See response:
From: lbo-talk-bounces at lbo-talk.org on behalf of cgrimes at rawbw.COM Sent: Tue 1/1/2008 2:10 AM To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org; lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org Subject: [lbo-talk] Allen, racism, fascism and beyond
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"machine that is impossible to reproduce in America---and the corollary which Chip Bertlet keeps championing, that American fascists are completely reducible to a few Ayran-nation weirdos with tatoos and motorcycles. (And believe me Chip I want to you to argue me out of this idea.)"
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Great essay--annoying parody of my work. I study a whole range of authoritarian, fascist, and neonazi ideologies and movements. I do not believe, and have never written, that the main threat of fascism in the United States comes from "a few Ayran-nation weirdos." I have written repeatedly that the main threat of fascism in the U.S. does not come from places like the Bush administration, as horrid as it is, but from right-wing populist mass movements of white people: The overwhelmingly white Christian Right; nativist and xenophobic anti-immigrant movements; and jingoistic anti-Islamic ultra-patriotic militarism.
This is a central premise of Right-Wing Populism in America by Matt Lyons and me. Has anyone on this list actually bothered to read it? We repeatedly cite Allen and talk about the invisibility of white racial consciousness as a barrier to progressive organizing, and central to replacing class consciousness with historic racialized scapegoating.
See also:
Chip Berlet, "When Alienation Turns Right: Populist Conspiracism, the Apocalyptic Style, and Neofascist Movements." In Lauren Langman & Devorah Kalekin Fishman, (eds.), Trauma, Promise, and the Millennium: The Evolution of Alienation. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005.
One reason my work is more popular in Europe than the U.S. is that over there folks actually bother to read what I write.
Bad way to start the new year.
-Chip