“We’re the platform for the alt-right,” Donald Trump’s campaign CEO, Stephen Bannon, told Mother Jones’ David Corn (8/22/16)—“we” meaning Breitbart News, the online news outlet that Bannon headed until he was picked to run the turbulent Trump campaign.
And the “alt-” (for “alternative”) right? Well, Breitbart (3/29/16) tried to explain what that is in a 5,000-word piece last spring, written by Breitbart tech editor Milo Yiannopoulos—perhaps best-known for being banned from Twitter for harassing actress Leslie Jones—and Allum Bokhari, who describes himself as “Milo’s deputy.”
Bokhari and Yiannopoulos are vague on what the alt-right is, other than describing it as “young, creative and eager to commit secular heresies” with its “jarring, taboo-defying rhetoric.”
They can tell you what it’s not, though—racist! Despite the fact that everyone seems to think it is:
Some—mostly establishment types—insist it’s little more than a vehicle for the worst dregs of human society: antisemites, white supremacists and other members of the Stormfront set. They’re wrong.
Since no one definition is on offer, let’s look at its various pieces as described by Breitbart.
“The Intellectuals”: These, according to Breitbart, are what separates the alt-right “above all else” from “from old-school racist skinheads (to whom they are often idiotically compared)”: They “are a much smarter group of people…. They’re dangerously bright.”
First noted among these geniuses is Richard Spencer, who’s prone to saying things like, “Our dream is a new society, an ethno-state that would be a gathering point for all Europeans.” He rejects the word “racist” because it’s “pejorative,” but “the notion that these people can be equal is not a scientific way of looking at it.”
Other alt-right thought leaders cited by Breitbart include “Steve Sailer’s blog, VDARE and American Renaissance.” “All of these websites have been accused of racism,” the article notes—which makes sense, because they’re all dedicated to promoting the pseudo-science of racial superiority (Extra!, 3–4/05).
There are a few other currents mentioned—like the “online ‘manosphere,’ the nemeses of left-wing feminism”—but for the most part, the influential thinkers of the alt-right movement Breitbart cites are people who would be called “racists” by anyone who wasn’t concerned that that word unfairly stigmatizes those who believe their race is better than others.
“Natural Conservatives”: The next constituency of the alt-right is described as “mostly white, mostly male middle-American radicals, who are unapologetically embracing a new identity politics that prioritizes the interests of their own demographic.” They are said to have “a preference for homogeneity over diversity,” with their chief concern being “the preservation of their own tribe and its culture.”
So—racists? No, insists Breitbart—because they “eschew…bigotry on a personal level.” But the “natural conservatives” are “frightened by the prospect of demographic displacement represented by immigration.” And “many of them instinctively feel that once large enough and ethnically distinct enough groups are brought together, they will inevitably come to blows.”
In other words, they’re racists.
“The Meme Team”: This is an online subculture that Breitbart characterizes as “a young, rebellious contingent who feel a mischievous urge to blaspheme, break all the rules and say the unsayable. Why? Because it’s funny!” They are “drawn to the alt-right…because it promises fun, transgression and a challenge to social norms they just don’t understand.”
What sort of “social norms” are we talking about? Well….
Millennials aren’t old enough to remember the Second World War or the horrors of the Holocaust…. Racism, for them, is a monster under the bed, a story told by their parents to frighten them into being good little children…. They don’t believe that the memes they post on /pol/ are actually racist.
Bokhari and Yiannopoulos don’t actually show any examples of the I-can’t-believe-it’s-not-racist memes seen on 4chan‘s /pol/ forum (for “politically incorrect”)—perhaps because they fear their readers lack the proper ironic sensibility to appreciate art like this:
That was originally posted to /new/, the predecessor to /pol/—but derivatives of the image could be seen on /pol/ to this day.
“The ‘1488ers’”: These are what Breitbart considers the “real” racists—as in, “Anything associated as closely with racism and bigotry as the alternative right will inevitably attract real racists and bigots.” To qualify, you have to identify—unironically!—with the shibboleths of the organized racist movements, the “14 words” of a white supremacist oath, and the coded reference to “Heil Hitler” as the repeated 8th letter of the alphabet.
To hear Breitbart tell it, such people are part of the alt-right—“those looking for Nazis under the bed can rest assured that they do exist”—but “no one really likes them,” mainly because they’re uncool; they are “humorless ideologues who have no lives beyond their political crusade, and live for the destruction of the great.”
So that’s the tour of the alt-right given by Breitbart: Essentially, it’s racist intellectuals, natural racists, people who make racist jokes and Nazis.
They might be seen as beneath contempt, were it not for the fact that one of the two leading campaigns for the presidency is led by someone who bragged of being this movement’s “platform.”
Never met a racist who admitted that he/she was a racist! Actions speak louder than words.
So long as society perpetuates the myth of race as a scientific fact, it is only a matter of time and, typically, economics, until one group of people begins to attack another for no good reason and on no other basis than their physical appearance. The situation allows those who have caused the economic situation to avoid responsibility by siccing their victims on one another. I wouldn’t expect the capitalist class to have the slightest interest in changing anything; people might start looking more closely at where the money and jobs have actually gone–and who benefited. And come after them.
Until the grownups inform the children that homo sapiens are all alike and that the differences of skin color are as determinative of a person’s intelligence or behavior as are height, weight or hair, the world will continue to experience the economic downtrodden looking for an easy target for their outrage.
Without ignoring the historical or quotidian impact of the popular notion of race on those most affected, it would behoove those responsible for religious, educational and governmental leadership to make an effort to disabuse once-and-for-all society of the notion that race has any scientific relevance.
It couldn’t hurt.