Dakryn's Batshit Theory of the Week

[Einherjar86]

Figured this is best for this thread:

https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2020/...-fOX2IV5TJh5gNUSWJD0yBObjuebfc4xR5alKxJruflQ4

There has been a lot of pushback against describing what's happening in the U.S. as fascist, but the arguments often fall back on either essentialist or reductionist arguments: i.e. fascism is either essentially Nazism, or fascism is only Nazism (or another Axis variety). This forces a narrow definition of fascism, which is already ill-defined; but as the piece points out, European fascism exhibited some significant characteristics:

Paxton has argued influentially that fascism is as fascism does. But conspicuous features are recognizably shared, including: nostalgia for a purer, mythic, often rural past; cults of tradition and cultural regeneration; paramilitary groups; the delegitimizing of political opponents and demonization of critics; the universalizing of some groups as authentically national, while dehumanizing all other groups; hostility to intellectualism and attacks on a free press; anti-modernism; fetishized patriarchal masculinity; and a distressed sense of victimhood and collective grievance. Fascist mythologies often incorporate a notion of cleansing, an exclusionary defense against racial or cultural contamination, and related eugenicist preferences for certain “bloodlines” over others. Fascism weaponizes identity, validating the herrenvolk and invalidating all the other folk.

Many of these characteristics describe contemporary conservative politics; but even that doesn't fascism make. In other words, not all patriotism is fascist; but maybe all fascism is patriotic. Something to think about.

The more interesting stuff is on Hitler's infatuation with American slavery.

The Courier was one of many African-American papers that not only saw affinities between Nazi Germany and Jim Crow America, but also traced causal connections. “Hitler Learns from America,” the Courier had declared as early as 1933, reporting that German universities under the new regime of the Third Reich were explaining that they drew their ideas from “the American pathfinders Madison Grant and Lothrop Stoddard,” and that “racial insanities” in America provided Nazi Germany with “a model for oppressing and persecuting its own minorities.” The African-American New York Age similarly wondered if Hitler had studied “under the tutelage” of Klan leaders, perhaps as “a subordinate Kleagle or something of the sort.”

The Nazis themselves saw a clear kinship. Recent histories have demonstrated that Hitler systematically relied upon American race laws in designing the Nuremberg laws, while the Third Reich also actively sought supporters in the Jim Crow South, although the political leadership of the white South largely did not return the favor. But the correspondence between the two systems was perfectly evident at the time, on both sides of the Atlantic. A Nazi consul general in California even tried to purchase the Klan, with the idea of plotting an American putsch. His price was too low—the Klan was nothing if not mercenary—but, as journalists remarked after the story came to light in 1939, the Klan could not afford to seem foreign; “to be effective,” its nativist agenda had to be pursued “in the name of Americanism.”

There's a clear objection here, i.e. that the U.S. doesn't tolerate slavery anymore. But fascist aspirations persisted well into the twentieth century in the U.S.:

Then, too, there was Father Coughlin. “I take the road of Fascism,” he said in 1936, before forming the Christian Front,” whose members referred to themselves as “brown shirts.” His virulently anti-Semitic radio program, regularly transmitting claims from the fabricated Protocols of the Elders of Zion, reached almost 30 million Americans at its height—the largest radio audience in the world at the time. Those listeners tuned in at the end of 1938 as Coughlin was justifying the violence of Kristallnacht, arguing that it was “reprisal” against Jews who had supposedly murdered more than twenty million Christians and stolen billions of dollars in “Christian property”; Nazism, he said, was a natural “defense mechanism” against the communism financed by Jewish bankers. Coughlin’s weekly newspaper, Social Justice, which had an estimated circulation of 200,000 at its height, was described by Life magazine at the time as probably the most widely read voice of “Nazi propaganda in America.”

But the American leader most often accused of fascist tendencies was Huey Long. As Louisiana governor (and senator), Long imposed local martial law, censored the newspapers, forbade public assemblies, packed the courts and legislatures with his cronies, and installed his twenty-four-year-old lover as secretary of state. Long was a racketeer, but his “Share Our Wealth” program did improve local conditions, building roads and bridges, investing in hospitals and schools, and abolishing the poll tax. His economic populism was also not predicated on furthering racial, ethnic, or religious divisions; he subordinated his white supremacism to his redistributionist political message. “We just lynch an occasional my pals,” he breezily declared when dismissing anti-lynching laws, though he also recognized “you can’t help poor white people without helping Negroes,” and so was prepared for his rising tide to lift all boats. When Long set his sights on the 1936 presidential election, Franklin D. Roosevelt was sufficiently alarmed to inform his ambassador to Germany: “Long plans to be a candidate of the Hitler type for the presidency,” predicting that by 1940 Long would try to install himself as a dictator.

There's a lot to this piece, and it's not airtight; but it amasses a lot of historical evidence, and takes pains to acknowledge historical context:

American fascist energies today are different from 1930s European fascism, but that doesn’t mean they’re not fascist, it means they’re not European and it’s not the 1930s. They remain organized around classic fascist tropes of nostalgic regeneration, fantasies of racial purity, celebration of an authentic folk and nullification of others, scapegoating groups for economic instability or inequality, rejecting the legitimacy of political opponents, the demonization of critics, attacks on a free press, and claims that the will of the people justifies violent imposition of military force. Vestiges of interwar fascism have been dredged up, dressed up, and repurposed for modern times. Colored shirts might not sell anymore, but colored hats are doing great.

Reading about the inchoate American fascist movements of the 1930s during the Trump administration feels less prophetic than proleptic, a time-lapse montage of a para-fascist order slowly willing itself into existence over the course of nearly a century. It certainly seems less surprising that recognizably fascistic violence is erupting in the United States under Trump, as his attorney general sends troops to the national capital to act as a private army, armed paramilitary groups occupy state capitols, laws are passed to deny the citizenship and rights of specific groups, and birthright citizenship as guaranteed under the Fourteenth Amendment is attacked. When the president declares voting an “honor” rather than a right and “jokes” about becoming president for life, when the government makes efforts to add new categories of ethnic identity to the decennial census for the first time in the nation’s history, and when nationwide protests in response to racial injustice become the pretext for mooting martial law, we are watching an American fascist order pulling itself together.

Provocative yes, but not overstated when taken as a whole.

 

[Einherjar86]

This is... savage.

https://modelcitizen.substack.com/p/climbing-the-bell-curve-to-the-cathedral

Siskind says that HBD is either partly correct or can’t be shown to be false, linking to a Steve Sailer blog post. The unusually tortured, elliptical formulation of this confession suggests that he’s anxious to maintain plausible deniability. But then he immediately implores his correspondent to keep his opinion secret, even from his most trusted confidants, otherwise “I will probably leave the internet altogether or seek some sort of horrible revenge.” Just pause a moment to think about that. Now relate it the drama around Siskind shuttering Slate Star Codex. That was an episode in which he noisily left the Internet (though not quite “altogether”) and, in my opinion, clearly sought revenge against Metz and the Times. Does this not illuminate the reason he might do such a thing? Of course it does. It’s like shining an arc light in a closet. That was my point in linking to these emails. They are by far the strongest evidence available that my hypothesis about the entire affair is correct.

As a matter of logic, the fact that I once incorrectly maintained that there’s value in responding to Steve Sailer’s sealioning in a tolerant, liberal spirit of constructive intellectual exchange has no bearing whatsoever on the value of Siskind’s leaked email for establishing his mens rea in nuking his website. Of course, the idea behind this bit of Steve Sailer-related whataboutism is to distract from the fact that this email obviously does have substantial evidential value in support of my interpretation of the affair. Yarvin and Yang (great name for a racism-denial law firm!) act as though I’d linked to the email to build a case for Siskind’s cancellation. And what’s good for the goose is good for the gander, right?

But that’s not why I linked to the email, is it? I linked to the email to show that Siskind didhave views on race that he knew many people would find repugnant, that he was terrified that he would get cancelled if they came out, and that he was prepared to flee and/or fight if they did come out. I appreciate the opportunity to drive this point home.

 

[spikes77]

This is... savage.

https://modelcitizen.substack.com/p/climbing-the-bell-curve-to-the-cathedral

ehh Ein, I don't know about savage, sounds whiny IMO. I've only recently became aware of Wilkinson through a recent bloggingheads with Wright- (https://bloggingheads.tv/videos/61078?in=20:43&out=) --and it looked like he was going a bit easy on the ny times (he does write for them) -- but had mostly positive things to say about SA. In that substack post it looks like he was trolled/rustled by moldbug and dragged SA through the mud for a hot take. I've read ssc on and off for 4-5 years, so nothing in the original ny times article was surprising, but for readers unfamiliar with ssc, it definitely seemed overly negative (to say that he "aligns himself with Murry is an example--that's like saying sam harris aligns himself with murry for that one time he had him on and engaged with him)--Overall, none of the articles on wilkinson's substack seem noteworthy--- point me in the direction to something wilkinson has written that you thought was decent--In the meantime, i'll go back to checking in on ssc and reading wesley yang tweets

 

[Dak]

Important words have lost their meanings because journos be journo-ing by way of social media. Lots of Gell-mann amnesia happening.

 

[Einherjar86]

I guess Wilkinson's just joining the likes of Moldbug and SA at their own game, i.e. posting whatever the fuck they feel like on their own platforms.

It reads less whiny to me than curiously amused, like he's trying to resist laughing at a drunk person making a scene in a bar.