Thing is, most conservative leaders went to the same schools as most liberal leaders did. They know what’s really true. They’re lawyers, most of them, so they’ve been trained to passionately argue any side of an argument, even ones they don’t really believe, as part of their job. But conservatives have formed a party of people who want to believe the world is a certain way and their faith demands no doubts about it. So the lot of their leaders pay lip service to crazy beliefs not founded on scientific study because that’s what their voters want to hear. They won’t have the support of their base otherwise.
I would like to point out the sad fact that when the US created Japanese internment camps in World War II, they were actually following Canada’s lead (they had ordered their internment a month earlier by a Liberal PM no less). But, usually where the US leads, Canada isn’t far behind. I don’t think the current PM would do anything terrible but he could get replaced by a Trump-lite in the next election as the Canadian right gets more radicalized by their neighbors to the south.
Brannon himself described Breitbart.com as a the platform of the alt-right, and the man who coined the term “alt-right”, Richard B. Spencer, specifically said the term is about “white identity.”
that Wikipedia page about spencer should be required reading. spencer is explicitly a white nationalist, to the point where he somehow thinks it doesnt mean white supremacy: just so long as it enables them to do “peaceful” ethnic cleansing.
he’s also the one of the heil dump, and founded one of the main altright websites.
the altright may contain other elements, but dear god those other elements sure seem fine aligning themselves with the worst of the worst.
This is a fascinating question to me. I’m not quite sure when a sort of pop postmodernism started showing up on the Right. Maybe when the current style of prosperity gospel Christianity started to gain a foothold–maybe in the Nineties? It seems as though the Protestant work ethic had an affair with The Secret, and an odd, thinking-makes-it-so kind of Christianity came out. It then merged with the most jingoistic style of American exceptionalism, The result is the current unholy mess of a worldview that is primed to think that pure propaganda is fine because, if you believe it hard enough, it will become true.
The difficulty is, that worldview can be reinforced for a while in electoral politics because that’s one realm of activity in which thinking can make it so, at least for a while.
But then you get to climate, which doesn’t care what you think and won’t negotiate.
I think if you know anything about the underlying rhetoric of white nationalism and you listen to the words coming out of Spencer’s mouth, you’d realize he’s a white nationalist/supremacist.
Understood - this may be privilege at play here. I’ve mentioned before I think that some of the best humor is the kind that has an element of discomfort (science backs this up, too). There’s also a very fine line that’s all too easy to cross.
I can laugh at a black comedian making white people jokes, or a woman making jokes at the expense of men. The inverse of these scenarios on the other hand is nearly impossible to pull off and not sound like a horrible person even if you’re clearly not serious. That takes a lot of skill and most comedians can’t do this.
I find it much easier to appreciate humor with an aspect of “punching up” versus “punching down.”
