I’m back.
I am a seeker. I have always been looking for the truth. And I’ve always done my best to move toward the truth in as authentic a way as I knew how.
My life has been a study in moving from darkness to light. I wrote about this in my book Democrat To Deplorable. That transition wasn’t purely political but also mental, emotional, relational, and spiritual. As I went from Democrat to deplorable, I also went from the manosphere to the Americasphere. From hedonism to service to others. From liberal values to traditional virtues. From subjective secularism to objective truth.
People told me the pursuit of happiness meant doing whatever you wanted. Objective truths were hidden from me growing up in a Democratic family. Growing up liberal, growing up in a progressive environment, freedom meant you could thumb your nose at anyone trying to warn you to stop doing something that might harm you. It was pursuing your happiness, doing your own thing, no matter what that thing was.
It took me decades of being a proactive, engaged adult learner to figure out that that wasn’t the case. I learned that our country was built upon people who didn’t believe that you should do your own thing no matter what it was. I learned that the Founding Fathers encouraged us to act in harmony with the virtues and excellence of Aristotle and the morals of religion, specifically Christianity.
I’ve always been on a trajectory of trying to figure out the truth. It has taken me a long time. And I have made bad decisions along the way.
Three years ago, I did some things I am no longer proud of. Things which disgust me today. The catch was, they were acceptable in the context of my belief system at the time. I used to believe that consent between and among all parties involved was enough. This is humanism—a belief system that says humans are born innately good, so whatever we desire must be perfectly acceptable. All desires are equally valid and moral. That means if you enter into a consensual relationship or a consensual engagement with somebody, then that’s enough, and it contains all the justification there is for your behavior.
Now I recognize that consent is (still) required, but it’s not enough. Consent is not enough to mediate society. Because people can consent to terrible things. That does not make those things acceptable. I thought that as long as I did what I wanted without causing direct damage to others that it was OK. It was my life after all. But I learned Consent cannot make bad into good all by itself.
After that realization, I began to explore what else needs to come along with that consent. If consent is not sufficient to determine good and bad, if consent is not the totality, then what is? What about the common good? What does the action you’re consenting to mean for everybody else involved in other ways? Like your parents and your children? The common good not is not to be enforced through law, but perhaps through social mediation, through cultural mediation, or “The Law of Fashion and Opinion.” We should do what is good so that our world is good for others.
In the last few years, I have been offered the amazing opportunity of one-on-one education with some of the greatest scholars and spiritualists and political philosophers in the world. https://www.youtube.com/jackmurphylive
My connections over the last three years led me through a cycle of awakening. With that came a rejection of humanistic relative morality and an embrace of objective good. I’ve had an amazingly accelerated, dedicated, professionally tutored educational process that has brought me from that one position three years ago of “consent is all” to a new position today where I reject some of the things I used to embrace.
What have I found in this new way of thinking? There is virtue, specifically. Those virtues contained within our definition of masculinity: to build, to create, to provide, to protect, to instruct. Men acting upon the world with the intent to make it better for all people. No man is a man who gathers power to himself solely to revel in his own power. No, you have to do it in a way that’s virtuous and reflects the Aristotelian excellences. And that’s why the second part of our version of masculinity is also to act with honor, courage, loyalty, and strength. In every context, including sexually.
Originally, masculinity according to Aristotle was about being a good man to be part of the good polis that you create together, which is something I’ve talked about before. Then came Machiavelli who said it was actually just about glory. Well, that’s insufficient. And then Hobbes and Locke who said masculinity is about survival and property. Well, that’s insufficient as well. And then you get to modern life where identity is the only truth and masculinity is an angry rejection of postmodernity. No. Masculinity is not just about tearing down the world because you can, just because you want to exert your will.
Masculinity is actually a little bit of all those things combined into one. Being a good man to build and maintain the good polis for your people. Achieving glory through moral means. Survival and protection of property in the face of tyranny. Anger at modern life and its threats to our family. And tearing down what is evil for the sake of rebuilding the good polis. Masculinity is all of these. That’s my current definition and working usage of the idea of masculinity.
All this learning led me to found the Liminal Order. Not because I was a perfect man ready to teach others to be perfect men. I was still deeply flawed. I carried shame and scars from my days when I believed in liberalism. You’ve seen some of my worst moments on the Internet in the last couple of months. When they were still secrets, they drove me to pursue virtue in order to distance myself from the past version of me I hated so much. I wanted to teach other men to avoid the traps of hedonism I’d fallen into.
Some have said that me running the Liminal Order is the height of hypocrisy. They mistakenly believe that I continued to do these actions up to the very day my sins came to light. They wonder how I could teach men to be men when I have done the things I have done. And they question, rightly, why I did not reveal myself to others and own my mistakes as I teach men to do.
My biggest mistake was not coming clean about my past. I should have, so that it did not control me or threaten the work I do to help others. Because when my past was revealed, people believed I still did those things. And that made me angry. My anger at their being revealed was really anger at myself for having ever believed as I did. I was ashamed. But in the moment, my anger turned outward at the people who revealed my sins when I felt I wasn’t ready. I was wounded and wanted the pain to stop.
People have called me many things. Hypocrite. Grifter. FBI plant. Mossad asset. Spy ring leader. They’ve invented fanciful stories about my escapades. Some have used this as an excuse to tear down the work I’ve done helping men.
All of this is my responsibility. In refusing to own my past, I opened the door for the most hostile actors with the worst imaginings. So today, I am owning my past.
Criticism has also fallen unfairly on my brothers in the Liminal Order. Men have been mocked for associating with me. And people have wondered what it means to be a member of the Liminal Order when the founder has secrets like these.
I was not the man I should have been. But I am no longer the man I was. The Jack Murphy you see in gossipy articles died before anyone even heard of him. I should have been honest that he ever existed, instead of covering him up, but I did not want him to detract from the work I started. Some of that work includes the Liminal Order, men who joined together under a banner of brotherhood in a world gone mad. And my work with them continues, because it is far too important to be derailed by foolishness.
Let me address those men and that group so the world knows the truth.
The Liminal Order is not and never has been a Jack Murphy fan club.
That is spelled out plainly on our initial contact page. This is not a group to celebrate myself. The Liminal Order is a network of men living out masculine virtues in a degenerate world. Some are men who were raised with good values, who never strayed from the path, and who have come seeking others like themselves. And some are like me with their own dark secrets that they reject. They seek to become better men. Perhaps to move from Democrat to deplorable like I did, or from from consent to virtue.
The Liminal Order has three core values: Masculinity, Brotherhood, and Sovereignty.
None of which say Jack Murphy is God. No, it’s about community service, loyalty to each other, and helping each other out. We help each other when we’re grieving. We help pay for funerals. We help men move their families out of violent zones into safe havens. We help men find jobs. We build businesses and institutions that reflect our values. We help men be loving fathers for their children and stable husbands for their wives. We help each other do what men are supposed to do.
As for myself, I know I am not the perfect man. I have never once said Jack Murphy possesses perfect masculinity. I have consistently and continuously taken guidance from philosophy, politics, and religion, and sought to reflect on the ancient teachings and contextualize them for today. Any guru that tells you they’ve got some new way of doing things is a liar. The only honest one is someone who helps remind you of what has already been established or decided or handed down over time. I am not Jack Murphy, creator of masculinity. I am Jack Murphy, learning masculinity for myself and teaching others as I go. The more I learn, the more I can teach.
I’m a seeker, which by its nature contains humility. I’m always looking for more answers and more truth. And you can see that through everything I’ve ever written. If you’ve been listening to my podcast, you know I’ve always come with humility. I’m always asking people questions. I’m the student, they’re the teacher. And if you need any evidence to the contrary that Jack Murphy says I’m the perfect Giga Chad meme and others have to do what I say, look at my history of work. And that work continues. One obvious example this year in the Liminal Order has been the philosophical analysis of masculinity as taught by Dr. Michael Millerman. He understands the philosophy of masculinity. So we learn from him. We’re all still learning what it means to be a man and we do it together.
I considered stepping back when my past sins came to light. Should I shut it all down and go silent? If people believe I’m a hypocrite, should I back off so I don’t damage the cause?
Then I remembered I’m not the only podcaster who has faced the past being dredged up, with every regretful past thing they’ve done, and had to come to terms with them in public. I considered Joe Rogan, for example. Why do people listen to Joe Rogan? Is it because of his inappropriate jokes, even racist jokes, and other things he has said? No. People don’t listen to him for that. Do they listen to him in spite of that? Yes. And Joe Rogan has talked about how he used to have “liberal” values. Which really means hedonistic values. And he had to transition from leftist liberal values to traditional virtues. And that results in behavior change.
If you look at all of the great conversion stories in history, they’re only memorable because of how drastic the change was. I think about Saul converting into Paul, for example, in the New Testament. He went from slaughtering Christians to writing a huge chunk of the Bible and correcting churches.
This is not me placing myself on par with the greats of history. I don’t expect anyone to say, “Hey, look, there’s St. Paul, Joe Rogan, and Jack Murphy. They’re all the same.” Definitely not. That’s the opposite of virtue, the opposite of humility.
But why do people listen to Joe Rogan consistently? And relate to Paul’s writings? It’s not just because they’re experts. It’s because they were normal men with a normal perspective. And they were humble because of their pasts. We see their painful pasts, and the mistakes they’ve made, and the men they’ve become in spite of those pasts. And those conversion stories make their work more meaningful to us, not less meaningful.
That is the mistake I made. By hiding my sins I made people believe what I taught was a lie. If I’d revealed my foolish past earlier, people might have learned from my conversion story. Not because I’m on par with Joe Rogan and Paul, but because I’m a normal man who made bad decisions when he thought they were right. And now I see how wrong they were. And I can say from a place of authority, “These things are wrong, and here is how I know.”
Leftist liberal values, which include hedonistic values, tell us we can do whatever we want without consideration beyond consent. This is not the way to build a meaningful life. We’ve all seen the extreme behavior liberal values can result in. The destruction of the family creating generations of broken people who don’t know how to love or be loved. Drug epidemics claiming millions of lives. School kids having their nudes posted online and committing suicide from the embarrassment and bullying. And, yes, people doing shameful things in their relationships and on the Internet.
People called me a hypocrite for not owning my mistakes. Well, I own them now. They’ve been revealed for the whole world to see. And there’s no going back.
I would not go back if I could. Because my past reveals that everything I’ve warned about has been true. I’ve written countless emails, blog posts, and tweets and recorded dozens of podcasts and even wrote a book warning about the evils of liberal values. I’ve told everyone who will listen that libertine beliefs and licentious actions will destroy individuals and in turn society.
When I say that now, people will know that I’m speaking from personal experience. I’m not saying it academically, theoretically, or rhetorically. These are raw memories of how Leftist beliefs nearly destroyed me. They nearly ruined me again when I refused to own up to them. Their being revealed caused people to walk away from the truth I was trying to share.
My story doesn’t negate what I’ve taught. It proves it. My own life is a study in the truth of what I teach. And it’s time I embrace that so I can do more good than ever before. Because if I can prevent even one young man from following my path, if I can help just one man find virtue before he makes grievous mistakes that will haunt him, all the stupidity I embraced will be worth it. I place greater importance on the health of our society and our people than on my own comfort. So if the truth can help save people, then let the truth be shouted from the rooftops.
And I’m not starting from zero. My bad choices from three years ago have led to three years of changes and improvements. I’m engaged to my long time girlfriend so we can get married and do things right. While so many people are shacking up and playing house, I am putting action behind my values. That’s not to say I’m better than others, or that I’m a perfect example. It’s me living what I teach. As I learned more about the importance of accepting responsibility and the purpose of marriage in society, I changed to embrace my duties.
This is one change in a thousand as I continue to transition from leftist values to traditional virtues. And one of the most traditional virtues is lifetime commitment and faithfulness, right?
Maybe some people reading this are hiding secrets of their own. Their licentious past conflicts with who they want to be. I see a lot of people argue online about whether women can reform after ten years in hookup culture. Can they really be a loving wife or mother? Or whether men can come back from various emasculating experiences to become honorable. Can they really be respectable?
I am here to say: You can find redemption. Just because you were X in the past does not mean you will be X forever.
Christianity morality has informed a large part of my quest for redemption and growth. A unique part of Christianity is redemption. We are redeemed not by our own works but by grace. And part of that grace is true repentance for what we’ve done and a heart desiring change. As I move to explore my faith, I am pressed to cultivate humility, repentance, and a heart for change. And this experience has created more urgency for me to seek that redemption than ever before. I must become what I am called to be rather than what I have chosen to be in the past. What was old will become new.
Frankly, if anyone rejects the ability to be redeemed, they are rejecting Christian morality but the American spirit as well. That is not to say that I am synonymous with the Christian faith, or that I don’t have to show my repentance and desire to change. I do, and that is on me. But those who would attack me from here on out, those who say there is no hope for a man to change, it is not me they are attacking, they are attacking Christian ideas and the American love for a comeback. And I will no longer respond to them. I will spend my effort changing and learning and being redeemed from the man I was when I didn’t know better.
I cannot be Jack Murphy, leader of perfect men who’ve never made mistakes. I am not the Giga Chad without need for redemption. I can’t be that role model, and I never wanted to be. And I will never be perfect. And after this revealing of my past, I can’t even pretend to be. Because that was never my role to play. This new phase of my life demands I become something else.
So, who am I now?
Jack Murphy, a man who was once a libertine fool but embraced virtue.
Jack Murphy, a seeker who will learn more about morality until the day I die.
Jack Murphy, a companion for people who believe they’re too broken to be redeemed.
Jack Murphy, a living example of God’s grace and the American spirit.
This is who I am. I would like you to be part of it. If you’re holding things back, secrets you’re afraid would hurt you, I want you to know there’s a way through the darkness. And if you want to be part of my journey, I’m glad to have you along.
If you’re someone who’s horrified at my past, let me say that I share that horror. The man I was three years ago is not who I want to be. And I am doing everything I can to become the best man I can be. That includes learning from everyone who will teach me. If you’re further along in that journey than I am, I’d appreciate your insight and advice. I am a student and I want to learn. Learning is how we become better than we were.
And if you don’t want to be part of my journey, that’s fine, too. Maybe you don’t believe in redemption. Or you aren’t interested in seeing a transition from humanism to objective good. Go ahead and unsubscribe. This is the road I’m on, and I have to walk it. If our paths diverge here, I wish you the best.
The Jack Murphy of three years ago is dead. The Jack Murphy of three months ago is dead, too. From here on out, I will be the Jack Murphy who acknowledges the past so I can encourage those with a painful past of their own. I will work to make the world better, as I was already doing, but this time without the shadow of regret hanging over me. And I will continue to shout for all the world to hear that there is real truth to be found in virtue, masculinity, and social responsibility.
We must make the world better. I hope you’ll join me.
-Jack
March 4th, 2022
PS: For more on my political and moral evolution check out this thread here:
