When did you first realise that Regressive Leftism was losing what was very much almost universally accepted establishment status, and was showing the first signs of finally being usurped by something far more sensible? For me it was when more subtle and effective power brokers of the Orwellian movement became so complacent and so blinded in the quest for new marginalised groups that they could call their own, that they gave a mainstream platform to the most damaged, damaging, and lunatic elements of the left.
It was virtually overnight, after a good decade or two of chiding ‘all of the white people’ about the evils of blackface (except Al Jolson, who thought in the correct manner so was defended in typically hypocritical leftist fashion) that the left was completely discredited when we were presented with Shaun King and Rachel Dolezal.
Both of these people were clearly Caucasian, wracked with such white guilt that they had literally decided that racial transition was in order. At some point prior to their public lives, they hit the tanning salon and turned the dial up to eleven. Rachel Dolezal dyed and permed her hair. Sean King closely cropped his hair to hide any straightness that might betray his whiteness, and grew a pencil-thin moustache to accentuate his lips because presumably ‘all of the white people’ think that blacks have pronounced lips so he saw it as a convenient life hack to help enable his transition.
To anyone reasonable on either side of the political spectrum, this was all completely ridiculous. Even a left-leaning friend of mine conceded that “if this nonsense becomes a trend, everything we’ve done is for nothing”. But did the left power-brokers distance themselves from their lunatic fringe? No. They enabled them.
Rachel Dolezal was anointed by the N.A.A.C.P., despite the fact that she’d basically followed the lead of C. Thomas Howell in Soul Man and taken a position away from someone of genuine African-American ancestry. Nobody in authority had a problem with it. Shaun King was legitimised by the New York Daily News, and wrote articles that included scathing critiques about ‘cultural appropriation‘ of all things.
In retrospect, it’s quite remarkable that an ideology that was accepted (albeit grudgingly by those of us across the aisle) as the establishment got so caught up in the concept of ‘inclusiveness’ that they gave these fringe lunatics a platform to completely undermine and discredit progressivism in such a spectacularly destructive manner. The left have always been horrible at vetting extremists among their own ranks, and the end result was the tide of the Culture War changing dramatically overnight. Conservatism and libertarianism (not to be confused with the pseudo-libertarianism of Gary Johnson) is now very much the establishment.
But as the mortally wounded Regressive Left has shown, going mainstream is fraught with its own dangers. The problem with populist politics, whether nationalist or socialist, is that it energises and emboldens the idiot segment of humanity. They are attracted to the tribal element more so than what the tribe represents, and like Shaun King and Rachel Dolezal, their mindless fanaticism is usually what brings the side unstuck. I know a millennial who is an idiot. No ifs or buts. He shares Hitler memes to get a rise out of leftists. Amusing in a s—stirring way of course, but I have no doubt in my mind that if the same person with the same IQ had been born five years earlier in a slightly different political climate, he’d be an insufferably annoying social justice warrior. No doubt about it whatsoever.
Much has been made of Alt-Righter Richard Spencer in the Mainstream Media. Now, I’m reasonably sure that the guy isn’t a Neo-Nazi. He seems more of a garden-variety troll. But I am fairly certain that he’s an idiot. The trolls undoubtedly did their bit in the ‘Great Meme War’ that got Trump elected, but now it’s definitely time for them to take a few steps back. Particularly the idiots among their ranks. Their complete lack of self-awareness rivals any repulsive purple-haired social justice warrior. What was an alternative grass roots movement in the prevention of a globalist U.S. administration is now a reality, and mainstream. Behaviour must change accordingly.
For any Trump supporter to cheekily refer to the media as the ‘Lugenpresse’ knowing full well that the press is in attendance, and using anything else that can be construed as white supremacist rhetoric, is idiotic and unwarranted in every sense of the word. The alternate media has made fun of the ‘Trump is literally Hitler’ narrative of the MSM since day one, and discrediting that narrative helped us to lift the veil on what was an orchestrated campaign of disinformation. The mainstream media had stepped into quicksand throughout the election cycle and is slowly but surely sinking. Richard Spencer and imbeciles like him are nothing short of a helping hand out of the mess that MSM is in.
Even some of the more valuable Trump supporters are self-aware enough to realise that they can become a liability if they are seen to be too close to the administration. I’m sure that Alex Jones and Milo Yiannopoulos, for example, are very close to the administration. I’d be very surprised if they didn’t both attend official victory parties. Both were instrumental in the election result, in my opinion. Yet Jones and Yiannopoulos wisely realise that they can better serve the cause from afar, because if they are too close it will be problematic. Let’s face facts, both have said things in the past, or have reputations that could damage the bigger picture, but at least they realise this and seem fine with not getting a place at the adults’ table.
Trump has distanced himself from emboldened idiots of the Alt-Right, and that’s probably for the best. As conservatives, libertarians, or centrists, we cannot make the same mistake as the left did by not vetting these people. There are millions of emboldened idiots at the formative stage of their lives right now. Leftism is no longer cool. Conservatism is punk rock. In a sense, that is a good thing, because it’s the reason that the progressive power base has eroded. On the other hand, if we follow the lead of the left and allow these millions of idiots a platform to hijack the whole thing, conservatism is in trouble. The idiots don’t get it. In much the same way as leftists believe that conservatives are Nazis, these new converts seem to be of the mistaken belief that you need to be a Nazi to have conservative values. Same stupidity, different ideology.
How do we prevent a pretty solid movement from being hijacked and undermined by the coming wave of pseudo-conservative idiots who would have blossomed into thoroughly repellent progressives five or ten years ago? It’s no easy fix. I’m hopeful that this new era of conservatism will organically weed out the elements that will otherwise undermine it before it has a chance to become fully realised.
But part of me is concerned that this mercenary millennial troll army that helped Trump take the White House may become restless and begin to pillage and raze the city now that it has been taken. The Romans used to solve that problem by giving their idle soldiers land to farm as a distraction during peacetime, to discourage them from running riot. Perhaps the Trump campaign team could solve a lot of problems by coming up with a FarmVille-type application to award to anyone that ever came up with a Pepe meme as a thank you for their service, and a way to ease them back into civilian life.
The troll army is certainly getting restless and dangerous. Any incarnation of a Trump Presidency that doesn’t fit squarely into their concept of what a Trump Presidency should be is only going to result in insurrection. Many are already turning on the guy more zealously than anyone at CNN. The victory of the President-elect depended upon making these people feel like they were important. His prosperity may well depend upon making it clear to them that they aren’t.
It’s your XYZ.
