The Dark Enlightenment

[Jerky]

People used to talk about wealth caps as if there was a remote possibility that such a thing could be implemented.

Ah... simpler days... from a time when before the forces of counter-reformation finally succeeded in their decades-long project of forcing a critical mass of the population to re-imagine themselves into something that would have seemed utterly alien to the generations preceding them.

And so it continues.

Aristotle says that a state should have laws preventing people from becoming too wealthy, owning too much property, because that invariably leads to bad government. I'm not sure caps on wealth isn't a bad idea. "Now more than ever."

[Belligerent Savant]

.

Two rich white men, both with very wealthy and very beautiful celeb girlfriends, smirk at one another about some black guy who, they say, really ought to stick to singing and dancing and stay out of politics. This black guy, one of the white guys ( the one who celebrates his own ignorance of politics) says, has offended "all black people." This same white guy suggests he should have "bullied" him and then tells him to "take his meds."

I see your point but also that is perfectly compatible with neoliberal discourse to me.

One can argue that contemporary "neoliberalism" may well be a species of Fascism -- perhaps not classical/textbook fascism, but the spirit is there.


Didn't watch the SNL clip, but I'm sure the display of smarm/privilege was met with hearty, self-congratulatory audience applause, which in turn serves to only further galvanize the 'populist vote' (or those that align with the working classes), practically assuring another 4 years of Trump.

It's also a cynical play by SNL: despite the outward 'protestations' of their skits, the execs/money-makers will gleefully accept another Trump term for the wealth of writing material Trump and his ilk will provide (same goes for all the 'news' networks/late-night cable shows -- ratings will remain high while Trump holds court.)

[liminalOyster]

I see your point but also that is perfectly compatible with neoliberal discourse to me.

I can certainly see a choice to see all that as part of a general neoliberal sensibility. But I can also see the contours of something new and concerning. The idea of a kind of regime of neuorgovernance ("take your meds") certainly fits in the former, but what I see happening with race in this little clip feels like something else. I mean, point blank, here's some white dude telling a black dude that he's no longer allowed to be black because he's thinking wrong. In a pretty literal way too - his "crazy" is overriding his blackness. Obviously, Kanye's actual commentary is garbled at very best. But some of it - the non-MAGA shit - sounds like stuff Chuck D would've said in the early 1990s.

[American Dream]

Yeah, I really noticed the meds commentary. I am evolving personally beyond my previous history of leaning reflexively against any and all psychiatric meds towards a more nuanced position embracing the stories of people I know who are using these substances and feel that they help them a lot. I am still broadly anti-Psychiatry in terms of aligning with many/most of the critiques of Biopower in this regard. I see it more and more in my world, most every day. But definitely that video is creepy, irregardless of how we might label it ideologically.

I see your point but also that is perfectly compatible with neoliberal discourse to me.

I can certainly see a choice to see all that as part of a general neoliberal sensibility. But I can also see the contours of something new and concerning. The idea of a kind of regime of neuorgovernance ("take your meds") certainly fits in the former, but what I see happening with race in this little clip feels like something else. I mean, point blank, here's some white dude telling a black dude that he's no longer allowed to be black because he's thinking wrong. In a pretty literal way too - his "crazy" is overriding his blackness. Obviously, Kanye's actual commentary is garbled at very best. But some of it - the non-MAGA shit - sounds like stuff Chuck D would've said in the early 1990s.

[liminalOyster]

I don't have any opinion about an individual's personal choice wrt using a psychotropic drug if they decide it eases their suffering in some way.

But in this instance, "take your meds" seems more in line with something like a kind of broader neuro-governmentality. Davidson basically comes off like a petit jackboot thug with his threat of bullying and his weird post-racial cockiness.

[American Dream]

Yeah, I'm strongly for self-determination as a fundamental principle wrt Neurodiversity issues. "Fascist" is a word I'm very careful with though. I don't throw it around casually in reference to: Milo, the Proud Boys et al, so I would be hesitant to use it for that SNL clip. "Creepy as fuck" does come to mind however, especially with regards to Neurodiversity shaming to induce medication compliance.

[liminalOyster]

I'm very sparing with the term fascist. I mean it here in a particular (if not necessarily precise) way as relates to culture and/or the social world.

I have no problem with naming Milo and Gavin (or Farage) as fascists. But in another sense, the end goal of their program feels, to me, much more like traditional shock value, some kind of economy of reaction. They absolutely depend on their Other to even have a program at all. Whereas the Davidson SNL line about "not noticing" politics much more so points to some kind of unification of all difference to the point that it becomes invisible.

[American Dream]

Got it- I'm more fully appreciating your points now.

I'm very sparing with the term fascist. I mean it here in a particular (if not necessarily precise) way as relates to culture and/or the social world.

I have no problem with naming Milo and Gavin (or Farage) as fascists. But in another sense, the end goal of their program feels, to me, much more like traditional shock value, some kind of economy of reaction. They absolutely depend on their Other to even have a program at all. Whereas the Davidson SNL line about "not noticing" politics much more so points to some kind of unification of all difference to the point that it becomes invisible.

[American Dream]

Why horseshoe theory is nonsense




More useful ideas include:

Confusionism: This term originates in France and is used in the UK by Andrew Coates and can be defined as the phenomenon that leads on certain subjects groups and individuals belonging to a priori opposite spectra of the political field to ally for opportunistic reasons but also because they arrive at these specific subjects to find and develop common ideological bases.

Querfront, German for "transversal front") has been described as "a recurrent motif in far-right thought over the past century. Craving the legitimacy that an alliance with progressive forces can provide, reactionaries seize on ostensibly shared positions, chief amongst them opposition to corrupt élites, to create the impression that progressives could benefit from making common cause with them." (See here for more.)

Red-brown alliance: Like Querfront, this term originates in interwar Germany when Communists (going through their ultra-left Third Period, when they denounced Social Democrats as "social fascists" allied with the Nazis - leading to the war-time Molotov-Ribbentrop pact between Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia) although there are earlier examples. This important blogpost exhaustively details the history, including Strasserism (the purportedly working class socialist Nazi current purged during the Night of the Long Knives) and National Bolshevism.

Unorthodox fascism: This is the term used by Spencer Sunshine for left/right crossover movements such as new forms of Third Positionism, Julius Evola's influence, popular mobilizations against finance capital, conspiracy theories, Sovereign Citizen pseudo-legal theories and fascist neofolk music - see his forthcoming book of the same title.

Fascist creep: This is the term used by Alex Reid Ross that can be described as the creep between fascism and leftism, "the disturbing attraction many 20th-century leftists felt for reactionary ideology", often based on "nostalgia for [a] precapitalist 'lost paradise'" - see his book of the same title.

The big neo-Nazi crib: Finally, Croatian antifa activists have documented what they call "the big neo-Nazi crib", where fascists have rebranded by copying antifa iconography and re-purposing it. I've pasted a few of their examples at the end of this post.

Read more: http://brockley.blogspot.com/2019/03/wh ... sense.html

[American Dream]

The Lovecraftian Enlightenment?



"... these things we’re summoning into the world right now…are more like the Lovecraftian The Great Old Ones, they’re entities that are not necessarily going to be aligned with what we want..."
-AI expert Geordie Rose

http://visupview.blogspot.com/2019/10/t ... nment.html

[American Dream]

"Privilege Politics" makes for an easy foil:

ANGIE SPEAKS 19: EXIT THE VAMPIRE CASTLE

Angie Speaks' Exit the Vampire Castle is a dramatic commentary on capitalism's effect on cancel culture and its corrosive results, based on an essay (of the same name) by theorist Mark Fisher. This year's Angie Speaks Halloween Special, draws inspiration from Fisher's essay and attempts to unpick the forces, metrics and incentives that lead The Political Left away from striving towards Social Justice and towards the thrill of empty catharsis and spectacle. Beware the curse of the VAMPIRE CASTLE!

(31 October 2019 / 21 minutes)


https://youtu.be/qdDg8KYjePo



Angie Speaks is an Anarchist, Leftist, video series with a creative and mystical flair! Angie blends together the historical, the artistic and the esoteric in a fun and accessible way that highlights the importance of the subjective and creative aspects within leftist thought.