# When the Mask Slips – Decision and Exception

The mechanisms of elite rule, the cloaks of ideology, and the illusions of democracy all operate under normal conditions. But what happens when the normal breaks down? What happens in moments of crisis, of emergency, of the state of exception? It is in these moments that the true nature of power, often hidden beneath layers of procedure and law, is revealed.

Carl Schmitt, one of the most controversial and penetrating political thinkers of the 20th century, argued that the essence of sovereignty is not the routine administration of laws, but the decision made in the exception. The sovereign is not who upholds the rules, but who decides when the rules can be suspended.

In a crisis, a war, a natural disaster, a pandemic, a terror event, the normal order is disrupted. Laws may be set aside, rights curtailed, and extraordinary measures taken. In these moments, the true locus of power is exposed: who has the authority to declare the emergency, to suspend norms, and to redefine the rules?

This concept, known as decisionism, prioritises the decision itself, the act of will, over abstract norms or legal frameworks. It suggests that all law ultimately rests on a prior decision, a fundamental act of power that establishes the very order the law is supposed to govern. The validity of a legal system, therefore, is not inherent, but derives from the authority that created it, and retains the power to suspend it.

Throughout history, we’ve seen this play out:

- Lincoln’s suspension of habeas corpus during the American Civil War.
- France’s état d’urgence after terrorist attacks.
- Lockdowns and mandates during the COVID-19 pandemic, imposed not through parliaments, but by bureaucratic decree.

During the pandemic, parliaments were sidelined, elections postponed, populations confined. Not by armies, but by press briefings, executive orders, and scientific edicts. The sovereign wasn’t your vote, it was whoever controlled the narrative of emergency.

This understanding of power connects with counter-revolutionary thought, which emphasised the necessity of decisive action in critical times. When the existing order is threatened, the ability to act swiftly and decisively, even ruthlessly, becomes paramount. The sovereign, in this view, is not bound by abstract principles, but by the imperative to preserve the existing order, or to establish a new one.

The state of exception, then, is not an aberration, but a revelation. It is when the mask slips, when the normal illusions are shattered, and when the fundamental nature of power—the power to decide—is made terrifyingly clear. It is in these moments that we see who truly rules, not by law, but by the raw, unfettered exercise of sovereign will.

## The Weaponisation of Virtue

In older eras, elites ruled by divine right, by bloodline, by conquest.

Today, they rule by moral superiority.

The modern ruling class does not say, “Obey us because we are powerful.”

It says, “Obey us because we are good.”

This is the weaponisation of virtue.

It begins with a cause, climate, equality, health, safety. Causes no one dares oppose. Then it moves through institutions. Corporations, governments, NGOs, media, all align around the new dogma. Dissent is not just incorrect; it is immoral. To question is to hate. To hesitate is to harm.

Moral language becomes a political tool.

Surveillance becomes “protection.”

Censorship becomes “safety.”

War becomes “humanitarian intervention.”

This is power in its most refined form: coercion disguised as compassion.

And like all elite strategies, it is not accidental. The appeal to virtue creates a hierarchy of legitimacy. Those who hold the “correct” views are elevated. Those who resist are shamed, unpersoned, or exiled from public life. This isn’t justice. It’s hygiene.

You don’t need riot police when the population self-censors.

You don’t need a gulag when people volunteer for digital silence.

The public goes along not because it agrees, but because it fears being labelled.

This form of control is more effective than brute force.

It enlists the masses to police themselves.

People become complicit in their own oppression, believing they are doing good.

The tyranny wears a smile.

And unlike the monarch or the dictator, today’s elite never claim to rule.

They claim to serve.

That’s what makes them harder to see.

And far more dangerous.