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I saw the documentary White Right recently. It taught me to see white nationalists as angsty teens going through a “fuck the world” stage. The main differences are (1) they never grew out of it, and (2) as adults, they’ve linked up into an awkward club.
As a political movement, of course, white nationalism is noxious and intolerable to polite society. But psychologically, the individuals can be modeled as socially stunted and often traumatized adolescents.
I find this very thought-provoking. If we take each case individually, they seem to call for compassion, support, maybe some therapy (like e.g. what we would offer to troubled foster kids). But the fact that they’re politically organized demands that we treat them as a threat.
A teenage “fuck the world” attitude can be pretty ugly too. But it doesn’t have political teeth, so we just roll our eyes while extending empathy to the person behind it.
Do you hold this opinion of other racial nationalisms, or is white nationalism unique in some way, in your estimation?
Great Q. I don’t have any handle on the other racial nationalisms. I don’t even think this analysis applies to e.g. Nazi nationalism during the Third Reich. I think it applies in conditions where the nationalists in question are “structurally low status.”
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