Faith is difficult without an authority in place.

Readership: All; Men;
Theme: Awareness and Introspection
Length: 850 words
Reading Time: 5 minutes

Intro

A few readers have mentioned that I emphasize authority too heavily. Maybe so, but I believe this is what is missing in today’s culture, so it needs to be emphasized. If you’re the type of man who already has a firm grasp of authority over his life, then maybe these posts are not for you.

The previous post, Faith and Authority (2025/8/29), explained my understanding of Authority as it relates to Faith. In a nutshell, Faith and Authority go hand in hand. You can’t have one without the other.

This post addresses specific criticisms related to this topic.

Responses to Criticisms

“[Among those opposed to Patriarchy, The Manosphere, and The Red Pill,] there is a general aversion to authority, headship, organized religion, and true conservatism.  This is no coincidence, as the recognition of hierarchy is an important hallmark of The Red Pill (and Christian faith).  In fact, this aversion to authority / Headship is what clued me in to this as being a central tenet of The Red Pill, as I explained in a previous post, Red Pill Authenticity: The Spirit of Headship (2023/4/28).  It is also worth mentioning that trust in authority is central to faith — our trust in God.”

Σ Frame: Red Pill Bad! (2024/7/20)

1. The Central Importance of Authority

One reader said to Jack,

“You cannot see anything outside the frame of authority and authoritarianism, can you?”

As I stated in the previous post, trust in authority is central to faith.  The recognition of authority is foundational to faith. Below are more examples of how this plays out.

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2. The Authority of Manosphere Personalities

IMO, blogs are primarily a forum for sharing and discussing ideas. Regular writers are able to establish a voice of authority by virtue of their reputation, based on their regular contributions and the value of the content. The value of their contributions is often determined by whether it is accurate, believable, relevant, reliable, truthful, and trustworthy, thereby inspiring confidence and faith in readers.

Blogs are less valuable for providing accountability and personal instruction, because the authority of the participants is based on the value of their writings, and NOT as one who has the power to enforce discipline and order.

There are two exceptions.

  1. Blog hosts are able to exercise a little more authority than readers via writing posts and screening comments.
  2. Participants may be willingly inclined to take a certain person’s comments to heart. This form of philosophical trust often hinges on the reputation of that person’s writings, as described above.

Other than these two caveats, it is not reasonable to expect a netizen to submit to another netizen’s purported authority.

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3. The Authority of Scripture

Christians, especially Western Evangelical Protestants, often cite the Bible as an authority and will usually combine this with an appeal to logic.

For example, here’s one comment that seeks to establish a common authority of scripture and logic.

“…first I need to know if you accept the Bible as the inerrant and sole word of God?  Because I will cite scripture, and if you hold a different axiom, then there is no point in my doing so.”

A mutually recognized authority must be in place for any further dialogue to commence, whether it is scripture, or an ecclesiastical authority, or the word of an expert, or a scientific research article, or something else. Without first establishing a mutually recognized authority (the Bible in the above case), we cannot have an argument in good Faith.  This is another example of how Faith and Authority go hand in hand.

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4. The Authority of the Church

Recently, in the sphere, there has been some discussion about discipline within the church, specifically the procedures outlined in Matthew 18.

Matthew 18 is filled with references to authority, with the primary point being to recognize the authority of Jesus Christ (e.g. by humbling one’s self as a little child, by receiving the Lord’s forgiveness and forgiving others in turn, etc.).  Several of these verses charge us to recognize the authority of Christ in our relationships with others (i.e., through forgiveness).

As a case in point, one blogger stated that a commenter should be subject to the authority of his church in order to resolve a dispute between them. But the problem with this approach is that Matthew 18 is not applicable for two reasons.

  1. Matthew 18 is intended to resolve interpersonal conflicts between two fellow believers within a church, NOT to govern philosophical debates on blog forums.
  2. Neither of them attends the same church, and so there is no single church authority over both of them.

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