A modality is the way or mode in which something exists or is done. You might often see it used with reference to diagnostic modality, which is the way in which a disease or illness is diagnosed by a doctor.

Whenever someone talks about a way of doing something, or even, say, creates a subreddit to discuss ways to do a certain thing, sooner or later someone is going to come along and say

"Yes, we can do it that way, but should we?"

The word "should" is a slippery one. It really has two meanings.

  1. "This is a moral imperative." (You "should" not have sex with someone else's wife.)

  2. "This is the most effective way to achieve X.", where everyone agrees that X is a desirable end. (You "should" not run with scissors.)

The problem with the first one is that it's based on fundamentally flawed premise... that an absolute morality exists which can be discovered. That, of course, is bullshit. You cannot get "ought" from "is", never could, never will.

Does this mean that moral codes are fake, and we can do whatever we want? Well, we can, but morals are useful because they exist in the second sense. Moral codes are transactional, not absolute. In other words, they are a piece of social technology that cultures come up with for the purpose of achieving their ends, a social contract that we indoctrinate people into so that they can get along and work together, and thus achieve more than they could in an atmosphere of strife.

This means that an effective man does not have one code of moral behaviour. He has different types of moral behaviour, depending on who he is dealing with, what level of trust he has with them, and what level of reciprocity he can expect from them. The more internal trust a group or culture has, the more elabourate its moral code can be. Moral codes are tools, pieces of social technology, and different tools are appropriate for different tasks.

Losing sight of this is the root of the blue pill, and of the downfall of both civilizations and individual men. When a man can be suckered into acting against his self-interest and in the interest of others who will not do the same for him, he allows himself to be taken advantage of. This is Phase One, "Denial", when a man is unhappy with his lot in life, but refuses to act to change it, because "that would be wrong".

The moment of awakening (beginning of Phase Two) is the moment when a man realizes that the notions of right and wrong which he was taught were not absolutes. They were not even a social contract. They were a slave collar to extract the maximum of labour from him with the minimum of reward. The blue pill is the weaponization of morality. This is why there is a big difference between dispensing blue pills and swallowing them. One is using weaponized morality against others. The is allowing weaponized morality to be used against you.

Thus, the question of whether you "should" sleep with someone's wife has two answers:

  • The Blue answer ("no, it's wrong" or "yes, he doesn't own her")

  • The Red answer("what is he to me? Do we have trust? Is there a social contract? Would he extend me the same courtesy? Does he have my back? Is this my friend, or a stranger?")

The difference between RP and BP is not the difference between "keep the code" and "violate the code", but between "the code is absolute" and "the code is situational".

"I against my brother, my brothers and I against my cousins, then my cousins and I against the stranger."