Re: <nettime> Europe and the MAGA mind virus

[GM - tedbyfield via nettime-l <nettime-l@lists.nettime.org>]

Geoff, you’re exactly right. The usual term is “dogwhistle,” but 
like most internet-era neologisms for describing different modes and 
styles of communication (“playbook,” “trolling,” 
“canceling,” etc), that word muddies things up as much as it 
clarifies them — so it’s best to ignore it.

What you point out — that Vance was speaking not to those assembled 
but to others who would take their place — should be obvious but 
apparently, amazingly isn’t. The conceit — that he would have been 
speaking primarily to them — is nonsense. Does anyone seriously think 
that officials at these rigorously ritualized speeches are actually 
*talking with each other*? At any time other than Vance’s speech the 
answer would be a resounding *of course not!*. So, if it’s surprising 
in this context, then that in itself seems strange. But it isn’t 
mysterious.

The US has been awash in liberal denialism for decades, but over the 
last decade of Trump it’s drowning or, arguably, *has drowned*. 
Slogans like “this isn’t who we are!”, “we’re better than 
this!”, “not my president!”, “another world is possible!”, etc 
are just the tip of the iceberg. Beneath them is an entire empire of 
recursive negations about *this* world: “these people are insane / 
uneducated / etc,” someone — some heroic prosecutor, the courts, 
some secret “resistance” in the civil service — will stop them, 
it’ll happen in a courtroom, or in some other state, or on Election 
Day. Always somewhere else, always somewhen else.

Right now, US liberaldom feels the winds of heroism ruffle their hair 
whenever they use words like “fascist,” “nazi,” and “coup”: 
they’re like OMG PINCH ME I’M ACTUALLY SPEAKING TRUTH TO POWER!!!!! 
But if it feels thrilling now, that’s only because they spent the last 
decade smugly challenging those names for what was happening and (as 
always) impugning anyone who used them. Those who did were dismissed as 
(again with the negations!) unhinged, ignorant (that the left 
“always” says those things), incoherent, ill-mannered, and fifty 
other shades of othering. And after the first barrage of ad hominem was 
over, in swept the cavalry of pedants: legions of Arendtsplainers 
who’d cluck about how Trump didn’t meet X, Y, or Z criteria peculiar 
to 1930s Germany, bores arguing J6 wasn’t a “coup” because it 
failed or because the military didn’t intervene, and so on. Even now, 
as the richest guy in the world and his army of shocktwerps maraud 
around the government, demolishing one hard-won agency after another, 
liberals *still* nervously debate whether they’re allowed to use the 
word ”coup,” as if this were a crisis in taxonomy.

This has a much deeper, longer history of course — most recently, the 
Democrats’ insistence, despite all evidence, that the far right was 
exceptional, though exactly *how* it was exceptional changed with the 
seasons. Rightist were the dying gasp of an old world, the result of 
“low information” or “media deserts,” loners and losers, 
anomalies brought to power by accidents of history, their bark was worse 
than their bite, etc. The *only* thing these disparate explanations had 
in common was (wait for it. . .) denialism.

Unfortunately, this — liberal denialism — is one area where there 
was almost perfect accord between US and EU elites. And that, I think, 
is what explains the response to Vance’s speech. As you say, he was in 
the room with them, but he was speaking to others who weren’t there. 
And *that* sent a very strong message to those present.

Ted

On 18 Feb 2025, at 6:24, Geoffrey Goodell via nettime-l wrote:

> I am not convinced that JD Vance's speech served no purpose.  The 
> question we
> might ask is: Who is his audience?  It seems unlikely that the 
> audience is his
> American constituency; suggest that they know or care little about 
> European
> politics or even NATO.
 < . . . >
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