The Rise of the Alt-Reich
President-elect Trump’s appointment of Steve Bannon to a senior White House position has generated significant media coverage, and increased the attention on a group that was deeply involved in propelling Trump to the presidency–the so-called “Alt Right.” Make no mistake, the alt right’s ideology is dangerous—plain and simple, full stop. And, when I refer to “their ideology,” I’m referring to their self-proclaimed positions. Take as an example the following from Breitbart’s own description of the alt right, “They are mostly white, mostly male middle-American radicals, who are unapologetically embracing a new identity politics that prioritizes the interests of their own demographic.”
That sentence is nothing more than a thinly, thinly veiled attempt to sanitize racism. Leaders of the alt-right claim that they aren’t really racist, homophobic, women-haters; rather, they are just aiming to shock and annoy the liberal PC police with bombastic and hyperbolic language. They acknowledge that they do attract racist, homophobic, women-haters, but most of the real alt-right bros within the movement don’t like those people, so it’s fine. The problem with that argument is that at least two things have to be true: 1. You have to believe that at their core they really are just shock-jocks with a political axe to grind, and 2. That their followers know what hyperbole means, and how to use it conversationally. They satisfy neither of those requirements.
Hyperbolic or not, one of the core values of the alt right movement, that is not only OK, but exalted to prefer your “tribe,” white men or perhaps if they are feeling generous–white people, over other tribes (non-whites, and if addressed honestly, anyone that is not a conservative, white, non-gay American). The alt right uses the identity politics of “Other” to an extreme and dangerous level. When we de-legitimize the concerns of “other tribes,” especially “tribes” defined by race, that is racism. And, the flip side of “prioritiz[ing] the interests of their own demographic,” is allowing the lesser treatment of other demographics. The alt right claims to dislike “political correctness,” so they should support calling a spade a spade, or here, calling a racist a racist, but shockingly they don’t seem to appreciate being painted with the same broad brush that they use for lambasting the “others.”
I recently thought about my “tribe.” I’m a liberal, white female. Out of my circle of high school and college friends, there are numerous interracial couples and several gay couples. This is not an attempt to pat myself on the back—look at me, I’m not a bigot because I have gay friends. Before I started thinking about what was wrong with the alt-right ideology, I hadn’t stopped to consider that there is a vast array of people that make my life better simply by existing in it. And that array of people comes from many races, genders, ethnicities, religions, etc. But once confronted with an ideology that champions putting “whites first,” it is impossible not to stop and consider all the people that that excludes.
Obviously, I have shared experiences with my former classmates, friends, and family. But any viewpoint that says I need to be the same demographic or race as the members of my “tribe” is a viewpoint that I cannot condone, because it is wrong. We can and should form attachments with those we share experiences with. But those shared experiences should not be limited to an accident of birth. They should be from all the different aspects of life experiences, and even more broadly, shared ideals and aspirations, which can and should be beautifully unbound by race.
To be clear, I do not share Chief Justice Roberts’ assertion that we live in a post-racial, colorblind world. Skin color is real, and when we deliberately segregate ourselves into groups that look exactly like us, we run the risk of believing this “post-racial and colorblind” world actually exists. It does not, and ignoring race is not the same as “post-racial.” White people, this next part is for us. Being white comes with some privilege, even if YOU YOURSELF DO NOT FEEL PRIVILEGED. Having privilege is not the same as being privileged. Consider the furor that abounded when Colin Kaepernick started taking a knee during the National Anthem. One of the arguments that was made most was that he was a hypocrite because didn’t know true oppression. The evidence? That he was raised by white people. Stop, because this argument is important. Think about what that really means. If you argue that being raised by white people means he was buffered against some of the truly horrific incidents that black people suffer, you must FIRST ADMIT THAT BEING WHITE COMES WITH SOME PERKS. Why is acknowledging race important?
Because now we get to the scary stuff. Yeah, that was the gentle lead-in part of the alt-right story. The biggest problem with the alt right’s view that it is virtuous to favor one’s race over all others is the insidious thinking that results once one starts excluding people from the list of “tribe” or otherwise favored groups based on demographics. It is not hyperbole to say that is type of thinking that allowed “separate but equal” to be a legally accepted form of racial segregation in the not-that-distant American past. Of course, this now-disabused thinking was thankfully overturned by the famous Brown v. Board of Education Supreme Court case. Still it is important to note that this thinking can, and has, been taken even further to support all manner of terrible actions in the past, and it’s not hard to imagine how that might look in an administration that has appointed an alt-right champion to a position of power in the White House. No, Bannon is not Hitler. He’s not Goebbles, but is that really the bar? Is that what we are aiming for now?
The alt right may dress up their ideology with whatever veneer they want, but at its core, it is racism and it needs to be confronted and rebutted, with the same “unapologetic” approach they advocate.
Tags: Alt Right, Donald Trump, Steve Bannon
Evey wrote: “Consider the furor that abounded when Colin Kaepernick started taking a knee during the National Anthem. One of the arguments that was made most was that he was a hypocrite because didn’t know true oppression. The evidence? That he was raised by white people. Stop, because this argument is important. Think about what that really means. If you argue that being raised by white people means he was buffered against some of the truly horrific incidents that black people suffer, you must FIRST ADMIT THAT BEING WHITE COMES WITH SOME PERKS. Why is acknowledging race important?”
I love it when people bring logic into an argument when the argument is based on rage and racism.
That jumped out to me as well. It was pitch perfect. (And the same argument used against Obama.)
The only defined policies of Trump’s were the ones on racism and bigotry. They were painfully specific – and that’s what was voted on.
Important as well to understand the antecedents of the alt-right.
The Promise Keepers–largely composed of white male evangelicals.
The Men’s Rights Movement–explicit “tribal” conceptualization, largely composed of white males.
The Three-percenters–a more lower middle class (parallel to, but not quite inside the militia movement) white group spurred on by the historically inaccurate meme that it was the ultra-patriotic 3% of the colonial population (white males, natch) who fought and won the American Revolution while everyone else watched.
The Young Americans for Liberty–campus group (overwhelmingly white) that started life as a libertarian enterprise (I’m sorry to say), but which has moved progressively through the Ron Paul spectrum and out the other side to the proximity of the alt-right.
With Stephen Bannon as chief strategist and Jeff Sessions as Attorney General, we have to face the fact that when Trump can’t bring back the jobs he’s going to need enemies to distract his supporters from their misery. The alt-right and its fellow travelers are good at finding enemies.
^^^
This, times one thousand. This administration is going to make clusterfucks obsolete, and someone will have to be the reason why their magic Laffer dust isn’t fixing the economy.
Very true, anonymous, but that’s the way it’s always been. Blaming other people for their not getting the job, promotion, into college, etc.
And the manosphere isn’t just misogynistic (Rape should be legal on private property), it’s particularly racist.
I’ve had a number of conservative friends tell me that they fear that a race war is coming. To the few that I think could handle it, I’ve told them that I won’t be on their side of the war if it comes.
A race war would be the culmination of what they’ve wanted to do since 1865. If they can’t own black people, they’d rather they all be dead. Same with Muslims. Women they’re happy to keep enslaved, if only so they don’t have to fuck the sheep.
LG, you won’t be the only paleface on the barricades for the minorities. To my everlasting disgust, many of the most racist Americans I know are Italians, who apparently are unaware that they have been considered “white” for less time than women have had the vote — that is, less than a century. And guess what? When they run out of darker-skinned people, the Italians will do.
Gotta blame somebody but themselves. And, really, isn’t that what all political problems come from? When things go wrong, some people look at what they could have done differently. The rest blame everyone else and never look at themselves.
That’s crazy. Who seriously thinks like this? And my bet is their neighborhoods, and daily life in general, isn’t brimming with diversity. Will they set up look-outs for buses of black/brown people heading toward their cul de sac?
Altho, the fact that this concerns them speaks more about their guilty conscience. I mean, why would they fear a race war, unless they’ve supported racists and racist agendas?
They don’t “fear” a race war any more than cooler heads in the South feared a civil war. They SAY they fear it, but they want it.
What do you think is behind all these incidents of people who look like normal citizens going berserk when they confront someone who condemns Trump? To paraphrase Lee Atwater, they haven’t been allowed to say “ni**er” for 50 years, so now it emerges, Tourette’s-like. It’s like profanity — other words just don’t convey the rage. Because, as I said, some people blame themselves first, and the rest — not only conservatives, but mostly — blame anyone except themselves.
The data were overwhelmingly clear about this — the less diverse the area in which these people live, the more they fear minorities and immigrants. You would think that the most anti-immigrant fervor would be in the states most affected (Texas, etc.) but exactly the opposite was found to be the case. Can’t find the link at the moment.
And let’s point out one very large elephant in the room (pun intended): the people who want the race war are inherently better armed to fight it than the people who have depended on the protection of the State, however imperfect.
What happens when the State (never a great protector because always infiltrated) becomes not just an imperfect ally, but at best a neutral bystander and at worst a facilitator of the “race war”?
Then America, perpetrator of the genocide of one population and enslavement of another, starts to pay for its twin original sins.
This:
Good thing white people were A-Okay with the white nationalism thing because the jobs thing was always a big, fat lie – anyone who tells you they supported Trump’s economic “message” is a big, fat liar, too – or an idiot. (Sorry, just calling like it is.) Especially since the white people so worried about their economy (and good jobs created just for them!) were the very ones who destroyed those jobs. They voted against unions/labor and their economic self-interest for decades. And while my heart breaks for the minority groups that will truly suffer, I’ll have trouble shedding a tear for these white Trump voters when they lose more jobs. But maybe they need to get screwed again to see the light? Bring it. Bring it hard.
/end rant
^^^I was making exactly this point.
Of course you were. You’ve always seen through this white economic anxiety crap.
I have a childhood friend, who’s a white, Evangelical women, whose husband traded her in for a younger model, and a Trump supporter. I took unabashed glee is telling her that her single-parent, head of household tax advantage wasn’t only gone but that she was going to pay more. She said, “That can’t be true. Trump isn’t targeting me (Read: white people).” Then she looked it up. BOOM! Head exploding. I said, “Don’t worry. If you’re nice to me I might send you some money from my Trump tax break.” Okay, I lied. She’s on her own.
/Yep, that’s another rant
Why is it that those who voted against Trump will most likely get some huge tax breaks?
Because we’re not willing to throw people under the bus for economic gain, nemski. This really is a question of “What is your morality and ethics?”
Yeah, I’m pissed. I voted for my taxes to be raised significantly. No, I don’t expect a medal. However, what white people, who voted for Trump, should expect is my laughing at them as I cash in and they get screwed. No sympathy here.
Democrats haven’t been this upset, since the Republicans freed their slaves.
Trying to whitewash your racism with what the now-racist party did only 150 short years ago? Good luck with that, Bubba.
I’m right there with Pandora. I Trump-proofed my portfolio the week before the election, and it’s up over $200K since. I’d gladly give it all back for a different election result, but OTOH I’m looking forward to the fat, white and stupid getting what they voted for.
I’m right there with Mencken,too. “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”
Nice history re-write. Democrats founded the KKK and didn’t support the 13th, 14th or 15th amendment.
And if it were put up for a vote today, the Republicans wouldn’t support any of the amendments. We already know who the Klan supports…
Stat and other Republicans have rewritten their ancient history. This is your legacy now, Stat. Actually it’s been your legacy for quite a while. The only difference now is you’ve taken the hoods off.
I wonder what else Democrats did (or didn’t do) in 1870 that’s sticking in this brainiac’s craw? Didn’t support the construction of the Brooklyn bridge? Supported readmitting Mississippi to the Union? The Outrage!!
So ridiculous, but I guess it gets him through the night.
STat: You don’t know your history very well then, do you? You have no idea what philosophical changes each party has gone through over the decades. You have no ideas, period, for that matter.
I vote for banning this fuckstick.
You make it to easy. Bottom line is middle class America has rejected your liberal world view across the board all over America. If calling us all racist for standing up and having a say justifies your losses then have at it. Truth is your the party that wants to divide everybody into different groups when all I see is Americans.
So you’re right because you won? Motto of the fuckstick, I guess. Is all of “middle-class America” as illiterate as you?
I don’t want to divide anyone, though slicing each of you fucksticks in half to see if there’s a soul in there might be fun. Oh, and just by the by, the election results did not, again, match the exit polls — and diverged by far more in places without paper ballots to double-check.
The Republicans did not win the election in the terms we normally won to use “win” and “lose.” They stole it, just as they did in 2000. And, for the sixth time in seven elections, your side lost the popular vote.
Hardly evidence of “rejection.’ Although, you being a reject, you ought to know one when you see one.
I agree. Middle white America had a tantrum. Wait until they discover how badly they screwed over themselves.
@pandora: They’ll just blame us again, for their own failure to do their homework.
Here’s the thing I don’t get. If it’s supposedly minorities who bring our schools’ test results down, how did they create all these incredibly stupid white fucks in their segregated schools?
Been getting screwed with stagnate wages and runaway health care costs for awhile. I’ll take my chances. I’d reply to Anonymous but that douche makes no sense.
@pandora: I’m still punching holes in the wall over how stupid your classmate is. White people in this country are so fucking lazy they can’t even be bothered to take the two seconds on Google it would take to educate themselves.
The word you’re looking for, ignoramus, is “stagnant.” And when those health care costs go up faster and the coming recession costs you your job, you’ll probably blame everyone but yourself again.
Fuckstick.
Buckle up, Buttercup. You’re about to get royally screwed. You’ll be crying for the ACA once insurance companies are in charge again. I lived that nightmare years ago (in my 20s) – where our health insurance was more than our monthly mortgage payment.
Stagnant wages? What do you do for a living? Obviously, you’re not doing so well, or in an upwardly mobile job, if stagnant wages are an issue for you. This is what I’ve been talking about. I care about health insurance and stagnant wages, but not because they impact my life – they don’t. But here you are, totally dependent upon things that you voted against. But you sure showed us liberals. Good luck. I sincerely mean that. Given what you just wrote, you’re going to need it.
Anonymous, look at what Stat’s revealed about himself. He’s concerned about the cost of health insurance and stagnant wages. He’s the person who’s going down first.
It’s cold comfort.
We fight for two generations to help these dumb fucks, and then they turn around and vote for Trump to “get even” with liberals. They do this again and again. And it’s not that they’re stupid. They’re lazy. They rail against government running things without understanding that pre-FDR they’d be sitting on the front porches of their squats trying to figure out how to get rid of their pelagra.
“Niacin? That sounds foreign.”
And here’s the further thing: Liberals are the ones trying to clean up the Democratic Party. Nobody is trying to clean up the GOP.
Just to show you what a closed, cluster-fucking circle Washington is, you know how Jared Kushner, whose daddy bought him admission to Harvard, got rid of all the Christie people to get even for his Daddy doing time? You know why Daddy did time? For illegal campaign contributions.
To the Clintons.
It’s not about me buttercup. It’s about the middle class having stagnant wages and we are already getting screwed with healthcare increases. The ACA has been a failure.
You already revealed your financial situation. Again, I do feel sorry for you.
We can’t all be housewives.
It’s about the middle class having stagnant wages and we are already getting screwed with healthcare increases.
Except this has been true for more than 30 years. And the ACA wasn’t a factor. The factor, really, is the fact that you keep voting for the GOP who keep giving your money to their friends. Your stagnant wages are because the GOPs friends don’t think that you should share in the productivity you create. So as long as you are voting for these people, you keep voting for your economic pain.
Enjoy, buttercup.
Who was Obama giving my money to?
The GOP enforced an austerity regime, remember? There wasn’t much spending beyond early stimulus measures.
By pointing out that I don’t have to work, you proved my point. Unlike you, I have a financial interest in voting Republican. You? Nope.
Also, so much for you being the party of Family Values.
Actually you don’t know my situation. You know what happens when you assume. What is your point about family values?
Stat couldn’t handle being a”housewife “. Too much personal responsibility.
What is your point even being here? We know all you people are trolls, you don’t have to prove it here.
And it is about him. Here’s Stat’s comment:
“Been getting screwed with stagnate wages and runaway health care costs for awhile. I’ll take my chances.”
Now he’s trying to pretend he was asking for a friend.
He got upset and and called me *gasp* a housewife – something Republicans claim to support. I’ll answer him in his native language – Republicanese: Sorry, you’re a lousy provider, Stat.
If you want to know I pay $25 a month in health care for a family of 4 so again it is not about me. I have friends and family that are receiving notices in the mail about increases. Some as much as 50% or $500 per month increase.
@AQC – I think it is more difficult to work full time and run a household raising kids. For me being a housewife is a day off from work.
@Stat: “It’s about the middle class having stagnant wages”
Yet I remember a time eight short years ago when people were taking wage cuts of 30% and 40% to keep their jobs. Many others took “furloughs” during which they went unpaid (I collected my one and only unemployment check when my week came up). You’re lucky to have had stagnant wages (for all I know you’re a state employee) compared with those unlucky folks.
Elect Democrats to undo the damage caused by Republicans. Start believing that government can’t do anything right despite vast evidence to the contrary, and that Democrats are holding us back. Elect Republicans for “change,” let them do their damage, then elect Democrats to restore order and the closest we can get to prosperity. Repeat indefinitely, apparently.
Even if Stat’s complaints were valid, where’s the evidence that Republicans will help him? When have they ever done so? Reagan lowered taxes, but in doing so broke unions and kicked of 30 years of wage stagnation (look it up, Stat). That’s on them. NAFTA was supported by Clinton, but Democrats were split over it. Virtually all Republicans supported it. Whatever else it might have done, ACA apparently did what it was supposed to — no, not increase the number of people on insurance. It interrupted the steep spending increases on health care.
Paul Ryan wants to privatize Medicare. Tell me, please, Stat, who benefits by such a plan? Certainly not the people — Medicare’s satisfaction ratings are above 75%, far higher than any private insurer. So for whom is he proposing this legislation? Ayn Rand, apparently. It’s a philosophical issue for this entitled prick. Fuck the people who will go without health care because of it.
These are the people you are rooting for, asshole. Gloating about it simply makes plain what you are — a crab in a basket. You’re willing to fuck up the entire system, perhaps even the global order which the US constructed, just so you can inflict misery on others.
How do you live with yourself, Stat?
LOL! Keep exposing your family values, oh so successful one – who really, really, really was just asking for a “friend”.
“If you want to know I pay $25 a month in health care for a family of 4 so again it is not about me. I have friends and family that are receiving notices in the mail about increases. Some as much as 50% or $500 per month increase.”
You must be a state worker. That’s nothing close to a real-world price. A free-market family plan runs about $2,000 a month in the real world. A $500 per month increase is nothing compared with the pre-ACA rate increases you could count on if you were diagnosed with diabetes, no matter how well you contained it, or if you suffered a brain hemorrage.
If it’s actually not about you, then you truly are despicable. You’re fucking people over because you think life’s not “fair,” I suppose. The only way your “friend” will get cheaper insurance post-ACA is by getting a plan with a deductible so high that she’ll be wiped out by a serious illness either way. Most working people don’t have $25,000 lying about for medical emergencies.
Your out of touch if you can’t see that these increases are happening right now under the ACA. Huge price increases With rising deductibles for less coverage. Yes I am fortunate to have low cost but others aren’t and that’s who needs a better system. It isn’t selfish to want that for people. Trump has said he would keep the good parts of the ACA and improve on the others. With Clinton it was not going to change.
“Trump has said he would keep the good parts of the ACA and improve on the others.”
The good parts? Like keeping the preexisting condition rule without the mandate? Do you even understand how the ACA works?
I pay $25,000 a year for my insurance, so which one of us is out of touch here? I never, ever went two years without a premium increase in 35 years of working in the private sector.
“I am fortunate to have low cost”
And, despite your failure to confirm my guess, I’m pretty sure only public employees get a deal that sweet. You’re not “fortunate.” You’re living off everybody else’s taxes.
@pandora: Somebody paying that little has no idea how insurance works, because he or she doesn’t have to.
@anonymous–actually, if Stat only pays $25/month for a family of four, that means that both partners are State employees, because that’s the only way even the State gets insurance that low.
Thus Stat and Mrs. Stat are both employees of the government that they disdain.
Why does everyone harass the Republican electors to switch their vote from Trump? If Trump is as dangerous as everyone says he is, wouldn’t it benefit the Dems to switch their votes first to a more respectable republican candidate? If you have the over 220 Dem delegates switch to someone first, you could easily get the additional republican votes to go along.
Expecting the winning party to vote for the losing parties candidate is insane.