Yet another evil little twink (derogatory) has entered the American Pantheon of right-wing villians, joining the ranks of Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, Mike Pence and Stephen Miller, Nick Fuentes has been accepted as not only an alternative to MAGA but a successor of it. So I want say some things about Fuentes how to deal with him and how not to deal with him, how to understand him and what people get wrong.
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The New Right - Owens, Carlson and Fuentes
There is clearly a new right forming, and it is not just infighting but a clash of actual ideals. This runs along multiple fronts and oftentimes deeply personal disagreements (ref Candice Owens beefing because of Charlie) but there are some strong ideological lines that can be drawn. The most prominent of which is the relationship they all have with imperialism - and this is similarly a line that can be drawn between the new left and the establishment “Left”.
Historically Americans in the voting booth have never been able to vote on imperialism as both sides full-throatedly supported the slaughter of three to five million in Iran in Iraq, there was quite large bipartisan consensus on Vietnam and on Korea. The left and right Wings in American politics have always represented minor disagreements on domestic affairs but strong alignment on Foreign Affairs, and the opposition to both of them from either side has typically fallen along foreign affairs.
But if we go a little bit further back in history we will see a familiar phrase “America First” from the America First committee which was a coalition of people that did not want to intervene in World War 2, and as you can imagine the people at the helm were vitriolic antisemites and Nazi sympathizers, but this Coalition also included a comparatively small contingent of far left wing and antiWar activists. We saw a better and more representative example of anti-interventionist left wing activism during the Vietnam war.
This context is relevant not because it's a comment on America in World War II, we obviously should have intervened. I comment on this because there has always been this divide between establishment and non-establishment politics, and a very very similar divide can be seen here - with the pro-palestinian left and the Nick Fuentes right.
Both are rejecting the model of america as an empire, and I think the most significant distinctions between these two factions, what we might call left and right wing populism, are not in their stated policies of Foreign Affairs (though they do differ on those ref nick on Venezuela) but the reasons why they reject this model of American Empire and what their alternative is. I suggest the left is the anti imperial model, wanting to tear down the empire, ideology and all, and build something better, while the fascist model is the alter imperialism model, wanting to take the supremacist ideologies from imperial times and bring them to their logical conclusion.
America as a White nation Among Nations, Not a Hegamonic Empire -
A reactionary in an empire is different than one out of it and that is the difference i am trying to articulate. In an empire the goal of the reactionary (ben shapiro) is to justify the violence of the empire and its expansion, using things like nationalism, identiarianism, etc, (Israel as an outpost for Judeochristian values) while serving the aims of the empire (in americas case corporations) even at home, with regulation etc (Austerity). Empire is justified by supremacy, and propelled by profits. The American empire is falling though, so this model is being reworked
The Groypers model responds to this, and is not of white Imperial hegemony (as the british though of “Christianizing the natives“) but much more similar to Leibensraum, where the “superior” races have space and lots of it, but do not live amongst those that are not of the same race: Germany for Germans. This is fundamentally different than what an Empire is, and actually breeds solidarity amongst fascists. I note this in a series of videos, but the Israeli fascists that want a Jewish Israel have a lot of solidarity with Indian fascists that want a Hindu India, or South African fascists that want a white South Africa. Sure in their heart of hearts they think their individual race or ideology is best, but at the current time they just want their homeland. This is what is meant by America first, White America should be first in america. The goal is an ethnostate not the most powerful America possible.
Instead of being anti-imperial, you become alter imperialist. Not wanting to deconstruct (or maintain) the imperial system, but seeing it unraveling anyway and wanting whats left to be yours.
This clearly conflicts with Ben Shapiros telling of things, where his conception is clearly racist and bigoted but there is an extent to which he genuinely believes his bullshit about Western values and their supremacy. You will often hear him talk about judeo-christian values and how they are the foundation of literature or society, and use this to justify for example exercising power and control in non-western societies. The Forefront of his mind is how to build the best Society across the world and in his mind because of the supremacy of American and Western values (all in incredible air quotes) this justifies the most powerful International America as possible.
I'm not convinced I've explained this the best but I hope these two different and competing models, of an imperial hegemonic America and America as a nation among nations and importantly an ethno state, is at least a foundational helpful distinction when understanding these two ideologies. Further we see the outgrowths of these ideologies come into conflict, the obvious one here being Israel, but other examples like H1B Visas, or this discussion with charlie kirk and the australian white supremacist. white supremacists deep enough into this movement understand this, and it's important we don't write off genuine ideological distinctions in the right wing as mere incoherency or idiocy, and it's further important to not confuse SOME limited overlap between the anti-imperial views of the left (which I hope I don't need to elaborate too extensively on) and the alter imperial views of the far right.
With this basis set out, I want to set out some ways we address this ways to not think about this and action items.
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A lot of the Groyers are Probably Kids -
From the onset I want you to on one hand properly react to the rise of very clear white supremacist fascism in America that is willing to openly rear its head and has openly received support from the president (from him repeating myths of white genocide in South Africa and Nigeria to welcoming Nick Fuentes to Mar-A-Lago) on the other hand I want you to win these people do engage with you online no that maybe 30 to 40% of them are below the age of 16. We know this because a bunch of Nazis have been caught being fucking children. That's all I want to say on this, children have a lot of time can make pretty funny memes and don't really believe what they say a perfect recruiting ground for Nazis who generally are Anonymous and don't care about morals, and are a good portion pedophiles. Next
No They are not CLOSE to class consciousness and NO they are not Stupid
No Nazis are not close to class Consciousness they have it and have misdirected it. And for the love of God please do not in your mind think that Nick Fuentes is stupid, he is not I don't suggest you go watch his stream because it's toxic little nasty fucking cancer, but if you do you will notice that he understands perfectly well the left Wings argument, he is actually quite willing to explain it to his audience, but what he offers is a alternative to that unfortunate conclusions of leftist analysis that make you feel better.
It sucks being poor in capitalism, and it really sucks knowing that things probably won't get better within the next 5 to 10 years, both of which in my mind are pretty clear analysis from actual material dialectics, and further even if the revolution does come the Utopia that we're working for is everyone being equal which to white men that have had their ego bruised doesn't actually sound that good. Further a fact of being in the Imperial core and being raised in a white supremacist Society is that you have to go through really hard work of deconstructing that white supremacy, that's hard that sucks, and mature people recognize that it will ultimately make everyone feel better, but once again immature little sad white men don't.
Socialism is Depressing, Rascism can give you Identity -
So you can come to the end of that analysis, come to the end of that logic, and not feel satisfied and Nick Fuentes offers the alternative: racial hatred. That feels fucking good, Supremacy is a fucking drug and I think anyone who is spoken to someone they think is dumber than them knows this. And this works especially well on comparatively well off white men, or at least white men that are primed to think they are doing okay, or will be (given the myth of the future millionare in america). Being better off economically along with everyone else doesn't sound that good, living in community of equals doesn't sound that good, but staying about where you are and knowing that you are better than everyone, and having some power over them, damn that sounds good.
This is where you are pushed from antiimperial leftism, to alter imperialism fascism, not princpled (as clear with his invasion of venuzala) but merely oriented to benefiting white americans as much as possible.
And that's the beauty of fascism, it takes the genuine marxist analysis of class Consciousness and class conflict but is able to take the gloves off and use the nasty weapons of racial, gender and ethnic hatred to mobilize and evangelize. The leaders pretty much know this and if you read the writings of fascist leaders (dont) it becomes pretty clear they do, but no matter how many times u tell that to a fascist that they are being manipulated that doesn't stop that manipulation from feeling so good.
That's wildly simplified and he also runs off different ideas, such pointing out the hypocrisy of being a republican nationalist while sending billions to Israel, or inherent contradictions in the Republicans being a corporate backed party and being against immigration which corporations generally support. But these are draw-in issues, they get clicks but to keep you there and to radicalize you he needs to hit something deeper and that's what racial class Consciousness does, some might call it national socialism.
How to Combat This and Where do we Go From Here
It doesn't feel good to hate a friend, and the solution to racial ethnic and gendered hatred has always been integration. But given we're on a time scale where we can't fundamentally address everyone's racial ethnic and gendered hatred, what do we do? Well we have to mobilize, and take care of the communities that want to take care of us.
I always end off on a note of saying find friends who can support you and support others, and so if you want maybe a fuller address of that go look at any of my last endings, but with this in particular the seed I want to plant is the idea that part of those communities can be people that used to be the people we might be mobilizing against, and this is what we talk about when we talk about restorative justice. This is not forgiving them for all of their choices, as their sins are not yours to forgive necessarily, but this is meeting someone where they're at giving them more grace than they are due and helping the fellow Community member a fellow human and a future comrade recover from the cancer of fascism.
This is not always possible this is genuine labor and it is often inequitably expected across classic marginalized lines, and this is not a call to ignore any of those things. It is though a call to just consider but if we don't engage in a form of restorative justice with those that we can and have energy and care and Community with to do so, we may be contributing to the carceral state that produced this cancer in the first place.
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