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SethCotlar's profile
Seth Cotlar
Seth Cotlar
Seth Cotlar
@SethCotlar

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Seth Cotlar

@SethCotlar

Teaches American History at Willamette University. Wrote a book on Tom Paine and the Americans who hated/loved him. Writing a book on nostalgia in 19th C Am.

Salem, Or
medium.com/@sethcotlar
Joined May 2014

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    1. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

      Having listened to a few podcasts on which Rich Lowry talks about his vision of "conservative nationalism," I have many thoughts, but mostly this one. Maybe people would love the nation more if anti-gov't and anti-tax conservatives hadn't spent 50 years starving its institutions.pic.twitter.com/Sqe52G7V8d

      9 replies 56 retweets 201 likes
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    2. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

      As in, maybe if we had well-funded systems of public education, public transportation, public housing, Medicare for everyone, etc etc. then people would have reason to feel more invested in and connected to their fellow citizens. Just spitballing here.

      2 replies 15 retweets 87 likes
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      Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

      It's interesting because conservatives generally think of humans as self-interested, transactional beings. That's what makes the free market work, supposedly. But when it comes to politics, we're supposed to have a totally emotional, non-transactional relationship to our country.

      8:52 AM - 10 Nov 2019
      • 17 Retweets
      • 77 Likes
      • Dr. Captain Abraham Martin Ferrini Karthik Chandramouli M@ Bridgette Benton Jim, awaiting news Betsy W Gregory Chandler Marc N Cunat
      3 replies 17 retweets 77 likes
        1. New conversation
        2. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          In this interview, for example, Lowry's vision of "the nation" is entirely cultural. He picks out presumably "timeless" parts of American culture like the TJ Memorial (built in the 30s) & T-giving (started in 1863) as the sinews of "American nationalism."https://thefederalist.com/2019/11/07/podcast-rich-lowry-on-nationalism-and-why-america-needs-it/ …

          1 reply 1 retweet 34 likes
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        3. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          The red meat in that interview involves the supposed "leftist, culture elite" plot to destroy "our culture" & "our history." Lowry imagines a future in which the TJ memorial & T-giving are cancelled. Vote GOP, or grandma's stuffing recipe is banished to the dustbin of history!

          2 replies 3 retweets 37 likes
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        4. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          The two specific issues Lowry associates with this anti-American plot on the part of the "cultural elite" are Black Lives Matter and gender fluidity. I suspect working class black youths in St. Louis and trans kids in North Carolina were unaware of their "cultural elite" status.

          2 replies 5 retweets 58 likes
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        5. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          What's going on here is as old as the conservative hills. People from marginalized communities organizing to demand legal rights and protections are figured as "un-American troublemakers" who do not speak for "the real America" which they supposedly "hate."

          2 replies 13 retweets 67 likes
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        6. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          People in positions of power who take these protestors seriously, who listen to their experiences and use their power to advocate for them, are figured as "outside agitators" and "cultural elites" who are trying to "force their way of life" on the good, noble "real Americans."

          2 replies 2 retweets 44 likes
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        7. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          Meanwhile, the people in positions of power (like Lowry and GOP politicians) who just want these "pesky" transgender and black American youths to "get over it and toughen up" are somehow not acting like "cultural elites," but are just salt of the earth, "real Americans."

          1 reply 4 retweets 41 likes
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        8. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          This would be slightly less galling if Lowry and the host didn't also positively invoke MLK as one of their heroes, one of the people who articulated the sort of American nationalism these conservative men embrace. Puhleeze.

          2 replies 3 retweets 40 likes
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        9. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          The way Lowry and the host talk about BLM and transgender activists is *exactly* the way their conservative predecessors talked about Civil Rights activists in the 1960s. They want to claim the gains of that movement, while demeaning its contemporary inheritors.

          3 replies 6 retweets 72 likes
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        10. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          Even worse, they probably, if given the chance, would identify their own, conservative movement, as the true inheritor of MLK's mantle. This is the move D'Souza and Kirk make all the time.

          1 reply 2 retweets 40 likes
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        11. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          But in the interests of historical accuracy, it's worth remembering that Lowry currently sits in the National Review editor's seat previously held by St. William Buckley, who had this to say following MLK's assassination. h/t @ifthedevilisixpic.twitter.com/Dhxe8JHKCf

          4 replies 6 retweets 34 likes
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        12. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          One last thought about "conservative cultural nationalism." "To devote oneself to the business of preserving and reproducing the culture of one's group is to risk one of the most terrible fates in modern society, obsolescence." Louis Menand, The Metaphysical Club, p. 399.

          1 reply 2 retweets 26 likes
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        13. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          Here's the full paragraph from which that sentence comes. The anti-modernist thread in the American Conservative Tradition is becoming ever more apparent and prominent these days. Trump's "I know a guy" anti-institutionalism is textbook, gemeinschaft Know Nothing-ness.pic.twitter.com/u6vYWzMAd3

          1 reply 2 retweets 21 likes
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        14. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          It also captures the "Flight 93" dead ender mentality we see in articles like this, and in the writings of paleo-conservatives like Rod Dreher. The modern world "hates us," hence we must either destroy it or be destroyed by it.https://amgreatness.com/2019/11/02/a-great-awakening-to-the-fight-is-upon-us/ …

          1 reply 3 retweets 21 likes
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        15. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          I understand that hysterical edgelord drama vamping like this generates clicks and book sales...but you'd think that conservatives who, by their own definition have an appreciation for history, would have a more nuanced grasp of how change happens.

          2 replies 2 retweets 20 likes
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        16. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          In the 1830s some people thought the railroads spelled the end of civilization as we know it. In 1865 many of the nation's white people thought giving black people the vote would be catastrophic. In 1900 most men thought that giving women the vote would unravel the nation.

          1 reply 1 retweet 16 likes
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        17. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          In 1922 folks thought radio sounded the death knell of our culture. In 1954 they thought the same thing about TV. Don't even get me started on the birth control pill. Or the electric guitar. Or gay people kissing each other on TV.

          2 replies 0 retweets 23 likes
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        18. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          And yet somehow...somehow...all of these cultural changes have happened and the rising generation has managed to survive and find meanings in their lives that resembled but also sort of departed from the meanings their parents and grandparents found.

          1 reply 2 retweets 23 likes
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        19. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          Instead of learning to ride the wave of historical change, the last several generations of American conservatives have decided to "stand athwart history yelling stop." It's never worked & never will. But it makes for copy that'll sell to grumpy people with power. And so it goes.

          3 replies 6 retweets 25 likes
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        20. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          We all have a "sky is falling" Chicken Little in our lives. American Conservatism has often taken the form of cultural Chicken Little-ism...whatever the new thing is, it's gonna make the sky fall. And then after the sky hasn't fallen, there's a new thing that'll make it happen.

          2 replies 1 retweet 15 likes
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        21. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          Rinse. Repeat. It's almost enough to make someone grab one of these conservatives by the lapels and say "why are you upset about the new ways young people are thinking about and enacting gender roles? It's no skin off your nose. GET OVER IT!"

          2 replies 1 retweet 16 likes
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        22. Seth Cotlar‏ @SethCotlar 10 Nov 2019

          And the fact that so many of today's conservatives are boomers (and others) who love their 1960s and 1970s rock and roll that sounded so discordant and civilizationally destructive to the parents' generation is just [chef's kiss].

          1 reply 1 retweet 20 likes
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        23. End of conversation

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