Morbid Symptoms

 Modern Rhinoceroses

If you ever read or seen the play Rhinoceros by Eugene Ionesco, you might know what I’m talking about.  It was included in the post-war “Theater of the Absurd” along with plays by Genet, Beckett, Adamov and others. It was a reflection on Ionesco’s youth growing up in Romania, a country which gradually became overwhelmed with anti-Semitism and fascism prior to WWII.  He saw it happen in its human form.

The most startling parts of the play are when ‘normal’ neighbors, friends, even family members suddenly turn into rhinos.  And I don’t mean ‘Republicans In Name Only.’ They become ‘beasts’ and ‘semi-beasts’ associated with ultra-right politics. I friend of mine recently told me that an old friend, formerly a leftist radical of some kind in the Socialist Workers Party, has announced she is now a Republican. I told her that is not an isolated incident.  I also know a former friend of mine who used to be in Progressive Labor Party, who is now a Trumper and has found BeJesus to boot.  That is evidently part of the package.  She’d been an atheist, an Obama supporter, then a Sanderista.  I know other former Sanders supporters who also became Trumpers – perhaps only for a while. If people are personally close, this is especially troubling. 

Recently I had to ask a local peace activist in Vets For Peace why he was praising a vicious white nationalist like Tucker Carlson. (He’s ‘anti-war.’) I’ve had to query bunker Stalinists on why they are supporters of a militarized right-wing capitalist like Putin. Former Sanders supporter Tulsi Gabbard cheers Hinduvata lord Narendra Modi. Other anti-war activists are hoping anti-working class and anti-Kurdish reactionary Recep Erdogan wins the election in Turkey as part of their geo-political game. Some ‘leftists’ side with the Iranian mullahs against the women’s and workers’ movements in the recent upheaval.  They claim it’s all a CIA operation. An erratic dodge like RFK Jr. is now some kind of hero.  Even a racist dweeb like the Air National Guard leaker gets plaudits.  Not your grandpa’s whistle-blower!

I guess living off a steady stream of hating liberalism and the Democrats makes some think becoming a Republican, a reactionary or a geo-politician is an act of liberation! It’s actually a fatal reaction.  Some of these ‘leftists’ support anti-abortion movements claiming abortion is ‘genocide;’ or troll vegetarians and vegans like any good Republican.  Others praise the ‘truth telling’ of billionaire Elon Musk. This is the angle of many post-left podcasters on Youtube.  The fall of Glenn Greenwald is a sterling example.  In 2021 he labeled Steve Bannon and Tucker Carlson as 'socialists.' Libertarian podcasters like Jimmy Dore denounce woke and accuse people of being ‘cucks,’ echoing Republican memes.  Joe Rogan, the bro-Libertarian dude, is now some kind of inspiration. The list is long.

All of this is related the growth of ‘red-brown’ alliances – seen in a mild form in the recent anti-U.S.-war rally in D.C. jointly endorsed by the People's Party and the Libertarian Party, with some questionable neo-fascists also present. Prominent U.S. anti-war activist Medea "Media" Benjamin attended too.

WELLNESS?

But there is another strain in this – the wellness movement.  A nuanced understanding of capitalist medicine and health leads to solutions that are not always related to taking drugs or getting an operation, i.e. ‘western medicine.’  Healthy food, quality exercise or work and other OTC methods supplement visits to a hospital or doctor.  However the wellness movement went further than that in reaction to the CoVid contagion.  Part of it came out against all drugs, all vaccines, all methods – even masks - not related to homeopathic ones.  It’s sort of a modern version of Christian Science or faith healing with new-age updates.  Statistics later showed that after the creation of CoVid vaccines by ‘Big Pharma” those not getting vaccinated or masking died at far higher proportions than those inoculated and masked.  This occurred mostly in Republican, southern and prairie / mountain counties.  Additionally, not getting the vaccine or wearing a mask made CoVid spread even easier, so it was irresponsible to the community not to get inoculated. 

Science and community-consciousness are not strengths of the far-Right; they are far stronger in magical thinking – miracle cures, bowls, crystals, BeJesus, pleasure and me, me, me.  You’ll remember that retrograde liars like Alex Jones peddled tons of quack cures on his show, including boner pills, and he was not alone.  Dr. Oz is another, both endorsed by reactionaries like Ron Paul and Trump.  Stewart Rhodes (3%ers) actually got his start in the Ron Paul campaign for president in 2008.  When Trumpers pretend to lecture Marxists on the evils of Big Pharma you gotta laugh.  The problem with Big Pharma is it is capitalist and its purpose is to make profits off disease.  But that does not mean that science, bigness or everything U.S. pharmaceutical companies produce is rotten. Big Pharma should become social property instead, which would halt their profiteering and their problematic drugs. The intellectual property of those vaccines should have been widely available across the whole world for free.  As it is nearly 7 million died of CoVid world-wide, with 1,125,209 dying in the U.S. alone.  Hundreds are still dying every day, still the 4^th cause of death in the U.S. Those are official figures but the U.S. saw almost 800,000 extra deaths over those 2 years too, not due directly to CoVid.  So it contributed to other deaths uncounted in the official stats.

Fascists try to integrate with environmentalists and anarchists around deep ecology or animal rights – even Earth First harbored some.  Some ‘anti-imperialists’ are libertarian reactionaries and want to cuddle up with clueless liberal anti-war types.  The Right haunts Nordic mythology, which used to be a harmless cultural enjoyment. The Boogaloo Bois during the Floyd upsurge were an example of a suspect ally – pretending to be ‘anti-cop’ and on the right side. Some leftists endorsed right-wing anti-mask or anti-vaccine protests.  Even the clown ‘Qanon Shaman,’ covered in Nordic tattoos and wearing a Buffalo/Viking headdress sometimes sounds like a hippie new ager.  Fact-free and low-fact conspiracy theories become the main method of analysis. Both sides swallow their own propaganda. Right and left populism became one, because they’re both “Agin'the Guvmint.”  But do they have the same purpose?

This blog has covered variations of the ‘red-brown’ alliance – MagaCommunism, Naz-Bol or National Bolshevism, ‘3^rd’ Position Ideology, anarcho-capitalism (Anarchopulco!), the Trumpen-Left, modern Brown Shirts, autonomous Nationalists, social nationalism and abstract ‘anti-government’ attitudes that come from two directions.  These are names for a phenomenon in which socialistic and fascistic types or ideology blend, combine or work together - and some transition into rhinoceroses.  For instance it is the present practice of the Communist Party of Russia to work with Russian ultra-nationalists.  This harks back to a vast error in Germany prior to Hitler’s takeover.  The Communist Party thought that they could take power after the Nazis, all the while seeing the Social-Democrats as the main enemy.  They formally worked with the Nazis on occasion through a joint organization, both opposed to the Social Democratic government. Sound familiar?

All of these are “morbid systems” of a social structure and movement disintegrating.  Never again.  No blocks with the Right!

Prior blog reviews on this subject, use blog search box, upper left, to investigate our 16 year archive using these terms:  “Against the Fascist Creep,” “Tongue in Speak,” “The Brown Plague” (Guerin); “The Black Hundred,” “Who is Ron Paul?” “It Can’t Happen Here” (Sinclair Lewis); “Fascism Today,” “Kill All Normies” or the “Anti-Fascist Series.” 

The Cultural Marxist

May 22, 2023