No more apologists for Fascists
23rd May 2022 · 0 Comments
A racist and anti-Semitic illness infects America. This virulent ideological cancer, known as the “Great Replacement conspiracy theory,” most recently caused the violent deaths of ten African-American employees and customers of a small grocery store in Buffalo, New York. Eighteen-year-old Payton Gendron opened fire upon 13 defenseless people, as he spouted the worst ethnic slurs imaginable.
The problem is that the young shooter did not come up with this bullet-pointed list of barbarism on his own. He derived his manifesto from the Internet, from websites of white nationalist organizations who have been graced by speeches from GOP members of Congress like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Paul Gosar.
And instead of condemnation from Republican leader Kevin McCarthy for daring to address these groups, these congresspersons were not even slightly reproached. Of course, they set an example for a suicidal and confused young man to be radicalized into terrorism. Until every politician of every political stripe condemns every Alt-Right group, and anyone who chooses to espouse these dangerous philosophies unequivocally, more shootings are in danger of occurring – and not just to African Americans.
Consider just a sampling of sick quotes from Gendron’s manifesto:
• “Call me an ethno-nationalist eco-fascist national socialist if you want, I wouldn’t disagree with you.”
• “I’m advocating for is (sic) the gentiles vs. the Jews. We outnumber them 100x, and they are not strong by themselves. But by their Jewish ways, they turn us against each other.”
• “The Jews are the biggest problem the Western world has ever had. They must be called out and killed.”
• “We cannot show any sympathy towards them [Jews] again.”
• “I wish all JEWS to HELL! Go back to hell where you came from DEMON!”
• “The Jews are responsible for many problems that we in the western world face today….For our self-preservation, the Jews must be removed from our Western civilizations, in any way possible.”
“The manifesto’s language closely echoes the themes of previous rants posted by white supremacist shooters, and refers repeatedly to the virulently racist and anti-Semitic Great Replacement conspiracy theory, which argues that Jews are responsible for non-white immigration into the United States, and that non-white immigrants will eventually replace (and lead to the extinction of) the white race,” noted the Anti-Defamation League in a report posted on its website.
“Before the shooting, [the man later arrested and charged] allegedly posted a virulently racist, 180-page manifesto detailing his reasons for the attack,” noted the ADL. “According to the manifesto, [Payton Gendron] chose that store and zip code because he believed a high percentage of Black people live there. This mirrors the approach taken by white supremacist shooter Patrick Crusius, who targeted a Walmart in El Paso, Texas, with a substantially Hispanic customer base.”
Time magazine reports that “significant sections of the Buffalo gunman’s document are copied from the manifesto of the New Zealand man who killed 51 people in the massacre he live-streamed in Christchurch. The Buffalo shooter also casts himself as a hero in the mold of other racist mass shooters, including Dylann Roof, who killed nine Black parishioners during a Bible study in Charleston, S.C., in 2015.
The true horror, as Wyoming Republican Rep. Liz Cheney made clear last Monday morning, is that Gendron’s insidious ideas have become common place in the mainstream political discussion because politicians in her own party have allowed it so.
“The House GOP leadership has enabled white nationalism, white supremacy, and anti-semitism. History has taught us that what begins with words ends in far worse. @GOP leaders must renounce and reject these views and those who hold them.” So far, Kevin McCarthy has chosen to do neither, Cheney concluded.
In the wake of the shooting, New York Governor Kathy Hochul has proposed some good ideas on how to ward off future terrorist attacks, such as what was seen in Buffalo. They include, better enforcement of “Red Flag Laws,” creating a new ‘Office of Counterterrorism’ within the State Police focusing on “domestic terrorism” (and monitoring social media for evidence of violent tendencies and extremist ideology), as well as mandating tracing systems for semi automatic weapons.
However, none of these reforms will work unless – with one voice – all elements of the body politic condemn ALL forms of ethno-fascism. The U.S. House Minority Leader must be no exception, unhesitant to censor any one of his members who would seek votes by legitimizing the racist fringe.
Or else, lists like this one will be printed every Monday in the newspapers of every major city.
This article originally published in the May 23, 2022 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.
