Jeff Epstein

The cultural landscape has been irrevocably changed by the Epstein revelations. Of course, I’m not telling you anything you don’t already know. While I’ve been following the news like everyone else, I’ve only loosely discussed it here because the shit that’s being alleged is so cartoonishly evil that it would push the boundaries of what any writer could conceive. I mean, Jeffery Epstein might’ve been behind QAnon? It sounds too stupid to be true. But more shockingly, apparently there really was a cabal of sex criminals running the world. Hell, they STILL are in charge. And those that initially alleged its existence and dismissed as cranks were behind it the entire time! I mean, Alex Jones might be the most vindicated man in history but in an absurd plot twist, he is now running PR for the cabal!

But I don’t want us to lose sight of the true depravity of the situation. There are real victims here. And because of the collective sense of helplessness we all feel, I hope we don’t compartmentalize this saga into another internet meme.

Yet the reason I bring this up is because these file releases feel like a nuclear bomb was dropped on the contemporary culture war. Leveling accusations of “virtue signaling” and “identity politics” sound almost meaningless. The left/right distinctions that have defined political thinking since the 20th century are nearly obsolete. With outing of this cabal, even the term “culture war” is a misnomer. The file releases have confirmed our worst fears. The eternal struggle has been, and maybe always will be, rich vs. poor.

Of course, the dead carcass of old world thinking will continue to fester in the minds of these so called “cultural warriors”. One doesn’t easily ween themselves off the propaganda which nourished them for so long. Or, in other words, “fascistic” thinking will carry on. But its nakedness has been exposed.

But just to conclude this thought, while there are no shortage of definitions for fascism, I like to keep things very simple. In my mind, fascism transcends being merely a material or political movement, but it’s a psychological movement as well. It’s well documented that fascist movements take advantage of an individual’s insecurities and loneliness by enrapturing them in the spectacle of power over the Other. So fascism is not only the fetishization of power, but also the fetishization of the aesthetics of power.

What goes around

Last year, I predicted the very predictable fall of YouTuber Turkey Tom. The accusations against him, which are discussed in the video here, hardly come as a surprise to those who are familiar with that personality type. For legal purposes, I should point out that as far as I’m aware, Turkish Thomas has yet to address these allegations. So as it stands now, these are just accusations. Nevertheless, I think the news has come at a very timely moment. And thank you to Muck Hole for doing my homework. Turkey Tom is a near perfect example of the “Trumpist” mindset, which I sat out to distinguish from the typical fascist mindset in my prior post. Is there some overlap? Sure. I might discuss that at a later time. But Trumpism rests in a bizarre state that is both more benign yet far more terrifyingly nihilistic than fascism. Read the comments section of Muck Hole’s video and you might see comical variations of the Nietzschean saying “when you stare into the abyss, the abyss stares back.” And that’s a correct summation on the matter. In my view, the video does a pretty good job of explaining the psychological loops one finds themselves in prior to making the great leap into fascism. The internet has been an abyss we’ve been staring down for nearly 30 years. This combined with the economic and political situation we’re experiencing under neoliberalism, it was only a matter of time before someone came along and flicked the switch into full blown authoritarianism.

Your neighborhood fascist

“It should be awkward to NOT talk about politics these days,” a quote I read on my IG feed. And I agree! The situation in Minneapolis has gotten a lot of people talking and the word we hear a lot is facism. Hyperbole? I think not. Especially when the head of ICE looks like this:

While Greg Bovino’s style choices may be neither here nor there, it is interesting to see how the term fascist has become an increasingly accepted term to describe the second administration of Donald Trump. It wasn’t that people weren’t calling him that the first time around. They were. It’s just that everyone from MAGA hats to Marxists would dismiss those accusations as over exaggerated defamations from liberals holding sour grapes after the embarrassing defeat of Hillary Clinton. Which was also partially true. But, what no one wants to admit now, the “libs”, whom everyone has been trying to “own” the last ten years, were actually RIGHT. So a word of advice to the Left and center-left: if everyone can agree that Trump is a “fascist”, then someone owes someone an apology. Maybe Terence Ray is right; It’s time for truth and reconciliation between leftists and liberals.

But that’s not what I want to talk about. Firstly, I want to chagrin at my lack of credentials in discussing this topic. I ain’t a sociologist or political scientist (I am, however, a historian. And that’s a hill I’m willing to die on). For more qualified views, I recommend Hannah Arendt and Robert O. Paxton. The point I’m wanting to make is fascism is considered a flavor of authoritarianism, generally speaking, and Trumpism is a subflavor of fascism, or possibly a different subcategory of authoritarianism altogether. I suppose it’s the wannabe academic in me that wants to define our terms and not get things conflated. In sum, while there are notable similarities, Trumpism and fascism are fundamentally two different things (even if those distinctions are merely academic to the casual eye).

First let’s start with the differences. The historical differences are obvious. Strictly speaking, fascism was a heavily influential ideology in Europe from the 1920s on up to 1945. Key components were national renewal via purging the “Other” (for example, antisemitism), militarism, and the merging of corporate interests with state interests under the control of a despotic figure. Another interesting component was a social Darwinian promulgation of “the will”, or, in simpler terms: “might makes right”. While it’s easy to draw parallels between the fascism of Europe to Trumpism in 21st century America, the biggest difference to me is this: cynicism.

To be honest, I can’t speak much to Mussolini, but I think it’s safe to say that Hitler was very much a believer in the bullshit he spewed. While the Nazis attracted its share of hooligans and grifters, the leaders who fueled its engine: Hitler, Goebbels, Bormann, Himmler, etc were all true believers. No doubt, Trump has a few “true believers” in his cabinet, but if you put a gun to my head and asked me if I thought he held any genuine ideology in regards to the US or the conservative movement in which he hijacked, I’d tell you ‘no’. Every action the president has committed both times in office has been in service to his own enrichment and preservation. Therein lies the biggest distinction between Trumpism and fascism. Hitler and Goebbels committed suicide and went down with the ideology they proclaimed. Trump would never. While it’s obvious that Trump and his movement have disdain for large segments of the population, there’s a very American flavor to Trumpism that was perhaps absent in 1930s Germany and Italy—a flavor that could only appear in late stage capitalism: an unbridled passion for narcissistic self-interest.

Anywho, I’m tired of writing for today. Maybe I’ll pick this up later. I’ll let you know 👍