Daily Archives: January 7, 2022

During a recent appearance on a TV show, controversial journalist and intellectual Hassan Nisar stated that the country needed a dictatorship which should rule uninterrupted for 15 years. He then went on to say that anyone mentioning democracy should be executed by a firing squad and their relatives should pay for the bullets.

Nisar is already infamous for his outbursts against the countrys two large political parties, the PML-N and the PPP. But his wrathful tirades are mostly reserved for the PML-N. He has often attributed his enraged style of speaking to high blood pressure. He certainly doesnt seem to mind it, though. It makes him what he is: a very angry old man.

Nisar graduated with a BA degree in Economics from the Punjab University (PU) in 1971. He came from a well-to-do family. He was associated with a progressive student outfit at PU, and also became an admirer of Z.A. Bhutto. He began writing columns for Urdu-language monthlies, before becoming the co-editor of a popular lifestyle magazine, Dhanak. The magazine was banned by the Zia-ul-Haq dictatorship.

Nisar was a staunch opponent of the Zia regime. He remained a sympathiser of Bhuttos PPP, till he became a regular columnist for the countrys largest Urdu daily, Jang. Nisar really came into his own during the General Musharraf dictatorship (1999-2008). He began to appear on TV, where he was often heard launching into religious parties, clerics and so-called ulema. His vast knowledge of Muslim history aided him in successfully deconstructing their theories and ideas.

Now he had become an admirer of Musharraf. His diatribes against the Islamists were stemming from his deep-seated abhorrence of the reactionary Zia regime, and from his dislike of those who were criticising Musharrafs doctrine of enlightened moderation. Nisar also supported the secular Mohajir nationalist party, the MQM, when it became an ally of the Musharraf regime. Nisar is Punjabi.

Livid when Musharraf was forced to resign in early 2008, Nisar blamed PML-N and the PPP for this, and developed intense hatred for democracy. As a way to express this, he publicly hailed the rise of Imran Khans PTI in 2014. More than championing Khan, he was actually signalling his support for the military establishment, which was allegedly propping up PTI as a viable challenge to PML-N and the PPP.

By now Nisars attacks against democracy and especially the third PML-N regime had become outright rants. He was applauded by PTI supporters but severely criticised by others who accused him of using foul language that should not be used by a public intellectual. As Khans government, that had come to power in 2018, began to disintegrate into farce, Nisar confessed that he had made a mistake by supporting PTI.But his demonisation of politicians and democracy only intensified. He was rightly denounced on social media after his most recent tirade went viral. But he is not the first to suggest a rigid authoritarian set-up and public executions as a solution. Such ideas became ingrained in a lot of people of the Subcontinent decades ago. And the irony is: these ideas are not exactly indigenous. Their origins are European. Let me explain.

Even though Nisar did not mention Hitler or Mussolini, the imagery that his rant sketched was very close to dictatorships that these two gentlemen enacted in Germany and Italy. And as I mentioned, Nisar isnt the first in this region to do so. Often, one comes across a statement made by a Pakistani or an Indian praising the former German Nazi leader, Adolf Hitler. Hitlers regime (1933-1945) was responsible for the systematic state-sanctioned murder of millions of people considered to be of the inferior race. So it is odd to hear praise for him coming from folk who would also have been sent to the gas chambers in Auschwitz along with men, women and children of the so-called non-Aryan races.

Livid when Musharraf was forced to resign in early 2008, Nisar blamed PML-N and the PPP for this, and developed intense hatred for democracy. As a way to express this, he publicly hailed the rise of Imran Khans PTI in 2014. More than championing Khan, he was actually signalling his support for the military establishment

The phenomenon of some South Asians romanticising Hitler could be the result of the regions recent shift to the populist right. But there are many other possibilities. The idealisation of Hitler among some sections in India and Pakistan could also be due to the residual impact of a clever propaganda campaign that the Nazis unleashed upon certain segments of Indias Hindu and Muslim polities in the 1930s. This fact has been largely forgotten by mainstream history. However, even a brief recap of this can aid us in better understanding the ironic spectacle of a brown Muslim or a Hindu fawning over a mass murderer who would have thrown them in one of his many death camps at the drop of a hat.

In his essay for the May/June 2000 issue of the academic journal Social Scientist, Eugene J. DSouza writes that Nazi German propaganda made its way into India when mainstream Hindu and Muslim leadership in the region had become disoriented after the gradual collapse of two major anti-British movements in the 1920s: the Khilafat Movement and the Non-cooperation Movement.

DSouza writes that this is when German business interests in the region were first activated by Nazi Germany to contact the more radical elements within the Hindu and Muslim political, social and media outlets. The campaign in this regard began from Bengal, where communal and revolutionary anti-British sentiment was the strongest. To Nazi Germany, the British were enemies, even before the start of the Second World War.

Nazi agents (largely recruited from German businesses in India) preyed on the fears of Bengals landed and business elites, telling them that their lands and businesses were under threat due to the socialist bent of the Indian National Congress (INC). Hitlers notorious biography Mein Kampf was then translated into various languages of India including Hindi, Urdu and Bengali. These translations were distributed free of cost, especially among the editors and staff of various Hindi and Urdu newspapers.

DSouza writes that Nazi agents began to infiltrate various Muslim and Hindu social and cultural organisations. The 8 September 1939 issue of the English daily The Times of India quoted Jewish and socialist refugees from Germany in India as saying that Indian employees working in German companies were being used to spy on the refugees.

The idealisation of Hitler among some sections in India and Pakistan could also be due to the residual impact of a clever propaganda campaign that the Nazis unleashed upon certain segments of Indias Hindu and Muslim polities in the 1930s

Apart from utilising the services of India-based German businesses, Nazi Germany also sent agents to India disguised as technicians, tourists, salesmen, musicians and photographers. According to DSouza, German businesses would frequently give advertisements to Indian newspapers that were willing to facilitate Nazi propaganda.

Even though the main intention of Nazi Germany was to ferment unrest in India against the British colonialists, its plans never looked to unite the anti-British Hindu and Muslim segments. Maybe the Germans had noted the volatility of such a move. Hindus and Muslims had collaborated with each other against the British during the Khilafat and Non-cooperation movements; but both the movements had eventually mutated into becoming communal, giving the British the space to crush them.

Instead, and as noted in the files kept by the British colonial governments Home Department (File number 8301, 1939), Nazi agents in India applied a two-pronged strategy in which they approached radical Hindu and Muslim leaderships with entirely separate sets of rhetoric and propaganda.

For example, when the agents managed to get a foothold in newspapers funded and run by the Hindu nationalist organisation the Hindu Mahasabha, they constantly informed the Mahasabha that Hitler considered the Hindus of India as the real custodians of the Indian nation, while the Muslims and other non-Hindu communities in the region were aliens just like the Jews were in Germany.

It is thus not surprising to note similar sentiments in the works of the periods celebrated Hindu nationalists such as V.D. Savarkar and M.S. Golwalker. Both werent very secretive about their admiration of Nazi Germany. However, during their interactions with radical Muslim groups, the Nazi agents completely flipped their message. The agents glorified the martial tendencies of the Muslims and claimed to be major supporters of the religious and territorial interests of the Muslims, especially in the Middle East.

For Nisar, the unabashedly authoritarian set-up that he keeps peddling is the subjective meaning and purpose that he has created for himself. It is a fantasy of an ageing man, disillusioned by evolutionary political processes and instruments. He sees them as meaningless and useless. Maybe this is how he has begun to see himself as well

According to the Home Departments files, Nazi Germany funded various established and small newspapers as long as they continued to publish pro-Germany articles and propaganda. Hindi newspapers in this circle would carry anti-Muslim, anti-Jewish and anti-British articles; whereas the Muslim-owned Urdu papers, that received advertisements and funds from German companies would produce anti-Hindu, anti-Jewish and anti-British material.

According to the Home Departments files dated 18 October, 1939, the German wife of a Muslim professor at the famous Aligarh University received funds from Germany to publish a daily called Spirit of the Times through which she tried to prove that Nazi ideals approximate to the tenants of Islam.

In his detailed study of Indias pre-Partition Muslim and Hindu middle-class milieu, German historian Marcus Daechsel, in his book The Politics of Self-Expression, writes that middle-class political culture in interwar India was haunted by fascistic resonances. Activists from various political camps believed in Social-Darwinism, worshipped violence and war and focused their political action on public spectacles and paramilitary organisations. Marcus identifies various Muslim and Hindu personalities and organisations that did this. And, as DSouza demonstrates, almost each one of them was shaped, influenced and, at times, funded by Nazi propaganda in India between 1933 and 1940.

DSouza laments that the origin of Nazi propaganda still echoes in India, especially in the politics and rhetoric of Hindu nationalists. In Pakistan, these rudiments largely emerge during discourses involving talk of Israel and the idea of nationalism held by certain radical right-wing elements. The fascinating thing is that in both cases, the language is almost the same as it was in the 1930s. The narrative, its tone and language are quite similar.

According to Marcus, despite their enthusiasm for Nazi Germany and Hitler, most radical Hindu and Muslim ideologues never fully comprehended the Nazi ideology. That is why they largely sound contradictory. And since the narrative, imagery and language in this context has not changed much since the 1930s, the same is the case today when a Hindu or Muslim politician glorifies Hitler. The results are always ironic.

But I believe there is another set of roots in this context, at least in Pakistan. These roots lie in the impact that the 1979 Islamic Revolution in Iran had in Pakistan. A report in a 1984 issue of the Urdu daily Jang quoted a despondent taxi driver in Karachi hoping that Pakistan would witness an Iran-like revolution in which thousands would be publicly executed. Only this can solve our problems of corruption, ethnic violence and the injustices faced by the poor, he said.

The taxi driver was driving a rented cab, but could not save the money to acquire his own vehicle. He was struggling to retain his small rented apartment in which he lived with his wife and four children. When the reporter told him about the horrific situation in Iran, plagued by international isolation, a collapsing economy, severe internal conflicts and a brutal war with neighboring Iraq, the taxi driver called it American propaganda.

He refused to consider slightly more reasonable solutions to his economic problems other than wishing for mass executions. This nihilistic mindset would continue to swell, even when the romance with the Iranian model receded. The mindset was eventually addressed by the equally nihilistic Islamist organisations. They did not offer a better life experience in this world but in the other, or the one that begins after death. However, for that, these organisations claimed, just being pious wasnt enough. There was greater piety in the act of slaughtering enemies of the faith in this life so that one could enjoy a better afterlife.

This is not to suggest that Hassan Nisar is a sympathiser of militant Islamists. He is quite the opposite, really. Yet, in his own way, and unfortunately, he too has become a nihilist of sorts. I would describe his condition as Existentialist Nihilism (EN).

EN refuses to attribute any meaningful significance to the human race nor any purpose. To EN every person is an isolated being born into this world and is forever unable to understand why he or she is here. Therefore, EN suggests that one can potentially create their own subjective meaning and or purpose.

For Nisar, the unabashedly authoritarian set-up that he keeps peddling is the subjective meaning and purpose that he has created for himself. It is a fantasy of an ageing man, disillusioned by evolutionary political processes and instruments. He sees them as meaningless and useless. Maybe this is how he has begun to see himself as well. The kind of regime that he envisions, he believes, will add purpose and meaning to politics. His politics. What he is suggesting is a fantasy. Not a solution.

This is also what has happened to the man he once supported, who is now the PM of the country. Conventional institutions and issues of the country have lost all meaning to him. He has thus created his own meaning and purpose for his existence: to save society through spirituality.

Originally posted here:

Of Disillusioned Men And Their Existentialist Nihilism - The Friday Times

[This post originally appeared as part of Recommendation Machine, IndieWires daily TV picks feature.]

Where to Watch The Standups: Netflix

Somehow, Netflix has found a way to keep adding to its comedy section over the past two years. With starts and stops to in-person events, there have still been semi-regular new sets from comedians all over the world. Still, the weekly avalanche of specials that began roughly in late 2016 and continued all the way through most of 2020 has understandably thinned out somewhat.

With that back catalogue still growing, Netflix has been missing its collections, the seasons worth of sets gathered together with no other thematic tie than these people are funny. In 2021, those comedy collections came via a competition (Comedy Premium League), a mixed-documentary format (Your Life is a Joke), and a preexisting group (Plastic Cup Boyz: Laughing My Mask Off!). The four-episode Locombianos, featuring a quartet of comedians from Colombia, was the closest last year came to a new drop that felt like a night at a comedy show with a complete lineup.

So its refreshing to be able to start 2022 with Season 3 of The Standups. (The last round ended up having some of the best comedy Netflix put out in all of 2018.) Technically a release in the waning days of December, these latest installments might as well be a page-turn. Its not that these six half-hour sets are some declaration that the worst is over (especially considering the big events that are still being canceled). But this collection, especially when taken together, is helpful for this in-between state that many of us find ourselves in not wanting to ignore what weve all collectively gone through and also not wanting to have to be dominated by it.

When Brian Simpson starts off his half-hour set with a joke about pandemic relief checks, its more than just a lets get this out of the way first opener. It sets the tone for much of whats to come, largely built around reevaluating things that you usually take for granted. It also has the spontaneity of a truly great crowdwork moment, one of the highlights of the whole season.

One of the joys of going to a live standup show is feeling the energy in the room change with each new comic. Not better or worse, just noticeably different. Naomi Ekperigin arriving on stage is an instant jolt to the rest of the room by the time shes giving you her personal theoretical Nancy Meyers movie (My name is Margot, with a t) theres already enough momentum to propel you forward through the rest of the 30 minutes. (Her set also makes for a good companion piece to her always enjoyable podcast Couples Therapy.)

Mark Normand and Dusty Slays sets show how much pacing can make a difference. Again, not necessarily better or worse, but Normands set would definitely result in the longest transcript. Slay returning to his Were having a good time transition/mantra gives the audience a little extra time and patience to soak things in. Its two styles for people who expect different levels of joke density from their standup specials. In that way, The Standups can work for a wider comedy audience without feeling watered down.

Of the six, its Janelle James who zeroes in the sharpest on some of the bigger lessons from the past 21 months. Lines like We dont know how to sacrifice and it sucks still keep their edge, even as shes smiling as she says them. Shes a talented performer, sharp enough to keep her set insightful about some massive collective shortcomings without getting fully trapped by nihilism.

Melissa Villaseor, like Slay, pretty much avoids any references that would date this to the end of 2021. Its a hybrid of impressions of celebrities and family and hypothetical grandkids, along with some great stories from the not-so-distant past. The order of these sets is always interesting, but putting Villaseors at the end almost represents a little bit of finger-crossing. Were certainly not out of the woods yet, but with luck, this whole collection should feel familiar again before too long.

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The Standups Is a Solid Start to the Comedy Year - IndieWire

Himesh Patel stars in Station ElevenPhoto: Ian Watson/HBO Max

For weeks, Ive been wondering how Station Eleven was going to work as a show. Reading the book has been both a blessing and a curse. I read Station Eleven before the pandemic but after Trump became president, and I found it comforting during that seemingly apocalyptic event. It has the kind of optimism Ive found to be anathema in most TV dramas, which favor nihilism, cynicism, and an anti-hero complex that I havent enjoyed since 2016. Even Patrick Somerville being showrunner didnt give me much hopeI also read The Leftovers before I saw the show, and I couldnt stand the latter. Not because it wasnt good (I didnt watch far enough to have an actual opinion), but because I couldnt stomach the despair or gray morality of the characters when I had to spend more time with them outside of Tom Perrottas text.

But with this weeks episodes, Whos There? and Dr. Chaudhary, the show has both met and exceeded my expectations. Adaptations are tricky thingsthe best ones become more than the sum of their parts, but usually fall into the trap of merely summarizing the story. When I wrote about Gael Garca Bernal not fitting the character Arthur Leander in episode three, it was because I was expecting the show to go the way of the book. But, like casting Captain America Chris Evans in Snowpiercer and Knives Out, the show works to subvert our expectations while staying true to the book.

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I read the book on Kindle, so I had the advantage of seeing what people had highlighted in their copies. In the book, Clark has the same jobdoing assessments of CEOs. But the book includes a flashback to when he went on one particular interview that stopped him in his tracks. Dahlia, who hes meant to speak to about a CEO, tells him that said CEO is a joyless bastard. Adulthood is full of ghosts, she says.

Im talking about those people whove ended up in one life instead of another and they are just so disappointed. Do you know what I mean? Theyve done whats expected of them. They want to do something different but its impossible now, theres a mortgage, kids, whatever, theyre trapped. Dans like that.

You dont think he likes his job, then.

Correct, she said, but I dont think he even realizes it. You probably encounter people like him all the time. High-functioning sleepwalkers, essentially.

What was it in this statement that made Clark want to weep?

Was it the show that had me on Clarks side, or this particular sequence? In the book, published in 2014, Clark is a distinct figure because hes gay, outside the heterosexual mores of Miranda and Arthurs relationship. But in the show, hes something darker. As one of the only white adult characters from pre-pandemic times, hes showed as having money, status, romantic success, and so on, but hes still bitter about Arthurs success. Arthur, in turn, is a friend who actually likes Clark, and is shocked at his misplaced anger. And it turns out his relationship with Miranda was a lot more troubled and full of misunderstanding than Clark, Tyler, Elizabeth, and even Miranda understood.

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The subtle way this episode clears a lot of my confusion about the rest of the show is masterful. While in the book, the above conversation grants Clark a release from himself before the pandemic, in the show, Clark still does not seem to have learned this lesson. Clark is the figure to be wary of here. He acts like Arthur is the source of all his anger, his problems, his bitterness, and he acts like Tyler is yet another Arthur he so personally dislikes. The museum is less a source of safety and kindness and more a way for Clark to rule with an iron fist and hang on to his sleepwalking life with an even stronger grip.

Another thing the book doesnt have is Elizabeth. Knowing that she wasnt sleeping with Arthur before Miranda burned down the guesthouse explains more of her character, and even more of how she and Arthur struggled to find understanding. She, like Clark, was unaware in the old world, but in the post-pandemic times, she is much more understanding. I can understand why she holds Tyler at the end of the first episode and says, in an almost childlike way, He came back.

Beyond Clark, Whos There? doesnt completely workI absolutely do not understand how Kirsten went from being so wary of Tyler that she stabbed him for freaking her out, to listening to him. The main problem is the way that Tyler terrorizes the Traveling Symphony is enough for Kirsten to not like him. Or did I mistake that sequence where he uses a child as a suicide bomber? Maybe its because she doesnt trust the museum and some of the Tylers frustrations with Clark are legitimate? Not all of them are. Maybe its because hes the only other person whos read Station Eleven. Even Kirsten has a weakness.

Ah, and then we get to my favorite, favorite episode of this series, and the one Ive patiently been waiting for: Dr. Chaudhary. In the book, Jeevan is important in the beginning and a footnote in the ending; but the structure of the show lets Jeevan be his own, totally new character. Hes a coward, plain and simple, not unlike Dev Patels character in The Green Knight. While both PatelsHimesh and Devhave luxurious hair and British Indian origins, its the fidgety, awkward, and ultimately, really funny way they shrink back from responsibility that really gets me.

Jeevans episode is by far the funniest and perhaps even the most relatable sequence of the show. Hes bogged down by the responsibility of Kirsten, protesting that he needs other adults and she needs other kids and he cant stay in the cabin all winter. He hates the book shes found solace in, throwing it away in one scene. He hates how much she better related to Frank and how much they both so obviously miss him. Most of all, he hates that he has to be strong for Kirsten yet he actually cant be strong for Kirsten.

In Whos There?, when Clark meets Kirsten in the before times of the play, Arthur tells him that Kirsten apparently has a bad home life. Theres an implication that Kirsten had survival instincts long before the pandemic, although why and how we may never know. But certainly its in strong contrast with Jeevans wishy-washy awkwardness. He even lies over the radio about being alone and being a doctor, which is what ends up separating him and Kirsten, but also what helps him grow the fuck up.

Even the little tribe that Jeevan finds is hilarious. Of course Kirsten knows his old pre-pandemic nickname, Leavin Jeevan. Of course he falls in with a bunch of would-be moms in a Y: The Last Man-type sequence (Brian K. Vaughn did say that the comic was about Yorick learning he had to grow up from the strong women around him). If theres anything that can get a man to grow up, I guess it would be seeing several live births over the course of a day or two. I knew, I knew, that the pregnant lady he fights off was going to end up being his partner. Somehow, every part of Jeevans experience with the pandemic is comedy over tragedy, through a combination of dumb luck and almost over-the-top sincerity.

Pairing Jeevans episode with Clarks is great: While Clark is barely holding it together, ready to go on a bender from even the smallest perceived slight from Arthur, his emotions packed inside him like sardines in a tin can, Jeevan is constantly spilling his emotions everywhere. The main problem is he cant lie, and if he tries to lielike when he initially shrugs off Kirstens protest that he got rid of the bookhes too obvious about it.

But its the moment he does lie, when he understands suppressing his emotions in order to hold someone elses, that he finally blooms. Its when hes helping a doctor help a girl give birth, and things are not looking good. Hes there for her till the end, finally showing up instead of shrinking back. The baby doesnt survive, and its Tyler who shows up as the Dave the now deceased mother was looking for. He doesnt get to keep the baby, but he does give you a chill down your spine as you get to see exactly how intertwined the characters are.

From there, every moment of his happiness feels earned. He earns the home he makes in the cabin with his partner, his three adorable children, his actual work as a doctor. Hes off to make a housecall. Hm, I wonder if there was a character whos in a hospital bed who needs some assistance.

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Station Eleven plays with comedy and tragedy this week - The A.V. Club

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. If that's right, the assorted fanatics, thrill-seekers, and nutjobs who stormed the Capitol one year ago today have surprising precursors.

The respectable backgrounds of manyof the rioters didn't look much like the "peasant army" that populist commentator Patrick Buchanan threatened to lead against the political establishment in the 1990s. Nor were their anarchic tactics reminiscent of the highly organized "suburban warriors" who flocked to Reagan. More than the public faces of the postwar American right, the theatrical flair, indifference to law and constituted authority, and threat of serious violence on display last Jan. 6 resemble the New Left of the 1960s and 1970s. The defiant, moralistic, revolutionary spirit that animated the Yippies, Weathermen, and Black Panthers hasn't disappeared but it now lives on the right, too.

Such a migration would have seemed improbable half a century ago. In the popular imagination, the period pitted long-haired radicals against a staid majority. Conservatives wore neckties and followed the rules. The younger activists who emerged from the civil rights and antiwar movements practiced free love, fought the police, and occasionally set off bombs. Unlike the union-allied "old Left,"moreover, the newer generation had little interest in promoting the material prosperity of industrial workers, whom they saw as complicit in capitalism, or in winning elections. "We shall not defeat Amerika [sic] by organizing a political party," Abbie Hoffman proclaimed in a blend of menace and humor that was once distinctive, but now has become disturbingly familiar. "We shall do it by building a new nation a nation as rugged as the marijuana leaf."

Liberal institutions haveassimilated these defiant gestures into the self-congratulatory epic of the Baby Boomers. In the recent Netflix production The Trial of the Chicago 7, director Aaron Sorkin depicted Hoffman and his contemporaries as chatty idealists subject to official repression. Angela Davis who supplied guns to militants who murdered a judge and took hostages in a California courtroom and cavorted with Communist leaders in Cuba, East Germany, and the Soviet Union has become thoroughly respectable. Last November, she was the guest of honor at a "diversity summit" organized by the university where I teach.

Conservatives preserve a better memory of how extreme these figures were. That's why names like Bill Ayers, who founded the terrorist group Weather Underground, and Herbert Marcuse, who taught Davis philosophy, and Saul Alinsky, who tried (unsuccessfully) to reconcile the old and new lefts, acquired prominent positions in the demonology of the right. According to writers like Newt Gingrich, Norman Podhoretz, and Mark Levin as well as less famous talk shows, bloggers, and social media influencers the modern Democratic Party is little more than a vehicle for the New Left aspiration to fundamentally transform America.

Especially in more lurid versions, such assertions are easy to dismiss as conspiracy theories or guilt by association. What critics tend to miss, though, is that they're inspired by envy as well as revulsion. Conservative writers and activists are almost unanimous in rejecting the New Left's goals. But many see them as authors of ahow-to guide for imposing an unpopular and disruptive agenda on an initially recalcitrant majority. The flamboyance, militance, and violence of the 1960s left might not have worked right away, after all. In the long run, though, ideas about social justice, national guilt, and sexual freedom that seemed bizarre and dangerous at the time are now thoroughly mainstream features of American life.

This isn't just a historical argument. Even as they denounced the violence and destruction, conservative activists could see the rioting that swept the country after the death of George Floyd in spring of 2020 as offering both permission and a model for the outbursts that culminated at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. When it came to criminal justice, violence inspired by factually dubious assertions promulgated by ideologically radical groupswas not just excused, but celebrated by the media, cultural, and to some extent political establishment. If the ends justified the means for those seeking to transform America, why couldn't they do the same for those seeking to preserve it?

Probably few of the actual rioters consciously associated their conduct with the leftism of another time. Many, and perhaps most, genuinely believed that Trump was the victim of massive, outcome-changing electoral fraud. But some of those responsible for propagating that fantasy knew exactly what they were doing. The writer and organizer David Horowitz, who has made a career out of his transition from the New Left to MAGA, helped launch Steve Bannon and used his own platform to promote conspiracy theories about the election. As his contemporaries and former allies Ron Radosh and Sol Stern noted in The New Republic, Horowitz's conception of domestic politics' war against an implacable foe "may sound daring and original to Trump's followers, but it's really a reprise of his earlier support for the revolutionary left's strategy of 'bringing the war home' to America's streets and campuses."

Similar ideas have found advocates without Horowitz's biographical connection to the New Left. Figures associated with the influential Claremont Institute have also adopted the rhetoric of incipient war against a fundamentally hostile"regime" that is, regrettably, accepted by most of their fellow citizens. Despite the appeals to patriotism and solidarity, these aren't the politics of Richard Nixon's "silent majority."As Matt Lewis has described, the newer, weirder right that made its public debut on Jan. 6 doesn't look much like the staid conservatism of even a decade ago. It more closelyresemblesthegonzo nihilism of AbbieHoffman and his comrades, who hoped to tear down "Amerika" in order to replace it with a hazy utopia.

Such dreams are almost always disappointed, though. For all their success in changing how Americans thought about race and sex, the New Left never managed to shake the capitalist economy that was its real foe. That's why major corporations are among the most lavish promoters of the social progressivism conservatives abhor.

In a remarkable irony, socialist journalist Christian Parenti recently tracked down the author of the first written account of a "privilege walk" an ostensibly anti-oppression training exercise developed by Herbet Marcuse's graduate student and third wife that's become a staple of the corporate diversity industry. She's now a Mark Levin fan and a Republican voter who believes Trump is the only thing that stands between us and totalitarian control.Fifty years ago, a toxic brew of paranoia, Manicheanism, and rejection of legal and constitutional restraint left a trail of bodies, ruined lives, and corrupted institutions that discredited the left for a generation or more. A year after Jan. 6, it's still too early to know what disasters it threatens for the right and the country as a whole.

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The Capitol riot's roots in the New Left - The Week Magazine

ByChristopher Lockett, Memorial University of Newfoundland

One year ago, some witnesses to the assault on the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., referenced zombies when describing the mayhem as the mob of Donald Trump supporters broke into the building and people sought safety.

It was like something out of a zombie movie, recalled a photographer who was at the scene, speaking of seeing hordes of rioters. Similarly, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said it almost felt like a zombie movie as she described hiding and seeking shelter.

In the 20 years that zombie apocalypse narratives have grown and reached critical mass in popular media, such comparisons at an insurrection at the seat of American democracy where five people died and scores more were injured and traumatized are disturbing, but unsurprising.

More significant, however, is that zombie apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic narratives have become popular during the same economic and cultural currents that gave rise to Trumps Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement and his presidency.

Depictions of the end of civilization on Earth, especially after the advent of nuclear weapons, have often focused on the spectacle of disaster, as discussed by writer Susan Sontag in her classic 1965 essay The Imagination of Disaster.

In many post-apocalyptic narratives that have become prevalent in the past two decades, like Cormac McCarthys novel The Road or the television series The Walking Dead, the actual disaster itself is less significant than life in the aftermath.

Literature scholar Connor Pitetti notes this diversification of the apocalyptic imagination in his essay The Uses of the End of the World: Apocalypse and Postapocalypse as Narrative Modes. He writes that in the 21st century, narratives about the bomb have been joined by those pertaining to more diverse eschatological powers forces bound in some transcendent and otherworldly way with end times and the final history of humankind.

Cultural critic Laurie Penny writes that more post-apocalyptic entertainment has come out in the beginning of this century than in the entirety of the last one.

But why should this be the case? Some scholars of history, literature and culture suggest that if people come to believe civilization as we know it is irreparably broken, the prospect of its end may become an appealing fantasy.

One factor may be the desire for alternatives in a world where contemporary consumer capitalism is often presumed to be inevitable, rather than a human choice, as noted by the late historian Tony Judt in his book Ill Fares the Land.

It becomes easier, says literary critic Fredric Jameson, to imagine the thoroughgoing deterioration of the Earth and of nature than the breakdown of capitalism or even to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism, in the words of cultural critic Mark Fisher.

Writing about the dangers posed by Trumpism, interdisciplinary political scientist Thomas Homer-Dixon notes the key factors giving rise to it include stagnating middle-class incomes, chronic economic insecurity and rising inequality. Additionally, he writes, while returns to labour have stagnated and returns to capital have soared, right-wing ideologues inflamed white fears that whites are being replaced.

Trumps principally white constituency views the increasing diversification of the American populace as a threat.

During his campaign, Trump elected amid this populist, nativist backlash vowed to be a wrecking ball laying waste to the edifices of the Washington, D.C., establishment. The sentiment was similarly voiced by his former senior strategist Steve Bannon, who in 2017 characterized Trump as a blunt instrument with which to deconstruct the administrative state.

This appetite for destruction wasnt Trumps creation; rather, Trump has given voice and license to the forces of reaction and backlash.

A sense of perverse pleasure in imagining the end of democratic law and order was evident in the Capitol assault a year ago, especially in the often absurd and mythically styled costuming of some of the insurgents. It ranged from sinister white supremacist, extremist paramilitary garb to the familiar 1776 getup of Tea Partiers, but also vaguely frontiersman-like furs and pelts, and of course the pseudo-tribal cosplay of Jacob Chansley, the notorious QAnon shaman.

As news footage from the day shows, bizarre outfits did not mitigate the rage and violence that marked the attempted coup. Nor do they detract from the dangers posed by the MAGA movement.

Commentators have noted how the extremist ideologies of Trump supporters are entwined with a revival of religious impulses. These are often focused on stark contrasts between goodness and evil and the possession of secret knowledge that fuels conspiracy theories and end times apocalyptic speculation.

Penny argues that the proliferation of apocalyptic narratives exist somewhere between wish fulfilment and trauma rehearsal.

An example of this can be seen in discussion groups and message boards enthusing over the prospect of a zombie apocalypse.

A common refrain, widely merchandized on decals, T-shirts, mugs and beyond, has become: The hardest part of the zombie apocalypse will be pretending Im not excited.

Such statements reveal a sort of hopeful nihilism: a sensibility that seeks, gleefully, to demolish and destroy in the vague assumption that life in the ashes will be better, truer and more authentic.

In a zombie apocalypse, this may be seen in characters who come into their own as hyper-competent bad asses when resisting zombies (a trope notably parodied in the British zombie comedy Shaun of the Dead), but also characters who face zombie enemies against whom violence is not merely sanctioned but morally imperative.

So have the zombies been trying to warn us about Trumpism this whole time?

The question is not nearly as glib as it seems. Cultural preoccupations, such as the disaster films Sontag wrote about in 1965, almost invariably provide a window into societal anxieties and fears on one hand, and wishes and desires on the other. Unfortunately, such insights often only reveal themselves with the benefit of hindsight.

Sontags writing articulated the pervasive fear imbued by the Cold Wars threat of nuclear war. At the same time, however, they expressed faith that societal institutions government, the military, science would prevail.

Sadly, our obsession with post-apocalyptic scenarios is largely borne of the loss of such faith.

Christopher Lockett, Associate Professor, English, Memorial University of Newfoundland

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

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COMMENTARY: Why it's grim, but unsurprising, that the US Capitol attack looked like it was out of a 'zombie movie' - SaltWire Network

As I get older, holidays, especially the emergence of a new year, become both a time of remembrance and joy. They offer memories steeped in both new beginnings and loss; the value of loved ones and close friends; the beauty of solidarity forged in giving and sharing; and a hope that merges struggle, passion and justice.

The dawn of the new year rests not merely on long-cherished narratives but also offers a time for renewed visions. It is also about birth, the emergence of new possibilities, the weighing of mistakes, a renewed sense of struggle against the haters, liars, and the dreadful conditions that produce and support them. It is about a gentle kiss and touch that comes early in the morning with the ones you love. Such moments speak to falling into the comforting abyss of desire, becoming more conscious of what it means to make yourself vulnerable so you can step outside of the privatized prisons that a brutal economic system puts us in.

In a time of apocalyptic cynicism, the normalization of violence and deepening collective despair, thinking about the new year is more than a discourse of traditional aspirations. On the contrary, it is an interruptive and critical moment crucial to examining the horrors of a present descending all too quickly into fascism and what it might mean to create a new language, vision and motivations to embrace a future that imagines the fullness of justice, compassion, equality and democracy.

Thinking about the new year is and should be an act of resistance.

The new year offers a space to ponder what it means to reclaim history as a site of struggle, resistance and civic courage. This suggests reclaiming historical memory as a site of learning and resistance; it means making education central to politics; it means utilizing both a language of critique and a discourse of hope; it means building a mass movement with international ties in the struggle for social and economic justice. Under such circumstances, the cry for justice, equality, and freedom takes on a new urgency and offers up new possibilities. It infuses the present with the fire of wakefulness, longing for and hopefully producing a new language for reclaiming our sense of agency, consciousness, and the courage to never look away. Hope expands the space of the possible and becomes a way of recognizing and naming the incomplete nature of the present. The new year suggests giving new meaning to the promise of a world without suffering, inequality and the anti-democratic forces sprouting up like dangerous weeds. The new year should offer the opportunity to rethink life, dignity, and a humane equality as they unfold in their fullest and always with others. The new year should be rooted in dreams that reject a vision of the future as simply a continuation of the present.

Lets make 2022 a year to talk back, beat down the fascist currents sweeping across the United States and elsewhere. Lets make it a time that brings together the fractured movements on the left in order to build a mass movement and political party that speaks with the people rather than against them.

I realize that these words of hope come at a difficult time in the United States, Canada and across the globe. Civic courage and the social contract are under siege. Educators, artists and public intellectuals underplay the connection between fascism and capitalism. The government has failed miserably to deal with the COVID crisis. And we face a cultural landscape dominated by the empty ballast of the mainstream media that lacks the courage to both deal with the growing threat of authoritarianism and to name neoliberal capitalism and white supremacy as organizing principles of American politics. We live at a time in which disorder and manufactured ignorance have become normalized. Too many Americans view freedom as simply an individual right and ignore the fact that it is also a matter of social responsibility. Civic illiteracy is now wrapped in a false appeal to freedom. Civic courage loses its ethical moorings when it fails to relate the collapse of conscience to the collapse of the welfare state. Struggling for a better world seems almost incomprehensible in a society where the pathology of power, privatization and greed have turned the self-inward to the point where any notion of social commitment and struggle for social justice appears either as a weakness or is treated with disdain. Freedom has partially collapsed into a moral nihilism that creates a straight line from politics to catastrophe to apocalypse. Chaos, uncertainty, loneliness and fear define the current historical moment. In too many cases, learned helplessness leads to learned hopelessness. A culture of consumerism, sensationalism, immediacy, and manufactured ignorance obscures how political and moral passions substitute sheer rage, anger and emotion for a thoughtful defense of truth, the social contract, civic culture, a culture of questioning and democracy itself.

Of course, there are clear and powerful examples of civic courage among young people, the Black Lives Matter Movement, educators, health care workers, union organizers, and others fighting social injustices and systemic racism while caring for the sick, dispossessed, and those bearing the weight of poverty, bigotry and hatred. These inspiring and brave agents of democracy offer a history and sense of the present that allow us to greet the new year with a vision of what a different future would look like, one born out of moral witnessing, the social imagination, civic courage and care for others.

While it is true that we face the new year at a time when social fractures and economic divides fuel a tsunami of fear, anger, falsehoods, conspiracy theories, and in some cases, a politics wedded to violence, we need to summon the courage to reject normalizing such events. As such, we can never let hope turn into the pathology of cynicism, or worse.

In the midst of a surging authoritarianism, we do not have a language that fully comprehends the crisis Americans face politically, economically and socially. We need a language that views politics more comprehensively, connects the dots among diverse issues, and offers empowering strategies for creating mass movements. Hopefully, the new year will offer us the time to construct a visionary language as a condition for rethinking the possibilities that might come in the future, one that offers the promise of a sustainable democracy. Values such as freedom, solidarity and equality need to breathe again, develop deeper roots, and renew an individual and collective sense of social responsibility and joint action. We need to throw out the harmful assumptions that turn freedom into a toxic notion of selfishness, hope into a crushing cynicism, and politics into a site of indifference, cruelty and corruption. The new year should push us to reclaim the virtues of dignity, compassion and justice. It should remind us of the necessity to dream again, imagine the unimaginable, and think otherwise in order to act otherwise.

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Amid Apocalyptic Cynicism, Lets Embrace Radical Hope in the New Year - Truthout