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Democrats who think that President Trump may have committed an impeachable offense for apparently trying to extort Ukraine are " human scum." A Republican congresswoman trying to make a political point during said hearing is " lying trash." Just as every person with an "R" next to their name became "racists," and every person with a "D" became "socialists," we have diluted the meaning of every word in the book as it pertains to politics, and now we're reaping the rewards.

Barack Obama was not a socialist, a fact that we can surely all see with his recent demands that Democrats slow down their sprint towards Stalinism. But the Right abandoned all nuance when it came to the former president and his social-democratic ways. Now, legitimately socialist Bolshevik presidential candidates and rising superstars have radically shifted the party's Overton window on policy. And conservatives no longer have the language to describe it.

Mitt Romney was not a racist. His vehement condemnation of Trump shrugging off literal white nationalists in Charlottesville should have made that clear. But just as all Republicans were for the better part of a decade, Romney was effectively smeared as a racist during the most milquetoast Republican presidential campaign of a generation. And now actual alt-right racists have earned the embrace of prominent Republicans, and Stephen Miller sits in the West Wing, firing off V-Dare and American Renaissance articles to journalists.

We should be able to excoriate racists and racism-apologists as such. But when everyone's already been branded a racist, no one is.

Now we've cranked the euphemism treadmill so fast that we're flying off the back end. Democrats and Republicans alike are now happy to get in the gutter and call each other scum and trash, using words we might have once reserved for machete-wielding MS-13 members and torch-bearing neo-Nazis. Words are supposed to mean things, but we've desensitized everyone. When perfectly fine members of Congress are now trash and scum, what do we call actual bigots or authoritarians? What about predators and murderers?

This isn't healthy. It isn't normal. But we can at least say that it's bipartisan.

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We've been flung off the euphemism treadmill - Washington Examiner

The second half of the book looks at the use of the swastika and related imagery post-World War II, as taken up by nascent nationalists after the fall of the Soviet Union, skinheads and neo-Nazis, ignorant designers, and, today, the alt-right. As Heller notes, "Many contemporary hate markers are rooted in Nazi iconography both as serious homage and sarcastic digital bots and trolls."

The Internet, particularly our social media-fueled version of it, has created a new ecosystem for hate speech and symbols, all of which can be rapidly produced, trafficked and consumed, at times unwittingly. If, as Heller writes, "symbolism plays a huge role in propagating unsavory ideas," then recognizing those symbols for what they are, is critical.

"I think the more information out there, the better," he says. "But does that mean that information is being digested?" When dealing with the dissemination of troubling designs, the slipperiness of online accountability and the contrarian, rebellious and disingenuous attitude of many of these symbols' users doesn't make the distinctions between malice, a joke or an honest mistake any clearer.

"In any case, the intent is not the issue; history is," he writes. Heller is known for his in-depth knowledge of design history. At SVA, he lectures on the history of graphic design and illustration. Throughout the book, Heller is emphatic that the past not be forgotten, or re-branded. He stresses the now-crucial mnemonic function of the swastika, as the number of those who lived through Nazi atrocities grows fewer, or as memes and misinformation campaigns diminish the severity of the intolerance and injustice, it stands for.

"This is a book that has been designed about a symbol that is being constantly designed, but it's not about design per se," Heller says. "It's about a totality of meaning, context and presentation."

"I can't predict how [the book is] going to be used, and I can't even say how I want it to be used except that I hope it brings people to talking about the symbol."

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SVA MFA Design Co-Chair Steven Heller Examines the Swastika in 'Symbols of Hate' - SVA Features

I initially assumed that angry students had heckledDonald Trump Jr. off the stage last week as he was promoting his new book at UCLA. I was wrong. Junior's big on "owning the libs." He surely showed up at the event armed with snappy comebacks aimed at collegiate "snowflakes," but ended up getting a bitter dose of what Republican politics of the future may look like, courtesy of an emerging right-wing political faction known as the "Groypers."

The Groypers (aka the Groyper Army) call themselves "America first nationalists," so you may wonder what sort of beef they have with a Trump. Their leader is Nicholas J. (Nick) Fuentes, an unwavering Trump supporter and Holocaust denier who marched with white nationalists in Charlottesville. His grudge isnt against Don Jr., but rather with the book event's moderator, Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, a conservative activist group focused on college campuses. Kirk's transgression was fearing alt-right contamination of his "respectable" organization and firing a woman for associating with the Groyper Armys commander-in-chief, who runs a YouTube channel called America First" which promotes views that arent respectable.

Fuentes and his Groypers are trying to fashion themselves as the uncompromising outsiders of the Rightrebels who refuse to sell out to the Republican establishment. As Trump rose to power on his outsider stance, it's a claim that could carry clout. Fuentes' problem with making it stick, however, is complicated by his anti-Semitic, anti-gay, and anti-immigrant rhetoric. When your views appear indistinguishable from Richard Spencer, a claim to being the wave of future conservatives is a hard sell.

The Groyper symbolis a version of the alt-rights Pepe the Frog. As political guerillas, the Groyper Army stages stuntsat conservative events, films them, and distributes the videos on the Internet to broadcast their power. Trump Jr. cancelled the Q&A session to prevent getting Groyped, which is what got him jeered off the stage. Groypers like to use Q&A sessions to ask embarrassing questions about such loaded issues as the changing demographics in the U.S. ("white genocide" is the term they use) and the Republican preoccupation with Israeli.e. the Jews.

Nick Fuentes, a Boston University dropout, was once caught on a hidden microphone saying he's "not a fan of race mixing." He believes homosexuals and transsexuals are degenerates, and talks about the "mannerisms and customs of white people. Fuentes, who uses the word "liberal" when discussing the ultra-conservative views of Ben Shapiro, is part Latino, although he considers himself white. But he won't call himself a white nationalist. Instead, he talks of the need for America to maintain its "European" dominance.

Fuentes' reticence in embracing certain poisonous labels associated with the alt-right gives the impression of a marketing-savvy messenger who wants to be allowed to nibble around the edges of respectable political discourse. If he's able to seed conservative culture with his extreme views now, perhaps the day will come when such coyness is no longer necessary. But debating whether or not the Groypers are a part of the alt-right is little more than an academic exercise. If Fuentes and his band of pranksters somehow found themselves in power, they'd shut the borders to non-whites and target Jews, gays, transsexuals, and other minorities. The alt-right would have little to complain about.

The Groypers, who brag about "wins" at Republican events they target, are capitalizing on the divide within pro-Trump conservatism that surfaced after the Charlottesville rally. Richard Spencer thought the naively designated "Unite the Right" protest would be the impetus for getting a seat at the political table, but instead it relegated him to irrelevance. Spencer now has to endure ridicule after a leaked audioreveals him spilling racial slurs in an apoplectic rage, while Fuentes burnishes his reputation as an authentic defender of conservative values from the paleoconservative point of view.

Fuentes believes the pro-Trump movement has been diluted by fake conservatism and deep state operatives. The Groypers disparage putting the economy ahead of their race-based vision of the American nation. They prefer the Pat Buchanan vision of this nation over that of Shapiro and Charlie Kirk, and rail against the degeneracy of those rejecting what they call their traditional Christian values. While some of his fellow extreme right-wingers have been censored on YouTube and other social media, Fuentes continues to gain followers. Twitter took Richard Spencer's blue check away, but Fuentes still has his.

The Groyper Army rejects the concept that this nation is based, above all, on ideas. To them, America is a "people" and a "land." That's what the Charlottesville protestors were referring to with their Nazi-derived chant, "Blood and soil!" In their world, the Jews are bankers and industrialists holding down those who, by their ethnicity alone, have a natural right to power.

The Groypers are a younger and fresher version of the alt-right that went into oblivion on the day after the Charlottesville rally ended, but they've just slapped a fresh coat of paint on the same old white nationalist ideas. Fuentes, a Catholic, wants you to believe that his politics are religion-based, but his differences with Spencer are mostly stylistic. They might have a heated debate over whether or not Donald Trump is awesome, but not over matters of substance.

Read more from the original source:
The Groypers Emerge As the Far Right's Enfant Terribles - Splice Today

By Daniel Nardini

The Young Americas Foundation is described as conservative. Having gone to its website and read what the people in this organization have to say it seems more radical right wing. They blame liberals and radical leftists for anything and everything (apparently there is no distinction between the two for these people). While I myself am not thrilled with Anitfa and politically left wing organizations like Democratic Socialists of America or the Communist Party USA, saying that these leftists are behind everything dirty and despicable paints a kind of Armageddon mentality of good versus evil. Such a radical viewpoint does nothing about solving problems or coming to any real solutions. But then, such radical people are normally that way.

Yet even among radical people like these, there are those who are way out there. In this case, I am talking about former Young Americas Foundation supporter Michelle Malkin. Malkin is a famous (or should I say infamous) politically right wing advocate. Strangely enough, there are two taboos that many right wing groups will never crossoutright racism and the Holocaust. Well, Malkin crossed this line when she came out in full support of alt-right extremist Nick Fuentes who has denied there ever was a Holocaust. Malkin is the same person who said that Japanese-Americans should have been interned in internment camps. Even for people to the right, this was to the right of Attila the Hun. The Young Americas Foundation essentially got rid of Michelle Malkin and will no longer sponsor her activities or lectures across American campuses. But dont worry, there are still plenty of crazy people in the Young Americas Foundation who will rail against the political left and liberals as if they are the same thing. I guess there is no such thing as the bottom of the barrel anymore.

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Crazy Among the Crazies - Lawndale News

Airman accused of spreading white-nationalist propaganda is demoted but remains in military

For years, Cory Reeves allegedly posted hundreds of messages on a secret online forum for white supremacists under a pseudonym. In now-public posts, Reeves appeared to swap workout routines and diet tips with his like-minded internet friends; he also appeared to paper his town with far-right propaganda, participate in white-nationalist group meetups and share racist memes.

All the while, the Air Force master sergeant kept his apparent role in the white-nationalist group Identity Evropa quiet as he served in the military in Colorado Springs.

But in March, anti-fascist activists in Colorado used a massive leak of chat logs to identify the airman. The chat logs, from now-defunct Discord servers, revealed how Reeves had allegedly spent his spare time spreading white-nationalist propaganda and socializing with other members of a group then known as Identity Evropa. The Air Force Times reported in April that the military branch launched an investigation into Reeves' alleged white-nationalist ties. In August, the Denver Post noted the airman was still serving at his master sergeant rank despite the 729 Discord posts, written between October 2017 and March 2019, that appeared to lay out his white-nationalist sympathies.

The investigation recently came to a head when the Air Force demoted Reeves in September but officially allowed him to remain on active duty despite hundreds of online posts linking him to a white-nationalist group. The Air Force Times first reported Reeves' fate last week.

"The Air Force has completed its investigation," Lynn Kirby, a spokeswoman for the Air Force, told The Washington Post in an email late Tuesday. "Racism, bigotry, hatred, and discrimination have no place in the Air Force. We are committed to maintaining a culture where all Airmen feel welcome and can thrive."

The episode highlights a growing concern about active-duty military and veterans joining the ranks of white-supremacist organizations. The leaked Discord chat logs, published by the nonprofit media collective Unicorn Riot in March, led journalists and activists to expose members of the Air Force, Army and Marine Corps as members of Identity Evropa, which has been labeled a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

In his alleged Discord posts, Reeves discouraged people from using slurs and violent language, not because he opposed it but because he wanted to keep the Identity Evropa server "more refined." Under the username "Argument of Perigee," a reference to the orbit of satellites, Reeves posted photos of himself at Identity Evropa events, with a distinctive, often visible tattoo on his left forearm.

He claimed to be the only Identity Evropa member in Hawaii for four years while stationed there, before he moved to Colorado Springs to work at nearby Schriever Air Force Base. There, he joined forces with a more active chapter of the group, plastering parks with teal stickers branded with the group's recognizable dragon's eye symbol. Reeves held up Identity Evropa banners and signs in front of an immigrant detention center run by the contractor the GEO Group, according to photos posted to the Discord server. He railed against interracial marriage and shared memes of Pepe the Frog, a meme used as a hate symbol by the alt-right.

Reeves repeatedly referenced an "ethnostate" in the his alleged posts. He also appeared to mock people in interracial relationships, including his own family members: "We have little-to-no control over our family members," one post read. "My younger brother reproduced with a full blood Aztec...."

"Respectable, upstanding men of Evropean heritage shouldn't be engaging in sexual relations with women of other heritage," another post said.

Less than six months after he was publicly linked to the Discord posts, the Air Force stripped Reeves of his rank, reducing him to a technical sergeant and dropping him from his status as a senior non-commissioned officer. But his commander decided to keep Reeves in the Air Force, despite posts that showed him making racist comments and recruiting for a white-nationalist organization so toxic it had to rebrand when its secret message boards were outed, taking on the name American Identity Movement.

White-supremacist and extremist groups have long targeted military service members and veterans. In 2008, the FBI published a report warning about the tendency for white-supremacist groups to recruit active members of the military and veterans, often placing people with combat experience in leadership roles. The leader of Vanguard America, which the Anti-Defamation League identifies as a white-supremacist group, was a recruiter for the Marine Corps. A self-avowed white nationalist, Christopher Hasson, 50, a Coast Guard lieutenant and Marine veteran, allegedly plotted a mass terrorist attack this year to "establish a white homeland." Colorado ranks among the top states for white-supremacist propaganda, the Denver Post reported in March.

The Air Force, like each branch of the military, has an explicit policy banning its members from promoting white-supremacist groups.

"Air Force military personnel are prohibited from actively advocating supremacist, extremist, or criminal gang doctrine, ideology, or causes," the branch's instruction manual says. "Members who actively participate in such groups or activities are subject to adverse action."

Kirby told The Post that Air Force commanders have several disciplinary actions to choose from when an airman is found to violate that policy.

"When Airmen fall short of this expectation, they are held accountable," she said in an email. "Each case is evaluated based on the facts presented, and commanders have a variety of administrative and/or disciplinary actions they can administer based on the findings of the case."

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Airman accused of spreading white-nationalist propaganda is demoted but remains in military - Stars and Stripes