Much of the mainstream political discourse is shaped by nostalgia – and the Right understands that they can latch onto that, weaponize it, in order to make their political project of rolling back the social and political progress of the past century more attractive.
The general sentiment that “Conservatism is no longer enough,” that “We need to stop calling ourselves conservatives,” is being echoed over and over again within the reactionary intellectual and pundit sphere. 3/
Sunday reading: Rightwing Dreams of American Reconquista
A counter-revolutionary zeal, desire for vengeance, and lust for radicalism characterizes today’s Right.
Thoughts on what unites Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis, Christopher Rufo, and Nate Hochman:
https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/rightwing-dreams-of-american-reconquista
A desire for radical measures to defend the “virtuous minority” – and with it the laws of God and/or nature as they supposedly manifest in traditional hierarchies of race, gender, religion, and wealth – against the “Un-American” forces of “woke” leftism is shared across the Right. 2/
Sunday reading: Rightwing Dreams of American Reconquista
A counter-revolutionary zeal, desire for vengeance, and lust for radicalism characterizes today’s Right.
Thoughts on what unites Donald Trump, Ron DeSantis, Christopher Rufo, and Nate Hochman:
https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/rightwing-dreams-of-american-reconquista
Anyway, Jonathan Katz dove deep into the Hanania, uhm, phenomenon in a series of great pieces for his Substack newsletter that everyone should read (link below). It’s difficult not to despair over the willful naivety of America’s “reasonable” center and media establishment. https://theracket.news/p/anatomy-of-a-troll
And yet, it wasn’t just the “respectable” Right that coddled him - but a significant portion of the centrist and self-proclaimed “moderate” sphere did so as well, treating this guy as a thoughtful conservative who deserved to be taken seriously. What an utter disgrace.
Seriously, spend a few minutes a do an extended Twitter search with “black” as the search term for Hanania’s Twitter. Just unabashed white grievance, non-stop raging against affirmative action or “black-on-white crime.” There’s nothing subtle about this.
This, for instance, is what Hanania said after the guy who killed Jordan Neely on the NYC subway was charged. I find it very difficult to construct a plausible version of who “these people” are supposed to be that’s not brutally racist. And this is far from the worst of what he regularly says.
I don’t say this to diminish the excellent, crucial reporting here - but: Don’t ever again trust a single word out of the mouth of people who needed to read this to realize who Hanania is and treated him as anything but an unabashed racist and rightwing extremist until yesterday.
ICYMI during the week: If you can stomach something that is not directly about the Trump indictment, here is an attempt to put his past actions and future plans in the context of the fantasizing about radical “counter-revolution” on the Right more broadly:
https://thomaszimmer.substack.com/p/rightwing-dreams-of-american-reconquista
