Yeah I was kidding. Its the most fucking ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard of. Maybe I’ll edit for clarity.
Edit: As a further point of clarification, the distinction I’ve found with the current incarnation of the Klan that surprised me and made some kind of sense here is that it is no longer a centrally organised body, but a loose collection of similarly minded groups who use the name. Thus there’s not really any charter to go against.
I don’t really wish this guy well, it seems like a completely absurd and fairly offensive idea, which is what makes the Mr. Show sketch so funny.
The trailer park I lived in between 1972 and 1979 had a bit of Klan presence (the guy in the trailer next to the dump had been accessory to a murder in the Klan’s service), and scuttlebutt had it that the rodeo grounds next to my high school’s football stadium was occasionally used for Klan rallies, though I never actually saw anything like that. In retrospect, this sounds odd for semirural San Diego County. On top of the usual reasons for detesting the Klan, I was also bent outta shape that they made it impossible (or at least unfashionable) to style yourself a “Grand Dragon” or “Great Titan” in any respectable organization, whether you possessed a bullet-riddled car or not.
Imperial Wizards, Grand Dragons, Genii, Titans, Hydras, Giants, Goblins, Nighthawks, Sentinels, Magi, Ghouls, Cyclops, Centaurs… it’s hard to believe they didn’t base their organizational structure on a D&D players handbook.
I’m not…particularly optimistic… about this particular offshoot/rebranding; but it does bring to mind something an American History professor of mine told me (damned if I can find the source, and doing so without freaking out the workplace internet filter isn’t going to be any easier); but he was the sort of subject-matter-expert that I’m inclined to trust:
Apparently, while the ‘classic’ Klan was almost entirely anti-reconstruction/white supremacist, some of the various offshoots, especially in areas with different economic makeups, did veer into economic populist issues urgently enough that they were at least willing to politely ignore, if not necessarily discard, the race obsession. The instance he told me of was somewhere in the dystopian exploitation zone of ‘Coal Country’, and the situation of all labor so dire that the local-level Klan, more or less by necessity, took on quasi-union characteristics, and couldn’t afford to exclude enthnic undesireables(lest the mine management simply use those as an alternate labor source).
It’s not exactly a triumph of principles and the human spirit; but it’s also not wholly surprising that there is a point past which you are squeezing the whites at the bottom of the economic totem pole so hard that telling them to blame the blacks and the immigrants, who are even more shit-on than they are, just doesn’t pass the laugh test anymore. No brotherly love and reconciliation; but it’s hard to keep class-consciousness entirely at bay unless you are willing to actually provide a modicum of economic security and superiority, as well as the symbolic stuff, to the low end of the white hierarchy.
“Congressional candidate” says it all for me. Strongly held beliefs become surprisingly malleable as a person climbs the dungheap from local activist, to local politician, to national career politico.
“Hey, all you black people, Jews, and gays, it’s great to see you all here! We sure are glad you came to our meeting at this here remotely-located building with heavy locks on all the doors. Now you all just get comfortable, we’re gonna all step outside for a minute. If you smell smoke, that’s just the uh… campfire!”
They were probably inspired by the incredible example of #Gamergate proponents who against all odds, stuck to their guns and insisted they were one thing and not the other all the while.
Although, even if not to be taken seriously, the fact of this upstart KKK outlet handing out olive branches in the form of summits with the NAACP et al means there is one very real difference between them.
It mean that even the KKK is smarter than #Gamergate.
“They liked my handlebar design,
My Fu Manchu was really fine
My [something-something] made 'em blink,
My Pancho VIlla made 'em think
But when I shaved it really small
My Jewish friends would never call…”
I will say that naming your inclusive organization the KKK takes a fair bit of guts/stupidity. I feel like they are probably disproportionately likely to be targeted for violence by other KKK branches.
