I appreciate the detailed post. I think there are some of these elements out there for sure. But I also think there is some nuance that places the vast majority of people securely outside of "white nationalism," even when it comes to some of those categories.
I think many people were turned off by things like DEI quotas and boys playing girls sports. That's reasonable. That's not white nationalism.
While we should teach accurate history about the wrongs committed in our past, we shouldn't teach kids to be ashamed of the current USA as a result. National pride is not white nationalism.
Immigration has been a thing forever. This isn't some new white nationalist movement. From 2004...
I'm not a culture war guy and think Desantis' focus on it (and others) is over-the-top. But again, some of the early legislation - like not teaching kids about transexualism until after 3rd grade - isn't unreasonable or nationalistic.
Are there some who have taken it too far? Sure. Are there some who have just bought into the propaganda of furries and CRT in schools, which are mostly cheap parlor tricks to stir up votes? Sure.
I'm still not buying some systemic white nationalist movement.
BTW, does this comment fall under the white nationalist descriptor? It will be a good measuring stick.
Let's judge people based on the content of their character and the merit of their work rather than the color of their skin.
MLK obviously said something similar and the SCOTUS ruled in alignment, but it seems that comment may be considered white nationalist propaganda in today's climate.
Yeah, of course there’s always nuance when it comes to philosophies or ideologies, right? Its never 100%. Not every Christian believes the exact same thing about every issue within Christianity, but what makes them Christian is a few shared core beliefs and that’s generally what I’m looking for when identifying a white nationalist or a fascist or a communist et al, what are the shared core beliefs?
You’re right that aiming for immigration reform isn’t, in and of itself, a part of white nationalism. And there are perfectly legitimate and reasonable debates that can and should happen around our country’s immigration system. But when you look at the increasingly intense rhetoric and policies that are starting to show up, when you look at that rhetoric put together with other positions, policy around immigration becomes part of a larger idealogical structure.
You point to a South Park episode that kind of illustrates my point, in 2004 the issue was immigrants who are taking jobs that Americans could have otherwise had - fast forward to 2016 and Trump is running on the platform that immigrants are violent criminals. That’s a sharp difference in rhetoric. Another statement from Trump that, to me, was very telling was when a judge halted his travel ban on mostly Muslim countries and Trump said (paraphrasing) “of course he ruled against me, he’s Mexican“ suggesting that Trump’s stance on immigration influenced the decisIon. This thought process that a person will act in the best interest of their ethnic or racial heritage and that that heritage pits people against each other is white nationalism at its very core.
But to your point, white nationalism certainly isn’t anything new. I mean, you can go back before the civil war and see when white nationalist narratives and talking points began creeping into the American culture. Certainly after the civil war when the southern ”lost cause” narrative took hold, that was really the birth of white nationalism as a political tool.
And since then we’ve seen various elements of white nationalism become part of the political landscape, some in the form of subtle dog whistles, some more overtly. But I also think that white nationalism is systemically engrained in America’s culture and the reason for that is - the country was, in fact, founded by white people with white traditions and white values and white religions. So when you talk about American traditions or values, you are inherently referring to traditions and values put in place by white men.
I think where you see political affiliations line up now is that there’s a group who says ”we should actively work to maintain and defend America’s traditions, values, and religious beliefs” there’s a group who says “we should actively work to pull away from America’s traditions, values, and religious beliefs” and there’s a third group that says “we shouldn’t be actively doing either, we should just do the best we can to make the country the best it can be.” I think most people fall into category 3, but they don’t always vote, and they don’t always donate. The people in the first 2 groups do and so they get the loudest voices.
I don’t think many people are actually white nationalists, but I do think many people are supporting white nationalists positions and repeating white nationalist rhetoric without realizing it. And national pride certainly isn’t nationalism, but national pride based on half truths and falsehoods is nationalism and that’s what I think we’re seeing more and more of.
And that’s really what’s new with white nationalism. Sure its been around for a while, but I don’t know that its ever been so openly embraced as it is now by mainstream politicians, certainly not since the civil rights era. This embracing of white nationalist philosophies is causing a mainstream acceptance of post truth beliefs and that is, I believe, the biggest existential threat to our democracy. Whether it comes from the right or the left, the absolute inability for us to agree on simple, basic facts is just destroying us. There are so many things that we could be doing right now as a country to drive economic growth, innovation, improving quality of life, but we can’t do it because we spend all of our time arguing about things that are already settled fact. Instead of talking about how we can drive the economy through green initiatives or innovate with new forms of energy, we’ve spent decades arguing over whether or not climate change is even real. And when the very real issues of climate change start to manifest themselves over the next several decades (look up climate migration if you think immigration is a problem now), America isn’t going to have an answer for it because we wasted the time we had to prepare.
On your MLK comment, I mean context matters right? Whether something is “white nationalist” or not depends on who is saying and why they’re saying it and who they’re saying it to.