Identitarianism

JUST THE PANTS, PLEASE:

Why do fascists love yoga? : For more than a century, elements of the far right have been attracted by the rigour of eastern disciplines. But does the connection stand up? (Miles Ellingham, 7/24/25, The Observer)

After reading Home’s book, I met him near his old yoga studio. Home and I sat in the shade of an overhanging tree, meditative but not cross-legged upon a rock. I put it to him that if, say, ping-pong happened to have a number of fascist devotees, it doesn’t necessarily make it fascist. “But what about if the guy who came up with the game of ping-pong had a bunch of fascist and white supremacist followers,” he responds. “Also, ping-pong doesn’t have the mystical trappings of a cult.”

Home argues that fascist yoga continued into the late 20th century, only in a slightly more veiled way. “A lot of the earlier fascist yogis are referred back to,” he says of subsequent followers. “So even someone like Harvey Day, who is explicitly anti-racist in his books, can’t resist mentioning the Aryan origins of yoga and will reference Francis Yeats-Brown and other people, and I think it’s the credulity around the beliefs, it’s what I describe as anti-essentialism and belief in one’s own truth. Also, with QAnon and anti-vax stuff, you see this being discussed more.”

Home sees a telling similarity between the reverence QAnon adherents feel towards their saviour, Donald Trump, and the ardent spiritual devotion for Hitler displayed by the Nazis. “There’s a very clear parallel between the two things,” he says. Whether QAnon’s “esoteric Hitlerism” is consciously borrowed or simply emerges from the same mythic structure, he continues, “hinges on research I haven’t done”.

Travis View, via his QAA Podcast, has been examining the QAnon movement since its origins in 2017. View points out perhaps the most obvious recent collision point between far-right QAnon conspiracy theory and new age beliefs: Jacob Chansley, AKA “the QAnon Shaman”. Chansley became the mascot of the 6 January insurrection after he stormed the US Capitol in facepaint and a fur horned headdress. Having gained access to the Senate chamber, Chansley led the rioters in quasi-Christian prayer but, View explains, he was also fascinated by Native American mysticism and occultism.

“I also think there’s a broad overlap,” View says, “between the hyper-individualism of the far right and new age wellness thinking. There’s a distrust of, for example, public health measures and a belief that you have a moral obligation to take care of your own health entirely. This is why there’s so much overlap in anti-vaccine belief; it’s a far-right belief, but also something you’d see in crunchy yoga circles.”

Another similarity, View says, is that both camps prioritise esoteric knowledge. “If you’re very deeply into spiritualism, there’s a belief that there’s esoteric knowledge that is suppressed and you can ‘awaken’ to it … and then on the far right, they have the same belief, but it’s that the media and the education system is controlled by Jews or whatever, and in order to escape this thinking, you have to awaken to the lies of society. Both promote a personal hero’s journey you have to go through in order to reject mainstream orthodox knowledge.”

APPLYING DARWINISM:

It’s Carl Schmitt’s Moment (James Traub, Summer 2025, Democracy)

Yet those, whether of the left or right, who wish to treat Schmitt as a guide need to fully reckon with what he meant by democracy in the absence of liberalism. With his flair for the resonant opening line, Schmitt begins The Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy by declaring, “The history of political and state theory of the nineteenth century could be summarized with a single phrase: the triumphal march of democracy.” But by “democracy” Schmitt does not mean the political and civic institutions through which the wishes of voters shape the policy of the state, or even the deep conviction of human equality that Tocqueville regarded as the essence of American democracy. Schmitt means the idea of “the people” as supreme governing force that descends from the French Revolution. For Schmitt, as for Rousseau, the people are not a pluralistic group of individuals, but a single homogeneous mass possessed of a “collective will.” The leader seizes upon that will to guide the state. Democracy is thus incompatible with pluralism, which Schmitt describes as a form of “liberal individualism” that reduces the state to “a revocable service for individuals and their free associations.”

The whole panoply of individual rights set forth in the great democratic documents—and, indeed, individualism as an ethos—belongs, Schmitt argues, to liberalism rather than to democracy. The collective will is not the sum of individual wills individually expressed, but rather the single will of a unified people. That unity must be forged if it does not naturally exist. In one of his most brutal passages, Schmitt writes, “Democracy requires, therefore, first homogeneity, and second—if the need arises—elimination or eradication of heterogeneity.” The “other” must be excluded, he argues, whether by restrictions on immigration or the denial of citizenship.

Democratic homogeneity can in theory be based on any unifying characteristic. But in 1923 one did not have to look far for the deepest sources of identity, which Schmitt saw in “[t]he more naturalistic conceptions of race and descent…the speech, tradition, and consciousness of a shared culture and education.” Homogeneity meant racial identity. Schmitt goes on to ridicule the precept of “absolute human equality” as a meaningless article of liberal hypocrisy. A society that embraces people of every faith, doctrine, and language—that is, a pluralist society—will never cohere around a collective will. Democracy depends on exclusion of the other and of the non-equal. Behind this strange argument is Schmitt’s deep conviction that it is the state that ultimately creates the people rather than the people who create the state. A strong democracy is one in which the state has forged the people into a united force.

He had them at Identitarianism.

EITHER A CHRISTIAN OR AN IDENTITARIAN:

Time With Erich Fromm: A Cautionary Tale (Art Kusserow, 7/18/25, Voegelin View)

Fromm’s comment on the inherent conflict described above might best be summarized here: “There is only one possible, productive solution for the relationship of individualized man with the world: his active solidarity with all men and his spontaneous activity, love and work, which unite him again with the world, not by primary ties but as a free and independent individual. However, if the economic, social and political conditions do not offer a basis for the realization of individuality in the sense just mentioned, while at the same time people have lost those ties which gave them security, this lag makes freedom an unbearable burden. It then becomes identical with doubt, with a kind of life which lacks meaning and direction. Powerful tendencies arise to escape from this kind of freedom into submission or some kind of relationship to man and the world which promises relief from uncertainty, even if it deprives the individual of his freedom.”

The ”relief from uncertainty” Fromm describes is to be found in identification with a leader who promises “freedom” from such uncertainty. The identification with such leaders, who are often elevated to “messianic” status, and the fantasied relief they promise, explains the psychological underpinnings of the supposed “populism” broad-based media often struggle to explain.

OTHEFR THAN THAT, HOW DID YOU ENJOY THE SHOW…:

Autocracy, Corruption, and Decline: Why Hungary and Orbanism Must Never be a Model for the U.S. (Michael Maya, June 30, 2025, Just Security)

Do average Hungarians share the enthusiasm for Orban exhibited by Trump, CPAC, and the Heritage Foundation? In short, no. Here is one telling statistic: from 2010 to 2024, emigration from Hungary rose by 464 percent. In fact, the number of Hungarians leaving their country rose sharply almost immediately after Orban’s April 2010 election victory. For scores of Hungarians, the future looks bleak, with a recent survey finding that 34 percent of recent graduates and 55 percent of 18-40-year-old Hungarians plan to emigrate. In light of Hungary’s aging population – its median age is 43.9 years – Orban can ill-afford to drive out Hungary’s best, brightest, and youngest. That so many Hungarians are eager to flee Orban’s rule provides the first hint that enthusiasm among his U.S-based cheerleaders is misplaced, even suspect.

Even a cursory inquiry into Orban’s record reveals that he has presided not over Hungary’s advancement but rather its alarming decline. For one, he has masterminded Hungary’s transformation from a full democracy to an “electoral autocracy,” according to the European Parliament. Freedom House now rates Hungary as only “partly free.” As noted in Bertelsmann’s 2024 Sustainable Governance Indicators (SGI): “Elections are typically free but not fair, with the ruling Fidesz party benefiting from large-scale gerrymandering, asymmetrical media access and the misuse of state assets.” Today, Hungary is an SGI bottom dweller, ranking 30th out of 30 with respect to: (1) Elections, (2) Quality of the Parties and Candidates, and (3) Access to Official Information.

Adding to Hungary’s woes is its economy, which has stagnated since 2022, with GDP growth rates declining for four years straight and a ballooning budget deficit of 4.9 percent of GDP, significantly higher than the European Union average of 3 percent. Hungary is also plagued by high inflation, forcing the government to take drastic steps such as limiting grocers’ profit margins. Predictably, Hungary’s currency, the Forint, has lost value and both domestic and foreign investors, wary of arbitrary regulatory shifts and opaque enforcement, are rethinking investments in Hungary. More than €20 billion in EU funds that would have come to Hungary have been suspended over rule of law violations, and innovation lags as firms hesitate to invest in research, development, or new technologies. Why? Among other things, they lack confidence in intellectual property protections.

For ordinary Hungarians, Orban’s mismanagement of the economy has translated into living standards significantly lower than many of the other 37 member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Given these and other declines, it is no surprise that, just in the last year, Hungary fell 13 places in Gallup’s World Happiness Report. Hungary now ranks below Russia, China, Uzbekistan, and Honduras. Predictably, countries with thriving democracies dominate the list of happiest countries.

WHY MAGA HATES AMERICA:

Rediscovering Order in an Age of Populism (Mike Pence & Ed Feulner, Summer 2025, National Affairs)

Conservatism once proudly embraced a positive vision, offering the American people clear alternatives to the prevailing left-leaning orthodoxies of the day. In the final decades of the 20th century, conservatives not only opposed affirmative action’s quixotic pursuit of equal outcomes, they championed equality of opportunity for all. Conservatives were not simply opposed to letting communism run wild; they contained it by boldly leading the free world. Conservatives were not just critical of big government; their support for free markets unleashed one of the greatest economic expansions in history. At the heart of conservatism lay an ambition to help America flourish, coupled with the desire to preserve the private institutions — families, churches, local communities, and the like — that serve as the building blocks of an ordered society. […]

Conservatism is not a rigid ideology promising utopia; it is a disposition — a state of mind grounded in timeless principles. It recognizes human nature as it is and has been throughout the ages, and points toward a distinct approach to governing ourselves. Conservatism values obedience to a transcendent moral order, reverence for tradition and our forebears, prudence in decision-making, humility regarding our place in history, and the pursuit of justice in a fallen world. These harmonious values make conservatism a timeless philosophy that aligns seamlessly with self-governance.

In seeking to privilege white males, the Right needs bigger government, has to repudiate morality for its universalism and, thereby, must oppose the Founding.

WHY MAGA IMAGINES DONALD MUSCULAR:

The Dark Magic of Words: Why Fascism and Illiberalism is So Seductive to Writers: Ed Simon Looks at Eduard Limonov, Gabriele D’Annunzio, Yukio Mishima, and Others (Ed Simon, June 23, 2025, LitHub)

Myth and fantasy are what the fascist trade in, of Russia made great again, or Italy made great again, or someplace made great again (it’s always some place), but at the expense of our souls. This is the danger of an artistic temperament at its most extreme, what Nietzsche celebrated as the “Dionysian” in The Birth of Tragedy, where the artist “enriches everything out of one’s own fullness: whatever one sees, whatever wills is seen swelled, taught, strong, overloaded with strength” until all of reality merely becomes “reflections of his perfection.”

Such idealization of pure experience is an idolatry of death, since such an artist can’t envision the world beyond their individuality, can’t conceive of others enduring after the poet’s extinction. Think of Limonov’s “Yes, Death!,” of D’Annunzio’s 1894 novel The Triumph of Death.

CUOMO RAN AS DONALD:

Zohran Mamdani and the Making of a “Muslim Menace”: Islamophobia and the politics of belonging (Tazeen M. Ali, June 24, 2025, ARC)

In a campaign mailer designed by a PAC supporting disgraced former New York governor and current mayoral hopeful Andrew Cuomo, Queens assembly member Zohran Mamdani’s image appears with his beard digitally altered to look longer, fuller, and darker. This manipulation invokes tired Islamophobic tropes that cast bearded brown Muslim men as dangerous, violent, and in Mamdani’s case, unfit for public office. While the mailer was never distributed by Cuomo’s camp, the image leaked online. Mamdani responded to the image by calling it what it was: Islamophobic and “meant to make me look threatening.”

Moreover, the manipulated beard image is a part of a long-standing tradition in American politics: altering minoritized candidates’ physical features to further racist, Islamophobic, and antisemitic tropes, and cast them as inherently other. Cuomo’s camp condemned the altered image, but this smear was not an isolated incident: it was part of a broader pattern. As Mamdani’s campaign has surged in the final days before New York’s Democratic mayoral primary—which ends Tuesday—he has faced a wave of coded and overt attacks. Cuomo has warned voters that to elect Mamdani would be “reckless and dangerous.” Mamdani has also received multiple death threats replete with Islamophobic language, calling him “a terrorist who is not welcome in New York or America.”

These attacks are not just about politics. They are also about identity. Mamdani, a Twelver Shia Muslim, African-born immigrant, and democratic socialist, represents a challenge to entrenched racial, religious, and political hierarchies. As with other progressive politicians of color, from Ilhan Omar to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the backlash against him reveals the limits of establishment tolerance for candidates who refuse to conform.

WHERE’S CATO WHEN WE NEED HIM:

Caesar in California: A domestic deployment in California could mark the moment the military ceases to serve the Constitution—and begins serving the man. (Jonathan M. Winer, Jun 9, 2025, Washington Spectator)

Most significantly, the President would be using the Insurrection Act not to restore order in a collapsed state, but to override political resistance in a functioning, law-abiding one.

This is not Little Rock, where federal troops escorted children into school after Governor Orval Faubus defied the Supreme Court. It is California—a sovereign state whose disagreements with federal immigration policy have been debated in courts, not on battlefields. The precedent is telling. Then, as now, a state deployed its National Guard in defiance of federal authority—Faubus to block school desegregation ordered by the Supreme Court, Trump now to impose federal immigration enforcement over local resistance. But the roles have been reversed: President Eisenhower used the Insurrection Act to uphold constitutional rights and enforce the judicial mandate to desegregate Arkansas public schools. Trump now flirts with using it to suppress political dissent and override judicially recognized state discretion. In both cases, the stakes concern more than law enforcement—they test whether the military serves the Constitution or the will of a single executive.

The Insurrection Act grants the President broad power—but that power depends on facts that justify its use. When those facts are weak, manipulated, or manufactured, the result is not emergency governance but authoritarian performance.

The administration may counter that ICE officers are unable to execute lawful warrants in cities where resistance is both physical and coordinated. They may argue that when protesters form human chains to block detentions, and local police stand down, the rule of law is undermined. These facts would need to be documented in detail—especially if challenged in a motion for emergency injunctive relief.

That challenge would come quickly. Within hours of a formal invocation, expect California to file for a temporary restraining order in federal district court. The complaint would argue that the President’s action is ultra vires, lacks factual basis, and violates constitutional principles of federalism, due process, and freedom of speech and association. Declarations from ICE personnel, federal marshals, and state officials would be critical in assessing whether the claimed “impracticability” is real or rhetorical.

Whatever a district court decides, the outcome would likely be appealed and quickly reach the Supreme Court. The stakes are enormous. The Insurrection Act grants the President broad power—but that power depends on facts that justify its use. When those facts are weak, manipulated, or manufactured, the result is not emergency governance but authoritarian performance.

We’re all so fond of declaiming, “Never Again!” And then we get spooked by “others” who mean it.

ALL DONALD HAS TO OFFER IS IDENTITARIANISM:

Against Identity by Alexander Douglas review – a superb critique of contemporary self-obsession: A philosopher challenges us to forget about ourselves in this powerfully strange counterblast to identity fetishism (Steven Poole, 10 Jun 2025, The Guardian)

Philosopher Alexander Douglas’s deeply interesting book diagnoses our malaise, ecumenically, as a universal enslavement to identity. An alt-right rabble rouser who denounces identity politics is just as wedded to his identity as a leftwing “activist” is wedded to theirs. And this, Douglas argues persuasively, explains the polarised viciousness of much present argument. People respond to criticisms of their views as though their very identity is being attacked. The response is visceral and emotional. That’s why factchecking conspiracy theories doesn’t work. And it’s not just a social media problem; it’s far worse than that. “If you define yourself by your ethnicity or your taste in music,” Douglas argues, “then you ipso facto demarcate yourself against others who do not share in that identity. Here we have the basis for division and intergroup conflict.”

The Right is the Left.