Please make it stop
I briefly noted Tucker Carlson’s latest culture war offering yesterday, but in case you missed it:
Here’s a little excerpt from the program:
Hookay. There has been a lot of chatter about the homoerotic nature of this promo but I really don’t think that’s the point. I suspect Tucker is pushing something else, which John Stoehr’s Editorial Board gets to in his newsletter today:
The Nazis made a fetish of men’s bodies. Some were closeted, but all? As Annika Brockschmidt, author of America’s Holy Warriors, said:
Fascist aesthetic is highly militarized, focusing on sculpted male bodies that represent the strength of the volk.
This form of hyper-militant masculinity can carry homoerotic implications. This is very on brand, not off brand for fascism.
Other aspects are ruralism, anti-urbanism, idealised version of hyper-virility, anti-feminism, pro-natalism.
This is a case study in modern American fascist aesthetics, anti-modernist, inspired by idealized ‘Roman’ bodies.
There was a lot of this during the post 9/11 period too. They fetishized the movie called “The 300” about the Battle of Thermopylae in the Persian Wars, casting themselves as the embattled Spartans. It featured the same imagery:
This is a favorite autocratic fantasy. It’s silly, yes. But it’s also a warning that these people are feeling their oats. It’s what they do when they think they are on the verge of winning.