Chris Hedges is a Public Menace
The Southwest Political Report
August 29, 2017
By Matt Sedillo
If 500 Nazis are allowed to march unharassed, 10,000 will march the following the month. Whether Nazis, Confederates, Minutemen, Christian Crusaders, whatever particular strand of white supremacy or combined strands of hate brings the hatemonger to the party they must be confronted immediately.
The self deputizing, vigilante, already quasi-death squads must be confronted. They must be forced to crawl back to their basements and hotel rooms. The threat is real, so must the resistance be. If we are to transform society more work than this need be done. If we are to prevent self deputizing death squads from roaming the street they must fear public gathering. There is no way around this and there is no reason to think of this work as mutually exclusive.
Liberalism by definition is counterrevolutionary. In times of crisis it calls for the pacification of struggle and the return to normalcy. It posits that both right wing calls for ethnic cleansing and the resistance to that as equally menacing to the liberal order of society.
Liberalism is an ideology and practice not a state of being. Anyone can express “both sides ideology”, even eugenicist fascists like Donald Trump. Donald Trump is not a liberal by any means, but his infamous “many sides, many sides” response to the White Supremacist violence of Charlotsville was a textbook liberal response and increasingly is undiscernible from many prominent liberals particularly those posing as “leftists.”
The liberal onslaught of false equivalencies and its war cry of “both sides” is an ideology of death. In times of absolute crisis liberalism it is a death cult most often practiced by those not directly targeted by whatever platform of mass vigilantism is gaining momentum. When practiced by those who are directly targeted by fascist vigilante ideology, be it in White Supremacy, Male Supremacy, Christian Supremacy, American Exceptionalism, to name a few, or various other combinations of hate platforms, liberalism often takes on even greater levels cult like devotion to its cry of “both sides.” The notions that all sides have their point, that all sides know suffering and that all sides can be redeemed becomes the central focus of the liberal argument rather than defense of a given community or even a given self. In times of absolute crisis liberalism is death cult regardless of who is expressing it.
A favorite talking point of the liberal is the common economic pain and social alienation of fascists. The pain of fascist vigilantes is irrelevant to the conversation concerning the threat of fascist vigilante culture and organization.
Chris Hedges recently wrote in the opening paragraph to his latest article attacking Antifa that,
“Behind the rhetoric of the “alt-right” about white nativism and protecting American traditions, history and Christian values is the lust for violence. Behind the rhetoric of antifa, the Black Bloc and the so-called “alt-left” about capitalism, racism, state repression and corporate power is the same lust for violence.”
This is a bizarre statement that makes one wonder is Chris Hedges arguing that there is some kind of peaceful way to go about the organization of “white nativisim” or a non violent way to go about “protecting American traditions, history and Christian values” and if there were it would be respectable. His characterization of the so called “alt-left” is equally absurd. The term “alt-right” was possibly coined but definitely popularized by hipster eugenicist and ethnic cleanser Richard Spencer to obscure the fact that he was calling for ethnic cleansing. The term “alt-left” is a creation of the very same white supremacist politics that produced Richard Spencer and is now being promoted both by the Ultra White and their liberal enablers to create false equivelancies.
Throughout his article Chris Hedges reaches across the oceans of space and time to make further false equivalencies between right wing death squads of central america and leftist revolutionaries, the Yugoslavian government and CIA sponsored literal Neo Nazis, Argentine fascist generals and leftist revolutionaries, and finally to the actual Nazis as led by Adolf Hitler and the communist resistance to Nazism. In short Chris Hedges gave “many sides, many sides” presentation of much of the 20th century in order to attack the idea of revolution from below.
In Chris Hedges presentation Donald Trump is seen as “a narcissistic kleptocrat, con artist and pathological liar.” He is correct in this. But this is not the basis of his appeal. Donald Trump’s appeal lies not in his casual realtionship with facts, or his vainglorious public persona and certainly not in his personal corruption. The appeal of Donald Trump is his call for a wall on the southern border with the demand that Mexicans pay for the wall. Donald Trump demands that Mexico pays for what they have done to White America. Donald Trump’s legion of vigilantes feast on the promise of vengeance and of putting Mexicans in their place. Mexico will pay and for more than just a wall. Donald Trump’s appeal lies in the fact that he calls MS13 and by fascist extension all Salvadorans “animals.” Donald Trump’s appeal legion of white supremacist vigilantes feast on the promise of this as well. Donald Trump’s appeal is that he calls for a ban on Muslims. That the middle east an area of the world peopled by so many of the victims of US imperialism shall also pay for what they have done to the US appeals to Trump’s Christian Crusader base. Donald Trump’s appeal lies in calling Black Lives Matter a terrorist organization and in calling Black protesters “thugs.” Donald Trump’s appeal is based on the demand that Black protest must be silenced and punished for having offended White America. The Donald Trump appeal is based on false victim narratives of fascists who are calling for ethnic cleansing.
Chris Hedges is light on specifics when it comes to the content of their cry. Chris Hedges will not address the content. Only throw his hands up in typical liberal fashion in defense of the “grand republic.” Hedges is likely aware that in times of absolute crisis neither side has use of liberals.
False equivalencies spread confusion. Confusion strengthens the fascists. Liberalism is a death cult. Chris Hedges is a public menace.
[The Southwest Political Report was founded by Irene Sanchez and Matt Sedillo. Two Chican@s who were born in and grew up on the Eastside of Los Angeles and call Southern California home.]
7 Comments
Great article!
The likes of Hedges would be crying about ‘rights’ for Fascists when they’re getting ‘rightfully’ 86’ed. What part of New York Times and Pulitzer Prize doesn’t equate to Controlled Opposition, LiB-rals??
the self-fulfilling prophecy of liberal handwringing aiding nazis continues
The very first sentence shows the idiocy of the writer’s logic. In 1966 the KKK marched and often times a few hundred came out to gawk but Martin Luther King did not waste his precious time bothering with them. The marches by the KKK were done to try to protest his successes in desegregation. Current marches by the KKK had been about such matters as statue protests. These are people reacting to your success. THEY are the counter protest. You don’t waste your time with them because when you do, you build their numbers and their frenzy level. When you work on your own marches and efforts they lose their energy. But you want to feed their energy and build their numbers in doing so.
The numbers growing are not done in terms of who shows up to march — it is about what they are doing behind the scenes growing a bigger group of people to defeat you at the ballot box, which is the real battle ground.
Never in that 1966 period did the KKK (and in chicago back then it was the Nazis) start having “10,000 people” marching just because 400 came out to gawk at 25 robed figures marching. You are trying to create a problem. And you will succeed in making a problem for yourself in growing the Nazi movement if you continue in your frenetic and paranoid vein.
The author completely ignores the possibility that millions of people voted for Trump because he said he was going to stop interfering with other countries He also said he wanted friendly relations with Russia. Peace is abhorrent across the political spectrum in the U.S.
I believe that white supremacists are very few in number and have scant influence among the general population
As a self identifying liberal, and someone deeply respectful of Chris Hedges, I am also open to thought-provoking criticism warranting careful consideration — even criticism of the stereotyped domain that neither I nor, likely Hedges inhabits — and yet Mr. Sedillo savages here.
That domain has a psychic geography curiously akin to the same landslide-prone slopes, (loaded with ad hominem boulders), that our shared (Sedillo, Hedges and myself) adversaries inhabit.
To be clear, I am certainly not the political beast Mr. Sedillo slurs as “liberal” but rather the linguistic species of liberal as adjective — an apolitical idealist and humanist describing the parent noun, “progressive.” Mr Hedges speaks for himself quite well, while Mr. Sedillo needs to clarify for his readers something as simple as how we might best deal with binary reductionism employed both by Sedillo and our adversaries. Certainly, mimicry is not a viable option.
I’m with Hedges and yet hopefully await a finer rhetorical edge for Sedillo to whet.
The existence of an alt-left which equally destroys democratic rights has existed in nations such as China now, and the USSR in the past. It is harmful. This does not excuse Trumps reference to this. this does not excuse the alt-right.
Matt Sedillo obviously doesn’t read, with any regularity, Chris Hedges’ articles – or his books. Matt Sedillo knows not.
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