvi is the one conflating Church and State.
Despite being Catholic, Greene maintains that this conversation is about America as a “political project” and that people “don’t vote for the common good” and never have in a democracy. Whereas Shenvi argues that the Church must do the work of persuasive work of convincing people to “vote for the common good,” Greene contends that politics should be kept out of the church. Shenvi appears to take a utopian approach where the Church can cure Man of certain political problems, which is contrary to the Founding Fathers, who despite living in a hegemonically Christian society, rejected democracy, universal suffrage, and multi-culturalism. Shenvi would likely argue that the Church can make these things work when history and human nature dictate otherwise.
Protestantism has an issue with an overreliance on the church to solve every problem with regards to politics, and it is ironically the Romanist who says that the Church should focus on being the Church rather than take an ecclesiocentric approach to politics. In practice, it is a problem that people are getting their political understanding from pastors, like Jack Hibbs, Doug Wilson, or even Joel Webbon, who really should subcontract the political theory to those who have studied it. The papists do not look to their pope for marching orders regarding politics whereas many in Protestantism do so with their pastors, who are often ill-equipped on these subjects. Protestant political thinkers should increasingly be laymen while pastors should take on a supporting role rather than center stage. This is not an insult to those who speak on political issues, but collectively, they are not the best at understanding political theories.
Conclusion
The debate between Neil Shenvi and Dave Greene was a friendly obliteration and revelation of how intellectually inept the former is when it comes to political theory and sociology. The desire to affirm the existence of a Black ethnos and not a White ethnos is Shenvi’s internalized liberalism. Even when it can be proven that people behave in groups, elites drive political movements, multicultural democracy is an ethnic census, or diversity erodes social trust, his liberalism does not have a response but to revert to Bible Jukes and an appeal to liberal platitudes. In the end, acknowledging these realities would mean that “white evangelicals are the lone bulwark against moral insanity in America.” This goes against Shenvi’s programming.
To some extent, Shenvi has acknowledged his defeat by pivoting from using “woke right” to Dissident Right, while maintaining his objections. If the Church is going to be an effective political voice, then it must understand political dynamics as they are, not as they desire them to be.
3 Responses
The “job” of the church is evangelism. Give people Jesus and hearts/lives are changed. See people as Jesus sees them- lost and in need of the Savior then you will see a change in society, government, and, most importantly, the church.
From DeBuhn’s notes on page 157 of his attempt to reconstruct Marcion’s gospel:
“Luke 10.29–37 The parable of the Good Samaritan is unattested for the Evangelion [of Marcion]. It goes unmentioned by any of the witnesses to Marcion’s text, most tellingly by Pseudo-Ephrem A, which gives orthodox interpretations of the parables found in Marcion’s gospel. The story is first attested in Clement of Alexandria and P 45 in the early third century.”
It doesn’t make sense for Marcion to have removed it from Luke, as the story is criticizing Jews, namely the priest and Levite (which he would love to have in there surely), AND as Marcion supposedly believed in an “alien God” saving a people that he did not create, which would make him a foreigner to the people he is saving, just like the Good Samaritan; so it would seem Marcion ought to include the story, or even invent it himself. Yet the evidence in Tertullian and Epiphanius suggests it was not in Marcion’s shorter Luke. Therefore, I judge, the story of the Good Samaritan is not authentic, and therefore the idea that Jesus defined “neighbor” across ethnic lines is sketchy; not to mention if this was central to his message in any way, why is it not in the other gospels but only in Luke?
Oh, and this doesn’t deny Inerrancy per RC Sproul’s “Chicago Statement of Inerrancy” because the Reformed mucky mucks there said its inerrant “in the original autographs” not in the current Nestle Aland or the ESV or KJV.
Even if you want to spew in response the usual STRAWMANNING from the church fathers that Marcion was a heretic, and taught two gods, blah blah blah, you will have to deal ultimately with his increasing popularity, and that the racially conscious will find out about him and how the Race Mixing parable was not in his text. And that they will figure out he didn’t literally teach two gods, but is being strawmanned for teaching the same as John chapter 1, i.e. that “no man ever saw God” before Jesus’ incarnation and “the Law came by Moses but GRACE and TRUTH came by Jesus Christ” and again Christ saying in John “All who came before me were thieves and robbers.” Judaism is false, the Old Testament is manmade, but God hated Judaism enough to incarnate and morph the messianic concept to his own image to one-up and subvert Judaism and prevent it from becoming the world religion by the Romans adopting it; God “fulfilled” whatever manmade prophecies the Jewish “prophets” made up that he wanted to, twisting them to his own usage, and by divine fiat declaring he fulfilled “prophecies” even by “fulfilling” things from the Old Testament that were never intended as prophecies, and God did this to stop Judaism from being imposed on all mankind by the Romans who were getting tired of polytheism and wanted to adopt monotheism, and there was a danger they would embrace and impose Judaism, so God took the manmade text of the Jews, the Old Testament, and twisted it around his little finger and made something good from it and created Christianity; its not as the Calvinist and Catholic churches tell us, i.e. that God was a Jewish racist commanding genocides against Whites and speaking through these racist prophets; rather, God HIJACKED a manmade text and subverted it to his ends to destroy the most vile religion ever created, i.e. Judaism, and keep the Romans from adopting it. Whites will figure this out, and no amount of “no, the Old Testament is the inerrant word of God” will stop them; William Lane Craig is already saying everyone prior to Abraham in the Old Testament is a myth; next step, realizing Abraham is a myth too and that the reason physical descent from Abraham is declared to NOT MATTER in the New Testament is because Abraham is a fictional character; that’s why we can be spiritual descendants of Abraham and that can be by divine fiat legitimate and this not be a problem.