Austin Ruse

recent articles

Carlos Maza Could Use Man Lessons from Steven Crowder

Carlos Maza is a nasty little man who goes by the nom-de-tweet Gaywonk. A gay guy with pronounced gay-voice, he has been stalking and trolling conservatives for many years. He stalked me a few years ago when he was a “reporter” for the hard-left Media Matters. He came after me on Twitter, harassing me, calling … Read more

Time for a Non-Feminist Reappraisal of the Role of Women

The rank confusion spawned by the push for transgenderism is a direct result of the contemporary feminist movement, which came to the fore and started to transform American life fifty years ago. It is one of the most insidious effects of feminism and underscores the urgent need to put forth a reasonable, non-feminist—indeed, non-ideological—understanding of … Read more

Why the Church Has Failed to Convert Modern Man

A couple of months ago I noted that we live in a time in which connections like family, kinship, religion, and inherited culture and community are dissolving. The feeling against borders and Brexit shows that even national connections are disappearing in the minds of many people. But a time of dissolution is also a time … Read more

Bishop Tobin Attacked for Speaking a Plain Truth

A few days ago, Bishop Thomas Tobin of Providence sent out a message that within living memory absolutely no mother or father, liberal or conservative, Christian or Jewish or secular, or anyone old or young would have considered to be controversial. He said, gently, that it was not good for parents to take their children … Read more

Oedipus the Detective

The murder mystery is as old as murder. When the blood of Abel cried out for justice, the all-seeing Judge took up the case and Cain was caught in his crime. So it was, and so it is. All are Cain to one extent or another, murdering what is precious in their own lives. The … Read more

Coming Out of the Closet

It was the late 1990s, and I went up to Rolling Stone on Sixth Avenue in Manhattan to say hello to my old friend Bobby Love who was the longtime managing editor. I had worked at Rolling Stone for a short while many years before and had made many friends and drinking buddies, including Bobby … Read more

The Writing Is on the Web

With the unfolding of spring comes a renewed awareness and appreciation for life. It is peculiar, though, how the observation of life, birth, and the rounds of nature’s dance can lead to the contemplation of death. Resurrection requires that life conclude before it may rise again. Spring can, as a result, be solemn even as … Read more

Care for the Common Good Requires Sexual Morality

Catholics who put themselves forward as advocates of social justice seem to behave as if the sexual teachings of the Church did not bear upon the issue at all. These Catholics are not wrong to care for the common good. The quality of their recommendation—whether it is mistaken or not—will depend upon what they recommend, and how, … Read more

Time to Scrap Our Current Definition of Privilege

It used to be that a “child of privilege” was someone born into a wealthy, established, and well-connected family. This situation was considered part of life. It seemed neither possible nor especially desirable to prevent people from having money, influential connections, and a certain degree of respect on account of their background. One reason was … Read more

An “Ultra-Conservative Crusade” Against Pope Francis?

Beware the quick one-shot cuts in television interviews. Buckets of deception are in those quick cuts. It usually means something fishy is going on. Consider the Palm Sunday hatchet job performed by MSNBC “journalist” Richard Engel on various politically conservative Catholics he says are conspiring to bring down Pope Francis. Right off you can smell … Read more

A Crisis of Both Justice and Civic Friendship

Even though the Mueller report seemed to bring an end to the long investigation of the 2016 Trump campaign for something that is not even a federal crime—collusion—the left can’t seem to let it go. Even though they expressed full confidence in Mueller as the investigation went on, they suddenly began to question his credibility … Read more

Mayor Buttigieg’s God of Feelings

Mr. Peter Buttigieg, mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and a candidate for the presidency of the United States, has picked a theological quarrel with Mike Pence, the current vice president. The specific focus of the quarrel is not of peculiar interest beyond our times—our peculiar times. The general import is as vast as creation. Political people generally have an outsized … Read more

Catholic University Students Slam Porn, Then Lefty Faculty

Progressives think every inch of ground gained will never be relinquished. This is why clawing anything back is harder and bloodier than having lost it in the first place. The administrators of Catholic University of America are discovering just how hard it is to walk back the revolution that started in the 1960s. But they … Read more

The Contradictions of Mayor Pete Buttigieg

Moving from political obscurity as the gay mayor of South Bend, Indiana, to the media’s flavor-of-the-month Democratic presidential candidate, Mayor Pete Buttigieg announced last week that his campaign has raised over $7 million since launching his exploratory committee in January. “Mayor Pete,” as he has asked his constituents to call him, is the first of … Read more

The Divine Tragedy of Achilles

As the heroes of The Iliad are slain in blood, Homer gives each of them an epitaph in poetry, that they may die not as expendable masses, but as men with names. Even as they fall, death swirling round them, the blind poet looks for the monument of man, decrying its absence while railing at … Read more

In Academia as in Government, Personnel Is Policy

News is that Providence College, where I taught for 27 years, will be getting a new president in 2020. He won’t have troubles with money or buildings, whereas for re-establishing the Catholic faith as the school’s foundation, aim, and reason for existence, he will face, outside of the theology department, a nearly universal hostility from a … Read more

Southern Poverty Law Center Is Punished for the Wrong Crimes

A writer named Bob Moser is incensed at what became of the Southern Poverty Law Center where he worked for a few years in the early aughts. The recent revelations of sexual harassment and racism unfolding at the Poverty Palace built by SPLC founder Morris Dees down in Montgomery, Alabama, caused Moser to pen a … Read more

Catholicism in a Time of Dissolution

We live in a time of dissolution. Many people find it hard to take such claims seriously because people have always complained about the degeneracy of the times. And in any event, life involves change, which means the old disappears to make way for the new. So a time of new life would also be … Read more

The Proper Response to the College Admissions Scandal

The college admissions scandal that hit the news a few weeks ago has generated shock, much commentary, and many calling for the heads of the rich and prominent who tried to get special treatment for their offspring. We need, however, to take a sober look at the legal response to this and what the scandal tells … Read more

Male Homosexuality and Priestly Formation

There is no homosexuality. Of course, there are homosexuals, but there is no one thing, no one condition or syndrome that is homosexuality. If we are to address the “homosexual problem” in the Church, then we must first understand what we are talking about, and whatever that is, it is not a thing called homosexuality. … Read more

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