by liberal japonicus (image information here)
Hartmut mentioned Horst Wessel in connection with Charlie Kirk. First a little background on Horst Wessel and a Forward article about why people are connecting the two. This academic paper is worth a read, though I am getting sensitive to the criticism that being too academic is problematic.
During the years of the ‘period of struggle’ in Weimar Germany, Goebbels was to give new meaning to the Nazis’ irrational world view with his use of myths which served to cloak a brutal reality. The most effective of these myths grew out of the conditions of the political civil war waged by the paramilitary forces of Weimar Germany’s most radical parties – the Nazis and the communists. I The blood myth – which featured the death of a noble warrior, his resurrection, and ultimately his spiritual return to the fighting columns of Brown Shirts – was the most compelling theme of all, and it found its apotheosis in the saga of Horst Wessel.
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For Goebbels, it was insufficient to intone chants over the bodies of countless SA men. He was convinced that generalities do not move the masses; only easily identifiable symbols would serve such a purpose. The agony and death of Horst Wessel, killed by communists in the winter of 1930, was exactly the theme that the Gauleiter needed to offer his propaganda the unifying symbol it lacked.
I did say precursors, so I’m also thinking Lei Feng. The New Yorker had this article, which is unfortunately behind a paywall. Lei Feng might be a better parallel, in that Kirk isn’t being invoked as Horst Wessel was, a warrior, but the way that Kirk’s Christian faith has been waved like a bloody shirt (though it has been noted that Kirk’s embrace of Christianity seemed to represent an attempt “to distance themselves publically from Neo-Nazism“)
Here’s a Chinese military link lauding Lei Feng.
“Lei Feng is a role model of the times, and the spirit of Lei Feng is eternal. To achieve the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation, we need more role models of our times”, President Xi Jinping, also general secretary of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Central Committee and chairman of the Central Military Commission, said in an important instruction on further carrying out the activities of learning from Lei Feng, a late ordinary soldier and a household icon in China celebrated for selflessly helping others. The year 2023 marks the 60th year since revolutionaries of the older generation, including Mao Zedong, wrote inscriptions for comrade Lei Feng. Over the six decades, on the land of China, people listen to his stories, read his diary, learning from Lei Feng has become a broad ideological consensus and action consciousness. Time goes by, Lei Feng is always in our hearts; with the change of times, the spirit of Lei Feng is timeless.
In fact, in Chinese, you can say 活雷锋 (huó Léi Fēng) the way we would say a Good Samaritan. I await with bated breath the Right complimenting people as ‘he’s a really Charlie Kirk’. God help us.
That’s certainly what the Republicans are doing: deifying Charlie because that’s how they legitimize themselves and delegitimize everyone else.
I’ve been thinking about Ezra Klein and his horrible fascist-enabling article about Kirk “doing politics the right way.” Apparently, Ezra thinks that having public discussions where a hater gets to air the hateful crap is doing politics the right way.
I’m more in agreement with this guy who says in the article that he doesn’t debate fascists. Why not? Because they are wrong, so there’s nothing to discuss.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/the-problem-with-debating-fascists-from-a-guy-who-s-debated-just-about-everyone/ar-AA1MOhSE?ocid=msedgntp&pc=HCTS&cvid=68cc404ce9b94b64b1660870857945a1&ei=21
Medhi Hasan engages in lots of debates, not to change the mind of the person he’s talking to, but to reach the people who are watching and listening.
We need to move the Overton Window so that discourse that promotes stochastic violence is not debated or discussed as if there was legitimacy to it. Just called out for what it is and rejected.
On the Horst Wessel side of it, though, much of the religious right is referring to Kirk as “a warrior for God” and “a soldier of Christ.” The Christian side of the culture wars is heavily influenced by the “spiritual warfare” types. They literally believe that they are engaged in spiritual combat against demons who have jurisdiction over geographical areas. It’s very animist – I’m wondering if it isn’t to Christianity what Shinto is to Buddhism. As such, I expect more hagiography, and more militant hagiography, as they seek to meld temporal military service with spiritual military service in their political theology. It’s a very small narrative step from the valorization of the fallen soldier as political martyr and extending it to all of the Left Behind mythology and fantasies of one big, final End Times battle for the soul of humanity. Kirk is ideally situated for this project.
Was Jesus, the Christ, a nationalist?
The Roman governor of the Roman province of Judea allegedly crucified Jesus of Nazareth for calling himself (or being called by others, perhaps) “King of the Jews”. So, yes?
MAGAts are generally ignorant of the content, let alone the history, of their “faith”. Or maybe not. Maybe “Christian Nationalist” is not an oxymoron but the modern-day culmination of the Jesus cult. Forget that whatever Jesus of Nazareth thought of “nationalism”, American “patriotism” never crossed his mind. Ignore what namby-pamby Christians have to say about welcoming the stranger or caring for the poor, it’s what the multimillionaire pastors of megachurches have to say that counts. Or what “martyrs” like Charlie Kirk have to say, for that matter.
The Gospel According to Saint Charles of Kirk got a curious sort of publicity boost by dint of his death. On the one hand, his “martyrdom” is purported to require veneration of his dedication to spreading his gospel. On the other hand, quoting it verbatim is blasphemy, according to the MAGAt Inquisition.
The MAGAts are determined to canonize Saint Charlie, but to forbid quoting him. Come to think of it, they don’t like libruls quoting Jesus of Nazareth either.
–TP
Well, they used to canonize Reagan, although the real St.Ronnie (as vile as many of his policies were) would be hunted out of the party these days as a RINO. It was and still is blasphemous to tell that he raised taxes (12 times iirc) when he realized that his initial tax cuts would have led straight to national bankruptcy.
real St.Ronnie (as vile as many of his policies were) would be hunted out of the party these days as a RINO
Or, given half a chance, purge most of the “Christian nationalists” (and pretty much all of the Trumpys) from the party. The left has demonized Reagan so long** that it’s easy to lose track of the fact that he actually cared about this country. And not just some delusional image of what it actually never was. Also, when some piece of ideology turned out to work in the real world, he would accept that reality and change. Something the current Republican Party is either unwilling or flat unable to do.
** Mind, I had little use for him. Not as President. Not when he was Governor here.