News from CJ Hopkins & Consent Factory

May 2022 edition

OK, I’m going to try to keep this newsletter fairly brief, because I’ve got my micro-publisher hat on and am about to publish a new book, which is mostly why I haven’t written a new Consent Factory column for a month. I’ll tell you the news about the new book, and a talk I had with Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., in a moment, but first, let me tell you a little about micro-publishing.

I never set out to be a micro-publisher. My stage plays are published by Bloomsbury Publishing and Broadway Play Publishing, both established publishers. I got into the micro-publishing thing when I wanted to publish my 2017 novel and I didn’t want to subject it to what the publishing industry refers to as “sensitivity readers” … and the atmosphere that has led to the creation of such people.

If you are not familiar with “sensitivity readers,” this opinion piece in The Guardian, written by “a trans, 40-year-old [author] from Bradford navigating life on the south coast of England,” who has also worked as a “sensitivity reader,” describes what the job entails this way:

“A sensitivity reader is an additional editor who works alongside the publishing house staffer who acquired the rights to your book. This individual will conduct a very specific read of the manuscript, and offer notes on characters from marginalised groups, or elements which may cause offence.”

And this piece in The Spectator describes it this way:

“Sensitivity readers are freelance copy editors who publishers pay to cancel-proof their new books. They read books that feature identities or experiences that are outside of the lived experience of the author. They then critique the writing through the prism of what they claim to be their own authoritative life experience to guide the author toward more authentic representation … for critics, these individuals are the latest stage of the culture wars: woke-ifying new books before readers even have the chance to read them. For publishers they offer a seductively cheap way of reducing the risk of a book or its author being cancelled and the ensuing reputational and profit damage to the firm.”

Those of you who have read my dystopian sci-fi novel, Zone 23, can probably imagine how the “sensitivity readers” at the corporate publishers would have reacted to it. And then there’s my Consent Factory Essays series, which, if you’re receiving this newsletter, you’ve probably read some of my essays, and … well, I don’t think I have to go on. Such is the state of the publishing industry.

Fortunately, one doesn’t need a corporate publisher to publish books these days. One can publish them oneself and distribute them through the same distributors that the big publishing houses use. Which is what I’ve been doing since 2017. The trick is the promotion part. The big publishers have publicity departments. Micro-publishers like me do not, so we rely on good word-of-mouth and folks sharing the promotional material we create. Also, when you’re publishing books like mine, you can forget about major book reviews. I don’t want to moan about the business any further, so let me give you one example ... Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.’s book, The Real Anthony Fauci, has sold over a million copies, and garnered zero reviews from the major book reviewers. Reflect on that for just a moment.

Oh, and speaking of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., that’s the other news I wanted to tell you about. He had me on CHD.TV to talk about pathologized totalitarianism and various other taboo topics. It was recorded several weeks ago, right around the beginning of the war in the Ukraine, so keep that in mind when we get to that. It was a pleasure talking to Robert. On a personal note, my family more or less worshiped his family when I was a kid back in the 1960s. The fact that we have both ended up “Russian-backed, Covid-denying, anti-vax, conspiracy-theorist extremists” (or whatever) all these years later is kind of strange. Anyway, here’s the interview …

And here’s the news about the new collection of Consent Factory Essays …

It should be available in a week or two. Once it is, I’ll let you know, of course, and I’ll beg you to help spread the word about it, and to post reviews, and … well, to buy a copy. The cover design is by Anthony Freda, who has designed the covers of all my micro-published books.

Here are some good things some good folks have said about it …

"We'll look back on the Covid-19 period as one in which governments worldwide cynically stoked panic in search of draconian laws and speech controls. We made paranoia seem sane and asking, 'Why?' seem like insurrection. C. J. Hopkins was one of the only people in English willing to do the latter, and he did it with his trademark wit and bravado. He'll be remembered as a signature chronicler of the 'New Normal.'" – Matt Taibbi, TK News

"C. J. Hopkins' essays over the past two years represent some of the most searing (and therefore satisfying) chronicles of life in – and against – the locked-down, masked-up, triple vaxxed madhouse of New Normal insanity. They remind us of the twisted mandates we were forced to endure, and offer a stark warning of what GloboCap has in store next." – Max Blumenthal, The Grayzone

"Proverbs says 'guard your heart, for from it flows the wellsprings of life.' When my heart needs inspiration, I often head to the Consent Factory or into my C. J. Hopkins book collection. Hopkins' pathway through reality is within our intimate space. Grief comes with facing what tyranny causes us to do to ourselves and to each other. But there is power and redemption in mastering what Wordsworth called the 'thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.' C. J. Hopkins writings are essential intelligence for navigating these times, not to mention maintaining our sense of amusement and preserving a human culture. My advice? Don’t leave home without him." – Catherine Austin Fitts, The Solari Report

The book begins with a big, fat introductory essay, which is long and philosophical, and is not available online, or anywhere else, so you will have to get the book to read that one. You’ll probably want to get a copy anyway, so that you’ll have one when the new Disinformation Governance Board of the Department of Homeland Security decides to remove me from the Internet. Given the intensity of censorship and quasi-censorship I’m experiencing on social media currently, that decision could be taken any day now.

But seriously, I’m going to really need your help getting the word out about the new book, as Twitter and Facebook are “restricting” my posts and flagging them as “age-restricted adult content,” and playing various other nasty little games to damage my reputation and income as an author, as I reported in one of my recent newsletters. I know I joke about it a lot, but it really is getting scary, all the GloboCap censorship, deplatforming, and so on, not to mention all the other disturbing features of the new global-capitalist form of totalitarianism that is rapidly becoming our “reality.”

I’m starting to feel like an actual Samizdat writer.

OK, so I failed once again to keep this newsletter brief, but that’s it for now. Stand by for the imminent relentless promotional campaign to follow. In the meantime, if you want to catch up on my other books, they are available from most fine booksellers. There are links here on the Consent Factory Publishing page of the Consent Factory blog, or you can physically order them at your local bookstore … assuming you have a local bookstore.

All best, as ever, from sunny New Normal Berlin,
CJ