In defense of the sanctimonious women's studies set || First feminist blog on the internet

So. Trump.

EG

I thought I hated that motherfucker twenty years ago when he was just an egomaniacal racist magnate. Little did I know he was also a fascist waiting for the right moment to bloom. And let’s make no mistake. I don’t throw the word “fascist” around lightly. I don’t use it to describe everyone to the right of Che Guevara. But I’m sure as hell using it now. We have the narrative of decadence and decline: America (by which we mean the US, of course, because what else of interest or importance could there possibly be on two continents?) was once great, but has been debased by multivarious outsiders and corrupt insiders with their degenerate ways. We have the promise of ultra-nationalistic rebirth: make American great again. We have the condoning of violence against those who disagree (“Maybe he should have been roughed up”). We have the uneasy coalition of traditional elites and these radical right-wingers. We have the racism. One wonders what Robert Paxton would say.

Should we talk about this fascist motherfucker? Banning Muslims from the US is a fascist idea. Interning Japanese-Americans is one of the US’s many shames, not a model to follow (make no mistake; according to his campaign, Trump means that Muslim Americans currently traveling abroad would not be allowed to come home). Requiring all Muslims to register is a fascist idea. And don’t for a minute think that the rhetoric Trump is pushing isn’t fostering the kind of violence described in this article about anti-Muslim attacks, or what this little girl in the Bronx experienced the other day. Those brownshirt-wannabes are Trump’s foot soldiers, make no mistake.

I know some people feel that if he takes the Republican nomination, it will all but guarantee a Democratic victory. I’m not so sure about that. Fascism can be quite popular. Indeed, that is part of its power–it’s a populist regime. So I’m not so sanguine. I am…concerned.

Edited: Now Trump is saying Muslim Americans who travel would be allowed to go home. Let me see if I can find the thing I read last night saying the opposite. Found it.

58 thoughts on So. Trump.

    1. Thanks for the link! I agree; that post really is interesting. All of these elements and emotions that Trump is stoking–they’re not just going to go away, whether he does or not. I appreciate having someone lay it out like that.

      1. What is most troubling, though, is the momentum that Trump’s candidacy has given that tide. He may not himself lack any real ideological footing, but he has laid the groundwork for a fascist groundswell that could someday be ridden to power by a similarly charismatic successor who is himself more in the mold of an ideological fascist. And it doesn’t take a very long look down the roll of 2016 Republican candidates to find a couple of candidates who might fit that mold.

        I think that while Trump is giving voice to the Republican id, there’s a much better chance of Cruz actually winning the nomination, and the latter’s positions are all but indistinguishable when it comes to bigotry and xenophobia. Even a supposed “moderate” like Jeb! endorsed religious tests for refugees, while Rubio isn’t significantly better. In practice any of them would likely mirror the agenda of the GOP-led House and (almost certainly if they win the presidency) Senate, which in combination with control over SCOTUS is a scary thought.

  2. I think some people in the media are overestimating the predictive power of nationwidepolling this far out from individual caucuses. From a purely statistical perspective, there’s effective no change of Trump winning. His support is too limited to a single segment of the Republican primary electorate, and as the other candidates start to drop out, their supporters will go elsewhere.

    Cruz is far too unpopular to win, both with Republicans and nationally. He has a shot in Iowa, but that’s never meant much (especially on the GOP side).

    Rubio is looking strong, on the other hand, which to me is much more concerning- he’s nearly as right-wing as Cruz, but dressed up in a package that most voters believe to be significantly more moderate. A Rubio/Kasich ticket is probably the biggest electoral threat to HRC that the Republicans could put together.

    1. However at this moment, Trump is the largest and richest contender for the republicans. Somehow with his egotistical and anti-islamic views he’s appealing to xenophobic americans who don’t know any better because the only education they get is from scare tactic news.

  4. As I said during our own election, sometimes invoking Godwin’s law is not a fallacy, but a frightening reality.

    At this point, this guy is such a fucking menace that I no longer want him to lose the nomination and election, I want this garbage he’s spewing to cost him EVERYTHING. He deserves no less.

    (On an up note, I’m glad to see some of our leaders openly denouncing his bullshit.. some are pushing to prevent him coming here, because hate speech)

  5. the real danger of trump is not so much his winning the republican nomination but the damage he is doing in the interim leading up to 2016. question: who let the dogs out? trump has uncaged the rabid, racist, and too often violent hordes who would attack someone like me, a black woman, and who have now physically assaulted mexicans, muslims and other blacks. already one family of a muslim teen say that he was beaten and thrown off a roof. if his rhetoric isn’t nullified, expect more violence and even death. unfortunately, i am not being hyperbolic.

    1. the increasing threat of violence and death for ethnic minorities is making me want to hide my muslim background from strangers. but i don’t even know if that will make a difference, given that my name already “gives it away” to lots of people (even though obviously having an arabic name doesn’t equate to being muslim).

      and of course if someone finds out about me hiding my islam from others, im just going to be accused of “taqiyyah” lol (its a term that means concealment of religion under duress, but islamophobes take it to mean “secret radicalization and strategic deception in service of jihad”).

      1. yes, it is so frightening. in ny a muslim store owner was beaten. there is a picture of him crying. people come to america for the freedom and safety and trump is basically turning america on its head. the worst is that he is so far gone, he doesn’t care about the damage he is doing. i hope he drops out soon, otherwise i foresee more violence and death.

    1. Did he? I don’t doubt it, I just can’t find the quote. His opinion of Latin@s is fucking disgusting, and frankly, it’s disappointing that he’s still solidly in the political limelight after that.

      2. Thanks for sharing that. Also, the idea of a “deportation force” is absolutely fucking terrifying :-/

  7. I am concerned as well. A lot of people are comparing him to a modern day Hitler. There are differences of course, but I see the similarities.

  8. the idea of having to officially register as a muslim makes me very uncomfortable, especially given that it means ill be tracked by the government. for reasons i don’t want to share publicly, there is an additional danger that i face in being registered and tracked as a muslim.

    also, trump plans to close down lots of masajid (mosques) and marco rubio wants to go even farther, proposing that any space where he fears “radicalization” is taking place to be closed down.

    i wouldn’t be scared if trump and rubio were just plain ol racists who are recognized as such and therefore ignored/opposed. but what worries me the most about the developments with trump and others is the public reception. it’s not just republicans who support him, but also pretty much anyone with racist tendencies. for white supremacists, trump is the man who has the guts to say what “everyone else” is thinking about non-white people overall.

    and he does it without even calling himself a racist. he goes out of his way to deny accusations of racism, but his racist supporters know what he really means behind all of those public statements like “i love muslims and i have muslim friends, I just want to keep our country safe”. same goes for every other form of racism he has expressed. he attracts the crowd of white people that believes in the notion of white marginalization, which serves as the basis for many racist worldviews, cutting across bipartisan lines.

    so the support for people like trump and rubio is really just a reflection of the changing social environment of this country, where racism thrives more than ever because of the increasing ease with which racists can get away with their words and actions. even if trump isnt elected, his inspiration for whiteheads across the country will remain, and with it overt racism will only spread and intensify. after all, even without him calling for it, his white supremacist admirers have already begun to respond to his rhetoric faithfully by carrying out racist violence.

    1. I completely agree. Even if Trump vanished tomorrow, the fascist hatred he has stoked and helped to build won’t go anywhere, and the violence it becomes will be just as dangerous. I read an article this morning saying that Stormfront had to upgrade its servers or redo its website or something to cope with the surge in traffic Trump is bringing them. If that’s not ominous, I don’t know what is. Ah, here is the article.

      1. You don’t think there is an underlying problem that Trump is appealing to? How do you explain how the Sweden Democrats went from a joke to being the largest force in Swedish politics? How do you explain Rotherham? How do you explain the UK law society effectively proclaiming that women are worth half as much as a man?

        If the left won’t stand up for basic women’s rights, and indeed, will call anyone who even attempts to address the issues racist or Islamophobic (e.g. Maryam Namazie), or even worse, ‘house Muslim’ or ‘porch monkey’ (e.g. Maajid Nawaz), then you can hardly be surprised that the far right is in accedence.

        1. As I believe I made clear, I think the underlying problem Trump is appealing to is the unfortunate popularity of fascist demagoguery.

          You seem to be fond of asking suggestive questions without actually making statements. Why don’t you come out and articulate what you think the “underlying problem” is?

          The US is in a very different position from Sweden, as my Swedish brother-in-law will tell me at great length if I ask him after the kids are in bed. Compare the immigration statistics w/respect to total population, for one thing. For another, consider refugees in particular and how many the US takes in compared to Sweden. The Sweden Democrats have roots in Nazi-ism and white supremacy, so no other party will co-operate with them, which is a great problem in a Parliamentary system if you want to be a force in politics, so what I assume you mean is their spike in popularity. I explain that by the popularity of fascist, xenophobic, demagoguery. It’s not unique to the US.

          By Rotherham, I assume you mean the child sex abuse scandal? Which, as awful as it is, and it is, pales in comparison to that of the Catholic Church, so I fail to see any issue specific to Pakistanis. And having read the linked article, it seems to me that you’re massively over-stating the case; what this looks like is an attempt by lawyers to expand their client base by enabling sexism, which was roundly criticized and shut down, so, not a problem there. Namazie and Nawaz are deeply admirable people, both of whom reject the far-right nationalism espoused by, for instance, the Sweden Democrats and equate it to radical Islamism (not Islam). Nawaz in particular is opposed to nationalism of all sorts.

          In the context of the US, where Trump is, Muslims make up less then 1.5% of the population. Attacks on “basic women’s rights” come from the Christian right wing, so invoking women’s rights here is laughable. Nobody here is blocking Namazie or Nawaz from speaking. What we are seeing a rise in is violence against regular Muslims who are just trying to live their lives, as the article I link to details. I note that nothing you cite is relevant to Trump.

      2. Because I think Trump is a symptom, not the actual cause.

        Yes, of course I meant the rise in popularity of a neo-nazi party. Their main political policy is shutting down immigration. Maybe if the government there had listened to the concerns being expressed by their citizens, which were certainly founded, given Sweden has now been forced to shut its borders, the SD wouldn’t have such huge popularity. I’m saying that because no one in any of the other parties in Sweden were prepared to address the problems honestly or seriously, many voters held their nose and switch to the SD. It even has high popularity among immigrants. Getting them back is now going to be damn hard work.

        The real issue with Rotherham is that one of the failures of law enforcement was their fear of being called racist. Indeed, there were apparently even cases of fathers being arrested for attempting to rescue their daughters in preference to the rapists themselves. In that light, and with apparent Labour complicity, can you really not see that people would prefer to vote Tory or UKIP or even start supporting the EDL? It’s the conversation being shut down before it even starts with the word ‘racist’ to cover an obvious problem that is shifting people to the right.

        It’s the feminist and LBGQ societies siding with the Islamist society to shut down Namazie from speaking about her experiences, even when the leader of that Islamist society has to step down for homophobic comments. It’s perceived as a form of racism too, that of lowered expectations.

        While I support gun control, suggesting that gun control would have prevented San Bernardino, when it obviously didn’t in Paris does give the appearance of attempting to simplify the problem away from the motives of the shooters.

        I’m saying the left is losing the politics battle by immediately shutting down any and all discussion of the problems with Islamism by calling racism. Absolutely, some of motivations against Islam is motivated by racism, but I don’t think the majority is. When people can’t discuss issues openly for fear of being branded a bigot, they’ll shift their vote in the privacy of the voting booth or in anonymous polls, to the few on the far right who are prepared to speak out. Trump feeds off that. I’m saying Trump is only possible because of how badly the left has handled the politics of Islamism all over the world.

      3. That’s a common left-wing fantasy, that right-wing policies and politicians only gain popularity because of a failure of the left wing to adequately address an issue/explain its position/what have you. It’s a refusal to accept that many, many people find racism, fascism, and totalitarianism to be appealing and so support them.

        Again, almost none of the issues you cite are happening in the US. Do you think Trump’s supporters have ever heard of Namazie or Nawaz? You think they give two shits if they speak or not?

        The only thing you cite that happened in the US is the shooting at San Bernardino. It happened shortly after a shooting at Colorado Springs by a Christian extremist. And yet there have been no front-page articles about how where the Christian terrorist was “radicalized,” no soul-searching about the role of fundamentalist Christianity in the US. So yes, the hysteria around the San Bernardino shooting in the US is motivated by racism. Otherwise we would see an equivalent reaction regarding the Colorado Springs shooting. Instead, we get humanizing pieces about how he was a gentle loner except for occasionally, y’know, abusing women and animals.

        There’s another child sex abuse scandal afoot in the UK, isn’t there? One having to do with the BBC and Parliament and who knew what when. Is that about the dangers of Radical Anglicanism? It seems that UK cops, like others, have all kinds of reasons for not investigating child sexual abuse.

        Trump is not responding to Creeping Radical Islamism in the US, because as far as I know, there isn’t any. If anything like what you describe had happened in the US, believe me, we’d be hearing about it non-stop. He’s racist, and has given his followers permission to express their racism. And racism and fascism appeal to people, and they always have.

      4. Aj, putting aside those “founded” concerns for a moment…the reason that neo-nazi party has gained so much popularity is that lots of whites are already proudly racist. even if the above quoted is true, that wouldn’t reflect anything good about these neo-nazi supporters. its merely an example of the political phenomenon where racists who find their concerns ignored by some politicians will go find someone who listens.

        do you really think that racism would be less of a problem in sweden if the government banned muslim immigration as soon as the whites asked? if the ongoing histories of white supremacy teach us anything about that situation in sweden, its that racism will always get worse and the people who support it will never be satisfied until POC are either under full subjection or systematically eradicated. and over the past few decades, racism has been intensifying all over the globe. the neo-nazis and their allies see this and are willing to take advantage of it at every opportunity. put the blame where it belongs: racists.

        that brings me to the “concerns” you’re referring to. wanting to ban muslim immigration isnt merely a concern, its a push for global racialized segregation and marginalization for the sake of their own comfort and “cultural preservation” (white tears). if they were truly motivated by wanting to end sexism, racism, etc they would pay just as much attention to the non-muslims who cause the same kinds of suffering.

        I’m saying Trump is only possible because of how badly the left has handled the politics of Islamism all over the world.

        trump is possible because the entire world is full of racists. and the country he wants to lead is itself rooted deeply in genocide, slavery, internment camps, racialized city planning initiaves, deportation of undocumented non-white immigrants, killing hundreds of thousands of muslims overseas, and so on. things that lots of people have already supported throughout US history. trump and his audience are already familiar with each other.

      5. also, about maryam namazie: she portrays islam as a singular religion that is inherently authoritarian and dogmatic. and she even says that islamophobia isnt racism because it just means the fear of islam (good luck trying to find a way to hate islam without being anti-muslim).

        and for some background here, im a muslimah who tried to push islam out of her life as a teen because of seeing it as an inherently evil and oppressive religion. im well aware of most islamophobic rhetoric out there, because for a time i wholeheartedly believed in almost every bit of it. i probably would have even responded to your first comment with resounding agreement 4 years ago.

        so im not talking out of my ass here when i call out people like her for racism. im familiar with her kind of islamophobic rhetoric and i see right through it. we can talk about all the important issues of feminism she brings up without resorting to demonizing an entire ethno-religious group.

      6. also, about maryam namazie: she portrays islam as a singular religion that is inherently authoritarian and dogmatic. and she even says that islamophobia isnt racism because it just means the fear of islam (good luck trying to find a way to hate islam without being anti-muslim)… so im not talking out of my ass here when i call out people like her for racism.

        Just out curiosity, Aaliyah, what race is Muslim? I suppose you believe only Arabs are ‘real’ Muslims? As an Indonesian, I certainly hear that a lot, but it’s particularly ironic coming from someone claiming to be anti-racist.

        Frankly, the America left’s vendetta against Muslim women who speak out about their lived experiences with Islamic misogyny (including activist who’ve survived FGM and assassination attempts) is fucking repugnant, and should be a source of enduring shame.

        Criticizing Islam is not the same thing as criticizing Muslims; your argument is as intellectually dishonest as people who (in a different context) suggest that criticism of the politics of Israel is inseparable from antisemitism. Religion deserves no special treatment or protection from criticism; people who try to come up with creative interpretations to defend misogynistic Quaranic (or Biblical) verses should be treated with the exact same contempt we treat the trolls on Anita Sarkeesian’s YouTube series about misogyny in video games.

        I could blockquote a bunch of Quaranic verses instructing men on how to beat disobedient wives, or encouraging them to commit marital rape, but I’m sure you’re familiar. Before anyone starts to get all defensive, the same goes for the Bible.

      7. Trump seems to me to be the US equivalent of the Swedish Democrats, UKIP and the National Front. I’m not a US citizen, and didn’t mean to imply I was. I see Trump in the broader picture of world events.

        I don’t agree with you that it’s pure racism. That idea, it seems to me, is a peculiar version of the White Man’s Burden. Japan is xenophobic by most standards, but there isn’t a push for them to increase immigration despite falling birth rates. The typical response is that white countries must atone for past colonial sins. Ignoring that Japan has a imperialistic colonial past, I would also point out that the Ottoman Empire was incredibly vicious and imperialistic and the Barbary Slave trade was only shut down in the 19th century. Indeed, it’s very likely slavery still plays a large part in the economies of countries like the UAE today. Yet, there aren’t any calls for Turkey to atone for its past sins. (Although, to their credit, they are one of the countries that are taking a lot of refugees, even if they are also taking the opportunity to smack the Kurds around some more.)

        Looking at Gulf countries today, hardly any of them have accepted displaced people. Saudi Arabia would rather fund Wahhabi mosques in Germany than use it’s massive air conditioned pilgrimage tent cities to house refugees. Then there’s Kuwait’s infamous response.

        The idea that European countries and their offshoots, like the United States and Australia, are somehow uniquely responsible and therefore must accept open borders and unlimited immigration is a racism of lowered expectations. No one, apparently, expects brown people to be as morally capable as whites. This is especially peculiar coming from the United States and Australia, whose native populations were pretty much destroyed by European immigration. If they’d had the power to prevent Europeans from settling, they certainly would have. Many on the left (including myself) seem to think they would have been right to do so. Were they then xenophobic racists for opposing European immigration? That seems like Double Think to me. (And, it’s not that immigration per se is a problem. Rather, that if you want a cohesive society, it must be minimal enough that the integration problems can be well handled.)

        But, if you want to know what shifted my vote from being a life long leftist, to starting to vote right, it was the left wing party supporting gender segregated political events in order to pander to Muslims. I can’t support a political party that thinks that is acceptable. My point is, I can see the appeal of Trump, because the left seems happy to throw out crucial values to appeal to Muslims. It’s constantly attacking Western civilisation but not holding Islamic countries to the same standard. That seems a more insidious racism, and I can’t buy into it anymore.

      8. Just out curiosity, Aaliyah, what race is Muslim? I suppose you believe only Arabs are ‘real’ Muslims? As an Indonesian, I certainly hear that a lot, but it’s particularly ironic coming from someone claiming to be anti-racist.

        i don’t believe that only arabs are real muslims, or that any ethnic group has an exclusive claim to “true islam”.

        i think islamophobia is racism because it treats muslims as an ethnic other. muslims, including white converts to a lesser extent, are racially attacked for being muslim. and choosing one narrow set of conservative ideologies to represent islam, a way of life cental to muslims, amounts to making vast negative generalizations about what muslims believe. there isn’t just one kind of islam.

        Frankly, the America left’s vendetta against Muslim women who speak out about their lived experiences with Islamic misogyny (including activist who’ve survived FGM and assassination attempts) is fucking repugnant, and should be a source of enduring shame.

        well, to be clear, im not trying to call them out for speaking about their experiences. im just not ok with certain rhetoric i hear from lots of apostates (male or female) which is thinly veiled racism against muslims.

      9. @Aj

        european colonization of america is nothing like immigration because it began as a genocidal regime and still is today. immigration on the other hand is merely entering another country/land.

        are you suggesting that european whites wanting to limit muslim immigration is actually resistance to islamic colonization?

        1. immigration on the other hand is merely entering another country/land. are you suggesting that european whites wanting to limit muslim immigration is actually resistance to islamic colonization?

          And this isn’t even a matter of standard immigration, but of accepting refugees. Very few people are suggesting the U.S. allow open borders or unlimited immigration; the hope is that the country show a willingness to accept a number of refugees proportionate to our population, resources, and ability to integrate them. Considering that the U.S. is one of the primary forces that keeps the Saudi and Kuwaiti governments in power, the fact that those governments are denying refuge doesn’t absolve us of responsibility at all. It’s not that I have lower expectations of brown people, it’s that I’m a citizen of the U.S., not Saudi Arabia.

      10. muslims, including white converts to a lesser extent, are racially attacked for being muslim.

        How is this more coherent than saying misogyny is actually women being racially attacked for being women? Your insertion of the word ‘racially’ doesn’t make any sense to me.

        Islamaphobia is bigotry, but because Islam and Muslim are not races, it is emphatically not racism.

        im just not ok with certain rhetoric i hear from lots of apostates (male or female) which is thinly veiled racism against muslims.

        If they’re actually saying ‘Muslims are evil people,’ sure, I agree it’s not OK. If what they’re saying is “Islam is a shitty thing that we’d all be better off without,” again, that’s not attacking Muslims, that’s attacking Islam.

        I know and like lots of Christians and Muslims and Jews, and I still think Christianity, Islam, and Judaism make the world a much worse place than it might be. The two aren’t incompatible, and more than the fact horoscopes are silly is incompatible with me still liking some people who believe in them.

      11. @Aaliyah

        are you suggesting that european whites wanting to limit muslim immigration is actually resistance to islamic colonization?

        I think it’s an understandable response to seeing Muslims already in Europe saying things like this, this or this.

        1. That has nothing to do with the comparison you made between European genocidal colonization of North America and Australia.

      12. And since you brought up the word ‘apostate,’ let’s remember that the Quaran and the hadith are both very clear that apostates deserve death, in multiple places, and that this rule is enforced in the majority of Muslim-majority countries, with the rest generally sentencing apostates to prison instead. So I’d imagine apostate Muslims have a pretty good reason to be afraid of Islam.

        Religious texts get no special protection. If we can criticize Twilight for misogyny, we can criticize the Quaran in the exact same way. That doesn’t mean that every fan of Twilight or every Muslim is a misogynist or a bad person, and it doesn’t mean criticizing the works they profess to admire is the same as attacking them personally.

        I will say, however, that when either group refuses to acknowledge the problematic parts of their respective fandoms, that’s when I tend to raise my eyebrows. Engaging in obfuscatory apologetics isn’t respectable, whether you’re trying to explain why it was actually romantic for Edward to stalk Bella or why the Quaran’s instruction to beat disobedient wives really was all about the importance of communication in relationships.

      13. Considering that the U.S. is one of the primary forces that keeps the Saudi and Kuwaiti governments in power, the fact that those governments are denying refuge doesn’t absolve us of responsibility at all. It’s not that I have lower expectations of brown people, it’s that I’m a citizen of the U.S., not Saudi Arabia.

        Yes to this. I have huge problems with Saudi policy on a bunch of issues (like, all issues), but I’m not a member of the Saudi monarchy and so I limit my advocacy to where I can effect change. For example, by trying to persuade my government that rejecting refugees from Muslim countries is both barbaric and, also, exactly what ISIS wants us to do.

        Saying “those people over there did something bad so I can too” is a habit that you’re supposed to get over in preschool.

      14. @ludlow

        since muslim is a non-white (or supressed) ethno-religious identity, prejudice against someone for being muslim is racist. all anti-muslim genocidal regimes so far, such as the bosniak genocide, have targeted muslims for being muslim and mirrored other racial genocides in terms of scale and purpose. and I think the fact that so much mockery of muslims is indistinguishable from mockery of a race/ethnicity (like making fun of the muslim greeting and “allahu akbar” and jokes about assumed cultural norms of muslims) says a lot about how islamophobia functions the same way as racism does.

        If they’re actually saying ‘Muslims are evil people,’ sure, I agree it’s not OK. If what they’re saying is “Islam is a shitty thing that we’d all be better off without,” again, that’s not attacking Muslims, that’s attacking Islam.

        well that kind of statement treats islam as a monolith and refuses to consider that not everyone subscribes to conservative islamic beliefs. it also invalidates the islam of muslims who deviate from orthodox beliefs in general. presenting only one image of islam as relevant to analysis – often the most conservative and authoritarian one can possibly find – is incredibly dishonest and inevitably ends in demonizing muslims. by all means, criticize zealous sunni male scholars for opposing homosexuality, but things go too far once the critics begin to show only one side of islam as relevant and important.

      15. Trump seems to me to be the US equivalent of the Swedish Democrats, UKIP and the National Front. I’m not a US citizen, and didn’t mean to imply I was. I see Trump in the broader picture of world events.

        Your broader picture makes no sense. The Swedish Democrats are talking about events in Sweden. UKIP is talking about events in the UK. The National Front is talking about events in France. These are all fascist nationalist parties. You haven’t explained what groundswell of creeping Islamism Trump is responding to. Because he’s not. I don’t think you have the faintest clue how racist the US is.

        I don’t agree with you that it’s pure racism. That idea, it seems to me, is a peculiar version of the White Man’s Burden. Japan is xenophobic by most standards, but there isn’t a push for them to increase immigration despite falling birth rates. The typical response is that white countries must atone for past colonial sins.

        This is incoherent. US racism is not a version of the White Man’s Burden. Nobody here has said that white countries must atone for past sins. People have pointed out that they’re propping up the Saudi and Kuwaiti governments now. Nor do I think that Europe consists of “white countries”–that’s racism right there. What I have said is that fascist demagoguery appeals cross-culturally. I stand by that. It appeals in the US, it appeals in Europe, it appeals in the Middle East. It’s interesting to me that you see the rise of right-wing fascism in Europe and the US as somehow totally separate beasts from the rise of ISIS. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar doesn’t. Right-wing ideologies are gaining adherents and power all over the place.

        But, if you want to know what shifted my vote from being a life long leftist, to starting to vote right, it was the left wing party supporting gender segregated political events in order to pander to Muslims. I can’t support a political party that thinks that is acceptable. My point is, I can see the appeal of Trump, because the left seems happy to throw out crucial values to appeal to Muslims. It’s constantly attacking Western civilisation but not holding Islamic countries to the same standard.

        1) That is not what is happening in the US. That is not what Trump is responding to.

        2) So you’d rather throw out fundamental values in favor of racism and xenophobia. That doesn’t seem to give you any moral high ground to me.

        Pretty Amiable has the right of it. I’m not Saudi. I’m a citizen of the US, the country that bills itself as the nation of immigrants. This is where my activism is. I’m a member of an ethnic group that was denied refuge even when we were being slaughtered en masse. Your right-wing nationalism kills people like me. It’s nice that you’re comfortable with that. I’m not.

      16. Your fantasy, by the way, that Trump is picking up disillusioned voters who would otherwise turn to the left is completely delusional, by the way. He’s leading in polls of Republican primary voters. This is the right wing of the US. What he’s done is move it further right.

        I mean, seriously? What is the fantasy here? That people are just aching for solutions that recognize the equal worth and common humanity of all, but when the left fails to articulate them perfectly, they say, fuck it, we scorn your attempts, let’s go fascist, then? How do you see that as at all realistic?

      17. EG says:
        December 11, 2015 at 8:59 am
        Your fantasy, by the way, that Trump is picking up disillusioned voters who would otherwise turn to the left is completely delusional, by the way. He’s leading in polls of Republican primary voters. This is the right wing of the US. What he’s done is move it further right.

        I don’t actually think that is correct at all.

        Trump is appealing to some prior centrists (or was, before he went “no Muslims” on national TV) for a particular reason. Which is perhaps best addressed by your next quote:

        I mean, seriously? What is the fantasy here? That people are just aching for solutions that recognize the equal worth and common humanity of all, but when the left fails to articulate them perfectly, they say, fuck it, we scorn your attempts, let’s go fascist, then?

        What I think you’re failing to recognize is that with respect to choosing which small fraction of desired immigrants ends up getting to immigrate to the USA, many many centrists DO NOT see all of them as equal worth to the USA.

        There are many excellent liberal arguments in favor of broad immigration, including the moralistic “we should let folks in even if they are not beneficial, for humanity’s sake and because it’s the right thing to do” one. But many of the better arguments in favor require a certain level of… concessions (maybe not the right term) that all populations are not of equal benefit, risk, composition, assimilability, etc.

        Trump is convincing centrists because his arguments resonate with the public. And they resonate with the public because many non-SJ centrists generally believe :
        1) US civilization is better than the civilization of many other countries, and it’s OK (as opposed to racist, imperialist, unethical, colonialist, etc.) to think that;
        2) It’s OK for the US to put its national interests above the interests of non-citizens, and it’s OK to argue for that;
        3) Not all potential immigrant populations are the same;
        4) We should–or at least, we can–consider population characteristics when evaluating immigration.

        Do you think those are facist? I don’t: Mildly conservative, sure, but not fascist. And those are very popular statements among a lot of non-fascist folks, and the left isn’t making them. And I don’t mean the straw “isn’t making them perfectly,” like you said, but that they hardly are making them at all. If Trump is the only one talking about the things they care about, they’ll support him.

        Hopefully Hilary will change prior to the election.

      18. Trump is appealing to some prior centrists (or was, before he went “no Muslims” on national TV)

        Citation needed. Every single poll I’ve seen has been of Republican primary voters, and every single poll I’ve seen has shown that his popularity went up after the fascist anti-Muslim comments. Are you seriously contending that the people among whom it is popular to talk about registering Muslims and preventing them from entering the country are “centrists”?

        Do you think those are facist? I don’t: Mildly conservative, sure, but not fascist. And those are very popular statements among a lot of non-fascist folks, and the left isn’t making them.

        They are conservative positions; hence the left wing is not espousing them. That’s the point. The people whom Trump is appealing to are conservative. They’re not folks who would otherwise be amenable to left-wing solutions to immigration concerns precisely because of the opinions you articulate and the assumptions on which they are based. And quite frankly, if they are so immoral as to think that the validation of such positions is worth buying into fascism for, I really don’t see that it is at all likely that they would have otherwise been open to left-wing analyses and solutions.

      19. EG says:
        and every single poll I’ve seen has shown that his popularity went up after the fascist anti-Muslim comments.

        Yes, but those were made in conjunction with other points (for example, those I listed) which seem more compelling to a lot of the folks I have talked to.

        IOW, there’s a larger issue of ‘least worst’ going on here.

        If the debate was “should we focus on being super careful regarding islamic terrorism, but still try to help refugees if we can” versus “should we ban all muslims,” the second one is a loser. If the debate is ‘ban muslims’ versus ‘trust us, we don’t want to make any muslims angry so we should just go along’ then the liberal side looks a lot worse.

        Are you seriously contending that the people among whom it is popular to talk about registering Muslims and preventing them from entering the country are “centrists”?

        Hmm. I think a lot of the people who argue (and correctly so, as I understand the law) that it is perfectly constitutional to consider that in the immigration context are, indeed, centrists. And a lot of the people who argue that we should at least consider those differences are also centrists.

        Also, a lot of the people who espuose the positions I stated above are centrists.

        They are conservative positions; hence the left wing is not espousing them. That’s the point.

        I think they are at best MILDLY conservative positions, which used to be (and arguably should still be) centrist positions. And there are plenty of folks who vote Democratic who espouse them privately, and who share those views.

        Which of those views do you disagree with?

        And quite frankly, if they are so immoral as to think that the validation of such positions is worth buying into fascism for, I really don’t see that it is at all likely that they would have otherwise been open to left-wing analyses and solutions.

        You don’t think that’s mostly because the left wing has been consistently fucking this up?

        Look, it’s mostly come across as a group of folks who are primarily interested in appeasement and social justice; and who are only secondarily interested in protecting national interests. (Presumably Obama is in fact interested in US security, but he has not projected that publicly very well.) That was a huge screwup.

        Also, Trump is certainly a scary blithering idiot who should not be president, but much of the stuff being called “fascism” isn’t, actually, fascism.

        1. You don’t think that’s mostly because the left wing has been consistently fucking this up?

          Look, it’s mostly come across as a group of folks who are primarily interested in appeasement and social justice; and who are only secondarily interested in protecting national interests. (Presumably Obama is in fact interested in US security, but he has not projected that publicly very well.) That was a huge screwup.

          The polls I’ve seen show Clinton with a significant lead over any of the Republican candidates when it comes to who voters trust to handle national security, so no, I don’t buy that this is a screwup on the part of the (broadly speaking) left wing.

      20. Yes, but those were made in conjunction with other points (for example, those I listed) which seem more compelling to a lot of the folks I have talked to.

        Not the issue. I was responding to you saying that his popularity was rising before those comments. Those comments have aided his popularity.

        You have not provided any citation in support of your contention that people other than the Republican primary voters I have seen polled support Trump. You keep talking about “centrists” and their support for Trump, but have provided no evidence that any such exists.

        IOW, there’s a larger issue of ‘least worst’ going on here. If the debate was “should we focus on being super careful regarding islamic terrorism, but still try to help refugees if we can” versus “should we ban all muslims,” the second one is a loser. If the debate is ‘ban muslims’ versus ‘trust us, we don’t want to make any muslims angry so we should just go along’ then the liberal side looks a lot worse.

        You’re straw-manning like there’s no tomorrow here. Please find me examples of the US left espousing a policy of “we don’t want to make any muslims angry so we should just go along.” Unless you’re arguing that Trump’s supporters are responding to events regarding college speakers in the UK, or to George Galloway, whom I doubt most of the US has heard of, you need to provide some evidence that this is the choice here. I haven’t seen any evidence of that at all. For instance, find me something Obama has said (not that Obama is the left; but I’ll broadly grant a “liberal-left” for “left,” here). Further, I reiterate, if they find Fascist Trump to be the lesser evil, I find them odious.

        I think a lot of the people who argue (and correctly so, as I understand the law) that it is perfectly constitutional to consider that in the immigration context are, indeed, centrists. And a lot of the people who argue that we should at least consider those differences are also centrists.

        I don’t give two shits about whether or not it’s constitutional. That word hasn’t passed my fingertips once. It’s not what this post is about. I’m not Jill. I’m not a lawyer. I don’t care. And again, I didn’t ask you about whether or not people think we should “consider those differences.” I asked you about people supporting Trump. Try to stay on topic.

        I think they are at best MILDLY conservative positions, which used to be (and arguably should still be) centrist positions. And there are plenty of folks who vote Democratic who espouse them privately, and who share those views.

        And are those people supporting Trump? Because that’s what this post and this argument are about.

        Edited for an italics screw-up.

      21. You don’t think that’s mostly because the left wing has been consistently fucking this up?

        Look, it’s mostly come across as a group of folks who are primarily interested in appeasement and social justice; and who are only secondarily interested in protecting national interests. (Presumably Obama is in fact interested in US security, but he has not projected that publicly very well.) That was a huge screwup.

        That wasn’t a “screw-up”; that was a concerted character assassination attempt by Republicans. Further, no, I don’t think the left has fucked anything up, even if I grant the liberal-left. It’s not Clinton or Obama who has consistently fucked up our safety and national interests. It’s the right-wingers. It’s just that this country is in the grip of hard-on fantasies about big guns making us safe. I’d like to see an actual example of liberal appeasement.

        Also, Trump is certainly a scary blithering idiot who should not be president, but much of the stuff being called “fascism” isn’t, actually

        No shit. That’s why I was specific and provided citations for how I was using the term. If you have an issue with any of those, feel free to be just as specific in return. Otherwise, if the issue doesn’t apply to this post, I fail to see its relevance.

        But I’ll see your general statement and raise you:

        Many people, right-wing and centrist and liberal together, like to think that fascism was a one-off, that it could never happen again, and certainly not happen here, because that’s a comforting thought. But it’s also bullshit. It happened once, and it can happen again. It happened somewhere, and it can happen anywhere. But in support of this fantasy, they’ll narrow the definition of fascism until it becomes meaningless, so they don’t have to worry. But that lack of worry just means they’ll never see it coming. Fascism is always wrapped in the flag and carrying the dominant religious symbol and representing itself as in the national interest. By definition.

        1. Fascism is always wrapped in the flag and carrying the dominant religious symbol and representing itself as in the national interest. By definition.

          Sorry to nitpick, but I’m not sure that the swastika qualifies as a symbol of the dominant religion in 1930s Germany. The religious mythology of the Nazi party was pretty odd. No question the party had a lot of support from relatively mainstream Christians though.

      23. Not really. The Nazis had some highly placed pagans, but largely promoted Christianity, and Hitler denounced paganism.

        Not to get too far off topic, but it’s actually somewhat more complicated; Nazi (or Positive) Christianity was heterodox enough that I think you can legitimately question whether it was, in fact, Christian. I mean, this gets pretty deep into the semantics of the boundaries of religion; is a ‘real’ Muslim/Christian/Jew/Buddhist anyone who identifies with that religion, or are there some essential qualifications? Can you deny that there is one God and Mohammed is his prophet, and still be Muslim, or that Christ wad divine and still be Christian? If not, where’s the line? My take is usually that the categories ‘Islam,’ ‘Christianity,’ and so on aren’t actually well defined, and that they instead encompass a constellation of sub-faiths and movements which may not actually be more closely related to each other, than they are to ‘other religions’ entirely.

        Even so, calling yourself Christian while eliminating more than half the Bible, identifying the Fuhrer as the messiah, and deny Christ’s divinity and the Resurrection at least raises some thorny ontological issues.

      24. All that is fair and true, but I think the point of the quotation I was citing is not that US fascism would necessarily be devout and orthodox and “truly” Christian, but that it would have to take on the trappings or symbols of Christianity, and I think the un-Christian doctrines of Positive Christianity sort of prove that point. Even while espousing all of that, it still has to call itself “Positive Christianity” rather than “Positive Buddhism” or “Positive Jainism” or anything else, because it needs to appeal to the dominant religion.

        1. Oops, my reply ended up below. Could we get a “reply” link on every comment (even if replies wouldn’t further nest) and a clearer indication of where the reply comment we’re posting will end up? Even the preview normally appears at the bottom of the page.

  9. since muslim is a non-white (or supressed) ethno-religious identity, prejudice against someone for being muslim is racist.

    Ethnoreligous groups are ethnic groups which also share a religious background. Examples include the Ashkenazim, the Sikh, and the Copts, among others. So, once again, I’m curious; which ethnic group are Muslims?

    You’re confusing anti-Muslim prejudice with anti-Arab racism. Check your privilege (and yes, Arab Muslims are absolutely privileged within the ummah) and cut it out.

    islamophobia functions the same way as racism does.

    Wait, are you arguing that Islamaphobia is a form of racism, or that they function in the same way? Because those are two different claims.

    well that kind of statement treats islam as a monolith and refuses to consider that not everyone subscribes to conservative islamic beliefs.

    Well, now you’ve shifted the argument from ‘is criticizing Islam different from criticizing Muslims’ to ‘are specific criticisms of Islam factually correct,’ which is a different question.

    Anyways, all Islamic beliefs, just like all religious beliefs, are inherently problematic.

    it also invalidates the islam of muslims who deviate from orthodox beliefs in general.

    That’s fine, and I admire Muslims willing to denounce the particularly contemptible passages of the Koran and hadiths. But that doesn’t make Islam immune from criticism; it’s just a reason to be sure your criticism is properly nuanced before you make it.

    1. sorry for the long comment ahead:

      Ethnoreligous groups are ethnic groups which also share a religious background. Examples include the Ashkenazim, the Sikh, and the Copts, among others. So, once again, I’m curious; which ethnic group are Muslims?

      they are their own distinct ethnic group – i used ethno-religious to convey that islam is central to muslims’ lives, but maybe a better word could be used.

      You’re confusing anti-Muslim prejudice with anti-Arab racism. Check your privilege (and yes, Arab Muslims are absolutely privileged within the ummah) and cut it out.

      …im indian, not arab. i thought you already knew about my ethnicity but i guess you forgot? anyway, im not confusing anti-arab racism with islamophobia. theyre totally distinct even though they overlap for arab muslims.

      Wait, are you arguing that Islamaphobia is a form of racism, or that they function in the same way? Because those are two different claims.

      i guess i should have worded that better. i think it’s a form of racism because it has all the characteristics of racism, not merely a kind of pseudo-racism. im just trying to point out the ways in which prejudice against muslims and their religion is racialized. muslims relate to the world as an ethnic group and are targeted by racists as an ethnic group. so id say from that perspective that islamophobia is a form of racism.

      Well, now you’ve shifted the argument from ‘is criticizing Islam different from criticizing Muslims’ to ‘are specific criticisms of Islam factually correct,’ which is a different question.

      Anyways, all Islamic beliefs, just like all religious beliefs, are inherently problematic.

      i outlined how a narrow, overwhelmingly negative portrayal of islam is inherently anti-muslim because of it limiting the scope of what muslims actually believe, as if they don’t believe in “true islam” unless they are subscribing to most violent conservative interpretations. so i didn’t shift the question at all.

      im not like the muslims who look at surah 4:34 (the verse about wive’s obedience to husbands and guidelines for punishment) and assume that its ok because the prophet was against severe wife-beatings according to a hadith (as if there’s nothing wrong with the idea of men controlling women in the first place). im highly critical of many interpretations of islamic scripture. but I think criticism crosses the line when it paints all islam as the same or fails to make any nuances about what lots of muslims actually believe.

    2. …im indian, not arab. i thought you already knew about my ethnicity but i guess you forgot?

      I’m sorry; I’ve never encountered the assertion that Muslim is an ethnicity as well as a religion anywhere outside of Arab politics, but it was wrong for me to assume. I sincerely apologize.

      they are their own distinct ethnic group

      You keep repeating this, but it’s simply not true for any definition of ‘ethnic group’ that I can imagine. Slavic Muslims are an ethnic group; ‘Muslims’ full stop are not.

    3. I think anti-anti-Islam rhetoric is pro-religion anti-atheist rhetoric disguised as anti-racist rhetoric.

  10. Put an ocean between the US and a developing country and its all military aid and intervention. Share a continental land mass and its just “wall. Don’t look down.”

  12. EG, I assume you’re referring to the famous quote [mis?]attributed to Sinclair Lewis: “When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross.” I don’t disagree with it, but that’s not a definition of fascism. Historians are still arguing over how to define fascism, but I think the emphasis on national renewal is particularly relevant when it comes to Trump: “Make America Great Again.”

    1. I’m not sure there’s a totally correct definition, any more than there is for any other form of government (all you have to do to see how blurry the borders of the category ‘democracies’ is remember that Saudi Election Day was last week), but I think the sine qua non of facism is an government that legitimizes authoritarianism with appeals to nationalism, and whose goals are centered around national restoration through military and economic self-sufficiency, and which is characterized by some degree of mixed economy.

      Interestingly, I couldn’t come up with any definition of facism that doesn’t include modern Communist China. I hadn’t thought about it before, but as a wealthy nation that justifies its police state with call for “national rejuvenation,” it certainly meets all the criteria I can think of (except, perhaps, mass mobilization- but I’m not sure how central that is).

      1. I went with Paxton’s definition when I was writing this post (you’re right, Pseudonym, that quote’s not the definition of fascism), because he also highlights the importance of racism to fascist ideology.

Comments are currently closed.