I think this is one time where Freddie's take is correct, bit actually a little behind the curve. The "tradfem" influencer who happily lives in the woods and raises goats under the patriarchy has been a meme for a minute, and various Tumblr users for years have been warning about the ecofacist pipeline where people who claim to love nature and granola are suddenly talking about reducing the global population.
> It is not possible that God promised the whole garden to everyone.
The particular meme Freddie mocks in this line is weirdly fascinating to me, because it can be read as a very typically Christian thing ("you pray for a miracle, but God has already given you the miracle of eternal salvation"), and of course, the Prosperity Gospel reading that Freddie skewers. In the former reading, a Christian would say, "no, God actually *can* offer His garden to everyone, that's sort of the point. A fraction of the infinite is still infinite." In the latter, of course, Freddie's point stands. Still, I wonder if the ambiguity is intentional, a sort of sleight-of-hand?
(Not that Freddie gives a whit about this off-topic ramble. As a materialist, his concern is caring for the finite, weed-ridden, and ever-so-fragile gardens of this world, because in his view, they're all we have.)
There are masculine parallels to this in the Manosphere, but the artifacts and practices are coded differently. It's a mix of pseudoscience, self-help, martial discipline, and dormroom Stoicism. It's like, a military officer claims that taping their mouth shut before they fall asleep results in deeper rest, which allows more jiu-jitsu practice, push-ups, combat meditation, and getting ahead of the 99% of the people who don't do this one simple thing. Then you slam plant shakes and ingest nootropics that are just saw dust.
"The term “fascist” is criminally overused these days, but the Brothers of Italy, the party Meloni helped found and currently leads, has legitimate, no-bullshit fascist associations."
Yes, Benito Mussolini (founder of the Fascist Party) was first the editor of the Socialist Party's Daily paper Avanti! Mussolini abandoned the International Marxist cause for the Nationalist Marxist cause, Mussolini didn't want Italians fighting wars of colonialism which would be required under the Internationalist Marxist cause.
So basically, if you're an internationalist, you're by definition a colonialist.
I'd make the case that the causality runs in the reverse. This self-help girlboss ideology is so prevalent because its useful. This is a vaguely Marxist take, sort of German Ideology type stuff, that basically the conditions create the ideology and not the other way around. Trying to add up all the pieces of an ideology ends up being like reading tea leaves, because it was never really designed to be rationally thought though. Telling people, women in particular, that they can indeed have everything if they just want it and work hard enough is 100% in tune with our current "meritocratic" neoliberal economic system.
The same goes with Christianity. Donald Trump, in as close to an objective fashion as one is able to reach, was the least Christian president of my lifetime. Everything about him was offensive to Christian values, but Evangelical Christians were among his strongest supporters. The pieces don't fit, none of it adds up, and it was never supposed to. It's useful to the status quo to let them think that Trump will somehow get them their way, that if they're just mean and aggressive enough, they'll finally get to show those snooty liberals in coastal cities what's what. Those same rural Republicans get to believe that the system is working for them, no matter how much they say they hate the US government, they get a little less rowdy, and it's back to business as usual.
I'd go even further and say everyone wants to think our beliefs and ideas matter, that our conception of society, politics, art, the world in general are of great consequence, but I'm here to tell you they are not. The system cares way, way less about what you think than getting you to act in a certain direction. No one really cares what you think, what you do and don't believe you've figured out as long as it doesn't conflict with power.
"And yet I find it a deft little symbol of a plausible future that I’m seeing more and more hints of: rather than conservatives continuing to fight culture wars they can’t seem to win, regardless of political victories, some conservatives will simply embrace a lot of the cultural artifacts and identity bric a brac the conservative movement writ large has long derided."
This is exactly right and I was hoping that you would tie this into the recent desire for right-wing safetyism on campus - right on cue, you did.
I don't blame RWers for taking our wins where we can, to an extent, but on safetyism and censorship in particular it's a losing game, to adopt the frame of the Left, because the Left simply cares more about discourse, is better at it, and will ultimately win. But seeing the chance to wield equity-speak for their own ends - because some Jews feel unsafe on campus, real DEI and censorship have never been tried - a lot of them can't resist.
It will be darkly funny to see RWers - most of whom I'll probably vote for - running on safetyism when it comes to border security, and running on the manifestation of a based trad future due to some primal national will within us. A Neoromanticism with a therapist.
I think Ukraine-mania was also a symptom of this, by the way. A Marvelized conflict where a lot of people got to live out armchair fantasies of fighting off an ogrish horde of invaders (while conveniently sending other people to actually fight.)
“Therapeutic Nationalism” is an awesome way to put it. Scary when you think about it.
Although I completely agree with the ideas of the piece I do get thrown off by all the labels, conservative, liberal, left and right. I feel they can be left out entirely and the point of the piece could be argued just the same. I realize you need a shorthand, but since their meanings are all jumbled now that shorthand no longer seems to work. I get that is sort of the point so maybe it’s just me.
1. Of course humans are stupidly reflexive, believing whatever ludicrous shit it is that they want to believe. I think it has something to do with their standing on the food chain because if even stray dogs were to be so self-deluded, they'd end up as medical experiments or bear bait.
2. American conservatives conveniently forget that Meloni is not married to her partner, the father of her kids. Both like to talk "family values" but only when convenient.
3. For her part, Meloni could feed migrant toddlers alive to piranhas and nobody in the PMC goodthink class in the US or Europe would raise so much as a peep in protest, as long as the likely alternative on offer questioned American hegemony in general and America's wars in particular.
Thanks so much for subscribing. Your support makes this project possible.
Therapeutic Nationalism and Other Opportunistic Decouplings
get ready
FREDDIE DEBOER
DEC 13
READ IN APP
"For years now, I’ve written once or twice annually about a phenomenon that I’ve struggled to name but which everyone understands. It’s a particular kind of social and aesthetic culture, not exclusive to Instagram but very heavily associated with it, that merges girlboss feminism with the contemporary therapeutic imperative, a strange syncretic mysticism involving horoscopes and “manifesting,” and a blanket excuse for narcissism and selfishness dressed up in quasi-political and self-help terms. You know what I mean." Freddy, you're such a card !!
I tried to enter my Bad Bitch Era by manifesting Shohei Ohtani to the Cubs and it didn't work so I'm on board with your take now Freddie.
I think this is one time where Freddie's take is correct, bit actually a little behind the curve. The "tradfem" influencer who happily lives in the woods and raises goats under the patriarchy has been a meme for a minute, and various Tumblr users for years have been warning about the ecofacist pipeline where people who claim to love nature and granola are suddenly talking about reducing the global population.
> It is not possible that God promised the whole garden to everyone.
The particular meme Freddie mocks in this line is weirdly fascinating to me, because it can be read as a very typically Christian thing ("you pray for a miracle, but God has already given you the miracle of eternal salvation"), and of course, the Prosperity Gospel reading that Freddie skewers. In the former reading, a Christian would say, "no, God actually *can* offer His garden to everyone, that's sort of the point. A fraction of the infinite is still infinite." In the latter, of course, Freddie's point stands. Still, I wonder if the ambiguity is intentional, a sort of sleight-of-hand?
(Not that Freddie gives a whit about this off-topic ramble. As a materialist, his concern is caring for the finite, weed-ridden, and ever-so-fragile gardens of this world, because in his view, they're all we have.)
There are masculine parallels to this in the Manosphere, but the artifacts and practices are coded differently. It's a mix of pseudoscience, self-help, martial discipline, and dormroom Stoicism. It's like, a military officer claims that taping their mouth shut before they fall asleep results in deeper rest, which allows more jiu-jitsu practice, push-ups, combat meditation, and getting ahead of the 99% of the people who don't do this one simple thing. Then you slam plant shakes and ingest nootropics that are just saw dust.
"The term “fascist” is criminally overused these days, but the Brothers of Italy, the party Meloni helped found and currently leads, has legitimate, no-bullshit fascist associations."
Yes, Benito Mussolini (founder of the Fascist Party) was first the editor of the Socialist Party's Daily paper Avanti! Mussolini abandoned the International Marxist cause for the Nationalist Marxist cause, Mussolini didn't want Italians fighting wars of colonialism which would be required under the Internationalist Marxist cause.
So basically, if you're an internationalist, you're by definition a colonialist.
I'd make the case that the causality runs in the reverse. This self-help girlboss ideology is so prevalent because its useful. This is a vaguely Marxist take, sort of German Ideology type stuff, that basically the conditions create the ideology and not the other way around. Trying to add up all the pieces of an ideology ends up being like reading tea leaves, because it was never really designed to be rationally thought though. Telling people, women in particular, that they can indeed have everything if they just want it and work hard enough is 100% in tune with our current "meritocratic" neoliberal economic system.
The same goes with Christianity. Donald Trump, in as close to an objective fashion as one is able to reach, was the least Christian president of my lifetime. Everything about him was offensive to Christian values, but Evangelical Christians were among his strongest supporters. The pieces don't fit, none of it adds up, and it was never supposed to. It's useful to the status quo to let them think that Trump will somehow get them their way, that if they're just mean and aggressive enough, they'll finally get to show those snooty liberals in coastal cities what's what. Those same rural Republicans get to believe that the system is working for them, no matter how much they say they hate the US government, they get a little less rowdy, and it's back to business as usual.
I'd go even further and say everyone wants to think our beliefs and ideas matter, that our conception of society, politics, art, the world in general are of great consequence, but I'm here to tell you they are not. The system cares way, way less about what you think than getting you to act in a certain direction. No one really cares what you think, what you do and don't believe you've figured out as long as it doesn't conflict with power.
"And yet I find it a deft little symbol of a plausible future that I’m seeing more and more hints of: rather than conservatives continuing to fight culture wars they can’t seem to win, regardless of political victories, some conservatives will simply embrace a lot of the cultural artifacts and identity bric a brac the conservative movement writ large has long derided."
This is exactly right and I was hoping that you would tie this into the recent desire for right-wing safetyism on campus - right on cue, you did.
I don't blame RWers for taking our wins where we can, to an extent, but on safetyism and censorship in particular it's a losing game, to adopt the frame of the Left, because the Left simply cares more about discourse, is better at it, and will ultimately win. But seeing the chance to wield equity-speak for their own ends - because some Jews feel unsafe on campus, real DEI and censorship have never been tried - a lot of them can't resist.
It will be darkly funny to see RWers - most of whom I'll probably vote for - running on safetyism when it comes to border security, and running on the manifestation of a based trad future due to some primal national will within us. A Neoromanticism with a therapist.
I think Ukraine-mania was also a symptom of this, by the way. A Marvelized conflict where a lot of people got to live out armchair fantasies of fighting off an ogrish horde of invaders (while conveniently sending other people to actually fight.)
“Therapeutic Nationalism” is an awesome way to put it. Scary when you think about it.
Although I completely agree with the ideas of the piece I do get thrown off by all the labels, conservative, liberal, left and right. I feel they can be left out entirely and the point of the piece could be argued just the same. I realize you need a shorthand, but since their meanings are all jumbled now that shorthand no longer seems to work. I get that is sort of the point so maybe it’s just me.
1. Of course humans are stupidly reflexive, believing whatever ludicrous shit it is that they want to believe. I think it has something to do with their standing on the food chain because if even stray dogs were to be so self-deluded, they'd end up as medical experiments or bear bait.
2. American conservatives conveniently forget that Meloni is not married to her partner, the father of her kids. Both like to talk "family values" but only when convenient.
3. For her part, Meloni could feed migrant toddlers alive to piranhas and nobody in the PMC goodthink class in the US or Europe would raise so much as a peep in protest, as long as the likely alternative on offer questioned American hegemony in general and America's wars in particular.
I did not see the (strong) finish from where this essay started. Excellent.
To quote Milan Kundera "kitsch is a folding screen set up to curtain off death" - this is just a new manifestation of fascist kitsch.
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Thanks so much for subscribing. Your support makes this project possible.
Therapeutic Nationalism and Other Opportunistic Decouplings
get ready
FREDDIE DEBOER
DEC 13
READ IN APP
"For years now, I’ve written once or twice annually about a phenomenon that I’ve struggled to name but which everyone understands. It’s a particular kind of social and aesthetic culture, not exclusive to Instagram but very heavily associated with it, that merges girlboss feminism with the contemporary therapeutic imperative, a strange syncretic mysticism involving horoscopes and “manifesting,” and a blanket excuse for narcissism and selfishness dressed up in quasi-political and self-help terms. You know what I mean." Freddy, you're such a card !!
I don't go there so can't comment on your comments of others comments.
Peace