"But it’s worthwhile to remember that what’s animating these efforts are not just ideas or an aggrieved sense of fairness, but burning, passionate contempt for women and minorities."
Thank you. Thank you for your willingness to state this so plainly. I think many liberals and progressives only fleetingly notice this hugely important fact. But for many women and minorities, it is blindingly obvious that this is the affective fuel driving rightwing politics right now.
Yes, much of the DEI language and formal initiatives are bloodless. Some are pernicious (imo no one should have to submit or sign a "diversity statement" when they apply for a job). But formal DEI measures are an epiphenomenon of a slow but real shift, and shift that has permitted women and minorities to stop conceding to hoary ideas about their place in natural law and in the rise of "civilization." That shift has set off not just political opposition of various kinds. It has ignited gut level feelings of disgust, contempt, hatred. As the emails show, all kinds of people are susceptible to those feelings, including women like McDonald and gay men like Thiel.
Say you will about the excesses and sometimes silliness of identity politics and Twitter activism, a lot of people are in the fight because they know at a visceral level that the rightwing doesn't just want to preserve a social "order," they want to crush and humiliate and strip the dignity from the people they view as upstarts who don't know their place.
As I am eager to read more about in your book, there have long been some of these notes played on the right, but the two that strike me as especially prominent now
1. Really, genuinely believing there is nothing to save and preserve in actually existing America. The Flight 93 Election is jarringly blackpilled and that perspective hasn't changed. These guys were always disgusted with emergent cultures and trends, but they look at Main Street with disgust now.
2. The total absence of Christianity.
Both of them lend the movement to a more fascistic character.
I was blown away when the recent airplane door fiasco was turned into a means to criticize DEI. A plane falling apart midair was blamed on diversity campaigns at the airlines, with absolutely zero substance linking the two.
My $0.02 — These goons are beyond cynical, the likes of Musk Thiel and Hanania. They know DEI has nothing the f to do with such problems. But they also know that social fear drives conservative voting habits. And they know they don’t want minorities and women in their board rooms. So they push the fear button over and over and over. They are immersed in post-truth. Meanwhile, the conservative base has conditioned like Pavlov’s dog.
Researching a piece on how sensory differences impact thought and ideology, I was fascinated to learn of a psychological model — the dual process motivational model of ideology and prejudice. It delivers some excellent insights that can help understand right wing group dynamics, particularly the ones that drive prejudice. Social dominance oriented (like Musk) and right wing authoritarians (like the MAGA base) tend towards different beliefs, personality traits, motivational factors, though they are not mutually exclusive. Social dominance oriented focus on domination and power, push inequality etc because they think they will benefit due to their own feelings of superiority. They conform for self interest. Right wing authoritarians rather tend to act out of fear that the social order is breaking down, closing ranks and punishing the offenders. They conform for safety.
Crude biological determinism has one nice self-fulfilling element. If you assume that intelligence is a factor which is largely governed by race and gender and also assess the intelligence of others by their ability to reach conclusions identical to your own, then the fact that small numbers of women and racial minorities agree with you is now evidence for your correctness, rather than your bigotry. Convenient!
This is a beautifully written article especially on the rights biological determinism. But I’m increasingly convinced that the left can’t be given a free pass here. Kendi, DiAngelos et Al theories are toxic and, frankly illogical and inane. Their widespread adaptation by major cultural and business structures has poured fuel on the fire, allowing an opening for Claremont.
Not a new observation by any means, but I constantly return to how goddamn childish they all are. Say what you will about the liberal technocrats, but they at least putatively want to improve the lives of real people. All of these 'Leave it to Beaver is our biological-cultural steady state' people evoke nothing more than a group of boys on the playground debating the details of exactly how boys rule and girls drool.
I think that what you are saying here is correct and portends an ominous future for any institution in which these people find a foothold.
What I have not seen anyone point out is that many of these DEI initiatives that so rile these guys seem (to me at least) to increase in corporate and liberal institutional settings after the financial crisis in '08. The neoliberal center (particularly after the election of Obama) decided that this kind of superficial cultural liberalism was going to work as a legitimating ideology in face of all of that exploding inequality. That their version of this elided any political debate about economic distribution was why they could half-heartedly embrace it.
Of course, this section of the right's obsession with all this belies their class status. Surely, the origin story of many of these reactionaries can be traced back to having to sit through some kind of DEI PowerPoint in an air-conditioned conference room a few years ago and concluding that Maoists had seized control of the mid-sized insurance company they worked as middle manger in. This is why pols like DeSantis or Blake Masters eat shit in a way that Trump doesn't. Trump's celebrity is able to channel all this into a much wider and broader coalition of aggrievement.
Would be helpful if the GOP just cut to the chase and officially adopted the Führerprinzip. They could give it some of that Boer panache and call it the Baaskap Beginsel. Trump’s list of enemies has become the foundation text of the party, and it’s the only law they recognize. And the list is *much* longer than it was four years ago.
Next time there won’t be any doddering generals or technocrats in the White House muttering ineffectually about the “rule of law”. It will be all Stephen Miller and whatever drone army he trails in with him. Mitchell will drop dead of something or other, Collins will continue to be “concerned”, Johnson will pray to his phantoms, and the destruction will fully commit this time.
People have to savvy to the fact that fascism is a process, it doesn’t hatch fully formed, it feels its way, it reacts to opportunities, and eventually…it arrives.
Thank you for writing about this argument. Actually I read some tweets of Richard Hanania and it’s quite scary & racist what he proposes. I admire America civilization because it advanced so much in woke idealogy that Europe should follow. It’s very positive that people of minorities could reach positions that they can’t normally reach. Actually it happened because of woke that secretary of defense reached his position and it’s sad that he had some difficulties lately. I just hope America doesn’t cancel advancement that it made to include everyone. It’s shining example to imitate.
to raise a point of yours--that the dreyfus affair is a more instructive historical analogy--the rancor of these chattering and professional-managerial class reactionaries is not at a revolutionary transformation of society (whatever their apocalyptic fantasies might indicate) but at a diversification of high society. then with dreyfus it was the incorporation and elevation of jewish people, now with claudine gay it is the integration and advancement of black people, liberal women, and other minorities. in both cases there is resentment against formerly oppressed colleagues and competitors and paranoia around imposter citizens and civic interlopers. they rage against not communism or revolution but civic nationalism and cosmopolitan modernity.
a coincidental crisis of elite overproduction only further intensifies their status anxiety and vengeful legacy entitlement.
happy to see you acknowledge the psychological aspect to this because libidinal economy is more determinative than orthodox political economy i think.
1. I wouldn't say that the Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers reflect consensus big business very well. They went partisan and ideological a long time ago. The Business Roundtable or the Bipartisan Policy Center are more representative of big business thinking. Or perhaps the Clinton wing of the Democratic Party.
2. It's all about racism, masculinism, and ressentiment. They define almost the entirety of conservative social policy, such as it is. Racism and masculinism have some policy autonomy: ressentiment-driven policies are mere negations of whatever the conservatives think their opponents desire.
Writer Scott Lemieux hits the bulls-eye: "... the right attack on DEI isn’t on particular bureaucratic manifestations of the practice that just create meaningless busywork and no-work jobs or act as a cover substitute for actual equality and inclusion. It’s on the very concepts of equality, inclusion, and diversity themselves."
Julian Sanchez, a rare libertarian who didn't cross the Peter Thiel Memorial Bridge to neoreaction, reinforces Lemieux's point in a tweet: "As happens with some frequency, DEI is a fine idea in principle, frequently executed very badly by fundamentalists, but defended anyway because the most vocal criticism comes from bad people who object more to the good principle than the bad execution."
Bad people who object more to the good principle than the bad execution. Whoomp, there it is.
"Liberal authoritarianism" is how he describes the system here. It is by no means the worst place in the world, but he glosses over a lot of the problems and the underbelly of the place, which is what you get when you have an elite caste (Emirati citizens) ruling over a succession of other castes (professional westerners, Filipino, IndoPak, and African office functionaries and service and construction workers). For example, he didn't mention the full extent of the vice - bars packed with a United Nations of desperate whoredom.
But he might have thought it was a virtue of the place too delicate to mention. I think this is what they would like the US to become. An authoritarian state led by an elite, with libertarian business regulation, and a majority population without political rights and willing to sell their bodies cheaply.
"Race is just one aspect:, but on every issue from gender to sexual expression, they view mankind in all its manifestations as a primordial slime mold that just seeks to expand and dominate."
It kind of just seems like we need to impute an absence of intelligible thought, also known as psychosis, on radical activists (whether or not they're on wingnut welfare). There is a little 'every accusation is a confession' involved in doing that, but that's why we pray to something and are very observant of our surroundings. Humility and Zen.
"But it’s worthwhile to remember that what’s animating these efforts are not just ideas or an aggrieved sense of fairness, but burning, passionate contempt for women and minorities."
Thank you. Thank you for your willingness to state this so plainly. I think many liberals and progressives only fleetingly notice this hugely important fact. But for many women and minorities, it is blindingly obvious that this is the affective fuel driving rightwing politics right now.
Yes, much of the DEI language and formal initiatives are bloodless. Some are pernicious (imo no one should have to submit or sign a "diversity statement" when they apply for a job). But formal DEI measures are an epiphenomenon of a slow but real shift, and shift that has permitted women and minorities to stop conceding to hoary ideas about their place in natural law and in the rise of "civilization." That shift has set off not just political opposition of various kinds. It has ignited gut level feelings of disgust, contempt, hatred. As the emails show, all kinds of people are susceptible to those feelings, including women like McDonald and gay men like Thiel.
Say you will about the excesses and sometimes silliness of identity politics and Twitter activism, a lot of people are in the fight because they know at a visceral level that the rightwing doesn't just want to preserve a social "order," they want to crush and humiliate and strip the dignity from the people they view as upstarts who don't know their place.
As I am eager to read more about in your book, there have long been some of these notes played on the right, but the two that strike me as especially prominent now
1. Really, genuinely believing there is nothing to save and preserve in actually existing America. The Flight 93 Election is jarringly blackpilled and that perspective hasn't changed. These guys were always disgusted with emergent cultures and trends, but they look at Main Street with disgust now.
2. The total absence of Christianity.
Both of them lend the movement to a more fascistic character.
Yeah, its ugly. Thanks for stating it so clearly
I was blown away when the recent airplane door fiasco was turned into a means to criticize DEI. A plane falling apart midair was blamed on diversity campaigns at the airlines, with absolutely zero substance linking the two.
My $0.02 — These goons are beyond cynical, the likes of Musk Thiel and Hanania. They know DEI has nothing the f to do with such problems. But they also know that social fear drives conservative voting habits. And they know they don’t want minorities and women in their board rooms. So they push the fear button over and over and over. They are immersed in post-truth. Meanwhile, the conservative base has conditioned like Pavlov’s dog.
Researching a piece on how sensory differences impact thought and ideology, I was fascinated to learn of a psychological model — the dual process motivational model of ideology and prejudice. It delivers some excellent insights that can help understand right wing group dynamics, particularly the ones that drive prejudice. Social dominance oriented (like Musk) and right wing authoritarians (like the MAGA base) tend towards different beliefs, personality traits, motivational factors, though they are not mutually exclusive. Social dominance oriented focus on domination and power, push inequality etc because they think they will benefit due to their own feelings of superiority. They conform for self interest. Right wing authoritarians rather tend to act out of fear that the social order is breaking down, closing ranks and punishing the offenders. They conform for safety.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s44159-023-00161-4#Tab1
Crude biological determinism has one nice self-fulfilling element. If you assume that intelligence is a factor which is largely governed by race and gender and also assess the intelligence of others by their ability to reach conclusions identical to your own, then the fact that small numbers of women and racial minorities agree with you is now evidence for your correctness, rather than your bigotry. Convenient!
This is a beautifully written article especially on the rights biological determinism. But I’m increasingly convinced that the left can’t be given a free pass here. Kendi, DiAngelos et Al theories are toxic and, frankly illogical and inane. Their widespread adaptation by major cultural and business structures has poured fuel on the fire, allowing an opening for Claremont.
Not a new observation by any means, but I constantly return to how goddamn childish they all are. Say what you will about the liberal technocrats, but they at least putatively want to improve the lives of real people. All of these 'Leave it to Beaver is our biological-cultural steady state' people evoke nothing more than a group of boys on the playground debating the details of exactly how boys rule and girls drool.
I think that what you are saying here is correct and portends an ominous future for any institution in which these people find a foothold.
What I have not seen anyone point out is that many of these DEI initiatives that so rile these guys seem (to me at least) to increase in corporate and liberal institutional settings after the financial crisis in '08. The neoliberal center (particularly after the election of Obama) decided that this kind of superficial cultural liberalism was going to work as a legitimating ideology in face of all of that exploding inequality. That their version of this elided any political debate about economic distribution was why they could half-heartedly embrace it.
Of course, this section of the right's obsession with all this belies their class status. Surely, the origin story of many of these reactionaries can be traced back to having to sit through some kind of DEI PowerPoint in an air-conditioned conference room a few years ago and concluding that Maoists had seized control of the mid-sized insurance company they worked as middle manger in. This is why pols like DeSantis or Blake Masters eat shit in a way that Trump doesn't. Trump's celebrity is able to channel all this into a much wider and broader coalition of aggrievement.
Would be helpful if the GOP just cut to the chase and officially adopted the Führerprinzip. They could give it some of that Boer panache and call it the Baaskap Beginsel. Trump’s list of enemies has become the foundation text of the party, and it’s the only law they recognize. And the list is *much* longer than it was four years ago.
Next time there won’t be any doddering generals or technocrats in the White House muttering ineffectually about the “rule of law”. It will be all Stephen Miller and whatever drone army he trails in with him. Mitchell will drop dead of something or other, Collins will continue to be “concerned”, Johnson will pray to his phantoms, and the destruction will fully commit this time.
People have to savvy to the fact that fascism is a process, it doesn’t hatch fully formed, it feels its way, it reacts to opportunities, and eventually…it arrives.
Thank you for writing about this argument. Actually I read some tweets of Richard Hanania and it’s quite scary & racist what he proposes. I admire America civilization because it advanced so much in woke idealogy that Europe should follow. It’s very positive that people of minorities could reach positions that they can’t normally reach. Actually it happened because of woke that secretary of defense reached his position and it’s sad that he had some difficulties lately. I just hope America doesn’t cancel advancement that it made to include everyone. It’s shining example to imitate.
to raise a point of yours--that the dreyfus affair is a more instructive historical analogy--the rancor of these chattering and professional-managerial class reactionaries is not at a revolutionary transformation of society (whatever their apocalyptic fantasies might indicate) but at a diversification of high society. then with dreyfus it was the incorporation and elevation of jewish people, now with claudine gay it is the integration and advancement of black people, liberal women, and other minorities. in both cases there is resentment against formerly oppressed colleagues and competitors and paranoia around imposter citizens and civic interlopers. they rage against not communism or revolution but civic nationalism and cosmopolitan modernity.
a coincidental crisis of elite overproduction only further intensifies their status anxiety and vengeful legacy entitlement.
happy to see you acknowledge the psychological aspect to this because libidinal economy is more determinative than orthodox political economy i think.
1. I wouldn't say that the Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers reflect consensus big business very well. They went partisan and ideological a long time ago. The Business Roundtable or the Bipartisan Policy Center are more representative of big business thinking. Or perhaps the Clinton wing of the Democratic Party.
2. It's all about racism, masculinism, and ressentiment. They define almost the entirety of conservative social policy, such as it is. Racism and masculinism have some policy autonomy: ressentiment-driven policies are mere negations of whatever the conservatives think their opponents desire.
Liberal blog Lawyers Guns and Money had a good take about this issue earlier this week.
https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2024/01/the-anti-dei-backlash-is-about-the-theory-not-the-execution
Writer Scott Lemieux hits the bulls-eye: "... the right attack on DEI isn’t on particular bureaucratic manifestations of the practice that just create meaningless busywork and no-work jobs or act as a cover substitute for actual equality and inclusion. It’s on the very concepts of equality, inclusion, and diversity themselves."
Julian Sanchez, a rare libertarian who didn't cross the Peter Thiel Memorial Bridge to neoreaction, reinforces Lemieux's point in a tweet: "As happens with some frequency, DEI is a fine idea in principle, frequently executed very badly by fundamentalists, but defended anyway because the most vocal criticism comes from bad people who object more to the good principle than the bad execution."
Bad people who object more to the good principle than the bad execution. Whoomp, there it is.
I'm in Dubai now, not my first visit. So I re-read Michael Anton's paean to this place.
https://claremontreviewofbooks.com/the-road-to-dubai/
"Liberal authoritarianism" is how he describes the system here. It is by no means the worst place in the world, but he glosses over a lot of the problems and the underbelly of the place, which is what you get when you have an elite caste (Emirati citizens) ruling over a succession of other castes (professional westerners, Filipino, IndoPak, and African office functionaries and service and construction workers). For example, he didn't mention the full extent of the vice - bars packed with a United Nations of desperate whoredom.
But he might have thought it was a virtue of the place too delicate to mention. I think this is what they would like the US to become. An authoritarian state led by an elite, with libertarian business regulation, and a majority population without political rights and willing to sell their bodies cheaply.
"Race is just one aspect:, but on every issue from gender to sexual expression, they view mankind in all its manifestations as a primordial slime mold that just seeks to expand and dominate."
It kind of just seems like we need to impute an absence of intelligible thought, also known as psychosis, on radical activists (whether or not they're on wingnut welfare). There is a little 'every accusation is a confession' involved in doing that, but that's why we pray to something and are very observant of our surroundings. Humility and Zen.
What's with Hanania liking this article? What is he trying to pull?
please don’t call hanania high brow