#64, efforts to parse truths, reveal contradictions, or negotiate with this mode of power are disguise what it is: a new fascism
“The new regime bears important similarities to classic fascism: rapid, rabid intensifications of white nationalism, dismissals of reason, autocratic leadership, deepening entwinements of state and capital, disenfranchisement, attacks on liberal and representative democratic institutions, and increasingly open right-wing populist violence. However, today’s neo-fascism relies on distinctive, twenty-first century dynamics that are not only antithetical to the survival of democracy in the United States but also threaten planetary ecological collapse. These dynamics, slippery as they are, must be illuminated to move toward understanding— and ultimately transforming—our current condition. We also need new surges of radical creativity that can generate a complex ecology of democratic sensibilities, alternative solidarities, political modes, and relationships that move beyond the ruts of rote protest politics. Here, we offer eleven theses on emergent neo-fascism and a receptive, full-bodied politics that can vitalize a formidable demos to defeat the regime.”
In one of many acts of self-reflexive uncertainty and commitment to contradiction that unerline this project (“understanding and not simply producing contradiction; naming and not evading complexity” is my own fifth #hardtruth written half-way through #100hardtruths-#fakenews”), I share Haro and Coles’ #5, which reads:
“Efforts to parse truths, reveal contradictions, or selectively negotiate and collaborate with this mode of power are both blind to and disguise what it fundamentally is—a new fascism that operates through disordering ordering and hyper-prerogative power.”
(this #100hardtruths was given to me by a friend and scholar who wishes to, and succeeds at remaining anonymous online)
See More:
- “Eleven Theses on Neo-Fascism and the Fight to Defeat It,” Lia Haro and Romand Coles
- Institute for Social Justice
- The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, Naomi Klein
- Visionary Pragmatism: Radical and Ecological Democracy in Neoliberal Times, Romand Coles
- Anonymity Online
- #100hardtruths-#fakenews: a primer on digital media literacy